Daring to play it big

When I discoveredthat the topic title of our blog hop of this month is “Daring to play it big”, Iwas a little bit uncomfortable, as I did not know what to write about such atopic since I was not a risk-taker; I am used to playing it safe. I asked forclarification from my best friend who proofreads my posts every week and sheexplained that it means daring to follow your dreams and having a vision aboutwhat you want to do and despite of the challenges that you know you may face, youstill go after your dreams. The sky is your limit! What a challenging topic forsomeone who has never been a dreamer or a risk-taker. But, still I love it; itinspires me to dream big dreams and work to go higher and higher.

I started tothink what dreams I one day had and the risks I took to reach them, and whatchallenging dreams I have now but still believe I can do it. It took me hoursto find answers for these two questions. To answer the first question, I foundthat I did take risks, three years ago, when I invested a big sum of money tojoin the International Coach Academy to study coaching. Although I wasn’t sure whetheror not I was able to commit to this study till the end, whether or not I willbe able to complete the requirements successfully,  whether  or not I will find it interesting, or whetheror not  it will allow me to make thechange I desired to my life; I took the risk, nevertheless. I joined ICA with adream of making a change to my life, to find happiness and satisfaction andlearn to live differently. At that moment, no one could assure me that byjoining ICA I would reach this goal. From my readings about coaching on thenet, I got a strong belief that this is exactly what I was seeking for a verylong time. I was always interested in listening to my friends, supporting themand I always did my best to make friends take a more positive perspective when theywere down. How happy I felt when I was able to make them smile, and how frustratedI felt when I couldn’t. The strong desire I had to learn more about coachingand the stronger belief that this is what I wanted to do didn’t give me thechance to think about asking for advice about it. I am glad I didn’t because I amsure nobody would have encouraged me to do it. After all, coaching wasn’tpopular in my community at that time. Again, I had to take a bigger risk, a yearand a half later, to be able to realize my dream. I had to leave my full-timejob to be able to fulfill my ICA requirements on time. It was a very harddecision to make, but once it was done, coaching became my biggest dream and Ihad to invest all my energy and time in it to reach my goal. I took the majordecision and I quit my job. One year later, I graduated and became a certifiedprofessional coach as I have been dreaming for three years. I never regrettedthe money I had invested; I never regretted the job and the career I had left. Onthe contrary, I am now encouraged to dream even bigger dreams.

Now with theexcitement I feel about coaching, I want to help others to experience it andmake extraordinary changes to their lives as I did. The first dream I have isto help women find happiness and satisfaction in life. From my conversationswith several women in my community I realized that they are unsatisfied andunhappy, they feel frustrated, unappreciated, unvalued and manipulated. Theyfeel guilty if they think about their happiness. They feel guilty when theydon’t give up all their needs and think only about fulfilling others needs. Eventually,bitterness and resentment become the feelings that dominate their lives. Idecided to make the happiness of these women my niche. I started to think abouta program with specific steps to follow with my clients to be able to reachhappiness. But my dream is not only to help them reach happiness andsatisfaction. I dream of getting them to radiate happiness and beauty from withinafter following their own tailored self-care program. I dream of helping themlive a life aligned with their values. I wish I could help every woman in theworld reach happiness and be her best. I wish I could help them understand thatthe world sees them the way they see themselves. I want to teach them that ifthey acknowledge, appreciate, value, love and be kind to themselves, otherswill follow suit. My dream is to support every woman to realize how amazing sheis and how beautiful she can be. First she needs to believe in herself beforeasking others to believe in her.

“Shootfor the moon. Even if you miss, you’ll land among the stars.”  ~Les Brown~

Absolutely,dream a big dream! Even if you fail to reach it, you will reach something high.Now I believe that in reality there are no limits, we are imposing the limitson ourselves and our dreams. The only difference between someone who dreams bigdreams and realizes them and another who doesn’t, is that the first believes s/hecan and the latter doesn’t; the first works hard with persistence and the lattergives up easily;  the first never looksback but only looks and moves forward while the latter is uncertain where to go.Try once to dream a big dream for something you strongly desire and work on itvery hard, don’t give up your dream and never look back and you will see howrewarding it is and how happy, confident, proud and strong you will be. After suchan experience only the sky will be your limit.  

This post is part of a blog hop series sponsored by students and graduate Coaches of ICA. Please hop on over to their posts and see what else you can learn about ”Daring to Play BIG” 

 Jenn Alex Brockman
http://kickasswebsitecoach.com/play-big-business-purpose/ ‎

Intuitive Coaching: 
http://reneevosdewael.com/2012/03/19/daring-to-play-big/

Sylvia Gautier – Proactive Life Coaching
http://myactioncoach.wordpress.com/2012/03/19/daring-to-play-big/ 

Brandy Morris-Chaudhry- Illuminated Perspective
http://www.illuminatingpotential.com/2012/03/19/daring-to-play-big/

Nuria Lencina: Coach for Mamas
http://coachformamas.com/reflections/how-big-are-your-dreams/

Pamela Rudisill: In Sight Life Coaching
http://insightlifecoaching.co/2012/03/19/daring-to-play-big/

Kenetha Stanton – Chrysalis Wellness, LLC
http://www.chrysalis-wellness.com/2012/03/19/daring-to-play-big/

Life Balance

The post below is an old post of my blog My happiness journey. This post is addressed to women who are giving up their happiness for the happiness of others, so as I have chosen my coaching niche “Women looking for happiness” I decided to share it with you on this blog and I hope you find it helpful.


When I think about the word balance, I think of fairness, equilibrium and stability; everything is in the right amount. When I think about balance in life and how we may apply it on different aspects of our life, I find that first we need to be clear about our values then make the balance according to them .

While thinking about my life in the past I realize there weren’t any balance in my life and I didn’t give enough attention to my values. My life was a long list of  SHOULD DO that was dictated by a so demanding and stressful job, two young kids and a familial life that according to the culture doesn’t allow a lot of freedom to the woman. The ideal and perfect woman, in my culture, is the woman who remembers and cares about all the members of her family and extended family except herself. Some women could live this way for some time but later on when they get older and realize that they didn’t enjoy their life some of them get depressed and they feel that they lost their life. A woman who looks for her happiness and her satisfaction is a selfish woman and she is not accepted or appreciated.  No one knows that the happiness of the woman is a must for all others in the family to be happy.  No one realize that a miserable, angry, resentful and frustrated woman is never a nice person to live with.

I address my post to all the women in my community and especially mid aged women. Those who lived a big part of their life thinking only about what others need and what others want; those who were stealing, secretly, some parts of their time for themselves as if it wasn’t their right. I tell them:” Put yourself as a first priority and think about your needs as you think about others needs. Know what really matters to you and live according to it. Make a BALANCE between your needs and others needs and let everybody help you to keep this balance.” Don’t think or say nobody will do without even asking; just ASK and you will be astonished how they will all support you because they all love you and need you. The main problem is you never asked; you assume that others know what you want and what you need but actually they don’t because they are not you. Only you knows until you let them know; teach them lovingly how to treat you, respect your needs and support you. Be clear about what you expect of them. 

So start now and think about how to bring satisfaction, happiness and fulfillment to your life by making the BALANCE. Let your family and friends support you. Don’t say it’s too late; no it’s never too late just be clear about what is important to you and make it as one of your first priorities and do it on a daily or weekly basis as you want, it will bring you a lot of energy, satisfaction and fulfillment. 

Think how to make yourself happy and your life won’t be the same any more.

9 tips to deal with the guilt feeling (Mommy guilt 2)

In my postlast week I talked about the feeling of guilt I had experienced during longyears of my life and how it left me unhappy and drained most of the time. Inthis post, I will share some ideas I believe can help to reduce the feeling ofguilt most of women experience at one stage or the other in her life.

9 Tips to Dealwith the Feeling of Guilt

1-   Beclear about your values and your standards: Focus on living a life according toyour values and don’t compare yourself and your children to others, justcompare them to your own standards. When your life is aligned with your valuesand your standards, you will feel more peaceful and more satisfied.

2-  Believe in yourself: When you believe in yourself, you believe in yourcapabilities and you feel more confident so it will not be easy for others tomake you feel guilty. If you lack self-confidence and self-esteem, you can askfor the support of a professional to help you find out the reason of your lowself-esteem and help you overcome it.

3-   Avoidpeople who reproach and criticize you or reduce your time with them: I believethat people who reproach or criticize others suffer low self-esteem and theyproject this feeling on others by finding their faults. This act makes themfeel better about themselves. These people are energy drainers. Avoid them asmuch as possible or at least minimize your time with them and don’t take whatthey say personally. Just let go of it and consider it as if they are talkingabout someone else.

4-  You have the right to say NO, when you avoid people or activities that are notmaking you any good you are honoring your happiness and your well-being; sodon’t feel guilty when you say No to someone who is draining your energy orsomething that is not adding any value to your life. Your happiness is yourresponsibility; so protect it and say a big NO to anything that is notsupporting it.

5-  Deal with open issues to reduce the feeling of guilt: unresolved issues andunfinished projects are usually a source of guilty feelings, so for yourhappiness make-up your mind and finish pending issues or projects or totallyforget about them.

6-   Bekind to yourself and acknowledge yourself: Notice how you speak to yourself. Doyou speak kindly to yourself and acknowledge what you are doing? If you are notable to be kind to yourself, how do you expect others to be kind to you? Youteach others how to treat you. Be your best friend, how do you treat your bestfriend?

7-  Accept the fact that we all make mistakes: Makingmistakes is not a sin, we all did and will do mistakes; it’s our way to learn.So if you made a mistake just accept it and find out what you can do toimprove the situation. If you can, do it or let it go for good, feelingguilty won’t change anything. It’s over. 

8-  Forgive yourself and others: Forgiveyourself when you have made mistakes, accept it and forgive others for theirmistakes, it is the only way to get rid of the feeling of guilt. Forgiveness isrecommended for your sake as the release of anger you are holding in your heartactually harms you not the person you are angry with.

9-   Whatyou focus on increases: For the sake of your children, stop reproaching and criticizingthem for their mistakes and start acknowledging them for theirachievements. Do not nurture their feeling of guilt. When you appreciateyour children’s efforts and their positive behavior, they will be encouragedto do more of the positive behavior to get more of your acknowledgement.Sometimes children behave inappropriately to grab your attention when theappropriate behavior doesn’t.  They need your attention and youracknowledgement, so focus on the encouragement and acknowledgement toenthuse them to do more of the good behavior. 

We areliving in a new era, new environment, new mentality and new circumstances. Whywaste our time in negative thoughts and feeling while we can shift to morepositive feelings that bring happiness and satisfaction? All we need is to letgo of all thoughts, feelings or behaviors that are not serving us anymore andreplace them with new ones that are supporting us on our life journey and honorour happiness and well-being.

Mommy guilt (1)

Guilt is “a feelingof worry or unhappiness that you have because you have done something wrong,such as causing harm to another person”—Cambridge dictionariesonline

According to the meaningit’s a feeling you have because you have done something wrong, but Ithink that sometimes it can be just a doubt that what you did has harmedsomeone and you live with this feeling torturing you.

The feeling of guilt hasdeveloped inside of me ever since I was young because of the continuous blameof my parents with every mistake I made. My parents were very generous on reproachand criticism; I think that they believed that this was the best way to make uslearn to be careful not to make mistakes.  The focus they were giving tothe mistakes was extremely huge while the encouragement and acknowledgement hadno place in our lives. Until may be a few years ago, I defended myself all thetime. Even in my inner self-talk, I always focused on how I will defend myselfwhen my mother starts reproaching me. It was bitter feeling guilty and havingto defend myself all the time even when I didn’t harm anyone. I just gavemyself the right to do something different than what shewanted me to do. 

Becoming a mom developeda bigger feeling of guilt inside of me; a feeling that is depriving mostwomen and moms from enjoying their lives. I had a full time job when I gavebirth to my first son. During the first 2 years of his life, I used to spend 4hours daily to commute from home to work and back. We used to leave the housetogether at 6 AM and be back at 6 PM. I sent him to a nursery at the age of 3months and I left him from 8 AM to 4 PM since the first day. From the age ofthree months to the age of 5 years old he used to go to the nursery from 8 AMto 4 PM 5 days-a-week, and the feeling of guilt was poisoning my life. When he was4 years old, I had to travel frequently and leave him with my husband ormy mother. I had to be away for 4 to 5 days-a-week, 2 to 3 times-a-monthfor 10 months or almost a year and of course the feeling of guilt was killingme. I think he felt how the guilt was torturing me, so in turn he manipulatedme and punished me in every ways. When I think back about those days of mylife I can see how the negative feeling had left me drained, suffering andunhappy just because I thought that I am harming my son by leaving him at avery young age at the nursery. I can’t forget how hard I cried the first day Isent him to the nursery; I felt like I was abandoning him. For me, my feelingof guilt was mainly because I was leaving my son to others to take care of forlong hours, I didn’t have enough time to take care of him or spend quality timewith him. 

It took me many longyears to get rid of that feeling and to understand that feeling guilty is oneof the reasons why I felt drained and unhappy all the time. One time I talkedabout it to a counselor, and she told me that it was not a question of how muchtime you spend with your kids, but how you spend that time with them.Since then I started doing my best to make the time I spend with my kidsenjoyable for me and for them. I learned about quality time. I learned that theconcept of the mother being available for her kids 24/7 is not correct. Irealized that the meaning of a good mother and a good wife thatI inherited from my mother and my culture is not useful for me anymoreand is not doing me any good. I had to rethink and redefine it according to myvalues, my priorities, my ambitions and my own definition of happiness.

Does my story soundfamiliar? Does it sound like yours or someone you know? I am sure that thereare hundreds, thousands or may be millions of women who had similar experiencesor stories in their lives, especially when their kids were young. On my post ofnext week I will share with you more information about the feeling of guilt andhow to deal with it. If you have any questions, stories or tips to deal withthe feeling of guilt, please share them with me.

A letter to an amazing woman

Dear sister,

    I am writing thisletter to share my thoughts and my feelings with you; you are the only one whocan understand what I think and how I feel. I know you go through a lot ofstruggles and fights every day like me. I want to share with you a greatexperience that I went through one day.

I live a life like yours; working,taking care of my family, giving birth to my lovely children, raising them,feeding them, looking after them, doing my best to make them feel comfortableand happy, taking a lot of responsibilities at work and at home. I am trying mybest to prove to everybody that I am a successful working person, a good wife,a good mother and a good daughter. I have done all that I can to pleaseeverybody. At work, I worked extra hours to get my work done on time. I alwaysfound the energy and the time to take my kids to their workouts, or take themout for some fun, even when I was very exhausted. I had to go see my parentsand tolerate their blame while I needed someone to give me a tap on the back. Igave up opportunities to travel— something that I really love and enjoy—to meetnever-ending project deadlines. I felt unsatisfied, unfulfilled andunhappy. My days and my life were a long list of tasks for everybody elsewith nothing for me, for my happiness, and my self-care. Although I have donemy best to please everybody, they were rarely pleased with whatI did; on the contrary, they criticized me more and more.

One day I realized that I couldn’tgo further. I needed to find a solution. I felt totally unhappy andunsatisfied. I needed to make a huge change but I didn’t know where to start orhow to start. At that time I thought it was a time management issue so I lookedfor books about time management. I came by a book that made me realize afterreading it that my problem was not about time; it was mainly a mindset issue.It’s my way of thinking, my way of living, my way of allowing unimportantthings to consume my time, leaving me unsatisfied and unhappy at the end of theday. I wasn’t putting myself and my happiness as a priority. The book thatI mentioned before made a huge change in my life. I had gotten the book in 2000.The author of the book is one of the most famous personal coaches in the world, andever since I read it, I started searching for and learning about coaching.Now that I became a coach myself I decided to offer my coaching to WOMEN allover the world and especially on the HAPPINESS aspect of life. 

Dear sister, 

    The amazing woman Iwant to address my message to is YOU, every woman all over the world. Yes, youare amazing. No one can tolerate what you are tolerating for your family, yourchildren, your parents, and your friends. The support you are offering everyonepassing your way is fantastic. No one can bring happiness to your family as youcan. No one cares about your children and fights to protect them as you do. Noone is giving up and denying their happiness for the happiness of others as youare.  I admit you are amazing, caring, tender, loving, courageous,sacrificing and strong. I admit you are great, but there is something I want towhisper in your ear “You can’t make others really happy unless you are“.Your happiness doesn’t mean you give up happiness of others. Your self-caredoesn’t mean you give up caring for others. Your self-love doesn’t mean yougive up loving others. Showing self-care and self-love and looking for yourhappiness means you appreciate, value, and respect who you are. Be sure that asmuch as you appreciate yourself, your family will appreciate you and what youdo. As much as you value yourself, your family will value you. As much as yourespect yourself, your family and the entire world will respect you. So just beproud of who you are and show enough self-care and self-love. You will feelhappier, more confident and you will shine. 

“Youeducate a man; you educate a man. You educate a woman; you educate ageneration.”  ~ Brigham Young ~

Can you imagine that by taking careof your happiness, you are teaching others how to be happy and this is exactlywhat you aim for, don’t you do your best to make others happy? In thisworld, there are millions of stories of amazing women with achievements thatvaried from fighting for their families and their children to make their livesbetter to leading their countries and their people to greatness. In history,you can find plenty of such stories. Don’t you like to be one of these rolemodels? I am offering you a small secret, just learn to make yourselfhappy and you will be a role model for everyone else. You will shine andilluminate others lives, you will energize and inspire others. You will teachmany others how to be happy; something that all the humanity has been lookingfor for centuries.

Starting this week, I invite you todedicate only one hour daily for yourself to do something you like. Don’t say Idon’t have one hour per day, you have 24 hours a day and one hour is not toomuch for your happiness and your wellness. Listen to music, walk in the openair, meet a friend, have your hair cut, read a book, go to the movie, or attenda seminar. Do anything that you like; just relax and enjoy every minute ofthese sixty minutes and write down how you felt after this hour. You can havethe seven hours of the week organized in different ways, half a day once perweek, three and half hours twice a week, two hours and half every second day orone hour daily. Manage them the way that suits you. The important thing is tocommit to it as an important appointment in your week. Plan ahead for it, anddon’t give it up for any reason. You will feel the impact thishour will have on your life.

Want to be great?

“You don’t have to begreat to start, but you have to start to be great” ~Zig Ziglar~

So true! How many timesdid you procrastinate doing something because you thought you weren’t ready yet,that you needed to think more about it, or that you need to prepare some more? Youkeep thinking and thinking and over-thinking, then planning and searching, thenmaking excuses that you want to be well prepared and ready for taking the rightactions. And do you finally take any actions? Most probably not.

Actually, it’s your fearthat is holding you back. It may be fear of failure, fear of makingmistakes, fear of the unknown, fear of getting out of your comfort zone, andsometimes it’s fear of success. Anyway, whatever the reason of your fear, youwon’t be able to overcome it unless you start and take action. To achieve agoal you don’t need to be professional; all you need is to have a clear visionof what you want to do and how to do it then START. You will make mistakes, sowhat? It is an opportunity to learn the right way to do something. You may fail;the greatest champions and the best scientists have failed but they never gaveup. How many times did you have a dream and you gave it up just because youdidn’t believe you could do it then you found someone else do it? The onlydifference between you and them is that they believed they could, while you didnot. They felt fear and they overcame it, but you did not. They started and theykept going toward their dreams, but you did not even start. 

The first step you take isyour first step towards greatness. If you still can’t start, reflect on thesequestions. They can help you gain clarity about what is holding you back:

1- What would I do if Ihad no fear?

2- What would I do if Iwas sure I would never fail?

3- What would I do if Ibelieved there isn’t a word called “mistakes”? There are only optionswith different outcomes; some will lead to my goal while others willnot and I will learn what the right ones are.

Start today, look for agoal that you gave up and see which action you can take immediately to bringyou closer to your goal and take it. Actions create the momentum that you needto keep going, so keep taking actions, even small ones, to keep the momentum.Your pace may differ from time to time. It is OK but never stop, for it will behard to restart again.

22 tips to keep yourself motivated (continued)

On my post of last week I shared eleven tips to getand keep you motivated while you are going through life and in this post Ishare the rest.

12-  Ask what’s the worst thatcould happen if you give up your goal?

       Visualize how you will be;how will your life look if you give up your goal, and what are the results ofgiving up your goal. Visualizing the outcomes can keep you motivated to work onyour goal especially if the image you visualized is not the one you desire ofyourself or your life.

13- What’s holding you back? 

       Discovering why you arestuck or unable to take action is the first step to solve the issue? To find asolution you need a clear vision of the problem before being able to handle it.Is it a fear? Is it a lack of self-confidence? Is it a belief? What can you doto deal with it? Sometimes you may need the support of a professional coach todeal with it and get rid of the reason for good.

14- If not now, when? 

      If you don’t start working onyour goal now, when will you?  Most probably you will keep procrastinatingfor good. If you aren’t able to take action on your goal now, this means thatyou are stuck and need to find out the reason. Find out the simplest action youcan take to start, do it, and you will feel the difference. 

15- Fear is normal.

       Do you feel fearful ofdoing something new although you badly want to do it or fearful of taking anyactions toward a goal?  Who of us didn’tfeel fearful when we started doing something new? Every one of us feels fear;the difference is there are people who take action despite their fears andothers who allow fear to hold them back. Always remind yourself that fear isnormal and that every one of us experiences it at one point or another in ourlives. Your support group or a professional coach can help you to deal withyour fears.

16- Put structures in place to remindyourself.

      We tend to forget the change wewant to make or the goal we want to achieve. Putting structures in place to remind us of our goal can be so helpful.A structure can be an affirmation written on a piece of paper and kept indifferent places in your home and office. Inspiring pictures, reminders on yourcell phone or any other ideas can be used. What is essential is to find the ones that work best for you.

17- Keep quiet. 

       Learn when to talk aboutyour goals and with whom. Some people can be a great source of support and motivationwhile others may resent your improvement, so it’s better to keep quiet. Keepyour goals and your success to yourself in presence of the latter.

18- Failure is normal. 

      Fear of failure is one of themost common reasons people are stuck and unable to move forward. However, failureis essential for our learning. To reach any destination there are several options,and to know which one is the right path we may have to go through several untilwe reach the right one. All of us have failed at a certain point in our lives,and our reaction toward this failure determined where we are now. Justaccepting failure as a part of the journey can make a great difference in yourlife.

19- What inspires you?

       Keep inspiring resourcesnearby. Find what works for you, movies, songs, books, affirmations, quotationsor anything that inspires you, and refer back to them when you need amotivation boost. You may set a daily time for reflecting on one of theseresources to bring you motivation, or do it when needed.

20- Create strategy and reusewhat worked for you. 

      Knowing what you want to do isthe first step, and knowing how you will reach it is the second one. To getsomewhere you need to know very clearly what your destination is and how youwill get there. Make your plan. What obstacles might you face? How will youovercome these obstacles? Who can help you or support you along your way? Whatresources do you have? What strategies worked for you before that you can reuse?A clear vision of how you will reach your goal is crucial to your successin reaching your goal.

21- Timeline.

       Be very specific when youexpect to achieve your goal and every sub-goal.  A plan with veryspecific dates brings more clarity and momentum, it helps keep you accountableand avoid procrastinating. Specific start dates and end dates are veryimportant.

22- Enjoy the journey and celebrate.

      Focusing on the end result andbeing attached to it can be frustrating because achieving a goal may take along time.  Forgetting a while about theend result and focusing on the actions you are taking, the momentum created andthe sense of achievement you feel with every step you take can be soempowering. Enjoy the journey, the learning, the achievement and celebrate yoursuccesses.

Bonus Tip: Acknowledgement. Acknowledge yourself foryour achievements. Acknowledge others for their achievements. Sometimesacknowledgement is all we need to keep going. It brings you and yoursurroundings great energy, motivation and love.

Hope you find these tips helpful and I welcome yourthoughts, your questions and your comments.

      

22 tips to keep yourself motivated

Motivation is the force or influence that causes someone to dosomething, it’s the desire, willingness and enthusiasm. There are two types ofmotivation external and internal. The external motivation can be anything thatenthuses and encourages you to work, exercise, study or take any action. The external motivation can be a bonus that makes you work harder or a partner who enthuses you to exercise regularly or any kind of motives that make you keep doing something. But in this case when the motive is no longer there your motivation fades and you don’t feel enthusiastic about what you were doing any more. The internal motivation or self motivation is to feel energized to do something internally without any external motive. It is the best source of energy to keep you enthusiastic about your dreams and makes you move forward. We feel self motivated when we have goals and dreams and here are some tips to keep yourself  motivated.

1-  Dream of your ideal life 

  Before setting goals take some time to imagine how do you imagine your ideal life? Think of all aspect of your life how does it look like? Write down a full detailed picture of the life of your dreams. How is your personal life, your career, your family, fun and recreation, spiritual life, health and wellness, hobbies?  Dream and dream big dreams.

2-  Set goals 

     When you can visualize your ideal life clearly you will be able to set goals. Write down very clear specific goals, when your goal is so clear to you, you will be able to define what steps you need to take to reach it. Revise your written goals daily to keep yourself focused.


3- A daily habit to build
Set aside 30 min every day , early in the morning or before going to bed, to revise your written goals, define your daily tasks (for the day or the following day), how productive you were? What can you do to increase your productivity and keep focused on your goals?

4-  Take action

     Thinking and setting your goals, planning how and when you will reach them are all important but the thing that really creates momentum and motivates you to keep going is to take action. Without taking actions you will not reach your goal so start as soon as possible  even with small steps, it will raise your motivation and energy. 

5-  Find a partner or a support group

   A partner who has the same goal can be a great source of motivation for you as you can be for him/her. Your support for each other will have a great impact on your results and you can uplift each other. In case you can’t find a partner who is working toward the same goal build yourself a support group and I prefer that you always have a support group. It’s a group of like minded, positive, and supportive people who care about your happiness and success and willing to be there for you when you need their support. They can be family members, friends, colleagues or even connections on the net. The essential is they provide you with the support you need.

6-  Notice your thoughts and inner self talk 

    Take care of your inner self talk and your thoughts, fight all forms of negative thoughts or self talk. Make yourself a list of affirmations to repeat everyday to keep you motivated and positive. Write your thoughts, feelings and inner self talk in different situations and notice the patterns in them. Replace the negative inner self talk with more positive statements.

7-  Don’t let criticism frustrate you

   Listen to criticism and examine it. Do you find anything valuable in it? Do you learn something out of it? If yes that’s great, if not just let it go, don’t allow negative people make you loose your motivation or your desire to achieve your goal. 

8-  Impossible to fail 

      What goals will you set if you believe that it’s impossible to fail? What dreams will you have if you are sure you are capable of achieving them? Sure you will dream big dreams,right? Why not dreaming big dreams? The only thing that hold us back from achieving big dreams is the fear and the unclear vision that fear causes, but if we can eliminate our fear of failure our motivation will soar and our ability to achieve our goals will be totally different.

9-  Write in a journal 

      Build the habit of writing daily in a journal. Write your thoughts, your feelings, your reactions. Write  what motivates you and what demotivates you?  Writing in a journal helps to gain awareness about yourself, your feelings, your thoughts, your perspective and your perception of yourself. It makes you know do you love, respect, value and appreciate yourself or not? So you will know what do you need to do to make yourself feel better about yourself and hence feel more confident and more motivated to achieve your goals. Unconfident people are less likely to achieve goals.

10- Search for success stories
       Searching for people who could achieve the same goals makes you feel that your goals are reachable and as other could achieve them you will do as well. You can learn from them, what obstacles  did they face and how they could overcome them?

11- Be patient
       One of the reasons that make people quit their goals is that they aren’t patient enough. Achieving goals takes time, we don’t make any change over night. As a seed needs time to grow and it takes time until you see the sprout coming out of the soil, the result of your effort needs time to show. 


You can read the rest of thisarticle on the post of next week.  


Your comments, thoughts and questions are welcomed.

2 strategies to boost self confidence and self esteem

Self-confidence is having or showing confidence inyourself and your abilities (Merriam Webster learner’s dictionary).

Self-esteem is a term used in psychology toreflect a person’s overall evaluation or appraisal of his/her ownworth. Self-esteem encompasses beliefs (Wikipedia).

Empowering something that is empowering makes youmore confident and makes you feel that you are in control of your life (Cambridgedictionaries online).

Disempowering is to cause a person to be less likelythan others to succeed; to prevent them from having power, authority, orinfluence (Merriam Webster learner’s dictionary).

 So self-confidence is the belief about our self-worth (self-esteem)and our ability of achievement, and depending on the beliefs we hold about ourself-value and our abilities our lives will be. If the beliefs we hold areempowering we will feel more confident and in control of our lives andhence capable of succeed, but if our beliefs are dis-empowering or limiting we feelpowerless,  fearful, unworthy and less able to succeed.

 Usually our limiting self beliefs are due to unsuccessful experiences early in our life like childhood and youth. Letting the outcomes of such early experience control our life is not the right thing to do and it doesn’t serve us so we need to examine them and find out how to deal with them. On a previous post I discussed how our limiting beliefs can cause low self confidence and low self esteem and I mentioned some tips that worked for me to change my negative self talk that the limiting beliefs caused. On this post I like to talk about two very important strategies to fight lack of self confidence. 

The first one is courage which is defined as the ability to control your fear in a dangerous or difficultsituation. So if we lack self confidence because of a fear we feel when we face a certain situation, the best way to improve our self confidence is to face the situation we fear most. As much as we face the situation we will  be able to let go of the fear and improve our self confidence. It can be made gradually, for example someone who has stage fright and can’t speak in public, by rehearsing to speak in front of a small group of friends or family members can be a good start. Then by increasing the number and inviting more people their self confidence will develop and grow.

“Don’t wait until everything is just right. It will never be perfect.There will always be challenges, obstacles and less than perfect conditions. Sowhat? Get started now. With each step you take, you will grow stronger andstronger, more and more skilled, more and more self-confident and more and moresuccessful.” ~ Mark Victor Hansen ~


The second one is taking actions, even small ones. Procrastinating till later, till you are ready, or till everything is perfect is not a good way to create motivation. Taking regular actions toward our goal encourages and empowers us to take more steps and more actions,  it brings momentum and with every step taken we build our self confidence.


What useful strategies or tips worked for you to improve your self confidence and overcome your fears?

Leaving my fears behind

For me 2011 were one of the best years of my life, it was the year of achievement, change, clarity and great awareness. During this year, I knew myself more than any time else. I could realize how I see and treat myself. I learned what I need more of and what I need to let go. I learned for the first time in my whole life that I am responsible for my choices and that these choices create my life; so I am responsible for most of what is happening in my life. It was a great awareness that brought to me huge clarity and now I think I can live a happier and more fulfilling life.

One of the things that I learned in 2011 is to say “No”. “No” to time wasters, “No” to energy drainers, “No” to anything that doesn’t matter to me and won’t bring me any value or benefit; All this learning I intend to take it with me in 2012, only one “No” I will leave, it’s “No” to new opportunities, trying new things that I don’t know. I used to avoid anything I am not familiar with, I wasn’t fan of trying new things, even when I decide to try something new it must be tried by someone else and they found it OK. I wasn’t ready to take any risk. I was limiting myself in a very small area and depriving myself from the pleasure of living a new experience with the pleasure and fun it may bring. 

Eventually I decided to break this limiting fear of trying new things, I had an opportunity to talk on a program in our local radio and as usual I had this negative inner self talk “What if I couldn’t talk confidently? What if I made any mistakes? My voice is not OK….. ” and due to this self talk I thought about apologizing but I got a question that totally shifted my attention and my mind ” Why don’t I look at it from a curiosity perspective? How a radio program is recorded? How this place look like? How the announcers work?” and I found myself  excited about the idea and so curious to go and live this moment. I could convince myself that it’s just a talk with a friend about what is coaching and what I do as a coach, I’ve done it before with my friends and all noticed how excited I am about it so why not think of it the same way. I did it and it worked very well. We talked for more than an hour and they recorded 3 parts that will be submitted on their weekly program for three successive weeks. 

It was exciting and a great achievement to beat this limiting fear and since then I decided to leave the “No for doing something new” behind me forever and live with a new mindset, to look for every opportunity to try new things. This is the best way to rediscover  my undiscovered talents and abilities.

This post is part of a blog hop series sponsored by studentsand graduate Coaches of ICA. Please hop on over to their posts and see whatelse you can learn about ”What did you learn from 2011 that you’ll change in2012?”.

Joyful Growth Coach

http://joyfulgrowthcoach.com/2012/01/what-did-you-learn-from-2011-that-you-will-change-in-2012/

Coachinu

http://coachinublog.com/2012/01/16/lessons-learnt-in-2011-that-could-make-a-better-2012/

Intuitive Coaching

http://reneevosdewael.com/2012/01/16/just-let-go-of-what-doesnt-work/

Learner Focused Coaching

http://learnerfocusedcoaching.com/2012/01/16/how-do-you-measure-a-year/

Bodacious Possibilities

http://bodaciouspossibilities.com/2012/01/looking-back-looking-forward/

Turning Stones Coaching and Consultancy

http://turningstonescoaching.com/2012/01/15/how-to-stick-to-your-new-years-resolutions-a-k-a-what-i-learned-from-2011/

 What I am is What I Choose

http://whatiamiswhatichoose.wordpress.com/2012/01/16/what-did-you-learn-from-2011-that-youll-change-in-2012/