The Arm in the Woodchipper

If you are serious about moving your life forward you must address "The Arm in the Woodchipper". 

So I had a friend who was doing some yard work, his son was helping him, and then he went into the house for a few minutes. He heard screaming coming from the front yard, so he rushed out, and he noticed that his son had gotten his arm caught in the woodchipper. The dad then noticed that some grass that was growing over the side of the sidewalk had not been trimmed yet. The dad picked up some shears and started to trim the grass where it was growing over the sidewalk because "If you are going to do a really good job on the yardwork, you can't allow grass to be growing over on the sidewalk."

What is the problem with this situation? Is the grass the most important thing to be taken care of at the moment? If you are a caring father, you will run over, get your son out of the woodchipper, call 911, and take your son to the hospital. Later on, when all of the other things are taken care of, you can come back and worry about the grass growing over your sidewalk. In your own life, what is your Arm in the Woodchipper?

When you wake up in the morning, what is the most drastic or important thing that needs to be taken care of before anything else? Normally you have a morning routine where you will take care of the three sh’s: poop, shower, and shave. Next, you will make sure that you have a cup of coffee or food to eat, so that you can function for the rest of the day. 

What are the most important things that we need to take care of in our lives? Looking at Maslow's hierarchy of needs, our first needs are physical: food, clothing, and shelter. Our second needs are emotional and community (tribal). We need this group of people to guide our passions in life. Our third need is our spiritual needs. This is where we get on the Road to Kaivala, take a trip to a higher dimension, and are of service to others. 

After your basic needs are met, what is your Arm in the Woodchipper? What, if not taken care of, will destroy the whole foundation that supports you to pursue your passions? Are you under siege? Are their soldiers in your front yard? Will they be there next week? Do you have a job? Is the pay adequate? Do they treat you with respect at work? Are you having problems with your significant other, or are you in harmony with them?

You wake up in the morning, decide to go downtown, and join the protest against police injustice that is affecting 1/10th of one percent of your community. If you miss work, you will be fired as you have already taken off too many days or have been late. Your vehicle is about to be repossessed, and you are three months behind on your rent. What is your Arm in the Woodchipper? 

If you do not take care of your basic needs, it will lessen your ability to help your community. The first thing that you need to do is to go to work and take care of your obligation there. The next thing, if you do not like your job, is to look for another one or another way of bringing resources into your life. Do you need to grow a garden or find a less expensive place to stay? Do you need to get a better-paying job? All of the worries about these higher problems will be totally ineffectual on your part if you do not take care of the basic needs first.  If your life and the lives of others are at immediate risk then this could be your Arm in the Woodchipper. This will need to be decided each and every day. We do not try to get new projects going until the Arm in the Woodchipper is taken care of.

If you have the first needs met (safety and physiological), are you having problems with your family or friends? Do you have family or friends? Verizon Wireless had a "friends and family plan" that they were selling one time, so I purchased this program. I came back a week later, quite upset, and they asked me why. I said, "because I have had this program for one week and I still have no friends and no family."

You will need to identify what those exact problems are, and learn how to solve them before you move onto the next level. Are you screaming at your kids because they have spilled some milk? We know you have enough money to buy milk because you have moved past the first two levels. Why are you upset over something so easily replaced? The Arm in the Woodchipper is the relationship that you have with your children, which needs to be addressed first. If you are screaming at your kids and trying to motivate the community to a higher level of consciousness, your kids are the Arm in a Woodchipper that needs to be addressed. You are taking care of the wrong thing. You should be taking care of your children first, then focus on motivating the community (your tribe) to a higher level of consciousness. 

Every day you need to examine what your Arm in the Woodchipper is. You will have to go through the hierarchy of needs from the bottom up and decide which one is not being met as you go up the chart. 

Another example is an individual that is trying to open up a brand new store. They decorate the store, poor thousands of dollars into it, buy hundreds of thousands of dollars of products and pay their employees wages, but the store isn't succeeding. Why? They have great products, a great store, and great employees. Their Arm in the Woodchipper is that they have no customers. What should have been done first was to evaluate the customer base and needs before opening the store.

Another example is when a student goes to college to get a well-paying job. Have they figured out what real job openings will exist when they graduate? Do they know what this job will pay? The college or school will tell you "There are people making $50k doing this!", but you still need to ask yourself, what percentage of graduates get a job paying this in the first year? Before you get a student loan and spend all of this time, make some phone calls, find out what the job market is like in the real world, and find out what will the job market be after you graduate. $50k/year will not be enough money to live comfortably and pay off your student loan. How much do you need to make to take care of your needs and pay back the student loan after five years?

In your life, before you take action, it is important to understand what the Arm in the Woodchipper is. Is it shelter? Then that must be taken care of first. Is it food? Is it your health? Is it the people that are around you? What really needs to be taken care of before anything else? Make sure you take care of this.  Are you worried about aliens, and have no food or shelter for the day? Are you worried about the sun going dark 4 billion years from now? Are you worried about conspiracy theories, but have no time for your family, or other projects? Are you worried about the condition of your clothes, and have forgotten about the condition of your body? Every morning ask what the Arm in the Woodchipper needs to be fixed, and take care of this first. Then when you have time, trim the grass with a pair of scissors.