Got Resilience?

When most of us talk about health, we are really referring to a reduction in illness. The kind of Health that I want in my life, and that I equip my clients to create in their lives, is different. This is Health with a capital H. This kind of Health often appears as:

• Peace-of-Mind
• Energy & Vitality
• Desire for Whole Foods, from nature not the factory
• Fulfilling Relationships
• Empowered Choices
• Enough Rest
• Spiritual Connection
• Letting Go, when necessary
• Smiles, Laughter, Fun

Sound good? Yes, you really can have all of that. The best ways to achieve Health require attention to the many and varied factors that contribute to our well-being, such as stress level, good nutrition, healthy relationships, fulfilling work, positive self-image, and self-empowerment. These factors are interconnected and synergistic, whether we realize it or not.  I have believed and experienced for a number of years now, that achieving Health has as much, if not more, to do with who we are being, than what we are doing. I am sure my 1-on-1 coaching clients would attest to that statement. It seems that much of the work these individuals are doing is the work of creating Health in their lives by looking closely at who they are being and what they are creating or manifesting in their lives as a result.

How about you? What is your vision for Health & well-being in your life? How do you create Health and well-being from the inside out? Let me offer to you a powerful resource called Got Resilience?, which is my program for creating Health in your life. Got Resilience? guides you in claiming the Health that is rightfully yours; remember the bulleted list at the beginning of this post? You really can have all of that. Got Resilience? includes a 4-session teleclass series, a day-long retreat, and individual coaching (packaged separately; you do not need to participate in all, though it is recommended for maximum benefit). The next teleclass series begins on Thursday, Sept 29th. The next retreat will be on Wednesday November 2, 2011. Read on for teleclass details. Retreat information and registration will be available soon.

I hope you will join me for this important and powerful series and find answers to your Health questions.

Got Resilience? Teleclass Series: Four Thursday lunch hours (12pm-1pm). Sept 29, Oct 6, Oct 13, oct 20.  Click here to register.

Learning Objectives:

1. Self-assess your current stress level and level of satisfaction in key life areas
2. Identify your primary internal & external stressors
3. Identify the steps you can take to eliminate stressors that are within your control
4. Identify the steps you can take to relate differently with those stressors that are outside of your control
5. Gain clarity around self-sabotages, limiting beliefs, and the assumptions that currently run your life
6. Gain clarity around your desired future state…what are you moving towards?
7. Increase skill at avoiding emotional reactions “in the moment” and instead, respond to situations with intentionality
8. Learn and practice various stress management / resiliency building activities
9. Learn skills and tools for rewriting limiting beliefs, changing your self-sabotaging inner dialogues, and establishing and maintaining clear boundaries in your relationships
10. Understand how to best nourish your body and mind for greatest resiliency, vitality, and energy through whole foods
11. Achieve greater congruency or resonance in your life; that is, aligning your daily behaviors with your most important values. A congruent life is the key to peace-of-mind.
12. Real-time coaching to support and challenge you, and help you make the changes you most want to make in your life.

Some of the tools you’ll receive in the teleclass:

1. Wheel of Resiliency, self-assessment
2. Goal Setting and Milestones Planning
3. Language of Empowerment
4. Power of a Perspective, 6-step process to perspective shifts
5. One Belief at a Time, a process for rewriting limiting beliefs
6. Resources for incorporating more whole foods into your daily diet (and avoiding energy-sapping processed foods)
7. Values Clarification Exercise
8. Real-time Coaching segments during the calls

Registration Fee for the 4-part Teleclass: $75. Click here to register.

My April 11, 2011 article was titled “The Road to Resiliency.” In that article, I wrote, “Most of our stress comes from within, not from without. Even in the face of the most challenging external circumstances, we GET TO CHOOSE our response, our perspective, our approach. Our response, perspective, approach, in turn, either increases our resilience, our calm, our groundedness, OR leads us to experience more stress.”

Since that writing, I have had the privilege of being introduced to a man who personifies RESILIENCE. His name is Jason Fowler. Jason was a child and teen Motorcycle Champion, racing motorcycles around the country from the age of 7. When he was 17, a tragic motorbike accident left him paralyzed from the chest down. In the years that followed, Jason chose an attitude of resilience and empowerment, rather than one of self-pity, negativity, or despair. His resiliency and his self-supportive attitude have led him to become a top competitor in worldclass races, including winning the handcycle division of the Ironman World Championship in 2009. For those that aren’t familiar, that’s a 2.4 mile swim, a 112-mile bike race, and a full marathon (26.2 miles); all using only his arms!

I am very excited that this incredible man is coming to tell us his story live on June 13, 2011. My Juice Plus+ team is hosting his visit at the Great America Pub in Conshohocken, PA (6-9pm). Jason will be with us to share his story and his inspirational message of self-empowerment and dreaming big.

Seating is very limited for this event.  As my guest, there is no admission fee to you. Please reply to me as soon as possible, today even, if you’d like to join me for this cool opportunity to hear Jason speak in such an intimate gathering.

Watch a short video clip of Jason here.  Learn more about him at his personal website.

I hope you’ll join me on June 13th!

Denise@SherpaDeCoaching.com
610.287.2989

Men, please don’t take offense at what I’ll say next. One of the things I love most about being a coach is the opportunities I am given to work with other women. Just as there is a certain fraternity among men, so too is there a special kind of sisterhood among women. While we are each undoubtedly unique, we are each strikingly similar.

If you visualize life as one long chronological path, from birth until death, we all have our respective place along the path. Presently, I am somewhere in the middle; hopefully not quite halfway yet, but I’m darn close. As such, I find myself in the unique dual-position of being both mentor and student. Teacher to the generations of women coming up behind me, which include my own daughter and nieces, and at the same time, student to the wise women walking ahead of me. One thing I’ve learned with certainty is that no matter where we are on the path, we all have something to give and to share with one another.

My women’s retreats, provide the space and the time for us to do that. There is such positive energy and connection at these gatherings, where women of different ages, backgrounds, professions, and life situations, come to witness one another’s experience, learning, and growth. My next retreat is taking place on Saturday, November 6, 2010. Watch the introductory video below. I hope you will join us.

And if you’re a man reading this (thanks for sticking with me this far!), please forward to all the women in your life. They deserve a retreat like this!

Register now!

Got questions? Call me at 610.287.2989 or email me at
Denise@SherpaDeCoaching.com

A new season, a new schedule, time for a new You? I’ve heard it said that September and January are the two months of the year that, more than any other time, trigger people into action towards their goals and desires. January has the obvious claim to fame around New Year’s Resolutions. What is it about September? Perhaps the cool crispness in the air feels more motivating than the hazy sluggishness of summer days. For us moms (and dads) the kids returning to school schedules creates more structure, if not more time, for us to work within then do the summer months. And maybe it’s something about the sheer beauty of Autumn approaching, with its metaphorical presentations of transition and change.

Transition and Change. Where in your life are you ready for a change? What new transitions might you be facing this fall? Now through October 30th, 2010 I am offering free sample coaching sessions for individuals wanting to explore new possibilities for their life, career, health, relationships.

Letting Go. “Angels fly because they learn to take themselves lightly” Susan Jeffers. Where in your life would it serve you to ‘lighten up?’ What is it time to let go of? Powerful questions that we can explore together in a coaching relationship. Give me a call!

Denise@SherpaDeCoaching.com

610.287.2989

www.SherpaDeCoaching.com

Introducing my new Wellness Workshop series

Health, Wholeness, Vitality

I am excited to be co-hosting a monthly wellness workshop with my good friend, AnnMarie DeLucca, RN and Wellness Educator. Our kickoff session is this Wednesday, Sept 22nd from 12:30-2pm. I am also excited about the venue we’ve selected for our series: The Cedars House in Fairmount Park, Philadelphia.

The workshops in our series combine wellness and nutrition teaching with the life coaching necessary to make it all stick. Each 90-minute program blends personal coaching activities and goal setting with practical information to help you achieve greater health and vitality for yourself and your family. Open to the public. Registration is free, but please pre-register by contacting me at 610.287.2989.

View more details here:

Wellness Workshops at Cedars House 2010



What in your life do you want to create anew? At the end of this article is a link to take my free “Healthiest You” assessment and help you answer this question. AND through April 30^th, I am offering a free 30-minute coaching session with me to debrief your assessment and claim your intentional fresh start!  Read on.

We are less than a week away from the first (calendar) day of Spring!

What does the approach of Springtime evoke in you?

For me, the start of Spring evokes excitement and wonder over the new life happening in the natural world around me:

• Shoots and sprouts are pushing up through the earth
• Trees and perennials are forming buds
• The animal world is busy welcoming in new babies
• Color is slowly creeping back in to my yard
• Bright leafy greens adorn the local farm stands

The start of Spring also brings to mind ‘spring cleaning’. When I was a kid, spring cleaning involved washing and ironing curtains, emptying and washing out kitchen cupboards, and cleaning out closets. While I’m sure I did my share of complaining, I did, at some level, feel connected with the idea of de-cluttering and an intentional “fresh start.”

An Intentional Fresh Start

My examples above are but a few of the many metaphors Springtime offers us, pointing us in the direction of “creating anew.”

What in your life do you want to create anew?

Perhaps a relationship, your fitness level, your work/career, your emotional resilience, a goal you want to reclaim, your home environment? Align with the inspiration of Springtime and create some new possibilities for yourself now!

I’ve created a coaching package to support you, called The Healthiest You. The package provides a structure for you to explore:

• Your goals and taking action towards them NOW
• The balance in your life now (or lack of balance)
• New perspectives and activities to get you “unstuck” and make a fresh start
• Empowered choices for yourself
• Fulfillment in your work and relationships

Get started now! I am offering you a no-cost opportunity to take my

“The Healthiest You” assessment, powered by ChangeWorks (the online system you’ll click through to).

“The Healthiest You” looks at 12 activities that lead to a balanced and healthy life.  Click on the link above (and below) to access the assessment. It will ask you to rate how challenging you find each activity, how important each activity is to you, and your current ability to successfully handle each activity.

Through April 30^th, I am offering a free 30-minute coaching session with me to debrief your assessment and claim your intentional fresh start! I’ll email you to schedule our session once you’ve completed the assessment.

Here’s the link again:

The Healthiest You Assessment.

And thank you for taking this first step to creating anew the life you truly want!

In my last blog post, I mentioned sharing the story of my first triathlon, turned biathlon. Read on…

If any of you are from the Philadelphia area, you’ll likely recall the torrential rains, flash floods, wicked lightening storms we had in late July and early August. One such storm occurred on the morning of August 2^nd. This was the morning I was racing in my first triathlon, SheROX, taking place in Fairmount Park. On that morning, I woke up before my alarm to a familiar sound. “What’s that”, I thought? “No, it can’t be thunder. It’s not going to storm today.”

Fast forward a couple of hours. I’m standing in the field at Fairmount Park, wearing the rarely seen triathlon ensemble, a hot pink swim cap, my trisuit, and my running shoes, awaiting a decision by race officials. The decision in question was whether to allow the swim or to cancel it. If canceled, the half-mile swim would be replaced with a mile and a half run. Standing there looking at the Schuylkill River, I have to say, I have no idea what took race officials an hour to make the decision to cancel the swim. I will spare you the details of what was floating down the river. Though I did not personally see it, news reports said that a dead body was one such item. Even so, I was disappointed not to finally conquer my first open water competitive swim.

Fast forward another couple of hours.  I finished the first run portion in 11-minutes, grabbed my bike, and ran out of the transition area.  I have a really great road bike that I was lucky enough to score from a female Hawaii Ironman Champion living nearby. So I’m flying along on my bike, having a blast passing people, when all of a sudden it starts raining. No, let’s make that pouring. I was still having fun until the spills and crashes started to happen (not me thankfully). I decided I should probably slow down (a little). Which I did and safely finished the bike portion and was off for the final run. I crossed the finish line with my husband and kids cheering me on!

I was standing in line for a leg massage, when the STORM hit. Thunder so loud it shook the ground like an earthquake; Lightening bolts struck seemingly within feet of where we were standing. And the rain! It was like having buckets dumped over your head, one after the other. News reports said that Philadelphia received 5 inches of rain in 2 hours that day! That’s a month’s worth of rain in 2 hours! Fairmount Park quickly turned into a bunch of ponds with some grassy areas in between. Race officials eventually closed the racecourse and urged people to return to their vehicles, which were parked literally a mile away. Not feeling like taking chances with my two small children, my family and I huddled inside a trailer for a while. Eventually, the worst of the lightening passed and we began our long walk back to the car. And to an eventful ride home. One road after another was closed due to flooding, rockslides, bridges out. Ironically enough, by the time we got home, the sun was beginning to shine.

Later that evening, I went online to see my race results, which were pretty good. Until I began to think, had the first run really been a swim, it would’ve easily taken me 15+ minutes longer to complete. And I would never have made it through the transition area so quickly either.  I still hadn’t completed a triathlon! I immediately searched TriMax Triathlons website and registered for the Blue Marsh Triathlon on Sept 20, 2009. Please everyone, do your sun dances and send prayers out for clear skies!