I Am A POWERFUL Woman

More Joy. More Peace. More Power.

Tag: happiness (Page 2 of 2)

Help!
Do you really want help?

Help…Not Just Anybody

November 11, 2012 / / 0 Comments
Help!

Do you really want help?

Do You Really Want Help?

I am at a place in life where I am being offered a lot of help.  I am surrounded by people who love and care about me.  That’s a GREAT thing!

“Let me know if there is ANYTHING I can do to help.  I mean it.”

“Do you need any help?”

“What can we do to help?”

I feel extremely loved and grateful for all of the offers of “help” but I have also learned a thing or two about help over the past year and I would like to share it with you now, by picking apart the lyrics to The Beatles song Help.

Help, I need somebody
Help, not just anybody
Help, you know I need someone, help  
The truth is, I don’t want help.  I don’t need help and The Beatles didn’t NEED help either.  The word help implies that I am not capable of doing what needs to be done to improve my mood or situation, whether it is a bad day, sickness, a death, lack of money, what have you.  
Help means..
“I NEED you to fix this for me.”  
“I’m helpless.”
When I was younger so much younger than today
I never needed anybody’s help in any way I totally wanted help up until a couple of years ago.  I spent my adult life waiting for someone to swoop in and show me how to be a productive member of society.  I felt incapable of doing anything well (parenting, housework, homeschooling.)  I had zero confidence, and I wanted to be rescued. 
But now these days are gone, I’m not so self assured 
Now I find I’ve changed my mind and opened up the doors
Help me if you can, I’m feeling down  Yikes! No one can help you feel better.  Your experience of life comes from your thinking.  Happiness always comes from inside of YOU!  No one can help you PERIOD! And–as much as you would like to, you cannot “help” anyone either.  You might be thinking of people in your life that you are currently “helping” and be completley irritated that I am saying your efforts are futile.  YOU cannot HELP or SAVE anyone.  But there is something you can do! 
And I do appreciate you being round While I don’t want anyone attempting to help me, I know the offers of assistance are coming from a place of loving kindness and I am thankful to have such wonderful caring people surrounding me during my current trial.
Help me get my feet back on the ground
Won’t you please, please help me I want something better than help. 
I want your SUPPORT!  Stick with me.  There is a difference.
And now my life has changed in oh so many ways
My independence seems to vanish in the haze 
But every now and then I feel so insecure
I know that I just need you like I’ve never done before
The last four lines of the song are the difference between help and support.
And The Difference Is…
The last four lines say this.  
I need you to help me.
I am needy.
I am an energy taker.  
Help me.
I will completely drain you of your time and energy.
I am insecure.  
Fix me.  
I have been that person.  I have been the energy drainer.  I am NOT interested in being that woman again.   
Support is a completely different experience than help, to the person on the receiving end.  Support is empowering.  Support means that the person assisting in whatever capacity acknowledges the POWER of the person who happens to be knocked down at the time.  Support is mutual.  The person receiving support is able to in the next moment give support back to the supporter. 
 
Support is 100% belief in another person.  Belief in their strengths and in their ability to rise above their obstacles and soar.
  
There is no feeling greater than the 100% support of another person–in my opinion. More of us would follow our dreams and reach our full potential if we would only believe in and support each other this way instead of trying to help or fix each other.
Was there a time when someone got behind you 100% and you soared?  Come find me on fb and tell me about it.  I love to be inspired by others!
  
 

How Did You Cope?

October 10, 2012 / / 2 Comments
Boucher Family

The Boucher Family

When I started I Am A Powerful Woman on facebook, my biggest problem was that we were a family of seven with very little income.  I was on top of the world emotionally.  I was no longer a victim of my own thinking.  I was creating my days instead of reacting to them.  Nothing could bring me down or so I thought.  I was living through tough financial times and I wasn’t freaking out over everyday challenges. In all our years of marriage I felt like we always had our priorities straight.  We didn’t have money but we had each other and five healthy kids.  We were rich indeed.  And it was just getting ready to turn around for us financially.  My husband was promoted to management and we finally had enough money to get on top of our financial situation.

My husband moved out of the house a month ago.  I was completely blindsided.  My well being flew out of the window and I crashed hard.  I am not angry–just very sad.  We are not at each others’ throats.  Our communication is civil and the situation could be much worse than it is, but it is still not at all the way I would choose for my life to be going.  I was CRAZY in love with him and my life was completely intertwined with his.  I am still scratching my head over this turn of events and what is to become of me.

Some of my first thoughts were that I would be okay one day.  I will get through this and it is an opportunity to explore my life independently.  I was a young wife and mother and have never been independent from another grown up.  Some days I have been just fine.  Other days I don’t know how I could ever be happy again.

I thought recently about how much pressure he was under to provide for such a large family and how unhappy he was in that struggle–especially the last couple of years.  During his darkest days was when I learned I had control over my thoughts and could be happy regardless of other people’s emotional state and actions.  I soared.  He sunk.

My feelings of despair have really shaken me up.  Will I ever be happy again?  How is it possible that I was able to feel happiness in the midst of his stress, but I can’t feel it now?  How can I separate my life from his and find myself again?  Where did my POWER go?

Have you been in my position?  Are you here now?  I am very curious as to how others coped through these hard days of learning a new way to live without sinking into despair and not functioning.  The best advice I have been given for really rough days is to ask myself, “Am I breathing?”  and then ask, “What’s the next thing?”  With five kids, there is always a next thing to be done.

I cannot change the past.  It is what it is.  The ONLY thing I can control is the way I CHOOSE to BE in the world today.

I made a list yesterday of all of the things that I have done for myself or that others have done for me that have encouraged me during this time.  Here are a few of the things on my list.

* Self Care

* bubble bath

* candles

* an $8 purse

* Pumpkin Spice Latte

* dinner with a couple of friends (Yummy Mexican food!!!)

* my mom took me to the movies (a lovely distraction–We saw Dark Knight Rising.  Nothing like fighting and killing to get over a broken heart.)

* I bought a puppy for my kids

Puppy Power

Puppy Power!

* Loads of love and support from friends and family–texts and calls.   These have meant so much to me.

How did you cope?  What did you do (or are presently doing) to make it through a similar situation?  What helpful books did you read?  Comment below or come over to fb and share.

 

 

 

 

Be The How Does She Do It Woman!

July 8, 2012 / / 1 Comment

Are there women in your life that seem to get 10 times the amount of work accomplished in one day than you do in a week or a month? At this point I feel like it is SUPER important that I let you know that I am not one of those women.  I stand back in awe and can’t seem to figure out how they do it all.  I comfort myself from time to time by saying, “Oh, I’m comparing my worst with her best.” But the truth is there are women out there that are on top of things and I want to be more like them, but still be me.

At this point in my life, I am not the woman to come to for

*organization and time management tips

*help building a successful business

*healthy gourmet meals

*DEFINITELY not financial advice

*Decorating or craft advice

*Eventhough I’ve homeschooled my kids for almost a decade–you don’t want to come to me for advice there either.  (That would fall under organization and time management tips.)  While we are not a scholarly family, we do know how to survive 24 hours, 7 days a week in the same home without killing eachother–so that’s an accomplishment!

I am a work in progress.  While I can’t help you with the above list, what I have learned about happiness and well being over the last year is something I want to share with all women.  I know how to feel joyful and peaceful with not enough money to pay the bills, my father on a respirator in ICU, fighting kids, a messy house, and no health insurance.  The list of things I COULD worry about on a daily basis is HUGE and yet most days you won’t find me rocking back and forth in a corner overcome with worry, but you would have five years ago.  So come to me for unconditional love,a deep belief in you, your POWER and possibilities.  Come to me as an example of someone who is working daily to overcome obstacles and improve her life and believes in the same possibilities for you, but for the above list we need an expert in those areas.

Sandi Krakowski

Sandi Krakowski

 

I am so excited to pass along a FABULOUS Time and Life Management MP3 from Sandi Krakowski.  She is an expert in this area.  Sandi has built 11 successful companies while homeschooling. This is a POWERFUL resource and I hope you will make time now to listen to the whole thing!

Time and Life Management MP3 CLICK! CHECK IT OUT!!!

I am eager to implement what I learned and watch my life be transformed.  I am very SERIOUS about this.  I believe this is the answer to the scattered unfocused manner in which I have been living my adult life.  I hope you find it as useful and exciting!

“How on earth does a Millionaire Mompeneur who homeschools, have recovered from a life threatening illness, has been debt free for almost 5 years now DO IT ALL? I will tell you. But.. it won’t be pretty. It will be facts, figures, nitty gritty, get it DONE already type of information you’ve been craving for. The clients who do what I tell you will make more money, have a better sex life, enjoy their kids and have the business of their dreams.”–Sandi Krakowski at A Real Change
I want to hear what you think about it!  Come to facebook and let me know!

Sending LOVE and POWERFUL thoughts your way!

Sarah Boucher

Connect with me!
www.facebook.com/IAmaPowerfulWoman.net
www.iamapowerfulwoman.net
https://twitter.com/#!/P0WERFULW0MAN

Unleash Your Power With Self Care

May 22, 2012 / / 5 Comments

Self Care helps me get centered–grounded in my well being.  When I approach my day this way, I have a better experience of life.  Circumstances that would normally send me over the edge are easily handled and life moves on.  I have experienced a major shift in my life because of practicing self care.

We are taught that the world is an outside in deal–that things outside of us make us happy.  When I get this thing I’ve always wanted, then I will be happy.  The truth is that happiness is ALWAYS an inside out job.  This is why self care is crucial.  Michael Neill says, “We think we are experiencing reality but what we are really experiencing is our thinking.”  Making Self Care a habit has definitely helped me with my thinking.

Image

Self Care is a very personal practice.  You have to find the right combination for you, but I will offer you the same starting place that was given to me.

These four Self Care thoughts come from Bill Cumming.  His organization is called The Boothby Institute. Bill recommends spending time each morning thinking about these four main points and then reading a couple of pages from authors like Marianne Williamson, Don Miguel Ruiz, and Greg Baer, whose books reinforce the main ideas of Self Care.

Self Care Thoughts

  1. We live in a miracle.
  2. We are ALL interconnected.
  3. The ONLY thing I can control today is the way I CHOOSE to BE in the world.
  4. Be gracious with yourself.

When I first started self care, I thought about these four thoughts and then tacked on The Four Agreements too.

  1. Be impeccable with your word.  (Don’t use your words to hurt yourself or others.
  2. Don’t take anything personally.  (Nothing others do or say is because of you.  It’s their own drama.)
  3. Don’t make assumptions.  (Don’t assume you know what others are thinking or that they know what you are thinking.)
  4. Always do your best.  (Your best changes from day to day.)

Doing self care that way worked for me, but now I do it differently.  I pray about the Self Care thoughts and then pray about whatever else I want to pray about.  It just seems natural to me in thinking about the miracle of life, to thank God for it right then and there.  That may or may not work for you.  There are no rules.  I only know that taking time to dwell on those four points does make an incredible difference in the way I experience a day.

If you find yourself in the middle of the day ungrounded–do self care.  It makes sense that if it works in the beginning of the day that it would work in the middle too.

I want all of us to go through our days with MORE JOY, MORE PEACE, and MORE POWER and Self Care is a very effective way to do so. I created a one page Self Care Guide that you can print off. I use it from time to time to help my wandering mind stay focused. I even skip around from one section of the page to another as my thoughts roam, filling out whatever part of the page the thought fits into.

In addition to the Daily Self Care Guide, here’s a link to an AMAZING video that leaves me feeling like I’ve just done Self Care every time I watch it.

I hope you enjoy these resources and please feel free to share them with others!

I Am A Powerful Woman shirt

Sarah Boucher happily encourages women to grow in their power daily at I Am A Powerful Woman. Come join the conversation there.  If you have questions regarding the 12 week program What One Person Can Do or the online version What Every Person Can Do, you can get in touch with Sarah here.

 

 

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