Whew! I don’t know about you but my life has been HECTIC! Time is SO precious! What am I committed to these days that has me feeling hectic?
First, my business is blooming even though it’s normally a time to hunker down and eat cookies (I’m launching Project Liberation in January and people have been flocking to hear about it). And because of my commitment to have an occasional cookie, I’ve increased my workouts – which as you know takes time + commitment. Of course we can’t forget about all the frantic activity in anticipation of celebrating a wonderful Christmas with my family. So, those are things I’m committed to giving my precious time towards.
In the midst of all this action, I realize that I’m inspired to continue my commitment to SLOWING DOWN. I’ve been aware for a few years that my tendency is to go so fast that I barely remember being somewhere or doing something. I rush and race to the point that I’m actually pretty skilled at doing a mediocre job at the stuff I hurry through. (Not bragging.) So as I type these words, I take a deep and full breathe, noticing the tension drop away from my shoulders simply from the thought of slowing down. I can do this. I really can.
The fear thought is that if I don’t hurry, something will not get done. The presents won’t get bought, the cookies won’t get baked, the house won’t get cleaned. The client won’t enroll, the business won’t grow, I won’t hit my year end revenue goal (I will, actually – and my revenue will have grown 15% over last year.) If I hurry, I can get everything done.
Really? I ask myself, has there ever been a year when something important DIDN’T GET DONE? At the end of the year, I can look back and be proud of what DID get done. I can know in my bones that I bought enough presents and baked enough cookies.
In fact, I can take it one step further and see that in every situation, I was enough. That’s me shifting my belief in my thoughts from fear to love. You see? When I’m in this space, there is no need to rush. Every moment is sacred and alive. This is how slowing down serves me – though I will admit to sometimes forgetting.
Do me a favor? Drop me a comment to let me know how slowing down serves you. The very act of taking the time to comment will represent your commitment to being present and participating in the moment.
Some of the most life shifting conversations I’ve ever had have been around a person’s relationship with commitment. For myself, I now know that what I used to think was a commitment never really was one. Because true commitment must be proven through action.
Intention + Action = Commitment.
Commitment begins with an intention for something you will accomplish. Once the intention is clear, a commitment comes alive and into the world through a declaration; commitment is real when it is spoken out loud. Commitment is evidence of what you are or are not actually creating. Sometimes I might imagine that I’m committed to something because of my intention, and without action there is no fuel in the tank to accomplish it. My unconscious commitment has the potential to create things I don’t want, because ACTION is such a powerful force.
As an example, I’ve always had an intention for physical fitness. If you’d asked me, I would have said physical fitness was very important to me. And, if you had asked me what I was actually doing to create physical fitness, I would have had to admit that I was doing very little. It was an intention, without action. And what I was really creating through action (inaction) was poor physical fitness. Being unfit was an example of my unconscious commitment.
A true commitment alters my behavior. It’s me, being ALL IN. It’s me doing whatever is required until what I’m committed to is accomplished. It’s not relevant how much time I spend, or how much effort I expend. The result is what matters, and it’s what qualifies it as a commitment.
I get power not by creating goals for myself; rather, by carefully choosing my commitments. It has felt heavy at times to hold something as a commitment, without truly creating committed behavior. I feel guilt and shame, disappointment and frustration. I can instead choose a path more resonant with success, accomplishment, and discipline.
If you’re interested in 2012 being a year for intention + action, you might want to grab one of the remaining 3 spots in Project Liberation by going HERE!
Is there something you’ve always wanted to do that hasn’t yet happened for you? Maybe you’ve been stuck in status quo, and you know it’s time to jump out? Is there a business idea alive in your imagination? Everything great begins with a BIG IDEA. How about that book you’ve been meaning to write? Or the art you’ve been creating in your head that you wonder if you could actually sell? Perhaps this is the year you get devoted to loving your work, or finding work that is lovable.
I’ve named 2012 as the year for innovation and creation. So many people have big plans for 2012. People are writing books, starting new businesses, building innovative new products, and even choosing 2012 as their year to find their soul-mate. It’s bound to be an exciting year of creation, and I’m beyond stoked to get it started and be a part of the coming alive process.
So, let’s say, for example, you have had an inspired business idea for a while. You know that it could work – and you know for every day you don’t launch you run the risk of someone else launching before you. And you don’t know how to begin. You’re scared it won’t work, that it will be hard, that you don’t have enough money, or that you don’t have what it takes. So you freeze. And then you imagine your future life full of regret for not following through. You become that bitter person with all the potential and none of the courage. Bummer, right?
OR
You start believing this thought:
If you can conceive it, you can give it life.
And then you know you need to find a way.
Here is how it could look for you:
First, you will do some mind mapping to develop the seeds of your BIG IDEA and plant them into fertile soil. You will use your amazing and yet untapped critical thinking skills to develop a strategy, including action steps and dates. You will get committed to practicing focus and discipline, necessary habits to get anything worthy done. You will take baby steps + giant steps toward making your BIG IDEA a reality. You will reach out for support when you need it. You will know without a doubt that your BIG IDEA is possible and you’ll take daily action to make it happen. You will act in spite of fear, and be accountable to the action steps you commit to taking like never before.
Does this sound hard? Feasible? Impossible? Does it sound like torture? (If it sounds like torture, you may as well stop reading right now.) Maybe for the first time ever, you will learn to ask for help.
It’s possible, and even more so if you hop onto Project Liberation. You’ll get huge support for making this dream of yours come true. You’ll plug into a network of expertise for navigating your doubts and fears – a virtual live wire for confidence and can-do energy force fields colliding for the sole purpose of making BIG IDEAS possible.
It’s all right here, under the hood of this powerful engine of creative possibility. There’s a local version which rocks live group interaction, and a virtual version which makes it possible for people who won’t travel thousands of miles to be part of it. Go check it out and imagine yourself there, ready to roll up your sleeves and get this sh*t done. If not you, who…and if not now, when?
Over this past weekend, we spent wonderful time with family, welcoming my son and his girlfriend home for the holiday and hosting 30 family members for Thanksgiving dinner. By Sunday, my husband and I were pretty much on our own, after finishing all the holiday decorating and getting our home back in order. We very rarely sit for hours watching television during our normal routine, and one of our traditions each year during the holidays is to cuddle up and watch holiday movies on the Hallmark Channel. I know what you’re thinking. Yes, they are sappy and predictable and oozing with low budgets. Nonetheless, it’s a tradition that we enjoy. (My husband enjoys it too, though he is reluctant to admit it.)
So yesterday, we did more sitting that we usually do. And funnily enough, each time my husband or I would get up from the loveseat, our dog Murphy would steal our spot. Murphy, as you may remember, is an 85 pound chocolate lab. He LIVES to be as close to us in proximity as possible. He saw the opportunity to get even closer to the one of us still on the loveseat, and he grabbed it. Murphy did this repeatedly throughout the day. At one point we realized what his real motive was. He discovered that where we had been sitting, we left behind an incredibly cozy warm spot. He craved our body heat. It got to be really funny to watch him mozy on over, head bowed, sneaking up onto the furniture hoping nobody would notice.
So, about the warm spot. Yes, Murphy is a dog. His only real job in life is to deliver unconditional love to his humans. He takes no risks, nor is he expected to (save snatching anything smelly out of the laundry until we pay attention to him. Pretty low risk, really.) Seeking the warm spot, where it’s comfortable and the scents are dog-yummy (C’mon, You know how much dogs love to smell butts) is well within the realm of his canine existence.
It got me thinking about us humans, and our figurative desire to find the warm, comfortable spot in our own life. We look for ways to hunker down and avoid or at least minimize risk. We settle into our predictable routine, hoping nobody notices (especially ourselves) that we’re not stretching and growing. We want safety and security and comfort, and sometimes we avoid exhilarating experiences in exchange.
There are areas in my life that represent the warm spot. Places where I’ve become complacent and comfortable. It’s in those areas where I can see ways to reach higher and expand my contribution. It may not be cozy and comforting, and yet eventually that stretch that I’ll make will become easier and more familiar. When I stretch, I expand. It’s there, where all the bonus points exist. It’s where my commitment to living full out and fearless resides.
I learned two things yesterday. One, that settling into a warm spot is good for a short time. And second – that it isn’t a sustainable plan for me in the long term.
And for Murphy? It’s perfect.
It’s gratitude season. I posted something on Facebook recently. It read something like:
Choosing gratitude for all the abundance in my life.
The post prompted an expected number “like” responses. And then, one comment from a good friend of mine which read:
Gratitude is a beautiful thing. It seems to me it is easy to choose gratitude when one feels they have abundance. The bigger question is: what does one interpret as “abundance”? That definition flows to all of the rest. So when one is in a financial struggle, facing creditors and defaults, can one still see the abundance? Can we see abundance in our access to clean water, food, and shelter? Or do we compare our position to those around us and wallow in misery? Let’s face it, on the world stage, most of us are the 1%. That is the great challenge and one that can only truly be tested in the toughest times.
His comment gave me pause. Am I really grateful for my basic needs being met? What is abundance, after all? Was I grateful for the abundance in my life even when I had enormous difficulty paying the mortgage? When the going was tough, did I notice that I was still provided for?
I vividly remember times during the last several years when I had creditors chasing me, after making poor financial choices. Though I am aware that if you look around you will always find someone worse off than you, the emotional pain of financial worry was crushing and all consuming. The question remains, was I grateful?
I’ve learned (over and over again) that all the great lessons to be learned exist inside the crappiest moments of my life. When it hurts, when it feels hopeless, when I’m certain there is no possible good outcome, the last thing I naturally focus on is “What am I learning?” Often it’s after you’ve moved through it that the true lessons and gifts emerge. And eventually, they always do.
Here was my comment back to my friend:
I’m happy you elaborated on this point. The word “abundance” is perhaps overused. For me, I’m blessed in so many areas – not the least of which is clean and available drinking water. I am grateful for my mental, physical, and emotional health. I’m blessed by my relationships with others which sustain and feed my spirit. I don’t limit my definition of abundance to financial wealth. I am in love with my life in spite of the challenges and bumps in the road, and have actually come to love those just as much for the richness they provide. I think there is a false sense that financial abundances cures everything – that more is better – and it simply isn’t the truth for me. I choose an attitude of gratitude and not just because it sounds good but because it keeps me humble.
People are often curious about what I actually do with people who work with me as a coach. I love it when people are curious, and yet there is part of me that knows how elusive the words are in describing this amazing work. So a part of me pauses, seeking the right string of words to magically articulate the essence of what I do.
Though I love this work with every piece of my heart, I actually dread this question. I’d love to be able to describe it in a way that my MOM understands, so she could relate to what I do. At present, she likely has no real idea what to say to her friends when they ask. Seriously? I can only imagine how she might answer. (No worries, Mom. Most people don’t really get it either.)
(Photo Credit: Megan McCrorey)
There are certain aspects of my work that are easy to describe. The conversations I have with people are quite similar in terms of topic; I can roughly generalize the themes that occur. In fact, I can narrow down to as few as 5 areas where most of the work is done. Here they are, and I’ve also provided some of the thoughts behind the themes, for your entertainment:
Worthiness/Unworthiness
I am not enough. I’ve never been enough. I’ll never be enough. I don’t have enough. I’m not smart enough, good looking enough, or ambitious enough.
Relationship to Money
I don’t understand it. I don’t know how to make it. I don’t feel comfortable asking for it. I don’t want to be greedy. I want more but I’m ashamed of wanting more. I have plenty and still worry that it’ll run out. I worry about it all the time. I can’t afford this.
Time Scarcity
There is never enough time. I’m scared I’m not doing the right things. I’m worried I’ll die with my music inside me. I never finish things I start. I procrastinate. Time confuses me.
Relationships with Others
My marriage is dying. I’m estranged from my daughter. I don’t know how to really love someone. I don’t spend quality time with people. I’m worried about what people think all the time.
Relationship to Work
I hate my job. I know there’s more for me but I don’t know what it is or how to start. I am not a good leader. I am not performing at work and need to step up. I want to start a business. My boss is out to get me.
Within each of these themes, fear runs rampant. After all, fear is really the only thing that ever stops us, ultimately. So, in large part my work with people consists of a series of conversations that navigate these areas, exploring the fears that show up. These thoughts that you have are real, even though it’s the relationship with thought that is actually the problem.
Maybe it’s easier to describe to you what I don’t do.
I don’t fix you (you aren’t broken).
I don’t give you the answers (the answers are already inside you, and my answer will never be as good as yours).
I don’t give you therapy (I’m not qualified, for one thing. Second, therapy is more focused on your past. I’m interested in your present and future).
I don’t do interventions or exorcise your demons (‘nuf said).
I don’t enable your weaknesses (you are way too powerful for that).
I don’t give up on you (Even though you may want to give up on yourself).
I don’t buy into your old, tired stories (I’d much rather help you create new ones).
The only way to fully grasp the power of these conversations is to have one with me. The first one’s on me - go here to grab your spot.
For some, it’s been the most compelling conversation they’ve ever had (without the use of mind altering drugs). Just sayin’. 
It’s Monday, and I’m imagining all the mumbling and grumbling that is occurring in a place near you about that very fact. Mondays are a reminder, once again, that work sucks – at least for a large percentage (some say 80%) of the population. Job-haters abound to the point where it’s almost uncool NOT to whine.
Seriously? How can that possibly be? Monday comes every seven days, as does the dread and disappointment when you’re choosing to do soul-less work. And you know, somewhere deep inside you that it IS a choice, even though you might be thinking that you don’t truly have one.
I could get up on my pulpit and preach the benefits of finding work you love. There are many irrefutable benefits. I’d rather submit that your soul can be brought to any job. Your true self is dying to come alive, where ever you are right now, in this very precious moment.
What if you could bring your soul to work, regardless of the work? You do yourself and the world no favor by chugging along joylessly in work where you shrink inside. What can you cultivate from your true and abiding spirit that would reflect who you really are today in spite of your circumstances?
Are you with me?
I’ve just passed the 5 year mark in my business. (Can I get an AMEN!)
In March, 2006, I began a spiral down into one of the lowest periods of my life. I was working as a General Sales Manager, and the job was literally killing me. Eventually, my body confirmed the affects the stress level was creating for me, and I was rushed to the Emergency Room where I was later diagnosed with viral meningitis. I truly thought my time was up. I’d never been so ill, and there were times when the thought of dying felt like a welcome relief from all the pain.
Some time later, I returned to the job that was killing me. Not long after my return, while still taking heavy duty pain medication, I realized I just couldn’t do it any longer. I had to get an exit plan. So, after a discussion about that with my boss, I got my exit plan. The next day he fired me.
Some of you already know this story. Shortly after I got fired, my husband was diagnosed with melanoma, the number one cancer that kills. Thus continued my spiral down into the depths of life’s toughest moments.
And at some point, after a long recovery, my health returned. My husband beat the cancer (More than 5 years cancer-free now). And I found my purpose in life – to begin my own business as a coach/consultant, helping people navigate their own life challenges. Life will begin to flow, if you’re patient enough to wait for it.
Now, my life continues to rock. My business is thriving; work has never been more rewarding, fulfilling, and fun. My husband and I have never been healthier, and our marriage never stronger. We’re at the top of the wave again.
As I contemplate the places I’ve been over the last 5 years in terms of highs and lows, I realize that the ebb and flow of life is part of the natural order. We’re meant to navigate challenges, and as true as that statement is, we’re also meant to flow to the top of the wave when it occurs. And the best is yet to come, as the crest of the wave continues to grow higher and the lessons at the bottom go deeper.
This is life, and as long as I’m breathing, I vow to relax into it; both ebb and flow. I will throw a celebration party when life flows, and when life ebbs, I will love and nurture myself, knowing that this too shall pass.
I was thinking this morning about the wisdom that life doesn’t happen to us, it happens FOR US. Though sometimes I feel overwhelming resistance to my challenges (Things SHOULDN’T be this way…) it’s true that I can always look back on it and see the value. The trick is to learn to see it in the moment, right? It’s really about opening myself up to the not knowing, exposing myself to what could be the worst possible scenario. And then, seeing that this, too, will be navigated. Everything will unfold perfectly.
I’m aware that holding onto something too tightly (perfection, success, dreams) has the potential to squeeze the joy and life from it. Today I will loosen my grip, relaxing in the flowing thought that nothing needs to be difficult. It’s a surrendering, of sorts…and these words borrowed from a poem by the brilliant psychotherapist, Jennifer Welwood, reminded me that I know this.
Willing to experience aloneness,
I discover connection everywhere;Turning to face my fear,
I meet the warrior who lives within me;Opening to my loss and pain and ignorance,
I remember who I am and what I’m here for.Surrendering into emptiness,
I find fullness without end.Each condition I flee from pursues me,
Each condition I welcome transforms meand becomes itself transformed
into the blessing it always was.
What are you fleeing from? What if you surrendered, instead? What if surrendering was really a sign of strength, rather than weakness?
Sometimes it’s the stories from my own life that allow a person to hear something that otherwise would be analyzed and discarded. Today during a session, I told this story:
When our children were small, we invited a Chocolate Lab puppy into our home. At the time I was a very busy mom with a hectic home life and career. The dog was collectively named Jasmine, and for years, she was more my husband and kids’ dog than mine. When the kids eventually went away to college, I was left with an empty spot in my heart that precious Jasmine happily filled. As the story goes, Jasmine got to be 14 years old and her health began to decline. At some point, it became clear that it was time to end her suffering and put her down.
Here is a photo of her during one of her last days with us:
That trip to Dr. Tom’s office is imprinted in my mind forever. We were ushered immediately into a patient room, where the doctor sadly confirmed that we were making the right decision. It was time to let her go. My husband and I held her as the injection was given. She closed her eyes forever and I felt my heart shatter into a million pieces. My husband and I were bawling our eyes out while the kind staff showed us the back exit to our car. Through the tears, we somehow made it home to grieve the loss of our amazing family member.
I understood why my husband was so torn apart. What I didn’t understand was why it had me so wrecked. After all, she wasn’t really my dog. She was their dog. I had opened my heart and there it laid, broken and bloody in the place where our precious Jasmine had once licked her butt.
So it’s important to point out that we did at some point return to a normal life. We had already put down our family cat in a similar way, and I was certain that I didn’t want to go through anything like that EVER again. I felt vulnerable and hurt from being so open to that kind of love, and my husband felt the same way. We vowed not to get another dog, since it made life so much easier.
Fast forward to a few years later. It’s Christmas time, and our son was about to come home for a visit. We were driving in a snowstorm to a Christmas party, and I bring up the idea that it’s time to get another dog. To my husband’s credit, he resisted vehemently. We both remembered what it felt like to lose Jasmine, and our life had been pretty free and easy without having to care for her. Did I mention that I can be relentless? Well, that’s exactly what I was and before long we had a new Chocolate Lab puppy just in time to greet my son as he returned home for his visit.
Here is a recent photo of Murphy:
At two years old, he’s a happy pain in the butt at times, and we’ve all grown to love him dearly. Frankly, I can’t imagine the vast cavern in my life that would exist without him. He is just starting to be allowed on his own out of his crate, and it looks like we’re entering the lower maintenance years with him. Though we have our moments, we know in our hearts that having him with us is the right thing.
You may be wondering what the moral of this story is? Here you go…
All the joy that is possible for us comes only through the opening of our hearts. We must be willing to put our heart on the line if we want to love fiercely and fully. It’s a two way street. When we hold a part of ourselves back, something bigger and fuller in others is held back too. I know I’m talking about a dog, and yet this story is a metaphor for anything you ever wanted to do or be in your life.
Open. Decide to allow wonderful things in, even if the cost is that it someday leaves. Accept that you may fail, and that you win just by having the experience of attempting something.
Let whatever is calling you in, with arms wide open.
