What does this mean?

Obstacles and resistance are my specialty. Over the past 16 years I’ve learned to work with them in a way that quickly transforms them and turns them into fuel.

And since my work revolves around them,  people ask me all the time what it means when they encounter obstacles on the way to their goals and visions.

Does it mean “it wasn’t meant to be”?

Does it mean I should do something else?

Is it a sign to stop? To press on?

Shouldn’t things come easily if they’re really right?

.What does this mean?

This is hands down the Number One question I get about blocks, obstacles and resistance.

And what I say is this:

Your obstacles tell you NOTHING about your chosen goal and whether it’s right or wrong.

That’s right! There is NO information in your obstacles or resistance about whether you’re going toward the wrong thing.

Your blocks and obstacles CAN tell you lots about:

• the route you’re taking
• the strategy you’re using
• whether the timing is right
• your beliefs and fears
• the inner work you still need to do
• and more

But they tell you nothing about the rightness or wrongness of your goal.

The ONLY thing that tells you whether to keep going toward your chosen destination is your DESIRE.

It’s what separates “seemed like a good idea at the time” from “I will walk over broken glass to get to this, no matter what it takes”.

Desire is of the heart.

It’s a slow-burning kind of passion.

It’s far more powerful than WANT will ever be.

It’s magnetic – pulling us inevitably towards.

It can feel like longing and it can bloom fully into Love.

When desire is deeply present, transforming the obstacles can become an act of devotion.

When desire isn’t there, every obstacle seems like too much – just one more reason to quit.

So, if you’ve been questioning your current path and wondering what your obstacles mean, look deeply into your heart and see if your desire for it is still there.

Maybe it’s dimmed a little over time or maybe it’s just a tiny spark of what it used to be.

Take some time to re-inspire yourself and fan it back into full strength. I promise your obstacles will start to look smaller!

(And if you need some support understanding your current obstacles and deepening your desire, perhaps it’s time for a Discovery Session.)

What have your obstacles been telling you and how have you been interpreting their messages, both good and bad? Please join the discussion in the comments below!

Calendar from Linda & Harriet

Happy New Year!

And with the New Year comes the inevitable  reviews and stats on how well we generally do at following through on our New Year’s resolutions!

Generally, the stats say we don’t do so well and, in my experience, there’s one big reason for that…  we haven’t dug deep enough to find out WHY we really chose our New Year’s resolutions in the first place.

Some resolutions seem so obvious.

We KNOW that we’re 25 pounds over our healthier weight, or we KNOW that the smoking or junk food is bad for us – so OF COURSE we should resolve to do something about them.

In this case, too, we’re often making the obvious resolutions for the benefit of someone close to us. We say we’ll do it because it makes THEM feel better and also gets them off our back for a little while.

And sometimes we pick a resolution for someone else’s benefit.

We may choose a resolution because THEY picked one and if you live in the same house it’s a lot easier to BOTH quit smoking or eat healthier.  And, of course, you want to be supportive…

The downside is this :

That isn’t always the truth of our own heart and it sets us up for a lot of inner struggle, defeat, self-judgment and maybe their judgment too, when we don’t succeed in staying with it.

There’s a much more powerful and satisfying way to go about this and it requires a little digging – into our desires.

With resolutions a “good idea” just isn’t good enough.

You see, all the kinds of resolutions I listed above seem like perfectly good “ideas” – but that’s the problem, they’re just ideas. They’re in the mind and we haven’t brought them down to heart level yet.

The heart level is where all the power is and the fuel that will keep you going even when you want to quit, and even when your spouse or room-mate quits!

Let’s say you’re faced with the obvious choice that resolving to lose 20 pounds would be really good for you – and everyone else in your household thinks so too. That’s a fine and healthy and well-intended choice – but lets take it deeper now.

5 questions to ask about your resolution to find the desire behind it:

Take some time and sit down in a quiet space, maybe first thing in the morning or last thing at night, and simply watch your breathing for a minute or two as a way to quiet your inner world. Notice your body relaxing just a little bit and just breathe.

Then take a few minutes to reflect on WHY you would want to make that resolution this year. Next you can ask the following questions in any order you want and see what comes up for you:

1. What feels important about this for you? Why?
   (And when you get an answer, you can ask Why? about that, and so on, peeling layers into your heart as you go)
2. Is there something happening in your life right now that makes this choice more important than before?
   Maybe you tried this and couldn’t follow through. What’s different now?
3. Is there a longing behind your resolution?
   Is there an ache for something that you’re missing in yourself or your life? And how does that longing relate to the resolution you chose?
   (Hint: longing is GREAT fuel for staying motivated.)
4. Is choosing this a way to stop feeling badly about something?
   Is there an underlying desire to simply feel good again, with or without the change? If that’s the case, find a way to come to a deep acceptance of where you are now, first, so you’re not in reaction to feeling bad at the same time that you’re trying to change.
5. Is choosing this a means to something else that you desire even more?
   For example, someone might be choosing to lose weight in order to find a relationship. If so, what’s the desire that’s even stronger than your current resolution?

Write down whatever comes up for you in the process. You might even want to do this over the course of several days in a row – sometimes we hold back a bit the first time, because we’re a little scared of what we’ll find. This definitely gets easier as we go along!

This could change things….

Based on what you discover, you might choose a different resolution all together, deepen your motivation for your original one, or decide it’s not the right time to make one at all.

No matter what you decide for this year, you’ll be a lot more honest about it, a lot more motivated and a lot more likely to succeed!

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this or on New Year’s Resolutions in general. Share your comments below.

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On A Roll, by Sally Spooner

Most of us have heard the phrase “I’m on a roll”. And often we’re smiling when we say it, because it usually means that more than one good thing in a row has happened – like, we made 3 great shots in a row or we had 4 positive phone calls in an hour.

You get the picture. A “roll” is all about momentum!

In terms of moving forward with things in our life, especially the things we’ve been resisting or procrastinating on, there’s no dynamic more useful than ‘a roll’!

But how can we reliably conjure one up? They seem notoriously difficult to control. I mean if we could just create one whenever we wanted, we could get all kinds of things accomplished, right?

Well, what if we can? I was definitely on a roll this afternoon and I started to do what I often do when I catch myself in the middle of a pattern – I started to take it apart and figure it out.

What started it? How did I get there? How did I keep it going?

And what I realized is that ‘a roll’ starts with an energy boost.

Today, it started with accomplishing something pretty small and easy that I had been avoiding – one email to one client.

Whew, I thought…that was easy! So I sent another one from my to do list, and then another until all 5 items on that list were crossed off.

Wow, did that feel good! And I got all kinds of energy from doing it!

So then I dove straight in to a writing project I needed to start and plowed through that for an hour or more until my body told me it was time to stand up and move. And boy it felt great to get started on that project.

Next thing I knew, I had the energy to power-walk down the road to the mailbox – something I’ve been trying to do every day this week. I got back feeling revitalized and lo and behold…I had the energy to clean up the kitchen! And believe me, the kitchen is my nemesis – it’s the BIGGIE on my list.

Are you seeing the pattern here?

I started with one tiny email and ended up completing the BIG ONE, the kitchen. What I realized is that each task freed up energy for the next one.

So, the most important key to getting this “roll” going was starting small, with something that I had almost no resistance to doing in that moment, even though I had been putting it off.

As soon as the first small task was done, I felt so great about it that I got a boost of energy that made the next task possible.

Could I have done the kitchen after the first email? Noooooo!

There’s no way I would have had enough energy for that. It took the great energy and relief of completing 5 emails, invoices, an hour of writing and a fabulous walk to the mailbox to create enough energy for me to tackle the kitchen.

Isn’t that wild? You’d think that after each task I did, I’d have LESS energy available, but I actually had MORE!

Somehow, the energy I had available after each task led me to the next right task, not too big and not too small for what I could handle then.

It was like walking up an easy set of stairs.

So try this process:

The next time you’d like to conjure up ‘a roll’, pick a small task that will feel great to complete and just do it. And when you feel great after you’ve done it, pick one more and see where the energy takes you.

And if you feel blocked in your next task or like you don’t have enough energy to tackle it, you’ve probably picked one too big or too stressful. Try going for a smaller, easier item or something that feels fun and keep the energy going.

I’d love to hear about your experiences with this or with momentum in general.

Happy New Year!

And with the New Year comes the inevitable media blitz of reviews, resolutions and top ten lists. And of course all kinds of reviews and stats on how well we generally do at following through on our New Year’s resolutions!

Generally, the stats say we don’t do so well at sticking with them and in my experience, and that of my clients, there’s one big reason for that…  we haven’t dug deep enough to find out why we really chose our New Year’s resolutions in the first place.

Some resolutions seem so obvious – we KNOW that we’re 25 pounds over our healthier weight, or we KNOW that the smoking or junk food is bad for us – so OF COURSE we should resolve to do something about them.

In this case, too, we’re often making the obvious resolutions for the benefit of someone close to us. We say we’ll do it because it makes THEM feel better and also gets them off our back for a little while.

Or we may pick a resolution because THEY picked one and if you live in the same house it’s a lot easier to BOTH quit smoking or eat healthier.  And, of course, you want to be supportive…

The downside is : this isn’t always the truth of our own hearts and it sets us up for a lot of inner struggle, defeat, self-judgment and maybe their judgment too, when we don’t succeed in staying with it.

There’s a much more powerful and satisfying way to go about this and it requires a little digging – into our desires.

You see, all the kinds of resolutions I listed above seem like perfectly good “ideas” – but that’s the problem, they’re just ideas, they’re in the mind and we haven’t brought them down to heart level yet.

The heart level is where all the power is and the fuel that will keep you going even when you want to quit, and even when your spouse or room-mate quits!

Let’s say you’re faced with the obvious choice that resolving to lose 20 pounds would be really good for you – and everyone else in your household thinks so too. That’s a fine and healthy and well-intended choice – but lets take it deeper now.

Take some time and sit down in a quiet space, maybe first thing in the morning or last thing at night, and simply watch your breathing for a minute or two as a way to quiet your inner world. Notice your body relaxing just a little bit and just breathe.

Then take a few minutes to reflect on WHY you would want to resolve to lose weight this year. You can play with any of the following questions and see what comes up for you:

• What feels important about this for you? Why?  (And when you get an answer, you can ask Why? about that, and so on, peeling layers into your heart as you go)
• Is there something happening in your life right now that makes this choice even more important than before?
• What are you longing for? Is there an ache for something that you’re missing in yourself or your life? And how does that longing relate to your choice?
• Is choosing this a way to stop feeling badly about something? Is there an underlying desire to simply feel good again, with or without the change?
• Is choosing this a means to something else that you desire even more? (for example, choosing to lose weight in order to find a relationship) If so, what’s the desire that’s even stronger?

Write down whatever comes up for you in the process. You might even want to do this over the course of several days in a row – sometimes we hold back a bit the first time, because we’re a little scared of what we’ll find. This definitely gets easier as we go along!

Based on what you discover, you might choose a different resolution all together, deepen your motivation for your original one, or decide it’s not the right time to make one at all.

No matter what you decide for this year, you’ll be a lot more honest about it, a lot more motivated and a lot more likely to succeed!

Let me know how it goes!