Good morning to my readers who may have wondered why I haven’t had a lot of new blog posts lately, or mailings to my list,

I do occasionally  berate myself that I haven’t kept this blog up regularly, or sent out my Mail Chimp newsletters more often. Some of my subscribers probably feel they already get enough mailings as it is.  Maybe they don’t really care. Others will write and ask why they haven’t heard from me in a while. Sure, I’m  kind of a busy person. Most of us are these days.  I have gradually learned not to be “too busy”, though. There are still times when I ask myself if I am doing “enough”.

My life often works on a feast or famine principle. I don’t know about yours.  While I can’t control external factors, I can certainly control how I handle them and so can you. I need to remind myself of that periodically.   Do you?

I can still  be hard on myself about not doing enough. What is “enough”?  What is “too busy”?  Who decides on the quantity of things we need to cram into our schedules?  It’s true that there are some obligations that must be our priorities.  Certain work tasks a boss or supervisor might assign,  paying our bills,  making dinner for our small kids, or taking care of our health needs are things that usually have to come first. Some things are not negotiable or flexible. That’s just life’s reality.

Still, without understanding our most important personal values and goals, we are bound to either cram too much into our already stressful days. We are more likely to focus on things that don’t support or enhance our lives and that don’t contribute to our well-being and positive self-esteem. Knowing what is most important to us is crucial to our peace and also to our success. Ignoring those things is what often contributes to our stress and negatively impacts our health and our eventual productivity.

When was the last time you took some time to do a personal review of your top values?  These values are your moral compass and if you are not paying attention to them when you make your choices and set new goals, something is going to backfire.  Maybe you won’t reach the goals you think you need to reach, because you are just echoing what you believe others find important.   Another possibility is that you will work and slave to reach those goals, will succeed, but you won’t feel the satisfaction you expected. You just won’t be especially happy. Your successes won’t really have true meaning for you, if they don’t mesh with your most significant personal values.

So what I am reminding myself of,  is that I tend to work hard enough most of the time.  What I am doing most of the time is what I need to do in those moments (even if it sometimes looks like just sitting on the couch and reading,  chatting on the phone with a friend,  going out for a walk or playing with my Scottie and my Sealyham dogs).  I don’t have to be busy all the time anymore.  I don’t know that I ever really did, but perhaps had convinced myself of that.   I have to remember that we each define our “hard work” differently.  I don’t need to be successful according to the terms of other people. I need to satisfy myself.  At this stage of the game, I do mostly know what makes me happy.

If you don’t know what makes you feel happy and fulfilled, maybe it is time to review your personal values. There are different ways you can do that. Working with a coach is just one of them.  I often do those assessments with my coaching clients. Sometimes they are formal assessments and sometimes I use a variety of talking and creative exercises to help clients think things through and delve deeper than they have been accustomed to doing.

If I have learned anything, it is that being true to what we believe, to who we really are and adhering to our most deeply held values, will get us through more tough times in life, than trying to ignore who we are and what we hold dear.   Squeezing in a lot of tasks or projects others find important, but we don’t, because we are constantly told that’s how to succeed or to be happy, will usually result in misery or just in lack of productivity.

If you’d like to discuss what you need to clarify or to change, in order to live the best life you can, I’d be happy to have a little chat about it.

You can contact me through my web site, using a form, or directly at ir**@vi*******************.com