Transformational Life Coach

How to Shake the Shackle of Procrastination.

It’s not what you do that makes you tired
It’s what you don’t do
When you know you ought to
That makes you tired

Hello, My Friends

What do you do to get yourself out of a funk?

Do you have a routine you follow when life has knocked the wind out of your sails?

This week I have found life doing what life does best, it keeps on trucking on, no matter how I’m feeling about what is happening in my life. Time keeps on skipping past, oblivious to any thing I think might be worthy of a break in time.

Last week I shared a little about having an anti-procrastination day. It is amazing how the jobs that get put off as, too hard, too messy, too time-consuming easily get packed into an invisible basket called “Later”. An shoved some where out of sight. The thing is out of sight is not out of mind, our mind never actually forgets, and the thought pops in now and again to nag at us.

If you were to watch someone who doesn’t have the procrastination gene. (Is anyone ever immune, or do they know of strategies that others don’t?) Do they roll up their sleeves and get it done? Do they put it on their calendar, they plan for it and then follow through, with focused action?.

My question is, “How do they speak to themselves, to ensure the job is done?”

What do they tell themselves to get past the excuses? “I don’t feel like it.” “I can’t be bothered.” “I’m too tired.” “I’ll start that next week.”

What is procrastination? It’s putting off till later what you could be doing now. It’s lacking self control and acting against your better judgment.

That’s the thing, we all know what we need to do. To achieve our goals we have an idea of what needs to be done, however, the bogey man fear struts into the arena and wipes us out before we even get started. We feel the emotion of fear in our bodies, which creates the fight, flight or freeze response in our brain. The brains main function is survival, so it warns us not to proceed. Even when there is no logical reason not to move forward, we listen and stop. The stage is set for procrastination, and his cousins, guilt and shame to take over the drama of our lives.

Today, I want to give you a few strategies on how to take back the centre stage of your life, and live into the life you have always wanted.

It’s simple really, ‘DO IT NOW!’

Simple, but not easy.

As you learn to be the hero, or heroine of your life, and take back your control, from the bogey man, you will find you get so much more achieved, and your sense of satisfaction, and confidence grows.

What triggers your procrastination?

Creative pursuits, such as writing, painting, acting. Things that you may be waiting for inspiration to strike you.

Moving into new ventures, changing jobs, creating side hustles to supplement your income, Things that require you to move into unchartered waters, so to speak.

Dieting or beginning a new exercise plan. Things that require diligently repeated activity.

Courses or training, learning new skills. Once again foreign territory, the unfamiliar land of the new and different.

Spiritual, Ethical or moral behavioural changes, things that you know are good for you, but will take consistently pulling on the steering wheel of your life, to create tension to change your unwanted behaviour from the ruts that are comfortable.

All of these stoppers are mental resistance. We build a story around how hard it will be to make the changes that are required, learn new skills, stick to a programme. This resistance causes us to find distraction in the easy things of the moment, like social media, movie watching. We even tell ourselves that cleaning out the fridge is a good thing, instead of writing the next chapter of our best seller.

Instant gratification is the thief of our long term life benefits.

We can learn to use resistance for us. Each one of us has our own preferred flavour of resistance. It is in understanding our resistance that we can disarm procrastination.

Resistance is our friend, it is trying to tell us something about ourselves. The greater the resistance, the greater the potential for change. The more important the call or action required is, the more resistance we have to doing that action. By identifying what your resistance is, and what is on the other side of the action you are resisting, this is where you will find achievement and fulfillment.

Resistance is a guide, use it to shine a light on the bold action that needs to be taken.

Mental resistance is with us at every step on our journey to living the life we want. Make friends with it, welcome it and use it for our good. By becoming aware of our flavour of mental resistance, we disarm procrastination.

Daily routines are the secret key to overcoming mental resistance and procrastination.

It is amazing how often inspiration turns up at the appointed time in your planner, it’s like it has been sent a special invitation. Energy arrives for the activity once you begin. Enjoyment flows from doing the difficult.

When we rationalize (tell rational lies) to ourselves, we open the door to self-sabotage. A rational lie is I’ll do that tomorrow, knowing we actually probably won’t. We don’t tell ourselves the truth. If we really don’t want to go to the gym, then cancel your membership and be honest with yourself. If you really do want to go, then schedule it, make it an unbreakable commitment to yourself and go.

How often do you use the words, “I’ll do that tomorrow.” ?

These four words will keep you stuck in procrastination.

Do it today. Make a plan, then do the plan. Never put off until tomorrow what can be done today.

Take out your timer, see how long it really takes to write a page, to fold a load of washing, to do the dinner dishes, to practice the piano, or to work out. This little trick beats the time procrastinator, “I don’t have time now.” You’ll surprised how much you can get done in fifteen minutes.

It’s not what we do that makes us tired,
But what we don’t do,
That we know we ought to do,
That makes us tired.

Doing the work is what produces results. You don’t have to feel good to do the work, but doing the work will almost always make you feel good.

To overcome procrastination:

Show up, follow your schedule. Whether you feel like it or not.

Be patient, building the future you want will take time. Be consistent, be diligent, be focused.

Act in the face of fear, fear is an illusion and action will take you through the illusion. Everything you want is on the other side of fear.

Failure and criticism are not personal, do not take them to heart, they are part of the learning journey, and have nothing to do with your self-esteem, or your identity.

Resistance is your guide to what is important, be aware of what you are resisting.

So in a nut shell, these five things are part of my arsenal to overcome procrastination.

Until next time, plan your work, and work your plan. Beat procrastination with the rod of constructive action that leads to your goal.

xoxo Linda

#authenticlivingwithlinda

Email me at authenticlivingwithlinda@gmail.com

Find me on Facebook @authenticlivingwithlinda @lindacodlin25

Connect with me for a one on one coaching appointment.

Reclaim Your True Identity

By invite only

You may enter

Life is mine

To live

By design

Hello, My Friends

What a wonderful week it’s been! (Just try living without it. )

It’s been an anti procrastination week in my home, we have moved rooms around, so my office is in a better place for writing, and the client consultation room is situated for easier access. Hubby and I attacked the braiding of the dining chairs, I glued as he attached the braiding. We do make a really handy team. The best part is, the sense of satisfaction that another item is out of my brain. The chairs are no longer nagging at me.

What have you been procrastinating about? This item will be nagging at you, eating your energy and leaving you feeling tired when you haven’t done anything.

I have a quote on the wall of my office. It reads…

If you’re not ACTIVELY involved in getting what you want.
YOU DON’T REALLY WANT IT!!!!

I use this quote to remind me to stop wishing for something to happen, to make a plan, and then begin to make that plan a reality. Action gets results. If I don’t like my results, I change my actions. Which by the way always starts with how I’m thinking.

This week I’ve been thinking about the area that gives most of us the most amount of difficulty.

Relationships.

People are communally inclined. As such this can create conflict. Two people with differing points of view. Each thinking and believing they are right, which by default makes the other wrong.

Once we lock horns in this battle of right and wrong, it becomes a pride issue and changing your mind becomes almost impossible, even if you want to. You have a need to not lose face. Am I right?

I lived like this for more years than I care to admit, I stayed in a marriage well past it’s expiry date, because I didn’t want the nay-sayers (those people who in the early days, very opinionatedly informed me it would never work, he was so wrong for me.) to be right. So we lived in misery, while these people lived their lives in their own pot of misery or happiness, I’m not sure which anymore.

That’s the thing about opinions, they are someone else’s view of a situation. As opinions go, they give value in that they give a different perspective of the situation you are facing. Other people’s opinions must be taken as that, an opinion, and researched for yourself. If you choose to take advice, check that it is coming from a valid source and matches with your values.

I have found in the past, I have made decisions based on other people’s beliefs, and their agenda, which I must say was well hidden until after the decision was made. To find that once the decision was made I was locked into the consequences of that decision, whereas the advisor got to walk away, and take no care or responsibility for the decision.

Learning the hard way, to weigh up the advice with the proposed consequence negative and positive before deciding on the course of action I want to take, without becoming paralyzed by fear is an art in itself.

What has this got to do with relationships you may ask? Everything, It is all about learning to be 100% responsible for yourself, and your decisions. Both the past and the present ones. It is about seeing people as the are, rather than how we want them to be.

How often do we tell people what to do? Best intentions intended, without actually taking into account what is really needed. Some-times it’s support that is needed, a shoulder to cry on, an ear to listen to all the poison and hurt, so it can be reduced. Some-times a friend may need a jab of tough love, a home truth or two from your outside perspective.

When all is said and done, the only person who can change their situation is the person in the situation.

You can’t change your friend, make her leave an abusive relationship, or make her stick to her eating plan. You can support her, and sometimes, you get to walk away and let her figure it out for herself.

Relationships can be tricky, because we believe we need other people to validate us, to tell us who we are and what we can and can’t do. When ever we allow others to make decisions for us, even the tiny ones, we give our power over to them. Sometimes this is exactly as it should be, relationships are about give and take, trust and support. The problem arises when you depend on others to make you feel accepted, to feel worthy, appreciated and important.

By giving these needs over to another, they have the ability to manipulate you.

One day you wake up and discover you have lost yourself, little by little your identity was stolen. One small decision at a time. You gave yourself away to keep the peace, to keep yourself ‘safe’. You gave away your power without knowing how important it was.

Now you want it back, the other person doesn’t want to let it go. Your struggle has multiplied. By implementing what my coach calls ‘The Red Velvet Rope Policy” you are able to regain your power one decision at a time.

The Red Velvet Rope Policy, is about deciding what you want in your life, and keeping everything that isn’t that, out. If they don’t have an invite into your life, then they are not permitted to enter. Should they muscle their way in, you have pre-decided on a set of actions that will occur. The first time they muscle past your rope, you take them back to the rope and inform them of the rules for entry, if they don’t choose to comply with your rules, they are denied access.

The only way this will work is if you are consistent, and that the rules are for your benefit. They are not a tool to control the behaviour of anyone else. The other person gets to choose what they want to do, they can either abide by the rule or not. If they choose, not, then they choose the result that you have previously decided would happen.

The red velvet rope policy is your safety zone, once you have begun to set safety zones around you to keep the trespassers out, you can extend your safety zone to prevent the flyby, hit and run saboteurs that take aim from the other side of the rope. This increases your ability to not be offended by the beliefs and opinions of other people.

As a life coach, I am able to empower you to put up strong and safe zones around your life. My contact details are below, if you want help taking back your identity. Email me, or find me on Facebook.

No more procrastinating. This is your week.

xoxo Linda

#authenticlivingwithlinda

Email me at authenticlivingwithlinda@gmail.com

Find me on Facebook @authenticlivingwithlinda @lindacodlin25

Connect with me for a one on one coaching appointment.

Blame: Whose fault is it anyway?

Hello, My Friends

I hope you have had a week of blessings, that what you have put out into the Universe has come back to you.

That has been my experience this week. When you put out confidence, confidence comes back to you. When you put out fear, fear comes back to you in many disguised forms. When you state what you want and put in the action to back that want up, you find it comes to you, as you planned or in better ways.

This week I’ve been thinking about the subtilties of blame.

Who do you blame for the life you are now living?

Your parents? An Ex? Your spouse or partner? Your boss, current or past? The weather? Climate change?

Blame feels good, you get to lay all your problems onto some-one else. If only they did more, or did it this way, if only he/she didn’t argue so much. If only I was treated with more respect.

Blame lets you pass your life off to someone else’s control.

This is all well and good, when things don’t go right, when you can side step the wrath of some-one who has been hurt or property that has been damaged, and needs replacing.

The thing about blame is, it is a silent killer. It comes in quietly one thought at a time and steals your control, it steals your dreams, it steals your ability to make decisions.

I believe we lay blame because it is easy, it lets us off the hook. We get to point the finger at some-one else, indicating if they hadn’t done what they did then we wouldn’t be where we are now. And there is an element of truth in this.

Today I want to sow a new seed of thought.

What if we took responsibility for everything in our lives?

Instead of blaming our partner for not taking the rubbish out, we take responsibility for it.

If the trash doesn’t get taken out, who does it bother. You or your partner?

You, right? You want the space to be tidy, it is your emotions that are being upset, it is your energy that is being expended.

How about asking your partner to take the trash out? Oh, you’ve tried that, you say, and it sat all day in the house. So, what if you took it out yourself? “Then my partner wins.” What do they win? The laziness game, getting you to do more so they can do less.

If this is the foundation of your relationship, ask yourself, “Does this serve me?” Why would you want to be in a relationship that isn’t built on mutual respect?

In the rubbish scenario, you are giving your emotional power away over a bag of rubbish. If you are unable to take the rubbish out, employ some-one else to. Gain your emotional power back, stop blaming your partner for not fulfilling your needs. Find another way, that doesn’t harm you or your partner to get your needs met.

As you take responsibility for every decision you make, and every action you take, you will regain your power.

“What about things beyond my control?” You ask. You always have a choice, some times the consequence of one choice is less painful than that of another choice, their is always a consequence. Either way you will pay, every time you place the blame on someone else, and take the victim stance of this happened to me, I didn’t have a choice, you give the offender your power. And Yes, maybe they were in the wrong, but you are still suffering the consequence of your choice.

What if you had done a bit of background work and figured out what the long term result would be of not reading the entire contract before signing it, or presuming the other person had your best interests at heart, when your gut was telling you otherwise.

The thing I want you to think about is, who pays the price, the person you are blaming or you.

It is always you.

When-ever you give your energy away to some-one else’s behaviour, you pay the price. By blaming them, you are handing them the reins of your life, you may as well become their slave. They become your excuse for not following your heart, they become the reason you didn’t do as well as you could have done.

What about taking back the reins, acknowledging that your parents, your ex, your boss, your spouse or partner did mess up? What about, telling yourself they did what they did, and it can’t be changed now? What about letting the past go, and living in today.

The thing about blame is that it lives in the past, people may try to place the blame on you for some-thing that hasn’t happened yet, this is a form of manipulation and control. The blame is their issue not yours.

When you choose to be responsible for your thoughts and your actions, all of them, the ‘good’ ones and the ‘bad’ ones, you take back your control, and your power. By being responsible for everything that pertains to your life, you get to make decisions for your life. You take back power over the rubbish, you take back power over your boss, you take back your power over how you allow others to treat you.

Blame strips you of the power to act, it puts you in the passenger seat of your life. You are at the mercy of who ever is driving. Why not be your own driver? Face fear for yourself, instead of because of some one else, face your future head on, rather than through the lens of some-one who doesn’t want what you want.

Will things have to change? Yes! Will you be empowered to do so? I hope so. You are going to live your life anyway, why not make it on your terms? Why not live for your dreams? Why not pay the price for what you want? You’ll be paying a price either way, just with blame you pay the price by giving your power and control to others, when you choose to be responsible you pay the price of learning and growing, becoming empowered and strong, dynamic and victorious in your life.

Until next time, release blame and begin to walk into your power by taking responsibility for every aspect of your life, control all the things within your personal space. (Side note- you can’t control other people, only yourself, your thoughts and your actions)

Happy authentic living, being who you know are meant to be.

xoxo Linda

#authenticlivingwithlinda

Email me at authenticlivingwithlinda@gmail.com

Find me on Facebook @authenticlivingwithlinda @lindacodlin25

Connect with me for a one on one coaching appointment.

8 Questions to Ask to Unravel Limiting Beliefs.

There are no limits to what you can accomplish,

Except the limits you allow to remain in place,

Kept in play by your thinking.

Inspired by Brian Tracy

Hello, My Friends

What a week I’ve enjoyed! Business meetings, client consults, writing and journaling. Creating beauty, peace and style within my home, enjoying the fresh daffodils that spring is producing. I love the way my home feels, inviting and homely. What are the high lights of your week? Do you get enjoyment from them? Tell me in the comments below.

We all have a mindset, every second of every day, we are receiving and reviewing information. That is what our brain does, it receives input from all our senses, it decides what is important and what isn’t.

Sometimes our brain tells us something is more important than it really it, or neglects to pass on a message that is really important.

Underneath our conscious mind is the sub-conscious mind, this is the mastermind that runs the show. The mastermind determines what we actually do and believe. This sub-conscious mind has been given programmes based on our history and often the beliefs of others. If we are unaware of who is in the drivers seat we sabotage ourselves, and don’t know why.

Today’s topic is about investigating what is stopping you from getting, doing and being what you want. It is always, always, always a thought. Finding this thought may take some digging, usually the thought was laid in the very foundation of your life before you could walk, talk, or even know you have the ability to think. You see, as infants your sub-conscious mind is wide open to all the stimuli around you, you are an emotional being, you feel with your emotions, your intuition and perceptions, as a baby, you don’t have a filter, you gain this at around the age of seven or eight. So everything that happens around you and to you is gobbled up into your subconscious mind, without any view of right or wrong, This comes when some-one else teaches you how to think.

Okay, today. Lets have a look at Limiting Beliefs.

These are the beliefs that hold you back, stop you from moving forward into the life you’d really like to live.

A limiting belief shows itself as an action, or a lack of action.

Procrastination, Boredom, Overwhelm, Anxiety and so many more.

Each of these are created by a thought.

8 QUESTIONS TO ASK YOURSELF.

What is limiting me from achieving what I really want?

What do you really want? If you don’t know what you’re not getting, or doing then how can you work out what is stopping you?

You may need to ask yourself “What is stopping me from …?” a few times. Write down your responses until you to get to the true core of the situation.

For the example I’m about to share with you, I’d been ‘busy’ doing everything except what actually needed doing. The word for that is procrastination. I had to dig deeper, yes procrastination was the action, but, what was I thinking? Sitting under the procrastination was the feeling of being bored and overwhelmed at the same. (Could these two be the opposites of the same coin?)

I’m not normally some-one to be bored, as I always have some-thing on the go, and I’ve learned to overcome overwhelm by picking one thing, beginning, and sticking at it till it’s done. So for me, this was a bit of a flag.

What is limiting me from achieving what I really want?

What did I really want? To complete a written task that had a deadline.

What was limiting me?

Boredom and Overwhelm.

When I asked this question, this statement popped into my head, randomly, so I decided to go with it and see where it led me.

My limiting belief statement was, ‘Lazy people sit around and do nothing all day.’

Please do not be offended, I am using a real event from my life, to show how confronting and sneaky a limiting belief can be.

Acceptance and awareness are key to acknowledging a belief that may be limiting you. The louder your inner critic talks the more likely you are to have hit the nail on the head. My inner critic was in shock and disgust, “I am not a lazy person, “I hardly ever stop to rest or have fun.”

Whose voice is this?

Whose voice do you hear saying this statement? What is the background to the statement? This is not the time for judging the speaker, you want to be aware of who is speaking with curiosity and interest.

For me, this was my mother’s voice ,in judgement of her mother. “Sitting knitting is not working.” As a child I heard this comment only once, we were visiting my grandparents. There is a back story to this, which I won’t go into now. My perception of this one statement, was that sitting around meant you were lazy, and this was to be avoided, which explained a lot of my behaviours as I was growing up. My interpretation in this event was, “Sitting writing is not working.”

Is it true?

Is the statement of your belief true? Yes or No

For my situation. No! Not all people who sit around all day are lazy. “I am not lazy”

Is it helpful?

Does this statement help you to achieve your goal? How does it make you feel? How do you show up when you are feeling this way? Do you like how you show up?

In my situation it was not helpful. I was feeling militant, I would show up with gritted teeth and sheer determination, to “show them I was not lazy.” This was not the attitude of love and respect I wanted to come from.

What is my identity with this belief?

Does this belief feed into other beliefs? How have you lived from this belief? Is there a pattern to your life, stemming from this statement?

In my situation, this belief sat along side the belief of having to work hard for a living and that pleasure always comes after work. My belief was that work was hard, body breaking labour, and writing was not that for me, I enjoy writing, it comes easily to me, so then it can’t be work. Right! Hence the limiting belief. Also resting and fun were not options if I wanted to succeed. What I really wanted, was for pleasure to be my drawcard, to find love and pleasure in everything I did or didn’t do. My pattern was, the work was never done, so there was never time for love, fun or pleasure.

Why is this belief so important to me?

This is usually where we find the thought that is hiding behind the belief, the driver of what is actually going on. When you find this thought, Ask yourself, Why is this so important to me? What would happen if I changed this thought?

In my situation, my reply was working hard and not resting was so I wouldn’t be judged. (That opened another can of worms for another time). I asked myself, “Why is the judgement of others dominating my thoughts and actions? What would happen if I knew I was worthy of downtime, pleasure and relaxation. What would it mean if I did nothing but sit?

The secret to this question is to write down all the sub answers, these are the arguments for your belief being around, these answers are what your sub-conscious mind believes to be evidence that this belief is true.

It is in changing these sub answer thoughts, that the belief can be changed. Use this system to dissect each of your sub answers, getting closer to the real truth of how they came to be in your life in the first place. Remember no self judgment, only interest and intrigue about how they came to be.

What is your solution? What thoughts do you need to think to live in your solution?

If you responded with “I don’t know?” “What if you did know? What is your intuition telling you to do?” This is the thought you must act on. Build a positive, present tense affirmation around this thought. Write it onto a card to carry it in your pocket, or make it a screen saver on your phone, to remind yourself of the belief you are putting in place, to remove the redundant belief.

In my situation, I had to plan downtime, to figure out the attitude behind having to fill every moment with activities. To include pleasure tasks that don’t involve action or movement. Sitting drinking a cuppa, just because I could. To find the value of pleasure in everything, whether in activity or in rest.

The final step: Is to safely burn the piece of paper that the limiting belief is written on.

For some reason this cements into the sub-conscious mind that this limiting belief is done with, and gives freedom to build a new thought pattern to replace the old pattern. As we build evidence of the new belief with our actions our brain recognizes that this is now, our new operating system and transfers our thoughts and actions to this system. Giving us permanent success.

Learning to allow more pleasure into my life has had many far reaching benefits. One is that I no longer procrastinate over sitting and writing. I do what needs doing as it is required to be done.

Use these 8 questions to unravel what is stopping you from getting the results you want from your life, in a way that makes you happy.

Until next time, live into your authentic self.

If you require help to unravel your tricky limiting beliefs, you can connect with me, my contact details are below.

oxox Linda

#authenticlivingwithlinda

Email me at authenticlivingwithlinda@gmail.com

Find me on Facebook @authenticlivingwithlinda @lindacodlin25

Connect with me for a one on one coaching appointment.

Telling Your Story, Your Way.

Writing your story to benefit your future, is, in your hands.

Tell your hero’s story.

The victor gets to write the story, be the victor of your past stories.

Hello, My Friends

Do you ever get so excited about something that your words fall out of your mouth before you have a chance to filter them?

This is exactly what happened to me. I was talking to some one who happened to mention my favourite subject, and before I knew it I was rabbiting on, sharing stories that I thought had been long forgotten, and the painful memories that went with those stories.

Once the muddy memory was stirred and my emotions fired up, my mouth went into overdrive. No putting the brake on, the memory had escaped into the present and was wrecking havoc with my ability to focus on what was at hand.

One day I may share this memory, but for today I’ll share how to get on top of a runaway story from the past.

The first thing as always is awareness. How can you stop a freight train in full go mode, if you don’t know you want to stop it?

Identify the memory, this bit is easy. Once the mud had been stirred it, it was clear (as disturbed mud) where the memory was. The more difficult part was to sit and listen to my brain retell it.

And it wasn’t putting me as the heroine. I was the victim, my brain was telling me who had done me wrong, and how and why they should pay. It was enjoying rerunning the details, blow by blow. Imagination is a wonderful tool, when it is used for our benefit.

I let my brain go on for a while, reliving the emotions and the sensations that those emotions evoked in my body, welling up in tears when it got to the saddest part, and feeling the anger surge violently when I wasn’t going to put up with the abuse anymore.

Once the picture had run it’s course, I was exhausted. Emotional reruns do that to us.

I sat in the semi-darkness, nursing the left over feelings of hurt, shame and guilt.

Then I decided this story was done, this would be the last time it gets to play with my emotions, with my permission. Creating a feeling of victim-ness in me. From this moment forward this story would become my empowerment to better things.

Pulling out my journal, I went into my sacred secret garden.

Ordering my movie projector player to begin again, I rewrote the story. I turned the villain into the victim, they were the victim of their life training. I made a decision to see them as a human. Isn’t it weird how we dehumanize people who do not live or think like we do.

I altered the details and the feelings around situations that happened.

That’s the great think about memories, they are an emotional stamp of an event. AND we have the ability to alter that emotional stamp at any time, so we feel better about the event and how we handled it.

The truth is, the event happened and I can’t change that. I can’t change the outcome or the physical facts surrounding the situation, but I can and I am choosing to change my story about myself and others in the story.

I am using this story to reinforce my belief that I am powerful, I am growing and maturing. I am empowered by the hardships, knocks and events that have happened, that were intended to keep me small, and make me believe I was broken. I am the heroine of my story. I survived and I am here.

Sitting in the semi-darkness, by the light of a touch lamp barely glowing, I wrote out all the heart ache, all the sorrow, all the guilt and all the shame. I cleansed my mind, my body and my spirit of all the feelings that generated vibrations that didn’t lead me to peace, harmony or joy.

Once I’d written everything out, there was no editing or monitoring my words, the hurt, and hateful emotions spewed out onto the page in all it’s ugliness, the bitterness, the feelings of broken-ness, and never feeling like I’d ever be ‘normal’ again, were all written in unreadable words. Peace flowed into the space that all this darkness and hurt had once been.

Ripping the pages out of my journal, I screwed them up and placed them on the imaginary altar in my sacred secret garden and burned them. In reality, I took those pages filled with hate and hurt to the incinerator and watched as the pages flared bright orange and the smoke wafted in the breeze taking the emotions away with it.

Peace had returned. Now, the Universe doesn’t like empty spaces, so back to my journal. This time to rewrite the ending of this story the way I want to remember it. With peace and love for myself. This is my version of the story and I can tell it however I want to. So I write all the good and marvelous things this event created for me. The fabulous people I met and the impact they had in changing my life. The skills I have now because of this situation and the way I learned to manage. I am who I am today partly because of this event.

Gratitude slowly moved into my heart, the feeling that everything does happen to strengthen me, and teach me how to be my best self, honestly with authenticity. The feeling that I can trust myself to handle any situation that comes my way, gives me confidence to let my emotions be.

So, what started out as a painful filter-less moment, turned into healing, hope, love and gratitude.

Was it easy? Nope! Definitely not.

Was it uncomfortable? Yip! Very, feeling emotions that have been locked up and hidden away for a long time are usually stronger and compounded by the fact that they have been locked up. So, when they are freed they over-compensate and are heightened.

Was it freeing? Oh, Yes! This is one story that has been set free.

Will it come up again? Most likely, my brain likes to dwell and ruminate on the hurtful past, for some reason it thinks it’s doing me a favour. I have a new story now and I share the revised version with my mind. Repetition is great for memory recall.

So into the future with one less bag of hurt to hold be back and trip me up.

Do you have a story from your past that has you playing the victim?

Does it keep you stuck in feelings of smallness, hurt, and pain?

You can find healing and peace too, find some one you trust who can guide you through a similar process to the one I followed, clear the hate, hurt and pain from your life, so you can walk briskly with light steps and a joyful heart into your future scene.

Until next time, remember your past stories by choice rather than by default.

xoxo Linda

#authenticlivingwithlinda

Email me at authenticlivingwithlinda@gmail.com

Find me on Facebook @authenticlivingwithlinda @lindacodlin25

Connect with me for a one on one coaching appointment.

What is your Truth?

The light within you,

illuminates your truth,

nurture your seed of truth,

watch it grow,

let your truth shelter,

you from life’s storms.

Hello, My Friends

Hand picked spring flowers, scent permeating through the house, inviting.

The little things that show some-one loves you.

What are the little things that make you feel loved and appreciated?

Is it a cup of hot coffee waiting for you, when you rise in the morning?

Maybe it’s a smile and a sticky kiss?

Or maybe it’s having a tidy space to live and work in?

What about a hand written card, or letter?

A neck rub when you’ve had a stressful day, or dinner on the table at the end of a long tiring day?

Do you even notice the little appreciative acts of those around you?

What is your self talk when you receive a compliment?

Do you nod in agreement and murmur “Thank You.” or do you minimize the compliment telling yourself, “If they really knew the true me they wouldn’t be so nice.”

Some-one the other day asked me, “How do you know what your truth is?”

What a great question.

Looking back over my life, I realize that I was sold a lot of lies which unfortunately I believed. The lies formed the way I viewed everything.

I couldn’t believe I was worthy of love, so I couldn’t accept love. I would hear people telling me how much they loved and appreciated me with my ears, but my heart had it’s shield up and deflected the words. My mind always had suspicions as to the motives of others, it would tell me they wanted some-thing, to be aware of the wolf in sheep’s skin.

However deep inside me I knew I was better than how I was feeling and responding. Some feeling deep inside me, well hidden from the light of love stirred, questioned.

Always the thought, “There has to me more to life than this?” “When will I find true love?” “Why am I so broken, and how do I get fixed?”

Then I stumbled across a secret, and it watered the seed, deep in my heart. Slowly the light of a new better thought seeped into my spirit, and the seed of love began to grow.

I learned that for me to accept love from anyone outside of me, I must allow the seed of love within me to grow.

How do I love me?

What about you? Do you love yourself from the inside, out?

This is where your truth lies, your truth is deep inside you.

Learning to love who you are releases you from the emotional chains that captivate.

How do you begin to love yourself?

You admit your life sucks, that you are not the person you want to be, that you don’t treat yourself or others with kindness or respect, that you want more than the life you are stuck in, that you are unhappy in your body, that you want your life to have more meaning.

Or maybe you’re like I was, I put on a happy and smiley face, on the surface I appeared to be happy, I was polite and kind on the surface, however under the surface I was like a volcano just waiting for a weak spot to trigger an explosion.

You become aware of and acknowledge honestly all the ways you are not who you want to be. Be kind to yourself, you are doing the best you can with what you know.

The beliefs that hold your life together, are forging the habits that make your life what it is.

A belief is a thought that we have thought over and over, until it becomes second nature. These beliefs then become the auto pilot on which our lives run with little or no thought required, they become the set point which our behaviour reverts to in times of stress and tension, they determine how we live our lives. And we aren’t even aware they are running the show.

For me, my belief that I was unlovable, and unworthy were not serving me. So I created a new thought, I created a way of living, that made the new thought part of my reality. Constant repetition of a thought that stepped my belief up one degree at a time, until I had a new set point to live by.

I stopped striving and struggling to be perfect, I relaxed into being me.

What is your truth?

Truth is like the sun.
You can shut it out for a time but it ain’t goin’ away.
Elvis Presley

What if you stopped striving and struggling to be everything to every-one and became you?

Are you an artist in hiding? Are you a nurturer, some-one who loves to help people?

Do you have a hidden dream in your soul? Do you want to be a professor? A published author? A skilled craftsperson, creating fine furniture that lasts for generations? Do you want to be an owner operator of your own business? or do you want to go fishing and hunting on your own piece of paradise?

What is your truth?

The truth is still the truth, even if you don’t believe it,
And a lie is still a lie, even if you do believe it.

The life you are living today doesn’t have to be your truth.

Human’s have a gene that is always wanting more than they have, we are always looking to grow. Humans are seeking growth emotionally, physically, and spiritually, often we don’t understand this and misread the need to acquire more, study more, and want more as a ‘negative” trait, feeling unsatisfied is one way we know it is time to grow and look for the next challenge.

What is your truth?

Begin to seek your truth and you will find it.

Everything begins with a thought. If you can think a thought you can change a thought.

Loving yourself is thinking about yourself in kind and respectful ways. Every thing starts with a thought. Your belief about yourself is made up of thoughts. The things you have surrounded yourself with began with a thought. Your style of dress is a way of thinking. Your way of eating, walking and talking are all formed by thought repetitions.

You can think a thought, you can change a thought.

Your truth is already within you, you have probably had an idea or an inkling of what you would like to do, be or have. Try and see if this is where your truth lives. You will know your truth because it will feel like coming home.

Seek out your authentic truth, and move into that with ease and grace.

Live your TRUTH boldly.
Others may decide to think less of you,
but it isn’t your job to prove worth,
It is your job to live knowing your worth
can never be defined by another’s assumptions.
Hold your head high, be proud,
carry on.
Rachel marie martin

xoxo Linda

#authenticlivingwithlinda

Email me at authenticlivingwithlinda@gmail.com

Find me on Facebook @authenticlivingwithlinda @lindacodlin25

Connect with me for a one on one coaching appointment.

5 Attributes of STYLE.

STYLE IS .. A FEELING

STYLE IS .. AN ATTITUDE

STYLE IS .. MAKING CHOICES

STYLE IS .. QUALITY OVER QUANTITY

STYLE IS .. SELF-LOVE

Hello, My Friends

Young children have enthusiasm, their energy seems boundless.

How do we tap into this enthusiasm and energy?

Waking up with pep and vitality, our young grandson was in action the minute his feet hit the floor. He was asking questions and waiting for the answers, he was interested in everything. Wanted to know how things went together, asked questions of people, respectfully, seeking answers to his active mind.

Imagine if we were as open and enquiring as this young boy.

This week I’ve been talking about style on my Facebook page. (authenticlivingwithlinda or lindacodlin25)

5 attributes of style …

STYLE IS.. A FEELING
STYLE IS.. AN ATTITUDE
STYLE IS.. MAKING CHOICES
STYLE IS.. QUALITY OVER QUANTITY
STYLE IS.. LOVING YOURSELF

STYLE IS A FEELING.

Everything we do, we do for the feeling we believe it will give us.

The style you live your life in right now is because of a feeling you think it will give you.

Maybe you think if you do what you are told you will be loved, and accepted.

Maybe you feel if you stay over weight no-one will notice you, and you’ll feel safe.

Maybe you think, by living a small and contained life, I’ll never be hurt.

Or maybe you feel you need the latest gadgets, and the fastest cars to be seen and liked.

Maybe you want to be the centre of attention so you are continually getting in mischief.

These are all states of feeling.

Every action you take or don’t take, gives you, or takes you away from, a feeling you want or don’t want. Every thing you do is for the feeling you believe it will give you.

Style, everyone has a style. Your style may be to appear different, or it might be to fit in. What is the feeling your style gives you. DO YOU LIKE THIS FEELING? If so, sweet carry on living the way you are. If not you can change it. Only you can change it, because it comes from inside you.

2. STYLE IS AN ATTITUDE.

What is attitude anyway? Attitude is the way your thoughts, beliefs, and actions intercept to produce a reaction in your body.

Everyone has an attitude, often we try very hard to cover up our attitudes, especially if they will be perceived and judged as being negative. Your attitude shows up in the way you walk, the way you talk and in the way you do things, or don’t do things.

The way you do one thing is the way you do anything. This is talking about your attitude, if you have a negative attitude toward work, you won’t give your work your full attention or your best.

If you have a cheerful attitude, you probably find life is kind and cheerful. The thing about attitude and your current style is that they can’t be faked. When you apply a cheerful smile over a disgruntled emotion, the emotion will come through every time.

You can alter your attitude by, investigating your thoughts, beliefs and actions. Often we begin with our actions because they are easy to see. The thing about that is your actions are created by your thoughts and beliefs. If you want permanent change in your actions, work with your thoughts and beliefs at the same time.

Style is your attitude to life, do you like the results your attitude have gotten you so far. Remember style is as much an inside job as it is an outward appearance. Only you can truly answer how you really feel about your style of living.

3. STYLE IS MAKING CHOICES.

We make hundreds of choices every day, most we don’t even think about.

Our lives are made up of thousands of seemingly little, insignificant decisions. These decisions are choices, and they can have far reaching outcomes. For example lets say you’re feeling a bit blue, so you don’t get up when you normally would, you skip your morning walk, shower, and daily hygiene routine to lounge on the sofa and watch a movie you’ve been meaning to see.

This may seem like a one off, but your mind now has ammunition to use the next time you don’t feel like going to work, or going for a walk. Your mind will remind you how good it felt to sit on the couch. And before you know it you are having to battle your mind to do what was your normal routine. The more ammunition we give our brain the more it will either work for us or against us, our brain doesn’t care either way, it just wants to keep us alive, and it loves to solve problems.

Have you noticed that at times your brain will create problems to solve? Making decisions that are in alignment with what you want from your life and in sync with your values will give your brain something constructive to focus on.

Decision making is a skill that can be learned, it is a style we use either for our benefit or for our detriment. How do you make decisions? What is your style of choosing what you want from your life? Style is learning to make decisions that align with what you want, in a way that benefits you and those around you.

4. STYLE IS QUALITY OVER QUANTITY.

Quality by implication suggests flawlessness, superior workmanship, longer lasting and of excellence in character, form or use.

Often we use monetary value to decide the quality of an item or service, this can leave space between what we want and what we get.

How often do we purchase a lesser value item because of the number on the tag?

How often do we purchase things in quantity because we perceive them to be a bargain and we may need them one day?

Do you purchase items from an attitude of lack and fear? Are you afraid if you don’t buy now and stock up that you may not be able to afford it later?

Is your personal space full of gadget you thought would make you feel good, to discover that they didn’t? Often we spend our money with the intent of avoiding or gaining an emotional response.

When we learn to feel our emotions for what they are, and learn to seek out the feelings we want on purpose, we may find our need for shiny trinkets drops off.

Style is choosing quality, purchasing one item of the finest workmanship you have the resources for, that will be a generational piece, rather than many items of lesser craft. Over time you will find that your standard of living will increase, the items in your personal space enhance your feeling of space and peace.

What do the items you surround yourself with, say about your style? Generally our external environment is a reflection of our inner thinking and emotional state. When we are feeling trapped we try to find things that will distract us, when we are feeling overwhelmed we become lethargic and unable to move. Style is about the quality of your thoughts and feelings. Style is about the quality of your questions. Style is about the quality of your possessions. Style is about the quality of your clothes. Quality is an integral part of Style.

What does your style say about the quality of person you are? Do you like what you see?

You get to upgrade your quality of living, and as you do so upgrade your style.

5. STYLE IS LOVING YOURSELF.

Loving yourself is respecting who you are. How you treat yourself inwardly shows up in your exterior style of living.

Everything you do speaks to the way you see yourself, whether you love and respect yourself, or whether you see yourself as being worthy or unworthy of the best life has to offer.

The style of self love, is caring about how you look, your hairstyle, your posture, your body and how you clothe it.

The style of self-love is how you show up for yourself, the way you put your needs ahead of other people’s needs. (Often we don’t do for ourselves, what we will do for others. ) The style of self-love is in the safe boundaries you have around your thoughts, and around the way you allow other people to treat you, talk to you, use you and abuse you.

The style of self-love is when you have confidence to stand up for yourself, have strength of character to face hard things head on, giving yourself grace to make mistakes and to learn from them.

Style is found in everything you do or don’t do.

It is my intention that you will begin to look at what you do, what you have, and what you want in your life, and ask yourself how your current style of living is enhancing and moving you forward to feeling, and experiencing the life you really want.

Learning to live in your authentic style is the feeling of freedom to be you.

Until next time, happy styling.

xoxo Linda

#authenticlivingwithlinda

Email me at authenticlivingwithlinda@gmail.com

Find me on Facebook @authenticlivingwithlinda @lindacodlin25

Connect with me for a one on one coaching appointment.

Use Your BUTS to Benefit YOU.

Thoughts create actions.

Goal cards are passports to the future.

Goal Cards create focus.

BUTS are the flags that warn of impending danger to achievement.

Action creates evidence.

Hello, My Friends

This week, has seen our young grandson of 8, staying with us while his parents are working. We’ve had fun creating a knights helmet, sword and flag, the shield is still in progress.

This little person is a real chatterbox, I’d forgotten how difficult it is to listen and get things done. I love his sunny disposition, and the joy he brings. He is learning to think strategically by playing endless games of squares, (You start with a grid of dots, each person joins two dots with a line, the goal is to prevent the other person from making a square, or series of squares.) and working out how to win at noughts and crosses.

This week I had a stark reminder of how our thoughts create our actions. Three weeks ago, hubby opened a jar of homemade jam. This particular jam was very well set, and didn’t spread easily. My daughter and I were reminiscing about some of the baking I did when she was a child, this got me thinking about how I could use this jam.

Cheese cakes; that’s what the recipe book called them. I recalled they were delicious, a pastry shell, with a jam centre and sponge topping. My mouth was watering as I thought about them. I baked them this weekend, they smelled divine.

Over the last few months I have been eliminating the amount of sugar and refined flours I have been consuming. Usually baking doesn’t bother me, but this week my mind did a number on me and I wasn’t on guard enough to counter it.

It used the old thought pattern of, “You know one won’t hurt you. ” “Remember how delicious they were.” ” You’ll feel so good after you’ve had one.” “Go on have a little one, no-one needs to know.”

Have you ever had your mind trick you with these sweet words?

I gave some of the baking to our neighbours, in an effort to reduce the temptation. I put them away in the cupboard, figuring out of sight was out of mind. No! My mind was very determined I needed these cakes.

Late in the evening I went to the cupboard, I put the plate on the coffee table with my herbal tea, I told myself they were for my hubby. Who was I kidding? Hubby knew and I knew. I had decided to have one. I knew, I would from the time I had baked them, I just didn’t want to admit it to myself.

So my feelings over ruled all my thinking and planning not to eat any, They overcame my cajoling, bribing and good intentions that I had at the outset . My brain had sold me on the wonderful feeling this cake would give me.

Reality, I didn’t enjoy it as much as I thought I would.

I no longer need food to feed my emotions. I am in a place where I can feel what I’m feeling. So I allowed myself to feel the disappointment of allowing myself to be duped by a past that doesn’t belong in my present.

I gave myself the grace to do a YOU TURN, to not beat myself up, and to deal with the fact that I broke my two month trend for something so unsatisfying. It’s a new day, and now my body is dealing the consequences of sugar and refined flour. I will use this as a reminder in the future as evidence that I actually do know what is best for my body.

What about you? What little seed of doubt, or negativity, or disbelieve has wormed it’s way into your thinking? What is promising you the wonderfulness of feeling great, even though you know it will have a sting in its tail?

As I mentioned earlier, all it took for my thoughts to runaway from me, was a memory of how I perceived this morsel of food once made me feel, and in the hope that it would create that feeling again, I allowed it grow until it came into fruition.

When we flip these little seeds on there head, they also have the ability to be a little seed of inspiration, motivation and what could be. We pick up a thought that we could be slender, we could earn more money, we could drive a nicer car, we could have more love and affection.

When we sit in the place of imagination and let this thought grow, and blossom, we give our idea wings, and we give our brain a challenge. Our brain loves challenges.

Before our seed of inspiration grows into maturity it needs to be nurtured, watered, and fed. We do this by research, my sitting with the positive side of what if. What if this could actually happen?

And before the big BUT, comes along to snaffle your inspiration and idea away. STOP.

Listen to the BUT. Write out all the BUTS, especially the so called negative ones. These buts are your friends.

You may say, “But I can’t go into business for myself.” “But I can’t lose weight.” “But I am too sick to do that. ” “But I can’t manage money.”” But my family will laugh at me. ” But …. (Whatever your BUT is. )

Your BUT is helping you to see what you believe to be true about you. This is good. It is only when we get a true reading of what we really believe and think, can we change it.

This is where the emotional work begins. Everything we currently do, we do for the feeling we believe we gain from it. Our actions either lead us away from pain, or towards pleasure. There is a subtle difference in the wording, but a huge difference in the energy emitted from our actions.

When you begin to take action towards what you want, rather than taking action by moving away from what you don’t want, you invoke the law of attraction and begin to put into practice the compound effect. The Compound Effect is where small, seemingly insignificant actions taken over a long period of time create vast results. For example by choosing to not eat dessert every night, over the period of a year or so, you will be able to see the results on your body. If you added a walk instead of the desert you will see results quicker, Small manageable actions can have huge effects.

Also you begin to create evidence for your brain, you are proving to yourself that you are the kind of person who … Doesn’t eat dessert, who enjoys evening walks, who is reducing your body size and gaining fitness. This evidence is used to silence your inner critic.

This was part of the steps, I didn’t include in my battle with my brain and my feelings. If I had reminded myself that I am a person who only eats for health and well-being, that sugary and floury foods are like poison in my body. I could have stood down the entire scenario before it took over. Lesson to be learned, always have what you DO want in front of you. In cases of temptation, pull out your goal card, read it and visualise how you feel, having already gained it. Remind your emotions how wonderful it is to be the person who has money, slimness, mobility without pain, love, and happiness. Remind yourself how it feels to be driving the car you want, sitting in your lounge, reclining on your self massaging chair, or watching television in your purpose built media room. What ever your goal is, keep the feeling and visual of it in front of you. This inspires and motivates your mind, letting it know that you are willing to do the emotional work and the physical action to make it yours.

So, BUTS are your friends, they let you know what is stopping you. Your goal card is your passport to a new life. Use it to remind yourself of the feeling you will gain when you have the goal. Use your imagination to see yourself enjoying your goal. Then set your determination to do the action to make it happen.

Be your authentic self, living the life you want for your future today.

xoxo Linda.

#authenticlivingwithlinda

Email me at authenticlivingwithlinda@gmail.com

Find me on Facebook @authenticlivingwithlinda @lindacodlin25

Connect with me for a one on one coaching appointment.

Emotional Labour is the hardest work ever!

Nothing is, until we think a thought about it.

Well, hello, my beautiful friends.

What a week I’ve had, temper tantrums, unmotivated episodes, joyful elation and dedication to my dream.

This week I set the goal to reupholster the new(ish) dining chairs, hubby had done the labour intensive work of sanding and varnishing, it was my job to add the fabric, I gathered all the tools I thought I would need, I gathered my enthusiasm, and began.

As a qualifier, I have never upholstered any thing before, so DIY Linda at the helm. I cut out the fabric following the pattern (old fabric that came off the chair) First attempt, I didn’t allow enough fold under. Second attempt was much better. Positioning the fabric on the chair I smoothed it out and began using the heavy duty hand stapler.

When did I lose the strength in my hands? It took a lot of effort to squeeze the spring loaded handle, to eject the staple where I wanted it to go, only to find that as the staple left the gun it bounced on chair and the staple didn’t go flat into the chair. Long story short, it took three attempts (I stapled and re-stapled the entire chair three times) to get the first chair covered, in the process I discovered it was best to use the little office stapler to ‘tack’ the fabric in place so it wouldn’t move or stretch as I prepared the fold under, I methodically used two hands to fire off the staple, one to squeeze the trigger, the other to hold the head onto the surface with my body positioned directly above the chair legs.

Straightening the crinkles out of my back, I surveyed my work. Not too bad. The failed staples scattered all over the floor were testament to learning in progress, feeling pretty pleased with myself I admired chair number one and told myself the next one will be easier now that I know what I’m doing. And it was.

Chair number four was my undoing, tiredness had set in, the staples began jamming, the fabric was stretching and needed redoing. Ah! My temper flared, it was time to have a break. Now, for those who know me, I can be very stubborn, obstinate even. There was no way I was going to let a little thing like a stapler and pleats stop me finishing the job. Hubby walked in to find me beating up the stapler to remove the stuck staples. Frustration has a way of making us behave in irrational ways. He gently took the stapler, removed the blockage and reloaded it for me. (I know the stapler had nothing to do with my frustration, it was how I was thinking about the job, wanting to get it finished that was causing my frustration) Finally after re-stapling the entire chair twice, with another pile of twisted and useless staples on the floor the chair was done. Phew! Only two chairs to go.

Drama, I created it, I felt it, and I reacted to it. Not very well at that.

One good thing about this entire saga, is, I now know I created it, and I can change it. In the past I’d have taken out my frustration on anyone in the area, and that anger would have simmered for days under the surface, affecting every other interaction I had whether human or not. Not anymore, I went for a long soak in a super hot, deep bath and relaxed all the frustration out of my body and brain.

Tell me about your week. In the comments below share with me your successes and your frustrations?

Nothing is, until we think a thought about it.

Often we don’t do what we know we ought to be doing. Why?

We are having a thought about the action, and that thought is creating resistance in our mind, which our body reacts to.

Often, the hardest part of doing anything is beginning. Getting the body in motion, once we have begun, the task is not as daunting as we first thought.

Emotional labour is the hardest work ever. I read this the other day, and it is so true.

How many times do we make an easy five minute job, last all day?

It’s the emotional resistance to doing the job that creates the conflict within us.

I remember when I had four babies under four, cloth nappies were the norm, and washing was a huge thing for me, I had children who were bedwetters, creating mountains of washing.

When I was in poor me, life is hard mode, the washing pile just grew and took over the house, unwashed linen and clothes in the laundry, and washed, unfolded clothes on the couch in the lounge. One day, I’d had enough, I had to figure out a better way to handle this mountain of washing. The bedwetting wasn’t going to stop any time soon, so I figured out at way to reduce the amount of washing, by doctoring the children’s bedding, by making the washing my first priority every day. Getting it washed, and hung on the line. I learned to fold it as it came off the line directly into the basket, and to put it away as soon as it I took it inside. I created a system for hanging and labelling the clothes, so each child’s items were hung and folded together, making putting them away easier. I conquered the mountain of clothes. It took time and planning. It took focus and effort. It took thought power. The emotional labour of having had enough, and needing to be willing to do something different to give me a different result, and a better feeling about myself and the laundry situation gave me the drive to find a solution.

What is your emotional labour?

What are you avoiding?

What will it take for you to have enough, and draw a line under it?

To say, “I won’t take this any more”, and find a solution that will make you feel better.

The emotional labour is the hardest work ever, once we step over the threshold, past the brain and our thoughts about any activity we have been putting off, the activity becomes easier.

Life is not supposed to be so hard.

Our Emotional Responses make life what we want it to be.

Make your life easy, elegant and efficient by choosing the thoughts you think about everything.

Nothing is, until we think a thought about it.

I’d love to hear what you think about this statement.

Accountability buddies enhance personal power.

An accountability buddy gives you the wings to be IMPERFECT so you can soar with confidence.

vickyayala.com

Hello, My Friends

This week has been a long one. We have been in level 4 lockdown. The thing is, this week has the exact same number of hours as last week, and the exact same number as next week will have. The only difference is the way I have viewed them. Interesting isn’t it, how the thoughts we allow to sneak in have a way of taking over.

Spending time with hubby seemed to be more fun than working. Reality check, if you ignore the work it waits for you. And, then monitoring your self talk about excuses you gave yourself for not doing the work becomes really important.

Authentic living with Linda, is about authenticity, being real with who we are, and where we are at.

Life doesn’t always go to plan. We don’t always feel like doing the right thing at the right time. We lose the plot now and then. Welcome to humanity.

Today I want to talk about accountability and personal power.

In psychology the meaning of accountability is the extent to which an individual is answerable to another (e.g., a supervisor, official review body, a group of peers) for his or her behavior, decisions, or judgments.

Also in psychology there definition of personal power is characterized by freedom from the dominance of others. It is infinite, it’s about access to and control of limitless inner resources, such as our skills and abilities, our deeply held values, our true personalities, and our boldest selves.

How do we meld these two seemingly opposing elements into our lives?

I want to suggest that when we live in our personal power, we value the accountability we have to ourselves first, and then to others.

Accountability is a choice we make. Just like living in our personal power is a choice. Sometimes it is productive for us to have some-one to report to, they help to keep us on track.

The question is whose track are you on? Are you on a track that you have deliberately chosen for yourself, or are you walking the track of some-one else?

Accountability is a tool that we can use to measure our results, without monitoring how we are going, we could end up in entirely a different space to where we want to be. The most important person to be accountable to, for our behaviours, judgements, and decisions is ourselves. When we are moving forward in our personal power, accessing the infinite wisdom, resources and abilities that are within us, and acting on these. It is to our future selves that we are accountable to live into our full potential.

Do you have a goal that scares you? A desire to do something so great and wonderful you don’t share it with anyone because they will think you are crazy. This is where your person power lives, it’s in the goals and dreams that pull you out of mediocrity. It is in who you have to become to live in your wonderful dream.

My life is very different today than it was two years ago. I grabbed onto my big dream, and began the journey of redeeming my personal power. Of becoming accountable to me.

The only person I have to prove anything to is me. The only person you have to prove anything to is yourself. Such an easy to write statement, and such a difficult statement to live from.

If you, like me, grew up in an environment that taught, you were acceptable by the way you behaved, then being accountable and caring what others think about you is really important.

Learning to be accountable to myself, for myself is a journey of many pitfalls. And it all boils down to how I think. To the beliefs I hold as true about myself. Our self image depicts how we see ourselves. Have you ever wondered why you can do almost impossible things for other people, but you can’t get out of bed to go for a run in the mornings? It’s your image of yourself, you don’t see yourself as someone who lets other people down, but your own personal standards allow you to let yourself down all the time.

Having an accountability buddy helps you to overcome letting yourself down, as you grow into the belief that you are a person who shows up for yourself and for what you have planned. Your accountability buddy is like having training wheels on your bicycle as you learn to ride unimpeded. As you gain momentum and your thoughts about your ability to show up and act with your personal power become stronger, you and your buddy can remove the training wheels for the activity you were in training for.

The great thing about growing into our personal power is that it is a continual journey, as we master one skillset we can move into the next skillset, taking our accountability buddy with us.

Do you have an accountability buddy? Some-one who will encourage you, inspire you, pick you up when you lag behind. Some-one who thinks the best of you, who won’t let you get away with less than your full potential, some-one who will goad you and motivate you when you run out of belief in yourself. An accountability buddy is some-one who will hold you to account to do what you say you will do, they will help to keep you moving towards your big and sometimes scary goal, when you want to run back to the safety of your cave.

Your personal power is the battery that gives you the energy to plan, to step forward and begin walking when the path is still unknown and unseen. Your personal power is made up of your intuition, your perception, your belief in yourself, and in your will to persevere against all odds.

Tap into your personal power to move into your freedom, find an accountability buddy, some-one who will stretch you and to whom you can stretch, and watch as you both grow and flourish.

Until next time, live from your authentic self, grow your personal power and belief in who you are, find a buddy and follow your dream.

XOXO Linda

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