What is your vision for 2015?

The beginning of a new school year!

If you live in America and have school age children, you will now be a few weeks or a month into the new school year.

I don’t know about you but I always enjoy the beginning of the school year. It brings back the structure and order that is missing from summer. I am not a highly structured person by nature (this might be an understatement) so I appreciate having the discipline of school imposed on me!

I also like to use this time of year to look at where I am in my life and where I am going.
Today I want to share an exercise with you that I first came across in Tony Robbin’s book, Awaken the Giant Within. I have simplified and modified it a little. If you want to be surprised by how powerful and motivating this deceptively simple exercise can be, then you MUST do it! Don’t just read it.

It won’t work if you simply read it.

So get out a pen and paper or use your computer and let’s begin!

A. Firstly, Let’s start with YESTERDAY.

Think back to September / October 2005. If you have children, how old were they. What were you doing? And where were you living?
Now think of three areas of your life and describe each of them as best you can in a paragraph or two. Here are the three areas:
1. Your relationships (with your significant other, your family of origin, your friends and with your children).
2. Your occupation and finance (your job, career, studies, hobbies, passions, calling etc). Even if you were not working or earning, think about where you were in this aspect of your life.
3. Your Health (emotional, physical and spiritual). Think about diet, exercise, relaxation, sleep, physical health, happiness-sadness, stress-anxiety, any chronic or acute illnesses or injuries. Think of your relationship with something spiritual. Describe where you were 5 years ago.

B. Secondly, let’s look at TODAY.
Once again describe each of the above areas as they are now, today as fully as you can. Where are you right now in each of these areas.

C. Thirdly, let’s look at TOMORROW.

Write down the date 5 years from today. How old will your children be? Where will you be? Do you know? Where do you want to be? What are your dreams and hopes and plans and goals? What is your vision?
Look at each of the three areas of your life and describe how you would like them to be. Dare to dream and be as bold and courageous as you can be. Be as detailed as you can be. Describe the state of your relationships, your finance, your health! Don’t limit yourself. Paint a picture of yourself in five years time that is inspiring and motivating and somewhat possible!
Next time we will look at what we can do next with our vision.
Enjoy yourself and send me your comments. I love to hear from you!

Very Warmly,
Kim

 

Mothers are containers, like cookie jars!

Holding a child until painful feelings subside is critical mothering work.

Here is a wild idea. But it will start to make sense as you read -

Mothers are like Cookie Jars! Mothers are Containers!

Yes! When it comes to our children’s feelings and helping them manage them, we mother’s are like washing machines or tumble dryers or mixing bowls or cookie jars.

We are required to open ourselves up to our children and help them manage all sorts of feelings. When we allow ourselves to do this for them, we teach them a lifelong skill for dealing with their feelings. We prepare them for a life of managing their feelings rather than trying to avoid their feelings or become overwhelmed by them.

There are many ways that people avoid feelings. Feelings can be numbed with substances like alcohol, food, TV, video games, sugar, street drugs, prescription drugs, promiscuous sex. Feelings can become overwhelming to the point of depression (numbing sadness) and anxiety (intense worry and dread) that is incapacitating.

The ability to help our children with their feelings cannot be undervalued. It is a critical skill for emotional intelligence.

So how do act as containers for our children.
1. We show our children that their feelings are okay. That we accept all feelings including from joy and excitement and pride to sadness, anger, confusion and helplessness. We tell them it’s okay and normal to feel hurt, disappointed, angry, in love, excited, silly etc.

2. We also help them understand that feeling and acting are two very separate things. It’s okay to FEEL angry but it’s not okay to ACT OUT that anger by being mean or hitting or hurting oneself. It’s okay to FEEL good about yourself and proud of what you have done, but it’s not okay to make another child feel inferior or bad about himself.

3. We acknowledge our children’s feelings without trying to make them go away (because the best way to make difficult feelings go away is to just let them be). We ca say things like:

“I am sorry you feel so angry today. It must be so frustrating”.
Or “Sorry that you are so disappointed”.
Or “I can only imagine how hurtful it is when your best friend turns on you like that”.
Or, “I can understand how it feels like your heart is breaking today.”

We stop ourselves from saying things like:
“Oh! Never mind. You’ll be fine.”
“There is always someone worse off than you!”
“Pull yourself together and put a smile on your face.”
“I don’t have time for this!”
“Stop feeling sorry for yourself.”

REFLECTION: What are some of the things you say to yourself or your children about feelings that are unpleasant?

4. We offer to help them “contain” their feelings. There is that container word again! Think about your arms as being strong walls around your child who is full of feelings that he or she cannot manage. Sometimes the act of containing your child’s feelings looks like:
a. Sitting on the couch quietly and holding a young child while she cries or fusses.
b. It can be simply listening to an older child.
c. It can be respecting the space of an adolescent.

All in all, the message is: “I am not afraid or freaked out by your feelings. I am here to help you manage them, not to make you feel bad or ashamed about them.”

REFLECTION:
1. Think about the way your parent responded when you had feelings that were difficult to manage.

2. Did it help? Or not help you?

3. How do you handle your feelings now? Do you let them be, or do you make them go away?

4. How can you help your child learn good ways of handling painful or overwhelming feelings?

Email Marketing Dos and Don’ts

As a mother with three young children, I find working as a coach and therapist to be a real gift. I can be at home when my children are home and I can schedule my working hours around their school hours. I am so grateful not having a company or boss dictate my working hours. Of course, this comes with many disadvantages too. I do not get any benefits, or paid holidays. And I have to do all my own marketing (greatly helped by Mike Litman of Total Coach).

I am posting this helpful newsletter from Paul Gillin, social media expert, about email marketing:

Timely Advice and Strategy
For Business Marketers and Executives

by Paul Gillin, October 8, 2009

As I write this essay, the founder of Email Data Source is telling the audience at the Inbound Marketing Summit, that email marketing has a return on investment of 44:1. I believe that, and Bill McCloskey’s words remind me that it’s been a while since I sang the praises of this venerable but highly useful marketing tool.

E-mail should be central to your online marketing plan.  It’s how you turn casual passersby into steady customers. It gives you permission on a regular basis to contact your constituents. It’s your best tool for driving website traffic and business results.

As a practitioner of e-mail marketing going back nearly a decade, I’ve learned a few simple do’s and don’ts. Fortunately, there aren’t a lot of rules. The most important ones are to be useful and to respect the access that your subscribers have granted you.

Do give visitors to your websites every chance to subscribe to your e-mails. Put a signup form on every page. If you can manage it, squeeze a promo into your e-mail signature. Remember, a Web contact is casual but an e-mail subscription is a relationship.

Do give your subscribers special treatment. Offer them exclusive offers and discounts. Some software companies now give newsletter publishers free promotional licenses to products that are one release out of date. Look for these offers and ask if you can adapt them for your subscribers.

Do use an e-mail service provider. I use iContact, but there are many others, including Constant Contact,Benchmark Email and Lyris. There are even free options. For a nominal cost, you’ll get reporting, tracking and list management you’d never be able to duplicate yourself.

Don’t deceive your subscribers. If you tell them they’re signing up for a newsletter, don’t send them promotional messages. If you say you won’t contact them more than once a month, then don’t do that. Monitor your unsubscribes. If a lot of people are leaving, they’re trying to tell you something.

Do provide a Web version of your newsletter. Mine is here. This makes it easy for people to share your content on social bookmarking sites, Twitter and Facebook. It also makes you discoverable by search engines.  Finally, it’s a way for people to respond to you.

Which reminds me: do invite response to that Web version you just created. Email is boring when it’s one way. Start a discussion.

Do sweat the subject line. Make it provocative or intriguing. However, don’t mislead people into opening the newsletter if you can’t deliver the goods.

Do keep messages brief and varied. Provide several “points of entry” to engage your audience’s different interests. Have fun. The most well-read item in my newsletter is the short “Just for Fun” blurb at the end. Do you think I don’t know that?

Do provide alternative delivery in text format. All service providers support this option. Not all subscribers prefer HTML and they shouldn’t have it forced on them.

Don’t add subscribers without their permission. There’s nothing wrong with renting an opt-in list, but scraping addresses off websites or borrowing other people’s lists can get you in legal trouble.

Don’t underestimate the value of e-mail marketing. This newsletter consumes three to four hours of my time every week. I wouldn’t do it if I didn’t think it was important.

To subscribe to Paul Gillin’s newsletter, go to www.gillin.com