I recently began volunteering my services to One To One Women Coaching Women and it’s been an incredible experience.
One to One has given me the opportunity to coach a brilliant, motivated woman with big dreams who could not otherwise afford to hire me. Coaching her has been my privilege. In a few months, I will conclude my work with her. I will miss talking with her every week, but I know she will be ready to move beyond our coaching and continue to create the life she wants on her own.
One to One is conducting a fund-raising drive and my goal is to raise enough money to gift a woman a life coach. I only need to raise $450 to do so. Please read the letter below for more information about how to donate.
Help a Woman help herself – Gift her a Life Coach!
We all know that feeling - that there is nowhere to turn! What if we had a life coach who could help us look inside ourselves for answers and guidance?
But what if you could not afford one?
With your financial support we can help women help themselves by gifting them a life coach!
One to One Women Coaching Women is a 501(c)3 non profit organization does just that! We coach low-income, high potential women across the United States to take charge of their lives in new ways. Through 26 sessions of life coaching at no cost, these women are supported in identifying what they really want in life, making plans to work toward their goals, and receiving support to achieve outcomes.The life skills they learn and self-confidence they gain provide economic and personal benefits for the rest of their lives.
All our professionally trained coaches volunteer their time and services in hope that these women become and remain more capable and independent; even becoming role models and teachers of the new self-confidence and skills they take away from coaching.
Please help bring no cost life coaching to a woman today! With your donation to One to One, we will be able to support more women in our local, regional, and national communities!
WAYS TO CONTRIBUTE:
1. You can join me and my other friends and family in bringing a life coach to a woman by contributing whatever you can. Once we reach the goal, I’ll share the good news with you! Can you donate $25, $50, or $100 or even more?
To DONATE NOW, please visit http://www.onetoone.info/donate.htm or send a check to One to One Women Coaching Women – PO Box 530346, Birmingham, AL 35253-0346
All your support is greatly appreciated! We couldn’t do it without you!
For more information about One to One check out:
“I tend now, since my coaching experience, to value my own opinion much more than I ever did before. Now I ask myself “what do I want”. And I constantly remind myself that I have choices and options. The things that I don’t like, I try to change. The things that are ok, I try to make better. This is very empowering. Probably the most important change that I’ve made through life coaching is to exercise my options.”
– Stephanie Lyas, past OtO Client
I’m heading to Toronto to co-lead a series of one-day coaching clinics on “Coaching Skills for Community Leaders, Managers and Anyone Who Wants to Empower People” with Richard Michaels. I am honored to work with Richard who has been my teacher and mentor.
Join us if you are:
- Eager for new ways to motivate and empower people
- Excited about developing the abilities of employees, volunteers or clients
- Passionate about helping people transform their dreams into action
- Curious about how life coaching can awaken potential in you and others
Here’s how to register.
I’ve been credentialed as an Associate Certified Coach by the International Coach Federation. This marks a milestone in my career and the culmination of an eight-year process of self-discovery and professional risk-taking.
I’m taking some time to savor this accomplishment and reflect on all that has happened in the past eight years to bring me to this place.
Thank you Colin, Jennifer, Holly, Mike, Marysa, Meghan, Margy, Jill, Stephanie, Virginia, Steven, Bill and, of course, Jonathan for supporting me and for paving the way.
Live Your Life By Design
I’m teaming up with two inspiring coaches, Paige Continentino and Karen Levine to present, “Live Your Life By Design”, a one-day mind, body, and spirit workshop designed especially for women who want more out of life.
Discover and explore your personal and career goals, dreams, and desires. Learn powerful strategies and techniques you can use immediately to transform life by default into a life you design and create for yourself.
The workshop blends short presentations of key ideas with experiential learning opportunities.
Come prepared to have fun as you make discoveries and learn how to integrate these into action plans you can implement right away.
September 12, 2010, 9:30 AM – 4:30 PM
Meta Center, 214 W. 29th St., 16th flr, NYC
For more information or to register: http://liveyourlifebydesign.eventbrite.com
Sign up by August 1 for preferred pricing and receive a complimentary, one-hour, follow-up coaching session.
Bonus: 10% of the proceeds for this workshop go to One to One, Women Coaching Women, an international nonprofit organization that provides pro bono life coaching services to highly motivated women who want to make a difference in their lives but cannot afford to engage a coach.
Meet my coaching colleague and friend, Lauree Ostrofsky.
Lauree is inspiring, funny, bold and brave. She has a knack for boiling seemingly gargantuan problems down to their very solvable essence.
Here’s her talk, “How My Brain Tumor Will Change Your Life”. Watch and be inspired. I was.
I’m teaming up with two fabulous coaches, Paige Continentino and Karen Levine to lead ”Life by Design”, a group workshop for women.
Date: Saturday, September 12, 2010
Location: The Meta Center, 214 W. 29th Street, NYC
Time: 9:30 am – 4:30 pm
Description: Move beyond your current circumstances and create a Life by Design. Full class description coming soon!
Cost: $150
Bonus: A portion of the proceeds from this workshop will be be donated to One To One Women Coaching Women.
Contact Me to register.
Several years ago I studied improvisation skills at my friend Holly Mandel’s school, Improvolution. One of my favorite games was “New Choice”. Here’s how it goes. A group of players improvises a scene. After a few minutes of allowing the scene to develop, the director calls out, “New choice!” and whoever spoke last has to improvise a whole new scenario on the spot. Scary and fun, right?
Before studying improvisation, I’d never realized how important a skill it is for everyday life. Even with that knowledge, I seem to need to learn the lesson over and over again. Today I had another reminder.
While in line at the supermarket deli counter this morning, I missed a perfect opportunity to play “New Choice”.
It was 8:30am on a sweltering day in the Bronx. I had a short amount of time in which to do some grocery shopping and get home to watch Darshan before Jonathan headed off to a rehearsal.
When I walked up to the deli counter there were three burly construction workers ordering sandwiches for their lunch break. Each of them had a bag of three rolls from the bakery bin which they were handing to the deli guy, one by one, and ordering individual sandwiches. It was taking forever.
All I needed was ¼-pound of sliced turkey and some provolone. I was trying to wait patiently and appreciate the rare treat of having a few minutes to myself, but I just wanted to make these guys move faster! I fidgeted and shifted my weight from side to side. I sighed. Loudly. I bit my lip and checked my cell phone mindlessly.
As the guys chatted and complained about their jobs, the heat and their wives, I just wanted to scream, “Hey! All I want is a little turkey and cheese! Can’t you let me go ahead of you? It would be such an easy and nice thing for you to do! Hello?????”
New Choice!
Right there. That was the place my inner improv director could have yelled, “New choice!”
Of course, this dawned on me only after I walked away from the deli counter in annoyance, without my turkey and cheese.
Now I see all kinds of different options.
New Choice: “Excuse me, gentlemen, I have a small order. Would you mind if I went ahead?”
New Choice: Talk to the manager and see if there’s anyone to help the deli guy make sandwiches.
New Choice: Settle into waiting. Bask in the rare gift of free time.
New Choice: Skip the turkey and get pasta.
New Choice: Call a friend.
New Choice: Meditate.
New Choice: Compose this blog.
New Choice: Visualize my next big business challenge.
New Choice: Roll my neck, roll my shoulders, roll my wrists, fan my fingers.
New Choice: Stroll around the store for a few minutes until the deli counter is clear.
New Choice: Order lunch from the diner.
New Choice: Sing along to “Peace Train” by Cat Stevens which was playing overhead.
So here’s my challenge to you.
Summon your inner improv director and give her a megaphone.
“NEW CHOICE!”
I recently wrote a blog post entitled Passion Play: Part One. As the title suggests, I had every intention of writing Part Two. The topic was so alive and compelling to me, I could feel Part Two writing itself.
Since then, I’ve been drafting and re-drafting to no avail. It just doesn’t feel right to write it.
This has me thinking about the commitments we make and how we choose to honor them.
When something is alive for me, it feels effortless. When it’s not, it falls flat. It just sits there, quiet and still and bored.
Writing Part One was like a leaf gliding on a summer breeze. The words flowed and the ideas came together easily. It took me 20 minutes to write.
Writing Part Two has been like running through Jell-O. It’s clearly not alive for me right now, yet I made a public commitment to write it. Dilemma.
Does this sound familiar? When did you last commit to something, then realize when the time came to act that your heart wasn’t in it? What did that feel like?
We put so much pressure on ourselves to follow through, to keep our word, to avoid letting people down. And that pressure often has us doing things that just don’t feel quite right.
I believe that this is an enormous drain. It keeps us from freely sharing our best effort, our most sincere attention and our most alive selves with the world around us. That’s a hefty price to pay.
So I decided to write this post instead and honor what’s alive in me. And it feels more like leaf gliding than a run through Jell-O.
I’m offering “A Mom Is Born” as a group workshop in just a few short weeks.
Date: Saturday, June 26, 9am – 1pm
Location: 411 Ridgewood Road, Maplewood, NJ
Cost: $75
Click here to register. (Scroll down to the middle of the page.)
Thanks to the fantastic Gayle Lemke for inviting me to conduct this workshop for Shakti Ma.
