I've been thinking a lot lately about the steps that are the most dependable in terms of helping us shift our mindset, actually do what we say we're going to do and begin to feel differently about parts of our lives.

I'll cut right to the chase - there is one core thing that determines whether your life will be better in a month, six months, a year. 

If you want to be confident, at some point we have to accept that we will face hard things in life. Setting expectations of what things feel like will help us feel more confident when we face the inevitable challenges.

We are all constantly in cycles of growing and dying. If you want to get really philosophical about it, every day we live is both a day of growth (if you're measuring from your birth) and death (if you're measuring from your death.

There is one tip that you hear over and over again and I know how easy it is to roll your eyes at how obvious it is.

Some in-depth, honest reflections as I ease back into business as usual after taking a week.

I always advise my clients when they're feeling an emotion, to ask themselves: “What is this emotion trying to tell you?”

This was something that had been explained to me over and over again but now I was living it in real life. It was my freshman year at Yale University. We were all living in buildings that looked like castles, navigating living away from home for the first time, looking around eagerly at the people who people had said may be “friends you'll have for the rest of your lives.” And all around us hung a question: What made each of us good enough to be accepted here?

When it comes down to it, 95% of getting what you want in life comes down to three things:

Action, Awareness, and Letting it Happen.

There is enormous value in us continuing to face moments of difficulty, over and over again in our lives. Having to deal with rude messages from a man on a dating app or disappointment about ghosting aren't just important because they're necessary steps toward what we're looking or (“you have to kiss a lot of frogs until you find your prince”).

The uncertainty, which can come with disappointments like ghosting or a “meh” date, is a sign that we're putting ourselves in a situation with the potential for upside. But if we charge our dating life with too much unknown (betting big to win big, looking for our person), it's like we're day trading - not likely to succeed in the long run! 

If there's one thing I've learned since becoming a coach - what themes I start to notice in my clients or even in the comments I get on my most recent TikTok always seem to the things that everybody (and especially I) need to hear myself. 

When something bad happens - you get ghosted, dumped, fired, rejected, ignored, forgotten - the feelings are painful. It's normal to reckon with, “how did this happen? why did this happen?” and then the follow up I hear most from clients or in the comments of videos on TikToks (whether explicitly or more subtly): “what did I do to cause this?” or in other words, “is this my fault?”

The first date went well. You think you might be able to see something with this guy. And then in advance of the second date, you realize your mind is spinning.

I know you have something in your life that you're suppressing right now. Whether it's anger, guilt, fatigue, sadness. There's something in your life, a feeling that when you start to feel that wave hit you, you immediately go to work pushing it away.

When did you learn that you can't be yourself? When did you learn that asking for consistent effort from someone your dating is “too much”? When did you learn that things don't work out for you? Or that the only way to get wealthy is by marrying rich? Or if it's easy to get, it's not worth having?

I saw all of these clients make a decision that was subtle but deeply important. They chose to believe that their view, their desires, their needs were valid. Even when in the face of fear or judgement or potential rejection, they each looked in the face of some amount of fear or downside and said: “because I want it is reason enough" and by doing so, saying “I am enough.” 

Are you in an early dating scenario and want to get closer to him/her/them? Are you feeling stuck in your job and feel like there's something more out there for you but you can't get yourself to apply for new things? Are you swiping on the apps and disappointed with what you're seeing?

Every woman at some point has tried to read the mind of the guy she’s dating, to know what he’s thinking. But this strategy sends you careening in the wrong direction, anchoring your actions on his desires versus your truth. Let’s talk about how to avoid this pitfall.

Now the choice is yours - do you speed up the process or slow it down? Do you go bravely into the world in search of your person or hide away because you remember the pain of your last disappointment or heartbreak?