Choose Your Ways for Inspired Living

On our life journeys we often look for inspiration to help and guide us through the days when we settled into plateaus of mediocrity or are overwhelmed by life’s demands. At these times I myself appreciate looking at other people’s thoughts on the life journey and seek to learn from them. Live The Life Of Your Dreams by Laura Ponticello is such a book. She provides 33 inspiring tips to help in the continual growth of the inner life. Laura is an author, personal coach, and motivational speaker. You can find out more about her at lauraponticello.com

Although her books are geared towards women, the principles can be appreciated and connected to the life journey of men as well. In this book her 33 life inspiring tips revolve around 7 key themes of 1. Think Big, Dream Big 2. Don’t Let Fear Hold You Back 3. The Art Of Self-Talk 4. Take Time For Yourself 5. Sacred Spaces for Healing 6. The Power Within 7. Live Life With Passion.

I will touch on 5 of the tips that stood out to me. First of all her tip # 5 is Pursue Something With Passion. Having passions in life keep life purposeful and urge us to continual growth. That is one element of life I promote in my book Living More Than OK. I like how in this section she encourages “Explore a new side of yourself” so during your life journey seek out new activities or hobbies to enjoy to add to your life.

Her tip #16 is Sit with a Prayer. She encourages those who have a passion for following a spiritual life make prayer an important aspect of your life. The sitting with a prayer caught my attention as she is reminding us to look at some of the great prayers that have been written down and meditate on those. She uses the prayers of St. Francis as an example. There are also books on the prayers of Charles Haddon Spurgeon, the great protestant preacher from the 1800’s that can be used in sitting with a prayer.

To add happiness into your life her tip #20 is Do One Thing Every Day That Makes You Happy. Break away from the business of life and take a happy break savoring a cup of coffee or tea while reading a book or listening to a favorite song.

If you enjoy walking, her tip #25 is Walk With A Purpose. Go out for a walk but have a purposeful mindful attitude of gratitude while you walk. Walking with a grateful heart will allow you to observe positive things around you on the walk. Maybe you will notice a flower bed you never noticed before or a landscape idea you may wish to add to your lawn.

The last tip that I will share here that stood out to me is tip #28 Gratitude Is Attitude. When you carry a grateful attitude into your life there is more positive energy to keep you moving forward. Think over each day what you are thankful for in your life and you will see it makes a difference in your outlook for the day.

Her other tips are just as helpful as these 5 but I want to keep you in suspense to look for a copy of the book through Laura’s website or by request at your local library. As you move through your life journey for the best inspiring life keep looking for new ideas to inspire you on your journey.

Reflection: Of the 5 tips from Laura’s book I shared which one stood out to you? What are 3 personal ideas you use to inspire yourself in your day to day life?

Insights in Turning Your World Right Side Up

There are many times in our lives where our journey feels upside down. Depression, grief, random difficulties drop into our lives making us feel despair and gloom. How can we move back to a flourishing happy life during these dry patches? I came across a book recently that provides helpful tips and encouraging challenges to move towards turning our world right side up. That book is The Sky Is Green And The Grass Is Blue by Deb Scott.

From her website it is seen that Deb Scott helps people transform their lives by combining her unique practical business, training and leadership experience as a successful professional, with her passion to help people be the best person they were created to be. Her website is www.debscott.com where you can find out more about her, her books and radio program.

What I like about her book is she shares from the difficulties in her life and brings out examples of pains and struggles we all face. She then offers a variety of tips and ideas to help the reader move from pain to promise and hope. One of my favorite tips that I want to share with you is an exercise that helps you look at your personal strengths that you can be thankful for by relating positive words to the letters of your name. This is from page 9 in her book: “Write down each letter in your first name and think of something you are grateful for about yourself right now, in this present moment; something about you, something you have, someone you have in your life. It could be any person, place or thing.” She uses her name in the book for an example. I have tried it with my first name for an example here:
F Faithful to those I love and my values.
R Resiliently moving forward with God’s dreams for me.
A Academic in my desire to grow in critical and creative thinking.
N Nourishing personal growth in self and others.
K Kindly seeks to care for students and patients in my career field as Professor and Counselor.

(I found this helpful website to look for positive words with the letters of your name - http://positivewordsresearch.com/positive-words-that-start-with-letters-from-a-to-z/ ) Give it a try with your name and make a poster to place in a place where it can be a reminder for you.

Deb encourages the reader to make her ideas personal for their life journey. She doesn’t try to fit all people into the same cookie cutter of “do these few things for personal happiness”. She understands we each are unique creations by God and each our on our own journey. That style struck a chord with me as that is what I try to do with my book, Living More Than OK. We each have our own personal calling to follow. Not all ideas work the same so we need to be open to the ideas that work for us in our unique circumstance.

As a professional Counselor I appreciated her chapter on Professional Guidance Therapists and Coaches. Many self-help books are not honest in facing the realities of the difficulties in life. Some authors write like “read my book and all your problems will turn into beautiful butterflies”. That is not realistic and actually provides a disservice to the genre of self-help books. Self-help books can be helpful tools for self-improvement and providing tips in various areas of our lives but they are not a cure all for all problems. Deb reminds her readers to be open to seeking help from professionals. She does so in a manner to help break down the negative stereotypes we still see in the culture at large about seeking therapeutic help for mental and emotional problems.

I have just shared a couple of gems from the whole treasure chest of profitable ideas found in Deb Scott’s book. You will need to get a copy of her book to find more gems for what you are facing in your upside down life. She has many more exercises, lists of helpful web resources and other books that can be helpful. Don’t settle for an upside down life when you can live right side up. Feel free to post any comments about turning your life right side up.

Reflection – Are you going through an upside down time in your life? Try the little name exercise listed above to refocus and the positives in your life. Be open to outside help from a professional if you are going through a major difficulty. Don’t let fear or pride stop you from seeing a Counselor or Coach in your area.

A Jazzy Look at Your Next Chapter

A few weeks back my wife and I enjoyed a Tom Braxton jazz concert at The Falls at La Cantera in San Antonio. We have enjoyed a number of the jazz concerts at La Cantera but this was special as he is one of our favorite musicians. I list him in my book, Living More Than OK, as he inspires creativity in his musicianship. We found a place to set our chairs for the outside concert right before the first song started.

Tom showcased a number of his songs of his new CD, The Next Chapter. Tom is such a personal musician in that on one song he went out into the crowd playing his sax as he walked through the crowd. We have heard him numerous times primarily at the Corpus Christi Jazz festival here in Texas. His musicianship is impeccable and creative. Between songs he is down to earth and friendly in relating to the audience. On his new CD each song is enjoyable but my favorites are The Next Chapter (the title song), It Is Well, and Sunrise on Malawi.

The song The Next Chapter, caused me to reflect over my life story. Here is the Youtube link to the song so you can take a listen to it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mbBDrbn03-A

We each on our life journey are writing a story with our choices, our interaction with people, and I believe our interaction with God. At different junctures in life we turn to a new chapter. As May and June are here many young people are ending high school and college chapters to begin new chapters. In my PhD in Psychology I am ending the coursework chapter and will begin soon the dissertation chapter. Each time we start a new job that is a new chapter in our life.

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How do we face the new next chapters that come our way? Too often we face them with fear and anxiety. That is because the unknown is often fearful. Sometimes people turn to alcohol or drugs to try to escape new next chapters. Tom Braxton’s song, The Next Chapter, on reflection of it points us to a positive way to face the next chapter we face. The tune is very upbeat and energetic. Think through how improved our lives could be, if we let go of the fear and approached each new day and each next chapter with a positive energy. We could be more excited about life and have more openness to new possibilities if we follow the energy of his song in our lives. We enjoy the journey when we appreciate the chapter we are presently living and look forward with anticipation to the next chapter.

Reflection: How is your present chapter going on your life journey? Are you moving into a next chapter of your life? What choices can you make to improve how the chapter goes in your life story?

Take a Risk and Dive In

In everyone’s life journey we face turning points where we need to make a choice. That choice always involves a risk to some level as we do not know the actual consequences to our choice. We can speculate and strategize but bottom line we do not know exactly what will happen until we take the risk to choose. Even not choosing is a risk as we may miss out on great opportunities or relationship developments by not choosing.

Part of risk taking is getting to the point where we take a leap of faith. We then dive into the water of our choice and experience the results of our choice. As I was thinking about the risks that are involved in our choosing process the song “Dive” by Steven Curtis Chapman. Take a few moments to watch the video and soak in the ideas found in the lyrics.

Dive by Steven Curtis Chapman (click on the title to see the video)

long-awaited rains have fallen hard upon the thirsty ground
and carved their way to where the wild and rushing river can be found
And like the rains I have been carried here to where the river flows, yeah
My heart is racin' and my knees are weak as I walk to the edge
I know there is no turning back once my feet have left the ledge
And in the rush I hear a voice, it's telling me it's time to
Take the leap of faith So here I go
I'm diving in I'm going deep In over my head I wanna be
Caught in the rush Lost in the flow In over my head I wanna go
The river's deep The river's wide The river's water is alive
So sink or swim I'm diving in I'm diving in

There is a supernatural power in this mighty river's flow
It can bring the dead to life, and it can fill an empty soul
And give a heart the only thing worth livin' and worth dyin' for, yeah
But we will never know the awesome power of the grace of God
Until we let ourselves get swept away into this holy flood
So if you'll take my hand, we'll close our eyes and count to three
And take the leap of faith Come on let's go

It is interesting to me that this song came to mind as in my one Psychology course this week I have been doing readings in Existential Psychologists Victor Frankl and Rollo May books. Their thoughts revolved around in our human journeys they state we seek meaning and through our personal beliefs we create significance by our choices. The song in its context is looking at risk in the spiritual life. Hearing the voice of God and diving in to follow His calling. The analogy of water relates well to the spiritual life. In the Old Testament the children of Israel pass through the Red Sea. In the New Testament Jesus speaks of rivers of living waters. From my Christian worldview the life of faith is a risk. To me the risk is worth it as Diving in provides meaning and purpose in understanding grace and the faith walk with God.

In the sense of looking at these lyrics from the general standpoint of risk the concepts can relate to any risks we face at turning points in our lives. When we are at a turning point in our life the feelings about our environment are like in a barren thirsty ground. The choices we face in those times are a risk that gives us that weak in the knees sense like is described at the song’s beginning. It is at that point we need to use our reason and weigh out the choice we need to make. I know the song speaks of the “leap of faith” but we have been created as reasoning beings so the risk options should be weighed first. Then the dive occurs when we make the choice. Our choice is the leap of faith as we fully can not calculate what the consequences will fully be. Our choices bring meaning to the next direction in our life journey. Whether spiritual or non-spiritual a picture of flowing down a river is an effective metaphor of our life experience after major choices in our lives. Often initially we feel like life is floating by as a rushing stream. Are you ready to dive into life?

Reflection:
Reflect over a turning point in your life. What was the risk or risks facing you lat the time? What choices did you make? How was the river ride at that point in your life? Moving into this New Year are there major choices to make? Have you considered diving deeper into the spiritual realm of life?

Looking Ahead Into Your 16 Life spheres

Part of moving into a new year, is looking back savoring the past direction and activities in our lives. This I have looked at over the past couple of weeks discussing the topic of savoring life. The other important aspect of a new year is the ability to start afresh in moving forward with new ideas, new goals, and new accomplishments on the journey forward. An important book that can help us with this is Creating Your Best Life by Caroline Adams Miller and Dr. Michael Frisch. Here they present research on the effectiveness of creating life lists for what we desire to accomplish in our lives.

Today I want to look near the end of the book where they bring up the idea of looking into 16 spheres that are vital to our life journey and then create goal lists of want we want for ourselves in these 16 areas.

The first sphere areas they look at are Purpose, Values & Spirituality. Our purpose is the overarching reason we see for our existence. Why has God placed you on this earth? Our values are those beliefs are the most important to us. Examine your spirituality -- what place does God have in your life. Or if you are a non-believer in God what brings meaning to your life? Personally, As a Christian spirituality is the driver of my purpose, and values for me in my life journey. The authors encourage creating a mission statement based on your purpose and values. As I have mentioned before, this can be written out as a short declaration like the U. S. Declaration of Independence. Or it can be written as a poem or some create a short mission statement like an advertising statement craft a mission statement for their life. The New Year is a profitable time to review a previous mission statement or create a new one for a new year. For new ideas on mission statements the authors suggest looking for examples on the internet. I found a helpful mission website to look at mission examples -- www.missionstatements.com .

The next sphere area they discuss is Family, Friends and Relationships. Those around us who touch our lives and the lives we touch are important to our New Year life journey. In today’s world sometime friends have taken the place of family as we are more scattered across the country. The important point is to look at your significant relationships and build a list of how you want to improve these relationships during the New Year. What goals and action steps can you create to improve this area of your life?

The spheres of the inner and outer self, is discussed next- Health, Self-esteem and Volunteering. Many New Year’s resolutions revolve around health in desiring to diet and exercise. The list and goal concept of looking at our health moves beyond a short wish spoken at midnight. Take time to write down what improvements you plan in the coming year in relation to your health. The self-esteem sphere is how we build our inner self of believing in our self and being proud of the skills and talents we have. It is that inner confidence that helps us be resilient in the face of the difficulties and changes that may face us in the New Year. Jot down a list of those skills and talents you have that you can make use of in new areas you want to challenge yourself in the New Year. The volunteering sphere relates to the fact that we do not develop ourselves for selfishness. We need to focus on relationships but with volunteering it may be not in close relationships but giving of time and personal talents to needs in your church or a community cause you are interested in. In today’s world there are so many volunteer opportunities. Check with your local church or local chamber of commerce for service opportunities. Do a brainstorming list of ways you can volunteer some of your time or resources in this new year.

These next spheres bring deeper level of fulfillment to our lives --Play , creativity, and learning. By play the authors do not mean sitting in front of the tv. Make a list of activities you enjoy and make a list of potential vacation, and weekend getaways to bring fun into your life. Think of play as active in creating your play lists for the year. Creativity. I am a big believer in creativity as it brings depth in to our existence. Place on your list the scheduling of quiet time in your life to contemplate new ways to be creative. Search on the internet sites that will help you look outside the box on creativity. As to learning, life long learning will keep the mind sharp. Create a list of books you wish to read, Think about taking a class at the local college or take an online class.

The spheres of Money, work and retirement relate to the practical side of earning a living and what are your plans in your retirement years. It is never too early to begin dreaming of that time in your life. In your list in these areas think how can you make the best use of the money resources you have. You don’t have to be a stingy miser but living simpler provides you with more funds to enjoy your retirement years better? What of your work? In your lists can you come up with ideas to turn your job in to a calling? Rate areas of your work and find which areas you thrive in and enjoy; and then areas of struggle to improve in during the year.

Their final section of spheres relate to surroundings – Home, Neighborhood, and Community. Make a list in this area and think first of improvements you desire in your home. This can be physical improvements or values of new traditions you desire to create. In your neighborhood, are there neighbors you would like to get to know. In the news recently there was a tragedy and a person mentioned they had lived next door for years and never even learned the last name of who lived beside them. Sad to say that is the norm. Then with the community this reflects back to the volunteering sphere. Are you involved in a local church or synagogue in your community? Are there ways you can be involved in the community such as literacy projects, community clean ups? Add these to your list for the year.

In the coming year we will delve more into the specific sphere areas and other topics for you to be living more than ok in the New Year. In these first few weeks of the New Year think over which sphere areas do your need more improvement in your life.

Reflection: Take some quiet time to reflect on your life in these 16 spheres. Make a list of what you want for yourself in the 16 spheres. Then prioritize which of the spheres are most important to you at this point in time.

The Career Journey: Openness to Happenstance and God Moments

On our career journey, I mentioned earlier that career assessments can open up career possibilities for individuals to think over. Another aspect to look at in our career journey is happenstance in our lives. These are the chance events that pop into our lives. These events have an effect in our careers and life in general. Some consider happenstance as luck or circumstances. Coming at life from my Christian worldview, I see a Creator God guiding life rather than random chance so I view happenstance occurrences as God moments. His special intervention in our lives.

I count it a privilege to have attended a few years ago a training by Dr. John Krumboltz and Dr. Al Levin about Happenstance which was based on their book Luck Is No Accident. I appreciated their thinking that Career Counselors need to have a whole life focus instead of just looking at finding life fulfillment in just a career. Events that come into our lives shape the direction we move in career and our overall life journey. I highly recommend this book if you are exploring career and life fulfillment. Their thoughts helped me to view our life journey as the Beatles song says The Long and Winding Road instead of a straight direct line.

As I read through their book and considered their Happenstance Learning Theory I applied it to my career life journey. What we think we will do in our high school years can vary widely as we react to life events. Drs. Krumboltz and Levin point out that our careers and lives are not a result of just pure chance happenstance. It is the choices we make in response to those events. That is an important factor to consider. As I look at my life, I see turning points of happenstance in the timeline of my life.

For example in my junior high school years in Ohio, I had a high respect for the pastor at my local church. Having grown up in a single parent home I looked up to him as a role model. So in High School I decided I would go to Bible College and be a pastor of a church. Then in my senior year a new pastor took charge who was a real jerk, was abusive to people, and had an affair with the secretary of the church so I became disillusioned. In my disillusionment I looked at my high school career test results. The results listed careers of minister but also engineering. So in my disillusionment I chose engineering. During the first year of college I realized by working with a career counselor I had deeper Social leanings in my career choices and I should not let one poor example of a pastor disturb my move in that direction. So I moved first back home and worked a while at a factory to sort out where to go to school. I selected a Bible College in Chicago where a couple of my friends attended.

After my Bachelors degree in Bible at Moody Bible Institute I went on for a Master of Divinity degree at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School also in the Chicago area. By then I had an interest in Counseling so I took that emphasis in my degree. You would think I would then move into a religious ministry position but that did not happen. Some life events occurred to move me into a job with a Publishing company in the Chicago Suburbs. It was a lower level position keeping track of returned books from bookstores and schools. Being a booklover I thought this may be an opportunity to move into the publishing world. I noticed in my work there, in my small office at the back of the building, workers from various departments would stop by and many would vent their frustrations concerning their lives to me. Especially after a few years as the company was bought out by another company; stress levels rose at work so even higher level managers would come by and they would apologize for “venting”. I would reply “don’t worry everyone does – I’m the company shrink back here”.

At this time I was also doing volunteer work with a Korean minister who was working with college students from different cultural backgrounds. I found I enjoyed tutoring and counseling the students on their life plans. As the publishing company spiraled out of control from the corporate buyout; and I had two deaths in my family, my mother and oldest brother -- I moved into a customer service job at a local suburban corporation. For the next two years I worked customer service in phone order departments. Definitely not my dream job of high school days but it paid the bills. During that time I kept volunteering with the Korean minister as I enjoyed helping the college students. This is when I met my future wife, Susie at one of his meetings. After a year of having met her, she needed to move from Chicago, IL to Texas to pursue her Pharmacy career

As she moved to Texas I had a decision to make -- do I follow her to Texas or just stay in Chicago? Continuing to think about Happenstance or God Moments, (in my high school days I would never have envisioned this choice). I had no desire ever to move to Texas as I did not care for cowboys or the Wild West. Some of my friends echoed that thinking. Other friends of mine told me to look at my life. If I really loved Sook , (as Susie is known in Chicago), I would take the risk and move to Brownsville. It was also pointed out to me that I really did not enjoy my work in Customer Service. So I took the risk and moved.

My move was to Brownsville, TX the southernmost tip of Texas. I landed work in Real Estate while I looked for other types of work as well. With my lack of Spanish skills it was difficult to find other work. I thought back to my volunteer work with college students in Chicago and thought working at a university would be fulfilling. I eventually landed a job as a Student Success Advisor at a Technical College in the area. By then I had married Susie and she encouraged me to go back to school, as I had always wanted to finish a Masters in Counseling. I finished that degree at the University of Texas at Brownsville. After working 5 years at the College, a Career Counseling position opened at UTB so I applied and got the job. This is a job that I am thankful for being a part in opening students’ minds to their possibilities for their futures. But it is miles apart from what I thought I would be doing when I graduated from High School.

As I look over my life and think of the Happenstance Theory I see the life events that I had not planned nor envisioned in my high school life: living in Chicago, working at a Publisher where co-workers would turn to me for their “Venting”, my mother and brother’s death, the stress of the company spinning out of control , meeting the Korean minister through a musician friend where I gained a passion for working with University students, meeting my wife at a Korean church, moving to Texas. All events I did not plan on, but the choices I made concerning them helped shape the present I am enjoying now. Some events were stressful others joyful but looking back I can see them as God Moments, of molding events in my life and career journey.

Take time to look back over your life journey. What are the unplanned events that entered your life to bring you where you are today? Take some time to write your life journey down and reflect over the choices you made in the various turning points in your life. Be thankful for your life journey.