I mentioned this to a co-worker about a year ago….that we all could benefit from having someone very knowledgeable and helpful to talk to, to guide us through thick and thin, to be there, for a number of things really.  And look at what i found! This is great.  I hope to make use of a life coach for myself.  Thanks.

Hi Deborah,
Great awareness. I now pronounce you winner of my book. If you would be so good as to send me your snail mail address, I will send it. In it you’ll find part of my story and will see how my Wise Fairy Godmother entered my life and did just what want in yours. Brilliant of you!
Love,
Maia

Hi Maia,

How are you? Nice to meet you.

I got your DM on Twitter. Don’t know if it was personal or just a mass mailing, but thought I’d respond anyway.

What’s blocking my spiritual growth? I have been living in the Northeast for the last two years and it’s been very difficult for me to adjust. I lived near Santa Monica for 12 years and I just can’t get used to the six months of winter, the incredibly hot and humid summers and all too brief spring and fall. The physical layout of this area is very claustrophobic, compared to living near PCH and seeing the ocean every day.

I’ve tried a variety of ways to help me deal with this transition. I’ve been in therapy, done(and still do) EFT and energy medicine, currently doing yoga twice a week, volunteer in my current town and nothing has really helped this feeling of displacement. My husband feels it too.

I’ve also learned meditation and read Pema Chodron, Eckhart Tolle and Jon Kabat-Zinn.

So it seems like I am doing lots of good things, but it still hasn’t helped me cope as well as I thought it would. I suppose I’d feel much worse without doing all of this, but I still miss my L.A. friends and the glorious weather so very much.

We’d love to move back, but we moved here for work and as the economic climate has dramatically changed since we left L.A. we are grateful for a job and health insurance. Still, when you live somewhere you feel no connection to, it colors everything.

What’s your advice on this?

Thanks for taking the time to read this.
Sincerely,
Ellen

Hi Ellen,
You probably have written to the very right person. I’ve lived in Las Vegas for 3 years and Dallas for 4 and never felt I fit. It just never felt like home. So first thing, let me assure you, you can make it back to LA. You’ll just have to know when the time is right.

It’s been said that the more we focus on what we don’t want, the more we get what we don’t want. I definitely subscribe to that point of view of life. So first thing I’d suggest is to allow yourself to be where you are. Then begin to look at all the gifts and positives and things you are learning by being where you are. For example: does this shared experience add an extra aspect to your relationship with your husband that might not have been there had you both not experienced this? Get the idea. (I’ve developed some good tools around these things that might be on my site www.allaboutlifecoaching.com and in my book which you can find on my site if you look in the right column).

Then I suggest you create a vague picture of how you’d like your life to be. I say vague because it’s unlikely at this time that a specific one would feel believable to you and so you will continue setting up getting more of what you don’t want. And just know that somehow you will attract a way to create what you want. We always do. When I lived in Dallas and felt very much like a fish out of water, we had committed to stay put at least until my daughter graduated high school. One year after she was off at SF State, I said to my husband, "What are we still doing here?" And we decided we’d need to save around $35,000 and it would take us a year, at least, to do so. At the time I was a commissioned salesperson and the next month I made a sale that earned me a $34,000 commission! The month after that we moved back to LA.

We all have our own path and own experiences to experience so, of course, I don’t know what yours will be. I just know what you want can be created and you can feel good in the mean time. As a matter of fact, feeling good will be the quickest way to make it happen.

Let me know how it goes,
Maia

Peggy asks: I’ve lived in the Valley of the Shadow of Death my whole life. I loss my whole family, one at a time, then my only child, my son at age 27. He took with him my heart, my joy, my smile.  He was my compass, my anchor.  It’s been almost 7 years and I am still lost.  My world has no colour.  I try to go on, honestly I do, but at the back of my mind is the question, what for?

My answer:

Dearest Peggy,
I don’t know if I can help but I know if I experienced all you have, I would find it very difficult to climb out of the hole it put me in. But since you are alive and living on planet Earth, it seems much wiser to work on making that life bearable for yourself and even happy. It is very hard work but even that you asked tells me you have the inner resources to do it.

I don’t know if my little book can be a help for you. I think it will and I so much want to send it to you. Please send me your snail mail address so I can send the book to you.

I normally ask winners of my book if it’s ok to print their question and my response on my site. I hesitate to ask but maybe if it’s ok with you, it might help others with similar pain. But I totally understand if you choose not to allow it.

Again, Peggy answered with the following: Thank you so much for your kind words.  I look very forward to reading your book and I thank you for the offer.  I am a little lost right now and desperately searching for steps out of the pit.  Thanks for shinning a light down the hole.

The only thoughts I have about making my statement public is that there is nothing I wouldn’t do to help another mom survive this.  I was asked to write something for a group that sends support to mom’s who’ve lost a child.  This is what I wrote and if you feel it might help others, I would be grateful

When I lost my son and the pain hit, it actually dropped me to my knees.  I was stunned at how debilitated I was.  After all, I’d been through more losses than just about any two or three people I know.  I know how to do this.  So, why was I on my knees?  I had no idea.  The worst part of losing your child is that no one around you knows how to help you, so most of the time, they turn away and now you have another loss to deal with when you are already so fragile and vulnerable.

It takes so much energy to put on the “normal” mask so not to make others uncomfortable.  Our society tends to turn a deaf ear to those suffering this kind of loss.   I can confirm to you that absolutely nothing in our life, no loss, no death ever prepares us for losing our child.  There is no pain as sharp as that pain..  There are no words to describe it.  This loss is private, but it shouldn’t be.  We don’t talk about, but we should be able to and even asked to.

I, personally, don’t think that silence helps others because, when it happens to you, trust me, you won’t know what to do either.  We don’t know what to expect, so we expect far too much of ourselves.  We don’t know how to handle it and neither does anyone else.  Your family doesn’t know how to help you.  Your friends don’t know how to help you and often you end up feeling isolated and completely alone in the world.

Please give this some thought if you have a friend or loved one just trying to survive this horrible loss.

Peggy Schnurr

Laura asks: How do I find my inner spirituality and overcome the voices of my religious upbringing.

My answer: This is a wonderful question and a life time "occupation". We all have childhood programing of some sort that doesn’t serve us in our lives now. And we have brains that can be retrained. It takes vigilance and effort but the rewards are great. My programing was largely about what was wrong with me. It has taken lots of work, lots of discovering tools and teachers but I can happily say, it’s almost gone. I know how unique and special I am (as is everyone) and more importantly, I FEEL IT!

Rebecca, this week’s winner of Once Upon a Time There Was You: Three Magic Secrets to Finding Your Real Self asked the question on twitter : How 2 keep a marriage hot & heavy.

Both my husband and I answered since we’ve been "hot and heavy" for 25 years.

My answer: I’ve never seen it as a problem, I guess, because my husband seems to be endlessly fascinated and in love with me. (I’m going to write my answer first and then read it to him to see if what I write seems true to him too.) I believe he is endlessly fascinated and in love with me because I am 100% myself. I always let him know how I feel – even when it seems scary or will make him mad or her won’t like it or whatever. Also, because I live in an environment of complete love and acceptance that I first of all give myself and first of all need from myself, my husband sees a deep, emotional, emotionally intelligent, creative partner – and that he keeps finding hot and attractive. (Now I’m going to read him what I wrote to check it out.)

My husband says: the image you gave of "hot and heavy" sounds like it’s about a physical thing (let’s call it PART A) but if the other (what I wrote – let’s call that PART B) isn’t happening, then the physical thing (PART A) will just stay where it is. What makes it and keeps it exciting is when it’s coupled with PART B. So he agrees.

LAST WEEK’S QUESTION:

Are you devaluing yourself if offer your services or gifts so to speak for free? People speak of valuing yourself by asking for what you are worth in terms of the service you provide but are you really valuing yourself if you go against what you feel in your heart? And is money the only currency to measure worth? Robin J of www.guidetolifeblog.com

What a brilliant question! Let’s start with the last question first – "is money the only currency to measure worth?" Of course it’s not but – and there is a but – a BIG BUT – If you are telling yourself that it is your heart speaking and that this person is worthy and you have something to offer them, you must look at your whole life and see what you are allowing into it in the form of material abundance. I’ll have to speak a little bit about my own history with this to be able to answer this without knowing you so you can see an example of the way it works for me.

When I worked for John Gray, I did coaching with my workshop facilitators who I had trained to offer these workshops. I coached many of them to get out of their own way. But I didn’t know I was coaching and I was getting a salary to provide the support that I did (and a not very big salary at all). But then in the next chapter of my life I realized I was a coach and so went to The Coaches Training Institute for official training and waltzed out their doors into the life of an official Life Coach.

In the beginning I was told the same things that our winner was told "if I value myself and my services I won’t give them away for free" and things like that. From one perspective that is true. It’s not exactly about valuing myself but more about whether I really believe I have something to offer that is worth paying for. It is a part of my refinement on my journey toward my real self – the self that truly loves and values everything about me as unique and a gift to whomsoever I choose to support – whether they see it as valuable or not. That is a very refined journey for me.

So in those beginning days I did offer some of my services for cheap because it’s all I thought I was worth. Today it is very different. I know without a shadow of a doubt that no one client is my Source. I know without a shadow of a doubt that my material success will arrive as long as I am a vibrational match to it. I know that what I have learned and have to offer my clients, paid, trade or free, is an invaluable contribution to their growth. I know without a shadow of a doubt that I have come to Planet Earth for the express purpose of offering my gifts.

So when you know all that, you won’t even have the question any more.