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Self Worth

Where does your self-worth meter sit?

When we unpack our personal problems, I would say 95% of the time it comes down to an issue of worthiness.

Fact is, we are all born worthy. But somewhere along the way, we started to doubt it. We unknowingly allowed a poisonous idea to creep into our brains and it became our go-to thought to explain most anything that went sideways in our lives.

But it was the thought error of a child. That sweet adorable youngster, who didn’t know any better, came to an incorrect conclusion.

That inexperienced young brain wrongly attached the meaning “I am not worthy” to someone else’s actions or words or to a random event.

They were wrong, but it happened. And once the thought was established, that sweet little brain used it again and again until the thought grew legs and became a belief.

We all have areas of our lives where our self-worth meter has a low reading.

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The Words We Choose

The words we use on a consistent basis can have a dramatic effect on the quality of our lives. Our words, our syntax and the questions we lead with are often habitual. We all have our go-to emotions and reactions and say things like – that’s just how I am.

Except it’s not.

That’s just how you have conditioned yourself to be. While you have likely been influenced heavily by those around you, you are the author. You created your emotional home and the words you habitually use will take you there.

One of my clients, when describing how she felt at work told me “it’s as if I have a target on my back”.

How would that thought make you feel? Anxious? Stressed? Nervous?

How do you act when you feel anxious or stressed? What do you do? How would it effect the work you did? We all are different, but you might not be as thorough, or it might make you defensive or reactive.

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Making Decisions/Thought Loops

Decisions are not always easy to make. We spin. We go back and forth. We weigh things out and ask for help yet still we feel unsure and conflicted.

Yet our minds crave resolution. And when that thought loop is open and our issues are unresolved, we become preoccupied and fixated.

I often won’t sleep well if I have open thought loops. And I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one who wakes up in the middle of the night spinning on something that seems unsolvable. (and our half-asleep brains are always so reasonable)

One of the things that keeps us from being decisive is the idea that we are faced with one decision that is right and one that is wrong. We get focused on making the right decision, when in fact, there is no right or wrong decision, there is just a decision.

Your brain wants to keep you from acting due to the fear of failure. But failure (if you choose to use that word) is just information.

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Extraordinary

What differentiates average lives from the extraordinary ones?

Let me first say – I am not harshing on anyone living an average life. But being a coach, I am intrigued with the unique attributes of each state.

We are all born with a brain wired for survival. But the question is, do you want to survive, or do you want to thrive?

Many people will look at their life, make an assessment of where they are, and then go forward based on what they see as an appropriate expectation.

But extraordinary lives happen when you look at where you are and then dream large about what is possible.

Perhaps you were born with that restless urge. Maybe you had a moment of inspiration along the way. But in the pursuit of our deepest desires we find our purpose and meaning in life.

Many people I coach come to me with a long list of limitations and ‘reasons why they can’t’. Reasons why they aren’t further along.

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We must get better/Closed doors

For things to get better, WE must get better.

For things to change, WE must change.

There is no way getting around this.

In our current situation with the pandemic, it’s as if the door to life as we once knew it has been closed.

Some people are standing at the door, jiggling the handle hoping if they do the right thing it will open.

Some are standing behind the door with their arms crossed, pissed off because it’s closed.

But others are looking for windows.

I know a lot of people are trying to be patient while they wait for things to go back to normal.

Except I don’t think we are going back.

We all must be flexible, adaptable and willing to change.

Flexibility often relies on your skill set, and now is a great time to be open and willing to developing new methods of doing things.

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Being Willing to be Wrong

Are you willing to be wrong?

I would guess most of us might have some push back with the idea.

Life seems simpler to understand when we have a clearly defined right and wrong or good and bad. It allows us to have filters so we can quickly make sense of things.

But what happens when we pull those filers out of the depths of our brains and examine them?

This weekend (just for fun lol) I identified a few beliefs I had looping somewhere in the back of my brain.

One was something I knew I was not good at.

One was an observation I had made about myself as a parent.

One was a description of who I was as a person.

For years I had seen them as facts. Observations. But not one of them served me or made my life any better – quite the opposite.

I examined what those beliefs had cost me in the past. I saw how they were currently playing out in my day to day.

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Letting Go

What are you willing to let go of in order to get what you want in life?

I was working with a client one day and used the analogy of a boat.

Many of us build amazing boats, filled with wonderful things. We work on our boats for years and they truly are lovely…but they are tied to the dock of the ‘here’.

We have never taken them out of the harbor, even though we built them so they could sail on the ocean.

We tell ourselves ‘one of these days’ the time will be right.

But for now, we would rather stay in prep mode. We have tried to imagine the future but the water between the dock ‘where we are’ and the shore ‘where we want to be’ seems scary and unknown.

One of my clients was bound to her dock by a story of inadequacy from her childhood. A story about family dynamics and the effect it had on her. She had spent years in therapy and self-analysis and had a very thorough understanding.

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Setting Big Goals

Setting big goals is not something I was ever good at. I had goals, don’t get me wrong, but I am talking BIG goals. Big goals were scary. It meant committing to something. And then all the self-help books said if you were serious about your goal, you had to tell people about it.

As if.

I still sometimes find myself setting goals based on what I believe I can accomplish. But that’s not a big goal – that’s just an acknowledgement of the work I planned on doing anyway.

Big goals are ones where we have no idea how we will do it. They are a leap of faith. And so many of us are reluctant.

But why? If we set a big goal for the next 12 months and don’t hit it, what happens? Will the ground break open and suck us in? Will we be sentenced to 6 months in solitary? Will we have to walk around for a month with a neon sign saying LOOSER on it?

Not likely. Not unless we choose to punish ourselves.

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Do You Like Yourself?

Do you like yourself?

I remember my life as an angsty teenager, and I am pretty sure the answer back then would have been a hard no, accompanied by a long list of reasons why.

But now that I am all grown up, I don’t have problems like that anymore.

Oh wait. Yes I do.

One of my favorites these days is when I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror and all I see is this older woman looking back at me. I don’t always recognize her, and there is a moment when I seriously wonder what she is doing in my mirror. I have no idea why I still expect to see my 20 or 30-year-old self.

Hmmmm. Unless it has something to do with the fact that the only pictures of me in our home are of a younger version, usually with great hair and make-up. Seriously, I just had that realization. Wow. (add – find new/old pictures to my list of things to do for next week) But I regress.

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Who Do You Want to Become?

Who do we want to become?

I ask this question to many of my clients. Getting clear on where and what we are striving for always helps us make decisions in the moment.

Understanding the ‘why’ is also important because it give us something to lean into when the road gets bumpy.

I’ve sat with people who want to increase their annual income so they don’t have to worry about money anymore. But when the ‘why’ is so we can stop worrying, chances are we will never find the success we want. When we have created the habit of worrying, having more money will not magically change it or make us happy.

The same reasoning will apply If someone wants to lose 20 pounds so they can stop feeling like a ____(insert jab here). Loosing any amount of weight won’t magically make us love life if we have the habit of negative self-talk and a lack of self-appreciation.

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