Sometimes it's hard to be thankful, even on Thanksgiving! With the holidays upon us, the smell of turkey cooking, pies baking, families packing up to go to the relatives, there are many among us who are in pain. For them life is hard. Perhaps they've lost their job and now worry about how they will [...]
Trust is the greatest gift you can offer a relationship. The dictionary says trust is: the reliance on the integrity, strength, ability, surety, etc., of a person or thing; confidence. Trust is something we most frequently give freely. I trusted teachers to teach my kids. I trusted my friend to be there when I [...]
Are you expressing the real you? What does authenticity mean to you? Is it about always telling the truth? Can you honestly say you’ve never said a ‘white lie’ to protect someone’s feelings? Or even to protect yourself? Authenticity is not simply about telling the truth, it is about fully expressing yourself in a real and honest way. It’s about sharing with others what you feel and think, not from a place of judgement but from of acceptance and love. Halloween is a perfect time to talk about what makes you, you! As children we had fun dressing up and becoming something other than who we were, playing make believe and imagining different lives. As adults we may still be trying to figure ourselves out. There are many books, programs, and workshops that we may participate in order to delve into the psyche and define ourselves authentically. And many of us do. I love Mike Robins and his message in his book “Be Yourself, every one else is already taken.” […]
What does it mean to “love yourself”? We all know that to truly be able to love another we have to be able to love ourselves. I know I’ve heard that all my life and I’ve also shared that with those that I counsel. Still, people ask… What does that look like, sound like, feel like? Most people feel that caring for themselves is ‘selfish’. Yet not caring for yourself causes you to feel ‘self-less’. And if you are self-less then who are you? Of course there are times when we act on the behalf of another and not self. Like when we put the needs of our children before our own. But that is not something we can do every minute of every day. Our brains simply won’t let that happen. The mind is an amazing thing. It can not NOT protect us. Therefore, if we always act from a self-less place, we will unconsciously expect someone ‘out there’ to act on our behalf. Oops! That’s what we call an expectation. And those don’t usually work out too well. But when we truly love ourselves, honor our needs, care for our bodies, and are gentle with our feelings… […]
How to empower yourself and your senior This week I want to share with you an interview I did with Susan Baida of eCare Diary on empowering you and your senior loved one. It is full of information about how to plan for the aging process and how to have that all important conversation with your parents. Whether a parent, grandparent, aunt, uncle or neighbor and friend, we all know and love a senior. From them we learn a lot about life, gain wisdom, insights, and understand our history. But when it comes time to help them in their latter years, we all feel a loss of power of some kind. For the Senior it is a loss of control. A feeling of being dependent on someone else just to maintain their daily activity. Because of that most seniors resent and resist any help from us For adult children it is a loss of peace of mind. Not knowing what or how to be the best service to our loved one. Because we just want them to be safe but we don’t really know what they want. […]
Do they really know you love them? If not, here’s why Did you know that there truly is a specific language of love that each of us responds to? Yes it’s true. Author and counselor, Gary Chapman, wrote a book called The 5 Languages of Love many years ago and when I read it, it literally changed my life. All of us have experienced love in some form as children and as adults we express our love to others with that language But many times although you are giving love, the person receiving it doesn’t get the message. That’s because their language is different from yours. In this week’s aha video I share the 5 languages with you. […]
How old do you have to be to do what you want? Isn’t that a good question!! It’s a question my senior clients often asked when their adult children were trying to force some activity on them. We look at our parents aging and want to keep them active, vital, and engaged. We unconsciously believe that their busyness will keep them young and with us longer. We spend so much time doing things we really don’t want to do but that we believe is either important, or needed, or expected. And we’ve come to accept that all the ‘doing’ is what life is about. So it’s not surprising that we want the same from our parents. […]
Got Stress? 101 Ways to PLAY Einstein said “Play is the highest form of research” and I agree. Stress has been identified as one of the leading causes for disease today. There are many ways to release stress, some good like meditation and exercise, others not so good like overeating and overspending. But PLAY…. is the most natural way to change your state and release stress and have fun. Click the video to hear more. […]
Is life getting you down? 3 Steps to renewed enthusiasm Sometimes things happen in our lives that are energy drainers, time stealers, emotional pitfalls, and mental mindtraps. All these things cause us to lose our enthusiasm. When this happens the light goes out of our eyes… the smile disappears from our faces…the gitty is gone from our gitty-up. Life may then feel burdensome, heavy, too much to handle. If you know what I’m talking about then you will find the tips I give you in the video below very helpful. […]
Is Pefectionism Keeping You Stuck? Having high standards is a good thing. Right? Of course it is. It is how we endeavor to achieve more from and for ourselves. But sometimes when we set those standards too high, especially when we are just learning something new, we keep ourselves from moving forward. In other words we get stuck! I never considered myself a perfectionist. Things don’t always have to be in place. My hair doesn’t have to be perfect, and I admit I don’t mind a few wrinkles in my shirt. But as I began creating my new video blog I realized that my need to make it perfect for you was stopping my creative flow. I was overwhelmed by all the mistakes and flaws. I wasn’t giving myself the grace I give my students and clients when they are trying something for the first time. […]