Maintaining Self-Love in a Relationship

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Self love is the foundation to any successful relationship. When you’re in love it is easy to put your partner’s needs ahead of yours. Maintaining your self love is important. Ignite Your Potential professionals have curate tips to help you maintain and grow your self-love while loving others.

 

“Self-love is not selfish; you cannot truly love another until you know how to love yourself.”  

 

Maintain Mental and Physical Health

Keeping your mind and body healthy exemplifies your love for yourself. In order to keep your mind healthy, avoid ignoring or dismissing your feelings. If you support others, when you are not mentally balanced, you will become drained, mentally and physically. Consider seeing a therapist or coach to cultivate mental wellness. Smart people see therapists and coaches in order to review what is going on in their minds and with their emotions. It’s a space to process all the things you experience day to day. 

“Mind and body are not separate, what affects one, affects the other.”

Alone Time

Alone time gives you space to self-reflect, track your goals, and grow as an individual. It’s hard to dedicate attention to your own needs if you are often preoccupied with someone else or with your work life. Include “me” time in your schedule to do something you genuinely enjoy. Your quality of life will thrive.

“When we can be alone, we can enjoy time with others without using them as a means to escape.”

Know Your Worth

Develop a relationship with yourself first, in other words, be your own best friend. Once you recognize your value, others will too. Then, when the right person comes along, it’s a great addition instead of a dependency for self-worth. 

“Your relationship with yourself sets the tone for every other relationship you have.”

Ignite Your Potential coaches, suggest entering relationships as a “whole person” looking for another whole person to blend and share a beautiful life with. As opposed to a “half” looking for another “half” to complete you. This will make a difference in the quality of your relationships. 

“A healthy relationship is when two individuals come together and agree to help make the other person the best version of themselves.” 

Our award-winning coaches at the Ignite Your Potential Centers offer a complimentary 25-minute phone session to help maintain your self love in a relationship! We are the #1 career coaches in San Francisco and the #1 career coaches in Los Angeles, let us show you how we earned that praise.

 

Stuck in a Work Rut? Get Out of It!

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Before you start looking for a new job, try these four ideas for getting your head back in the game and rediscover your sense of being centered and empowered.

Figure Out the Root of the Problem

Before you can get out of a rut, you have to figure out why you’re in it. This means self-evaluating. When did you start feeling this way? Was it after a poorly received presentation? A change in responsibilities? Also, keep in mind that the cause might not have anything to do with work. Once you identify the cause of your unhappiness, you will be better able to handle it.

Focus on Self-Care

Taking care of yourself can solve a lot of smaller problems. That means making sure you’re getting enough sleep, exercising, and eating right. At work, take breaks and make it a point to eat lunch away from your computer screen. Self-care is a part of self-management and building resilience.

Remember Why You Wanted the Job

It’s easy to forget why you were excited about your role or the company in the beginning. Take the time to remember the reason this job is important to your big picture strategic plan.

Take a Break

Even if you can’t swing a weeklong trip, plan a quick weekend getaway. Getting out of your routine can clear your mind and help you refocus. It can seem counter-intuitive, but we need rest to allow our brain to recover. We will be sharper upon our return.

After reading this article if you are inspired to take your career to the next level, remember that all of the award-winning coaches at the Ignite Your Potential Centers offer a complimentary 25-minute phone session to help you meet your life goals and career goals. We are the #1 career coaches in San Francisco and Los Angeles, let us show you how we earned that praise.

The Top 3 Keys to Your Self Care Tool Kit

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Self-Care is often difficult for highly career focused people. Without it, fatigue and burnout are inevitable. The tendency to overextend without prioritizing self-care practices is an easy, but dangerous, pattern to develop. Work demands seem urgent, and are even framed as such by others, so it can be counterintuitive to pause and take a look at what is going on with our own bodies and mind. Yet our suggestion is to think of yourself as an athlete. To be your best you have to condition yourself on all levels.

When we want to make changes to feel better, it is easy to think that we need big alterations. Sometimes this is true, but often it is the smallest, consistent changes that are the most powerful. Simplicity and ease is essential while you experiment and implement new ideas and ways of doing things. 

Our team of highly trained career coaches helps clients identify and implement new ways to practice self-care with greater ease and simplicity. Below are the top three keys of self-care we’ve come up with. Read through and decide what small but powerful changes you can implement into your schedule.

1. Vital Wellness

Our bodies are comprised of rhythms that have their own autonomous flow, the breath, sleep, and digestion to name a few. Being aware of these aspects and doing what you can to attend to them gives greater vibrancy to our experience of life.

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  • Nutrition What you put into your body, you get out of it. Eating nutritious foods, and enough of them, are important for physical wellness. Pay attention to how you feel after eating, notice the effect of different foods. Practice the 80/20 rule and eat clean whole foods, veggies, and protein only during the week. You may be surprised the impact to your energy levels.
  • Hydrate 75% of people are chronically dehydrated. Being properly hydrated means your brain and body are functioning properly. Plus you will feel less hungry and more awake.
  • Breathe Breathing deep into your abdomen, allowing it to swell, creates an instant feeling of grounded calmness. This is because you are stimulating your vagus nerve, which slows your heart rate and lowers your blood pressure.   
  • Movement The word “exercise” often has the feel or connotation of one more obligation, one more task on your to-do list. Whatever the form, movement allows your body release to endorphins, which increase your feelings of overall wellness. This is lifelong – your desires and needs will change – pay attention and change things up
  • Bodywork We carry a lot of tension from our physical lives. There are many options in this category: massage, acupuncture, chiropractic work, etc. Make it important to set aside the time for yourself and find the methods that help you recover from your day to day.
  • Sleep Hygiene In many ways your sleep “life” is as important as your waking life. Over time see what works best for you. What is your ideal amount of sleep each night? Give yourself this. Set boundaries to make it happen.
  • Give Your Body Mindful Attention Use the body scan technique to check in with each part of your body. Listen to what your body is telling you. Caring for yourself is how you show up for the most important things in your life.

If you struggle with this area of your self-care toolkit, it may be time to seek assistance outside of yourself. Our team of life coaches at Ignite Your Potential can give you the encouragement and empowerment you need to overcome the challenges you have in this area. Their expert coaching service will allow you to:

  • Establish the traction you need to make change
  • Find your presence
  • Expand your own resourcefulness to increase your engagement
  • Help you overcome crisis
  • Get back your vitalness
  • Optimize whatever area you want to work on: get a complimentary session!

2. Mental Wellness

Mental wellness refers to your emotional, psychological, and social wellbeing. When this area of your selfhood is in order, you experience a state of well-being in which you realize your own abilities, cope with the normal stresses of life, work productively and fruitfully, and are able to make a contribution to the world. Here are some ways we keep this in check:

  • Perspective Attitude has a direct effect on how you experience life. Keeping a good attitude is a powerful way to relieve stress and find more joy. This takes self-awareness, begin by paying attention to your internal dialog, the way you are talking to yourself about the world as you walk through it. Begin to influence your attitude by looking for the positive and productive angle. Learn to coach yourself into a better attitude.
  • Feel and Name Your Emotions Repressing or blocking your emotions doesn’t provide the necessary release you need in order to move forward with your life. Your emotions will leak through or cause other challenges if you don’t acknowledge them. As something comes up for you, take the time to name what you are feeling. Bring some understanding to what’s happening for you emotionally. It can be helpful to talk with a friend or a therapist. Giving space for this is a way of giving space to yourself, who you are, and what you’re feeling. People who do this find more peace of mind will arise.
  • Resolve a Nagging Issue We all have a small nuisance in our life that secretly plagues us, like a lost button, broken cabinet, a piece of clothing that needs repair, etc. Pick a new one each week and eliminate it.
  • Set Intention Prior to getting your day started, take a few minutes to meditate on your intention for the day. Intention allows us to navigate obstacles with clarity and confidence.
  • Relationship with Self Our view of ourselves is very important. Make sure you’re treating yourself as if you would treat a beloved child who was in your care. How would you feed that child? How would you talk to that child? We are obviously not children, and I don’t mean to infantilize anyone, but this analogy is meant to offer a right perspective. You are important. Treat yourself that way.
  • Give Time to yourself Whether this is a vacation, a day off, or even space to take a short nap. Make time for yourself to rest and recoup.
self care

Prioritizing self-care will not only strengthen and energize your career but will also help you develop a greater sense of peace of mind and clarity.  

Our team of expert career coaches can help career-focused people and executives strengthen a variety of aspects of their lives so they reach their highest potential in their careers. Click here to receive a complimentary initial session!

3. Environmental Wellness

Your environmental wellness is comprised of the things you regularly experience outside of yourself that have a direct impact on you. Here are some ways we maintain a high degree of environmental wellness:

  • Make Connections Making new connections with positive, interesting people is rewarding, refreshing, and expands perspective.
  • Discernment Everyone brings something different into your life. Jim Rohn said, “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” Choose wisely.
  • Create your Surroundings Be mindful of how you best work and use this to create surroundings that support you and your workflow. Is it in natural light? With music? Without clutter? Pay attention to the ambiance and other conditions that contribute to your ideal productivity and happiness. Create spaces that are optimal for you.
  • Use Technology Wisely Consider how much time you are spending on social media and on your devices in general. Is the amount of time your spending working for you? Notice if you feel energized or drained by these habits and act accordingly. Technology is an amazing set of tools that are endlessly helpful to us but make sure that they aren’t becoming a habit pattern that isn’t serving you. Also, think through customizing your social media, choose to unfollow negative people or negative media outlets.
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At Ignite Your Potential, we know maintaining a high degree of this self-care involves letting go of old habits. For support to attain better self-care so you can achieve more in life and career, Ignite Your Potential coaches are standing by ready to get started.

Get my free appointment >

 

How do you create your wonderful life?

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I often see people compromising before they even get started.

It’s terribly sad to me because it’s a self-imposed trap that comes about because we believe we can’t have what it is we really want.

Lean in: this is an illusion. The people you see who are successful…they keep their eye on what it is they desire. They tune into themselves. They ask this important question and they take the answer very seriously.

What do you desire? Keep asking yourself this question, like a mantra: What Do I Desire? What Do I Want For Myself If I Can Have Anything? And when you begin to hear the answer from the deepest part of yourself. Only then, are you ready to move forward. To create the life of your dreams.

Here’s Alan Watts guiding us through this process:

So I always ask the question: What would you like to do if money were no object? How would you really enjoy spending your life? Well it’s so amazing as the result of our kind of educational system, crowds of students say ‘Well, we’d like to be painters, we’d like to be poets, we’d like to be writers’ But as everybody knows you can’t earn any money that way! Another person says ‘Well I’d like to live an out-of-door’s life and ride horses.’ I said ‘You wanna teach in a riding school?’

Let’s go through with it. What do you want to do? When we finally got down to something which the individual says he really wants to do I will say to him ‘You do that! And forget the money!’ Because if you say that getting the money is the most important thing you will spend your life completely wasting your time! You’ll be doing things you don’t like doing in order to go on living – that is to go on doing things you don’t like doing! Which is stupid! Better to have a short life that is full of which you like doing then a long life spent in a miserable way. And after all, if you do really like what you are doing – it doesn’t really matter what it is – you can eventually become a master of it. It’s the only way of becoming the master of something, to be really with it. And then you will be able to get a good fee for whatever it is. So don’t worry too much, somebody is interested in everything. Anything you can be interested in, you’ll find others who are.

But it’s absolutely stupid to spend your time doing things you don’t like in order to go on spending things you don’t like, doing things you don’t like and to teach our children to follow the same track. See, what we are doing is we are bringing up children and educating to live the same sort of lifes we are living. In order they may justify themselves and find satisfaction in life by bringing up their children to bring up their children to do the same thing. So it’s all retch and no vomit – it never gets there! And so therefore it’s so important to consider this question:

What do I desire?

How Are You Living?

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If you know a smart chiropractor, naturopathic doctor, fitness trainer, nutritionist, or pilates expert, if they are helping you lose weight or get healthier, they will ask you to do a food journal. Many of you may have tried this as a way to increase your awareness about what you are putting into your body. In fact, several studies have shown that people who keep a food diary are more likely to be successful in losing weight and keeping it off.

But have you ever considered using a similar method to increase your awareness about yourself in general? In other words, instead of a food journal…what about a How Are You Living Journal?

Sometimes it’s hard to observe ourselves…like fish observing water. But there are ways we can gather this information.

Play the Researcher

Researchers are trained not to judge their findings: whatever they uncover, they observe it, sit with it, document it, come to know it. When you do this for yourself, the information can help you achieve your goals.

Sometimes observation alone can produce change. Sometimes it’s the beginning of a process. Whatever the case, I have consistently witnessed that…awareness rules.

Record the Moment

In the directions below, I detail how to start, and keep, your Living Journal.

1. Program an alert into your phone so that several times a day you are reminded to ask yourself these questions.
2. Jot down small notes about what you see. It’s best to do this in a given moment, rather than noting some things at the end of your day. What we think is going on with us and what is actually going on with us can be slightly different. We all have blind spots.
3. If you’re doing this alone, remember to look it over each week – just writing it down is not enough to bring it into your awareness.
When we’re working together, I ask my clients to bring the journal to our check-in.
4. Consider these questions. There’s no need to answer them all, but let them jog your thoughts to record what you’re feeling in the moment…

Mind
What is running through your mind?
What is going on with your internal dialog?
What’s the emotional tone? Mellow? Kind? Grumpy? Silly?
How might you describe the atmosphere of your head space?

Body
What is your body language saying in this moment?
Are you breathing deeply or shallowly?
Do you feel tired?
Are you hydrated enough?
How would you classify what you’ve eaten today? Vibrant? Fine? Call the health department?
Take a moment to notice your body. Any tension areas? How do you feel?

Connection
Are you alone or with others?
Would you say you’re present or off in the world of thoughts?
What’s happening around you? What do you notice?

Actions
Any particular behaviors you’d like to note? Going to the gym? Moving your body in some way? Are you meditating? Are you in a bar with your buddies? Anything self-care related going on?

Assess How You Are Living

All of these questions give you information about the states-of-mind you hang out in, how you may be dragging yourself down or draining yourself of energy, how you are supporting yourself, how certain foods may be affecting you. It gives a snap shot of how you are really living.

After a week, take a look at your journal and take note: Has anything surprised you? What patterns have you noticed? What do you make of it all?

If we were in session, we would go over your journal together…

You Can Create a Positive Ripple Effect

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An inspiring talk by about an average person making a difference. May you find the courage and audacity to connect with and soften those around you. Now imagine taking it step further, and like Mary Anderson, making it a habit.

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Take a Moment…

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You have to slow down to enjoy this video made by Rishi Kaneria starring stuntman Dante Ha. I love art that pulls your attention into the moment and the unseen world revealed by slow motion.

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How Might Our Lives Be More Fulfilling If We Took Imagination Seriously?

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Janet Echelman gives a great Ted talk. It conveys, if you read between the lines, the creative process. When it comes to creation, you have to let go all the time. You have to have ideas and then release them…allow them to play out and then cut them loose if they don’t belong within the creation. It becomes a beautiful dance.

Somehow Echelman’s stunning artwork itself conveys this same message about creativity. Imagine my delight when last week I got to see one of her pieces in the San Francisco airport. Her work truly shares with us the rediscovery of wonder.

How might each of our lives be more fulfilling if we take imagination seriously? What new thing might creativity bring to each day? One thing is for sure…creativity brings us into the present moment. It brings us into direct contact with the vibrant world around us. It helps us see in a new way. It brings us back to a more playful way of being. Consider an experiment, for the next week try out 8 Steps to Using Your Imagination. See what happens. Share it here.

How Do You Grieve? And Why Bother?

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Grief is challenging in part because it feels painful, complicated, and vulnerable. I mean, who out there, really wants to grieve? Some never do process grief and in avoiding it, carry it deep within the psyche…a heaviness hidden from the self. Some are experts in processing emotions and just do so, eventually moving along. A funeral can often act as a wonderful way to bring closure to the grieving process and to start celebrating the life of those who have passed. You can find a detailed break down here of services like cremation. Between these two points are every other way we steer our course through emotions, specifically grief. So how do you grieve? Does it just happen naturally? Do you have to make space for it, taking specific actions in order to feel the range of what comes up? For those of you familiar with the terrain of grief…please be our sherpa and tell us how you navigate.

While grief comes through in times when we have lost someone we love. It’s also an emotional experience that can accompany any type of loss or change. If you switch jobs, become a parent, finish your degree, retire, go from a stay-at-home parent to a working-outside-the-house parent, move out of state, and the list goes on, all of these experiences (even when they represent something positive) are a type of loss. Change is loss. Most people have grieved for someone they loved after they’ve passed away. And for some people, they must now start thinking about organising a funeral. If this is you and you don’t know where to start, then it may be in your best interests to contact https://riemannfamily.com/ who can help give them the perfect send-off. If you change the way you treat your body and your eating habits, you are losing the other way you have been living. Like that song goes, “Every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end.”

I notice for myself, that sometimes I have “built in” aspects, created to “protect me,” that can keep me from going deep into emotion. So I have to make space to soften myself. I have to make sure that I’m not unconsciously escaping from my feelings through food, substances, shopping, socializing, over working, trying to control things in my life or trying to control others. I have to take really good care of myself with what I am eating, how I am sleeping, etc. I have to find ways to soothe myself and allow myself to become more introverted. And then slowly if I give myself space to reflect, journal, take baths, watch sad movies, listen to music…the emotions will come. This is how I invite my emotional self…because just like a tender, careful, shy child, my emotional self has had to slowly learn to trust me. In the past I hurt it through pushing it away, making it “buck up,” abusing it through harsh internal language, and simply ignoring it as if I didn’t have an emotional self.

So why go through this? Why bother taking the time to process our emotions or our grief? Especially since, if you’re like me, there are so many ways to go unconscious and avoid our soft sides. For some of us, if we don’t make this space, it will begin to take over, at worst, this is the core of the classic “nervous breakdown.” More mild versions are: break through emotions where we overreact to things (discharging unprocessed emotions at others) and depression (where our emotions turn against us or get stuck.) So one answer to why bother: this is how we avoid these small and large breakdowns. By making space for our emotional side, we can keep our emotional experience in it’s rightful, personal place…rather than unconsciously bringing them into our work lives or having them erupt without conscious intention. This is how we take care of ourselves. This is what healthy and balanced people do. Yet there is also another reason to make a conscious effort to meet our emotional self or process our emotions and grief. In doing so, our emotional side becomes our ally; (drum roll please) we actually become stronger and wiser. A metaphor for this is found in fairytales or mythology where the hero finally conquers the dragon and the dragon who was once a tyrant transforms into the hero’s right-hand companion for the rest of the journey.

When we become softer and allow our emotions to come through we become freer, and what is left, is stronger. Our emotions will then bring us many gifts including compassion, tenderness, and a sense that we are whole.

How to Have Deeper Connections: How to Feel Like You Belong

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Brene Brown spent six years doing extensive research on vulnerability, connection, and shame. She found that people could be divided into two groups, those who have a strong sense of love and belonging, a sense of connection with others, and those who struggle for this sense of love and belonging, wondering if they are good enough.

One of the amazing things she found was that people who have a strong sense of belonging believe they are worthy of love and belonging. Conversely, those that don’t have a sense of love and belonging, believe they are not worthy. Can you believe that?! What keeps us from feeling loved is the belief or sense that we are not worthy.

But wait there’s more…She goes on to say that those who feel worthy have certain things in common. For one, they have courage, and people, she is using the original definition of the word as it first came into the English language. Courage: to tell the story of who you are, with your whole heart.

“So these folks had the courage to be imperfect. They had the compassion to be kind to themselves, first, and then to others, because as it turns out, we can’t practice compassion with other people if we can’t treat our selves kindly. They had connection (and this is the hard part) as a result of authenticity. They were willing to let go of who they thought they should be, in order to fully be who they are, and you absolutely have to do that in order to have connection.

The other thing they had in common was this: they fully embraced vulnerability. They believed that what makes them vulnerable makes them beautiful. They didn’t talk about vulnerability being comfortable, nor did they talk about it being excruciating, they just talked about it being necessary. They talked about the willingness to say ‘I love you’ first, the willingness to do something where there are no guarantees, the willingness to breathe through waiting for the doctor to call after you’ve had your mammogram, the willingness to invest in a relationship that might not work out, they thought this was fundamental.”

The biggest problem is that “you cannot selectively numb emotions. You can’t numb hard feelings without numbing joy, gratitude, happiness. Once we begin numbing, suddenly we feel empty and then we are looking for purpose and meaning, and we feel vulnerable, and then we numb again. We need to look at how and why we numb ourselves.” The challenge is to move away from these habits toward full range feeling, toward vulnerability. And the pay off? Deeper connection with others and a sense of love and belonging.

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