choice-point Archives - Page 2 of 3

Having What You Want

I Don’t Know What I Want The most important question, and the initial question, that I pose to any new client when starting a new coaching relationship is, "What is it that you want?" You’d be surprised but more often than not, people are challenged to articulate what they want. More often than not, they have trained themselves to want what they “should” want, or want what other people want. When faced with "what is it that YOU want," their knees go weak and their mind goes foggy and they go into a muddled abyss, not knowing how to answer

Am I Frivolous?

In my most recent session with Mandy, a beautiful and brilliant woman in her mid-thirties, she shared with me that she was thinking seriously about attending the Weaving Heaven and Earth Retreat in Bali. But at the same time, she believed wholeheartedly that spending time and money on such an experience was frivolous. "How can going on excursions into beautiful environments, and talking about how to experience Heaven on Earth contribute to my needs for shelter, food, and clothing? I just can’t wrap my brain around doing something like this. I mean, it sounds fun, but frivolous! Aren’t my survival

No Way-I’m Not Going!

I leave for Bali in a few weeks, and as the time draws nearer I find myself terrified of traveling to a part of the world that I’ve never been before. What comes to mind is "no." What comes to my whole being is an experience of fear and trauma. Part of me wants to back out! It’s too scary!!! I realize that I have a choice in this moment to avoid and ignore the sensations of fear and trauma, or I can explore the source of these sensations and fears. I’ve discovered over time, that to immerse myself in

Who Wants a Boring Life?

It’s been about a month since I’ve written for Orcas Issues. I’m in the midst of preparing for my big adventure to Bali as well as putting together the program for my Retreat – Weaving Heaven and Earth. I’ll tell you, who ever said aging is boring didn’t get it right. The Aging – Who Me? group at the Senior Center has been running for a whole year now. Happy Birthday to us! We have been meeting two Tuesdays a month with pretty much the same 11 participants – with a few leaving and a few joining us. You’d think

How Do I Know This is Right For Me?

Am I Meant to Be in Bali? How Do I Know if this Retreat is Right for Me? It is one thing to be intellectually savvy about spirituality. You’ve read the books; you talk about it in ways that allow you to feel confident in your truth. However, it is another thing to venture into experiences that will put you smack dab in the middle of the very essence of what you’ve only been thinking and talking about, until now. When choosing a workshop or retreat experience, you want to trust that you will be safe in the hands of

Cease Abandonment

Quite often for me, the writing of one article stirs some inner work that reveals another bump in the road – an obstacle that, again, on one level seems like no big deal, yet on another stops the natural unfolding of one’s life path. For every one of us, by sitting with these obstacles, an epiphany arises naturally, along with the doubt of its truth and realness. The Epiphany Last Sunday, after my article, “Aging Into Shameless Perfection” was published in Orcas Issues, I thought about all of those times in my life where I’d felt shamed, forsaken, and

Aging into Shameless Perfection

There were three times in my young life when my parents wanted to disown me. The first time, I was 10 years old and requested that I be allowed to leave Sacred Heart Catholic School to attend the public school. Initially they were appalled by my desire. My mom and dad went to our parish priest, Father Hurley, who threatened to excommunicate me. But in the end, my parents reluctantly allowed me and the rest of my younger siblings to attend the public school – it saved my dad a lot of money! The second time my parents wanted to

Old Dogs Do Learn New Tricks!

My dog Gracie is almost eight years old – 56, in dog years. She has been chasing frisbees her whole life, but it was just last week that she actually caught one on the fly. I could see her mind working that day, working out the mechanics, figuring out the potential trajectory of my throw, and as she was running, she looked over her left shoulder and saw the frisbee coming. She leaped into the air and caught it! It was a glorious moment for Gracie, one she wanted to repeat, again and again! My friend Lorna, who is 72,

If I Weren’t Me

A favorite part of my job as a Life Coach is that I get to witness human beings take tiny filaments of beliefs and turn them into huge knots of limitations. They, like most of us, aren’t able to hear themselves speak, nor see how their thoughts create the world around them. As their thinking partner, I hear what they themselves can’t hear, and I share with them what I’m hearing so they can make sense of the tangled knots of beliefs that lie within. After which they are at choice to choose differently. The other most favorite part of

Coming of Age “ Regardless of Age

One theme of Aging- Who Me? is that we are never not aging. We are never not developing, growing, unfolding, evolving. We are in fact in a constant state of emerging. As humans we are bombarded with choices, constantly. Some are big choices, some, not so big. For example, choosing the right college; choosing marriage or parenthood; choosing the “right career; choosing how to be with a partner or family member who’s harmful and abusive; choosing how to be with an incurable disease, choosing to come out of the closet in regard to their sexuality, their spirituality, or politics; choosing

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