Peacefully Imperfect

In my line of work, I hear a lot about life’s imperfections as told by those who live them and somehow have found their way to my doorstep. In fact, it is because of some of these imperfections that they seek my service. Yesterday I heard about yet another bleak diagnosis that shouldn’t have been and as used to it as I get, it still sits uncomfortably with me. Why do life’s imperfections still surprise us or worse yet, defeat us?

I have to think back to when we bought into this belief that life has to be perfect. As a little girl for me it started in the fairy tales of the princess and the prince who are reunited despite the plots and plans of evil doers and/or destiny in their stories and always live happily ever after. In my own personal story, the desire to live an empowered life and have a better quality of life than the girls I grew up with pushed me to seek the perfect life. It was partly youth, partly conviction, partly the belief in the stories, and partly a sense of responsibility that I owed it to those who couldn’t, that seduced me into believing that the perfect life was out there for me to seek and own.

Back then, I was thirsty for perfection. Today, I know better. I see people in their 30s or well into their 40s who are suffering because of this belief that they must be doing something wrong if they are not married to their soul mate, have 2.3 perfect kids, a perfect house, a perfect career, a perfectly toned body, and perfect friends who live similar lives. The economic downfall is placing all kinds of pressures and the imperfections are oozing from the cracks of their misperceptions and they are either angry or depressed. It is as if a promise has been broken. Some feel it when they are diagnosed with cancer, some when they lose their jobs, or marriages, and some when something “bad” happens to their loved ones. No matter how it shows up, it can be described as a sense of disillusionment with how they believed things would turn out.

As a life coach, I think that my profession may have contributed to this illusion. Some coaches claim to help people live a better life, but I am of the belief that the client is already living the life they have chosen. The main issue is taking responsibility and accepting their own disillusions. No matter how many goals they set, it won’t take away their fears of illness, or failure. The source of the problem is not underachieving humans who don’t know how to organize themselves. The source of the problem lies in the belief that because they have been an over achiever in all areas of their life, they should have it better than this.
Philip Simmons (1) writes in his beautiful essay, In Praise of the Imperfect Life: “It was the ant that returned me to the world, that called me to another way of worship, the way of all things ordinary and small, the way of all that is imperfect, the way of stubbornness and error, the way of all that is transitory and comes to grief.” Somehow in the process of growing up, we forgot that we are humans living mortal lives in fragile bodies. We were inspired to become super human. No one told us the cost of that.

Today, when someone tells me, “I just want peace”, I have to ask them, “what are you willing to let go of?”. I am not sure they quite understand the depth of what they might have to give up or allow. Peace does not come at our command. It is always there invisible to us because we are too busy and/or anesthetized in our pursuit of the perfect life. Once again, as Philip Simmons has said: “The imperfect is our paradise. Let us pray, then, that we do not shun the struggle. May we attend with mindfulness, generosity, and compassion to all that is broken in our lives. May we live fully in each flawed and too human moment, and thereby gain the victory.”

(1) Learning To Fall: The Blessings of an Imperfect Life. Philip Simmons. Bantam Books, 2002.

What's Weighing You Down?

Where I live, winter is not ready to be done. Another big snow storm is on its way to top off what is already coating the ground and people are getting grumpy about the cold. I don’t mind the snow and the cold, I just get tired of all the layers we have to put on to leave the house and then take off when we come in. It’s the boots and the socks and the gloves and the scarves that weigh me down and wear me out. The hint of spring is an exciting time, you can leave the house with a light jacket and perhaps even wear sandals on your feet. You feel lighter and more like yourself with nothing to hide or cover up.

The beauty of living where there are 4 seasons, is that as soon as you get tired of one, the other one will be here. There is a time for shedding and a time for layering. And so it is in life. We all carry too much weight from time to time and need to let go of those heavy weights. Some are easier to let go of and some stay with you despite your longing for them to be gone. Being busy and going about the business of the day over time prevents you from noticing what’s weighing you down. Soon, you don’t even recognize what they are or that you have a choice to let them go. We all can create spring in the middle of winter easily, but we do not recognize that ability in us.

What are the things that weigh you down? I’ve come up with 4 categories that those pesky weights fit into: pain, blame, shame, and guilt. All categories involve at least one other person. They all have to do with something big that happened some time ago. The fresh wounds are easy to recall. It’s always the old ones that are somehow more powerful and knock you down when you least expect them to. And it is usually when you are embarking in a new relationship or endeavor that you find yourself weighed down and unable to move in a new desired direction. The old issues sneak up and weigh you down so even the new feels like old and soon you give up because everything looks just like another shade of gray.

Sometimes you feel nothing and might think that there is nothing you can think of that is weighing you down. However, when you are asked, do you feel light? Do you feel like yourself? The answer is no. Feeling numb is a consequence of shoving down your pain, blame, shame, or guilt. Over time, it feels like nothing. It’s almost like body weight. If you’ve gained weight over time, you don’t notice it in your body but after you lose all of it, you feel lighter, healthier, more energized, etc. So, don’t be fooled by the numbness, it is not a good thing!

Once you have identified the pain, blame, shame, or guilt, just let it go. Sometimes, the simple process of recognition, does the releasing and sometimes, you have to give it a gentle shove. Sometimes you have to revisit the issue, because the release was not complete. If you are ready to bring spring in, simply stay aware of what’s going on. Feel the pain, blame, shame, or guilt if it comes up and then simply say good bye and consciously let it go. Don’t worry, it won’t pollute the earth or take over someone else. Like a freshly blown up balloon that is deflated, it just goes back to its original shape and is soon forgotten. Keep at it, and your extra weight will go down so you can feel your healthy and natural self. You will start feeling you, and not all the stuff around you. Here’s to bringing in spring in the middle of winter!

Dismantling Patience

On the path towards new consciousness, certain concepts lose their meaning and significance. It’s like old technology, they become obsolete and cumbersome. Forgiveness is one of those concepts. A Course In Miracles states that it is necessary for us humans to forgive but eventually we’ll realize that it is not necessary because there is no need for it. There is nothing to forgive!

Patience is another one that is on its way out and one I’d like to think about today. Patience was a virtue. Patience implied that you had to slow yourself down to the level of the other person or whatever it was you were waiting for. Living in the now moment and with total compassion eliminates the need for patience. Being impatient means being intolerant, whether it is because you are in a rush to be somewhere else or because you are pre-occupied with something else (stressed). Thinking about patience or lack of it in this way may motivate you to become more patient with others. But what about patience with yourself, with life or whatever is or isn’t happening?

It all comes back to self-acceptance. How well do I accept myself just as I am? Will I accept myself after I lose some weight? Will I accept myself after I become successful or achieve some goal? Will I accept myself after I make more money? Will I accept myself or some other better, newer and more improved version of me? Unfortunately, that’s a carrot we’ll never get to. If we don’t learn to love and accept ourselves just the way we are in the now moment, we won’t later either. This does not mean that we should not strive to do better or improve ourselves. Improvement or enhancement of our experience of life is similar to going from point A to point B because it brings us joy, it is fun, or we are curious about what point B is like. In these cases, the journey of getting to point B is fun too. We are not in a rush to get there, because it is all part of the enjoyment. In fact, when we get to point B, we’ll realize that we might want to go to C, etc. It never ends, because it is all about expanding. Patience is not required, it is an unnecessary concept. If however, the goal of getting to point B is to avoid being in point A, then the journey seems difficult, a struggle and not enjoyable. I am reminded of Andre Agassi’s book, Open in which he states that he hated losing more than he loved winning. His journey was exhausting, joyless and full of struggle. He had no patience in his matches, he wanted them done with, so he could get to point B or not be in point A anymore.

Today, I am determined to dismantle patience. I am going to use awareness to notice when I am not being compassionate and accepting of what is. And with practice, I’ll realize that I won’t need patience anymore. I just need to remember that I am the master of my experience and that if something isn’t working out for me, I need to first change my attitude and then take any necessary actions. Patience will be obsolete, ready to be discarded like an old typewriter. I’m looking forward to a gentler, more efficient and less cumbersome way of being, one that includes everything and everyone just as they are. So long Patience!

Who Is In Charge?

“When you don’t cover up the world with words and labels, a sense of the miraculous returns to your life that was lost a long time ago when humanity, instead of using thought, became possessed by thought. A depth returns to your life. Things regain their newness, their freshness.” Eckhart Tolle (Guardians of Being, 2009)

What does it mean to be possessed by thought? It is so much a part of who we are and what we value that we don’t recognize that we are ruled by our thoughts. In other words, our mind/brain determines our experience of life. We identify so much with our superior ability to think that we consider ourselves superior to all other animals. An organ whose function is to make sure our bodies are doing what they are supposed to be doing, keep us safe by evaluating our surroundings and comparing and contrasting to past events is now the CEO of us. If you compare it to an organization, it is like having the safety department in charge of the whole organization. In this scenario, the organization will be very safe, but will it grow? Will it take any risks? Will it develop any new products? Will it be creative? It may, but those are not its primary focus. In fact, its top goal is to grow the function and capabilities of the safety department. So now, you have safety people everywhere, they are telling everyone else what to do. The more the company hires safety people, the more the people think about how they might need even more safety measures, this is all they think about. They start worrying about all kinds of things, because their job is to come up with scenarios to protect the organization from. Soon all the other departments start getting intimidated by the safety people. They stop thinking for themselves, their job becomes satisfying the goals of the safety people. The organization is run by fear and intimidation and a constant fear of not being safe enough. As crazy as this may sound, it is no different from how most of us live as humans.

We have given full control of our experience of life to our heads or our thinking and yet the function of our brain is not to take control of us. Then who or what is in charge?

Shaun Ellis, a British naturalist spent two years of his life living in the wild with a pack of wolves without any human contact. This is what he wrote after his experience: The hardest thing was adjusting to the human world. The one I had just left, and felt I belonged to, was so simple and balanced. There was no deception, no malice and no gratuitous cruelty. Keeping the family safe and fed was all that mattered: wolves killed to eat; never for fun and never more than they needed.

When have you ever described your life as simple and balanced? Do you remember when it was so? Is there something you could strike off of your list for things to do or add, that could bring some simplicity and balance in your day? Who is the CEO of you? My wish for all of us is to remember who is in charge and demote those who are not in compliance of the true mission and vision of our being.

Helplessness

The tragic and devastating news from Haiti has been somewhere in my consciousness since I heard about it. Pictures of the people sitting by, making do with close to zero by the side of the buildings that once were, tug at me relentlessly. What do we do when we hear of such devastation? How do we help? Yes, we can send a check somewhere to some humanitarian organization to help out. What else? My dear friend whom I’ve met through the blogosphere, Gabi has just written a post on a similar topic that has to do with what can we do in the midst of absurdity and injustice. After reading hers and feeling my helplessness I wonder about this place we are all sitting in. What might come from helplessness?

The first thing I notice when I feel utterly helpless, like when I did right after my father passed away is that if I stop thinking, rationalizing, and justifying I feel peace. And the only way I can do that is by not thinking. Yes, when you feel helpless, just go with it, do not analyze it, do not try to fix it. I know it sounds counter-intuitive, but it works. Now, you might say, great, I am glad that you know how to feel peace in the midst of such devastation. But how is that going to help the world?

I am not an expert at what the world needs, but I have a hunch at what the world doesn’t need. The world doesn’t need more drama, blame, or righteousness. When we can’t stop ourselves from listening to the news and getting caught up in the drama of the how and how many and the tragic human stories, we are no different from the rubber-neckers at the sight of a car accident on the road. We perpetuate the story, we feed into the tragedy and its energy, we talk about it and analyze it and justify that such a thing would never happen here, because we build our buildings according to code, etc. to make ourselves feel more safe. And all of this usually happens within seconds of feeling helpless. It is as if we want to feel something, anything other than helplessness. So, we push through, deny, and avoid it. How could this benefit the planet?

What I have learned is that the more we connect with the sadness, the more we start thinking, rationalizing, and justifying or worse, get angry. What would happen if we just felt the helplessness and stayed with it without trying to mentally understand it?

I am reminded of a scene at a memorial service when you are the grieving family and people are passing through the line to wish you their respects. There are those who have something to say, to make you feel better, some justification, i.e., he/she lived a full life. There are those who offer help and prayers. There are those who just say I am sorry and move on. There are those who just hug you and look into your eyes without any hurry to walk away. And there are those who will try to distract you by talking about anything but what they are there for.

Today, I’d like to think about this tragedy in the same vein as the memorial analogy. How do I want to wish my respects to the people of the country who have lost everything? What if anything do I want to contribute? What might benefit the people the most? The answers and even just the pondering of my answers to these questions will keep me from becoming part of the problem.
Wishing you all peace, especially if you are feeling helpless.

Diversity

My first reaction to the term diversity, is not a positive one. Having spent years in the corporate world I soon learned that diversity had become an HR buzz word to ensure that every department had their token people of color or different ethnicity and that made the whole organization look good and abide by the organizational norms and numbers. Diversity for me always meant creating an environment for different thinking and ways of being to ensure that we were not trapped by our own short sightedness. So, it didn’t matter where this diversity came from. It was a way to ensure that we weren’t too comfortable, that we were stretching ourselves and expanding.

True diversity defies hierarchy. In fact, if we are truly interested in diversity, we have to throw out the whole concept of order. Only then, can we embrace all the potential offerings of diversity. Only when we give up the idea of what’s right, fair, or acceptable can we see the endless possibilities that true diversity gifts us with. Diversity is about inclusion of everything and everyone. Indeed, diversity may create a little chaos and some organizations cannot handle that. In the age of streamlining, cost cutting, and standardizing, diversity is choked off or becomes even more of a superficial token because no one wants to rock the boat.

I love the concept of true diversity because it is about integration, integrating the dark and the light, the wrong and the right, etc. I like to start with the only place I can start with, me. How diverse am I in my own thinking? How open am I to different ideas, even things that seem crazy? How easily do I dismiss ideas that defy the norm or are considered dark/negative? I might decide after answering these questions that I am open and pretty diverse in my own thoughts, beliefs, etc. in the privacy of my own mind. The next step is, how do I voice this diversity out there, or do I? Am I always trying to be the harmonizer, the positive thinker, the motivator? Do I dare to be negative? Where are the boundaries I dare not cross, or are there any? Now, I am not suggesting anarchy or being negative just to be difficult. I am however, asking if I have the courage to stand out. If you find yourself rationalizing it by thinking that it depends on the circumstance and what is at stake, then you are still bound by conditions. My question is precisely about that, are we willing to experience the expression of diversity regardless of the risks involved. And as long as we are bound by our need for security, our organizations will reflect the same.

As a painter, I used to try to remember my art teacher’s words and instructions. I remember he even told us to not buy black paint, because we’ll never need it. Mind you he was teaching us how to paint flowers and pretty nature scenes, and I had years of Catholic School education and was a good girl who followed instructions and never bent the rules. Years later, I bought the black paint. I rarely used it, because I was told that I wouldn’t need it. One day, I went a little crazy and opened the tube of black paint. I felt the possibilities of where my painting could go. It changed everything. I became more daring in my art. I decided to break all the so-called rules of how you mix colors, etc. I did my own thing and embraced the diversity that had entered my painting. I am still in awe of what I might create, because it could be anything. I don’t have a style or a method. I am open to expand, to let the art do its thing.

Now, I sit here pondering if I could only apply this way of being to all other parts of my life in every moment of every day, what would that be like? I have a hunch it would be an endless and expanding evolution of rich and intense experiences. But am I ready for that?

It Wants To Come Out

Sunday was a very special day. My 10 year old daughter contracted what could have been food poisoning or a bad case of stomach virus. Needless to say, the end result was the same. In the depths of her agony, she kept on demanding that I make “it” go away. Holding her and rubbing her back as she was crying, I was trying to distract her. I couldn’t tell her to think of the beach on a sunny day, or some other serene image because she wasn’t ready to hear that, so, I asked her: “what do you think the pain is trying to tell you”? In her rage and anger at her clueless mother, she shouted, “it wants to come out”! I applauded her understanding of the message and encouraged her to help it come out. Well, the rest is history and you can imagine what followed.

Her words stayed with me: it wants to come out. Where else do we need to let “it” come out? And what might our “it” be? It is the last week of the year and in preparation for 2010 I was thinking about where in my life have I kept “it” locked in? What have I turned my back on? What might I have neglected or denied? Following that, if I keep on locking it in, what will happen? Will it get my attention in another way? Will I implode?

I remember the scenes from movies where someone is dying and at their death bed they declare that they wish they had done x, y, or z. Are x, y, or z my “its”? Is there something I wish I had done or done differently? There always is, isn’t there? No point in regrets, but what about now? What can I do differently today? Perhaps the infamous “it” is just some old, stale way of thinking that needs to come out to be put to rest. Perhaps the “it” is not something that needs to be flushed away, but something that needs to be seen and heard. What if the “it” was your voice, your true voice that got muddled under all of your so-called responsibilities and duties, and now it is just a little nagging sound that you ignore among other naggings you hear daily? What if you ignored it for so long, that now you can’t tell if it is your own voice or someone else’s?

Everyone has at least a few “its” hidden away discreetly. No one can hide them for too long. They tend to get bigger and louder when they finally see an opening. Or they might find the wrong opening. If only we could first recognize them, get acquainted with them and then gently ask them what they want. We will hear it, if we get quiet enough. From that quiet place, having heard our own voice we can do what needs to be done. Happy recognizing to you and yours!

Live Like an Artist

I heard somewhere that when you are an artist, you look at everything differently. For me, it is all about capturing that moment of surprise or delight on paper. Even though it is not an exact representation of the experience, it is an expression stemming from that experience. It is like rewinding the moment you fell in love with someone over and over again, except it is all new. So, yes, you look at everything differently. You walk through life aware that at any moment you could fall in love with the brightest shade of green you’ve ever seen, and as a result everything in your life will have more depth and meaning.

It’s about going deeper and deeper into the experience of life with fresh eyes and an open heart. It’s about being like a child, innocent and without expectations, deeply curious, and fearless to a fault. The only difference is that as an adult you know the bad, you’ve played out the same scenarios enough times to have lost your curiosity, and you’ve been burned, so you know what to be afraid of. My wish for all of us for the New Year and beyond is to be like a child even though we think we know better, to experience life like an artist, prepared to fall in love over and over again. I hope we can still be curious and courageous without worries about consequences. I hope we can unfasten the security latch and go a little crazy.

Happy New Year! Thanks for your support, insights and sharing. Keep on creating, your masterpiece is still waiting for you!

Evolution Hurts

I experienced what I’d like to think of as a small miracle this weekend. We had an ice storm and there was black ice on the steps which I did not know about. Upon going down the steps like I would normally, I slipped and would have landed on the steps with at best a terrible bruise on my back where it had hit the edge of the sharp stone steps. However, I miraculously stopped mid-slip without any effort of my own. It was as if someone gently held me so I wouldn’t tumble down. In that moment, I realized how much pain I had escaped, not to mention the delay in my over scheduled day. I went about my business amazed and grateful for whatever stopped me from falling and feeling the pain. But it isn’t always like that.

What has been showing up in my own personal life, in my clients’ lives, and with my friends recently is the fact that living a conscious life hurts. This was the point I was trying to make in last week’s post. What some people may have imagined about spiritual evolution as being this journey to happy land where the “law of attraction” just brings all of the goodies we deserve and we are immune from feeling pain or getting angry is shattered into a million pieces when we embark on a real-life journey of consciousness expansion. Perhaps no one would go through it if they knew how painful the journey can be. I deliberately use the word, painful, because if I wrote “challenging”, it would imply a certain level of difficulty and then I’d be sending you into your head. Consciousness expansion is not an intellectual activity, it does not involve mental analysis, it involves feeling some of the most intense feelings that many of us have consciously or subconsciously chosen to avoid.

The resistance comes in many forms: “but I don’t want to feel angry”, “I am tired”, “I just want to be happy, peaceful, etc.”, “why can’t I be happy?”, and on and on it goes. We all want to be happy and we have learned to avoid the opposite of happy which can be depressed, sad, or angry. How does the avoidance manifest? Based on what is going on in our lives and our personalities, it could be: super-busy schedules (do anything and everything to not be aware of what we are avoiding), a numbness in our demeanor, alcohol, drugs, partying, taking it out on someone else, obsessive behavior like over-cleaning, etc. So, we all have coping mechanisms. We all know how to not look at the truth that is staring us down. We do this in our personal lives and we have collectively done this when it comes to our jobs, our government and its policies, and our planet. We have collectively looked away and found something else to focus on in order to avoid feeling the pain. In fact, we live extremely convenient lives. We don’t have to leave our homes or our cars anymore. Everything is available with a phone call or through the internet. All of this convenience has added to a sense of entitlement which makes feeling any kind of pain intolerable (no pun intended). I do not want to go into the why, but I do want to validate the how and the now.

The pain however, is what comes before the change, and sometimes right after. The pain is the validation that something is happening. The now is about the inconvenience of pain. The now is about the truth without any sugar coating. I always tell my clients-to-be, “this is not going to be fun and it might be kind of rough, are you sure you want to do this?” The answer is a resounding yes, until they hit the brick wall. This pain is especially uncomfortable, because when we are expanding and learning and practicing and it all is working so well, we think we have graduated. No more pain in my life. So, when it hurts, it feels like a failure, it undermines what we have learned and questions the whole journey and we feel like we are back at the first step. I am writing this somewhat unusual post, because I sense a strong need to let those who are experiencing pain and doubt as to why they have chosen to “grow” that this is a normal part of the experience. Please don’t run away, beat yourself up, or worse yet, give up. You will get through this and it will be quick if you don’t avoid the pain or the darkness. You will not crumble or die, you will get through it, but only in getting through it do you really experience it fully and find your own answers. The answers to some of our difficult questions are not somewhere in some book or with some guru. The answers are inside each and every one of us. The answers urge and cheer us on to get through the pain. The answers bring the joy and peace we have been looking for. Evolution hurts, that’s why we call it “growing pains”. As much as we’d like to freeze certain moments in time for eternity, life beckons us to grow and evolve and with that comes the inconvenience of pain.

Extreme Transitions

A shaman once explained that when you choose to heal, you accept that you die on different levels, and just when you think you are done, you die again. At first I found this explanation a bit morbid. But I realized that no one who is going through a major transition, is really afraid of death. They are however, afraid of dying. In fact, we all are afraid of dying. Sometimes it is the unknown, a lack of understanding of what it might be like. Sometimes like watching a loved one die, it is the fear of pain, the waiting, the hopelessness, the loss. These are all emotions we go through when we are going through a major life transition. So maybe, it is like dying over and over again. How do we get through it?

Transitions are the moments in between what once was and what is yet to be. If we are awake enough and aware enough, we might be excited about the future because we think we are done with the past. So, we want to rush into it. No one, likes to be waiting in the waiting room of change. It feels like nothing is happening there. Worse, yet, you are alone because everyone else is either where you used to be or where you want to be, unless you have joined some kind of support group or better yet, have a close friend who is going through a similar transition. Even then, there is a tremendous sense of loss, because you have lost your identity. Take divorce for example, until the divorce is final, who are you? You used to be someone’s wife, you had a certain last name and now, you are still not divorced, so you are technically married, but … I hear so often the words: “I just want it to be over with”, like removing a band aid. I don’t know of anyone who would rather have the band aid be pulled off ever so slowly lingering every moment of the sensation of the hairs being pulled off of their skin. And yet, we don’t seem to have the choice, time becomes our enemy and we feel sentenced to our waiting room. Is there a wisdom to any of this?

To the one in the waiting room, there is no wisdom. We have heard and even repeated the concept of being in the moment or being present. But being in the moment, in this case is excruciatingly painful. Being aware of being in limbo does not make it any better. In fact, it makes it worse. Because in that present moment without hope for the future, it is gray , lifeless and lonely. So, once again, what’s the wisdom, what’s the gift of this situation?

When we are in between two worlds, or dying we have the opportunity to consciously experience the transition. We can feel the past and its hold on us, its unfulfilled promises, its hopes, its good times, its bad times, etc. We can feel this and feel into the unknown, the future, what might be, a new experience, new people, etc. And we can feel this now moment that is empty, an empty, lonely place to self-observe, accept, make peace with, say goodbye to, grieve, surrender, and rest. Does it feel good? No, it doesn’t. At least, it doesn’t have the sugary feel good high that we are so accustomed to and enjoy. It feels like the end is here, the end of something that you were so familiar with, and endings are sad. Yes, the optimist in me is nagging me to write, “but with every ending there is a new beginning”. True but this statement is not helpful for the one who is experiencing the ending on bloodied hands and knees. The ending needs its own place of honor. We honor those who pass on and the same way we need to honor the part of us that died in our extreme transition. Waiting rooms of life are opportunities to respect the gravity of the moment. We can remember the good times and that may make it feel lighter, but let’s release judgment and the need to make it better by hanging on to the good times. Let’s let go of these polarities of good vs. bad. Let’s just let it all be, like a quiet moment in a funeral service. It’s ok to be quiet, it’s ok to feel hopeless, it’s ok to feel lonely, it’s ok to feel angry, it’s ok to feel whatever it is you are feeling. It’s our desire to feel what we are not feeling that grips us and squeezes us painfully in an attempt to drag us into the past or push us into the future.

So, if you are in the waiting room of life going through your extreme life transition especially at this time of celebration of the upcoming holidays, don’t fight it. Don’t avoid it, don’t deny it, and don’t make it be what it isn’t. Honor your journey and where it has brought you. When you feel what is, even if it feels like dying, feel into it, so you can once again fully engage in what is yet to be.

Anyone Listening Out There?

I was a little skeptical of my husband’s claim that people just don’t listen anymore. As a coach, it’s what I do with clients and hanging out with other coaches, we listen to each other when we talk. So, this statement from him got me thinking and looking around. I didn’t have to look too hard. This past weekend we were at a dinner party where I realized that he did have a valid point. It was a small gathering of friends and I noticed that some people just loved to bust into conversations which is fine, but then they didn’t ask what the others were talking about and made assumptions as to where the conversation was going and they talked and talked and gave their opinions and made their suggestions and on and on it went. I also realized that I am teaching our daughter who is 10 to stop doing that at home, but decided that perhaps I’ve been too hard on her as some of the adults I know don’t know any better. How come no one listens anymore?

Is it because we are so stressed and running in so many different directions that when we finally relax with friends and family, we just let loose and unburden ourselves and empty our thoughts to anyone who might care to listen? Is it that we have had to stay quiet and keep our opinions to ourselves, perhaps for fear of losing a job, in a dysfunctional marriage where neither partner has a meaningful conversation with each other anymore, hanging out with young children all day without adult companionship, etc.? Is it that we think that it isn’t cool to be a little quiet at a party and you have to mingle and have something to say even if you really don’t? Somehow, being quiet became uncool and unacceptable which is in contradiction to what most people I meet are looking for in their lives.

This kind of behavior also reminds me of what I’ve noticed about TV. It seems that every second of TV time has to be filled with loud and obnoxious noise and so-called entertainment, so much so that it is hard to tell the commercials from the program. Even after all the noise, there is the news clip running down below our screen just in case we find the noise boring and need more visual distraction. I used to love watching a football game from time to time and now with all the commentaries and noises and loud giant robots smashing into each other, it has taken away from the game and just made it noisy entertainment. No wonder our kids are always telling us they are bored. When you turn off all of that noise, the silence can be deafening if you’ve never heard it before.

Perhaps it is all of this noise and distraction that we fill our lives with that does not allow for true self-expression or communication. Or perhaps, we are being trained that in order to be successful or liked, we have to jump in front of an audience and make the loudest noise possible regardless of whether they care to hear us or not. Technology has made it possible to stay in touch with each other regardless of time or distance, but it has minimized the concept of etiquette or real meaningful communication. I find myself in conversations that get started, but go nowhere, because it is easy to lose the train of thought and start a new one. Frankly, I am confused at what friendship even means these days. Technology has helped reduce our attention span to sound bites less than 140 characters and so we are very direct and to the point in our tweets, but have forgotten to call each other just to hear each other’s voices. The convenience is great, but it cannot replace the old fashioned “hello, how are you?” Followed by a real pause with ears that listen to what the person is really saying and eyes that see what the person is not saying and the space to allow for those much needed quiet moments.

Being quiet may be uncool, but it is what we all either unconsciously, secretly or openly crave. It is in those quiet moments that we find that creative idea, notice the birds or the clouds or…, realize what is really going on with our friend, recognize what we need or want in our own life, and eventually find real joy. When we are filled with that inner joy can we then fully participate in the noise out there and our participation is then received and appreciated. If we are empty we have nothing to give, so let’s take the quiet time to fill up, everyone around us will be glad we did.

Thankful For the Good, the Bad and the Ugly

So often at this time of the year we are asked to give thanks for what we have, our blessings, etc. It is a great exercise in wading in positive feelings of gratitude. However, what happens to what we might not be too happy about? Our so-called mistakes, or short-comings often get neglected by choice. It is as if we don’t want to mix the good with the bad. We are saving the bad for another time. For some, it comes out when they repeat an unwanted pattern and then they proceed to beat themselves over it. Others choose to be reminded of the bad by others (relationships, an incident on the TV or a movie, etc.). Some spend their lives avoiding any such thoughts, or so they think until something happens that pushes it all to the surface.

I am a firm believer in two things: there is no such thing as good or bad; and if you are afraid of something, it’s better to stalk it and face it until it no longer spooks you. Gratitude is an emotion that encompasses this. If you are grateful for the lesson you have learned from your mistake, then you must in a sense be grateful for having made the mistake for if you hadn’t, you might not have learned the lesson. If you feel into this statement, you will notice that the word mistake no longer has power over you and you have faced something dark or negative and nothing bad happened. Life is indeed like opening up a box of chocolates and biting into all of them. There are some you are going to love and some you wish you could spit out. You learned which ones you like and which ones you won’t try again. Being grateful only for the good is like taking out all of the chocolates you like and pretend the ones you don’t like aren’t in the box. Life is a rainbow of colors and flavors and our job is to experience as much of it as we can. For only in the experience are we going to know what we like and what we don’t.

Even in the depths of grief, there is the sweet memory of the one we lost and the love we feel for them still. And unfortunately, at times, it is in losing them that we recognize how much they meant to us. That in itself is the gift of loss. So, in the spirit of this beautiful American Holiday, I would like to ask you to look back into your life and think about your blessings, your talents, and your so-called mistakes, short-comings, or losses. Imagine a basket that contains your entire life experience up until now and imagine all of the events, people, and decisions like small fruits or flowers in this basket. Some are fresh and delicious, and some are not. But they are all there, and you wouldn’t be here in this exact place and in this precise form, if it weren’t for all the fruit and flowers in that basket. Your basket is uniquely yours, you have filled it with its content, it represents all of your choices and experiences. Now, that you have a fresh inventory of the basket, breathe it all in, give thanks and honor all of its content. You are indeed an amazing creator. Keep on creating, don’t close the door on the creations that have caused you pain, for there is wisdom in that pain. I wish you all a very happy Thanksgiving!

It Can Be a Matter of Conscious Choice

It can be, because it doesn’t seem like it is all the time. Sometimes it feels like it is not up to us. What am I talking about? I am talking about conscious choice. I’ve written about Charlie, our little dog in the past. He is a little black pug who is so not an alpha dog. Charlie would never have survived in his pack, he would have been the first to have been consumed by the alpha pack leader. He would have been a hindrance to the pack because he would wander off in the woods if he thought he saw a pretty leaf he could chase. He would slow them down. Charlie has a friend he plays with every day, another pug who is female and full of life and energy. She is the one who determines how many circles they run, which direction they go, and who gets to get on top! Charlie doesn’t mind being led. I don’t think Charlie understands how he shows up in life. He just is. His playing with his friend reminds me of how we as humans interact with each other. I wonder how many are truly consciously aware of how we show up, furthermore, if we choose to be or do we?

Recently, I met someone who was very demanding. He was not interested in asking if it was convenient for me, or if I was even interested in what he was talking about. I soon realized that if I continue being nice and make it convenient for him, I would be very unhappy. So, I became more demanding too and explained how I wanted it to be. I didn’t hear back from him again. Making the conscious choice to show up assertive may cost you a friendship, but if you have to let someone rule over you to be their friend, that may not be a friendship at all. On the other hand, you may consciously choose to allow the other person to make certain decisions if those are important to them and not to you. For example, I have a good friend who makes all of our lunch decisions (where to meet and when). I am ok with that, I don’t care where we go, so I let her take charge of that. However, if the place she suggests is inconvenient or I’d rather go somewhere else, I will speak up. I am also certain that she doesn’t mind making all of those decisions. I have a choice and I am aware of the dynamics of our relationship.

The same holds true in our most intimate relationships. If you feel like you are the one who makes all the decisions because your partner won’t, you have to consciously decide if this is the role you want to play. I hear so many complaints from women who feel like they do all the “work” in the relationship. Yet, I never hear if they actually have allowed their partner to do some of the “work”. Yes, I use the word allow, because it is about allowing. When you want things done your way and at your speed, you are not interested in the work getting done, you are interested in having your way. That need to control translates as not allowing. So, our partners avoid helping out and let us do it ourselves because they know that whatever they do will not be good enough.

This past weekend, my husband and I went out to a concert and a babysitter took care of the kids. She was the perfect baby sitter. The kids and the dog were well taken care of. Once she left and I looked down, I noticed that there were leaves all over the floors and the rugs. I guess the kids and/or her must have taken the dog out and tracked the leaves all back into the house. I felt a tinge of annoyance, and then I remembered how glad I was to have had a night out alone with my husband and a great babysitter who didn’t mind staying over until well into midnight. Allowing is about accepting all that is, just the way that it is, even if it isn’t quite the way you’d like it to be. That night I consciously chose to be grateful and content. I consciously chose to put my attention on what truly mattered. I would have had nice clean floors if we hadn’t gone out that night, but I would have also missed out on a great date! We spend so much time on things that truly don’t matter to us and we have done it so many times that we don’t even notice it when we do it. All of the years of practice at giving our attention to things we don’t really care about has dulled our awareness and robbed us of recognizing our own personal choices. We give away our power in a hundred different ways each day and then we wonder why we aren’t happy. To make matters worse, we try to control our environment to bring a sense of order and/or balance back again and all that does is make it worse.

So, the next time you feel helpless, exhausted, or angry about a situation that involves someone else, ask yourself what really matters and how you have co-created the situation? Once you know and are clear on what really matters in that situation, then you can do or be as needed. However, you have to take responsibility for the consequences of your action or words. People may or may not be happy with an empowered version of you and that is the chance you are taking. Make the conscious choice and watch what happens…

Does The Truth Have a Chance?

Since last week’s post, I’ve been pre-occupied with the truth. I’ve been catching myself looking for it everywhere and noticing that somehow it has lost its clout. No one seems to be interested in it. I am also reminded of that great line from the movie, A Few Good Men, when the Jack Nicholson character says: “you can’t handle the truth”. It makes me wonder if we really can’t handle the truth. Or is it simply that the truth is not as interesting or shocking as the stuff we make up or is made up for us.

Last night I watched the CBS News (60 Minutes) interview of Andre Agassi by Katie Couric and I watched the truth try to make an appearance despite being shoved into drama, turned into gossip, and nailed by gotcha journalism. I didn’t expect this from 60 Minutes and especially when the guy they were interviewing had already confessed everything, but I am learning that there is little difference these days between any of the so-called news shows on TV. For those of you who missed the show, Agassi has written a new book (to be out today), an auto-biography called Open. In it he confesses to a lot of things including taking crystal meth, wearing a hair weave, and hating tennis. Mind you, Andre Agassi is a retired and respected tennis player who is married to another retired and famous tennis player and is an active philanthropist. Between the two of them, they live a very comfortable life. Writing this book is not going to make or break his lifestyle. With the camera up close, it was clear that his reason for writing this book was to be open and honest about himself and a step in his atonement for his mistakes of the past. He could have let it all be, no one would have known or cared about any of this. His image would have been untarnished and he would have remained a great tennis star. Instead, he chose to come clean, to speak the truth. To me, this was wonderfully refreshing, especially coming from the guy who made “image is everything” a famous line. Instead, Katie Couric kept on asking him things like how many times did he take crystal meth, for how long, how does he feel about what others are saying about him, etc. This was a moment where we could have found out more about what speaking his truth means for him, if he could go back in time, what would he change if anything, what are his hopes for his children, etc. I could think of a dozen questions that would have honored his speaking his truth and left us inspired or compassionate and curious towards people living lives so different than ours.

This interview got me thinking again about our lack of interest in the truth and our lack of patience and even tolerance for those who are being truthful. We would rather not believe them. As Katie Couric said, some of us might have thought that he was just being whiny or trying to sell his book. Any twisted, negative rationale is ok, but the truth. I hope I am wrong, and I hope that people can see and feel beyond what was demonstrated on TV and continues to be demonstrated 24/7. I hope that truth becomes fashionable again, because it is pretty potent, but if we keep on avoiding it we are just feeding into the illusion we are living in. I can’t imagine that this is what we choose. I hope that we can indeed handle the truth. I am certain that Mr. Agassi feels like a huge burden has been lifted. He doesn’t have to be anyone’s tennis star or fulfill anyone else’s dream. In fact, he has liberated himself from that pedestal. He is free to be himself if he chooses so. I wish him all the best.

What Does Truth Have To Do With It?

He has been officially separated from his wife and even lives in another state. He comes into town every weekend to visit the kids and spends the weekends on the driveway or in the garage (where he is allowed to be). The kids don’t want to be around him, they blame him for everything. He doesn’t know that we know about it. He still pretends that he is commuting back and forth and that the house is theirs and everything is ok. I don’t say anything one way or the other, I don’t want to intrude and I don’t want to be drawn into the drama. I go along with his stories even though I have heard the ugly version from his wife. This is a story of someone I casually know and spending the weekend listening to him tell his story to others, I realized how much he still might believe it to be true.

He made me think about the stories I exchange with others. Once we repeat the same story over and over, we believe it too. It’s what politicians do best, it is what churches and other religious institutions have done for centuries, it is what corporations do (except their disgruntled employees know otherwise, and spread their own stories. But the corporations are more powerful and can spread their stories more efficiently and can reach a wider audience), it’s what families and cultures do, and on and on it goes. In fact, when we get together with people, it provides the perfect opportunity to exchange our stories. He tells his story, we tell ours, or someone else’s whose story we like, and pretty soon by the end of the gathering we leave more convinced that our story is indeed true, especially if others bought into it and we even have some fresh stories that we can spread around.

In my neighborhood, the common story is about H1N1 vaccinations. Having two school aged kids, I admit, I get sucked right into it. We all share our knowledge about the latest whether it be which pediatrician is giving them out to which towns have been inoculated to conspiracy theories, etc. We are all concerned about our children’s health and probably our own too. We are frustrated with the fact that there is no clear communication about where and when we can get vaccinated. We are unclear about how serious this threat is. In summary, we don’t have enough information. And because it might be a matter of life and death (especially when we listen to the nightly news and hear about the town next to ours who had the latest fatality, etc.), we go into fear mode. This is the perfect environment for creating drama to feed into our fears. The feeding keeps the fear alive and strong, it makes us be right, so it feeds into our self-righteousness, we keep on talking and obsessing about it, we attract those who might not have been afraid, and it keeps on getting bigger and bigger. At this point, we are willing to lie, cheat and steal to get the vaccine, which I am afraid I am seeing happen in my neighborhood.

So, what happened to the truth? And does it matter? At this stage in the game, you have chaos and fear together hand in hand with extremely strong convictions and delusions about matters of life and death of young children! This is an extremely dangerous concoction that could easily get out of control. I know with my neighbors, that no one at this stage is really interested in the truth. They just want the vaccine. Going back to my friend with his delusions about his life and marriage, I wonder how interested he is in the truth. Once you live inside the stories that you have created, you have no reason to be interested in what may be considered as neutral and disarming. From my perspective, accepting a failed marriage and visiting the kids at the court appointed times is a lot easier to handle than travelling back and forth every weekend, sitting in a cold rental car, waiting for kids who don’t want to see you, and lying to everyone you meet. On the other hand, his choice of lifestyle is more exciting, complicated, exhausting, and sure to draw sympathy from whomever might know the truth. He also gets to avoid the pain that he might feel if he accepted his role in the dissolution of their marriage. And as a bonus, there is the possibility that she might feel sorry for him one day and let him come inside and his story would be true after all.

Whether we are living inside our human-made stories in our personal lives, or out there in mass consciousness which is fed by us, the media, and all of our friends and families, we are separated from the truth. We believe what we want to believe, and we have done it enough times that we believe that it is the truth. We spend our lives proving our stories to be true and because everyone else is doing it too, we have no reason to stop. The only time we stop is when we are tired of the drama, we are in search of the truth, or our story got so out of hand that we got called on it. So, the next time you find yourself convinced of something that does not bring you peace of mind/heart/soul and body, ask yourself if it is true. Is it true that you have to do whatever it is you are doing, is it true that the government is out to get you, is it true that your life is going to end if you leave your job, your family, your (fill in the blank), is it true that she/he hates you, etc. Is it really true?

Patience

This is part 5 of a five part series on tools for going through life transitions.

The last tool when going through a major life transition is patience. Often times, we just want to zoom through our changes and get to the end. The attitude of having to get to the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow can dissolve the power from the other tools like self-acceptance. You cannot be accepting of you and what is when you are in a rush to get to the end. A difficult transition requires lots of patience and gentleness. When you have altered your course in life, you are traveling on unknown roads. It may be scary or unfamiliar and patience helps you on your journey.

When you lose someone you’ve loved deeply, you may feel lost without them, buried in grief, patience is the only tool that can help you get through the darkest nights. Sometimes, we want to numb ourselves by keeping company, or doing stuff and when our friends are not available or we run out of things to do, we may find loneliness as a prison that we tried so hard to get away from. But loneliness is temporary and it will pass. In the middle of a transition, it could be your companion if you choose to look at it that way. Patience with yourself and this in-between phase is critical. It truly makes the time go by easier. You might find your creativity blossoming in those quiet and lonely moments, if you are accepting of it. If you fight it, get impatient and try to force things to happen, creativity will stay away until you are done playing your game. When you do get impatient, remember you changed your life, or something has changed, by definition, the old ways/rules do not apply anymore. Change is just what it means, different. Different is what we say we want, but we are not prepared to deal with the unfamiliarity that comes with it. Our brain cannot come up with new solutions, it only knows what it has known from the past. I have written about trust in past posts (September 08 and July 09), and this is where self-trust becomes crucial. Along with self-trust will come new solutions from new places foreign to your head.

Creativity is a gift that is waiting for you to stop doing, stop rushing into the future, stop numbing yourself and denying what is. Creativity is waiting for you to get silent, truly silent. Creativity will creep up on you when you are present. You’ll find yourself creating in a way that you may have had a long time ago, perhaps even back when you were a child. You will find yourself filled with a peaceful sense of being and from that place even making a simple meal for yourself will be a joyful event. You may decide to rearrange your furniture, or buy new drapes, or paint your bedroom a different color. You may decide to take dance lessons or go on that long awaited adventurous trip you never took, or simply clean out the attic. Whatever it is you do, is coming not from compulsion or duty, but from joy. You will be filled with an inner sense of joy and peace that is inexplicable. Nothing in your outer world has changed and if you think about it, your joy seems senseless, yet more real than any feeling you may have ever felt. When you practice patience in your journey, especially through the difficult times, you will be gifted with these precious moments consistently. So, step back and see the big picture, observe yourself in it, accept what is, honor everyone you’ve ever encountered, and be patient. These five tools are the essential tools in living a big life. If you fall off the wagon, and notice that you have not been using one of the tools, then go back and pick it up. It takes lots of practice! I wish you unspeakable peace and joy on your journey…

Honor

This is part 4 of a series on tools for going through major life transitions.

Tool #4 in going through life transitions is the ability and practice of honoring everyone, especially those who may have hurt us. Honor is similar to self-acceptance and self-respect but it is done for the other. It is also something that you can practice doing regularly throughout the day. It takes away the need for righteousness or the need to be right. In fact, it is almost like pouring cold water on that live wire that is sizzling with self-righteousness. It fine tunes and focuses the image you see in your big picture. When you can honor people who drive you crazy or even characters in the news who are portrayed as truly evil, you are able to see more clearly and into farther distances. You can disentangle from the pangs of judgment that you may have experienced when you first encountered someone who did something you consider wrong. It feels like when the Novocain sets in and you begin to feel nothing. It allows you to expand your consciousness so you can feel grander than your human story.

Honor is about accepting others for where they are at, no matter what. You don’t have to condone or agree with their actions or words, but you can still honor them for their experience and the role they play in your journey. I personally have learned more from the difficult people in my life than from those I’ve had agreeable relationships with. It is as if the tension in the relationship is a lesson ready to be unwrapped. So often we get stuck in our own opinions, our way of being brought up and our view of the world that we need to be shaken up a bit. The horror in the news provides that shake up, the opening of the eyes, the soul, and the heart to understanding a bigger world. Once we allow the other to be as they are (by the simple practice of honoring), we have stretched our reality and this makes everything easier. We are now free to expand and move into a new place and a new experience.

Tool #4 or honor can also make self-love or self-acceptance easier. If you are having difficulty with self-acceptance, then honoring others will loosen things up and you will find that now you can use tool #3 more easily. Also, if you are wondering how to use honor, it is very simple. Just practice saying it out loud or in your own head when someone makes you mad. Start with the easy ones, not some serial killer in the news or an abusive parent. Start with the rude person you encountered at the grocery store. If it feels fake, keep on saying it until it does not. Then you can use it with people who have hurt you in a deeper way. Try it at least for a week consistently and decide for yourself if you sense a change or a shift.

Stay tuned for tool #5 in next week’s post!

Self-Acceptance

This is part 3 of a series on tools for going through major life transitions.

Now that you are in the midst of a huge transition, you’ve realized that you need to see the big picture and learned to observe yourself, what’s next? The answer is self-acceptance. A result of self-observation might be regrets, realization of having made a few mistakes, noticing repeated patterns or choices, etc. This is why the next tool is self-acceptance which includes: self-forgiveness and self-love. Yes, you may have made a few mistakes, but you cannot change the past, only your experience of the present moment. If we are judgmental of our self, then we are not accepting our self and cannot move forward. Guilt and shame are shackles that bind us to our past and will ensure that we don’t move forward and create joyful experiences throughout our transition. This may sound simple, but imagine a woman who has left a dysfunctional marriage with no job and has to provide for her children who blame her for the dissolution of their family. In order for her to experience success and joy, she has to accept her decision as hard as it may have been and allow her children to go through their own experiences without any guilt. As a mother, this is not an easy task. Self-acceptance comes when one takes responsibility for one’s own life and only that. Yes, she is a mother, but she is not responsible for her children’s feelings or opinions. Her acceptance of her own decisions and self-responsibility is the greatest teaching to her children who only learn by example.

This tool is a very powerful tool that is not easy to use. It takes lots of practice and it will undo many beliefs that no longer serve you. It will uncover the past and stuff that have lingered on for too long. It will give you the opportunity to choose what you really want and move forward in your journey, but only if you are ready and willing to boldly accept you and all that you are and all that you have done. This is where self-love comes in handy. Once again, the topic sounds benign, but we are mostly amateurs at it. We have been trained to love others, but not our self. We only venture to love our self, if someone else deems it deserving. If our loved ones say that we are a great mother, friend, brother, employee, etc. then we might consider our self deserving of love, but here too, only deserving of their love. Unconditional self-love is the result of true self-acceptance and very necessary to move through challenging transitions. However, if you cannot love yourself unconditionally, how can you truly love another unconditionally? If you cannot forgive yourself for mistakes, how can you forgive someone else? And if you cannot accept you, in the shape you are in right now (whatever weight you may have, whoever you may have hurt, whatever job you may have, however messy your home may be, etc.), you are not in the present moment. If you are experiencing regrets about the past or fantasizing about the future, you cannot move through change simply because you are not here to experience it. It is a denial of what is. This denial will only prolong the inevitable and that’s the reason why transitions seem so difficult.

In summary, if you are going through earth shattering change, you may want to take a look at the big picture, observe you in it, and then jump right in and love and honor yourself and the journey you’re on. Self-acceptance is an essential tool when going through transitions. For tool #4, stay tuned until next week’s post.

Observation

The next essential tool or tool #2 for going through life transitions is the ability and practice of observing yourself. This goes hand in hand with the first tool, seeing the big picture. Once you are aware of the big picture, you can then observe yourself even when you are participating in life. In fact, it is crucial to do it as you go through your day. What you may not have been able to decipher, you can now recognize easily. Separation from your ego and your personality allows you to see it more clearly. You will be able to see your fears, reactions, compulsions, judgments, expectations, beliefs, etc. This in turn allows you to work through them. Take fear for example, once you realize which fear gets in the way of moving forward, you can go deeper into it and figure out what it is made of, how it shows up in different scenarios, how you have coped with it (or not) in the past, etc. And last, but not least, what might the fear be teaching you? These are all questions you can work with your coach to help you move through the fear and make some life empowering choices.

Observations can also reveal our judgments and beliefs. No matter who we think we are, we can’t help but to judge ourselves, others, circumstances, etc. Perhaps the word judge is not accurate, because it is more like evaluations. We are always evaluating things, comparing them, mostly done in order to understand. But once our ego gets activated, the evaluation becomes more like a ranking system that we use to judge. And unfortunately, the judgments only imprison the judge, not the object of the judgment. Once you cast an opinion on something, you hold that thing within the constraints of that opinion. Any other event or object that is similar to that first event or object, will follow the same fate, and so on, and so on. No one can feel free when they’ve slammed the judgment doors shut. Every time we think, “I should have”, “I could have”, etc., it is a judgment on what is. Observation, allows you the space to catch yourself casting judgment. The moment you become the observer in your own story, you have given yourself the power to choose. Once you know that what you were thinking was a judgment, you can choose to think and eventually believe something else. This is also the first step in changing belief systems.

Observations also reveal expectations. We want things to turn out a certain way. Expectations like judgments imprison the person who is doing the expecting. When you expect, you are saying “no” to what is not within the domain of your expectation. In other words, you are closing the door on all other possibilities. It is a self-limiting practice that we have learned to do early on in life. We have been trained to respond a certain way from the moment our parents and teachers taught us how to speak or behave, and since then we’ve been practicing this way of being. You do something and then you expect something for it. This all works well until you don’t get the reward you were expecting for your behavior. And even as adults we then behave like children having a tantrum when it all comes crumbling down. Observations allow you to see what it is that you are expecting and the space to choose to dismantle this learned behavior. Eventually, you will get to a place where you will only do that which brings you joy. The action is driven by the intent to experience joy, not to get some reward. As simple as it sounds, you’ll be astounded at how often you do things because you are expected to do them. And this type of re-wiring of your SELF is not easy! Observing yourself helps you zoom out of your story and see the big picture. These two tools go hand in hand when going through transitions or even just when you want to have a bigger and more fulfilling life experience. They allow you to choose how to be in every moment of every day instead of reacting to what you think is happening.

If you are going through a major transition and are still interested, stay tuned for tool #3 in next week’s post.

See The Big Picture

She was in her 50s, recently divorced, moved to a new town, and working at a new job wondering about the purpose of her life. She talked for a long time and then paused, looked at me and asked, “is it too late to try to figure out what I am supposed to be doing?” She was yet another person going through major life transition(s) and stuck in those lonely moments wondering what it is all about. I realized that people whose lives are not intersecting with those transitions, just keep on going mostly not driven or even curious about the “whys” of life. I don’t think that some of us are deeper or more serious, I just think that some of us hit the bumps real hard, fall, and then in our recuperation phase, we have the opportunity to ask those deeper questions. It is as if transitions provide the opportunity to be curious about life. When everything is going as planned, when nothing goes wrong, no one questions anything. We are too busy involved in our stories, enjoying the regular routines and non-events. Months turn into years and we may look back perhaps well into our later years and wonder where it all went. Then perhaps an illness, retirement, etc. will get us quiet enough to listen, but that too might quickly be disrupted with the loud noises of the lives of our younger loved ones and we quickly put aside our foolish sentimentality and rush to join them where they’re at, and so it goes, another life spent lost in the mundane stories that run into each other.

Most of us are enamored with the Hollywood type of happy endings. If our life is not predictable and does not fit into the patterns that are accepted by mass consciousness, we panic, we judge and we do all that we can to forcefully squeeze into a life that fits everyone else’s expectations. Then, when we are still not happy, we start blaming everyone else and the cycle continues until the next bump or transition. Transitions get a bad rap, because they are usually seen as something outside of our control. They are perceived as something that happened to us, and in our attempt to understand, we start labeling and judging and make the event the bad thing and us the victim of the bad thing. This is when we start to neurotically recreate a more predictable and acceptable life if we can. If the transition is extremely difficult (e.g., a divorce or death) then we seek outside help and support. Soon after the pain numbs down, we go about the re-building of a new house following old instructions for an old house, until this new/old house comes crumbling down with the next transition.

She was ending our conversation by admitting that she felt lonely at times and it would be nice if she had someone in her life. She was giving up on the whole life purpose thing and looking dreamily into the horizon imagining the new guy she’d build a new life with. Transitions are opportunities for real change, and even though, we claim we want change, our tendency is to re-create an old story. After all, old stories are familiar and we know how to play the same role even if the other characters are being played out by new actors. Since most people like to have a multi-step guide to whatever it is they are looking for, I have come up with my own guide that I hope you find useful. I’ll go into step one or tool one in this post.

The first tool that helps when making big changes is the ability and practice of seeing the big picture. In my sessions, I invite the client to join me on the outside of their story and take a peek in. It is so much easier and lighter to look at even the most difficult transitions from that perspective. It is also easier to make decisions. The key is to be able to masterfully zoom in and zoom out of your story. This also gives a better understanding and appreciation for what is going on. The tricky part however is that when we zoom in, we get stuck. So, I like to work with clients on how to get them unstuck when they dive in deep into their creations. Transitions are the pauses that we have created to provide us with the opportunity to go deeper, to understand ourselves, our choices, and then be able to consciously make changes that empower us towards living a more fulfilling and deliberate life. So the next time something supposedly goes terribly wrong, take a deep breath and zoom out so you are able to see the whole picture and then decide what if anything needs to be done. You will feel more empowered, liberated and purposeful.

Stay tuned in for the second tool for living masterfully through change in next week’s post.