If you just, if you only, if you could, what would it be? What’s keeping you from living your best life?
These sentence starters sort of sound like goal setters, but don’t be fooled. They can really be tricky little non-starters. Five pounds may as well be 500 pounds, because, in our minds, they are out-weighing the odds that we’re ever going to get there. They are fantasized versions of what a better you or me could achieve, acquire and attract. And they are keeping us from thinking that we qualify for something better than we already have.
When we say these words, we are declaring to everyone – the universe, too – that we’re “not enough” right now, and may well never be. Therefore, we don’t deserve this better life…yet. The worst part is that we’re telling ourselves this and we may actually be listening. These “If only’s, “When I’s,” and “After I’s” are nothing but big, uninspiring blobs that are lodged between the life we are living and the life we really want. And that keeps us firmly planted in some kind of weird blob purgatory where we’re not really living yet. So let’s do some blob busting.
“Most people, unconsciously, dream themselves out of their goals,” says “Abundance Now” author Lisa Nichols. “They dream so far past their current reality or what’s currently possible that they end up abandoning their goals and damaging their own self-esteem. They are chasing the macro-win all the time and they’re not looking at all the micro-wins that they can feel really good about to get them to that macro-win. Micro-wins lead to macro-wins.”
The problem with only being focused on the macro-win is that we’re putting our life on hold. We’re actually dismissing the present as real life as we obsess over some massive goal. And we’re also depleting ourselves by not celebrating the little successes, which is a way of punishing ourselves for not having the discipline, strength and intelligence to figure out how to lose those pesky five pounds, take those online classes or work smarter, not harder. Ouch. Those blobs are not only in our way, they’re causing us pain!
I remember reading that Oprah would know that she had “made it” when she could afford a big, luxurious bathtub. I think about the people I know who do own big, luxurious bathtubs. Do you know how often they actually soak in them, with bubbles up to the ceiling, a glass of champagne in one hand and a great novel in the other? I don’t actually either, because that would be creepy, but I’m guessing they don’t use these big soakers very often. I do, however, hear people complain that these massive bathtubs take up too much space, require too much hot water, and after all, who has the time to bask in this kind of frivolous behavior, anyway?
But that’s ok, Oprah, because that was a tangible marker for you. More importantly, I hope you celebrated like a blissed-out mermaid, because that’s what really counts – taking a moment to congratulate ourselves for reaching an important goal. So, can we please have more bubbly celebrations? Lisa Nichols says we most certainly can, by creating more micro-wins.
As Nichols describes, micro-wins offer a taste of that thing we want more of. If you want to go to Paris to see the Louvre, Nichols suggests visiting your local museums now, while you’re saving money for Gay Paree!
Leadership Coach Ronda Beaman has mastered the micro-win. Beaman travels the world teaching leadership skills to top-flight executives. Before this, she was raising two boys as a single mom, working full-time and taking classes on nights and weekends toward advanced degrees. She would have liked to have put her boys on a plane and show them the world, expand their horizons and have some fun together, but that wasn’t in the budget, yet. So she created some micro-wins.
As she explained it to me, she would have Italy Night, Morocco Night or Japan Night, for example. The three of them would research the selected country – through encyclopedias, not the internet then – decorate themselves and their kitchen table in honor of the celebrated culture, and prepare the cuisine of the selected nation of the night. At dinner, they might sip miso soup, roll sticky rice in nori, and discuss what they had “seen” that day when they climbed Mount Fuji.
These globetrotting events became much-anticipated mini-vacations for the family. And no doubt, the boys got to experience the world through books, their imaginations and their taste buds. My jaw dropped when I heard about the innovative, educational, family fun and togetherness these people were having on a budget right down the street from me! Guess who else’s jaw dropped? USA Today! Yup, the newspaper proclaimed them “America’s Most Creative Family.” Are you kidding me? Turning hot dogs into racecars with toothpicks and cardboard wheels at my dinner table wasn’t creative enough?
Today, Beaman is the hugely successful executive coach and chief creative officer for PEAK Learning, a leadership firm based in Arroyo Grande, California. She is the first recipient of the “Art of Teaching” award and has been “Professor of the Year” at three universities, including Northern Arizona University. In her spare time, she’s written bestselling books and was named 2018 Fitness Idol! And, she can now actually fly her family to Japan or Timbuktu if she wants.
If you just, if you only, if you could, what would it be? What’s keeping you from living your best life? What micro-wins can you have and celebrate now? Go ahead, I see you there in your toga with a handful of legumes. Write them down on your scroll during your Ancient Rome Night and consider this a double micro-win! Because really, no one will notice those five pounds under a toga anyway. FBN
By Bonnie Stevens, FBN
Bonnie Stevens is a public relations consultant. She can be reached at bonnie.stevens@gmail.com.
