Are you ready for something new?
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This weekend I was immersed in the past. I lost my father in November, and the house he and my mother lived in has just been sold.
My sisters and I are in the process of emptying the house, and my job the last few days has been going through mountains of family photos — many from boxes of my grandparents that have been sitting in the basement of my parents’ house for decades.
Treasures have been found, emotions have been sparked, and I am gaining insights about how lives have been lived over long spans of time.
Seeing my parents, and their parents, in the bloom of youth and as they aged, is very sweet.
Seeing myself as an infant, during my childhood, as a gawky teenager, a young adult, a bride, and a mother, I am reflecting on the life I have lived, and the life I am living now.
How are you living your life?
Looking back at my professional life, it’s clear that I started in a career I enjoyed, and that I continued for several decades without considering if it was really fulfilling.
What I became aware of, when in 2009 I hired my first coach to help me with my business, was that I had been drifting through my life without looking at or thinking deeply about the big picture.
I, like most busy professionals, was focused primarily on what was right in front of me. Added to work, raising children, serving on boards, making time to be with my husband, and managing a household, and my attention and focus were fully occupied.
Things seemed to be fine.
What was pivotal for me was working with a coach who asked me to took clearly at my life, and how I was showing up in it.
When I did that, I saw a lot I had not noticed before. Slow steps followed by more small steps, I started to see many ways I was not showing up fully in my life. I also realized I no longer loved the work I had been doing for nearly 3 decades.
Most significantly, I realized I was ready to make changes.
What does it mean to be ready?
There are times when you know you are ready — for something new, something different, something more exciting. You feel it, and you take a step to bring that change into your life.
More frequently, the question of “being ready” — to look for or accept that new job, to make that big decision, to step into something different even if it is not fully defined in your mind — is one that feels unsettling, or even frightening.
I believe that when you start to get curious and feel a stirring, it is a significant signal from your heart.
Your heart may be “ready” before your head catches up!
That was my experience, and I see it all the time when I speak to women who have hesitated to look deeply, or take action, to explore a stirring they feel.
Fear and doubt show up. Many women are willing to settle for what is now, rather than take a new step.
I get it.
These 3 steps may help
If you are pondering something new or different and not moving forward, see what happens when you proceed like this:
1. Get clear
First get curious. Ask yourself questions like these, and answer them honestly.
What is working optimally in your life?
What feels like a struggle, or feels simply “ok”?
What lights you up?
What do you want more of?
What do you want less of?
Add more questions that come to mind, and look clearly at what you discover.
2. Set an intention
Your intention can be to research and learn more about a new possibility that you want to consider.
It can be to reach out to people who can advise and/or support you.
It can be to initiate a change — with a very small step, or a larger one.
3. Take action
This step is key.
Until you take some action (remember that small actions count!), and commit to staying in action, one of two things will happen.
Changes that you have declared you want will not happen.
Or you will be at the mercy of inevitable changes that happen around you. Rarely will changes like that match up to what you had envisioned for yourself.
Is it time to say “Yes” to your biggest, best life?
My life was pretty great before I looked closely and decided that I wanted less stress and to be more lit up every day.
I decided to create a more fulfilling future, and I have not stopped creating my life.
I have had great coaches, mentors and teachers who have supported me, inspired me, and believed in me. I am forever grateful to them, and grateful to myself.
I am aware that when I said, “Yes” to myself, I gave myself a gift far greater than I could have imagined on the day I started this journey.
I deeply appreciate all that my grandparents and parents did to set me on my path. And I am proud that I used that foundation as a springboard to a bigger, happier life — where I can help other great women to become the creators of the lives they yearn for.
I invite you to experience yourself living a life that delights you!
And I’d be happy to explore the possibility of working with you to make that dream your reality.
My father, my grandfather and my mother holding me at the start of my life’s journey.
