The Strong Within Affirmation Podcast

Fantastic Fridays-#363  December 29 The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

I Focus On The One

“If I look at the mass, I will never act. If I look at the one, I will.” ~Mother Teresa

Being in the coaching industry I see a lot of coaches making huge claims to better people’s lives. They will say things like, it’s my mission to reach a million people, it’s my mission to reach 50 million people, or it’s my mission to reach a billion people. And I am all for helping people, but I know when I’ve stated goals like this, it was no longer about helping people, it was more about stroking my ego.

Because in the end how will I ever know I helped a million people. If I help one person, that could ripple into them helping 50, who help another 100, and so on. I think we get so caught in trying to see the bigger picture that we miss… the picture. We miss that it isn’t about helping as many people as possible, it’s about helping who’s in front of us right now. And like Mother Teresa said, when we get too big for our britches…we don’t act. We don’t step into our helping pants to change the world…one person at a time.

And while this podcast may seem like it’s about helping others, it’s also about helping ourselves. I know I’ve spent so much time assisting other people, in efforts of avoiding the work I needed to do on myself. It’s not that the gesture wasn’t nice to help others, but I was doing a disservice to those I helped because I wasn’t at my best. And I couldn’t ever be at my best focusing on the masses, until I remembered that I was one within the masses that needed my best love and care first.

With the new year coming up we’ll most likely set new goals of what we’d like to achieve in this coming year. I want to challenge you to be a more purposeful, to be clearer in what you want, and to shrink your goals down from saving the world into saving one person at a time…yourself included. I want you to change the equation around from how you might’ve been doing things before and ask the better question of, “How can I make a bigger impact by focusing on one instead of the many?”

And while that may sound selfish or counterintuitive, it actually makes better sense to act on a smaller scale first. Greater impact happens when we put our full attention on what’s in front of us. Think of it this way, have you ever been talking with someone and they’re somewhere else thinking about what else they need to be doing or who else they could be hanging with. It’s kind of annoying, isn’t it? Well, when we focus too big, when we focus on too many instead of seeing the smaller more immediate impactful objectives in front of us…then we miss our potential from doing something great. We look at the impact we want to have in a year, but we don’t look at what we have to do every month to get there, and we don’t look at what we have to do every day with that month. We’ve told ourselves that magnificent things come in big packages, in helping more people, in doing more…but greatness comes from doing the small things great first…consistently. So how can you be more consistent in making a bigger impact by doing the smaller things better in your life?

Today’s Personal Commitment:Let’s break this down simply, what are your goals? And are some of them starting out too big? Write down the goals you have for the next year and see how you can break them down into more manageable parts. I know some of the goals I set were unrealistic because it was more about what people would think if I achieved it rather than doing something that was great on its own merit. Having it be something that would satisfy me knowing it, not trying to impress others.

When I’m hired to give talks on inspiration or changing your life…I work to remember that it’s not about reaching everyone. It’s about reaching at least one person…and so I work to reach one person at a time…hopefully, I reach more. But if I’m making my message too generalized to try and reach everyone, then my message becomes watered down and helps no one.

So I’m going to challenge you, to analyze your goals and ask if they’re truly for you. And after you do that see if you can break them down even further into the smaller pieces…see if you can focus on reaching the one first before trying to reach the many. Ask yourself how you can do the smalls things greatly. Because we cannot help others, we cannot give to the many, if we don’t reach the one first. And that one, may more often than not, be yourself.

I Focus On The One

Thanks for listening.  I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together, Personal Development Life Coach- Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected]  phone:865-219-3247

Music by: - Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. - I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Thoughtful Thursdays-#362 December 28 The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

I Decide To Be The Chaos Or The Calm

Christmas can bring out the best in people, and it can bring out the worst in people. It’s an environment that brings us in close proximity with loved ones, and even closer proximity to some we may not be able to stand…all while hovering around great expectations of what a holiday should be like.

Something I’ve been working to remind myself of—is that the chaos is not around me; I decide to be the chaos or the calm. And since the holidays are over, I thought it would be a perfect time to talk about how we go about our lives unaware of the problem and continuing to choose to be chaos.

One of the biggest problems with our happiness levels is by the expectations we put on things or events. It’s great to have good expectations for things…in fact, it’s the only way I’ve made it this far in my life by continually having hope that the best moments are happening in the present…not the past, or the future…but right here right now. It’s about taking our expectations further than just what we think something should be…it’s about being above the situation…meaning that we will not find joy or sadness because of the situation…we will choose to find the calm within ourselves to enjoy wherever we are at the time.

For me, this holiday, I found myself getting snippy or annoyed because I was listening more to the voice of what was bugging me at the moment…instead of creating the best voice I wanted to hear in the moment. So, let’s take a trip and time travel as I take you back to my high school days. I used to love reading the funny pages in the paper each morning, and I think this is where guys have been labeled as only having selective hearing. I would be at the kitchen table eating, and no one would be talking to me, but as soon as I picked up the paper to read…my mom would always begin asking me questions…and then she would get mad when I was zoned out not even realizing someone was talking to me. And every morning I would be like, “Ma, you never ask me questions when I’m not reading the paper.” Now I’m sure I was over exaggerating a bit as I probably had some quiet morning reading the funny pages…but I still chuckle about how it seemed to happen like clockwork.

So let’s come back to the present…or well, the near present as Christmas was a few days ago. I felt myself getting snippy with family, as I was focusing on what annoyed me. I was focusing on how people weren’t paying attention when certain accidents happened like knocking over the 2-liter bottle of soda because their mind was elsewhere. And thinking about it now, it was me really only focusing on myself and what I saw…not on how people were experiencing their day. That they were having such a good time serving and being in the presence of loved ones that they were moving faster than normal and they were more focused on having a grand old time.

So basically, I was letting the small events alter my mood…and what I just said was… “I was letting.” The event didn’t determine how I felt… I did. I decided to put more heed to the negative voice inside my head that people should pay more attention and stupid things wouldn’t happen…thus creating a negative chemistry in me. I was having an expectation of how I would have acted and was putting my expectations on them…judging someone for something silly…and thus I was creating my own negative mood.

Now I know this may seem like a silly little example, but I find when I’m going unchecked with paying attention to how I feel most moments, it’s easier for me to be annoyed with how things should be…instead of just living in the moment and letting people be and act how they want, and for me to just be present and enjoy their company.

I spent so much of my younger life thinking that I had to be a certain way to be liked, to not be noticed in a negative way…that I hold myself and others to an expectation that doesn’t serve me anymore…and part of that expectation is that we must be perfect and not make silly mistakes. And so the reason I really get annoyed is not because they messed up, but that I’ve chosen an internal dialogue that interferes with my calm. A lot of my anger came from the idea of perfectionism for myself which then I projected onto others. It was this unrealistic expectation I had that what mattered to me should be just as important to others…which caused a chaos within myself, as I was focusing on what others should be doing instead of paying more attention to myself.

I know you may not be like me, and you have different triggers…but the question I want to ask is, when do you get annoyed or angry, and why are you getting that way? There are times that are warranted for anger, but a lot of times anger is misunderstood. For example, it’s easier to express anger instead of hurt, it’s easier to get angry when things don’t go perfectly, or it’s easier to put the blame on an emotion instead of saying we made a choice and didn’t make the best decision at the time.

Anger is easy to talk about, but if we allow our emotions to go unchecked at times…we then live a life of blame. We say that the emotion was in control of us, when rather it was a matter of being mindful of what we were doing, and how we really wanted to feel. If an emotion is affecting you negatively, and if you don’t take the time to ask yourself why decided to process an event a certain way …then you will always be a person who is lying to yourself. You will be that person who says I couldn’t help the way I am, I just reacted…or you say they made me so mad so it’s their fault. You will be that person… who never takes accountable for their life…and you will never reach true happiness because you’ve told yourself someone or something else is in control of it.

I’m as much as fault as anyone here. I’m not perfect, and I find it’s a constant balancing act of being aware of how I feel, and if something feels off then having the courage to go further and find out why I am feeling a certain way that doesn’t feel right to me.

Change happens by going to the places that we don’t want to go…the places that scare us, or the places that will take some extra work…but doing the extra work internally to see what’s going on, will make all the difference in deciding whether you will be the chaos or calm in the moment. It will be the factor in deciding whether you’re a person who makes a difference by holding yourself accountable for your life…or being the person who puts the blame on others because it’s easier. You’ll be the person who becomes an avid liar…continually telling yourself that something else was in control of what made you happy or miserable in your life. You will be a person in continual chaos.

Today’s Personal Commitment:Take a look at your holidays, and ask yourself how you acted…or reacted. Were there times that you could’ve been more present and collected instead of annoyed or upset with something? Were there times that you could have been more present and found ways to just be in the moment…not trying to change or expect anything from anyone…except to be your best self in the moment? Not everyone is going to be as aware as you, and when we expect others to know what we know, we set ourselves up for failure. But when you focus on how you want to feel, and keep yourself in line with following through with those purposeful emotions…then you create a different energy that not only attracts better things to you, but also influences people differently. You change people by focusing on being in the emotions you want to be in.

But remember this, if you’re getting a lot of negative attitude, it might be because you’re too awesome and it rubs people the wrong way. So don’t judge people for being upset at your awesomeness, it’s only natural to envy the astounding person you are…so don’t fault them for being jealous of you.

I Decide To Be The Chaos Or The Calm

Thanks for listening.  I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together, Personal Development Life Coach- Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected]  phone:865-219-3247

Music by: - Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. - I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Wisdom Wednesdays-#361 December 27 The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

I’m Upgrading

The master has failed more times than the beginner has even tried. ~ (not sure who said it as I have seen multiple attributions from Confucius to Stephen McCranie to Yoda of Star Wars)

Sometimes it would nice to be ordinary, to not worry about whether you’re getting better, or if you’re good enough already. Sometimes it’d be nice to not care about how you’re perceived, or how well of a job you did, and what the future will hold for us. Sometimes it’d be nice to be kinder to ourselves in the pursuits of becoming who we’re meant to be.

And if you’re listening to this podcast, I’m pretty sure you’re like me where you want more for your life, where you want to be better for yourself and for the people around you, where you want to be constantly challenged because you’ve found joy in growth…and remembering the great lesson you learned, that being comfortable isn’t always the best road.

I’ve lived a life being very critical of myself. I figured the more I could keep telling myself why I failed, then the more I would learn from it and become better. And while I kept working on self-improvement, I kept holding myself back because of the unkind way I was dealing with myself. While I’m sure I improved in some areas, I regressed in many other areas because of my unkind ways towards myself. In fact, I trained my subconscious to begin hating me. Our subconscious doesn’t know the difference between truth or fiction…it’s only a mirror reflecting what you show or tell it.

I’ve spent a good portion of my life reading, listening to, or seeking self-improvement techniques. And while I kept reading and trying to learn ways to become better, something felt very wrong…because I always felt crappy. I put on the mask of happiness for everyone else, but I could feel the spark of who I was dying silently within me. And while I didn’t know how to change at the time, I knew that what I was doing wasn’t producing the results I wanted…and so I did the only thing I knew how to…I began changing the dialogue I utilized towards myself.

And while I’m not perfect, I continually work not to just become better, but I work to become kinder to myself. Kindness doesn’t mean I give up easily, in fact it makes me more relentless as I encourage myself to find better ways around my obstacles. And through that kindness, it gives me more energy as I become my best advocate. It’s like that teacher, parent, friend, or coach who believed in you…you gained more resolve and energy because you knew they believed in you…and if they believed in you then it meant they thought you could do it. The power of someone believing in us is a wonderful gift.

So now anytime I make a mistake, I work to believe in myself like others did in me. When I make a mistake, it’s a perfect chance for me to change my focus from saying I’m a piece of crap for not being good enough or that I messed up royally in that project, event, or relationship…into saying something more positive and reminding myself that there is a great learning opportunity here.

So I’m going to challenge you to be better with me, not by berating yourself, but by being kinder to yourself. I’m going to challenge you to change your internal dialogue from, “I’m a mess up, I’m a failure, I’m so stupid or that was so stupid of me,” or whatever hateful thing you could say…and instead say, “I am upgrading.”

I want to remind you that you are learning from every fall, you are bettering yourself by going through your mistakes and seeing them as lessons not as ending points, and you are becoming your own best advocate believing in the greatness of yourself again.

You are not becoming obsolete as the world keeps moving forward…you’re upgrading yourself constantly…by challenging yourself and seeing your mistakes as necessary, and you are becoming kinder to yourself on your journeys.

You’ve come to this podcast to become better. I want you to really hear me when I say this…so pause your mind for a second and listen…you can’t become better if you aren’t loving yourself. You can’t become happier or more joyful if you’re continually finding ways to hate who you are and what your perceived failures are. And while you can live a life of getting by, you can’t live a life of fulfillment focusing on why you never have enough or are enough. You are enough! It’s not that you’re failing, it’s that you are constantly learning and upgrading to become the best version of yourself.

Today’s Personal Commitment:When you make a mistake, or call yourself a failure…change your dialogue to say… I’m upgrading. It’s not a pass to give up on things, but it’s a different way of handling the issues in front of you. So this week I’m going to challenge you to add this phrase to your vocabulary and see how you feel and what happens when you make it a bigger part of your narrative.

I’m Upgrading

Thanks for listening.  I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together, Personal Development Life Coach- Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected]  phone:865-219-3247

Music by: - Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. - I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Tag Me Tuesdays-#360  December 26 The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

I Am The Mountain, Not Softened Nor Troubled

One of my favorite movies is called, Into The Wild. It was a movie directed by Sean Penn and was adapted from Jon Krauker’s book of the same name. The movie is based upon a true story about a young man named Christopher McCandless who graduates from Emory University and abandons his life as he knew it. He donates all $24,000 of his savings account and hitchhikes across the country to live in Alaska’s wilderness.

I won’t give away too much of the movie because you may not have seen it yet, so I’ll try to leave out as many spoilers as possible, but the reason I loved this movie is because of the ideals of the purposefully wandering person. In fact, after seeing the movie I went and bought the book and read it right after.

I believe, we as people, look with curiosity and intrigue to the wanders of life because we are trying to find ourselves, and I believe that we hope we can find meaning or answers in their stories. If you look through such stories in humanity, I believe the wandering tales are popular because of a common question most of us ask…what is the meaning of my life? And some of my favorite Wandering stories are:

St. Francis of Assisi who gave up his luxurious life, under his father’s silk merchant business, in order to serve the poor. He dedicated his life to following in the footsteps of Jesus by preaching His message. He, and the Franciscan Order of monks that he founded, gave up all ownership of property and lived in chastity. I think I liked St Francis as well because he reminded me of my grandfather. Animals loved my grandfather, as you’d see birds land by him as he would feed them, or squirrels eat out of his hand in his backyard. And I remember seeing pictures of St. Francis within my grandparent’s home, as he’s illuminated by a light around him and surrounded by all sorts of animals. St. Francis is the patron saint of animals, as he viewed them as his brothers and sisters because they were God’s creatures, just like people.

Another favorite traveling tale of mine is in the Lord of The Rings by J.R. Tolkien where he writes a poem with a famous line about wandering, referenced frequently…and the poem goes like this: All that is gold does not glitter,Not all those who wander are lost;The old that is strong does not wither,Deep roots are not reached by the frost.From the ashes, a fire shall be woken,A light from the shadows shall spring;Renewed shall be blade that was broken,The crownless again shall be king.

And the last wandering tale that comes to mind is from a famous poem that Christopher McCandless wrote a note on the backside of, as he took a picture of himself with it in Alaska. The piece of paper he wrote on, was the backside of poem from Robinson Jeffers. In a documentary called “Return To the Wild,” they showed that the poem was on two pages within a book he was reading so the note he wrote, only had half of Jeffers poem on it…I am going to share the whole poem with you. The poem is called “Wise Men In Their Bad Hours” and it goes like this:

Wise men in their bad hours have envied  The little people making merry like grasshoppers  In spots of sunlight, hardly thinking  Backward but never forward, and if they somehow  Take hold upon the future they do it  Half asleep, with the tools of generation  Foolishly reduplicating  Folly in thirty-year periods; they eat and laugh too,  Groan against labors, wars and partings,  Dance, talk, dress and undress; wise men have pretended  The summer insects enviable;  One must indulge the wise in moments of mockery.  Strength and desire possess the future,  The breed of the grasshopper shrills, "What does the future  Matter, we shall be dead?" Ah, grasshoppers,  Death's a fierce meadowlark: but to die having made  Something more equal to the centuries  Than muscle and bone, is mostly to shed weakness.  The mountains are dead stone, the people  Admire or hate their stature, their insolent quietness,  The mountains are not softened nor troubled  And a few dead men's thoughts have the same temper.

The note that Christopher wrote on the back of this poem said, “I’ve had a happy life and thank the Lord. Goodbye and may God bless all.”

The reason I believe he wrote his note on that poem is because it was an analogy for his life. I’ve taken the poem to mean that the masses are like grasshoppers, not caring about anything more of themselves as they’ll be dead soon, and so they mass produce being unenlightened and aware of their bigger purpose. But the very few who are willing to seek and be more, the very few who are willing to be like mountains…to reach for higher achievement that most will not climb towards…those wise people will be like the mountains not softened nor troubled as they shed their weaknesses…as they do more than just survive like the masses. They’re willing to give up their comforts if need be to find the better parts of themselves.

And at times we are made prisoner by our comforts. We fear the road of moving forward by leaving the luxuries we’ve balanced our lives upon. And like crutches when we’re wounded they can be helpful, but if we overly rely on the crutch, then do we really live a life of progression and reaching our fullest potential?

I don’t think we have to do an all or nothing transition like Chris McCandless or St. Francis of Assisi leaving everything behind…but I think to become better, to have a fulfilling life…we must be willing to leave behind the crutches in our lives that imprison us. I think it’s good to ask questions like… “while this may make my life easier, does it make my life better? Does it help me to reach for more in the pursuits of being the person I truly want to be?”

And that’s why the wandering person entices me, it’s the admiration of having the courage to leave the dead weight behind (whether physical or internal) and not look back; it’s the strength to voyage out and be alone to find out who you are underneath all the layers that society or others have piled upon us over the years, and it’s the chance to go on adventures and find exciting new pieces of yourself along on journeys. So while we may wander, we don’t have to be lost, we don’t have to leave it all behind, but I believe we must get in the habit of asking ourselves, “while this ‘thing’ is good, does this make me better?” And if not, let us be like those purposeful wanders who move forward to disconnect from what no longer is serving us. Let us be like the mountains, neither softened nor troubled as we reach higher…not to just survive, but to truly live a life of meaning and purpose.

Today’s Personal Commitment:What crutches in your life are keeping you unbalanced from living the life you desire? How are you like the wanderer in your life…are you wandering running from things that you fear, or are you running towards things that drive you to reach for the best parts of yourself? So today, think about all the things that you have been unhealthfully leaning on that are no longer serving you, write them down, and then ask the question of “what can I do differently?”

Changing overnight off of crutches usually doesn’t happen, but by becoming aware of what’s keeping you weak is the starting point to becoming strong again. When we become aware, we can then start taking smaller steps that strengthen us, where we will no longer need the crutches that are keeping us crippled in our lives.

I Am The Mountain, Not Softened Nor Troubled

Thanks for listening.  I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together, Personal Development Life Coach- Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected]  phone:865-219-3247

Music by: - Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. - I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Mindful Mondays-#359  December 25 The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

Tis The Season To Remember…My Purpose

Happy holidays, no matter what you celebrate, if you celebrate. And if you don’t have anyone to celebrate with, I’m going to celebrate the life of you today, as this podcast is about the awesomeness of you. It’s about being thankful and in appreciation of something…and no matter the miles between us…I want you to know that I’m in appreciation of you.

I want this podcast to be all about you. I hope my podcasts are always about you, but I want to get you prepared to be the best gift you can be…for everyone you interact with during these holiday times. Now while it’s Christmas day, and maybe the holiday shopping mayhem may be over…I want to remind you to be kinder to others and to yourself during these times.

I want to remind you to not be like the small majority who are lost in the moment and forgetting what the holidays are about in their stresses and the hustle and bustle of this time. I want to remind you about patience in the parking lots and not to drive like a banshee to get the last space. I want to remind you to take a deep breath when you’re stuck in slower holiday traffic, as you hold your tongue and frustrations to find peace and calm within yourself. I want to remind you that while you may be buying gifts and thinking about others…how are you buying them? What I mean is, sometimes we are giving things…but we’re so focused on the monetary aspect of what we gave…that there’s no deeper meaning behind it, besides that of…I went out and bought this for you.

So give yourself the gift of peace by finding joy in whatever you partake in this day. If you’re with family, ground yourself in this moment…put your phone away a bit more, breathe a little deeper to keep yourself present and calm, express a little more kindness when you feel trapped or stressed around other people. You don’t have to partake in their chaos. If they want to be a certain way, that’s their prerogative. Your pathway today is peace and love…or maybe you might have different emotions you want to focus on. So what do you want to experience today? When we plan how we want to feel before the events of the day, we begin a visualization process. We set a book mark, or reminder, in our subconscious that can awaken us when we’re diverting from that plan. So prepare yourself by saying how you want to experience this day, and then find ways to follow through by being present in your intentions.

A Life Coaching Student of mine went to a funeral for a family member. He traveled ten hours by car to where it was being held. He gave me a call while he was there, and talked about how stressed he was. I asked him why he was stressed, and he said, “because everybody is acting like they always do expecting me to plan everything and keep things in an orderly fashion.” He’s the planner and the organized one of them all, so it was only natural that his family would go back to habits of expecting him to take control when he was there.

I asked him a very important question, “what was your purpose for going up there?” He responded, “to support and be helpful.” I said back to him, “well you got exactly what you asked for.” He felt so much calmer reminding himself of the reason he went up there in the first place. He got exactly what he was asking for, but during the stress and chaos of everyone and everything else, he got swept in with it…by forgetting his purpose.

In your life you won’t get what you want, you’ll get what you are continually focusing on. So, let’s be purposeful with our intentions…and follow through with them. You can’t control anyone else, but you can remind yourself of what you really want out of the situation, and you can follow through with staying in line with those emotions that you decided you wanted to be a part of.

So let’s be a blessing during these times. Let’s not be a bother with our anger and frustration, but let us be kinder to others and ourselves. It’s not a good excuse I know, but most people are running around letting their unchecked emotions control them…don’t fault them for their unawareness…let us be the aware ones and be the change…not wait for others to be the change for us. The power is in your hands to be a blessing, not a curse. So before you do anything today, take a deep breath…take 5 or 10 or how many you need to find the calm…and then ask yourself how you want to feel today. What emotions do you want to partake in, and what emotions do you want to share…and then go about your day making a commitment to living within that.

Today’s Personal Commitment:How do you want to feel today? What are the 2-5 top emotions you want to experience and share in your day? Write them down on a sheet of paper and fold it up in your pocket or put it somewhere where your hand will touch it again during the day. It will be the reminder to keep asking yourself, am I in alignment with the emotions I wanted to feel today, and if not…then what do I need to do to make that happen? Good luck, happy holidays, and thank you for being a part of my day today. I know this sounds cliché, but you listening to me today and being with me in spirit is one of the greatest gifts I could ask for…but if you have a million dollars that you want to share with me…I’ll take that too 😉.

Tis The Season To Remember…My Purpose

Thanks for listening.  I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together, Personal Development Life Coach- Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected]  phone:865-219-3247

Music by: - Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. - I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Smiling Sundays-#358 December 24 The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

I Rise From My Fires

A gem cannot be polished without friction, nor a man without trials.” ―Seneca

Every hardship, every fall, every scrape, bruise, cut, wound whether physical, emotional, mental or spiritual is not your breaking point…it’s your proving point. And the only way you’ll fail is if you lose perspective. If you step too close to the problem and forget the greatest of lessons…that you are not your problems…or that your problems are not you…they surround you but will never become you. For when you can take a breath to pause and step back, to see the bigger picture, you’ll see the storm as only a moment in your life…not an endless turbulent horizon.

And I like the thoughts of storms, because what they do is clear a pathway. Take a look at wildfires that are happening all over as we look at them as catastrophic, which they can be if they get out of control, but environmental scientists will reason that they are seminal in a healthy ecosystem. In an article called “Why are wildfires good for the environment” by Will Donovan, he interviews Dr. Timothy B. Mihuc professor of environmental science at State University of New York Pattville, and Dr. Mihuc says, “Many forests cannot sustain themselves without natural wildfire, including pine barrens, lodgepole pine forests, Eucalyptus forests and many more. These forests require canopy fires to regenerate because the trees in the forest are adapted to only produce seeds following a major fire event. Hence, fires can be regenerative for the forest, and without them many of these forest types would decline on the landscape. It’s like ‘resetting the clock’ on the ecosystem allowing it to thrive all over again for another 200 years.”

What also was interesting is he said that when these new younger trees grow after a fire—they create patches in the forest which act as buffers and stop the spread of fires in their tracks. But as humans, we’ve used fire suppression in ending smaller natural fires which causes unnatural occurrences in nature that creates greater problems later on.

One of the reasons I named my life coaching business Strong Within was the idea of fire. There are two meanings within my logo…the first is the yin yang aspect of balance. The W is shaped as a flame with water below it to balance it out…but the idea for the flame came from the the mythical bird of the Phoenix who dies in the fire but is reborn and raised anew in the ashes. It was the idea of dying of the old self by going through the life trials of fire and being reborn better, and having a better perspective about the true strength that you’ve always possessed within.

We have learned to fear the fire, the destructive force of what the flame can do…but that’s because we have forgotten we are the flame. We are the changing force in this world, and when we suppress our true strengths, when we fall in line to not stand out, to not be our authentic self…we then die a slow death instead of live a long remarkable life.

So remember that every abrasive force pushing back on you, every fight coming towards you, and for every storm that you go through…it is not the act of becoming better at seeing the problem…but the process of seeing the friction as the beautification of yourself…and seeing the solution through all the fog. It is not your breaking point, but rather your proving point.

Today’s Personal Commitment:

What’s your life logo? What mythological creature will be the mascot and reminder of how you want to live your life? Is it the Phoenix born anew in the ashes through the fires of trial and tribulation; is it the Ouroboros that snake or dragon eating it’s own tail as it depicts infinity or the repetition of life in Samsara and Nirvana and how every ending is always a new beginning; or maybe it’s like griffin—the body of a lion and the head and wings of an eagle as those combination of animals represent courage, leadership, great sight to see problems better…etc.

I always loved looking up mythological creatures and their origins and meanings. It was like looking for the better parts of humanity’s ideas. I saw it as ways of looking for more strengths within myself. So maybe this might be a fun exercise to make up your own coat of arms, on how you want to live your life and be guided by higher principles. I thought that starting my life coaching business would be about helping people, and it is, but it was really about making myself better so I could help others become better. It was about me becoming the Phoenix and being reborn because of the fires that tested me. I still have a long way to go, we all do, so I’m praying for more friction in our life as we are still being polished.

I Rise From My Fires

Here's a link to the article of Why Wild Fires are Good"  https://blog.suny.edu/2013/08/ask-an-expert-why-are-wildfires-good/

Thanks for listening.  I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together, Personal Development Life Coach- Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected]  phone:865-219-3247

Music by: - Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. - I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Synergistic Saturdays-#357  December 23 The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

I Put Everything On The Table

“Being perfect is not about that scoreboard out there. It’s not about winning. It’s about you and your relationship with yourself, your family and your friends. Being perfect is about being able to look your friends in the eye and know that you didn't let them down because you told them the truth. And that truth is you did everything you could. There wasn't one more thing you could’ve done. Can you live in that moment as best you can, with clear eyes, and love in your heart, with joy in your heart? If you can do that gentleman – you’re perfect!”

– Coach Gary Gaines, from Friday Night Lights

I was on an MTV show back in 2011 I believe. It was a show called I Used To Be Fat, and no I wasn’t the overweight person…every time I say I was on that show people jump back and say you used to be fat??? And I’ll say, “no, I was the coach and trainer on the show for a person I was helping.”  The whole premise of the show was each episode had a different teenager who had just graduated high school and they had a summer to work with a trainer to change their life before heading to college.

It was a pretty stressful experience at the time…because you are trying to get someone to do something they don’t want to do, in a very short amount of time, all while knowing millions of people may be watching you fail miserably. I had two months with the young lady I was working with, and it was my hope to not just help her lose weight but to change her self-image so she would be doing a permanent change, not something that would last until she no longer was on her diet or not working out anymore.

Well, things were going great…for the first two weeks…until major meltdowns kept happening. I dealt with a lot of crying and upsetness about how this young woman didn’t want to be doing this anymore and how it was too hard. We put in long hours every day…but I kept reminding her that this was only two months of her life. I told her, “you can do whatever you want after this, but let’s commit fully to this moment.” And that’s the problem with reality TV shows, it’s about getting quick results for the ratings of the show. No one wants to watch a slow process of change, the viewing audience wants to be tricked into thinking it happens quickly and with minimal effort. But when you get in crunch time of trying to lose 50 pounds in two months, it’s usually unrealistic for most…and it’s a whole hell of a lot harder than you’d imagine. We spent hours in the gym every day.

In the show we didn’t reach the 50 pound mark in two months, but she was happy with her progress, and that’s all I could ask for as this transition wasn’t really about me, it was more about her. The funny thing is the weight she lost, is the weight she said she would be comfortable losing. She said she wanted to be at a weight she felt comfortable in in high school. And at the time I said, “that’s good you want to get there, by why are you stopping there?” And she said, “oh I am not stopping there I just want to get there first.” And I had heard that sort of statement many times in my training career…I’m not going to stop there… And what happened at the end of the show is she got to the exact weight she said she would be comfortable at.

And that’s what we do in our lives, we look to get back to where we were comfortable…not where we truly want to be…and I believe that’s because we’re afraid of failing, we’re afraid the work will be too hard, we’re afraid it won’t be worth it…and so we settle for mediocrity in our lives giving just enough…by only showing up. I see this day in and day out…how people don’t reach their goals because they only show up at the gym dreading it and doing the work as they fight it the whole time wishing it was easier. I see them showing up at their jobs wanting to make more money or get that promotion when they only do the bare minimum never giving more than what’s asked of them, as they fly below the radar. I see them doing it in their relationships, as they get bored with the status quo and show up thinking that only being there by body alone is enough.

To be better, to have what we want, to live the lives we want…takes a commitment to leave it all on the table. To give what we have at that moment, ready to make as many mistakes as possible and correct them. When I played ice hockey I went to a hockey clinic to better my skills and I was working with a Michigan player who was voted the best player in the state and was the most sought after recruit for college hockey. We were doing a puck handling drill where you had two obstacles and you would stick handle your puck around those obstacles in a figure 8 pattern forwards and backwards.

I was going at a speed that was comfortable to me, so I could hold onto the puck, and this mentor came over and challenged me to sprint through the drill—to make as many mistakes as possible and pick up my pace. He was challenging me to be ok with mistakes and to elevate my play to another level. I made a ton more mistakes but after the week of working on this drill I had drastically improved because I was willing to put it all on the table, I was willing to make as many mistakes as possible, and I was willing to get out of my comfort zone that was keeping me trapped where I was.

Are you putting everything on the table in your life? And if not, why not? What are you afraid of, or what’s the story you’ve been telling yourself that it’s ok to be subpar in what you do? I’m not judging anyone in this life, but you aren’t meant to reach for the minimum, you are meant to do amazing things… not because those things will always be for the world to see, but because you decided to put your every ounce of effort into the tasks you were performing today. Greatness isn’t in the amazing things that happen to us, greatness lies in the willingness to leave everything all on the table in the actions we are performing at the moment. That’s when great things happen, not by luck or things just happening…it comes from our standard operating procedures…and that is where a fulliling life is created…by leaving it all on the table.

Today’s Personal Commitment:What’s your comfort zone? What’s your standard operating procedure in the things you do? Would you know your comfort zone at work, in your relationships, in your personal life?  Because if you can get to in your mind and ALSO feel it in your body when you’re coasting…that will be your own personal book mark. It will be the indicator for your subconscious letting you know that something doesn’t feel right to you. We’ve let our subconscious know that doing the bare minimum feels right, so it operates by what you’ve taught it, so let’s teach it a different way of alerting you to let you know when you aren’t performing up to the standards you want for your life.

 It’s not about over doing things or feeling you have to prove something, but it’s about living the lives we were meant to… to be in continual growth. The best times in my life weren’t the comfortable times, they were the times when I was challenged, and the times I rose to the challenge. They were the times when I said I’m not going to settle…I’m going to leave it all on the table today, and see how many mistakes I can make and correct along the way. It’s not that we’re looking to be reckless, but we’re looking to persevere in our betterment. We’re looking to find the marrow of life and drink up all of its beauty. We’re looking to truly live by seeking to always be reaching further than we did yesterday. Not to be anal and never happy, but to create a life that’s in accordance with nature…always growing and seeking the best parts of ourselves.

I Put Everything On The Table

Thanks for listening.  I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together, Personal Development Life Coach- Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected]  phone:865-219-3247

Music by: - Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. - I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Fantastic Fridays-#356  December 22 The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

I Can Handle Any Problem One Day At A Time

In one of my favorite books, How To Stop Worrying And Start Living by Dale Carnegie there was a story about a minister that I liked. The story was called, “I Learned To Stop Worrying By Watching My Wife Wash Dishes.” He was a minister who had insomnia and stomach pains, and he feared he might have stomach cancer or at least ulcers. He went to a specialist who assured him that he was fine and that his pains were caused by emotional strains.

He took care of all the churches needs, preached, looked over the sick and dying in the church, and was the head of many volunteer organizations as well. His plate was overflowing and he added to all that by worrying even more. He felt he could never relax from the load he had put upon himself. So he took the doctor’s advice and took one day off a week and begin to lessen his load of responsibilities little by little.

As he was going through old sermons, he decided to crumple up his older notes and throw them in the wastebasket. And that’s when he came to an epiphany to do the same thing to his worries that he could do nothing about. He would crumple up his worries and rid himself of that strain.

He felt an immediate load lifted off himself because he purposefully decided to let go.  He also began to notice the small subtle things around him that made people joyful in their daily routines. He saw how his wife would whistle every night while doing the dishes, even after 18 years of marriage and washing them every night. He asked how she could be so carefree about this, and understood that she didn’t try to wash yesterday’s dishes, or the dishes tomorrow, she only washed the day’s dishes in front of her. After he came to the epiphanies of crumpling up his worries and only handling the days load, he no longer had insomnia or stomach pains.

So, how is your life like that minister? How much stress are you putting on yourself purposefully? Are you trying to wash all your dishes at one time, or are you focusing on day at a time? The beautiful thing about Dale Carnegie’s book is in an earlier chapter he talks about living in day-tight compartments. The deliberate practice of only living from when you wake up till you go to sleep. We try to over control things and we stress ourselves out and sometimes, if not most times, that stress seeps out into our lives in one way or another. Whether it be a health issue, a mental issue, taking it out on our loved ones, or just the constant tension of feeling trapped.

How can you lighten your stress load on yourself? Sometimes it might be taking things off your plate that are overwhelming you, or sometimes it takes having a different mindset about your problems. For me, I know I get stressed when I’m overthinking things. I’m trying to find all the things that could go wrong or have gone wrong before…and that’s all I’m focusing on…instead of thinking about it, planning, and then moving forward with that plan.  It’s easy to get caught in our mind overthinking things without action, and it’s easy to get caught in the physical aspects of trying to do too much. So take a look at both sides of your life, the mental and the physical, and ask yourself if you are trying to do too much…or if you are focusing in a manner that’s keeping you stuck.

Life really isn’t as complicated as we make it. We fear that a mistake will be the end of the world, so we try to get it all done in one fell swoop, instead of understanding it’s a process of doing what we can one day at a time. Making mistakes one at a time. learning from them and growing from them…instead of fearing them and trying to avoid them. So again…how can you live in day tight compartments more often, how can you wash only your dishes for the day…and how can you crumple up your worries you can’t do anything about and throw them away from your life?

Toda’s Personal Commitment:What are your dishes? What are the worries you haven’t crumpled up that are crippling you? Let’s make this commitment easy today, so… for the next week write down what you want to handle in the day. And then at the end of the night, write down your worries that are no longer serving you onto a small piece of notepaper, and then crumple it up and throw it in the wastebasket before you go to bed.

I Can Handle Any Problem One Day At A Time

Thanks for listening.  I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together, Personal Development Life Coach- Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected]  phone:865-219-3247

Music by: - Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. - I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Thoughtful Thursdays-#355 December 21 The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

Both Of Us Can Be Right

I got in a discussion with a friend about control, and we both decided to agree to disagree. She said that we weren’t in control of anything in our lives, and I disagreed with her. I get her point when looking at the grander cosmic scale of things, that maybe we are merely animals essentially controlled by our emotions, with a slightly higher awareness of things…or maybe even that fate plays a part in our design. She brought up the point that if a meteor was to hit the earth that everyone would be afraid and scared and not in control as we would be victims of our emotions.

And while I understand her opinion, I still don’t agree. I brought up the point that people experience different emotions and not everyone would be scared, and she disagreed with me. Even heroes feel fear she said…which I agree with. But they have conditioned themselves to not let their emotions dictate their choices. If you look at firefighters, military personnel, or police officers for example…they are less likely to freeze up like the average person would because they’ve gone through drill after drill to prepare them for chaotic situations. My argument wasn’t that they don’t feel fear, but that not everyone feels or experiences the exact same emotion for a similar situation.  People don’t process events the same way.  So maybe if we were to take it from another angle away from heroes…what about someone who was wanting the world to end…so they could end their pain? They would process that event as a blessing and be happy about it.

I do believe there’s more to it than just deciding how to process an event with our mind. I think we understand something happens, like a person dying, and we’re not immediately sad about it. It might feel that way, but what happens is our mind will process the event and then we decide what emotions to associate with that event. It’s a collaborative effort, and I’ve come to find that while I don’t have control over the things outside of me, I have control over how I experience those things within myself. And as I said there’s more to this equation such as listening to our intuition, being more connected to the spiritual realm, and all the other depths of life.

However, the point I’m trying to get across is what happened previous to our discussion. I was re-reading my favorite book Siddhartha by Herman Hesse, and the last reading point, I’d come to when I closed the book, was a quote that helped to bring peace to me during my discussion with my friend. In the beginning of the argument it was about proving my point, but halfway through I felt this pulling inside me saying, “what are you doing?” I recalled the quote in the book, and I immediately held my tongue as I let my friend finish what she was saying. The funny thing is, almost at that moment my friend brought her point to an end as she said let’s just agree to disagree. So maybe she felt the same energy as me of not wanting to argue this point anymore, or maybe she didn’t want to hurt a friendship over a philosophical way of looking at life.

And the quote I was thinking of said this: “A true seeker, one who truly wished to find, could accept no doctrine. But the man who has found what he sought, such a man could approve of every doctrine, each and every one, every path, every goal; nothing separated him any longer from all those thousands of others who lived in the eternal, who breathed the Divine.”

~ Hermann Hesse, Siddhartha

And so during the argument, this quote reminded me that I didn’t have to be right. I didn’t have to prove my point, or disprove hers…we both could be right. I’ve been in eternal searching looking to go deeper in things, and by doing so I could never accept any truths, as I was always in the eternal seeking mode. I would always be trying to prove my point to others, and why they should think a certain way. Because if I can get others to think this way, then maybe there’s something to my thoughts…and maybe I wasn’t wrong in pursuing them.  But what does it matter, whether they believe my way or not…if they are living in accordance with their truth and are happy and fulfilled?

I know sometimes I want people to live their best life and to know they have the power to be who they want to be…that they’re in control of themselves in the situation. But is that really about helping them, or is it more about trying to prove I’m right? Is it more about me, than it is about them? I’ve come to know over my life that there are many truths to one path.

I think I’m a seeker because I enjoy bettering myself, and there’s nothing wrong with that, but sometimes I think I seek just for the sake of seeking. If you are continually looking, how can you ever stop to enjoy what you find?

And that’s a deep thought right there because when you’re in eternal searching, how will you know that you’ve really found what you sought? How will you know when you’ve come to the best answer you could’ve? When should you stop digging? I don’t have an answer for you, but it’s my hope that I can find love and peace in everyone’s path. That I don’t judge them for thinking differently…but that I wish them well in their journey.

Maybe for me, I want to help so many people because I see myself in them. And if I can help them, if I can seek for them, then maybe I can be the answer not only for them…but for myself. I’ve come to many truths that have brought me peace…but the reason I kept seeking, were those truths were too easy. I mean the meaning of life should be a hard task, you should be seeking your whole life…but, what if we already have the answer? I believe we do…and my truth doesn’t have to be your truth. In fact, we could have two totally different ideas and still be right. Both of us can be right. And like the quote in Siddhartha, when you’ve found what you’ve sought, everyone else can be right too. It’s not about proving to them why they’re wrong…it’s about living your truth. And for those who want to know your truth, you can share it with them by living your life and being the example first…and then answer their questions when they’re ready to ask you.

Today’s Personal Commitment: What are you seeking, and why are you seeking it? Will you ever know when you find it? I’ve spent a life time in paralysis of analysis…where I would find an answer but it would never be what I thought it should of been so I’d keep looking, or I found the answer I wanted but it felt too easy or off in some sort of way and I would then continually search because maybe my answer wasn’t good enough. And there’s nothing wrong with finding a better answer, but sometimes the answer doesn’t need to be searched for but aligned with as we stop seeking eternally and accept an answer for the moment.

What’s your paralysis of analysis, what are you continually seeking that’s keeping you from moving forward in a healthy manner? And when you find that answer, ask yourself why you are doing it? Sometimes we are doing eternally seeking for fear of leaving a belief behind that we have had for a long time, sometimes it’s for fear of having to do something different that feels uncomfortable, sometimes it’s for fear of failing, and sometimes it’s just because it’s all we’ve known and so why change when nothing’s supposedly broken.

And I’m not saying you and I are broken, but maybe we can pause from time to time from our seeking and ask is there a better way. Sometimes we can find joy in doing what we found and relish in it in the moment. Because if we are always seeking, does that mean we are never satisfied in the moment? So today, how can you find peace in not having to prove someone else wrong, but to find fulfillment in your truth?

Both Of Us Can Be Right

Thanks for listening.  I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together, Personal Development Life Coach- Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected]  phone:865-219-3247

Music by: - Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. - I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Wisdom Wednesdays-#354 December 20 The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

I Leave Self Sabotage Behind

Punisher Netflix season 1, episode 1 - 21:00… “3AM”
Curt: So what about you Frank, what is it going to take to make you happy?
Frank: Come on. Happy? Happy is a kick in the balls waiting to happen.
Curt: So you kick yourself in the balls first…that’s crazy Lieutenant.

Self-sabotage is really only our fears speaking out that we might fail, that something might not be what we thought it could be, or that maybe we aren’t worthy to have what we wish for. We dream big as children, and as we grow up day by day, year by year…one thing after another doesn’t work out as we had hoped…and so instead of seeing it as a lesson that we can’t do everything at once…we see it as a lesson that what we wish for either won’t happen or will let us down.

And maybe one reason that is, is because of Hollywood culture that’s thrust in our faces. The happily ever after stories we are continually told, is that everything will work itself out just because that’s how the world works. Yet, that’s only partly true…everything will work itself out, but we have to put effort into meeting the world where it is. And that’s hard because we choose one side or the other and never materialize either side fully. We say we are realists and don’t believe in fairy tales or dreams…we only believe in things we can touch. Or we stay in the fairy tale, being lost in the dreams of our minds because it’s softer than the hard cold world. But we don’t have to be in an only this or only that mentality. We can have portions of both and I think that’s more “real” than one story or the other.

In all the things I’ve achieved in my life, I didn’t reach them as fully as I could have because I found it easier to self-sabotage myself…than to believe more in my achieving it fully. It was easier to say I wasn’t good enough, I wasn’t deserving enough…or I wasn’t patient enough. I put in the time…but it was taking too long, and so I came back to the real world away from my dreams saying that it wasn’t worth it dreaming towards something that may never happen. And I think when we work towards goals we underestimate a lot of things that dissuade us from pursuing them further or ever again.

We underestimate the amount of time it could really take, we underestimate the obstacles that could be in our way, we overestimate the amount of joy it would bring us thinking it will be our answer to save ourselves, and we underestimate our power…as we get burned out from being let down over and over again in the pursuit of our goals.

And the reasons I believe we will continually be let down is because we think the goal will save us. We’re always looking to the future saying when this happens…then it will be different. This one thing will take me from the chaos I’m in, and be my ultimate answer…my happily ever after. So we lie to ourselves by saying, “once we get married we’ll stop fighting, once we have kids we will get it together, once I get this job I will make the money I need and handle my money better, once I have this education people will respect me more, once I lose this weight people will desire me more…” or any other desire we can think about…and how it could be our saving grace.

A personal training client of mine told me a story about one of his friends who was over 300 pounds. He wasn’t very happy with his life and about the way he looked. This overweight gentleman had been heavy his whole life, and had never had a girlfriend before. He made a commitment to lose the weight, so he could get a girlfriend. And he lost the weight, but he never went out with anyone…and ultimately he committed suicide. He had the idea that if he had lost the weight then he would be more desirable and it would all come together for him in getting a date.

Now I don’t know exactly what happened, there are a lot of blank spaces in that story…but my guess is that he never went out and tried to talk with someone, he never tried to ask anyone to coffee as friends, or he never saw the people who were interested in him as he was too afraid to move forward. You see the weight was an excuse for him to not talk with women. It was the excuse he had lived with for most of his life, that he could have someone if only he wasn’t so heavy…and when he lost that weight he couldn’t use that excuse anymore. And his belief system was on overload, as his truth was being put to the test as he had attributed love as being only physical. He believed that losing weight would bring all the pieces together and his expectations of women desiring him would happen because he lost the weight…and when that didn’t happen, it only more brought more disappointment. It shattered the dream that all he had to do was lose weight and it would all come together.

And like the gentleman above, we all do this in some sort of manner or another. We believe that a goal, a milestone, or one answer to a problem will be our saving grace. But the “thing” was never the saving grace, it was just one stepping stone in a long pathway of our lives. We look far off in the distance saying once I get there, then I will have made it…instead of understanding you’ve already made it…you just on a journey of experiencing life more fully and learning more along the way. That “one thing” wasn’t your answer…it was just another checkpoint on your map, it was just another footstep on your journey, and it was one dream among many others in your mind to work towards.

So I say dream…and keep dreaming. Tell your story of happily ever after…but find a way to fuse it with the reality of the now. Find a way to live in both places simultaneously to know that the goal isn’t the answer, and that the goal isn’t too far too in the distant to reach either…but just another step to work towards. Find ways to have your hands touch this world and not be turned cold by it…have your dreams transform the world as you continue to hope while being grounded in present the moment. They say a goal is just a wish with a deadline…but I think when we do it right it’s also a way to keep our eyes focused on the future while keeping our mind mindful of the steps we are taking in the moment. Your dreams are achievable…especially when you step out of your way. The only obstacle in your way is yourself…let’s step out of our way today.

Today’s Personal Commitment:
Awaken yourself today what your tendencies and habits to self-sabotage yourself are. Look at some of the things you wanted and failed at, look at the things you had and you lost, and look at some of the things that seemed too far out of reach…and then ask, how you kept yourself from reaching or keeping those things in your life? I know for me when I get frustrated or overwhelmed I go back to old habits that keep me depressed and down.

When relationships didn’t work out or I was frustrated being alone, I would subconsciously find people who weren’t good for me…I think it was my way of saying I was meant to be alone and I would go to any depths to prove it to myself to have more chaos in my life. When I get down and depressed or think something will never happen, I get overwhelmed and literally throw my hands up in the air as a giving up sign. I find that I sleep more to calm the voices of failure in my mind. It’s kind of like a place of calm for a bit, but it never really solves the problem…it just sweeps it under the rug for a little bit. I would be better to meditate or journal…so I would be actively working thru the problem instead of fleeing it through my excessive napping at times.

Those are only a few examples of my self-sabotaging…what are yours, and how can you do something more proactive to change your direction? Maybe you might be like me, where other people believed more in myself than I did. I had coaches and teachers who saw my potential and wanted to bring it out… but I always came to a wall. Not because they weren’t good mentors, they were great in fact…but they could only take me so far until I could stop sabotaging myself and begin believing more in the power of myself. So how will you stop sabotaging yourself, and begin believing more in yourself today?

I Leave Self Sabotage Behind

Thanks for listening.  I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together,
Personal Development Life Coach-
Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected]  phone:865-219-3247

Music by:
- Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
- I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide