Step Two was about writing your own affirmations to help you stay positive.

Step Three got you off the sofa and exercising your right to be fit and trim.

Step Four was all about taking the time to meditate and getting centered in your universe.

Step Five found you getting silly and feeling better for letting your hair way down.

Step Six You know what it is. No, well then get quiet ask your Intuition.

Step Seven is about empowering the world when you volunteer.

Step Eight gave you permission to whine a little bit. Just a little bit.

Step Nine taught you that “Just” is just another four-letter word.

Now that we are on Step 10. I hope that you will all keep your eye on all the things that make us grateful to be alive at the beginning of 2010.  We have come a long way. We know that having a fulfilling and fun life (yes, life needs to be fun for adults also) can mean shattering the glass ceiling or painting it purple. We have seen the rewards that hard work can bring, and we should always look forward to changing or reinventing ourselves whether it is where we will live, whom we will love or what laws and social mores will work for us. Or need to be changed.

Some days, gratitude shows up; some days, we have to dig deep for it, but it is there. At the end of a long day,  go over all the things you are grateful for: your child’s smile, an opportunity to help someone, the weather did not cause a bad hair day, your husband’s offer to cook (or bring home take out) and a foot rub that will bring a perfect ending to a day that started out 18 hours earlier. Keep the knowledge that in the days to come, you will see glimmers of happiness and potential as long as you stay alert and open to what life will throw your way and know for sure that the good news is that there is good news in our lives.

        

Step Two was about writing your own affirmations to help you stay positive.

Step Three got you off the sofa and exercising your right to be fit and trim.

Step Four was all about taking the time to meditate and getting centered in your universe.

Step Five found you getting silly and feeling better for letting your hair way down.

Step Six You know what it is. No, well then get quiet ask your Intuition.

Step Seven is about empowering the world when you volunteer.

Step Eight gave you permission to whine a little bit. Just a little bit.

My hearing (or lack of it, according to some people) has become highly sensitive to the expression that begins with, “I’m just….”

Maybe it comes from years of personal experience, but I try to be so careful about what I say about myself —either to myself or to the general public.

Most women don’t say the words, “I’m just” and follow it with…“fabulous,” “so excited about my job (or future),” “so mindful of my own goodness,” “a healthy person with so much energy” or phrases like, “I am just so grateful to be able to get up each day and explore new options.”

No, nowadays it seems to proceed, “I’m just not getting anyplace with this job”; “I’m just never going to move ahead with my life”; and my least favorite, “I’m just not good enough to matter.”

You can change the way you view yourselves by adjusting the “just channel” in your heads. It won’t happen overnight, but you can start by becoming aware of their self-defeating slogans.

Try to look at it this way – when we were kids, we couldn’t say certain words or else we would suffer some nasty consequences. Start to think of “I’m just” as a phrase that could cause your dear great grandmother Tillie to faint dead away. Or even better, utter those words and have a “time out corner” dedicated in your name. Let “I’m just” start to taste like Irish Spring on your tongue. I can still taste it, but that’s a whole different story.  Mmmmm…good.

One way to strike it rich before “I’m just” leaves your repertoire is to keep a jar handy and every time you say that dastardly expression, throw in a dollar. You just might jet off to Europe for a month’s vacation, all expenses paid, or you just might end up with moths flying around the jar.

I am just so sure that we can change the way we think about ourselves.

Ralphie from ‘A Christmas Story’ said he became a connoisseur of soap because his mom so often stuck bars of soap in his mouth.  I wonder if it was for saying “just?”

        

Step Two was about writing your own affirmations to help you stay positive.

Step Three got you off the sofa and exercising your right to be fit and trim.

Step Four was all about taking the time to meditate and getting centered in your universe.

Step Five found you getting silly and feeling better for letting your hair way down.

Step Six You know what it is. No, well then get quiet ask your Intuition.

Step Seven is about empowering the world when you volunteer.

Okay it is time to take off the sweet persona that we show to the world and whine, but only for less than five minutes. Otherwise, it starts to get ugly.

Who said a dream recognized would mean a life without annoying interruptions? I know better than to utter those words.

We live here and we can’t all go move to a deserted island. Oh, some could, but then we’d have a lot of people wanting to visit and that would get annoying. Insert whine.

Since we are all living on this planet, the deal is to let everyone live in peace, but that doesn’t mean you can’t get crabby once in a while. It’s alright.  It’s our right.  We need to know that to whine is divine as long as something good comes out of it. It could be the end of a relationship that has been toxic, a new idea cropping out of all the venting, or a feeling of cleansing and freedom.

If it’s good for the soul than I approve.  In fact, I feel a whine coming on right now. Four minutes and 27 seconds.  I just beat my best time and I feel so much better.

Whine on!

        

I am lucky to say that I live with a wonderful ex-chef who makes fabulous meals.  He has agreed to help me out (after about 6 days of begging but whatever works!). I bought the Flat Belly cookbook and he even “post-it” a few recipes but said most of them are about portion control.

I realized sadly that I normally eat twice my weight when my chef takes a night off and we order take out. So I told him no more take out and on the evenings that he deserves a night off, I will find myself in the kitchen and putting together something that resembles food. So this was good news. Today is Day One. Yesterday was Moe’s Mexican food.                      

The other thing I realized that is has to taste so bloody good for me to go off this new way of eating – my new lifestyle. If I am going to have the best Mexican food again it will be from the Mexican deli on Valencia in San Francisco. It will also be a very expensive meal since I live in NY. So I will let you know when hell freezes over.

I did more work on the coaches on the edge’s book proposal and got some of it back from my copyeditor friend. Once these sections are done – we will be that much closer to getting it out to overly eager literary agents who will get us a great publisher who will give us anything we want. That’s legal.

I am keeping this short and I hope you will join in and let us know how you are doing and how we can help keep you on track. One of the things I want to do is take better care of me. So I did 2.14 miles on the treadmill and now I am off to have a HOT, smoothing bath. Here is NY the wind is whipping and the temps are really dipping below zero.   

So do tell!

        

I have been living under a rock when it has come to taking care of me, myself and I. I have worked my butt off all year (and yet my butt still clings to me like a whiny child) and I look around and I am round in a lot of the wrong places.  I would send a photo but my old camera died (we suspect it went out of focus one too many times) and the new one that Santa bought me is consulting with its lawyer.

So I talked about doing this and then I forgot to do it and then I came up with a 1000 excuses and now I am back to say that I have had it and would like a new start. This is where you all come in. I want to do a blog on getting healthy (had to say that so it doesn’t seem like it is all about weight lost) and I would love anyone who wants to join me come in and let’s get busy and support each other. BTW – it is all losing the weight. I would hate to start this off as a big fat liar.
that sort of looks like me. if there was no sun out and it was midnight.

I would like to blog 2-3 times a week about my progress but I would like this to be about all of you who would like to change or start something in your lives. I want to be there for you and vice versa.

We can hold each other accountable.

Okay, I will start:
lose 20 lbs. the healthy way – eating right and exercising more
Get the Coaches on the Edge book proposal out to literary agencies by Feb. 2010. It was originally for Jan. 2010 but now I am going to set time up (big chunks of time) to get it done. I have a wonderful friend who is a copyeditor and she is helping us to keep it tight and real. Thanks, Nicole!
I will make time everyday to stop and get quiet. If you knew how hard this is for me to do, you will know that this is BIG!

All right. Enough about me….unless you would like me to go on! What can I do to help keep you reach a goal? We are all in it together, so I am hoping that some of you will jump in and let’s make this new year the year of simplifying our lives by getting rid of things that are stopping us from moving ahead.

So who would like to join me?  I have been known to beg. It ain’t pretty.

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I was one lucky intuitive coach wanna be when I heard about Tara Roth.  She is clever, insightful and brings much to all who want to learn more about their intuition and how it will make their lives better.

Tara just posted her first You Tube video and I wanted to share it with you all. More to come, but you knew that.

        

So Step One found you moving on up to the place where we all belong – the top of our list!

And Step Two found you scribbling little love notes to yourself. Keep them coming. And maybe write one for your partner, spouse, child, friend, co-worker, neighbor, etc. You get the idea. Expand the love out to the universe. Write it down and let the love continue to flow. Who knows the Nobel Prize for Love could be yours one day! Right after I receive mine.

Step Three will get you off the furniture and exercising your right to be fit and trim.  

Step Three: Shake it. Move it. Walk it off. Work up a sweat. Get your body moving and grooving.  The reports just came out we as a nation are becoming heavier and less fit. Colorado was the only state to have the least number of obese people but it is an alarming 18.9%.  In 1991 not one state had an obsess rate higher than 20 %.( Trust for America’s Health Report). Yikes!

I have a confession to make. I have been a bit of a slacker in the area of Step Three. But I promise to do better.  I do. I promise.

Start slow, but get off that sofa and put the Ding Dong down.  It all comes down to loving yourself enough to gift yourself with some extra years to be with your loved ones. So join a gym, get a buddy to go walking and lift some weights. Put the fork down after one serving and drink your water. If it doesn’t make a difference in your life, don’t eat it. If you would kill for it then I would say have two spoonfuls and then put it away. A little more savoring means a little less laboring at the gym.

I got a pedometer strapped to me and from the looks of it, my yellow lab and I have a date to walk another 2,000 steps right after dinner. Of course, we will have to stop every two feet. I have no idea what she is sniffing at (yes, I do) and I really don’t ask too many questions. I’m just gonna walk.  My butt off.

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Whether you are planning on reinventing yourself after retirement, or you are working as a high level professional or you are somewhere in between, you need to take charge of My New Balance Sheet for My Life and with pen in hand (pencils are for sissies) begin to enter things that really make you happy. Happiness during a recession is possible.  Repeat as needed.

As I look down at my list (yes, I did one before I signed on), I see some very basic entries that will not shock you, but the order may make you go, “What is this woman thinking?”

Number One – I top the charts with a couple of gold stars next to my name. I needed to take ownership of it. You need to take ownership of it.  Right now.  If I decided, for whatever silly, insecure reason, to lower myself to the bottom of my balance sheet, then I would be guilty of not being the best mother, wife, partner, business women, entrepreneur, friend or extraordinary woman that I know is hiding inside of me.

Yes, trust me,   it took some time for little old me to realize this, but we must be number one in our lives. Once you are filled with love and admiration for yourself, then that love and admiration will radiate out to warm the hearts of all who come in contact with you. You know how the Sun is in the middle of it all? How life would not be able to exist without its rays? Well, from now on you are an excellent facsimile of that Number One Planet. Just don’t leave home without the SPF#15.

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