4 Powerful Reasons Why You Have to Listen to Rudolph ... every day from Thanksgiving to New Years

Don't you just hate it when you have to listen to Rudolph and Frosty prior to December 24th??

No? Me, neither!

I put up holiday wreaths on the doors the week before Halloween. I have decorations in the windows now. Gonna start listening to holiday songs and singing lustily with them for two solid months...

WHY? you ask.

Yeah, I know, having holidays go on and on can be annoying. What other cultures do is they have numerous holidays throughout the year. It reminds people of joy and love and the essential sweetness of life at regular intervals year-round.

We benighted savages of the USA really only have two holidays - July 4th (one day, big deal) - and the period from Thanksgiving to New Years. We are forced to work too many hours, with no or expensive health care "benefits", we have practically no holidays, we spend our weekends doing the chores that we can't do during the week. We are the most anxious people on Earth - and no wonder! Every other industrialized nation on earth removes the basic worries of life - health care and education, elder care help and baby care support - so that citizens can soar and strive and live good lives.

So we are exhausted, scared/worried and desperately needing rest most of the time.

When you only have one extended holiday, when you have to pack a year's worth of joyful play into one month of weekends and (if you're lucky) a week off from the long-hours grind.....

Even I, who absolutely practice what I preach and do the 5 Tools every day of the year, yearns for the plethora of official holidays that the rest of the world enjoys. Sure I make every Sunday a spiritual and creative oasis, but - it IS more fun to have fun when the rest of the community is smiling as well.

So - tired of Rudolph by Dec 1st? Have compassion on the rest of us holiday-deprived revelers. And work for a nation where the national good trumps corporate greed. Bless us all, every one.

Thinking I Understand You.....

Thinking I understand you .... and I really, truly don't.

This quote is so important to keep in mind.

When I am most inclined to shoot off my mouth, full of certainty that I know what The Truth is - especially if I think I know the answer AND it's really quite simple, if you only...... - this quote flashes into my mind and I shut my mouth.  

How hard it is for this language-loving species of ours to get through to ourselves that sometimes the finest wordsmith on earth really, truly cannot convey an experience. You'll never know what war is like from watching movies, reading books or even listening to people.  You'll never know what a violent physical assault, especially a sexual assault, does to the depths of a soul from listening, reading or watching movies. [And watching movies can cause PTSD in empathetic people, so please don't.]  You'll also never know about parenting from having your nieces for a weekend or from reading, listening or watching.

You'll never know about the awe, the soul-shattering, body-shaking or very quiet transcendence that comes at the top of tall mountains that you climbed yourself.  You can't visit a forest or a waterfall in a video.  You can't imagine the near-extinction event our ancestors survived 60,000 years ago.

We call it humility.  Just an acknowledgement of the shouldn't-be-so-profound truth that we don't know everything, and we usually don't know better than the people who have had the experience.  It's just the human experience.  Until we actually have a Vulcan mind-meld, our experience-sharing ability will always be limited to what language can convey and some of the most important experiences are impossible to completely encapsulate in words.  



I work with entrepreneurs who want to blast through the internal barriers to success, stemming from events of their earlier life.  I also work with other serious professionals and people who aspire to being serious professionals, who are held back by traumas from childhood, previous spouse, military experience, traffic accidents, violence.  It may be formally-diagnosed PTSD or just "barriers" that need blasting away.  I don't pretend to be all-knowing.  I just have some very powerful tools for making the problem go away - permanently.  

You don't have to put up with less enjoyment than you could be having from life.  Contact me for a FREE Getting Unstuck session today.  A real session, not a sales pitch. Be impressed by all my academic degrees, specialty certifications, testimonials and special programs at www.soaringdragon.biz  Then contact me at  victoria.leo.reiki@gmail.com.

Being Real

Over a century ago, this American essayist wrote a profound truth about human nature: we don't want to hear the truth about ourselves. We respond to truth from others like we respond to rattlesnakes. We don't tell ourselves the truth. And our conscious mind is so 100% focused on protecting our social selves from any kind of negativity that we suppress all that we could know. But all that energy spent fending off deep self-knowledge, if it were harnessed to the wagon of our dreams? My god, we could rocket to the stars, couldn't we? So much peace of mind,just waiting to be harnessed. Such creativity - blazing fountains of creativity! - if only we could reclaim all that blighting energy.

What are we so afraid of? The scorn of the "world" when we show/admit that we aren't perfect people, in one or all of our roles (entrepreneur/career, parenting, spouse, citizen, Christian/Jew/Muslim/other - every single label that matters to us - and we all have labels that matter to us!) The disappointment of loved ones who see the real us for the first time. [They preferred to put us on a pedestal, so they didn't have to do the hard work of being real, either.

Take one small step nearly every day. Be real in one moment with one person. Eventually you'll be able to fire your social self's internal "safety net" but don't expect to do that today. For today, one person, one moment. As the Buddha said, you fill the pitcher drop by drop.  

Digging Deeper Into the Terror Attacks, A Brilliant, Simple Explanation for American Disengagement

What We Miss When We Jump….

One of the key teachings of all the wisdom traditions concerns the dangers of jumping to conclusions on the basis of inadequate information.  Our limbic systems, bless them, never, ever think that they have inadequate information.  What we call a capacity for critical thinking is merely a limbic system that has been trained to stop, loop in the prefrontal cortex, and then and only then step lightly to a not-deeply-held conclusion.  Everyone who has taken the training with me is glad they did. 

I’ve felt for some time that the answer to “why didn’t Americans get emotionally involved with the East African embassy bombings?” wasn’t simple racism.  I knew that the knee-jerk “they’re all racists” explanation for why there hasn’t been a Je suis Ankara movement to complement the solidarity Americans felt with Parisians after the terrorist attack, was missing a core truth.  But simply knowing that someone else is engaging in simplistic thinking isn’t the same as being brilliant oneself. 

Then I read an article in APU Insider [In Homeland Security contributor Sylvia Longmire] that supplied the brilliant missing link. [I got my 2nd MA at APUS, great school.]  The reason why Americans are emotionally wrought about Paris is because we either have been there, someone close to us has been there and connected us to it vicariously or we dream of going there (mostly because – again – it is someplace that others we know have been).  Few Americans have been to, or wish they could go to, Dar es Salaam or Ankara.  Psych research clearly shows that a huge part of emotional connection is familiarity.  When something is just a point on a map, we humans don’t feel connected.  But places that feel “familiar,” we care about.  [Advertisers understand this: even if you rationally don’t want to, your limbic system, where decisions are made, feels more positive about products you have heard about repeatedly.  The familiar has a positive vibe to it.]  

** My earlier post misattributed the brilliant idea.  Pls forgive my error.

Sign up for a FREE Getting Unstuck session with powerful coach and transformation guide Victoria C. Leo, at www.soaringdragon.biz

3 Powerful Reasons Why CSI-Type Shows are the Road to Career & Business Success

 All right, so if you’re not already addicted, you don’t have to start.  But if are already a heavy consumer of modern who-dunnits, you also don’t have to stop.  [If you are living a high-stress life situation, you do need to limit your viewing.  Too much violence and mayhem, even if most of the focus is on intellectual cleverness, has a well-studied negative impact on your longevity and health.]

So what do these puzzler shows do to you, that has a positive impact on your life and career:

1)      You get into the habit of not jumping to conclusions.  In real-life crime, the most obvious suspect usually did do it.  Spouses, gangs, drugs and alcohol: that’s where real detectives look.  But in the puzzler shows, your brain gets programmed to stop and do 360 interviews, digging for what’s hidden, before you come to any conclusion. 

Think about what this would be like as it plays out in your career and personal life.  Stop, breathe, get your pre-frontal cortex involved before you let your limbic system lock on to  the first (stupid) thing that occurs to it.  What would your life and career be like if all your ideas were fully vetted by your thinking brain before it gets cast in mental concrete? What if everyone around you, especially management, did this? Oh. My. God.

2)      You collect actual physical evidence before you believe anything.  You collect evidence that could potentially contradict the first batch of physical evidence.  No stone is left unturned.  Real law enforcement doesn’t have this kind of budget.  But our fictional detective processes, where science is the real hero of the show, are thorough, meticulous and don’t believe anything unless there is lots and lots of irrefutable evidence for the conclusion. 

Translate this into your own career life.  I’ve watched shoot-from-the-lip jerks be admired and promoted, more times than I can count.  But I also have lived the corporate life long enough to have seen what happens when managers realize, a year too late, that they bought the sizzle and ignored the steak.  The sizzler is sent packing.  Listing the possible options with pros and cons out loud, while your thinking brain is doing its diamond-sharp analysis as a background process, allows you to, at worst, promise a data-driven robust conclusion later in the day, and at best, end the oration with your really wise, “steak” conclusion.  Nice place to be, either way.

3)      You get shot, stabbed or conked on the head regularly, but very rarely die, unless you were hoping to leave the series for a new job anyway.  If we could deeply believe the maxim of all the wisdom tradition – “It’s going to be all right, long-term.” – we would be more willing to try things.  Some new ideas fail.  Most are so-so.  Some are spectacular.  All of them reward your courage and vision with growth. 

If you watch enough cliffhangers that turn into recoveries, you might start believing that you are bullet-proof as well – not enough to get you stupid, but enough to give you courage to jump off a mountain with a skilled tandem hang-gliding partner.  For a millisecond or so, before the lift grabs you and saves you, you are dropping through the air, with no force but gravity working on you.  The more times you drop and are saved, the more certain you become that, whatever happens in your career, you will walk away alive, with lessons and knowledge that no one can ever take away from you. 

If we all did this in our non-TV lives, human history would take a dramatic turn for the better, as would your career or small business.  Try it and see!

Victoria C. Leo creates blast-through-barriers programs for career professional and entrepreneurs.  Visit www.soaringdragon.biz, http://soaringdragoninjapan.blogspot.com, Facebook group Healing Minds, Healing Bodies or email victoria.leo.reiki@gmail.com.

Soar With Dragons to Genuine Joy (part 1)

  What do you think is the most popular category for re-pins on Pinterest and for responses and shares on Facebook?  Inspirational sayings, right?  As a culture, we are starving for uplift.  How did we end up in this place?
Part of it is a reflection of economic realities.  Prior to the Reagan years, labor and management had a more equal balance of power.  With the near-demise of labor unions, the real wages of most Americans have dropped sharply, more and more of us have only part-time or contingent work with no benefits, we are working longer and have very little realistic hope of a dignified and comfortable retirement.  Having economic fears and anxieties simply means that you’re aware and paying attention.
Our health is a legitimate concern as well.  For the first time in history, life expectancy and overall health measures of adult Americans are declining.  Our young adult offspring have less hope and opportunities.  [If none of these categories apply to you, have compassion and generosity for the rest of us.]
In a reality where glib “don’t worry; be happy” platitudes are lacking in wisdom as well as empathy, how can someone like me insist that Happiness is the goal of ALL of my programs?  My answer to you:  Blast away all the external Barriers to joy that you possibly can and then learn the Secret Sauce that allows you generate joy internally.
So why am I such a joy advocate?
The first reason is physical health.  Anxiety and worry depresses your immune system, raises your blood pressure (which damages kidneys and arteries and leads to premature death and an end to sexual function), and wrecks your skin.  If you want to live longer, stop wasting money on supplements and potions and practice Reiki, EFT (tapping), meditation and daily movement.
The second is that joy is infectious.  All your other problems start easing, when you approach other people with a glow.  You can talk your bankers into outrageous rule-changes, you can encourage discounts and more-time-to-pay from nearly everyone, you can blind hiring managers to your flaws and weaknesses, and you can convince everyone else to have hope for their future as well.  You can even have the faith to commit to healing of long-festering problems (with me) if your expectation for your future changes.
How do you shift yourself away from dwelling on all your legitimate sources of dismay?
Well, you don’t want to ignore reality.  That is one beef I have with some less-than-wise proponents of Positive Thinking.  Did you know that in the 1950’s, the early advocates of civil rights for women and minorities were accused of fostering disloyalty and even treason because they were bringing up “negative” views of American society?  Don’t ever, ever allow a preference for a positive twist on your situation to morph into suppressing your first duty to tell yourself and others the truth about your life.  Black Lives Matter.  Women’s lives matter.  If this is “negativity,” then thank god for it.  Walk away from anyone who tries to suppress or muzzle your grasp on Truth.
But joy can be part of Truth, too.
Carve out time in your day, every day, for joy.  Joy is your natural state when you are fully present in your body, in your reality.  Stress comes from moment-by-moment time travel to the past and the future.  So -
Ø  Stop rushing from place to place, so you have time to breathe deeply and look up at the clear blue sky or the new daffodils or the cute dog walking your neighbor.
Ø  Have less things on your to-do list, if you have to, but make time for Reiki, tapping (EFT), yoga and meditation.
Ø  Give yourself time to breathe and be still, accomplishing nothing tangible, unless you count better physical health, sharper thinking and – joy.
 As one of my inspirational pins reminds me, “It’s just a bad day, not a bad life.” [On Pinterest – SoaringDragon]
And make time, at least once a week, to be creative.
Ø  Get some inexpensive ($5) watercolors or acrylic craft paints from the craft store, some painting paper or cheap canvases and swirl some colors around.  It’s called abstract art.  Don’t show it to anyone or ask anyone for an opinion.  If you get a negative remark, tell the person to shut up.  When you let go of the desire to “do a good job,” and get others’ approval, not only do you create great art – because “great art” is anything that is an authentic reflection of your feelings and your vision - but you will feel such an intense upwelling of pure joy, it will take your breath away.
Ø  Build something.  Get craft supplies or a kit and make something.  It doesn’t even matter what.  It is the PROCESS of the creation that reduces stress, gives you new insights into your life and makes you bubble with joy.  I used to build furniture.  I still build and create useful objects every week.  You can get addicted to stained glass and mosaic kits.  That is my fun time, and if you try it, you, too, can contemplate giving up your TV.  Go to Michael’s or Joann [never Hobby Lobby], just walk around and when something catches your heart, don’t talk yourself out of it, second-guess or shame yourself.  Buy it. Take it home.  Try it out.  Keep going into mindfulness, to keep the critical voices at bay.
 Ø  Embrace colors.  Color has amazing impacts on your brain.  Painting the prison walls calming colors really does reduce conflict.

Ø  Learn a new skill.  I keep telling people that crochet is so simple, children learn it easily.  I can crochet in the dark, with my eyes closed, while watching scenery go by on a tour bus, because it’s a simple tactile task.  With crochet, you can create stuffed animals, a nifty protector/carrier for your smart phone, purses, clothing, housewares galore.  My smart phone carrier has compartments for phone, charger, USB, earbuds, a credit card and ID.  I can use it as a purse for short trips where I don’t need a gazillion ID cards.  Knitting is fun and leads to the same bumper crop of clothing, gifts and beauty.

There are literally thousands of cool things to learn – and learning something new brings joy.   Sign up for something on Coursera, The Great Courses, Udemy or another learning site.  When you are learning, your pre-frontal cortex lights up, and when it lights up, so do your joy circuits.  And your Pride in Yourself circuits.  You deserve to feel that good.  Learn something.  Konnichi-wa!
 People like the Dalai Lama, who encourage you to seek joy in the midst of your troubles (while also having compassion for your legitimate pain and difficulty), are your true North Star if you want a life that soars.  You deserve to soar with dragons.  Take action today!
 Who Am I?I’ve been where you are, thinking that I could only truly harbor joy in my heart when every desire of my life was being fulfilled.  I learned better, and so can you.  We’ll start by clearing away the fixable external problems. Victoria Leo offers programs guaranteed to blast through your barriers to bring you physical health, peace of mind and soaring goddess energy!  Is your career or dreams of entrepreneurship keeping you up at night?  Do you need freedom from worry and lack of faith in yourself?  Do you need physical health?  Every program also teaches you how to generate joy from within.  There IS a secret, magic formula and I will teach it to you!

Victoria offers both science-based and spiritual solutions that really work! Visit www.soaringdragon.biz and choose the program that will transform your life.  You deserve to soar with dragons! Victoria’s Facebook group Healing Minds, Healing Bodies welcomes you, as does her blog SoaringDragoninJapan. You can find her books on Amazon, Nook, Kobo or at your local bookseller.
   

Reframing Insults Puts Power Where It Belongs - In YOUR Pocket

Sometimes it's the small things that count.  I have a client who recently transferred to a new group with a "mentor" who was making him miserable.  In listening to him, the causes and solutions became clear.

The cause?  She raced along at breakneck speed, such that Michaelangelo or Einstein couldn't have kept up - and used an exasperated tone of voice when anyone asked a question or even asked her to slow down.  You can understand his pissossity at the meta-communication that he was an idiot.  You can understand why he wanted the basic respect that he deserved as a highly-regarded professional.

I started by getting him to reframe the situation from anger to an understanding that this young thing just didn't know how to teach.  When he was sure that no sane person would actually think he's an idiot, he was able to hear that, and shift his energy from defense to commiseration.  Who doesn't remember what a jerk they were when they were 20-something?  

Getting angry at a jerk is usually a "weak" response.  Realizing that your respect and integrity will never be diminished, in discerning eyes, by the actions of a jerk gives you the emotional space to take a breath and make a non-attacking response.  Truly, emotionally realizing that the jerk is incompetent, not powerful, defangs the attacker in the eyes of your reactive limbic system.  This is easier with a hypnotherapy journey, which my client used, but if you devote time to it, you can reprogram your deep heart and soul on your own. [Call me.  It's shorter, more fun and more comprehensive if a pro does it with you.]

Then I got him to manage her - with praise. The first time he thanked her and praised her for her knowledge and thanked her again for her efforts (all very sincerely), he saw the first smile he'd ever seen on her face.  "She walked away with a spring in her step," he marveled.  A month later, he has no trouble interacting with her.  She will probably continue to not know how to teach anything – and not be motivated to learn! - but the exasperated bad manners are gone.  In any case, my client knows how to interpret her bad manners.  Reframing it as her incompetence at teaching [“these young folks,” he tells himself] allows him to genuinely praise the things she does well and ignore her incompetence.  

His stress level (and all the bad effects that brings) is way down, so it’s another example of how healing minds heals bodies as well.  Call me for a free Getting Unstuck session.

1 Simple Step to Improve Your Home Life in 2016

Even the most career-obsessed person knows that an unhappy home life sucks the energy and joy from your life.  And most of us are more balanced than that. So here is one simple step to make a big difference in your personal happiness for 2016 – and you’ll make your spouse or partner much happier as well.

Here’s the scenario that most of us live with:

Ø  There is no demarcation in communication between the tactical (kids’ dental appointments, other calendaring, the bill that needs paying) and the strategic (where are we going on vacation next year, what % of our time are we spending on kids, parents, hobbies, our spiritual growth, an irritation I have with you, an important way in which you are disrespecting me, my time or my importance in your life).  The tactical gets sandwiched into whatever snippets of time are available.  The most important strategic questions – the primary relationship and its emotions, meaning the meaning that the relationship has in our lives, how valued we are, how trusted you are – require undivided attention and a calm interior, so they never get aired until the bucket overflows on a particularly stressful day.

Ø  Important conversations (both tactical and strategic) about finances, vacations, problems or opportunities with the kids, problems and opportunities with in-laws, ourselves, our careers, our <fill in the blanks> gets sandwiched in to a brain that is tunneled on the stress of the moment.  A tunneled brain cannot even absorb all the details and nuances of the issue, much less process it with both analytic and intuitive wisdom. 

Ø  Because we cannot absorb the full reality that is being presented to our tunneled brain, we lose most of the context and half the content.  Our spouse correctly concludes that we aren’t listening and (possibly incorrectly) that we really don’t value them. 

Ø  Whoever is paying the bills, dealing with the teacher or the nasty neighbor, or mediating the in-laws knows what’s going on, but the other partner really doesn’t, so that miscommunications with the external world occur, wasting everyone’s already scanty free time. [The time you should be spending at the gym, right?]

Some people have a weekly What’s Going On? Meeting in which they coordinate the tactical.  It’s a step toward wisdom, certainly.  It’s a rare family that sets aside well-rested, unpressured time to tackle the strategic.  You need to.

To the rescue – the mandatory weekly Family Meeting!  Have a scribe, either the person with the best handwriting, or the person who really loves to take notes or who is the most comprehensive note-taker [that would be my partner], or both/all parties on a rotating basis.  Start with the tactical stuff.  Write everything down!  This ensures that whoever dealt with the problem, challenge or opportunity isn’t the only adult who knows who said what and what was done.  

So far, so tactical.

Then start on the strategic, specifically the non-relationship-oriented events, plans, goals.  Brainstorm.  Talk about retirement, or your career plans, or the possibility of relocation, or what kinds of investments you both really care about.  Focus on listening twice as much as you talk.  Take three long, deep breaths and don’t respond to any idea that upsets, scares or enrages you until you are calm again.  Have a Time Out process.  Stand up and stretch.  Talk about reducing expenses on things you want but don’t need, so that the longer-term strategic needs can be met – or even the strategic wants, like a life-altering trip to India or above the Arctic Circle, can come true without incurring debt.  You can forego the $5 cup of coffee if you know what you are getting instead.  Keep your eyes on the prize!

The last element of the Family Meeting is the relationship.  Keep reminding yourself that no human being is going to support you in your life goals, including your business and career goals, if they are disrespected themselves.  Cheer when your spouse trusts you enough to bring up something that s/he wishes you’d do or not do, or do differently.  You are finding out about it while s/he still loves and trusts you.  If I had a dollar for every male friend, colleague, relative or client who has told me in bewilderment that he has no idea why his wife is divorcing him, I would have a fully-paid condo in Lahaina.  With the exception of the 3% of humanity who are sociopaths, people are only mysterious when we aren’t listening.  Coaxing problems out of hiding when they are still small and fixable keep the garden of love well-weeded.

And that is the most effective, most powerful boost you can give your career and your life for 2016.

3 Steps to Career Success AND Family Joy in Nov/Dec

 So many things culminate in November and December.  At least six major family and religious holidays.  End of year git-er-done deadlines at work.  Everyone’s deepest non-rational needs and craziness being triggered.  Kids enraptured with the magic of lights, desserts and all the decorating at home.  One’s own remembered delights and memories of magic can be ruthlessly tamped down in the service of Reality, but since deep desires can’t really be tamped down, you find them popping up at the most inopportune moment.  Spending more money on gifts and travel than you soberly would choose to allocate from the resources you have. 

Can we really be surprised that so many people, especially parents with full-time jobs, wish they could just fast-forward to January, when they are being honest with themselves?

The good news: there is a way out of the madness!  You need to solve these three problems:

Ø  You’re not paying complete attention to work when you’re at work.

Ø  You’re not paying complete attention to your family and/or your personal needs for joy and magic when you aren’t at work.  Exacerbated by not having enough hours for your non-work life.

Ø  You’re spending too much money.

Let’s take them in turn:

You’re not paying complete attention to work when you’re at work.  Yes, I know that you think you are.  But if you are not giving your children, your spouse and your desire to enjoy this special time of the year its due, those concerns will leak into your work time and you will be constantly fighting distraction.  Or the guilt at your long hours when you know that your family really wants to share this time with you will take up cognitive bandwidth, even when you’re not aware of it.  Or you’re shopping online when you need your cognitive resources 100% focused on the supply-chain problem.  So you can solve this problem by solving problem #2, right?  Let’s do that.

You’re not paying complete attention to your family and/or your personal needs for joy and magic when you aren’t at work.  This is exacerbated by not having enough hours for your non-work life.  Your kids need your undivided attention in order to thrive.  Your spouse needs to know that s/he is undisputed #1 in your life.  Full stop.  If you want to live a long and happy life, have kids who cry buckets at your funeral and a spouse who sustains you for a half century of adult life with his/her unvarnished appreciation and adoration, you need to deserve that.  Full stop.  Kids remember these holidays.  You can’t buy them off with toys and other “stuff,” not in the long run.  They might get all excited about the stuff, but what will keep them away from drugs, early sex and general life stupidity is the strength of their connection to you.  Your spouse needs your help in cutting down the workload, firming placing 90% of the obligations in the No pile.  S/he needs you 100% emotionally present in the evenings, for the joys of decorating the house, making desserts, writing a yearly holiday letter.  S/he needs your 100% emotional presence as you explore a new light show, or visit an ethnic holiday you know nothing about, or do a service project together.  The end of year holidays are about love, about family, about goodness and generosity and caring for others.  They are about joy.  You, my friend, need joy.  You need to sit your kids down and tell them about holidays when you were a child.  You all need a dose of magic, as much as you need to step away from consumerism.

If you are truly present when you’re not working, you can pour it on 100% when you are working., and head home at a reasonable hour.  And by that, I mean no later than 6 PM.  Don’t even think about trying to negotiate this.  If you are 100% focused, you can get a reasonable amount of progress every day toward your organizational goals.  Do it, and then leave, guilt-free.

You’re spending too much money.  There are so many reasons why your spouse deserves your undivided attention during your non-working hours, and one reason is that when your spouse has what s/he needs from the love of their life, they will be more amenable to walking away from the Shoulds that generate too much spending. 

Ø  Gift only children.  Buy them educational toys. No gadgets, unless it’s a group gift from several families.

Ø  Or have a Pick a Name Out of the Hat at Thanksgiving.

Ø  Or create things.  I crochet while I’m relaxing with videos.  You might have talents at baking or crafting or building.  Sometimes I inflict my art on people.  They can throw it out and re-use the frame, I don’t care; having them know that I love them matters.

 

Unless you have more money than the Queen of England, you are probably spending too much.  You need much more money for retirement than you think you do.  Your kids need some seed money for college.  The animal welfare groups need a big donation.  The polar bears are drowning and the planet needs saving.  These things matter.  You can deal with selfish people trying to guilt-trip you into shopping now much more easily than you can deal with an unhappy retired life or kids with crippling education debts. 

Work with your spouse on an announcement to both families about your firm commitment to reserving the holidays for love and service projects.  Write a heartfelt letter about teaching your kids the value of sharing and caring, including creating small and meaningful gifts.  Wrap one or at most two nice educational gifts for your kids under your own tree or other symbolic object.  Whether you are pre-parenting, post-parenting or non-parenting, the same rules apply. 

All the holidays are about Light – the Light of wisdom, the Light of love, and the Light of joy.  They all dispel the darkness.  Focus on wisdom, love and joy, and don’t confuse them with “stuff.” 

So you see the solution!  When you fix the “time-at-home” problem and the spending problem, you automatically resolve the distractions that are keeping you from career success in November and December.  When you fix the “focus on work, then come home” problem, you automatically resolve the deprivation that you are inflicting on yourself, your vulnerable children and your spouse.  Life isn’t linear.  It’s a web, in which the solution to one part of the web relies on progress elsewhere.

You deserve to excel at work this holiday.  And you deserve excellence in your spouse, parent and human being roles as well.  You can do it!  Let the Light shine!

It's the Simple Things..... That Are So Hard

The Power of Simple and Sincere Praise

Sometimes it's the small things that count.  I have a client who recently transferred to a new group with a "mentor" who was making him miserable.  In listening to him, the causes and solutions became clear.

The cause?  She raced along at breakneck speed, such that Michaelangelo or Einstein couldn't have kept up - and used an exasperated tone of voice when anyone asked a question or even asked her to slow down.  You can understand his pissossity at the meta-communication that he was an idiot.  You can understand why he wanted the basic respect that he deserved as a highly-regarded professional.

I started by getting him to reframe the situation from anger to an understanding that this young thing just didn't know how to teach.  When he was sure that no sane person would actually think he's an idiot, he was able to hear that, and shift his energy from defense to commiseration.  Who doesn't remember what a jerk they were when they were 20-something?

Then I got him to manage her - with praise. The first time he thanked her and praised her for her knowledge and thanked her again for her efforts (all very sincerely), he saw the first smile he'd ever seen on her face.  "She walked away with a spring in her step," he marveled.  A month later, he has no trouble interacting with her.  She will probably continue to not know how to teach anything, but the exasperated bad manners are gone - and in any case, my client knows how to interpret her bad manners.  Reframing it as her incompetence at teaching [“these young folks,” he tells himself] allows him to genuinely praise the things she does well. 

His stress level (and all the bad effects that brings) is way down, so it’s another example of how healing minds heals bodies.....  The next time someone insults instead of mentoring you, or you feel legitimate anger arising, stop, take a deep breath, and consider the possibility that your "enemy" is just incompetent - and we've all suffered from that disease.  The same person who has literally saved lives can't figure out her GoPro, allegedly the simplest camera on the planet.  I need compassion.  We all do.