Reset Your Day

The new year prompted many people to examine their habits and try to establish better ones. I’ve heard that by mid-February, most people have already let go of their resolutions. I’ve heard clients recently fighting against this trend.

The trouble seems to be that good habits (and bad ones) are set off like dominoes. Hitting the snooze button means missing a workout, which leads to a grab for sugar, which results in lack of productivity, and on and on. If we miss one beat, the whole day feels off track. 

One strategy for recovering your day is to select intentional points at which you can reclaim good habits. Maybe you did sleep late, miss a workout and grab a couple of donuts on the way into work. Commit to eating the healthy lunch you brought from home. Visualize the mental clarity and physical boost you’ll get from making the better choice and reset your day from there. Or, if you can catch it earlier, try just three minutes of slow, mindful breathing on the way to work and skip the donuts altogether.

Set alarms on your phone to check in with your habits each day. Select times when you have a natural transition so that it can be an entry point back into your good habits. When the alarm goes off, either give yourself a pat on the back, or use the moment to reset. Even if the only part of your day that gets on track is your bedtime routine, you’ll rest better knowing you finished well!

No matter the month, it’s always a good time to examine your habits and set goals for yourself. If you’d like a thinking partner for the process, click the contact link at the top of the page.

Winter Preparation for the Next Winter

When it comes to gardening in the winter, I’ve always thought of it as the time to prepare for spring. Master gardener Julie Witmer gave me a new perspective when she recently explained how to use winter to prepare for next winter. She suggests looking at your landscape for holes, places where evergreens would be helpful. Her perspective is not to get through winter or to hide from it, but to plan for it, making sure that your garden has winter beauty built into it.

In my haste to usher in the spring, I forget every year that another winter will follow. When life presents hardship, grief, and transitions, I tend to bury my head or plan for the days when the trouble will pass. Witmer’s advice for gardening offers deep wisdom for our lives. What if in the midst of hardship, we could examine our inner landscape and take inventory of our evergreens? Our faith, relationships, and disciplines add beauty and serve as reminders of life in all seasons, but it may only be in winter that we recognize the barren places. We can accept this revelation as a gift.

If the winter has given you insight into your need for evergreens, and you are ready to prepare for the next winter (because there will be another winter), let’s talk. Click the contact button above to start the conversation.

Winter Preparation for Spring

Winter is a season of darkness, but it’s not all bad. One perspective on winter is that the darkness surrounds the light to protect it. Like a womb for new life, it provides space for rest and recovery.

Now that the days are getting longer, I’m no longer retreating into the darkness. And I’m not the only one. The daffodils and tulips, planted in faith last fall, are coming up. The morning birdsong has a hint of a spring melody in it. We’ve been preparing garden beds, ordering seeds, and organizing the potting shed imagining what our little bit of land might hold in the spring and summer.

Our lives also move through seasons. You may be retreating into darkness, needing time to rest and recover. Or, you might be feeling the call of spring and imagining what life’s next chapter could hold. 

Coaching provides space to reflect, plan, set goals, and problem solve as you move out of your winter and into spring. If you’d like to schedule a complimentary session to give it a try, send me a note through the contact link above.

Honoring Your Dreams

Photo Credit Cody Bennett

When I was little, I planned to be an author and a substitute teacher. I guess at some point I also wanted to have insurance and a retirement plan, because I dropped the author dream and became a teacher. 

The desire to write never left, even though I mostly ignored it.

Five years ago, I finally started writing fiction. Other than being a reader of good books, I had no idea what I was doing. I didn’t know the craft for fiction, the rules for formatting, or the system for publishing good books. You could argue I didn’t have the time either.

At first, I didn’t tell anyone what I was working on, but eventually I started sharing. 

Some people thought it was silly, overly sentimental, or a waste of precious time. I didn’t stop writing, I just stopped telling them about it.

I joined writing groups, found a mentor, and attended writing conferences, sharing my journey with other dreamers and people who embraced creativity.

My publication list is not nearly as long as the list of rejections, but I’m satisfied to know that I’m nurturing my creativity and preserving stories that matter to me. I’m also happy to share that I’ve had an offer from Cricket Magazine to buy one of my stories, so my dream of being a paid author has come true!

If you have a dream that has been tugging at you, or if you want to build space in your life for creativity, there is a path forward, and coaching can help you find it. Click the contact link above to get started.

Preparing for the Next Stress

Everyone can agree that 2020 was rough. And even though vaccines have begun, and the current crisis will pass, it is inevitable that other rough years and crises will come. 

As you set goals and make plans for the new year, begin by reflecting on the last one. There were many circumstances out of our control, but the ways we respond to our circumstances are a result of our own physical, emotional, and spiritual health. You may have noticed that your coping mechanisms for stress weren’t healthy or helpful when the source of the stress lasted months.  

I’ve been thinking lately, if my kids’ schools shut down again and we were going to spend all day, every day together, what routines and attitudes could I help them develop now? What routines and attitudes should I develop? 

What communication skills could I develop so that when my husband and I experience another stressful season we can do it with more empathy and grace? 

It’s not only a matter of planning for the worst-case scenario and it’s certainly not a pessimistic approach. Committing to growth and making adjustments will make our lives richer in the of best times, too.