Whether the song brings to mind for you Buddy Holly or the Rolling Stones matters not. You might not even know the song, at all. And don’t worry, I’m not going to go off on a long diatribe about the twisted ways in which songs like this skew our image of self. Nope. I’m gonna leave it alone. This time…

You can be responsible for yourself, hold yourself accountable for your thoughts, words and deeds - all without beating yourself up when you screw up. Accept the fact that you’ll probably always make mistakes. Last time I checked, none of us were perfect, so it’s very likely to happen. But, when it does…

I have uttered these words twice in the last week, once to a coaching client and once to myself, both times in conversation about being a parent. The idea of being a lighthouse is certainly not limited to our role as parents. We can be lighthouses in all areas of our lives.

Would that we could do everything we do in life because we want to, not because we have to, huh? But I wonder - where are the ‘have to’ things coming from? As adults, who’s in charge of us, bossing us around, telling us what we ‘have to’ do?
No one.
Every day we make thousands of [...]

My sister sent me a link to a video today that I just couldn’t pass up sharing. It’s message is applicable to us as individuals striving to become ourselves and live authentic, meaningful lives, as much as it speaks to us as a nation.
www.YesWeCanSong.com
Yes We Can
It was a creed written into the founding documents that [...]

“She was becoming herself and daily casting aside that fictitious self which we assume like a garment with which to appear before the world.”
— Kate Chopin
In more than one conversation this week, I found myself saying, “You’re just becoming yourself, that’s all. And change, of any kind, tends to make us nervous, makes us question [...]

How many times have you caught yourself saying or thinking, “I can’t help it. That’s just the way I am.” Probably a lot, right?
On the one hand, it’s good to know ourselves well. Really good. But on the other hand, too often we let “that’s just the way I am” become an excuse for not [...]

I have spent a good portion of my life attempting to “pound the square peg that is me into the round holes in life” just to fit in, to feel accepted, to feel a part of enough to make a contribution. Yet all the while, I never really felt like I fit in, was accepted [...]

To get what you want, be clear about what you want.
You may be thinking, “Well, duh, Suzanne. Thanks for pointing that out.”
Once upon a time, I would have thought that, too. But not anymore, because I’m seeing the difference being clear about what I want makes in my life. It’s HUGE.
Let me give you an [...]

To some, “Do you know what you want?” may seem a silly question. Like, who doesn’t know what they want?
Well, actually, a LOT of people don’t know what they want. Granted, most people are able to make preference choices, meaning they can choose one thing over another when presented with the choice, but to [...]