Inspiration
"Any change, even a change for the better, is always accompanied by drawbacks and discomforts."
~ Arnold Bennett
For more quotes like
this,
click here.
Speaking Schedule
Below is a list of where and when I'm speaking for the next few months. Most of these events are for my corporate or organizational clients (i.e. not open to the public). The ones in blue, however, are public events. I hope to see you at one of these!
6/1: San Francisco, CA
6/2: San Jose, CA
6/4: Palm Springs, CA
6/7: San Francisco, CA
6/14: San Francisco, CA
6/15: Dallas, TX
6/16: Oakland, CA
6/21: San Francisco, CA
6/22: San Francisco, CA
6/23: San Francisco, CA
6/29: Berkeley, CA
6/30: Palo Alto, CA
7/12: Cleveland, OH
7/14: San Francisco, CA
7/19: San Jose, CA
7/22: San Jose, CA
7/23: Shenandoah, IA
For more public event details, click here.
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May 26, 2011
In This Issue
Featured Article: Embracing Change
Recommended Resources
Daddy's Little Girls
Hey there! I hope life is wonderful for you and those around you. I'm hoping to get back to sending out the ezine every week in June, we'll see how that goes.
My article from two weeks ago, "The Importance of Live Conversations," got lots of good feedback. If you'd like to re-read that piece, feel free to check it out on my blog. You can also read it on the Huffington Post. And, if you'd like to listen to the audio podcast associated with this article, click here.
Have a great rest of your week. I'm honored and grateful to have you on my list!
With Appreciation,
Embracing Change
For this week's audio podcast, click here.
We recently went into escrow on our house, but don't yet have a new house to move into. As excited as we are about our move (just across the San Francisco Bay from Concord to Marin County), it feels pretty scary to not yet know exactly where we’ll be living next month.
With this big change and a few others coming soon, I've been noticing how I deal with and relate to change. I have somewhat of a love/hate relationship to change. I love the excitement, growth opportunity, and newness of change. But, at the same time, I can easily fall into states of worry, fear, and overwhelm when facing change, especially big ones.
How do you feel about change? While it may depend on the specific change (i.e. one we want versus one we don't want, or one that seems exciting versus one that seems hard or even "bad."), most of us seek and fear change simultaneously. Even positive changes can be unsettling or even downright upsetting. And, while each of us has a unique personality and perspective, many of us tend to be creatures of habit.
Change is one of the main "constants" in life, ironically. However, we don't usually spend all that much time thinking about our relationship to change or specifically expanding on our ability to adapt to change - we usually deal with it from a place of survival, reaction, or necessity.
What if we embraced change more consciously and learned how to not only "manage" it, but thrive through it. Whether you're someone who enjoys change and handles it quite well, or you hate it and get totally stressed out by it, all of us can benefit from embracing change more deliberately and supporting those around us as we all go through the big and small changes of life - especially these days.
Here are some things you can do and think about as you deal with change in your own life – so as to more effectively and peacefully deal with it when it shows up.
1) Become consciously aware of your relationship to change. Knowing how you deal with change, what stresses you out about it, what allows you to navigate it most effectively, what kind of support you need as you move through the change process, and more, are all important elements of embracing change. It's rarely the circumstances themselves that cause us stress or difficulty; it’s our relationship to them. By altering our relationship to change, we can become much more peaceful and successful in dealing with it.
2) Acknowledge and express your true feelings (especially your fear). When change occurs, there are usually a number of different emotions we experience. We tend to focus most of our attention on the details, specifics, and circumstances, not so much on our emotions. However, it is our emotional experience and reaction that dictates much of our effectiveness (or lack thereof) in dealing with change. Whether it's something we consider "good" or "bad," fear is almost always associated with change, because we're moving into something unknown and often uncomfortable. By acknowledging and expressing our fear (and other emotions) in an authentic way, we can take back our power from the situation, get real about how we're feeling, and move through it with more ease and grace. There's nothing wrong with any of the emotions we experience during change, the problems begin to arise when we don’t express our emotions authentically.
3) Get support. As with most things in life, change is much easier to deal with when we get help. We don't have to go through it all alone and there are probably many people in our lives who have gone through similar changes before and can support us in the process. Asking for and receiving help from other people can be challenging for many of us and can feel quite vulnerable. However, one of my favorite sayings is, "The answer's always 'no' if you don't ask." Getting support not only makes dealing with change easier for us, it allows other people to be of service, which is something most people love to have the opportunity to do in life.
4) Look for the gold. There is "gold' in the midst of every change - even the most painful and difficult ones. When change is more "positive," it can seem easier to find the gold in it. However, positive change can also be tricky because we don't understand why we still may experience fear or discontent and sometimes won't acknowledge these and other feelings due to our own embarrassment. With change that is more "negative," it can often be hard to find or see the gold. When dealing with difficult changes in our lives, being able to authentically get in touch with the gifts, blessings, and growth opportunities available to us can help as we navigate our way through the experience and also allow us to evolve in the process.
Have empathy and compassion for yourself and others in going through change. It's not easy for most of us. By embracing change we become not only more effective in dealing with it, but more peaceful, present, and powerful in our lives.
How do you feel about change? How effective are you in dealing with change? What can you do to embrace change in your life in a more peaceful and positive way? Share your ideas, commitments, thoughts, dreams, and more on my blog here.
To listen to this week's audio podcast, including additional thoughts, ideas, and tips, click here.
Growing Up in Heaven, by James Van Praagh
 In his newest book, James Van Praagh reveals the reality that love transcends the physical and material planes of this world; loved ones are never really lost and children who pass from this world are very happy in heaven! Growing Up in Heaven follows the path of a child’s soul—their time spent in heaven and their connection to the living.Widely considered as one of the most accurate and authentic mediums in the world, Van Praagh has written three New York Times bestselling books and was a producer of the hit T.V. show The Ghost Whisperer. For more information and to order copies of this powerful new book now, click here.
"We love supporting each other - especially
when we're going through change."
- Samantha and Rosie
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