Women in the LEAD

Journey to Trusting Ourselves

At some point in the journey to trusting ourselves, we are called upon to reclaim the uniqueness that once so embarrassed us.  To not only accept ourselves with all our idiosyncrasies, but actually to embrace and celebrate our individuality.

“Trusting Yourself” M.J. Ryan

Women often feel a lack of confidence and a sense of inferiority over their unique qualities.  If we could begin to take an inventory of our uniqueness and look for the gifts that it holds, we could change our lack of confidence into great confidence. 

• What unique feature have you be insecure or embarrassed about?  What gifts does it hold?  How could you view it in a different light?

  -- Maureen Simon

WOMEN: Loosen Up to Achieve More

I don't know about you, but sometimes I get so wound up with pressures in work and life, it works against me. I read today a meaningful passage with a reminder to us all:

"Loosen up. To be tense is the surest way to fail in any undertaking great or small. To desire success is a splendid thing but to pursue success too tensely is to make certain of missing it.  The carefree approach in any endeavor is a shortcut to success. In music, in sport, in study, in business life, many people fail, or advance very slowly, because they make hard work of it. Treat your work as fun. Regard the difficulties as part of the game, laugh off the annoyances. This, of course, is the real difference between work and  play. Take it easy! Loosen up!"

--- Emmet Fox

So today with a lightness of being may you make a meaningful contribution to this day!
I will be working to do the same.

Debbe

Debbe Kennedy
Author and founder, Global Dialogue Center
Home of Women in the Lead

I am hosting monthly online dialogues starting in July, 2008.
Join me. Learn more... http://www.puttingourdifferencestowork.com/dialogues.html

There Is Only One Success

There is only one success – To be able to spend your life in your own way.

Christopher Morley

That’s certainly a different picture of success, isn’t it.  We so frequently look externally to define success.  What would your life look like if you made up your own definition and lived your life by it? Give it a try!  List what success means to you and for each area that you define list one step or action that you will now take to move you closer to living your personal version of success.  Don’t go externally for feedback but look internally.  Move your life in the direction of your dreams. 

Maureen Simon

WOMEN: Success Inside Out

Sometimes when I read in the morning, I just know that there is a message coming that will have an impact. It often feels like a brush of intuition coming over me as I open the book at random, a unique way of reading for sure. This all started years ago. I had given a young friend the classic book, Gift from the Sea by Anne Morrow Lindbergh. My friend was going through a terrible divorce, while holding down a significant leadership job. She was working hard to find herself. She told me. "I have had no time to read this book, so I've been just opening it to see what might be there for me." Her story prompted me to start this practice of random reading (which I know I've mentioned sometime in my writings here). Over the years, it has rarely let me down. Eventually I finish the book, but its lessons and messages come to me from its inside out when I need it most.

This morning was still another inside out experience with one of my cherished books...

John Homer Miller's Take a Look at Yourself written over 50 years ago, but new to me continues to captivate me. The lesson today is one I am quite sure is one in which you will relate. He offers a suggestion for the living of a successful life:

He suggests that getting your mind off yourself and upon others---those for whom the world is to be made better and more beautiful is the place to start. "Only in living to make the world better for others do you discover the best in life for yourself. That in turn strengthens your power of endurance and increases your enthusiasm for living."

He then tells this poignant story about the classic play and actor in "Rip Van Winkle" with its current day lesson for all of us.

"Joseph Jefferson once was asked how many times he had played Rip Van Winkle. He consulted a notebook and read off the exact number of times, which ran into the thousands. Then he was asked, "Don't you get tired of playing it? The actor replied...

'I did at first. After I had been playing Rip for a year or two I became thoroughly fed up with it. I thought I owed it to myself to freshen my interest and prove my versatility by learning another play. But the audience wanted rip and I went back to it. The I made an important discovery. I discovered that every night's audience is different from every other, and that if I quit thinking about myself and thought only about the people I was trying to serve, each performance was a new and exciting adventure.'"

This perspective gives us each an opportunity to create success each day from the inside where we stop to commit ourselves each day to serve others that cross our path --- and then carry our conviction to contribute through our action, behavior, thoughts and deeds to carry it out to our world.

Have you realized this lately?

Debbe

Debbe Kennedy
Author and founder, Global Dialogue Center
Home of Women in the Lead

My New Book! Putting Our Differences to Work (June 2008)
The Fastest Way to Innovation, Leadership, and High Performance
Learn more: www.puttingourdifferencestowork.com http://www.puttingourdifferencestowork.com/dialogues.html

Also, I am hosting monthly online dialogues starting in July, 2008

Recovering Our Original Unity

“We are already one and we imagine we are not.  And what we have to recover is our original unity.  Whatever we have to be is what we are.”

-- Thomas Merton

As the world becomes smaller and global communications become immediately possible we begin to feel a sense that “the other” is not that far away.  We also begin to realize that our differences are not that different.  We come to realize that we share the same planet within the same galaxy and that nothing is very far away.  For me these thoughts lead to a sense of unity – a sense of oneness.  In millenniums past we have allowed a sense of separateness to ensue.  We have felt a distance and measured ourselves as like or unlike “the other”.   As the world becomes smaller these differences dissipate and we have a new opportunity to recover our original unity.

Maureen Simon 

WOMEN: Is indecision holding you back?

Do you ever wonder what real things stand in your way of achieving or accomplishing your heart's desire? This morning I was reminded as I was reading one of my cherished books, Take A Look at Yourself by John Homer Miller. It was a little find in an old book store sometime back, written over 50 years ago and full of wisdom.

He wrote...

"Decision is so important that three fourths of your life is determined by your ability to make up your mind, by your capacity to meet and adjust yourself to new situations. Decisions must precede your every action. It determines not only what you do but how and when you do it."

He went on to share a story about about Mary Lyon, the founder of Mount Holy yoke College and its first President. "At age sixteen, she kept house for her brother for $1 a week. She was hungry for knowledge and self-improvement as many of us are. Her time was precious to her; she scarely knew an idle or wasted moment. After her death a paper was found among her belongings on which she had listed seven ways of wasting time against which she guarded and against which she preached:"

• Indefinite musing [or daydreaming].
• Anticipating needlessly.
• Needless speculation.
• Indulgenence in reluctance to begin a duty.
• In doubtful cases, not deciding at once.
• Musing needlessly on what has been said or done or what may be.
• Spending time in reverie which should be spent in prayer.

I admit many of these unconscious inhibitors keep me from taking bold steps sometimes. It is usually the feeling of being overwhelmed with what seems a gazillion tiny decisions many of which have run into one or more of these roadblocks that keep me from moving through my life and work with more ease.

HOW ABOUT YOU?

I have Mary Lyon's list beside me now. It will be an inspiration for action.

Best...

Debbe

Debbe Kennedy
Author and founder, Global Dialogue Center
Home of Women in the Lead

My New Book! Putting Our Differences to Work (June 2008)
The Fastest Way to Innovation, Leadership, and High Performance
Learn more: www.puttingourdifferencestowork.com

Also, I am hosting monthly online dialogues starting in July, 2008
http://www.puttingourdifferencestowork.com/dialogues.html

We Are All Here For A Purpose—What’s Yours?

I  really enjoy watching the recordings from the brilliant conferencce--  TED—which is held here in California annualy.Today I was watching Rick Warren, author of The Purpose Driven Life speak about –us not being here by accident. He went on to say that our lives really matter –to God –history and the universe. We really need to “get” this idea in order to fully live our life.  In his talk Rick asked us to ask our selves: “Why do I feel I have to pretend more than I am?  He went on to say that it comes down to purpose. When we are clear on our purpose there is no pretending. Life becomes very real—meaningful.

Take a look –at Ted and at Larrys talk--- C:\Documents and Settings\Owner.YOUR-8214EAC618\Desktop\TED  Talks  Rick Warren Living a life of purpose (video).mht

Enjoy!

                                                                                                Maureen Simon

Finding Your Way Back To Yourself

“Each man (woman) has only one genuine vocation – to find the way to himself (herself)…His (Her) task is to discover his (her) own destiny – not an arbitrary one – and live it out wholly and resolutely within himself (herself).  Everything else is only a would-be existence, an attempt at evasion, a flight back to the ideals of the masses conformity, and fear of one’s own inwardness.”

Herman Hesse

n       What would it take for you to find the way to yourself? 

n       How much do you conform when conforming does not feel right? 

n       Where or when are you afraid to look within?

Maureen Simon

WOMEN: Finding New Levels of COURAGE

Life is always asking a little more from us, yes? Asking us to be more, do more. This has been on my mind with all the tragedy, death and destruction and it has reminded me again that I've collected a few pieces of encouragement that seem to help me find new levels of courage---that always leads to creating new VISIONS of what is out there for us to capture.

Below are three things that have been trusted friends:

1. I have a big rock on my desk that has YES! carved into it. It reminds me that once I really answer, "YES!" to a question life asks me that the way is opened.

2. When I get scared about doing hard things, I repeat a mantra over and over that a friend shared. I CAN, I WILL, I MUST, I AM. Try it sometime. It gives you an instant lift.

3. Twelve two word sentences define my heart's desire. I found them in a spiritual song some years back. If these things happened what else does one need?

Melt me.
Mold me.
Fill me.
Use me.
Cleanse me.
Teach me.
Hold me.
Reach me.
Shield me.
Free me.
Call me.
Lead me.

How about you?
What encourages you?
What tools to you use to find new courage?

Debbe Kennedy
Founder, Global Dialogue Center
www.globaldialoguecenter.com
Home of Women in the Lead

Do Not Believe What You Have Heard.

“Do not believe in what you have heard; do not believe in the traditions because they have been handed down for generations; do not believe in anything because it is rumored or spoken by many; do not believe merely because a written statement of some old sage is produced; do not believe in conjectures; do not believe in as truth that to which you have become attached by habit; do not believe merely the authority of teachers and elders.  After observation and analysis, when it agrees with reason and is conducive to the good and gain of one and all, then accept it, practice it, and live up to it.”

Buddha             

§         What agrees with your reason and is conducive to the good and gain of one and all?

§         Where do you want to tie your boat – align your values’

§         Who is the tribe that supports you?

§         What do you most believe in?

                                                                                                          Maureen Simon