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Five Paths to Self-sabotage: Are You Standing In Your Own Way? – Part 3

August 23rd, 2010, No Comments »

My goal in this blog post series has been to point out how many of the things that hold high-achievers back in business and life actually come from inside the mind.  Here are two more I’d like to point out.

4. You are a hard worker. Yes, this is probably one of your greatest strengths, but it can also get in your way. When you are trying to do something new, hard work is often not enough. If you aren’t satisfied with how things are going, if you aren’t getting where you want to go, or if you can’t make changes that stick for the long haul, than there is something wrong with your plan. Hard workers can sabotage themselves, because when they don’t see the results they want, they tend to tell themselves that it’s because they aren’t working hard enough—so they work harder. The problem is, working harder using the wrong strategy will simply burn you out and leave you feeling defeated and ineffective. If you are feeling frustrated at your lack of success and tired of working so hard, it’s time to consider path number two and asking for help. Consulting with someone who isn’t stuck inside your mindset and approach can make a world of difference—sometimes very quickly.

5. You’re scared. High-achievers are often very used to creating success. Trying something new, struggling, letting go of old, but comfortable, mindsets—this can all be disconcerting. Stepping outside your comfort zone can be scary.  Success can also be anxiety-producing. Stepping up, playing a bigger game, moving into a bigger or stronger version of ourselves—all these things may feel exhilarating, but they can also push buttons we never knew we had. The first impulse for most of us when we feel anxious or scared is to slam on the brakes. Sometimes we get in our own way because we are unsure of moving forward.  The good news—you are not alone and fear does not indicate weakness. It means that you are challenging yourself and by stretching, you are growing. While slamming on the brakes won’t get you where you want to go, you can still use those brakes to set a pace that feels safe and comfortable. Finally, when you let go of your “flying solo” mentality, it frees you up to seek the help you need so that you don’t have to feel like you are walking in the darkness by yourself.

The bottom line:

Do you need to get out of your own way? It’s an essential question. Paying attention to any gaps in your foundation and mindsets that are messing with your head game may be the most valuable investment you can make in your success.

Take good care,

Five Paths to Self-sabotage: Are You Standing In Your Own Way? – Part 2

August 19th, 2010, No Comments »

Last post I outlined how neglecting self-care can be a common path leading to self-sabotage. Here are a few more common mindsets that may cause high-achievers to stumble in reaching their goals.

2. You are flying solo. This is a very difficult one for women who expect a lot of themselves. If you have a goal and you aren’t accomplishing it, one of the first questions you should be asking is whether you could use some help. Could you use a coach or a mentor? Here’s where the fun comes in. Notice the conversation you have with yourself when you ask this question. Many high-achievers will run circles around themselves in order to avoid getting the quality support that might quickly propel them forward.

Notice the head game: “I should be able to do this on my own.” “Other people don’t struggle with this.” “I’m a strong person, I can do this.” Again, here’s the truth: strong people do ask for help. Successful people surround themselves with teams that can support them in accomplishing their goal. They leverage the time, expertise, and energy of others.

Asking for help is NOT a form of weakness. It’s often the bravest and the most pro-active thing that you can do to create your own success. Here’s another interesting fact. If you are someone who struggles with asking for help, it’s probably easier than you think. You don’t even need to know what you need. Approach someone you trust, share your dilemma, and simply ask, “I’m not sure what I need here, do you have any ideas about how you or someone else could help me with this?”

3. You are cutting the wrong corners. Success requires an investment. Most importantly, this means an investment of yourself—your time, your energy, and your focus, and sometimes, your finances. Having the time, energy, and focus committed to your goal are critical ingredients for success—no matter what you are trying to accomplish. Sounds straightforward, right? Unfortunately, many busy people try to skip this step. Either head games get in the way (if you feel guilty spending time and energy on yourself, you’ll get caught here), or you might not really know how to do this.

Shifting gears and priorities, carving out space and time, and persisting when things get tough are incredibly difficult tasks—especially when you are a busy woman who expects a lot from herself. Before you purchase another “how-to” book or program, ask yourself whether you’d be better off investing in a coach who could help you create the physical, mental, and emotional space and foundation necessary for you to implement the plans that you already have.

I hope you’ll join me next time for the final two paths. These may just surprise you a bit!

Take good care,

Do You Have Your Blueprint for Thriving?

August 10th, 2010, No Comments »

In my part of the world, it’s “back to school” season. There are lots of ads about “fresh starts,” a “new season” and all the supplies that we can buy to be prepared. Many women start to think about fresh starts and changes for themselves as the new season approaches.

Can I be honest?

If you truly want to be successful with whatever change you are dreaming of making—ending overeating, losing the weight, getting fit, becoming more organized, or growing your business—new supplies, clothes, or even the newest book on the topic isn’t what’s going to do it for you.

It’s not about the plan. It’s about having a plan that you can follow through with. And a system in place in your life that allows you to complete the plan.

If you’ve tried to make this particular change before, think about it. Why didn’t it happen the last time you tried? Chances are you lost motivation. Or your schedule got too crazy. Or you found it too hard or too boring or too time consuming.  Or you felt guilty taking the time required to get to the gym or prepare the healthy food or work on your novel….

Quite simply, you didn’t have the blueprint you needed to get you to the final destination and help you stay there.

Showing you how to create that blueprint is what I’m good at.

Wouldn’t it be great to figure out how to get where you want to go—with the most ease and least amount of struggle?

Wouldn’t it be great to get moving NOW and be well on your way by October, November—the holidays?

Wouldn’t it be fantastic to start the New Year and have already accomplished that thing you resolve to do every January?

That’s what my new program, The THRIVE Formula: Four Weeks to Unleashing Your Inner Champion is all about. Sign up now. Start next week (or listen to the mp3 downloads on your own schedule). Fill in the action guides you’ll receive during and after each call and take the steps I give you. You’ll be in action toward your goals after the first call. And we’ll cover all the things you need to know to keep you unstuck and moving forward. You can even choose to have individual coaching along the way.

The seats are filling up. Are you going to join us?

http://unleashingyourinnerchampion.com

Take good care,

Could You Use a Detox—For Your Brain or Your Life?

July 12th, 2010, No Comments »

It’s the bane of the high-achieving woman—you probably never run out of things to do—or ideas about what you could be doing. Sometimes it’s fun. Creative high-achievers tend to be talented at creating work they love. But the constant doing can also work against you and lead to a decrease in your productivity, your focus, your energy, and your passion.

Too many ideas in your head can even prevent you from taking action because you feel overloaded or confused about where to start.

• Is your head too full?
• Do you have a hard time stopping—even when you know you need to?
• Have you sought out so much advice that you feel like you know “too much” and can’t even find a place to begin amidst all the rules and wisdom you’ve acquired?
• Do you know that you need to do to relax, reduce your stress, or refocus but you aren’t sure how to stop your life long enough to do it?
• Do you have a pile of books or an in-box full of recordings that you feel like you need to listen to before you can move forward?

Then you could probably use a detox. Not a nutritional cleanse, but a process for clearing out the gunk in your head space—the garbage that’s overwhelming you, throwing you off track, or keeping your life so full of “shoulds” that it’s hard to work on the motivation to do any of it.

Luckily, you don’t need a week at a spa to embark on a mental detox. Here are some steps you can take today to start cleaning out your brain.

1. Examine the junk that’s weighing you down. Take a look at what’s swirling around in your mind. Sometimes the thought of cleaning out a messy closet is so overwhelming, that we just avoid opening the door. It can be the same with our thoughts and the expectations that we hold for ourselves. One symptom of overwhelm can be a tendency to avoid your thoughts—overeating, or choosing mind-numbing activities instead. Grab your courage, take a deep breath and a clean pad of paper. Set the timer for 15 minutes. Now write down all the gunk that’s in your head. This includes everything you feel you need to be doing, the expectations you have for yourself (these usually start with “I should”), the unhelpful stories you are telling yourself (these often begin with “I can’t” or “I don’t” or “I never”) and anything else that feels like it’s mucking up your life. Get it out of your brain and put it on paper. Now get a different colored pen and circle the ones you want to keep.
2. Create your own clarity. Get a clean piece of paper. Take another deep breath. This time, ignore all the “shoulds” and the rules and write down what you know to be true of you. Write down what you know about what you need to be successful, to be fueled, and to be at your best. I’ll give you an example. A client who is coaching with me to take charge of emotional eating and to lose some weight was feeling lost about how to approach her upcoming vacation. She felt like she “should” continue with the Emotional Eating Toolbox™ program she had started. She felt like she “should” be writing in her journal and meditating. She was worried about overeating on vacation and gaining weight. She was also worried that she would drive her partner up the wall talking about what to eat and worrying about getting things “right.” I asked her what else she knew. She knew she desperately needed and wanted to relax and that if she gave herself permission, she could actually do so on this week-long trip. She knew that she was already automatically using many of the tools in the emotional eating program—when she was present and relaxed. She knew that the more she got wrapped up in “getting her eating right,” the more she was going to overeat and binge and not savor the foods she was looking forward to. She also knew that there are certain foods that her body doesn’t handle well and that she needs to avoid them to feel her best, and that to do this successfully, she needs a game plan and a few minutes every morning to connect with herself and get her head on straight. What my client knew and what you know about yourself, is the starting place for creating your best plan and deciding what you need and what you can let go of.
3. Start the detox process. Go back to your first list. What can you let go of? For now. What parts of those swirling thoughts in your head  a) aren’t a priority and don’t need to be addressed NOW, b) are unhelpful or are confusing or otherwise getting in your way, 3) don’t fit your mission, your purpose, or who you are—today (hint—many of these things may be a part of someone else’s agenda, but not yours). Cross them off. For now. Be sure to look for mindsets and beliefs that you can let go of as well. As my client reviewed her list, she easily saw a number of things that she didn’t want on her agenda during the next week. She also quickly realized that perfectionism, and her expectation that she needed to perform at a certain level, was sucking the joy (and the benefit) from several key activities in her life. On top of that, the expectation that to be successful she had to be perfect was keeping her stalled and unable to move forward on a number of things.
4. Rinse and repeat. Overwhelm comes back. That’s okay, it’s one of the hallmarks of a rich full life. The key is having strategies to handle it when it happens. A periodic detox can be just the ticket for rebalancing a life or a brain that’s gotten too full.

Take good care,

Free Teleseminar: Could YOU Use More Ease, Flow, and ME-time in Your Life?

June 24th, 2010, No Comments »

It’s time for the next (free)  Smart Woman’s Teleseminar–and you’re invited!

This month, I’ll be talking about the number one challenge busy, high-achieving women face–making time for yourself, getting done what needs to be done, AND creating that juicy lifestyle you work so hard for. Don’t roll your eyes–it IS possible.

The Official Topic:

Overwhelmed, Overcommitted, or Overweight? How to Unleash Your Inner Champion and Take Back Your Life (in less time than you think)

Sounds good doesn’t it? Can’t you just picture your own personal super hero—complete with cape—standing in your corner?

Here’s some of what I’m going to cover:

• Two powerful myths that are holding many women back (and how to break free of them)
• How healthy lifestyle and self care impact the game you bring to your business and your professional life
• What your inner champion is and why you need to connect  with her
• How you can create more ease, flow, me-time, AND success in ten minutes a day.

… and much more.

This teleseminar takes place Tuesday, June 29, 2010 at 3pm Pacific, 4pm Mountain, 5pm Central, and 6pm Eastern. You’ll want to be on the call live to get your questions answered and participate in this important teleseminar, but if you absolutely can’t make it, know that we’ll be recording the call and will email access to the recording to all who enroll.

You can save your seat and get all the information here:

I hope to see you on the call,

Are you ignoring your own advice? Three ways high-achieving women let themselves down and get in their own way

May 26th, 2010, No Comments »

Are you a hard working woman who often feels exhausted, stressed, overwhelmed, overworked, or like you will never catch up or get to the fun stuff that you really want to do?  Did your latest self-improvement plan fall by the wayside because other stuff got in the way?

In spite of your considerable strengths, talents, and accomplishments, you may find that when it comes to creating the work-life balance that works for you, achieving your personal goals, or squeezing the juice out of life, you just aren’t getting where you want to go—or if you are, it isn’t nearly as enjoyable a ride as it could be.

It’s not unusual for smart hard working women to notice a difference between their sense of effectiveness and success in their professional lives and the care they take of others, and in the care, time, and results they experience with their personal goals, projects, and pursuits. Many women believe they have no choice but to sacrifice themselves for their other responsibilities.

Contrary to what you may be thinking, it doesn’t have to be an “either or” choice. In fact, those who really thrive professionally and interpersonally are the women who’ve learned to take the best care of themselves and carve out the time and the experiences that allow them to be at their best.

Interestingly, most of us know that. At least, it’s the advice that we give to others. Most women I know, including those who are the hardest on themselves, are the first to go to bat for another’s needs or to step forward with compassion or empathy or a warm hug—for someone else.

A question I often ask my clients is: “Are you taking your own advice?”  I’m betting that you have great inner wisdom about what you need and about how to nurture yourself in the direction that you want to go. Unfortunately, many women are much better at dishing out this good medicine than they are at taking it.

Here are three ways women often ignore their own wisdom and get in their own way:

1. Would you talk to your mother with that mouth? I bet you are generally a very nice woman. You may be full of words of encouragement and tact and have probably developed some excellent verbal skills for nurturing others. Have you ever stopped to listen to the soundtrack that plays in your head? I’m talking about the constant banter that you carry on with yourself. We all do it. We talk ourselves through tasks. We talk ourselves into things (and out of them). We talk to ourselves when we’ve had a hard day or when we are facing a challenge. And we talk to ourselves when we succeed.If you could download it and play it back, what would your soundtrack sound like? Is it full of encouragement, acknowledgment of the things you’ve accomplished, gratitude, and an optimistic attitude? Or, like many busy women, is your soundtrack often tired, cranky, intolerant, and on the judgmental side? Do you call yourself names like lazy, dumb, fat, or ugly or push yourself beyond the point of reason, or ignore your pleas for rest, help, or a time out? Now really. Would you talk to your mother or your best friend the way you speak to yourself? Would you encourage anyone the way your inner coach speaks to you? If the answer isn’t yes, you’re a smart woman and you know you need to clean up your act.
2. Do you tell your friend to stop whining and work harder when what she really needs is a big hug and some breathing space? I doubt it. But many high achievers tend to adopt this kind of strategy toward themselves.  If you are someone who is a firm believer in the care and nurturing of others but are only paying lip service to this in your own life, you have some work to do. If working harder is your primary success strategy, it’s time to take a step back and look at the bigger picture.  Start by applying the wisdom you dole out to those you care about. You know–about taking good care of yourself, taking a break, making sure you get enough rest and good things to eat. If you were your own best friend, what would you be insisting on and encouraging for you? It’s time to step up and start listening to your own good advice.
3. Do you blow off the work presentation, your child’s soccer game, or your friend who needs you because you “just don’t have time?” Hardly. Most busy women I know are not only caring, they are organizational geniuses. I’ve seen mothers find a way to be in two places at once and women juggle a major presentation, a home remodel, a relationship crisis and half a dozen other challenges. And still. So many high achievers can’t make it to the gym or find the time to shop for the healthy food or carve out the time to take that yoga class they really crave.  They forget what they know and tell themselves that they are too busy to fit themselves in. Are you so busy being spectacular that you’ve forgotten to leverage your strengths and talents in service of YOU?  If so, I guarantee you are paying a price that is far bigger than the time it would cost you to schedule yourself.

There really is no point in living life with one hand tied behind your back. Why not start using your own advice and applying your own wisdom instead of living by a different set of standards that you apply only to yourself?

Take good care,

Free Teleseminar: One Minute Plan for Dealing With Challenges

September 11th, 2009, No Comments »

How many times have you set a goal or started down a path towards change only to fall off track because life got too hectic, you got busy, and your plan fell off the radar?How often do you feel so busy that you aren’t even sure HOW
to slow down?  Do you sometimes feel you don’t even have time to think let alone create a plan for success?

Slowing down is hard. Stopping and listening to yourself is hard. Being mindful of where you want to go is hard.

What if I told you that there is a one minute plan that could start to make these things easier?

I’m thrilled to be interviewing Stacey Mayo, The Dream Queen, and the creator of The One Minute Meditation™.

Our Topic: The One Minute Plan for Dealing with Overwhelm, Stress and other Life and Business Challenges

During this free teleseminar you will learn:

• How you can respond more effectively when life and business challenges as they come up

• The importance of finding and aligning with your BIG YES and how it significantly reduced the overwhelm

• That it is possible (and easy)  to access peace of mind in just one minute and

• Practical steps that will bring you more peace AND success

Stacey Mayo is the director of the Center for Balanced Living and the author of  I Can’t Believe I Get Paid To Do This!: Remarkable People Reveal 26 Proven Strategies for Making Your Dreams a Reality.  She has been featured on the CBS Evening News, in Forbes, Newsday, and the Wall St. Journal. Stacey loves to help people get out of their own way to make their dreams come true, integrate and balance their personal and business lives, become Peaceful Entrepreneurs who make an big impact and great living while doing something they love.

Won’t you join us?

The call will take place on Thursday, September 17 at 11am Pacific, 2pm Eastern and will run 45-60 minutes.

This call will be recorded and all who register will have access to the recording.

Go here to reserve your spot.

Melissa

PS: This is not a call to put off.  Click here now and in 30 seconds we’ll get you registered.

Accountability: my win-win vacation ritual

July 20th, 2009, No Comments »

Accountability is one of the most powerful tools for change, and smart independent women often overlook it when working to create new habits or take on new challenges in their own lives.  Creating accountability doesn’t have to be an unpleasant chore.

Every summer my family spends one perfect week on my favorite island in the Pacific Northwest.  The same families return every year, and over the time we’ve been doing this, some very special friendships have formed. Each year we marvel at the changes in our children and catch up on the events of the last 12 months. It never ceases to amaze me how much can—and does—happen in a year.

One rainy summer, when the lake was not so appealing, my friend Margo and I started one of my favorite traditions.  We’re both business owners and life coaches with missions we feel strongly about.  That rainy day, we sat down and committed to goals for ourselves and our businesses for the next year.

Each year since, we’ve come together to share our wins, evaluate where we got stuck, and set our goals for the coming twelve months.  Committing our plans to paper and to each other makes them real in an important way and, we find that it actually creates some powerful momentum.  There is always something that I push myself to do, “because I told Margo I would.” The results of this one short sit-down are pretty powerful. Each year as we review how far we’ve come, we never fail to be surprised about something that we hadn’t quite realized we’d accomplished in just 12 short months.

Who know what you want to accomplish? Do you have an accountability partner? I’d love it if you’d leave a comment and share how accountability works for you.

Take good care,

Melissa

PS: That’s me and Margo just before we set our goals for the next 12 months.

Smart Choices Success Circle: Key ingredients for creating winning lifestyle change

June 22nd, 2009, No Comments »

Announcing The Smart Choices Success Circle

Calling all smart savvy women who are BEYOND sick-and-tired of struggling with food, weight, and their eating: I’ve designed the program you’ve been asking for–a Mastermind Community for smart capable women who want to make peace with food, get off the diet roller coaster, and start living the life they hunger for.

Accountability, motivation, help and active support–it’s all here.

The Smart Choices program is designed to be effective, accessible, and easy to use.

This innovative program provides the tools, support, and targeted coaching busy women need to get on track, stay on track, take charge of day-to-day overwhelm, and create lives that support the new choices they are making.

This is NOT a diet program. I know that you probably know more than you ever wanted to about what you think you “should” be doing to get where you want to go. This is a program designed to help you take those tools and make them work for you. The Smart Choices Success Circle is designed to provide the tools that traditional weight loss programs don’t discuss. The focus of the Smart Choices Success Circle is accountability, motivation (that lasts), solid support, and enduring change.

In the Smart Choices Success Circle, we take on the reasons those other plans haven’t worked.

Fun (really!) and easy to use, the Smart Choices Success Circle provides wrap-around resources including a motivating goal-setting process, online message board and community forum, weekly audio tips and coaching challenges (emailed directly to you), a weekly accountability tool, and productive Smart Choices Coaching Club phone calls where laser coaching, brainstorming, strategizing and celebrating keeps members in action and out of stuck spots.

Too many women feel alone with their struggles with food and weight.

The Smart Choices Success Circle provides the opportunity to share in the collective wisdom and support of other like-minded women who are striving to make peace with food and end their struggles with weight, eating, and overwhelm in a lasting way.

You can learn more about the program here.
Take good care,

Melissa

PS: I’d love to have you check out this great new program. Join us this month and use the code NEWSLETTER to receive your first month’s membership for only $12.99!

Are you busy reinventing the wheel when you could be enjoying success?

June 16th, 2009, No Comments »

You have a lot on your plate and a lot of things that are important to you. You’ve decided that you want to make health or lifestyle changes and spend more of your valuable energy on yourself. You want to feel better and be more of the person you know you can be.

The question is, “How do you actually make it happen?”

How do you keep your goals on your radar? How do you remember to say no to other requests that interfere? How do you stay strong in your resolve and how do you keep moving forward when you aren’t sure how to do it or if you even want to?

In the years that I have worked with strong, capable, determined women, I have observed a crucial mistake that can make the going much tougher, and the related component that will boost the success rate of just about any attempt at lifestyle change.

The crucial mistake that I see frequently is the tendency to underestimate the benefit of a dynamic support structure when working to create new habits with food, with exercise, or with managing a busy and stressful life.

Many successful women have found success by learning that they can rely on themselves. They know they are tough and many feel like if they want it done “right” they want to do it themselves. While some struggle to delegate in their professional lives, they know that success in business comes from creating and leveraging a team that can support you, expand your capabilities, and help you get where you need to go.

The place I see many smart successful women struggle, is in allowing themselves to have that same type of quality support when working to build something important in their personal lives.

The truth is, engaging a strong, active support system is one of the most effective strategies for creating changes that last. I’m not just talking about having a group of people who care about you. I’m suggesting that you evaluate your current support system in terms of its ability to actively help you get where you want to go.

Here are some questions to consider:

1. Who’s in your corner? Who can you rely on to stand with you and support you in your current goals? Who are the people who want you to achieve whatever it is that YOU want to achieve?
2. Who holds you accountable? I’m not talking about the “diet police” here. Who is willing to hold you to your goals and your objectives in a kind and helpful way? Who helps you make sure that you follow through and asks you about it (again, in a way that feels helpful), when you haven’t?
3. Who contributes to your motivation? Who can you rely on to remind you why you are doing the hard work involved in making changes? Who can you count on to hold up that picture of your final destination and encourage you to keep going? Who reminds you how far you’ve come and all the ways your efforts will or are paying off?
4. Who do you celebrate with when you achieve victories along the way? Acknowledging the milestones on the way to the finish line are incredibly important in maintaining motivation and feeling good about the work you are doing. Who encourages you to celebrate when you decide you are “too busy?”
5. Who believes in you? Who are the people in your support system who know you are capable of achieving what you have set out to achieve? These are the ones who can tell you WHY you are able to be successful. They know your strengths and help you see how you can leverage them to move forward more easily. They remind you that you can do this during the times when you might not believe that you can.
6. Who is your example? Are you the leader of the pack-the one who motivates everyone else-or do you have someone in your support system who is one or two steps ahead of you? Are you reinventing the wheel or learning from the wisdom of others who have succeeded before you? We tend to see more possibilities and grow more when we are surrounded by others who encourage us to stretch our ideas of what we believe we can do.
7. Who is your sounding board? Who do you talk things through with? Who do you go to to brainstorm strategies, tweak plans that aren’t working for you, get advice or just blow off steam after a tough day?
8. Who tells you the hard truth? Who do you trust who will tell you (in a supportive and helpful way) when you are missing the boat or getting in your own way? Sometimes strong women send out the vibe that they are “fine,” they “have it under control,” and they don’t need help. The truth is, we all need help sometimes. Who are the people who will call you on it when you are trying to be the Lone Ranger and it isn’t working for you?

Use these questions to identify any holes you need to fill in your support network. Doing so will absolutely pay off.