Tuesday Truth or Dare: It's a Doing Thing

Truth:  How many times have you said "I wish ......"?   I wish I could travel more.  I wish I had a better job, more money, self-confidence, my own business, and so on.

Some wishes are about feelings or fears.  I wish I was braver, empathetic, happier, less anxious.

Wishing doesn't make it so.  Wishing won't make it happen.  If you want to travel, then you have to change your wishing to doing.

Turn your wish into a goal and then DO the steps to achieve it!

Dare:  A wish is a dream without any goals.  It will remain a wish until you put in steps to do it.  

Think of one thing that you really wish to do - travel, move, be an entrepreneur, singer, actor, writer, artist, go back to school.  Write it down.  Set the date you will DO IT!

Look at the date and start writing your steps.  Your first step will be small and create the foundation.  Move forward. Set a goal. Make a plan, then move forward. The steps may be small, but move forward. That's the only way the dream becomes a reality. Move forward. 

Each step will build until your wish becomes your do.

When you finish one of your steps, celebrate!  You are one step closer to achieving your dream.  You are gonna DO IT!

7 day Challenge: 

Wake Up and Smile!

Write down one wish: I wish I could travel to Paris

Set the date you will be in Paris

Write out the steps to get you there

Celebrate each successful step you take

Have Fun In Paris 

 

Celebrate your ballsy spirit!

Make it a Great |Day!

What Time is It? Time for a Treat

When was the last time you treated yourself?

I'm not talking about expensive spa days or lavish vacations. They're good too but I want you to think of small, daily treats that you can have just for you.

Small treats or simple indulgences will nurture your well-being.  They will lift your spirits, refresh you, and restore a sense of balance in your life.

Schedule "Treat Time".  Get in the habit of scheduling your treat time - it is critical to your well being!

Treats are fabulous for setting and achieving your goals.  Set a goal and set your reward when you accomplish it.  A mini-celebration of you and what you've accomplished!

Remember, it's a treat from your perspective, not anyone else's.

Treat Yourself Self-Care

• Add small treats and simple indulgences to your daily life
• What is something that would be deliciously indulgent for you?
• When will you treat yourself?
• Mark time for treats - "TM" Treat Myself - in your calendar

And Remember Treats come in all sizes and price ranges!

Some Treat Yumminess to get you started

• Spend time with a friend chatting over a slow cup of tea
• Go for a hike - city or country - wander and take in the sites and sounds
• Take a long, hot bath with bubbles up to your neck
• Stop, sit on a bench and watch the world go by and smile
• Sit down in silence and read a book
• Have a decadent nap
• Buy fresh flowers for your home or office
• Give to charity or a friend
• Eat chocolate 

Add your own wonderful, delicious treats to the list.

About Susan Ball:  Susan inspires her clients to live the life of their dreams with passion, joy, and love. Susan is an experienced international Life Coach helping people discover and live their ideal life through NLP, Mindfulness, and G.R.A.C.E.

Learn more about Susan by visiting her Online, on Facebook

Keep it Small & You Will Shine

It's that time again - New Year's Eve.  It's a time when we sit back and say "I need to change something"; "I need do something about ......"; "I really should......." etc.

I know that you're thinking about changes for the new year because I am too! Changes that will have a positive impact on your life and ultimately, make you feel better, healthier, and happier.  Yes, I want to make those changes and so do you.

The question is how do we make our changes last longer than a day, a week or a month?  How do we make it a true "lifestyle" change?  One that will have impact and we'll be able to actually celebrate?

Here Are the 3 K.I.S. Tips for Success:

Keep Your Changes Small - smaller - smallest

I want to lead a more active life - yes, I do.  But just saying that makes me feel a little stressed.  What does that mean?  How will I measure my success?

In order to succeed, I'm going to make my target small - smaller - smallest:

• I will take a leisurely walk on three mornings each week; or
• I will choose one night a week and make it a tv-free night; or
• I will commit to having a meat-free meal once a week; or
• I will choose to set the table and eat a proper sit-down meal at least one night each week; or
• I will only eat potato chips on Saturday nights while I'm watching the hockey game!

Now I can celebrate my accomplishments.  Much nicer than feeling horrible that I haven't accomplished this huge, unmanageable goal and then quitting.

Tell Your Truth

Stop lying to yourself!  Be honest and tell yourself the truth about what you will and won't do.

I did this exercise and now I'm completely comfortable knowing that I will never set foot in a gym - yuck; I will never completely stop eating junk food but I can accept only eating chips on Saturday.  What a treat to look forward to!

Be crazy honest with yourself.  If you want to change something about your life, what are you willing to do and what aren't you prepared to do.

Now, breathe a sigh of relief because you are on your way to success, honestly!

Allow Flexibility

Be flexible!  Flexibility lets you bend a little.  When you are flexible and you can bend, you won't snap and break your promise to yourself.

Let's say I wake-up on one of my leisurely walk days and it's raining cats and dogs.  I have two choices:

1. go out in the rain, get soaked and cold, be miserable, not joyous and feeling good about myself; or
2. Choose Flexibility - I will stay home today and walk tomorrow and I'm okay with my choice.

Choosing to be flexible will inspire me to keep going.  

Think about your goal 

Make it small - smaller - smallest

Tell Yourself the Truth 

Be flexible - bending so you won't break

You've got this!  

Happy New Year.

About Susan Ball:  Susan inspires her clients to live the life of their dreams with passion, joy, and love. Susan is an experienced international Life Coach helping people discover and live their ideal life through NLP, Mindfulness, and G.R.A.C.E.

Learn more about Susan by visiting her Online, on Facebook

Single-Tasking or Overcoming Overwhelm

When was the last time you focused on one task and completed it without interruption?

I'll bet  it was quite a while ago and I'm confident in my wager.  My confidence is because I speak with clients everyday in my coaching practice who are struggling with "I'm overwhelmed".

They are average people with jobs, kids, spouses, parents, friends who volunteer and get involved with their children's activities.  Their calendars are filled with due dates, to do lists, task lists, and appointments.  Some of their planned activities actually overlap leaving not even one second from the end of one activity to the start of the next!

Is that even humanly possible?  Is it healthy?  Does it leave time for just simply enjoying life?  NO!

A common result of too much overwhelm and busy-ness, is procrastination.  It all becomes too much and there doesn't seem to be enough time to do anything.

Overcoming overwhelm begins by adopting "single-tasking".  The fine art of doing one thing at a time.  The ability to delegate or forget about it.

Running around like a chicken with your head cut-off filling in the demands of "everyone" except you is not only unhealthy it is unproductive and not sustainable.

Tomorrow look at your mega huge calendar of things to get accomplished and pick one - just one.  Write it down - I will do/finish/meet with/visit/enjoy this one thing.  Do not take on any new projects or appointments.  Break down your task into steps and achieve each step individually and do a good job so you can smile at your success.  

I have become committed to the idea of single-tasking and the health benefits in choosing to back away from the dreaded multi-tasking.  

I would love to hear if you are a single or multi-tasker.

Your Journey to Wellness Begins with a Question

Today, I'm going start a regular Honesty Thursday series of posts.  I want to talk about how I have changed my way of thinking and as a result improved my lifestyle.

I have clients who will say to me I want to be like you to which I respond You Can with a little work and authenticity!  There is no magic pill, potion or spell that I can prescribe that will make you get up in the morning with a smile on your face looking forward to the day as an adventure in the making.  The prescription writer is YOU!

Not too long ago I found myself dreading the mornings.  I would wake up thinking yuck, another friggin' day, when will this end, what is the purpose of getting up!  I was dreary to say the least with absolutely no plans for the future and nothing to look forward to.  I was on the cusp of filling my prescription for anti-depressants. I was low and the few friends I had probably hated to hear from me.

I had no money.  I had a dead-end job in a big shiny corporate office.  I squeezed myself into a subway car at a god-awful hour of the morning to be surrounded by miserable looking lemmings.  I had a relationship that had run its course.  I had decided that my present and future would be lonely, broke, and defeated.

Sound Familiar?!?  I'm sure there are folks reading this right now who can relate to how I was feeling about life and you're wondering how did I turn it around.

It started with a good and true friend.  They are the friends who ask you the hard questions.  These are the friends you want.  Tip:  Get rid of the nodders!

We were having a coffee and I was doing my usual life is so rotten, I hate my life, blah, blah, blah.  She kept asking me one question:

So, What Are You Going to Do About It?

What a stupid, irritating question!  I was livid.  I wanted her to find the solution for me, NOW!  For some odd reason, my friend wouldn't cooperate and kept asking me that question.  I went home and decided I would not be friends with her anymore which of course, added to my Down on Life Story.  

A strange thing was happening though.....I couldn't get that question out of my head!  When I would think about my finances and wanted to wallow in self-pity, this little voice would ask "Well, Susan, what are you going to do about it?"  The question followed me everyday and everywhere. I wanted to answer the question just so it would go away!

To begin your Journey to Wellness, here are your first steps:

1. Honestly think about your friends and family and determine who are the "nodders".  Nodders will not help you in your journey.  Drop them from your friends list and replace them with true friends who will ask you to be accountable to you.
2. When you find yourself feeling down because you're thinking about your debts, or how you will never be able to travel to Australia, or how you will be stuck in your dead-end job forever,

STOP, take a deep breath and ask

"So, ____________, what are you going to do about it?"

When we get together next Thursday, you will have decided which friends will truly help you on your Journey to Wellness and you will have started to think about stepping out of self-pity mode into a I Can Turn this Around space.  And that's where we will pick up.....Setting Small Chunky Baby Step Goals.

I'm really looking forward to your comments as you move along with me.  It will be a sort of an e-course in a casual way.  I will provide worksheets, tips and tricks and how-tos.  The end result will be one Incredibly, Fabulous You!

Baby, It's Cold Outside

Welcome to winter in Canada.  We are experiencing a blast of arctic air that is set to stay with us for the next 10 days!  I may be proudly Canadian but these cold blasts can be miserable!

That being said, the cold snap got me thinking about my goals for the future.  Oh, I have several and I'm a firm believer in setting goals for your life, career, business, relationships and health.  Small goals that are easy to achieve and celebrate are my favourites.  Each day I celebrate a goal that I successfully completed.

Larger goals are wonderful but if you forget to create an action plan to achieve your big dream type goal you will begin to feel discouraged.  This may lead to giving up on your dreamy goal.

Today, I was looking out my picture window and I started to daydream and a new dreamy goal came to my mind.  My new goal - Every Winter I Will Spend a Minimum of 3-Weeks in a Hot, Hot, Tropical Climate.  Fabulous goal and I want it to be successful so I set about creating an action plan.  I will be in Costa Rica or other tropical paradise from January 22, 2014 to February 15, 2014....period.

My action plan created the steps I want to take to make my goal a reality.  First, finances - how much will I want?  I divided that amount by 52.  So much easier to look at dollar values when they are small and it makes it doable!

Second, what do I want to change in my business to ensure the extra funds are available.  I set about writing action steps to increase my income.

Third, hubby.  Okay, he pretty much loves whatever I plan so I'm good there.

Done!!  I set a goal and developed the action steps to make it a reality.  As a bonus, I created new and fantastic action steps to grow my business.

The benefits of Goal Setting and Creating an Action Plan are enormous.

So, get out your pen and paper, start daydreaming, jot down notes.  Dream big and choose one to make a reality.  You will have a new sense of accomplishment, confidence and an event in your future to look forward to.  How great is that!