Energy Drainer

Posted on May 16, 2012 by dmackinnon

I once had the experience of getting some feedback about a workshop I gave about letting go of energy drainers (anything that drains your energy).

One woman who attended the workshop thought the workshop was terrible. How do I know?  My husband told me.

Let me explain.

At the end of the workshop, I asked attendees to come up with one thing in their lives that was draining their energy and to write their name and phone number down if they wanted me to call and check up on them a week later (accountability can be a big motivator!) I had called and left a message on this woman’s machine and she called back to tell me what she thought of my class. Since I wasn’t home, my husband took the call.

At 9 o’clock that night, as I walked in the door from work, my husband told me this woman had called and then he proceeded to read from three sticky notes all the things this woman thought about my class and how irresponsible I was for telling people to stop cleaning out their basements and sending thank you cards.

As he read these words to me, I thought my husband agreed with her. I felt terrible—for days. Talk about an energy drainer!

Eventually, I started to wonder why I felt so bad. After all, I didn’t know this woman, so why did I care so much what she thought? Why was I so focused on this one negative comment when I’d received so many positive comments about the workshop? Well, because it’s human nature to focus on the negative. But also, because I thought my husband, whose opinion I did care about, agreed with her. I asked my husband if he agreed with what this woman had said. He didn’t. Okay–I felt a little better.

Then I thought about The Four Agreements, one of which is “Don’t Take Anything Personally.” What if this woman’s reaction to my workshop was about her, and not me? That felt better, too. The fact that this woman was at my workshop meant that she was probably feeling pretty drained. But my prescription for getting rid of energy drainers (Bag It, Barter It, or Better It) must have come up against one of her long-held beliefs. For all I knew, she might think she has to vacuum the carpet in the bedroom before bed and then crawl over the footboard into bed so she doesn’t leave a footprint.

I’m exaggerating (slightly), but some people do have very high expectations for themselves with regard to all manner of tasks that “must” be done.

At that thought, I absolved myself of all responsibility for this woman’s experience of my workshop. My energy went way up, so I went back over the content of the workshop and realized I was proud of it. If I could help someone let go of whatever was draining their energy, it was totally worth the occasional negative comment.

What if we didn’t take anything personally for a whole day? How would that feel?

Posted in Approval, Beliefs, The Four Agreements | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Call and Response

Posted on April 27, 2012 by dmackinnon

A friend and coaching colleague, Sarah Seidelmann, recently gave me a recorded guided meditation, called Guided Journey To Meet a Core Beastie. One evening, when I was feeling antsy, I grabbed my iPod, headed out the door to walk around (and around) my neighborhood, and listened to the guided meditation.

I met my Core Beastie: She’s a buffalo. She met me in a beautiful meadow and she brought me to Cathedral Grove, which is in Muir Woods, in California. I had visited there once, years ago, but it’s not a place you forget. It is a holy place and I was in awe when I first saw it and the same emotion came up when my buffalo brought me there.

Once I finished my guided journey, and my walk, I went back home and grabbed my Animal Speak book. I looked up buffalo, or bison, as the American buffalo is called. The Keynote of bison is “Manifesting Abundance Through Right Action and Right Power.”

The last paragraph of the description of bison reads: “If bison has shown up in your life, look for opportunities for abundance and increase. Also ask yourself some important questions. Are you honoring that which you seek? Are you remembering that the divine is essential to all things in the physical? Are you giving honor to yourself and to the efforts of others within your life? Do you show gratitude for what you already have?”

In my busyness, I thought, have I forgotten to be grateful?

I believe that there is always Call and Response. If I notice a robin in my yard, and it occurs to me to wonder what Robin means in my life right now, then I have made a call to the Universe (or Spirit, or God) and the robin is a response—to me, personally. I feel the same way about the buffalo that met me on my guided journey.

The fact that I met a buffalo on my guided journey tells me to expect abundance in my life. The fact that the buffalo brought me to Cathedral Grove tells me that I need to honor the divine in my life more and I need to express my gratitude more. My most frequent prayer is this: “Thanks!” After this guided journey, I felt the need for a little more formality in my prayers.

I immediately wrote out a gratitude list, something I used to do daily but had gotten away from. That prompted me to go find my husband to thank him for supporting me in all that I do.

Since then, I have started to go outside to pray again, another practice I had gotten away from lately.

Meeting my buffalo has made me more conscious of the abundance in my life, of all the ways I am supported, and has given me an opportunity to express my gratitude in more concrete ways. The result? More peace, more joy, more love. There is, apparently, no end to the abundance.

Posted in Call and Response, Guided Journey, Journey | Tagged , , | 8 Comments

It’s Perfect—Always

Posted on April 21, 2012 by dmackinnon

Recently my husband was adding a form to my website and he somehow made the whole website disappear from my computer. I have no idea how he did this (neither does he) but when he told me, I just said, “Okay, that’s fine.” And I meant it.

I thought, I must need to re-do my website, and I moved on with my day. I still don’t have my website back (it’s online, you can find it, I just can’t make any changes to it because I no longer have access to it!) but I plan to re-do it as soon as I can and, until then, it will stay as it is.

A few weeks ago a friend (Lisa) and I drove about an hour to Boston for an all-day writing conference.  Before we left town, we stopped at Dunkin’ Donuts. When we got to the parking garage in Boston, I looked for the little backpack I had put my wallet and pens in. Not there! As soon as I realized it wasn’t there I knew exactly where it was. I wasn’t worried. I had a strong feeling that it was all going to work out. I called my husband and asked him to go pick up my bag at the Dunkin’ Donuts.

“Is it there?” he asked.

“I’m sure it is,” I said.

“Well, can you call and check?”

“I will,” I said, “but I’ll only text you if it’s not there.”

I called the Dunkin’ Donuts and they had my bag. “Cool,” I said. “My husband’s going to come pick it up. His name is Tom.”

My friend said, “Oh, thank God! I can finally breathe normally again.”

We went on to have a wonderful day. I got to bum money off Lisa (I paid her back!), attend the conference, and I didn’t have to carry my bag around with me all day.

As I notice again and again that things always work out, I more often respond to any snafu or problem with a “this must be perfect” attitude.

“How is this perfect for you?” This is the question I’ve been asking my clients lately whenever they tell me something bad that has happened.

While this, on the surface, can be a really annoying question (that I originally heard from Brooke Castillo), it is a question that my clients can always answer.

Not sometimes. Not most of the time. Always.

There is always a legitimate, believable, true reason why a particular circumstance, no matter how crappy, is perfect for them (and you, and me.)

You may be thinking: No way is Aunt Lulu’s cutting me out of the will perfect for me, or something similar, but I invite you to close your eyes and meditate on whatever your situation is, and see if you can find the answer to the question—

How is that perfect for you?

Let me know what comes up.

Posted in Acceptance, Beliefs, Self-coaching, thought work | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

It’s Not You…It’s Me

Posted on April 14, 2012 by dmackinnon

A good friend, Jane, recently called me to vent about her husband. She’s married, has  three beautiful children and a full-time teaching job.

She said, “I was enjoying a yogurt after clearing the table, filling the dishwasher, and cleaning off the island, when Pete asked me if I was going to wash the kitchen table. I told him I would do it and he said, ‘now?’ I told him no, that I would do it after I finished my yogurt.”

All this sounded reasonable to me, except the part about him asking her if she was going to do some work.

“You’re not going to do it,” he replied. “You always say you’re going to do it, but you never do. When are you going to mail that package?” He gestured to a package that was sitting on the coffee table. “You’re not going to do that, either. You should just throw it out.”

Jane told me all this and my heart went out to her. I wanted to call her husband a jerk and tell her to tell him to shove it.

But would that help my friend? Not in my experience. So I went with my second thought, rather than my first.

“Wow,” I said, “the thoughts in his head must be really stressful if nagging at you like that makes him feel better.”

“What do you mean?” Jane asked.

“Well, can you imagine how bad you would have to feel–what story you would have to be telling yourself–that would make talking like that to someone you love the best thing you can do in that moment?”

“Hmm,” Jane said. We went on to talk about other things.

Jane and I caught up with each other the following week and she said I really helped her.

“How?”

“You said Pete’s thoughts must be stressful to make him talk to me like he did,” she said. “It made me realize what he was saying really had nothing to do with me and I was able to let it go.”

Cool.

It doesn’t matter what another person says to us—it’s always about them.

Last night my husband and I were talking about my son’s reaction to one of his toys breaking.

“He just put his head down and started crying,” I said as I rinsed dishes in the sink.

“I remember feeling that way when I was a kid,” my husband said.

“Me, too.” I said, “but I’ve never seen him react that way before.”

“Well, developmentally, he’s becoming more aware,” my husband said.

“I know that!”

Once again, my defensiveness rears its ugly head.

Was my husband making a comment about my knowledge of child development? I don’t think so. I reacted to my thoughts about not practicing medicine for the past two years.

His words had nothing to do with me, and my thoughts about his words had nothing to do with him.

Excuse me while I go apologize for over-reacting to my husband.

Posted in Judgements, thought work | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Choosing Not To Suffer

Posted on March 22, 2012 by dmackinnon

The other day my stepson and his friend came to my house to pick up some of the stuff my stepson had stored in our basement as he was moving to a new apartment. They said they needed to make another trip so I invited them to stay for dinner when they returned. They said yes, so I went into “cooking for company” mode.

I spent the afternoon cooking and baking. I had planned to go for a run or a swim, since my husband was home to watch our young son, but I cooked instead. I happily seared meat and chopped vegetables. When I got to the point where everything was cooking, I pulled out my stand mixer and whipped up a batch of cookie dough so I could make a special dessert.

Just as I was putting the finishing touches on the meal, I saw the truck pull up out back and my guys started loading furniture into it from the basement. I watched them out the kitchen window for a minute and then went back to the stove.

Ten minutes later, my husband and son came in.

“They’re not staying for dinner, Di,” my husband said.

“Oh, okay,” I said. “Are they out front?”

“No, they left. They wanted to get back and start unloading.”

“They didn’t even say good bye?”

“I’m really sorry,” my husband said.

I stood for a second, tongs in one hand, oven mitt on the other. I had a decision to make. I could either be really upset that I had cooked all afternoon “for nothing,” or I could let it go.

Truthfully, I love to cook, so company coming is an excuse for me to take time to cook a big meal. I could have gone running and picked up pizzas on the way home. I chose not to.

I shrugged and said, “That’s okay, Tom, it’ll still be a good supper.”

And it was.

Posted in Behavior, Beliefs, thought work | Tagged , | 2 Comments

Belief = Action

Posted on March 7, 2012 by dmackinnon

If you really want to know what I believe, look at my behavior.

For example, I’ve been saying for years that I wanted to get out of debt, that having debt is not for me. But if you looked at my spending habits, you could see that I didn’t really believe this. I would buy things with credit, and I was totally unreasonable about gifts. I would spend so much at Christmas-time that I was embarrassed to tell my husband. So I got defensive (as usual.)

I’m sure my husband concluded that I didn’t really believe getting out of debt was important.

If you really want to know what someone else believes, look at what he or she does. I once had a client who had three small children. Her husband called himself a “family man” all the time. He worked hard all week “for the family,” and spent every weekend from May to September working on a pit crew in one of the race car circuits. Which meant he left for work on Friday morning and his wife and kids didn’t see him again until Monday after work.

He said his highest priority was his family, but his behavior didn’t match. When I pointed this out to my client, who was trying to follow her own path, she realized that she needed to make some changes in her marriage. Since she worked full-time and had total responsibility for the children, she had no time to even think about how she would like to spend her time.

My client sat down and had a heart-to-heart conversation with her husband one weekend when the kids were busy elsewhere. When she pointed out that his behavior put their family last rather than first, he responded amazingly well. Unlike me, he didn’t get defensive. So now they spend their summer weekends together in the woods or at the lake in the camper they bought with the money he made from working the pit crew.

Back to me: I believe getting out of debt is important. So I’m no longer “renting my money” from the bank (Meadow Devor, a money coach, uses this phrase in her book, Money Love.) I pay for what I buy with money I have. Also, my husband and I got rid of some recurring expenses that we decided were not as important as getting out of debt, like cable and Netflix DVDs. Now, when I go out to dinner with family or friends, I don’t automatically pay for everyone, unless I have the cash in my pocket. I used to see that as being stingy, but now I see it as being honest.

One category of spending I haven’t changed is Charity. I have a very selfish reason for doing this: What goes around comes around.

That’s something I believe, too.

Based on your behavior, what do you believe?

Posted in Behavior, Beliefs, Limiting Beliefs | Tagged , | 2 Comments

Remedial Play

Posted on February 13, 2012 by dmackinnon

I truly believe that playing is an essential part of a happy life and, on a more practical level, I also believe that it is an essential part of a productive, useful life. The second part of that statement really appeals to my Puritan work ethic, so I’m going to go with it. I’m not just telling myself whatever feels good, I’m helping myself become a better, stronger, more useful person when I play.

When the days, weeks and months go by and suddenly I realize I haven’t played in a really long time, I sometimes can’t think of anything that feels like play to me.

That’s when I go back to the five senses.

Touch: What feels good to me? A long, hot shower comes immediately to mind. I know that doesn’t sound like play, but we’re talking getting back to basics here and it’s a good place to start.

Hearing: What sounds good to me? Music feeds the soul. And it gives us a way to experience strong emotions in a structured, safe way. When the sad song ends, so do our tears. On the other hand, a happy song like “I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles)” by The Proclaimers can have me bouncing around all day.

Sight: What looks good to me? Nature! Trees, rocks, sky. Bright light. Sometimes just looking out my window at the tree branches swaying in the winter wind is enough to change my perspective.

Taste: What tastes good to me? Oh, so many things. Today, a pineapple smoothie makes me smile and feel like I’m on vacation.

Smell: What smells good to me? I used to wear perfume every day, but since I had my son, that sort of went out the window. But taking half a second to spray a little Happy (by Clinique) on my wrists really does make me happy every time I smell it.

Play doesn’t have to be a board game or a roller coaster ride. It can be more subtle than that and still create a feeling of well-being and possibility. Not that I’m against board games or roller coasters (or the Spider Man ride at Universal Studios in Florida—I love that ride!) Even if we can’t get to a Florida theme park, we can still play the day away.

What do you do to play?

Posted in Play | Tagged | 7 Comments

Saying No Is Not a Bad Thing

Posted on January 30, 2012 by dmackinnon

Who would you rather ask a favor from? Say you need a babysitter or even, God forbid, to borrow $100?

Here are your choices:

Friend A, who will interrogate you about why you need a babysitter or what you want the money for. You know she will do this as she always does. She’ll usually do you the favor or give you the money, but you can’t get out of explaining why—and she doesn’t always approve of your reasons.

Friend B, who will ask you the date and time and how long if it’s the babysitting gig, or will ask you when you need the money if it’s the loan. Once you answer those questions, she says “yes,” or “no.” And that’s the end of it.

Who did you pick? I pick Friend B. I don’t mind her saying no, and I really like not having to explain my reasons for wanting or needing a favor. Having to justify my request makes me feel like a child. And I’m not—a child, that is. I’ve been making my own decisions for many a year now.

Byron Katie talks about three kinds of business in her book, Loving What Is. There is: my business, your business, and God’s business.

Whose business is it what I need a babysitter for? Mine. Whose business is it whether or not a friend babysits for me? Hers. All she needs to decide is whether or not she can babysit.

Whose business is it what I need $100 for? Mine. Many people might disagree, but I believe this is true. Whose business is it whether or not my friend loans me money? Hers.

So I will usually choose Friend B to go to for a favor, and I am trying hard to be a Friend B. It’s not always easy, and we haven’t even talked about God’s business! All I’ll say about that is I can’t control the things I can’t control, so I’m not even going to try (mostly.)

Are you a Friend A or a Friend B?

Posted in thought work | Tagged , , , | 3 Comments

Who’s Judging Me?

Posted on January 21, 2012 by dmackinnon

My husband, Tom, left the country and dry land for three weeks. I stayed home with our son. In some ways, life was harder, but in some ways, life was a lot easier.

I noticed about a week after Tom left, that I felt good. Lighter. I had more “work” to do, and less time to myself, but I was doing surprisingly well.

I thought about why. I realized that I felt “disapproved of” by my husband very often. Does he disapprove of me? He says he doesn’t.

Before my husband left on his trip, he had been working a schedule that kept him at work until 9 PM. So we were in each other’s company very little for the past three months. And I still felt his disapproval. How could that be?

Who was really disapproving of me?

Me.

I make up that he is disappointed that I cooked only for myself and our son, that I didn’t make a meal that included a portion he could take to work for lunch or dinner the next day.

Has he ever asked me to make enough for him for leftovers? Nope.

I make up that he thinks I should get more done during the day than I do.

Has he ever said this? Never.

If I do pack a lunch for him for work, he is very appreciative. If I mention that I didn’t get much done that day, he’ll say that I’m taking care of Joey and that’s a full-time job.

For some reason, with Tom on a boat in Central America, he was so far away from me that I just did my own thing without thinking about whether or not he would approve. And it felt great.

What’s stopping me from feeling great when he’s back home? When he’s at work? When he’s out running?

My thoughts.

So I decided to question my thoughts about Tom and whether or not he approves of me.

Since he’s been home, I’ve been doing a lot of questioning. Mostly “Is it true?” The answer is always “no.”

One night when he was very tired, he made a couple of comments that, in the past, I would have taken as evidence of his disapproval.

We were reading in bed before going to sleep. In the past, when he shuts out his light and almost immediately asks, “are you almost done?” I would hear that he thinks I’m inconsiderate.

But this time, I questioned my thought. Here’s how I did it, using Byron Katie’s method:

Thought: Tom thinks I’m inconsiderate because he asked me if I was almost done reading.

1. Is it true? I don’t know.
2. Can I absolutely know that it’s true? No.
3. How do I feel/what do I do when I think this thought? Lousy. I feel bad, like a chastised child. I shut off the light, but I’m resentful. I never ask him to shut off his light when he’s reading! I say goodnight but it’s grudging and that’s not how I want to end my day.
4. How do I feel/what do I do if I couldn’t think this thought. I would feel fine. I would answer Tom and move on.

That’s what I did this time. I answered Tom with “I’m almost done,” finished my page, and then shut off my light. No bad feelings, no disapproval.

A very small moment in my life, but when all the small moments feel bad, it adds up to a pretty miserable day.

Changing that very small moment allowed me to end my day in peace and love—not such a small thing, right?

Where in your life are you making up that someone disapproves of you?
Try questioning these thoughts.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

Wildly Improbable Goals

Posted on December 30, 2011 by dmackinnon

Back in the fall, I started thinking about goals for 2012. More specifically, I reviewed my list of WIGs (Wildly Improbable Goals). Martha Beck talks about them in her book, Finding Your Own North Star. WIGs are goals that seem almost impossible but they are things you really, really want in your life.

A WIG that I have had for years is to study French in France. I lived in Switzerland many years ago and became fluent in French but haven’t really spoken the language in twenty years. It’s been a dream of mine to sit in a café in Paris and speak French with someone who can correct my grammar and my accent (and tell me cool stories about the history of Paris). I don’t think it will take long before I can speak French again, ably, if not fluently.

So I reviewed my list, added a couple of new WIGs, then put it away and forgot about it.

A couple of weeks later, my sister Donna called me. “What do you think about going to Paris in April?” she asked.

Donna told me that a friend of hers is planning to do the Paris Marathon and she was thinking about going to watch her run.

I said I’d think about it, but a part of me started to get excited. When this kind of synchronicity happens, it’s usually just the first of many.

About a week later, my husband and I were talking about vacation plans for 2012 (he has to plan his vacation time at least six month in advance).

I asked him what he thought about me going to Paris in April.

His response was, “We can’t afford it.”

I told him I was committed to our get-out-of-debt plan and I wasn’t going to go into debt to visit Paris.

In my mind, I continued the conversation (you know how you do that? The person you were talking to leaves the room, and you keep thinking of things you wanted to say?) Anyway, here’s what I was thinking at Tom: But if I assume I can’t afford it, I won’t think about it and then I definitely won’t be able to go. If I keep my mind open, maybe something will happen or I can figure out a way to pay for it and then I’ll be able to go.

About a week later, I was talking to a friend about staying open to possibilities and I ended up telling her my philosophy about WIGs and how I was hoping to go to Paris but I needed to figure out how to pay for it.

She said that, as a retired flight attendant, she could get me a “buddy” ticket to Paris. “It wouldn’t be free,” she said, “you’d have to pay around $120.”

As soon as she said that, I said, “See? If I hadn’t kept my mind open, I never would have mentioned it and I’d never have known that I could possibly get a ticket from a friend!”

By now, I know that my trip to Paris is a done deal. I don’t know all the details about how it’s going to happen and how I’ll pay for it, but I know it’s going to happen. I’ll keep working hard at the things I know how to do, and some other unexpected, helpful, thing will happen that I can’t even imagine yet.

My friends, Evie and Allie, two amazing shaman, have a meditation CD that I love. In it, Evie says to “see your prayer already answered,” and then let go of the how.

Once you set a goal or name an intention, you set something in motion that is beyond your own efforts. Once you declare to the Universe what you want, the Universe will work on your behalf in ways that you cannot imagine.

What are your WIGs? Take some time to think about what you really want that seems almost impossible today, then write it down and see what comes next.

Posted in Goal setting | Tagged , | 4 Comments