Tony Robbins talks about water and acid

Here's a cool video that repeats the basic principles to which I adhere and recommend. You'll note he talks about water and acid.. Tony actually recommends and drinks alkaline ionised water. Being a world traveller, it's hard for him to carry his own water alkalizer around, so he drinks Penta water.

On Business Today

I just spent 3 hours discussing the the question of business ethics with a psychologist friend of mine. The freeform notes below are a ‘yet to be organised’ collection of thoughts I have had since that discussion.

Firstly, I suggest that we could ask ourselves why we are in business. Is it because we want money? Why do we want money? What is money alleviating or fulfilling in us? This may seem obvious but it may vary greatly depending on the dominant belief system or systems we live life by. Some of us may see a business as a living, a way to beat the system, or a way to live the warrior, the provider, or the hero's life. In that sense we may just be trying to enact our perception of our personal destiny.

The behaviours I witnessed in my early days working for an American corporation - the extreme competitiveness, the no-holds-barred approach all bears out the fact that some businesspeople really need to 'get a life'.

So having asked the question and received the obvious answer; ‘to support my family’, ‘to pay for my house’, I suggest we might choose to look a little deeper – into the twilight zone of hidden strategies we all play out to ‘manage’ our ideas of what life is. And in doing so we may release the blockages to business 'love' we would all hope to experience.

Why? Because when we do we may uncover some very interesting and useful facts about how we perceive and use ethics in our businesses.

For instance, in my own case, my mother, a country girl who married her policeman sweetheart, carried a fear of poverty out of the Depression years and a belief that the world was tough, uncompromising and ruthless. In the name of love, (as we all have done and will continue to do), she reminded me of this at every opportunity. Although I tried not to take on these values, and rebelled at every opportunity, history tells us that we do indeed play out our parents’ values in our own lives.

My Dad, the policeman, was, I suspect, a dreamer who never got the chance to dream. In those days it was the Depression, then the war, then working to bring up the family; the sum of life and its parts. Yet what I remember is a man who was loyal, honest, steadfast, and who did his best in his own ‘unexamined' life’s way, to live these principles. He was also generous, forgiving and supportive. However when he became an Inspector of police commanding a large regional town’s force, his honesty cost him friendship, camaraderie and status. He took down all those disciplinary cases from the top of a filing cabinet; conveniently ‘lost’ by his predecessors, and naively perhaps, did his duty; he followed them up and as a result some corrupt cops received what they deserved. My lesson was that although I loved my Dad and was drawn to and influenced by his values, he was ‘too honest’. Honesty cost him dearly.

So how did this relate to my business ethics? Firstly, my experience with the American corporation at the tender age of 18 showed me what I didn’t want. Almost in direct opposition I started up a hang glider making business. Risky - but in at the start of a boom. My life continued and over the years every business I owned had some degree of risk. If it didn’t, as one forlorn ex-partner informed me, I made it dangerous.

In hindsight, I now understand that the danger element was my 'safety' strategy. As a hang glider maker, a fisherman, an underground newspaper publisher, I believed that if I could succeed with a dangerous business I wouldn’t have too much of the sort of competition that my mother had warned me about; that ruthless world of business. Of course, the competition did come, as it had to, metaphysically speaking. Fear something enough and it will always become real.

So I can say that I ran my business by my mother’s ideals. Run hard, work hard, play hard. But at some point in each venture, I hit the brick wall I now recognise and choose to dub ‘Dad’. Of course it wasn’t brick; it was simply something in me that yearned for a way to run a business that was 100 percent ethical, 100% customer supportive, and 100% JOY!

It wasn't that I was unethical. It was more that when an issue arose that had a multiplicity of answers, I sometimes took a decision I now see did not advance me as a 'human being human'. I'm sure many people relate to this; if you believe the business world is adversarial, you will find yourself in decisions where that belief weighs on and affects your decisions.

So one could say I was running through cycles of split personality business disorder; and it always came to the point where a major expansion looked like a reduction of customer support - or future sales looked like the sort of selling that left me feeling a little less of myself. And again and again, I attempted, and failed at, a hybrid model. Fast, tough and ruthless doesn’t integrate well with steady, honest and empathic.

I guess in retrospect, failing to carry on each of my business ventures in a compromised fashion was the best thing I could do. To continue to pursue an ethically compromised model with dear old Dad looking over my shoulder was impossible.

The other obvious lesson in retrospect is that two value systems translate into fractured business decisions and a woeful waste of creative energy. They say swapping from one task to another in business adds an extra 20% to the overall worktime, and I’d confidently suggest that running two belief systems in one business drains it of far, far more that 20%. The really crazy bit is that you really believe in what you are doing!

Where do I find myself now? Luckily (even though it may not appear so) the GFC (Global Financial Crisis), reduced sales inquiries and changeover to new internal management and IT systems has once again loaded me up - and highlighted my basic management flaw. And this time I’m able to see my past patterns and at 63, I'm staring down the barrel of less years to put it right and experience full power integral business.

So I’m choosing what I have been afraid of my whole life; running an ethically sound, empathic and integral business model. Yes, my present business is ethical and cares for customers; but I am now demanding that our future expansion must maintain and perpetuate these ethical values and ferret out those areas where my dear old Mum is still talking to me. I'm going to give 'Dad' a go. My decision reflects a quote my psychologist friend gave me;

“The purpose of business is to create value and serve society.”

It came from Harvard business school and what it tells me is that if I’m not aligned with these precepts, I’ll get more of the same. I am choosing to serve and create value. And that has no room for the ethics of a consciousness that thinks you have to beat the other guy to the punch.

If this resonates for any of my readers I will be happy. As one great sage said, ‘A life unexamined is a life not worth living.” If we spend most of our life in our own business then maybe we really do need to find out why we do what we do; for our sake, our employees’ and the world’s sake.


One last thought: the way you run your business is a product of the way you think: the way you think is a product of your past experiences, traumatic and otherwise. So blaming yourself for how you run your business isn't helpful; but looking at it, feeling into it and looking at what that does for you just may be life - and career-changing.

Ian Blair Hamilton

PS: Here's a book on leadership that helped clarify my mind on what the hell I'm doing working. It's a wonderful treatise on the power and value of service.

The Pursuit of Happiness

Are there really lessons to be learned from the study of a man's life?

What the Italians thought of water.

At Frosinone, Lazio, close to Rome, a famous mineral water is still highly thought of and sought after. However how long have Italians loved their alkaline spring water?

Well, it seems Michelangelo came to Frosinone, saying of his kidney stone that it was 'the only kind of stone I could not love'. and subsequently claiming that the water healed his kidney stones.

Back in the saddle again

Well, Cassie and I are back from Italia (sob!) but it was great to see the team at AlkaWay (nee ION LIFE) doing a great job keeping everyone happy with their new alkaline water systems.

Yes, we are now officially ALKAWAY. It signifies a big step for us because it is accompanied with major changes within the old ION LIFE. We recognise after ten years that we are the alkaline specialists in Australia and New Zealand so we should begin to sound like them. Frankly, though I chose the original name ION LIFE, I did get tired of people asking me if it was an insuurance company.

You'll see our other changes rolling out in the very near future including a brand new customer service system that was sorely needed to maintain our expected high level of service. It will mean you will know more about what we are up to, plus have more data available to you to manage your relationship with us. The new website at www.alkaway.com.au is just the start. It's not complete, but it's up and working if you need to order a filter replacement for your ioniser.

Secondly you'll see changes in the way we look after you. We've appointed team members to manage specific areas of interest for our customers, such as our commercial clients, our gym and sports clinets, our affiliates and dealers.

Thirdly, we have appointed Graham Correy as our new general manager. Graham is exactly what I needed. As many of you are aware I'm a bit more 'creative' than practical, and the effect of my style of management on the ever-growing ION LIFE was taking its toll. I don't want a company so big that its customers just become names and numbers, but as you out there grew, my ability to maintain our relationship reduced. Graham has already instituted great system changes to how we do things and you'll notive it in the coming months.

Lots to report on and talk about now I'm back so please, if you haven't bookmarked this page, do so now. As always, I promise to keep you in the loop with the latest and most 'out there' developments in both conventional and other medicine.

What amazing times we live in! i-Phone object recognition for visually impaired.

Just take a look.

One for Microwave haters to get heated up about

It appears that if you wnat your daily ration of antioxidants from those lovely organic vegetables, you'll do much better with a microwave. What to do.. what to do...
See the report here

Say No More

.. and this is the company supplying a huge segment of our bottled water products...