I often say, “When we win a million dollars, I’ll…”.  This week has been no different.  Most often I say it as a joke.  The truth is that when I look at our lifestyle compared to billions of others on this planet, there is not one thing we are wanting for. 
This week, however, we really do need to make a decision based on money.  It isn’t life threatening. It’s not even close to a crisis.  We were unexpectedly invited to join some friends on a trip next fall. It is to a country that really is not on our bucket list.  However, we know we would have a great time and I’d bet that once we came home we would wonder why it hadn’t been on our list.  The big decision we need to make is whether to spend the money or save the money.  We can afford the trip; taking it simply means that we would not get to go on a different trip that we had been thinking about. 

When I was growing up there wasn’t much spare money in our house.  Amazingly, at the time, none of my brothers or sisters or I realized this.  We had plenty of home grown food, we all worked on the farm as well as having other jobs so we had pocket money and my dad made sure we had a camping holiday every summer.  We didn’t go to restaurants or stay in hotels or fly on planes.  My father ‘taught’ (read: lectured at the dinner table) us that these things were excesses and that people who engaged in such frivolity must be irresponsible.  He had us convinced that camping was way more fun than any hotel could be.  And that a homemade meal eaten at a picnic table in a campground was far better than any restaurant meal could ever be.  He made sure we knew that saving was good, and spending on unnecessary things was a waste.

Naturally, I took in all of this advice and it shaped my propensity to be a saver.  I think hard about spending on big purchases.  Alas, I may have generalized his advice to create a belief that all spending is bad. I now know that nothing could be farther than the truth.

As I’ve been thinking about our potential trip, I recognize that this ‘save or spend’ decision is one that we are asked to make many times in our lives.  Sometimes the decision is about money, like our current decision is.   Most often it is about things that on the surface may not seem as important as money, but in the twilight years of our lives may end up revealing themselves to have been far more valuable than any amount of money.

The things I am referring to are things like talents, opportunities, best clothes, manners, kindness, volunteerism and clean houses.

When was the last time you were presented with an opportunity, even a small one, and because you may have been tired or busy, simply decided that you could save it for another time?  Of course, you may have assumed the opportunity would present itself again.  Perhaps it isn’t opportunities you are saving, perhaps it is that you are saving your talents.  You may have a beautiful voice and yet do not use it in your own home.  Or perhaps you know how to create incredible meals but you are saving the good ones for company. 

Maybe you have an outfit that shows off your skin, and makes you feel beautiful, but you think you need to save it for somewhere special to wear. Or perhaps you walk right past the opportunity to spend some energy on an act of kindness, saving it for a more convenient time.  Sometimes I save kindness for complete strangers and spend my short-temper on those I live with.  I’ve been guilty of turning down a chance to go for a walk, in nature, in order to spend my time on making sure I have a clean house.  And I’ll bet many of us have spent time volunteering for others when someone in our own family could have used our company; or perhaps we didn’t spend our time volunteering for others, instead we thought we could save that for a time that was more convenient for ourselves.

My dad wasn’t completely right about everything.  As an adult, I recognize that he didn’t want us to notice what we didn’t have and he did want us to learn to be grateful for what we did have.  He was right about that and each of his children have grown up to be responsible, contributing adults.  He may even have been right in teaching us that it is good to save.  However, I think it is also possible that there are many wonderful moments in which we should spend freely.  Looking back, I see that my dad knew this too.  He would have had no trouble encouraging us to spend our talents, spend our love, spend our kindnesses, spend our good manners and spend our time wisely, among other things.

The good news about the upcoming possible trip is that there isn’t really a bad decision to be made.  Whether we take this trip or a different one, Jim and I will be spending time together, making memories.

As you travel through this next week, notice where you are choosing to spend, and where you are choosing to save.
My inquiry for you this week is, ‘Is this moment a moment meant for spending or saving?’
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Elizabeth is a Life and Leadership coach, working with motivated clients wishing to live their best life.   She creates and facilitates custom workshops for corporate, public and private groups and provides leadership coaching for individuals and groups.  Contact Elizabeth to learn how to begin to take bold steps toward spending your life in a way that honours your values.

I really love the look of a nice hat.  Unfortunately, I don’t look good in hats.  I’m not sure if it’s the shape of my head, my thin face or my mindset, but I do know that whenever I have tried on a hat, no one, not one person, has ever said, “Wow!  That looks great on you.”  It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that some of us should keep our head bare (except when bike riding, when even I succumb to a helmet).

My sister and my daughter can each really pull off ‘the hat’ and each of them do it regularly. They each have quite a variety of hats and each of them can wear them like they were meant to be worn.  I think that is part of the secret.  They both really know how to make it work.  It is as if the hat is just the finishing touch on a perfect picture.  As for me, whenever I put on a hat, I feel so self-conscious I kind of slink into a room, looking for a dark corner so as not to be seen.  This is NOT the recipe for the successful wearing of a hat.  You really have to feel good in a hat to wear it with confidence.  It has to feel so good that you almost forget you have it on.

Despite my inability to carry off hat wearing with confidence, the truth is that I have had the opportunity to wear a number of very exquisite hats in my life. 

For many years I wore the hat of teacher with pride.  This hat fit me to perfection.  There was no hiding in corners when I wore this hat.  I felt passionate, innovative, dedicated and inspired.  I never wanted to hide for all the years I wore this hat.  And no matter how many days I wore this same hat, I always felt renewed and current.  I wore this hat so well that I almost never took it off. It just became who I was.

Another hat I loved was my parenting hat.  It’s become very well worn over the years and I think parts of this one have now been sewn into every other hat I’ve ever had.  It comes with me on every journey and even though it has changed over the years, it’s still my favourite of all.  The original fit so well I usually forgot it was on my head.  I didn’t have to remember to put it on when I left the house, I really think I even wore this one into the shower.

My runners hat has carried me many places and been with me through many problem-solving moments.  When I wear this hat, I feel free.  I feel like I can do anything. There is a certainty to this hat.  I know what is expected of me when I wear it and I know I can find a way to achieve my goals.  In this hat, I forget little grievances, I dismiss doubts and instead I listen for the familiar pat pat of my shoes as they strike the ground.  There have been times when I have lost this hat; in doing so I felt like I had lost a vital piece of myself.

My dancers hat is quite new to me.  I love this hat because it requires me to be more than I thought possible.  When I put on this hat, I know it is ‘show time’.  It’s such a gift to have a hat that thinks we can do more than we ever thought we could.

This past week I donned my facilitators hat as I worked with a wonderful group of School Board officials.  In this hat I feel creative, confident, energetic and purposeful.  I’m very at home in this hat.  When I wear this hat, I get to watch people as they gain valuable insights about themselves and about the contributions they make to their organizations, families and lives.  I could wear this hat every day.  It energizes me and shows me at my best.

In other parts of my life I have less showy hats, but I have hats nonetheless. I’ve been known to wear the hats of uncertainty, guilt and control (this one is one I try to leave in the closet as much as possible now that I see how it really looks on me).  The hats of worry, self-doubt, and pettiness are not good looks for me either.

I’ve also worn the hats of grief, of joy, of wonder and of love.  Wednesday evening, I brought out a hat I rarely wear; my silly hat.  What a laugh we had at our dance practice with me wearing this one!  I’m trying to remember to wear my hat of curiosity as often as I wear my hat of certainty.

Since it’s spring time, a time of new life and renewal, it’s a good time for me to think about which hats I’d like to donate to someone else and which hats I’d like to wear more often.  In my case, I’d love to have someone design me a hat made by combining my comfortable parenting hat, my confident coaching hat, my inspiring dancers hat, my consistent runners hat and of course my full-heart hat.  Since I haven’t found this designer yet, it will be up to me to stop by my closet each day and make a conscious choice about what hats I will choose.

As you head into Easter week, what bonnet will you choose? 

My inquiry for you this week is, ‘Is this the hat I choose to wear?’

Have a great week!  You look fantastic in that hat!
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Elizabeth creates and facilitates custom workshops for corporate, public and private groups.  She provides leadership coaching for individuals and groups.  Contact Elizabeth to plan your next professional development day or to simply spend some time with her trying on hats!

Happy St. Patrick’s Day!  Top o’ the mornin’, luck of the Irish, green beer, and all that goes with it.

I was paging through the Calgary Herald on Thursday and saw an advertisement for a St. Patrick’s Day themed concert; a joint performance by the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra and Natalie MacMaster.  For those of you unfamiliar with her, she is a world renowned Canadian fiddler.  I thought, ‘Oh, I bet that would be good’ followed quickly by, ‘I wonder if I could still get tickets?’

So, Friday night, on the eve of St. Patrick’s Day, Jim and I and our good friend Jan, found ourselves sitting in Jack Singer Concert hall. I was the one with the tears streaming down my face.  All of us were feet tapping, smiling and clapping along.  It may have been the best concert I have ever seen.  It certainly was exactly what my heart needed.

When I was a young girl, I think I would have been between eight and ten, my mother enrolled me in Irish Step Dancing.  My sister, Mary, three years my elder, had already been taking lessons, and I guess I was asked if I would like to take them too.  I am guessing all of this because I don’t really know the precise details.  I do know that on Wednesday evenings, Mary and I would walk to the bus stop, and she and I would ride it all the way downtown to the dance studio where we would have our lesson.  I also know that we were expected to practice and I recall transforming my ‘classroom’ that was in our basement beside the wringer washer, into a dance studio so we could practice our steps.  Mary was a patient teacher and I loved it. 

We each had the most beautiful performance costume to wear.  Mine was green, completely hand embroidered by our mother. It had first been worn by Mary, but she had graduated into the purple dress, also hand embroidered.  I also have a vague recollection of a box arriving from Ireland with a pair of hornpipe shoes in it for Mary. 

To add to our childhood story, our family gathered around the television on Saturday nights to watch, Don Messer’s Jubilee.   This was East Coast music at it’s finest and with both our parents hailing from the Maritimes, it must have felt a bit like home to them.  To make it even better, our Dad had a fiddle playing friend who resembled Don Messer enough that when he came to visit, fiddle in hand, we truly thought that Don Messer was at our house!  At the time, this was just my normal childhood. I did not recognize that all of this music and dancing, exposed me to and connected me to my roots.  In those early years, it was simply my normal.

It also spoke to my genetic roots, which I have discovered via the miracle of Ancestry.com, and a gift from my sister, make me 55% Irish and 25% British (Great Britain). 

Somewhere, during the dancing and Don Messer years, our normal changed.   Our mom was diagnosed with breast cancer, and despite several surgeries and treatments, no cure was to be had.  Our beautifully embroidered dresses found themselves in a closet, the Irish music quieted and our family situation changed.  Dad remarried and new traditions surfaced.  The new was not bad. It was different.  In some ways it was exciting.  We had a new mother, new siblings and soon a new home.  And the Irish parts faded.

Flash forward almost one-half a century.  Something was calling me to find a place to dance.  I must have heard about the Chinook Country Dancers somewhere although I have no recollection of this.  However, when I did some internet searching, I found this group.  Despite finding out that I had missed the first three lessons of the season, despite not knowing one single soul there, despite losing my way the first night, I somehow found myself in a dance class again.  It’s hard to describe the feeling of finding something that you didn’t realize you had lost.  But I recognized it right away.  My body remembered what my mind had put aside.  And later that season, when Reba J introduced our new song, Belle of Liverpool, and I heard the first few bars, the part of me I had allowed to become silent, began to be heard again. 

Last night at the Jack Singer Concert Hall, Natalie MacMaster, increased the volume on that part of me again.  For the first forty minutes, her music combined with the incredible Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra, was the perfect balm for my soul.  Her down to earth manner and her superb musicianship captivated me.  But then, her inviting her 12-year-old daughter, Mary Frances, (my mother’s name) to the stage to dance was what opened the floodgates for the tears.  The combination of the music and the dancing was breathtaking and inspiring.  The dancing wasn’t the perfect match for what I had learned but it was close enough that I recognized it.  I could have watched for hours.

Each of us have parts of ourselves that we have allowed to become silent.  Sometimes this happens because our situation in life changes.  Sometimes it happens because we get busy with other things.  Sometimes others convince us that we no longer need this part.  Sometimes it is that we have simply forgotten.  Sometimes it is linked with fear of the feelings it may bring forth.  Sometimes we have lost our courage.  No matter how it happens, no matter how silent the memories have become, there is a knowing part in us that, if given the slightest encouragement, will bring them back out into the open.

Take time this week, to bring back tiny pieces of something you have allowed to go silent.  May your soul be fed with it as mine was last night.

As for me, I am ever grateful to Natalie MacMaster and Mary Frances Leahy, for sharing their warmth and music with each of us last night.  I am also grateful to be dancing with my little group at a St. Patrick’s Day event today and I think I just might bring out my inner Mary Frances for the performance. My Irish eyes are smiling.

My inquiry for you this week is, ‘What is whispering to me?’

Elizabeth is a Life and Leadership coach, working with motivated clients wishing to live their best life.   She creates and facilitates custom workshops for corporate, public and private groups and provides leadership coaching for individuals and groups.  Contact Elizabeth to learn how to create your best life.
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I felt sad this week when I heard that Roger Bannister, the breaker of the four-minute mile, had died.

I’m a runner and I’ve loved hearing the story of this man.  I loved knowing that no one thought it could be done; to run faster than a four-minute mile seemed impossible in 1954.  In fact, to many of us runners, it is so far out of reach as to still seem impossible.  What I also love about the story of Roger Bannister is that by all accounts, he was an ordinary person.  He was ordinary in the fact that he was not a professional athlete, nor was he pursuing fame.  The legend goes that on May 6, 1954, Roger Bannister, a medical student, completed his regular shift at St. Mary’s hospital in London, then took the train to Oxford, where he planned to compete against runners from the Oxford track team.  Even the day itself was reported to be unimpressive for running. It was blustery, never conditions a runner hopes to run in when trying to perform at their best.

Despite it all, despite the very ordinariness of it, that day in May of 1954 was exactly the day the ‘impossible’ became possible.  And yet that still isn’t what I love best about this story.  What I love best is that Roger Bannister, although I’m sure delighted with his result, kept his accomplishment in perspective.  In the later years of his life he revealed, during an interview, that this was not the greatest accomplishment of his life.  He was even more proud of his career in medicine and of his family.

No matter how he chose to view his running career, his running of the mile in 3min, 59 seconds and change, did something much greater than creating a statistic in a running journal. It allowed people to see that something they had believed impossible was indeed, very, very possible.  Not many days after this famed race, the four-minute mile was broken again and over the years it has been broken again and again. 

In the years since 1954, Roger Bannister has allowed millions of people to believe in dreams, even when, by all accounts, they seem out of reach.

Flash forward 63 years to the late Fall of 2017.  With the sidewalks and pathways too slippery to go for a run outside, I found myself looking for something to watch on television while working out, and I came across a brand-new show, ‘The Great Canadian Baking Challenge’.  I was delighted to discover that one of the ‘home bakers’ who had been chosen to be a contestant on the show was Linda Longson, from High River, Alberta.  I recognized this name and then her beautiful face!  Linda works in High River for the same school board I was employed with for my entire teaching career. Although she worked in Central Office and I in a classroom, over the years our names and faces became familiar to each other.
Week after week as the season progressed I engaged my whole family as we cheered Linda on from our living rooms.  What I loved about this were several different things.  Of course, I loved that I ‘knew’ Linda.  I loved that the love she had for her family showed up in every baking creation she presented.  I loved that she had been baking all her life for her family and friends and that she had taken the risk to try out for this show.  I especially loved that Linda was the oldest competitor on the show and that she had not let her age define her.  She instead let her generous spirit, her experience, her desire to learn and to help others learn, her love of her family, her desire to do her very best, and her love of baking define her.   It became very apparent that Linda was a top competitor and as the weeks went on, it was obvious to us that she would make it to the finale.

We could hardly bear watching the final episode and I’m afraid we were not very Canadian-like when Linda’s name was not announced as the Top Baker.  We may have shouted out, ‘No.  Linda was robbed!!!’.

Nonetheless, once I had recovered from my heartbreak at the judges making the wrong decision, (truthfully the winner, Sabrina Degni, from Montreal, was simply amazing too) I realized that had Linda won, she could not have supplied me with any more inspiration than she already had.  So often as we approach the later years in our career, we notice jobs being given to younger versions of ourselves, we notice that we might be considered to be the face of ‘yesterday’ rather than ‘tomorrow’.  And the sad thing about this is that we quit taking risks, because we believe that we may have missed our opportunity. 

Being the oldest competitor, Linda may have had these same doubts herself. However, she put those aside as she brought the best thing she possibly could have to her audition: herself.  It was more than enough.  Young, middle aged and old alike would quickly become inspired by this incredible woman who dared to put herself on the stage of life.
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I write about Roger Bannister and Linda Longson together, not because their passions lay in the same arena, but because they share two qualities I admire greatly.  First, they each harboured the seed of a dream inside themselves and they had the courage to take the steps to walk (or run) toward it.  Second, while each of them achieved something great, and had every reason to be proud of themselves, neither of them believed that this accomplishment was the defining moment of their life.  Both of them knew that they are bigger than any one of their victories.

Each of us has a dream inside ourselves.  For many of us the dream is faint, even hard to see because we have long since decided it was out of reach, or too big, or silly, or unimportant.  Most of us will die with that dream still inside ourselves because we are too busy telling ourselves why we can’t possibly pursue it. 
 
Thanks Linda and Roger for not letting yourselves be led by fear and for inspiring me to go looking for my dreams again.
 
Keeping in mind Arthur Ashe’s quote, “Start where you are.  Use what you have.  Do what you can”, my inquiry for you this week is, ‘What one step can I take to bring my dream to life?’ 
 
Elizabeth is a Life and Leadership coach, working with motivated clients wishing to live their dreams.   She creates and facilitates custom workshops for corporate, public and private groups and provides leadership coaching for individuals and groups.  Contact Elizabeth to learn how to begin to take bold steps toward your dreams.

I have spent a LOT of time at my computer this week.  I created my own website a few years ago and that means that it is up to me to make any changes I want or need to make.  It doesn’t sound too daunting until I actually sit down to work at it and then I realize that not only do I want to say a few things differently, but I also need to figure out what goes where and how to make sure that it is an easily navigable site.  Needless to say, I’ve spent a lot of time writing and re-writing, moving things around and then moving some more, stepping back and re-reading, getting feedback, adjusting and of course making many do-overs. 

As I was typing I noticed that I was using the BOLD function to highlight titles. I also used it to point out areas that I deemed to be important; areas that I wanted the reader to notice.  It dawned on me that the word bold, is now used in a way that is very different from how I was originally familiar with it. 

When I was young, if it was said that, ‘she’s very bold’ it would NOT have been a good thing.  I did not want to see this comment on my report card.  Children did not aspire to be bold.  To be bold meant that we had been rude, that we had overstepped our bounds.  Most often being bold described a child speaking to an adult in a way that might question the adult’s authority or their opinions. 

In some ways, this is similar to the typing function, bold.  Children who were bold definitely called attention to themselves. The stood out from the rest of us well-behaved little soldiers and I for one, couldn’t even imagine how they might live long enough to make it out of childhood! It was made very clear in our household that being bold did not win us any favour.

Today, bold has taken on a different meaning.  To be bold now refers less to being rude and much more to being brave.  When I watched the Olympics and saw the sports of Snowboard Cross and Big Air, I heard the commentators describe certain athletes as making bold moves with their ‘tricks’.  These comments were made in an extremely complementary way.  In no way were these athletes rude, but they certainly seemed brave.  They were bold in the very best way.

Part of my re-defining of the word bold and of becoming comfortable with stepping into becoming bold is recognizing some of the people in my life who have chosen to make bold moves or to live boldly.

Last week I witnessed an act of boldness in my front hallway.  I had met with a group of my former students who are now at the post-high school stage of life.  These students and I have worked together for about seven years on our project to build schools in Kenya.  We meet more or less monthly.  Some of the members of this group are away at school so they can only meet when they are in town.  Last week we had a small membership and when people were saying their good-byes at the front door, one boy, Tyler, asked if he could speak to me for a minute.    

Tyler has been a part of this group since it’s beginning.  Currently he is the only male member of the group.  For the past four years, since I left teaching and this group went on to high school and beyond, Tyler has not missed one meeting.  For the first three of these past four years, Tyler has arrived early to the meeting, said hello, and then has said NOT ONE WORD until our meeting was nearing the end and then he would say, ‘Well, I have to go.’  I would always thank him for coming and tell him I’d look forward to seeing him next time.  At the next meeting I would meet him at the door with a smile and we would go through the same ritual.

This past year, Tyler has begun contributing to meetings.  It turns out he has some wonderful ideas.  He is articulate, mature and thoughtful.  So, when Tyler asked to speak to me I was curious about what he might have on his mind.  I assumed he had a good idea to share or that he wanted me to write him a letter of reference as so many others have requested.

I couldn’t have been more wrong.  When all the others had left, Tyler said that he wanted to thank me.  He talked about how he had been too shy and unconfident to speak out in the first SIX years of his involvement in this group.  He told me that he figured that I would never know it but that my welcoming him month after month and making him feel like he had an important part in the group was what gave him confidence to realize what he did have to offer and it gave him confidence to come out of his shell and try new things.  He told me that being part of this group had given him courage to join an organization at which he reads to young ESL children, to join a leadership group at his school the year before, to join a group at his church and to volunteer at the local fire hall.  It also gave him the space and courage he needed to be able to offer some amazing ideas to our group.  He told me that he wanted me to know what an impact I'd had.

I was speechless.  Of all the things I could have guessed he would say, this was not it.   The truth of the matter is, all I did was to provide a welcoming space for Tyler.  Not one thing more.

Tyler is a bold young man.  He is bold in the most wonderful way.  He has not only boldly stepped into some new roles, he has also boldly begun to use his powerful voice that will no doubt be well-used for many years to come helping and serving others with dignity and respect.

When I was a child, I feared being labelled as bold.  Now I aspire to be so.  I am grateful to Tyler and other people in my life who have given me new scripts about what it means to be bold.

When an old website no longer serves me, it is a good idea to update it in order that it can accurately reflect my new self.  When an old definition no longer serves me, it is a gift to have a living example of what might be a better definition.  Thank you, Tyler for inspiring me to be more bold.

My inquiry for you this week is, ‘How can I live more boldly?’

Elizabeth is a Life and Leadership coach, working with motivated clients wishing to live boldly.   She creates and facilitates custom workshops for corporate, public and private groups and provides leadership coaching for individuals and groups.  Contact Elizabeth to learn how to begin to take bold steps.