Tag: #success

Thoughtful Thursday posts, Uncategorized

Thoughtful Thursday – July 25, 2024

amybenoit

My intention is to post a Thoughtful Thursday column each week and share some of the insights I have learned in the past week. Here are some of the things I’ve learned this week:

Mentally Stronger with Therapist Amy Morin – 10 Mental Health Improvement Strategies Therapists Prescribe Their Patients
  • Act contrary to how you feel. Explore the behaviors that reinforce that emotional state and act the opposite. Ex: depression may want you to stay in bed all day, but getting up and moving is the best thing. Change your behaviors first, and the feelings will often follow.
  • Challenge your negative thoughts. Intense emotions cause irrational thoughts. Challenge your thoughts and prove that you can do something. Prove that your thoughts aren’t always accurate.
  • Add structure to your day. Be intentional about building in healthy tasks and having structure outside of work, but also allow room for flexibility.
  • Schedule fun, meaningful things to do. Having something to look forward to is really good for your mental health. Schedule one fun or meaningful thing each week.
  • Spend time in nature. Nature has incredible benefits for our mental health; it reduces anxiety, improves concentration, reduces depression, and helps us feel happier overall.
  • Get physical activity. Exercise reduces stress and anxiety and improves self-esteem. Find an activity that you enjoy so that you can stick to it.
  • Find a way to relax. Watching tv and scrolling on your phone stimulates your brain, so aim for ways to relax your brain. If you invest time into caring for your mental health now, you will feel better and perform better later.
  • Work on something that you’ve been putting off. The more you put something off, the more you dread doing it and the worse you feel.
  • Take care of your body. Eat a healthy diet and get adequate sleep.
  • Get social support. The people you spend time with might be the biggest factor that determines how mentally healthy you are. Having positive people in your life reduces the symptoms of mental illness. Remove yourself from toxic relationships.
Sad to Savage – Little Things to Help You Get Out Of A Rut
  • Do a check in and figure out why you’re in a rut. Is your schedule day-to-day not fun? Are you not sleeping enough? Are you nourishing your body with food and water? What are you spending your time doing? Is that keeping you stuck? Are those things helping you or hurting you? What do you need to change?
  • Pick out a goal right now to work towards. Ex: train for a 5k, make a healthy meal 3x/week, build a new habit
  • If you’re someone who really likes to talk on the phone, talk on the phone when you’re outside on a walk. You could start making plans with friends on the weekend to go on a walk. Look up gyms in your area and go to the cheapest one. Go on a treadmill and find a show you will only watch while walking on the treadmill.
  • Redesign a space in your home. Change around the furniture.
  • Find a book to read. Find a book about something you want to learn more about.
  • Know that you are allowed to change your mind and your habits whenever you want. You can become whoever you want to become.
  • Try a new hobby.  Take a class.
  • Pay attention to the people you have in your life, the environments you have, the music you listen to, the content you consume, the people you follow … all of those things can contribute to you feeling like you are in a rut.
  • Make a list of things that make you feel happy that you can turn to when you’re feeling down. Ex: family time, running, going outside, reading, etc.
Chasing Life – Does Money Buy Happiness?
  • Money CAN buy happiness. Buy experiences (trip, dinner with friends, etc.). Experiences bring more happiness than material possessions. Make spending feel like a treat – hedonic adaptation.
  • Think about how your choices about money impact how you use your time. If it doesn’t have any bearing on how you spend your time, you can probably let go of spending money on that for now.
  • Buying time – if you can, buy your way out of something you dread doing. Ex: mowing lawn, cleaning house, grocery shopping, etc.
  • Another fact mentioned is that people who donate to causes/charities through recurring charges aren’t nearly as happy as people who get involved in person and directly see the impact of their monetary donations.
Self Improvement Daily – “You can have it your way.”

Burger King’s motto “Have it your way” is a welcome reminder that each one of us matters and deserves to be cared for. We don’t need to settle for how things are; we can create a new reality for ourselves.

We can pursue our ambitions with pride. We can change our future if we have the courage to do so. Being selfish in investing in yourself can be one of the most selfless things you can do because it can great the greatest impact on others.

If you’re overstretched at work and compromising your own health, that’s not having it your way. When we enforce better boundaries about our work hours, we can have more time to fulfill ourselves in other ways.

If you don’t have as much time for the things and people you love, or the energy to do anything at the end of a long day, that’s not having it your way. When we say no to others, we say yes to ourselves.

Reordering priorities and making a commitment will start to shape your life your way. Balance your personal life, care, and passions in a way that you feel good about by figuring out how it all fits together.

This post from Seth’s blog really resonated with me:

The two bicycle errors

The two bicycle errors

“Momentum activities like public speaking, board sports and leadership all share an attribute with riding a bicycle: It gets easier when you get good at it.

The first error we often make is believing that someone (even us) will never be good at riding a bike, because riding a bike is so difficult. When we’re not good at it, it’s obvious to everyone.

The second error is coming to the conclusion that people who are good at it are talented, born with the ability to do it. They’re not, they have simply earned a skill that translates into momentum.

There’s a difference between, “This person is a terrible public speaker,” and “this person will never be good at public speaking.”

And there’s a difference between, “They are a great leader,” and “they were born to lead.”

The thing about momentum activities is that we notice them only twice: when people are terrible at them, and when they’re good at it. That includes the person you see in the mirror.”

My reflection: we only notice when someone is really good or really bad at something. We don’t see the “average” and we often don’t see the process that it took to get to “good.”

I look forward to reading, learning, and sharing more with you soon!

Thoughtful Thursday posts, Uncategorized

Thoughtful Thursday – June 13, 2024

amybenoit

My intention is to post a Thoughtful Thursday column each week and share some of the insights I have learned in the past week. Here are some of the things I’ve learned this week:

Mary’s Cup of Tea – Feeling Behind in Life? Listen to this
  • If you’ve been validated based on meeting or exceeding expectations, then when you don’t overachieve, you feel the complete opposite and feel like you are failing or falling behind. What if you aren’t falling behind but are where you need to be but you’re so used to being validated by external arbitrary expectations?
  • If you are constantly trying to perform, perfect, achieve, and do, you are disconnecting from the “being.” You’re turning yourself into a human doing rather than a human being.
  • Feeling behind in life is a result of comparison. It’s about comparing yourself to others based on external factors.
  • If you believe the solution to feeling behind is to catch up and get ahead, that is still comparison. That is still basing your worth and feelings of security, confidence, and assurance on some random arbitrary timeline.
  • “If the path before you is clear, you’re probably on someone else’s.”
  • It’s only a success if it’s aligned with your true desires. What some of us view as successful is not what the “achievers” deem successful.
  • When you compare yourself to people who graduated, got jobs, got married, reproduced, bought cars and houses and vacations, not only are you doing a disservice to yourself, but you’re also contributing to the narrative that “success” is measured by external achievements rather than inner fulfillment.
  • Whose ruler are you using to measure your success? Is that aligned with your true desires and values? Who is judging how behind or ahead you are? Is it society or that external validation voice you’ve internalized? Why are you continuing to use that against yourself? We are all paving our own way.

This podcast really resonated with me because sometimes I have felt “behind” in life. Nine years post-college, I am now pursuing a paralegal certificate, I don’t have kids yet, I haven’t traveled the world, and, although I am proud of many things in my life, my life doesn’t look like what I thought it would at my age. Yet, some people I know have compared themselves to me. It is easy to fall into the comparison trap.

Optimal Health Daily – The Five F’s That Keep You Stuck in Chronic Pain

Living with chronic pain, fatigue, or other persistent symptoms can feel like an endless battle, consuming every aspect of your life.

The Five Fs that keep you stuck in chronic pain and symptoms

Fear – constantly reacting to the symptoms with fear will intensify your suffering, and the anticipation of discomfort will lead you to avoid certain activities or movements, perpetuating the cycle of pain and anxiety.

  • Confront these fears head-on through education, reassurance, and gradual exposure to previously avoided activities. Challenge irrational beliefs and perceptions.

Fixing – medical interventions have their place, but often fail to address the underlying emotional and neurological factors contributing to chronic illness.    

Focus – where you focus your attention matters.

  • Learn to redirect your focus away from pain and toward things that bring you joy.
  • Frustration – living with chronic pain often breeds feelings of frustration, especially when you’re putting in so much time/money/effort to healing.
    • Be patient with yourself and accept where you are on your path to recovery. Embrace the process as a gradual and non-linear journey.
  • Fighting – can exacerbate your suffering. What you resist persists.
    • Surrender to what is and practice acceptance. Acknowledge your pain and allow yourself to experience it fully.
Life Kit – Fiber has tons of benefits. Here’s how to eat more of it
  • Fiber keeps you regular, lowers cholesterol, helps regulate blood sugar levels, keeps your hunger in check, and is the primary food source for microbes that live in our guts.
  • Microbes play a critical role in influencing health throughout your body. Those microbes are adapted to work with different fibers.
  • Probiotics are foods or supplements that contain live microorganisms that have a proven health benefit (kombucha, yogurt, etc.). Prebiotics are the food or fuel for those good microbes in your gut. All prebiotics are fiber, but not all fibers are prebiotics.
  • Recommended 25-30 grams of fiber per day – 14 grams per 1,000 calories per day
  • Eat the rainbow. Eat a variety of foods rich in fibers – sweet potatoes, avocados, berries, asparagus, artichoke, brown rice, quinoa, beans, lentils, etc.
  • Your best bet is to get fiber from a variety of plant-based foods instead of fiber supplements so that you can also get the vitamins and nutrients from foods. The fiber used in supplements has been highly purified and is a simple structure; these simpler fibers tend to get fermented faster by gut microbes, which means they might not reach all the microbes throughout your gut.

Tips:

  • Switch out white bread with whole grain bread.
    • Drink lots of water to help the fiber bind.
  • Eat a variety of foods rich in fibers.
  • Take note of which foods cause you to be gassy. Moving after eating can help with this.
Stuff You Should Know – Short Stuff: Amber Alerts
  • AMBER alert: America’s Missing: Broadcast Emergency Response
  • An amber warning is when a child has gone missing and it ends up being a statewide or nationwide alert. Vehicle info is included – vehicle model and license plate
  • January 1996 – Amber – 9-year-old from Arlington, TX. She was riding a bicycle in her neighborhood and was abducted by a man in a pickup truck. There was a nationwide search for Amber. This was pre-AMBER alert. Three days later, a dogwalker found her body in a creek.
  • Every state has different criteria for issuing AMBER alerts. The Department of Justice has issued guidelines about recommendations: law enforcement has a reasonable belief that a child was abducted, law enforcement believes a child will suffer serious bodily harm or worse, enough detail about the appearance and abduction of the child
  • Enter info in NCIC system – flag as a child abduction – will be a nationwide alert
  • Most missing kids do not meet the criteria of any AMBER alert. If people weren’t abducted and if you don’t know what the kid was wearing, you won’t meet the criteria for an AMBER alert.
  • In 2020, there were 365,000 entries that year in the NCIC system for missing kids and only 200 of them met the criteria for AMBER alerts to be issued.
  • The point is that an AMBER alert is very serious and action is needed fast. People wouldn’t take them seriously if they got notifications on their phone frequently. They would be desensitized.
  • AMBER alerts have contributed to the recovery of 1,186 children in the last seven years!

For Minnesota: The Amber Plan requires law enforcement to meet two criteria when evaluating a non-familial child abduction. Law enforcement must have both parts of the scenario before an activation can occur:

  1. The AMBER Plan should be activated when a child 17 years of age or younger is abducted and there is reason to believe the victim is in imminent danger of serious bodily injury or death.  AND,
  2. There is information available to disseminate to the public which could assist with the safe recovery of the victim and/or the apprehension of the suspect.

The Amber Plan is activated by the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension only when the two requirements above are met; as a result, the Amber Plan is not activated for every child abduction. In cases where the Amber Plan criteria are not met, the Minnesota Crime Alert Network may be activated to notify the public and request information on the case.

Summary of Department of Justice Recommended Criteria

  • There is reasonable belief by law enforcement that an abduction has occurred.
  • The law enforcement agency believes that the child is in imminent danger of serious bodily injury or death.
  • There is enough descriptive information about the victim and the abduction for law enforcement to issue an AMBER Alert to assist in the recovery of the child.
  • The abduction is of a child aged 17 years or younger.
  • The child’s name and other critical data elements, including the Child Abduction flag, have been entered into the National Crime Information Center (NCIC) system.

This post from Gabe the Bass Player resonated with me this week:

https://www.gabethebassplayer.com/blog/good-enough-to-try-things

Good Enough To Try Things

June 7, 2024

Not ‘good enough to have it all figured out’.

Not ‘good enough to not make a big mistake.’

Not ‘good enough to get by’.

Are you good enough to try things?

Do you have the faith and guts and confidence to try something in the face of it maybe not working and the ‘mistake’ might make you look less-than to some people…that’s a scary question. And you have to be next level good to pull it off.

I look forward to reading, learning, and sharing more with you soon!

Thoughtful Thursday posts, Uncategorized

Thoughtful Thursday – April 11, 2024

amybenoit

My intention is to post a Thoughtful Thursday column each week and share some of the insights I have learned in the past week. Here are some of the things I’ve learned this week:

Optimal Finance Daily – 10 Money Questions Every Couple Must Answer

Note that these questions are for couples in serious long-term relationships. You and your partner may not agree on everything. It’s more important to work through conflicts and come to an understanding.

  1. What is your policy on loaning money to relatives? Are you supporting/do you plan to support any family members?
  2. How much money have you saved?
  3. How much debt do you have?
  4. Are you comfortable investing or do you prefer to keep your money in the bank?
  5. Are you a saver or spender?
  6. How do you feel about merging finances once we’re married? This question has a lot to do with the question about how much your partner has saved. If you’re the only saver, you may not want to merge finances.
  7. Do you have a budget…and can I see it?
  8. Will you support me if I choose not to work?
  9. What type of bill payer are you? Minimum payments/full bill upfront? Automatic bill pay/send via mail? Do you pay all bills on time?
  10. What is your dream, and how do you plan on paying for it?

I thought this podcast was very interesting and I wish I had known about these questions sooner. For full transparency, I did not/have not asked all of these questions, but I think it’s a great idea!

The Liz Moody Podcast – 10 Learnings From My Week At The Life-Changing Hoffman Process Personal Growth Retreat
  • When you are saying how you feel, use “I” instead of “you.” This helps the emotion and experience feel more personal.
  • If you are struggling to change, start with any action. Action is required for change. You can act yourself into a new way of thinking, but you can’t think yourself into a new way of action.
  • We are all human and we are all going through challenges, so stop judging other people. By judging others, you are paving those pathways in your brain that are primed for judgment, and you are priming yourself to judge yourself. When you notice you’re telling yourself a story about someone else in your head, talk to them and find out more about them.
  • Clarity is kind. Don’t beat around the bush.
  • In order to heal, we need to turn out instead of in. Involve other people instead of keeping to yourself. The power of community is vital to healing. You are not a burden. Reach out to people. Relationship bonds heal relationship wounds.
  • Fun is a key part of healing. Access connection, joy, and love. Healing doesn’t always need to be hard and not fun. You can enjoy the process of becoming the person that you want to be. You will get better results if the healing process is enjoyable, too.
  • Everything we see in others is typically also in us – “You spot it, you’ve got it.” In other people, we notice the things that we are most sensitive about or don’t like about ourselves as much. The traits we find most triggering in other people are usually things we are dealing with internally and things we are reacting to negatively within ourselves. When we notice positive attributes in other people, often those are positive traits we notice and value about ourselves.
  • Don’t forgive and forget. That sets you up for future hurt. Forgive and remember because holding on to it only hurts you. Resentment is like drinking poison and hoping it will kill your enemies. The only person made prisoner by our resentment is ourselves.
  • When you impress people into liking you, it makes you feel inherently unlovable. It can make you feel that without those things, you wouldn’t be lovable or likable to people. If people only like you because of your status/your job, you may feel unlovable without your job. When we give people an arbitrary sense of status (ex: celebrities), we’re actually depriving them of their ability to be human and to feel lovable for who they authentically are.
    • When we don’t share what we do for work, the ways you identify your relationships with people are built on who you really are on the inside. You’re forced to present a raw version of yourself, and people will love you for you. You have worth outside of your job and the work that you do.
  • Be, do, have. How do you want to feel? How do you want to live? Let that influence what you do in the world and the choices you make. Those choices, as a result of the being and doing, will create the things that you have. You’ll have a different relationship with those things because you won’t need those things to be happy.
    • Be, do, have instead of do, have, be.

  • How do we help people who are different from one another experience a sense of belonging and support in the workplace?
    • Acknowledge that we all have some privilege. Ex: access to hot water, drinking water, etc. Being aware of our privilege helps us to see where we have access and ease, and access and ease give us power. What about me or my experience might someone look at and consider to be typical?
    • We need to be willing to recognize the differences in people and want to get to know them across those differences. Let me learn about your experiences so that I can develop empathy for you and gain perspective I wouldn’t otherwise have. Hear their stories, gain empathy, and broaden your view. Ex: interviews – how often do we dismiss candidates because we didn’t think they were a culture fit or they didn’t give us the exact example we wanted? What if we used their stories to evaluate where they have an opportunity to thrive and grow? Hear their circumstances and experiences.
    • Extend your privilege to others respectfully and impactfully in the ways you are able to.
    • Allyship can involve considering food allergies, accepting correction when you mispronounce someone’s name, left-handed scissors, etc. What do you have the ability to do to support others?

I really liked this blog post from Seth’s Blog this week:

Analyzing the last move

Analyzing the last move

“When the deal falls apart, or the team loses the game, or a partnership hits the rocks, it’s easy to focus our energy on what just happened.

“What if they had called a different play?”

This overlooks the real issue. It’s the first move, or the fifth, that led to this problem, not what happened at the last moment.

Creating the conditions for success is a very different project than finding a heroic move that saves the day.“

This post from Gabe the Bass Player also resonated with me this week. Often, we envy the successes, accomplishments, or belongings of others. Yet, we aren’t willing to do what it takes to obtain them.”

What Will You Give Up

April 9, 2024

“One of the hardest parts of getting to where we want to go is giving up the things that make us feel good in the short term…

It’s hard to give up scrolling

It’s hard to give up Netflix

It’s hard to give up scrolling Netflix

It’s hard to give up the peace and quiet that comes from not doing much…or doing the same old things.

It’s hard to give up the notion that people will understand why you’re doing what you’re doing

It’s hard to give up your norms

It’s hard to give up not rocking the boat

It’s hard to give up the security of your hard won reputation

The best way to get to the new place is by starting something new…and giving up something else is a great way to start.”

I look forward to reading, learning, and sharing more with you soon!

Book review posts, Uncategorized

The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

amybenoit

“The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People” is a very interesting and educational book written by Stephen R. Covey. I highly recommend this book and am certain everyone can get something out of this book.

Habit 1: Be Proactive

How often do you use and hear reactive phrases such as “If only,” “I can’t,” or “I have to?”

Use your R & I! Use your resourcefulness and initiative when problems arise!

Problems = direct control vs. indirect control vs. no control

  • Direct control problems are solved by working on our habits.
  • Indirect control problems are solved by changing our methods of influence.
  • No control problems involve taking the responsibility to change the line on the bottom of our face — to smile, to genuinely and peacefully acccept these problems and learn to live with them.

Between stimulus and response, man has the freedom to choose.

Viktor Frankl

Habit 2: Begin with the end in mind.

Picture your funeral. What would your family, friends, coworkers, and church members or community say about you? What character would you like them to have seen in you? What contributions or achievements would you want them to remember? What difference would you like to have made in their lives?

Habit 3: Put first things first.

The cause of almost all relationship difficulties is rooted in conflicting or ambiguous expectations around roles and goals. Many expectations are implicit. They haven’t been explicitly stated or announced. It is important to state expectations.

Many people refuse to delegate to other people because they feel it takes too much time and effort and they could do the job better themselves. Transferring responsibility to other skilled and trained people enables you to give your energies to other high-leverage activities. Delegation means growth, both for individuals and for organizations.

You can’t think efficiency with people. You think effectiveness with people and efficiency with things.

Stephen R. Covey

Habit 4: Think win-win.

Win/win = a frame of mind and heart that constantly seeks mutual benefit in all interactions. Seek to understand, identify the key issues and concerns, determine what results would constitute a fully acceptable solution, and identify possible new options and achieve those results.

Habit 5: Seek first to understand, then to be understood.

Seek first to understand, then to be understood. Most people listen with the intent to reply.

Continuous deposits are needed. 6 major deposits: understanding the individual, attending to the little things, keeping commitments, clarifying expectations, showing personal integrity, apologizing sincerely when you make a withdrawal.

Habit 6: Synergize.

As a principle-centered person, you try to stand apart from the emotion of the situation and from other factors that would act on you and evaluate the options. Looking at the needs that may be involved and the possible implications of various alternative decisions, you’ll try to come up with the best solution, taking all factors into consideration.

The person who doesn’t read is no better off than the person who can’t read.

Stephen R. Covey

Management is doing things right. Leadership is doing the right things.

Stephen R. Covey

Habit 7: Sharpen the saw.

Life life in crescendo. The most important work you will ever do is always ahead of you. Regardless of what you have or haven’t accomplished, you have important contributions to make.

What one thing could you do that, if you did it on a regular basis, would make a tremendous positive difference in your personal life? What one thing in your business or professional life would bring similar results?

4 dimensions of renewal

Daily Private Victory- Spend a minimum of one hour a day in renewal of the physical, spiritual, and mental dimensions. This is the key to developing the 7 habits.

I highly recommend this book!

I look forward to reading, learning, and sharing more with you soon!