The Only Person You Can Change Is You

Do you ever find yourself exhausted, irritated, and resentful when a person in your life won’t start or stop certain behavior? Maybe they don’t take care of themselves as you think they should or they won’t stop a habit you think is negative. Maybe you want them to study more, drink less, exercise more, be happier, be more punctual, focus better, work less, be less angry, be less critical, parent differently, or relax more. Behavior of others that is not aligned with your life approach can create significant discomfort and can feel annoying or even infuriating.

How do you respond to difficult behavior? Common approaches include passive aggressive remarks, nagging, withdrawing, or saying mean things. While these strategies give a momentary sense of taking action, none produce meaningful change. Often, your desire for change comes from a positive desire for the person to have a good life. Other times, the desire for change is motivated by you believing your way is the right way and everyone else should just get on board. Regardless of the motivation, you can’t change other people. Period. Science and years of experience reveal humans change when the discomfort of their current behavior outweighs the inherent discomfort of change. 

Change is an internal job. People change when they decide they are willing to do the uncomfortable and unfamiliar work of trying something new even when it is hard. No amount of external pressure from you has the power to motivate change in another. While hard to accept, it is incredibly freeing to realize it has never been and will never be your job to get someone else to change. You can invest the energy you’ve been putting into changing others into your internal work of change and growth. So, how do you shift from trying to change others to engaging personal growth?

12 Ways to Engage Personal Growth and Stop Trying to Change Others

1. Notice. Notice frustrated, irritated, annoyed, angry, resentful energy you are feeling toward someone. Notice where you feel it in your body. Try being curious about the origin of the feelings. Notice patterns of irritated feelings and how they relate to a pattern of behavior in the other person.

2. Admit. Ask yourself if you are trying to control or change someone else’s behavior. Am I trying to get someone to start or stop a behavior? If the answer is yes, admit to yourself you are trying to control something you can’t control. 

3. Remind. Remind yourself despite your best desires and efforts, you have never and will never have the power to change another person. 

4. Rest. Rest into the reality and freedom of not being responsible for changing others. 

5. Decide. Decide how you will respond to difficult behavior. You are in charge of your response despite the behavior of someone else.

6. Discover. Look inside yourself to discover the deeper reasons the behavior is bothering you. Do you have historical wounds around the behavior? Is the behavior a barrier to connection in your relationship? Does the behavior scare you? Does feeling out of control create feelings of insecurity for you? Do you hold a belief that bad things will happen if others don’t do things the way you do?

7. Sort. Sort whether the difficult behavior is something you can let go. Every behavior does not need to change. Sometimes making space for the other person to be different than you without judgement is most helpful. If you determine the behavior is truly causing problems, reach for directness rather than nagging.

8. Communicate. If you’ve identified the behavior as a true problem, calmly and directly communicate your concerns. Try going light on judgement and asking curious questions to understand the other person’s perspective about the behavior.

9. Boundaries. Decide what you will do or not do if the behavior continues long-term. Follow through on boundaries over time. 

10. Model. Model healthy behavior in your interactions with the other person. If you are asking them to relax more, prioritize relaxing. Try modeling with a joyful attitude rather than one of judgement.

11. Encourage. Verbally acknowledge positive change the other person makes regarding the difficult behavior.

12. Accept. If the other person chooses not to change the behavior, accept their choice. You can’t make them choose differently. Instead, focus on how you will interact in the relationship.

Accepting you can’t change anyone but yourself is uncomfortable but freeing. Lean into the freedom and be gracious with yourself and others as you navigate letting go of trying to change others. Connect with us for counseling and coaching along your journey at Journeybravely.com.

Stephenie is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with 20 years experience specializing in emotional/relational health counseling. Stephenie loves hearing others’ stories and helping people find new perspective that produces peace, healing, and connection through individual counseling. Stephenie provides treatment for adults, teenagers, and families with anxiety symptoms, parenting struggles, teen issues, depression, grief, divorce, and other life transitions. Realizing your life is out of balance and ready to schedule your initial counseling session? Connect here for information about counseling Stephenie provides and get your initial therapy session scheduled.

You Can’t Know Until You Know

Our oldest son walked away from us and into his dorm just before we headed out of town after the first college move in. The symbolic moment of him walking away from his childhood and into his adulthood wasn’t lost on me and brought some tears. Now we begin the redefining of a new version of life and relationship as we navigate simultaneous joy, gratitude, grief, pride and excitement. 

Many parents have gone before us launching kids. We listened, cared, and expressed compassion. However, without having walked the road ourselves, we didn’t deeply understand that particular experience. We couldn’t know until we knew. Now we see this family transition with new eyes, fresh emotions, and have a deeper empathy to offer those who come after us. We will send a thoughtful text, take a mom for lunch, tell a Dad he might feel sadder than he is expecting, give longer hugs, and check on people weeks after the move in. 

While pain isn’t unique to the human experience, we all walk through different brands of pain at different moments. Your pain is your own and needs its own space to be felt and processed. And, your pain journey can also be an invitation to care for others with similar pain in uniquely empathic ways. If you’ve walked through divorce, you understand what those walking through divorce might be feeling and needing. If you’ve walked through Cancer diagnosis, you understand what those walking through Cancer might be feeling and needing. 

So, how do you use your experience to extend care and empathy to others walking a similar road to the one you’ve walked?

10 Ways to Care for Others from Your Experience:

1. Give your personal pain space. Take the time to understand your experience, feel your feelings, and reflect on what you’re learning. Seek support as you process your pain.

2. Notice the pain of others. Be aware and curious about pain others might be experiencing. Extend compassion broadly to others while noticing when a person’s pain might align more closely to something you’ve experienced.

3. Remember your experience. Remember how you felt in your body and thoughts in the midst of pain. What did you need? What would have helped you feel seen and cared for? Explore remembering your pain as a brainstorm while also being mindful that each person may have different needs.

4. Listen with validation. Ask curious, open ended questions. How are you feeling lately? What is this like for you on the inside? How are you navigating this transition emotionally? Then remind the person their feelings are normal. I understand why you’re feeling sad, this is really sad.

5. Ask how you can support them. Sometimes people aren’t quite sure what they need but other times they can tell you clearly. Remember to ask.

6. Offer encouraging words. Send a card, text or call letting them know you are thinking about them and care about their experience. 

7. Offer practical gestures. Deliver dinner, take them to coffee, take them a basket of snacks, provide house cleaning services.

8. Offer kindness. Send flowers, a thoughtful item through the mail, leave something thoughtful on their porch.

9. Offer your presence. Offer a hug, to sit with someone and listen, invite them on a walk, or offer to do something they enjoy.

10. Follow up. Put reminders in your calendar and/or reach out to check in when you think of the person consistently over time.

Your understanding and empathy can be a meaningful gift to someone else walking through hard things. Remember the care you offer is for the other person and not to fill a need in yourself to provide care. And, at the same time, providing empathic care to others does often result in deeper healing within you. Connect with us along your journey for counseling and coaching at Journeybravely.com.

Stephenie is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with 20 years experience specializing in emotional/relational health counseling. Stephenie loves hearing others’ stories and helping people find new perspective that produces peace, healing, and connection through individual counseling. Stephenie provides treatment for adults, teenagers, and families with anxiety symptoms, parenting struggles, teen issues, depression, grief, divorce, and other life transitions. Realizing your life is out of balance and ready to schedule your initial counseling session? Connect here for information about counseling Stephenie provides and get your initial therapy session scheduled.

What do you want, really?

You’re back to a new year with resolutions to overhaul areas of life. Maybe you’re back to the gym or back to morning practices or back to church, crossing your fingers you can keep it going longer than last year. 

While the idea of positive life change is helpful, resolutions are often missing a key ingredient to make them truly life impacting. Why does the resolution matter? Why are you trying to change? Are you changing because someone judged you, you don’t feel enough, you’re jealous of someone else? Are you changing because you have something to prove, you want better photos to post, you’re seeking approval? Judgement, shame, and approval seeking will only drive change for short periods of time. If you want long-term life change, it’s time to ask a different question.

What do you want, really?

When you get to the end of life and reflect back on how you lived, what you made important, how you invested your energy, what do you want to be true about the person you’ve been and the way you lived your life? What do you want, really?

8 Steps to Figure Out What You Want, Really

1. Ask yourself what you want, really. Brainstorm what you want. “I want to double my current income.”

2. Ask yourself, “What will that get you?” What will doubling your income get you? It will give me more freedom for family vacations. What will more family vacations get you? More vacations will give me more time with my family. What will more time with your family get you? More time with family will help me know what’s going on with my kids beyond grades and activities. And what will knowing what’s going on with your kids more get you? It will get me more authentic, connected relationship with them so they know I really want to know them. 

3. Follow the “What will that get you?” question to the deeper desires and values. Name your desires and values. What I want really is to have authentic, connected relationship with my kids and for them to know I really want to know them. 

4. Clarify what you want, really. So, it’s not really that I want to double my income (while that would be nice), what I really want is deeper, more connected relationships in my family.

5. Orient your priorities and choices toward what you really want. Try using reminders in your phone and post it notes for several weeks to remember your value/desire. How am I scheduling my time this week to prioritize more meaningful connection with my family? How are we considering family connection when we sign up for family activities? How am I putting boundaries around my phone time to prioritize family connection? How am I showing up in conversations with my family this week? What will I choose to say no to so I can say yes to what I really want?

6. Determine how you will measure your progress at the end of 2025. How will you know if you have engaged in more authentic, connected relationships with your kids and shown that you really want to know them? I will know based on how much they share about their lives outside of grades/sport. I will know based on average face to face time spent talking or having fun together each week. I will know based on how affectionate we are or how much we laugh together. 

7. Celebrate progress or evaluate lack of progress. If you made progress in living toward what you want, enjoy and continue to lean into change. If you don’t see the progress you were hoping for, identify the one thing that prevented progress the most. Distraction with work on my phone during family time was the one thing that prevented progress the most. 

8. Determine the one thing you can commit to that will most likely move you toward what you really want. I will create a phone/email boundary from 5-9 so I can be more present with family in the evenings.

Approaching personal growth from your deeper values drives long-term change much more effectively than trying to live up to an external standard. Remember that orienting your life habits to your values takes time and commitment and is very worth the work. Connect with us along your journey for counseling and coaching at Journeybravely.com.

Stephenie is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with 20 years experience specializing in emotional/relational health counseling. Stephenie loves hearing others’ stories and helping people find new perspective that produces peace, healing, and connection through individual counseling. Stephenie provides treatment for adults, teenagers, and families with anxiety symptoms, parenting struggles, teen issues, depression, grief, divorce, and other life transitions. Realizing your life is out of balance and ready to schedule your initial counseling session? Connect here for information about counseling Stephenie provides and get your initial therapy session scheduled.

Investing Relationship Energy Strategically

Have you ever done something kind for someone you value to then feel like it went largely unnoticed? Do you feel frustrated when you spend time and energy investing in a relationship to feel like the other person doesn’t really see or appreciate your investment? Doing thoughtful things for your loved ones matters, however, the human instinct, most often, is to do for others what you would like someone to do for you. And, while that approach works sometimes, often the other person in the relationship feels most loved and seen in ways that might be different than what helps you feel loved and seen. 

Maybe you are spending energy cleaning your child’s room and packing time consuming lunches when what really makes your child feel seen and loved is playing a game with you. Maybe you are spending energy buying something for your partner when what really makes them feel seen or loved is time and meaningful conversation. Maybe you are spending energy planning a party for a friend when what makes them feel most loved is spontaneous lunch with you. 

Investing energy in relationships unintentionally can create frustration, confusion, and disconnection over time as both parties can end up feeling unseen. So, how do you figure out how to invest energy in your relationships strategically so your effort is landing in a way that feels meaningful to the other person? And, how do you learn to communicate your needs clearly to others so they can invest energy strategically in their relationship with you?

7 Ways to Invest Relationship Energy Strategically

1. Let go of mind reading. Mind reading is a myth. Culture has sold you a false idea that mind reading equals love. No one can read your mind and you can’t read theirs. And, that’s perfectly okay. Let go of expecting yourself or others to read minds when it comes to what makes you or them feel seen and loved. 

2. Reflect on what makes you feel seen and loved. Notice what makes you feel valued, connected, deeply seen and known. Do you feel most seen with side by side time together, meaningful conversation, acts of service, physical touch, encouraging words, gifts, surprises? Notice that what makes you feel seen works for you but is not necessarily the same for others.

3. Ask the other person what makes them feel seen and loved. Be curious and take notes. Remember, your way of feeling seen is not the right way, it’s just your way. Let the other person have space to need and want what feels best and most connecting to them in the relationship.

4. Make adjustments in your approach. Make consistent and meaningful efforts to spend more energy on what helps the other person feel seen and loved and less energy on things that do not matter as much to them.

5. Tell people what you need. Communicate clearly what helps you feel seen and connected in your relationships. Remember that communicating what you want and need does not take away from the value when the other person gives you what you’re asking for. Being clear about your needs makes you more likely to get what you need and to feel connected in your relationships. Instead of hoping someone reads your mind about wanting a nice dinner for your birthday, tell them a nice dinner would make you feel loved. 

6. Give and notice positive feedback. When your friend does something that felt meaningful, tell them directly what it meant to you. When your family member tells you the focused time you spent with them was meaningful, take mental note and prioritize spending focused time with them.

7. Initiate check in conversations periodically. Try directly discussing connection in your relationships. Ask the other person how it’s going for them? Don’t judge their response. Share your connection needs.

Spending your relationship energy strategically feels better and much less frustrating. Be patient with yourself and others as you learn. Connect with us along your journey for coaching and counseling at Journeybravely.com.

Stephenie is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with 20 years experience specializing in emotional/relational health counseling. Stephenie loves hearing others’ stories and helping people find new perspective that produces peace, healing, and connection through individual counseling. Stephenie provides treatment for adults, teenagers, and families with anxiety symptoms, parenting struggles, teen issues, depression, grief, divorce, and other life transitions. Realizing your life is out of balance and ready to schedule your initial counseling session? Connect here for information about counseling Stephenie provides and get your initial therapy session scheduled.

Regret Avoidance vs. Living and Learning

I was a high school senior deciding between college in my home town or 5 hours away. I meticulously weighed the pros and cons and spun up scenarios of different directions my life might take if I didn’t choose the exact right university. The back and forth had a deadline and I eventually decided to leave my home town. Five years later, I was 1 year into a job, married, and moving forward in life when it hit me...it didn’t really matter which school I chose. Either way, I would have chosen the same career path, likely married the same person (since he was a childhood friend), and my life would have been good. Some things would have been different, but it all would have turned out okay.

Do you ever find yourself immobilized in decision making because you fear regret? Maybe you feel that every decision needs to be made perfectly in order for your life to progress well. Fear of regret can make it hard to choose a school, take a job, commit to a relationship, make a move, or plan a trip. Worrying that every decision might be the wrong decision can keep you from enjoying your life and creates a stuck feeling of anxiety. What if there was a way to flip the script in your head about every decision being a chance for failure and regret? What if every decision is an opportunity to live and learn, to grow and become wiser?

I talk with hundreds of humans each year about various life decisions. Over time, I have observed and embraced the reality that most decisions don’t have one right path. Most decisions have some flexibility and you could choose one of various options and still experience a positive outcome. Of course there are poor, unwise decisions and we all want to avoid those. But outside of that, most decisions aren’t permanent, can be adjusted if needed, and produce growth and learning. It’s possible to define a life well lived as one characterized by growth and learning rather than by a list of specific accomplishments. So, how do you shift from a regret avoidance approach to a living and learning approach to life?

5 Ways to Shift from Regret Avoidance to Living and Learning

1. Identify the decision at hand and notice any fear of regret thoughts surfacing in your mind and body. Name the fear of regret to yourself and gently release the thought rather than obsessing about worst case scenarios.

2. Brainstorm decision options. Notice that most of the time, multiple healthy decision options exist. Narrow your brainstorm down to the top 2 or 3 decision options that seemwise and in line with your values.

3. Remember your decision history. Remind yourself of times when decisions have been flexible and could be adjusted over time. Remind yourself of times when decisions have produced growth and learning that resulted in positive change in your life. Remindyourself of times when even decisions you would make differently now taught you something important you might not otherwise have learned. Try journaling using theabove reminders as prompts.

4. Watch for life’s lessons. As you make decisions, watch for opportunities to learn, to pivot, to embrace a new skill or character quality. When something doesn’t go like you planned, reach for the learning, notice the discomfort, then be open to growing. Our greatest times of personal growth tend to result from unexpected and hard circumstances.

5. Embrace the resulting freedom from letting go of fear of regret. Lean into the joy of knowing the vast majority of your decisions are able to shape you into a more mature and whole person if you don’t resist the process. Try creating an internal message like,“I’m going to make a wise decision based on the information I currently have. I will make adjustments as needed. I will embrace all the growth and learning from the decision I’m making and choose not to regret it.” It’s okay if regret emerges from time to time. Gently dismiss it and move forward with your new approach.

Stephenie is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with 20 years experience specializing in emotional/relational health counseling. Stephenie loves hearing others’ stories and helping people find new perspective that produces peace, healing, and connection through individual counseling. Stephenie provides treatment for adults, teenagers, and families with anxiety symptoms, parenting struggles, teen issues, depression, grief, divorce, and other life transitions. Realizing your life is out of balance and ready to schedule your initial counseling session? Connect here for information about counseling Stephenie provides and get your initial therapy session scheduled.

The Life Changing Shift from Victimhood to Empowerment

Ever find yourself feeling like life is happening to you and you have no control? Maybe a person did something that was unfair or hurtful. Maybe a storm disrupted your home or event. Maybe airlines canceled your flight. Maybe a health condition is making your life difficult. Living life inevitably results in discomfort. It can often feel like things are being done to you and you are a victim of people, your environment, or conditions you can’t control.

Human nature extends us a tempting invitation to see ourselves as victims because victimhood lets us off the hook for taking responsibility for what we can control and casts the blame onto someone or something else. For a moment, embracing victimhood can feel comforting because it keeps you from having to self-reflect or take meaningful action toward change. However, in the long-term, victimhood ends up creating helplessness, hopelessness, bitterness, and resentment.

In reality, life throws curve balls and there are many things outside our control. But, even when the curve balls come, there is a helpful alternative to seeing yourself as a victim. Regardless of what is happening in your environment, you have been granted the gift of self-control. When someone does something unkind and when hard things happen, you have a choice about how you will respond. You can slide into victimhood, blame others, feel helpless, harbor resentment. Or, you can acknowledge the pain of your situation and then shift toward using your self-control to decide how you’re going to show up in the given situation as a healthy version of yourself.

David Emerald writes about the shift from seeing yourself as a “victim” to seeing yourself as a “creator” in his book, The Power Of TED (I highly recommend the short read). Shifting to a creator mindset is accomplished by figuring out where your self-controlled power exists in any given situation and to take meaningful action toward what you’d like to be true that is within your control. Determining what healthy control you have and how you want to respond to people/circumstances creates empowerment. So, what are the practical ways to begin shifting from victim to creator?

6 Ways to Shift from Victimhood to Empowered Creator

1. Acknowledge the discomfort of a person, situation, or condition impacting you in ways you can’t control. For example, your friend betrays your trust. Admit to yourself this has happened, that it hurt you, and that it impacts trust in the relationship. Don’t skip the pain.

2. Sort what you can and can’t control. You can’t control your friend’s behavior, the weather, illness, traffic, etc. You can control or manage yourself, your thoughts, your feelings, your behavior, your responses.

3. Notice the invitation to victimhood. Notice feeling helpless, blaming, telling others your story of being wronged when you did nothing to deserve it, your internal story of life happening to you, your over focus on someone else’s bad behavior or negativity ofcircumstance rather than focus on what you can do.

4. Gently decline victimhood’s invitation. No thanks, victimhood. Yes, this situation is uncomfortable and there are some things here I can’t control, but, I’m going to figure outwhere I do have power and I’m going to use it.

5. Ask yourself, “What do I want to be true in this situation?” I want my friend to know their betrayal hurt me. I want to set a boundary to let them know I won’t continue thefriendship as it has previously existed without loyalty. I want to have friends I can trust.

6. Use the healthy self-control (not others control) you have to help create the reality you desire through meaningful action. Have the uncomfortable conversation with your friend. Change the closeness of the relationship if they continue to betray your trust. Explore deepening other relationships that feel more respectful.

Stepping from victimhood into a creator role is certainly work, however, the resulting empowerment is life-giving, healthy, and produces mature growth in yourself and your relationships.

Stephenie is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with 20 years experience specializing in emotional/relational health counseling. Stephenie loves hearing others’ stories and helping people find new perspective that produces peace, healing, and connection through individual counseling. Stephenie provides treatment for adults, teenagers, and families with anxiety symptoms, parenting struggles, teen issues, depression, grief, divorce, and other life transitions. Realizing your life is out of balance and ready to schedule your initial counseling session? Connect here for information about counseling Stephenie provides and get your initial therapy session scheduled.

You Are Ridiculously In Charge

I don’t remember most of my dreams, but I’ll never forget this one. In the dream I am in the third-row seat of a car traveling down a straight highway. I am content with my situation until I am suddenly aware that the car is on cruise control, and I am supposed to be in the driver’s seat! The rest of the dream is my struggle from the third row, over the second row of seats, and the center console to the driver’s seat. In the several months I had the dream, I am not sure I ever made it to the driver’s seat.

I had this recurring dream during a season of my life when I was living on autopilot. During this season, life felt more like something that was happening to me than a gift I got to live. I think all of us have had seasons, or days when we’ve felt like this. Maybe there are areas of your life right now that feel exactly like this. We weren’t given life to be a passive passenger in the back seat. In nearly all areas of life, including our relationships, our vocation, our health, our attitudes, and our personal growth we often have far more power than we think. The reality is, we are ridiculously in charge of the lives we’ve been given.

5 Ways to be ridiculously in charge of your life:

1. Let go of the need to be in control. If the last three years have taught us anything, it is that there are things outside our control. But even when we are not in control of everything happening in life, we are in charge of how we respond, our attitude and the actions we take in response to difficult people, circumstances and setbacks. Trying to control things outside of our control distracts us from the choices we can make. One of the great ironies of life is that we try to control what we can’t control and play victim to things we are in charge of.Be in charge: Make a list of things outside of your control and another list of things you can control. Be intentional throughout the day of focusing your energy on things you can control.

2. Acknowledge learned helplessness. There are many different reasons why we begin to feel helpless. Sometimes it’s because we are trying to control things outside of our control, so we begin to assume we have no agency in other areas of life. Sometimes this happens when we see what others have that we don’t (if I had their resources…, if I were as lucky..., if I were given the same opportunities..., if the world weren’t against me…, if I had more time…). This view of life may let us off the hook for responsibility, but it will rob our lives of meaning. Being ridiculously in charge means shifting from focusing energy on what is not possible to how you will find a way and taking the next step. Be in charge: In what areas of life have you learned helplessness? What one small step can you take forward?

3. Treat the past as a teacher not a master. The past becomes a master when we assume it is a predictor of the future. You do not have to be imprisoned by mistakes or failures in your past, and you do not have to repeat them. Allow those experiences to teach you, not define you. Today is a new day, a new chapter. What story do you want to tell? Be in charge: If you were to write the next chapter of your story, what would you title it?

4. Approach life as a possibility to be lived rather than a problem to be solved. The easiest way to get stuck in life is to focus on all the problems in life that need to be solved. When we do this, we start living life as a list of “should”; I should lose weight, I should read more, I should be a better spouse/parent, etc. Life soon becomes an obligation. When we shift our focus from the problem to the possibility, “should” becomes “can”; I can lose weight, I can read more, I can be a better spouse/parent. This approach to life is empowering invitation to live the life we want to live. Be in charge: What are your dreams? What do you want to be true?

5. Be intentional about yes and no. Being ridiculously in charge means we recognize the everyday choices we make are helping us move towards our desired outcome or they are not. This is true of both the active choices we make as well as the passive choices. And, because we are limited beings, every time we say “yes” to something we are saying “no” to something else. Be in charge: Once you identify what you want to be true in your life, make a list of things you need to start and a list of things you need to end.

If you would like to connect with us, you can find us at www.journeybravely.com.

Todd Craig has over 20 years experience having helpful coaching conversations with individuals, couples, and groups including 5 years experience of professional life and leadership coaching. He uses effective, strategic tools including the Birkman and Enneagram in his skill based coaching to help people move their stories and goals forward. To meet with Todd, connect here.

An Invitation to Dream

One of the most difficult seasons of my life were the two years I had hopes and dreams I was too scared to share with other people. The truth is, I wasn’t even brave enough to acknowledge them to myself. It was time to move from one chapter of life to the next, but I thought I didn’t know how I wanted to begin writing the next chapter. I kept talking myself out of the things that were stirring within me. However, when I got brave enough to acknowledge and share my dreams, amazing things began to happen. Life, relationships, and even work become adventures to be lived when you name your dreams and ambitions. When you are brave enough to do this, you take the first steps on an exciting journey of growth. Struggling on where to start?

6 Practices to Help Clarify Your Dreams

Focus on the potential, not the problem

The tendency to focus on the problems of life leads to anxious thoughts that anchor you to status quo thinking. When you allow yourself space to imagine the life you want to live, you begin to develop a passion and desire that can move you forward. As I’ve written before, one the most powerful and important questions to wrestle with is, “What do I want…. really?”

Postpone edits

The discipline of dreaming requires postponing edits. Many of us choose to live a limited lifebecause we edit chapters in our life story that haven’t been written yet. Focusing on potential and allowing ourselves to dream makes us vulnerable to disruption or disappointment. So, we prematurely edit our, what could be, magnificent stories in favor of a settled life.

Resist either/or thinking

We have been told ad nauseum, “you can’t have your cake and eat it too.” While this is true in some situations, there is a temptation to overapply this. As you imagine what is possible give yourself permission and hold yourself accountable to keeping a both/and mindset. Either/ or thinking comes from a scarcity mindset; there is only one cake. An abundance mindset allows both/and thinking, I can eat my cake and bake more.

Figure out what first…. how later

Don’t limit your future based on your current capabilities. It’s so tempting when you begin to imagine what is possible to quickly begin wondering how to make it happen. When you do this, you shut the door on imagining what is possible and shift to problem solving. You don’t have to know how to get there yet. If you already had the skills and knew how to get the outcome you wanted, you would have already done it. When you keep your attention focused on what you desire to be true, you will naturally begin gathering evidence of the behaviors and attitudes that lead you towards that vision or away from it. Getting clear on what you want will contribute, over time, to the clarity of how to get there. When focused on the problem you say, “I don’t know how.” When focused on the possibility you say, “I don’t know how…yet.”

Leverage What ifs

“What if” thinking can be a blessing or a curse entirely based on how you apply it. When you imagine “what if?” in a negative way you paralyze yourself with fear. What if I can’t? What if it fails? While these may be possibilities, so are the positive “what ifs”. What if I can? What if it all works out? The challenge here is to intentionally focus on the positive.

Be patient, enjoy the journey and make room for serendipity

Dreams shrink when they are rushed. If your vision is big, it will take time. Keep the view in front of you and take the next right step. You don’t have to have it all figured out. And, again, if your dream is big enough, you probably won’t have it all figured out. We tend to overestimate what we can accomplish in a short amount of time and grossly underestimate what is possible in the long term. Resist the temptation to shrink your dream to fit who you are today. Instead, allow yourself space and time to grow into your dream. Celebrate the steps you take along the way and enjoy those unexplainable moments of serendipity that happen along the way.

One of our great joys in working with people is to witness those moments of transformation when a lightbulb goes on and clients begin to imagine and believe what is possible. If you’d like to connect with support along your journey, connect with me here.

Todd Craig has over 20 years experience having helpful coaching conversations with individuals, couples, and groups including 5 years experience of professional life and leadership coaching. He uses effective, strategic tools including the Birkman and Enneagram in his skill based coaching to help people move their stories and goals forward. To meet with Todd, connect here.

What is This Time For?

There was a season of life where I reached the end of the day feeling I had been a slave to my to-do list. I was busy running from one task to the next. And, even when the days were as productive as they were busy, I often felt unfulfilled at the end of the day. Though things were getting done, there was no time to appreciate my accomplishments and tasks that were being accomplished were sometimes at the expense of being present with the people that matter most to me. I was overwhelmed, tired, and frustrated.

Time is one of our most precious gifts. Time is finite, we can’t “make time,” (even though we often use the phrase) we can only spend it. Additionally, we don’t get “do overs” with our time. So, we have developed and utilize tools to help us maximize our time including watches, calendars, alarm clocks, time management apps on our phones, to-do lists, and many others. Ironically, we can allow ourselves to be controlled by these tools, which are supposed to help us stay in control, at the expense of the very moments the tools were intended to help us maximize.

So how do we break out of this cycle? Here are three strategies that have been helpful for me and my clients:

1. Consider the different aspects of time. In our culture, we tend to think of time in a narrow and limited way. I often introduce my clients to the words the Greeks used to differentiate two ways they thought of time. The two words are chronos and kairos. The Greek word chronos is the easiest for us to understand because it aligns with the mostcommon way we refer to time. Chronos refers to the quantity of time. When we say, “It arrived at 3:07,” or “I am getting married in 18 days,” or “The cupcakes will be ready in 20 minutes,” weare talking about chronos time. Most of the tools we have for time management are built around maximizing time in a quantitative sense. The Greek word Kairos, however, refers to time in a qualitative sense. We tend to think about time in this way far less. However, when we say, “It showed up at just the right time” or “We knew it was time to get married” or “These cupcakes are taking forever” we are referring to kairos time. Our hectic schedules can challenge our efforts to maximize time in a qualitative sense. Of course, both understandings of time are important. A chronos understanding helps us recognize the limits of our time and the need to act so we can move our stories forward. And a kairos understanding helps us think beyond those limits so we move our stories forward with intentionality and meaning.

2. Slow down to speed up. With a Kairos understanding of time, we can begin to see that sometimes the most efficient thing we can do is slow down and take a breath before rushing to the next thing. When we do this, we let go of anxious mental energy in favor of focused mental energy. This also gives us space to exercise a third strategy.

3. Ask, “What is this time for?” When we are thinking about time with a chronos understanding, we will tend to ask questions like, “What do I have to do?”, “Where am I supposed to be?”, or “How long is this going to take?” In this sense, time is being spent and we can find ourselves looking towards what’s next. But, when we are thinking about time with a karios understanding, we might ask a question like, “What is this time for?” Asking this question can help us relax into the moment and consider taking in all the benefits the present moment has to offer. Asking, “What is this time for?” may save me from rushing to accomplish more tasks on my to-do list (quantitative) in favor of taking time to be fully present with my child who is asking for help with a school project or waiting to be tucked in at night (qualitative).

As you work toward making shifts in how you view time, we are here to support you in your journey.

Todd Craig has over 20 years experience having helpful coaching conversations with individuals, couples, and groups including 5 years experience of professional life and leadership coaching. He uses effective, strategic tools including the Birkman and Enneagram in his skill based coaching to help people move their stories and goals forward. To meet with Todd, connect here.

Kindness vs. Cancelling

You’re in the middle of a conversation and suddenly it becomes apparent the person you’re talking to holds a different opinion on an important topic. Maybe you start to worry if you share your thoughts, you’ll be judged or cancelled. Maybe you feel incensed the other person could possibly hold that opinion or belief and you feel tempted to judge, cancel, or shame them. Maybe you want to learn to hold the tension of differing views and values but you feel confused about how to be true to your values while not judging or shaming someone else.

Cancel culture regularly sacrifices kindness in the name of being right and holding others accountable. Cancel culture says for justice and rightness to prevail, people must be publicly shamed for holding independent beliefs that deviate from some moral majority. And when you’re part of the moral majority, cancelling others can feel justified. The problem is cancel culture is built on the false idea that shame creates true change. In reality, current shame research (read anything by Brene Brown for more on shame) tells us shame actually breeds insecurity, self-loathing and hopelessness. Shame may create a temporary, superficial, face-saving shift but results, long-term, in the opposite of healthy change. Ashamed people are highly likely to make poor choices that have negative, hurtful effects on themselves and others.

So, if you remove shame from your toolbox, what options do you have? Reflect on a time when you needed to learn something new. What was most effective in helping you move forward? Maybe someone said you were unintelligent and you needed to get it together. Maybe someone said you must be ignorant for not already knowing something. Was that helpful to you?  Or, maybe someone lovingly and kindly said you are a valuable person period. Maybe they directly and kindly shared a different perspective and allowed space for you to hold your value while also presenting a new possibility. Was that helpful to you? Kindness consistently moves people toward change more effectively than shame. And, kindness makes you feel better about yourself at the end of the day.

5 Ways to Practice Kindness Over Cancelling:

1.     Slow down and take a breath. Different opinions/values can create emotional overwhelm if you feel strongly about something. You may find yourself going into fight or flight and impulsively speaking words of shame. Try taking a few breaths and reminding yourself that someone else having a different value than you does not mean attack or shame are needed. Instead remember that both values can exist even if you disagree.

2.     Humanize the other person. Often when someone holds a different value, it’s tempting to begin viewing them as “other” and deserving of shame. Try remembering traits you like and appreciate about the person. Remind yourself they are a whole person with strengths and weaknesses and try not to define them by the one issue about which you disagree.

3.     Seek to validate. Validating means try to understand how the other person might believe or feel the way they do based on their history and experiences. You don’t have to agree. Instead, try to embrace and articulate to the other person that you can understand how they might see things the way they do even if it’s very different than how you see it. Validation reduces defensiveness and opens avenues for seeing the other person as valuable despite differences.

4.     Embrace humility. Try remembering that while you may hold your values to be very true and dear, you are not the absolute authority on truth. You can believe your values are right and true while also recognizing others can differ from you and still be worthwhile humans who may help you understand something new.

5.     Communicate directly and kindly. Share your thoughts and beliefs calmly, directly, and with a kind tone. Remember that your values/opinions can exist securely even when others don’t agree. 

Approaching others with kindness instead of cancelling creates opportunities for growth in yourself and others. Kindness brings more conversation, connection, and increased possibilities for change without the unnecessary negativity of shame. As you practice walking in kindness, connect with us for support along your journey at journeybravely.com.

Stephenie is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with 19 years experience specializing in emotional/relational health counseling. Stephenie loves hearing others’ stories and helping people find new perspective that produces peace, healing, and connection through individual counseling. Stephenie provides treatment for adults, teenagers, couples, and families with anxiety symptoms, parenting struggles, teen issues, depression, grief, divorce, and other life transitions. Realizing your life is out of balance and ready to schedule your initial counseling session? Connect here for information about counseling Stephenie provides and get your initial therapy session scheduled.