I’d like to share a learning moment from my week – it’s an “Exciting New Answer”, that comes with a New Action and a New Result. It’s from a book called Letting Go, by Guy Finley, which I recently found and borrowed from a wise friend’s book shelf.

Guy provides 5 Exciting New Answers, Actions and Results, and they are all great. They are nice on their own too, so here is #1 for you to try out in your life:

Your New Answer:

Real strength is the refusal to act from weakness.

Your New Action:

See where you have been calling inner-weakness an inner strength; such as calling anxiety, concern or anger righteousness [a strength]. Dare to live without these false strengths.

Your New Result:

The end of your confusion and pain over why your strength so often fails you. At the same time you will experience the birth of a New and True strength that never turns into it’s weak opposite.

How Does This Play Out for Me?

The weakness I zeroed in on was my habit of worry. Guy is right – it does feel like a “strength” – an energy that will do something important for me. Wow, that’s weird.

When I was little one of my brothers’ too-many-not-nice nicknames for me was “the worrier”. This habitual state of being has caused me plenty of sadness, disappointment, confusion and shame.  

Though I’ve always known that worry is not what I want, and I’ve worked frequently on overcoming this habit, it has stayed with me in various forms. It has even hurt my digestive process, with symptoms of Irritable Bowel Syndrome. That is very hard to admit in a blog, but I’m taking this opportunity to let go of the shame part through truth telling and acceptance.

My favorite quote from Napoleon Hill’s Think and Grow Rich, is,

“Life brings nothing that is worth the price of worry.”

I believe this and want it to be true! Yet somehow I am not able to take it in all the way. At one time I thought I found the exception to this great rule – certainly it is valid to worry about my children’s safety, right? Yet, I know that there is a difference between care and worry, and that extending care instead worry is healthier for all involved. But how do I separate the two?

Another way worry shows up for me is that, even though I LOVE my work now, I often feel a sense of worry or concern on Monday mornings when it is time to return to it. I want to transform that to joyful anticipation, which I know is possible. I even have a shining example. Tony Robbins proclaimed, years ago, that his Mondays are like most people’s Christmas’s! I wonder if that is still true for him. Assuming this is possible, I’ll have some of that please.

Moving Forward

With this new strange realization, that I have been treating worry as a strength, I am now “daring to live without this false strength.” I’m developing care as my New True Strength.

I’m also getting help in transforming my worry from Joe Dispenza’s book, Breaking the Habit of Being Yourself. He offers the science behind our emotional habits and how they reside in the body, and the path to transforming and reprogramming them.

Harvesting those Emotional Pings to a Happy Ending on the Trail

My ambitious project to transform worry aligns deeply with my Empathic Communication work. Even though people seek my mediation and coaching skills because they are in conflict with “other” – spouse, employee etc, the silver lining for them is always transforming the relationship with “self”.

This is done by me listening to my heart, or emotional body, with it’s many daily pings of emotion. Feeling the pings, and tracing them to find my core needs. The painful pings show me where my core needs are not being met, and the pleasurable emotion pings point to beautifully met needs. My noticing and naming them sets me up for meeting them better in the future.

I had some heart pings last Saturday when I dumped my work agenda over the side of the wagon in trade for a very slow, luxurious, unplanned day with my daughter Claire.

The pings of worry came in quite loudly, for sure, but thankfully the pings of hope for meeting my needs of special connection and rest won out. It turned out to be an exceptional trade up. We had fabulous time in nature, and I had not one, but two naps! The photo above is a view from our hike, on Pratt Trail in Ojai.

What About You?

If you’d like to share, I’d love to hear what Exciting New Answer #1 awakens in you about any false strengths in your life, and opportunities to develop new True Strengths.

If you are in conflict, experiencing at least a #7 out of 10 pain level, then I invite you to set up a complimentary session with me to explore your options for a cure. You can find a time that works for you here Breakthrough Conversation.

Peace and many blessings,

Catherine

About the Author Catherine

Catherine Cooley is a mediator and a communication coach. She has worked in environments of extreme conflict including prisons, the court system and local communities teaching what she calls "Breakthrough Conversations." She specializes in helping people foster clear, respectful, warm, cooperative relationships at home and in the workplace.

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