Firstly, let me say what a very humbling experience this was. I’ve had a few days now to process what I have just been through and you know something, we are as soft as Brie cheese that’s been left out in the sun for a few hours. I’m the first to admit that I love all my home comforts and am very fortunate and grateful to have all the mod cons for cooking and cleaning. We live in such a fast paced world and no wonder my head spins with each new day trying to work out what’s hot and where it’s cool to be seen… and that’s just online!!

This is not my first trip overseas to a place where the minimum monthly wage is way below the poverty line at $30.00, but it has been quite some time since I have experienced such a lovely race of people who will never have all the conveniences that we do and not even a fraction at that!

This is taken in the Kokoda Village.

Port Moresby itself is very dirty and all hotels, shops and restaurants are locked up and have razor wire around the boundaries. You DO NOT venture into the streets on your own no matter what! You see, there are many desperate people who wait for such an opportunity and then bring out a knife to take the contents of your bag. Apparently, it is the murder capital of the world and not somewhere you would want to be without security guards by your side.

Once in the villages, it is quite safe to mingle with the natives of the land. After all, their ancestors are the original Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels who helped our Aussie diggers when wounded by the Japanese during WWII.

So upon our arrival, we were briefed and enjoyed a couple of quiet drinks at the hotel in anticipation of what we were to face for the next 8 days!

The next morning we had to have our packs and ourselves down at reception at 6am. Kind of early I thought and in hindsight, we could have slept another 2 hours. Everything moves very slowly in PNG. We were all anxious to get going. That nervous energy filled the space we were in. Pacing, catching a few more winks if we could… eating our snacks out of boredom… and finally at 10:30am we received the news that the fog had cleared and we were ordered to the airport to catch our late flight to Kokoda Village for the start of our trek.

Our tour guide Dave from www.noroads.com.au pointing out some terrain we would cover on the trek.

Once there, we were introduced to our personal porters and others who would join us and off we went with courage and enthusiasm in our steps to discover what is the Kokoda Track and to take in the beauty and history as we went.

All in all, we were that excited to get going that the first day went quite quickly. A steady fairly easy climb until we were just outside our first camp site at Deniki where we experienced the first of many steep climbs. I think shock set in and I remember thinking that I hoped that there weren’t any others as steep as this! Did I say that? Already the psychology and mindset are prevalent.

Stay tuned for the next installment… !

The Deniki Camp site. Day 1

Yes, that’s right! 16 more sleeps until I am on a plane flying out to Papua New Guinea to trek the Kokoda Trail. Yikes!! The training has almost taken over as I prepare for this grueling trek. By the time I have packed to go out for a hike and then get to where there are mountains to climb, most of the day is over when I get back home. There have also been gym sessions and other walking and aerobic exercises as part of keeping my fitness up. The training has been difficult, however, I have just sat through a series of videos on YouTube which I had mixed emotions about and at times, had tears streaming down my face which I will show you shortly.

A few months back when I was looking into the history of the track, I found that there were many video’s and sites with information regarding Kokoda. It is not something that I had specifically wanted to do although I knew that a personal challenge such as this was on the cards in so far as my own personal development went and when my friend and personal trainer Marc Stafford was organising a team to go and asked me, I said “yes.” To continue to grow in mind and spirit, challenges or goals which seem out of reach must be set in order to step up to the next level.

photo credit-pomfotos

Now I am not saying that you all have to go and trek Kokoda to step up to the next level. You yourself know what might be out of your reach and going for it may be the ticket that opens your mind and helps you along your own journey of personal development.

One of my goals for this year is to Coach, as in a Life Coach so this trek is fitting to help me discover parts about me which I need to develop and also to increase my mental toughness. My mental toughness (or lack of) will surely show while on the trek and it will be around 60 - 70 percent of that which gets me to the end of the 8 days. I have affirmations which I repeat out loud to myself to get into the right headspace for now. I’m sure once I am on the track, they will come in very handy to get me from one village to another. One foot in front of the other… one step at a time.

This trek, along with my NLP training and my own personal coaching with a very tough coach is what will bring me closer to this goal of being in a position to empower others to achieve the goals and dreams they set for themselves.

So this is part 1 of 8 of the video’s which I watched embedded here with the links to the rest of the series. It is worth the 30 minutes to sit through them all and see this band of Australian personalities to get an all round vision of what the trek is like and how they cope along the way. As well as getting a look at some of the most pristine rain forest in the world. Share your thoughts with me on this once you have been through them.

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Part 6

Part 7

Part 8

Thank You for watching.

It seems only fitting that my 100th post on Buzzing with Ange is to share with you my greatest personal challenge to date. Seeing as this blog is about personal development, it is important that I let you in on how my journey is progressing and some of the challenges that I take on. I am involved with a fitness group who have organised to trek the Kokoda Trail in Papua New Guinea in June of this year.

For Australians, this is the setting of an extremely difficult time during World War II where we lost the most number of diggers - 6000, in the shortest space of time - 7 months. The Aussie soldiers held the Japanese back from taking Port Moresby by land, retreating many times and firing back to exhaust the Japanese soldiers into re-thinking their strategy which saw them file back to the Northern part of the Island.

The Kokada Trail is a single file footpath that stretches for 96 kilometres (about 60 miles) in a north/south direction, straight across the Owen Stanley ranges in Papua New Guinea. My good Aussie mate Allan and I will be combining our efforts to bring you some history of the Kokoda Trail, along with the training I am undertaking and most importantly, the mindset behind taking on such a feat.

This is not a decision I made lightly and for those that know me on a personal level would know that I am not the kind of girl to get my hands dirty, camping and hiking in the outback is not something I do on a regular basis as I am a creature of comforts and I really, really like hot showers, clean toilets, meals cooked in a clean kitchen and a comfy bed with a cozy doona/comforter to snuggle into. So, do you think I am going to have to have a paradigm shift in order to get through this challenge and change my mindset around creature comforts? I think it will open up new possibilities for me in the way I perceive things, and I will definitely be in need of a Fuzzy Wuzzy Angel on this trip.


Kokoda Memorial 1000 Steps

Saturday just gone was our first official training day as a group and I was whisked off to the Dandenong Ranges here in Melbourne to climb the 1000 steps which are part of the Kokoda memorial. I didn’t count them as I was too busy trying to catch my breath. I have plenty of work to do on my fitness level in preparation for this adventure so stick with me and I will give updates on my progress.

I will leave you with a sample of what I am to expect once we land in Port Moresby… tell me your thoughts and if someone here has already taken this challenge on, please share your experience. There are many expeditions organised on regular basis through various companies.

Who of you out there think that you are going to get by in retirement? Who of you are planning to retire on a decent enough income to be able to live the life you truly desire?

Well let me give you some interesting statistics……….

1. 96% of the population will be dead or dead broke at age 65.
2. 3% will retire financially independent.
3. 1% will retire wealthy.

I am on the Gold Coast of Australia attending a 21st Century Academy wealth creation seminar. We have just had an incredible two days just for women. Women statistically make better investors than men as we do not get emotionally attached or let our ego’s in the way of our investing. So we are being taught simple strategies that we can take away and apply to get on with our journey to wealth creation.

Here are a few more statistics…………

1. 47% of women in their 50’s are single.
2. 50% of marriages end in divorce.
3. In the 1st year after divorce, a woman’s standard of living drops an average of 73%.
4. 7 outof 10 women will live in poverty at some time.

It’s amazing that we still believe in our education system. It was designed in the 19th century so is now out of date. What do we learn at school? Work hard, get good grades and then find a job and trade your time for money. The harder you study, the better the grades, the better your job.

Well I am on a mission to learn how to create wealth and become financially free. The first secret I learned is that it is 80% mindset and 20% work. So long as your head is in the right frame of mind, you will attract and create the wealth that you need and desire.

Just one more statistic for you…did you know that if all the wealth in the world right now was divided equally amongst every body, we would all be millionaires. So if you do not have your 3 million dollars you are being ripped off.

Who of you have heard of the “Baby Boomers?” These are people born after the second world war from around 1946 up until 1961 or there abouts. Generally speaking, this group of people are the ones who have started all the trends over the last 50-60 years.

Well in around six years time, a lot of those baby boomers will have reached retirement age. Once this happens, they will want to draw out their Superannuation Funds or 401K as it is called in America. This is money put away while you work to live off when you come out of the workforce.

Once this happens, it will have a profound effect on the way we live. For example, these funds are mostly invested in the stock market. As there will be a vast majority of retirees all at once, there will be a lot of funds drawn out of the stock market at one time. The repercussions of this will leave us with a devastating ripple effect.

The Dow Jones is a group of stocks on the US stock exchange that govern the way we live. If there is a decline in share prices, then unemployment will rise. Inflation will rise. Interest rates will go up. Do you get the drift? If we are not in a position to take care of ourselves no one else will.

This is why it is important to start taking action now so we can be prepared for when this happens. And when it does, it will not be short term. You need to have a substantial portfolio of investments to see you through for perhaps ten years as this is how long it will take to repair itself if we are lucky.

I needed to pass this information on as I want you to be prepared for it too. If you need a place to start then look up this link at Dynamic Wealth Education and you will have access to the same information as me. See for yourself how simple the strategies are and order the free DVD.

I will be here for the next four days in seminars so will impart to you some more of what I learn in that time.

To Your Success!

Ange