A serendipitous moment occurred in my life a few weeks back. I was up to my eyeballs in boxes & bubble wrap in preparation for my move to Phoenix only 48 hours away and I decided to just take a day off to invest in my mental health.

Well, actually much more than that. I had devoted the entire day to attending Andy Dooley’s magical workshop called BreakTHROUGH: How to become an Unstoppable, Irresistible, Deliberate Creator! And, boy, did he deliver. Andy’s infectious humor and effervescent enthusiasm transformed a bland hotel meeting room into pure bliss.

One of the most powerful moments of the day for me was developing awareness around the stories we tell ourselves. I sat up and listened intently when Andy asked: “Which came first, the story or REALITY?” And here’s the kicker, folks – “The story always comes first.” He elaborated, “The hardest part of telling a new story is believing it when you’re surrounded by conditions that don’t support it. Remember, reality is a temporary illusion.”

My personal stories include the mundane and simple, “I forget things,” to much more elaborate and arcane rubbish that reeks of drama, neediness, panic, insecurity that makes my brain hurt unnecessarily. So as we were challenged to do, I wanted to start telling myself new stories and begin feeling differently, feeling good about the reality I am creating for myself. Right here. Right now.

Particularly, I’m determined to move my fixation off the one thing that’s out of whack in my life and focus on the gazillion things that I can actively appreciate here and now…all just by telling myself another story.

As a professional coach, I regularly help people examine and process their present and visualize their future. But just for a moment, I want to look back with you.

Childhood memories can be a major stumbling block, filled with drama and trauma. (Blah, blah, blah. Nothing that a few years in psychotherapy couldn’t help. Right?) I think it’s a very rare few who walk away from that experience completely unscathed.

So, dear reader, I decided to tell myself another story about my own time of wonder. Here’s a glimpse of the magic that made my childhood truly special:

• Meeting the prima ballerina from the New York City Ballet at the Saratoga Performing Arts Center after their performance of Swan Lake during the summer of my sixth year.

• Visiting the Great White North (aka Canada) in our Volkswagen pop-up camper van one glorious July. Seeing the tide come in at the Bay of Fundy and driving through New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, then boarding the car ferry to Newfoundland for several weeks of family camping euphoria.

• Traversing the streets of Boston from the jumpseat in the back of a Checker Cab.

• Trying to get my mouth around the 3 inch thick roast beef & Russian dressing on rye sandwich at Joe’s Deli (which I’m not sure exists anymore…) in Albany, NY. (Apologies to my vegetarian readers!)

• Collecting seashells and crabs by the bushel in Searsport, Maine.

• Taking the train to New York City for a Dad and Daughter lunch date at Manny Wolf’s (now Smith & Wollensky’s in Midtown).

From the outside, I’m sure this looks like a wonderfully elitist upbringing for a white chick from New England. Ok, I’ll give you that…as a good sociologist from UCLA enlightened me on such things in grad school. But I will gently remind you that there’s a flipside here. Let’s just say, in this life, we all need compassion. Regardless of circumstances. No judgment. Lots of love. And, for me, a cup of coconut gelato would top this off nicely, too! <wink>

What’s important here is that I can be conscious, awake and aware around the stories that I tell myself. I can create my own reality based on the script I decide to run through my head. So can you.

Tell yourself a new story. How can you change your focus? What can you appreciate about your life right now?

P.S. Andy Dooley’s BreakTHROUGH workshop may be coming to a town near you…if so, check him out!

Photo credit: nophoto4jojo on Flickr

I’ve been mulling over this concept for months now. Maybe years. It’s like a good old-fashioned homemade soup* – in my mind, of course. Start with fresh chicken stock. Add some sliced ginger. A few cloves of garlic. And simmer. Finish with coconut milk. Forget the microwave; it’s just not going to produce anything nearly as tasty.

It’s a truth we’re not always willing to own up to. Sometimes things just take time. And that’s the way it is. Period. We’ve psyched ourselves up for the sprint when we should have been preparing for the marathon. And, no, it’s not a half-marathon. In life, we’re all here to go the full distance. The whole 26 miles and 385 yards.

Two things coexist here, begging to be considered simultaneously: scope and pace. What’s the big picture look like? And what’s it going to take to get there? I’m not necessarily talking about goal setting. I’m talking about the ultimate BIG picture here and how one goes about customizing and fine tuning the training schedule.

My fixation for understanding has been wrapped around pacing myself in life. Is it a universally held truth that I must accept and conform to the tempo of the status quo? What if I actually discovered my very own personal life rhythm? I’ve heard the beat of my own drum and, you know, it actually sounds really good to me. And it doesn’t mean I have to accomplish X by the time I hit 30 or whatever. Anyways, I have no regrets about waiting until I was over 30 to:

• Complete my undergraduate (and graduate) education
• Get married

And it took me yet another decade to:

• Have a child
• Buy a home

A bit unconventional? Yes, for some. But not for me. It’s been a great ride of joy and contentment. Without bumps? Absolutely not. But I wouldn’t trade the slow boat to China for a Learjet. It’s just not my style. Oh, and I’m convinced I’m in good company, too.

“I was 32 when I started cooking; up until then, I just ate.”

~Julia Child

Did it inhibit my ability to thrive? No, not in the least. I vividly remember an anthropology professor whose encouragement inspired me to enroll as a returning student. Certainly, his boost was welcome. But the fact is: I was ready. I wanted to experience the “higher learning.” Ah, there it is, plain, yet in its full glory: experience.

How do you experience your life? Have you found your inner drummer? I’d love to know how you pace yourself without getting caught up in the ubiquitous need for speed.

Photo credit: Joe Brandt

*Editor’s note: I like to cook. If you’d like the recipe for a quicker version of Tom Ka Gai (Thai Coconut Chicken soup), just email me for a deliciously simple recipe. Paradoxical? Nah, I love to experience food more than prepare it. ::wink::

I have to admit it; the power of choice hit me hard in my early 20s. But it started out with the littlest of choices. Freshman year of college in Boston, I couldn’t handle living with my roommate. She and her boyfriend reminded me too much of my parents – all serious & boring – living a monochromatic life. So, it wasn’t hard to decide to move two floors up to live with my friends, Julie & Tina.

Amid the flashing Christmas lights, non-stop strains of John Barleycorn Must Die, and the makeshift “refrigerator” of a shopping basket hung out the window, we three were caught in the dilemma of whether to add food coloring to the fish tank. To me, I was now living a vibrant, Technicolor life in an 8 x 8 dorm room. It wasn’t hard to make that choice, yet it was so liberating. I felt instant freedom.

However little, that decision showed me that conscious choice opens up possibility. As I looked around, it wasn’t only my former roommate that lacked vitality – it was my whole environment. I felt confined by my New England upbringing and well-schooled, hard-working, high-achieving, status-conscious relatives – probably due to my mixed Jewish/Irish-American roots. I was willing to venture further afield. I would transfer to a school out West. Again, not so hard to do.

I ended up in Boulder at CU and loved the Rocky Mountain way. I learned how to play hacky-sack and watched would-be rock jocks scale apartment building walls. But in some ways, it was more of the same. I was really looking for something that had deep meaning to me and I wasn’t finding it. But what was that next move? It had to be bigger, bolder. I hadn’t challenged myself to the point of scary.

Yet scary is where I landed when I decided to ditch my college education in favor of engaging in volunteer training & outreach work for a global non-profit organization half-way around the world. Um, now I was facing a steep cliff of fear. What would the consequence of this decision be? How were my parents going to react when I tell them? Let’s just say, it wasn’t pretty. But I did it. I swallowed the lump in my throat. I stuck to my convictions. I was ready to bungee-jump into L-I-F-E.

Incidentally, I made this radical choice during the 1982 recession. I was 19 when I touched down in Australia and two years later when I returned to the U.S. at 21, I was a different person. I still faced all the growing pains and challenges of early adulthood – I just did it in the midst of this incredible adventure. And with this post script: economies be damned.

Oh yeah, and I randomly stumbled upon my life calling – helping individuals become aware through conscious choice that their lives can be fulfilling, dynamic, extraordinary – that they can thrive their lives no matter what the circumstances. I had no idea one little choice would lead to the unconventional path of my 20s or my professional dream come true.

So what is it about choice? Every day you are making choices and those choices become your life. That’s exactly how it works for all of us.

“You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, ‘I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.’ You must do the thing you think you cannot do.”  ~Eleanor Roosevelt

I challenge you to make a choice that’s outright scary.* If anything’s possible, what’s next for you? What’s your bold move? Think of that leap you’ve been wanting to make. Imagine jumping off the fear bandwagon: what are you doing and how does it feel? How does your life rock after that?

*Gentle word of caution: I am not advocating putting life & limb in harm’s way. Be wise, be prudent. Take a healthy non-dangerous risk and see what happens.

Photo credit: Eric Baillargeon

Editor’s note: This post was originally published on October 27, 2008 on Brazen Careerist. With many recent college graduates hitting the job market, it seemed apropos to re-post it here & now, albeit slightly adapted. jf