Desiree Briel Rodi Consulting & Coaching
Business and People Strategy Unite
How do you tell your story? Do you like your narrator or do you wish your story read differently? What is keeping you from rewriting your story in order to write a different present and future?
Read More "The Marathon – Three Thoughts for Thursday – May 2023"
Spring is in the air! Can you feel it? Is hope emerging for you with the coming of spring?
Today marks the 5th anniversary of my stroke and I am celebrating with a training run and pie with my kids. In April, I will again run the Boston Marathon as another celebration of my journey. I am celebrating for many reasons. I am celebrating most obviously, that I am still here. I am also celebrating that I am not just here, not just surviving, but I am thriving. I am celebrating because I am genuinely grateful for February 28, 2018 – a day that changed my life in so many great ways. I am celebrating because I am so thankful for the opportunity to have experienced at 37, what many others may experience, but not until their 70s or 80s. I was given this gift to not look back with regret but to look forward with intention, purpose, and renewed focus.
Five years ago, on this day, I came home from a swim to get my older son to preschool. I was moving books from a shelf in his room when my left arm inexplicably dropped the books, and a tingle shot up and down the left side of my body. My arm went offline. I took some migraine medication convinced this was just an odd symptom as I had had complicated migraines before, and I went about my day, taking my oldest son to school, taking my younger son to childcare, and going to a parenting class. I clearly remember mentally questioning at the parenting class, if people could tell I couldn’t feel the left side of my face or that my tongue felt funny when I spoke, but I carried on.
By lunchtime, the numbness persisted. I called a doctor I’d been meaning to call to establish care since we’d moved to LA and was told they would not see me. Instead, they directed me to the ER. So, I directed my car to UCLA Westwood with, I will admit, a little frustration with this inconvenient situation. I remember my husband and our two-year-old meeting me there and being greeted by a whole team of physicians who soon informed me I’d had a stroke. I remember the first words out of my mouth were, “Can I still run the Boston Marathon?” The doctor responded, “There will be other marathons” to which I explained that I’d run 10 marathons to finally qualify, and I really wanted to run this race. I remember thinking, I don’t need my left arm to run. People thought I was crazy, including these doctors, and as I reflect, I’ll admit, I sounded pretty crazy. Six weeks later, I ran the Boston Marathon in some of the worst weather in the history of the Boston Marathon. I crossed that finish line with the odds stacked against me. I didn’t run another marathon until last June when I decided qualifying for Boston and running the infamous marathon would be a really great way to celebrate the post-stroke years.
I remember all the “shoulds” that flooded in with good intentions. I remember choosing to sit in the discomfort and pause, to not be too quick to take action, but to allow myself to question, research, feel the fear and anger and frustration and grief. A few months later, I had an “ah-ha” moment. I call the first of these epiphanies, a “God moment” as it was sincerely life-changing, from the inside out, and felt as if it has been a thought simply delivered, not conceived. One morning, as I stood in our home office, the sun gently coming through, I felt warmth and light from within and there was a sudden knowing and confidence that came over me. I’ve learned to be more comfortable with these moments that garner looks of judgment from others, that garner those looks that say, “you’re nuts!” I realized in that moment, I didn’t find it crazy that I’d run the Boston Marathon after a stroke because I’d been training my whole life to overcome. I’d had so many opportunities to overcome that it had become second nature. I was determined and resilient and strong and courageous because of these experiences, and this stroke was no different. I realized the time had come to stop hiding these experiences that made me different – brain surgeries, lots of moves, financial struggles, growing up in a Hispanic family, so much self-doubt and lack of belonging – it was time to celebrate them. These were the experiences I’d been taught to hide in order to “fit in” but by hiding them, I’d been denying my very existence. I had been denying my voice, my value, my worth, and my strength, courage, determination, grit, and resilience; I had been denying my superpowers. The time had come to own my power, to use my voice, to be fully and unapologetically me. Over the coming months, I also found a deep desire to support others on their journeys of authenticity, to find and own their superpowers, too. There were more learnings and epiphanies that came that year that have encouraged me to live boldly, fearlessly and more authentically. My life now has direction and my struggles and triumphs have a purpose.
Since my stroke, I have learned to live bigger, to begin to stop listening to the “shoulds” or at least to question them, to speak up, to stop banging on doors that don’t want to open, to follow the path unfolding before me, to allow things to be easier, and to be more intentional and less reactionary. I officially launched my own business and had the third child I dreamed of having. I started a PhD program to look at what is impacting elementary school teachers tasked with implementing social and emotional learning programs after realizing my own vision for the way emotional intelligence might increase our capacity for being human, and therefore increase our capacity for other humans such that we might realize our full potential and become the unique puzzle piece in this world that we are meant to be. I started coaching, facilitating EQ workshops, and writing. I have also been working as an adjunct faculty member at Seattle University. As a child, I wanted to teach. I have reacquainted myself with my inner child and the wisdom she holds. I am manifesting these dreams, one day at a time.
I am learning to invest more in the people who see me and love me for who I am and who I am becoming. I am taking more risks, allowing myself to be seen, to be vulnerable and authentic. I am learning to dare more greatly, to cultivate an ability to listen to my inner voice and to follow the direction and guidance this voice provides. I am committed to my own well-being, growth, passions and to being an example to forge a unique path rather than trying to follow and live up to others. I am no longer chasing – chasing opportunities not meant for me, chasing relationships and love not freely given, chasing people who don’t or won’t see me, chasing a sense of worth and value determined by others.
I am taking time to observe and appreciate the little things too often taken for granted. I am making the space for the things I’ve learned seem small but have a big impact, like volunteering to read in the classroom of my son, reading with my kids and taking them to the library, teaching them to ski, playing Magna-tiles on the floor with my daughter, snuggling under the blankets to watch a movie with my three littles, and giving and receiving more hugs. I am reminding myself as needed, that life is best lived in the moments, and restful moments are just as important as productive moments.
I am learning to see my own value and worth. I am fully committed to creating my own authentic journey, to exploring the meaning I make from life and how this meaning-making influences my choices. I am learning to be freer and kinder to myself, to stop and admire the beauty that surrounds me, and I am finding peace, deeper satisfaction, purpose, and joy. So, on this 5th anniversary of my stroke, I hope you will join me in a toast to living a life that is true and full, never taking for granted tomorrow, and never letting yesterday’s regret keep you from living life today!
As Henry David Thoreau said, “Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you’ve imagined!”
What lights you up?
I participate in a Brain by Design Masterclass conversation each week and it is one of the highlights of my week! My heart feels full after participating in one of these weekly conversations. I love the space we co-create, the new knowledge and information shared and exchanged, as well as the questions that arise to challenge and expand my thinking. I also appreciate the support and connection with this learning community. We recently discussed the book, Atlas of the Heart by Brené Brown, one of my very favorite researchers and authors, and a book I featured here last February. We kicked off one of our sessions with the seemingly simple question “What lights you up?” and took an opportunity in pairs to just listen to each other verbally ponder, brainstorm, and pay tribute to the things that light us up.
As we did this exercise, something I noticed afterward, was that I physically felt what it feels like to be lit up as I thought about the things I do and experience that bring me joy. To name just a few, running, reading, spending time with friends, engaging in deep conversations, teaching, skiing with my kids, baking, watching my kids play, and getting to write and do the work I love as a coach all fill me up and give me energy. I felt warm and joyful and full of light just acknowledging each of the activities, experiences, or aspects of life that make me feel full, happy, grateful, and satisfied. I often think about our unique purposes and ponder the idea of the things that bring each of us joy as holding important information about who we are at the core and what our purpose is in life. Or I consider if what we are good at and our passions differ, considering at least, how filling our joy and energy buckets can help us pursue our purpose and path if they aren’t one and the same.
During this month of love, I encourage you to reflect upon your passions and ponder the things, activities, and people you love and what you love about them. What lights you up? What activities do you do that bring you joy? What experiences do you seek and commit to that fill your cup? What does this tell you about yourself? Are you lacking in aspects of life that make you feel joyful? Do you do enough of the things that give you energy and light? Do you proactively make time for these activities, to notice and appreciate the joy something or someone gives you? What if you did more? Do you see the benefits of doing things, seeing people, and noticing that which makes you feel happy and alive? What if joy gives us direction? How might you begin to pay attention to the things that bring you joy and the information these observations hold?
Photo by Aswin Raj on Unsplash
“One ought, every day at least, to hear a little song, read a good poem, see a fine picture, and, if it were possible, to speak a few reasonable words.”
~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe ~
“I urge you to please notice when you are happy, and exclaim or murmur or think at some point, ‘If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.’”
~ Kurt Vonnegut ~
“If your compassion does not include yourself, it is incomplete.”
~ Jack Kornfield ~
Photo by Rohan Makhecha on Unsplash
How to Expand Time & Increase Happiness with Cassie Holmes
Hosted by Jonathan Fields
What does it mean to be time-poor?
We’ve all heard the old phrase, “time is money,” usually in the context of work and productivity. But, time isn’t just about money, it’s about happiness, health, and life. How we use it and feel like we have enough of it, is everything. Time is precious and, it is also our one nonrenewable resource. When a dollar is spent, you can earn another. When a day is gone, it’s gone for life.
So, how can we move forward, making sure that we live more intentionally and spend our time wisely so we won’t have regrets in the end? My guest today, Cassie Holmes, has done incredible research on making the most of the world’s most precious resource, time, and I’m excited to tackle these big questions and ideas in this important and timely conversation with her today.
Her new book, Happier Hour: How to Beat Distraction, Expand Your Time, and Focus on What Matters Most, gives readers the blueprint to reframing their time and overcoming time poverty. And in our chat today, you’ll hear us dive deeper into this notion of having too much to do and too little time, how to distinguish between what matters and what doesn’t when it comes to our time, and what to consider and do if you want to lead a more intentional, happier life — which I’m sure that’s all of us.
You can find Cassie at: Website | LinkedIn
If you LOVED this episode: you’ll also love the conversations we had with Tim Ferriss about being present and intentional in life.
Photo by Josh Boot on Unsplash
By Matt Haig
I’ve been trying to make it a habit to not just read for work and research, but to also read for pleasure. I deeply enjoyed reading this book! The premise connected for me to the work I do as a coach, to my fascination with the midlife and the opportunity to craft the next chapter with intention, and to my belief that we are the authors and creators of our stories. The story also related for me, to the idea that the options are many, and until we try them we don’t really know the reality of the dream, but instead, we often torture ourselves with an idealized vision we’re too afraid to try. This book also made me think about both The Artist’s Way and Designing Your Life, and the challenges they both present in different ways, to prototype, dream bigger and do the work to uncover your purpose and give your dreams a chance to live – life is only as great as the life you dare to live.
What Amazon has to say:
The #1 New York Times bestselling WORLDWIDE phenomenon
Winner of the Goodreads Choice Award for Fiction | A Good Morning America Book Club Pick | Independent (London) Ten Best Books of the Year
“A feel-good book guaranteed to lift your spirits.”—The Washington Post
The dazzling reader-favorite about the choices that go into a life well lived, from the acclaimed author of How To Stop Time and The Comfort Book.
Somewhere out beyond the edge of the universe there is a library that contains an infinite number of books, each one the story of another reality. One tells the story of your life as it is, along with another book for the other life you could have lived if you had made a different choice at any point in your life. While we all wonder how our lives might have been, what if you had the chance to go to the library and see for yourself? Would any of these other lives truly be better?
In The Midnight Library, Matt Haig’s enchanting blockbuster novel, Nora Seed finds herself faced with this decision. Faced with the possibility of changing her life for a new one, following a different career, undoing old breakups, realizing her dreams of becoming a glaciologist; she must search within herself as she travels through the Midnight Library to decide what is truly fulfilling in life, and what makes it worth living in the first place.
Photo by Karine Germain on Unsplash
You can sign up to receive my Three Thoughts for Thursday post as an email on the third Thursday of every month by clicking here. If you’ve missed any of my Three Thoughts, you can find them all on my blog. If you enjoyed this post, take a look at January’s Three Thoughts.
If you are interested or know someone who may be interested, I also offer leadership and emotional intelligence coaching and workshops. You can find more information on my website, or you can use this link to set up a free 30-minute introduction to coaching session.
In September 2022, I completed a year-long, quarterly series entitled “EQ and WooWoo” with my colleague and Spiritual Coach, Katie Kay. If you are intrigued and would like to learn more about this year’s series, Yoga, EQ & WooWoo, please email me or click here to see what we have planned with Hola House.
This workshop series was designed to help you manifest action toward the year you want to live, the person you want to be, and the goals you want to achieve. These quarterly sessions intertwine the use of Yoga, Tarot (and other WooWoo tools) and Emotional Intelligence to help you and your clients step outside the box in order to take your coaching and personal work deeper.
Also in September, I hosted my first local, in-person event here in the Seattle area, Savor the Sweetness. It was a fulfilling experience and event, and I look forward to hosting quarterly events for local women in 2023 – stay tuned and contact me for more information or to join the invite list!
I have the privilege of hosting the Emotional Intelligence Special Interest Group for ICFLA. Please join me for another year of EI learning and growth as a part of these sessions. You do not need to be a coach or a member of ICFLA to attend.
If you are interested in joining and co-creating these learning communities, please use the links above to find out more about ICFLA’s Emotional Intelligence Special Interest Group and the EQ & WooWoo Workshops. I hope you will come along for the journey!
I’m always looking for new inspiration, new books to read, and new podcasts to listen to, so please send your suggestions my way or comment on this post to offer some new recommendations!
As always, thank you for your continued support and readership! Stay strong, stay brave, stay true to you!
Wishing you a season of joy, passion, love, and paying more attention to the things that light you up!
Expanding and Aligning with Possibilities and Opportunities
As I write this, it is Tuesday, and I am in the moment, practicing letting go…I just drafted my thoughts for January on surrendering expectations and expanding possibilities and opportunities, only to fail to save the draft and to be forced to begin again. Ironic?! Ouch! Accepting the disappointment, frustration, and breathing deeply as I begin again…
January typically feels like the doldrums to me; a great letdown after months of holidays and excitement. After several years of working on accepting January and on reframing in order to more fully embrace the month, I have noticed I feel pretty neutral and open to the month of January, open to the lessons that lie ahead, open to experiencing something different than feeling disappointed, let down, disoriented, by the hard shift to quiet.
I had planned to attend Fielding’s Winter Session for the Ph.D. program I am in, in person, in Santa Barbara for the first time in three years, and only the second time in my time as a Ph.D. student. I boarded a flight directly to Santa Barbara, planning to make the conference my only focus. When the time approached for the flight to take off, instead, we were deplaned, and the flight was canceled as the Santa Barbara airport closed due to flooding. I quickly made plan B and made the necessary arrangements to change my flight to land in LA later that evening. I was planning to meet my good friend from college in SB for an evening to catch up. Instead, she offered to pick me up in LA, and we’d drive up the coast together. We made it to Camarillo before the roads closed. Thankfully we found hotel rooms, ran to Trader Joe’s nearby, and spent the evening together. We’d still achieve the goal of conversation and time spent together.
The next day, the roads were still closed, so I made the tough decision to cancel the rest of my planned trip to Santa Barbara. Alaska Airlines was willing to fly me back from LA, and a good friend in LA was ready and willing to host me. We even got to go to dinner at a favorite restaurant. Originally, I was to fly back on the 12th, but then the airline decided to send me home on the 11th. Truth be told, having wrapped my mind around leaving on the 12th, I was disappointed again. Another situation in which to practice acceptance – acceptance of the circumstances and of the disappointment.
I arrived home, and we headed out on our annual trip to Suncadia for my husband’s birthday weekend. We had a great time playing in the snow, tubing, sledding, snowshoeing, ice skating, swimming, and of course, going down the water slides! On our final day, we headed to the pool before driving home. My first trip down the slide entailed falling up the stairs and scraping up both shins and a knee. I had the full “kid experience” of joy, disappointment, frustration, pain, and a choice to make – let an injury ruin my time or regroup and dive back into the fun. I took a moment and felt grateful my kids could witness this experience of mom being in their shoes, of mom getting hurt and having to make a decision about what to do next. I took care of my wounds and returned to the slide to end our weekend with 25 trips down the slide in the books. I was also grateful to have the example of my kids, who are resilient and so quick to recover; they inspired me to jump back into the fun, too. I was again reminded of the importance of feeling all the emotions, accepting what is, and choosing how to go forward in each of these experiences. I am sitting with gratitude for this January reminder that it doesn’t take the start of a new year to make a change, to choose a different path, or to show up differently. Each season, each month, each week, each new day, and each breath we take presents an opportunity to start again.
So, this January, this week, this day, this moment, this breath, what needs acceptance? What needs to change? What needs to be let go of? How will you move forward? Who will you become? How will you show up for yourself and others in a new way that will support your growth and honor theirs? What will you bring forth? As you inhale, pause, and exhale, how might you begin to see all the opportunities and possibilities for change? As the sun rises again, what does this new day offer and what will you do with the offer?
Bill Perkins is one of the world’s most successful hedge fund managers and entrepreneurs, and the author of the bestseller, Die With Zero. In this episode, Bill unpacks the Die With Zero philosophy which challenges conventional thinking related to the balance between health, wealth, and time—the three variables important for fulfillment. Bill makes the case that we should strive for maximum net fulfillment rather than net worth (or even health). He argues that we need to optimize our life to have memorable experiences before it’s too late and that most people are over-saving and under-living. Bill also explains how one can apply the principles in Die With Zero to break out of “autopilot” and optimize their life to achieve maximum net fulfillment.
Don’t be surprised if Bill’s book, Die With Zero comes up again in a future post…
This book has been sitting with me and impacting me already with the ideas of aligning with what is and the direction of what is unfolding before me in order to increase resilience and joy in life. I have been inspired by the ideas of how I might accept, cultivate and make the most of what has been given to me rather than spending so much energy longing and striving for something else, perhaps something not meant for me at all. I’m curious about what might come from pausing, being present, aligning, and investing in cultivating all that I’ve already been generously provided; my new endeavor is acceptance, expansion, and peace.
In a world of great noise, disruption, and dysfunction, it’s hard to be heard or know how to make a difference. But master the principal underlying change, and you can live your most significant, joyful, and resilient life. That principle is resonance, and Resonate is your guide. In these pages, you’ll discover
You’ve likely heard of “being on the same wavelength.” But prepare to be surprised by how pervasive resonance is, and how powerfully you can affect it. Resonance connects the inner and outer worlds, linking subjective experience and objective impact. It cannot be faked or fooled; resonance is a physical fact. But how we resonate is a choice, a condition we can cultivate. Combining the physics of energy transfer in the human body with physical practices adopted from Zen training, Resonate uniquely integrates how we can develop ourselves to change our world. Let Resonate show the Way.
You can sign up to receive my Three Thoughts for Thursday post as an email on the third Thursday of every month by clicking here. If you’ve missed any of my Three Thoughts, you can find them all on my blog.
If you are interested or know someone who may be interested, I also offer leadership and emotional intelligence coaching and workshops. You can find more information on my website, or you can use this link to set up a free 30-minute introduction to coaching session.
In September 2022, I completed a year-long, quarterly series entitled “EQ and WooWoo” with my colleague and Spiritual Coach, Katie Kay. If you are intrigued and would like to learn more about this year’s series, Yoga, EQ & WooWoo, please email me or click here to see what we have planned with Hola House. This workshop series was designed to help you manifest action toward the year you want to live, the person you want to be, and the goals you want to achieve. These quarterly sessions intertwine the use of Yoga, Tarot (and other WooWoo tools), and Emotional Intelligence to help you and your clients step outside the box in order to take your coaching and personal work deeper.
Also, in September, I hosted my first local, in-person event here in the Seattle area, Savor the Sweetness. It was a fulfilling experience and event, and I look forward to hosting quarterly events for local women in 2023 – stay tuned and contact me for more information or to join the invite list!
I have the privilege of hosting the Emotional Intelligence Special Interest Group for ICFLA. Please stay tuned for another year of EI learning and growth as a part of these sessions. You do not need to be a coach or a member of ICFLA to attend.
If you are interested in joining and co-creating these learning communities, please use the links above to find out more about ICFLA’s Emotional Intelligence Special Interest Group and the EQ & WooWoo Workshops. I hope you will come along for the journey!
I’m always looking for new inspiration, new books to read, and new podcasts to listen to, so please send your suggestions my way or comment on this post to offer some new recommendations!
As always, thank you for your continued support and readership! Stay strong, stay brave, stay true to you!
Wishing you a season of expansion, opportunity, possibility, and the courage to embrace and align!
I dedicate this post to the strong women who inspired me, challenged me, and shaped me, and took their journey beyond this earth in 2022 – my grandmother Gwen, my great aunt, Ada, my Tia Margie, and my great Aunt Mary. You each left a legacy of strength, determination, faith, independence and inspiration, and your impact with continue in those you loved and left behind.
~
I thought I’d try something a little different this December. As happens for me at the end of the year, I am deep in my efforts to make this holiday season special, I am reveling in the lights and candles and winter fires, and I’m also trying to find time and space in the chaos to be still, to reflect, and to savor the moments.
Some of the themes coming up as I look back on the year are intentionality, living fully and authentically, looking ahead and not getting tripped up by short-sightedness, the importance of curiosity, juxtaposition, forgiveness, and surrender. I am looking back, considering the fears and obstacles I’ve overcome, what I have accomplished and achieved, how I have felt, what and who have challenged me, what I need to let go of, what I might like to keep and repeat, and honoring the year that has been before looking to the year ahead. I am pausing for a moment and basking in these final days and moments of 2022, in the joys and sorrows, the ups and downs, peace and chaos; I am reveling in the beauty in this year of a wonderfully messy life.
In that vein, I thought rather than adding to the year’s list of quotes and books, and podcasts, I’d look back and offer up some of my favorites. So, here you will find my favorite quotes this holiday season, along with a few new podcasts resonating with my reflective state and encapsulating some of these aforementioned themes. I’ve also provided a list of the books I’ve featured in 2022 in case you are wanting a good book to read over the winter break or need a gift idea.
As the year winds down for you, I hope you are also taking time for yourself, and that you might also take a moment to pause and reflect. What is your proudest moment or accomplishment this year? When was your lowest day, and when was your highest? What tripped you up and challenged you? What did you learn? How did you grow? Who made the greatest impact on you this year? How do you feel about the impact you had? What would you like to take forward with you? What might you need to let go of to create something new next year? How might you both surrender and move forward with intention? What brought you peace in the chaos? Who and what are you most grateful for as you reflect back on 2022?
“Often people attempt to live their lives backwards: they try to have more things, or more money, in order to do more of what they want so that they will be happier. The way it actually works is the reverse. You must first be who you really are, then, do what you need to do, in order to have what you want.”
~ Margaret Young ~
“Sometimes when things are falling apart, they may actually be falling into place.”
~ Unknown ~
“Patience does not mean to passively endure. It means to be farsighted enough to trust the end result of a process.”
~ Elif Shafak ~
“We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.”
~ Albert Einstein ~
“The cave you fear to enter holds the treasure you seek”
~ Joseph Campbell ~
Perhaps the butterfly is proof that you can go through a great deal of darkness and still become something beautiful.
~ Beau Taplin ~
“…this is too extraordinary. This is too wonderful. I must tell Botticelli that he was wrong. Suffering is not the answer. Light is the answer.” ~ Roscuro in The Tale of Despereaux by Kate DiCamillo, Ch. 19
If you surrender to the wind, then you can ride it.
~Toni Morrison ~
#292, How to Enjoy the Last Two Weeks of the Year
The Lazy Genius
This episode addresses expectations, one of my favorite topics that goes along with one of my favorite quotes from Richard Rohr, “Suffering comes from unmet expectations.” What expectations do you have that might threaten to cause you to suffer this holiday season and how might you let them go?
#533, A Self-Interested Case for Forgiveness, Jack Kornfield
Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris
Forgiveness is key to reclaiming energy, making new ways, forging new relationships, and creating space for opportunity and possibility. Who and what might need forgiveness as you close out the year?
Super Soul Special: Oprah Winfrey – FORGIVENESS
Oprah’s Super Soul
This podcast brings together so much wisdom from so many on the topic of forgiveness. Searching for peace and purpose is often a journey of forgiveness and release. Oprah prefaces the podcast with the other side of forgiveness is freedom!” She goes on to highlight this powerful insight from Dr. Gerald G. Jampolsky. “Forgiveness is giving up the hope that the past could be any different.” Forgiveness is about unburdening yourself from the weight of resentment you might be carrying around.
Take a moment to listen to some inspiring stories, perceptions and observations, and astute learnings from those who have traveled profound journeys to forgiveness and have found freedom on the other side.
January – Search Inside Yourself
By Chade-Meng Tan
February – Atlas of the Heart
By Brene Brown
March – David Whyte is a poet, author, speaker, philosopher.
April – The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse
By Charlie Mackesy
May – Running with Purpose: How Brooks Outpaced Goliath Competitors to Lead the Pack
By Jim Weber, CEO of Brooks
June – Take Your Shoes Off First
By Julia Freeland
July – Courageous Clarity
By Phyllis Sarkaria
August – Limitless: How to Ignore Everybody, Carve Your Own Path, and Live Your Best Life
By Laura Gassner Otting
September –Bittersweet
By Susan Cain
October – The Four Pivots: Reimagining Justice, Reimagining Ourselves
By Shawn A. Ginwright
November – The Surrender Experiment: my journey into life’s perfection
by Michael A. Singer
You can sign up to receive my Three Thoughts for Thursday post as an email on the third Thursday of every month by clicking here. If you’ve missed any of my Three Thoughts, you can find them all on my blog.
If you are interested or know someone who may be interested, I also offer leadership and emotional intelligence coaching and workshops. You can find more information on my website, or you can use this link to set up a free 30-minute introduction to coaching session.
In September, I hosted my first local, in-person event here in the Seattle area, Savor the Sweetness. It was a fulfilling experience and event, and I look forward to hosting quarterly events for local women in 2023 – stay tuned and contact me for more information or to join the invite list!
Please check out my latest blog post, The Problem of Intentions, Also check out my post, Be Careful, Recipes and Inspiration Yield Different Results! and my November Edition of Three Thoughts for Thursday, as well. In light of my continued themes on process and habits, you may also be interested in my series, Lessons of the Run – Endurance, Resilience, Rest, and Grit. And if you could stand to hear more about processes and patterns, stay tuned for an upcoming expanded post on Examining the Process – Behind the Drive.
I have the privilege of hosting the Emotional Intelligence Special Interest Group for ICFLA. Please stay tuned for another year of EI learning and growth as a part of these sessions. You do not need to be a coach or a member of ICFLA to attend.
In September, I completed a year-long, quarterly series entitled “EQ and WooWoo” with my colleague and Spiritual Coach, Katie Kay. If you are intrigued and would like to learn more about future events, please email me. This workshop series was designed to help you manifest action towards the year you want to live, the person you want to be, and the goals you want to achieve in 2022. These quarterly sessions intertwined the use of Tarot (and other Woowoo tools) and Emotional Intelligence to help you and your clients step outside the box in order to take your coaching and personal work deeper. New and related sessions will begin in 2023. Contact me for more information.
If you are interested in joining and co-creating these learning communities, please use the links above to find out more about ICFLA’s Emotional Intelligence Special Interest Group and the EQ & WooWoo Workshops. I hope you will come along for the journey!
I’m always looking for new inspiration, new books to read, and new podcasts to listen to, so please send your suggestions my way or comment on this post to offer some new recommendations!
As always, thank you for your continued support and readership! Stay strong, stay brave, stay true to you!
Wishing you a season of reflection, curiosity, clarity, and joy in the moments!
What are you grateful for in this season? What might you surrender? How does surrender increase your gratitude?
Read More "Gratitude and Surrender – Three Thoughts for Thursday – November 2022"
Fall is still my very favorite season, and I have noticed I especially love October! During this season, particularly the month of October, the colors seem especially vibrant and I am constantly in awe of the changes and transformations I observe in the trees around me. I also likely don’t need to mention again, my fascination with midlife, but I will because not only am I in it but so are many of my clients. In this season of life, I am also observing and celebrating transformations.
I find the learnings and lessons of midlife profound and connected to my observations of October. This month as I have been noticing the leaves changing color, the new hues and shades amidst the green, I have been thinking about the desires for purpose and authenticity that seem to come with midlife. I have also been considering the willingness to finally take off the mask and boldly step forth in truth. The midlife and post-midlife, to me, represent a call to bare oneself with unapologetic transparency, to willingly stand out rather than submit to a need to blend in or the “shoulds” of others, and to learn you belong because of your differences, not in spite of them.
As I observe the natural cycle of seasons, I think maybe it is just nature that leads so many to wait until later in life to show up fully, much as trees change in the 9th, 10th, or even 11th month of the year. I wonder what our world could be like if we embraced our true selves and diversity and reveled in the humanity that unites us earlier in our journey through this one precious life. Perhaps change is simply a part of humanity and the real lesson is to embrace growth and change as it comes in each stage but also to support truth and authenticity throughout the journey.
What could the world be like if we saw in color instead of so often in black and white? What if we could appreciate and embrace all the different hues rather than picking favorites or passing judgments? How might you show up more authentically and fully even through periods of transition and changes? How might you, in whatever position in life you find yourself, encourage others and create an environment that supports others to show up more transparently, honestly, and fully human? What is your dream for yourself when you think about how you’d like to show up? What keeps you from showing up this way? What gives you a sense of belonging? What is your dream for our world? If you don’t have one, why not? What is one thing you might choose to work on in yourself that may begin to pave the way for a more just world, one change, one transformation at a time?
“When the winds of change blow, some people build walls, and others build windmills.”
~ Chinese Proverb ~
Assumptions that Stop Us from Listening Well, with Oscar Trimboli
Coaching for Leaders, Episode #598, October 9, 2022
Oscar Trimboli is an author, host of the Apple award-winning podcast Deep Listening and a sought-after keynote speaker. He is passionate about using the gift of listening to bring positive change in homes, workplaces, and cultures around the world. Through his work with chairs, boards of directors, and executive teams, Oscar has experienced firsthand the transformational impact leaders and organizations can have when they listen beyond the words.
Oscar is a marketing and technology industry veteran with over 30 years of experience across general management, sales, marketing, and operations for Microsoft, PeopleSoft, Polycom, Professional Advantage, and Vodafone. He is the author of the book, Deep Listening and now, his newest book, How to Listen: Discover the Hidden Key to Better Communication*.
In this conversation, Oscar and I explore several of the assumptions that tend to get in our way of listening well. Oscar highlights distinctions that will be useful mindsets for you in showing up better in future conversations. Plus, we discuss how listing goes far beyond simply asking questions.
Download my interview notes in PDF format (free membership required).
I so enjoyed this podcast about how even small assumptions can keep us from experiencing true connection and understanding. I especially loved that he shared the experience of his son and his wife as they navigated the meaning of half of eight/8!
The Four Pivots: Reimaging Justice, Reimagining Ourselves
By Shawn A. Ginwright
I am LOVING this book! It is reminding me that I need to sit down and write my own visions for how Emotional Intelligence can help support a world of equality by allowing us to connect with our humanity, and expand our ability to be more human and our capacity for other humans. More on that to come!
What Amazon Has to Say:
“Reading this courageous book feels like the beginning of a social and personal awakening…I can’t stop thinking about it.”—Brené Brown, PhD, author of Atlas of the Heart
For readers of Emergent Strategy and Dare to Lead, an activist’s roadmap to long-term social justice impact through four simple shifts.
We need a fundamental shift in our values–a pivot in how we think, act, work, and connect. Despite what we’ve been told, the most critical mainspring of social change isn’t coalition building or problem analysis. It’s healing: deep, whole, and systemic, inside and out.
Here, Shawn Ginwright, PhD, breaks down the common myths of social movements–a set of deeply ingrained beliefs that actually hold us back from healing and achieving sustainable systemic change. He shows us why these frames don’t work, proposing instead four revolutionary pivots for better activism and collective leadership:
Awareness: from lens to mirror
Connection: from transactional to transformative relationships
Vision: from problem-fixing to possibility-creating
Presence: from hustle to flow
Supplemented with reflections, prompts, cutting-edge research, and the author’s own insights and lived experience as an African American social scientist, professor, and movement builder, The Four Pivots helps us uncover our obstruction points. It shows us how to discover new lenses and boldly assert our need for connection, transformation, trust, wholeness, and healing. It gives us permission to create a better future–to acknowledge that a broken system has been predefining our dreams and limiting what we allow ourselves to imagine, but that it doesn’t have to be that way at all. Are you ready to pivot?
Here are a few of my notes and key takeaways/questions from Pivot 1: Awareness, Lens to Mirror
Ginwright notes that eliminating problems doesn’t create victories. This was powerful for me as it put into perspective all the time and effort we as a society, and as humans, consultants, parents, managers, etc., put into solving surface problems. He went on to note that “inequality erodes our ability to see any other way – predefined our dreams, conditions us to focus on surface-level issues. He calls for deep, personal work, over instituting new solutions to these “surface problems” in order to create real and lasting change.
He further calls out the need to go deeper, to strive to see the myths and beliefs Ginwright notes “that we are living by that must be seen in order to change them.” How might you work to go beyond getting striving to be better at your job, looking towards the next promotion, and really support this deeper work that will serve you more fully and will also serve our society and world, one person at a time?
What are you doing to support yourself and your inner work, to have a lens and a mirror? What “obstruction spots created by socialization” have you worked to clear to be a better human and create change?
Thoughts on Ginwright’s “True sight – hindsight, foresight and insight” concept, and the idea that “the hardest look is inward”?
How might you integrate his reflections on clarity – “Suspension, Saltation, and Creep”?
Topic for further ponderings – What gets in the way of clarity – Ego, Lack of Confidence, Lens of Opposition, and Resistance – how do you see these show up in your professional and personal life/communications/relationships?
You can sign up to receive my Three Thoughts for Thursday post as an email on the third Thursday of every month by clicking here.
If you are interested or know someone who may be interested, I also offer leadership and emotional intelligence coaching and workshops. You can find more information on my website, or you can use this link to set up a free 30-minute introduction to coaching session.
On September 17th, I hosted my first local, in-person event here in the Seattle area, Savor the Sweetness. It was a fulfilling experience and event, and I look forward to hosting quarterly events for local women in 2023 – stay tuned and contact me for more information or to join the invite list!
Please check out my latest blog post, The Problem of Intentions, Also check out my post, Be Careful, Recipes and Inspiration Yield Different Results! and my September Edition of Three Thoughts for Thursday, as well. In light of my continued themes on process and habits, you may also be interested in my series, Lessons of the Run – Endurance, Resilience, Rest, and Grit. And if you could stand to hear more about processes and patterns, stay tuned for an upcoming expanded post on Examining the Process – Behind the Drive.
Beginning last year, in April 2021, I have had the privilege of hosting the Emotional Intelligence Special Interest Group for ICFLA. Please join us for November’s session on Tuesday, the 29th of November for a panel discussion of EI in the Workplace.
In September, I completed a year-long, quarterly series entitled “EQ and WooWoo” with my colleague and Spiritual Coach, Katie Kay. If you are intrigued and would like to learn more about future events, please email me. This workshop series was designed to help you manifest action toward the year you want to live, the person you want to be, and the goals you want to achieve in 2022. These quarterly sessions intertwined the use of Tarot (and other Woowoo tools) and Emotional Intelligence to help you and your clients step outside the box in order to take your coaching and personal work deeper. New and related sessions will begin in 2023.
If you are interested in joining and co-creating these learning communities, please use the links above to find out more about ICFLA’s Emotional Intelligence Special Interest Group and the EQ & WooWoo Workshops. I hope you will come along for the journey!
I’m always looking for new inspiration, new books to read, and new podcasts to listen to, so please send your suggestions my way or comment on this post to offer some new recommendations!
As always, thank you for your continued support and readership! Stay strong, stay brave, stay true to you!
Wishing you a season of colorful foliage and brilliant transformation toward authenticity and true belonging!
The sunsets have been stunning, the colors bold and breathtaking. Likely, the forest fires raging in Oregon and southern Washington have a part to play in the way the light and pollution come together to create art in the sky as the day comes to a close, a reminder of how beauty can come even from endings and destruction.
As the summer comes to a close, I have been reflecting on the beauty of both the season and its end, and how the close of summer enhances my desire to embrace and enjoy every last moment. The sunsets have called me to pause and appreciate the beauty of a day’s end. These reflections around endings and destruction have also led me to again recognize how endings give way to beginnings, destruction gives way to new creation, and the importance of savoring the journey and the bittersweetness of these moments.
It is also in this transition from summer to fall that I reminisce on the butterfly migration in the Los Angeles area I was so privileged to witness while living there. While we were in LA this past April, we went to the butterfly gardens at the Natural History Museum. One of my very favorite experiences in LA was the mass migration of butterflies. They were so thick in the air everywhere; it was as if we’d been invaded. So unexpected and such a pleasant surprise, these beautiful butterflies even surrounded us on the traffic-jammed highways! I arrived in LA for what would be a 2+-year sojourn, angry to be there, and left quite transformed by the colorful experience and deep friendships I gained. Our LA experience provided a new reference and definition for me of bittersweetness. Only at the end could I see the beauty of the personal transformation I’d undergone as the sunset on our time there and the butterflies undertook their journey.
As the sun sets on this day, on this season, both literal and metaphorical, what is ending for you? What do endings mean for you, and what emotions do they trigger? What is beginning? What beauty do you see in the finale? When and where have you experienced beauty in the breaking, in the ending? As you reflect on your life experiences, where do you see moments of bittersweetness? How have they shaped you? How have you shaped and made meaning of these moments?
Quote I’m pondering:
Perhaps the butterfly is proof that you can go through a great deal of darkness and still become something beautiful.
~ Beau Taplin ~
What I’m reading:
Bittersweet by Susan Cain
I just finished listening to the Audible version of this book and absolutely loved it! As someone who has been accused of being Eeyore, of being overly sentimental, of feeling a deep appreciation for the character, Sadness, in InsideOut, and as someone who walked down the aisle to Moonlight Sonata, this book spoke to me on so many levels. I have come to feel great frustration with our cultural insistence/mandate to “be happy, just be happy,” ALL OF THE TIME! I believe what we so often think of as the “negative emotions” have a very important place and purpose, and at the very least, allow us to really know what it feels like when happiness comes within.
Thinking about sunsets, beauty in endings, and the breaking down involved in metamorphosis, makes me also consider my time living in Los Angeles, a time that truly allowed me to feel and experience bittersweetness. I showed up angry to be there and left changed and sad to say goodbye. The transformation was all the things – painful and inexplicably wonderful all at once, and to say goodbye was both excruciating and exciting.
I hope you will give this book a read or a listen! This book spoke to my soul. I felt a deep human connection and a new appreciation for my own life experience. I’d love to hear what you think!!
~
What Amazon has to say:
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • Sadness is your superpower. In her new masterpiece, the author of the bestselling phenomenon Quiet explores the power of the bittersweet personality, revealing a misunderstood side of mental health and creativity while offering a roadmap to facing grief in order to live life to the fullest.
“Bittersweet grabs you by the heart and doesn’t let go.”—BRENÉ BROWN, author of Atlas of the Heart
“Susan Cain has described and validated my existence once again!”—GLENNON DOYLE, author of Untamed
“The perfect cure for toxic positivity.”—ADAM GRANT, author of Think Again
ONE OF THE MOST ANTICIPATED BOOKS OF 2022—Oprah Daily, BookPage
Bittersweetness is a tendency to states of longing, poignancy, and sorrow; an acute awareness of passing time; and a curiously piercing joy at the beauty of the world. It recognizes that light and dark, birth and death—bitter and sweet—are forever paired.
If you’ve ever wondered why you like sad music . . .
If you find comfort or inspiration in a rainy day . . .
If you react intensely to music, art, nature, and beauty . . .
Then you probably identify with the bittersweet state of mind.
With Quiet, Susan Cain urged our society to cultivate space for the undervalued, indispensable introverts among us, thereby revealing an untapped power hidden in plain sight. Now she employs the same mix of research, storytelling, and memoir to explore why we experience sorrow and longing, and how embracing the bittersweetness at the heart of life is the true path to creativity, connection, and transcendence.
Cain shows how a bittersweet state of mind is the quiet force that helps us transcend our personal and collective pain, whether from a death or breakup, addiction or illness. If we don’t acknowledge our own heartache, she says, we can end up inflicting it on others via abuse, domination, or neglect. But if we realize that all humans know—or will know—loss and suffering, we can turn toward one another.
At a time of profound discord and personal anxiety, Bittersweet brings us together in deep and unexpected ways.
What I’m listening to:
I was so inspired by and resonated with Susan Cain’s Bittersweet that I sought out podcasts with her as a guest. I found one new podcast I want to investigate beyond the interview with her and one old favorite, The Tim Ferris Show, that I’ve found to provide consistent inspiration. Let me know what you think!!
Passion Struck with John R. Miles
Passion Struck is a show focused on exploring the mindset and philosophy of some of the world’s most insightful people. John R. Miles unpacks guests’ wisdom on creating an intentional purpose-driven life and turns it into practical advice that you can use to impact your work, life, and relationships.
Susan Cain is one of my favorite authors and completely changed the way I viewed myself and my own strengths. Susan is the author of the Quiet Journal, Quiet Power: The Secret Strengths of Introverts, and Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking, which spent eight years on The New York Times bestseller list, and has been translated into 40 languages. Her new masterpiece, Bittersweet: How Sorrow and Longing Make Us Whole, is available now.
Susan’s first record-smashing TED Talk has been viewed more than 40 million times and was named by Bill Gates as one of his all-time favorite talks (and if you like that one, you should check out her most recent TED Talk with violinist Min Kym). LinkedIn named her the top sixth influencer in the world, just behind Richard Branson and Melinda Gates. Susan partners with Malcolm Gladwell, Adam Grant, and Dan Pink to curate the Next Big Idea Club. They donate all of their proceeds to children’s literacy programs.
In her new book, Susan discusses why sadness and the happiness of melancholy are key to achieving self-transcendence and the union between souls. As with the majority of people, you’ve probably been taught your entire life to look at the positive side and be happy no matter what. While there is a place for optimism and looking at the bright side, by burying your melancholy and sadness, you may actually be doing yourself a terrible disservice.
Additional Podcasts with Tim Ferris and Susan Cain:
The Tim Ferriss Show: #357: Susan Cain — How to Overcome Fear and Embrace Creativity
You can sign up to receive my Three Thoughts for Thursday post as an email on the third Thursday of every month by clicking here.
Women local to the Seattle area, you are invited to attend Savor the Sweetness on September 17th. For more information and to RSVP, please click here.
Please check out my latest blog post, The Problem of Intentions, Also check out my post, Be Careful, Recipes and Inspiration Yield Different Results! and my August Edition of Three Thoughts for Thursday, as well. In light of my continued theme on process, you may also be interested in my series, Lessons of the Run – Endurance, Resilience, Rest, and Grit. And if you could stand to hear more about processes and patterns, stay tuned for an upcoming expanded post on Examining the Process – Behind the Drive.
If you are interested, or know someone who may be interested, I also offer leadership and emotional intelligence coaching and workshops. You can find more information on my website, or you can use this link to set up a free 30-minute introduction to coaching session.
Beginning last year, in April 2021, I have had the privilege of hosting the Emotional Intelligence Special Interest Group for ICFLA. Please join us for September’s session on Tuesday, the 27th of September, with special guest, James Garrett of BrainByDesign, who will offer The Brain Science of Overcoming Fear.
For more information on the next “EQ and WooWoo” workshop (Thursday, September 22nd) with my colleague and Spiritual Coach, Katie Kay, please email me or RSVP. This workshop series is designed to help you manifest action towards the year you want to live, the person you want to be, and the goals you want to achieve. We will be hosting quarterly sessions that intertwine the use of Tarot (and other Woowoo tools) and Emotional Intelligence to help you and your clients step outside the box in order to take your coaching and personal work deeper. September will focus on Relationship Management, harvesting what you’ve planted, and continuing to care for the relationships you are building and maintaining.
If you are interested in joining and co-creating these learning communities, please use the links above to find out more about ICFLA’s Emotional Intelligence Special Interest Group and the EQ & WooWoo Workshops. I hope you will come along for the journey!
I’m always looking for new inspiration, new books to read, and new podcasts to listen to, so please send your suggestions my way or comment on this post to offer some new recommendations!
As always, thank you for your continued support and readership! Stay strong, stay brave, stay true to you!
Wishing you a season of stunning sunsets, moments that take your breath away, and recognition of the beauty in the bittersweet!
Before you can change the path, habit, or process keeping you stuck, you must first clearly see it, observe it, and own it.
Process, patience and purpose -How do these themes connect for you? Do you sometimes question your progress and thus the process, or lose sight of the purpose and then struggle with both patience and process? What have you learned about process, purpose, and patience in your life? How does your view of process connect to patience and purpose for you?
Another Chance
I am often inspired by nature, the seasons, and the cadence of life around us, as well as the view through the eyes of my children. Spring comes every year and offers another opportunity to try again, to do something new, to grow and change, a do-over if you will. This past month, we took our first spring break trip, our first big trip on an airplane, since February of 2020. I feel so fortunate to have been able to take our first family vacation, a real vacation, since COVID. We’ve taken road trips and spent some time in an Airbnb or two along the way, but this was the first time in 26 months that we boarded an airplane. This was Sally’s first flight, and given the passage of so much time, seemed like a first for the boys, too. A silver lining of COVID, my kids don’t take such trips and flights for granted anymore. It was pure joy to travel for the first time again! So much seemed new!
We went to Southern California where we soaked up the sun and time with friends and family we hadn’t seen in over two years. The boys shared some of their favorite places with their sister (we called Los Angeles home from 2017 to mid-2019), while simultaneously experiencing them all anew – Legoland, the San Diego Zoo, the Space Shuttle Endeavor, the Natural History Museum in LA, Noah’s Ark at the Skirball Center, sunset on the beach – so much goodness and joy, a taste of newness even in revisiting old favorites.
This travel experience makes me think about the opportunity spring presents each year – an opportunity to plant and grow something new and different, an opportunity to grow something old and familiar in a new way, an opportunity to reinvent, try again, to grow after a season or more of remaining the same, a chance to see new opportunity, and a time of rebirth. Every spring, there is another occasion to start fresh, to try again, to try anew, to show up differently, to see differently, a “do-over” and a chance to appreciate things/people/experiences more deeply.
This spring, what are you seeing as if for the first time? What are you noticing with new eyes? What is being illuminated for you or providing you clarity? What might you do or what might you change to see things from a new vantage point or through a new lens? Where are you feeling stuck and in need of a new way of seeing in order to move forward? As we begin to reemerge, what are you more deeply appreciating and savoring, as if familiar and new all at once?
“I slept and dreamt that life was joy. I awoke and saw that life was service. I acted and behold, service was joy.”
— Attributed to Rabindranath Tagore
This podcast came across my path via email from a colleague at Seattle University where I teach as an Adjunct Faculty in the Albers School of Business, Department of Management. The content both encouraged me and challenged me as I considered my own journey to stay present and aware, conscious, and in the moment, as well as my desire to share ideas and content in this email that resonates and people will like. The theme of being liked hit home as I have been pondering ways to grow my audience and have worried about people losing interest. At the same time, the joy of our spring break and the reminders to embrace each moment and take all that life has to offer, with acceptance and gratitude also sat with me. So, I challenged myself to listen openly and to share openly.
The Commitment to Stay Conscious
Michael Singer Podcast, Season 2, Episode 3
Even when you’ve devoted yourself to spiritual work, it can be difficult to maintain mindful awareness. In this episode, Michael speaks on the difficulty of maintaining consciousness and equanimity when we seem hardwired to be hooked by outside stimuli.
This quick read is packed full of insight and human wisdom. One of my favorite moments was this exchange between the Mole and the Boy:
Mole, “I am so small!”
Boy, “Yes, but you make a huge difference!”
What Amazon has to say:
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER · WALL STREET JOURNAL BESTSELLER · USA TODAY BESTSELLER
“The Boy, the Mole, the Fox, and the Horse is not only a thought-provoking, discussion-worthy story, but the book itself is also an object of art.”- Elizabeth Egan, The New York Times
From British illustrator, artist, and author Charlie Mackesy comes a journey for all ages that explores life’s universal lessons, featuring 100 color and black-and-white drawings.
“What do you want to be when you grow up?” asked the mole.
“Kind,” said the boy.
Charlie Mackesy offers inspiration and hope in uncertain times in this beautiful book, following the tale of a curious boy, a greedy mole, a wary fox, and a wise horse who find themselves together in sometimes difficult terrain, sharing their greatest fears and biggest discoveries about vulnerability, kindness, hope, friendship, and love. The shared adventures and important conversations between the four friends are full of life lessons that have connected with readers of all ages.
You can sign up to receive my Three Thoughts for Thursday post as an email on the third Thursday of every month by clicking here.
Please check out my latest blog post, The Problem of Intentions, Also check out my post, Be Careful, Recipes and Inspiration Yield Different Results! and my March edition of Three Thoughts for Thursday, as well.
Beginning in April 2021, I have had the privilege of Co-Hosting with Kathy Hadizadeh, the Emotional Intelligence Special Interest Group for ICFLA. Please join us next week for April’s session on Tuesday, the 26th of the month as we explore our coaching lenses and how they can impact our clients!
For more information on the next “EQ and WooWoo” workshop (Thursday, June 23rd) with my colleague and Spiritual Coach, Katie Kay, please RSVP or email me for more information. This workshop series is designed to help you manifest action towards the year you want to live, the person you want to be, and the goals you want to achieve. We will be hosting quarterly sessions that intertwine the use of Tarot (and other Woowoo tools) and Emotional Intelligence to help you and your clients step outside the box in order to take your coaching and personal work deeper. June will focus on Social Awareness, tending to the seeds you’ve planted, and caring for the things you are growing.
If you are interested in joining and co-creating these learning communities, please use the links above to find out more about ICFLA’s Emotional Intelligence Special Interest Group and the EQ & WooWoo Workshops. I hope you will come along for the journey!
I’m always looking for new inspiration, new books to read, and new podcasts to listen to, so please send your suggestions my way or comment on this post to offer some new recommendations!
As always, thank you for your continued support and readership! Stay strong, stay brave, stay true to you!
Wishing you a season of “firsts”, of seeing anew, of do-overs, excitement, and joy!
Spring is Near!
As much as I love the season of autumn, I also love when the days start to get longer. March marks the start of Spring with the Equinox! Having grown up in Colorado, spring generally makes me think of the mud, but this year, I am thinking of the light. Equal days and equal nights. For me, as spring emerges, there is a sense of restoration and readiness to stretch and plant and grow, to bask in the light of the longer days. I can feel the light charging me up.
My ancestors were farmers so perhaps there’s something genetic that gives me the itch for spring, to dig in the dirt and plant things, to stay outdoors longer as the light allows me to stretch the day. I also am feeling this year, this urge to reconnect, to reinvigorate relationships, friendships, connections. Perhaps that is the purpose of winter, just as with plants and with animals who hibernate, to rest and restore in preparation for another season of planting and growing, stretching and connecting.
As I write this, the sun is shining through the green leaves of the tree outside my window. From this light of the sun streaming through the branches, I feel a warmth of anticipation, peace, hope, joy, a weight being lifted off of me as if I am becoming physically lighter in the light of the sun. I feel a reminder that I have everything inside of me to grow into all that I am meant to be as the sun shines upon me and provides its light and warmth to aid my growth.
As the seasons change, the days grow longer, plants begin to bloom, how are you feeling, both physically and emotionally? Do you connect with the seasons physically, mentally, emotionally? Do you feel a shift in your mood, in your patterns of being? Are you feeling energized? More connected? Longing for something different and new to spring forth? Or are you still in hibernation mode? How does spring make you feel and what does this season inspire? Metaphorically, what seeds do you want to plant and what will these seeds grow this year?
“…this is too extraordinary. This is too wonderful. I must tell Botticelli that he was wrong. Suffering is not the answer. Light is the answer.”
~ Roscuro in The Tale of Despereaux by Kate DiCamillo ~
I recently had the privilege and opportunity to be a returning, second-time guest on the podcast,
The Career Butterfly with host, Erica Parker Price
“Careers come in Phases. Find your Passion. Discover your Purpose.
Soar into the Future.“
This podcast is for the millions of women who have taken a career break and are ready to find their wings and soar like a butterfly. We provide weekly insights and interviews with women who have successfully returned to work, as well as experts working to make it easier to hit pause and un-pause on your career.
In Episode 123, Bringing Your Emotional Intelligence to Work, we take a deeper dive into EQ and its power to transform and connect us as human beings. You can also find resources that relate to the discussion and have informed my own research and work. If you are interested in my first interview with Erica, you can listen to Episode 116, Riding Your Own Unique Wave, to hear more about my personal journey.
Please check out all the other episodes, as well, as they all share common themes around resilience, humanity, struggle, reinvention, growth, and provide inspiration to continue to adapt, evolve, and grow – great themes connected to spring!
David Whyte is a poet, author, speaker, philosopher.
From his website:
THE POWER OF THE POETIC IMAGINATION
David Whyte’s writing explores the timeless relationship of human beings to their world, to creation, to others, and to the end of life itself.
He makes his home in the Pacific Northwest, where rain and changeable skies remind him of the other, more distant homes from which he comes: Yorkshire, Wales, and Ireland. He has traveled extensively, including working as a guide in the Galapagos and leading trips into the Himalayas; much of his work chronicles a close relationship to landscapes and histories. He speaks to the suffering and joy that accompany revelation, and the necessity of belonging to families, people, and places.
David Whyte’s poetry can be heard in the boardrooms of Fortune 500 companies, the hallowed halls of educational institutions, and from the stages of literary festivals and theological conferences. In each of these disparate settings, his work and compelling speaking style are moving and relevant, transcending the confines of any individual context.
I have been taken with his book, Consolations: The Solace, Nourishment and Underlying Meaning of Everyday Words, and his book, Everything is Waiting for You. His words have been resonating and inspiring me to see beauty and purpose, love and joy, and have served as a great reminder that I have everything I need to become.
You can sign up to receive my Three Thoughts for Thursday post as an email on the third Thursday of every month by clicking here.
Please check out my latest blog post, The Problem of Intentions. Also check out my post, Be Careful, Recipes and Inspiration Yield Different Results! and my February edition of Three Thoughts for Thursday here on my blog, as well.
Beginning in April 2021, I have had the privilege of Co-Hosting with Kathy Hadizadeh, the Emotional Intelligence Special Interest Group for ICFLA. Please join us for April’s session on the 26th of the month!
For more information and to register for the March “EQ and WooWoo” workshop with my colleague and Spiritual Coach, Katie Kay, click here. This workshop series is designed to help you manifest action towards the year you want to live, the person you want to be, the goals you want to achieve. We will be hosting quarterly sessions that intertwine the use of Tarot (and other Woowoo tools) and Emotional Intelligence to help you and your clients step outside the box in order to take your coaching and personal work deeper. March will focus on Self-Management and planting what you want to grow.
If you are interested in joining and co-creating these learning communities, please use the links above to find out more about ICFLA’s Emotional Intelligence Special Interest Group and the EQ & WooWoo Workshops. I hope you will come along for the journey!
I’m always looking for new inspiration, new books to read, new podcasts to listen to, so please send your suggestions my way or comment on this post to offer some new recommendations!
As always, thank you for your continued support and readership! Stay strong, stay brave, stay true to you!
Wishing you a season of light and abundant planting!
Inspiring Heart-Work, Creativity, and Magic!
With Valentine’s Day right in the middle of February, this month always makes me think of love and matters of the heart. I’ve been inspired to tend to the relationships around me and to consider how well I love and care for myself, reminding myself of the example I am setting for my children on a daily basis. I challenged myself to write on a red, cutout heart each day, for each of my kids, something I love and appreciate about them. I noticed how this shifted my moods on days I felt rushed and grumpy, and how even on days I felt positive, loving, and patient, how this brought me added joy, this pausing to consider all the ways and traits and things I love about each of my children.
As I write this, I am wondering what I would write and how I would feel if I challenged myself to think of something each day that I love and appreciate about myself. So often, and I know I am not alone, I am quick to criticize myself and rarely think of the things I’ve done well or like about myself. Perhaps that is the challenge for me and for you as we finish out the month of February – consider each day what you love and appreciate about yourself and write it down! Notice how you feel when you acknowledge good, positive, wonderful things about yourself and write that down, too. What comes up for you? Is this task easy or difficult and why? What if you make this a habit? How do you start to feel? How does your view of yourself begin to shift? How does the tone of your inner voice change?
Quote(s) I am Pondering:
One of my favorite times of day is when I get to read with one of my kids before bed. This is a task my husband and I divide and conquer. One of the books I recently read with my younger son was The Tale of Despereaux by Kate DiCamillo. This quote stood out and made me ponder, along with the second quote I came across elsewhere that also seemed to fit. These quotes made me think of the various ways we can approach brokenness and pieces, with carelessness or intention. Our attitudes can determine the outcome of how we bring the pieces together and what we make of them.
“There are those hearts, reader, that never mend again once they are broken. Or if they do mend, they heal themselves in a crooked and lopsided way, as if sewn together by a careless craftsman.”
~ Kate DiCamillo, The Tale of Despereaux ~
“Sometimes when things are falling apart, they may actually be falling into place.”
~ Unknown ~
Podcast I’m Listening To and Appreciating:
Magic Lessons with Elizabeth Gilbert #BigMagic
Elizabeth Gilbert is the author of Eat, Pray, Love and Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear
which I featured in my Three Thoughts for Thursday, November 2020.
In this podcast series, Elizabeth Gilbert sets out to provide “roadmaps for creativity.” She takes the subject of creativity out into the world to have real conversations with real people, giving us the extra nudge we need when we’re feeling stuck in our creative lives. This podcast was intended to “help another batch of aspiring artists overcome their fears and create more joyfully.”
Unfortunately, there are only two seasons of this podcast, but it is still worth the listen! What are your creative gifts and what are you doing to nourish and use them?
Book I’m Reading:
Atlas of the Heart by Brene Brown
What Amazon has to say:
In Atlas of the Heart, Brown takes us on a journey through eighty-seven of the emotions and experiences that define what it means to be human. As she maps the necessary skills and an actionable framework for meaningful connection, she gives us the language and tools to access a universe of new choices and second chances—a universe where we can share and steward the stories of our bravest and most heartbreaking moments with one another in a way that builds connection.
Over the past two decades, Brown’s extensive research into the experiences that make us who we are has shaped the cultural conversation and helped define what it means to be courageous with our lives. Atlas of the Heart draws on this research, as well as on Brown’s singular skills as a storyteller, to show us how accurately naming an experience doesn’t give the experience more power—it gives us the power of understanding, meaning, and choice.
Brown shares, “I want this book to be an atlas for all of us, because I believe that, with an adventurous heart and the right maps, we can travel anywhere and never fear losing ourselves.”
You can sign up to receive my Three Thoughts for Thursday post as an email on the third Thursday of every month by clicking here.
Please check out my latest blog post, The Problem of Intentions. You can also find my most recent posts, Be Careful, Recipes and Inspiration Yield Different Results! and Losing Sight, along with my January edition of Three Thoughts for Thursday here, on my blog, as well. Beginning in April 2021, I have had the privilege of Co-Hosting with Kathy Hadizadeh, the Emotional Intelligence Special Interest Group for ICFLA. Please join us next week, on Tuesday, February 22nd at 11:00 am PST for our first session of 2022, The Impact of our Blindspots on our Coaching with our very special guest and EI and coaching expert, Alison Whitmire, President of Learning in Action.
In January, I kicked off the workshop series “EQ and WooWoo” with my colleague and Spiritual Coach, Katie Kay, designed to begin the new year with manifestation in mind. We will be hosting quarterly sessions that intertwine the use of Tarot and Emotional Intelligence to help you and your clients step outside the box in order to take your coaching work deeper and create intentional action. Upcoming sessions will take place on March 22nd, June 23, and September 21 – email or watch for future announcements for details on how to register.
If you are interested in joining and co-creating these learning communities, please use the link above to find out more about ICFLA’s workshops and watch for more information on registering for March’s Curate Your Garden: Workshop 2 in the year-long series on “EQ and WooWoo”. I hope you will come along for the journey!
I’m always looking for new inspiration, new books to read, new podcasts to listen to, so please send your suggestions my way or comment on this post to offer some new recommendations!
As always, thank you for your continued support and readership! Stay strong, stay brave, stay true to you!
Wishing you a season of light and love – both for yourself and those around you!
I’ve been pondering my own negative reaction to the idea of intentions as we begin the year 2022, and I hear people begin to talk of setting resolutions and intentions. Just thinking about the word, intention, I feel my face scrunch up into a frown or grimace, a face full of skepticism and disdain. I feel frustration, even anger, and my temperature rises. I had to look up the word to determine exactly what it meant apart from my associations, interpretations, and strong, visceral reaction.
In-ten-tion: noun, a thing intended; an aim or plan.
“She was full of good intentions”
Synonyms – aim, intent
Perhaps some of my disdain stems from the fact that the word is a noun, and a noun alone is devoid of action. Come January or tomorrow or even today, don’t we want to create action? When I think about reflecting and looking forward, I think about change and achievement and choice, actively moving forward, not just hanging out with a noun. Then I start thinking about the meaning of this noun, and for me, the word intention seems to become synonymous with an excuse, another noun and stumbling block for creating action.
“A thing intended; an aim or plan” is the definition that comes up when I google the word, intention. I don’t want to intend to act, I want to create action. I don’t want to aim at a goal, I want to accomplish the goal. I don’t want to simply make a plan, I want to actively start walking, taking the steps, doing the work with purpose. What describes how I want to act is the adjective form, intentional.
In-ten-tion-al: adjective, done on purpose; deliberate
“He was cited with intentional wrongdoing and harm.”
Synonyms – deliberate, calculated, conscious
I want to be deliberate and conscious and calculated, but again, “to be” still isn’t an active verb. “To be” still sounds stuck in one place, to me.
What gets closer to the action I seek to live by, or the verb form of “intention”, is to act intentionally, deliberately, on purpose. I want to live with purpose, act with purpose, make decisions with purpose. A friend, colleague, and fellow coach, over the years, has taught me the importance of language. The words we use, think, and speak are attached to our actions and either propel us forward or hold us hostage. My intentions will no longer hold me hostage!
My word for 2022 is INTENTIONALLY.
In-ten-tion-al-ly: adverb, deliberately; on purpose.
“I intentionally scheduled time to talk.”
Synonyms – deliberately, on purpose
I will act with intention. I will be intentional. I will make decisions and choices about how I spend my time, how I use my resources, how I choose my words, how I show up, and what I accomplish INTENTIONALLY. I will not set intentions and shrug them off to have been good but not important enough to achieve or at least create action in an attempt to achieve. I will not set intentions and use them to excuse my lack of action. I will intentionally make choices to ensure I am intentional about living my life and achieving my goals and I will manifest with intention. Sure, intention can come along, but I will be intentional about intentionally creating the path ahead. I will not be detoured by good intentions but will be guided by intentionally seeking, exploring, designing, generating, and producing the year I envision.
Words are important as they form the stories we tell ourselves and the reality we create. What is your guiding word for 2022? What words do you use that may be holding you back or getting in your way? How might you be more intentional with your words and intentionally write new stories and create new realities?
It’s the Season of Thanksgiving! What are you grateful for? What practices of gratitude do you have? How does gratitude serve to shift your lens, your mood, your outlook?
Read More "Season of Thanksgiving – Three Thoughts for Thursday – November 2021"
What do you call this season – Fall or Autumn? What colors and experiences are you appreciating and learning from this season that will aid you in your growth next spring?
Are you looking for a path to follow, a recipe to execute, or the inspiration, permission, and support to bake your own creation? It can be a fine line between following and forging.
Read More "Be Careful! Recipes and Inspiration Yield different Results!"
J is for June and for JOY!!
Joy… What comes to mind when you think of joy? Have you heard the term “unadulterated joy”? Take that term apart – “un-adult” – and it seems to imply adulthood gets in the way of joy. I recently had a conversation about my own relationship with joy and this idea that I need to earn it, need to complete all the tasks on my to-do list before I can experience joy. Unsurprisingly, the to-do list is never-ending! Does this resonate with any of you, this idea that joy is only allowed once you’ve done your chores? When I also think more about joy, I think of children and the purity of their joy in the simple pleasures and new experiences of life – playing in the rain or running through the sprinklers, eating ice cream, learning to walk and run, building a fort or a Lego creation, sharing their success, playing at the park – the list goes on and on. I have memories of this joy, but I admit, I often think partaking in that kind of joy is now out of reach as an adult.
But what if it is not? What if we can still tap into that child-like, “unadulterated” joy? What if we don’t have to earn it but can stop and experience joy along the way, as we work through that never-ending to-do list of adulthood? If the list is never-ending, what’s the harm in a break from time to time? This is what I encourage you to think about as you read this June edition of Three Thoughts for Thursday and embark upon the summer months. How can you invite more joy into your life? How might joy be just the thing you need to fill up and go further? How might you look at life through the eyes of a child and pause now and then to pick a dandelion, eat a popsicle on a hot day, laugh, jump in a puddle, and simply live in the joy of the moment?
Quote(s) I am sitting with, pondering and find inspiring:
“Joy comes to us in ordinary moments. We risk missing out when we get too busy chasing down the extraordinary.”
~ Brené Brown ~
Podcast I’m Listening to:
The Happiness Lab – Laurie Santos
You might think you know what it takes to lead a happier life… more money, a better job, or Instagram-worthy vacations. You’re dead wrong. Yale professor Dr. Laurie Santos has studied the science of happiness and found that many of us do the exact opposite of what will truly make our lives better. Based on the psychology course she teaches at Yale — the most popular class in the university’s 300-year history — The Happiness Lab with Dr. Laurie Santos will take you through the latest scientific research and share some surprising and inspiring stories that will change the way you think about happiness.
Happiness Lessons of The Ancients: Lao Tzu
May 2, 2021 : 37:09
The challenges of life often cause us to work frantically to overcome our difficulties – but the Chinese thinker Lao Tzu recommended that instead we should emulate the slow, steady, yet powerful flow of a river.
Solala Towler has studies and taught the principles of Daoism for more than 30 years – and explains how we can implement them into our daily lives. Things like retaining our childlike wonder, being content to go with the flow, and appreciating moderation in all things so that we don’t burn ourselves out.
You can read more about Solala’s work at https://abodetao.com/
Book I am Reading:
The Book of Joy: Lasting Happiness in a Changing World
An instant New York Times bestseller
Two spiritual giants. Five days. One timeless question.
Nobel Peace Prize Laureates His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Desmond Tutu have survived more than fifty years of exile and the soul-crushing violence of oppression. Despite their hardships—or, as they would say, because of them—they are two of the most joyful people on the planet.
In April 2015, Archbishop Tutu traveled to the Dalai Lama’s home in Dharamsala, India, to celebrate His Holiness’s eightieth birthday and to create what they hoped would be a gift for others. They looked back on their long lives to answer a single burning question: How do we find joy in the face of life’s inevitable suffering?
They traded intimate stories, teased each other continually, and shared their spiritual practices. By the end of a week filled with laughter and punctuated with tears, these two global heroes had stared into the abyss and despair of our time and revealed how to live a life brimming with joy.
This book offers us a rare opportunity to experience their astonishing and unprecedented week together, from the first embrace to the final good-bye.
We get to listen as they explore the Nature of True Joy and confront each of the Obstacles of Joy—from fear, stress, and anger to grief, illness, and death. They then offer us the Eight Pillars of Joy, which provide the foundation for lasting happiness. Throughout, they include stories, wisdom, and science. Finally, they share their daily Joy Practices that anchor their own emotional and spiritual lives.
The Archbishop has never claimed sainthood, and the Dalai Lama considers himself a simple monk. In this unique collaboration, they offer us the reflection of real lives filled with pain and turmoil in the midst of which they have been able to discover a level of peace, of courage, and of joy to which we can all aspire in our own lives.
Recently, I had the opportunity to be a guest on a podcast – my first time and it was so fun! Erika Parker Price created the podcast, Ready, Pause, Go, “the only podcast that focuses on the POWER of the career pause.” You can listen to my episode with her here.
Please check out my latest blog post, Lessons of the Run, Part IV: GRIT. You can also find recent posts Are we Losing Our Humanity? and previous lessons of the run, Lessons from the Run, Part 1: Mile 18 – Endurance, and Lessons from the Run, Part 2: Resilience, Lessons of the Run, Part 3: Rest. If you missed my May edition of Three Thoughts for Thursday, you can find it here, on my blog as well.
On April 27th, Kathy Hadizadeh and I kicked off the Emotional Intelligence Special Interest Group for ICFLA. Our next session will be on June 22nd and we will be diving deeper into Self-Awareness: Surfacing and Understanding Emotions. If you are interested in joining and co-creating this learning community, please use the link above to find out more and to come along for the journey!
I’m always looking for new inspiration, new books to read, new podcasts to listen to, so please send your suggestions my way or comment on this post to offer some new recommendations! Your feedback is always appreciated!
On my wedding day, we had planned to say our vows outdoors in the autumn beauty of Southwestern Colorado. I’d grown up there and the fall was always my favorite time of year with warm, sunny days and beautiful aspens turning gold among the evergreens. We woke up to rain, not just a drizzle, but torrential downpour, complete with thunder and lightning. No problem, we had a backup plan to move the ceremony indoors. Then the power went out so we hunted up every candle we could find. No problem, surely the power would be restored by dinnertime. We took photos, dashing out from the covered patio when the rain would take a break to capture the shot. The overcast skies made the colors pop! The power did not come back on in time for dinner. No problem, the stoves were gas stoves and a few friends had brought their guitars – dinner by candlelight and music played by friends, what a gift!
This year, we made it to the Tulip Festival in Skagit Valley just north of where we live. It was a bit rainy as we set out. No problem, there were no crowds to navigate, and wow did the colors pop! As we stood in the colorful fields of tulips and daffodils, storm clouds overhead, a light drizzle around us, I couldn’t help but think of my wedding day, and in a broader sense, of how the storms of life can make joy really stand out. I also couldn’t help but see the joy of my boys as they bought me a bouquet of flowers. The clouds and drizzle couldn’t dampen the beauty they saw. As I looked through their eyes, I, too, felt joy in the beauty I saw before me in the meeting of the storm clouds and the fields of blooming tulips as far as the eye could see. The beauty of the bloom was dependent on the rain from these clouds.
The contrast of the dark and threatening skies and the fearless beauty of the flower seems important, essential even. The focus of our vision determines what we see and what we make of the situation, of the picture before us. Do you typically see the storm clouds and fear the rain? Do raindrops make you want to go inside and wait for sunny weather? Do you see how the overcast skies serve to make the colors even brighter in contrast? Do you focus on the clouds or the flowers? What about in your life? Do you focus on the fear, uncertainty, and suffering or do you savor and appreciate the contrasting joy and beauty? Do the dark days make the good days even more valuable and precious? Where does your focus lie? How can you begin to reframe the storm clouds that may allow your view to change and the colors, the joy in your life, to “pop”?
Do you see wilting flowers or the beauty of the bouquet my boys bought for me a week past its harvest?
Quote(s) I am sitting with, pondering, and find inspiring:
Don’t let the fact that you don’t know what you’re doing stop you from doing anything.
We start everything from a place of not knowing – walking, reading, dating, working. And through the doing, we learn.
We may not get it right the first time, but eventually, we know what we’re doing.
~ Neil Strauss, @neilstrass ~
Podcast I’m Listening to:
Quit Overthinking Things – HBR IdeaCast
Ethan Kross, Professor of Psychology at the University of Michigan, has spent years studying how people talk to themselves and the effect that this “chatter” has on our performance. From professional athletes to top students and senior business executives, even the most talented among us sometimes struggle to quiet the voices in our heads. And Kross says that, while some self-talk can help us, it’s often unproductive. He offers tips and tricks to break out of negative thinking and get back on track, especially at work. He is the author of the book, Chatter: The Voice in Our Head, Why it Matters, and How to Harness It.
My notes:
I appreciated this podcast as I thought about the clouds and the flowers, and how our perspectives and lenses can become habits. Kross highlights negative thought loops, the inner voice, struggling with chatter, frequency, and intensity which can vary, and calls out the impacts of this chatter specifically on these areas of life:
Uncertainty propels chatter, and we can get stuck – this seems especially relevant in the uncertainty in which we’ve been living. I often refer to getting stuck as “the hamster wheel.” Kross also notes that chatter factors into depression and anxiety. We have a lot of time alone with our thoughts.
Tips from Kross to tame the chatter:
Book I am Reading:
I have been working to question and get curious about my own lens and habits, and on understanding and taking control of changing habits, such as I mentioned above for instance, the voice in my head that often allows negative self-talk to take the stage first. As a part of this curiosity, I have been trying to cultivate a gratitude practice and space for a more positive, optimistic self-talk. Working to cultivate new ways of being and new patterns has set me on a path to understand habits, and how I might break old habits and ways of seeing that may lead me astray or cause me to stumble. Likewise, I want to understanding how I might replace these old habits with new habits that better serve me on my path.
The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and BusinessNEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • This instant classic explores how we can change our lives by changing our habits.
NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The Wall Street Journal • Financial Times
In The Power of Habit, award-winning business reporterCharles Duhigg takes us to the thrilling edge of scientific discoveries that explain why habits exist and how they can be changed. Distilling vast amounts of information into engrossing narratives that take us from the boardrooms of Procter & Gamble to the sidelines of the NFL to the front lines of the civil rights movement, Duhigg presents a whole new understanding of human nature and its potential. At its core, The Power of Habit contains an exhilarating argument: The key to exercising regularly, losing weight, being more productive, and achieving success is understanding how habits work. As Duhigg shows, by harnessing this new science, we can transform our businesses, our communities, and our lives.
With a new Afterword by the author
“Sharp, provocative, and useful.”—Jim Collins
“Few [books] become essential manuals for business and living. The Power of Habit is an exception. Charles Duhigg not only explains how habits are formed but how to kick bad ones and hang on to the good.”—Financial Times
“A flat-out great read.”—David Allen, bestselling author of Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity
“You’ll never look at yourself, your organization, or your world quite the same way.”—Daniel H. Pink, bestselling author of Drive and A Whole New Mind
“Entertaining . . . enjoyable . . . fascinating . . . a serious look at the science of habit formation and change.”—The New York Times Book Review
Please check out my latest blog post, Are we Losing Our Humanity? You can also find recent posts Lessons from the Run, Part 1: Mile 18 – Endurance, and Lessons from the Run, Part 2: Resilience, Lessons of the Run, Part 3: Rest, andBe and See the Light which are all still relevant to our current circumstances. If you missed my April edition of Three Thoughts for Thursday, you can find it here, on my blog as well. On April 27th, Kathy Hadizadeh and I kicked off the Emotional Intelligence Special Interest Group for ICFLA. Our next session will take place on Tuesday, June 22nd at 11 am PST and will focus on Self-Awareness. If you are interested in joining and co-creating this learning community, please use the link above to find out more and to come along for the journey!
I’m always looking for new inspiration, new books to read, new podcasts to listen to, so please send your suggestions my way or comment on this post to offer some new recommendations!
As always, thank you for your continued support and readership! Stay strong, stay brave, stay true to you!
I’m a day late, so this month I am adding a fourth thought for you to ponder and explore. Here are Four Thoughts for Friday! Happy New Year!
I’ve been noticing how on-edge people are these days – weary and at this critical tipping point. I never know if I will be greeted by anger or frustration or by empathy and grace. I see people longing to be seen and feel this longing myself for empathy and human connection. I also feel myself precariously balancing on the edge of an abyss from time to time, day to day. We’ve been living in isolation for nearly a year, and if we ourselves aren’t constantly living in fear, the environment seems thick with apprehension. We are on the edge of a chasm and in need of a new way forward.
But! Yes, I am starting a sentence with but… But, change is coming and we have the power to create our path forward. The tunnel has been long and there is still great distance to cover until we fully emerge, however there is light at the end of the tunnel. We get to envision and create what lies beyond!
January is generally a tough month for me. Looking back on my Three Thoughts from last January, I noted the doldrums of this winter month. If you’re like me, and I suspect there are many, I was so ready to close the door on 2020, I raced through the holidays and quickly packed them away for the first time in my life! I raced eagerly into January 2021, working to control my expectations that simply turning the page of the calendar would solve all of 2020’s problems. While I tried to be realistic, I embraced the hope and flicker of light this January seemed to provide.
With this sense of controlled, apprehensive hope, I have been thinking about creativity and our human need for creating. As we’ve turned the page of the calendar, I’ve been considering what I can do to create a new and better path forward. I’ve reflected on the last year filled with challenges, ups and downs, and have allowed myself to feel all the emotions and to consider all the lessons, to begin to ponder and dream what I’d like to create moving forward, after all, we create our reality. This is my challenge for 2021 – to take the mess of 2020 and create something beautiful for 2021 and beyond – may the lessons live strong beyond just this next year!
I challenge you to consider and allow yourself to acknowledge all the feelings experienced in 2020, the full range of emotions, and to lean into the lessons and learnings these emotions connect with and hold. What did you experience? How did your experiences make you feel? What have you learned about yourself and about life that will serve you as you go forward? What have you learned about strength, grit, resiliency, empathy, compassion, bravery and your own humanity? What do you hope to create this next year? Over the next 5 years? 10 years? What is your new vision for the future?
Quote(s) I am sitting with, pondering and find inspiring:
“Without great solitude, no serious work is possible.”
~ Pablo Picasso ~
“Don’t throw your suffering away. Use it. Your suffering is the compost that gives you the understanding to nourish your happiness and the happiness of your loved ones.”
~ Thich Nhat Hanh ~
Podcast I’m Listening to:
Ten Percent Happier – check out the Meditation App!
I’ve featured the Ten Percent Happier podcast with Dan Harris but want to pause and introduce the meditation app he offers. To kick off the new year, he has been offering a meditation challenge and I have found the themes and reflection very helpful, inspiring and resonant. Specifically, Day 9 asked “What is Happiness, Really?” and offered a reminder of the necessity and beauty of juxtaposition, and how to lean into emotions with equanimity. Day 11 reminded me to be kind to myself with the theme “How You’d talk to a Friend” and Day 12 was a good reminder “You’re Not Alone.” I have found myself pondering aloneness and loneliness. Personally, I find when I choose to be alone, I’m happy, but force me to be alone as the isolation of 2020 has done and loneliness sets in with a vengeance.
Not only are the themes relevant and great reminders we are not alone, they also offer the opportunity to practice meditation and grow that muscle to be present and aware.
Article I Recently Read:
I’ve written about rest and its importance myself, and came upon this insightful article on LinkedIn this past week entitled, “The 7 types of rest that every person needs” by Saundra Dalton-Smith, MD.
During the pandemic, I have seen and heard a lot around the topic of “self-care”. I often think about and get curious about what fills me up, what fills my cup, and as a coach, seek to help others also discover how to fill their cup. My thinking has been much like the comparison to putting on your own oxygen mask before helping others and I’ve often told myself, I can be more useful if I take care of myself. This article really helped me think about these ideas and thoughts in a new way and provided a new language and lens. What types of rest do you need, provide for yourself or could use more of?
The article was featured on Ideas.TED.com and you can find more helpful topics and articles on the site.
Book I am Reading and Reflecting Upon:
By Julia Cameron
I recently purchased this book to inspire this year as I challenge myself to create my way forward. I am looking forward to the 12-week journey the book will guide me on and hope you will check it out, too! Let me know what you think! Your feedback is always welcome and appreciated! Share with me what you are reading, listening to, and where you are finding inspiration!
What Amazon Has to Say:
Since its first publication, The Artist’s Way phenomena has inspired the genius of Elizabeth Gilbert, Tim Ferriss, and millions of readers to embark on a creative journey and find a deeper connection to process and purpose. Julia Cameron’s novel approach guides readers in uncovering problems areas and pressure points that may be restricting their creative flow and offers techniques to free up any areas where they might be stuck, opening up opportunities for self-growth and self-discovery.
The program begins with Cameron’s most vital tools for creative recovery – The Morning Pages, a daily writing ritual of three pages of stream-of-conscious, and The Artist Date, a dedicated block of time to nurture your inner artist. From there, she shares hundreds of exercises, activities, and prompts to help readers thoroughly explore each chapter. She also offers guidance on starting a “Creative Cluster” of fellow artists who will support you in your creative endeavors.
A revolutionary program for personal renewal, The Artist’s Way will help get you back on track, rediscover your passions, and take the steps you need to change your life.
Please check out my blog posts on Lessons from the Run, Part 1: Mile 18 – Endurance, and Lessons from the Run, Part 2: Resilience, and Lessons of the Run, Part 3: Rest, as well as my blog post on the light at the end of the tunnel – Be and See the Light! Stay tuned for my upcoming blog posts My Vision: The Power of EQ to Create Change and my thoughts on Courage vs. Confidence! If you missed my December edition of Three Thoughts for Thursday, you can find it here, on my blog as well. As always, thank you for your continued support and readership! Stay strong, stay brave, stay true to you!
A race or a journey? What meaning are you making?
On Monday, April 17th, I ran the Boston Marathon. This was my second Boston Marathon, the first I ran in 2018. Many of you will recall I set out to qualify for Boston this year as a way to celebrate and commemorate the 5th anniversary of the stroke I had just six weeks before running in 2018. Qualifying and running Boston this year was my way of really stepping back into running, paying homage to the growth and work of the last five years, living without fear, closing a chapter on my stroke, and taking forward lessons that have helped me to live bigger.
The weather defined the 2018 marathon; some of the worst weather in the history of the Boston Marathon, cold winds, and icy rain ran with us the whole way. This year what defined Boston for me was the ability to soak in and revel in the experience, the sights and sounds, and high fives from the incredible crowd that lined the entire route to support us and cheer us on. What defined Boston for me this year was the choice I made to experience the journey and not simply focus on the finish line.
I have found myself pondering the meaning I am making from this experience and thinking about the choices we have in creating meaning from our experiences. I have been mulling over our ability to rewrite and reinvent our meaning with the passage of time and the collection of new learnings and experiences in life that allow us to see the past differently. In the moments and days since crossing the finish line, I have found myself teetering between feelings and sensations of joy, contentment, pride, accomplishment, disappointment, loss, sadness, and emptiness now that the marathon is over. My training hadn’t gone as I’d hoped, and the weeks leading up to race day had left me weary, anxious, and disappointed as my pace seemed to slow the harder I concentrated and tried to run faster. I tried to let go of expectations for a personal best or a Boston-qualifying time at Boston, though in the back of my mind, I secretly, not so secretly, hoped I might surprise myself.
On the morning of the marathon, the bus from the hotel to the buses that would take runners to the start in Hopkinton was full. I found myself taking an Uber with another runner I’d taken up with at the hotel. A new connection was made. In the line for the bus, I conversed with another woman waiting to run. I met up with a neighbor also running; we took a photo to commemorate the moment and rode the bus together from Boston Commons to the staging area for the start of the race. I savored the opportunity to get to know her better and relished the calming effect the conversation had on my nerves. When I last ran Boston, the weather was so bad there was no staging at the start of the race; the corrals we’d been assigned were forgotten, and we were simply told to run. This time on race day, I paid attention to the experience of staging and all the volunteers there to support our endeavor – I’d had no idea there was a school where the buses dropped us off or that we would walk over a mile from the school to the corrals at the start line or that there would be so many stations with water and food.
Usually, as I begin a marathon, my ambition and competitive nature set in, and I do my best to begin forging my way to the front of the pack, the finish line solely in mind. I found myself instead holding back, observing, paying attention to my pace, and intentionally maintaining rather than pushing. The last time I ran Boston, I couldn’t remember any details of the towns we ran through; I couldn’t even recall the infamous Heartbreak Hill or when I’d climbed it. This time, I found myself recording every detail, taking every opportunity to high-five the many, many adorable children who lined the course with their parents to cheer us on. I paid attention to the mass of runners in front of me that never thinned out; as I crested a hill, the sea of runners stretched in front of me all the way up the next hill. I stopped to hand off an unnecessary jacket and gloves to my husband and said hi to my parents and kiddos, who were able to come out to watch and greet me along the streets of Framingham. Last time I didn’t get to see my soggy cheer crew until the finish line. I noted that Heartbreak Hill doesn’t come until after mile 20, making an uphill climb all the more challenging both mentally and physically. I appreciated that my last experience in Boston gave me a sense of excitement and curiosity to help conquer the climb. At the finish line, which I crossed in good spirits and even with smiles, I took a photo and offered to take photos for other runners to celebrate reaching this goal. I crossed at 4 hours and 8 seconds, found my family, cleaned up, and changed clothes in a porta-potty, and off we went to continue our explorations of Boston, ending the night back at Fenway Park for the 27th Mile Post-Marathon Party. I felt gratitude that I crossed the finish line with the energy and physical ability to keep going.
In the days following the marathon, I have found myself in this state of post-race blues, struggling with disappointment that I didn’t get a better time, frustration that my watch died at mile 23, and thoughts of how I could have and wish I would have just shaved off 9 more seconds to cross the finish line under 4 hours. And I have also had moments of bliss and gratitude that I felt good at the finish line, pride and accomplishment that I took the opportunity to enjoy the experience, savor the course, and I still finished at the 4-hour mark, remembering why I set out to run Boston again in the first place – not to set a personal record but to bookend a life-altering experience. My mind has been going back and forth between the perfectionist and the recovering perfectionist, the part of my inner voice that has always told me I can and should do better, be better, and the part I’ve been retraining myself to hear the voice that says, “Well done! That was awesome!” My 2-year-old daughter has been an incredible inspiration; her inner voice is an encourager, and I not only hear her encourage herself, but I am also often greeted in the morning with “Good morning, mommy! You go for a run? Good job, mommy-bear!” I am a firm believer these days that we are the authors of our stories, we are the ones who shape our narratives, and we can take charge of our inner monologues. I also want to acknowledge that old habits die hard; the struggle is real. I think I will choose to take forward the view through the lens of gratitude, accomplishment, overcoming, satisfaction, and joy, but I feel it is also necessary to acknowledge the other lenses through which I have viewed my experience of the Boston Marathon since crossing the finish line. The inner critic is real, and so is the inner mentor, the inner encourager. I am choosing to give voice these days to the inner mentor and to allow this wise voice to have a say in how the story is written.
The Boston Marathon experience was so much more than the run. The experience was the time with my kids, sharing the history of Boston and our country, sharing the experience of savoring the moments. The experience was remembering the “why” of being there again. The experience was about overcoming and relishing, not about setting a record. The experience was about sharing this victory with my greatest fans and cheerleaders, with those for whom I strive to be an example and from whom I learn so much from the example they set – my family and my kids. If I keep in mind my goals and reasons for setting out to run Boston again, the run was hands down a success – I enjoyed every high-five I took the time to take. I remember the course and all the great signs and support. I can recall Heartbreak Hill. I crossed the finish line with a smile, feeling fine, able to change and go about the explorations of Boston, capping the day and the marathon experience with the Post-Marathon Party at Fenway Park. If I let the first narrator write the story, the experience was joyful, blissful, and deeply satisfying. The other voice that wants to try to edit the story to focus on the time that wasn’t good enough or could have been better, well that narrator has been asked to sit down; their story is incomplete, their view myopic, and they tell a story that doesn’t serve the future I want to create. I am owning my role as the creator of my story. I am the narrator, and I choose the tone of voice that tells the story. Of course, not all parts of the story are joyful, but this chapter was filled with a sense of accomplishment and gratitude, so I’m bringing in joy to tell this part of my story.
Have you taken ownership of your life story? Do you see yourself as the author? Can you identify the dominant voice telling the story of your experiences? What other voices might you allow to speak? When, why, and how? Have you experienced a shift in how you perceive your story as time passes, or you experience something that gives a new perspective to your past journey and the part an experience has played that has shaped your present or your future? Do you see the importance of taking ownership? Of directing how the story is told in order to direct how the story plays out?
Desiree Briel Rodi Consulting & Coaching 