Life is a completely different experience when it is lived from a mindful, purposeful place of intention setting as opposed to a random existence of hoping for the best. Of course, the latter may appear to be a comfortable place at first, but in reality, you are making a choice to experience limitation. I believe that if you have picked up this book, you are ready to choose and go after more of what you want in your life now rather than settling for “what might be some day.”
Learning how to manage change within ourselves and around us will have a transformational impact in our lives. It enables us to really go after what we want and therefore allows us to enjoy more of our experiences, whether personal or professional.
Leading our lives on our own terms is the most empowering perspective we can hold. This book, in part, is a personal leadership journey from which everyone can benefit. It is about becoming more self-conscious about revealing what really fulfills us and what we want in our lives.
Once we know, we will explore how to find the path to get us there.
Ultimately, we will arrive at the opportunity for choice and engagement in the experience that we believe will bring happiness for us.
Regardless of our occupations, our obligations, or our socioeconomic statuses, we are all the leaders of our own lives. If you are like most people, you have probably been leading much of your life from a state of unconsciousness. You weren’t asleep, but you were just moving along, wishing and hoping that everything would ultimately work out for the best. This can leave you frustrated with and perhaps even resentful of some parts of your life if they are not working out the way you had thought they would.
The questions you need to ask yourself:
“To do what?” you may ask. To change, grow, and shape your life on purpose. These questions are in a precise order. To be ready requires entering a new state of being. To be able requires a clear understanding of skills and systems. To be willing requires that you engage in a practice.
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The title Open up and Say aaah! refers to opening your heart and mind and finding your voice. It is about building and strengthening your skills of awareness, acceptance, and alignment to guide your choices toward happiness. Aaah! is an acronym for a powerful life tool that will help you face change or challenges with new perspectives. With it, you can mindfully choose your responses and shape your experiences, regardless of the situation or circumstances.
This book has two parts. In Part I, you will be introduced to foundational pieces that will make you “ready and able” to manage yourself through this personalized self-help process. Part II is where you must be “willing” to dig into your current circumstances and the process of shaping your life into what you want to experience-in your way and on your terms!
You may choose to read the book from the beginning and go right through in a linear and progressive way. Or, for those either returning to this process or brave enough to just leap into it, you may want to start with Part Two and the diagnostic section. The choices, you will learn, are always yours!
Part I is designed and written to first introduce you to the concept of selfhood, a place you enter by choice, not simply by rite of passage. Here, we begin the process of becoming conscious and purposeful about leading ourselves through the change and growth process in our lives. When we are in a state of selfhood, we are ready to begin to do this. Within the state of selfhood, we will explore several areas that will both prepare us for and provide us with fundamental principles that later will allow us to reach our full potential:
– We will look at the links between health and happiness and highlight the importance of taking ownership for our self-care.
– We will discuss techniques for how to be self-sufficient and will learn to coach ourselves through the change and growth process.
– We will look at how to build and strengthen our most important relationship in life, the relationship with ourselves, and in doing so will create great self-reliance.
– Finally, we will look at how change, growth, and happiness are an integrated system and how we can be selfempowered to manage each effectively and comfortably in our lives.
When you understand the elements at work in selfhood, you are ready to step into the leadership role of your life. With the tools provided next, you will be able to begin to work with change and growth to shape your life on purpose and create the happiness you desire.
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Part II of this book is an interactive experience and a practical guide through a personalized self-coaching process. Because we all have different learning preferences, you will be offered visual, auditory, and kinesthetic approaches to the activities you will do, to best suit your learning style.
We will begin with a diagnostic tool to identify where you are in the growth and change process for different areas of your life. Once you have completed and scored your personalized assessment, I will frame the findings in the context of an intuitively based change and growth model. You will then engage in exercises to help you identify lost or hidden treasures within yourself. These findings will be extremely useful in your personal journey of seeking, finding, and creating the life you want to experience.
You are the coach here, but I will be on your shoulder and will be whispering in your ear, encouraging you, and supporting you along the way. This is not an easy overnight process. It will, however, be well worth your investment of time if you want to figure out where you are stuck and how to get over it. Like any practice, you will have to try it more than once. I call it the practice of aaah!
- We will look at the links between health and happiness and highlight the importance of taking ownership for our self-care.
- We will discuss techniques for how to be self-sufficient and will learn to coach ourselves through the change and growth process.
- We will look at how to build and strengthen our most important relationship in life, the relationship with ourselves, and in doing so will create great self-reliance.