|
|
Change
First of all Happy New Year! New means getting used to something and thinking about how best to take care of it. What do I want to do with this new year? Change is often the resounding response. Make some positive changes.
Get rid of those behaviors that keep you from attaining your goals like overeating that keeps you from losing weight or sitting in front of the TV instead of reading the latest bestseller. Change is often the hardest thing to do. Most people like the status quo and their comfort zones.
Change is a constant. For example, I am so glad the freezing cold of the Colorado winter will take a change soon for spring and I can already experience changes as the days now are getting longer. It will happen and not by anything I design. Several items in this newsletter reflect on change. I hope as this New Year enfolds that our appreciation of change does too. | |
|
"Smiles"
A grandmother was telling her little granddaughter what her own childhood was like: "We used to skate outside on the pond. I would swing on a tire which hung from our tree in the front yard and we rode a pony. We would pick wild raspberries in the woods." The little girl was wide-eyed, taking this all in. At last she said, "I sure wish I'd gotten to know you sooner!"
Riddle
What is everyone doing at the same time? Growing older
What grows shorter as it lives longer? A candle |
|
Books In Review
Two books about change worth reading!
Change Your Life and Everyone In It: How To Transform Difficult Relationships, Overcome Anxiety and Depression, Break Free from Self-Defeating Ways of Thinking, Feeling, and Acting In One Month or Less by Michele Weiner-Davis (1995)
--And--
Change or Die by Alan Deutschman (2007)
ChangeYour Life and Everyone In It is by a colleague of mine in the Colorado Association of Marriage & Family Therapists who uses the Solution-oriented Brief Therapy approach (SBT). Instead of focusing on why a person experiences problems, SBT helps figure out how to resolve problems. The approach is based on a simple formula: do more of what works and less of what doesn't. People are reminded to recognize what they already know about what works so they can repeat successful solutions. They also identify and eliminate the repetitive and unproductive patterns that lead to failure. Weiner-Davis is also the bestselling author of Divorce Busting.
Deutschman addresses the issue up front and personally: Change or Die. What if you were given that choice? If you didn't, your time would end soon-a lot sooner than it had to. Could you change when change matters most? Nine out of ten people do not change even when their life depends on it. He offers three keys to change which he calls the three R's: relate, repeat and reframe. Relate is forming a new, emotional relationship with a person or community that inspires and sustains hope. Repeat is when the new relationship helps you learn, practice, and master the new habits and skills that you'll need. Reframe is when the new relationship helps you learn new ways of thinking about your situation and your life. Most aversions to change are based on what he calls the 3 F's: facts, fear and force. You guessed right--facts, fear and force do not create successful, sustained change. This book challenges one's notions about change.
|
Don't change. Change is impossible, and even if it were possible, it is undesirable. Stay as you are. Love yourself as you are. And change, if it is at all possible, will take place by itself when and if it wants. Leave ourselves alone. The only growth-promoting change is that which comes from self-acceptance.
--Anthony de Mello
Nothing is permanent but change.
--Heraclitus (500 B.C)
|
| Blueprint for Success
 Mary Ann Van Buskirk is a keynote speaker and author and has been selected from a nationwide search to be featured in Blueprint for Success, a highly successful book series from Tennessee based Insight Publishing. The book features best-selling authors Stephen R. Covey (Seven Habits of Highly Effective People) and Ken Blanchard (One Minute Manager.) Van Buskirk, Blanchard and Covey, are joined by other well-known authors and speakers, each offering time-tested strategies for success in frank and intimate interviews.
Mary Ann Van Buskirk, M.A., M.Div. is a Licensed Professional Counselor in Colorado, a Licensed Marriage & Family Therapist, a Fellow in the American Association of Pastoral Counselors and co-founder of Positive Coaching with over twenty years of experience as a counselor, trainer and national speaker. People who have worked with her report vast improvements in their abilities to relate in healthier ways at home and at work. Success is a result of healthy relationships. | |
|
|
"Everything appears to change when we do."
Sincerely, |
Mary Ann Van Buskirk
Life Dimensions |
|
|
