The Unitarian Universalist Church of Reston

What is spirituality? The only thing I know for sure as I write that question is that I absolutely don’t know. After all, I only began my own spiritual journey a year ago at the age of 38 when I walked through the doors of the Unitarian Universalist Church of Reston, in Reston, Virginia. If you know me, you may be surprised to hear that I have been going to church for the better part of a year now, and plan to soon make it official by becoming a member. After all, I am a self avowed atheist, and have been for the better part of my life. This statement may be off-putting to some readers, but I think it is important to be up-front from the beginning: I do not believe in God. However, my belief that there is no god makes me no less inclined to long for spirituality — a connection to something greater, something bigger than myself and outside of myself. I simply choose to define what that is differently than many others. And while Unitarian Universalists don’t preach atheism, they do preach acceptance of all, along with the core tenets of compassion, and connection — all ideas I can wrap my brain and my heart around.

Though the concrete act of me walking through the doors of UUCR is a way that I seem to mark the start of my search for spirituality and deeper connection, I realize now that this journey is one that has neither a beginning nor an end except, perhaps, where it is marked by birth and death, and, even then, who I am to say it doesn’t go beyond that? Although I feel certain for myself that there is no Heaven or Hell, I also subscribe to the belief that we are all energy and energy is neither created nor destroyed — an idea that lends itself to a different way of viewing eternal life.

When I contemplate spirituality and what intuitively that means to me now that I have opened myself up to accepting something greater into my life, I do feel that it is something all around us all the time. Sometimes it lights up like like fireworks in the sky as if say “Look at me! I’m here! I’m extraordinary!” while at other times, it might be more like a flicker from a firefly, there one second and gone the next, a moment that can be missed if you blink. Of course, I realize that to many of you that may sound a lot like God, so maybe we aren’t so different after all.

I also know that while I love every service I go to on Sunday mornings, walking away feeling like my mind and heart have been stretched to new limits each week, I also know that church is usually the last place I feel spiritual. I feel many wonderful, positive things, but spiritual, no. Instead, the moments when I feel something greater than myself are moments I’ve had many times in my life, but maybe because I had some religious baggage or perhaps it was just a lack of proper guidance, I didn’t define them at the time as experiences of enlightenment. Moments like listening to a concert in the St. Chappelle Cathedral in Paris on a cold November night, closing my eyes and feeling the music reach inside me and flow through my entire body, leaving me feeling invigorated and drained all at once. Maybe the feeling I had was not unlike someone going through a Baptism, being reawakened to a new knowing — a knowing that there is a nameless something that evokes awe in the very core of my being. Even now, just writing about that moment, there is something coursing through my veins that wasn’t there a few minutes ago, and I feel a little more at peace this morning. In fact, music is something that is most likely to evoke a feeling of spirituality in me and on the same trip, I experienced a moment of nirvana once again, while sitting in a bar, dark and tinted with hues of red (or maybe that’s just how I remember it?), listening to a jazz trio where each instrument spoke to one another in a language only the players fully understood.

There are other moments and places, too, that aren’t centered around music, that bring me an inner peace and a feeling of connectedness to the world around me. Muir Woods, a redwood forest just outside of San Francisco always feels to me like my own personal cathedral — a place of worship — even when surrounded by the crowds of tourists who flock to see the grand work of nature. I have access to wonderful parks here in Northern Virginia, and love to hear the roar of the Potomac while hiking the trails through Great Falls Park where, even though one is only a few miles from the sheer suburban chaos of the DC Metropolitan area, you can truly lose yourself (in the best possible way!).

And I can find spirituality in animals. Although I don’t spend nearly enough time around horses, when I touch one, when I rub my hands along its soft muzzle, there is something there, a connection that goes far beyond words. I feel spiritual when I see a mother duck leading her small fluffy ducklings to a stream on the campus of George Mason University, completely indifferent to the busy students looking down at their iPhones, mindlessly walking through their lives, missing out on this firefly moment. When a cicada comes out of the ground after seventeen years of lying just under the surface while I go about my business, growing older, sprouting new gray hairs, wondering how I’m going to handle my kids entering into adolescence, I feel a miracle.

So, clearly music and nature have the profound ability to awake my spiritual soul, but it is not only external forces that have that power. Though admittedly my commitment to the daily practice of meditation ebbs and flows, the stilling of my mind and heart let me speak to a higher self within — a higher self that in our busy, high-wired modern world can sometimes be very hard to reach. Still, each time I take 15, 10, or even 5 minutes to put out the call to that higher self, an inner wisdom to guide me through the ups and downs of this brutiful (to quote Momastery) world, I become aware of something that transcends my own presence here.

I was at a seminar yesterday where we spent a lot of time discussing spirituality and its place in the mental health profession particularly as it relates to the treatment of eating disorders, and I came away believing what I already have intuitively come to know — that a healthy sense of spirituality can be a vital component to overcoming some of life’s greatest challenges. As William James said, spirituality involves “a sensation of union, of a direct connection with the cosmos, with nature and the Divine Energy. It includes a belief in the reality of an unseen order and in the human need to be attuned to it.” Though each of us may define Divine Energy differently, tapping into it whether it’s through prayer, meditation, getting in touch with nature, or listening to music, is a chance to awaken something both within ourselves and throughout the greater world.

I am thankful that I have awakened to the journey I was already on, though unaware, and look forward to new experiences of personal and spiritual enlightenment through intentional practice and random acts. What do you do to awaken your spirituality?

You can use the principle of intention with respect to planning meals and snacks or even generally applied to your food relationship. Weekly intentions might take the form of incorporating healthy snacks, packing your lunch to work, and/or having meals planned throughout the week. The reality is that those who are most successful are the ones who realize they are worth taking those extra ten minutes per day to pack their lunch or plan their meals. I recently had a client measure the time it took to create a healthy salad to pack in her lunch bag. To her surprise, creating and packing this salad took only three minutes. So sometimes we perceive that it will take longer than it actually will. Why not give yourself the challenge? I am sure you can find three extra minutes to pack your lunch.

Reflection Questions

1) Identify the sabotaging thoughts that get in the way of having a healthy food relationship (i.e., “I don’t have the time”, “It is too expensive”, “I am too tired”, “I’ll start next week”, “Next month, next year”).

2) Identify the supportive statements that you tell yourself about cultivating a healthy food relationship (i.e., one meal at a time, I am worth the time and investment, progress not perfection). In what ways are you already incorporating mindfulness in your food relationship?

Action Steps

How might you incorporate the act of intention with your food relationship? What will you commit to do over the next month? Make your act of intention focus on only one thing. Some ideas may include: starting your day with a healthy breakfast; practicing mindful eating at a minimum of one meal or snack per day; committing to having a regular day to grocery shop and meal plan. Some find it helpful to break down shopping and meal planning into two planning sessions and two shopping sessions per week. For example, on Sunday plan meals and snacks through Wednesday, and then again on Wednesday plan for Thursday through Saturday. Recognize that you are worth the investment of time. When you are able to plan and have healthy food options readily available you set yourself up for success.

Michelle Market, LPC is a Licensed Professional Counselor and Wellness Coach with more than 10 years of experience in Wellness and Women’s issues. She is dedicated to helping females feel better physically and emotionally. She has a private practice in Herndon, Virginia and works with Adults. Michelle provides counseling, coaching and workshops. She specializes in self-esteem and healthy food relationships. Her mission is to create and maintain positive change in the lives of her clients. She believes that beauty comes from the inside out. For more information visit her website www.michellemarket.com.

I went into my dressing room to try my clothes on, but I couldn’t help wondering what the rest of the story was for this man. Was he working so hard to just make ends meet for himself in one of the wealthiest counties in our nation? Maybe he was supporting his family, putting a child through college, or at least hoping to. What did he do in his native country? Was he a farmer? Or did he have a stall selling fruits and vegetables along side prepaid calling cards? Or maybe he was he a doctor, as many a taxi driver I’ve spoken to have been. Or a professor, or a lawyer, or one of many other white color professions that may have served them well in their home countries, but for which there is little reciprocity in terms of their credentials here in the U.S.

Alas, the clocked ticked, and by the time I was done deciding that nothing I brought in with me was going to work out, I had little time to investigate his life story. But that doesn’t mean he doesn’t have one. Or any other person that I come into contact with for 3.5 seconds at a time in my day. It’s easy to treat every person that we are not intimately connected with as a cog in the wheel of our life — they are there to keep things turning, making things comfortable for the rest of us, taking our money at the registers, folding clothes we choose not to buy, making our food, and packaging it up for us to take home and feed to our families, sweeping floors, cleaning up after our kids have spilled more food on the floor of a restaurant than what went into their mouths. It’s so easy not to notice them. To go through life as if we are surrounded by ghosts who only give us the slightest hint of their presence through a smile here, an automated “have a nice day” there. But at the end of their shift, they go home and live lives just like we do, putting dinner on the table (or hoping to), wanting the best for their kids, wondering if they’ve made the right choices in life.

My Dad used to tell me that some of the most interesting people he’s ever met were taxi cab drivers. They mostly sit in silence, occasionally perhaps broaching the area of small talk, mentioning the weather or asking about where you are going. You might mention your upcoming girl’s weekend, or a business trip, or a night out on the town in which you opted not to have the responsibility of driving home. But, ask the driver about his story (and I’m not being sexist here, but let’s face it, most taxi drivers are in fact male), and the story you might hear could be one filled with adventure, success, sadness, and pride, all rolled into one. I still remember a taxi ride early one morning to the airport, and probing my driver a little revealed that in Afghanistan, he’d been a brain surgeon, but couldn’t get the proper licensing here to practice medicine, and still needed to support his family that included a terminally ill mother he was caring for. Sure, he could have been making the whole story up to increase the generous tip I had already planned on giving him, but there was such a resignation in his voice that I turned off my cynicism and accepted his tale at face value. For even if it wasn’t true, surely there was tragedy and hope in this man’s life that was worth valuing and believing.

It wasn’t just taxi drivers my Dad talked with. Everyone at the grocery store he frequented not only knew him by name, but knew his family and asked about them frequently, as did he of their families. To my Dad, every person he came into contact with was an opportunity for engagement, exploration, and mind expansion that was symbiotic. That approach towards life is a gift he has endowed me with, though admittedly, it’s one that needs constant fostering. By recognizing that each person has something to offer this world, and taking time to listen and find out what that might be from time to time is an experience that will brighten your world as well as theirs, and brings us all one step closer to understanding the humanity that ties us together.

How many times have you been at a restaurant, or in a store, where the staff didn’t seem to want to give you the time of day — they barely acknowledged your existence. It probably was infuriating. We expect our presence to be recognized by those around us, but how often do you recognize the presence of those around you, except in how they may do something for you? And yet, that’s the lot so many people face, day in, and day out, just moving about as an auto-matron of sorts, there to serve others without any acknowledgement that they exist outside of their current role.

So today when you’re buying your triple grande soy latte at Starbucks (oh, wait, that’s me), or stopping for lunch at whatever McBurgerBellFila fast food joint you frequent, or going through the checkout line with your milk, diapers, and fully cooked rotisserie chicken, remember that the person on the other end is a person worth knowing too. Smile at them, and when they ask you how you are doing, not expecting you to respond with any great fervor, shoot right back at them, and ask them how THEY are doing. Acknowledge their existence and let them know you see them. Because don’t we all really just want that? Don’t we all just want to be seen? To know that we’re alive, not just because we can feel sensations running through our bodies, but because another person can look at us and not just through us.

The world is a gift to all of us, as are the people within it. Let’s all take the time to celebrate that gift just a little more.

The spare bedroom in our house is known as ‘the office’. Although the only piece of furniture that now occupies the room is a futon which is usually pulled out in the bed position and covered in toys that have spilled over from our kids’ rooms, it once served as a home office for my husband. And, even though he moved his office into the basement more than a year ago, the bedroom which has become our guest/play room will likely forever be known to us as ‘the office’.

Fortunately, our spare bedroom doesn’t have an identity that is being warped by conflicting ideas of who it is and who it should be based on past experiences. People, on the other hand, are different.

An individual’s identity develops over time, shifting and growing with each life experience. But sometimes it becomes easy to get wrapped up in maintaining a piece of your identity from the past even if it may not reflect who and where you are now. This can be physical, as in “I am dieting to get back to the body I had in high school”. Or it can be emotional, where one might lament what they see as a loss in the life they had in the past, as in a parent longing for the care-free days of their pre-child life.

While past experiences are an important part of who we are today, remaining tied to the past can lead to feelings of frustration and discontent. Instead of hanging on to who you “used to be”, concentrate on who you are now, reflect on the positive things, and consider what you might change for the better — not in an effort to get back to the past, but instead to move toward a better future.

Have you been trying to go back in time? What would happen if you let go of the person you “used to be”?

By Michelle Market, LPC

Imagine quiet amongst the chaos of your daily to-do’s. Imagine uninterrupted time during your day to focus on your breathing and slowing down. When you allow your mind to quiet down, how do you feel? Is it uncomfortable? Why might you avoid slowing down? These are questions to give some consideration as you begin to implement the practice of meditation.

It is possible to slow down, although it often needs to be intentional and, initially, rehearsed. Picture the first time you learned to ride a bike. You did not do it perfectly the first time. You fell, bumped into things – you started slowly. Learning the art of meditation and quieting your mind can sometimes feel like the same process.

When was the last time you sat in silence for any extended period of time? Meditation not only is a healthy coping skill to handle stress, but it is also a tool to help us tune in with ourselves. Quieting our mind results in becoming more centered. When we have slowness in our day we develop greater awareness of what is going on in our mind, body and with our emotions.

Steps to incorporate meditation into your day:

Choose a time in the day that is most conducive to your meditation practice. (All you need is 5 minutes). Initially, it is helpful to set a timer (start at 5 minutes).

Find a space where you can sit comfortably. Sit up tall with your legs uncrossed. Have your hands open and palms up. Close your eyes.

Find a word to focus on that will illicit a calm response. For example, peace, acceptance, slow, breathe.

When you have other thoughts that enter your mind picture them as clouds floating through the sky and then focus back on the calming word that you had chosen, refer to this as your mantra.

Take notice of taking slow, intentional deep breaths. Inhaling through the nose and exhaling through the mouth.

Though there are many different ways to meditate, here are five types of meditations that may be easier to incorporate into your day:

Candle Meditation: Light a candle and place your focus on the flicker of the flame. When your mind begins to drift, re-center your focus back on the candle.

Walking Meditation: Find a path to walk (preferably a scenic route). Take notice of slowing down your steps one foot in front of the other. Take notice of slowing your breathing. Take notice of the scenery, the flowers, the trees and the grass as you connect with nature.

Cleaning Meditation: Turn any chore into a mini-escape. Take focus on the rhythmic nature of the chore. For example, if you are washing dishes, notice the sound of the water, take notice of the soap bubbles and take notice of your breathing. Use your calming word to re-center.

Car Mediation: While driving to work or running your errands turn off the music and drive in silence. Make a conscious decision to practice deep breathing.

Breathing Meditation: A simple way to incorporate calm into the day is committing to taking 3 deep breaths at different times throughout the day. You can use different transitions as a reminder to breathe such as before meals, before checking email, before starting the day. You will be amazed at the calming effect of just changing the way you breathe will make.

To sit without any judgment and to invite slowness is a gift of compassion to ourselves. Be patient in the process and start slowly. Begin to look forward to this pause within your day. Make the commitment to incorporate this self-care tool on a daily basis.

“I commit to 5 minutes of quiet each day.”

As you begin this practice on an on-going basis, you will start to look forward to this time of the day and will notice the days that you skipped. Meditation provides a bridge to create peace within ourselves.

Michelle Market, LPC is a Licensed Professional Counselor and Wellness Coach with more than 10 years of experience in Wellness and Women’s issues. She is dedicated to helping females feel better physically and emotionally. She has a private practice in Herndon, Virginia and works with Adults. Michelle provides counseling, coaching and workshops. She specializes in self-esteem and healthy food relationships. Her mission is to create and maintain positive change in the lives of her clients. She believes that beauty comes from the inside out. For more information visit her website www.michellemarket.com.

When Your Personal and Professional Lives Collide, You Can’t Control the Wind But You Can Adjust Your Sails

By Barbara M. LaRock

Image via Flickr, courtesy of QuiteLucid

As you begin to think about bringing more balance into your life, consider the following set of 12 rules from a brochure on white water rafting safety. They’re relevant and applicable to the choices we all make as we decide how to live our lives.

1. Decide before you start if you’re going to steer from the front or back
2. Someone has to be elected to call out orders clearly.
3. Take rest in calm places.
4. Never stop paddling even when it seems hopeless.
5. If you get into trouble, don’t panic.
6. Don’t be surprised if the boat doesn’t go where you want it to go.
7. On a raft, the more activity on the left, the boat goes right, and vice versa.
8. If you go under, let go of everything and you will float.
9. Everyone paddles, but the current always takes you.
10. Trust the boat and if you are in white water, hold on.
11. Remember, white water is what you came for, so enjoy it.
12. The people in the boat are the ones who will pull you out of the water if you go overboard, and they are also the people with whom you must eat supper.

Keep these rules in mind as you negotiate your own white water. They’re definitely points to ponder if you, like most people, are struggling to fit together all the pieces of your life. As you are probably all too well aware, most people today are overscheduled, over-committed and generally overwhelmed. This kind of over scheduling can leave you running on empty and desperate about how to improve your situation.

For people with children, the impact of this imbalance can be serious when you consider that as parents, you are your children’s first and most important teachers. Your kids are always learning from you and will copy into their own lives the way you live your life. Following are examples of things your children learn from you. In fact, they’re important areas to examine whether or not you have children.

• How you manage time and what choices you make about how you spend your time
• What priority you place on the relationships in your life
• How you handle both professional and personal stress
• How you share responsibilities such as chores at home or responsibilities at work
• What place hobbies and interests play in your life
• How you handle free time–days off, weekends or vacation

The lesson for all of us to learn is that it’s up to each individual to create a life that is balanced, a life that s/he loves. No one can do it for you. It’s your responsibility. It’s not healthy to keep saying, “if it weren’t for this” or “if it weren’t for that, everything would be great.” Nor is it healthy to put your satisfaction in the future, e.g., when the kids or older, or when you or your spouse get a raise, or when you finish a project, etc. Remember: Life is not a dress rehearsal. Your future is now.

An important part of developing self-awareness is to take some time to think about your priorities–to identify the areas that are important to you. Priorities are individual–what’s important to one person may not be important to another and vice versa. To that end, consider a few questions whose answers may prove quite revealing to you. Ask yourself: What do I really want for my life? When you consider this question, what comes to your mind first? Do you want more rest? More exercise? A promotion? More time alone? More time with family or friends? A new home? To telecommute? To expand your business? List everything that comes
into your mind.

Take a look at all that you’ve just written and ask yourself if your desires are really your desires or are they meant to please someone else. Also ask yourself if your desires are ones you think you should have rather than desires you truly want. “Shoulds” can get you into difficulty. Now that you’ve considered what’s important to you, prioritize these areas. In other words, put them in order of their importance to you. Then ask yourself how much time and attention the top priority items are receiving. This activity will help you see areas that are out of balance–areas that matter to you but aren’t getting enough of your time and attention and aren’t being nourished.

By becoming self-aware you’ve determined what matters to you. The next step in creating a balanced life is very important. You must learn to respect and protect what’s important to you. This means your schedule and the way you live your life should reflect your priorities. A crucial piece here is to stop reacting to life and ask yourself what causes you to lose site of your priorities. What or whom do you allow to get in your way? You are in the driver’s seat–not circumstances. There are no victims, only volunteers.

Think about when you’re on a plane listening to the flight attendant explain emergency depressurization procedures. You’ve all heard the flight attendant remind passengers traveling with someone who is dependent on them to put their own oxygen mask on first so they can be available to the dependent person. The bottom line The bottom line is you have to care for yourself first. This is not selfish–it’s taking care of yourself so that you can be available to those who matter to you and depend on you. You have to learn to say no to anything that doesn’t respect your priorities. This is how you honor and protect what’s important to you. It’s simple, but definitely not easy. If you’re a people pleaser, this can be especially hard.

A rule that’s attributed to the Dalai Llama is a simple formula that will help you protect your priorities:  Respect for self, respect for others, responsibility for all your actions.

Here are some tips to help you honor and respect the priorities you’ve identified:

• When you notice yourself feeling overwhelmed, ask yourself: what’s really happening – what’s going on and, what am I really feeling. Answering these questions will help ground you.
• You can’t maintain your sense of balance and grounding unless your basic needs are met.
• Remind yourself to give thought to what you want, what you choose and what you prefer rather than what you should want or ought to be doing.
• Identify the free time that you do have. Obvious free time is easy to identify. Most of us have a lot more free time than we realize, we just haven’t learned to recognize this “hidden” time and we let it pass away unnoticed. This free time usually won’t be a large block of time, but is most likely made up of small pieces of time. Examples of free time we may not realize we have are: waiting in traffic or riding Metro; standing in line at the bank or the DMV; your lunch or coffee break; waiting for doctor/dentist appointments; time on business trips–on planes, waiting in airports, eating alone.
• You’ve prioritized important areas in your life. Now think about what you need to do to reach your goal of spending more time on those areas. Ask yourself what small steps you can take to reach your goal. For example, if a priority for you is to spend more time on a hobby or interest, take a class or learn from a friend. If spending more time with a spouse/partner is a priority, identify what time you both have so you can reach your goal. You might try to set up a “date” night once a week or meet for lunch on a regular basis.
• If you want to read more, ask yourself what free times are available to you so you can read. You may want to carry a book with you so it’s handy when you have some “hidden” free time.
• Identify the things that revitalize and refresh you and make time for them–exercising, reading, visiting with friends, watching a favorite TV program, spiritual or religious time, or just being alone.
• Identify and eliminate things (including people and places) that bother you and drain your energy. Determine what you can delegate at work and at home. For instance, if you let family members choose a chore they have interest in doing, they’re more likely to do it with minimum grumbling. A word of caution: if you delegate, be careful about criticizing those who do things differently than you do. Also, remember to show appreciation. A word of thanks goes a long way. When people feel valued and recognized for what they’ve done, they’re much more likely to do it again — and willingly.
• Shop via catalog or on the Web. Use services that pick up and deliver such as dry cleaners and copy services. Order office products online. Delivery is fast. Hire a housecleaner if you can afford it.
• If your child is in day care, if it’s at all feasible, check in on him/her during your workday. This is obviously a lot easier if your child is in on site day care. However, new software enables you to actually see your child in day care from your computer. If your children are at home alone after school, have them call you or you call them during the time they’re at home alone. You’ll be more productive at work if you’re not worrying.
• Find a gym with a day care center such as a YMCA. If you have a small child, consider a jogging stroller.
• If you have a spouse, negotiate time alone–everyone needs time alone! If you have children during your alone time, the other spouse spends time with the children. Then the spouse whose had the time off reciprocates with supervision of the children.
• Set aside a family evening–take turns suggesting what games to play. Rent a movie–take turns choosing the movie or build a model together. Try to find a place in your house for a jigsaw puzzle for everyone to work on.
• Find a convenient place in your home for a master calendar and enter everyone’s activities and commitments on that calendar so you can see at a glance where jam up times are and what the best times for couple and family activities are.
• Set aside a special place, perhaps near the back door, for each child to have a “storage area” such as a plastic box to keep their own lunch boxes, boots, mittens, backpacks, sports gear and other belongings.
• Let children participate in menu planning during the week or on weekends, whichever works best for you. Then let the kids participate in cooking AND cleanup.
• When you first come home from work, be aware of and let your spouse and family know what kind of transition time you need. Talk about that transition time and work with your spouse and family so you get what you need.
• If you travel on business, telephone your family every night and talk about their day as well as yours. Send e-mails. Consider sending a postcard. These things keep everyone feeling connected and cared about.

Finally, give yourself credit for the effort and time you put into the steps that will lead you to your goal of achieving a more balanced life. As with anything new, you may find yourself experiencing some stops starts and course corrections. Progress is never a straight line forward; to be sure, there have to be steps forward, but it’s normal and indeed expected to have some backsliding and some plateaus. Don’t give up. Creating balance and a life you love will give you a better, more fulfilling life and will make you even more productive in your professional life. An added bonus if you have children is that you will be giving them the gift of priceless lessons for life from their first and most important teacher.

Barbara M. LaRock, M.Ed., offers life, leadership and career coaching as well as organizational training.  Her firm is located in Reston, VA.  Her background prior to coaching includes teaching, advising and mentoring students; designing and directing training programs for trade and professional associations; and organizational training involving presentation and facilitation of workshops and seminars. Barbara’s coaching specializes in life-related and career areas with her individual clients and provides them with encouragement, support and challenge as they focus on transition and change in their personal and professional lives. Her clients find more enjoyment in their everyday lives and become even more productive on the job. For more information, visit her web site Barbara LaRock.

Copyright 2010

No parts of this article or the article in its entirety may be reproduced without permission of the author.

Would you like more time in your calendar and your life? What if changing the way you look at time could make a good life a great life? Think these concepts are impossible? Read on.

At one time or another, most of us have said, “There just isn’t enough time in the day” or “I can never accomplish all I want to both at work and at home”? This kind of thinking makes people see themselves as victims of their overcrowded, overwhelming and demanding schedules. They then sit back, complain and continue their self-defeating behaviors. You can, however, change your attitude about managing time by acknowledging and accepting your responsibility for managing yourself.

It goes without saying that everyone has the same amount of time in his or her day. It’s how you choose to “spend” that time that counts. The word “spend” is key. When you spend money, you choose what amount to pay out in order to get what you want/need. The same holds true for time. Each of us decides how much to spend to get what we want/need. Time is wasted when we don’t spend or invest it wisely. It’s up to each of us to decide what our personal and professional priorities are and then to honor those priorities. This is why effective management of time really is self-management.

Effective time/self-management begins with examining and knowing your own style. People who are structured, organized, good at identifying, setting and respecting priorities, and good at meeting deadlines find managing their time relatively easy. On the other hand, people who lack determination and discipline and who are reluctant to have structure and organization in their lives have a more difficult time managing themselves and their time. But, with resolve and practice, they can learn to get done more of the important things in their lives.

Here are a few tips to help you get started managing yourself and your time more effectively:

1. Keep in mind that you, not circumstances are in the driver’s seat.
2. Keep a daily log for one week of how you spend your time.
3. Assess your own style and attitudes about time. For instance, if you’re a morning person, schedule your most difficult tasks early when you are at your best.
4. Take 10 minutes at the end of each day to write down your top 5-6 priorities for the next day in order of their importance.
5. Make sure that before the end of your workday, you accomplish the top 5-6 priorities that you set for yourself. Let nothing pull you off track or intervene with this accomplishment.
6. Maintain a calendar, either written or electronic, so you don’t over schedule yourself.
7. Have a clear understanding of what is important to your family members and your associates.
8. Delegate what you can.
9. Every week, handle one unfinished task or project that has drained your energy.
10. Respect other people’s time
11. Learn to say no to anything that takes you away from respecting your priorities, and
12. Practice living with the guilt that may come from saying no. You will get better at it.

Remember that it’s up to you to manage yourself–and your time.

Barbara M. LaRock, M.Ed., offers life, leadership and career coaching as well as organizational training.  Her firm is located in Reston, VA.  Her background prior to coaching includes teaching, advising and mentoring students; designing and directing training programs for trade and professional associations; and organizational training involving presentation and facilitation of workshops and seminars. Barbara’s coaching specializes in life-related and career areas with her individual clients and provides them with encouragement, support and challenge as they focus on transition and change in their personal and professional lives. Her clients find more enjoyment in their everyday lives and become even more productive on the job. For more information, visit her web site Barbara LaRock.

Copyright 2010

No parts of this article or the article in its entirety may be reproduced without permission of the author.

It seems like most of us are either on a diet, trying to create a body that we can feel happy with, or treating our body with complete disregard, filling it beyond capacity with foods that would make our body scream in pain if it could talk. And then, when we can’t stand to look in the mirror anymore, or feel totally out of control around food, we go on a diet. Again. But let’s face it — diets don’t work.

Ninety-five percent of people who go on a diet regain the weight lost, and often more, within five years. But how are we supposed to reconcile those statistics with things like “obesity epidemic” or “1 in 3 Americans are overweight” and “war on obesity”. If diets don’t work, how are we supposed to cure our country of unhealthy eating habits and an inactive lifestyle? Jamie Oliver thinks he has the answer with his Food Revolution. Michelle Obama hopes she has the answers in trying to eradicate childhood obesity by encouraging kids to get off the sofa and get outdoors. In both cases, the focus, ultimately, is about teaching people to live healthier lives — to choose apple slices instead of chips, grilled chicken instead of burgers, bike riding instead of Playstation. But together, both Obama and Oliver are only getting at half the problem — which is what people eat, and without addressing the other half — why people eat, they will never reach the long term success they both genuinely want and hope to achieve.

The concept of intuitive eating is gaining momentum and working towards that goal with the help of books like Intuitive Eating, and Eat What You Love, Love What You Eat will be far more effective than wagging the finger at people in an effort to get them to make better choices. The Body Love Manual takes intuitive eating one step further by guiding readers through a process of identifying what it is that keeps them so disconnected from the bodies, preventing them from listening to and properly nourishing their bodies. Though the subtitle of the book is How to Love the Body You Have as You Create the Body You Want, don’t be mistaken. This is not a diet book in disguise. The Body Love Manual is for anyone ready to put away dieting forever, deciding to become an intuitive eater, and challenging the thoughts and feelings that so far have preventing you from achieving that goal. Integral to this process is learning, as the title suggests, to love your body. As Hills points out, “The human body is tragically under-appreciated, neglected, and abused…The fact is that it is very hard to feel motivated to take care of something you don’t care about. Conversely, when you care deeply for and truly honor your body, you will be far more likely to make the healthier choices for it.”

The Body Love Manual should not be a quick read. It requires reflection and real emotional work. But ask yourself if you identify with this passage from the book:

“As the number I saw on my bathroom scale went up, my sense of self-worth plummeted. During this period of my life, it was rare for me to appreciate and value any of my other qualities … [which] became secondary in comparison to my weight.”

If you feel like you could have written those words yourself, then perhaps it is time to begin the work towards loving your body because “When your thoughts about yourself are respectful and appreciative, you will begin to attract more positive experiences of all kinds into your life.”

Though the Body Love Manual talks about achieving your ideal weight, you might begin to question what your “ideal weight” is and in fact you may find that you are already there, because your “ideal weight” should reflect a healthy lifestyle that is not measured by a number on the scale but by the feelings that come from your mind and body which will tell you when you’ve reached it.

*As required by FCC law, I am disclosing that The Body Love Manual was donated by the author for purposes of this review.

By C.Reed Weber

Everyone has at least one Worst-Case Scenario tucked away and most of us live in fear of the day when that scenario — The Worst — will be played out. Maybe it involves a career choice, or perhaps loss of employment. It may involve family members or loved ones. It could be a single incident, or first in a chain of events that will bring you to your knees. It doesn’t really matter what you fear, the fear itself is enough to make you miserable.

But should The Worst happens, you may be surprised to discover life continues on. Birds sing. Clouds float. Children laugh. People cry. The Worst has happened, now what? What won’t happen is life will not stop. It may seem to you as if life should stop, but amazingly everything keeps going right along. The sun rises every morning and the stars shine every night. It may seem to you Clouds of Gloom rain everywhere you go, but soon you will realize only you are getting wet. Then you’ll find yourself in the position of being “outside” things for a time, but eventually you’ll be able to pick up the threads of your life and continue on. You will wake up. You will grocery shop. You will eat meals. You will talk with people. It happens very slowly, but as days pass you’ll find you are living again. Living is what you are supposed to be doing while you are tromping around on this planet!

My father once told me: “Be prepared for The Worst, but Live for the Best.” I think that sums it up nicely.

C.Reed Weber has been writing since she first discovered an unguarded pencil and continues today as a freelance journalist and grant writer. Living Beyond the Worst has been adapted from Happy Thoughts, a collection of email columns she wrote for friends and family during 2008-2009. Weber is currently working on developing Happy Thoughts into a book. You can purchase mini-volumes of Happy Thoughts from her Etsy site.

By Esther Kane, MSW

As a psychotherapist, this is my busiest time of year. Why? Because a lot of people are really bummed out and don’t understand why. They come to me feeling desperate in the hopes that I will help them get their “pep” back. Many are predisposed to seasonal depression, otherwise known as Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD). This is a very common form of depression, which is only noticeable during those months where there is very little sunlight (like now!).

Symptoms of SAD

The symptoms of SAD commonly begin every year between September and November and continue until March or April. Symptoms often include a number of the following*:

• Sleep problems: Oversleeping and difficulty staying awake but, in some cases, disturbed sleep and early morning wakening
• Lethargy: Feeling of fatigue and inability to carry out normal routine
• Overeating: Craving for carbohydrates and sweet foods, usually resulting in weight gain
• Depression: Feelings of misery, guilt and loss of self-esteem, sometimes hopelessness and despair, sometimes apathy
• Social problems: Irritability and avoidance of social contact
• Anxiety: Tension and inability to tolerate stress
• Loss of libido: Decreased interest in sex and physical contact
• Mood changes: In some sufferers, extremes of mood and short periods of hypomania (overactivity) in spring and autumn.

If you identify readily with all or most of the above symptoms and you’ve experienced them every winter for at least three consecutive years, chances are you are suffering from SAD. Luckily, there can be great relief found from a variety of non-invasive modalities available. I will outline the methods that the majority of my clients struggling with SAD have found most helpful:

Light therapy

Recent research has shown that 85 percent of people diagnosed with SAD have been helped by light therapy.  This involves being exposed to very bright light (at least ten times the intensity of household lighting) first thing in the morning for 15-30 minutes every day.

Look into getting a special light used to treat SAD. The one I use and recommend constantly to my clients is called the “Litebook Elite”. It’s small, lightweight (8 oz), and durable.** The great thing about light therapy is that it is safe, has no side effects, and easy to use.

Regular Exercise

A 2001 study by  Duke University, in North Carolina, found exercise to be a more effective treatment for depression than anti-depressants, with fewer relapses and a higher recovery rate. Researchers say a chemical in the brain called serotonin may be the key. People suffering from depression have low levels of serotonin, and exercise can boost those levels.

Find an exercise routine you enjoy and can commit to at least three times a week. Make sure it’s active enough to get your heart-rate up and your blood pumping — this boosts serotonin levels and leaves you feeling more upbeat and positive.

Talk Therapy

Engaging in regular sessions with a psychotherapist who specializes in Cognitive Behaviour Therapy to treat various forms of depression will give you the tools you need to re-train your brain from negative to positive thinking. When combined with other modalities of healing, this can provide much relief from SAD.

Practice lots of positive self-talk; much of depression is a result of what we say to ourselves. We need to learn to ‘think happy’: when we do this, the brain follows suit.

If you’d rather work on your own, I suggest you pick up a copy of David Burn’s classic self-help guide to overcoming depression, The Feeling Good Handbook. This is a wonderful resource and can be helpful to anyone who needs to change his or her thinking from negative to positive.

*adapted from The Seasonal Affective Disorder Association’s website.

** You can order a Litebook Elite by calling 1-877-723-5483. If you use my professional # (BC 0007) when you place your order, you’ll save twenty percent on the cost. I have registered myself with this company in order to make these lights more affordable to people.

Esther Kane, MSW, Registered Clinical Counselor, is in full-time private practice as a psychotherapist in Courtenay, B.C. Esther has over a decade of experience counseling women and their loved ones with a multitude of presenting problems.Her main focus is helping women to become free of barriers which keep them stuck so that they can become all that they dream of being. To learn more about Esther’s services, please visit her website at EstherKane.com.