You have a ton of them. As you should. Where to start?

When you act in alignment with your deep values, it’s easier to decide. You + your deep values = congruence. When you act in accordance with what you really want, you’re fine. There’s plenty of time to do everything you want to do. I swear. You’re not required to do anything that you can’t do in peace.

What kinds of things do you usually say that you want?

Think about some of the things in the past couple days that you have told yourself you want. For example: new clothes, time to watch TV, a couple more brownies, to get skinnier, your partner to do the dishes.

An exercise:
Go to your place of peace. Do this by thinking about someone or something that is easy for you to love. Notice how that immediately brings your heartrate down and softens everything inside.

From that state, while peaceful and soft, think about the top 3-5 things that you want in your life. Think about the end of your life and looking back. What are the main things you want to have accomplished? Not specific bucket list items like “visit every continent” or “run a marathon.” Consider how you want to be in the world. Consider what you want to be representative of your life.

I’ll go first: I want to have great relationships with husband and kids, to continually grow spiritually by letting go of what doesn’t work and helping others, to have a vibrant, strong and healthy body, to do meaningful work with my whole heart. How about you?

How much time have you spent on any of these things in the past few days?

You want to be healthy. What are you doing about it?

You want to create a business? What are you doing about it?

You want to write that book. What are you doing about it?

Why?

Align your activities with your real desires.

For example, say you really want to lose weight. Why? What do you think it will give you? If what’s really important to you is feeling strong and present and awake in your body, but what you tell yourself is that you want to lose 10 pounds, there will be some incongruence there. On the other hand, if what you want is to feel strong, present, awake and focusing on losing 10 pounds at a time is a way for you to do that, that’s something else entirely.

Idea overwhelm. Here’s the cure: start with your deep values, your deep desires. Match your ideas to those.

I am so passionate about ideas. About business creation. About sailing through despite having a case of Shiny Object Syndrome. I want you to know what I know: you can do this. Your overarching, sometimes exhausting enthusiasm is the best thing for you. You just need to use it in a particular way so that it doesn’t kill your results.

Please join me for my free class: How to Pick the Best Idea.

I’m not sure what the big deal is. Selfish is a character trait that’s become the bogeyman for so many of us. I’m not suggesting that it’s a great quality. But so what? Neither is dishonesty or arrogance, but we do those all the time too.

First of all, it’s not selfish to want what you want. It becomes selfish when you want others to change so that you can have what you want.

Why don’t you rest when you are tired?

–Because it would be selfish to sit down when there’s so much to do.

Why did you agree to serve on that board?

–Because it would be selfish of me to do what I want when someone has to do it.

Why don’t you exercise?

–Because my kids need me to drive them to practice and it would be selfish of me to go to the gym when they need me to take care of them.

So what do we do instead? Lie so that we don’t look bad in order to not look selfish. All the while being arrogant enough to believe that we can control what someone else thinks about us.

See? Avoiding selfish brings dishonesty and arrogance. None of those are things that I want to lead my life with.

And yet! Selfishness is the one that’s so terrible.

You don’t hear this:

Why did you not agree to serve on that board?

Because it would be dishonest of me to pretend like I want to do something that I don’t.

I think selfish is the boogeyman because it’s about us.

We believe that when we lie or believe we know what’s best for others, we’re protecting ourselves. That constructs an armor that lets us believe (which isn’t true) that it will keep us safe. Safe is a perception, not an actual event, 99% of the time anyway.

To ask for what I want. To admit what I want exposes who I really am.

What if you don’t like me? And kick me out of the tribe? This goes way, way back through ancestral biology to primal fears of being kicked out of the tribe. Because at one time, to be kicked out meant death.

Today, being kicked out means a different door opens.

Instead of claiming what I want, telling the truth about who I am, I’ll cover it all in a falsely modest cloak of “but I don’t want to be selfish.”

No. Dive in. Be you. Be real. You are enough right here, right now. No matter what. Why not? It would be dishonest not to.

Now you. I want to know what you think. Is selfish a big fear for you or are you OK with it?

We want to be in community. To belong. To be in the club. To be loved.

To love.

It feels so good to love.

5 true things about loving

1. It’s OK to be happy when your beloved is not.

2. Their crisis is not your crisis.

3. What they think of you says everything about who they are, not who you are.

4. “Because I don’t want to” is a good enough reason.

5. The best way to be together is to be OK with being alone.

Know this: God knows about your dream. He put it there.

Everything you need to get you there is available to you. He wouldn’t plant something there that you can’t do.

When you get peaceful, that’s when you’ll access it.

The only way to get peaceful is to admit how franticfranticfrantic you are. How scared you are. How frustrated. Lost. Without answers. And to accept that spinning it over and over again in your head is not the way out.

Dropping into the middle of all of that spin and heading toward the light–that’s the way out.

It’s like this–duck underneath all of the stuff going through your mind. Imagine you’re in a collapsed tunnel and there are pockets of oxygen underneath it all. Duck your head and crawl out. See that light over there? Crawl in that direction.

“Hold your face to the light, though for the moment you cannot see.”–Bill Wilson

Help is on the way.

Your job: accept, duck, crawl toward the light. Trust that you’ll get exactly what you need when you need it. You only have to trust enough. You don’t have to get all Mother Teresa zen about it.

God’s job: everything you can’t do.

If you can’t do it, ask for help. You lack nothing. You have enough. You have everything you need right now.

If you fuck it up, it’s all good. Nothing is permanent. Not bliss. Not failure. Keep walking.

This post is part of Mara Glatzel & Tamarisk Saunders Davies’s  Perfecly Imperfect Project, a self love blog hop. 19 bloggers are telling the truth about their own self care. Good stuff.

I have a bad attitude about self love.

It’s because it seems dumb. Life coachy. Weak. Because it conjures up images of Stuart Smalley ranting on about how doggone good enough he is. Honestly, I’m afraid you’ll think I’m dumb, life coachy, weak. I don’t want you to think I’m unworthy of your attention.

I am a smart woman. Creative. Courageous. Funny. I believe strongly, wildly in Self Love. I’m naming it and claiming it. Self love is the foundation of my life. I actively love myself because Love feels better than indifference. It’s not in the same universe as selfishness. Instead, it fuels and supports real generosity and selflessness.

The foundation of my foundation is The Truth.

When I was invited to be part of this project I was thrilled. Moi?!? You want moi to be part of your party. Yes! I’m worthy! I’m doggone good enough, Stuart!

When I sat down to write this post, I danced around it half a dozen ways. One option: In Defense of Self Love. In that post I would have waxed on about how it’s a really good thing. Really. It’s not stupid. I’m not stupid for believing in it. My plan was wholly defensive and unnecessary.

So I planned a different kind of defense. In this one I would admit that I believed in it, but I would still hold back. Stay cold and reserved. The truth about self love encased in a list post.

I stayed shallow to defend myself from being shallow

Backfire, baby.

The coachy things that I don’t like are the things that are trying to be deep and meaningful but lack substance. They feel superficial and silly. I actually think the “shallow” stuff is the deep stuff. Dirty jokes, TV, mystery novels, going to the grocery store. Whatever–the dailies and the irreverent. Although I do love me a good, deep, feeling rich conversation.

The toughest task. The greatest reward.

Like I often do when writing about a tough topic, I started a conversation on Facebook. My friend Cliff, called “the coolest Ponka ever” by Sherman Alexie, changed the whole conversation for me. Here’s Cliff:

“For me, and for a lot of us, we have these large, dominant layers of our background, past and childhoods that are painfully full of messaging that screams anything and everything but to love yourself. Such internal layers of self-identity make the idea of self-love seem like maybe one of those glowing enlightened guru’s over in India that were all the rage back in the 60′s: sounds great but that’s on the other side of the world and I live here, in fucking Nebraska. So, without going on too much more, self-love, what a doozy.

We can intellectually know that we are good, valuable, loved, beautiful, sacred, unique, creative, excellent people. We can even have experiences of all kinds on a daily basis that reaffirm this. But man, when you’re dealing with maybe two decades or more of experience of say getting abused or being drowned in a culture of violence, alcoholism, self-destruction, inter-generational trauma, etcetera…the idea that we too are worth loving inside the privacy of ourselves and then to actually, actively, bravely and courageously pull it off…that can be a tough, tough task.“

You and me. Let’s actively, bravely and courageously pull this shit off. One radical, messy, imperfect act of self love at a time.

The Ten Commandments of Self Love. The Greatest of These is Love

1. Meet yourself where you are.

You might as well. Pretending you’re somewhere else doesn’t change reality. Let’s say your husband didn’t clean up after dinner. Again. Even though you have an idea about how you would like to respond, you’re not going to jump there immediately. Admit that you’re pissed/disappointed/hurt/tired, then give yourself whatever you need so that you feel more peaceful. Then, and only then, will you move past it.

2. Be kind.

Treat yourself like you would a beloved child or pet. Name calling is off limits. Stupid, idiot, pansy, weak. Bitch. These are names. They’re not nice. Don’t say them to anyone else or yourself.

3. Listen to your desires.

Your dream might be couched in a fantasy you can’t or wouldn’t want to pursue. Just because you want to quit your job and lie on a beach for a month doesn’t mean you necessarily should. The real desire underneath that fantasy is a deep need for rest and relaxation. Maybe you have an unbearable crush but you don’t want to leave your marriage. What about him is so appealing? Does he listen to you? Maybe you feel ignored and want your partner to pay more attention to you. What would it take to get that? Is he well read? Maybe you need to use your brain more or in different ways. Revisit some poetry or good fiction. Work on that abandoned novel again. Do you want sugar? Maybe you’re bored and what you really want is that pop of excitement in your mouth to wake you up. Then give yourself something more interesting than a bowl of ice cream.

4. Listen to your emotions.

They are partly the result of thoughts you’re believing. If your emotions feel crappy, you can change the thoughts causing them. They are often beacons and are there to let you know what you need. If you’re pissed off, you need to look at how your boundaries are being crossed. If you’re overwhelmed, this means you’re trying to do too much at once. Pull it back until you don’t feel overwhelmed anymore and then get moving again. If you’re sad, you’ve lost something important to you. Know that you’ll have something else important to you.

5. Treat Self Love like a way of life.

It’s not an activity to check off your to-do list. It’s not something you do in addition to everything else you do. It’s the guiding force for everything. You are the foundation in your life. The better you’re cared for, the better your life will be.

6. If you’re tired, rest.

This one is a bit tricky because there are a lot of things that cause fatigue. You need to find the thing causing your tired and rest that. Let’s say you’re exercising and you feel tired. This could be caused by a number of things. The rest you need will depend on what’s causing it. If you’re telling yourself how much it sucks, you’ll have less energy. Quit focusing on the suckiness and you’ll have more energy. If you’re in the beginning of your work out and aren’t warmed up yet, it’s harder to keep going. You don’t actually need to stop to rest. You just need to rest your expectation that it will be easy the whole time. If you didn’t get much sleep the night before and aren’t well hydrated, you need to exercise less hard than if you had full nourishment on board. If you’re trying to run a 5K but have only huffed and puffed through a 1/2 mile up to this point, you need to rest your expectations and back off. See # 1: meet yourself where you are.

7. If you’re hungry, eat.

When you’re full, stop. If it feels good after you eat it, that’s good. If you feel bad after you eat it, don’t eat it. Food is not bad or evil. How you use it is. Some desert, eaten with awareness won’t hurt you. A lot of desert eaten to numb until you feel sick will hurt you. The desert isn’t the problem.

8. If you’re horny, horn.

Preferably not in the middle of Starbucks after the hot barista holds your gaze a second longer than usual. Sex is the second most powerful force in the universe. It’s God-Given. It’s good. It’s goooood. Do it. With your partner or alone. Or both. Whatever you need, give yourself.

9. Feed yourself more positive thoughts.

Actively practice thinking thoughts that feel good. I’m not talking about thoughts that are supposed to feel good but don’t. But find ones that do feel good and remind yourself of them. Then look for evidence that they’re true. Actively practice gratitude by looking for the good in difficult situations. Pay more attention to what is working than what isn’t.

10. Believe fewer negative thoughts.

Ask yourself if what you’re thinking is helpful. You may be able to find plenty of evidence that it’s true. But is it helpful? If it’s not, quit entertaining it. My two favorite ways to let go of negative thoughts are Byron Katie’s The Work and Brooke Castillo’s Self Coaching 101.

Temper all of the above with Ahimsa

This is the yogic concept about avoiding violence. Practically, it means to do no harm. Don’t harm your future self. What would feel good right this second might be harmful in the long run. Don’t harm others. Sometimes self love is inconvenient to ourselves or others but it should never harm anyone.

I am fascinated by the creative process.

I know I’m not alone. I used to go to book signings all the time. I even traveled around like a groupie to see some of my favorites. One of my favorites was a double heading with Sherman Alexie and Lorrie Moore. She’s classy and he’s smooth as hell. Loved them. Love them still.

Every reading I’ve been to has questions from the audience about the author’s process.

Where’d you get the idea?
What kind of pencil do you use?
Morning or late at night?
Every day or in spurts?
Coffee or tea? Or whiskey?

What they’re really asking is “What do I have to do to write a book too?”

The ever-present dream is that if the wanna-be creator can replicate the activities of their favorite author, they can replicate their success.

But we both know that isn’t true, don’t we?

How do you write a book?

Butt in chair, fear tucked away, courage amped up, readyreadygo!  Whatever it takes to do that is what you need to do.

And yet! And yet! What happens behind closed doors? What do other people’s process look like? Do they flail? Are they graceful bastions of productive bliss?

This is process p*rn. And like the other kind of porn, it’s no substitute for the real thing but it just might prime your pump.

Today I have for you an interview with Katie McClain, the author of How To Tame Your Thought Monster. This is a very original, very cool book for kids and their parents to learn about managing their mind.

She spills a ton of information about what it looks like behind closed doors to write an entire book. And even better, what happened for her internally after it was published.

If you’re interested in this type of interview, I’ll do more. I’d love for this to be a regular thing.

This is good stuff. Listen to it here.

Here’s a primer on how to easily listen to mp3′s without it being a pain in the ass to set up.

How to Listen to Mp3′s On the Go

Resources and links from our conversation

How to Tame Your Thought Monster book

How to Tame Your Thought Monster book club (starts February 11th)

Sarah J Bray

Grace Kerina

People are always posting requests for reading material on Facebook. Here are some of the common questions and my answers.

What should I read if I have the flu but I’m not brain dead? Need something easy but not ridiculous.

Kate Atkinson and Tana French write smart mysteries.

Kate Atkinson’s are interrelated in a crazy-good, comic way. Try Case Histories first, Follow it with One Good Turn and Started Early, Took My Dog.

Tana French’s second book The Likeness is implausible as hell, but if you can avoid rolling your eyes at the plot line, it’s still pretty awesome.

All of Michael Connelly’s novels. Most feature Harry Bosch, a rugged, melancholy jazz lover. He’s anti-authoritarian and driven to get the bad guy. I never get tired of these books.  They can be, but don’t have to be, read in order. His latest is The Black Box.

Ridley Pearson’s best books are his Lou Boldt series featuring a Seattle based detective. I read almost all of them when I was about eleventy months pregnant with Lula. Pearson’s stand alone novels are pretty bad. His latest series is OK, but not as good as the books with Lou Boldt. The first in that series is  Undercurrents.

What can I read that’s so funny my children think I’m having a seizure when I’m reading it?

All of these recommendations are memoirs about extreme neuroticism. I do love nerdy neurotics.

Naked, Barrel Fever and Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris. These are laugh out loud, wrong, hysterical. I was reading Naked on the airplane one time. You know how sterile and weirdly quiet the airplane is. I kept snorting out loud while reading it. Then I’d look up and around, embarrassed and do the whole thing over again. His newest books aren’t as awesome. I think as his mental health improved, his stories stopped being so hysterical. There’s always a downside to mental health.

Let’s Pretend This Never Happened by Jenny Lawson. I woke David a few times because I was reading in bed and couldn’t keep from snort-giggling.

Journal of Best Practices by David Finch. After Finch was diagnosed with Asperger’s he started keeping a drawer full of notes about how to behave.

Need an inspirational pick-me-up. But please don’t blow sunshine bubbles up my bum.

Proof of Heaven by Eben Alexander. A neuroscientist contracted a rare form of bacterial meningitis. He was in a coma and very near death for a week. Just as his family made the decision to discontinue care, he woke up awake and ready to rock–well, relatively ready to rock. The book is about his travels to the beyond and all that he experienced there. White lights + angels + a neurosurgeon who had always dismissed near death experiences. Fascinating stuff.

Personal Development 101.

The Gifts of Imperfection by Brene Brown. She’s so damn good. This is an essential read. Down to earth, holy and funny all at the same time. Just the way I like it.

Finding Your Own North Star by Martha Beck. I love all of her books but I consider this the basic text for personal development. Her newest Finding Your way in a Wild New World is awesome, but I think it’s potentially too woo-woo if you’re not used to her. It’s definitely less nuts and bolts than North Star.

Money: Practical with a thump of magic.

I Will Teach You to be Rich by Ramit Sethi. This arrogant, nerdy dude is brilliant. Love his arrogance, don’t be turned off by it. He’s funny as hell too. In this book he outlines a very practical how-to for automating your finances.

Lost and Found by Geneen Roth. Lovely memoir about losing a chunk of change as a result of investing with Bernie Madoff.

Essential books on creativity? Need inspiration and courage without militant get-er-done prodding.

Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott. This is one of those books I came home to. I found it by chance on an endcap in Barnes & Noble. I’ve since read most of everything she’s written, talked with her buddy Father Tom and stalked her at her beloved church in Marin County. Please don’t mention that last thing to her because I don’t want to ruin my rep before we become bff’s.

The War of Art by Stephen Pressfield. Pressfield is a real manly testosterone-y guy but he writes great stuff about creative resistance. I love his concepts, if not his kick-your-ass-fight-penis-penis-penis approach.

What now? by Ann Patchett. This is a long essay based on a commencement address she gave at Sarah Lawrence college. I also love the memoir of her friendship with Lucy Grealy, Truth and Beauty.

Want more? Visit my Amazon store.

I have several more recommendations there. They’re organized a little differently than this but it’s a good place to poke around.

While watching Breaking Bad last night, I practiced wire wrapping beads. They all looked like misshapen Dollar Store charms. I’m on a jewelry making bender. It’s off the hook. I have two tackle boxes full of vintage jewelry, several different pliers, and a stash of mixed metal sheets and wire.

I’ve spent a few months gathering vintage jewelry, assembling my supplies and reading books. I tried to make a couple of pieces, failing each time. Most of what I made didn’t even reach the level of sucky because I couldn’t get much together at all. I finally said uncle  and signed up for a jewelry making class so I can get some guidance.

I went from passing fancy to obsessive fact finding.

My obsession with jewelry making has now reached a turning point. I have now learned enough that I understand how most jewelry is constructed. I know what the tools are. I’ve waded through the online resources to find a couple I like. My Pinterest boards are full of inspiration for future projects.

It’s time to move out of the hopeful land of fact finding where anything’s possible and every outcome is glorious.

Tuesday and Wednesday before this week’s class I made lots of notes and sketches. I tried to keep my ideas simple enough to execute without much drama. Still, my mind spun with the sheer possibility.

I made two things in class yesterday. They’re both awful.

One is a copper sun with an oblong body and rays that come out of the right and left side, but not all the way around. It looks like a diseased and bloated spider. My teacher even looked a little bit scandalized at the way the rays turned out.

The other piece is a small copper charm with the big dipper carved into it. It’s not as embarrassing as the bloated sun spider but it’s still not very good.

The chasm. It is monstrous. This monster kicks asses. And not in a “Kickass rah rah rah” kind of way.

The chasm between what’s in my head and what I can make with my hands is wider than the Grand Canyon. Larger than the stack of business books I’ve culled while building my business. Longer than my list of ideas for creative projects.

The monster shows up lots of ways. See if any of these are familiar:

A great idea for an online class to teach and then only 2 people sign up for it.

Deciding to train for a 5K and realizing that running sucks.

Planning out a novel and writing the most cliched first chapter you’ve ever heard of. It puts Anne Lamott’s shitty first draft theory to shame. What you wrote is the shamefullest of shittiest first drafts.

Psyching yourself up for a networking shindig, putting on your fancy duds and favorite underwear. And then getting there and when everyone is already paired up, leaving you alone in a room full of people much more together than you, you get the hell out of there.

Here’s your cure: Expect to suck.There’s holiness in sucking. Go there and wade in it.

It’s part of the deal. Go through the shallows to get to the deep goodness.

I will wire wrap beads until I can do it so it looks good.

I will create and teach classes knowing that what I teach and who I do it for is exactly as it should be. And that in 1 year I will teach with more competence and authority than I do now.

I will run through that painful first mile because the deep breath and sudden rush of ability that comes at mile 2 is worth all of it.

I will write a shitty draft, scrap it and repeat until I make something worth sharing.

What about you? What are you willing to suck at?

I just scrapped my third blog post of the week.

I wrote one about why I am not going to give up sugar. But it sounded petulant and whiny so I didn’t publish it.

I wrote another about book recommendations for various moods. But it doesn’t feel epic so I didn’t want to publish it.

I wrote another about the top 5 lessons learned from my failed writing business. But I didn’t want to finish it so I didn’t.

After saving that last draft without finishing it, I finally listened to myself.

Procrastination carries holy messages. Listen.

This is one of my core beliefs and is the basis for much of my work with clients. They bring me unfinished projects and unrealized dreams. They pile self loathing on the top of it that sounds like this:

This shouldn’t be so hard.

What’s wrong with me? I should just do it.

I know what to do. If I wasn’t so lazy I would do it.

There’s a good reason we don’t do our stuff. Instead of self criticism, treat your resistance with curiosity.

Why is this so hard?

Why am I not doing it?

Do I really want to? Why is this thing important?

So I took my own advice. Why am I not blogging? I often love writing on my website for you. I love to connect with people here and behind the scenes, via my e-letter. I’m not lazy. So, what’s the what? I asked myself quietly “what’s up?” Then I got an internal flash of my 2013 goals.

Two of my writing goals for 2013

1. Get my writing into the hands of more people.

2. Strengthen my writing and focus muscles so that I can write 1000 words a day painlessly (OK. It was actually 5000 words, but I don’t want to admit that.)

Some of the actions I planned to take in order to achieve them:

• Learn more about sharing blogs via SEO, good titles and thoughtful topics.
• Write 3 big guides a la Coaching Practice in a Box.
• Write 1 epic post each month.
• Write a daily meditation for creatives (I batted this around a lot without deciding to do it.)

It’s becoming veddy, veddy clear. My old friend Resistance.

Any time I try to write focused blog posts like I’m supposed to, I get stilted and weird. I hate it.

But what I want is to reach more people, to write more, to experience the exquisite pain of creation more often. Looks like that isn’t the way to make that happen.

Starting with 1000 painless words a day is too much. I need to back it way up. I need something doable but stretchy. Maybe 15 minutes every single day. Maybe write 1 daily meditation a day for 30 days. That might be a good multitask. I can play with the daily meditation idea and stretch my writing muscles at the same time.

Here’s the lesson: Focus on what you want. Never force yourself to get it done the first way you try. If it’s not working, it’s not working. The how it gets done isn’t the point. Your deep desire is the point.

Listen. Your Resistance is holy.

What have you been putting off? What do you hear when you ask yourself nicely, “why?”

This is the time of new beginnings, high hopes and promise out the wazoo.

The new year is a good time to take stock of the past year, make course corrections and create a map for the next year. You don’t have to have it all drilled down perfectly. Reconnecting with what you want and remembering what you don’t will keep you headed in the right direction, more or less. More or less is plenty.

I take stock of my internal life regularly. I do it anytime I’m stuck or pissy. I also do longer, written reviews where I look at my resentments, fears and conduct. These are a little more formal and I finish them by reading them to someone else, asking to be relieved of what doesn’t work and then repairing any damage I’ve done in the process of being off track.

The annual review and yearly plan is a little bit different. If the twice yearly review is the inner eye view, this is the bird’s eye. This isn’t the time to analyze your hurts and fears. Note them, yes. But look at them against the larger landscape of the rest of your life.

The most important thing about conducting a review of your inner or outer life, is your mindset.

Approach your review with curiosity and kindness. Going inside without love is like going in with a machete. This is just a fact-finding and fact-facing mission. Just the facts, Jack. What works and what doesn’t?

Treat this process like a treasured ceremony. Light a candle. Brew good tea. Wear your favorite sweater.

Round I

Start with a prayer. Send it to the highest, best source you know. Here’s one:

Please

Go before me

Go after me

Go beside me

Go above me

Go below me

Be within me

Let me see what you would have me see.

1. Make a list of the life categories that are important to you.

These are the areas you’re going to examine more closely. For example:

• relationship with kids
• romance
• social life
• $-giving
• $-earning
• home
• travel
• health
• fitness
• spiritual
• creativity
• business or career–skill development
• business or career–organization
• business or career–growth
• adventure
• anything else that isn’t listed here

2. For each category, ask 4 simple questions

• What went well last year?
• What didn’t go well last year?
• How do I want it to change?
• Was it fun?

That last question is so important. If you’re not having fun, something needs to change. A good life is the collection of fun and meaningful experiences. We want to make money, have romance, lose weight, be a better mother/partner/business owner/artist in order to be happier and connect with others. We want those things so that we can feel a certain way. If you’re not feeling good, you must change.

Go do something physical while all of this settles. Take a walk. Do the dishes. Cuddle your kiddo. Orgasm.

Let it settle over you. Hold your judgement. Notice any feelings that come up. Let them roll through without trying to change anything. Sometimes it’s a wariness at the futility of some areas that never improve. Or disappointment is a dream that hasn’t worked out (yet.) Or sadness about what you had hoped for and what actually happened.

If you need to grieve anything, you’ll know it because strong feelings will rise. Allow them to show up fully. If you push them away, they’ll be there waiting for you as you go into the next section. You want to approach the next step with quiet strength that only comes when your insides are clean. Sometimes the best cleansing is tears.

You may feel proud and excited at everything you accomplished. Let this hang out too. Don’t try to make it bigger or pump yourself up. Just let the emotions be.

Round II

This is where you’re going to start making a list of things you want to create or experience in the next year. Most people can do much more in a year than they think they can. And they can do much less in a day than they think they can.

We’re going to extract goals from the desires you analyzed in Round I. And then I’m going to show you where to put them so they fit in with your life, your way.

Look at one section at a time. Cull from your answers to how you want things to be different. You have the power to create something different. Make a list of what you’ll do. This moves your wishes from the land of possibility to something more concrete.

Here’s one of my sections. Look at the way I answered each question and how I culled goals from the third question.

Parenting:
What went well last year?
Really grew to love Max. Settled into having all the kids. Continually tried to meet them where they were and tried to keep my personal agenda and issues out of it. When I couldn’t, kept facing it and trying to let go.
What didn’t go well?
I worried a lot about Lula. I haven’t had strong time and space boundaries so I’m wishy-washy when she wants me to stay home instead of work. Agreed to help in her classroom out of guilt.
What do I want to change next year?
I want to help them be better humans. Cultivate empathy, kindness and generosity. Have dedicated time with them.
Was it fun?
Oh yes. Especially getting to know Max’s funny personality.
Goals: Have one day of kindness every month involving them. Have a short weekly date with each of them.

This level of detail is about right for me. I have also looked closely at the beliefs that caused me to make decisions based on guilt, worry and to not have clear boundaries. That happened in a different type of inventory. This isn’t the time for that. This is more of the “yeah, I’ve struggled with this and that or been pissed about this or that.” Good to know. Deal with that later.

Round III

Go do something physical while all of this settles. Take a walk. Do the dishes. Cuddle your kiddo. Orgasm.

Next, you’ll go inside and find something more powerful to guide your path as you look at your goals more closely.

Part A

Now, consider how you want to feel most of the time. What do you crave?

When you drill down to your most desired feelings, you can focus on that before anything specific. The goals are just a roadmap. You can stick to them or not. It’s good to have a plan to start with.

We want the circumstances we want because of how we imagine we’ll feel when we have them. Actually, when you feel the way you want to feel you’ll be equipped with everything you need to create the circumstances you want.

How do you want to feel?

• Clear
• Focused
• Strong
• On purpose
• Light
• Free
• Real
• Generous
• Affluent
• Feminine
• Sexy
• Loving
• Joyous
• Vital
• Vibrant
• Any of 1 zillion other feelings not listed here

Part B

Pick a theme or word of the year.

Mine for 2012 was twinkle. For 2013 it’s leadership.

Let yours come to you without force. If you feel like you’re grappling and lost when it comes to picking one, choose something that is close. You can change your mind later.

With your desired feelings and yearly theme in hand, you can fit your goals into the next year.

This process is sort of like arranging puzzle pieces. You can’t do everything at once but over the course of a year you can do quite a bit. More than you’d think.

Watch for fears and Oh-Shit’s that say you can’t possibly make all of that happen. Don’t worry about it. You don’t have to marry any of these goals.

A word about goals

Don’t worry too much about exactly what you want to do. Some people love specificity. Some don’t. Go for exactly as much specificity as feels good. I think of goal setting as a starting point. As long as wherever you end up helps you feel the way you want to, the exact details don’t matter.

As part of my annual review I went through several years of notes I had taken while trying to figure out what to do next. Most of this collection was about creating this coaching business. But some of it was from the time I was still doing massage and yoga and didn’t know how to transition to something better. I was at the bank one afternoon and I grabbed the first piece of paper I could find–a loan application. I was fed up and tired of the constant spinning and worrying about what the hell I was going to do with my life. On the back of that paper I wrote out the main things I wanted in my life. I had specific ideas about how they were going to happen and I didn’t see any way I could get there, but it was what I really wanted so I listed them.

Today, about 3 years later I’ve created every single one.

I didn’t mean to. And none of them have happened the way I thought they would, but all have been born. This is despite my best efforts to control the outcome and hold on as tightly as is neurotically possible.

When you consider your goals, do just that. Consider them. Make a plan. Use your desired feelings and theme for the year guide you. This is much deeper and more powerful than the best organized spreadsheet you could create.

Go back through those goals and get rid of any that don’t sound very interesting or fit in with your feelings and theme. If a goal isn’t a hell yes, it’s a hell no. Sometimes your hell yes response is obscured by fears about how you’re going to do it. Or if you’re too big of a damn loser to get it done. (Hint: you’re not. This is Resistance speaking her holy and misguided message.)

Stay focused on what would feel like a hell yes if you were able to create it. Suspend your disbelief. Dream. Honor your cravings.

Make sure your goals are actionable and measurable so that you have something to track.

Yes: One day of kindness per month with the kids

No: Help the kids be nicer to people.

Got it?

Choose where each goal is going to go in the year. Pick a quarter to put it in. Give yourself a deadline.

That’s it.

Check in quarterly to see what you’ve done and what you haven’t. Make changes as necessary. Let go of anything that no longer matters.

Go forth. Create. Love.