I've had more than a few conversations recently about the wild swings and ongoing uncertainty in our economy. Even as many of us are feeling a new surge of grounded optimism, we can't help but notice the chaos and ugliness in the world around us. Should we be happy or worried? Should we take new risks or hunker down and hope the ill winds don't blow in our direction? Should we upgrade our crumbling kitchen or sell the house and move to the Cayman Islands? Should we trust our accountant or our inner voice?
Helping clients grapple with questions like these is what prompted me to write my first book in 2009, so I decided to share a chapter from it in this blog post, just to give you a little taste. The title of the book is 10 Ways To Find Peace Rather Than Panic (When The World Has Gone A Little Crazy), and I invite you to visit my website to learn more (http://www.mysolidground.com/) or use the above link to go to Amazon.com and see all the wonderful reviews! I'm honored by the positive feedback I've received about the book so far, and would be delighted for you to check it out, if you haven't already.
And by the way, although the economic downturn was my catalyst for writing the guide, it is intended to be a loving support during any period of uncertainty or transition in your life. So whether you're feeling a little wobbly because of the economy, or sensing a longing and readiness to create a bigger life, this book can help. I wrote it and offer it from my heart, and hope you will receive it with yours.
And now without further ado, here is Chapter 4 from 10 Ways To Find Peace Rather Than Panic (When The World Has Gone A Little Crazy). Enjoy!
Tell The Truth About Your Life
When everything is working according to plan, we fall into the mindset, patterns and routines that keep the plan in place. We go about our lives, executing tasks and checking things off our to-do lists. We get things done and keep going, without question, because there is a certain sense of security in knowing what to do, how to do it and when to do it. But when these patterns and plans begin to crumble, we recognize that what we thought was security was only predictability – a numbing sameness that seduced us through mere repetition. It felt like something we could count on. Until, suddenly, we couldn’t.
Now is the perfect time to pause – since you don’t know what to do, anyway – and look with fresh eyes at the life you’ve been living. What’s really working here? What isn’t? How are you feeling? What are you tired of? What do you need? What is your soul longing to be, do, create or experience? What are you, finally, ready to acknowledge? What kind of life do you want to live?
These are the unanswered questions that await you in the void, and it’s only when you let go of knowing how your life is supposed to go that you can begin to see how your life wants to go. Since you’re just floating about anyway, why not take advantage of this freed-up perspective to look at your life with loving curiosity? What might you be ready to release or stop doing? What is itching to emerge? Who have you become, and who do you want to be?
Keep asking, and be willing to answer truthfully. There is no need to posture, defend or justify. Just tell it like it is, with as much compassion, humor and perspective as you can muster. Maybe now is the time to admit, finally, that you’re in the wrong job, and all the energy you’ve poured into convincing yourself otherwise has depleted you. (You might even be secretly hoping to get laid off.) Or maybe you can finally see that you’re in the perfect job, even though it’s not as glamorous as the one you thought you should have, and it needs more of your focused energy and attention than you’ve been giving it. Maybe now you’re ready to take that course you’ve wanted to take for so long. Maybe now is the time to look at those credit card statements and see if all that stuff you bought is really making you happy. Maybe now is the time to tell the truth – the whole truth – about your life.
This isn’t easy to do. You might twist and squirm a little, trying to avoid naming your truth. You might even feel like a failure or sell-out for having ignored it all this time, and so you keep trying to pretend that maybe it isn’t really your truth, after all. Maybe this lifeless path is as good as it gets, and your task is to stay the course and talk loudly so you can’t hear the distracting murmurings of your soul.
But here is the beauty of this chaotic time: as the path you’ve been walking literally dissolves beneath your feet, you’re given a sort of “life amnesty,” an opportunity to come clean with yourself. There is no penalty for admitting that you’ve been heading in the wrong direction. You got a little lost, that’s all, and now you’re ready and willing to find your way back home. You’re ready to acknowledge your truth and let it light your way, step by step.
excerpted from 10 Ways To Find Peace Rather Than Panic (copyright 2009, Suzanne E. Eder)
Saturday, February 19, 2011
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Let's Not Be Selfish
The scene is a familiar one. I’m sitting across from a client as we explore possibilities for getting her dreams out into the world. She tells me, hesitantly and almost dismissively, about an experience or two she had, times when she dared to share her talent and genius with someone else. And the “someone else” was blown away, deeply moved or inspired or in some way helped by my client’s brilliance. But before I can jump into the story with her and ask her to tell me more, to share with me how it felt, to consider where that kind of energy might lead, she stops cold.
And she says something along the lines of, “But that was so long ago.” Or, “I think that was beginner’s luck.” Or, “I just don’t have what it takes to really build something with that.” Or the ever-popular, “But that won’t make me any money.”
Instant possibility-killers.
And that’s not the worst of it. What I’ve come to appreciate, more deeply than ever before, is that our habitual tendency to dismiss our talent - and our longings to share it with others – is just plain selfish. And I don’t mean the “good” kind of selfish that arises from love and reflects a healthy desire to nourish ourselves. I mean the petty, whiny, self-indulgent kind of selfish that arises from fear and reflects the inner admonition to keep ourselves small.
When we hold our talent in, we withhold it from the world. We deprive others of the wisdom and inspiration and beauty and playfulness and knowledge and support and fantasy and warmth and dazzling insights that we have to share, if only we would. And without those things, the world is a dimmer place. It lacks a certain vibrancy. It is in a fundamental sense incomplete, as the very contributions needed from us to make it whole are missing.
And all because we’ve decided we’re somehow not good enough. We think we’re sparing the world our ineptness, when in fact we’re depriving it of our greatness. And we’re depriving ourselves of the immense joy and generosity and aliveness we could feel if we celebrated and surrendered to our innate creative genius.
That’s a lot to deprive ourselves of. That’s a lot to deprive the world of. And that’s why I call it selfish.
I’m not trying to play the guilt card here. But sometimes we need a little shake to wake us up to a deeper truth. And the deeper truth here is that what we most long to create or give is what the world most needs from us. It’s an elegantly designed system that can function beautifully if we all do our part. And our part is to recognize, honor and empower our deepest longings and talents.
I know, I know, you may not know where or how to begin. You may be living such a crazy-busy life that cultivating a talent or two seems overwhelming. You may have convinced yourself that you really can’t make any money at what you love so why bother? I’m telling you, firmly and clearly, to set all of that aside. None of it matters. What matters is that you are fully alive and that you are giving the best of what you have to give to yourself and others.
Here are a couple of things I’ve learned that may help you get started - or stay committed – to living your dreams:
• Joy and passion are their own reasons for being. They do not need to be justified or to create specific results in order to “count.” Every moment you open to the life force of creative energy within you is a moment that counts. Every time you open the laptop and write, or pull out the sketchpad and doodle, or take your children on an adventure that delighted you to plan, or sing out loud because you feel so alive when you sing, or teach a friend how to play bridge, or practice with love and dedication that new piano arrangement you want to learn – every time you immerse yourself in your most cherished talents and longings is a moment fulfilled. Give yourself more of them.
• The real treasure in committing to honoring your dreams is in who you become. You grow into a person of immense courage and integrity and generosity, a person who loves life and loves herself and illuminates for the world what a love-filled life is like. You grow into someone you respect, and someone other people want to be around. You grow into who you were meant to be.
• Don’t make it about money, at least not right away. I’m a huge proponent of challenging our beliefs about what has value and what can be exchanged for money in the marketplace, but if we demand too soon of our talent that it covers all the bills, we strangle that very talent with our rigid expectations and subterranean fears of not having enough. Create space in your life to nurture your talent and let it build its own momentum and direction. Practice appreciating your talent and your self each step of the way, for it is only through loving appreciation that our talent can grow and flourish. And when the time is right to offer our creations and services in the marketplace, we’ll be fortified with the inner certainty that what we’re offering has value.
Okay, I think that's enough for now. Are you with me? I hope so…I love good company! And even if you have to take it on faith, know that you really can do this. Actually, only you can do this…this, that you most want to do. Decide that who you are and what you have to give really matters. (Because it does.) Dare to make your dreams a priority in your life, right now. Lavish your talents with dedication and appreciation. Relish them and look for opportunities to share them with others. Please, do it.
Because to do anything less is just plain selfish.
And she says something along the lines of, “But that was so long ago.” Or, “I think that was beginner’s luck.” Or, “I just don’t have what it takes to really build something with that.” Or the ever-popular, “But that won’t make me any money.”
Instant possibility-killers.
And that’s not the worst of it. What I’ve come to appreciate, more deeply than ever before, is that our habitual tendency to dismiss our talent - and our longings to share it with others – is just plain selfish. And I don’t mean the “good” kind of selfish that arises from love and reflects a healthy desire to nourish ourselves. I mean the petty, whiny, self-indulgent kind of selfish that arises from fear and reflects the inner admonition to keep ourselves small.
When we hold our talent in, we withhold it from the world. We deprive others of the wisdom and inspiration and beauty and playfulness and knowledge and support and fantasy and warmth and dazzling insights that we have to share, if only we would. And without those things, the world is a dimmer place. It lacks a certain vibrancy. It is in a fundamental sense incomplete, as the very contributions needed from us to make it whole are missing.
And all because we’ve decided we’re somehow not good enough. We think we’re sparing the world our ineptness, when in fact we’re depriving it of our greatness. And we’re depriving ourselves of the immense joy and generosity and aliveness we could feel if we celebrated and surrendered to our innate creative genius.
That’s a lot to deprive ourselves of. That’s a lot to deprive the world of. And that’s why I call it selfish.
I’m not trying to play the guilt card here. But sometimes we need a little shake to wake us up to a deeper truth. And the deeper truth here is that what we most long to create or give is what the world most needs from us. It’s an elegantly designed system that can function beautifully if we all do our part. And our part is to recognize, honor and empower our deepest longings and talents.
I know, I know, you may not know where or how to begin. You may be living such a crazy-busy life that cultivating a talent or two seems overwhelming. You may have convinced yourself that you really can’t make any money at what you love so why bother? I’m telling you, firmly and clearly, to set all of that aside. None of it matters. What matters is that you are fully alive and that you are giving the best of what you have to give to yourself and others.
Here are a couple of things I’ve learned that may help you get started - or stay committed – to living your dreams:
• Joy and passion are their own reasons for being. They do not need to be justified or to create specific results in order to “count.” Every moment you open to the life force of creative energy within you is a moment that counts. Every time you open the laptop and write, or pull out the sketchpad and doodle, or take your children on an adventure that delighted you to plan, or sing out loud because you feel so alive when you sing, or teach a friend how to play bridge, or practice with love and dedication that new piano arrangement you want to learn – every time you immerse yourself in your most cherished talents and longings is a moment fulfilled. Give yourself more of them.
• The real treasure in committing to honoring your dreams is in who you become. You grow into a person of immense courage and integrity and generosity, a person who loves life and loves herself and illuminates for the world what a love-filled life is like. You grow into someone you respect, and someone other people want to be around. You grow into who you were meant to be.
• Don’t make it about money, at least not right away. I’m a huge proponent of challenging our beliefs about what has value and what can be exchanged for money in the marketplace, but if we demand too soon of our talent that it covers all the bills, we strangle that very talent with our rigid expectations and subterranean fears of not having enough. Create space in your life to nurture your talent and let it build its own momentum and direction. Practice appreciating your talent and your self each step of the way, for it is only through loving appreciation that our talent can grow and flourish. And when the time is right to offer our creations and services in the marketplace, we’ll be fortified with the inner certainty that what we’re offering has value.
Okay, I think that's enough for now. Are you with me? I hope so…I love good company! And even if you have to take it on faith, know that you really can do this. Actually, only you can do this…this, that you most want to do. Decide that who you are and what you have to give really matters. (Because it does.) Dare to make your dreams a priority in your life, right now. Lavish your talents with dedication and appreciation. Relish them and look for opportunities to share them with others. Please, do it.
Because to do anything less is just plain selfish.
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