Cara Lumen | Sing a Deeper Song

Sing a Deeper Song

Self Awareness

The Next “Now”

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“Now” is where we are.  “Now” is this incredible moment.  What are you dragging into this “now” that you could do without?  When we step into the next “now” we can bring forth or leave behind whatever we choose. That choice will change our experience of “now.” I have an opportunity to change in this next instant.  I can drop my feelings of fear; I can embrace my feeling of hopefulness.  I can love more, create more, and understand more.  In this very instant, I can change.

Change your thoughts, change your experience

I know that I can change my experience of life by changing my thoughts but I only recently began to think about what I leave behind that could could make my “now” more positive. I could certainly drop things like anger, or low levels of self-esteem, but where am I now, in this instant and what do I want to change?  What do I need to leave behind?

What is the primary focus of your life right now?

Look for the over-arching focus of your life.  Is it work?  Relationships?  Spiritual growth?  My over-arching focus at this moment is discovering how to stay relevant in this retirement chapter of my life.  We each have a strong desire to feel needed and wanted. We want to know that what we do has meaning.  We want to feel relevant. My current challenge finds me living in a senior center, being 80 and watching people around me in varying degrees of health. I am in a fighting mood to preserve my health, stay strong to the very end, learn to figure out what the “end” is to me and figure out how I can continue to feel like I am a contributing member of my community.  What do I do?  What do I think?  What can I change?

What is holding me back that I can leave behind?

Leave behind your past. It certainly does no good to figure out how I would change the past. Dwelling upon it, beating myself up for it, or even being angry at any element or person in my past are things I should, could and must leave behind. I only have this moment.  What do I do with that?

What can I change about myself?

For someone who has been a happily introverted loner all of my life I am suddenly learning to be comfortable in social situations. That means I have to change. I have to find steps I can take to feel more comfortable with new people.  I have focused on the word “unfold” and am allowing that concept to influence a great portion of my life.  What attitude, belief, or expectation do you need to change in order to experience a different “now”?

What has changed about my circumstances?

I have retired. Retirement is a huge change.  I am a liberal metaphysician who moved to the conservative Midwest to be closer to physical family support.  As I focused on the cross-country move, a couple of knee replacements and a second move to a Senior Center, my business gradually went away.  I sit here as an “empty” person ready to move forward.  It is like starting over, not from scratch, but from this place in time.

What do I want in my next “now”?

When you stop defining yourself as your job, you are at a loss for words.  When you start defining yourself by your passion, you take off.  My passion is about learning and sharing what I discover with others. The focus of my passion right now is about learning to live a relevant life for the next 20 years or so.  My life seems to have been divided into 20 years chunks.  1-20 I grew up, 20-40 married, had children, 40-60 learned everything holistic I could while living in New York City. 60-80, moved to Northern California and became a spiritual counselor and a coach.  I now have the opportunity to make 80-100 fabulous.

Leave behind the perceived limitations

I have basically ignored the passing years.  My belief is that we only age because we believe we will. I have to keep my vision strong. In this particular living environment, I am alone in my beliefs.  I have to be consistent in the inner work that allows me to focus on being healthy, flexible, and an active contributor to my world.

I used to measure some of my success by the money I earned.  That is no longer part of the self-worth equation for me.  Now I measure my success in how deeply I can move within and bring what I discover into my daily actions. Every day I make choices to leave a soft footprint on the planet.  I minimalize and I economize. I take good care of my physical body and I focus on deepening my spiritual awareness. I drop perceived limitations and live with awareness and serenity in every moment.

Let what shows up guide you to what’s next

Each day I watch for the signs and signals that will guide me. I move through my day with awareness and savor as many moments as I can.  I interpret a blockage as a signal to change directions, to see if I’m on the right path and to discover where I should go next. The signs can be a random thought, a chance encounter, or a something I read. They can be something someone says or doesn’t say. The signs can be something I do or choose not to do.   Be aware of the ebb and flow of your day.  Watch the tides of time bring treasure to your shore.

Your vision will point to your action

My vision of staying healthy drives me.  I moved from Vegetarian to Vegan, I own the healthy foods I need, and I know what to fix for myself.  I’m learning more Qigong, practicing yoga, and extending my meditation practice.  My vision of health influences my choices.

My vision of honing my understanding of what comes after life has led me to the study of Taoism. I am the Tao Te Ching, and the words of Deng Ming-Dao, Rumi and Emerson. My daily study and introspection is a priority. My vision of understanding my inner world guides my exploration.

My vision of staying relevant is expressed in my writing.  I write poems and articles for my own awareness.  Some I share. The form this will take is part of my vision that continues to unfold.

Harness the power of the next “Now.”

I like this idea of moving into the next moment free of unwanted baggage. I can let go of a judgment. I can let go of a need.  I can release a want and simply be.

What do you want to leave behind as you move into the Next “Now.”

The Shedding Of Your Skin

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In order to grow, a snake must shed its skin. In order to expand, a birch tree splits its bark. What do you need to shed in order to grow?

The birch tree outside my window looks like an unkempt pony shedding its winter coat, filled with clumps and bare spots. What does it look like for me to make room to change and grow? What do I have to do? What do I have to release? How do I let go of my confining skin?

Identify the skin you need to shed

I recently shed the skin of primarily defining myself as a job I no longer choose to perform. I hung on tightly to that identity for a long time. I was comfortable in that skin. It was who I thought I was. However, I’m no longer a worker. I’m “retired” – whatever that means to me. And I am looking for a new definition of who I think I am. What skin are you ready to shed?

When the skin is shed, what is underneath?

Part of the process of shedding your skin is to begin to identify and accept what is underneath. As you begin to shed your “present” skin, you will find yourself resisting change. You will be unwilling to move out of your old, comfortable skin. You will be fearful of trying on your new shape. However, there is really nothing you can do to change the process. We all change. We all grow. We all let go and move on. It simply takes time and it is a process. Look at what is emerging and find the good in it. As I began to shed my skin of a profession, I found myself with more free time. I became more introspective. I now take time to think and read. I take time to allow a gradual unfolding of my life. The shiny new me that is emerging is mindful. She is attuned to nature. She is contemplative and serene. She is writing poems and articles like this. She is thinking before she speaks and acting with greater compassion. I like what I am uncovering that is under the skin I shed.

Let go of what no longer works

Letting go takes time. I let go of some belongings when I moved cross-country. I let go of more possessions when I moved from a two bedroom to a one bedroom space. Now I want to let go of things in order to simplify my life. I don’t need so much stuff. It has been difficult to let go of the physical things I have gathered over the years. But I know that even when I let them go, I will always have the memories. Letting go makes what remains more evident. Each season, as I change my wardrobe, I allow myself to let go of what cages me in. What do I no longer need? What used to be important that has lessened or been replaced? What can I let go of that is no longer relevant to my life today? Letting go, is an important part of shedding your skin.

Let go of who you think you are

It is even more difficult to let go of who I think I am, how I have defined myself throughout the years. Self-defining words like “writer,” “coach,” and “educator” have been my identifiers for a long time. At this moment in time “writer” is all that remains and that is enough, although I’m certain “educator” is tucked in somewhere with writer. Bring your idea of who you are into a simple statement. Mine is “I encourage awareness.”

Bring your passion into the present

What is your passion? What stirs you to action? That is the essence that you want to bring into the present. Writing is a core passion with me. Writing and learning nourish me. If I keep on learning and writing life will feel meaningful. What core qualities will you take with you into the next stage? What is the essence of what you love to do? The form will change. The time you spend on it may change. Let your passion drive you.

Something has to go

The lighter the pack on your back, the easier will be your journey. If you hang on to everything, you will soon have no room to move. Start with the physical plane. When I finally released my business books to the half price store, I felt lighter and freer. It was a major letting go for me, but those books no longer represented who I am becoming. I found a way to make an inner work business plan rather than an outer work business plan. That was a huge step.The primary reason for shedding your skin is to allow yourself to expand. It is a relief to let go of what no longer represents who you are becoming. Look around your home. Look at your current friends. Look at how you now spend your life. What are you willing to let go? What do you need to let go in order to grow?

Choose what you need to expand

As I shed my skin, I began to examine my personal philosophy. It is key to identifying my new direction. It may even be my new direction. I chose a new course of study that deepened my spiritual understanding. I began reading the books and learning the lessons I needed in order to move to a deeper awareness of who I am and how I can contribute. I set up new rituals. I take time to contemplate, to read, to write, to think. I meditate and practice Falun Gong and Yoga. I let circumstances guide me. I take life one day at a time and embrace what appears.

Give yourself time

The skin I have almost shed has taken three years. I have resisted growing older. I have resisted moving into retirement. I’m still searching for how to feel relevant. However, I am listening. I am thinking. I am letting go. It takes time to grow out of your skin. It takes time to finally shed it. Be patient. When you do shed your outgrown skin, you are free. You can joyously expand – until it’s time again to shed your confining skin.

How Not to Make Plans

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There is no way I can make plans the way I used to.  I used to schedule telecourses and plan book deadlines.  I used to set goals for the number of clients I wanted to coach. I had a yearly  plan. I had a quarterly plan. I had my whole year mapped out. Planning in that much detail now feels foreign to me.  It feels pressured.  It even feels restrictive.  I want to learn not to make plans.  I want to simply let life unfold.

Forget pressure

I’m semi-retired so I have had time to develop a life style that is more organic.  The mere idea of setting some goals to finish the book I am now working on is painful.  How can I rush discovery?  How can I hurry understanding?  The book I am working on is a journey of discovery for me.  I have to let it unfold.  There is no pressure.  There is no deadline. There is only time to gain understanding and formulate my theories.  You cannot hurry the absorption of new ideas..

Let go of restriction

If I fill up my schedule with self-imposed deadlines, there is no room for spontaneity.  Nearly every day I have an insight that I feel compelled to write about in order to absorb it into my own life.  However, that insight and urge to explore it doesn’t come at a specific time each day.  Discovery cannot be hurried. Writing cannot be completed any faster than it is organically finished.  There are restrictions in schedules. There are limitations in too much planning.  Try simply labeling a day with one action: Production, Writing, Technical, Community Building and see how that makes you feel.  Then spend the whole day with one goal – to take steps in that major area.

But what if that’s not what is calling to you on that day?  I can’t be technical when I have inspired words bubbling up.  I can’t write when there is nothing at the moment that calls to me to explore. Be prepared to flow with your inspiration. Check in each morning and see what you feel like doing. Then give it your all.  Gibran says. “Work is love made visible.”  Love what you do and it will touch the hearts of others.

Choose valued qualities and let life unfold.

I have chosen several qualities that I want to express every day of my life.

“Unfolding” is my first major quality. It allows me to be in the present moment and not pend time planning ahead or worrying about what might happen.  I can be present with my passion.  Unfolding allows me to simply jot down a phrase that inspires me and act on it in the muse of the moment or be content with the recording of the phrase and turn it into a meaningful article when I am ready.   I act on my passion, not the clock.

“Awareness” is my second guiding quality. Awareness allows me to be present in the moment and it affects how I respond and react to other people. Awareness allows me to notice the world around me and increases my ability to be inspired by a small gesture, a few words or the birds outside my window.  Awareness allows me to listen to my own heart, to follow my own passion, and to be patient with my own journey.

“Mindfulness” to me is slightly different from awareness. I mindfully take a conscious action.  That means  eating, walking, talking, meditating mindfully.  Awareness is about watching what shows up around you and mindfulness is about consciously applying yourself to the moment.

“Simplicity” is a quality that makes me conscious of my consumption, my footprint on the planet and even the core concept of my work.  Simplicity allows me to appreciate what comes my way and helps me relinquish striving and goal setting. Simplicity builds trust.  The answers that show up are basic and right on.

What qualities will guide you?

You get the idea.  Chose qualities that keeps you present in the moment and allows you to appropriately respond to each circumstance.  When you make certain your responses are aligned with the qualities you value, your life experience becomes peaceful and serene. You move through your days like a gentle stream flowing cheerfully on its way.  You easily move around rocks, tumble down hillsides, and pool into silence.  Along the way, you will nourish and nurture those you come in contact with as you clear a distinctive path for yourself.

The only plans you need to make are what qualities you will cultivate in every moment.

How to Work with a Procrastinator – Or Not

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I could tear my hair out.  I’m ticked, I’m annoyed, I feel disrespected and I’d like to give up the entire project.  I’m working with a procrastinator and I don’t like it one bit!

I don’t really want to figure out the reasons a person keeps putting things off until the last minute, but I do want to explore how they make people feel when they do.

How do you make other people feel when you procrastinate?

If you are a procrastinator, if you are always late, never complete your work on time or prefer to put things off until the last minute, please take a moment to think about how your actions affect other people.

It feels like you don’t care

When people put off doing their part of the work I feel like they not only don’t care about the project but they specifically don’t care about me, my feelings, or my needs.  It’s as if they don’t appreciate or value my contribution enough to make any effort to accommodate my working style. It’s no longer a partnership; it’s me carrying most of the load.  I know that is not the intention of the person who keeps putting things off, but those feelings make it difficult for me to work with a procrastinator. I have a choice.  I can figure out how to live with it or I can quit.

If you are working with someone else, accommodate their work pattern

When you enter into a partnership, get clear about how each of you likes to work. Make a schedule that will accommodate both working styles and honor it.  For instance, I always work ahead.  I’m enthusiastic.  I get excited. My mind is full of ideas, I quickly grasp the overview and I make decisions easily. I write rapidly and I have many skills around writing and publishing. I am always ready long before a due date.  Those qualities and preference could feel as irritating to a procrastinator as a procrastinator’s habits are to me.  They are definitely not a good match for someone who likes or needs the pressure of working at the last minute unless one of us makes some changes.

Change your habits to accommodate your team

If you are a leader, you want your team to care about the project and you want to help them do their best work.  You cannot be a last minute procrastinator and lead a team.  There is no way.  You will lose valuable people who will refuse to work with you. You must build into the schedule the working styles of every member of your team and hold team members to that schedule.  And that includes you!

If I’m building a house and want to put windows in on a certain date, I backtrack from that date and on my organizational chart I put “order windows” on a date that allows time for delivery. If I don’t order the windows on that date, they will not be on hand when they are scheduled to be installed.  When you are leading a team project, the completion of each step affects the ones that follow.  No procrastination allowed.  You’ll mess up the whole project.

I have to change my own response to procrastination

I’d like to stop working with the procrastinator I am currently involved with, but I also love what I do.  What can I shift within myself that helps me honor my own working style and still allows the last minute work to not bother me?  I do all of my content part at my own tempo within my preferred time line. I could simply be content with that.  However, the other person’s procrastination makes me have to sit around and wait on her to do her part so I can make the final adjustments. When her work finally appears, I put myself under pressure to finish the project on time.  Is that OK with me?  Is that how I want to work?  How do I feel about the end result?  Does what we produce together feel significant enough to me that I stay in this circumstance?

I have to choose what is important to me. 

The scenario that prompted this exploration into working with a procrastinator is that I’m the volunteer associate editor of my senior community newsletter.  The editor is the person who is paid to do the job. She is in charge but I have skills she does not have. Since I took over the formatting and content editing the newsletter has gotten rave reviews from the Board of Directors of our community.  I know my work is valuable and it is appreciated, but the editor still puts things off until the very last minute. Although this has been going on for six months, it really freaked me out this time.  I began to examine my choices to see how I could change my experience around our work together.

I took time to coach her in time management and organization skills and still the content she needs to produce is never ready when we have our finalization meeting.  There are always last minute changes that could have been avoided had she given any thought to the final product at an earlier point. So every month, unless I make a change in me or in the situation, her last minute rush annoys and upsets me. It makes me feel like she doesn’t really care about the quality of the newsletter and has no regard for my time or that of the people who hang around all day waiting for her to do the copying so they can fold and distribute it.

If you are a procrastinator, how do your actions make the people you work with feel?

I have to drop my judgments

There is no point in my being upset for the other people she inconveniences.  If it annoys them, they can speak up.  I have to make it OK for me to work with her.  Or I need to quit.  I have to make it OK with me for her to work the way she does.  I need to let go of my judgments and my opinions.  No two people do things the same way.  In this situation, we have a pair of opposites working and I’m the one who has to change.  Creating change in myself falls on me because I’m the one who wants things to be different.

I need to change my expectations

I work on the newsletter periodically throughout the month.  I am on the lookout for meaningful content.  That’s how I like to do things.  It’s my enthusiasm, not hers.  Her last minute decisions make more work for me because I have to change things around but in reality, those changes do not take long to make.  They are more annoying than time consuming.  If I drop my annoyance, it will not be a big deal.  I’m the one who has to change my expectations.

I know that in her eyes she has set aside one whole day to get the newsletter out.  That feels like a lot of time to her.  I could start from scratch and produce and publish the newsletter in one day.  So what.  It’s her job, her responsibility and if she’s not doing it the way I would I have to let that judgment go.

I had to let go of the outcome

It was the day of publication.  Everything was ready except the editor’s part.  She asked me to send her what was ready and she would add her part.  Here’s the deal, she doesn’t care as much about making it look good as I do.  She won’t take the time to tweak it into visual balance.  She will leave gapping white spaces on the front page.  I would have preferred she send the copy for me to insert so I could take the time to make it not perfect, but as well balanced as I could.  I had to let go of the outcome.

I need to put it in perspective

How relevant is this newsletter to the state of the Universe?  That concept takes the wind out of my sails.  This is a monthly newsletter to a small senior community in a small town.  Not a big deal.  So if I go within and remember that what I want to do is change some lives through what I write, then my one philosophical article in each issue has a chance of doing that.  But I also want to contribute to my community which is why I volunteered.  Don’t diminish what you do or your part in it, but do put it in perspective of the other person’s workload. I’m retired.  She is not.  My time is flexible.  She has many interruptions.  Take time to get some perspective on the situation that is bugging you.

I did discuss these opposite working styles with the editor.  She of course, never meant for me to feel the way I did. Will things change because I expressed myself and made her aware of how her procrastination makes me feel?  Maybe. Probably not.  I am the only one who can create this change in me.  I will do my part to the best of my ability.  I need to learn to be content with that.

What is important to you?

My big Zen lesson around working with procrastinators is to be clear about what I matters to me.  I care about writing for the newsletter. I could hold my participation to the submission of one meaningful article a month.  However, I have a huge desire to learn and share what I discover so I have a good time keeping an eye out for additional meaningful content. I take pleasure in creating an editorial calendar.  I enjoy doing the formatting and I’m the only person in our community with those skills Those reasons, along with the satisfaction I get from participating and adding value to my community, are much more important to me than the upset feeling I get working with a procrastinator.

Do I want praise? Not particularly.  Do I crave recognition?  Acknowledgement is always appreciated but I know how much my participation means to the final product.  Is it a need to control?  I probably have to look at that one.  I’m in the habit of working alone.  How much is the final project a reflection of me?  Probably not as much as I think it is.  The only thing I can control is the quality of my own work.  I can definitely do that.

How do you need to change?

If you are a procrastinator, think about how your work style affects others you work with.  Think about how it puts last minute stress on them where there need not be any.  Most of all think about how they feel – that you think so little of them you will not do anything to make their jobs easier.

If you are working with a procrastinator, either adjust your own reactions and responses or move on.

Out With The Old, In With The New

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This is one of those times I get reflective about how I’m doing and where I want to go. How can I make the next quarter better? Or the next year? Or the next five years? Am I headed in the right direction for me?  Am I headed for success?

Am I still going where I want to go?

How has my vision changed?  Can I see myself playing bigger, reaching more people, touching more lives? Have new paths opened up that I want to follow or explore?  Starting right this minute, what do I want to attract, create, and manifest over the next twelve months?

Write it down. Make it concrete. Prioritize. What’s at the core of all you do that you want to keep doing? Why do you get up in the morning and do what you do? What is your passion and are you still following it?

What new skills have I learned?

We are constantly learning and changing. What have you learned, discovered, experienced that has brought a new realization or insight that you want to incorporate into your life and business?  Have you added a new credential? Is there a new venue you want to explore?  Have you met new people to partner with? Write down your skill sets, see how many ways you can use them. Prioritize them and build them into your business.

What’s working and what needs to be phased out?

Get real with your dollars and cents. What is earning you money? What is fun but doesn’t bring in income?  How can you streamline your costs? What help do you need to get?  Shed the worst 10% of everything you’ve got – that includes clients, products and time wasters. That leaves room for you to add 10% more of the great stuff.

What are my goals for the year?

Only take the steps that forward the goal you have chosen for the year. That will keep you on target and produce more relevant results. Do you want to get more clients? How many? What do you need to do to make that happen? Get a coach? Do more networking? Do more referral education?  Pick tangible goals with measurable results and track your success. That helps you know what to keep and what to toss at your quarterly 10% house cleaning toss.

Re-price, Repackage, Reposition

The easiest way to increase income is to re-price – as in raise your prices.  Don’t look at what you do according to the time it takes you to do it. Look at the value it produces and price accordingly. When I coach a person in developing an information product, it’s not about the time we spend together or the time I spend strengthening the content, it’s about the value of the results she will get with the content we produce. Even more important is the knowledge she obtained that she can reuse again and again to make more  information products. That changes our thinking, doesn’t it?

Repackage – position your offering so people sign for longer periods of time. That allows them to make the buying decision only once. I ask for a three-month commitment because the decision-making process takes time.  The completing of the project is a snap after the decisions are made.  Some coaches have a six-month or twelve-month commitment.  How much time do you need to get the results you promise?  The coaching process is about change and that simply takes time. If you are settling for a three month commitment, look for other offerings you can make to up-sell that client to a longer coaching package. Keep finding ways to serve those loyal customers who already know and love you.

Chunk your products up or down. Present the same material in new formats. I broke a five-week telecourse down into a series of eight ebooks so people can access the information at a lower price point.  Breaking that information down also gave me the chance to expand each topic.

Reposition your offerings to a new target market. As I move into semi-retirement I have discovered a whole new set of personal challenges.  How do I stay relevant?  Who am I if I am not my business?  My passion to learn and teach and write remains but my interest has shifted.  I now help entrepreneurs who are moving into retirement with all their creative juices still flowing, to re-purpose their passion and talent so they can slow down and still feel productive and relevant. I’m focusing on personal growth. I help my clients find balance.  My business background can help them downsize and reposition their business. My spiritual background can help them prepare for retirement.  It’s the same me with the same skill set. It’s simply a different focus for my offerings.

Move more deeply in service

If you continue to move more deeply in service, to continue to find ways to support, nourish, guide, encourage, inspire your target market, you’ll be happy and they will keep coming.  Don’t throw out everything. Don’t start over with everything new, but take time to reflect on how you’re doing and how you’d like it to be different. Then simply take the steps to make it happen.