Get Into Action

Did you ever notice that when you are about to try something new, or take on a new challenge, or simply anticipating something that you are more nervous before the event then after it starts? When we try something new it challenges our mind and body. When we get into action, it releases our "feel good" hormones. Once we're in action it makes us feel better and the ambivalence we initially encountered decreases.

Clients often come to me because they know they want something, but just can't find the momentum to get started. Weight loss, new fitness routine, or taking the time to discover what is next for them in their lives...they want a change...but what? It's often easier to sit with the ambivalence, the what ifs and the worry. But, what does that really give you? What's the price of not changing? Of sitting and wishing it would just happen?

When I began training for my first triathlon, my head often filled up with ambivalent feelings, worry about what awful things could happen, whether I could actually do it or not, etc. To overcome it, I asked myself why I wanted to compete in a triathlon. What was my "WHY"? Why did I like triathlons? Why did I want to do them? When I discovered my answers to my "WHY" i realized that I loved the challenge of the triathlon, I enjoy working towards a goal, the sense of accomplishment, I enjoy the "wow" factor, and I enjoy the mental challenge most of all. Connecting to the "WHY" is what continues to motivate me.

Ask yourself, WHY you want what you want. Why do you want to lose weight? Why do you want to begin addressing your procrastination? Why do you want to discover what's next for you? Why do you want to run a marathon?

Why do you want to change? Find positive motivation. Engage your feelings, it creates an emotional charge that will power you through your procrastination and ambivalence. Your brain will naturally want to go towards pleasure...show yourself why you want it, and get into action to get it.

So put those ambivalent feelings to rest, get into action today. It's our own minds that create the "what ifs" before you start...once you begin, you realize it's not so bad afterall.

We Have Enough Time

Time. It's a very valuable commodity. So valuable, yet so often taken for granted or overlooked.
Time. It can run our day.
Time. Is there ever enough?
Time. It ticks away, it's not given back.
Time. It's yours to spend.
Time. A measurement of speed for a racer.
Time. It's a valuable commodity.
Time. How do you spend your time?

Make friends with time. "We race to win, but at what price? Driven by the threat of time, we wonder why we feel so empty at the end of action-filled days." Diana Hunt.

Time. How you spend it defines the quality of your life.

It's time.

Perhaps this got you thinking...thinking is good, it awakens awareness.
With awareness comes new possibilities. Nothing changes, however, without new action.

Create new actions today to spend your time in ways that fulfill you, allow you to live in the moment and go to bed feeling full; not empty. Wondering how to move from how you spend your time now, to spending your time to be more fulfilled? Here's a tip, think about what you love to do. Do you make time for it? If not, make an appointment with yourself. Love to knit, read, exercise, garden? Whatever it is, write on your calendar that you have an appointment with yourself to do just that. Write it. You make appointment with other people...do the same for yourself.

This is the TIME of your life. How are you spending it?

Want a good return on your investment of time? Invest time in yourself.
Check out my "Bootcamp." It's well worth your time.

Thoughts for Real Change

How about this statement, "Real, authentic change emerges only from a place of deep focus and intention." (I read this in "Body & Soul" magazine)

Real change comes from deep focus and intention. Hummm....consider that for a moment.
I'm sure you have some areas of your life that could use some change or tidying up. In order to make those changes, and to make them real and lasting, go to a place of deep focus and intention.

So, I ask you further...how do you go to a place of deep focus and intention? As a life coach one of my strengths is bringing my clients into that place of deep focus and intention. My job as a coach is to ask powerful questions, and challenge my clients to uncover their authentic answers. And the answers are not always on the surface, they are usually found deeper, underneath. This is why coaching can be so effective. It's not easy to look deeply within yourself alone. Having a supportive, encouraging coach enables you to take a more honest look.

As the quote above states, go to a place of focus and intention. Discover the power of meditation and yoga. If that is not for you take a walk or a hike and smell the fresh air, the breeze on your face, the birds chirping. Slow down, relax and find your place of inner focus.

I have always found that walking peacefully with a powerful question or statement on my mind allows me to go deeper into the question and uncover it's truths. And, really staying with the thought or question until I discover all it's riches has served me well. Staying focused on the question with the intention of discovering what might be there allows new a powerful thoughts to emerge. With the thoughts and discoveries comes awareness. With awareness comes new choices for change.

So what about you? Want to make real changes in your life? Take the time to focus and digest the questions in your life. Dig, unearth and discover.

What are you responsible for?

A friend of mine told me about a women's group she attends. Each week they have a topic and engage in great discussions. During one of her meetings, the topic of discussion centered around this powerful question: "What are you 100% responsible for?"

What a great question! I found myself pondering over that question for several days. What am I responsible for? And what do I want to be responsible for? What am I feeling responsible for that is not mine?

I've discovered that I need to take on some responsibility and let go of some. This has fostered a new outlook for me. I'm committed to making some necessary changes in my life to be responsible for those things that I need to be responsible for. My own happiness is on the top of my list. What about you?

I'm going to keep this blog entry short to allow you to ponder that powerful question as well. Take out your journal and discover...."What are you 100% responsible for?"

Think

According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary the definition of the word think is this:
To form or have in the mind. Think implies the entrance of an idea into one's mind.

I picked up the book, "Choices That Change Lives" by Hal Urban. I have had it sitting on my shelf for a few months now, and decided to take it with me yesterday as I sat at the local pool to watch my son swim. I happened to turn to the sixth chapter, Thinking. Being that I love to know what thoughts go on in people's heads, I thought that was the chapter for me to read. With highlighter in hand, sure I'd find some nugget of information I could use, I eagerly began reading the chapter.

Now, to back up a moment. My father in law, a math educator and school administrator, always told his students, children and grandchildren to think. In fact, his license plate for his car was, "Think 1". He insisted that we do not live our lives unconsciously without thought. He believed that the answers to anything evolved if we thought first. I could not believe my eyes as I began to read...

So, here I am reading this book and the author mentions a college professor who also professed the importance of thinking. This professor said, "the problem was that most people never learn to operate it (the brain) as effectively as they could, and that this usually results in unfulfilled lives." "Our thoughts rule of lives." Reading this, I got chills up my spine. It's what I have believe and know...and what my father law knew well before me. Somehow I could feel my father-in-law looking over smiling. (he passed away 2 years ago)

The chapter goes on to talk about the difference between an empty head and an open mind. (Big difference here!!) An open mind is really an attitude of being open to new information and to other points of view. An open mind, therefore, is open to being fed nourishing ideas, thoughts and beliefs. A empty head is just that....empty.

Just as it's important to have a healthy diet, it's important to have a healthy mental diet. While it's impossible to totally control everything that goes into our minds due to the fact we are constantly bombarded with email, phone calls, tv, radio, etc. we can choose to screen out a high percentage of the trash, and replace it with healthier material. It's important, therefore, to have a steady stream of positive, nurturing, and uplifting ideas and information. Stimulate and challenge your mind AND take the time to weed and feed your mind as well.

My father in law was a brilliant man. He chose to share his brilliance with whomever he came in contact with. He always wanted to write a book, but never did. Somehow reading "Choices That Change Lives" reiterated the powerful messages he shared with me. As Earl Nightingale, one of the great modern thinkers, has said, "schools teach us how to remember, not to think." He suggested, "there should be a required course called "Thinking" at every grade level of school and throughout college." How I wish I could make that come true for both Earl Nightingale and my father in law.

I've posted some new quotes with regard to this topic of thinking. Read and enjoy...and give them some thought. Afterall, "You are what you are because of what goes into your mind." - Zig Ziglar

Facing Your Fears

I wanted to share with you my latest speech entitled, "Facing Your Fears"...it's just something I have learned. I now know that facing your fears opens up a whole new world. Enjoy....

As a woman named, Marie Curie was quoted as saying, “Nothing in life is to be feared. It is only to be understood.” Today, I’d like to share with you the power of facing your fears

To begin, I’d like to share with you a story from my childhood. Travel back with me…I’m 5 years old, taking swim lessons at the local Boys Club. It’s “test day” to move up into the next class level. There’s ten of us, anxiously holding on to the wall of the pool in the shallow end. Our instructor, Mrs. Atkinson, stands on the side of the pool, whistle in her hand, eyes piercing at us…she was someone you did not argue with…she was intimating! Mrs. Atkinson, with her loud, screaming voice, instructs us to swim two laps of the pool, with ABSOLUTELY NO stopping!! If we stopped and grabbed the wall for any reason, she would step on our hands.

I stood looking up the vast lane of the pool, seeing the water gently sway and change color with the increased depth. It was like the water was just patiently waiting for me. I could feel that pit in my stomach, the uneasy feeling, the nerves…the “what if” questions running a million miles an hour in my head. “What if,…I get tired”…What if “I can’t do it?”

The whistle blew, one by one we had to put our faces in the water and swim… each stroke and each breath was a struggle. I became increasingly more and more out of breath and desperately needed a break. I HAD to grab the wall. As I very meekly grabbed the wall, and pulled myself to it, I saw those familiar feet of Mrs. Atkinson!! While stepping on my hands, she began “yelling at me to let go and swim…there was NO stopping she yelled! Frightened and panicked, I slid back into the water, fighting for my breath, paddling along like a puppy pawing her way through the water. It left me feeling that if you get tired while swimming, you will be helpless.

I have numerous other frightful water stories; being pulled out by the currents in the ocean, sailing, snorkeling, white water rating, witnessing a near drowning … each event contained an almost terrifying moment. It all began to prove to me that water was something for me to stay away from.

Deciding to train for and complete in triathlons, at the age of 39, began the journey of facing my fear of water.

My first step was to re-learn to swim. I took it slow. Eventually, I began to swim longer and longer. I was becoming more comfortable in the pool. But what about swimming in a lake?

The weekend before my first race, I ventured to a friend’s lake to get used to the lake water. I put on my wetsuit, cap and goggles and walked to the edge of the water. My heart was racing; my body was quivering; that panic and fear came over me like a cold, white fog.

After 10 long minutes… I took a deep breath, bent over and flopped into the cold and murky water. As I began to swim towards the dock, keeping my head out of the water, I could feel the cold water entering my wetsuit, creeping its way up my body. It was a chilling reminder of just what I was doing. My heart was pounding with fright and I wrestled with what could be lying beneath the water to grab me and my own voice trying to convince me I that couldn’t do it.

Pulling myself up the ladder of the dock, I felt exhausted and defeated. The dock, which was covered with bird-droppings and fish carcasses, was a morbid site. It was like visiting a prison in which no one survived! (Was the dock trying to tell me something?) I looked back at the shore…and felt trapped. The dock was no place I wanted to stay. The shore, my comfort zone, laid waiting on the other side of that murky, cold water.

It took every ounce of strength and courage to get back into the water and swim back to shore. I reached shore and felt defeated and felt unable to swim more then 25 yds in that water. How could I swim ½ mile? I did not compete in my first triathlon.

Instead I had to figure out how to get through this storm of fear.
I happened to read that fears are irrational. That to overcome them you must take the time to understand what it is you really fear. This caused me to STOP…to ask myself, “What is it that I am really afraid of?

Drowning?
Feeling helpless?
Getting tired in the middle of the lake and not be seen and given help?
The unknown?
Feeling I could not handle it?…that my fear of water was bigger than I?



I discovered that my fear was based on past experiences, future assumptions and what I was making up to believe about myself. Once I understood this…I began to take charge of my own thoughts and beliefs. Instead of my “what ifs”…I discovered ways to handle my fears. If I got tired, I could roll on my back! Instead of ‘What if I can’t” I made up a mantra for myself, “I CAN.I WILL.”

On August 3, 2004, I completed my first triathlon. Coming out of that water was like that scene from the movie, Rocky. I emerged hands high…smiling. I did it. It was then that I realized that my fears were not bigger than I…I had proved to myself that I was bigger than my fear…and nothing could stop me. I had discovered that the only thing that truly stood in my way of getting what I wanted was my own head. Once I set my mind to believing that I could handle it, I did.

What I learned from all of it…and what I want to share with you is this:
Take the time to understand your fear, believe you can handle it. Feel your fear and do it anyway. The richness of life will emerge. Nothing in life, after all, is to be feared…just understood

Sharing What you Know

Recently a woman I know from my gym told me about her new blog. She told me it was filled with just stuff she knew. Like where to find those hard to find shoes, or how the new restaurant in town was...or what was happening out in the Hamptons! It's truly filled with what she knows. Check it out: www.stacyknows.blogspot.com. Then on another occasion, my daughter's friend, was telling me how she was writing an email to send to her friends and family to share with them what she learned and experienced while on her annual work trip to Nicaragua. These trips, for her, don't mean traveling the a third world country to build houses and leave. Rather these trips touch the core of her soul. She arrives home having experienced amazing relationships, experiences and sights. While she and I discussed what she wanted to convey in her email, I suddenly realized that she too wanted to share what she knew. She knows, first hand, what it smells like, looks like, feels like to live in extreme poverty. She knows and is grateful for all that surrounds us here in the US. She knows the power of a smile. She knows what it is to reach out and help your neighbor.

Then today, as I stood in line for a shower my gym, a woman commented that she admired "us swimmers". She told me how she had such a tremendous fear of getting tired while swimming and then drowning. Her comment touched a cord within me. I, too, had had that exact same fear. The fear that if I were to try swimming, I'd get tired and drown. When I shared with her that I too had had that fear of water, she was relieved to know that others felt that way too. That was the third sychronocity around sharing what you know. I know about fear of water. And, I know about overcoming that fear. I also know that when we face our fears and understand them, there is a whole new world awaiting us.

I am giving a speech on facing your fears. I'll be posting that speech...cause it's really something I know about. AND, I'd like to share it with you. Who knows, perhaps it'll inspire someone else to face their fears and reap the rewards on the other side.