Let go and make a wish!

My personal guide to transforming your life and those of others 

Emotional competence can transform businesses into leading brands. In times of political, ecological and social transformation, the biggest transformation ahead of us is how we deal with our fears, emotions and our vulnerability. The western world needs leaders, like yourself, who can deal with their own fears, emotions and their own vulnerability. The most successful leaders are those who can act with the highest emotional integrity, with empathy and leadership capabilities to inspire, motivate and engage their teams, their customers, suppliers and stakeholders.

Silence is gold

Over the past few months, I have made a conscious decision to stay a little quieter than usual. The reason being, that this has been a transformational time in my life both personally and professionally. For the last three and a half years I have dedicated time and energy in preparing for this to happen. I have trained my mind, connected to my heart, listened to my soul and explored new opportunities. To identify and develop my personal and professional potential, I had to make the conscious decision to stay focused and dedicated. I have worked on myself day by day, hour by hour, minute by minute. On one hand, it has been a truly painful process. I have cried more tears in the past 42 months than ever in my life. I have experienced physical pain and oddly inexplicable physical symptoms. I have felt heartache, embarrassment, devastating failure and came to the point where I simply wanted to give up. I felt depressed and hopeless. Why has it been such a painful journey? It simply has been a process to let go of my old life, including patterns of belief and structures that I have built around my way of thinking. It was time to kick myself to get out of my 41-year-old comfort zone.

On the other hand, I have gained a new life filled with love, and I feel deeply connected to my heart and soul. I did this by staying focused on living to my highest potential in life (personally and professionally). I am surrounded by an environment that excites and inspires me day by day. I am truly passionate about what I do and the people I enjoy life and work with. I have surrounded myself with people whom I inspire, challenge, care for and trust, and vice versa. My environment encourages and supports me to be the best version of myself.

My life allows me to live my true potential – to inspire others and to support them to live their highest potential both personally and professionally. 

This Christmas I would love to give the gift of sharing with you how I personally let go and made space for good things to enter my life. It is a process that is simple but has been part of my personal transformation over the last three and a half years. Everyone has their own way of going through change. It’s my intention to inspire you with my own journey. If only one person feels inspired by this article, it was worth sharing my experience. This article should be an inspiration for you to live a life filled with health, happiness, financial freedom and success (which is unique to you) personally and professionally. That’s my personal wish for you this Christmas for the New Year to come.

My personal step-by-step guide to making space and invite magic moments into your life

Now, at the end of the year, I am taking the time to let go of what has served me in 2019 and to wish for the good things to unfold in the New Year 2020. This process helps me to discover the magic in my life, to walk through life with excitement and curiosity and to listen to my intuition. This process allows me to connect to my talents, my skills and to unfold my potential. 

“We have to listen to the child we once were, the child who still exists inside us. That child understands magic moments.”

- Paulo Coelho

My 3 step process to make your wishes come true 

1. Reflect with the power of meditation 

A lot of people tell me that they can’t meditate because their mind does not shut-up. When my mind is busy with thoughts, I have learnt that this is totally normal. My mind is simply answering the questions, which I subconsciously ask myself. 95% of the questions are sub-consciously the same, every day. I have created powerful experiences by simply asking myself one question every day “How do you feel, Michaela?”. I then just sit with patience and see how my body reacts, how my breath starts to become more shallow or deep. Sometimes I get hot flashes and feel angry, upset, sad. Sometimes I have a smile on my face or start laughing.

2. The act of letting go 

I believe that everything I experience in my life serves my path. My emotions show me where my challenges and opportunities lie. The act of letting go of what does not serve me anymore is an important process to make space for new experiences to enter my life.

One simple tool that I use regularly is to thank for everything that has served me. I say for example, “Thank you for allowing me to experience the fear that I had whilst preparing to speak in front of 100 people. It made me identify how much joy it brings me to share my knowledge, to engage with a large audience. It made me realise how talented I am to inspire others and transform people's lives”. Through gratitude, I tell my subconscious that an old chapter has closed, and I am ready to open a new one! I write down my thoughts and emotions, then burn this sheet of paper as a physical confirmation of my decision to let go.

3. Make a wish 

Making a wish allows me to use my imagination. To visualise how my life unfolds when my wish will come true, makes me feel the excitement, happiness, joy and love before it has even happened. Making a wish also requires good intentions and trust in life that what happens is meant to be. Any doubts will sabotage the realisation of my wish.

Why is the process of reflecting, letting go and wishing so important for you personally and for your role as a leader? 

Emotional competence can transform businesses into leading brands. Emotional competence is a unique selling proposition for any organisation. It transforms your brand, business and teams and positively influences your customer's purchase behaviour. It delivers outstanding social, financial and emotional rewards. Emotional competence takes you outside of the rat race to achieve your business goals on your own. Emotional competence gives you the freedom to achieve your goals with joy. It allows you to be passionate and live your values. You can enjoy the journey of transformation and change and the process of getting there with exceptional people – your customers, your team, your suppliers and your stakeholders.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year 

My personal process of letting go and making a wish allows me to leave my logical and rational thinking (the left side of the brain) for a moment and to connect to my intuition and my emotions (the right side of the brain). Magic can only happen when I follow my heart and my passion. 

This weekend I will gift myself with two days out of my schedule to let go and to make my wishes for next year. I have rented a room in a simple chalet in the mountains of Tyrol; living a simple life without any western luxuries. Being close to nature grounds me, and eliminating distractions helps me to connect quicker and deeper to myself. It eases the process of letting go and making new wishes. I will set the scene for the magic to unfold in 2020.

In the new year, I will share more about the transformation in my life, how you can be part of it and benefit from this new path that opens up – personally and professionally.

Michaela Christine Wolf is Consultant, Coach, Connector and Founder of Michaela Christine Wolf, a London based Luxury Marketing Consultancy. With her 20+ years of experience in retail, e-commerce and wholesale, Michaela transforms businesses into leading brads.

Michaela is specialised in developing and positioning unique brands, based on a profitable and successful business model.

Her unique communications approach, makes her an expert in acquiring, retainin and re-activating luxury consumers - from customer-centric research, strategy, planning to execution and controlling results. Team training, personal development and coaching have been an important part of her work to managing change in organisations. 

In the last 6+ years Michaela has been consulting for 30+brands including luxury & lifestyle brands such as Wedgwood, Rituals Cosmetics, Georg Jensen, Temperley London, Roksanda and Vienna Tourist Board.