The Invisible Me Youtube

New Site and New Blog!

I am absolutely thrilled to announce I have established a totally new website - still at www.workleisure.com but with a whole new image, layout and passion. It includes a blog so this one will be closing down.

So it's not goodbye but HELLO from a totally new location. Come and join me at http://www.workleisure.com/enjoy-being-you-blog.html

What Do You Need?

Perhaps you can sense that something is missing in your life, that you are experiencing a sense of unease about the direction your life is taking you. It could be you need to
* cope better with prolonged excessive stress, at work or in your personal life
* harmonize your work/life with an energizing mix of enjoyable interests at work, home and play
* ease a fear of your impending need to start making the transition from full-time work to whatever your next stage of life might prove to be
* come out of the fog that has been shrouding your life energy since the loss of a loved one.

If you feel the time is right to start following passions that you have ignored, put off, or forgotten, I can help you. Start by enjoying a stress-easing browse of the mass of helpful information in my various articles on my website at http://www.workleisure.com/resources/articles.html You won't be interrupted and I'm only an email or a phone call away if you need any help.

Revolutionising People Management Investment Programs

"People Management Investment" instead of human resource management; "emotional energy management" instead of work life balance; "expanding life potential" instead of staff development program. Whether or not any of those terms do it for you as a leader and/or manager, if you really want to attract, retain and develop the best people for your line of business, you cannot help but agree its time to change our whole thinking about workplace culture.

Such changes need to regard work and everything else people do in their lives as something of a seamless blending. You cannot get the best out of people if you don't see them as whole human beings.

I've just been watching some commentary on what may well be a "hung parliament" for Australian national government. I was excited at suggestions that this provided a fabulous opportunity to start changing the whole spectrum of national politics from one of what I call party protection (parties come first and the needs of Australia second) to one in which all Members of Parliament debate issues along non-party lines. A huge hope perhaps but something's gotta change!

It got me excited to sit down at my computer and hammer out a similar line of thinking I have had about managing people in business.

The whole concept of work in the 21st century pressure cooker lifestyle has changed forever. It is time to throw out the traditional 20th - no 19th! - century way in which workers are managed in business today. To my mind, for any business to be truly successful over the next decade, they almost have to see work as the means by which people can blossom to their full potential, rather than the other way around. The world and its economy revolves around people - first, last and foremost. Get the people right and you get the business right.

Crazy thinking? Maybe but business needs to totally upend the way it invests in its people.

Writing this blogpost has got me fired up!!! What about you? :-)

C'mon let's have your comments.

Mining the Gold of Silence

My Lifestyle Review workshop participants were doing some writing exercises last Thursday. There was almost deathly silence as each person pondered on what the exercises meant for their own lives. Eventually one person sat back, staring into space. I asked if he had finished. Quickly he demurred, “no, just deep in thought”.

I had fallen into the trap of treating silence as a vacuum to be abhorred, of being out of place in our fast lifestyle, an unproductive and wasteful use of limited time. I had been reminded that silence is essential for liberating our best thoughts and emotions. It’s when we allow our higher self to direct our life journey.

Workshops are a wonderful opportunity for intensive discussion. But the purest gold is mined during the times of silence.

Are You Special?

An apple tree is the only plant that can grow apples. That alone doesn’t make it special. What makes it special is when it does what it was uniquely created to do - grow apples. As a human being, you are unique in so many ways. But to be special you need to be doing what you are uniquely created to do. What are you uniquely created to do?


You were born with unique potential. Your resources are your natural skills, abilities and talents. But the spark that ignites your potential is lit by your passions. Everything you are passionate about at work, home and play helps to maximize your potential.


You can stick with the crowd and be inconspicuous. Or you can follow your passions and be special.

This is my latest "Making Life Work" Thought. I distribute these Thoughts to subscribers free of charge. All you need to do is to email me at peter@workleisure.com and ask to be added to the list of subscribers. For examples of other Thoughts, go to http://www.workleisure.com/products/MLWTProducts.html

Leisure is As Important As Work

I have been asked a number of times over the years, "Do you have a big hairy audacious goal(BHAG), a goal so big that others might think it is totally outrageous?

Having professionally observed human behaviour in leisure for almost 40 years, my BHAG has long been:

As many people in the world as possible to realize and apply the fact that leisure is as important as work in maximizing one's personal growth, development and potential.

I sense it isn't as outrageous a goal as it was when I first established Work Leisure International in 2003.

What is 'leisure'? First, it is not simply 'free time'. Leisure is a positive state of mind, produced from enjoying any freely-chosen interest - physical, mental, or spiritual - pursued purely for its intrinsic benefits, that makes you feel good about yourself.

For those who say their work is their leisure, no matter how much you enjoy your work it is driven by economic demands. While I love my work, my main leisure interest is singing (see http://www.workleisure.com/resources/ChoirArticle.html). The benefits that singing has given to my total wellbeing, work productivity, stress management, work/life harmony and self esteem are positively incalculable.

It also demonstrates why I believe in work life harmony rather than work life balance. It's not a matter of how much time you give to leisure but the effects of a passionate leisure interest. A short time each week of experiencing this sort of interest can drive the rest of the week.

For generations now, the traditional work ethic has driven human development. Managers saw leisure as a waste of good productive effort and even a competitor to work. Five major factors have altered that attitude:
1) the social revolution of recent decades,
2) the new workforce generated by that revolution, who work to live rather than live for work,
3) rising burnout as a result of prolonged excessive business stress and pressure,
4) the change from centralized knowledge in the hands of top management to decentralized knowledge and expertise across the organisation/the globe, and
5) the disappearance of the principle of the employer providing "a job for life".

People now make their own minds up about the nature of work and leisure. Leisure is again back in vogue as a valued feature of life.

I call it the new Life Ethic, accentuating the fact that work and leisure are both important in maximizing personal growth and potential.

Everything I do in my business is geared to pursuing my Big Hairy Audacious Goal.

If you think this is a great Goal, you can help by sharing this message with others in your network.