Newsletter October '22

Hi, you lovely being!

So good to connect with you, happy Fall!

Earlier last week, just as I was wrapping up a session, the person I was coaching asked me - “I’m curious, what are your insights from our session?”

She had just finished sharing her own learnings. I mentioned a theme - our common tendency to limit our possibilities through our established, unchecked beliefs. 

It seems as though we are seduced in equal measure by both our aspirations, and our fear that we can’t reach them. 

As part of us is ready for a change (heart), another part of us resists it (mind). Perhaps we can expect that for every action (wanting a change) there is an equal, opposite reaction (resisting the change). 

This heart-mind dynamic creates the conditions for a perfect inner storm, in which we often feel stuck. 

Here is the thing. The difference between a wish and a goal is a plan. But we first have to believe that our wish/goal is achievable before we can draw up an action plan.

We have to believe enough that we can change our career, speak up with conviction in high stakes meetings, run a marathon, run our own business, write a book. We have to be able to see ourselves doing it. But how? 

There are two tools we all can reach for when it comes to believing in our own dream. 

First, it’s all about imagining it.

If we can conceive that our goal is even remotely possible, we are setting ourselves up to actually pursue it. Our imagination responds well to this question - ‘if all was possible, and if it was easy, what would my dream/goal actually look like?’. We intentionally stretch your imagination this way. This process creates an intention, which will put future behavior in motion.

Second, it’s about accepting that fear comes along with any creative effort.

Fear is essentially nudging us to pay attention and make a rough plan. Fear is not the enemy. It is our loyal guide that’s saying ‘hey - pay attention to this’. Seen as insight, each message from our fear becomes an important guidepost. 

See for yourself with this quick exercise. Make a list of three fears you have right now, and for each ask yourself - what is this fear trying to tell me? Then listen deeply.

Recently a client mentioned his anxiety about opening emails from a certain person, which has been causing him to procrastinate and be delayed on a project.

What is this fear trying to tell you, I asked. That I tend to assume the worst, he said. That I see each email from this person as evidence that I’m not doing enough. What would ‘enough’ look like, I asked. I would take the time to think about what this person needs, and come up with proactive solutions, he said. That takes effort, and it’s no wonder he instinctively avoided it.

Fear has deep insights for us.

“The difference between misery and happiness depends on what we do with our attention” writes Sharon Salzberg in her book Lovingkindness, which I just started reading.

When we put our attention on what we want to pursue or create, rather than at what we risk in the process, we plant a seed in our imagination.

We get energized. No amount of external motivation can match the power of an aspirational vision we create for ourselves. 

If we look at imagination and fear as our guides, we reduce the amount of energy we tend to waste in anxiety and inaction. 
This is how we create what psychologists call personal agency.

Martin Seligman, the father of Positive Psychology, defines Agency as the belief that I can make things happen, that I have the power to make a difference. In his view, agency has three components, all learnable:

• Efficacy - the belief that I am capable of making a difference, which prompts me to be persistent, to try harder, to come up with innovative solutions.

• Optimism - the belief that the efficacy I have now will hold in the future. We practice optimism when we think that bad events are temporary, isolated, whereas good events are permanent, pervasive (“this event will help me in future situations as well”) and personal (“I helped make this happen”).

• Imagination - the range of scenarios and situations that my agency can create.

Evolutionary speaking, we are programmed to focus on the negative, but our perspective is often not based on actual facts.

When humans believe they have agency, they follow through, and make their way through fear and anxiety, Seligman says.

Think of a wish that energizes you from the heart. It doesn’t have to be a big thing. It can be anything - i.e. I want to speak up more in high stakes meetings; I want to eat a healthy lunch every day; I want to bring up an idea I have to my manager; I want to sit down for dinner with my kids instead of working.

As you do this, relax, make it easy.

Try to actually see yourself doing it. Breathe into it.

Channel your optimism and imagination. There it is. You just planted the seed for your own dream/goal. You are exercising your personal agency.

You have everything you need to make it happen.

Big hugs,

Ramona

ramona@ramonaharveycoaching.com

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Hi, I’m Ramona, a high-impact professional executive coach with a track record of empowering leaders become more impactful and more satisfied. I coach leaders at Google, Facebook, UC Berkeley, Capital One, Salesforce, Skim, Warner Brothers, and several non-profit organizations.

I’m a certified Emotional Intelligence trainer and Master Practitioner of Energy Leadership(TM).

Prior to becoming a coach I was a marketing research leader in tech (Twitter, eBay, Ancestry, StubHub). I started freelancing in 2015 to explore a career change, launched a self-funded research project on happiness, which led to later creating my signature Inside Out Leadership model.

I’m passionate about deep inner growth and personal agency, which I believe are key in making the world a better place.

I was born and raised in Transylvania, Romania.