Sunday, May 29, 2022

Hello Reader,

Welcome to the monthly Vitality Newsletter – inspiring, educating and supporting passion-driven, heart-centered women to create and sustain vitality at work and at home.

May 6: Pool with bare trees in background

May 13: Pool with trees with leaves in background

There is so much to be G.L.A.D. for this past month (more on G.L.A.D. below). May is such a transformational month in Ontario - where we transition from wintery conditions and not a bud on a tree to full ‘summer-like’ conditions with full leaves and blooming flowers, not to mention all the birds and chipmunks reappearing. In fact, much of the blossoming and sprouting seems to happen within a short few days.

The pictures above are of our backyard - taken six days apart. Now 10 days later, it's a lush green oasis.

At the beginning of this month it was cold, rainy, miserable weather - it felt like it would never end. Many were feeling impatient for the warmer, sunnier spring weather to finally arrive. But during this struggle, Mother Nature was doing her job, nourishing the soil with moisture - making sure the sun didn’t dry up the water before it had its chance to do its work.

And then, as if overnight, the growth and blossoming happened.

Almost unexpectedly.

And, yet, it happens every year…and, yet, we seem to forget.

It brought to mind how this transformation is a metaphor for life and for personal growth.

Isn’t it interesting that when we are in the midst of the struggle, we can easily forget that we’ve been here before. Maybe not the same struggle, but struggle, nonetheless. And we made it through to growth on the other side.

So if you’re going through a cool and rainy or stormy season, I invite you to reflect on how this metaphor, and leaning into trust and hope, may help you through.

And if you are going through a warm, sunny season, I invite you to reflect back on what you’ve learned about yourself and your situation that helped get you here. 🧡

In this Edition:

New on The Vitality Blog

What’s New in the Studio

Quote of the Month

Reflection of the Month

What’s Coming Up

New on The Vitality Blog:

1. 5 Things You Can Expect from a Certified Coach

For those of you following along on social media, you likely know that May 16-22 was International Coaching Week (ICW). And in honour of ICW, much of what I have been sharing on socials and The Vitality Blog this past month has been about coaching - what it is, how it can help you and what you can expect from an ICF Certified Coach. Read more on the blog.

2. How To Recharge Your Vitality with the Breath of Joy

For those times when you’re feeling a little flat, wound up or anxious and you want to bring your best energy to the next task or person on your schedule, I'm sharing one of my ‘go-to’ vitality recharge tools. Check out the video and blog to help you recharge and/or reset your energy to help you bring your best self into the next moment(s).

What’s New in the Vitality Coaching Studio:

The Vitality Recharge Tool Kit Membership (FREE)

The practices in this tool kit are offered freely to help you bring your full and best energy to the moments and the people that mean most to you. New resources/tools are added monthly. Register for FREE and bookmark it to have simple, easy to use tools at your fingertips.

Tension and stress are at an all time high in our world right now. These practices are my gift to you and are intended to provide simple training techniques to help nudge your brain and body into an optimal state for maximizing your vitality at work and at home.

The training techniques include a variety of short guided meditations and coaching exercises. These techniques help cultivate a deeper awareness of yourself so that you are able to respond more intentionally and purposefully.

NEW TOOLS:

Infuse some G.L.A.D. into your life (1 minute video)
Breath of Joy (4 minute video and pdf)

Vitality Recharge Tool Kit

Quote of the Month:

'When we can talk about our feelings they become less overwhelming, less upsetting, and less scary.'

~ Mr. Rogers

🗣 Talking about your feelings whether to your bestie, your dog, your therapist or your coach is part of the process of working through them.

😅 When your feelings become less overwhelming, less upsetting, and less scary, it allows you to get unstuck, get present and start taking action to help you move forward and ultimately feeling better.

⚠️ While you may talk about your feelings as part of a coaching or therapy session, there are some very important distinctions between coaching + therapy.

You can read the full post on Instagram here.

Reflection of the Month:

The Reflection of the Month is an opportunity for you to set aside time and put pen to paper to learn more about yourself. Increasing awareness of yourself is often the key to change and maximizing personal and professional potential.

Infuse some G.L.A.D. into your life:

Definition of glad:

experiencing pleasure, joy, or delight : made happy
very willing - glad to do it
made pleased, satisfied, or grateful - often used with of - was glad of their help
causing happiness and joy : pleasant

Resource: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/glad

A hallmark of my coach training through MentorCoach is a thorough integration of positive psychology. If you’ve coached with me before, you will know that one of the first assessments I use with clients is the VIA Character Strengths Assessment (you can take it here).

One of the dominant theories in positive psychology is Martin Seligman’s (2011) well-being theory, PERMA, which stands for Positive Emotion, Engagement, Relationships, Meaning and Accomplishment - each an independent, measurable pathway of a flourishing life. Seligman describes the integral relationship the 24 VIA Character Strengths have with flourishing. He states that these 24 character strengths underpin all five elements of a flourishing life and deploying your highest strengths leads to more positive emotion, to more meaning, to more accomplishment, and to better relationships.

And all four of the words represented by the acronym G.L.A.D. just happen to represent a character strength:

Pausing to get curious about what in your day you were grateful for, learned, accomplished or delighted you is using the strength of curiosity.

The double bonus of using curiosity and gratitude is that they are two of the five signature strengths that are correlated with happiness.

So I invite you to infuse a little more G.L.A.D. in your life:

What are you grateful for today?
What have you learned today?
What have you accomplished today?
What delighted you today?

What’s Coming Up:

Another thing I am G.L.A.D. for this month is the successful launch of my new Beta Course, Create Space for Vitality: Align your time, energy and priorities with your purpose. The combination of the weekly pre-recorded video lessons and coaching exercises with the weekly live group coaching was a huge success. As much as I love one-on-one coaching, group coaching brings that little bit ‘extra’ with participants sharing their experiences and supporting one another.

Keep your eye on your email and future newsletters to be the first to know about the relaunch of this course and any new offerings.

Psst… rumor has it, only those on my email list will be privy to upcoming discounts on courses, workshops and coaching.

If you’re curious about coaching and how it could be helpful in your stage of life or work, book a free consultation to experience it for yourself.

Book a FREE Call

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