image courtesy of viZZZual.com

Are the newest plants in your garden of New Year’s resolutions already wilting due to neglect? Or have you simply given up on making resolutions because you know they just lead to frustration and self-recrimination?

What if your whole underlying assumption is wrong?

What if it’s not willpower you lack, but clarity?

You know you need to clarify your priorities and let some stuff go. (Ouch!) But how?

Guess what? Your intuition knows. And it can tell you in just 5 minutes.

A fun 5-minute exercise to set your priorities for the new year.

Enter The ImageCenter, a simple, online tool that bypasses the analytical “thinky-brain” and taps directly into your whole-brain wisdom.

“I really liked using the ImageCenter, because I actually saw what my subconscious needs. The combination of seeing the images and hearing your thoughts about them gave me the ‘extra something special’ that provided just what I needed to finally start moving toward the changes I’ve been trying to make.”

Jenny Ryan
www.CrankyFibroGirl.com

During your session, you’ll be presented with a series of evocative images and an online virtual desktop to arrange them. You choose a question you want to answer (don’t worry, I’ll give you plenty of examples), and In an enjoyable 5-minute session that feels like playtime, you arrange the images you want to use into a very personal collage that answers your question.

The 5-minute time period ensures that you don’t overthink things—you jump straight to your subconscious, intuitive mind. Past ImageCenter sessions have been described as “remarkably insightful,” “amazing,” and “almost like magic.”

Within 72 hours, I’ll review your images and respond with feedback. You might be surprised to learn how much the images you choose and the way you place them can reveal about the answers to the question you asked yourself, and also the ways in which you best process information (a very useful thing to know).

Harness the inspiration of the new year and reserve your ImageCenter session today!

ImageCenter sessions are easy, fun, and convenient because everything is done online. No need to schedule a phone session and deal with the hassle of time zones, dropped calls, etc.…you do your session whenever you’d like, and I will get back to you quickly with my feedback.

All of my past clients who have used ImageCenter (and many others!) have been amazed at how much information and clarity they’ve received from a 5-minute session with the image deck. They rave about how much fun it is, and how they’ve gained valuable new insights about themselves, how they think, and what they value.

The details.

A New Year’s Clarity Session costs $69, and can be booked any time through January 31, 2012. Your session can be used any time once purchased. However, I highly recommend using yours within a week or so to get the most benefit from it, because we all know what happens to the stuff just sitting there in our inboxes. That’s right—nothing.

Book your session by clicking on the “buy now” button below. You’ll be taken to a Paypal checkout page (you don’t need a Paypal account yourself—any major credit card will do).

Within 10 minutes you should receive a confirmation email with a link to The ImageCenter and further instructions. (If it doesn’t show up right away, give it some extra time in case the server is having a slow day, and also check your spam box.)

If at any point you experience problems or you have any questions, don’t hesitate to contact me at michelle@PracticeMakesImperfect.com, and I’ll get back to you as quickly as I can.

Here’s to reaching your most important goals in 2012!

I’m so pleased that Karen Caterson of Square Peg Reflections has asked me to be part of her Support Stories ~ Strength from Within blog round-robin today. That’s why just for this week, I’m publishing my first post on Monday rather than Tuesday.

This is a story from a few years back, about a time when I gave myself the inner support I needed even when it was kind of scary to do so. I went against the grain of how I’d done things up to that point, explored parts of myself that were clinging to old blueprints, and gave myself something I sorely needed—rest.

As I believe I’ve mentioned (heh), I have always been what I call an “overachiever and people-pleaser.” After a lifetime of trying to be the perfect daughter, student, and friend, it was only natural that once I entered the work force, I assumed I had to try to be the perfect employee.

I thought I had to be on the ball all the time. Ready to do whatever I was asked, no matter how inappropriate or unrealistic.

I thought that I always had to appear 100% enthusiastic and competent no matter what.

Something else I have—a neurological disorder known as Selective Sound Sensitivity Syndrome, or “4S.”

I’ve had it for most of my life, and over the years it’s gotten worse, not better. It would take several more posts to describe the many things I’ve tried to eliminate or at least reduce the symptoms, and how I’ve gotten over the shame of thinking that having it was somehow my fault, and that I was quietly going crazy. What has gotten a lot better is that I no longer feel ashamed of having 4S.

However. (Sigh.) At my day job, I’m reduced to getting through the days by wearing earplugs almost all the time, covered by huge Bose noise-reduction headphones (the best $300 investment I’ve ever made), plugged into an mp3 player running a constant loop of white noise or nature sounds.

I don’t exactly relish walking around our professional services firm looking like an airplane pilot, and I’m sure there are people who just think I’m plain weird, but you know what?

I’ve now chosen my sanity over their approval.

Which in itself is a big step up for me.

Still, you can imagine how being in fight-or-flight mode pretty much 24/7/365 for the last 30 years has worn away at my reserves. On top of the normal stresses of day-to-day life, plus the ones I’ve always placed on myself for being such a perfectionistic, the 4S means that my ability to cope with any kind of stress, internal or external, has been severely compromised.

So a few years ago, I did something I previously would never have even considered as a possibility.

I went on medical disability for a couple of months.

I decided to believe my psychiatrist and therapist when they told me that yes, I really and truly was suffering from the long-term effects of something resembling post-traumatic stress disorder—except that there was nothing “post” about mine. I listened but didn’t give any credence to the part of me that said I was “sponging off the system” and being selfish.

And guess what? The world did not end, and my company survived just fine without me.

For myself, I was able to erase enough of my internal blueprint specifying that my firm’s work was more important than my self-care to actually take the medical leave. Then, over those 9 weeks, I allowed myself to do several wonderful-for-me things without feeling guilty about any of them.

I spent the first three weeks catching up on my sleep deficit, often sleeping 10-12 hours a night, until my body informed me it was all caught up by spontaneously and regularly awakening me at my normal time again.

I spent tons of time just reading, reading, reading. Anything I wanted. Fiction, non-fiction, and occasionally, when I felt up to it, something that taught me a little more about how the brain and nervous system work.

I made a list of all the movies I’ve been wanting to see for ages, joined Netflix for those couple of months, and watched almost all of them.

I walked. Simply walked. Nothing more strenuous—I didn’t think of it as “working out” or “exercising” (ack!), but as just being outside, getting my muscles moving, my blood flowing, and my head clear.

I wrote for hours and hours on end. About myself, my memories, my long-standing patterns, my goals and dreams.

I gave myself permission to remove the world’s weight from my shoulders for a while.

I knew that going back to work would be difficult, and it was. I knew that after two months, I’d want even more time to myself, and I did. But I dealt with it, because I’d given my nerves and my immune system some time to seriously recharge for the first time in—well, ever.

I certainly wouldn’t mind winning a million bucks or so in the lottery (although I’d have to play it, I’m told), or finding someone to financially subsidize…oh, a year or two of my life. I’ve accumulated many more books to read, after all.

But because I was able to give myself the support that I needed at that time, I’ve since learned more about managing my energy, buffering myself from sonic stressors, and taking it easier on myself than I ever have before.

This is giving me the energy to subsidize myself as I prepare to step out in a new life direction.

More on that coming soon if you’d like to subscribe, above. (Nudge, nudge, wink, wink.)

In the meantime, I’m looking forward to reading today’s other inner support stories, courtesy of Karen and my fellow Square Pegs!

Ever since I first learned about the theory of reincarnation, I’ve liked the idea a whole lot. I love life, and one time through isn’t nearly enough to experience everything I want to.

So when personal development blogger Abubakar Jamil invited me to be a part of his Life Lessons Series, I decided to write my contribution (this!)  in the form of a letter to my future self.

Now all I have to do is figure out a very safe place for it, fix the location so firmly in my consciousness that I’ll remember it in my next life, and be sure to come back as someone who can read English.

Dear Future Me,

The first thing I want to tell you is that you did a really good job last time around. I’m telling you that before anything else because one of the biggest mistakes I’ve made was judging myself much too harshly, especially in the first several decades of my life. When you do that you make everything so much harder than it has to be, so please, for the love of all things holy, get this life lesson down right away. Ease up on yourself!

You’re human, and that’s a package deal which includes all sorts of imperfections. Trust that all of your efforts are made in good faith, and that you’re doing the best you can at every moment based on what you’ve learned so far.  If you stay attuned to what’s happening within yourself (more on that in a moment), I’ll give you as much help as I can from wherever I’ll be when you get this letter. But if we lose touch…well, that’s why I’m writing to you now.

Secondly, I want you to know deep down in your very bones that your worth as a person is intrinsic. In other words, it is based on who you are, not on the things you do or don’t do. Unless the world has changed a great deal between my lifetime and yours, most of the people around you will probably be under the spell of this delusion, and feeling extremely overwhelmed because of it. If I could give you one gift, it would be to know beyond any doubt that you’re worthy of appreciation, concern and love no matter what.

I talked about attunement just above, and that’s the next piece of advice I have for you. In my time, “be in the moment” has become something of a cliché, but that’s because it’s a really, really important key to living as fully as you can. If you can stay aware and in touch with the many kinds of experiences that life will offer you, you’ll be able to embrace it in ALL its glory.

We humans are so smart that we invent thousands upon thousands of ways to distract ourselves from the pain of living. You know how I said being that human is a package deal? Well, part of that is that we all experience pain in varying degrees.

But here’s the thing. if you try to run away from pain, you can’t experience pleasure, either. It’s far too easy for me and the other people in my part of the world right now to escape pain by numbing or distracting ourselves with television, drugs, food, work, shopping, exercise, relationship drama, and other modes of avoidance. But the truth is, none of these really work in the long run. They just keep the pain at bay, and we use up so much energy holding it off all the time, we don’t have much left for anything else.

So it’s better to feel things fully in the moment, while understanding two important things: having the feeling won’t hurt you (it will just feel uncomfortable), and the feeling will pass. Sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly, but no feeling is permanent. You can take a step back and watch the emotional waves roll through you if you want–it’s tough at first, but you get better with practice, and it’s actually pretty interesting.

Of course, none of this means you’ll deliberately seek out pain. You’ve got me in you–you’re not that silly! (Like I said, if you pay attention inwardly, I’ll be right there with you.)

And it’s okay if you sometimes need a break from life’s pain–I wouldn’t counsel you to refuse anesthesia before a surgical procedure, for instance, and if your emotions occasionally get to be too much, it’s okay to lose yourself in a movie or a book or a game for a while. But if you’re remaining aware of yourself as I’m suggesting and you’re honest with yourself, you’ll be able to sense when you’re crossing the line between a little healthy escapism and addictive avoidance behavior.

You know what, Future Me? That’s  a lot already. These are probably the most important things I’ve learned so far as of this writing, and I did it through long and, yes, sometimes painful experience, making many mistakes along the way.

You won’t be able to avoid making mistakes (yep, the package deal thing again), but if I can spare you at least some of the pain, I’d like to.

If you keep just these things in mind as you begin this new lifetime of yours, you’ll have an amazing headstart on a very, very rich and satisfying life. So remember to:

• ease up on yourself
• know you’re worthy of appreciation, concern and love
• stay awake to all of life’s experiences
• don’t run from pain, knowing that having it can’t hurt you, and it’s temporary

The rest of it you’ll learn just fine as you go along.

Oh–and that leads to one final piece of advice: Trust yourself. At the deepest level, you’ll always know what to do next.

Go get ‘em, kiddo. You’re going to have a fantastic life.

I recently checked out author Patti Digh’s book Life is a Verb from the library. A dozen pages into it, I know I’m going to return it and buy myself a copy. I need to own this book.

Not just because it’s beautiful. It is, though—thick, creamy paper stock, colorful, gorgeously designed full-color pages (think Griffin and Sabine, only without the 3D envelopes), wide margins which she encourages you to (*gasp!*) write in, and a heft to it that makes the book just feel good to hold. Thoughtful book design like this is rare these days.

That’s all lovely, but I’m buying it because so far every page has been like a clear riverbed strewn with gold nuggets.

I’m at a point in my life where I’m re-evaluating many things, and the premise behind the book (at some point we each have only 37 days to live, and we don’t know when that day will come, so it behooves us to life fully all the time) speaks to me loudly and clearly.

So maybe I’m particularly primed to take in its insights right now, but man, oh man. Inspiration all over the place.

The line that brought me up short during my last few minutes of reading was this:

“The American Revolution was not financed with matching grants from the Crown.”

Actually, right there Patti is quoting David Bayles and Ted Orland from Art and Fear. But she expands upon this idea that “change occurs at the edges, without permission.” (Yep, that’s her this time.)

The Powers That Be, whatever they are, have a vested interest in things staying the way they are now, even if you can’t see what that is.

We’re raised to think that the people in positions of authority know best, but sometimes we’re not aware of how much they act in their own self-interest. A couple of weeks ago I re-watched one of my all-time favorite movies, Stand by Me. There’s a scene where Gordie, the main character, asks his friend Chris, known to be a “bad boy,” whether he really did steal the milk money at school.

Chris: Yeah, I took it! I mean, you knew I took it. Teddy knew I took it. Everyone knew I took it. Even Vern knew it, I think. But maybe I was sorry and I tried to give it back.

Gordie: You tried to give it back?

Chris: Maybe. Just maybe. And maybe I took it to Old Lady Simmons and told her, and the money was all there. But I still got a three day vacation because it never showed up. And maybe the next week, Old Lady Simmons had this new suit on when she came to school.

He gets angrier and angrier as he tells the story, but doesn’t break into tears until, “I just never thought…a teacher…”

What hurts Chris the most isn’t the injustice. Being blamed is nothing new to him, even when it’s undeserved—that’s par for the course. But the fact that someone in authority, whom he’d learned to look to as an exemplar of proper conduct, would do something so deceitful? That shatters Chris’s worldview.

And what happens when we do realize that influential people and organizations use that influence to bolster their own interests, sometimes at the expense of others? We’re usually resentful.

It’s all about what They are doing, how They aren’t listening to us, how They are so selfish.

You know what? We may very well be right. But complaining about it changes nothing.

We’d live more fully, Patti Digh asserts, if we…

“Stop saying they.”

Remember the old saying, “It’s better to ask for forgiveness than permission”?

As long as you’re not hurting others, I’m starting to believe that most of the time, that really is true.

What can you change about what you don’t like in your life, right now, today? It doesn’t have to be big. In fact, it probably shouldn’t be.

Can you use ten minutes of your lunch break to shop for the supplies for that art project you’ve been wanting to try?

How about asking the kids to clear the table and load the dishwasher after dinner tonight, so you can take a few minutes to walk around the block and get some fresh air?

Of course I’m oversimplifying, because many situations aren’t that straightforward. But be creative and look for the tiniest thing you can do.

Hate your job? Maybe you can’t do much about that today, but get a small plant for your desk so that you have something refreshingly alive to look at and take care of. Spend ten minutes brainstorming other options. Try writing alternate lyrics to a favorite song in your head while you do something boring and monotonous.

No, it’s not much. Not much at all. And it’s tempting to think, “Why even bother?”

Because at least it’s something.

Little steps do matter.

As Patti Digh says,

“Find the change you can make and make it. You’ll be funding your own revolution.”

A reader e-mailed me the other day, and out of curiosity I checked out her own blog before writing back. (You can find her at Grown Up Mom. )

What I read really moved me. In particular, she has a couple of recent posts about her youngest daughter’s attempt to get accepted into college to pursue a BFA and become an actor. The daughter is determined, but it’s rough out there, and the rejections are rampant. Her mother asks, “Is it stupid to encourage our children to follow their dreams?”

I e-mailed her back and said that I don’t think so.

As evidence of what can happen if children don’t follow their dreams, I shared with her a shortened version of the following story. Then I decided it was important enough to post about.

I’ve written before about how my perfectionism springs, in part, from having been a “people-pleaser” all my life. I learned early on from my parents, then my teachers and peers, to take my sense of self-worth from how I measured up against other people’s yardsticks—or what I imagined their yardsticks to be.

I also absorbed my parents’ messages about risk, and from these learned fear.

My parents were (are) loving, wonderful people, but they always encouraged me to play it safe, be cautious, and plan for the future. They always encouraged my extracurricular creativity and artistic interests, but when it came to schoolwork, I was told in no uncertain terms that the stakes were high.

“We’d still love you and be just as proud of you if you brought home Cs and Ds, as long as we knew you were trying your best,” they told me. (And to this day, I still believe they really meant that.) “But since you’re such a good student, and you enjoy school so much, it would really help if your grades stayed good enough to get a scholarship. College isn’t cheap.”

This was when I was about 10 or 11 years old.

No pressure, right?

As I hit my teens, I discovered pop and rock music. Unlike my peers, however, just listening and sighing dramatically over my favorite musicians wasn’t enough for me (though I certainly did my share of that, too). I decided I wanted to be a rock-and-roll singer. Front a band. Hold the masses in thrall with the power of my voice and my passion, just like my favorite singers did.

I felt it from them. I loved being on the receiving end. But I wanted to give back—to inspire other people with music in the same way that music inspired me.

But I’d already internalized the message that there was one standard, linear path to a financially secure life—get good grades in school, go on to college, and do well there so that you can land a good job when you graduate.

So it’s not that I took singing lessons or found a band to join and then succumbed to fear—I didn’t even try. I never even saw it as a viable option. Fantasize, sure, but actually pursue? I thought that this was a goal I couldn’t consider “for real”—so I never did.

I earned my B.A. from a good state university, moved to San Francisco, and have now spent over 20 years of my life doing administrative work in a series of “safe” office jobs. I’ve grown more and more miserable, and now, in my early 40s, I’m only just turning the corner and getting really, really angry at having spent so many years supporting other people’s agendas instead of my own.

I’m beginning to look at other options, but I have so much momentum (existing commitments, habits, fears, etc.) built up and pushing me in a direction I don’t want to be going, it’s that much harder to point myself in a new one.

Blogging here at Practice Makes Imperfect is partly my chronicle of breaking out of the people-pleasing mindset and finding the courage to figure out what my own dreams are after all this time.

Who knows? Maybe my rock star dreams would have turned out to be solid and enduring, in which case I might have been singing my heart out under the spotlight in your hometown this weekend.

Maybe I would have tried and totally screwed it up, or tried and pursued it until I was ready for something else.

Or maybe it would have turned out to be a passing teenage fantasy, and I would have at least gained a little experience and knowledge in an interesting area before I quit and moved on.

In any of those cases, my life would be different today for having tried to be a rock singer, even if only because I’d have developed more confidence in the ability to follow my own heart.

I wish I’d had the courage to take that path 20-25 years ago. But I also believe it’s never too late—and that following your dreams is one of the most practical things you can do, because it makes you energized, alert and happy. If you’re in those states, you can achieve a lot.

These days I reserve my singing for the shower . . . but I’m nurturing some other dreams.

I hope you’re doing the same.

I’m sick and tired of being good,
I’m tired of doing what I “should.”
When I do what you want me to
The benefits to me are few.

But I’ve been so well trained to fear
What happens if we don’t adhere
To all the rules we’re taught will keep
Us safe from wolves (obedient sheep)

That I’m no longer even sure
Of what I want; I just endure
Days and weeks and months and years
Of subservience to collective fears.

You say that I must earn my pleasures
By dancing to society’s measures,
Following norms I had no choice in making
With most of my waking hours yours for the taking.

But now I’m making a different choice
And listening to my inner voice
That tells me which rules I want to follow
And which make me choke when I try to swallow.

“Everyone does it” is not an excuse
For allowing myself to be seduced
Into a life that’s unfulfilling
In so many ways—I must be willing

To sever my ties to what you have taught me.
I am not the person you’ve always thought me.
The “good little girl” is growing into
A woman committed to learning what’s true

For herself regardless of what she is told.
She’s scared, but determined, and will not be sold
On a story that keeps her inside of your cages.
She wants to be daring and free and courageous

In facing her fear and her anger and doubt
Along with her laughter and joy, letting out
The pressure that’s built up for much too long
By struggling so hard all those years to belong

To a system she never really believed in.
So I’m waving goodbye now, truly leaving
Your heart-grinding tedium far behind,
Unless you’d like to change your mind

And come along, too. I could use some companions
When fording the rivers and crossing the canyons
I’ll surely encounter along the way—
But make your decision. I’m leaving today.

Pace and Kyeli Smith, two of the coolest people I’ve ever met online, do not think small. They have started a revolution, and two days ago, they released a manifesto explaining it. [Click here to view more details]

I dare you to read this and not feel inspired. Seriously.

The Freak Revolution, they say, is a revolution of ideas. From page 21 of the Manifesto:

No guns. No violent uprisings. No protest rallies. No bullshit. Just ideas. World-changing ideas. It has happened before, and it can happen again.

Think about the Renaissance. When the Renaissance swept Europe and then the world, was there a violent uprising? Were any governments overthrown? Were any anti-art monarchs assassinated? No. The creation and transmission of revolutionary ideas fueled the revolution. The ideas swept through the dominant paradigm, causing changes that continue to ripple through our lives.

I agree with Pace and Kyeli that the time is ripe for some bedrock-level changes to our collective way of looking at the world. They say that we are living under the control paradigm, which gives us certain (and often not very pleasant) ideas about how life works. But the very nature of a dominant paradigm is that we’re so immersed in it, we cease to question its underlying assumptions.

The Freak Revolution Manifesto exposes and deconstructs some of those assumptions, and encourages us to think about whether or not they’re actually true.

There is a lot in this 44-page document to think about, but one of the most powerful realizations that emerged for me was this: Because I’ve been a people-pleaser all my life, I’ve internalized the control paradigm so deeply that I’ve often blamed myself for not measuring up. I never even considered that I might be using a flawed yardstick.

Think about it this way. Let’s say I give you a $50,000 gift card to Home Depot, but inform you that you’ve got to get there and back yourself, choose your materials yourself, and arrange for their transportation. Your job? Construct a house which conforms to all state and local building codes (which you’re perfectly free to research at the library or on the Internet, of course) in two weeks, on your own. Could you do it?

I thought not.

So why do we so often feel responsible for equally insane amounts of stuff, remain in denial about the insanity, and feel guilty and ashamed when we can’t handle it all? Where did we get such a deep-seated need to be superwomen and supermen?

You’ve got it—the control paradigm, which tells us that only when we get a solid grip on everything in our lives simultaneously can we achieve a sense of inner peace. Which is impossible.

In their wonderful manifesto, Pace and Kyeli write about a different paradigm of connection. One in which we connect to our own hearts and souls, with each other, with the world around us, and with the Infinite. One which makes us feel happy, fulfilled, and balanced.

What I really like is that they don’t just talk about all this from a negative point of view, or in general terms, in a way that leaves you angry, frustrated, and thinking, “Great, but now what do I do?” The manifesto goes into quite a few concrete suggestions about how each one of us can start to make real, positive changes in our lives to disconnect from the control paradigm. To unplug from the unrealistic, hurtful, and demoralizing assumptions that we likely imbibed with our mothers’ milk.

And don’t be put off by the word “freak.” Pace and Kyeli use it in a pretty inclusive way. If there is any way in which you feel you don’t fit in or would like to buck the status quo, you can join this revolution.

Please, please read this manifesto. (You can read it online or download it: [Click here to view more details].) I think you’ll be very glad you did. I certainly was.