Happy New Year!

How was 2021 for you? Mine was a bit here-there-and-everywhere. I had some great days, celebrating my birthday and Mardi-Gras with some of my nearest and dearest, my first surf lesson, my first return to running-run after many years in retirement and the celebration of our 9th wedding anniversary. But I also had days that rolled into weeks that rolled into months that were just “meh” sometimes even less than “meh”.

If you listen to our show Date Forever, you likely heard me stretching to find things that fuelled me up some weeks, it’s not a nice place to be. And I know a lot of people were there with me as Australia and the world experienced more government mandated lockdowns, restrictions, additional rules and we continued with the Corona Virus Pandemic and the rollercoaster of logistics, emotions and feelings that goes with it.
 

I’ve done a lot of personal development, inner work with coaches and professionals to know...

Have you ever been caught out in a car that has run out of petrol? I have, it really sucks.

We’ve made it to the final month of 2021 of what has been a challenging year for all. This past week, almost everyone I’ve interacted with has echoed some kind of sentiment of “I am running on empty”. We are all longing for a break, an opportunity to rest and re-fuel. I know I am.

Fuel Collective is a bit of an unusual name for a business all about relationships but the name came about after realising a handful of ideas that all had one thing in common - a need for fuel.

A relationship ends when it runs out of fuel and the willingness to re-fuel is gone.

Each year Nath and I take a whole day to make a Game Plan for the year ahead, we set individual goals, shared goals and make a plan for our next 365 days. We are doing it tomorrow!

The Fuelled Up Life and Relationship methodology was developed after Nath and I examined our last 4-5 Annual Game Plan Days and figured out what...

Hey Hey,

My husband Nathan and I got married in 2012. I was 23 years old and Nath just a smidge older at 24.

I feel wildly grateful to have already spent more than a decade with my person and yet we are still only in our early 30’s.

The first few years of our marriage, to put it kindly, were directionless.

We didn’t have a big vision or plan for our relationship or life and we really did just fumble our way through taking opportunities as they came, living very reactively and we hardly ever stopped to think if any decision big or small aligned with our values, priorities or goals.

The result was that we didn’t achieve a whole lot. Both as individuals or as a couple.

In 2014 we spent a big chunk of the year reacting to some curveballs which resulted in me moving from Adelaide to Sydney solo before Nath followed 6 months later. I started working in a new business that was also a bit directionless - no team meetings, no goals or directions, no targets to work towards and...

Hey Hey,

This week's Friday Fuel Up is all about The World.

When I was 5 years old, I rode an elephant in Thailand with my dad while my grandma snapped pictures from the sideline. At that moment I fell in love with these beautiful animals; strong, beautiful, playful and weirdly graceful given their size. Ohh and did you know they are pregnant for almost 2 years!?

I now know and understand that the practice of exploiting animals for tourism is wrong for all kinds of reasons. But I didn’t know that in 1994 and I still held the belief that it was okay when my husband Nathan and I rode an elephant in 2011 while in Indonesia. 

I’m kinda embarrassed to share the pictures because I feel like I was a bit late to the party on this shift in thinking but as a visual human myself, pictures can be worth a thousand words. It's now a decade later and I’ve been able to reconcile that I did the wrong thing and that although I did a bad thing, I am not a bad person.

Through...

Hey Hey,

Today’s Friday Fuel Up is all about The Future.

Last week Nath and I went LIVE as part of our Couple and Team launch week to talk about Sharing a Grand Vision. It got me thinking about how daunting it can be to think about the future.

What is a Shared Grand Vision? For us, it’s a big beautiful vision for the relationship and life we are creating together.

Maybe you’ve made a vision board before, or at least seen one. They can take many shapes but generally a vision board is a collection of images and words you curate and then display in a prominent place to remind you of what’s important, your values, goals and dreams. It can also be filled with things that inspire you or fill you with happiness and gratitude.

Nath and I have a long term intent for our relationship and a desire to grow old together so for us it’s been such a worthwhile activity to ask some questions, have some conversations and then go about actively designing both our life and...