“Loving yourself involves the discovery of the true wonder of you; not only the present you, but the many possibilities of you. It involves the continual realization that you are unique, like no other person in the world, that life is, or should be, the discovery, the development and the sharing of this uniqueness.” ~Leo F. Buscaglia

Last week, in one of my coaching sessions, I had given my client some homework to gain more clarity on a VISION that she’s been struggling to define.

To do her homework most authentically and effectively, I made sure to encourage her to go somewhere quiet and private that would allow her to go within to seek the answers and clarity she needs.

When we kicked off our coaching call, I was excited to hear the enthusiasm in her voice. She explained that initially she didn’t give herself quiet time or any privacy to do the homework. In fact, she went to Starbucks and found herself people watching for over 3 hours!

Yet, what she explained next was absolutely profound.

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“Pain is not wrong. Reacting to pain as wrong initiates the trance of unworthiness. The moment we believe something is wrong, our world shrinks and we lose ourselves in the effort to combat the pain.” ~Tara Brach

I remember years back, when I had about a year of coaching under my belt, I hired a photographer to take some pictures of me for the new website I was creating.

This photographer was referred to me by a friend, and I had known that she had recently gotten married and was going through some major transitions in her life.

For the photo shoot, she and I decided to meet in the woods near my home – where we thought we could get some nice shots outside.

During the shoot, we chatted about a variety of things and our conversation eventually landed on the topic of her recent marriage. We discussed the changes she was undergoing in her life and she explained that not only did she just marry the love of her life, but she had lost over 100 lbs!

Needless to say this gal was claiming her worth in a variety of ways in her life!

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“Before you diagnose yourself with depression or low self esteem, first make sure that you are not, in fact, just surrounding yourself with assholes.” ~William Gibson

I shared the above quote with the group of gals who joined me in Kennebunkport, Maine for the Creative Business/Life Retreat that I held this past weekend. Needless to say we all got a great laugh from the quote and the Truth that the statement exudes.

You may be able to relate – and get a chuckle out of the above statement as well – where you’ve been (or are now being) surrounded by others who you know, aren’t being their Best Selves and, as a result, aren’t encouraging you to be your Best Self either.

This is why being around positive energy and people is so critical to your own growth and success in life, business and relationships. The key is knowing how to discern who and what has served you in the past and will continue to serve you – and who and what will not.

We all get stuck in ruts. We all get stuck in old patterns. And we all get stuck in believing that “this is all there is” and life is meant to be mediocre and bland.

But the Truth is – life is meant to be adventurous, joyous, mysterious, uplifting and constantly changing – which means you as a person are doing all those things! This is why it’s so important to surround yourself with positive energy – and this includes people who are just as committed to your growth and evolution as you are.

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“There is a time in our lives, usually at mid-life, when a woman has to make a decision- possibly the most important psychic decision of her future life – and that is, whether to be bitter or not. Women often come to this in their late thirties or early forties. They are at the point where they are full up to their ears with everything and they’ve “had it” and “the last straw has broken the camel’s back” and they’re “pissed off and pooped out.” Their dreams of their twenties may be lying in a crumple. They may be with broken hearts, broken marriages, broken promises.” ~Clarissa Pinkola Estes’ from Women Who Run With The Wolves

The statement above is from the fabulous book – Women Who Run With The Wolves – and is an acknowledgement for any woman who has ever felt like you’ve lost-out on life in some small or big way – or had too many paths that just didn’t turn-out the way you had planned or hoped for.

And the statement is a beautiful pre-cursor for an exercise the author encourages all women to do where she recommends constructing a personal ‘descansos’ – which is a symbol that marks a part of your life that was cut short. Typically a ‘descansos’ are known for being on the side of the road to mark the memory of a tragic accident and to honor a life that was cut short.

And in this case, I am introducing to the process of doing your own personal ‘descansos’ as a way for you to take inventory of any past hurts, ‘mistakes’, wrong turns, lost opportunities, broken hearts, and just plain disappointment that you’ve experienced on the road of life thus far.

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I have an everyday religion that works for me. Love yourself first, and everything else falls into line.” ~Lucille Ball

I’m sure you’ve heard of the powerful statement that Dr. Phil has used which is: “You teach people how to treat you.” Very true statement for sure.

There is another variation to this statement that could read: “Others teach you how to treat you.” In other words, you learn your sense of self-worth early-on based on how you were treated.

If you were nurtured, loved and paid attention to – you most likely have an easy time continuing
these habits for yourself.

If you weren’t nurtured and cared for the way you deserved to be, and you experienced abandonment, neglect, and emotional abuse – then you most likely have a hard time with feeling worthy of self-care. And, you most likely have an easier time forgetting about yourself and focusing on others needs before your own

Feeling worthy of your own time and attention is a skill that most of us need to learn to
incorporate into our everyday lives. Society teaches us that we must do good, give to others, and
be good people. All true statements.

Yet, you truly can’t give what you don’t already have (a.k.a. energy, feeling of fullness and
love, etc.) – when you’re running on an empty tank. We all know how it feels to do for others, but
when you’re doing so out of a sense of guilt and/or obligation, it doesn’t feel so good.

Take for example a client whom the other day had a realization about her own lack of self-care.
She said she knew exactly what she loved to do and wanted to do – but she just didn’t take the time
for herself and couldn’t understand why.

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Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most importantly, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.” – Steve Jobs

In order to live the life you were designed to live , it’s critical to understand yourself at the deepest level.

Recently I read a passage by the author Pamela Field in her book: A Woman Who Dreams Herself that: “We have two lives that run parallel with each other: the life we’ve inherited, and the life our Higher Self (a.k.a. our soul) has planned for us. And, at any moment, we can decide to change tracks.”

Have you ever thought of it that way? That there is the life that was passed onto you without any conscious choice – and then there is the life that is imbedded deep within your soul – like a blueprint – that has the plans on where YOU are meant to go and what you’re meant to do.

As I mentioned in the previous article: Carried Shame and Worthiness, oftentimes we don’t realize that if you’re stuck, or feeling a certain way about yourself, or doubting your abilities, etc. – it’s oftentimes a result of you holding onto someone else’s “stuff” and you holding onto shame that wasn’t yours to begin with.

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“If God had wanted me otherwise, He would have created me otherwise.” ~Johann von Goethe

In order to live the life you were designed to live , it’s critical to understand yourself at the deepest level.

Yet, most of us were taught to cover-up the core of who we are in order
to be accepted by others in both our original family of origin, and our peer groups growing up.

Becoming who you were designed to be is a courageous act because it requires you to get comfortable with being uncomfortable. It requires you to understand that not everyone is going to approve of what you do and who you commit to becoming.

That’s okay, people pleasing is so out-dated.

The most important and courageous act in being your own person is: accepting and loving ALL parts of yourself first and foremost. The parts that you honor and cherish and the parts that you’d rather not look at for fear that they are unacceptable.

I believe we spend way too much time trying to be perfect than being who we’re meant to be.

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“Dwell in possibility” ~Emily Dickinson

When you make the all important decision to live the life you’re destined to live, you will go through a myriad of emotions. One biggie of an emotion is the “should-a, could-a, would-a” effect – where you feel “if only” I had done this – or “if only” they had done that – or “if only” it could of worked out this way.

Having regrets about your past and/or present circumstances, not only hold you back from manifesting your highest vision, but regrets also drain your energy and keep you steeped in old self-defeating programming and patterns.

To regret is to feel a sense of loss, disappointment, and an overall dissatisfaction with a decision or circumstance in your life. These feelings, if you explore them, most likely are repeats of the past and reminders of false beliefs that you aren’t worthy, that you can’t have what you want, and that your dreams will never manifest.

Sound familiar?

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>”Having a vision for your life allows you to live out of hope, rather than out of your fears.” ~ Stedman Graham

Lately I’ve been finding myself talking more and more about the fact that having clarity on what it is that you really, really want, is extremely underrated.

It’s interesting to see the resistance that crops up when I encourage clients to start with the end in mind – to step back, take some time out, and get clear on what it is that they would really like to see happen – BEFORE we begin to put the action pieces in place.

At first glance, I used to think that the resistance that folks have to the visioning process had to do with them just wanting to get started with the action pieces because they value feeling productive above anything else.

And even though the need to feel productive still tends to trump the creative process of visioning, I’ve found another reason folks resist the visioning process – and this reason boils down to plain ol’ FEAR & Self-Doubt

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“Cherish your own emotions and never undervalue them.” ~Robert Henri

It’s inevitable, when you set a strong intention to change your life for the better, all sorts of emotions crop-up that you didn’t expect.

Learning to honor those emotions – all of them – is the KEY to transformation.

Often we don’t realize that our daily lives are playing out patterns from the past – and unconsciously we are each trying to heal old wounds by trying to “do it better” this time around.

And always, when you set a strong intention to experience something new, something better, something different than what you’re used to – painful and very uncomfortable emotions will crop-up.

Again, unconsciously we are more comfortable with the familiar – what we know – what’s predictable.

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