January 12, 2009

In This Issue

Featured Article: Love Your "Flaws"

Announcements

Speaking Schedule

Daddy's Little Girls

Welcome to this week's issue of Appreciation (and Authenticity) in Action.

I hope you and everyone around you is enjoying the New Year so far – can you feel the change in the air?  I sure can and it feels great!

Last week’s article was all about creating the New Year with intention.  I also wrote another article about being yourself this year, which was published this week on Oprah.com.

I appreciate you being on my newsletter list.  Have a good one!

With Gratitude,






Love Your "Flaws"

If you’re anything like me you’ve probably spent more time than you’d like to admit trying to “fix” your various “flaws.”  Although I may pretend otherwise, many of my own goals, desires, and even my motivation to “grow” often comes from a deep place of insecurity within me - thinking that if I can just fix what’s wrong with me, then everything will be okay. I've been very aware of this dynamic as I've been in the process of creating my intentions for the New Year in the past few weeks.

I recently had an insight, (one which I've had before but this time it came to me at a deeper level), that maybe instead of focusing on “fixing” my “flaws,” it's more important to love them instead. I've resisted this notion of loving my flaws for most of my life, worrying that if I actually loved the things I thought were wrong with me, they'd somehow never change, I'd be stuck with them, and I’d become unmotivated or lazy about self-improvement.

Ironically, it’s only love that leads to real healing and transformation – which ultimately can create the actual change we say we’re looking for, or a true sense of acceptance that gives us access to authentic liberation, regardless of circumstances.

At a deep level, all of our “flaws” are subjective and based on our own interpretations, perspectives, and focuses anyway.  We obsess about certain aspects of our body or appearance, our personality, our life or work circumstances and deem them as “bad” or “flawed.”  But, the truth is they simply are as they are – we add the meaning and interpretation to them.

Regardless of how philosophical we get about this, however, most of us as human beings experience a sense of feeling flawed in certain aspects of our lives and at particular times in life.  There's nothing wrong with us for feeling this way.  Although, as we each know from experience – feeling flawed can rob us of our energy, our passion, our happiness, our confidence, and our life.  It’s one of the most painful ways we allow our ego to run us and it can have devastating consequences if we’re not conscious about it.

Here are some ideas about what we can do to move through our experience of feeling “flawed,” to a place of acceptance, peace, and love:

1)  Acknowledge what’s true for you.  The first step in almost every process of growth and transformation is about telling the truth.  So often we try to avoid, run from, or pretend our “flaws” away (which never works).  But, if we relate to some aspect of our bodies, personalities, relationships, careers, or lives in general as a flaw, we first have to get real about it if we’re going to do anything about it.

2)  Admit and express the underlying emotions.  If we can identify, acknowledge, and ultimately express the true emotions we’re experiencing related to this perceived flaw, we can create a real sense of freedom for ourselves.  If a certain aspect of your personality, your body, or your career bothers you and because of it you find yourself feeling ashamed – as uncomfortable or potentially “negative” as it may seem, the best thing you can do is to acknowledge and express your shame authentically.  Emotions become positive when they are appropriately expressed and turn negative when they are denied and repressed.  Although this is a different understanding of emotions than we’ve been taught, we’ve all had many liberating and positive experiences when we’ve expressed “negative” emotions (like sadness, anger, fear, and more).  By expressing our real emotions, we can start to unlock and unhook ourselves from the drama and suffering of the situation, which is actually caused by our denial and repression of these emotions, not the emotions themselves.

3)  Forgive yourself.  Self-forgiveness is a big one and something that many of us, myself included, don’t have a lot of experience with.  Most of us have been trained to be hard on ourselves and also that forgiveness has to come from someone or something outside of us.  However, true forgiveness comes from within us and is what ultimately sets us free in life.  When we feel “flawed” in certain areas of our life, we often have a lot of blame and judgment – some of which may be directed towards other people or situations, but beneath that, most of it is directed at us.  When we’re able to forgive ourselves in an authentic way, we create the space for real change and healing to take place.

4)  Appreciate.  The word appreciate doesn’t mean “like,” “agree with,” or “enjoy,” necessarily.  Appreciate means to “recognize the value of something.”  What have you learned about yourself and life by dealing with this “flaw?”  While pain, issues, and challenges are not the only ways to grow in life, one of the many benefits of our challenges is that we get to learn a great deal about ourselves, others, and life in the process of dealing with them.  When we move into a state of genuine appreciation and gratitude for the learning associated with the difficulty, we can move out of feeling sorry for ourselves (which never helps).  It’s impossible to experience gratitude and victimhood simultaneously.

5)  Love.  The ultimate antidote for all suffering is love. Our ability to bring love to our flaws, to care for them with kindness and compassion (as we would for a child, a pet, or a loved one), is what will ultimately allow the true transformation we're looking for to take place. Love is the most powerful force in the universe. When we love our flaws we create an environment where we're either able to make the kinds of specific changes we truly want (from an authentic place of intention) or learn to love and accept ourselves whether an actual “change” takes place or not. Any issue, malady, or problem that shows up in our lives is an opportunity for us to deepen our capacity to bring love, give love, receive love, and accept love.

All of these things, in my own experience, are much easier said than done.  And, when we’re able to tell the truth, express our real emotions, forgive ourselves, appreciate our flaws, and bring love to all aspects of our lives (both light and dark), we give ourselves the opportunity to transcend our flaws in a real way.  This takes a great deal of intention, support, compassion, and patience. It is much easier to take a pill, get busy and distracted, whine and complain, pretend things are “fine,” or various other avoidance techniques we’ve gotten good at in life.  However, leaning into our “flaws” in an authentic way and doing so with profound love for ourselves, is how we can genuinely heal and end the cycle of suffering.

How can you appreciate and love your own “flaws” as a way to create freedom in your life?  Share your thoughts, action ideas, insights, and more on my blog here.



There is no audio message this week. Look for it next week.

Telesummit – Mastering the Inner Game, Jan 14 – 27th

There has never been a better time to launch your own business or dream - and there are inner forces that must be aligned with your creative essence to bring it to life. You cannot bring your vision to life if you're held back by limiting beliefs and a cacophony of negative inner voices. Let's face it, if your dream is big enough it's going to challenge you beyond your current capacity.  I’m excited to be a part of this exciting teleseminar series, Mastering the Inner Game, which takes place from January 14th through January 27th (my session is on 1/21 at 1 PM PT).  Each day during this series, Adela Rubio a conscious business mentor and coach, will be interviewing authors and experts like Ariane de Bonvoisin, Eva Gregory, Mary Allen, me, and many others, about how to master your inner game and create the kind of success and fulfillment that you truly want in 2010 and beyond.  Reserve your free online pass now, by clicking here.

Great New Book – No More Excuses, by Sam Silverstein

My friend Sam Silverstein’s new book, No More Excuses: The Five Accountabilities for Personal and Organizational Growth, is something that will benefit you and those you work with in a powerful way.  No More Excuses is a way of looking at the world—a standard to which we hold ourselves and others accountable. It’s a strategy for life and work that attracts others to us, because accountability is a universal trait of admired people. Many professionals avoid accepting personal accountability for failures while readily accepting credit for successes. But those who achieve truly great things in life know that true accountability makes all the difference between success and failure—on both a personal and organizational level. Based on interviews with over fifty successful masters of the art of accountability—including academics, Fortune 500 CEOs, and Hall of Fame athletes—No More Excuses identifies the five accountabilities that all truly successful people and organizations share. These principles and traits are the common currency of successful individuals and businesses across virtually every industry and culture.  For more information and to order copies of the brand new book, click here.

Listen to my interview with Dr. Fred Luskin

I recently interviewed my friend and mentor Dr. Fred Luskin on my radio show, “Let’s Get Real.”  Fred is one of the foremost experts in the world on forgiveness and author of Forgive for Good, among other books.  Our discussion was insightful, interesting, and quite powerful.  If you’re interested in learning more about the power of forgiveness, check it out.  To listen to our interview, click here (and then click on the link to the show with Fred – recorded on September 30th – to download the MP3 of our interview for free).  My show airs on Energy Talk Radio daily at 7:00 AM ET and 5:00 PM PT (as well as each Friday at noon PT).  Check it out!

Connect with me on Facebook and Twitter

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