Congratulations Brave Team… we have completed our first 8 full days in training for our special event… Winning The Inner Game!

Time to Check In:

1. I listened to or read something inspiring… not what I had planned or said I would read… but something inspiring or positive or mind changing for 15 minutes each day. Check!

2. I took a daily walk of empowerment and possibility, sometimes just across my living room floor on my way to bed, but powerfully walk I did.  Check!

3. I asked at least 2 people every day to take a look at this amazing opportunity we are offering (except for Sunday where I officially asked only one person but I did a lot of other talking that day… it really doesn’t justify anything, but that’s my story and I’m sticking with it (-;).  Check (with compassion)

So let’s assess how training went, and please feel free to share your breakthroughs, insights, and wisdom you gain along the way as well. What did I achieve or learn in practicing to become an Olympic Luminary this week? Well, almost every day, I didn’t feel like it. What?!? This was supposed to be exciting, inspiring, fun, and lift me to a whole new level! HOW CAN I NOT FEEL LIKE DOING IT? I don’t know, and the truth is, it doesn’t matter.

I can spend a lot of time contemplating why I don’t always want to do what I know will make a positive difference… or I can just not feel like doing it, and do it anyway. Why do we let how we feel hold so much power over doing something proactive? And at what point will we realize that feelings follow actions, not the other way around?

So here is my big lesson of the week: activity solves most problems.

I don’t feel like it so I spend an hour arguing with myself about whether I’ll do it or not. Then I just pick up the phone, call someone I have that knot in my stomach over, and we have an amazing talk. She is open to hearing what I want to share, she tells me about a school in Florida that might be the ideal school for my son, and we remember how much we have in common. I don’t feel like going out and inspiring a group that might not be as big as I expected (after all, I was up all night with a sick mom and ridiculous leg cramps wah wah wah)… but I go anyway and leave refreshed, excited, and so grateful for the perfect combination of people who showed up.

I hate to say it, but I’m beginning to think that every time I say to myself “I don’t feel like it”… then it is in that very moment that I must do it without delay. Perhaps my mind will decide that if that is the consequence of complaining, it is better to just quiet down and let me get on with my life. Let the inner games begin! Either way, I am going to commit for the next week to continue to DO IT ANYWAY! Serious athletes in training just keep at it, until it gets easier… and then they raise the bar. Who’s in? Game On!

And by the way, I love you all!

Someone said to me today  “I don’t know if I have what it takes”. How many of us wonder that throughout our lives? Do I have what it takes to succeed and go to the top of this company? Do I have what it takes to be a great mom or dad? Do I have what it takes to make it to Broadway? And how will we know? What does it take really? Who decides and when? How many of us scare ourselves with imaginary hoops to jump through without ever finding out how hard, or possibly simple it might turn out to be? Are you creating your future based on your past, or will you rewrite your story and create a new future based on a powerful decision today? Anything is possible, and it begins with this moment.

You have what it takes. The question is, will you give what it takes? I have a sign up on my wall that my 92 year old mother wrote for me on a bad day. It reads: “You won’t know if you don’t KEEP GOING!!! I believe in you!!!”

I believe in you! I believe you are capable of greatness beyond anything you have yet imagined. I believe that you have been given gifts to bring to the world and it’s time to play big and step into your light. But you’ll never know if you don’t KEEP GOING! And I don’t mean by testing the waters, or tiptoeing in to see what happens… but go with real commitment, no matter what. Take bold consistent steps and find out what happens. I’ll end tonight with of my favorite quotes:

“Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation) there is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one’s favor all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamed would have come his way. I have learned a deep respect for one of Goethe’s couplets:

Whatever you can do,
or dream you can, begin it.
Boldness has genius,
power and magic in it.”

— W.H. Murray, in The Scottish Himalayan Expedition

Here is my picture of the last two days of “doing the do” (-; Let’s talk about asking. Let’s talk about reaching out to others who don’t understand what the heck we’re doing and the emotional roller coaster ride it can take us on until we break through to personal freedom. Does this feel familiar?

I lovingly ask someone to take a second look at something she wouldn’t listen to 8 months ago, and she says okay. Up Up Up I go! I share with somebody the big picture who then gets excited and grateful that this could be an answer to her financial fears! OMG… we’re getting to the top, I can see everything from up here!  I get caught in a weird energetic power struggle with someone… trying to convince her that this isn’t what she thinks it is. She has to get off the phone, I feel icky, she feels icky. I wind up sending a text: “I’m sorry to go on and on about this, I am just overly excited”.  Elizabeth, what are you doing? You know better than that!  Whooosh, down I go. Calls come in and people are excited and inspired and sharing with others who are now getting excited and inspired as well, and I zoom back up! And on it goes… “I like it!” Yay! “I’m not interested” Ahhhhh! “I love this stuff” WOOO HOOO! “Please tell me this isn’t one of those things” OH NO. LOOP DE LOOP! Day over… Whew! What a ride!

What is this emotional roller coaster we climb onto when we try to share with others something that is important to us? And this goes beyond business. What happens to actors when auditioning, writers presenting their work, students’ offering their work to the teacher, workers presenting to the boss? Why does our joy, peace, and the validity of what we are doing depend on what “they” think about it? If our own minds are often critical and not always rooted in some beautiful truth, wouldn’t it follow that their minds might be much the same?

We are sensitive beings. Sometimes that works for us, sometimes not. I believe that sometimes we share something important and we start to feel their fear, or doubt, or impatience. We actually feel or hear their fear and the problem is, we think it’s our own. Then we get scared too, or doubtful, or just want to get off the ride altogether.

What if we made a commitment to love and honor ourselves and what we’re choosing to do? What if we learned to celebrate our own possibilities, and hold a loving and safe space for everyone else, no matter what their reaction is?

What if we went in to give, and not to get… and what if the only thoughts that really mattered were the ones in your own head? Those are thoughts we can work with. If they’re scared, we think patience. If they’re critical, we think compassion. It they’re not ready, we love them anyway and move on, because someone is waiting for all that we have to bring.

Here is the proposal of the day. Let’s make it our goal to bring love, joy, and well being to whoever we speak to today…. If we are to be luminaries… we have to practice bringing light into dark places and holding it high rather than snuffing it out as soon as someone sneezes.

Please post this up somewhere where you can see it… it is from Shad Helmstetter:

HELPING CHANGE LIVES FOR THE BETTER TAKES DRIVE, BELIEF, DETERMINATION, AND A WILLINGNESS TO STAY WITH IT NO MATTER WHAT! NO ONLY MEANS NOT NOW. WHEN SOMEONE TELLS YOU NO, IT IS NEVER ABOUT YOU. IT IS A SIGN THAT THEY MAY NEED MORE INFORMATION… MAY NOT FULLY UNDERSTAND… CANNOT YET SEE THE BIG PICTURE… OR IS UNCONSCIOUSLY AFRAID TO PROCEED, BUT A NO HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH YOU.

AND FOR THE RECORD… IT DOES GET EASIER. I’m going to get off the roller coaster for a while, and head over to The Magic Kingdom! Want to come? I am grateful you are on this journey with me!

With love and so much respect, Elizabeth

To have what you’ve never had, you must do what you’ve never done, and everything you’ve ever dreamed of is only one decision away. Today we decide! Today we begin taking consistent, small steps toward our personal freedom.

CHANGE YOUR THINKING  A minimum of 15 minutes a day for inspiration and new ideas… read a book, listen to an audiotape, do something to change your thinking for the better. What we focus on grows, so let’s focus on what we truly want to grow in our lives. Some are starting with “The Magic” by Rhonda Byrne.  A daily practice of true gratitude that can change your life.

CHANGE YOUR BODY  Take a daily walk… however long or short… but take a daily walk of power and possibility, as if you have already arrived at what you hope to accomplish. Our bodies need to know what we’re up to… we are in training now.

TAKE ACTION TO CHANGE THE WAY YOU FEEL  Reach out and invite 2 people a day, every day, just to take a look at the gift you have to offer.  Their response isn’t what matters, the fact that you offer in love and with a desire to help is what matters. If they want, you can show them a way to create financial freedom, get healthy, feel beautiful, and change their life. If not, you’ve planted a seed of possibility for them. Feelings follow positive action, so to change the way you feel, continue to take positive action.

LOVE EVERYONE, INCLUDING YOURSELF  Love is a practice, a decision, a shift in thinking… and in love, miracles abound!