We all have some natural talents.  Combine those with Skills and Knowledge – and watch out world!  We can leverage our Strengths.

To start unearthing your strengths answer the following questions:

• What would you love to be doing more of at work?
• What’s been a BIG DEAL accomplishment for you?
• How were you able to achieve this”
• And how did you know what the right action was to take to do this?

These simple questions will help you discover your unique talents and passions. By working with a coach to combine your strengths with the skills + knowledge you can have a chance to be challenged just the way you like to be challenged, recognized and rewarded for doing your best.   Put your strengths to work and start achieving the success you desire.

Working with a Coach from Orange Slice Training can help you start playing to your strengths.  Contact us today for more information.

Coaching is different than therapy.  Therapy focuses on the past and strives to answer the question “why.”  Whether you or I know an answer to why doesn’t necessarily change NOW.

Coaching on the other hand looks at “how?”  It’s also FUTURE focused.  Wrapping the HOW in the FUTURE creates inspiration. It creates action.  Action that produces results.

What you get:

• A future orientation
• A chance to unearth a Dream
• Specific, identifiable action steps that get you closer to your dream
• A partner in your accountabilities
• And someone who wants to see the best you have to offer yourself and the world
• The inspiration, nudge or kick towards helping you get what you want

Working with a coach you get to Design (yes, notice the choice of word here) a life worth living.  Something I love to call a Juicy Life.  It’s in that design phase goals are set.  Actions are identified.  And, yes…results start to occur.

So, what is it you’d love to be creating?

Working with a Coach helps you explore this question.  It’s not one that we regularly let ourselves entertain.  It’s one your coach persists on driving towards. It might be uncomfortable.  And when it is, you know your getting closer to the edge of a breakthrough.

Let me ask you these three questions:

• What is it that would be such a HUGE DEAL for you to accomplish or achieve?
• If you got that or achieved that, how would that make you feel? What might be different in your life as a result?
• How valuable would it be for you to achieve that?

(I’m guessing it would mean a lot to you, and be pretty valuable.)

So, if you could have a partner to help you get just that, what’s stopping you?

Experience Coaching today.  Many coaches will provide you a free sample session.  It’s a great way to experience what they have to offer, and it will give you a chance to taste what your Juicy Life has to offer.

A life that is best described:  Juicy?

Create Your Juicy Life is a practical, hands-on approach to creating just that – a life that is full, ripe and delicious!

For a limited time, I am offering the first section of this new book online to you FREE.  Simply complete the contact form with your name and email and I’ll gladly send it your way.  I can’t wait for you to start designing YOUR juicy life.

In this book, you will be provided with exercises to create your juicy life.  Take stock of your current reality – and then CHOOSE.  Notice. and Act.

This book is great if you are feeling stuck, need a nudge, or just want to experience more joy in your life.

If you could get more JOY in your life – what might that be like?  Well, now you have some practical tools to use to answer the question – and EXPERIENCE the answer.

SHINY EYES.

Ben Zander created a TED video talking to an audience about leadership. The true essence for leaders in developing “shiny eyes.” A curiosity in their staff, an investment, an interest.

We all get shiny eyes when we have a chance to speak about our Passions or Interests. What to really engage someone in a conversation and see them sparkle with excitement, belief and hope? Ask them, “So what would you love to being doing right now?” or “What did you love most about that?”

It’s not just a great coaching question – it’s a great relationship building tool.

What would you love doing right now?

It’s one that is full of energy and emotion, ideas and challenge, and it’s one in which we have decided to live with both feet in.  You know, some people approach the pool and dip a toe in – testing the waters of sorts.  I’ve seen very few people actually take the plunge after just testing it with a big toe.  It seems like the water is always too cold and there is something better to be doing than getting in a cold pool.   Now, the two feet in approach usually starts with a run or leap and blop – two feet in, followed by your entire body.  Shocking. Freezing. Invigorating.

And you spring to life! You soon realize, maybe it’s not as cold as you thought and you hang out a bit.  Or realize how refreshing and reinvigorating taking the plunge really was.  You’ve woken up!  A juicy life is one where you’re awake – free to choose, free to be, and free to take the plunge.

We are currently offering a NEW CLIENT program that includes 3-months of coaching, action and results.  Do you have something you’d like to achieve?  Just haven’t gotten to it yet?   A Coach helps you see results and develop skills to create your JUICY life.

Complete our contact form for a FREE worksheet and more information and you too can start living the Juicy Life.

The happiest people in his study were those that engaged in meaningful, deep conversations. Nearly 2/3 of their conversation that was measured was substantive and 1/3 was considered small talk.

In the day in age when blogs, twitter and facebook shoot information our way – how much of this is truly adding to our happiness factor?

Challenge for the day: Engage in a conversation that allows you to go beyond just surface issues.  Get to know someone. Rekindle a connection.  Share a passion. Dream. Or Joy. Engage in this conversation and post a comment.

1. Clarity. Being able to set you aim and focus on something specific helps you to achieve your result.  The more specific, the more likely you are to be successful with achieving your result.  First, What do you want? Get yourself really clear on what this is.  A deeper question that might be helpful to explore is Why do I want it?
2. Chunk it down. Now, I don’t need any study to show me that being able to take bite sized bites of something is easier to swallow than taking one large bite.  When a project is too big, too hairy, to scary – I don’t do anything.  Chunk your goal down into bite sized pieces.  What are you doing every day that gets you closer to your goal?
3. Action. To achieve your results, there needs to be action not just thoughts, not just “try’s”  (i.e. I’m going to try to do it) – but deliberate actions.  What are you doing?

Use the 2Day 2Achieve Worksheet to move you closer to your goal.  Action by action, day by day you will start to see what you are doing to create your own success. You can use this form at the beginning of each day to plan out what actions you will take.  Or, you can use the form at the end of the day and reflect on what two actions did you take today?  Either way you can’t go wrong when you are using this tool.

Just 2 a day.  What do you choose?

More importantly, what are you getting from the actions you’ve taken?

The benefits of regular mediation are endless.  It can come in these short burst, too.  You don’t need to set aside 30-minutes everyday to practice – but, what if you could?  Here are three other ways to get that relaxation and benefit from meditation in your day:

• Close your eyes for 30 seconds. This allows you brain to release the stimulus overload we take in visually.  Better yet, close your eyes and cup your hands over them. Then release after a short break.
• Use a Mindfulness Bell.  It can be a Tibetan Singing bowl, meditation chimes, or a website.  The Washington Mindfulness Community has this page where you can activate a bell when you need the pull to presence.
• Office Yoga.  Get a brief stretch with these simple Yoga techniques you can do at your desk. Opening up your chest and shoulders at work will take away some of the stress you carry at work.

Do what you can to bring a little vacation to each day.

Namaste.

The Story.  Yep, the story.

I’ve been to a number of different personal development sessions where this concept comes out – Landmark Education, Coaching Certification, and the book Language and the pursuit of happiness.  This concept of story is something very powerful when you can just stand with it.  Live with it. Own it.  And then get to choose – how is it serving me?

Think about that relationship in your life where you might benefit from a deeper connection.  Maybe it’s your brother, you boss or barista at your favorite coffee shop.  What’s the story you have about that relationship?

Once you’ve become aware of the story that you have – get yourself clear about what it truly is. What if the story was written a different way?  (your brain might shift to autopilot and convince yourself it’s can’t possibly be another way than it currently is today, or it’s not possible to change – because they aren’t going to change!)  As a coach, I’m not really interesting in spending the time and energy around why it can’t change – I’m interested in “if you want the story to change, what can you do to rewrite it?”  Here’s how:

1. Create the story you want to live in.  What is the story that would make you jump for joy, throw your hands up, pee your pants because – holy crap, I never knew it could be that good.  Describe that story.  Write it down.  What is the story you want to create?
2. If you got to live in that story – what would be different for you? What does this story sound like? look like? smell like?  What does this story evoke in your heart, head and soul? (write down a few notes about this)
3. And if you had that, what would you have? It might be a fuller relationships, a sense of letting go, peace, harmony…what else might it be for you?
4. Move to action to live in this story.  Identify 25 things YOU will do to show up in a way that lives this new story. (BTW this list is about you, not the other person)

Doing this simple exercise to repair, renew, revive a relationship in your life might have a profound impact.  I don’t know if it ends happily ever after.  I just know today might be uniquely different from days in the story of the past.

What’s it worth to you to see how you can rewrite the stories of your life  - or better yet, what are you risking if you don’t?

It was in the elevator at work today that I heard a colleague say “Isn’t it a great day out today?”  I’ve spent the last number of years in MN so I eagerly nodded and said, “Yes, it’s amazing what the bright sun and crisp glare of fresh snow can have on a day.”  That, and we both loved that it was 35 degrees today.  Yes, 35 degrees (F)!

Why is it, if you are reading this in sunny SoCal, you must think we have lost our minds.

Or, if this was June, and all things being the same:   35 degrees, sunny with fresh dusting of snow – I’d sound like a loon.

It’s all a matter of perspective – we simply got too comfortable in the deep freeze. And it wasn’t until we could thaw out that we could shift our perspective and see something from a different point of view.

Want to add some new ideas, new way of looking at things – shift your perspective.

Ask yourself these questions to glimpse into a new perspective:

• What would someone from Minnesota say about that?
• How might Olympic Gold Medalist Lindsey Vohn approach it? (also from MN)
• What might the courageous you say to this?
• How might (insert anyone other than yourself) do in this situation?

and let their perspective shape yours.  Who’s perspective would you like to learn from?