The Practices of the Heart Part V - The Practice of Seeking Resource

The lone thing changeless in this human race is change. This volition always be true. Which is why I happen every chance to update my knowledge. The pattern of seeking resource for me is to happen the best tools for learning, and environ myself with the best people to larn from. Resources are available in more than formattings today than ever before. Not only make we have got got got traditional schools, workshops, periodicals, and books, but now we have a countless of electronic beginnings like teleclasses, eBooks, podcasts, and webinars.

Additionally, people have always been a powerful resource. I consistently attain out to larn from others, such as as masterminding with successful leaders, seeking out mentors, and working with managers and teachers. These all afford me the chance to develop new capacities within and turn and develop my ain resources of cognition and skill.

How are you seeking resources in your life? Are you trying to be a rebel and travel it alone? There are so many who have got gone before you and are willing to help. See creating an effectual squad around you consisting of those with accomplishments and cognition that fill your gaps. Bash you necessitate a coach, mentor, or spouse to assist you with your home-based business? Bash you necessitate business office aid from an intern, or part-time employee or contractor? Bash you have got a trusted accountant, attorney, and copywriter on your team? Bash you have got other concern proprietors you can confabulate with from clip to time? Brand certain all your alkalis are covered.

Too often new concern proprietors believe they're supposed to manage everything alone and experience it's weak to inquire for help. Well, if that's you, then it's clock to recognize you can't make it all—and there's no shame in that. Few people have got expertness in every field. Don't be too disdainful to accept aid and usage resources from any topographic point you happen suitable. It's the lone manner to turn and spread out as an individual and in your business.

Furthering your instruction is an in progress process. We're in an age of changeless innovation, so to win in business, you must maintain up. If you believe you're too busy to take classes, you can larn online. If you don't have got clip to read a book, you can read the eBook or listen to the audio in your car. With so many easy, time-saving choices, you have got no excuses.

Incorporate the pattern of seeking resource to let yourself the space and freedom to turn and accommodate to change. Be unfastened to new ideas, and allow travel of what doesn't work any more. Keep updating your resources to the best you can find.

Someday you might even be a resource for person else.

Where is Your Turning Point?

If we are to understand adequate about our selves to go the individual we desire to be, then we must detect within our ego a purchase factor, a bend point that lets us to be our ain master.

There is no uncertainty that we are complex beings. Each characteristic, be it rational, emotional, physical and chemical or spiritual, have its ain complexnesses and barriers to understanding.

So much of our apprehension is limited by our language, by the words we utilize to state ourselves and others what we are thinking and what our ideas really mean. Our full beingness of the moment, what we are experiencing right now is surrounded by our past experiences and the significance and attending that we give to those past experiences.

You would believe that a babe would be an exact transcript of its parents. But, the fact is that the baby's DNA, which finds everything about it, is different. So each of us is think, feel, and act differently than our parents.

This agency that you are unique.

The minute that you recognize this, you must also recognize the powerfulness you have got over your ain mind. Only you cognize what the cardinal is to your mind. Only you can be responsible for the picks you do within your ain head.

We, each of us, delegate meaning to our experiences based on our acquisition and experiences. Your experience is different from anyone else's not because you have got got had different experiences, which you may have, but because your spring it different significance than I do, or anyone else for that matter.

No 1 else cognizes what is happening on in your mind. Even if you give me a verbal description of what is happening, I can not experience exactly what you are experiencing. In our minds, we each have got a alone theoretical account of ourselves and of the human race around us.

The linguistic communication and images, what hear and see and touch, is interpreted in our minds. As the signaling from the retina of our oculus go throughs through the eye nervus to our encephalon other signalings from our emotional and rational centres premix with it to constitute our alone apprehension of the world.

These are complex electrical, chemical and physical interactions that consequence in a memory and an interpretation. These go a set of instructions, as words and mental images and sounds, that are meaningful to you as a alone individual.

These instruction manual are your experiences, the memories you have got absorbed since your birth from every twenty-four hours living.

It is through this jelly of experience, this mass of past interpretation, that you must drag your twenty-four hours to twenty-four hours experiences.

If you are consciously funny and aware, if you dwell in the moment, then you will recognize that what you are experiencing now is a totally new experience. If you are not consciously funny and aware, you will not recognize that your life is an exciting journeying of discovery.

And that is the existent secret to overcoming any emotional job rooted in your past. Our emotional well being depends on where we pass our clip in our heads.

If you are focusing on your past, you are allowing the weight of your past experiences to overmaster the importance of any new experience. If you concentrate your head on what happened to you in the past, your past experience will oppress the significance of your life minute now.

We are all traveling on a clip line between birth and death. Where we are on that clip line is our present moment, here and now, the lone topographic point that we have got any powerfulness to take what we do.

We can derive control of our lives,now, by life in the minute with an almost child-like wonder and wonder.

If you are focused on the injury and maltreatment of the past, you are allowing that memory and the horror of those events, to oppress your wonderment and curiosity of life in this moment. You are giving up life now to dwell in the past where you are weak to change anything.

The additional along the line we are, the greater the weight and significance of our past experiences. If we have got got got not made picks that have given us command over our lives it will go more than hard to acquire control.

Only in the present make you have the powerfulness to take what to believe and do, and to program what you desire for yourself tomorrow.

Survive Transition and Icky Neutral Zones

Sick of what you are doing? Ready to go forth your old human race but not certain what your new human race is? In that painful in-between place? Ahhhhhh transitions. The slippery challenge of moving from one human race or manner of being into another. When life boots us out of our comfortableness zone so we can go our adjacent self.

I have got been going through a large passage myself these last couple of old age and as it picks up rush and finishes (at least on one level) it looks at every bend I am encountering others who are going through the same, sometimes really ambitious process. So a small article on passages and that awkward uncertainness phase called 'the neutral zone' seemed in order (to both reassure myself and others that passages really are perfectly normal and a necessary constituent of a well lived life).

Stages of Transition:There is a terrific writer named Bill Bridges, who have done a batch of research and authorship on the subject of transition. I particularly like his book called The Manner of Transition. In it (and in his other books) he explicates the typical phases of transition. That we be given to make through three large 'Ds': disenchantment, disidentification and freak out (the neutral zone) before we protrude out the other side into a different manner of being and stabilise again.

Disenchantment Phase: Disenchantment is the form that I see a batch of folks in lately. They come up for coaching job or my specialised artwork preparation because they are looking for something different – the same ol' same ol' just doesn't cut it and they look for something that volition add spark, spice or exhilaration to their life. Get them out of the 'ho hums' they have got been feeling for a while. Disenchantment is the same as the first phase in my SHIFT-IT process: Satisfaction Interrupted.

Might be an enterpriser who desires to change the nature or gait of their business. A skilled professional who is good at but world-weary by their position quo. A corporate employee who is thinking about jumping ship into a free agent lifestyle. Whatever the circumstances, they are disenchanted with the form they are now in (which once suited them fine) and are looking for something different.

Dis-identification Phase:After or during the disillusion form you come in into disidentification. In this form a individual either voluntarily dis-identifies themselves from their old life, or something haps to them that causes a separation. Their old personal identity starts to interrupt up. For myself, this happened when I was no longer satisfied with being a Graphic Recorder and started the convoluted procedure of becoming a Graphic Facilitator and then a Graphic Coach. The proverbial s#it hit the fan as my geographical location radically shifted and a core human relationship also broke up – paving the manner for greater shifts. I had to drop designation with 1 personal identity in order for a new one to emerge. For me, this personal identity driblet and displacement have taken about six old age and have gone through multiple levels.

This is the same for many of my clients who are in calling or concern transitions. They have got done something for quite a long time, and might be very good at it and acquire accolades, but it no longer 'does it' for them personally anymore. Others might personal identity them that manner still but they themselves no longer do. They often also have got the challenge of having their supports and incomes wrapped around this old personal identity – so it is slippery to happen a better feeling substitution right away. So they maintain the 'day job' so to talk going, long after they have got any vested personal identity in it. Kind of acquire stuck, especially when feelings of uncertainness and uncertainty prevail.

Wandering in the Neutral Zone: What haps adjacent is a freak out phase, where one can experience really lost and baffled and alone. Where you have got allow spell of the old on an emotional degree (maybe not physical) but the new hasn't come up into focusing yet. A oblivion land. Like letting spell of 1 trapeze and hoping the other one will emerge in clip for you to catch it.

Bridges have coined the phrase 'the neutral zone' to eloquently depict this experience. Like wandering in the desert or being on your ain personal pilgrimage. It is often in fact a sort of Negro spiritual experience to acquire through your neutral zone and emerge out the other side. Difficult to hang in there when you don't really cognize what you are doing or where you are going. Or how things will somehow stabilise into a new reality.

Natural Procedure Like the Seasons: It is fitting to be authorship about passages as we travel into winter. When you are in it, the neutral zone can look like it travels on forever with no end in sight. However that is not the case. It is 'not terminal' as Harry Bridges reassures. It is just the preliminary to something new. A clip of terminations and beginnings – just like wintertime is and then springtime follows. All looks to halt for a piece but it makes dad back up again just when all looks dead or despairing. It really does!

The Bigger Picture:To acquire a sense of these rhythms it is often very helpful to map out your life journeying to date. So you can see your ain rhythm of passage and alteration and position how things really make morph and happen their ain conclusions, like a watercourse determination its manner through the landscape. Your narrative makes travel on. It always has. It always will. Creating your Life Map will assist you appreciate that. To develop some religion that this too shall go through and certainty and assurance will go back again and you will acquire moving and going again.

Other Things That Can Help:It also assists to just appreciate and accept the procedure you are in - to give into it and trust it. As opposing to fighting or resisting it. And to just make whatever little stairway are in presence of you that you make have got some involvement or energy for. One little, better-feeling measure at a time. Doing your best to detect and place what you make like and make feel good about and move towards that as much as you can. Like volition pull like.

You will eventually "SHIFT-IT" and move into a new personal identity (which you will eventually passage out of too – cause that is just the manner life goes, alteration never really ends!). As person is quoted as saying 'life is just one darn thing after another' and that actually isn't such as a bad thing when you really see the alternatives. It is all in how you look at it.

All the best with navigating your passages and in making it through the 'icky' (that is a technical term - smile) neutral zone – stableness really is somewhere just around the corner. Bent in there!

© 2006 Christina L. Merkley

The SHIFT-IT Graphic Coach

The Secret and the Law of Attraction - Hip, Hype or Hoax?

'The Secret' is not so secret anymore. In fact most people have now heard about its key message ... the Law of Attraction. This philosophy states that we create our reality, both good and bad, by what we focus on. In other words, we attract our life results by what we think.

We've seen The Secret talked about ad nauseum. On Oprah, The Letterman Show, in popular magazines. Now, we're starting to see some backlash.

The current affair shows are starting to interview people who've 'used' The Secret and failed in their lives. The radio stations are starting to lampoon The Secret in satire. Recently, there's even been an 'expose' on one of the teachers of The Secret as a conman. Ouch, it's getting ugly.

Why? Because there is some doubt in some people's minds on the validity of the teachings of The Secret. There are sceptics out there. The unbelievers, those who choose not to be ordained by the teachings. And there are those who've tried to make it work and failed. Those who are continuing to get the same miserable results in their lives and choosing to blame The Secret.

But is it a case of these people again finding something else other than themselves to blame for the lack of results in their lives? Could it be that they've not applied the teachings of The Secret in the correct way. Could it be that the teachings work, for those people who 'get it'.

So what's the secret to getting The Secret? Why is it so hard to apply the teachings?

The Secret says we need to Ask, Believe and Receive. Ask for what you want, hold the belief that you will attain it, and open yourself up to receive it. As easy as that!

Or maybe it's not so easy for some people. Yes, you may be pretty good at defining and asking for what you want, and putting it out there. But for some, this initial step is the first stumbling block. You may find it difficult to realise that there are other options available to you. Or to conceptualise that you may be able to do things in a different way in your world to get different results. Better results, bigger results. It takes some thought, dreaming and hope to visualise another possibility for your life.

The believing part is about holding the faith with every thread of your being. It's about visualising what you want 'as if' you've already got it. Seeing yourself as though you're already there, ahead of the manifestation. Now this can take some doing. This is where it gets harder for some. Imagination may not be your strong suit. Or you may simply get caught up in your day to day habitual world and forget your focus. Or you may start to doubt. You may get caught up in other people's expectations of you, or your own negative or habitual thoughts.

Even if you're a success in believing you'll soon be achieving, the next step in the process may be your downfall. This step is about opening yourself up to receiving NOW. Getting yourself ready to realise the dream you've been chasing. This step is about unblocking and allowing yourself to grab hold of your gifts from the universe. And this may not be so easy for you. Because you may be habitually living your life expecting the same results tomorrow that you got yesterday. You may be holding the faith that The Secret stuff you've been hoping for will come...but in the future. The future never comes because it's always ahead of you. Getting yourself in the right mindset to receive now rather than later is the final milestone.

There are many other pitfalls, hazards and stumbling blocks that may set you back in your 'Secret' journey. Follow the footsteps of someone who is travelling the path and benefit from their insights and experience. Click here to follow a 31 day expedition down the pathway to a Better Life applying The Secret - http://thesecretjournal.wordpress.com. The Secret Journal of the Secret Journey.

The Tricky Business of Motivating Employees - Part 5

WAYS TO GET BACK ON TRACK

The emotional snowball will be harder to stop than it would
have been to address the work problem in the first place:

Addictive and compulsive behaviors must be addressed first.

As these are attempts to avoid and deny the original
problem, they will be in the way of getting back to the
underlying issue. Depending on which behaviors are present,
structured hospital or outpatient treatment may be
indicated, along with participation in twelve step or other
self-help groups. To locate these resources, the employee
can contact his/her Employee Assistance Program, health
insurance provider and the local branch of the National
Mental Health Association.

Psychotherapy may be indicated to begin unraveling the
emotional puzzle.

The first step will be to utlize either individual or
family psychotherapy to stabilize the individual's
situation at work and at home.

A "corrective action plan" will be needed at work (if not
already established), or plans to find other employment
must be made. Contracts with family members will be put in
place, so that the individual has some "breathing room" to
address conflicts while the family receives some initial
relief through basic agreements with their troubled family
member.

Then the work begins in earnest. What is the source of the
employee's work dilemma? A very careful history of the
problem is taken, to determine this. There are many
possibilities.

It could be uncovered that the employee has difficulties
taking direction from authority figures, which leads to job
dissatisfaction. Conversely, he/she could be struggling
with a position which requires more independent work and
less structure than the person can handle. Other types of
"personality conflicts" may indicate that there are people
in the workplace that remind the individual of unfinished
business with people from his/her past.

Then there are those that "do themselves in" because they
maintain unhealthy beliefs that interfere with
communication and negotiation. Here are some examples:
Those who do not assert themselves may either believe that
they have "no right" to comment on the ways they feel about
their assignments, or fear retaliation for their feedback
to management. Others may believe that "nothing ever works
out for them" and so fall into unhappy acquiescence in the
workplace. Naturally, few individuals with any of these
beliefs have worked much on developing the critical skills
of healthy assertive communication and negotiation.

For these and other similar emotional dilemmas, the work of
psychotherapy may reap benefits that resolve workplace
concerns and those beyond. To feel that one is reaching
their life goals, one must be emotionally "freed up" to
reach for them. A shift in behavior related to authority
figures, for instance, might result in an employee being
more receptive to management's requests and make him more
willing to be his son's parent (i.e. authority figure),
instead of friend. This might also result in a better
atmosphere at home, which is not marked by daily struggles
with the adolescent member of the family.

Sometimes, workshops and readings on assertiveness,
communication skills, self-esteem and the like are
recommended to complement psychotherapy. Once the
employee has a clear view of where the problems lie,
he/she will be able to continue working on them well beyond the
termination of therapy.

Career counseling also may be an option.

Sometimes, during the course of counseling, it becomes
clear that the employee has never found their vocational
niche. While this may be a problem related to the emotional
conflicts discussed above (such as an individual choosing
the same career as his father, but not one that fits his
talents or interests), career counseling may be recommended
to help the employee identify their aptitudes, interests
and preferred work setting. Career counseling also is
extremely valuable in insuring that the individual is
creating a career plan that is possible to successfully
pursue in the current economic climate and at the person's
given stage in life. For example, there is less and less
work for those who want to repair the office machines of
yesterday and it may not be the best plan to begin training
to be an astronaut at age 50.

IN CONCLUSION

The precise course of action needed to remedy any given
employee's job dissatisfaction will of course have to be
uniquely tailored for him/her. However, the information
presented in this article will hopefully provide enough
"food for thought" for employees to consider "working" more
deliberately "toward reaching their life goals" -- at work
and at home. It's also rewarding to know, that the more
satisfying life is, the more likely life span will increase
(refer again to the Health Trap section of this article),
giving more time to enjoy the outcome of this therapeutic
work.

Seeing Things As We Are – The Power of Your Worldview

"We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are."


–Anaîs Nin

Driving home from the pool after my morning swim, I happened to see a young woman walking toward the high school. As the car passed by, we made fleeting but certain eye contact. I was smiling; she was not. In fact, she seemed to be deliberately frowning. "What have you got to be so happy about?" her eyes were asking. "Why are you so unhappy?" I wondered.

In that brief encounter I imagined two worlds colliding, or at least two worldviews. It occurred to me once again how -- from moment to moment, through thought, word, and action -- we invent the world we inhabit.

How we think determines how we make sense of what happens to us and informs the quality of our days. If we think life is a treasure it most certainly is and we find the bounty in life to support our belief. If we believe life a trial, we will see disappointment, pain, and punishment everywhere and perhaps participate in creating it.

When life throws challenges our way, it's especially important to have a worldview that's creative, positive and vision-driven. What we tell ourselves when faced with difficulty makes a difference. Daniel Goleman, author and educator on Emotional Intelligence, calls self-motivation a key skill of emotionally intelligent people. When you're self-motivated, you see challenges in ways that help you learn from them and move forward in life.

My mother, Lorna, has a worldview that says we're here to love and help each other and, in turn, we are loved and taken care of. She does and is.

My friend Suzanne believes that perseverance will allow you to move through the seemingly impossible challenges of life with grace and dignity. And she does.

My lovely Aunt Mimi, who lived in a wheelchair most of her 83 years, believed "life is what you make it," and the way she lived her full and happy life taught those around her how to do the same.

Was my frowning school-bound friend unhappy? Did she really want to make my day miserable, too? Or was it just momentary indigestion. I'll never know. I do know that her emotional state is not about me. We'd never met. I also know that regardless of the fact that we'd never met, depending on my own worldview, I could easily have generated an attitude war in that moment. But I decided not to and continued on with a very enjoyable morning.

I can't think of a better way to begin each day than to remember the power of our innate creativity. Be mindful of what you hope for and what you worry about, what you believe and what you foster in the world. If life truly is what you make it, how are you creating your life today?

8 Reasons to Invest in Decision Diva Coaching

Coaching is a phenomenal way to work your way to the life that you want and deserve. Coach and client work through the "layers" of your life to this point, doing what is necessary to get you out of your old story and begin stepping into the life that you choose. A coach may be the one person in your life that has no agenda for you, but surely has your best interests at heart. This results in an outside perspective on your life that is invaluable to your progress . . . a must-have.

1. Clarity: In order to build the life you want - one decision at at time - and to know which are the "right" decisions to make, one must be very clear on who they really are. You need to move beyond who you were told that you are, who you think you are, who other people want you to be, and who you think you should be. Through open and honest conversation, various fun and enlightening tests, and assignments tailored specifically to your life circumstances, you will discover the true you that is bustin' to get out. You will have more clarity than you've ever had before. And you will learn how to make the decisions to honor who you are and take you where you want to go . . . one decision at a time.

2. Options and Opportunities: To the extent that you are clear on who you are and what you want and need, you will begin to recognize and understand all of the options that lie before you. They may have been there all along, but you just haven't seen them. We will create a new vision. You will know what to say "yes" and "no" to. You will have more control over your time and destiny. You may need to create options and opportunities for yourself . . . we will tackle that together. As the old saying goes . . . two heads are better than one! We will go through the brainstorming process as a team. Your possibilities are endless! You can create options and opportunities to suit your true self. No more trying to plug yourself into situations. You will be creating them based on what is best for YOU. Can you feel the freedom in that statement?

3. Acceptance: A HUGE part of the process of discovering who you are is accepting all that has led you to this moment. There is no good . . . no bad . . . there just IS. Together we will go back and reframe, to acknowledge and accept your unique history. It was all a necessary part of the process for you to be reading these words right now. We do not look in the rear-view mirror to re-live or beat you up for the past. We rewrite your story so you can live and leave the legacy that captures the true essence of who you are. What legacy do you want to leave?

4. Confidence: In the Decision Diva Dictionary, the word "confidence" means TRUSTING YOURSELF . . . to keep promises made to yourself and others; to know that you can handle whatever comes your way because you are CLEAR about who you are and what you want; the ability to rely on yourself to be your own best friend, leaving behind the negative self-talk and self-defeating behaviors; and being comfortable showing up as your authentic self . . . no matter what the situation. These are among the MANY skills you will learn through Decision Diva coaching.

5. Honesty: First and foremost, you will learn to be completely honest with yourself (perhaps for the first time in your life!) You will learn how to command honesty from others - and how to deal with a lack of honesty when it occurs. It all begins with you learning to confidently and comfortably stand in YOUR OWN TRUTH . . . even when it is scary and may not seem popular. To live an authentic life is the greatest gift you can give to yourself and others. When you are honest, authentic and standing in your truth, you set a great example and give others permission to do the same. Decision Diva coaching is the ideal SAFE place to practice this skill.

6. Insight: You will look at yourself and your life in a way that you never have before . . . guaranteed! You will see things from a new perspective, understand why you have made certain decisions in the past, and become so clear on who you are that the decisions you make FOR YOU - from this point forward - will become a natural process rather than a struggle or a sacrifice. Every insight you have into yourself brings you closer to the pot o'gold at the end of YOUR rainbow.

7. New outlook: The set of eyes through which you see the world will be forever changed. When we know better, we do better. And once we know, it is impossible to go back to the old ways when we are committed to our true selves. I am not talking about the "rose colored glasses" theory as we know it. I am talking about a genuine, positive "rosy" outlook, with a newfound excitement for life. Tapping into your essence, discovering the true you. Experiencing joy at every turn and seeing the beauty and wonder of life. These things will no longer go unnoticed . . . they will become a part of your being. That is the glory of being human.

8. Giving from Your Overflow: This is a concept introduced to me by my own coach, Angela. As women, we are accustomed to give, give, give - even when we have nothing left in our tanks. Sound familiar? You will learn how to give to yourself FIRST - filling your own tank - actually to the point of OVERFLOW - before you give to others. That means when you give you will not feel depleted - you will have the space and energy to FEEL the gift of giving . . . and the recipient has the opportunity to experience the joy of receiving. Keep filling YOURSELF up and you have more to give. No guilt. No selfish feelings. It is a gift that you give to yourself and others. A definite WIN-WIN situation for everyone!