Be Brave Blog

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Whose story are you writing?

 

wonderingI was talking to a friend of mine the other day about a relationship she’s in. Our conversation had a lot of, “I wonder if he…why doesn’t he…if only he…” pondering really about what was going on in the other person’s mind and wishing that their behavior and thinking was what we thought it “should” be. Wouldn’t that make things a lot easier? If, in any relationship, the other person behaved according to plan, our plan? The way we think they should respond? Of course it would.

But that’s not how it works.  After musing about this for a few minutes, she shared with me a piece of wisdom she’d recently received on the topic. Don’t write his side of the story. Just let that sink in for a minute.

How often do we do that in relationships? Whether it be romantic, friends, co-workers, we often expect others to behave, to respond, in the way we would respond. We play the scene out in our head and when it doesn’t play out like we expect, we’re disappointed. And then the fun really starts. We start assigning meaning to how they’re “not” responding. Unloving, uncaring, disconnected, disrespectful, uninterested. Our imagination takes a death spiral. And now, possibility with another person becomes futile in our minds.

What if we chose a different approach? What if instead of getting a Pulitzer for telling their side of the story, we chose instead to just be in the moment? To only think about our side of the story? To not assign definitions to what we think is going on, what we think the other person is thinking. What would that look like?

Could look like freedom. Freedom from the negative feelings and thoughts that come from trying to predict what’s going on for the other person. Could look like taking responsibility for our own true thoughts and behaviors, ones that are not dictated by how we should respond to someone who is…fill in the blank… Because in reality, they’re probably doing nothing of the sort.  If we decide that it’s ok to let go and not let our inner ego drive, you know, the one that says “you don’t deserve to be treated like that!” Treated like what??? The other person hasn’t done anything. You’re reacting to the story that you wrote.

So today my challenge is to stay focused on you. Let the other person write their side of the story. Chances are, it’ll have a much better ending than anything you could have dreamed.

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Trust me…

uplifted-handThe other day I was thinking about trust. Mainly, where do I put my trust, in people, or in stuff.  The idea led my brain on a twisty ride which I’m going to try and spill out. Often in relationships you’ll have conversations with the other person that stem around “do you trust me?” I tend to trust people easily. I believe what they say, I try to presume that their intentions are good, that they are kind. It’s an outward facing trust.

I also believe that I am also a trustworthy person. I am honest, if you know me, you know that I call it like I see it. I do have good intentions, I strive to be kind. The same things as I believe about other people. Again, outward facing.

The trust I’ve been thinking about is inward trust. It’s a question of who do I lean on, who do I trust when life is hard, because, be honest, for everyone there are times when life is hard. I believe, not dissimilar to many other people probably, that I hold things pretty close. Sometimes I’ll talk about how I feel, because I process out loud. But what people say, what they do, I put through my filter, my story, instead of taking their care and concern at face value. I think I hold back sometimes from trusting with my whole heart. Sound familiar?

So if I hold back trusting with my whole heart, where do I get comfort? Where do I turn when things are hard. To myself? Sometimes. That’s the whole self-reliant thing.  Helpful at times, but can also be isolating. What do I really do for comfort – full disclosure? – I call it stress shopping.  So there’s some dirty laundry. But if you’re like me, you have your go-to also. For me, again, it’s outward facing, not leaning on others.

Interestingly, as I go through this journey, I’m finding it doesn’t really bring me the comfort it used to because, honestly, it wasn’t comfort, it was distraction. Instead, I want to be able to trust that another person can comfort me, or that I could even comfort myself…show self-compassion. In thinking about this, I know I’m not alone. I know there are people out there who struggle with trusting that other people can comfort them. Who prefer to lean on stuff, on habits, on food, on distractions for comfort.

What I’m realizing is that we need people, each of us. Whether you’re self-reliant or not, we need others, and others need us, and that’s ok. That’s how God wired us. Really. He wants us to trust in Him and other people are an extension of His love. Each of us has that love inside of us, ready to share with other people. You may have a closet of comfort but I’d encourage you to try trusting in, leaning on, finding comfort and compassion in other people. I think it’s a journey worth taking, one that allows you and others to lean in, lean on, and move forward…together.

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Is time on your side?

 

running-timeTime. Is there ever enough of it? I’ve become conscious of how much energy I spend managing my time.  It’s crazy really.  I have all this stuff in my head that I absolutely must get done. I allow myself to feel stressed out about it and then spend more time figuring out how to get it done.  What I really want is to feel like I have all the time I need but that doesn’t seem to happen.

What if there was another way? If you had all the time you wanted, think about the possibilities! Right now, I’m stuck in feeling like time is something I fight against to get things done. I think the “things” dictate my day, not my decisions.  What I’d like to do is get to stop stressing about it because that just causes me more anxiety and negative energy overall.

So what’s the plan, Lisa? Good question.  First thing is to acknowledge that, in reality, there are very few things that actually “have” to get done. When I hold up the mirror, I’m looking for the personal value that’s driving my behavior. For me, I think my value of responsibility is calling the shots. Responsibility is fine when it’s used “for good not evil” as I like to say. But if the responsibility is due to a fear of what will happen if I’m not “responsible” it’s overstepped the boundary.

Back to the plan. What can I do, what can anyone do, to move to a reality where time really is “on our side,” not the common enemy?  Make a list. Yeah, super simple, not brain surgery. But one thing I’ve learned recently is that the more stuff I try to hold in my head, the less space I have for creative things, activities that bring me energy. I’m not only managing my time, I’m managing all the stuff in my head. I’ve fought lists too, but am learning that I forget and then have to spend time working backwards until I remember what I was supposed to do, or miss stuff. So step 1, lists, I can do that today.

What about this week, what can I do this week? Thanksgiving is coming up.  Lots to do, legitimately. But I can look at what needs to be done and determine if I’m actually the one who needs to do it.  My son can make mashed potatoes. The house doesn’t have to be spotless. I can let some things go. Ok, step 2, let stuff go.

Looking farther out, what else, what would be a longer term goal – the ideal goal? Keep the lists, look at the pattern of how I’m spending time. Make decisions on what needs to stay and what can go. As part of that, resist the temptation to fill the time with more “stuff.” Instead, for me, I want to build in time to “just be.” To spend time in self-care, in relationship, with friends, with family. That time? Well that’s time well spent.

I don’t think my fight against time is uncommon, so if you’re facing a similar battle, look at these simple steps for yourself. What value is driving you? What can you do today? What will you do next week? What’s your longer term goal? It doesn’t have to be hard and if you start today, like I am, you’ll be rockin’ by Christmas! Time will be on your side.

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How do you want to feel?

 

positve-energyTo start, this is not a political statement in any way, nor a comment about who won our nation’s election.  What is rolling around in my head are thoughts about the energy that people, including me, put out to the world and what reflects back at them.  I’m noticing an abundance of negative energy, thoughts, comments, rhetoric from people around the country, negative energy that seems to be growing.

The law of attraction is a theory that says “by focusing on negative or positive thoughts, a person brings positive or negative experiences into their life.” This is based on the thought that like energy attracts like energy. Whether you fully believe that theory or not, think about it. You’re in a conversation with your spouse.  They are amped about plans you made for the weekend, without consulting them.  You have a choice in that moment.  Say you get defensive, you shoot back that you shouldn’t have to talk to them first. How’s that work out for you? Likely you’ll get the next level up from your spouse, anger, frustration, resentment…and this cycle will continue until one of you steps out.  One of you chose to respond with negative energy and it attracted more negative energy.

What if instead when your spouse came at you amped, you stepped away from the negative energy, dodged it.  What if you responded that you could understand how that could be frustrating and that it would be frustrating for anyone in that situation…and apologized. How would your spouse respond? Chances are, they’d respond well, plain and simple. You chose to respond to negative energy with positive energy and that is the direction you both continued in.

When you spend your day thinking about the negative things happening around the country, or in your work, your relationship or with yourself, you’re drawing negative energy to you.  It is normal that you would continue to see the negative around you, that’s what you’re looking for to build your case.  We want information that supports how we’re feeling in that moment, and there’s plenty of it to be found. That’s what’s happening around our nation right now.

If you choose to shift your focus – or frankly begin your thought process – from a positive viewpoint, that is what you’re going to attract.  You will begin to see the positive aspects of situations.  People around you will begin to feel that positive energy and will respond in kind. That cycle is one worth investing in. When you’re thinking about the positive aspects in your life, you will see and experience more of them, you’ll create positive experiences.

So what if each of us made that choice right now for our nation.  Focus not on what you may perceive as the negative things happening around the country, but instead, focus and talk about the positive. Pray for peace and cooperation. Do your part to stop the negative path we’re on. We can build each other up or tear each other down, I for one want to choose the positive path, and build each other up, and hope my positive energy will draw the same from you.

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Art of the Reframe

reframe-handsPerspective. I’ve been thinking a lot about it this week. I think it’s interesting that two people can have the same experience, yet come away with completely different interpretations about what happened.  That’s part of the deal, interpretations.  With each experience we bring our own interpretations about the “truth.” But the truth is tempered by what we’ve experienced in the past, our beliefs, what we’ve been through. Sometimes it makes it hard to see the another perspective.

The other perspective is helpful for a lot of different reasons. Let’s just say you’re stuck. Ok, maybe that’s just me. Having the ability to see your circumstance from another point of view can be extremely helpful.  The other day, I was taking a look at my day to day work, thinking about the nature of what I do vs. what in my head I want to do. I had a conversation with someone whose opinion I trust about it.  She pointed out aspects about the work I’m doing that I wasn’t seeing.  Aspects that fell in line with exactly the qualities that I wanted to bring more of into my work. Reframe. She saw it from another perspective that I wasn’t seeing and shed light for me.

Or, I was talking with a trusted friend about achievement.  I’m a high, high achiever.  The great thing about being a high achiever is that you get a lot done, with a high degree of excellence.  That’s the way you should do it, after all.  The downside is that you never really feel, ok, maybe just me again, that you really ever achieve anything big because you’re doing what anyone should do in that situation. Except they don’t.  Not everyone has that same internal wiring, that same drive, so what you’re doing could be extraordinary. So back to my friend, I mentioned how I was thinking about this and gave an example of when I walked a marathon last year.  I had someone, whose opinion matters a lot to me, say “What, do you think you can’t walk 26 miles?” The way it was said registered to me as, of course you would, it’s not a big deal.  My friend asked me if, in fact, that person could have made the statement from a position of belief. As in, Lisa can do anything she sets her mind to. Reframe. He showed me a different way to look at it that actually spoke to belief, not expectation.

The amazing thing about the reframe, the other perspective, is that it can shift you. It can take what you currently believe about an area of your life and shed new light on it. It’s awesome when you have people you trust who can do it, a friend, spouse or family member. It’s also something a coach can do with you. Something I feel fortunate to be learning in my coaching training. If I could only apply it to myself more often. That’s part of the deal too though, sometimes it takes someone outside of your head to look in and reframe for you.  That said, I would encourage you to try it. In the midst of a circumstance that you wish could be different, take a deep breath and ask yourself “how else could I see this?” “What’s another way to look at that?” “How could I reframe it to move forward?” There’s no magic to it, but it IS a conscious choice. A choice that could move you forward in a more positive, empowered way. Try it. Or call me, I’d love to take that journey with you.

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About a Girl

I’ve RememberHer.jpgbeen thinking a lot lately about what it means to me, at 49, to be a woman…and it’s bringing up quite a few thoughts and stirrings in my heart.  I was born in 1967 which was around the same time the women’s movement was gaining a lot of steam in the United States.  The push was for equality.  Women should be seen as equal to men, just as able to succeed in business as men, earn as much as men… a lot of that sentiment has carried through my life. The women of the generation directly before me, my mother’s generation, were warriors for this cause. So wouldn’t it be natural for the daughters to follow?

And we did. We pushed ahead, we earned our own money, took care of our own needs. Many of us decided career first, then a husband – maybe, and then children – maybe.  Of the group of women I grew up with, several either chose not to have children or by the time their careers had shifted, so had their desires about having children.  For those of us who did get married and have children, we still succeeded at work, pushing to higher levels within our company so that we could be “equal,” with men. And we are…except, we’re not.

We’re not equal, but that’s what has been pushed on us.  That doesn’t mean that we can’t have the same types of jobs as men, because we can. But we have different expectations placed on us by society, and sometimes by ourselves.  We can work, but we also bear and take care of our children, take care of our homes, hold everything together for everyone else…but often don’t take care of ourselves.  I don’t say all this to whine, not at all.  I say it because, for me, I’m realizing that somewhere in the push to be equal and prove that I could succeed and be responsible, I forgot to be a woman.

I forgot about taking care of me.  I lost a good deal of my femininity. I had to be one of the boys, so where’s the room in that to be a girl? I don’t think we’re equal to men, because we are different.  That doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t be treated the same, but it’s being treated different because we’re women more than equal because we act like men. I want to reclaim that femininity! As I reach the cusp of 50, I’m ready to find that girl again. To take care of her, and, quite honestly, to be a little girly.  Maybe not all my girlfriends out there lost some of that feminine side, but I did, and I want it back.
If I haven’t chased you away by this post already, just think about it.  In your chase for equal did you lose some of the unique and beautiful aspects that make you a woman? You deserve to discover those parts, to let the world see those parts of you and to celebrate them.  We are women and we should do this together, come alongside each other and show support.  If you need a person, I’ll be right there with you. Be that girl again…

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I’m not laughing at you…

dont-take-it-personallyYesterday morning I was in the locker room at the gym after my swim (and as a side note, since I always swim in the pre-dawn hours, it was an awesome to actually enjoy the sunrise while I swam!) and this woman next to me dropped her keys, and then a second set of keys. And I laughed. Not because I was laughing at her, laughing because that’s a situation I often find myself in. So I offered the familiar, “I’m not laughing at you…”

I really thought about it though, and the truth is, I really wasn’t laughing at her, I was laughing at myself.  I spill – and am a master at the clean-up, drop, stumble, fumble, you name it. So my laughter was in camaraderie, kindred spirit.  It made me think about how easy it is to think that the laughter, the comments, are about me, and I don’t think I’m alone in that.

Each of us has this internal ego that takes the wheel and drives our thoughts, our actions.  I don’t mean ego in a bad way, per se.  Ego defined is a person’s sense of self-esteem or self-importance. Think about it, when we’re babies, the world seems to revolve around us. Parents, grandparents, everyone is looking at us, oohing and awing, it’s no wonder we develop that sense of self-importance.

But at some point, we can choose to either continue believing and acting like the world revolves around us, or we can make different choices.  For one, it’s a lot of work being the center of our universe.  Everything is considered in terms of how it impacts us, when in fact, it’s really about the other person. In his book, “The Four Agreements,” one of the principles Miguel Ruiz teaches to have love and happiness in our lives is:

“Don’t Take Anything Personally
Nothing others do is because of you. What others say and do is a projection of their own reality, their own dream. When you are immune to the opinions and actions of others, you won’t be the victim of needless suffering.”

When I read this, it really hit home.  I was in the midst of a difficult personal situation where I felt like everything the other person did was directed at me.  Taken in this context, how another person reacts or “shows up” in their relationship with others has more to do about them than about us.  Our ego tells us that it’s about us, when it’s not.  It tells us that they’re laughing at us, when their laughter is more likely something in themselves they’re laughing at.

If we take the principle of not taking what others say personally, not letting our ego do the driving, it truly does save us a lot of suffering.  A lot of unnecessary wondering ,worrying, creating our own story about what others must have meant by their comment.  If we can resist personalizing, resist “they’re laughing at me,” it allows us to show up more authentically, give more of our real selves, and have more empathy. Give it a try, truly laugh with someone today. Realizing that we are more alike than different, if you ask me, there’s a lot of comfort in that…not to mention someone else with expertise in spill clean-up…I could use the help!

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Emotions are not for sissies

mood-swingI think being “emotional” gets a bad rap. Granted, I’m a girl, so I have more leeway to be emotional, but even so, they’re not always accepted, especially the negative ones. Anger, frustration, irritation…sadness…grief I think you get away with if you have a reason people understand, but grief over the loss of a relationship, for example, no go.  And crying? Geez, it’s trouble in the making. Don’t do it at work, bottle it up, make it go away, don’t let anyone see you…oh wait, maybe those are just my experiences.

But the thing is, I AM emotional.  I’ve spent the last 48 years 364 days bottling all of it up though. There have been periods where it came out and even I couldn’t explain or understand it. Crying that would never end.  That was a few years ago, a forgettable phase I think many women this age could understand and happily live without. For the most part though, I’ve tried to be bright and sunny, but I’m not, at least not all the time.  I’ll start to cry but then use all my secret ninja tricks to try and make it stop. Stuff it down. Ladies, am I alone in this?

Over the last year, I’ve tried to get better at letting myself have emotion, acknowledge it and not just brush it away.  It’s been marginally successful. Rarely do I let myself have a good cry. Really though what is that? A good cry? Seems counter intuitive.  If I start to feel angry, I’ll play with it a little bit, but there’s no monster coming out. But I need to let myself feel emotion. As I’ve gone through my coaching training, part of it, as I think I’ve talked about, is looking at your own stuff, your own crap I like to say.  Helpful, incredibly helpful, but exhausting. It’s a non-stop barrage of processing emotion.  Ah-ha’s are great, but it’s often a fist fight with myself to get there.

I think we often don’t acknowledge how hard it can be to process emotion, to have and feel emotion.  When I used to ride my bike a lot, I rode with a group and I remember this one ride where my friend was trying to explain to me how to keep up with the guys.  She said that sometimes you have to practically turn yourself inside out with effort, leave it all on the road.  I think that’s how processing emotions can be at times. I think part of why I started riding my bike in the first place was to escape having to feel emotions, to process them, I just rode away from them, at least for that day. Not the healthiest from an emotional standpoint, but I did get a lot of relief, endorphin’s are a great thing.

Yesterday I was talking through some tough stuff with someone I care about, and it was hard, good, but hard. Today…I feel raw…like I’ve turned myself inside out.  That same feeling as doing it in a physical sense during a hard effort.  I worked hard to be transparent, to stay in the space, to share my heart instead of saying I was “fine.” Again, all good stuff, stuff that can bring people close together, but not for sissies.  Stuff you fight your way through, fight with yourself and that instinct to keep bottled up vs. the freedom of just expressing.

I think to fail to recognize how hard it can be to process emotion is to undercut ourselves. There’s no right or wrong way, per se, to process emotion.  We all do it in our own way.  But if your way was like my way, stuff it down, I’m here to tell you that won’t last forever.  Taking the time to understand yourself, to be brave and talk about how you feel, even if the only person you’re telling is yourself, well that’s worth it.  You are worth it. You might feel like you left part of you on the side of the road, and maybe you did, but that’s often a good thing, don’t let it stop you and don’t turn back for it. I’m right there with you.

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Big Brave Post

just-being-is-funIt’s no secret that I’m becoming a certified life coach.  Amazing program! But here’s the thing about it, to coach others, you have to deal with your stuff. What I’m finding is the more I deal with it, the more I realize about myself. So it’s a combo of “Yay!” and “Oh, crap.”

Not dissimilar to anyone else, as I’ve moved through life, I’ve had experiences from which I create thoughts about the world and thoughts about myself.  We get messages from the people who are close to us and from the world around us about what’s “expected.” But how each of us hears those messages is different, and unique, depending on our own circumstances.  The message I “heard” which really means the message I interpreted, was “be strong.”

It seems like too easy of an answer, but I think a lot of that comes from having had my foot amputated when I was 4.  I was blessed that my family and really my friends never treated me like I was any different than anyone else.  Except that, I was.  So, although not consciously, I set about proving that to be true.  Because my “difference” was external, I tried to show through my physical self that I was not only normal, whatever that is, but that I could do whatever I wanted to do. And really, I have. I’ve had amazing adventures on my bike, last year I decided to start walking half marathons and then a full marathon, then I took up open water swimming… all of which was awesome.

But in my head, I never hit the bar. Each time I’d accomplish something, the bar would move.  I’d set a higher goal, thinking that if I’d already, for example, ridden 100  miles, that riding 200 seemed like a better idea, because that would really prove something. To who though? To me? In theory I suppose.

Stick with me because here was the punch in the gut.  It doesn’t seem like this should have taken me 49 years to figure out, but it did. What I’ve done, what I set out to do, that’s not who I am. When I project that version of myself, the tough, strong self, people don’t really get to know me, the me that’s on the inside.  I get that the external stuff is part of who I am, and I’ve had some great experiences.  But it is only part of me. It’s the bright and shiny that distracts me from really embracing who I am on the inside.  To some degree, it’s the “on stage” version of me. Making myself feel like I’m “on stage” all the time is exhausting…and I do it to myself…no one else really expects it and they don’t get to know the real me, the backstage version.

So here’s the big brave part.  I’m setting a new goal.  It’s to just be. To not prove. To acknowledge to myself that I’m squishy. That parts of me may not seem normal, but they’re normal to me. I’m not always tough, and that’s ok. I don’t need to keep raising the bar. God knew I’d turn out like, He created me like this.  If it’s ok for Him, it’s going to be ok for me too.

What would that look like for you? To just be? Try it, be brave. I believe you’ll find you’re pretty amazing.

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Lost and Found – Joy

Play it safejoy.  One of Lisa’s cardinal rules.  I think it started when I was fairly young.  Limit risk, know what you’re getting into. Lots of contingency planning, back up plans.  Before I get into anything, I’ve usually done extensive research, made sure I know how it could go wrong and make plans to avoid that. I don’t want to deal with things going wrong. I want things nice and buttoned up, within my control, that’s what safe looks like.

So how’s that working for you? Yep, that’s the question I’ve been rolling around in my head, that I’ve been asked. Well, nice and safe, that’s how that’s working.  And on the surface, that seems fine, I had a lot going on with my kids, work, family, lots of responsibilities to tend to. So keeping my risks down makes a lot of sense.  No time for things to go wrong. But they still did go wrong. And in the meantime, I’d been so busy playing it safe I hadn’t been paying attention to the fact that there wasn’t a lot of joy in my life.  It’s hard to have joy where you’re busy being serious all the time.

And it’s also hard to really know what joy is when you don’t let yourself experience the other side, the pain.  Staying safe avoids pain.  Doesn’t mean you avoid difficulty, but safe steers you around a lot of pain.  Don’t be fooled though, the pain can still come, it just comes unexpectedly.  Comes when your safe existence is shaken, or shattered.

But if you walk through the pain, when, not if, you survive it, an interesting thing can happen.  You start to see more joy, at least I did.  Something about the pain strips away your defenses.  When I let myself be outside the lines, not be so safe, I starting seeing joy.  Joy in the simple things.  Joy in every day. Joy that God has had for me all along.  I started feeling deeper. My heart felt more compassion for others, more understanding.

When I stopped playing it so safe, that’s when I woke up. That’s when I saw what I’d really been doing.  Where the path I’d been walking down had led me. It caused me to rethink choices I’d made, ways I’d engaged with people I cared about. And I didn’t like some of what I saw. But I’d learned what pain felt like now, and it helped me to be brave. I had hard conversations. And there was some pain, because admitting when you’ve made mistakes – even when in the spirit of just staying safe, which you’ve used to justify what you’ve done in the past – it hard.

What’s the point of going down that hard path again? The once elusive joy now shows up more and more often. The braver I am, the more I lean into discomfort, the more joy and peace I’m experiencing. And that is an amazing thing. Give it a try!