Tag: choice

Building Healthy Relationships

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Our first November flakes of snow here in the midwest. As the weather starts to turn my thoughts are on warmth and connection. We talk a lot about the importance of self-care and awareness. But in addition to our relationships with ourselves it is important to also build healthy relationships with others. People who encourage us to be our best selves. Motivational speaker Jim Rohn believes that we become most like the five people we spend the most time with.

When we look at our circle of friends often we build relationships by proximity. The kids we went to school with, people we meet at the office, or neighborhood friends become our closest confidants. Building relationships based on physical proximity makes sense. Your coworkers or neighbors are most likely to be there when you need help. However we also want to practice the first rule of improv – yes and.

Yes, we want to build friendly relationships with the people who live and work nearest us. AND we want to build bonds with people who support us to be our best selves. With whom do you connect most deeply? When we surround ourselves with people who live nearby it’s important to asses if we share their opinions and values. When we spend time with people who don’t share our beliefs we may be tempted to, “Fit in.”

Finding people whose values we agree with and whose attitudes we admire may be challenging. But it is important to seek those relationships out so that we might become the best version of ourselves. We become our most authentic selves not by constantly having to prune back our opinions. We come our best selves by being surrounded by people who encourage us to dig deeper. Nourishing relationships fill our days with opportunities to enhance our lives and our interests rather than distract from them. We want to spend time with people who have our best interest at heart and who embrace and accept us exactly as we are. Within these relationships we find opportunities to grow and develop into the fullest, most beautiful and authentic versions of ourselves. 

If the relationships you are in do not meet these criteria, it may be time to consider where you last felt seen, valued, and supported. Then circle back to those people and relationships that felt the truest and best. Self-care is surrounding ourselves with loving people who encourage our growth and support us in our times of need. Give yourself the gift of being surrounded by nurturing connections and see how it transforms your life.

Choose Your Time Wisely

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Part of what makes life so precious is its fleeting nature. Life is temporary. This moment be it pleasant or dreadful is only a moment and in the blink of an eye it’s gone. We often believe that if we lived forever we would lack urgency. We might never tell others how important they are to us. Or delay challenging ourselves or trying new things because there would always be tomorrow. However time is one resource that is truly limited. Choose your time wisely.

I caught a clip from a film where a waitress charged a guest for their meal in years of their life. “That will be eight and a half weeks,” she scans his arm. “Take a week for yourself as well,” he adds, as a tip. It made me sick. It was a terrifying and cavalier prospect in my mind to trade our time for a lunch or service. And yet despite our current inability to add and subtract years of our life in exchange for goods and services, don’t we do that already? Simply with our choices or by virtue of our lifestyle? We add or subtract years of our life when we eat processed foods, smoke, or lead a sedentary lifestyle. We add them when we exercise or choose connection and mutually supportive relationships over unhealthy ones. 

Each of us has the opportunity to make a difference in our lives with the choices we make. When we think about those people who are important to us, those relationships we wish to nurture and develop, doesn’t it seem worthwhile to make the effort? When we choose to be present in the moment and invested in the people around us we unlock connection. Choosing not to be distracted is an act of rebellion. By engaging fully with those who are important to us we rebel against the the constructs of entertainment. We reject the advertisers and designers who strive to keep our attention locked and our pocketbooks open. 

When we distract ourselves with fruitless entertainments we cheat ourselves out of time. We believe, “it’s just minutes,” which seems to make the time feel expendable. I have a few minutes here to scroll, I’ll check my emails again. Time does not feel significant when it is stolen in scraps and small bits. And yet over a lifetime it adds up, those minutes become days, become weeks, become years. And all of that time is lost if we don’t make a point to invest it more wisely.

If we don’t cavalierly spend it on poor choices or mindless entertainment. We might choose instead to make propeller sounds. Those sounds let us fly with a kiddo to some far off land. We do not not care if the imaginary plane breaks down. Because all we have is right now with each other. We are missing nothing. All we have is this moment. Choose your time wisely. What would you like to do with it?

Changing your Luck

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Whether you are a religious person or not many of us have heard the sentiment, “Let Go, Let God.” The suggestion is used to remind us to release the illusion of control. The simple desire to have things in our lives go well, or go “right,’ leads us to the image of ourselves at the center of the universe. This perception leads us to believe that we are in some way controlling what comes to us and into our lives. And we can’t control the universe but we can control our actions and by shifting our patters we can absolutely change our luck.

We are often told to be attentive to our thoughts as that is what will be drawn into your life. A study was done on this concept of mindset and opportunity. The researchers collected several individuals who considered themselves both lucky and unlucky. The researchers told their subjects to go get a morning coffee. What the researchers did not tell the subjects was that they had left five dollars on the floor of the coffee shop.

The majority of people who considered themselves unlucky did not even see the money on the ground. They reported having an uneventful or average morning. The individuals who considered themselves lucky noticed the money and picked it up. They also did something else – they paid it forward. They added the money to the tip jar or bought a stranger in line behind them their drink. Many of the people who considered themselves lucky made new friends or business connections by sharing the money they found. Almost all of them both found the money and used it to do some good for others which resulted in a boomerang effect. Because they sent light, joy, goodness, out into the world, they also received that same energy back. They considered this how the universe works.

Therefore, just as we can practice smiling to put ourselves in a good mood. We can also fake the control we have over the universe by putting some goodness out into it. Perhaps you are having a rough day but if you do small things to improve the lives of others that reciprocity will catch up with you too. 

How can you take better care of yourself and trust the universe a little more? What healthful practice do you use when you feel yourself holding on a little too tightly?