My new resolution is to write something before I read my e-mail. I made this resolution during the recent CAM (Conversation Among Masters) Conference, when Brian Johnson challenged us with two questions:

1. What is one thing to start doing, which would have the most positive influence on your life right now?
2. What is one thing to stop doing, which would have the most positive influence on your life right now?

I invite you to answer those questions for yourself. When I answered them and started thinking about the implications of my answers I learned a lot about myself.

My answers were to stop reading my e-mail first thing in the morning and to start writing more frequently. So here goes…

I am now more aware of how I measure my contribution to the world beyond the mutual contribution I make in all my direct, personal relationships.

My contribution is the writing I do that helps others to change and grow without my direct presence. I measure contribution by the standard Eric Berne proposed 40 years ago: “is it good for the infant mortality rate?” To me that standard means is what I am doing ultimately contributing to a world in which more babies that are born alive stay alive.

* Educating and coaching people about how to have important conversations is key for me.
* I care that relationships work so that both children and adults get what they need from others.
* I believe in selfishness as described by Thomas Leonard in The Portable Coach. This means being aware of and communicating your own needs to others.
* I also believe that agreements people make with each other should be honored (or changed by mutual consent.)
* I want to help people operate with as much integrity as possible.

In order to do this I need to become more proficient with tools that will get my message out into the world. I’ll be contributing what I’m thinking about to two different blogs or perhaps three and my goal is to publish at least twice a week.

This is a creative production goal rather than an outcome goal. Outcome goals don’t work well for me. They don’t leave enough room to be surprised and I often surprise myself. It’s a goal of staying in a creative tension so that I stay productive. This is how I will stay in integrity with myself.

I need to stay in the creative tension instead of drifting off into “deserving retirement” or just grandmothering. I do enjoy my freedom to explore and travel and I adore my grandchildren. Both of those are fine in their place, but they are not enough for me. I need to stay creative and contributing in order to feel fully alive and happy.

That’s a lot of insight from answering two questions. I admit I was in a very stimulating environment where I was surrounded by other master coaches all challenging each other to live their dreams.

I hope you answer the questions for yourself, take time to think about the implications of your answers and share what you learn.

You can post your answers and comments here. If you prefer, send them directly to me and I’ll put them up on the blog for you.

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written by Laurie Weiss \\ tags: Coaching, Communication, Personal Growth, Psychotherapy, Relationships, Self Help, Self-Improvement

You can register HERE for some fabulous free tele-seminars with a mindset of joy, gratitude, authenticity and inspiration celebrating the holidays. Check them out. It includes Deepak Chopra, Marci Shimoff, Gay Hendricks, and many others. http://maestropath.com/holiday

My daughter sent a note saying if I was going to talk about getting organized I should tell you about NAPO, The National Association of Professional Organizers. There is an organizer search function to find help with your organizing needs. 

Enjoy!

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written by Laurie Weiss \\ tags: Personal Growth, Professional Organizers, Self Help, Self-Improvement

To help manifest Dr. Joe Rubino’s vision of raising the self-esteem level of 20 million people, here’s an irresistible offer for you that
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Remember The Self-Esteem System also makes a perfect gift!

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written by Laurie Weiss \\ tags: Ideals, Personal Growth, Self Help, Self-Esteem, Self-Improvement

A client who frequently loses focus in her own life when she notices that someone else is in pain or difficulty asked me if I could help her get to the state described by His Holiness the Dalai Lama in the following quote.

“A mind committed to compassion is like an overflowing reservoir – a constant source of energy, determination and kindness. This is like a seed, that when cultivated, gives rise to many other good qualities, such as forgiveness, tolerance, inner strength and the confidence to overcome fear and insecurity. The compassionate mind is like an elixir; it is capable of transforming bad situations into beneficial ones. Therefore, we should not limit our expressions of love and compassion to our family and friends. Nor is the compassion only the responsibility of clergy, health care and social workers. It is the necessary business of every part of the human community.” 

This client confuses the feeling of compassion with taking action that may or may not help the recipient, but is damaging to herself and her goals for her own life. 

She often becomes a Rescuer instead of a helper who puts on her own oxygen mask before assisting others. When she Rescues from this caring but thoughtless position she eventually becomes a Victim who needs assistance herself. 

In Transactional Analysis terms the kind of compassion described in the quote comes from an integrated Adult. An integrated Adult in a mature person attends to and considers (Inner) Parent rules, (Inner) Child needs and the constraints of reality before making decisions to take action. 

My client often makes decisions from a Child ego state, eager to please someone, and/or a Parent ego state that discounts the needs of the Child ego state and who tells my client that the needs of others are important and her needs are not.

These guidelines can help anyone in this position, who feels compassionate and wants to help others to be genuinely helpful instead of risking martyrdom.

Guidelines for Helping Without Rescuing 

1. What do I think would be helpful?
2. What evidence am I using to decide that help is needed?
3. Do I have the resources to provide this help?
4. What will helping cost me? (Time, energy, money, etc.)
5. How will helping benefit me? (I’ll have more fun, feel less tense, feel like a good person, be more comfortable asking for things for myself later, etc.)
6. What is likely to happen if I don’t help?
7. Given these predicted costs and benefits, do I really want to help?
8. Has the other person asked for help?

   If the answer is yes and you want to help, clarify what you can do and go ahead and do it.
   If the answer is yes and if you don’t want to help, decline and suggest an alternative.
   If the answer is no and you still want to help, don’t just go ahead. Instead offer some specific help. Wait for the other person’s agreement. If you don’t get agreement, don’t help!

9. Check to see if your help is actually helping. (Ask questions, observe)
10. Give only as much help as needed. Giving more than is needed often leads to resentment for the helper and low self-esteem for the recipient.
11. Accept the positive strokes youget for helping. (Say thank you.)

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written by Laurie Weiss \\ tags: Coaching, Communication, Difficult Communication, Personal Growth, Relationships, Transactional Analysis

Change happens. I just revisited a shockingly orderly storeroom in my home. Just 24 hours ago I recruited my husband and my visiting son to excavate 20 years worth of stacked boxes and precarious piles of miscellaneous treasures.

By the time we finished we had a car trunk full of items to deliver to a donation center, several huge boxes of papers to recycle, a pile of trash and many miscellaneous items related to the obsolete technology of developing film in a darkroom.

Some of the choices were easy to make. We asked questions like,

• Do you need this?  
• Will you miss it if you never see it again?  
• What on earth is this?  
• Can somebody else use this?” 

Other choices were more difficult.

Photography was a hobby shared by my husband and my dad, who bequeathed his (then ancient) darkroom equipment to us over 40 years ago. A few pieces have sentimental value. I remember using them while helping my father in his darkroom when I was a child. Yet they have no place in my life now. We haven’t decided how to dispose of those things yet.

A question we didn’t ask is why many of the things we saved for so many years were important in the first place. Why did we save them?

I think I saved most things because I expected to use them again. Then I didn’t, and it took more time to make decisions about disposing of them than it did to just let them accumulate. That’s my style. I’m not proud of it. I have a computer full of files that could be pruned — but they’re even less visible than what was in the storeroom. 

How about you? Would you feel better if you released some of the things you intended to use again? Or is it better to just keep moving forward and leave the clutter hidden away until you are moved to address it?

I don’t have an answer for you. What I suggest is to make a choice and relax. What we did do makes me feel lighter as we move into the busyness of the holiday season. And I’m not worrying at all about what I haven’t done yet. 

I wish you and the people you love a joyful and relaxed holiday season.

Also — If you are having trouble dealing with the holidays, watch for a blog post in a few days. My colleague, Dr. Joe Rubino,
created a free 45-minute audio recording called 7 Steps to Soaring Self-Esteem. You can claim it now at http://cli.gs/V8WdP2 if you like, or wait  for the post that explains it in more detail. 
It’ll be a great way for you to start the New Year.

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written by Laurie Weiss \\ tags: Coaching, Ideals, Personal Growth, Self-Improvement

Brief excerpt from a conversation with a client:

Me: So you didn’t live up to your ideals.

Client: That’s right.

Me: Do you think most people live up to their ideals?

Client: I guess they don’t.

Me: Most of us develop our ideals long before we encounter reality.

Client: Hmmmmm

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written by Laurie Weiss \\ tags: Coaching, Ideals, Personal Growth, Self-Improvement

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written by Laurie Weiss \\ tags: Personal Growth, Psychotherapy, Self-Improvement, Transactional Analysis

These are my posts covering my trip to Spain from packing on April 5 to the morning after on April 25. Read from the bottom to the top. Follow me on Twitter. http://twitter.com/LaurieWeiss

1. Pillow to pillow 24.5 hours awake, 23 hours travel time. Now, after 8 hours sleep thinking about food and suitcases. about 10 hours ago from web
2. Downloading my email in the Philadelphia airport after a pleasant 8.5 hr flight from Barcelona.3:11 PM Apr 24th from web
3. Starting to transition to my other life. Wonderful day at the pool with my grandsons. Sad that this time with them is over. Leave early AM.2:52 PM Apr 23rd from web
4. Reading: “Become a Blogging Maniac » Week 2″ (http://twitthis.com/anl8de )2:45 PM Apr 23rd from TwitThis
5. “Rhinoceroses can kill things. They have smelly breath that is poison.” A (age 4 1/2) to E (age 3)1:35 AM Apr 22nd from web Continue reading »

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written by Laurie Weiss \\ tags: Personal Growth, Relationships, Self-Improvement

My reachback and afterburn are colliding big-time. I write to help myself think it sort things out so I decided to share this with you.

Those words, invented by Eric Berne, are the best description I know of the situation when finishing one task and preparing to start another run into each other.

Yesterday morning I woke up in Spain and here I am 38 hours later, home in Colorado. I haven’t opened my suitcase and that’s something I need to do today.

• I also need to unpack the suitcase,
• fill the empty refrigerator,
• sort almost 3 weeks worth of mail,
• do the laundry,
• sort out the messages I need to respond to
• and prepare to leave again in a week for the Conversations Among Masters
  conference.

Right now my befuddled brain can’t remember where the conference is. I know it’s somewhere in the Midwest. Jetlag is normal for me under these circumstances. What I would ordinarily do is wander around the house going from one task to another without making choices since they all need to be done.

Writing is an experiment to see if thinking a little bit will help make anything easier. Since Jonathan is in the same boat, I don’t really know if this can go out soon, but that’s OK.

I’ve been reading Byron Katie’s wonderful book, “A Thousand Names For Joy.” It contains her comments on her husband, Stephen Mitchell’s translation of the “Tao Te Ching.” The repeated emphasis of her acceptance of the world exactly as it is inspires me and I would love to get through this day completely accepting my own disorganization.

I’ve put my four-year-old grandson’s birthday card to his grandpa, laboriously printed on bright yellow construction paper, in a prominent place to remind me of the joy of the last two weeks. Now it’s time to get on with this part of my life.

If I can figure out how, I’ll move the Twitter posts on to this blog so you and I can both learn about journaling the trip using social media. This is pretty new to me but one thing I did do was more than quadruple the size of my Twitter list during my trip.

This is the first time I’ve had unlimited access to the Internet while traveling. It made the experience different. I think I like it.

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written by Laurie Weiss \\ tags: Personal Growth, Self-Improvement

I don’t know who created this beautiful power point presentation. I wish I could thank and credit it’s creator. The story of "The Daffodil Principle" originally appeared nearly ten years ago in Jaroldeen Edwards’ book Celebration!

It spoke to me because long ago Jonathan and I were waiting until we had more money, until he finished his Ph.D., until we could move, until… Then we decided to stop waiting and start living. It was one of the best decisions we ever made.

I hope you enjoy it as much as I did. http://tinyurl.com/dhdq3p This link will take you to a dialog box offering to let you open or download the file. You will need Power Point in order to view it, either online or on your own computer. More about Laurie Weiss 

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written by Laurie Weiss \\ tags: Personal Growth, Relationships, Self-Improvement