The Breakthroughs Blog
DISSOLVING LIMITS. EXPANDING POSSIBILITIES!Personal Growth Coaching Blog
I’m writing this blog with the intention of helping people learn life changing concepts and principles, as well as to share my own reflections and perspectives as a coach.
There are times when I feel called to share “teaching pieces”; either a helpful model, concept or way of understanding their situation from another perspective. Often it was just what they were needing to hear. Then I offer the suggestion that they learn more about it through books or other resources. I want to provide one of those resources here for you – a self-coaching resource.
To make it more interactive for you, feel free to leave your comments at the bottom of each post and I’ll be glad to respond.
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Can We Use This Time of Self Isolation for Self Development?
If we want to answer any question like, how should we live, what should we do, what should we work on, what should we change, quit or start (not should really but could) it’s always best to do so from your values. If you aren’t sure about your personal values, now could be a great time to explore, clarify and prioritize your values so you can tap into your own source of wisdom and motivation, and answer all those ‘should’ questions for yourself.
Inner Leadership for Turbulent Times – Start with Heart
Do you have any skills or tools for coping with your inner world? How are you managing your emotions and thoughts and physiology with all this stress? The better you handle your inner world, the better you will handle everything in your outer world, the better decisions you’ll make, the better you’ll perform, the more energy you’ll have, and the better you’ll influence or support your family and your team. Try practicing Coherence to restore your resilience and energy
Is Hope Good or Bad? You decide.
Why does hope matter? Why is it important?
Because life is hard and often painful. Without hope, it’s immensely more difficult to envision a better future, one worth living for. Hope lets us set meaningful goals that motivate us to move forward, to learn and grow, and to realize our full potential.
She Has Risen: A Story of Triumph
I want to share a story about personal Triumph. A couple of years ago, I had the honor and pleasure of working with a client who had a dream in her heart and soul to write a book. Her name is Tanya Sood. This is about her owning and sharing her gifts with the world, while helping others do the same
The Coaching Habit – Book Recommendation
You want to be a better leader for your people and you know that coaching is the way to go but… you don’t know how to coach and you think you don’t have time to learn to be an amazing coach.
You’re probably right but what if you didn’t have to be an amazing coach, just a decent enough coach to coach your people in 10 minutes or less?
How Are You Going to Finish? Holiday Message for My Valued Clients
With only days left in 2016, no matter how many times you’ve fallen, how many times you’ve missed the mark, how many times you’ve judged yourself or others harshly, how many times you held back your true feelings, how many times you failed to honor your values, how many times you went too far, you can still finish strong and give with your whole heart, not just to others but to yourself as well, especially to yourself.
Overcoming Overwhelm With Self-Care & Love
It’s relatively easy to get overwhelmed these days when the demands on us are never-ending, and the supply of what we have to give seems to be shrinking in proportion. It would be ideal to take a vacation or go on a retreat every time we get overwhelmed but ideal isn’t always real or practical. Perhaps you can take one day off to nurture yourself? Here’s a collection of some of my favorite, positive, loving, self care practices that I hope help you come back to yourself, and inspire you to make some important changes to how you’re living.
Brene Brown: What We Can Learn From Vulnerability & Shame
Two words that most people like to avoid. It makes us sickly uncomfortable just thinking about them: vulnerability and shame. I found the following TED talks so inspiring, touching and meaningful and wanted to share them because they deserve to be heard (or watched). I trust that my clients, and hopefully random visitors to my site, will stumble upon this and get as much out of these talks as I did.
How, When & Why I Started My Journey of Personal Growth
A lot of people ask me how I started my journey of personal growth, especially people who are interested in working with me. They don’t just want to know that I took a course or read a book, they really want to know why, and what I was experiencing that led me to seek a new way of living. This is about starting my journey to find inner peace
Change Your State of Being & The World Changes With You
If our state of being affects our reality, how we think and the quality of our thoughts, how we feel and the richness and tone of our emotions, how we act or behave in the world and with what intention – then, it is evident that we should be very aware of our present state and learn how to shift it to our benefit.
Exchanging Presence
Imagine, exchanging the word Presents with Presence – so instead of buying material gifts this year, you offered those you care about your true presence. What Is Presence? Presence is a state of being, grounded in the here and now, in harmony with this very moment, no matter where you are, who you’re with or what you’re doing. It’s the most meaningful gift you could give someone (and yourself).
Coincidence, Synchronicity & Dr. Joe
Carl Jung said that synchronicities help pull us out of our egocentric thinking into a greater wholeness. Deepak Chopra said that synchronicities are clues to fulfilling our deepest dreams and desires. And that is why I’m sharing this with you. Perhaps it will help you reflect more deeply on a coincidence that’s happened to you or is about to happen for you and it will help you decide what to do next in your life.
Life Doesn’t Wait, So Quit Stalling and Start Living!
Life doesn’t wait. Like a river’s constant flow, it doesn’t wait for anyone’s permission or readiness but the invitation is there to jump, step or gracefully slide in at any time and ride the flow. Are you wanting to start something new, take a big leap, make a major transition or simply do one thing you know you’ve want to do but have been stalling on for a long time? And the more you stall, the more confused you get about wanting to take action?
Welcome 2014! Lessons in Facing Fear
Did you make any resolutions? Have you been sticking to them? Has it been easy or hard?
Here’s a little video I’d like you to see: it’s a clip of me on New Year’s Day, being interviewed on National Television. LIVE. The post isn’t about resolutions though but about my personal experience facing one of my deepest fears and some tips I can offer to help you face your own.
Taming Your Gremlin by Rick Carson: Book Recommendation
I highly recommend this book to all who feel plagued by the Gremlin within and would like to live their lives with more inner peace, mental clarity, more compassion to ourselves and others, and who would finally like to see what life can be like if we were our natural selves.
A special thanks and tons of admiration and respect for the author Rick Carson who has helped so many people throughout the world (including me) with his loving, compassionate and wise lessons.
The Virtue of Wisdom & Its Character Strengths – Video Series
Consider the Character Strengths below that relate to Wisdom and how using one of them alone or in combination with strengths from other virtues (courage, humanity, justice, temperance, transcendence) towards a goal could make you feel. It’s been proven that using our strengths in meaningful pursuits engages people (creates that feeling of flow and brings people into the “Zone”) and creates long-lasting fulfillment. So, it’s up to us to discover our strengths and continuously find new ways of using them.
Finding Your Inner Voice & Learning to Trust It
You’ve probably heard it many times before – “trust your inner voice, it’s the voice of wisdom. It knows what’s best for you and if you only trust it, choices and decisions that seem difficult will answer themselves.” We’ve heard it expressed in other ways too: “follow your heart, it will never fail you”, or “trust your gut, it’s always right”. But it never seems as simple as they say. So you may wonder, are you missing something? Or are they all just full of it? Maybe it’s not a voice at all.
Read more to get a new perspective or sense of accessing your inner wisdom.
Character Strengths Series: Routes to a Happy & Meaningful Life
Following this post, which provides a brief overview of character strengths, I’ll publish one post for each of the Core Virtues and will include a video about a person (or group) who lives and breathes the strengths associated with it.
If I’m lucky I’ll find one video for each strength but it’s proving to be more challenging and time intensive than I thought. The first video, however, is within and it’s an interview with none other than the father of the Positive Psychology movement, Martin Seligman.
Bell’s Let’s Talk Day: Raising Awareness on Mental Health
Let’s face it, there’s a beast of a stigma about mental illness. Bell Canada is doing something about it with a campaign that’s built to raise awareness about the prevalence of mental illness, the faces of illness, what kind of care is available and a lot more. Learn about it here
SAD Times: More Than a Case of The Winter Blues
It’s normal to have some down days here and there – despite all your best efforts of living a happy and healthy lifestyle. But this isn’t just a case of the blues or a few bad moods, is it? It’s worse and you don’t know when it’s going to stop or get better. It could be Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD), a form of depression. Don’t despair, you’re not alone and there is a lot you can do to help yourself this winter.
Forgiveness: Giving Yourself a Fresh Start
With the new year upon us – I wanted to prepare something to help everyone create the best year possible. In previous years around this time, I’ve written about intentions and heart smart goals, a distinct variation from resolutions. This year I wanted to share something different as well, something I thought would be good for the soul.
The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle: Book Recommendation
Over the course of my conscious personal growth journey, whenever times got tough and I lost myself in fear or worry or even anger, I went back to this book to remember its lessons. This book changed the course and nature of my life and I hope it does the same for you.
It’s all about understanding and embracing the power that exists in the present moment and that most, if not all, of our ‘needless’ suffering comes from us identifying with our minds and living in a state of unconsciousness. Is that hard to hear? Welcome to your EGO. Are you ready for this book? If you’re reading this, I bet you are, so read on…
Consciousness, Choice & Accountability
Every day is made up of 86,400 seconds. Each second is an opportunity to choose who you are Right Now. It’s a choice to stop reliving your past, to live in the present and to consciously create your future, moment by moment. It’s also a choice to give up your right to choose and let life take you where it may. It’s a choice you are accountable for.
Happy Mother’s Day
To all the mothers in the world, especially my own, happy mother's day! I consider myself so fortunate and I'm so grateful to have such a wonderful person in my life to love me, raise me, provide for me, shelter me, nurture me, protect me, enrich me, guide me and to...
Presence, Consciousness & Life Purpose: Aligning With the Now
You will learn who you truly are beneath the story and stories of the mind and ultimately what your life purpose is all about. The reason why I share it here is because I see coaching as a shared journey, a deep and meaningful relationship that facilitates such awareness and being-ness in another person over time. I hope this will help those interested in experiencing less fear, stress, anxiety, pressure and suffering in their lives while increasing their levels of inner peace, contentment, connection with self and others, and more joy in life.
Happiness Flow Productivity & Profits
This is the new model of success: one built on happiness, flow, gratitude and to adopt his firm’s foundational mantra “Awesomeness”!
You may never have heard of him but he was invited to speak among luminaries and business moguls such as Sir Richard Branson, His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Stephen Covey, Tony Hsieh and several others. His speech was voted as the best of the entire event. He speaks about why “Happiness is the New Productivity”.
Happy Endings and Happy New Year
As this day approaches, most people tend to focus only on the New Year ahead – fresh starts, new beginnings. Today, in light of New Year’s Eve, I’d like to shift your attention for a few moments to the endings of things – not just the end of the year but the end of every day and every experience. It’s important. How do you want to remember 2011 and begin 2012? You have some control over the matter by choosing what you focus on. Consider answering the reflective quesitons in this article to help you create your own happy ending and new beginning.
Find Your Center – Find Your Strength
Finding your Center means reconnecting with your true, inner self, the place within you that is calm, strong and unfaltering. Just a moment or two in this place is enough to regain the perspective you need to remember that everything is perfect, that you will handle all that needs to be handled, that you are doing your best, and that, is all you can ever do.
Learn more about finding peace and clarity within and get a few coaching tips to help you find your inner strength
Still Trying to Get There?
You can be, do or have anything you really want if you are committed and resolved to achieving it and you take the steps needed to make it happen. Anything is possible, but… you’ll never Get There…
Huh? What’s that you say, coach? Thanks for the vote of confidence!
Learn a new way to think about goals and achievement. It might twist your noodle a bit but that could be a really good thing!
The Gift of Presence
I’m taking a chance here and I’m going to confess something… I’m a big fan of American Idol, especially this season (2011). Did you just cringe? Give me a chance here 🙂 It gives me goosebumps and resonates with me every time I watch it because I get to see people taking big chances, sharing straight from the heart and moving people on an emotional level. I love that!
What is Happiness?
I’d like to introduce the topic of happiness to the blog and just float out that question and look at it for a while.
Though it’s one of the first things mentioned on this site and one of the main goals of coaching, to “discover your authentic self and learn to lead your life in ways that bring you the most happiness and fulfillment”, what does happiness really mean?
Achieving Life Balance
When people say they want more balance in their lives, they are referring to more than just an equal split of time across all the things they want to do in their lives. They’re looking to feel more in control and at peace with their lives. They want more enjoyment, more fulfillment and they want to feel more like a whole person again. They don’t want to be a slave to work or even to any one primary area of their life.
Read this article to learn more about what balance really is all about and do the self coaching exercise to help you prioritize your values and create some meaningful goals that will leave you feeling more whole and balanced in your life
Managing Your Inner Critic
The Inner Critic – a messenger of self critical thoughts – can control your every move and your every word. It might tell you, “That’s too risky, don’t even think about it” or “Don’t even consider it, you’ll get embarrassed”. Most of the time just a couple of ‘messages’ from this voice is enough to stop you from thinking about following that dream or even just doing what you want to do or say.
Learn how to soften its blows and defuse its powerful grip on your life.
From Self Doubt to Self Confidence
Whether self doubt is holding you back from fulfilling a great dream, from being more productive at work or from connecting with others more freely, we could all stand to gain a lot by having more self confidence and believing in ourselves more than our doubts and fears.
Read this article and do the included self-coaching exercise to shift from self doubt to self confidence.
The Power of Being Authentic
We wear masks because we all want to be and feel accepted by others – belonging is a very strong and basic human need.
There comes a time in people’s lives when they begin to value how they feel about themselves more than they value what others think of them; where they value self respect more than the respect or acceptance of others. There is an astonishing power and sense of freedom and lightness that comes from being authentic. It is so powerful and vivid that after a while, being ‘real’ is the only option worth considering.
Living Life to the Fullest
There is no ultimate formula for living life fully; it is perhaps our own unique expression of the list above that matters most. In order to have a full life then, you must know what fills you up, what fills your heart and gives meaning to your days….be present and mindful so we can allow ourselves the gift of experiencing every moment as fully as possible.
HEART SMART Goals & Resolutions
Finding the Positive Emotions in Your Resolutions
It’s that time of year when many people sit down to reflect about what they want to change in the new year. They think about what they’re not satisfied with, even what they’re guilty about, and they think (with logic or intellect) that they should change their ways. This post shares a new way to look at (and feel about) your new year’s resolutions and any goals that you have: using HEART-SMART Goals.
Questions to Reflect On
One of the best ways to gain clarity and spark new insights into understanding ourselves is through deep, personal reflection. Open ended questions invoke the deepest levels of self reflection because they direct and focus the mind on what matters – moving us away from our habitual thought patterns, into new and more meaningful ways of thinking.
Here are a variety of powerful questions that will help expand your awareness and could prove very fruitful if you’re willing to invest the time.
The Value of Personal Values
In the field of life coaching and personal development, values are the things that matter most to a person. They are the personal, intimate, gauges, signposts or internal barometers of what’s really important to a person and what isn’t. Life coaching (as well as executive or business coaching) can help you discover and clarify your values so that you learn how to live a life that honors what you value most helping you feel happier, more fulfilled, more at ease and at peace.
Harnessing Your Unique Strengths
When we are caught in the routine of life, most of us aren’t using our strengths very often and we end up feeling unfulfilled and ungratified. Coaching helps people discover, or rediscover, their best selves by tapping into their unique and natural strengths and coaching them towards mindfully choosing to use those strengths in their lives more often – sometimes by changing how they do something (their approach) and sometimes by changing the things they actually do (e.g. career).
Change Your Beliefs, Change Your Life
Beneath every thought and every single thing we perceive and interpret lies a belief within us. A belief is a web of thoughts and past interpretations that form a generalization of many notions and concepts. Over time this generalization has taken root within our minds and sometimes it can even feel like it has taken root in our hearts, when we believe something so deeply, we can feel it on a visceral level.
With these generalizations, we interpret and shape our lives as they happen.
Building Self Awareness
In coaching there is a lot of talk about awareness and a lot of inner work devoted to increasing and expanding self awareness. Awareness is also known in other domains as consciousness and mindfulness. It’s the same thing people have been talking about, studying, practicing and forgetting for thousands of years.