How am I doing with my Values

I was checking on myself and the value of self care, and I am doing pretty good job on the action of taking 2 minutes to myself in the morning, this is going well.

I want to take on another challenge on myself, and it's related to my diet. Part of Self care is taking care if my body. I must admit I am not so good with what I put in my mouth. I grab what ever I can find, mostly it will be sweets, crackers and cakes...

I can feel how this is taking a toll on my body, I feel I have less energy to create, love support and do all the things I want to do.

I know this need to be changed, so I am taking the challenge of asking myself every time I am about to eat or drink :

"Does this food is in line with the value of Self care?"

From today, I will ask this question and do my best to follow the choice the is helping me to care for my body.

I will let you know how that goes...

Relli

Are you connected to your deepest values?

How many times have you decided to get into shape, put on your shoes and gofor a walk, but you didn't. ?

How many times you knew you shouldn't eat the last piece of the cake and you still ate it?

Sounds familiar?

I have done it more times than I want to admit. Changing my bad habits is not an easy task, I find it to be very challenging again and again.

One thing I've learned a while back is that if I change my habits, I will change my life - easy to say.... but how do I change a behavior and manage to keep it for a life time?

hammm, good question.

While trying to figure this out, I stumble on a book that actually does a great job explaining this phenomena. The book is "The Power of Full Engagement ; Managing energy not your time is the key to High Performance and Personal renewal" By Jim Loehr and Tony Schwartz.

You should go read the book to understand how to manage your energy, but what was fascinating for me what the section on Values.

The authors claims that it is more likely to keep a promise to yourself, or change a habit IF you have a certain set of values that are in your head the whole time.

Let me give an example - one the the habit I am trying to break is - brushing my teeth before going out of my room to take care of the children, and not after they leave.

To do that, I need to remember every morning that this is what I want to do, and it is OK to do it.

This might sounds silly, but what I feel when I don't jump out of my bed and rush to take care of the kids, is that I am not a good mom.

So, I would like to create a system to feel good about getting up and taking care of my teeth first.

In the book, the authors argue that every action we make needs to be related to a value we believe in. It is more likely for us to keep the promise to ourselves, if we feel connected to a bigger value we are holding.

So, going back to my example, the value I think I need to set for myself is - Self Care.

Self care for me means - I am taking care of myself first, so I will have the energy for my family, work, community.

So, If I get up in the morning rushing to take care of the kids, I feel that i didn't even have a minute for myself before jumping into making lunches, nursing the baby, making sure every body is ready for school etc.

So, with the value of Self care I can feel that I am truthful to myself, and it's OK to take the 3 min in the morning to feel better when I leave the room.

I believe, just like the book says, that I will be able to keep this every morning, without feeling guilty WHEN I am thinking of the value of self care when I am doing it/not doin it. I might slip some days, but in the long run I will be able to change the habit and it will become a part of me.

For moms, I found it is very challenging to put themselves first. We are always needed to do something for someone, to listen to someone, get something for the family. The challenge is to make sure that you are being taken care of first, and then take care of everyone else.

A good exercises from the book (Page 141) to help you identify your values are :

• Jump ahead to the end of your life. What are the most important lessons you have learned and why are they so critical?
  
• Think of someone that you deeply respect. Describe three qualities in this person that you most admire.
  
• Who are you at your best?


• What one sentence inscription would you like to see on your tombstone that would capture who you really were in your life?
  

When you take the time (and it does take some time!!!) to answer those questions, you might find that some of the values are coming up again and again.

Look into these, and ask yourself :" How is my behavior is in line with my values? "

If it does, great.

If it doesn't - think of 3 small steps you can take to start and shift your action connect to the values. Every time you are doing something you are not sure about, ask yourself " how does that fits with my valve of......"

I think you will be amazed with some of your discoveries, give it a try and tell me about your findings, I would love to hear them.

Have a great valued day! Relli

Ellie Drake and our cells system

Yesterday I was listening to a very interesting lady. He name is Ellie Drake, and she is a women who teaches how our body chemistry is different between men and women. I was trying to follow her thought line about how it's actually work, but gosh, Chemistry is not my strong side...

BUT,

what I really got from her was something interesting -

she said - You don't have to know exactly what you want to do, but you need to move in the direction you feel you need to be going.

There is a special feeling we all have inside of us, that guide us. I can tell you about myself, that I have always be drawn to search for deeper meaning of life, I was always drawn to help others and be around people, and the last but not least is me being drawn to art.

I remember as a child,picking up flowers and doing something with them, helping people in need when I could do it.

Why am I telling you this ?

Because, like Ellie Drake says - I could feel the urge to do these things, I could feel it on a cellular level, I could feel where and when I growing as a person. When I feel growing I know I am fulfilling my destiny.

Although it seems only natural to follow my heart and feelings, I didn't for a long long time.
I was too busy rationalizing why it was better to do something else, something that will take me farther in life. For example - Being a manger. I was a manager. I was not happy doing it, I also know that it did not make others happy too....

I followed the 'western' path (get a degree, find a job, learn something that is useful anywhere and will make youo more money etc) until I was 32. When I was about 32, and was pregnant with my daughter, I followed my passion for flowers.

I ofter tell people, that going into the floral design class felt like coming home, like I was suppose to be there long long long time ago. It gave me a sense of purpose and an outlet for my creativity.

About the same time I was in the process of discovering myself again, especially my confidence in myself and who I am today.

Those two together, gave me a sense of direction and a mission to follow. Although today my life is missing some art (you know, 4 kids and life), I am giving what I have to others. I am helping moms, I am helping them understand how important it is to be a happy mom, how to manage their energy so they have it used in the right places and more. Helping them gives me the space to grow as a person, as well as sharing this knowledge, sharing my gift.

Althougth I am doing what feels good today, I spend too much time (years actually), energy and money, on trying to be what I am not, what I am not meant to be. I want to help others to skip this part and move forward with what feels good to them on a cellular level. We each have a gift to give, let's find it and work with it.

If you need help finding your true passion, please shoot me an email and i will do my best to help you.

Ask Masha Rosen - What you need to know about Homeopathy and Motherhood

I am excited to share with you this great news!

As a mother or 4, when my kids were young and sick a lot, I went to the Dr and got another dose of Antibiotic treatment for them. At some point, I realize that this is not gone work on a regular base, since I was afraid their body will develop resistance for it.

I started my own search for other ways to boost my kids health.

One of the options I found was Homeopathy. Although for some issues it did not help, for some it did. The beauty about Homeopathy is the simplicity of how to use it.

Now, when I am leading Coaching calls for mom, I hear from them how they would like to protect their kids in more natural ways.

I wanted to offer some advice and asked Masha Rosen (http://www.masharosen.com/) to tell us more about Homeopathy, and especially about How we can help our children.

If you had the option to meet Masha, what would you want to know?

Please share your thoughts with us, here on the comment area.

Talk to you soon, Relli

The Power of Ackgnoledgment

Have you ever done something you are sure is great to do, but you were not sure if someone else feels the same?

This is what is happening to me in the last few months. Ever since I started doing Coaching calls for moms (look on the upper right side of the screen for details), I am feeling it's a great service for the moms. To be honest, it's a great service for me too. Being a teacher, a coach keeps me learning . It also very much keeps me dealing on my issues, and that makes me a better person.

Last Friday , on our weekly call, a new mom came on the line. She told me that she found out about my calls and thought is was a great thing. She was about to call few of her friends and tell them about it, but she decided to wait. She wanted to check it out for herself and see how she feels about it, before telling other moms about it.

When the call (which was a lot about how to detach from your kid without feeling guilty)was over she said:

"Thanks you so much for doing this. This is a perfect way for me to talk to other moms, while my son is sleeping. Thank you for helping".

I was so happy to hear what she said. It was the acknowledgment from her that made all the work worth. Knowing that I am reaching out to other moms, make me feel I am giving the world what is within me. I am sharing my gift with others.

I can feel I am on the right track, but receiving a feedback helps me navigate through the unknown, just like a sign on the road tells you where you are!

Come join us every Friday :)

All my love, Relli

The Annoying side of computers

It seems like there is no other way today but to use a computer. I used to have an old laptop and after few 'breakdowns' of it, we decided to buy a new one.

It was suppose to solve all my tech problems, meaning - not crashing down again and again, but it is not really what is happening.

This computer has so many 'cool' features in become annoying. For example, before writing what I telling you, I was about to write about laziness. I read an interesting article I wanted to share my mom thoughts on it, but guess what - I can not paste what I cut.
Another example - they have this 'cool' feature that that screen it tranzperent, meaning you can see throuh to the other window below. This is so annoying, my eyes can not focus on the words, because there is something underneath...

These are just few examples, Why they do it - Go figure..

I am not the most technical person on earth, I am actually pretty bad at it, so it make things even worse when it comes to work efficiently with my new friend here.

The thing with computers is, that if something goes wrong and you are not techie enoght, you are doomed for long minutes and hours of frustration.

Well, that was what I was about to say, I hope I will figure that out soon!

Relli

Tiesto who?

Few months ago my husband told me about a show he wants us to go together. I did not ask too many questions about what it is, and simply said "if you want to go, we'll go". I never bothered to ask what this show is going to be like, and when the day arrived, we took off in jeans and snickers to go see this amazing show by Tiesto.

We arrive at the Cow palace, and very fast we were feeling very old and very strange. There were hundreds (if not thousands) of teens ages 16+ dressed, well they were not really dressed, it was more like Eve and Adam covering the most private areas of their bodies with a bit of fabric and some fur. So after we got the (expensive) ticket, we were finally in the great place of Tiesto.


We went in, and I am telling you, it was so noisy, people walking with drinks all over and smoking. I thought it was illegal to smoke indoor public places in CA, but obviously, this place have some other ideas about smoking. Anyhow, we are in thinking to ourselves: " we are pretty old for that..." We were shocked to watch these youngsters dressed with horse fur like, preschool necklaces with a pacifier attached to them. I don't know what the deal with the pacifier is, but I will get to that a bit later.


It was about 9:00pm when we got there and the amazing Tiesto show was about start his show only around 10:30, so we had some time to listen to the sounds of trance music. If you know a bit about me (and if not I will tell you) , I am not a big fan, to say the list, of trance music. In fact I can not stand this music. On the other hand, it is one of my husband favorite music, and he is actually listening to it while he is working. I am not sure how he does that but that's a different story.

So, you can imagine that by the time Tiesto was on stage, my head was already simply filled with hammers sounds, the smoke was making me feel like in a big stinky pub, so it was not too much fun. For about an hour I really tried to dance and 'get into the music' as they say, but I couldn't. It was not fun for me , it was fun for my spouse.


So, I was in and out from the dancing area, trying to figure what the heck I should do - if I ask my husband to leave, it won't be fair to him since he was having a blast, and it I stay, I am cold and miserable. So I went out to breath some fresh (well, at least I thought I will have that) and to get out of the very loud music. I could barely hear anything ans my ears just want to pop out. So, I hung out looking at all these young people dressed like horses with a pacifier, and I felt so out of place.

Oh, I forgot - after this event I asked a friend about the pacifier deal, and she suggested that the kids under 21, put alcohol in it, this way they can drink some too. I am not sure about it, but I haven't had a change to explore it more.

I was not having fun at all.

So, here is the question - how do you make an effort to enjoy something you really really don't like so your partner can have fun? Tough question I find it to be.

I recently read an article that is about how to make Fun fun for you , and I thought - how can I make this to be fun for me?


(http://www.happiness-project.com/happiness_project/2009/11/make-sure-the-fun-is-fun-for-you.html)

After going in and out, sitting and walking I decided to let my husband enjoy his time while I was dealing with issue of My fun, compare to HIS fun. After 2 hours I decided I was defiantly time to end this night. I made this brave decision after a drunk guy came to me and said" do you have cash". I was out of there. So, we left at 1:30am...

When we I told my husband :" next time, when you are up for trance, please find someone else to go with you. It is not fun for me and this way, it effect you too. You would have stayed longer if it wasn't for me". So, here you go, his fun was not my fun, and I learned my lesson - make sure what you are about to experience is within my fun area, and if not, stay out of there!

Relli

P.S. when I was younger and dating, I used to have a rule - I always arrived to the dating place with my own car, so in case I am not having fun or think it is not for me, I can take off and go back home without waiting or/and explaining why I want to leave. It worked so well. The only one that I made an exception for (my care broke) was my husband... Next time when we are off on a concert I am not sure about, I will bring my car ;)