Tiny Bites of Wagaliciousness

A friend has been waiting to hear about an application she submitted. It was taking a while…longer than she thought it should, and we were comparing prior experiences with this process. She was worried about so many layers of so many possibilities – reasons that maybe kinda could be coming into play that might be slowing down her application. My friend went deep into MSU – not the college or university, the mental state of Making Stuff Up. Humankind learned and passed on knowledge long before the invention of printing presses and written language through stories. Our predecessors used storytelling to share wisdom and warnings and to entertain each other. Our brains love stories, and in the absence of direct proof, our brains can make up some incredible stories! Usually when we go to MSU, our brain is making up a story that’s far worse than any eventual reality turns out. When something not optimal is happening in your life, resist the temptation to make up stories about what might be behind it – focus on something that’s within your control and let the other thing play out as it will. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

The other day a new person showed up in a mastermind group I’m part of. We meet once a week and many of us have been part of the mastermind for years. I don’t run the group and yet when a new person shows up, they might come to the conclusion that I do because of how I treat them. Dad was career military – we moved a lot, and I was the new girl in school every year or two. It’s an uncomfortable feeling for most people to be the new person in an established bunch of people, and might be shy about being the one to reach out so friendships can begin. I set an intention at the beginning of this year to make it easy for the “new girls” in the mastermind. Maybe you can do something similar? If there’s a pain you’ve personally experienced, how can you help others not need to experience it the way you did? PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Do you enjoy the feeling of regret? OK, that’s kind of a dumb question, right? What is regret, anyway? Regrets are nearly always about the choice not taken. The simple version is we wish we’d gotten chocolate instead of vanilla ice cream. In everyone’s life there are more complex versions – words we’d like to take back, a bad career move, or a relationship we jettisoned and now, in hindsight, think maybe it wasn’t so bad after all. No one enjoys the feelings of regret, yet when you pay attention to your thoughts, you might be surprised at how often your brain beats you up over events from the past. When regret creeps into your mind, that’s the moment to shift your perspective on that past event. Reframe it in a way that allows you to recognize your growth and your ability to make good decisions. In the ice cream example, remind yourself that vanilla is the most popular ice cream flavor in the world for a reason, and you can always choose chocolate next time. Catch yourself when you feel regret bubbling up and kick it to the curb – regret is a powerless emotion and you are NOT a powerless person. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Have you ever faced the end of a pet’s life? If you’ve ever had a pet, chances are you have, and the more physical interaction you had with that pet, the more it hurt to watch their life slip away. And the anguish of making the loving decision to put an end to their suffering is pain some people never want to repeat. Pets are wonderful additions to our lives. They give us so many opportunities for fun and learning and growth, yet their lives are so much shorter than ours that we walk through those endings so many times. The longer you live, the more pets you share your life with, the more often you come to the end of another love story. Yet most of us choose to do it again. Why? Because pets give us focus and purpose in our lives. Pets give our lives structure. Pets give us learning opportunities. Pets give us love, and they give us the opportunity to love, and it’s in the giving of love that we humans are at our very best. Even when it hurts so much to lose them, we still choose pets because by doing so, we’re choosing to love. That says something wonderful about the people who love pets. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Do you want a sure-fire way to lower your stress level while you build your leadership skills? Build creativity into each day. It doesn’t matter what kind of creativity, and yes, being more creative will help you be a better leader and also be less stressed. Creativity is just your playful nature coming out where you can see it, and when you allow yourself to be creative, you super-charge your problem-solving skills. Curiosity, creativity, and problem-solving are all controlled in the same area of the brain, so when you make time for creativity each day, you access resources that help you be more innovative as you manage change more easily. When you can do that, your team feels empowered to do it, too. Creativity could look like journaling or other writing, doodling, singing or playing a musical instrument, or learning something new that you’ve been interested in learning. Think about what you loved to do before adult responsibilities limited your time for it – that’s where your wellspring of creativity is just waiting for you to rediscover it. Build time for creativity into every day and watch yourself grow and bloom! PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Think about the person you like and admire most. It could be anyone in your life besides you – who do you hold in high esteem? Take a few minutes today to write down all the positive attributes you can come up with about that person. Write until you can’t think of even one more thing. Then, make a separate list of all the negative attributes they have. Compare the lists – I’m guessing that their positive aspects outweigh the negatives, right? Do you see words like “smart” “wise” “loving” “kind” “wise” “helpful” on the positive list? Most people admire people who have traits like that. On the list of negatives, are there any really strong words like “hate” or “evil”? Probably not, or you wouldn’t be feeling admiration for them. Yes, we’re all human, and we all have plusses and minuses in our personalities and skill sets, and that’s OK. You’ve just shown yourself that you can overlook the negatives in someone you care about, so I want you to think about this: why are you so hard on your own negative aspects? Instead of looking at them as character flaws, can you look at them as opportunities for personal growth? PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Have you ever heard the phrase, “wherever you go, there you are”? It may sound absurdly simple, yet it’s one of the most complex lessons we must learn, and there are a lot of people who never actually learn it. Maybe you’ve seen someone who keeps changing jobs – they’re excited about each new job at the beginning, yet within a few months they’re complaining about co-workers or their boss, and you’ve heard it all before. It’s not that every job they go to has the same type of badly-behaved people, it’s that this person is taking their lack of coping skills with them to each job. The best gift you can give to yourself is the gift of self-awareness, with a side of willingness to learn and grow. If there’s something not-optimal in your life that happens again and again, examine what part you may be playing in that toxic vicious cycle. Because if you don’t recognize your contribution to the problem, you’ll keep contributing to the same problem for the rest of your life. And aren’t new mistakes more fun to make than the same-old, same-old? PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

This morning a friend and I were talking about the clutter in our lives. She has lifetimes of paperwork, photographs, and ephemera from parents and grandparents to wade through, and I have lifetimes of collectable objects, and some paperwork and photographs, too. Does any of this sound like you, too? My friend and I talked about how giving things up can feel like losing the person who loved it or wrote it or is pictured all over again. Here’s a way to honor the memories while clearing out the clutter that’s easier on your heart. If you have a box of old photographs you inherited, set aside time once a week to go through part of the collection. As you go through the pictures, make two stacks – special and not special. Put the not-special ones in a box to be donated to the historical society in the town where the photos were taken. Scan the special ones into your computer, or use a service that will scan them in for you, then add the special ones to the donation box. You can do this with paperwork and with collectables, too. In this way, you’re honoring the memories without having to hold on to the things. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Do you ever feel like you’re having an argument with yourself and that you’re losing? You might not ever have thought of it that way, and that internal tug-of-war can show up in a lot of ways. There have been times in my life that I did something because I thought I was supposed to do it, not because I wanted to do it. Not only was there no joy in the doing of the thing, I often accidentally injured myself in the process! Maybe your inner self is more subtle than mine – I sure hope so! Once I noticed that pattern, I made it a point to examine whether what I was about to do was really for my best and highest good. When I stopped doing things for the approval of others and started doing things that felt right to me, the accidents stopped. Today, think about the times you’ve done things you didn’t really want to do – were you courting the approval of someone, or you felt like you had to do it, no matter what? Think about your inner tug-of-war and how it affected you at the time, and how it feels now. Can you stop losing arguments with yourself, starting today? PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Have you ever lost something and been frantic to find it? You can’t, right? The harder you look, the more frantic you feel, and that makes you look even more furiously, tossing things out of the way as you desperately search for what’s missing. And then, chances are, you’ve said something that nearly every human has said, too: “Why is it always in the last place I look?” The smart-aleck answer is “because you found it so there’s no need to look anywhere else” and I won’t insult you with that. When you’re in the mental space of desperation and frantic searching, your brain is about as far as it can get from problem-solving mode. It literally fails to consider anything except the desperate need to find whatever you’re looking for. Stop. Take a breath. In order to take in your entire surroundings and conduct an effective search, you have to access your brain’s creativity, and that doesn’t happen when you’re stressed. Take a break. Take a few long, slow, deep breaths. If you have time, take a bath and think about something else. When you feel centered and balanced, think about the last time you saw or used whatever is missing. That train of thought should lead you right to the thing you’re looking for. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Can you manage your own disappointment? One of the toughest things for most people to do is to find a way to be OK with a non-optimal outcome. It seems like it should be easier for us, because non-optimal outcomes happen all the time. You walk across the room and stub your toe on the table leg. You park your car at the grocery store, come out after shopping and see that a shopping cart has dented the side door. You fall in love, think it’s forever, and find out it’s not. When I was a senior in high school there was an art contest. All the finalists got to have their work displayed in the local mall, and I was thrilled that my sculpture was chosen. Before the judging panel awarded the prizes, someone vandalized some of the art and stole some of the pieces. My sculpture was stolen. Not optimal, and I was so disappointed to lose my creation. Mom taught me a great life lesson that day, and I want to share it with you: can you fix what has happened? If yes, fix it. If no, roll with it. Railing against it only makes a bad situation worse and prolongs your own grief. Roll with it, let it go, and move on with your fabulous self. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Do you ever feel like the bit-player puppet in some bizarre show starring every other puppet but you? Does it feel like the puppeteer is letting the rest of the puppets have way more fun than you? Do you know where those feelings come from? They come from you comparing your life to the lives of others. Not only is this kind of comparison unfair to you, it’s unfair to the others, too. It’s unfair because you know for sure what you’re living and you have no idea what’s going on in the other peoples’ lives. You know what you see, and you fill in the blanks that you don’t see, making assumptions about how they live and whether or not they’re happy. Then you go about your daily life beating yourself up about not having as good a life as they have, and without knowing it, you treat them as if they’re causing you harm. They’re just living their lives – it’s you causing your own harm by making assumptions and behaving as if they’re true. Live your life. Enjoy your life. Resist the temptation to compare your life to any other – yours is uniquely yours. Make it what you want it to be. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Is there someone in your life who is irritating you? You have to deal with them, and maybe their communication skills don’t match yours? You keep trying to get answers and they keep giving you incomplete info or worse yet, no info at all? It is so easy to assume that they’re just blowing you off, or that they’re rude, or that they’re completely incompetent. How do those assumptions feel to you? Not good, right?  And it’s from your not-good-feeling place that you launch even more attempts to communicate, right? Stop and think – how do you think your approach to them feels to them? Not good, right? So now both of you feel bad about each other and nothing productive can come from that. How would you feel if you made a different assumption – try to assume that they’re going through a difficult time in their life and must focus nearly all their attention and time on the big problem. You can feel compassion for them, right? And from that much better feeling place, when you contact them your words and tone will be softer and they’ll respond better. Deal with them inside your head and watch your irritation evaporate. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Do you have a tough time delegating? Most people do, because most people were praised for accomplishments made in childhood, which made us want to accomplish more so we could get more praise. Giving up a task can feel like giving up the opportunity for praise and most people don’t want to do that. Right up until the first time their leadership skills are praised because they delegated! Yep, it’s true – when you’re struggling under a heavy workload and you won’t delegate, you are not leadership material. Leaders delegate. They have to delegate or they’d have no people to lead and no time to do anything but all the tasks that fall under their umbrella of influence. Do you want to be seen as leadership material? Do you want to be promoted from mid-level management to the upper echelons? First, know your people – their strengths and weaknesses. Next, delegate what you can to people based on their skillsets, reliability, and respect for deadlines. Now, sit back and bask in the glow of your newly promotable self! PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Are you a fan of children’s books like I am? Hans Christian Anderson wrote fairy tales that weren’t originally intended for children, yet have turned into classic stories used to teach virtue and resilience. This quote from him is a wonderful reminder of just how much we take for granted on a daily basis: “The whole world is a series of miracles but we’re so used to seeing them that we call them ordinary things.” What ordinary things are in your life that you take for granted? The sun energizes our planet, creating the very life around us that supports our life. Earth has just the right mass at its core to rotate on its axis and sit in a planetary path around the sun, and that movement creates the gravity that holds us on the surface of our planet. Seaweed and phytoplankton create 70% of the breathable air on the planet. Today, look for things you take for granted in your life that you’d miss if they were suddenly gone. Start thinking of those things as miraculous. My coffee pot is a miracle! PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Quick…what are your first thoughts in the morning? Don’t laugh…I’m serious! I’m looking for your first thoughts about anything – it could be a groan and “just 5 more minutes” when the alarm goes off, it could be taking an extra minute under the covers to think about what’s on your plate that day, and it could be a feeling of excitement to get up and get going. For this coming week, focus on capturing your first thoughts of each day. Put a notepad and pen by the bed and write down whatever’s on your mind as you begin each day. At the end of the day, reflect on the kind of day you had – was it an overall positive or negative day? Now, read what you wrote as that day started – was it a positive or a negative expression? Chances are, your day went the way it started. This sounds too simple to be true – it’s true, nonetheless – your thoughts have the power to create your emotions. If you want to feel happier and more uplifted, start your day with happier thoughts. Make a habit of starting your day with positive thoughts about how your day will go. Then enjoy the ride as your day goes that way! PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

I saw a meme recently that mirrored something that just happened to me. The meme said, “the worst I ever wish on people is that they meet themselves in someone else.” What a gentle, loving way to dismiss the irritation, anger, or pain someone has just inflicted on you. I was dealing with someone who was disrespectful of my time not once, not twice, but three times in one week. The third time was on me and not on the other person. I could have stopped at two and didn’t. Is there someone in your life that you need to gently usher out of your mental life, whether or not you can usher them out of your physical one? Don’t let them continually irritate and agitate you – come up with something you can say inside your head to remind yourself that their bad behavior is about them, not you, and you don’t have to feel angry or hurt. You can just “bless their heart” and wish them the kind of life they deserve. Then move on. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

What’s your risk tolerance level? Loaded question, I know, and a tough one to answer because I didn’t give you any context. What’s at risk? If you’re like most people, you’ll take more risks in some areas of your life than others. I’m perfectly happy with a fairly high level of risk where investments are concerned, and not where my heart is concerned, apparently. Recently I was reflecting on the 8 years that have passed since the end of my 30-year marriage and had to laugh – I’m very comfortable living alone, I don’t really want to spend the rest of my life alone, and yet I’ve either disregarded or sabotaged every budding relationship since then. Is there a place in your life where you have layers of the onion that need to be peeled off so you can live the life you desire? The first step is to identify what your extra layers are protecting, and then to decide how to shed those layers. My heart doesn’t want to be blindsided again, yet by keeping it all wrapped up, it’s blind to the possibilities. When you come to a similar realization, try what I’m trying – understand the desire for protection, acknowledge that the protection is keeping you from something you desire, and make a plan to start shedding those layers.  PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Remember when you were a child and you skinned your elbow? It hurt, you cried, and hopefully someone lovingly washed and bandaged your boo-boo. You noticed the boo-boo for a day or two, and then it was like it never happened – other things caught your attention and before you knew it, your elbow was as good as new. It can be like that with emotional boo-boos, too. Most of the time we feel the pain and after a little while, put the event into perspective and move on, with our heart feeling as good as new. Some emotional boo-boos are bigger, though, and sometimes it’s hard to put them into perspective. If you have a boo-boo like that, maybe it’s still too soon for you to be able to see the bigger picture, or maybe it feels so big that you feel like you must carry the pain for the rest of your life. You don’t have to – think of the event as a tree, and try to zoom out and see the forest. Each time the sharp pang of emotion hits you, take a deep breath and remind yourself that your life is now and you deserve to live it. Zoom out as far as you have to in order to feel good, because feeling good is the first step in moving on. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Do you feel stuck? Stuck in a profession you don’t love or in a job you don’t love or in a relationship you don’t love? In that feeling of stuckness is a big wad of indecision. Making a major life change is something many people don’t have the guts to do, yet feeling stuck is awful. Life is too short for you to dread each day, so today, examine what’s making you feel stuck. Try not to get caught up in the feeling – just examine the wad of indecision. Find what you’ve been avoiding thinking about – the uncomfortable choices you’ll need to make in order to get yourself unstuck. Write the choices down, then think about why you’ve been avoiding making each choice. Write those reasons down. Get really analytical about why you feel stuck, and pick one small choice you can make today to start unraveling the wad of indecision. Now feel how that feels to make the decision – it feels good, right? It feels somehow just a little bit more free. Use this feeling as encouragement to make more small decisions, and pretty soon that unstuck feeling won’t be sticking to you anymore. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Do you ever wish you were 10 or 20 or even 40 years younger? Do you ever feel like you should have been born a pirate or a princess or an inventor at the beginning of the industrial revolution? All these feelings are normal – humans love to ruminate about the past, putting themselves in it in an idyllic way that makes their current-day life pale by comparison. Who are you hurting when you do that, you may ask? You. You’re hurting you. You’re hurting who you are now and who you are becoming. When you spend your present moment wishing you lived in a past moment, you keep yourself from experiencing life in the present moment, where all your power is. Daydreaming is powerful – when you daydream yourself into a delightful-feeling future you instead of an impossible-to-achieve past you, you open yourself to personal growth. Isn’t that better than being a pirate on a stinky old leaky boat? PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Do you believe you’ll be more physically fit when you can afford to join a gym? Do you believe you'll be able to drop that extra weight when you can afford to go to that naturopathic doctor? Do you believe you’ll finally write that book you’ve dreamed of writing when you quit your job and have more free time? What do you think is limiting   you right now? What is keeping you from reaching your goal or achieving your dream? What if I told you it’s not something outside of you, it’s you? Oops…you probably didn’t want to hear that, right? Neither do I, when I do this exercise for myself. Yet we have to look at the limiting beliefs we have because they’re the ways we bully ourselves. When you believe you have to join a gym to become fit, you eliminate inexpensive possibilities like going for a walk each day. When you believe you have to work with a specialist to lose weight, you eliminate the inexpensive possibilities like eating more eggs, canned tuna, and beans instead of processed snacks. When you feel like you have to quit your job to have time to write, know this – if you quit your job you’ll have less money and you still won’t sit down and write. Challenge the bullies inside your head – do what they tell you that you can’t! PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

How do you feel about the mistakes you’ve made in your life? If you’re like me and are prone to blushing, thinking about mistakes can bring on that hot red embarrassment as if you’ve just made the mistake again. Mistakes are uncomfortable because they showcase us as fallible and flawed, but guess what? We are fallible and flawed because we’re human. An interviewer asked actress Jamie Lee Curtis that question and her answer was brilliant: “Sure, I’ve made mistakes. We all make them – we’re human, after all. The great thing about mistakes is when you take responsibility for them. That’s the goal.” Mistakes are part of learning, and if learning is good, then mistakes must be good, too. Mistakes can teach us to prepare better and to be compassionate. Mistakes can teach us to swallow hard and be truthful, even when it’s to our own detriment. Mistakes are powerful – own them and learn from them, because it’s 100% certain that you’ll make them. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Remember being a child and thinking that the wisdom of the world lay inside the heads of grown-ups? Did you yearn to be wise like them? Did you dream of the day when suddenly you would realize you have wisdom, too? Do you know that you’ve always had wisdom? The only wise man isn’t the guru sitting atop a mountain in Tibet. The only wise woman isn’t a crone with abilities no one quite understands. The wisest person isn’t the one who knows more than everyone around them. Wisdom is knowing how to soothe a friend’s skinned elbow or broken heart. Wisdom is listening to the opinions and knowledge of others, and being open to learning from what you hear. Wisdom is knowing when to keep your fingers off the keyboard and your lips sealed in a pleasant smile. When you go looking for wisdom, remember to look inside yourself first. A lot of wisdom is there inside you…please share it when you can help someone with it. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

You’ve probably heard about how elite athletes use the power of their mind to train for events, right? Because our brains can’t tell the difference between what’s happening to our bodies or what we imagine is happening to them, in addition to skills, conditioning, and strength training, elite athletes also imagine themselves doing their sport, excelling at it, and winning. They build that imagination training into each day, secure in the knowledge that there is neuroscience behind what they’re doing. It’s not woo-woo, it’s sports imagery training, and it can make the difference between a gold and ending up out of the medals. Visualization isn’t just for elite athletes – you can use it, too. Pick one thing that you’d like to be better at, and calendar 15 minutes each day for you to be quiet and uninterrupted as you sit and visualize yourself gaining competence and confidence. No matter what you choose, you can improve your skills just by improving your skills inside your mind. Ready…set…visualize! PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

In the northern hemisphere, summer is coming to an end. The season for vacations is closing. Did you take a vacation this summer? Did you mean to and did you let busyness run your life? Do you have friends you’d like to spend more time with and that didn’t happen either? Right now…right now!...figure out how many vacation days you have coming to you this year. Look at your calendar and decide when you will use them. Write those vacation days on your calendar and let your manager know that you’d like to take that time off. Decide you’ll take a vacation, calendar it, and figure out the details later. We are better employees when we’ve taken time off. We’re better friends, partners, and parents when we’ve enjoyed some down time. We are healthier in our bodies, minds and souls when we’ve shifted our focus from go-go-go to relax and rest. Go ahead…plot those vacation days. You earned them, you deserve them, and you’ll be a better person for taking them. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Do you remember the last time you had a relationship break up? Maybe it was a good friendship, or maybe it was a long-term, committed relationship. How did you react? Did you try to explain yourself to the other person? Did you apologize for you-didn’t-even-know-what and did you try to convince them they were wrong about you and wrong about ending the relationship? With great love, I want to ask you a question – why did you react that way? When a person begs and pleads with another in order to keep a relationship, they’ve given away all their power. They might as well put a “kick me” sign on their heart because that’s what that kind of behavior invites. When a person decides to leave a relationship, let them. Don’t hate them or argue with them or plead with them – let them leave. Your strength in that moment will do two things: it will take away any power you may have given them, and it will remind you that your value lies inside you and you hold the key. There’s one more thing your strength might do – when they’ve had a chance to think about things, it might draw them right back to you. You decide if you’ll let them back in. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Are you a planner? Most of us plan some things carefully, some things generally, and let some things just happen as they happen. If you keep a calendar and a to-do list, that’s planning. My to-do list is designed to delight me instead of make me feel bad about the things that I don’t get done – maybe this planning process might be fun for you, too. On an app that syncs to all my devices I create a weekly, two-column list – To-Do and Ta-Dah! In the to-do column I plug in the things that are planned for the week, the things that need to get done, and things that are part of larger projects that I’d like to get done. Once I finish something, I tab it over from “to-do” to “ta-dah!” and that almost always makes me smile. Sometimes I even throw my hands in the air triumphantly with a big “ta-dah!!” This kind of planning will motivate you to use it because of the childlike fun of “ta-dah.” Try it, and let me know if it help you stay on track, too! PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Do you live or work with someone whose life is continually filled with drama? They’re always at odds with a co-worker or a friend or current events – there’s always something they’re complaining about. Often their stories paint themselves as the victim, or the caring person who’s continually taken advantage of. They tell you their tales of woe, expecting sympathy from you and rejecting anything that sounds like problem-solving assistance. It’s exhausting, isn’t it? People who revel in drama often are rudderless – they don’t know where they’re going in life, they have no goals they’re working towards, and so they just bob along, observing the world around them and getting attention by continuously complaining. Can you help them? Probably not, though you can try one thing: every time they come to you with a complaint, listen without speaking until they stop or ask you a question. Then you ask, “and what is your solution to this problem?" That’s all – nothing else. Ask that every time, and they’ll either stop complaining to you or maybe – just maybe – they’ll learn to create their own solutions. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

If you have a tough relationship with a parent, you’re not alone. Many people struggle through adulthood because they’re still dealing with the same toxic person who raised them. Feelings of resentment and guilt are opposite ends of the emotional teeter-totter, and avoidance is practiced a lot. When you have to deal with that toxic parent, getting stuck in the emotional drama, often to the point of spiraling, can happen. That’s normal. Not optimal, but normal. Call it trauma response or PTSD or just fed up with a narcissistic personality. Spending a lifetime trying to please a person who is manipulative, controlling, self-absorbed, and an Olympic-level gas-lighter is exhausting. Stop. Today, put these three things in place in your mind and your heart, and it’ll be easier to be around your toxic parent: 1. Stay calm. They want you to react, so your calm is your superpower. 2. Don’t own it. It’s not your job to make your toxic parent happy. 3. Limit contact as much as possible. And for your own mental well-being, consider counseling, especially as you begin to stand up to your toxic parent. Your life is yours – take charge of it in a way that feels good to you. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Recently my dog Kacey and I were entered in an obedience trial. She’s a smart girl who loves to work, and we’ve competed at this level successfully before. That day we were far from successful – as a matter of fact, I did something I’ve never done before. I asked the judge if we could be excused from the ring. Most people could consider that competition a failure. I consider it a turning point and a potential learning point. I don’t understand why Kacey wouldn’t work, but I knew one thing – I didn’t want her to think her inattention in the ring was acceptable, which is why I asked to be excused. When you can be ok with failure – when you can make what many would call a failure your friend – then you have learned the art of managing your feelings instead of letting your feelings manage you. Can you ask to be excused next time things aren’t going your way, so you can walk away and learn, too? PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

This podcast is all about your wellbeing and success, and researchers around the world continue to pile up evidence that happiness is the pathway to both. Humans have a wide range of emotional responses to the world around us, and we’re hard-wired to have at least a slightly negative outlook on the world – we’re wary of new things and can be hostile in a heartbeat if something surprises or scares us. Add to those two facts this very powerful one – we are creatures of habit and have spent a lifetime ingraining habitual responses to things that set us off. So how do we go about feeling happier with all those obstacles in the way? Pay attention to how you feel. You don’t have to monitor every thought, and couldn’t even if you tried. Pay attention to how you feel, figure out why you’re feeling that way, and try to find a thought that helps you feel better. Anything that feels better is good enough – it doesn't have to be on the same topic as the one you’re trying to shift. Learn to shift how you feel – that’ll put you on a pathway to happiness, wellbeing and success. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Are you good at forgiving? If so, that’s a sign that you are an emotionally intelligent, mature person. If not, that’s ok – it just means you have a little bit of personal growth you can work on. You might not have thought about it like this – there are new things for you to practice forgiveness about nearly every day. Any time we’re around people, things happen that we don’t prefer. Use the little things to build your forgiveness muscles – if someone darts into the lane in front of you, say and mean, “that’s OK, I probably would have let you in anyway.” Anything that irritates you is something you can practice forgiveness about. Forgiving doesn’t mean being foolish – forgive, and set a new boundary if you need to, or strengthen one you’ve already set. Forgiving people means you don’t let their poor behavior ruin your day, and it doesn't mean you have to tolerate their behavior again. Get good at forgiving – it’s one of the best gifts you could ever give yourself. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Have you ever had to spend too much time around a person who tries to mask their insecurities by belittling others? Many times people think a person like that is powerful – in truth, they’re so insecure about themselves that they hide behind the aggressive behavior. Sometimes they might be passive-aggressive, and sometimes they might say horrible things about another person, or maybe even you, loudly, not caring who hears. They swagger and puff themselves up and take an ugly tone of voice that drips with disrespect. If you live with a person like that, can you move or make them move? If you work with a person like that, can you ask for a work location as far from them as possible? If you manage a person like that, you have your hands full. They need to be seeing a therapist to work on themselves, so if they’re not, welcome to the world of hard conversations. If they’re not willing to work on themselves, put them somewhere that they can’t impact team morale. If that means you put them on the street, so be it. Toxic insecurity will torpedo your team if you don’t torpedo the person first. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Think about the last time you were angry. White-hot angry. Spitting nails angry. So angry you knew you’d never get over whatever it was you were angry about. Thankfully, most of us don’t get that angry very often. What I want you to think about, now that you’ve got that sharp memory dialed up, is how you didn’t feel any anger until I asked you to think about it. You were just minding your own business, going about your day, and then you pulled up this boat-anchor of an emotional memory, which at least momentarily, brought back at least a little bit of the anger. How do you feel about the event now? Are you at peace with what happened and how it worked out? Do you see how going through the anger helped you sort things out about yourself? Did the episode end a relationship or deepen it? And as you observe how you’re now feeling, can you notice the calmer way you feel now? Enjoy the calmness – that’s evidence that your emotional maturity grew because of that angry episode in your life. Yay, resilience! PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Can you imagine life without music? As I write this, my favorite satellite radio station is playing in the background. Is that you, too? Do you have a playlist and a set of workout jams? Or maybe you listen to music less often – I bet you still enjoy it when you turn it on. You probably have a few favorite songs, if you create short social videos you probably like exploring the music you can use with them, and there might even be a song or two that you love to sing. Can you imagine life without music? Do you get a little lift in your step when a song you like plays in a store? Do you slow down to hear a musician playing on the street or in the park? Do you get excited when your windshield wipers or your heartbeat matches the beat of the song you’re playing? The learning and awareness and pleasure parts of our brains light up when our ears pick up music. Your brain feeds you dopamine, our happy drug, when you listen to music. Seriously, can you imagine a life without music? PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Have you ever thought about what your superpower might be? Mine is the ability to take a complex topic like neuroplasticity and make it accessible and understandable. Need proof? You’re listening to it – this podcast dishes up neuroplasticity tools in disguises in 90 seconds or less every day. Back to you – what’s your superpower? This is something you could ask your family members, friends, and co-workers. They experience your superpower while you probably take it for granted because it comes easily to you. Go ahead – ask people what they think your top one or two strengths are. The one you hear most often is a superpower, so go ahead and own it. No one has your exact superpower because no one has lived your experiences and grown your unique shape of personal growth. As you go through your days from now on, pay attention to how you use your superpower – who benefits, how do they benefit, and how can you use it even better? Gamify your superpower and fly! PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Are you worried about something in your life right now? Most people worry – it’s a generational legacy that doesn’t serve us very well, yet we do it anyway. One of my favorite quotes is “Worrying is using your powerful imagination to create something you don’t want.” Abraham Hicks shared that, and when you’re in the process of worrying you do create something you don’t want: a stress reaction inside your body. The brain doesn’t differentiate between something that’s really happening or something that you’re imagining, so it fires up the same chemical and biophysical environment inside your skin. You already know this – stress is bad for your body in so many ways, and worrying is a horrible thing to do to your body. Thoughts are a choice – when you find yourself worrying about anything, make a choice to stop worrying. Laugh at yourself and say something like “oh, look at that old habit sneaking back in!” Then do something that doesn’t allow you to worry – singing is my go-to, because I can’t worry and sing at the same time. Don’t worry, be happy – Bobby McFarrin’s song says it just right! PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Have you ever thought of the you that you were 20 years ago? How about the you ten years ago – how did you change in that decade? Not how your life changed – how did you grow and change? What was the five-years-ago you like, and how have you grown and changed in the past five years? If you’re like most people – myself included – you don’t examine your personal growth often, if at all. Today, make a list of the accomplishments and personal growth that happened in each decade of your life, beginning with your teens. From 11 to 20, what did you accomplish? From 21 to 30? 31 to 40? Make your lists and then think about all the ways those accomplishments helped you grow and mature. Think about who you are now that you never could have been without those accomplishments and that growth. If you feel like it, make a “decades of your life” art project. Put it where you can see it often, and marvel at the you you’ve become. The 11 year old you would never have guessed all the great things you’ve done and the greatness you’ve achieved! PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Do you know who you are? Think about it, and at some point today, I want you to write down exactly who you are. Not just who you are in relation to other people – wife, daughter, mother, uncle, nephew, grandchild – but who YOU are. Start the exercise with a strong personality trait – loyal, loving, fun-loving, studious – whatever feels truest and strongest about you. Then write down more adjectives that positively describe you – honest, silly, athletic – and make that list as long as you can. Now list all the things and people you love – keep writing until you can’t think of another name. Now, put it all together and you have a pretty good idea of who you are. Read it out loud to yourself – add anything you may have forgotten. Now create a document that celebrates you – use fonts that depict each attribute, different colors for different people, whatever tickles your fancy. Print it out and hang it up where you can see it often, and read it aloud at least once a day. You are awesome and you’re worth knowing. Get to know who you are, and celebrate you daily! PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Do you work with someone who’s not exactly truthful? Maybe it’s just little lies in casual conversation, or maybe it’s a whopper like claiming they did work that you actually did. Those casual little lies can have big repercussions when they get passed around the office like a cute new puppy. Taking credit for your work puts you in a very awkward position – having to defend yourself with your boss, throwing your co-worker under the bus at the same time. That’s not a good look for you, nor is it something you should have to do. When your co-worker is habitually untruthful, they are probably struggling with low self-esteem and use lying as a way to sound and even feel more interesting and accomplished. Know that your manager depends on team members to let them know what’s going on, so if possible, get a group of people who all have first-hand knowledge of the lies and set up a meeting with the boss and without the liar. Be calm and factual – no name-calling or derogatory comments. In the case of the person taking credit for the work of others, take in proof of who really did the work. Again, calm and professional. Let your manager take care of things while you get back to work. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Are you a good friend to yourself? Would you be shocked if I told you that you probably aren’t? Hear me out – good friends lift each other up when they’re feeling down. Good friends take care of each other. Good friends give each other little surprises now and then, and check in on each other to be sure everything is OK when they haven’t heard from you in a while. Let me ask you that question again – are you a good friend to yourself? When you stumble, literally or figuratively, what do you say to yourself? Something like “dumb” or “clumsy” or can you laugh it off? When was the last time you did something nice for yourself? When was the last time you intentionally shifted what you were thinking so that you could feel better? If those were tough questions to answer, can you start now to be a better friend to yourself? You are the only person you’re going to spend your entire life with – please treat yourself like the best friend you could possibly have. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Do you know how to make a mental or even physical shift from a bad feeling to a better one? That’s not a skill most of us were taught in childhood, nor did we see a lot of people practice it so we learned to mimic it. We talk a lot about feelings on this podcast because your feelings are 100% in your control, and when your feelings are in the satisfied and above range – pleased, happy, joyous, etc. – then you’ve put yourself into the mental space necessary for you to succeed. That’s neuroscience. Controlling your feelings is neuroplasticity. When you’re feeling bad, think about the circumstance that happened just before the bad feeling began. Now, decide if what you’re feeling is how you want to feel, and if not, how you could work things around in your thoughts so you could feel better. Tell a better story to yourself about what just happened, or remove yourself from the situation, if that’s what’s needed. Distance yourself from the bad feeling by changing your thoughts or by taking physical steps and watch your mood improve. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Have you ever been betrayed by someone you sort of knew? It didn’t feel good, did it? Have you ever been betrayed by someone you knew well and trusted? Chances are, that hurt a lot worse. Know why? Because you had few expectations of the person you only sort of knew, and many many many expectations of the person you knew well and trusted. It’s not the betrayal that hurts so much, it’s the expectations we have about the person who betrayed us. When you can internalize this, you have the power to take the hurt away. How? By lowering your own expectations. First, analyze those expectations – were they even fair in the first place? If someone you trusted told your secret, then maybe your trust and expectations were misplaced from the start. Or maybe you can look at their betrayal as them trying to help you – perhaps the motives were good, so can you assume they were, instead of assuming your friend stabbed you in the back? Which feels better? How do you want to feel about that person? Find a way to manage your own expectations and find the best reason for the betrayal. Voila! The pain of betrayal has been lowered or maybe even banished! PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Have you ever loved someone very differently than they loved you? Or maybe they didn’t even love you? Being in love with someone is such a good feeling, right up until it isn’t. We’re at our best when we’re loving – we’re holding someone in the best possible light, seeing their virtues and not their flaws, we’re considering the object of our affection in our daily decisions, and we’re focused on helping make their life sweeter or easier or better. When those feelings and actions aren’t reciprocated, it doesn’t feel very good, does it? We might have self-destructive thoughts, like if we were a better person, they would love us, or maybe if we do more for them, they would love us. The truth is, sometimes someone we love doesn’t feel the same way, and that’s OK. It doesn’t feel ok as that realization comes to us like a kick in the gut, but just as you can’t be expected to be head-over-heels in love with everyone, neither does the object of your affection. Don’t pour your sunshine into someone who doesn’t think of you as their sky. Chin up, darling, and move on. Focus all those feelings of love on yourself until the right one for you comes along. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Have you ever heard the saying, “you don’t really know someone until you’ve walked a mile in their shoes”? It’s a visual way to describe trying to understand someone else’s life, point of view, and motivations, and it’s great as far as it goes. You will never really know someone, no matter how long you’ve known them and no matter how many things you’ve been through together. You can know a lot about them, and you’ll never know enough to be able to perfectly predict their actions and feelings. It’s the same with you and me – I can’t know what you know or know feel how you feel, and vice versa. Your life has uniquely prepared you for this moment in time, just as my life has uniquely prepared me for this moment in time. The best we can all do is try to give everyone in our lives the benefit of the doubt – believe that their intentions were good ones, not nefarious ones. When you can do that, it’ll be like you’ve walked at least half a mile in their shoes, and that’s a really good start to knowing them well.  PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Have you been the topic of gossip? Do you have a pulse? Both answers are the same – if you’re alive, someone somewhere at some time has talked about you with someone else. Gossip is a way for people to exchange information, to bolster their own sense of importance, and to create or deepen social bonds. Eleanor Roosevelt is quoted as saying, “Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people.” She was on to something that psychologists and researchers are now discovering – people with a high level of emotional intelligence spend the least amount of time talking about others, while those with the lowest levels of emotional intelligence spend the most time gossiping. If you hang with the people who gossip, and especially if you are the gossip, you need to think about this: it’s not a good look, and it’s also a big risk. According to an old Turkish proverb, those who gossip to you will gossip about you. Gossip is toxic…step away! PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

Have you lived long enough to have been through a major life change that was upsetting? Losing a loved one, losing a marriage, losing a job you loved or a house you loved – there are a lot of different types of trauma and it’s part of the human condition that we go through a few between the time we’re born and the time we die. There are people who are very focused on discussing the traumas in life, and when they’re with you, once they’ve gotten tired of talking about their own traumatic past, maybe they begin dredging up your past so they can help you keep it alive. Maybe they try to convince you that you need to talk about it so you can gain understanding and closure. They’re just looking for entertainment and you can choose not to play their “reliving pain” game. The past is gone…you have no power there. Let it go and focus on what’s happening now in your life, and what you hope to have happen moving forward. Stuff happens – get through it, roll with it, learn from it, and then let it go. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

I was talking to a friend the other day. She’d just been let go by a company she’d worked for since before this century began. She was mad. Very mad. Seriously mad. As she vented to me, she was playing out scenarios of how she could get back at the person who fired her and at the so-large-everyone-in-the-world-knows-their-name corporation that released her. I let her talk. She didn’t want or need my advice, she just needed to spew. When she ran out of steam, she asked, “What now?” Great question – have you ever had a ”what now” moment, too? Most of us have, and it’s a helpless feeling. When you’re the one feeling that way, I hope you have a good friend who can do for you what I did for my friend – hold up a virtual mirror. I reminded her how talented she is, what a great manager she is, how many people know and respect her, both inside and outside the workplace, and then I asked her to talk about the things she’s wanted to do in the past few years but was too busy to do them. Suddenly her mood switched from revenge to dreams. Suddenly her energy moved from defeated to hopeful. Suddenly she quit focusing on the loss and started focusing on the fact that she had a very generous severance package and had the time and the means to chase a dream. No revenge – just success. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing

As you live more life by virtue of being alive, you learn things. You learn things about the world, about how you currently show up in the world, and even about how you want to show up in the world. You learn things about other people, too – maybe you learn that some of them really love you, and some of them just love what you will do for them. You start to notice that some people don’t respect your boundaries or maybe don’t even acknowledge your right to set boundaries. You start to notice that being around people like that doesn’t feel good, and maybe even notice that you dread even the thought of having to deal with them. The more life you live, the more you begin to realize that not everyone deserves access to you, so you harden your boundaries and start shutting out the bad-feeling people. That’s when they start calling you selfish or arrogant. You’re not selfish or arrogant. You’re taking care of yourself and not allowing them to continue to manipulate you. Understand that their name-calling is the last desperate gasp of someone who only cares about being able to control you. They don’t care about you, they only care about what you can do for them. Walk away. You deserve better. PS...want more? Subscribe to the Mind, Body, Soul Sessions podcast, a weekly mental spa treatment for your total self! #success #leader #lawofattraction #personaldevelopment #mentalwellbeing