Tag Archives: #fulfillment

The Power of Habits

12 Thursday Mar 2015

Posted by in Emotional Intelligence, Leadership

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habit meme instagram 2

Habits are power. Like all power, it can be used for good or for ill. We have a tendency to focus on our negative habits. A search for “habit” graphic art resulted in pictures of a lot of bad habits such as smoking and overeating. We talk about our bad habits and work to get rid of them, but rarely mention our good habits.

In reality our days are made up of good, bad, and neutral habits. One study done by a researcher at Duke determined that 40% of our daily activities are habits which can include: the time we get up, the way we get ready in the morning, our mid-morning trip to the vending machine, our lunch-time exercise, and our before-bed snack or sit-ups. Some habits help us more than others.

Intentionally crafting useful habits can help us achieve our goals. However, we first need a clear vision of a goal that speaks to our heart. (You can read about the importance of a Big Why for your goal here: https://kathystoddardtorrey.wordpress.com/2015/01/19/goals-big-why-and-little-hows/) Using the power of habits without direction can powerfully move you around in circles. First, we clearly define our goal.

Then we explicitly state the steps that we need to take to achieve our goal. It’s important to break big goals down into little steps. Then we look at our small steps and figure out a way to make them into habits. Let’s look at an example.

I want to do a better job of taking care of myself. My goal is a moderate level of fitness and health, nothing extreme. I can visualize a vibrant, energetic me. It speaks to my heart; I can remember vividly how great I feel when I am taking time to exercise and eat well. It’s a wonderful feeling of power and I am way more motivated when I feel that way. I have a goal with a Big Why.

Now I create a list of things I want to do to achieve that goal. It could include lots of things like walking for 20 minutes four times a week, doing yoga twice a week, cutting out all soft drinks, etc. I don’t want to tackle them all at once. For a sustained lifestyle change, I pick one, make it a habit, and then move on to the next one.

When I do leadership workshops, I am standing up all day. When I stand for long periods of time, my back hurts if I haven’t been doing abdominal exercises regularly so that’s what I want to start with. I could decide to incorporate abdominal exercises in a variety of ways. I could do them first thing in the morning or take a break at a set time on the days when I am working at home. I think I want to do them first thing in the morning, Monday through Friday. Now I have established what I want to do, when I want to do it, and why I want to do it. All necessary!

Now comes the work. I must set my alarm 15 minutes earlier than I need to get ready. As soon as the alarm goes off, I get down on the floor at the foot of the bed and do my abdominal exercises. It takes around a month to create a habit so that means purposefully and intentionally getting up Monday through Friday and doing the exercises. It will take some willpower in the beginning to make myself get up and do them. However, it gets easier as time goes on. Eventually, I will stop fighting myself and just get up and do it without any expenditure of emotional energy. When that happens, I’ve made it a habit! It takes some willpower to get a habit established, but once it’s rolling along it takes very little emotional energy to maintain it. Once this habit is firmly in place, I can establish another one. Doing pushups in a door frame at 10:30am comes to mind, but it could be anything that will help me move closer to my goal.

One-by-one we can build a foundation of habits that will help us achieve our goals with little stress and angst. Uncle Ben told Spiderman, “With great power comes great responsibility,” and that is especially true about the power of habits in relation to the responsibility we have to ourselves to lead a fulfilling life. If we use the power of habits without thinking or planning, we create a life of frustration and stagnation. If we use the power wisely, we can achieve great things and create the life of our dreams.

Watch the video on this topic here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAziOrVsM3E

Create More Space in Life’s Garden

02 Monday Feb 2015

Posted by in Emotional Intelligence, Leadership, Positivity

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Garden meme

We are shaped in many ways by our childhood experiences because we interpret them from a child’s perspective – they were a big deal to our Little Self. Once we interpret the experience, we often establish a belief around it that we carry with us for the rest of our lives. Not all of those beliefs serve us in adulthood.

It’s easiest to explain with an example. Let’s say that when you were young, you loved to draw, but one day someone told you that your elephant looked like a rock with a garden hose attached to it. First, it hurt your feelings. Then you internalized the event by thinking that you were not a good artist and that you couldn’t draw. We don’t like having our feelings hurt so you decided to avoid being hurt by not drawing ever again.

Lack of drawing skill is a common childhood belief brought into adulthood as is “I can’t dance, sing, and/or write.” It takes time to learn those skills. We know that as adults, but as kids we just decide we are not talented after our first attempts and it’s better not to try.

Comments made to us in childhood can also affect our self-image for good or for bad. My Mom was usually very kind about my looks so I have a good self-image around my appearance. When she brushed my hair she said that it looked like spun gold. As a consequence, I like my hair and resist all of my hair stylist’s attempts to get me to color it. It’s great to hold on to the childhood beliefs that serve us in adulthood. If you decided back then that you were smart, handsome, creative, tenacious, determined or lovable, keep those!

However, my Mom also once made a passing comment about my having big ears. If you’ve watched my video on this topic (link here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j3-c3fZdAL4), you have seen that my ears aren’t huge, but I was self-conscious about them for a very long time. It wasn’t until high school that someone else told me emphatically that I did not have big ears. I was close enough to adult status to take in the comment with a little maturity and realize that Mom may have been kidding or just having a bad day. I am now at peace with my ears.

The beliefs can be big or small – anything from your ability to dance to your ability to have successful relationships. Your Little Self inside still feels the emotions attached to the experience strongly so take your Little Self by the hand and walk up to the belief and look at it from an adult perspective. Decide that you can learn to draw and that you are not doomed to failed relationships. Analyze what happened through the lens of adult maturity. It often doesn’t look near as big, scary, intimidating or meaningful.

Clearing out those unhelpful childhood beliefs can be very freeing. If we think of our lives as a garden, when we are born it is open with lots of space. We start having some negative experiences and fence off parts of our garden and declare them off-limits. “I’m not going to draw anymore,” “I will wear my hair over my ears always,” and “I can’t dance” become things we say to ourselves over and over again. We believe them without conscious thought or question. By stepping up to the fenced-off area and peering into it as an adult, we can see the experience from a different perspective and decide not to let it limit us anymore. We take down the fence and free up that space! We can try to draw and see if we like it. We can wear our hair short and show off our ears. We can dance to our heart’s content.

The more fenced-off areas we clear, the more room we have to live and play! So grab your Little Self by the hand, clear some fences, and dance together – you’ll have lots of space.

Goals: Big Why and Little Hows

19 Monday Jan 2015

Posted by in Leadership

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Big Why

I love making goals. There’s something of a fresh start wrapped up in a goal. If it’s a good goal, we are working toward something that we want. When I was first outlining my video on this topic (link below), I asked my husband to randomly say what he thought about goals. He said, “Well, goals are really desires, aren’t they? When you achieve a goal, you get a sense of fulfillment.” Bingo! He totally hit the nail on the head! Let’s think about goals as desires and things that will bring us a sense of fulfillment.

Using that frame of reference, write down a list of goals. One of the challenges of creating and achieving goals is our own ideas about what we “should” write down. We “should” lose weight. We “should” exercise more. But is that what you really desire? It might be. The trick is to figure out the Big Why of each goal. If there isn’t one, it’s time to toss the goal.

So what is the Big Why? It’s the underlying heart reason for wanting to do something. Let’s say that I put “Exercise three times a week” on my list of goals. I don’t really like to exercise. I feel I should. It doesn’t feel motivating at all. The first step is to ask myself why I want to exercise three times a week. Well, I’d answer that I want to stay fit and not grow too decrepit to do what I want to do. (My exercise goals are not lofty.) Wanting to stay strong and healthy is a good reason, but it still isn’t speaking to my heart. It still feels like a “should.”

So I ask myself again, “Why?” – why do I want to be strong and healthy? It could be that I want to be able to play with grandkids if any come along or that I want to be able to keep up with my husband who is very fit. However, the real reason for me is that I have more energy and feel more positive and motivated when I am at my ideal weight and exercising regularly. I feel more powerful and it’s easier to accomplish things. I really do find a sense of fulfillment when I interact with the world with a body that is in good shape for me. (It is important to note that my ideal exercise plan involves walking and gentle yoga. I am not a runner. My fitness level is mine – the level that works for me. It’s not a “should” level, it’s my level.)

Now it’s time to check in. Is this a reason that resonates with my heart or do I need to ask myself “Why?” again? Actually, that feeling of being energized and positive is very motivating for me. I remind myself of that feeling whenever I am tempted to eat too much or skip exercising.

You keep asking yourself “Why” until you get down the reason that has meaning for you, the one that truly feels like a desire and that will lead to a sense of fulfillment. That reason is your Big Why. It’s the reason that you feel in your heart. If you keep asking “Why?” and never get to reason that feels like a desire, mark it off your list. It’s a “should” goal and you probably won’t achieve it anyway because it doesn’t have meaning for you.

Now, you have a few goals with Big Whys. We want to figure out how to achieve them.  I will use my goal of creating online classes as an example. I’ve wanted to create some online classes for more than a year. I want to offer the expensive leadership classes that I give to businesses to everyone at a reasonable price. I believe that anyone who is motivated should be able to pursue his or her professional development.

It’s a big overwhelmingly huge and intimidating goal, which is why I didn’t begin on it for quite some time. I got started when I broke the goal down into Little Hows and realized that even small progress is better than no progress. If I stand in one place doing nothing for a year, I’m in the exact same place I was when I started – a year gone with nothing to show. I decided that the smallest movement forward was preferable.

I knew that my website was awful, my website provider was frustrating, and neither could support the online classes that I wanted to create. The first Little How was “Find a web designer.” I broke that one into even smaller steps: 1) Search for WordPress web designers, 2) Look at their work online, 3) Outline what I want my website to do, 4) Set up interviews with web designers, and  5) Pick one!

I use the same system to get started on our taxes each year. I will stare at “Do taxes” on my list and shudder. It is just too big a task until I break it down. I list the Little Hows: 1) Print off forms, 2) Collect W-2s, 3) Gather bank statements, 4) Find business receipts, etc. I get it done by focusing on the small steps, not the big picture.  By even doing one small thing a day, I make respectable progress.

Progress is what life is all about! We can move forward, make our desires a reality, and achieve that sense of fulfillment by thoughtfully choosing the goals and methodically taking small steps toward them. In other words, ensure your goals have a Big Why that resonates with your heart and then define the Little Hows that will baby-step toward your goal.

Here’s my video on Goals: Big Why and Little Hows: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2KtsfQrz3uc