Even Smart Women Make Mistakes

I challenge you now...

I attended the University of Missouri in Columbia and left there after my second year with my MRS. We got married in 1980 and we had a wonderful daughter, Bradley, in 1982. I learned from my mother that a woman should be married. My mother almost always worked when I was growing up, so I also learned that mothers, wives, work and support their family and husband. So, I aspired to get a job, get married, and have a family. And I did.

I have been in Advertising, Marketing, Brand Development and Product Development for over 30 years. I had been in the business for more than 20 years when someone asked me how I had gotten into marketing and my response was I tripped and fell. I Knew I wanted to work with people, I had not real plan and the only job available was in advertising, so took it. 

Flashback, It's Thursday, February 3, 1994, I am getting ready to fly to Minneapolis for a business presentation. I have on my “I feel brilliant and confident” Red dress and my husband has just gotten home from the overnight shift at Chrysler’s number plant supervising the quality of their mini-vans. He kisses he hello and says with tears in his eyes, “Robin, I met someone else that I want to share my life with, I want a divorce".

I go on to catch my plane, after all, I have been trained that a woman works and supports her family right? So sitting in the window seat of a Northwest Airlines Boeing 7-something-7 the shock of hearing those words begins to ebb a bit, I make a decision. While I can not avoid being a divorce statistic, I do have a say so over what type of woman I can be going through and on the other side of the divorce.

In that moment, I chose to CREATE my life. I chose to define life, living, and love on my own terms.  I promised myself that post divorce there was going to be a stronger, vibrant, life-loving woman whose heart would not be hardened by one man and one choice made way back when.

And so it began. Those were the seeds, the beginning of Succelerance.  I challenge you now... Share with me what YOUR life would be like if you chose to live a life you deem as rightly successful.  What would you do differently?  What would you keep doing?  What beliefs do you hold that you begin to wonder... just where did those come from?  

Look for more from me shortly.  Let the musings begin.  Check out this information on Succelerance and reserve your place at the front. 

Robin

Did I Just Hear You Yell "STOP THE MADNESS"?

Do you really need life coaching? You know what? You really don’t need a life coach! And that is a true statement if your primary focus is on more of the same, not making a real difference in your life and the lives of others. So then you start asking questions… What do life coaches do anyway?  Why work with one?  I can do this alone, what can a life coach do that I cannot do? And can I really afford to work with one? 

What do life coaches do anyway? Life coaches act as sounding boards, provide a different point of view, introduce new skills, work with you to achieve what you are committed to and hold you accountable every step of the way. 

Why would I work with a life coach, what value do they bring?  Tell me, when was the last time you saw an amateur or professional athlete be successful in their chosen field who did NOT work with a coach?  It’s a paradigm shift to apply this concept to your life! Your urgent desire could be how to share more time with your family, or how to make more money and not invest more time, or finding a fulfilling job or career.  Life Coaches work with you to shorten the length of time it would typically take for you to achieve your goals. 

You say to yourself, I can do this alone. I’ve been successful to this point. I’m fine! True, you really have made it to this point, but you know deep down inside that with that extra oomph, or that different approach you really can make it happen NOW.  It may seem scary or you may be ready for it, but  my job is to move you from "I can’t do that" to "LOOK WHAT I DID"!  

I cannot afford life coaching.  Are you going with that one?  Well I once heard the statement that it is you who decides what life coaching is really worth.  When will you make up your mind that the commitment you are living to fulfill is worth more than the investment in making it happen? How much longer are you willing to wait to bring your dream to life? What is fulfilling your life dreams truly worth to you?  

Learn more about what it would be like to work with me, Robin Spence, at Rightly Successful, LLC a Certified Elite Life Coach.  My rates are reasonable and you can discover if working with me is a match by participating in a 30 to 45 minute consultation. Look me up here. Thanks!

Consider designing your life and making choices out of Personal Freedom, feel free to contact me. Also, check out my earlier posts on Personal Freedom.  I also offer coach and self-directed workshops on 3 Steps to Personal Freedom.  You can learn more about those at www.rightlysuccessful.com.

Until then, I would love to read your comments!

Robin

One Shoe is of No Use to a Two Legged Woman - Work life balance

I’m a mom and I am incredibly proud of it.  At the same time, I’m a daughter and while I am tremendously proud of that too (I did a lot more to become and be a mom).  Being a daughter - at the age of 53 - is different work than being a mom, maybe even, perhaps even harder!  Really who knew?  Now I do. Do you?  I, at some point in my life thought I could be my own person.  I could make my own decisions, have my own thoughts, and make up my own mind. But aha… discovery time for me!  I still have mom and daughter to take into consideration

. 

I’m a two legged-woman, and consequently having only one shoe, aka being partially prepared to go through life does me no good. Walking through life as either a mom OR a daughter has not served me.   As a matter of discussion, what it really does is make life a lot out of balance.  Consider, ambling through life with just one shoe, even if the soul of that shoe is only ¼ inch thick, and you are pretty well grounded, you are still to some extent, off balance when you walk.  Now picture yourself with a 1’’ heel, really, talk to me about balance and comfort and being nimble and being able to run when you need to. None of which you are able to gracefully or effortlessly do as you attempt to navigate through life with just one shoe.

In talking with women I have learned that so many of them do this unconsciously. They are myopic on an aspect of their life, either on being a daughter, or a mom / an employee or mom / a woman-wife-girlfriend or a mom.   They think that they are making a decision from a balanced point of view when in fact these women are making a decision from an “OR / one shoed” point of view, not a holistic approach to living.

Earlier this week, I exchanged emails with an exceptional woman and family leader.  Notice I said “woman AND family leader”. With her husband, they looked at their lives and chose to live life from a place of love, harmony and peace and most importantly, do what was right for their family.  In looking at what worked for them.  The entire THREE generations of family members actively chose to move to a local that would be right for them. It fit their emotional, spiritual, lifestyle and cultural needs.

This family took six months to get clear about what brings them joy, what their financial requirements were and how they could be a stronger family and then took the next courageous act and made it happen. They uprooted the complete family so that the entire family could live balanced, wholesome and happy lives.  Wow, I commend and applaud that choice.

So I ask, when was the last time you looked at your work life balance and chose, what works and what does not work?  Have you recently taking your own life into your hands and said, X, Y and Z brings me joy and I am committed to bringing more of that into my life and less of 1, 3, and 5.  Frankly, it does not necessarily mean that you change locales. It could mean you change jobs, develop new or different friends, suss out new hobbies, find and join a church or spiritual home or approach your diet or exercise differently. 

Do tell - are you ready to accept that one shoe does no good for a two legged woman? By golly, I’m a two legged women and I want to stop hopping through life, NOW! And I want to do this for me, for my family and for my mother (and father)!  What new will you do for yourself today?

Friends, this is long enough for one read. Consider designing your life and making choices out of Personal Freedom, feel free to contact me. Also, check out my earlier posts on Personal Freedom.  I also offer coach and self-directed workshops on 3 Steps to Personal Freedom.  You can learn more about those at www.rightlysuccessful.com.

Until then, I would love to read your comments!

Robin