Words To Live By

There are so many speeches being given these days, words and more words. Some may say rhetoric. And as we know words can inspire and they can incite. Words can be uplifting and they can be damaging and soul burning. And, although we teach that words represent only a small percentage of any communication interaction, they continue to carry power.

Despite the ‘rhetoric’ I am a lover of words. The turn of a phrase, a silly pun, a stunning metaphor, or simply a well written piece of journalism. Words deliver me from the doldrums, lift me up, carry me on new adventures and to new places, and introduce me to new ideas and possibilities. It saddens me when words are used by pundits to damage, coerce, misinform or rule. Ah, but there in lies the power of the word.

Suffice it to say I have given some thought to the words I choose to live by. As a consultant, coach and facilitator words are essential. Spurred on by a column I read last Sunday, I decided to look back and to ask myself, ‘What are the words I live by?’ What are the phrases, poems, and quotes that inspire me and serve as my guidance, which become imbedded in my work and how I live? Here we go….

Be the change you wish to see in the world….Gandhi
When I left healthcare after 25 years to begin my own business, I had only a sense of what I wanted to achieve. I did not have a masterplan, or for that matter a business plan. I simply had a knowing that I needed to be engaged in work that had meaning and purpose and which lifted others up. As I launched into my consulting practice, at the time focused on team and leadership development, I began to read, and read, and read. Leadership, self-help, spiritual, business books, basically anything that seemed relevant. The year after we launched roadSIGNS, Jim and I decided to take a month-long sabbatical from life, and to celebrate 25 years of marriage, and rented a cottage in rural PEI. I took a suitcase of books with me and dedicated much of the time to exploring words.

Be the change… It seemed that every book I picked up, regardless of genre, contained these words. I am not sure that initially I understood, but like a hammer to one’s head, the message finally seeped in. The foundation of Law of Attraction (unknown to me at the time) – whatever I desired to teach, offer or coach in others had to live within me. I needed to change before I could create change.

WOW! This was an AHA moment! This continues to be my credo.

Our deepest fear….Marianne Williamson
Early in my consulting days I was introduced the Return to Love by Marianne Williamson. The famous quote used by Nelson Mandela in his inauguration speech, comes for this book:

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, ‘Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?’ Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”

The final two lines of this piece, “as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others”, have been another anchor for me. As my own work evolved I came to a point where I wanted to dedicate my work to enabling others to find their light and see themselves lovingly, these words have been my fuel. And of course, like Gandhi’s words, it meant I needed to see my own light and allow it to shine before coaching others to do so. Holding my hand to the fire!

I will not die an unlived life… Dawna Markova
Shortly before leaving health care, I had the opportunity to meet Dawna, then a consultant with Peter Senge’s The Learning Organization Group. We became colleagues, meeting at conferences a few times. Then she disappeared off the radar for a while, although to be fair she told me she was retreating to write. The result was her book, I Will Not Die and Unlived Life.

The book, inspired by a poem she had written years before, was a read which like Return to Love, changed my life. The poem however, remains a short powerful instrument in and of itself:

I will not die an unlived life.
I will not live in fear of falling or catching fire.
I choose to inhabit my days, to allow my living to open me,
to make me less afraid, more accessible,
to loosen my heart until it becomes a wing, a torch, a promise.
I choose to risk my significance;
to live so that which came to me as a seed goes to the next as a blossom
and that which came to me as a blossom, goes on as fruit.

This poem has been an invitation to live boldly, to take risks, to listen to what my intuition and spiritual guidance impart to me without fear of what others think. These words have given me permission to pursue dreams I did not even know I had.

Thoughts become things…Mike Dooley
I have been a student of the Law of Attraction for many years, hence the reference to ‘be the change’. I also subscribe to Mike Dooley’s Messages from the Universe which arrive daily in my inbox. And at the bottom of every message is the quote, thoughts become things.

I love it frankly, a daily reminder to check in with the inner dialogue, to assess what I am telling myself and what I am thinking and to renovate the thought stream if it is warranted. I have learned that when my thoughts and desires are clear, I can manifest. Thoughts do become things.

Highest Good
I am not sure of the source of these two words. What I do know for sure is that they serve as a comfort when I am confused, anxious, fearful, lost. I set the simple intention, “I am attracting what is in my highest good.”

In the last year alone, these simple words have seen me through many things, including the sale of our country home and finding a new place to live, making our way home from Portugal in March after the state of emergency was declared, significant downsizing and too many decisions to count. It may sound crazy but I simply feel that those words allow me to ask for help and share responsibility with a higher power.

There are other words and phrases that inspire me every day, books which have played a huge role in how I evolved our work through the years. I plan to share more of this as I launch into another year of blogging. While new books come on the market every day, the latest and the greatest and novel concepts, I am inherently aware that there really is no new knowledge. Simply said, new books re-frame what we already know. I have decided to go back to my favorites, look at the highlighted bits and reflect on how these words have guided me.

I encourage you to do the same. What are your words to live by?

Until next time….

Betty