opportunity Archives - Life Coaching by Christine Gipple

Resistance – How it shows up and keeps us stuck

A few years back, I had resistance to working with a coach to do some deep work. I had two main fears:

1) What if I surpassed my husband in terms of personal growth, ruining the possibility for us to stay truly “connected”? And,

2) What if I stayed the same? (which in my mind was worse than the first one)

Both of these fears were my resistance. Resistance is simply an unconscious (often self-imposed) defense mechanism that we put in place thinking it’s going to protect us from feeling the hurt, discomfort, pain, anxiety, rejection or whatever it is we don’t want to feel.

Fact is, resistance does the opposite of protecting us from any of those things. Resistance will bind us to the very pain and discomfort we’re trying so hard to avoid.

We often tell ourselves it’s scary to look inside and get to the root of our emotional stories, dramas, or situations, but the truth is, it’s actually scarier not to.

Once you see it, you can transform it. Louise Hay has a great quote, “If you’re going to clean the house, you have to see the dirt.”

You can’t change what you can’t see.

The good news is, once you see the dirt, once you face your resistance and actually DO that thing that scares you, you’re immediately more empowered. Then you can take steps toward your desires. Any small steps toward what you want will slowly dissipate your fear.

Think about something you’ve been wanting to say yes to, or something that’s been on your desires list and you’ve been too afraid to commit to. What can you do this week to move you closer to YES?

Think small, baby steps. Something bite sized and doable. Then do it!

Taking one step can be the catapult you need for big change.

You got this!

Sending you big love….

P.S. If you’d like to follow my blog and receive my newsletter on simplifying, letting go and creating more ease, you can do that here .

Being tired is a Choice: Shift from exhausted to energetic :)

Happy Sunday!

For the past 5 days, we hosted two girls from The Young Americans (YA) while our daughter did her first YA workshop. We chose to be a “home-stay” family (aka host) in hopes it would do two things – deepen the experience for my daughter, making her feel more comfortable trying something new, and support a great community. It did those things.

We also became very attached to *our* YA girls, Sasha and Moriah. 😉 This morning, I felt like I was sending my own children off to college as they loaded the tour bus for their next stop. Which I suppose I was – The YA school of performing arts is based in California where both the girls attend and live.

When I asked the girls how they keep their energy high on tour, Sasha laughed and said, “Well, sometimes coffee”, then added, “The way I see it is, being tired is a choice.” They also added that when we think we’re tired, sometimes it’s important to push through it and get to that edge, to go beyond where you think you can go.

Doing what we think we can’t takes courage.

How often do we stop doing something because we feel tired, or because something feels “too hard”? I know for me, I’ll procrastinate, telling myself a story that I either don’t know how to do something, it’ll take too long, or I don’t have what I need to complete it, etc. Then I waste mental energy ruminating over details in my head, making myself “tired”.

Truth is, if I simply DO that one thing that I think I “can’t”, or that I tell myself I’m not ready to do, it opens up a whole other level of energy.

Without knowing it, Sasha & Moriah gifted me this morning. They reminded me time is energy. And energy can be a feeling. A belief. A choice. Granted, I’m not advocating to push past healthy boundaries, where we ignore our need for sleep, rest and rejuvenation. I am saying sometimes we give up too soon. We tell ourselves we can’t do something, when in fact, we may not even try. Maybe we *could* accomplish it – if we chose to try.

Next time you feel tired, ask yourself what’s underneath that mindset. Do you really need sleep or rest, or is there some action you need to take, or some small step you could complete that would boost your energy?

I’d be remiss if I didn’t share our experience with YA. If you know children that love music and performing, definitely check out a YA workshop. There are still a couple stops left on this tour. After that, the next tour is in 3 years.

Sending a big hug to you on this gorgeous November day,

Chris

If you know someone who’d benefit from reading this, feel free to share it out! 🙂

P.S. If you’d like to follow my blog and receive my newsletter on simplifying, letting go and creating more ease, you can do that here .