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Category: Life Skills

Learn how to focus on the soft skills, the people skills like good communication, effective leadership, positive motivation, and managing your emotions.

The Goal-Setting Process: The Best Checklist Answers These 10 Questions

Written by Maria Connolly. Posted in Life Skills, Stepping Forward.

This goal-setting process gives you a fail-safe way to determine if a goal is what you really want and if it’s doable by answering these 10 questions. Have you ever been in a conversation like this… “What do you want?” “Well, I’m not sure, but I know what I don’t want!” If this discussion is about dinner, then it’s not a big thing. But if it’s a conversation about life, this indecisiveness is serious. Some people actually live their whole lives without ever identifying what they want out of life because they haven’t discovered a fail-safe goal-setting process that helps them make decisions they won’t regret. If you’ve been reading my blog for a while, you know I’m all about mindfully developing processes and systems that make life easier.

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How to Improve Your Feeling of Well-being — P.E.R.M.A. Model for Happiness

Written by Maria Connolly. Posted in Health and Wellness, Life Skills, Self-Leadership Skills, Stepping Forward.

You can improve your feeling of well-being and happiness when you focus, not on possessions or events, but on creating beauty in every moment of life. Are you in the pursuit of happiness? Or are you waiting for it to come to you? “The pursuit of happiness” is one of our unalienable rights, according to the U. S. Declaration of Independence. Isn’t that interesting? They focused on the process of searching for happiness, not happiness itself. Think about that deeply, because it will begin to profoundly change you.

If you want to improve your feeling of well-being, it’s important to make the mental shift away from the idea that “I’ll be happy when this thing happens”. Because when you get that thing, it’s not the key to lasting happiness. No, life shifts again and you want more or something different. The key to feeling happy isn’t simply obtaining your desires. The key is finding delight in the whole process of living!

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I Am So Disappointed In Myself — What Can I Do About It?

Written by Maria Connolly. Posted in Life Skills, Self-Leadership Skills, Stepping Forward.

When you say, "I’m so disappointed in myself" – pause, peel back the layers, assess without judgment, and make a plan to move forward.“I swore I would do better, Maria. I want to do better! But every time I get hurt or stressed out, I can’t help myself. I reach for ________ ( Fill in the blank with chocolate, ice cream, cigarette, alcoholic drink, TV clicker — all the things we distract ourselves with.) I feel so disappointed in myself!”  Can you relate to my client’s heartfelt plea? What do YOU do when the person you disappoint is you? And more to the point, what healthy things can you do instead?

Since we’re our own worst critics, we tend to turn off compassion and turn on self-disgust when we disappoint ourselves.  If that’s your default setting, know that you are not alone. Neither are you locked into always responding that way. 

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The Unexpected Benefits of Disappointment You Can Use to Your Advantage

Written by Maria Connolly. Posted in Emotional Intelligence, Fearless Mindset, Handling Change.

Learn to look for and see the surprising benefits of disappointment, so you can turn them to your advantage and manage the emotional fallout better.Disappointment is a difficult emotion to deal with because it’s painful and generally comes from a loss of some kind. And, for most of us, it triggers harsh, critical, judgmental self-talk. Is that your default setting, too? But the good news is we can turn it on its head and use it to our advantage. Yes, there are benefits of disappointment!

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3 Ways to Bounce Back from Setbacks When Life Doesn’t Go As Planned

Written by Maria Connolly. Posted in Life Skills, Self-Leadership Skills, Transform Your Life.

When emotions are raw, it’s hard to bounce back from setbacks, but practicing these three things will make it easier because you choose how you react.You pin your hopes on getting that promotion, being hired for your dream job, or taking a relationship to a strong commitment. You’re nervous because you question whether you’re ready. You’re scared to step out of your comfort zone, but it’s exhilarating to think this could be your future! And then… you get the news you didn’t get it. It feels like you’ve been punched and you can’t breathe. How do you bounce back from setbacks like these?

It takes having a system in place for handling disappointment. It makes sense to plan for a disaster before it happens because once you’re in the middle of it, you won’t be able to think clearly. The same is true of life setbacks. They are going to happen, so if you have a practiced way of handling small setbacks, you’ll be able to handle large setbacks more easily. 

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