Are You Relentlessly Resilient?

You're making changes and things are going well, until they're not. Understanding the process of change means embracing setbacks and reframing them as setups for success. If you're like me, you think you have to have everything thought through and planned for every possible contingency before you start. You can't possibly do that because there will be curveballs you can't possi...

I recently read a blog post by my friend Gregory Russel Benedict about not being willing to suck at something new.  The article really resonated with me because we almost always suck when we do something for the first time. The key is to be willing to be bad before you can be good.  When I taught piano, I hated teaching adults.  They expected to be able to play well instantly. Becoming accomplishe...

I'm doing a deep dive on change and the challenges it presents. I'm writing a book about it! "Launch Your New Life - Embracing the Challenge of Change will be finished by August and available in September. We resist change, even though it's inevitable. There is a biological reason for this. Our nervous system perceived change as a threat, and, perhaps, a life threatening threat. A...

Ready for a change? To increase your odds of success, prepare. Making a change obviously requires us to change. But most people secretly want to stay the same, but have the outcome that change brings. Lose 20 pounds but still eat anything you want. Save more money but keep your current spending habits. The key is to take small consistent steps towards implementing that change. I have a friend who...

Listeners know I am a student of change and resilience. When our efforts begin to pay off, are we ready for the change that success brings? I am starting to see things I've been working on for years start to come to fruition. It's exciting. It's terrifying at the same time. Why? Because in order to receive that success, I have to leave the part of me that believes I'm not worthy, o...

Fractures in our lives are not failures. They are the cracks through which wisdom can appear. I live at the top of a mountain and can see where a tiny pine tree seed found a spot of dirt in a crack in a rock and decided to grow. Were the conditions ideal? Of course not. Did that stop the seed from growing? No, over time the growing tree forced the crevice to open. I'm writing a new book "...

Every great story of overcoming features a Dark Night of the Soul, a descent into the Underworld, a reckoning with our shadow side and a re-emergence. When we are in the darkness, we can't see what's happening. We feel lost, vulnerable, and defeated believing this is our lot in life and it will not change. I spent several months in that dark place. Externally, you never would have realized...

This week was a tough week for me. I had a big disappointment which you'll hear about in the podcast. It was an opportunity to feel the disappointment and the anger, acknowledge it, and move on. Wallowing in disappointment wastes time and energy. Feel it, experience it, but don't get stuck in it. If you've done all you can do, if the situation is out of your control, surrender the disa...

If you're like me, there are times in life when I fight harder for my limitations than I do for my strengths. The transition I'm experiencing in my life right now, is HARD. And my internal dialog blindside me and deliver a TKO I didn't even see coming. That's why paying attention to what we're telling ourselves and what we're thinking is soooo important when life is throwin...

Is something that happens to you good or bad? It depends on your perspective. Hard things that happen may lead us to one of our biggest breakthroughs. When we honestly examine how we react or respond to something, we find that we have the ability to react differently. But our brains are designed to conserve energy and change takes effort. So we default to familiar, well-established habits of think...

Why do we expect ourselves to be experts at things we've never done before? I wish I knew. Yet so many of us hold us to a standard when doing or trying something new that we would never hold for someone else. Several friends have children who are graduating from high school this month. Navigating the unknown of what life looks like after their children leave is a source of mixed emotions. The...

When life changes are accelerating, we can feel completely overwhelmed. But living life by design instead of default, provides a clear direction. Yet we often feel like we have no control over what happens. That's a lie. We always have a choice (although we may not like the choice.) For those of us in our latter years of life (I will be forever young) time is more precious than ever. Where are...

What is the purpose of pain? Pain lets us know that something is wrong or out of alignment. When we avoid pain, we actually prolong it. Of course experiencing pain is unpleasant but the only way out is to go through it. The biggest lie about pain is we believe it will go on forever and we may make choices based on that belief. In my experience, even the most profound pain lessens after three days....

Endings and beginnings are part of life. We can look forward to beginning something new - a job, a relationship, an adventure. But each beginning also means something is ending. And endings can be painful. We often try to avoid the grief that comes with endings. But you can't. It catches up with you one way or another and allowing yourself to feel the hurt helps you heal. I'm allowing myse...

Is it just me, or is the world changing faster than ever? Yes, change is accelerating and it's dis-regulating our nervous systems and increasing stress. Why? We are hard wired to fear change. Our brain sees all change as a possible threat to our survival and so it kicks into high gear to protect us. Some changes we look forward to such as a promotion, a new love relationship, or retirement. Bu...

I asked Google for a definition of the word "sign". This is what it said: A sign is a gesture, action, mark, or object that conveys meaning, represents an idea, or indicates the presence of something else. I found the last six words intriguing "indicates the presence of something else." I see signs everywhere I go. Not 3 dimensional signs, but sign from God, the Universe, and d...

What things matter to you? Your jewelry, your clothes, your photographs? A wildfire last week near where I live had my property and those close by under pre-evacuation orders. Making decisions about what would stay and what should go was surprisingly easy. - because we are not our things. We give them meaning and value. I hope I never have to evacuate my house, but if I do, I know what goes, what...

The power and truth of this statement shook me this morning. It was the mantra that got my father through the hardest years of his life. In this episode, I'll share the story of the rainbow and why it meant so much to my Dad and now means so much to me.

Can you believe it's been a year since I started this podcast? Life has had its ups and downs, all documented here. I'm proud that I haven't given up, that I have expanded my vision of what is possible, and have been relentlessly resilient in the pursuit of my dreams. I hope this podcast inspired you to grow and believe that you can have more of life than others will tell you is possib...

There are millions of things I like to do in life. Being vulnerable is not one of them. I remember when the leader of a discussion group I was in told me I was most approachable when I was being vulnerable. What he didn't realize was when I feel vulnerable my mind tells me I'm unsafe and unable to defend myself. That isn't true, but it's how I feel. And learning to lasso my brain t...

Who is living inside your head? What voices are telling you that you shouldn't, you couldn't, or that they wouldn't do what you're thinking about doing? The overarching theme of the "Are You Relentlessly Resilient?" podcast is this - change may be hard, but staying the same is harder. Too many times those the "love us" tell us we want too much, that what we are...

We often want the results of change, but don't want to do the work required. Why, when we know that the change we want to make will improve our life, do we refuse to change or sabotage our efforts? We are biologically hardwired to resist change. Change is a potential threat, and until we know the consequences of that change, we are unwilling to proceed. For example, many people are overweight....

I recorded this podcast earlier this week and went to upload it on Wednesday. Mother Nature had other plans. High winds knocked out power where I live and I've been without power (except for a short window) since. Today the winds are even more fierce with 100 mph gusts on the mountain top where I live. I decided to come "down mountain" and get this uploaded. Sometimes life is what it...

Today is a very different episode of Are You Relentlessly Resilient? I've uploaded a video recorded today after a parole hearing for the driver of the getaway vehicle during a robbery in which my husband, Chris, was killed. The 5th anniversary of this event is tomorrow, December 4th. Chris' death, and my interactions with the first responder community after he was killed, was the inspirati...

Tomorrow in America we celebrate Thanksgiving. It's my very favorite holiday and one that often gets trampled on the way To Christmas. Gratitude helps things grow - people, opportunities, blessings. Taking time to give thanks for our blessings reminds of the how lucky we are and how many things we take for granted. Take a moment to thank your heart for beating, your eyes for seeing, your ears...