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Too Many Options . . . A Fish Tale of Decisions

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Trying to Keep Your Options Open?

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Ever been at a turning point without direction?

I know I have been.

What to do next becomes harder based the number of options. Having too many options is like having 21 fishing poles along a riverbank. Running up and down checking 21 fishing poles makes it difficult to respond when a pole gets a tug — what do I do with the fish that comes? Should I keep it or invest in what the other poles might bring? Keep it too long and it will start to . . . ahem . . . stink. Tending too many options, it’s easy to end up doing nothing.

Tiffany knows what I mean.

By defining what you are about in your career, your life, your relationships, you are actually giving yourself permission to do more, because you are choosing action over the inaction unlimited choice produces. — Tiffany Monhollon

I’ve been on few bad fishing expeditions. Now I know a good fish when I see one. The key is deciding what I want in a fish to start with. It’s like the sign in my high school said, “Not to decide is a decision.”

Are you faced with too many options? What decision could change that fishing expedition?

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2008: No More Hibernation Mondays!

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What Was I Thinking?

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It’s the second full week of the New Year. How does my body know that? About this time every year — without my consent — my body decides that I’m bear not a human. Hibernation begins to look so attractive.

I wake in the morning later than usual, and my first thought is when I’ll be able to visit my pillow again.

This morning, I decided to think about that. . . . What’s this living for the future? What’s this looking forward to sleeping? How many hours, how many days have I spent getting ready in the morning telling my brain to push out chemicals that said, “I don’t really want to be here.”?

I’ve taken over — banished that bear behavior. Now my brain is saying that “Mondays are time to reconnect with the folks I’ve not seen all weekend.” That sure makes getting up easier.

No more hibernation Mondays for this girl.

I’m a person, not a bear. I’m all about living this year.

Have you hibernating or wishing you could? How are you going to wake up this year?

Thank you, .
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When a Person Dies

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I've been thinking . . .

about choosing.

This week, a dear friend’s father died.

People close to her have reactions. Some stellar folks have risen to the occasion in the most human and gentle ways. Some have only seen the inconveneince to their own scheduled lives.

It seems so basic. When a person dies, we’re brought a reminder that we don’t have each other forever. So we gather to spend what time we might in honor of those still living as well as he who died.

I wonder about those who see the whole thing as just an unpleasant event. Where do they find meaning? Do they ignore the human side of everything?

It’s a question of life and death and choosing life . . .

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Do You Talk Yourself Out of Living Life?

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(Updated in 2020.)
I’ve been thinking  about subprime living.

At times in my life, in yours too I’d bet, a brighter future sits on the horizon. We look. We imagine ourselves in that future partaking of the what ifs and the could bes. We see the how to happiness, but don’t believe in it.

Then we talk ourselves out of living, using worn words like greener grass and harder they fall. We reign in our egos and close our eyes. Birds and airplanes spend time in clouds. Satellites and comets spend time with stars. We are people. We walk on sidewalks and wood floors.

We say we want. We say we will, and we’re invested. Yet we stop short of determination. We listen when others say, “No, don’t go.” We tell ourselves the reasons we’re wrong to try. While underneath, our fear is that we’ll fail and lose everything, that the brighter future won’t be so bright.

Thinking What we have is better than nothing. is subprime living. Not losing is no where near the same as a win.

Do you talk yourself out of living life?

Be determined. Bet on yourself. Live life. Live the prime of your life.

Be irresistible.

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz on your business!!

Sunday Morning Light: Answering Why Givers Don't Ask to Get Paid

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A New Answer and a Hit

Last night, I asked a question.

Then an audience came. Real folks showed up to push me out of my head into the daylight. I got advice, ideas, tough love, and friendship. I listened carefully to every word, and I’m still listening.

The best part of community is finding out that other folks have stopped where you’re stuck standing.

From the comment, I saw the dots connecting to form the message I took from that conversation. It’s simple enough.

When If I give away my time, I’m agreeing to that contract.
If that’s not working, I need to stop doing it.

hitting one out of the park

Thank you all for helping me stand outside of myself
to see the disconnects in my thinking.

I’m a lucky girl . . .

. . . a lucky girl who’s decided that
I’m hitting one out of the park in 2008.

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz!!

(Dear Jeff, I know you hate baseball analogies.)