Design Yourself

You've heard Sharon close each podcast with this phrase: There is nothing stopping you. But where did that come from and what exactly does it mean? Learn how this tagline came to be and work through some reflection questions for getting deeper on your own beliefs. Your intentions really can change the world, but first you have to discover what they are.

We shared this week that we are doing a special giveaway this month for early subscribers to our community. The full details of the giveaway will be posted over on the blog tomorrow January 24th, but in the meantime subscribe here to get your name entered in the raffle.

(And yes, if you've already subscribed, we've got you covered. And thanks!)

There is nothing stopping you is an intention that Sharon holds in everything that she does and creates. In this episode you'll learn about

• Where this phrase comes from
• How it is informed by Sharon's own growing up experience
• How your intentions can change the world
• How to let your intentions loose on the world

What you believe will influence how you show up and how you are are received by those around you. Be thoughtful about what you give this kind of emphasis to in your life. When you aren't purposeful about the intentions you are holding, you may find yourself carried by the momentum of something that isn't serving you.

Below are 5 simple questions to help you locate and speak out your own unique voice.

Questions to consider:

• What is your deepest conviction?
• In what ways are you sharing this conviction with the world?
• Any places where you are feeling stuck or out of alignment with this conviction?
• What intentions does your conviction spark for you?
• What is the impact that your intention/s could have on the world?

Mary Oliver's poem Summer Day

One of the many great legacies of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is that real, transformational change is possible when you stand up for what you believe. The first step in being able to emulate this kind of leadership? You have to know what you stand for. Today Sharon draws inspiration from this visionary leader and offers up questions for you to consider as you hone in on what it is that you believe and how you might best drive that forward.

Today we celebrate the profound leadership and long-lasting impact of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. May the questions and quotes offered below inspire you to chase after your own dreams.

What do you stand for? What are your core beliefs? What are you willing to stand up and fight for?

"I have a dream that one day little black boys and girls will be holding hands with little white boys and girls." – MLK

*

If you could offer one gift to the world before you die, what would it be?

"No one really knows why they are alive until they know what they'd die for." – MLK

*

Holding both what you stand for and the gift you want to offer to the world, name your vision.

Fill in the blank: "I have a dream that one day…"

*

Who can support you in bringing your dream to life? How might you influence that person or those people to make that dream a reality?

"A genuine leader is not a searcher for consensus but a molder of consensus." – MLK

*

What's holding you back from taking a stand for your dream?

"Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter."

Harvard Business Review article Seven Transformations of Leadership – a quick primer for those of you interested in learning more about the adult stages of development

Maturity Assessment Profile

Georgetown University's Leadership Coaching Program

What do you want? This question is the core inspiration for setting and moving towards a vision. Sharon believes that the greatest gift we can offer the world is to let our inner lights shine out brightly. To be our own unique selves. Visioning is an amazing resource for stewarding us on this path. Today Sharon shares Point Road Studios' vision process, the Go Beyond Vision Cycle. Learn about how this process came to be, why visioning isn't a linear but a cyclical process, and exercises for how you can begin playing with this tool on your own.

Sharon distilled her vision process out of a desire to make this resource accessible to those in her community who might not have access to a resource like one-on-one coaching.

There are 5 different access points for setting your vision. While you can follow these steps in order, it is not necessary. As you create – and continue to evolve – your vision, the key is going to the access point where your energy is at that point in time.

1. Get Clear 2. Look Back 3. Right Now 4. Step Forward 5. Go Beyond

*See full description of the Vision cycle in this blog post

Below are the 4 simple steps to take to name your vision. Do this each time you want to develop your vision.

• Name the kind of vision you want to create (e.g. work, family, home, whole life)
• Set a time horizon (e.g. end of this calendar year, on my 60th birthday, 3-5 years from now)
• Answer: What do I want?
• Name your Vision Statement (e.g. For my "whole life" I want "freedom and flexibility" by "April 3, 2025.")

• Get Clear: Name your top 3-5 core values.
• Look Back: Draw yourself at play – Remember a time when you were at play. What were you doing? What did you look like at play? Capture that essence.
• Right Now: Journal exercise – What is real for you right now?
• Step Forward: Begin to sketch out your action plan – What steps could you take today to move you towards your vision?
• Go Beyond: Consider – How can I let my vision loose? Do something that scares you.

Blog post that lays out full details of the PRS Vision Cycle, Go Beyond: A Process for Crafting and Unleashing Your Vision

Work through your own vision in the Go Beyond Coloring + Activity Book

Design Yourself 28: New Year, Same You

Design Yourself 15: Play Isn't Just For Kids

Happy New Year and welcome to 2017! Today's show is all about embracing who you are and what you want for the new year. Sharon offers alternatives to setting a New Year's resolution - because let's face it, most of us don't follow through on those anyway! She also shares guidance for how you can focus less on trying to reinvent yourself and more on tapping into what's awesome about you right now - and build from there. Our wish for each listener this year is that you can let go of what's not needed in order to focus on what makes you uniquely you. There is no greater gift to the world than to be yourself.

Notice if you have been eagerly awaiting the new year (i.e. can't wait to put 2016 behind you) or if the shift into January from December was a non-event for you?

What do you wish that this year ahead holds for you?

What do you hope will be different? What do you hope will remain the same?

*

• Goals drop you into a level of specificity and provide a sense of drive and action.
• Intentions bring you into the present moment and are more go-with-flow momentum.
• Themes set a tone for where you want to go and draw you forward to a new destination.

The greater danger for most of us lies not in setting our aim too high and falling short; but in setting our aim too low, and achieving our mark. Every block of stone has a statue inside it and it is the task of the sculptor to discover it. – Michelangelo

Simplify

• Focus on what matters most
• Focus on what's core to who you are
• Let go of the stuff that's not needed

Do what you love

• Life is too darn short to get caught in a hamster wheel spin cycle of doing what we feel we should do and not what we want to do
• Balance short term wins and long term desires, but do prioritize what you love

Focus on your inner – not outer – game

• Take care of your emotional health
• Listen to the whispers of your soul and heart, not just your head
• Creating quiet (e.g. through exercise, meditation, journaling, etc)
• Receive your own beautiful inner wisdom

• For more details on the distinctions between goals, intentions, and themes for the new year, check out this recent blog post Here Comes 2017: No Resolutions Needed.
• For those of you interested in learning more about how to get rid of the excess stuff in your life, I highly recommend Jess Lively's interview with Bea Johnson on the Lively Show podcast.

Maybe you, like Sharon, love this last week of the year for the quiet inspiration that it inspires in you. Or maybe you are thinking, "what quiet?!?!!" as you wend your way through the transition from 2016 to 2017. Today's podcast will meet you wherever you may find yourself. In this last episode of our inaugural season, Sharon shares the importance of finding and exploring quiet moments - with a special emphasis on how we can embrace them when they show up naturally and create them on our own when they don't. Here's hoping that you will find some magic in them, whenever they do show up.

Quiet is a gift. It allows the distractions of the everyday to melt away and we can center in on what matters most.

To fully appreciate quiet, we must be mindful. And to be mindful is to be present, in the here and now.

There are two ways that we might find ourselves spurred on to quiet: 1) A natural prompt like a major life milestone, or 2) An intentional move towards quiet.

We know these moments when they hit us. A birth or death; a graduation; a move, a job transition. Sometimes there are certain times of year that prompt reflection, like the start of a new school year in the fall, your birthday, or an annual vacation.

• What are the high points, the big celebrations?
• What's been tough?
• How have I spent my time?
• Where have I been?
• Who are the people that have been there with me through the year?

And then importantly shifting from this past reflection into some present centered learning.

• What lessons am I holding as I step into the new year?
• What do I choose to let go of as I shift from this year into the next?
• What actions or mindsets serve me as I make this transition?

1. Sit down with a close friend or business bestie
2. Personal reflection as a primary focus (e.g. journaling, going on a retreat)
3. Doing the work with intentional space for personal reflection (e.g. can be done for many mundane administrative tasks; how I approach tax preparation)

The bigger opportunity to finding quiet moments in our everyday is by creating them for ourselves. This is a practice and not an achievement. "Noises" will show up and throw us off center. How we come back to our quiet, our present, becomes the questions.

1. Recognize that quiet is available all the time
2. Create triggers for inviting quiet
3. Be present
4. Create a discipline making quiet part of your routine

• I shared at the end of the show a sneak preview for our January giveaway. To get your name entered for the There is Nothing Stopping You screen print raffle, join our community here.

• I drew inspiration at the top of the show from Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh. The meditation below is from his book of calligraphies, This Moment is Full of Wonders.

Breathing in, I calm my body.

Breathing out, I smile.

Dwelling in the present moment,

I know this is a wonderful moment.

• I shared that one of my own rituals for creating quiet is joining dear friends and fellow entrepreneurs on our annual Entrepreneur's Getaway. You can read more about that retreat on the blog.

Can it be that the holidays and end of year are really here? Tis so! If you, like Sharon, are finding yourself not yet fully in the holiday spirit, fear not. Today's episode is designed to help you find just that. Sharon shares 10 questions to get you reflecting on how you'd like to move through the coming weeks. Explore your own answers and see what Sharon's personal reflections might spark for you. Wishing that the holidays this year bring you just what you hoped for - and a few fun surprises too.

Here are 10 questions to help you find your holiday spirit:

1. What are some of your fondest holiday memories?
2. Are there any old traditions that you want to let go of or new ones that you want to start?
3. What's most important to you this holiday season?
4. What are you most excited about? How can you soak those moment up?
5. What emotion or emotions will serve you as you move through the next week?
6. What 2-3 experiences do you want to sit back and enjoy?
7. What MUST DOs are draining your energy? What opportunities do you have to delegate, get done quick, or revamp your approach?
8. What would bring you relief to move from your TO DO list to your DON'T DO list?
9. What gift would you most like to give yourself this holiday season?
10. What gift would you most like to offer those around you (your loved ones, your community, the world)?

DY Episode 16, Letting Go of the Busyness Paradigm

DIY felt leaf garland (from Lindsay Stephenson)

DIY felt pom pom garland (from Oh Happy Day)

This week we are celebrating the 4th birthday of Point Road Studios with the launch of our new website (www.pointroadstudios.com) and some reflections on key lessons learned in our first 4 years. Come reminisce and learn with Sharon as she reflects on topics like quitting your day job, demanding your worth, taking a stand, and more.

Celebrating our 4th birthday at Point Road this past week was a real milestone. There is something about 4 years that feels a little like a "graduation." I took the time to pause and reflect on some of my key lessons learned. Hope you will enjoy!

1. Quitting Can Be A Great Start
2. Entrepreneurship Can Meet Your Professional AND Personal Goals
3. Build Your Energy as You Go
4. Identify Your Ideal Client
5. Demand Your Worth (!)
6. Experiment
7. Boundaries are Expansive (Not Limiting)
8. Don't Go It Alone
9. Stand for Something
10. Change is the Only Constant

• Louis Barajas is the financial planner with a holistic approach that I referenced in insight number 2 Entrepreneurship Can Meet Your Professional AND Personal Goals. I first got to know his work through the book Small Business, Big Life.
• The Go Beyond coloring + activity book for adults was one of my most impactful experiments.

You know what's not possible? Being perfect. But man does it still have a magnetic force that draws us towards it. In today's episode Sharon shares some of her favorite resources for countering this pull as she discusses how to embrace imperfection. You'll learn also about some of the many imperfect things Sharon's experiencing right now (hint: it involves a lot of home renovations) and get a sneak peak into the launch of the new pointroadstudios.com which goes live at the end of this week. Enjoy!

None of us are perfect. We are human. Perfectly imperfect in our humanness. And even though we can "know" this intellectually, it's still hard to accept.

ADVICE FOR EMBRACING YOUR OWN IMPERFECTION:

1. Choose your focus for this season
2. Do C-level work
3. Get better with time
4. See the gifts in your vulnerability
5. Learn from the missteps

• Brene Brown's TED Talk on The Power of Vulnerability and her book The Gifts of Imperfection
• Interest in learning more about how multitasking doesn't exist? I love this podcast episode from Note to Self.
• Two podcast episodes that I referenced take a different lens into this same topic: 1) Fail Forward! 2) You Just Have To Start

This week Sharon shares one of the most helpful pieces of wisdom she's ever received: "It's more important to be present than prepared." Learn how she has come to understand this adage over the years and how she's added on to it as well. As part of this process, Sharon shares some questions you might consider if you find yourself holding on tightly to a desire to be in control and tips for bringing yourself back to centered awareness. May today's episode steward you in stepping into your full presence, regardless of how well prepared you might feel.

Today's show really focuses in on two core ideas:

1. It is more important to be present than prepared.

2. Everyone requires a different level of preparation to be present.

As we discussed it is more important to be present than prepared, we also looked at two ways of stewarding this mindset:

To aid this process, you might try and understand your impulse to control, but reflecting on questions like:

• What's important to me about controlling this situation?
• What value/s feel/s threatened by not having control?
• What could be offered to me in letting go of control?
• What is the opposite of holding on to control? (e.g. embracing ease)

To support you in drawing full awareness to your present moment, you might:

• Integrate breathing prompts into your routine
• Sit in meetings with your palms up (receiving posture)
• Ask for help from a friend
• Ask yourself: What will allow me to stay present?

The Thanksgiving season is upon us! Whether you are hitting the roads to travel to loved ones or embracing the opportunity to stay put, this week is often the start of a frenetic holiday pace. But it doesn't have to be. In today's episode, Sharon offers listeners a chance to settle into a spirit of peace and gratitude for the holiday season. Take in the 10 questions she shares to build up your own spirit of gratitude and hear her share how she is answering these prompts herself.

10 Questions to Get into the Thanksgiving Spirit

As you reflect upon the 2016 year, consider…

1. What makes you happy?
2. What have you overcome this past year?
3. What are you most proud of professionally and personally?
4. Consider something that has been difficult for you this year…what have you learned from this situation?
5. What's one thing that you could let go of that would bring you a greater sense of peace and gratitude?
6. What are your greatest gifts?
7. If you could give one gift to the world, what would you want it to be?
8. If you could give one gift to yourself, what would you want it to be?
9. What's one thing that you would like to give to somebody this week?
10. What are you thankful for?

• People to whom I gave thanks: My husband and Design Yourself audio engineer extraordinaire Colin Phillips; The team behind the Podcast Like a Boss course: Paul Jarvis of the Freelancer, Kathleen Shannon and Emily Thompson of Being Boss; Jason Zook of the Action Army; all of my awesome listeners who took a moment to leave a review on iTunes.

• Psst – want to leave a review for Design Yourself, but feeling a little lost technologically? I feel you. Here's a step by step overview to make the process easy whether you are using your desktop or mobile device.