But this “chronological makeover” might require more than a good memory. Did Mom and Dad’s actions match their words? Or did “What I say” and “What I do” contradict one another? It’s quite helpful to explore this, for one very compelling reason:  Mixed messages speak loudest.

Let’s say that a family member told you one thing about time and then did something completely different. How did you feel then, and how do you feel now about it now? Conflicting messages that confused you as a child can easily lead to “disconnects” in later life.

And those disconnects may create painful, missed opportunities. Fortunately, you can untangle these time knots and realign your energies. Even better, you can take an important step forward today!

Try an exercise about double messages with double benefits:

1. Think of an instance where you struggle to match your time choices with your expressed values.
2. Now, think back to your childhood, when someone you looked up said one thing about time and did something that differed.
3. Quickly write down what was said and what was done.
4. How did you feel about this? Write that down, too.
5. Compare and contrast your current conflict with what you witnessed others doing when you were young.
6. What’s similar? What’s different? What patterns emerge? Patterns always tell tales.
7. Now that you’re listening to the actions beneath the words, consult your heart. How might stories from your parents’ lives carry clues about your current situation? What past incidents narrow your sense of possibilities?
8. Envision a path to more rewarding time choices! Make this as vivid as possible, so you can really experience your progress on this path. This visualization helps motivate you and alerts you to opportunities to move forward.
9. Finally, ask your intuition about how to proactively walk this path and align deeds with words.

Engaging in this exercise will enrich you in at least 2 ways.

• First, you gain a compassionate context for time choices you make that puzzle and frustrate you. That feels SO much better!
• Second, you are in a much better position to change a troubling time choice once you understand its roots.

I would love to hear about your personal journey of finding time to live in power and harmony

And as you continue your journey, transforming yourself and your relationship with time, consider this:  Are you an entrepreneur, consultant, or small business owner who’s ready to take the next big step?  If you want to learn how to create and to keep a successful business running on your own, then this is for you! “How to Create Credibility as a Freelancer” is a booklet with 70 expert-proven tips that will help you recharge your energy and motivation, increase your visibility, and sharpen those vital organizational and time management skills.

Success is within your reach, so don’t wait, click this link and get started today!  http://bit.ly/FreelanceTips

Related articles

• Find Time to Know the State of YOUR Union: Are Your Head and Heart in Sync for Success? (thetimefinder.com)
• Find Time to Explore Your “Time Roots” (thetimefinder.com)
• Find Time to Free Yourself from the Perfectionism Trap-Your Heart Holds the Keys! (thetimefinder.com)

So, let’s pause for a moment.  How do you feel about your time choices so far today?  Don’t come from a critical place or you’ll clam up.  Just let yourself feel.

Are there choices you’d like to change?  Most of us are going to say yes to that … but before you start thinking about how you want to change those choices, let’s pause again.

Ask yourself, what is it that, for YOU, leads you to want to change how you use your time? 

Is it …

• Restlessness?
• Ambition?
• Intuition?
• Inspiration?
• Supporting your family?

It can be very helpful to feel out just what creates the desire for a change.  That lays the foundation for future time choices.  Then, having clarified what fuels your desire for change, it’s important to know what ignites it. 

Courage is the key!  Because moving into change means letting go of what’s familiar and comfortable, it’s courage that inspires you to let go to move ahead.

Since your time is finite, and your energy is, too, it’s important to make the kinds of courageous time choices that enable you to move directions that are in sync with your values and your goals.

As you identify new activities that are especially meaningful to you, you may find it easier to limit activities that compete with your emerging goals with these 3 tips to kindle your courage with your enthusiasm:

• Talk to yourself about the changes you desire.
• Validate how your new life choices reflect your evolution and growth.
• Envision yourself on your new path. Feel yourself move.

The more fully you commit to your emerging self, the easier it will be to let go of activities that are no longer a good fit. And the energy you release from your old attachments comes with you – just imagine how you’ll be able to use that!

As you courageously transform yourself and your relationship with time, consider this:  Are you an entrepreneur, consultant, or small business owner who’s ready to take the next big step?  If you want to learn how to create and to keep a successful business running on your own, then this is for you! “How to Create Credibility as a Freelancer” is a booklet with 70 expert-proven tips that will help you recharge your energy and motivation, increase your visibility, and sharpen those vital organizational and time management skills.

Success is within your reach, so don’t wait, click this link and get started today!  http://bit.ly/FreelanceTips

Related articles

• Find Time to Respect Yourself-When No Means Yes to You! (thetimefinder.com)
• Find Time to Celebrate Clarity and Realism this Holiday Season (thetimefinder.com)
• Find Time to Survive and Thrive Through Every Transition Time! (thetimefinder.com)

And just like getting into shape, cultivating your courage is a step-by-step process.  Each effort you invest provides a base for your next step.  Looked at that way, each step is a triumph!

So, as with any big goal, remind yourself that courage is usually gradually acquired, not dramatically seized.

Courage is flexible, too. You grow best when you accept setbacks, correcting your course as needed. And because courage brings you face to face with the unknown, you can expect surprises. So, build in time to accommodate them.

Here’s a simple exercise to help you become better acquainted with your courage:

• When you call upon yourself to meet a promising challenge, how do you experience this in your body?

• Do you feel a warmth or coolness?

• Are you breathing smoothly or braced?

• If you inflate yourself with confidence, only to quickly deflate, try a fresh approach.

• As a Tibetan maxim goes, “Rest the fearful mind in the cradle of compassion.”

• Humility and receptivity allow you to accept knee-jerk resistance and to gradually overcome it.

Accepting a measure of discomfort is most helpful as you grow beyond your comfort zone. Play the edge of your discomfort in small ways, as a daily exercise.  As this becomes easier, you will feel more resolute when gazing up at the next learning curve.

Want to learn more about how you can grow and optimize your time and efforts … in whatever areas you choose? Here’s a great way to explore avenues to increasing your time skills and heart-based power – whether it’s in your business, or your personal life.  I am so pleased to be able to offer my expertise and support as The Official SelfGrowth.com Guide to “Time Management”.

You can visit by clicking the link, and when you do you’ll find lots of time management articles by experts in the field, along with a vibrant and welcoming on-line community. Stop by my Expert Page and leave a comment or question … or just say hello.  There are lots of ways to connect … I’d love to get started!

Related articles

• Finding Time by Growing Your Courage Incrementally: Today’s Timely Tip! (thetimefinder.com)
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• Find Time to Let Changes Change You, Too! (thetimefinder.com)

Courage grows like a tree.  It grows as you grow, slowly and steadily.  And like a tree you nurture through the years, there are things that you can do to help your courage grow.

For example, the farther you send down roots of self-loyalty, the more you can branch out in new directions.  Your life can be a progression of loving life lessons – and what deep and sturdy roots that incremental process creates!

Self-loyalty requires taking the time to learn lessons from your choices. Especially from the outcomes that weren’t what you intended!

When you do that, you enjoy two benefits:

• You have updated your world map to include the new information learned from your lesson, and
• You have the assurance that you won’t turn your back on yourself when things don’t turn out to your liking.

Here’s another way to support sustained, steady growth. Are you still on speaking terms with your New Year’s Resolutions? If some of the bigger resolutions seem a bit daunting, consider creating 2 (or more) smaller resolutions that support each other from the overly ambitious single goal.

Let’s say your resolution is to move forward in your line of work, and you generally avoid drawing attention to yourself. Is there some class or group you can work with to become more comfortable with risking?

Commit to giving yourself all the support you need to achieve your resolution.

Strong trees grow slowly. So can you.

Want to learn more about how you can grow and optimize your time and efforts … in whatever areas you choose? Here’s a great way to explore avenues to increasing your time skills and heart-based power – whether it’s in your business, or your personal life.  I am so pleased to be able to offer my expertise and support as The Official SelfGrowth.com Guide to “Time Management”.

You can visit by clicking the link, and when you do you’ll find lots of time management articles by experts in the field, along with a vibrant and welcoming on-line community. Stop by my Expert Page and leave a comment or question … or just say hello.  There are lots of ways to connect … I’d love to get started!

Related articles

• Find Time to Nourish Your Courage with Love: Today’s Timely Tip (thetimefinder.com)
• Find Time to Do What You Can Because You Can Absolutely Thrive in 2012! (thetimefinder.com)
• Find Time to Be Yourself, Respect Yourself, and Do What You Can: 3 Timely Tips-Part 1 (thetimefinder.com)

One of the biggest ways that your courageous explorations will nourish you is that, with each step, you find that you actually have more of yourself to enjoy your time with!  Even better, this expanding self is your energetic and proactive self – the one that buoys your confidence and sparks your interest in new things.

But you and I both know that some days that expansive courage flows freely through your veins. Other days, perhaps you feel in need of a transfusion. What can you do on the “droop days”?

If you tend to scold yourself, prod yourself to buck up, or give up on yourself in exasperation, try something new. I suggest that you try something simple and profound … and brave … like love.

Self-acceptance or self-love is the fuel that, like oxygen in the blood, will keep you going AND nourish you at the same time. This acceptance can be very simple and very compassionate. Comfort with who you are this very moment provides an unshakable foundation for taking fresh new steps. Furthermore, your self-love helps you pace yourself realistically, so you can stay grounded, and learn as you go.

I like to think of my existence as a progression of loving life lessons. Life provides the lessons; I provide the love. This compassionate embrace of each experience further fuels my courage and opens me to whatever is around the corner or beyond the next ridge!

So, next time you feel a strong desire to make a change, ask yourself if you’re motivated by self-loyalty or self-criticism.

If you sense any judgment or impatience, slow down! Start by replacing harsh messages with self-affirming ones. Then you know that you are acting in your own best interests, not reacting to real or imagined criticism from others.

Begin any journey appreciating who you are. You might give yourself an affirmation like, “I’m exactly where I need to be.”  And know, right down to your toes, that you are!

Everything in your life has led you to this point. So warmly validate any and all steps that you have taken so far. The time you take to create a compassionate base for your courage will reward you every day of your life.  This is such a powerful and sustaining practice … I highly recommend it!

As you courageously transform yourself and your relationship with time, consider this:  Are you an entrepreneur, consultant, or small business owner who’s ready to take the next big step?  If you want to learn how to create and to keep a successful business running on your own, then this is for you! “How to Create Credibility as a Freelancer” is a booklet with 70 expert-proven tips that will help you recharge your energy and motivation, increase your visibility, and sharpen those vital organizational and time management skills.

Success is within your reach, so don’t wait, click this link and get started today!  http://bit.ly/FreelanceTips

Related articles

• Find Time to Give Yourself Exactly What You Need Every Single Day! (thetimefinder.com)
• Find Time to Survive and Thrive Through Every Transition Time! (thetimefinder.com)
• Find Time to Respect Yourself-When No Means Yes to You! (thetimefinder.com)

Well, for starters, it’s not always easy to say “No” to old pastimes or habits.  Change is a challenge that involves letting go and, sometimes, disappointing friends and/or family members who want you to stick with the ‘old way.’

In addition, new adventures carry you into unknown territory with new learning curves. Perhaps an extra helping of courage is called for!

Here’s today’s timely tip, to help you cultivate courage as you make time choices in the coming year.  In upcoming blog posts, I’ll offer additional tips for how you can cultivate all the courage you need, slowly and steadily, day by day.

Today’s Timely Tip:  Courage grows from small beginnings.

All oak trees begin as acorns. Like the mighty oak, your courage may take root with a simple, acorn-sized intention.

That is really all you need to initiate a powerful process of growth. You needn’t possess superhuman powers of foresight to predict how things will turn out.  You needn’t even be sure of the next step!  Your resolution can be to grow in a certain direction rather than arrive at a destination. Then you are fulfilling your purpose every day.

Action Step:  Approach your intention with warm, non-judgmental curiosity.

Brainstorm ideas about where you’d like to be taking new risks. What guideposts will you look for? If you’re embarking on a significant shift in your life, consider keeping a journal to trace your evolution. And regularly schedule a certain period of time to engage in your new activity.  Consistency is a foundation of courage.

BONUS TIP:  By focusing on the process rather than a distant or lofty outcome, you also pace yourself sustainably. Remember, as you evolve, any courage and skills you may now lack will have time to grow along with you.

What will be your next step as you cultivate courage for your journey?

And if you are interested in learning more about the Heart-Based Path, here’s one way that you can transform and deepen your relationship to time in the Heart-Based Way … I invite you to explore Secrets of Heart-Based Time Management™ – my chapter in the book I co-authored - Stepping Stones to Success!  In it I share my proven system for exploring and harnessing the power of your mind, your body and your spirit to help you deepen your experience of time and of your life.

As you work with the ideas I offer, you’ll explore your patterns, clarify your values, identify and prioritize your goals … and create your path for achieving them.  You can give yourself the gift of this wonderful resource today, and get started on your journey toward success, Stepping Stone by Stepping Stone …just click this link to get the details!

Let’s explore time together …