This Tuesday, I'll again be joining my friend Laura with Arbonne as we talk with another group of moms considering work-family balance. My evening's talk, according to the flyer, is quite rousing in that "Life Coach Nichole Santoro will inspire us with secrets to balancing work, family, and achieving your personal and career goals." I had to smile...if I knew THOSE secrets, I'd be selling quite a few books right now, no?!?
Then I thought, OK, this is really a great challenge and great fun! And I'm testing the waters with you - let me know what you think.
The truth is...the activities and support systems that help you reach your goals are all going to vary and be customized by person. Some people like paper calendars, some people like blackberries, some people love helping out at school, others prefer volunteering in the community, some people think part time work is 30 hours a week, while others max out at 10. Some people prefer to get support from their moms, some from mentors in their industry, others chat with their girlfriends, some want a personal coach, others want a supportive team structure. Some moms want jobs at home to blend their work and family. Other moms want clear boundaries between work and family so that they have one singular focus at a time. So there is truly an abundance of possibilities for creating balance with work and family.
As I pondered and pondered, I did come to a couple of universal ideas that could be true for EVERYONE. I've been reading them in law of attraction books and more recently, saw them explained in The Secret (I found this very interesting in that my "talk" is also titled "secrets").
Here's what I've come up with that I've found to be true in my own life. If there is just one universal secret, I believe it is that everything you want in your life comes about with internal changes. How I believe this works is fundamentally three components:
1) DESIRE. This can be very easy, in that "I want a new car, new job, new boss, new clothes." And sometimes not so easy and requires some thought, as in, "How do I want to use my talents in a new career?" Or perhaps, "I really want to be a makeup artist, stay at home mom, personal shopper, interior designer, etc." but I can't and/or I shouldn't. To really demonstrate desire, look to your children as an example. They are experts at making their desires known!
2) SELF-LOVE. Love Yourself enough to believe you deserve what you want and you can have what you want. It's just that simple, and probably the most difficult of the three. That's because we've grown up with so many beliefs about what will work and what won't work and so we're used to learning and playing by the rules. We may also have been taught that loving ourselves first is selfish. But as the conventional wisdom goes, we need to put on our own oxygen masks before we can help a child - or other people - with theirs. A very touching book which exemplifies this beautifully is, The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio: How My Mother Raised 10 Kids on 25 Words or Less. Goodness, if this mom managed to fulfill her passionate hobby of contest writing, and earn enough income off her prizes to make a housing down payment, imagine what each of us could do once we truly believe in ourselves!
3) EMOTION. "I really really really want this." "I really really really believe I can have this." Again, those kiddies have this one down pat. They're reminding you at every opportunity, just in case you've forgotten of course, what exactly it is they wanted and absolutely must have.
And then, the external components come into play when you're excited to implement strategies that will get you what you want...a better body, more time with your children, a new career. Trying to implement external changes (think of all the "how to's" lists in magazines) without first tapping into your deepest motivations is what can hold us back from succeeding.
Personally, I can say that when I started working with my first coach in 2004 and wrote my hopes and dreams onto paper, they have nearly all come true.
Try this at home. Be inspired by your life!
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