Month: December 2020

Resolutions Need Belief

Posted on by WorkAuthentically

I love this time of year! It has nothing to do with the holidays and everything to do with the possibilities.

It’s time to dream up new dreams, big and small.

It’s time to improve those things that aren’t working well anymore.

It’s time to release those habits and beliefs that no longer serve.

It’s time to make change happen!

I live to make change happen in my own life and help others do the same. There’s few things more exciting than making progress toward something you really want or seeing the dream you’ve had for a long time finally come into being.

The change can be simple, like forming a new healthy habit or monumental, like building a new career or life from the ground up. I find all kinds of change thrilling!

And this is the time of year to create a plan to change. Most people go the route of saying or writing resolutions. I prefer to call any change I make an aspiration, basically a dream for the future that I try to live into daily.

Regardless of what you call it, change is hard to do. What separates the large number of people who are going to fail on their resolutions in a few weeks and the small number of people who are going to succeed? It comes down to 3 things.

  1. Belief
  2. Support
  3. Accountability

The great news about belief is that it’s basically a given this time of year.

Celebrating the new calendar year is a time of hope and optimism. We believe this year can be better or different than the last. We believe in possibilities. We believe that we’ve got what it takes.

That’s why resolutions are so common right now. We’re all bursting at the seams with belief!

Hang on to that belief because you’re going to need it if you’re heading toward change! Knowing that most resolutions fail, we need to keep our rose-colored glasses on as we dare to be different.

Over the next 2 weeks, we’ll take a look at support and accountability as the other necessary pieces to make change stick. Can't stand to wait that long? Check out my books You Got This and Change Authentically for more motivation.

#PositiveAction Remind yourself that your resolution is not only possible, but probable. Believe that you can do it!

Have you already decided on your resolution? Awesome! Let’s hang out!!

I'm offering 1:1 coaching so 2021 is the year you finally keep your resolutions and make change happen. Want to learn more? Book a FREE call with me today to talk about creating resolution rocket fuel to get where you want to go!

 

Image by Mabel Amber from Pixabay

Successful Year

Posted on by WorkAuthentically

Well here we are, at the most anticipated year-end that I’ve ever known. It’s been so – what’s the word I’m thinking of? No, not unprecedented. Different. It’s been so different in so many ways.

I know most people are going to call it a dumpster fire of a year and it definitely had its moments. But it was also a successful year.

I know it was a mess! It still is, really. But there’s also success hiding within it. Here’s what I mean.

For my work, I had to re-think how I delivered education and coaching services. The pandemic changed the way I interact with people and organizations. But I was still able to help over 200 people this year. That’s a whole lot of people that have learned to surface their authentic career story, grow their confidence, communicate their value and find their best work!

I couldn’t do that work the way I’d done it before. It was dramatically different than how I thought the year would go. And yet. I know how our workplaces, families, and communities are transformed when people are doing work they love, so helping even one person do that would be successful in my book.

And speaking of books, did you know I published 4 this year? Crazy, right? I actually spent a lot of time in 2019 writing the first book, but Change Authentically wasn’t ready until February of this year. It almost feels like January and February 2020 were their own distinct year since those months were so dramatically different than the rest of the year!

I published two short e-books during the pandemic, but the majority of my writing time this year was spent on (you guessed it!) Success Authentically. It was an idea that kept nagging at me until I had no choice but to sit down and start. It was not convenient timing, since I had recently been promoted to teacher for my two school-age children who were thrust into the ever-challenging world of virtual learning. Given the constraints on my time and the unknowns at the start of the pandemic, I shouldn’t have even tried. And yet, I wrote a little bit every day until one day, it was magically complete. When I launched Success Authentically in December, it became a best seller on Amazon!

It’s funny. Becoming a best-selling author was not on my list of things to do in 2020, but that sure feels like success, even if it is different than the goals (which now seem hilarious!) that I set at the start of the year.

I volunteer my time for an organization that is dedicated to catalyzing a global solution to the climate crisis. One of the key components of that work, up until this year had been in-person education and conversations to help people understand how they can be part of the solution. You would expect that this work would have been on hold after we couldn’t gather in groups this year, but we were able to pivot, imagining a different way to achieve the same goal. I volunteered more than 60 hours with the Climate Reality Project, mostly from the comfort of my own home this year. The Milwaukee chapter of the group (where I’m a co-chair) grew our membership by 3x and launched a new monthly education program. So yeah. Success was definitely hiding in our challenges there too.

Of course, there’s also been lots of challenges at home. Having 4 people trying to work and learn and live in the same place isn’t easy, but we’re finding ways to make it fun, even if it’s different than before. Like everyone else, we’ve changed how we interact with our family and friends (excited for the day when hugging those far away folks becomes a reality again!). We’ve changed holiday traditions and created some awesome memories. We’ve been frustrated, angry, and disappointed. But we’ve found success in being together in different ways (virtual spring break, family book reading, picnics in the yard, and more). This year helped us all build resilience and it helped us get more intentional with our time together. And that’s the most important measure of success I can think of.

2020 wasn't all bad and it wasn't all good. It was different. Just like every other year.

#PositiveAction Look at your year to see the success hiding within it. If your list isn’t what you hoped, you’ve still got 2 weeks to change that!

 

Programming Note: There won’t be a blog post next week as I prepare for some time off with my family. Yup, it’s with those folks I see all day every day, but I’m still looking forward to our very different holiday!

 

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

Successful Disappointment

Posted on by WorkAuthentically

 

What is disappointment? It’s the experience of having reality not align to our expectations. Basically we’re hoping for one thing and get another instead. Pretty sure we’ve all felt it and felt it acutely in 2020.

Recently, I experienced a major disappointment. I had been hoping for and working hard toward one outcome (for an award/recognition), only to not see it materialize after all the effort I’d put in. It was crushing.

But in a year that has handed out more than an average number of crushing disappointments, I was in good company.

I talked to a friend that same day who was experiencing the disappointment of the sale of their house unable to go through as planned. A few days later, I talked to another friend who has been brave enough to return to school for an entirely new degree, but is disappointed with field work that has been far more challenging in unexpected ways, causing her to doubt her choice to return to school.

Can there be success in disappointment?

Absolutely. You just have to be willing to look for it.

For my friend with the college challenges, the disappointment is changing the approach for the remainder of the field work, but it’s not changing the brave new direction that’s been set. She’s staying in the degree program to eventually gain employment doing work that matters deeply to her.

For my friend with the house drama, it’s changing the timeline of when they will move and how they will accomplish it, but it’s not changing their decision to move. Moving was and is the success measure and they will hit it. Eventually.

As for me, I needed to remind myself that although awards and recognition are nice, they aren’t my measure of success. I’m not here to be the most highly decorated coach in the industry. I’m here to help as many people as I can find work that they love because our families, workplaces, and communities are transformed when people love what they do. When I looked at my disappointment with reset expectations, it was a lot easier for me to see the success and to celebrate it.

The punk-rock poet, Frank Turner said it best, “Everyone can find a song for every time they’ve lost and every time they’ve won”. So whether you’re killing it or getting killed by it, turn up the music and take another look. You might see more success than you expected!

If you are struggling with disappointment (from mild to crushing and everything in between!), check out my new book Success Authentically: Unlock Excitement, Purpose, and Joy At Work. You’ll find a brand-new approach to success!

 

#PositiveAction Take a good, honest look at your latest disappointment. You may be surprised to discover there’s a lot of success hiding in it!

 

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

Successful Holidays

Posted on by WorkAuthentically

We’ve just finished Thanksgiving, which is the unofficial start to the holiday season. This year, more than any other in recent memory, our holiday celebrations will be different from the past. Will they be successful, though? That’s up to you!

The holiday celebrations that my family enjoys don’t look like the ones we see on TV. They aren’t the perfectly prepared images on social media. There’s no spontaneous snowball fight or caroling door-to-door or 5-course meal on fancy china. There’s no diamond jewelry or car with a giant red bow on it.

So if it doesn’t look like all the holiday images we’re shown, is it unsuccessful?

I guess that depends on how you define success.

If your number one goal for the holiday season is to have a spontaneous snowball fight, then you should probably start with being in place that has snow. It’s not going to happen somewhere warm.

If you’re hoping for the fancy meal, you’ll need good food and lots of plates.

If you want a certain gift, tell someone or buy it for yourself!

The point here is that you need to decide for yourself what will be most meaningful for you. It doesn’t have to look like anyone else’s celebration. You get to define success for you and you get to collaborate with the others in your life that are celebrating with you.

A successful holiday season for me includes more intentional time together (yes, even in the year of constant togetherness!!) playing games, watching holiday movies, and singing songs. It includes special, once-a-year, homemade treats. And it includes extra time for people and causes we care about.

It doesn’t include a whole lot of other things because none of us consider them necessary for success.

If you are looking for an exciting new way to think about success, my latest book, Success Authentically: Unlock Excitement, Purpose, and Joy At Work is here just in time for the holidays! 

#PositiveAction Take time today to think about what the most successful holiday would look like for you. It’s easy to make a plan once you know what’s important!

 

Image byBUMIPUTRA fromPixabayplus the cover to Success Authentically!