Coming to Terms With What You Have and Who You Are

In order to grow and to expand we must utilise what we already have. 

How, however, can we do this if we cannot see it? 

How can we see it, if we are not looking for it as we are so focused on pushing forward?

We must learn to become mindfully grateful.

In appreciating what we already have we will not only understand its value but we then become aware of how we can utilise it to help move us forward and achieve.

Gratefulness

It is not only important to be grateful for what we have, but also for who we are and who we have become.

With gratitude we also find stability and reassurance, it reminds us of how far we have come and how much potential we have to achieve. 

I find myself writing down the things I am grateful for, my home, my husband, my children, my family, my experiences. All things that when looked at with another perspective could potentially cause us stress and frustration. This goes back to always trying to have a positive outlook on life and its occurrences. There are many perception exercises you can do, for example if you show someone a picture of a chair a person with another perspective could see it as an alligator! (bit of a stretch on that one I know) The first seeing a useful picture and the second seeing something to be feared. Perception is an important aspect of life and if we come to life with a grateful perception regardless of the circumstance we will always see the good in everything.

One thing that is normally at the top of my list to be grateful for, is myself. I know this may sound haughty to someone carrying a different perspective however look at it like this, if at the slightest sense of difficulty or overwhelm we buckled and thought that we could not do anything to change the situation and that it was out of our control, how would we survive? Who would get us through? More so, who would support those around us that we have to hold up?

Recently I had a situation that made me doubt myself and who I was. I am used to having a firm ground with who I am as a person as I realise all I've been through and how far I've come. When this wavers however and doubt sets in it can be detrimental. As I was already looking within to draw out more of my true self for me and for you, I had an occurrence in my personal life which left me feeling out of control and as though the issue was with myself. After many days of deliberating and trying to find faults with myself (which I know is very unhealthy) I was left in a state of complete overwhelm and scrabbling to piece myself together. A few days later I realised that it was actually the event that had happened two weeks before that had left me feeling out of control as I was unable to find a solution to it, and because I was faced with a situation of not being able to speak up and voice my views for fear of succumbing to yet another loss in my life I resulted to looking inward for the problem.

I am a strong believer that every problem has a solution and it wasn't until a few days after someone external mentioned the actual problem I was facing in passing and I looked into it's solution that it dawned it on me, 'I had completely forgotten the actual problem and got lost in thinking there was an issue with my own self and abilities'. Once this had become apparent to me I felt as though a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders and I was left with the sheer exhaustion of the last few weeks that quickly resolved itself with rest and putting aside my commitments for a short while.

Although this was an extremely confusing time for me as it had been more than a good few years that I had been in a position where I couldn't easily pull myself out of a rut because of the personal growth and development I had undergone (and I assumed I would never have to do so again because of it), I can now reflect and clearly see that I am grateful for two aspects. One: I actually did learn a lot about myself during this time of insecurity and found out things that can now have a benefit in my life moving forward. Two: I am grateful for the ability to be grateful for myself and how far I have come and I now realise the importance of this as without it I have the potential to drown. Knowing yourself, your abilities and your strength of mind is essential and something I will never let go of again, nor should you!

Planning

As they say, 'If you fail to plan you plan to fail'!

Right, we have our vision (I hope you have been visualising it daily as the clearer you see it in your mind the more real it will become in reality!) which we have broken down into goals.

The next step is to create a plan, lets plan exactly 'how' we are going to do this, and might I add, start taking action on it straight away as I tell my clients, "Action, Action, Action!' nothing happens without it, otherwise a dream will remain a dream, remember nothing has to be perfect to start.

The difference between a goal and the plan is the 'how' for example, the goal is 'talking on various platforms to spread my message' or 'connecting with appropriate people in the field I am looking to venture into to make higher connections and be around the type of people and environments I am looking to walk in', what's the plan?

How specifically will you get this done? 'I will go to these particular networking events', 'I will reach out to these specific platforms (that I have researched) and request the opportunity to deliver on them or be interviewed by them' 'I will send out these particular requests and remember to do the appropriate follow up'. Etc. (That’s the plan!)

Remember in our first edition I mentioned that if you want better you must first 'become' better? This week I want you to think about who it is you are going to become in order to achieve your goals and create your vision. Think about the sort of person you need to be in detail, what would you be doing on a daily - weekly - monthly basis? This goes for your planning as well. What exactly do you need to do and how often? Start to create a routine in your mind and get it down on paper. Break down your goals further into practical action steps.

I am not telling you to draw up a list and jump in with no leeway, remember things take time to build up and I am the first to tell you I have tried this multiple times and to no avail.

What you must do is start to implement the easiest steps first gradually increasing them as you see fit. Along the way do what feels right for you, let it happen naturally. Don't overburden yourself with what you think are 'must do' tasks, nothing is a 'must', do what 'feels' right, drop what doesn't.

When something is easy for you and you enjoy it, that's how you know you are in alignment with it because it flows and when you can do something small that has a huge impact is when you have found the right thing that suits you! You'll be surprised how much natural ability we have as humans that we don't have to 'stress', 'rip our hair out', 'turn grey' or 'use force' to achieve! 

Look for your 'flow' because when you find it you will float along like a gentle breeze with the sun in your face and wonder how life has suddenly become so easy, everything seems to have already been accomplished and more and yet you still have so much time left over that you have to question if you've missed something.

This week, plan, pause, breath, do what feels right for you. Everything happens at the right time!

Next week we will go into Boundaries and Time Scheduling.

Your Confidante,

Your Guide,

Your Mentor,

Your Coach,

Larissa! 

Larissa Finn - Endless Possibilities 

larissafinn.com