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Greetings!
Welcome to all of
my new readers and hello again to others! You have joined
me halfway through a five-part series titled "The
Possibilities of You." This series is intended to
invite you to become more intentional about how to manage the
five key dimensions of life: Physical, Social,
Emotional, Intellectual and Spiritual. To view the first
newsletter addressing the Physical dimension, click
here. To view the second newsletter addressing the
Intellectual dimension, click
here. To learn more about the third dimension, the
Emotional dimension read on! Look for the final two
dimensions, Social and Spiritual, in future newsletters.
Often
I hear people describe themselves in ways that suggest change is
not possible. They say, "This is just how I am, and
this is how I've always been." And in some cases, the
message is even stronger: "Why should I change to please
him/her (most often referring to a displeased partner, or
sometimes family, friends or even an employer), why cant' they
accept me as I am?" This statement suggests that not
only is change not possible, but it suggests that
if it is possible, then I don't want to change and shouldn't
have to!
My
response to these questions is always the same: "Do
you get what you want and need by being the way you are? "
If the answer is "yes" then it makes sense that you
would not see the need to change. What is there to change?
I'm assuming though, if you are asking the question in the first
place, there is something that is not working.
The first question then, is, what is not working?
Perhaps what isn't working is that you don't like your partner
nagging you. Maybe what isn't working is that you feel
inadequate because of the requests your partner makes and you
feel like you can't deliver. Or maybe you know on some
level that something isn't working, but you don't know what it
is, and you sure don't want it to be because of something about
you!
Probably
the most common complaint I hear about someone who has been
encouraged to pay attention to their behaviors is, "they
are trying to change who I am." The interesting thing
about this is that within this statement is the belief that how
we are is the way we are suppose to be, and that to change will
cause us to be someone we are not. Luckily we grow and
change. Growing and changing allows us to become a better,
more effective form of who we are. What
do you fear most about changing?
Sometimes
it is true, the "unhappy" partner, friend, employer,
or family member is the one who needs to consider making
changes. This change, however, might include leaving you, firing
you, setting different boundaries with you, or other changes
that may be uncomfortable for you if you remain more attached to
being the way that you are than being a way that you can
be in order to improve your connection with your partner
(or whomever). So the next question becomes, what
do I have the power to influence or change about my situation?
The easiest, but least effective place to linger
is the place in which we point fingers toward others, assigning
responsibility to everyone but ourselves for the discomfort in
our lives.
Back
to my question of whether or not staying the same provides you
with what you want and need, the answer is more often
"no." Our attachment to staying the way we are
simply because it is how we have always been is, in the end, an
ineffective way to stand your ground only to find that the
ground on which you stand leaves you very much alone,
disconnected, unsatisfied and unhappy. And we don't want that do
we!
So,
the good news is that we do indeed have the ability to change.
Today I'm going to talk about how we can change ourselves in
relationship to our feelings. Feelings impact every aspect
of our lives and the way we deal with (or perhaps don't deal
with) our emotions. We have the capacity to strengthen
ourselves emotionally, just as we can strengthen ourselves
physically
and intellectually.
To
Read Article One, The Possibilities of You
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