Wonder Wednesday: CECs

A couple of weeks ago I went to a course in order to obtain continuing education credit.  The presenter, Brett Klika had a lot of valuable information.  I learned a lot so I wanted to share some key points from my notes.

*You cannot grow without getting out of your comfort zone.
*Journal everyday.  Write 3 hours per week.  When we write things down they come to life.
*At the beginning of everyday make a list of 5 things you need to accomplish. Don't go to sleep until they are done.
*10,000 hours is how many hours it takes to master a craft.
*2 ways to mess yourself up---1) do the same thing everyday (we need a variety of movements) 2) don't do anything
*Read Mike Boyle's books.

In a nutshell, that's it!

Learning to Fly

Every time I look at this picture I laugh a little on the inside.  It's a perfect picture for what happened.  I felt like a little kid.  I also felt like a complete idiot because all the moves and exercises were completely foreign.  But I had a playful attitude and had a lot of fun experimenting.

In preparing for 12 Adventures in 2012 I went to an aerial yoga class.  It was a blast. So much of a blast that I want to get some fabric to hang in my living room.  We'll see if Aaron goes for that.  I'll keep you updated! :-)  In the meantime, I'm still working on that list and happy I tried out an adventure.  It makes me even that much more excited for 2012 and all the fun that will be had! 

Think about joining me...please!  Make your own list, maybe even start a blog for the adventures and then at the end of the year you can make a book about what you did.  How fun would that be?!  Think about it.  Your list will look completely different than mine and that's awesome.  Just make sure to share it with me!

The New Year. Right Around the Corner.

“You have to understand, in your heart and mind and soul, that NO ONE else is going to turn the corner for you until you turn the corner for yourself.  And it never has been or ever will be about the food itself.  All food is just proteins and amino acids and blah blah blah…it’s not about the food!  You are your own best advocate, and you are not doing yourself any favors by cheating.  You are perpetuating your own failure, and are teaching others to expect this failure of you.”  That's just a tiny excerpt, read the whole article here. 

A friend emailed this to me months ago (the above).  I think it has a lot of value this time of year with New Year's coming up.  Last week I found this quote (below) that I love so much.  It too is a very timely statement. Remember, knowledge and awareness give us power to overcome.  Realize patterns and focus attention to change the cycles.

"Most people don't have a problem starting. Everybody easily gets excited, joins, signs up, starts and begins. Millions of people make New Year's resolutions, start diet programs, join gyms, buy personal development books, go to seminars, but their life doesn't change. Because success is not defined by how you start, but how you continue over a long period of time." Darren Hardy

Thoughts on 2012

When people ask me what I do for a living, what I really want to say is that I'm a brainwasher. I like planting new ideas into heads. It's fun to tell someone that they can do what might have seemed impossible before the idea was imbedded in their brain via a view from the outside. Sometimes the words we feed ourselves internally are not productive. I believe this happens to all of us because we're human. But how powerful is it when someone else sees in you what you don't see in yourself? That hidden potential that is visible to others around you but what you may be blinded to day after day. Isn't it crazy what someone else's confidence can do for personal growth?


I believe you are reading this for a reason.  The reason being more than one.  But I want to ask you some questions in order to bring light to areas that you may be overlooking. Where are you now in life? Where were you a year ago from now? What are you doing in your life that's working? What's not working? Do you have people in your life that are breathing and speaking positive, motivating, insightful and powerful words to you? What do you want to do with your life? How will others remember you? What will they say about who you are and how you lived your life?
The questions could go on and on but the gist is you have this opportunity every 12 months. Every 12 months we get a new year; a renewal to your life in a way. Will this be like every other year or will you do something extraordinary?!

We're nearing the end of 2011 which means 2012 is right around the corner. It's that time of the year where I begin to reflect on how this year went and what I can do to tweak next year. I also begin thinking of a project. In the past I've worked on 52 sweets in a year (1 sweet a week), read a book a month, read 20 books in a year or tracked weekly workouts for 52 weeks. I'm thinking in 2012 it would be fun to track 12 new adventures; things I've never done before. I'm a curious person and there's a lot I've always wanted to try. I just haven't made it a priority....but 2012 is the year! On the list for 2012 is white water rafting in Oregon, hot yoga, an aerial silks class, snow skiing with my almost 5 year old son, trying a crossfit class, and maybe embarking on an adventure race with my husband. That's all I've got so far. And who knows, the list will most likely get tweaked and will definitely grow. But the bottom line is there's emphasis in living life in an adventurous and curious way!

Wonder Wednesday: Weaknesses

I've learned something over the past few weeks and had some really great revelations.  They all center around finding, pinpointing and becoming aware of weakness. 

Weakness is something I've spent most of my life dodging.  It's something that I've never wanted to look dead straight in the eye.  I'd rather focus on what I'm good at and keep that as the center of my universe.  And then if we really don't want to beat around the bush; I'm just plain prideful.  I want to hide the things I'm not good at.  I want to hide it from myself and others.  Maybe my thinking is that if I hide it, it doesn't really exist.  I'm not sure.  What I am sure of is that way of living isn't helping me or anyone else in a positive way.

So now what to do with this big reality?  I think step 2 is what I'm on right now.  I'm becoming aware of my weaknesses, realizing that I don't walk on water and notice that it's a blessing to be aware of weakness because that's the only way to get stronger.

However, I think it's important and fascinating that I haven't beat myself up about my it.  Maybe what I've been afraid of all along is the realization that it will feel really bad if I acknowledge it's there. 

While I don't want to put all my focus on this I do want to know it's there so I can fix it.  Ignoring it does no good. 

Words

Words inspire me so much.  Words are powerful.  Words hurt, they wound, they are remembered forever.  Words can also empower, strengthen, and they can be a gift.  Please use words wisely. That being said, I'm using these words to empower, not to tear down. 

High performing individuals... "begin with two beliefs: (1) the future can be better than the present, and (2) I have the power to make it so."

Always, always remember that.  You have the power to do WHATEVER you want.  We live in a free country.  We can make choices. 

Now I want to speak into whoever eyes come upon this blog entry: you can do it.  You have the strength, the knowledge, and the power to do what you want.  Go for it!!!! And let no one stop you.  Fly.  Put those people that speak good to you be in the forefront of your life.  The people who tear you down, the people who are full of critical spirits (a judgemental attitude that tears people down instead of building them up) are people to consciously steer clear of.  They do us no good.

Systems

In the wee early hours this morning my clients and I were talking and training (of course) about the shake.  Some absolutely love it, some could never do it and some won't even try it.  Here's the beauty in that and why I love our conversations in these training sessions so much: we all don't and won't do the same thing.  The key is finding the system that works for you.  So now the question becomes:

1. Do you have a system?
2. If you don't are you willing to experiment in order to get it right?
3. If you have a system are you willing to share it here via comment?

Got to love new perspectives!

Wonder Wednesday: Poser

I'm reading this book, Poser my life in twenty-three yoga poses by Claire Dederer.  Granted, I'm only on chapter 5 but so far it's a great read.  I connect with it because I've been practicing yoga since August of 2008.  How I fell into yoga was linear: I got pregnant in 2006, gained 50 pounds by 2007, started running to help lose the weight in 2008 and by mid 2008 had horrible knee pain from running too much, saw a chiropractor that also teaches yoga in August of 2008.  I've been in love ever since.  Fast forward three years which brings me to this book.  I relate to it well because the author is a mom that practices yoga. Go figure!  It's deep and I connect through her experience of mom and yoga-hood.  In this edition of wonder Wednesday I wanted to outline 3 things I've gotten from the book this far:

1. from page 35---I had discovered something; there was a pleasure in becoming something new. You could will yourself into a fresh shape.  Now all I had to do was figure out how to do it out there, in my life.

I love this because it describes transformation: trans·for·ma·tion/Noun:1.A thorough or dramatic change in form or appearance. It's what we go through in life but sometimes never grasp that it's happening in order to embrace and enjoy the process.

2. from page 50---Until then, I would fake it.

Reminds me of the expression, "fake it until you feel it."  I don't think there's anything wrong with that because in my experience it normally works.

3. from page 4---Fear. I hadn't even known it was there.

This takes me back to some of the first times in class attempting the pose below and I was incredibly scared.  At that point I realized there were many things in my life that I feared and often operated in response to that fear.