change
One of the best ways to lift your mood is by de-cluttering. It’s true. Here is my tale over the last few weeks: I lived in a one-room loft. When I left my house and husband three years ago my goal was to create a place for my adult children to visit that looked like home to them. And, I probably wanted it to look like home for me as well. My tiny place was filled with all the trinkets of the past, those things that meant so much. And, I was glad they were around for me to look at while I sat there in my place stunned at what had just happened to my life. There was comfort in things. Although my place was small, it was filled with memories. When each of my children came to visit, I told them that I hoped that it looked like home to them. It did. Mission accomplished.
Fast forward three years and I moved into a condo that is nearly three times the size of that little apartment. It has floor to ceiling windows with a loft living space and it is light and airy. So as I was unpacking box after box (don’t ask me how I had all this stuff in a one-room loft) and putting everything away I realized that I didn’t need to make this place look like a replica of my children’s home. I have done that. I eased them into the world where their parents lived in two different places. I did my job. I don’t have to fill this place with family memories. And, I think I don’t need to surround myself with clay projects that the kids made 20 years ago. Love them, but don’t have to see them every day.
With that in mind, I am feeling lighter, physically lighter. I don’t have to throw everything away, but, clearing it out and putting it away makes me feel better. I am not weighed down by the memories that were facing me daily when I awakened. I can wake up with a clean slate and move forward rather than letting objects keep me in the past.
Here is Your Challenge
You can do the same. If you are single you, of course, love your children and are probably surrounded by them through stuff. You don’t have to say goodbye to the stuff, just put it away. I am keeping the stuff, just not dusting the stuff every week. Take this challenge: clear off your refrigerator or a countertop or vanity this week and see how it makes you feel. Do you feel lighter? Physically lighter? That action alone can lift your mood and lighten your heart, even if it is temporary. And if tomorrow you put up a new refrigerator magnet, no worries, today your mood will be light and airy because you don’t have to manage and look at the stuff today.
I hope you will try this and let me know how de-cluttering even just a small portion of your life makes you feel. Let’s face it, there aren’t a lot of things you can do for free that can have such a positive effect on your mood and attitude. So, go crazy and clean off your kitchen counter!
Read MoreThink about this: are you the woman you want to be? Really, if you listed all the attributes that you would possess if you were exactly who you want to be, do you have them? That thought came to me during a conversation with a coach that I hired to help me move forward more intentionally. I thought I knew all the answers by now but I began to think about what pieces are missing, and how I can change that. As much as I write about embracing change, I am not doing that as fully as I thought I was, and I wouldn’t be surprised if you might be in the same boat.
I believe that for the first time I am totally aware that while I appear to be making everything work out great on the outside, I still have too many demons on the inside and they are holding me back from being the woman I want to be. So, you know what, it is time to change that and my hope is that you will join me. Take a look at these steps to getting closer to being the woman you want to be.
What is Missing in Your Life?
Honestly, if you had a perfect life, what would it look like? When you are daydreaming, and we all do, what is that dream? Where do you live? Who is with you? What does your average day look like? Are you the rockstar of your own life? Of course, you are, it’s your dream. Allow yourself to think about what your best life would look like. Not your win the lottery life but your best real life. What is missing from that life and do you really want it, or you just say you do? If you honestly do want to change your life, then how can you make it happen?
How Can You Get There?
To get to a new restaurant you need directions right? Well, if you need help moving forward toward your perfect life, do you know where to get that assistance? Tomorrow, what action will you take? Are you moving forward in the process, or are you just paying lip service to it? What professionals can help you make that dream a reality? Or friends? Or colleagues? Or family members?
Are You Sure It Is What You Want?
Be honest with yourself. Even though you say you would like to quit working, maybe the reason you haven’t is that it isn’t really what you want. If what you say and what you do are not the same, there is a fly in the ointment? Something isn’t quite right. Focusing your attention inward will eventually lead you to what you genuinely care about. When your daily activities are not aligning with where you want to go, something is off. Here’s an idea: write down what your perfect life would look like. Match it up to what your life is right now. Do they align? If the answer is yes, yay! If the answer is no, then maybe it isn’t what you want, or maybe you need to focus more on that piece of your life so you can actually get there.
When you align what you value with how you live your life, it doesn’t get any better. You are living your life as you intend. You are who you say you are and that is peace of mind.
Read MoreWomen are the great re-inventors, it’s true. If there is one quality that sets women apart from men and is one of the keys to remaining happy over a lifetime, it is the ability to re-invent oneself. Certainly, I can name famous women, most of them having one name like Cher, Madonna, Gaga, who have all had several incarnations. Look at Joan Rivers, who started out in stand-up, ended up on a fashion television show and in between ran a jewelry empire. Or how about Martha Stewart who built an empire, was sentenced to prison time then emerged strong after serving that time. The point is that women seem to have the ability to pick themselves up after defeat, assess the damage and then pivot and start over in a new direction.
I have a theory that women are so good at re-invention because their lives biologically are set up that way. Through youth, then motherhood or the reproductive years, followed by menopause, it is biology at its most basic level. We go through so many changes internally that making necessary changes to our lives is already in our DNA.
Think about how many versions of you there have been. Speaking for myself, I was a single woman, then a wife, then a mother, then a single woman again and soon will be a grandmother: all very different stages in life with different expectations. While men’s roles are very clearly defined over the course of their lives, women change roles almost daily. So, is it any wonder that women seem to be more able to handle, and better prepared to deal with, life when it throws them curve balls? Is it a surprise that women seem to thrive on change while men simply do not? No, it is not.
Looking back over my adult life, I was a single woman working in advertising when I met my future husband and no sooner did the minister say, “I now pronounce you husband and wife,” I was pregnant. I was having a difficult time finding childcare and wasn’t madly in love with my job, so I stayed at home with that baby and the one who followed. Now I was an at-home mother working as hard at being good in that role as I had at selling advertising time. When I look back at that young woman I wonder what made her feel like she had to be great at everything? It might be that my husband didn’t value my expertise at home as much as he valued my expertise earning a paycheck, but, that is how it was. I went back to work a couple of years later and was now a mother of two baby boys and a daughter on the way, working fulltime outside the home and full time inside the home. Not uncommon. Not complaining, just the truth. When my daughter came along I hung up my working outside the home shoes more permanently and dived into the world of at-home motherhood. Lots of trials along the way and a not so happy marriage lead me to where I am today (there is a lot of stuff in-between but this isn’t a book. Kids grew up and moved on, my marriage finally crumbled, etc.).
Here I am and now I get to start over: I have the chance to wipe the slate clean and really be purposeful with the direction I take. It is already happening in small doses: I live downtown in a one-room loft while my husband insisted on keeping the big house on a country club golf course (this appears to be a win for each of us, illustrating our differences). I love it!
So, back to Madonna and Cher: neither one of them was an actress until their respective singing careers lead them down that path, and the same can be said for Lady Gaga. And, how many hats did Joan Rivers wear over the course of her life? How many hats have you worn? Here is an exercise for you: write down the roles you have played over the course of your life. How many careers, responsibilities and supervisory positions have you been involved in along the way? Can you start over at sixty or beyond? Absolutely, without question. And, you can excel through those changes: you can make your life better.
Not all change is positive and not all change is fun, but change is inevitable, and if you don’t learn to roll with it you will not be able to age happily, that’s just the truth. We must adapt if we want to be happy in our sixties, seventies and beyond. Re-invent, re-prioritize and re-locate if you want to, and learn how much you still have to give to this world. And never stop moving forward.
Read MoreKeep this word top of mind: accountability. It feels like it is one of several buzzwords for 2018. The first time it caught my attention was when I was watching the Real Housewives of Beverly Hills and the newest member of the group is an Accountability Coach. A what? OK, not sure what that is but I’m listening.
The Oxford Dictionary definition of accountability is the fact or condition of being accountable; responsibility. Responsible? No one is more responsible than I am. I carried the responsibility for keeping my family together during my long and unsuccessful marriage. It felt like the weight of the world was on my shoulders every day. How can I be a person who is not accountable?
So, I started thinking about what accountability is and do I need a coach for it? No, I can do that myself, right? I just tell myself I am going to do something then I do it, easy peasy. Then why is it that I never follow through with a lot of the important stuff: less food, less alcohol, less sugar, less weight. Read more, watch Netflix less. Walk my dog five miles every day, hah!
I believe I am smart enough to be accountable to myself. I believe you are smart enough to be accountable to yourself. So why aren’t we and why are others able to help? If I knew the answer I would write a book about it and get rich and live happily ever after. But think about all the programs in the world that are based on changing behaviors and meeting with “helpers” weekly to keep us accountable, to help us stay on track to reach the goals we say we want to reach, whether it is about food issues or substance issues or career issues or motivation issues. There certainly seems to be a need for help with accountability.
Why it is I don’t know, but I do know that I am at the top of the list when it comes to not being accountable for some of the most important issues that I face. And I feel so let down when I get up every day not having fulfilled my promises to myself the day before, don’t you? Here is the answer: I am accountable to everyone else in my life, but not to myself. How terrible is that? To anyone who is depending on me, I am accountable. I feel responsible for my children’s sadness in their parents no longer being married and I feel responsible for money I lost on a terrible business venture, but that is more like guilt. If I tell someone I am going to do something for them, I do it. The end. But for myself, to myself, I am not accountable, and I would guess that a few of you are in that same boat. I hate to admit it but I think it is very much a women’s issue, taking care of others and being accountable to others but not ourselves. And, I feel ashamed of that and I hate carrying that shame around with me like my own invisible Scarlet Letter.
So what to do about that? If you started the year off with goals and haven’t followed through one bit with attained them, guess what, you can start now. You want to be accountable, start being accountable now. That is the good news. Accountability can start on any day of the week, not just Mondays. And if you fail today you can succeed tomorrow. The best part is that when you are accountable to yourself, you feel better. You feel inner pride. You exude confidence because you know you can do something that you hadn’t accomplished in the past.
Accountablity in 2018, that sounds pretty good, right? What are you wanting to be acountable for and are you ready to dig in? Can’t wait to hear from you and can’t wait for you to become accountable this year.
Oh, by the way, I have scheduled an appointment with an Accountablity Coach in two weeks!
Read MoreYou can learn a lot about yourself by being alone. It’s not always a bad thing. I have learned way more about myself when I am on my own than I have when I am in a crowd. That crowd Paula is happy and loud and funny. When I am alone, I’m just Paula. My time alone means time to think, time to process and time to understand what I like and what I don’t like. And, if you are not a person who spends much time alone, you need to start. It can be lifesaving. Without that time, that time to rest your mind and kind of zone out for a while, it is difficult to get centered. It is hard to fuel back up without putting on the brakes every once in a while.
Becoming Comfortable Alone
I have to say, I have always been comfortable alone. The man I was married to for more than thirty years was not. I was an only child so I always had my own room. I could hang out in my room for hours and hours and do nothing. It was my nest. I would do handstands against the door of my closet hour after hour (what would happen if I had to do a handstand now? I can picture my arms just crumbling to rubble and me landing on my head!) I would just hang around in my room and I like to think that the time was spent making me who I am today. That was the time for imagination and dreaming and wondering why some boy didn’t call me, then deciding I didn’t want him to call me anyway, then crying because that boy who I didn’t want to call me anyway, didn’t call me.
For as long as I can remember, I have always been comfortable being alone. I’ve been lucky enough to have lots of friends throughout my life and loved being in big houses full of other kids when I spent the night when I was young, but I got to come home and spend the rest of my time the way I wanted to, without much interruption.
I was also a kid who learned to sew and knit, so as I grew up I usually had some project going, like crocheting blankets for my parents and friends for Christmas. I could sit in front of the TV making something for someone for hours and be content. I was happy.
When Alone Time Can’t Be Found
Then I got married and had kids and worked outside the home on and off and there was not one minute alone! And, just when I thought I was alone, a baby would cry or a husband would moan and I was back at it. It didn’t take long for me to figure out that without alone time, I was a crab! Looking back, I just needed that time to reset and regroup and get back to center before I went out the door the next day. Life seemed to0 never let up until the kids were out of the house. Boy, did I have alone time then!
Alone When it is Not by Choice
The sad part of being alone is when you are and don’t want to be and it is all there is. That is true loneliness and not fun and not happy. When I was first on my own again I had a lot of nights when I was alone and lonely and no amount of knitting could make that better. I could have wrapped the world in wool and would have still been lonely. I know alone and I know lonely and lonely is not a choice. It is having no one and nothing to go to and it is ugly. Even making the choice to be alone can make you lonely for a while. But the two are not interchangeable and I can be lonely in a room full of people and was for most of my marriage.
So, get to know yourself and know whether you need time alone or not. If that is missing in your life you can fix that. Carve it out. Find that time to recharge. I am aware that I have to have that to be happy. For me, it is as important as sleep, that is certain. And, learn to enjoy that alone time. You deserve it.
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