There were long periods in my life when everything felt heavy.

I was surviving more than living, simply putting one foot in front of the other and doing what needed to be done.

By midlife, years of carrying unresolved pain and anxiety brought me to a point where I knew something had to change. I was in an unhealthy relationship, unhappy at work and felt exhausted from years as a single working mom.

So, I began searching for a better way.

Looking back now, I realize the path was always about learning how to live and feel lighter.

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Almost 10 years ago, I did something that felt both terrifying and freeing, I let go of almost everything I owned.

I was moving from California, where I had lived my entire life, to a small town in Missouri to be closer to family. It was a big change, and preparing for it required more than packing boxes, it required making choices and letting go.

I sold what I could, gave away the rest, and kept only what would fit into a small moving pod. The rest of my life came with me in a car, along with a ride or die friend and my two cats meowing in the back seat.

And somewhere in the middle of that process, something unexpected happened.

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I love a good story. In fact, I’m pretty good at making them up in my head, but sometimes they have a dark side. The negative ones are about not being enough, what is and isn’t possible for me, scary futures, being victimized, and what I need to do to be accepted in this world. I call them negative fantasies.

I know where they come from. They are based on residue from my past, sensitive areas that are easily triggered and belief systems that try to hold me back. If I allow myself to slide into these negative stories they will impact how I feel, what I believe, and almost everything I do.

And the craziest thing is, they aren’t even true.

They are simply one of the many ways that I make my life harder than it needs to be.

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It is once again the time of year when I share an end of year process. I find them incredibly valuable for my clients and myself to anchor what we have learned in the outgoing year and become clear and intentional in what we want to create next.

In the past, things have been set up as a step-by-step process to follow, but this year my intention is to make it more fluid. Going through the prompts in order will create a lovely ready-to-go process or you can use the list of questions as a menu and pick and choose which questions you would like to play with most.

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In today’s world of technology, influence and expectations, it makes sense that we get overwhelmed at times. Or maybe, even feel that way all the time.

My clients and friends talk about spinning minds and living in a constant state of stress. To cope they distract themselves with mindless social media scrolling, snacking on unhealthy foods and other habits that don’t serve them.

And then, they feel ineffective and guilty, blaming themselves for what doesn’t feel right in their lives.

I can relate. Can you?

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Lately, I’ve caught myself complaining about the weather, and I can’t stand the sound of it in my own voice. The weather has been bitterly cold and since my dog’s bladder leads us out walking a few times a day, I can say with confidence this is the truth.

I’m all for speaking the truth and I’m also aware that we can color our truths with perceptions, stories we tell ourselves and slants towards the negative. When my truth adds a bit of whine to my voice, it annoys me. And, if it annoys me, it probably bothers the people around me as well.

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I have fond memories of the library I went to as a child. I can remember climbing the stairs to the large historical brick building and the way my footsteps echoed on the wood floors inside. When I was old enough to go into the children’s room alone, I felt grown up and proud and the librarian always seemed so magical to me, like a Disney princess who gets to be the keeper of books.

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I understand the value of time. For many years I was a single mother, often taking on overtime or working 6 days a week because money was scarce. I had to make a choice between supporting us financially or spending more precious time with my son. Sometimes the choices I felt I had to make broke my heart.

My relationship with time has changed now. I have more space in my days and more freedom to spend my time in more meaningful ways. But I have never forgotten the value of a minute and the importance of using it wisely.

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My client was struggling.

She was a new coach who was planning to give her first workshop in a local chiropractic office. All she could think about was what could go wrong or who would judge her. Fear was running the show.

When I asked her to describe how the fear felt, what came up for her was a giant monster standing over her. It looked like the abominable snowman in the old Christmas movie about Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer. Only bigger. Much bigger. And, louder too.

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Sometimes, even the words “to do list” can bring up feelings of dread. These lists often symbolize what we see as failures, incompletions, and expectations not met. But is that really true? It’s possible we might be looking at to do lists all wrong.

How we perceive things impacts our experience of them and sometimes our perception about these lists is not the truth of what they really are.

To do lists are simply tools for remembering and organizing things we want to do.

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We, as humans, are wired to be problem solvers. This is a skill that has helped us survive both collectively and as individuals. When one challenge is resolved we look for the next thing to work on.

This not only keeps us in fix it mode but can also cause a negative bias toward our lives and the world we live in. There is always something wrong or something to fix. We forget to celebrate what is going well, gratitude for those who have helped or the magical moments and beauty of daily life. We are too busy looking for the next problem and exaggerating its importance.

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As the new year approaches I am thinking about what I would like to create in my life for the next trip around the sun. Some may call it goal setting, but my way of thinking about goals and bringing things to life has evolved over the years.

When I was younger, I was very committed to SMART goals and resolutions, and they served me well at the time. I excelled in my work, bought a home and generally improved my life. In later years, as I studied coaching and psychology and worked with more people, the potential downside of this method became more clear.

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