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Perfection is doing something according to a preconceived notion of what the right thing to do is. Excellence is exploring what the right thing is in the context of the experience. Perfection is always just out of reach. Excellence is immediately accessible by making a choice. Perfection always has rules about what you need to have before something can be done. Excellence is working with what you have and finding a way that works. Perfection is rigid and static. Excellenc

There seems to be this point in people’s lives when they give up. It goes back to that one painful experience that breaks them. I have heard many of these: getting cheated on, death of someone close, loss of a job, death of a pet, a business folding. Most all of them correlate to the loss of a dream. Since then, you have not really opened your heart as much. You are not quite as hopeful. Perhaps you have gotten a bit cynical. I understand. But it’s time to come back. The worl

Bart Anderson would challenge his students: "All of your feelings eventually do come out to play. You can either address them willingly- or on your hands and knees.” People stress taking responsibility for all kinds of things these days. But what about being responsible for what you are feeling? The overall healthiest thing you can do with a feeling is to express it. Feelings are energy. They work best when we experience (feel) and release (express) them. So it would follow t

We all get blocked, stuck, or overwhelmed on creative projects. So team-up with someone. Create a team with your husband/wife, boyfriend/girlfriend, friend, colleague, or associate. Have each of you identify something that you have resistance toward or are overwhelmed by. Pick someone to go first and then work on it together. The helper best takes the energizer role. He or she can see the situation with freshness and clarity. They can ask the blocked teammate questions to fin

Who is threatened by your success? Who gets scared when you let yourself shine? Do you crawl back in your box when you see the frightened look on their face? Intellectually, we know that we are not doing anyone any favors by protecting them. Holding yourself back for another person to feel safe is obviously not good for either person. You need to break free, and they need to be pushed out of their comfort zone. So why do we keep protecting other people? It is an emotional iss

Feeling trapped is not a pleasant feeling. Oppression comes from the inability to see the possibilities available to you. So being trapped ultimately is an illusion. But when you are in the middle of it, it sure feels real. The first thing to understand is that the source of the oppression is inside of you. You could argue that clearly your job or boss is oppressing you. At one level this is true. But there is something inside of you that is allowing the job, coworker, boss,

People find themselves in life situations they need to complete and understand. True compassion is allowing them (or yourself) to work out what they need to. We allow children to learn the lessons they need. Well, adults are trying to learn lessons too. Why not extend that same courtesy to them? Let them work it out. It is likely not rational or intellectual. They need the experience- so they can understand it. This allows them to complete the lesson or accept the truth. Then

Your ability to attain what you want depends on the way that you view yourself in relation to what you want. Decide what you want and commit yourself to it. Know that it is going to happen- it is just a matter of time. Every day take another step closer to what you want. It could be a small step like making a phone call, sending an email, or researching something. But every day, take another step. When you get frustrated with the lack of what you really want, remind yourself

Is the glass half-full or half-empty? Do you focus on the people that like you or the people that don't like you? Do you focus on the 10 positive things in your employee review or the 1 negative? Do you focus on the things you have or the things you don't have? Many of us focus on the negative. We have a "propensity of the negative." Why? The negative resonates with our negative self-belief system that tells us that there is something wrong with us- that we are deficient in s

You can walk through life open or shut down. So how can you stay open and vulnerable without being taken advantage of or setting yourself up for the slaughter? The best skill I have come across for this was taught to me by Bart Anderson. He called it "folding over the envelope". We tend to view our relationships as "all or nothing". We tend to share every part of ourselves or no part at all. Folding over the envelope starts with walking open and giving people the benefit of t

Our deepest issues are with ourselves. All anger, resentment, regret, and betrayal are ultimately self-directed- if we are willing to take them deep enough. Once we see and accept that it is us that let us down, true healing can begin. This healing is accomplished by finding compassion for yourself. You have to go back when you let yourself, your children, or the people you care about down. You need to understand why you made that choice. Regardless of the outcome, what was y

In our busy lives, one experience tends to blend into another. Often we do not complete the previous experience before starting the next one. This keeps us from being present. The unfinished experiences start to build up and keep us anxious and overwhelmed. A way to complete experiences and not drag one into another is called "Closure." Following are the 6 steps of Closure: 1. Acceptance of the reality of the situation. 2. Reconciliation: Learning something. 3. Asking: What c