It’s OK if you have not done them yet.
I’m talking about your goals and intentions for 2023.
⚡ Maybe the energy is just not there right now.
⚡ Maybe you still have to come up with something that really lights you up.
⚡ Maybe you’ve been so busy with your social life that you haven’t had time to take a moment with yourself and process.
Not because everyone is sharing theirs, it means that you have to have yours ready.
You may feel as if you're already behind or missing out if you haven’t burnt what you’re leaving behind and figured out the new year’s ‘you’.
It’s just the 3rd day of the year.
Be kind to yourself.
Trust your own process.
You can work on your intentions anytime and it’s always better if the energy is available.
Some people take their birthday as their start of the year and set their intentions then.
Others choose to align more with the seasons. If you think of it, having December as the year end was just a convention to adopt the Gregorian calendar.
Maybe you’ll have more clarity in March with the spring, when things open up in the northern hemisphere and the energy of change in the southern hemisphere’s autumn.
What matters is that you check in with yourself and honour your own process, so you come up with aligned intentions when the time comes.
Over the years, I moved from RESOLUTIONS to INTENTIONS and now I’m more thinking about a THEME or a WORD for my year.
It leaves more room for Life to do its work and helps me let go of the outcome (did I make it or not?) and open up to what comes my way.
If you feel inspired to work on these now, remember that you don’t have to do it all alone. There are many tools that can support your process: going into nature, working with journaling prompts, creating a vision board, and so on.
I hope this helps!
Happy new 2023!!
Love,
Paula
Would you say this is broken? 🧩
My guess is that you’d actually say, “What’s got into her? “Of course not!”.
And, if you’re anything like me, you’d be already rolling up your sleeves and diving right in, with curiosity and excitement to see it coming together.
Even when it doesn’t look like it, you’d be able to see it as a Whole, knowing that it’s just a matter of putting the pieces together.
You’d be somewhat following these steps:
A puzzle implies a mystery to be solved or something to be put together.
How wonderful!
What if we took the same outlook on ourselves and on life?
Remembering that nothing is ever broken, we were always Whole.
Knowing there is a space for every single piece, a perfect fit.
Every single experience, learning, mishap, adventure, has a place in it. It belongs here, for whatever reason, even if we don't understand or want it, it is one piece of a large and beautiful picture.
Just like with any puzzle, the key is to stay curious and excited, trust the rhythm of the Universe and find a method that works for us, knowing that we’ve always been Whole.
Shall we?
#coaching #lifecoach #spirituality #strategy #vision
“Please, Please, make it stop!!!” The man sitting next to me on the plane started screaming as soon as we took off.
I’m ‘team window’ as you can see from my picture, and I usually fall asleep before take-off, so when he grabbed my arm and said “I don’t feel well”, it took me a couple of seconds to react.
The person on the aisle was faster and got him the paper bags you use in these cases.
We calmed him down to the best of our ability; we explained that planes are the safest means of transport - I even shared that my brother was a pilot and that there was nothing to be afraid of.
But this was not the point, Carlos was not afraid, he just didn’t feel well in his body. He could not breathe properly and thus was panicking.
When the seatbelt sign went off, he was calmer and managed to explain that it was his first time on a plane, and that if he had known about this, he’d have never taken the job opportunity abroad.
He was not properly prepared for the experience; nobody had explained to him what he might feel throughout the flight.
Once in our awareness, we ‘the experts’ could serve him, support him and guide him throughout the flight. We kept an eye out for him and we were able to anticipate what might happen in case of turbulence (which we had flying through #Eunice) and during landing.
“Carlos, we’re about to land. I normally get ear pain at this point”.
“YES! I’m feeling that now”.
“Ok, here’s what you can do: Chewing gum and forcing a yawn works for me. Try if it does for you too”.
“THANK YOU SO MUCH!”
What could have been a very long 13 hour flight from Buenos Aires to Amsterdam for all, turned into a shared experience for all 3 of us strangers.
Here are some thoughts and learnings I’d like to share with you from this experience:
- It can be uncomfortable to hear someone’s ask for help, but we should not make it about ourselves.
I realised this was not about me saving the day, it was about holding space for him and for what he needed. He allowed us to do so by showing his #vulnerability.
How many people suffer but don’t say anything about it?
How can we stay open to the signs?
- Do not make any assumptions (the Third Agreement). Instead, find the courage to ask questions. “What do you need right now?”
- In hindsight, this is not too different from a #coaching journey. As a coach, I guide and support my clients through what I’m an expert in and what I have experienced myself: a spiritual transformational journey, reinventing myself in a new country and designing a life I love to live.
When you work with someone who knows what’s coming and what tools can support you, the journey is much more enjoyable and feels safer!
Would you like to explore what that could look like for you?
Book a discovery call with me here.
With love, Paula
Setting intentions does ✨
These last days of the year are a wonderful opportunity to reflect on the year that passed and to start tapping into the life we want to lead and the world that we want to create. It’s all about opening up to new possibilities.
You might be used to working with new year resolutions, but they seldom work. In my experience, there’s a slight difference between them and intentions, so let me share why I choose to go with the latter, for myself and my clients.
RESOLUTIONS involve behavioural changes that we know are beneficial. We aim at letting go of what no longer serves us. However, when thinking of resolutions, we look at what’s “wrong” in our lives and therefore, we might even feel some guilt or pressure if we go off-track.
INTENTIONS on the other hand, are linked to what we want to create, how we want to feel and they ask to bring mindfulness to our actions while making efforts to change, without being attached to an outcome. Therefore, they bring a much more loving and compassionate energy.
They are all about letting go and letting come what’s of the highest good for all.
When setting #intentions, think of questions like:
-How do I want the new year to unfold?
-Why will it be great? What would happen in an ideal world?
-What new opportunities do I want to explore?
-How do I want to feel throughout the year?
-What will give me energy this year?
I invite you to think of Intentions and a couple of SMART Goals to support them - we do need some structure to do the work after all 😉
‘Where intention goes, energy flows’. So when writing them down, focus on what you want, rather than what you don’t want. Be bold with your desires and always do your best!
Keep an eye out for my last post of the year, as I will share a very practical tool that I use to Reflect & Plan the year ahead in line with the intentions we've set.
Until then, happy intentions setting! 🙌
“To be honest, I really want to live by the sea” my friend confessed in a recent phone conversation. As she went on sharing her recent experience in Puerto Madryn, Argentina, I noticed how her tone of voice enlivened!
“I feel I belong there”, she said.
“That's great! I’m so happy for you. What are you going to do about it?”
“Meh, I’m not sure… I feel guilty about leaving everyone and everything behind. And besides, what will people think of me?”
As an expat myself, I get where she’s coming from and I know how she feels. I change gears:
‘Tell me, who are the 5 most important people in your life?’
She was quick to answer - “My parents, siblings, nephew”. Proud, not a single doubt.
“That’s so sweet. And what about You?” 😏 it was indeed a tricky question.
Silence…
“Oh, I see what you did there… I get it, thank you”.
9 out of 10 people answer in the same way - and I use this question often - not just with expats but with everyone prioritising everyone else but themselves when it comes to work, relationships, any kind of decision, etc.
Maybe you’re thinking it’s selfish to do so, or that it feels good to be there for others.
Well, let me share this with you: there’s a reason why you put your oxygen mask on first in case of need during a flight.
You can only show up fully for others when you have attended to yourself first.
What’s opening up for you as you read this?
What are you not allowing yourself to do because of guilt or of what others may think?
As the new year approaches, what do you want to leave behind?
Think about everything you believe, but don’t believe everything you think".
There are many stories we told ourselves, or the decisions we made about ourselves, at some point in our life to protect ourselves.
Our thoughts, if we think them over and over, and assign truth to them, become beliefs and drive our behaviours. And as our mind likes to be right, it will always look for evidence that matches up with what we believe to be true.
But this can be shifted once we recognise that our thoughts are just thoughts, and that they don’t hold true anymore. The easiest way to do so is to start looking for evidence to prove a different statement.
I’d like to share my own experience with you.
Early 2020, I was informed that my super-cool role couldn’t continue as such, and I had to make a choice between staying employed (different/ lower role) and keeping my salary, or leave and figure out what to do next. Not chill.
Internally, I knew what I needed to do, my whole body was telling me “take the less travelled road, there’s surely something new opening up for you”. Plus, taking a position that was meant for someone who really wanted it, just because I was afraid wouldn’t feel good.
But my mind? Oh, it was very active with all the reasons why I should play it safe. Else, I’d be digging my own grave. I started searching for opportunities in the company, spending time and energy on this when there was a hiring freeze that had caused my role to be made redundant…
“You just cannot leave a safe job in the middle of a global crisis”.
Until I, with the help of a coach, managed to break through the stories rooted in fear I was telling myself, my internal conflict kept draining me.
The narrative? That I wouldn’t find another job, that I wasn’t good enough to make it on my own, too old to start over, that my expertise wasn’t valued and that I’d be better off staying where I was.
Was this true? Of course not! In hindsight, I had built a life in the Netherlands on my own, reinvented myself, made a successful career, even created my own role! But that didn’t seem to amount for much when fear was in the driver’s seat.
The way out was to acknowledge that I was scared.
That there was no truth in me not being good enough to follow the path that was opening up for me.
That everything is perfect as is, because Life has a better plan than anything we can fathom.
I decided to trust myself and took my leap of faith. I had my breakthrough, my life changed and I’m living in alignment. So much so, that now I’m helping others reconnect with themselves and have their own #breakthroughs with my #coaching.
For me it was my job, but it could have been a relationship, or anything else.
So my questions to you are: What is your one decision that has the potential to change your life? How are you going to break through what’s holding you back?
