Balance

What Matters, What Counts

What Matters, What Counts

If it makes you come alive, it matters

By Minx Boren MCC

The poet Mary Oliver asks the provocative question, “Tell me what it is you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?” We face many challenges as informed and responsible women who want to find joy and meaning in our lives, no matter the circumstances or current conditions. Coaching can offer some bright ideas and possibilities that will make a difference. It offers provocative questions and useful tools and resources that can inspire you to tap into that inner awareness. This can help you get clear and courageous about whatever really matters to you, and then get into action to make this a reality.

“What’s alive in you right now?” Think about it. Maybe even pull out a piece of paper and journal about it. What arouses your passion and enthusiasm? Whatever it is, the world will surely benefit from that which makes you come alive.

If you’re not sure about the answer to this question, take the inquiry back a notch by first looking at your strengths and what you value most. As a place to begin, there is a worthwhile free assessment that can give you some clues. Go to authentichappiness.com and click the upper left hand corner Quick Link to VIA Signature Strengths and take the survey. You might want to ask a friend or two to do the same. Then share stories about your highest strengths and how you have used them in the world around you.

In her book Composing A Life, Mary Catherine Bateson observes that as women we often “compose” our lives from a number of seemingly disparate elements. These include things that we do along the way from graduating school to various jobs to finding our career path to the possible added dimensions of becoming wives and mothers. An example from her book is of the art student turned photographer who took a basket weaving class as a shared activity with her daughter. Eventually, this shared activity turned into a beautifully photographed book on the evolution and variations of basketry.

Think about what you are engaged in learning and exploring right now that might weave its way into the next steps of your life journey. Whatever your gifts and talents, focus on discovering and declaring them for yourself and then tapping into the energy of that awareness to make choices that count… for you.

what matters and what counts

are imagination and inspiration

a “Hail Yes!” attitude…

our heads held high…

and our knap sacks filled with

our gumption and our grit

our gifts and our gratitudes –

the building blocks of new

cornerstones of possibility

As women we are nourished and inspired by the communities in which we participate. As Vive expands its reach by developing its online magazine, I invite you to come blog with me and other likeminded women about your own thoughts and actions regarding your strengths and interests and how you are sharing them in the world. V

Check out Minx’s blog on vivemagazine.com for more coaching tips and to interact with other Vive readers about your own thoughts andactions regarding your strengths and interests.

Keeping Connected

by Minx Boren, MCC

The importance of cultivating friendship in a busy world

It’s not an overstatement to say that most of us have never lived through such stressful times. Stop and ask yourself, “How am I coping?” As women we know instinctively that we thrive and discover ourselves best through our friendships and connections. But who has time and opportunity to foster these relationships now when we need them the most? Tend and befriend is the phrase used to describe a woman’s tendency to gather with other women for comfort and support when the going gets tough. Research shows that, unlike men, whose testosterone driven brains react with instincts of fight or flight, as women we respond to stress with a flood of brain chemicals, including oxytocin which calms us and countermands fight or flight. We are physiologically encouraged to both gather the children and seek out, develop, and maintain friendships. The big bonus is that, as we do so, even more oxytocin is released, further supporting this calming effect and therefore, further easing the stress. The clincher is that estrogen seems to fortify the effect of oxytocin while
testosterone reduces it.

Did you know that tending to your friendships is a way to also tend to your health and wellbeing? A recent study at UCLA suggests that not only are women relational by nature but that our friendships may be a potent antidote to stress. Multiple studies also show that social ties reduce our risk of disease by lowering blood pressure, heart rate, and cholesterol. The Nurses’ Health Study from Harvard Medical School found that there is a direct correlation between more friendships and fewer physical impairments due to aging. The nurses were also more likely to feel that they were leading joyful lives. Given the stress we live in, doesn’t it just make sense for us to seek more ways to tend and befriend one another?

Modern lifestyles make this more difficult to achieve. It seems our roots are becoming more shallow as we move from city to city (whether permanently or because our jobs keep us flying from here to there) pursuing opportunities. Also, in today’s more mobile world, family and friends are often scattered in all directions. Modern day links frequently involve telephones and electronic correspondence with only occasional face-to-face opportunities to reach out and touch someone, to nurture old friendships or to build new ones.

So what’s a woman to do? To nurture the friendships you hold dear and to even expand your circle of connections, here are some quick and easy suggestions worth considering:

• Be a bit old fashioned. Schedule tea for two in your day planner every week and meet either in person or by phone for a deeply connective ½ hour.

• Invite a few best friends to an old fashioned PJ party. If necessary, chip in and hire a baby sitter to take care of the kids (at a PJ party of their own). For more ideas go to: http://www.authenticwoman.com/pajama/pj_retreats.html

• Gather some girlfriends together with aprons and bags of groceries to mix up a group dinner. Fill up on both food and friendship. Make conversation while making a meal. Carry on while cleaning up.

• Make time for a walk-talk with a buddy each week. Great exercise with great company. What could be better?

• Buddy up when things are tough. Going through a challenge or a crisis? Call on a wisewoman friend who is willing to listen deeply and reflect back to you who you really are – your strengths and talents, your  knowledge and intuitive knowings. Spend time heartstorming together about next best steps and possibilities.

• Build new bridges. Search out opportunities and networking events to connect with women in the neighborhood, in the community, and in the larger arenas in which you participate. Whether it’s an interest in a charity or a sport (yours or your child’s) or your work/career or some idea you’re passionate about, seek out like-minded others.

• Find reasons to celebrate. Make an effort to celebrate your friends’ milestones and achievements. Make it fun, make it easy, make it happen. Support is one of the great gifts of friendship so offer yours.

With a little imagination and effort, plus some creative time management, you can find ways to stay truly connected, even in this 24/7, “on the go” time we live in.

have you gone on a walk-talk lately?
…what a grand journey it can be going nowhere
around the blocks of the old neighborhood maybe
or along the beach at sunrise…
from Feeling My Way – 99 Poetic Journeys by Minx Boren

Minx Boren MCC is a poet, author, speaker and Master Certified Coach. She lives in Jupiter, Florida and works both locally and nationally.