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Is it Hard to Change?

March 13, 2012 By Leona Rehm Leave a Comment

That depends. If I’m not the one initiating change, or worse, not even asked my opinion about the change – it’s very hard!

Case in point: I belong to a charitable organization that started with just seven of us. Today it numbers close to 250. In those early days we were like a family. Today we are like a community. In the early days I played a significant role, today six people share that role. I’m not one of the six. Things change.

Last night I heard about another change that moves us away from the “one family” into segments. Like a company whose annual picnic changes to departmental picnics on different days at different parks creates a shift in the company culture this change is also going to create a change in the organizational culture. That hurts.

Whether good or bad is still to be seen, but I wasn’t part of the decision making, so it hurts even more. I found myself in a blue funk for a couple of days until I realized I needed to make some changes and I had some choices to make:

  1. I can resist what is, be miserable about it, make people around me miserable with my griping and complaining OR I can
  2. Communicate my concerns with the leadership seeking to get things changed back by working through channels
  3. Get involved in a leadership role again
  4. Take the time to understand why this change was initiated, what problem is it the answer to and seek a different solution that does not break us down into segments
  5. Embrace the change and see what there is for me to learn in the process
  6. Accept that this change is what is and determine my own path, level of commitment and continued involvement
  7. Leave the organization to go its own path recognizing that someday our paths may diverge.

The only choice that is unacceptable is the first. I want no place in my life for resisting complaining or griping. That’s the song of the Victim. I have yet to meet a successful business owner who is a Victim. Have You?

If you’re facing a change and struggling with it, let’s talk. Change is hard, but we don’t have to be the victim of change — or our emotions.

Filed Under: Change, Courage, Musings, Options, Transformation

Financial Recovery

March 5, 2012 By Leona Rehm Leave a Comment

I work with small business owners on the personal side of being in business.  One of the most personal aspects of business, which is usually the least talked about is personal and professional finances.  However, what happens when a business owner is sloppy about the finances?  Bankruptcy, closed doors, lost jobs, broken dreams are just the beginning.  Let’s say it just isn’t pretty. 

Because small business owners are among those suffering during this economically stressful time Andrew Barber-Starkey of ProCoach Systems suggested I read “Financial Recovery” written by Karen McCall.  What is happening as a result of my read is clarifying inspiring and enlightening to say the least.  Having read it I immediately thought of my some of my clients who are struggling and recommended it to them.  They, like many of the people in her case studies, are seeing positive results.

Are you plagued by Under earning?  Doing without? Making do? Overspending?  Why?  Do you find yourself making choices you know are not in your best financial interest but rationalize your way around those choices anyway?  Why?  Karen gets you to the root cause behind those choices.  But she doesn’t stop there.  She provides good solid steps for getting out of debt and changing those behaviors for good.  It isn’t necessarily easy to make those changes, but she provides you step by step instructions with real life case studies showing how those small steps can make a big difference.  She also provides software designed for those of us for whom working with numbers is a major challenge all of its own.

Are you ready for something different for yourself, your kids, and your business?  Check out “Financial Recovery”.  You’ll be glad you did!

Filed Under: Accountability, Courage, Determination, Finances, Perserverance, Rants and Raves

Is this a Love/Hate Relationship?

February 27, 2012 By Leona Rehm Leave a Comment

Do you just love and yet sometimes hate being the CEO of your own business? 

This has been a most unexpected journey, a mind stretcher, horizon expander and the opportunity of a life time.  It’s been filled with fear and panic.  It’s been a challenge.  It’s like a roller coaster ride full of screams of terror and delight.  It’s been boring and exciting and everything in between.

I know these life expanding moments are not limited to the owners of small businesses.  Anyone who decides to take responsibility for his or her own life and especially their income is going to feel some of the same emotions.  I just didn’t know it was going to be like this when I started.  Like a therapist friend of mine said, “I didn’t become a therapist so I could run a business.  I did it to help people.”  I wonder how many others in service fields blindly entered into business thinking just being a good _______________ (fill in the blank) is all it takes.

One of my coaches made the comment, “Leona, you have to be a coach, it’s your path to self-actualization”.  In being in business for myself as a coach, I’ve had to face my fears square on, toe to toe.  I’ve had to stare my demons down and move forward despite the knot in my stomach and the all too clear voice in my head telling me I am going to fail. 

Even so, as each coaching call ends there comes the exhilaration of knowing I am doing what I was created to do, being who I was created to be – and there’s no greater thrill.

How about you?  What’s it like being the CEO of your own business?  What are the challenges you’ve overcome and continue to face?  What are the keys to your success? 

I’d love to hear your thoughts!

Filed Under: Courage, Determination, Gifts, Gratitude, Love, Perserverance, Perspective, Self-doubt, Transformation

What do you do for Love?

February 20, 2012 By Leona Rehm Leave a Comment

What do you do because you love of the other person? 

How do you answer the call to business and the call to family, especially when the time commitment conflicts?

Today my Dad is back in the hospital.  It feels like we’re beginning that long hopefully slow to arrive end of life cycle with several trips to the hospital some more critical than otheers.  And I face a quandary.  He’s bored out of his mind, wants to come home, wants people to come and visit and someone to talk to.   I’m the one who lives closest to him – the other sisters are hour or more away, but I’ve got a business to run.  I spent the weekend in the hospital with him, but I’ve got to get some of my work done too. 

Quandary:  How to decide where to spend my time and how much time to spend where?  What are the priorities and values I am to call upon to make this decision?   Does love mean I drop everything to be by his bed?  What about love for my business and need to make a profit?  What about love for the family for which I am working to provide some extra income?

I remember watching a movie about an up and coming Olympic skater who was killed in an auto accident just before tryouts.  He’d made it all the way to tryouts.  The last scene was of his father, a small business owner who had never seen his son skate.  He had a business to run and needed to make money to pay for his son’s skating lessons addition to regular family expenses.  He thought he would get to watch him skate someday – but that day never came.

I don’t want to have those feelings left over when Dad’s departure comes, but I also can’t be putting my business on hold every time he or one of my kids or my husband gets sick.

I know this isn’t unique to me.  It’s something we all face as business owners, especially if you also are a single parent.  I’m wondering what others do.  How do you decide where to put your time and energy, especially when it seems like you are being called upon to spend it in more than one place / event at a time?

For me, this time I asked, “Is Dad safe and well-cared for? (Yes)  “Is this illness, at least at this time life-threatening?” (No)  “Does he NEED me there or is it more a matter of convenience – a keeping him company in an otherwise boring situation?” (No he doesn’t need me there to prove I love him, just to be someone to talk to)  “Having spent the last 2 days there with him, can my business tolerate my absence and prosper?” (No)

Those are the questions I asked myself.  What are the questions you ask yourself?  I’d love to hear your thoughts.  Want to chat – to explore your options?  Drop me a line and let me know what you think at leona@simplyeffectivecoaching.com

Filed Under: Love, Perspective, Values

Words to Live By on Valentine’s Day

February 13, 2012 By Leona Rehm Leave a Comment

Valentine’s Day – a day of romance, flowers, chocolate, and pretty cards, a day of expectations of special treatment and loving words. If you are a business owner and even if you are swamped and fatigued there are certain rituals you are expected to perform – a special meal is just a starter. It’s considered prudent to make sure that special someone gets something special.

Well for all you men who need a little more guidance in the art of meeting expectations, here’s someone who provides us with a few choice words Title: “These Are the Things You Don’t Say to Your Wife”

Hope You Enjoy – I think he’s a hoot!

Filed Under: Courage, Gifts, Love

When Love Goes to Work

February 6, 2012 By Leona Rehm Leave a Comment

February is the month for love: Love your spouse, your kids, your pet, even the grumpy neighbor down the street or the employee who’s a pain in the, well, you know where.

I’m all about love – who isn’t? AND I’m also all about implementation, so when someone tells me to “forgive” another person and I’m still hurting or angry I ask, “HOW? Usually the answer is “just do it!” That didn’t make much sense!    No more than telling me to “trust?  Just trust!”

How do you “just forgive” someone who has hurt you? How do you “forgive?” Then one day I was introduced to Byron Katie’s book “Loving What Is”. This book provides the “HOW?”

At first glance it looks easy (funny how that is)! However when you get into the process, altho’ the process is easy, it’s takes time. When you are a newbie to “The Work” it simply takes time – to spill your thoughts and emotions onto paper and then get honest with yourself. There are four questions to answer – just four – and something she calls the “Turnaround”. What’s amazing is what happens when you take the time to answer thoughtfully and honestly. And with practice it begins to take less and less time!

Feeling stressed by a situation? Answer the four questions and do the Turnaround. See what happens with the stress. Bugged by someone? Answer the four questions and feel the shift happen deep inside you. I answered the four questions and am amazed at the changes that happened in a troubled relationship.

Byron Katie is also very generous. You can go to her website and download the four questions and Turnaround, a variety of worksheets and read more about “The Work” and how doing the work changes lives. Check out It’s all about implementation. When you think about it, what’s the good of an insight if there is no practical way to apply it?

Wishing you a Lovely week!

Leona

Filed Under: Courage, Gratitude, Love

Chocolate and Potato Chips?

February 1, 2012 By Leona Rehm Leave a Comment

Last weekend I went on the annual Quantum Leap retreat.  Quantum Leap is a mastermind group I belong to.  At this retreat, which is a blend of work and play we celebrate with a chocolate fondue.  Each year we try out some new dippers.  This year our newest member, Lorina Shinsato  suggested dipping Ruffles potato chips into the chocolate fondue.  What a shock!  My first thought was blech but you’ve got to try it to believe it!  There’s something about the crunch of the potato chip and the salt that when dipped in chocolate delights the taste buds.  It’s really quite unexpected.

It’s like being in the mastermind group itself.  There are currently four members: a naturopath, a designer in vinyl, financial planner and me, the Life Coach.  We are different people with different backgrounds coming together to support the growth and development of each other’s business.  We’ve created a safe place to talk about what’s working and what isn’t, to challenge limiting beliefs and try out new ideas and get instant feedback from a variety of perspectives.  Like potato chips and chocolate:  Who’d a thought? 

This weekend limiting beliefs were challenged, comfort zones enlarged, new goals set, values aligned with actions, action plans devised and accountabilities established so that each of us will be growing and developing personally and financially.  It’s amazing to see what can happen in a supportive collaborative atmosphere! 

If you aren’t in a mastermind group and want to grow your business I can testify to the value created when you are working with people who have made a commitment to show up, share what is and what is wanted, what isn’t working, to be engaged and present with the others, receiving and giving support. 

If your mastermind group isn’t working I can help with a little facilitation.  If you aren’t in a mastermind group and want to be, call or email and I’ll help you get into one.  I have two right now looking for 1 or 2 more participants and you might be the one that’s a good fit. 

After all, who would have thought that Ruffles potato chips and chocolate would be such a great fit?

 

 

Filed Under: Accountability, Goals, Mastermind, Support Networks, Support Structures

Godzilla the Wiener Dog

December 9, 2011 By Leona Rehm Leave a Comment

“Fear is a threshold phenomenon, the threshold of a new adventure” Doug McKegney.

Doug was my first coach and now a good friend.  In those early days fear pretty much kept me paralyzed as I wanted to venture out into the world of coaching.  Doug was the first to tell me that fear is like the shadow of Godzilla only to find when exposed to the light of day, that it’s a wiener dog.  It’s a matter of perspective.

Today’s gift, if I could give you a gift would be the gift of Perspective. 

 Life provides many events, situations, joys, sorrows, frustrations and disappointments.  However, it’s not the event that makes or breaks the person – it’s how we respond to it – the meaning we give to it. 

I’ve quoted Viktor Frankl before because what he wrote is so meaningful to me.  A Jewish psychiatrist imprisoned in Auschwitz Germany during World War Two, enduring the unimaginable later wrote,  “In the concentration camps…we watched and witnessed some of our comrades behave like swine while others behaved like saints.  Man has both potentialities within himself; which one is actualized depends on decisions but not on conditions.” 

As we enter the holiday season with all its hustle and bustle, all the frenetic energy that goes into creating a just so “perfect experience”, as that person cuts us off in line or the store runs out of your favorite (fill in the blank), as the wants exceed the money available, as things just don’t go right, my gift would be a different “Perspective”:  to choose a different more empowering interpretation of the event unfolding before you, to embrace rather than resist or resent the moment.  As teacher, speaker, coach Jim Sorenson says, “Don’t let that guy who just cut in front of you, drive away with your good mood in his trunk”.  In that moment that event may feel like a Godzilla, but in taking a different perspective it becomes the wiener dog.

Filed Under: Accountability, Courage, Gifts, Gratitude, Options, Perfectionism, Perspective, Transformation

To See What is Not

December 8, 2011 By Leona Rehm Leave a Comment

If I could give you a gift today, it would be the gift of Vision.  This one is of a particular challenge for me:  Creating my own vision of what I want for my business and my life doesn’t come easily. After reading Joni’s blog on “Horizons” and Brett’s blog on “Projects” I have a better understanding of why.  Never-the-less, without a pretty clear vision of what we want to reach, accomplish, create – how will we ever know if we’ve reached, accomplished, or created what we want?  AND how can we then rejoice and savor the sense of accomplishment before charging on to the next one?  From my conversation with Gerald Grinter came the question he was asked, “What if you get to the top of the ladder only to discover you leaned it up against the wrong wall?”  It’s important to have a vision for your business – and your life! 

Doug Firebaugh once said, “Vision is the ability to see what is not yet – So you can create what never was.”

The power to Transform  would be wasted on someone who has no vision of what they want to create.  Our nation’s founding fathers knew what they wanted, in part because it was very clear to them what they did not want (an oppressive government).  Thomas Edison knew what he wanted in part because he knew what he did not want (light instead of dark).  John F Kennedy and Ronald Reagan are both said to have given us a vision of what we could be as a nation.  Inventors and leaders have vision: that inexplicable ability to see what does not yet exist.

What’s your vision: for business and life?  Did you envision working 80 hours a week or a lot less?  Did you envision yourself and your honey on a beach sipping Mai Tai’s while others make your money work for you?  Do you have a vision?  Do you have a plan for making that vision a reality?  If not, let’s chat!  If I can’t help you – I know people who can!

Filed Under: Courage, Gifts, Goals, Musings, Support Structures, Time, Transformation, Vision Tagged With:

Problem or Promise?

December 7, 2011 By Leona Rehm Leave a Comment

If I could give you a gift today, it would be “A Problem”. 

“What?” you say, “I’ve got enough problems.  I don’t need another one!” 

But what if what I gave you was different?   What if I also gave you different eyes? 

Duke Ellington, musician, composer of over 1,000 jazz pieces, and leader of his own Big Band, once said, “A problem is your chance to do your best.”  

What if you saw the problem not as an obstacle, but an opportunity?  What if you saw the problem not as a stumbling block, but a stepping stone?   

What if today the gift I could give you was the power to Transform any Problem into a Promise waiting to be fulfilled?  Would that be a gift worth receiving?  

My friend Laurie Fournier is into Transformation. ordinary walls, windows, doors, and even electronics into unique places to remind teens and adults of the greater values in life.  She’s taken an ordinary word like “Transform” and with her vinyl decorations transforms walls, windows, doors, mirrors and even electronics into unique ways to reaffirm the greater values in life – like Transformation. 

Remember:  You already have that power within you.  It’s a matter of perspective – of seeing things differently.  If you’re having trouble with your perspective give me call or send an email.  Let’s chat.

Filed Under: Gifts, Musings, Transformation
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