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When one of my school teachers reached the end of her tether and shouted she'd send me to the headmaster I didn't argue. I said, "Okay. I'm happy to speak to him."

Wrongly, she thought I'd fear the big, authority figure of the head teacher.

But my parents brought me up with a healthy attitude towards owning my own personal responsibilities and power and I didn't really have a fear of authority.

So the threat of didn't phase me.

I saw authority as something that I worked alongside with, not as something that looked down on me and bullied me into the behaviour "they" thought was right.

I had my own compass and I trusted that.

Looking back, I believe some teachers liked my attitude towards them and think they enjoyed having a student who made an effort to treat them as an equal! :)

I don't believe we need to be governed by outside authority if we have good training and feel we're responsible for what happens to us.

We don't need to have authority to tell us to be kind and caring to other people, yet we do have a system of laws that seem to tell us how we should behave and what happens if we don't.

I remember comedian Lenny Henry once saying wouldn't it be great to turn a corner and have a policeman pull you over and say, "The way you took that corner was well cool!"

Wouldn't it be great if the local authorities invited us to a magic show as a thank you for good behaviour and for not having to spend millions watching us via CCTV.

I'd love a bailiff to visit me and say, "Your bank want me to give you '100 bonus because your account is in credit. You'd clear your credit card to have that bonus every month, wouldn't you?

I think measures like this would encourage us all to live from the heart. Have more fun with life. But I know I'm dreaming.

Last night I was talking to the Mayor of a local city. I asked him about crime and people governing themselves and he told me that while one area governs itself will in his city, another area is rather dire.

As I drove home I wondered then if the neighbourhood that has the crime have lost their way from a more natural state of self-governing.

I wondered if they are failing to live from the heart and instead had learned to live in fear and needed some authority to restrain them doing harm.

Being able to live from the heart certainly put us in the flow and encourages new and wonderful things to come into our life.

When you're struggling and finding things hard it can be difficult to just switch mind sets. But it can be done. It just needs practice.

With love and good wishes

Neil