Not your circus, not your monkies. An interesting phrase don’t you think?
I have used it for years, changing it to ‘Not my circus, not my monkies’ when people have tried to involve me in discussions about others.
Gossip is not healthy, nor is it good energy to be around.
A circus, hmmm depends on the circus to be honest.
Ones filled with acrobats, yes please! Ones with animals? No thank you.
I only really wish to see animals in their natural habitat (says the dog owner of two beautiful fur babies) and the thought of going to a circus and seeing elephants just breaks my heart. I’d much prefer to wait until I get to the African and Indian sub continents thank you very much.
Oh the though of seeing elephants in the wild!! My heart just bursts with joy!
But I digress!
Monkies as we know can be cheeky, they can be ruthless, but they are also incredibly intelligent creatures.
So are humans, but are we really as intelligent as our primate counterparts?
You see we are destroying our own families, our communities, society and our planet simply for ego and convenience.
We have become obsessed with competing with others, instead of ourselves and the person we were yesterday.
We are constantly seeking better ways of doing things, of automating everything from making coffee, dinner and our businesses.
We have replaced people with machines, and our communities are dying.
Google maps and sat nav have replaced stopping in the street and connecting with someone who could possible help us.
We have car washes instead of kids in the local neighbourhood earning ‘a few bob or two’ which teaches them the respect for other peoples property, as well as what it means to go out and make money for themselves.
Not to mention bringing the community together as the kids grow up and have neighbours looking out for them.
We have online networking replacing in person networking, something I rely on heavily as I circumnavigate the world on this book tour and research trip for my next series of books.
Online networking has become a circus, and often not a very nice one, unless of course you connect with women such as Joanna Vaiou as I did for my latest peice on Female Leadership
For those of you who follow me on the various social media platforms, you will have seen me having a variety of different conversations about the women who ‘play’ in the online world of business.
And play they do.
They play with your mind, your emotions, and to be honest, many of them play you full stop. I refer to them as the ‘users and abusers’ and the ‘fakers and takers’.
They talk about love and light, female empowerment and the Divine Feminine, but there is nothing loving, light, empowering or Divine about their behaviours.
They are stuck in the world of vanity metrics, Of collecting people and saying what they need to say to lull you into a false sense of security so you open up that Billion Dollar Roladex (as coined by the Chief Feminine Officer Ungenita Prevost) and once it is opened, you don’t see them for love or money.
Don’t get me wrong, I love a bit of the woo-woo magic, empowering other women and honouring the Divine Feminine within.
What I hate to see is the bitchiness and selfishness that co-exists with it; but I guess you have to have the dark to be able to see the light right?
The ying and yang of life; the Ups and the Downs, but do we really have to have people trampling on others to get ahead?
Using sleazy ‘cut and paste’ messaging which would talk the silkiest tongue of a French Romanticist off their to ‘honour you sister’ when really there is no honour in their words at all?
There is very little ‘sisterhood’ and the incestuous world of Fakebook is enough to put you off your dinner.
Is it a great tool for business? Absolutely in a lot of ways.
You reach a different audience, can be more ´social´ and friends and family can see what you are up to.
The 17 touch points of being able to doing business with people is, in my experience, is akin to losing a mouth full of teeth… And we all know from my ocean crossing just over a year ago I know what it is like to lose my teeth!
For people like me, who didn’t grow up with our lives on social media, we know what it is like to actually spend time with people in person and over the phone.
Real human connections. Carefully choosing those who are in our space, and learning to walk away from those who do not share the same values as we do when it comes to business.
So what of our values?
Let´s look at Denise Coates is the highest paid woman in the world at £220 million. Some could say she is getting rich off the poor who choose to spend every last penny they have on a game of chance instead of investing it in their education on how to make money.
Does she have values when it comes to being in businesss? Unless we have spoken with her, got to know her, we don´t know.
And this is why getting to know the people in your network, having a real conversation with them is so much more important than simply reading something they have written, and that is coming from someone who writes for a living!
It is why I love appearing on podcasts, like my latest one with Clarissa Kristjansson who is founder of The Menopause Project and A Little Breathing Space. We got to connect woman to woman, energy to energy.
There were no emoticons to hide behind, just two women having a chat, sharing stories, looking each other in the eye and recording our conversation so other women could benefit.
“Human connection is a luxury good” Ungenita Prevost
We discussed what it means to be a master of our own time, how women today are martyring themselves in the world of motherhood, and relationships.
We disccussed what it means for me to be a long distance mum, away from my boys travelling for work; especially on days like today when it is my eldest sons birthday.
It is hard. Trust me it´s hard. The hardest thing I have ever done… and I had a pain free labour with this one! 16 hours! ooo ya mama!!
Being in business you need to know which circuses to be part of. The Press circus is one that will either help or destroy our businesses, which is why it is essential we act in the most honest, ethical ways possible.
Look at what happened to Mark Zuckerberg … and the tax situation with Google.
Not a circus of monkies I would like thank you very much!
We need to know which networks to be part of, which networks are serious about being in business, and which ones are in it for the prestige and the ego of saying they are in business.
Business can be a lonely place to operate, it can also be the most enjoyable. Knowing who to trust, and who to spend your time with, and who to allow in your space is crucial.
Do you delete those in your network who do not interact with you, even after you´ve sent them 1 or 2 messages?
I mean, let´s be honest here, if you invited someone into your space in the real world and they ignored you once, twice or three times, wouldn´t you want them to leave your space due to a lack of manners?
Yes, you may have fewer people in your network, but surely it is about quality rather than quantity? Isn´t that the philosophy of the Mercedes Maybach which I wrote about a week or two ago?
The choices we make, the circuses we attend or allow into our lives all make up the energy either lifting us up or holding us back.
And just remember, when you let go of the energy holding you back, you have a beautiful space to fill it with the energy which lifts you up.
To learn more about my 1:1 Coaching for women leaders, or if you would like to book me to appear on your podcast, or write a piece for your website, then contact me here with the details.
Have a great weekend folks!
And remember to live to laugh and laugh to live, life is meant to be joyful!
P.S. The House of Pre-Eminence is launching soon!! A Magazine for Ambitious Women Entrepreneurs who know how to lead and the true meaning of female empowerment. Make sure you join my list to recevie your copy every month!