Browse Life Transitions

Transitions provide continual opportunities to practice the art of the letting go. At each new threshold, the task is to let go of the old lifestyle, identity, and belief systems that are no longer serving us so that we can gracefully move into the new stage. The adolescent lets go of childhood. The high school graduate lets go of living at home (and the parents enter the transition of empty nest as their final child departs and so lets go of their primary identity being parent).

While I was researching and writing “The Conscious Bride” thirteen years ago, I simultaneously took notes and interviewed for the obvious sequel, “The Conscious Groom”. But when I presented the idea to my publisher they said that there simply wasn’t a male market for that kind of book. Perhaps they were right, but since that time I’ve received thousands of emails and posts on my message board from men who are seeking consciousness.

Transitions are always opportunities for growth and healing. Sometimes we need to heal ways of being in the world that are no longer serving us – like my clients who realize, through the wedding planning, that they’re suffering from the disease to please and that they need to learn how to put themselves first. Sometimes transitions provide opportunities to expand our internal resources – like the new mother who thinks she doesn’t have enough patience to handle the needs of her newbo and yet, through time and the immensity of her love, her patience grows.

Traditionally, the presumption of ‘fearless leader’ has been held in high regard. Someone who takes risks, who takes charge, and keeps full control and power in the face of adversity. What had not historically been considered was the impact yielding of such power and control had on the supporting individuals and thus, the dynamic of the entire community. It is not a surprise this is often used in conjunction with the term ‘dictator’. In a business situation, do you want a fearless leader, or an emotionally intelligent leader?

Around the sixth month of my pregnancy with my second son, my hip locked up to the point of debilitating pain. I had experienced something similar in my first pregnancy, but the second time was more extreme and I knew I needed help. I booked an appointment with a bodyworker and hobbled my way to his office. He asked if I was enjoying my pregnancy and I said, “I love that I’m pregnant but I hate being pregnant.” He laughed and said that when his wife was miserably pregnant he conducted an informal poll, asking pregnant women everywhere if they enjoyed it.

So here I sit, about to do my first blog for www.singledadstown.com. Heck, one year ago I didn’t even know what a Blog was. Now I’m a blogger. What a difference a year makes. Or in my case 5 years make, but I’ll get to that in a minute. I think that it is important that I let you know why I am doing this and what I hope to accomplish with my blog. First, I am doing this because I believe that single dads deserve to have a voice in today’s society. They need to learn f

One of the most common outcomes of transition and transformation is that the life we used to live is no longer our reality. So, how do you reconstruct your life, when many of the things you used to hold so dear no longer have the attraction they used to?rn rnHere are 3 exercises you can use to begin to recognize more clearly just what it is that makes your heart sing, that makes you feel like you are "humming", the vibrational resonance is that strong!rn rnWhen you become mor

Self-positioning is a process for personal self-reflection; you can do it on your own, as a personal development exercise, or with a group of people who agree to work with you for the mutual benefit of all of you. It is based on the psychology of social skills development.

Most people in an intimate relationship will, at some point, find themselves stuck in a projection about their partner. Projections are a bit challenging to define and even more challenging to see it when you’re in it.

When my clients are struggling with engagement anxiety and marriage fear, they often ask what they can do between sessions to help alleviate their suffering. I offer a variety of specific exercises depending on the details of the client’s story, but there is one exercise I suggest to all my clients: daily jou aling. I ask, “Do you journal?” to which they often reply, “I used to, but not anymore” or “Sometimes, but not regularly.” For jou aling to be effective, it needs to happen every day for at least twenty minutes.

Effective Communication Skills are the Mark of an Achiever. Have you ever blown a deal, a job interview, a promotion, or a relationship, because of your communication skills? Maybe you just couldn’t think of the right words to say. Has your tongue ever seemed disconnected from your brain? You can easily overcome anxiety, expand your abilities, and empower yourself for success by using these tips.

When my grandparents got married in the 1930s, I’m quite certain neither one of them had the kind of engagement anxiety I see among people today.

The founder of the Hospice movement, Dame Cicely Saunders, identified four important human tasks that people want to complete during the process of dying. They are: • To say ‘goodbye’ – to people, animals and things that have been important to them • To say ‘thank you’ – for a life together, for help and care provided, perhaps particularly in this last period when extra care has very often been needed. • To say ‘sorry’ – perhaps for failings or slights or demands, or especially for being difficult to live with, in the last illness. • To say ‘I love you’.

Transitions render us more vulnerable emotionally and psychologically than during other times in our lives. Being in a transition means that we are between stages and identities: no longer single but not quite married; no longer a non-mother but not quite a mother. These in-between zones are typically scary places when the familiar realm is out of reach and we’re left feeling disoriented and uncertain.

Fear’s entire mission in life is to keep you safe from the risk of loving. It sees love as a dangerous cesspool where the invisible sea creatures lurk beneath the dark surface, waiting to snatch you into their murky waters. Fear believes that if you risk your heart through committed loving you will endure unbearable loss: you will either lose yourself in some way or you will lose your partner. Either way, fear tells you to run because it’s trying to protect you from an unpredictable risk.

Why Tens of Thousands of People are Becoming Life Coaches About 5 years ago I wrote an article entitled “Healing from the Inside Out” that was published on this site. It stated that the consciousness movement around the world reflected advancement in human evolution – a growing recognition, ...Why Tens of Thousands of People are Becoming Life Coaches

A subset topic of the million-dollar question – is my anxiety/doubt evidence that my truth is that I’m with the wrong partner or does it mean something else? – is the issue of intuition versus anxiety. In other words, embedded inside every question of the mind suffering from relationship anxiety is, “Isn’t this anxiety really my intuition telling me to leave?”

The world is changing and so are the people in it. When life used to feature such simplicity, we have moved into an era were simplicity is a thing of the past on the outside of our characters, and an alter ego has a central role in our lives. At what point have we stopped being authentic and at what point will we crack to realize this dissension from our true nature and quite possibly our true calling? I live in an extremely interesting part of the world and recognize that a

Among the many misconceptions that people have about love – that it’s only a feeling, that the feeling of being “in love” should exist from day one, that attraction is static and based on exte al attributes – the faulty belief that often gets swept under the rug more than any other is that love is ambivalent. What does this mean? It means that: Love includes doubtr Love includes indifferencer Love includes boredomr Love includes numbnessr Love includes irritationr Love includes the need for spacer Love includes doubtr Love includes – dare I use such a strong word – hater

You’ve heard the phrase “feeling comfortable in your own skin.” Never is this more difficult when you are in a life transition and learning to take on a new identity. However, it’s important to know that being uncomfortable is not a sign that you are lost, powerless, or disconnected. The best example of this in the natural world is when a snake sheds its skin. During the shedding process, the snake is visibly uncomfortable and unproductive. It doesn’t eat; it is irritated an

My clients call me with a variety of anxiety-based questions (many of which I’ve discussed in previous articles): Does my anxiety mean that I don’t love my fiancé enough? How do I know that I’m making the right decision? Is there someone out there who’s better for me? Does the fact that I’m not excited about planning my wedding mean that I’m making a mistake? Embedded in all of these questions is another question, the one that they’re trying to articulate and hoping I’ll be able to answer: Will my marriage last?

How would your life be right now if you could live each moment without any baggage from the past? "Baggage" as it is referred to is previous memories and experiences that to this day influences our current perception of our reality. Since baggage is in our past, it is safe to say that our pasts help shape and define us. It becomes the filters through which we perceive reality. Our minds collect data and information about ourselves and the world around us. As we accumulate one

A Different Kind of Running Coach Introductionr When one thinks of a coach for an athlete, the first thing that comes to mind is the coach out on the field, in the gym, trackside or poolside, yelling commands, blowing a whistle, and monitoring with a stopwatch. More and more, athletes are looking to another kind of coach to support and motivate them to achieve greater goals. This is the personal development coach, or more specifically, a performance fitness coach.r

Perhaps you say: ‘Give me some space to think about that’. Or: ‘I need a breathing space before I can take that on’. So space is very important to us. But how can we understand that need for space? And what can we do to get it? This is an important part of self-positioning – it aims to ‘position’ us as we are now in relation to our past and future and in relation to other people, so the space we occupy is a crucial part of this. Perhaps you have failed an exam, or lost a job. Perhaps your child or your partner has left you.

“Our eyes are not viewers; they are also projectors that are running a second story over the picture that we see in front of us all the time. Fear is writing that script. Now fear is going to be a player in your life. You get to decide how much. You can spend your whole life imagining ghosts, worrying about the pathway to the future, but all there will ever be is what’s happening here, and the decisions we make in this moment which are based in either love or fear.” - Jim Carrey’s Secret of Life

After more than fifty years, my aging father sought closure of the previous life he had before he and my mother lived together. He had another family prior to the war in the town of Dalaguete 72.5 kilometers (25 miles) south of the city of Cebu, and where he begot six children.

Transcript from 6/14/12 blog talk radio show A Fine Time for Healing, Transitions in Lifer Transitions in Lifer Written by Randi G. Fine Life is a series of beginnings and endings. Seasons change; trees blossom and then go barren, flowers bloom and then go dormant, day turns to night, years begin and they end, we are born and we die. Endings are not sudden, nor are beginnings. They come about through the process of transition. Transitions, the uncertain spaces between the b

Love cannot be measured. It cannot be placed in test tubes in a science laboratory or placed on the great scale of life to determine whether or not there’s enough. The anxious/sensitive mind longs for a definite answer to the questions that swirl through its brain - Do I love you enough? What is enough? Do I love you as much as you love me? - praying that a divine hand will reach down from the heavens and seal the relationship with a stamp of approval. But love is not an exam you take in school where you can receive a letter grade.

Why is it that we speak more kindly to our friends, neighbors and family than we do to ourselves? What would happen if you routinely called your best friend names like stupid, fat or boring? That person probably wouldn't be your friend for very long. Yet, we talk negatively to ourselves all day, most of the time without even being aware that we are doing it. Sometimes we disguise negative self talk as humor, "I was having a dumb blonde moment!" The majority of the time, the thing we tell ourselves isn't even true.

When business building & networking, pretty much daily the question comes up, ‘Why do you do what you do?’ Before digging deeper, there are many common responses: 1. I have a strong skill set here and a lot of value to add to growing businesses. 2. I find this work fun & fulfilling, let me take the load off for others who don’t enjoy it so they can focus on their core genius. 3. There is a huge need here I am honored and thrilled to be able to fill it. And the list goes on…

We all long for a peaceful life. We search for peace through the mediums that our culture sells: through spending, watching television, searching the Internet, finding the “perfect” partner, having a baby, and a variety of other misguided methods. We even meditate, practice yoga, and attend retreats in an attempt to find peace. But none of these activities work if we’re using these tools as a way to escape or transcend the pain and messiness of life. Unless we’re willing to feel our pain and other uncomfortable feelings, the peace that we chase will perennially elude us.

rnThe Friendship day is a most respected day, which has celebrated in most countries in the world to appreciate true significance of friendship. On this special day, all of us greet our loyal and unrestricted friends who are always around us, without any bad intentions and when we need them, they will be always standing for us. A true friends shares our pleasure and sorrow for any time mutually as our triumph and our fails and ruins by our side in the good times and dreadful

Living with kids close to nature and on a creek, I find that my fear-mind has many opportunities to reveal itself. In spring, when the creek swells to river stature and rushes in white-lipped rapids, I worry that one of my kids will somehow escape through the gate and… In summer, as we gleefully splash in its pools and rock-hop to the other side, I worry about one of them slipping on an algae-covered boulder and… And now, in winter, as my older son courageously and curiously wants to explore the multi-faceted and miraculous displays of ice, my worry-mind sees the ice cracking, breaking, and…r

A recent and continuing occurrence, which happens to someone close to me, set me to thinking about the supe atural world. She claims to see dark apparitions of human-like figures lurking in the shadows of their house, sporadically appearing on no particular occasion, whether other persons are present or not, threatening enough to appear in her dreams. Except for wanting not to be left alone in odd or rarely frequented places of the domicile, she remains the vibrant and lively and strong-willed girl she has always been.

Sometimes an anger surges up in me about how abysmally this culture guides and takes care of its members around transitions. We expect engaged women and men to put on a happy face from proposal through honeymoon, ignoring their innate need to grieve the loss of their singlehood and honor their fears about getting married. We applaud pregnant women and new mothers for not allowing their baby to interfere with their regular life.

During my search for new recipes for my little vegetarian son (who declared he was a vegetarian about nine months ago; you can read about it on my blog), I stumbled upon a beautiful and inspiring book called, Healthy at 100, by John Robbins (author of Diet for a New America). As my current life affords scant time for the luxury of reading, the book sat around the house in a variety of locations for a couple of weeks. But a few days ago something urged me toward the book, and even though work and kids called as always, I picked it up and started to read.

At the core of each human being rests a heart full of love, tinged with sadness and aching with longing. Some would say this longing points to our awareness of our original separation from a divine source, the knowing that we are all one yet painfully separated from each another because of this form of a body. We ache to merge back into our source, to float in the sea of oneness that is only love. But we can’t quite get there.

The day that I reached the 300k mark in my business I didn’t feel happy. I had been frequently attending fancy events staying in fancy hotels – you know the kind with really large water features, perfect gardens, and extremely polite staff – the kind who say “can I do anything else for you miss” right after they have done anything for you. I had a book published. People were seeking me out for my expertise daily. I was on my way to the big time! I did not feel happy

As you get more and more drawn to your favorite things to do in your computer, you’ll find yourself constricted in a way that you need help either from someone or from a friend. You may need to run programs simultaneously and a number of tasks all at one time. If only you could do attend to them all at the same time you won’t need any help. Well you do not have to bother your friends anymore, nor worry about doing so many tasks at one time. There’s an application softwa

At the heart of transitioning consciously is the willingness to grieve. Sometimes grief arises unbidden as a pang of emptiness; sometimes it wells up in a bubble of memory about a former house; sometimes it appears as a longing for a past experience or stage of life; sometimes it comes barreling into the psyche on tidal wave of sorrow for a deceased relative or an estranged friendship. It can be attached to a memory or it can appear “out of the blue” without a specific content or story riding in its waters.

‘Where is the world headed towards?’ American Television journalist Kelvin Sanders while making a film with this title had interviewed Dr Margaret Mead, Herman Kohn and William Thomson a few years back. In this interview published in USIS’s ‘Spawn’ magazine the chief of American Museum of Natural History and Life Scientist Dr Margaret Mead and director of Hudson Futurology Institute Herman Kohn made optimistic prophecies that most definitely the future of 3rd world

A few weeks ago had a great session with the man I’ve referred to as “Matthew” in these posts. We’ve been working together for quite some time and have uncovered layer upon layer of false beliefs that are contributing to his unhappiness. But in this particular session we uncovered what I believe to be the core belief that is keeping him stuck.

Some people who come across self-positioning ask: why is it about your ‘self’? Isn’t that selfish, self-interested, self-absorbed? Shouldn’t we be thinking about others, outward-looking, rather than concentrating on ourselves?r

We hear a lot about the power of gratitude lately. There seems to have been a hundredth monkey leap in consciousness, a global awareness that gratitude is a powerful and relatively easy way to sweep out the propensity toward negativity and connect to what’s good and right in our world.

The Powerball lottery happens to be one of the best lottery games giving away big record prizes. The chances of obtaining the Powerball are 1 per 80 million Powerball tickets, and this makes the acceptable amount count millions of dollars. If you happen to be a lottery player, then I am sure you must have come across people who say that predicting the winning number is difficult so increase your chances of the win by buying more and more tickets. But the truth is that some w

"NOW is the operative word. Everything you put in your way is just a method of putting off the hour when you could actually be doing your dream. You don't need endless time and perfect conditions. Do it now. Do it today. Do it for twenty minutes and watch your heart start beating." ~ Sam Ewing Is what you are consistently saying to yourself contributing to your fears? Are you allowing your negative self talk to dictate your life and sabotage your dreams? Are your fears being fueled by the energy of your negative inner chatter?

“Embarking on the spiritual journey is like getting into a very small boat and setting out on the ocean to search for the unknown lands. Like all explorers, we are drawn to discover what’s waiting out there without knowing yet if we have the courage to face it.” ~ Pema Chodron Have you ever experienced a moment in your life when the unexpected hit you and things fell apart… rapidly? You wished you could turn back the clock, but you couldn’t? When I lived in Taiwan a

There is a room in your heart where sadness dwells. Each story of sadness lives there like a stagnant, frozen particle of light waiting for you to see it, to hold it, to wrap it in a blanket and bring it tea. When you visit your grief place with love, the particles of light start to shimmer and move – dance, even – for all things, even our pain, especially our pain, only want to be seen and loved.

One of the things I love most about South Florida is how “Doggie-Friendly” it is. Many places here – especially in Delray Beach – are tolerant and even happy when a dog accompanies you as you shop. Many restaurateurs allow you to dine in outside seating with your canine pal. Sipping on a beverage while kicked back with one of “The Boys” (our Poms) and people/pet watching is a fantastic way to relax.

If you follow my work you know that I view anxiety quite differently than most people. Instead of seeing it as something to eliminate as quickly as possible – usually with medication – I see it as the soul’s way of communicating, via the vessel of the body, that something is awry inside and is ready to transform. Eradicating the anxiety before you understand its message would be like stamping out a headache every time one appears and then realizing that the headaches were trying to communicate an imbalance in your brain chemistry that needed attention.