Are you 100% worthy?

June 15, 2023 ~ The Healing Modalities ~ Leave a comment

Believe it.

I used to run around trying to do all these things in order to prove that I was worthy. I used to overwork myself at my job. I used to volunteer on weeknights and on the weekends. I used to say “yes” to everyone and everything.

I thought I had to do all these things in order to show that I had value.

Now, I still do a lot of things, but it’s no longer coming from a place of “I need to prove myself and my worthiness.” Now what I do comes from a place of wanting to contribute because I know I have value to add.

Through my coaching school, The Life Coach School, I learned to believe that I am already 100% worthy. I always have been. I just didn’t know that this was something I could believe about myself.

Most of us aren’t taught to believe that we’re already worthy. What we are taught is to believe that we have to perform, achieve, and accomplish in order to feel worthy and valuable. That we have to please everyone and get everyone to like us to feel worthy and valuable.

We were not taught that our own self-approval, self-acceptance, and our thoughts about ourselves are more important than what other people think about us or even what we think other people think about us.

Much of the time, we do things because of what we think other people will think about us. We’ve been conditioned to do this. But we can’t control what other people think. Not if we do “good” things or if we do “bad” things. They will think whatever they want about us and that’s based on them and not us.

We build our self-worth through our thoughts about ourselves. Not through what we do for our work or job, what we do or don’t do for others, or what we do well or don’t do well.

We build our self-esteem through our relationship with ourselves. Our relationship with ourselves is built on what we think about ourselves. What kind of thoughts do we have about ourselves? What do we think when we look in the mirror? What do we think when we make a mistake? What do we think when something goes the way we wanted it to go? These are all thoughts we have about ourselves.

Once we become aware of our current thoughts about ourselves, we can see whether they’re in alignment with how we want to feel about ourselves. If we wouldn’t let others talk to us in a certain way, why do we let ourselves do that?

Your turn: “I’m already 100% worthy.” Do you believe that? What about, “It’s possible that I’m already 100% worthy,” or “It’s possible that I can learn to believe that I’m already 100% worthy.” What would happen if you practiced one of these thoughts every day? What kind of thoughts do you think about yourself? Is there anything you’d like to change about that? If so, what?

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Work with me: Want to see how self-care is transformative and can help create a more meaningful life in which you start committing to yourself and show up the way you want? I can show you how. I offer first-time seekers a complimentary 60-minute exploratory session. Sign up here.

What’s on your mind? It can be powerful to learn from each other and our common struggles when it comes to our practice of self-care–or just being a human being. If you have something you’re struggling with and would like some perspective, share it here. Your issue may be chosen and addressed in the next post–it’ll be totally anonymous.

What does worrying do?

June 8, 2023June 8, 2023 ~ The Healing Modalities ~ Leave a comment

It’s exhausting.

For most of us, worrying seems necessary. But what is it that we’re doing when we worry?

When we’re worrying, we’re making up a story about what could happen–usually the worst-case scenario–and then thinking as if it’s already happened.

What do we create for ourselves when we do that? We use a lot of mental and psychic energy focusing our minds on something that might happen and that will unlikely happen. And it’s exhausting.

When we think we’re protecting ourselves from a possible outcome that hasn’t happened yet, we’re hurting ourselves ahead of time. We’re already feeling all the emotions and thinking all the thoughts we might feel if this outcome happened. So we’re going through it as if it’s already happened, when it hasn’t yet or maybe never will.

Worrying is just a bunch of thoughts that we’re thinking. And likely the same thoughts repeating over and over again.

So what are the facts? A fact may be that an event is coming up on June 14th where you’re speaking in front of people. A fact may be that your son is going to a party with his friends this weekend. A fact may be that you’re traveling to Florida on June 25th. A fact may be that someone you care about hasn’t called you back for two days. A fact may be that you just got a mammogram done today and you’re waiting for results.

Everything else in your mind is just thoughts that you’re thinking about the facts.

We may think that worrying about something may “prepare” us for what could happen. But what if the worst-case scenario does happen? Will worrying about it make it any less devastating in the moment when it happens? No. Likely we will feel all the painful feelings that come up.

Worrying about it in advance only drains your energy ahead of time and doesn’t necessarily “prepare” or “protect” you from worst-case scenarios.

Your turn: What’s the upside of worrying? Instead of worrying, is it possible to keep your thoughts focused on the facts? What could happen instead if you keep your thoughts neutral or focused on the best possible outcome instead of the worst case?

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Is judging yourself working?

June 1, 2023 ~ The Healing Modalities ~ Leave a comment

Try self-compassion instead.

How does our self-compassion motivate us differently than our self-judgment?

Most of us are used to judging or punishing ourselves into action. This might sound like:

“I’m so fat, I need to workout extra hard today.”

“I’m such a loser, I have to figure out how to make more money.”

“My life sucks, I need to find a partner.”

“I’m a mess, I have to get this right.”

Whatever it is, we think mean things about ourselves in order to “motivate” us to do what we think we need to do in order to feel better about ourselves. “If I stop beating myself up, if I accept myself the way I am, I’ll get complacent and lazy, and never change.”

We think we need to beat ourselves up in order to take helpful actions. We might be in a rush to get “over there” because we think that’s when we’ll feel better about ourselves. Beating ourselves up may have gotten us results in the past, but at what cost to our relationship with ourselves?

When we have a self-judging narrative, everything we do can feel punishing:

Instead of seeing a healthy plate of food that will nourish our body, we see a restrictive, limited diet
Instead of doing a workout and celebrating what our body can do, we see it as a way to punish ourselves for “not eating right”
Instead of staying happy in a new relationship, we find ways to prove that we’re not worthy of happiness
Instead of celebrating our awareness of how we negatively talk to ourselves, we beat ourselves up for beating ourselves up!

Kindness, love, and respect for ourselves doesn’t start when we hit a certain goal of ours.

In fact, when we do hit that goal without doing the work of self-compassion and acceptance, the reward will likely be temporary and we might still not like ourselves the way we thought we would when we finally get “over there” by hitting that goal. It’s because achieving goals doesn’t create our feelings. Our thoughts create our feelings.

Kindness, love, and respect for ourselves can start right now, exactly as we are.

Decide that that’s possible.

When we have compassion and acceptance for ourselves exactly as we are at this time, we can start making the changes we want to see in our lives from a place of care, love, and patience.

It’s about our relationship with ourselves. So that in the long-run, we are where we want to be with ourselves and in our lives, loving and accepting ourselves along the way. No matter what.

Your turn: Are you open to feeling accepting of yourself as you are? If not, what’s getting in the way? What are some of the self-judging thoughts you’re aware of? What are some self-compassionate thoughts you can have about yourself instead? What would happen today if you found some self-compassion for yourself in a situation where you usually beat yourself up?

Feeling challenged by finding more self-compassionate thoughts? Book an exploratory session here to build your self-compassion practice.

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“I don’t deserve to ____”

May 25, 2023 ~ The Healing Modalities ~ Leave a comment

Look at your Power Sentences.

How we think about ourselves and our lives contributes to how we take care of ourselves (or don’t take care of ourselves).

We have sentences in our minds that run our life. Mostly without our awareness of them.

These are called Power Sentences.

They’re powerful because they affect the results we create in our lives, usually by providing more evidence that the thought (Power Sentence) is “true.”

When we’ve practiced thinking a thought over and over, it becomes a belief. Beliefs “feel true” even though they are just thoughts that we’ve thought over and over.

And if our thoughts/beliefs create the results we get in our life, let’s start to become aware of these Power Sentences.

Some examples of unintentional and unconscious Power Sentences are:

“I’m not good enough.”
“I can never get it right.”
“I don’t deserve to have what I want.”
“It’s always so hard for me.”
“Things don’t work out for me.”

What might these types of thoughts prove true in our lives?

It’s possible for us to think and practice new thoughts and beliefs – new Power Sentences – ON PURPOSE. Ones that SERVE our lives more than the current unintentional, unconscious thoughts and beliefs.

We must find the sentence that is running our life so we can make sure it is conscious and intentional.

The goal is to uncover our main Power Sentence, and make sure it’s what we want it to be.

Here’s an exercise to consider for finding your Power Sentence(s):

Who are you? What are you doing with your life? (Answer with one sentence only.)
Are you doing it consciously?
- Is this who you want to be?
- Is this what you want to be doing with your life?

When you look at your life as a result, you can see the SENTENCE CAUSING IT.
What are the results you have vs. the results you want?
Look at the effect of your sentences.

Here are some intentional, conscious Power Sentences to try on:

“I am always enough as I am.”
“I’m willing to figure out the things that are important to me.”
“I’m deserving of what I want in my life.”
“Everything happens FOR me to grow and learn.”
“I embrace all challenges.”
“I have value to contribute.”
“I am an extraordinary/amazing human being.”

What might these types of thoughts prove true in our lives?

Your turn: What are you discovering about your Power Sentences? What Power Sentences do you want to start practicing on purpose? What experiences do you want to create in your life to become even more of who you want to be?

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When you trust yourself

May 18, 2023 ~ The Healing Modalities ~ Leave a comment

Learn how.

There are different ways we learn how to trust (or not trust) ourselves. One of these ways is by doing (or not doing) what we say we’ll do–especially when it comes to ourselves.

Most of the time, we do what we say we’ll do for other people. This is because we know the consequences of not following through: the other person will feel let down and disappointed and possibly change how they think about us, and then we’ll feel guilty for having disappointed them and think we need to make up for it somehow.

But what happens when we say we’ll do something for ourselves and then we don’t do it? Let’s say we put an hour on our calendar to do one of the following things: go to the gym, do a yoga class, take a walk, read for leisure, or cook a healthy meal.

But we end up blowing ourselves off during that hour by using that time to keep working, scroll on social media, go out for drinks instead, or do something else besides what we had planned for ourselves.

When we’re the ones not keeping our commitment to ourselves, we feel a double whammy–we’re the ones who are let down and disappointed AND we’re the ones feeling guilty about letting ourselves down. That feels doubly bad. And yet we might not even feel the need to make up for it.

Knowing this feeling, the next time we go to make a commitment to ourselves, we might avoid disappointing ourselves and feeling guilty about it ahead of time, so we might think, “Why bother? I’m not gonna do it anyway.”

And then nothing moves forward with keeping commitments and building trust with ourselves.

That’s how a defeating mindset begins when we think about making commitments to ourselves. We diminish our trust with ourselves when we don’t follow through on what we say we’re going to do for ourselves.

To build trust with ourselves, we can take small steps. “Today I’m going to get up from my desk at 2pm and drink a glass of water and walk around the office/house for five minutes.”

And then at 2pm, we do what we say. We get up, drink a glass of water, and walk around for five minutes.

When we do this, there’s a sense of empowerment, a sense of accomplishing something and fulfilling a promise to ourselves–no matter how small. “It feels good to do what I said I would!” Celebrate that and remember the feeling.

This is how we start to strengthen the muscle of trusting ourselves more, knowing that we can have our own back. We can continue to make another small commitment to keep each day–it could be the same one!–until it’s just automatic for us to keep our word to ourselves. Until it feels uncomfortable when we don’t keep our word to ourselves.

When we get even better at keeping commitments to ourselves, we build even more trust with ourselves. We start to know what it truly feels like to have our own back–no matter what.

Your turn: You make decisions based on you and what you want for yourself; no one else can make these decisions for you. When you trust yourself to have your back no matter what the outcome is, there is no “wrong” decision. Just an opportunity to learn more about yourself and what you want or don’t want. What are you willing to do today to build even more trust with yourself?

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Take care of your Future Self

May 11, 2023 ~ The Healing Modalities ~ Leave a comment

Do it today.

A couple weeks ago, we talked about thinking about our Future Self and what our Future Self knows. We talked about creating from a place of what our Future Self knows.

In thinking about our Future Self, what we’re doing TODAY contributes to what and who our Future Self will be.

Today, if we don’t overeat, we are taking care of our tomorrow Future Self who won’t feel lethargic and guilty for overeating.

Today, if we don’t overdrink, we are taking care of our tomorrow Future Self who won’t feel hungover and waste a day away.

Today, if we spend an hour working on the report, we are taking care of our next-week Future Self who won’t need to scramble at the last minute to finish the report, like we usually do.

Today, if we plan our running schedule and start it, we are taking care of our next-month Future Self who can run 5 miles in preparation for the 12 mile run we committed to in three months.

Today, if we decide to finally leave the toxic relationship we’re in, we are taking care of our 6-month later Future Self who is in a healthier relationship with someone else.

Today, if we create a monthly payment plan to pay off our debt and choose on each of the following months to stick with the plan, we are taking care of our one-year later Future Self who no longer has debt.

We get to decide today with our actions how we are taking care of our Future Selves.

Your turn: What will you decide to do today to take care of your Future Self . . . what about tomorrow? Next week? Next month? In six months? In a year? In five years?

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Wish we learned this in school

May 4, 2023 ~ The Healing Modalities ~ Leave a comment

Who’s responsible?

We’ve all likely heard the saying that “You’re responsible for your own happiness.” It likely makes sense on an intellectual level, but how many of us actually embrace this?

If we’re responsible for our own happiness, that means we take responsibility for how we’re feeling–with ANY emotion.

But when we were younger, we learned the opposite from adults and even in school. We hear adults say, “You hurt Jimmy’s feelings. Say sorry!” or “Did she hurt your feelings by doing that?” And we’d likely think that “Yes, she hurt my feelings by doing that.”

Eleanor Roosevelt is quoted as saying, “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.”

What’s really going on is that we’re making what someone else says or does mean something about ourselves. We’re basically agreeing with what they said or did, which is the only way something can hurt us—if we let it. If we think it’s somehow true about us or if we somehow deserve it.

Again, intellectually, this may make some sense. Living it and practicing it can be harder though, because we’ve been conditioned to believe that we cause other people’s feelings and that other people cause ours.

But we know from the Model that our thoughts create our feelings. It’s not the external circumstance that creates our feelings, even though it’s so easy to think that the circumstance is causing us to feel something. It’s what we’re thinking about the circumstance that creates our feelings. Our thinking creates our feelings.

So in that sense, we can see how we ARE responsible for what we feel. Once we really become aware that this is how it works, we can be intentional about how we want to feel. Which means being intentional about how we are thinking.

I think some of us have a misconception that someone else is supposed to help our lives be great. When we relinquish ourselves from taking this responsibility, who do we think it belongs to?

I used to want someone to come save me from my life when I was feeling dissatisfied and like things were missing from my life.

You know what was missing from my life? ME. I wanted someone else to take the responsibility that is mine, to help my life become better than it was. To create more income for me, to find opportunities for me, to find a partner for me, to find a place for me to live, to help me eat healthy meals, to take care of me. How could someone else do this if I wasn’t willing to do it for myself?

No one is going to do it for us. No one is going to live our lives for us. That’s our responsibility. We get to take care of ourselves and our lives. Intentionally.

We have everything we need within us to take responsibility.

And that is great news. Because then we realize we can have the exact life we want when we take responsibility for creating it and caring for ourselves along the way. Intentionally.

Your turn: What have you been giving responsibility to someone or something else to fulfill for you? Are you willing to take responsibility for this? How might your life be different if you started taking even more responsibility for what you want? How might your life be different if you practiced intentional self-care?

Dive Deeper: Do you feel any resistance to the idea of taking responsibility in this way? If yes, why? What if those thoughts are just limiting beliefs about what’s possible for you?

Want to learn more about the Model and how your thoughts create your feelings? Sign-up for an exploratory session here.

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Connect with your body

April 13, 2023April 13, 2023 ~ The Healing Modalities ~ Leave a comment

Listen to yourself.

I was in the emergency department earlier this week because my heart rate was elevated for an extended period of time. I’m sharing the info in this post as a reminder to myself and to you about what listening to and honoring our bodies can look like. Sometimes our wills are stronger than what our bodies want from us and we don’t listen or pay attention to our body’s signals. I am listening to myself even more attentively going forward!

——–

How many of us know how to connect with and listen to our body’s signals and messages to us? Most of us didn’t really learn how to do this anywhere. In fact, we were likely taught the opposite–how to ignore and disregard our bodies: to keep going when we’re tired, to push through the pain to get it done, to always be productive and go after the next thing.

After undergoing emergency open-heart surgery that saved my life and while going through the recovery process, I finally learned better how to listen to and honor my body. In actuality, it was because I didn’t know how to do that sooner that I got to the place of needing emergency open-heart surgery. I wasn’t understanding my body’s signals that led to my body’s illness.

In the past, when I wasn’t feeling well, I didn’t allow myself to rest without feeling guilty, like I shouldn’t be taking the time off. And guess what happened when I felt guilty for resting when my body needed it? I created more stress because I was feeling guilty about resting and thinking I should be doing something else!

Resting when our bodies need it can be a hostile cycle if we’re not aware of what’s going on in our minds during the time. Part of us knows that we need rest and another part of us thinks about all the other things we “should” be doing but aren’t. So while we’re resting, there’s cognitive dissonance–we’re not at peace with our decision to rest.

One way to be at peace with resting and caring for ourselves is to be compassionate with ourselves, to accept that we need to rest, and to consciously choose to rest: “I am choosing to rest and care for myself. There is nothing else I need to do right now. This is important and resting will allow me to do the things I want to do later.” This may help to decrease cognitive dissonance.

This relates to more than just resting. It relates to what we choose to eat, drink, and do with our bodies, as well.

So, instead of ignoring my body’s messages, I learned to slow down and check-in with my body, to familiarize myself with its signals. I learned to ask the questions: “At what cost?” and “What can I do to take care of myself in this moment?”

And when the answer came, I gave myself permission to listen to and honor it. It could mean deciding to sleep in instead of going to the gym, or remembering to breathe deeply, or drinking some water, or choosing to eat (or not eat) something, or canceling evening plans after an unexpectedly tiring day at work.

A realization that I came to while learning to listen to and honor my body more, was that by not listening to my body, I was disrespecting and disregarding myself.

Self-care became a way to show myself respect and love, to regard myself with attention. How often do we expect love, respect, and attention from others when we might not even be giving these things to ourselves?

In the past, I thought that by pushing past my body’s needs, I was “being responsible” and getting things done that I thought I needed to do. But by not taking care of my body, that was actually being irresponsible. I see that now, but I didn’t see it in the past–likely because many of our social messages told me the opposite.

When we begin connecting to our body even more, we learn how to regard our body with attention, to listen to what our body needs. Then we can honor it by supporting it in a healthy, caring, respectful way.

Your turn: What can you do today to start connecting to your body more? Are you open to asking yourself the questions: “At what cost?” and “What can I do to take care of myself in this moment?” What might happen if you decided to give care and attention to yourself, to slow down and check-in with your body first?

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Life coaching for you

March 16, 2023 ~ The Healing Modalities ~ 1 Comment

Curious?

What do you think about life coaching? Have you considered it for yourself? How can coaching help you?

Life coaching can add value to your life when you think you have a problem—and thinking about it takes up a lot of your time and mental energy. You’d likely rather do something else with that time and energy.

Life coaching can help you make it a non-problem in your mind so you can focus on the things you want to think about and do instead. Things that move your life forward in the direction you want to go. Things you want to create for yourself.

At the very least, it can provide a committed time for mental self-care. It’s making time rather than finding time to keep mentally healthy.

As it relates to self-care, we look at your life holistically to see where the gaps are. What is your relationship to self-care? What is your relationship to your Self?

Sometimes your thoughts and beliefs do not align with who you want to be and who you think you are, which is a big obstacle to making healthy choices for yourself.

When we coach together, we’ll look at your thoughts about self-care and strengthen your beliefs about yourself—that you are a person who deserves care, especially from yourself.

When your thoughts and beliefs start to align even more, that’s when you begin making healthier choices for yourself. You align with who you want to be and who you are becoming.

If that sounds good to you, I’d like to personally invite you to join Self-Care Sundays, my weekly drop-in coaching sessions, or to book an exploratory session to find out how coaching can work for you!

Register for Self-Care Sundays

Book Your Exploratory Session

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Check your attention

March 2, 2023 ~ The Healing Modalities ~ Leave a comment

Where is it?

Do you know where your attention is focused in your life? Does it seem like you’re all over the place? Like you’re not focused because there are too many things vying for your attention?

While this is a normal experience, it doesn’t have to be yours if you don’t want it to be.

Like willpower, we have a limited amount of attention to spend during a day or a week. When we’re not intentional about where we spend our attention, we may be wasting it.

We may think we’re focusing on certain things, but “other” things are really getting our attention instead. We want to be aware of this so we can refocus on what’s really important to us.

Let’s say we have 100 units of attention for one day. Where do we want to spend those units on purpose during our day?

To find out where we’re currently spending our attention, we can make a list of things that we’re giving our attention to. Think about the things that are getting your attention, that demand your attention, or things that you want to be giving attention to but aren’t.

You’ll see things that are getting your attention and you may notice areas where you’re neglecting to give the attention that you want to.

You may also notice areas where you’re giving so much of your attention to but you don’t actually want to be paying that much attention to—because you’re sacrificing other areas that you actually want to pay attention to.

For example, in the past, I used to think about relationships a lot and focus on what wasn’t going right in them and how I could make things better or control things in a way where I could feel good and be happy. But I wasn’t paying enough attention to other parts of my life where I actually had more control. And everything just spiraled downward because I was focusing my attention on things that I didn’t have control over and couldn’t actually change.

What if I had used all that mental energy and attention on taking better care of myself, or creating opportunities and experiences, or finding other options in my life instead?

This is not to say that our attention should never waver. It does and it will because we have human brains. We just get to decide what we want to focus more or less of our attention on during our days. As it relates to self-care, this can serve us well.

Now I practice focusing my attention on purpose on what’s valuable to me and where I want to create shifts or changes in my life that can move me forward. I focus attention on taking care of myself in the myriad ways that self-care encompasses. I ruminate less on what I think isn’t going well and focus more on what IS going well—and also on expanding what I think is possible in my life and what thoughts I want to have instead, on purpose.

Your turn: What are the things that you give your attention to that energize you? What are the things that drag your attention away and de-energize you? What do you SAY that you value in your life? Does where you spend your attention reflect this? How can you be more intentional about where you focus your attention on things that move you and your life forward?

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