Announcing: Affirmations Coaching Group For Women who have an active spiritual practice and are ready to take the power of affirmations to another level. Six sessions starting, July 20, 7:00 - 9:30 PM. Campbell.

Healthy Living Coaching Group helps you set realistic and achievable goals, helps keep you accountable while supporting you to release obstacles to your success. Reduce stress and increase well-being through healthy eating, improving self-care, increasing exercise and thinking more positively. Wednesdays, August 11 – September 29, 2010, 11:30 AM – 1:00 PM

Learning to Deal with a Narcissist Workshops Dealing with the Effects of Narcissism,Tuesday, August 10, Boundaries-Tuesday, August 24, and Interacting with a Narcissist-Tuesday, September 7, 2010 6:00-9:00 PM. Location: LifeCompass Training Center, 454 Kenneth Street, Campbell. Fee: $25/each

Assertiveness & Self-Esteem Learn to express yourself and set healthy boundaries. Six Wednesdays, September 1-October 6, 6:00 - 8:30 PM. Kaiser 408-972-3340.

Powerful Affirmations and Prayers - Audio Program
Positive Affirmations & Prayers to Lift Your Spirits Audio Program.

Also available as an MP3 Download from Amazon

Affirmation: I am open to giving and receiving.

Quote: "You can be as safe as a bird in a cage. Then you realize the birds in the trees are the ones who are singing." Hank Dekker

Due to some very painful and challenging experiences in my life, I shut down. I started living my life very carefully. My attention was on keeping myself safe, avoiding any situation or circumstance that would lead to conflict with other people or the need to set boundaries that would be anxiety producing or stressful for me. I was watching others live life from behind my self-made wall of protection.

Did you know that you can't have the experiences in life you've always wanted and dreamed of unless you're open to receiving them? For people who've experienced trauma and painful experiences especially early in life, that can be very challenging. Many people, like myself, reacted to their experiences out of fear and the need for safety took primacy over all others. What does it mean to be open?

To be open involves trusting yourself enough to set boundaries with other people, to express your truth even if it means someone will dislike or disapprove of you. It means loving and accepting yourself exactly the way you are. Over the past several years, the work of learning to love and accept myself has resulted in an opening.

When a little chick is ready to hatch, the momma doesn't open the egg and let it out. The little chick must stretch and push and struggle to crack open the shell and fight its way out. Nature set up the birthing process this way for a reason. It is in the struggle, in the midst of fighting our way out of the shell that we learn and grow, that we develop the muscles we need to face the challenges in our lives.

This is the type of work that is required to learn to live an open life, a life full of love and service. I invite you to consider the upcoming opportunities that support this type of self-work: Affirmations Coaching Group For Women, Assertiveness & Self-Esteem.

Also, check out the Learning to Deal with a Narcissist Workshops.

I also work with individuals one-on-one to help them learn to love themselves and raise self-esteem. For more information, see my website www.theevolvingself.com. Or contact me to set up a complimentary 30 minute session to explore what Spiritual Counseling and Coaching can do for you.

Newsletter Archives:
June 2010 - I Just Want to Love and Be Loved/Narcissism
May 2010 - I Yam What I Yam/Living Your Life On Purpose
April 2010 - Feelings, Nothing More Than Feelings/What if You Chose Your Parents?

Do you struggle with perfectionism? This is such a common issue for people. Somehow we believe that if we can just do things "right", which usually translates into having everyone we know admire, approve and love us, then everything in our lives will be ok. Maybe we have an ideal in our minds, a standard to which we hold ourselves and of course, no one can ever live up to that standard, including us.

I think it's time we stop shoulding all over ourselves. Telling ourselves we should do, say or be in some way other than we are is just another way to make ourselves wrong. It fills us with shame and guilt.

If we could change the vocabulary and substitute the word could instead, it might enforce the truth that each and every one of us has a choice in what we do and say. So I want to encourage you to make a choice today to be perfectly imperfect.

Perfectionism is one of the effects of being around a narcissistic person. Check out the upcoming workshops...
Dealing with the Effects of Narcissism-Tuesday, August 10, Boundaries-Tuesday, August 24, and Interacting with a Narcissist-Tuesday, September 7, 2010