Why Everyone Needs A Cindy!

Posted on Aug. 27, 2010 by Baeth.

My world-class business manager, Cindy Gallo

So, would you like a business manager that anticipates your needs? Organizes your office (and your life)? Can manage web sites, online shopping carts and lots of customer inquiries? A business manager who creates so much business, that you have to start paying her commission as an act of appreciation? Oh, yeah, EVERYONE needs a Cindy!!!

Since we’re not hiring out ‘our Cindy,’ I’m going to share with you EXACTLY how we attracted Cindy into our business and how you can do the same.

First, Mark, my husband, and I sat down and discussed our ideal business manager. We listed his/her qualities.

Then Mark crafted a job posting to put on www.craigslist.com.

Here’s how the listing read (feel free to ‘swipe’ and modify for your Self!):

Craig’s List Help Wanted

Husband-and-wife-entrepreneur team seeks personal admin assistant that is motivated, reliable, responsible and organized and that wants to excel in their own life and is looking for a long-term commitment. Our business is growing rapidly and this is an excellent opportunity for growth in pay, responsibility and additional commission-based income above hourly rate (or salary).

Our business consists of Dan Kennedy-style online and offline information marketing with related workshops (in town and in other states) and public speaking engagements. We are also real estate investors, so an understanding of real estate paperwork requirements would be helpful.

Knowledge of 1ShoppingCart (or other similar shopping cart software), autoresponder setup and delivery, email marketing, ezine delivery and shopping cart data base management will greatly affect pay rate, as will a basic knowledge of website programming.

Great opportunity for rapid advancement in pay and responsibility with commission opportunities for up-selling products to existing customers. Some travel is essential for help with our out-of-town workshops and speaking engagements where you will be our personal assistant (all travel and expenses paid).

This is a positive, energetic and FUN business and we are looking for someone with a personality to match. You will work with us at our home (moving soon, location not yet determined). You will also work virtually with other team members in other states and some work from your home is also possible.

Must have your own car and be willing to do errands around town such as make deposits, pick up office supplies and mail, etc.

ESSENTIAL requirements:

Good communication skills and a cheerful disposition
Have own laptop computer with relatively current software
Typing and word processing ability
Understanding of Microsoft Outlook or similar
Understanding of database management
Understanding of Power Point and Excel spreadsheet setup
Faxing, filing, answering phones
Dealing with customer service issues
Scheduling appointments
Mailing out customer kits

$_____ to $_____/hr to start, with opportunity to advance rapidly to FT salary w/benefits

We then received nearly 50 resumes!

We dumped all the ones that were unrelated to our requests or had typos.

I then found Cindy’s resume and thought, “This woman is PERFECT!” BUT it said she lived in San Diego. Hmmmm… we live in Tucson. Mark called her and found out she was moving back to Tucson after being away for a while. Lucky us!

Now here’s the kicker: Cindy was the ONLY person we interviewed. We liked her and hired her immediately with a 90-day probationary period as a 1099 contractor. She sailed through with flying colors and then we hired her as a salaried employee. Our bookkeeper handles the tax payments and paychecks for our employees.

Now Cindy needs her own assistant! So we’ve put her in charge of hiring someone to help her, using the same process.

However, we improved the process to make it simpler, by adding this instruction as a ‘test’ to the job posting:

“If you would like to be considered for the position, please send a typo-free cover letter and resume. Let us know why you think you are perfect for this position in your cover letter. Send both documents via FEDEX to this address: The Hand Analyst, Inc., 7320 N. La Cholla Blvd., Suite 154-515, Tucson, AZ 85741 by this date____________. No emailed resumes or phone calls accepted.”

That request weeds out all the looky-loos and brings you only seriously invested candidates for your job opening.

Here’s to your success finding ‘your Cindy’ because “everyone needs a Cindy!”

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Belief, Self-Worth and Expansion

Posted on Aug. 27, 2010 by Baeth.

I’ll tell you what I really think. I think that many popular human beliefs are bunk, child’s play, even foolish. Beliefs we take for granted now – a round Earth spins around the sun, invisible germs cause illness, the music industry must adapt or die – were once laughed at as fantasy. Question EVERYTHING.

This is what I’ve come to understand, for myself, about belief. Since you can believe whatever you want, why not foster beliefs that honor your Highest Self? Why not cultivate thinking that says “yes” with curiosity rather than shutting something out because you can’t make it fit inside your worldview?

I’ll give you an example. Recently, I had dinner with some new acquaintances. We were discussing what to charge in our businesses. One of the women, a passionate yoga instructor, bristled when I suggested that her financial pinch was likely due to undercharging, and in many instances, giving her work away for free or nearly free.

She began defending her pricing, explaining to me that the economy, the neighborhood her business is located in and the clients themselves simply couldn’t sustain higher prices. Her voice grew tight and angry.

Bunk.

What she was really defending was her desire to stay small and safe in the world she knew.

To find more desirable clients willing to pay more desirable prices, she would have to drop the external explanations for her financial challenges and expand internally into a new concept of herself.

In other words, this talented teacher and healer needed to find the inner KNOWING of her own value and worth, then be open to receiving its reflection back to her in the form of ideal clients, more money and more joy.

Her financial expansion actually depends on her capacity to expand her awareness of her profound and needed value in the world.

At some point, most of us come to the realization that our beliefs either expand our consciousness (and opportunities!) or contract our soul to the point of alienation, stagnation, boredom, apathy, frustration, even rage or depression.

In my late 20s, I had to reach the point of questioning the usefulness of my own life – and damaging my health, relationships and self-esteem in the process – to realize that I had to make a radical shift in my thinking, in my conscious awareness, in order to get out of my self-imposed (and frankly, self-indulgent) exile.

I resorted to prayer and asked, “God, Universe, Higher Power – whatever is out there – if you show me my Life’s Purpose, I will forever be your humble servant.”

Two weeks later, a young woman named Terry-Linn showed up at my door and explained, via my palms, that my Life Purpose is to be a “Successful Spiritual Teacher and Business Owner with a Special Message for the Masses.” Um, okay.

I didn’t stop crying for about a month after that session. But I decided to ‘believe’ this concept about myself and my purpose on the planet. What IF what she told me was true? What could it hurt to believe it? My own self-concept wasn’t getting me any traction forward.

My life began to change in subtle and dramatic ways. Subtle: I started eating better, my chronic bronchitis cleared up, the negative ‘friends’ dropped away. Dramatic: I quit my job, got a business loan, started a business, took a road trip called “Hands of America” that funded my travels around the U.S. and was actually making a good living doing something I LOVED – reading hands.

I found wonderful friends, had amazing adventures traveling to new places and discovered something that had once been a foreign concept to me – I was okay. Could it be that the magnificence of the Universe lived in every cell of my body? Could it be that I was expanding like the Universe, coming to know myself through education, experience and ecstatic creative expression?

YES. My belief system had changed and I was completely transformed with it.

I’ve since come to ‘believe’ that negative thinking is not of the Universe. It is a natural consequence of nature wanting to protect our precious flesh-and-blood body, but beyond that, is unnecessary. I’d go so far to say, that today (it could change tomorrow – when I discover something else!) I believe that our TRUE LIFE PURPOSE is to love, enjoy and create in order to fulfill the Universe’s desire to expand through our expanding consciousness.

As YOU expand your self-concept, you literally shift the consciousness of the Universe. How cool is that? Now THAT is a belief I can get behind.

So, today, I leave you with this:

YOU are gorgeous and blessed. You’ve been given the perfect physical body, mind and spirit to create exactly what you came here to create. And what you came here to create is exactly – and ONLY – what YOU WANT TO CREATE. You have the total power to DECIDE. You have the total power to BE. ONLY YOU. The entire Universe lives inside you. As you see and declare you own magnificence and worthiness, never again will you question your right to be joyful, blissful and expressed. You are here now to learn, love, and most of all, live it, live it ALL, full out, no excuses! What are you waiting for? BE, DO and HAVE what you really, really, really want right now.

Why?

I want my consciousness to keep expanding! I thank you for loving yourself. And so does the Universe.

Bring your Life Purpose and Life Lesson questions to our NEXT Life Purpose Master Mind TeleClass on Thursday, September 23rd at 5 PM Pacific. For NEW MEMBERS ONLY, the first month is FREE and the new investment is $19.97 a month thereafter. GO HERE to get onboard. Our BRAND NEW Life Purpose Master Mind site will be up shortly! Join the hundreds of members who are committed to living their Life Purpose FULL OUT in 2010 and BEYOND!

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“Another Life Lesson Revealed, Part 7: Wise Risk-Taking vs. Fence-Sitting”

Posted on Aug. 05, 2010 by Baeth.

Sometimes your Life School, whether it be Peace, Wisdom, Love or Service, is also your Life Lesson. This data is derived from your fingerprint patterns.

What does this mean?

Well, your Life School is the foundation of your ‘magic purpose pyramid:’

Your Life School foundation is where you learn through trial and error the necessary skills to navigate the potholes, gremlins, and creepy crawlies at level two of the pyramid: Your Life Lesson. Your Life Lesson is your shadow, your nemesis, your ‘I just can’t get rid of it’ issue.

AND your Life Lesson is the breakthrough to your life. If you MASTER your Life Lesson with equanimity and grace to the best of your ability, you are granted an all-access pass to the top level of the pyramid, the penthouse suite – Your Life Purpose!

Sometimes your Life School and Life Lesson are the same, meaning your Life Lesson could be Peace, Wisdom, Love or Service.

Today, we’re going to look at the School of Wisdom as Life Lesson. If Wisdom is your school and/or Life Lesson, pay close attention. If not, just be aware that we all deal with “wisdom” issues at some point in our lives.

The School of Wisdom is about using what you know, about taking action by accessing all of your inner resources and learning through both understanding and experience.

Folks in the School of Wisdom tend to swing between two polarities. One is inaction and indecision. The other is reckless action, usually initiated to break the inertia caused by the former condition of fence-sitting.

Each Life School is related to a different part of the human experience: School of Peace (Body) = feeling safe in your body and on the planet; School of Love (Heart) = expressing what you feel fully and experiencing unconditional love; and School of Service (Spirit) = connecting to the Divine and being an expression of presence in all you do by learning to serve your Self first so that you can serve others.

The School of Wisdom is the realm of the mind but more specifically, the aspect of the mind that allows us to make decisions and then take ACTION on those decisions. The element associated with the School of Wisdom is fire. Fire represents movement, change, blazing a trail, initiation, beginnings and transformation. The goal is to get ‘out of your head’ and into motion, to move your hands and legs of fire and make your mark in the world.

The Core Fear for the School of Wisdom is the fear of making a wrong decision, hence the indecision and waffling. The upside of this fear is that folks in the School of Wisdom tend to be great analysts, engineers, lawyers, contract specialists, strategists, financiers and planners of all sorts. Any type of work that requires heavy analysis, investigation and fact checking utilizes the typical skepticism, scrutiny and sometimes-cynicism of the typical ‘Wisdom’ student.

The downside for Wisdom students can include fixation on particular Catch-22 problems that seem to have no resolution, repetitive negative-thought patterns, and relentless anxiety and agitation. Whereas folks in the School of Peace tend to deal with a more visceral, body-based panic when up against their demons, School of Wisdom folks deal in anxiety, followed by emotional shutdown and backed up by a persistent line of reasoning that may, in fact, lack a good deal of reason.

If you need someone to help you come up with a good strategy, a School of Wisdom member is usually a good candidate. And if you’re in the mood to be driven crazy by a repetitive argument that cannot be won (School of Wisdom folks specialize in mind riddles), engage a Wisdom School student.

The breakthrough for you if Wisdom is your test is learning how you make decisions and then using your own system to MAKE DECISIONS and ACT upon them.

For example, perhaps when presented with a new opportunity that requires a quick decision, you:

• Scan your body (School of Peace) for any physical symptoms or sensations;
• Then check in with your heart to see how you’re feeling (School of Love) and
• Then ask yourself, “Does this opportunity help me more fully express my Life Purpose in the world and be of Service?” (School of Service)
• Finally, review your diagrams and lists and check your facts.
• Now that you have all of this information, on the balance of things, what is your conclusion? DECIDE.
• Now take action on your decision.

Once you have made your decision, I recommend you don’t look back and just move forward. Doubting our decisions after we’ve made them is incredibly debilitating to our self-esteem and ability to stay on track.

As you begin to trust your decisions and take action with more certainty, you are going to notice what works and what doesn’t. Life isn’t about making the ‘right’ choice, but learning from the choices we do make so we can make better choices moving forward. The more you are able to commit to your decisions and put yourself at stake for something that really matters to you, the less anxiety and the more joy you will experience.

Two books I highly recommend for those on the Wisdom path are Power vs. Force by Dr. David Hawkins and Leadership and Self-Deception: Getting out of the Box by The Arbinger Institute www.arbinger.com. Both books are lucid and compelling investigations into the sometimes-twisted workings of the mind and how the mind can be your road to emancipation or enslavement.

Bring your Life Purpose and Life Lesson questions to our NEXT Life Purpose Master Mind TeleClass on Thursday, August 19^th at 5 PM Pacific. For NEW MEMBERS ONLY, the first month is FREE and the new investment is $19.97 a month thereafter. (NOTE: For regular and returning members, on your next billing cycle, you’ll be billed at ONLY $19.97! Unbelievable!)

GO HERE to get onboard. Our BRAND NEW Life Purpose Master Mind site will be up shortly! Join the hundreds of members who are committed to living their Life Purpose FULL OUT in 2010 and BEYOND!

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“Another Life Lesson Revealed, Part 5: Service vs. Sacrifice”

Posted on Jul. 16, 2010 by Baeth.

Sometimes your Life School, whether it be Peace, Wisdom, Love or Service, is also your Life Lesson. This data is derived from your fingerprint patterns.

What does this mean?

Well, your Life School is the foundation of your ‘magic purpose pyramid:’

Your Life School foundation is where you learn through trial and error the necessary skills to navigate the potholes, gremlins, and creepy crawlies at level two of the pyramid: Your Life Lesson. Your Life Lesson is your shadow, your nemesis, your ‘I just can’t get rid of it’ issue.

AND your Life Lesson is the breakthrough to your life. If you MASTER your Life Lesson with equanimity and grace to the best of your ability, you are granted an all-access pass to the top level of the pyramid, the penthouse suite – Your Life Purpose!

Sometimes a person’s Life School and Life Lesson are the same, meaning their Life Lesson could be Peace, Wisdom, Love or Service.

Today, we’re going to look at the School of Service AS Life Lesson. If Service is your school and/or Life Lesson, pay close attention. If not, just be aware that we are all moving toward Service. Why? Service is the alpha and the omega – Service with a Blissful Heart is WHY we are all here. Our unique Life Purposes are HOW we serve. For example, if your Life Purpose is Public Impact in the Healing Arts, THAT purpose IS how you serve.

To be a Master of Service, you must first Master Serving Your Self. Otherwise, you will begin to feel resentment. Resentment is the core challenge emotion for folks in the School of Service.

A wonderful book about the Service journey is Siddhartha by Herman Hesse. Siddhartha is one of the names for Buddha. Siddhartha gave up being a prince to become an ascetic only to then dive into the deepest depths of his own feelings, regrets, challenges, and peak experiences through pleasure. In the end, he found life by a river. He connected with nature as he connected with his own inner nature. It is a heartbreaking and beautiful story about allowing life to come to us, rather than chasing after it. For all we need is truly inside of us.

If you feel resentment, there are two things you can do to fill your cup. My dear friend, Orna Walters, describes it this way: “You are the cup and the saucer. Fill your cup to overflowing so that you always give from the saucer – never from the cup. What’s in the cup is YOURS.” One way to fill the cup is to honor your appetites for nourishing pleasure. It could be an afternoon of solitude, a visit to an art gallery, a new pair of shoes, some body work, a mini-vacation, a long vacation. What service do you need to fill up your cup? (Note: Service folks typically have five-star taste. I suggest you honor that while still honoring your spending plan, of course.)

Secondly, to keep yourself ‘serviced,’ you need to make requests for service – from others. Service folks are notoriously unskilled at this task. That’s right – ASK. Ask for more help on the committee, ask for someone to help you move your household belongings, ask someone to honor your boundary, ask for pleasure and ask for peace. ASK for all you need. But be sure to state it this way: “May I make a request?” Then make your request, gently and calmly. Watch the world begin to serve you and your resentment fall way.

Let’s face it – if you aren’t good at receiving service, what’s going to happen when you give lots and lots of it without receiving much back? That’s right – you’re going to be pissed off. That resentment taints your work in the world. If you show up to pitch in at the soup kitchen and you’re in a foul mood, this being your eighteenth commitment this week, um, don’t do anyone any favors, okay? Stay home.

As you fill your cup and make requests, you manage your resentment. You begin to feel served. This helps you cultivate a sense of gratitude and appreciation. From there, you can access a state of inner bliss. The GIFT of the served service individual is enlightenment, the great lesson of the heavens: BE HERE NOW. As you see that the Universe is supporting and servicing you, your capacity to serve others expands. As you see the Divine in your Self, you see the Divine in others.

Namaste. “I bow reverently to you.”

Bring your hand questions to our NEXT Life Purpose Master Mind TeleClass on Thursday, July 22^nd at 5 PM Pacific. For NEW MEMBERS ONLY, the first month is FREE and the new investment is $19.97 a month thereafter. (NOTE: For regular and returning members… on your next billing cycle, you’ll be billed at $19.97! Unbelievable!)

GO HERE to get onboard. Our BRAND NEW Life Purpose Master Mind site will be up shortly! Join the hundreds of members who are already committed to living their Life Purpose FULL OUT in 2010 and BEYOND!

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“15 Biz Niches – Which Is YOURS?”

Posted on May. 18, 2010 by Baeth.

Ah, your finger zones. Zones of revelation, zones of discovery, zones of treasure. Your finger zones reveal much more than you would ever realize just by looking at them.

You might think they are arbitrary spaces created by the placement of your finger joints. But they are so much more!

Your finger zones reveal:

• Hidden talents and hobbies

• Your “niche” in business

• Where you spend the most (and least) amount of time in your daily life

Today, let’s explore how these zones reveal your particular business niche.

First of all, make a note of these diagnostic tools:

Width of the zone indicates how much you DISPLAY the quality in question (Wide = big display; narrow = not so much.)

Length of the zone indicates how much TIME you spend there (Long zone = you spend lots of time there; short zone = not so much.)

Thickness of the zone indicates how much ENERGY you have for that part of your life (Thick = lots of energy, thin/flat = not so much.)

If you want to get really specific about this, measure each zone with a tape measure and ruler in relationship to the other zones on the same finger… or just leave it to me, the analyst! He he…

Okay, let’s dive right in:

Thumb:
Zone 1: Your Voice (also represents throat chakra) Possible careers: singer, speaker, writer, newscaster, poet, salesperson
Zone 2: Your Plan (also represents third eye/middle of forehead chakra) Possible careers: organizer, strategic planner, project manager, psychic/seer
Zone 3: Your Will (also represents crown/top of head chakra)
Possible careers: captain, CEO, star

Index Finger:
Zone 4: Your Territory/Turf
Possible careers: lobbyist, labor leader, manager
Zone 5: Your Goals
Possible careers: career coach, high achiever, flashy businessperson
Zone 6: Your Higher Vision
Possible careers: politics, advocacy, entrepreneur

Middle Finger:
Zone 7: Your Values/Ethics/Morals
Possible careers: life coach, environmentalist, landscape architect, precious metals/land investor
Zone 8: Your Money in the Bank
Possible careers: financial planner, business person, money making as part of purpose
Zone 9: Your Systems and Strategies
Possible careers: systems analyst, composer, scientist, metaphysician

Ring Finger:
Zone 10: Your Charisma Factor
Possible careers: HR expert, headhunter, socialite, charity fundraiser
Zone 11: Your Personal Design
Possible careers: jewelry/furniture/clothing/web site designer
Zone 12: Your Taste and Artist’s Eye
Possible careers: architect, painter, photographer, collage maker

Little Finger:
Zone 13: Your Sex Life
Possible careers: therapist, tantra expert, yoga instructor, modern dancer
Zone 14: Your Negotiation Abilities
Possible careers: deal maker, big business broker
Zone 15: Your Brainstorming/Storyteller
Possible careers: brainstorming/idea expert, storyteller, author, speaker, poet, singer, spiritual channeler/communicator, platform speaker/sales

Now depending on which zone is largest (longest, fullest, widest), you’re looking at an expression of your business niche. The smallest zone (shortest, flattest, thinnest) is where you struggle – good place to delegate, get help or improve.

We’ll explore the zones again in future issues, but for now, just eyeball your hand prints or actual hands and see which zones jump out as ‘big’ and which as ‘small’ relative to the other zones on the same digit. Then look at each hand in its entirety (zones are the same for each hand). Which zone - overall - seems most well-represented, least represented? Write it down.

Bring your questions to our NEXT Life Purpose Master Mind TeleClass on Thursday, May 27th at 5 PM Pacific. The first month is FREE and the new investment is $19.97 a month thereafter. (NOTE: For new and regular members… if you’ve been a member a while, on your next billing cycle, you’ll be at $19.97! Unbelievable!)

Email Cindy Gallo at support@yourpurpose.com to get onboard. Our BRAND NEW Life Purpose Master Mind site will be up shortly! Join the over 250 members who are committed to living their Life Purpose FULL OUT in 2010 and BEYOND!

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“Meet Phoebee Fleabee!”

Posted on Apr. 30, 2010 by Baeth.

Karen Schaefer,

Writer and Creator of “Phoebee Fleabee”

Karen Schaefer is a powerhouse that I had the good fortune of connecting with in a high-end mastermind. I instantly liked her and getting to know her better has only reinforced my initial first impression.

Recently, Karen took the leap and invested in a Life Purpose Blueprint session for herself. We were both a bit startled at the intensity of information revealed by her hands but also how her openness fully accessed my intuition. (In a reading, my psychic and intuitive abilities expand in accordance with the internal permission of the client to actually HEAR and RECEIVE what I have to tell them.)

And of course, the information in Karen’s hands completely reinforced the impressions I was receiving intuitively. Karen’s Life Purpose is “Author, Speaker and Creative Artist in the Spotlight” and her Life Lesson is to “own her power in the world!” I said to her, “Karen, YOU are a Queen Bee and you’re here to share the message that other women are Queens, too! It’s so important that you set your life up to honor your ‘ruler’ energy.”

Karen was silent. She said, “Wait until you see what I’m launching. Wow. That’s amazing.” Karen wouldn’t tell me WHAT she was launching, only that she was up to something wild, crazy and totally in alignment with her passions, her creativity and her desire to teach people to have good relationships with one another. (Karen’s Life Schools are Wisdom and Love. I combine these two schools to create the school of ‘Wise Relationships.’)

Most incredibly, Karen’s business, thebornleader.com, exemplifies what I most encourage people to do with their businesses. When you make your Life Lesson the secret spice in your business, your business expresses your Life Purpose. Karen put her lesson of owning her power into her business message and viola, perfect fit. Through her books, speeches, coaching, and businesses (she has MANY businesses!), Karen teaches others to be powerful – especially if they feel different or like an outsider. (Remember those ‘wise relationships!)

After our session, she sent me an email and here’s an excerpt (note that her new character is all about being different and celebrating that power in the world!):

“The biggest news that we have though is the launch of Phoebee Fleabee©. This is a kid’s book that I wrote 12 years ago and it features a vivacious bee with long flea legs and her stripes go the other way! Pete and I finally decided it was time to let her fly all over the world, so we created an “On Line Launch” and are giving her story away to over a million people between April 1, 2010 and June 30, 2010.

We again used Pete’s On Line Training technology to build the book, I did all the recordings and scripts for the videos to promote it and my friend Zulema de Rodriguez with AKA Talent Agency was nice enough to do all of it in Spanish for us [for our Spanish readers]. I knew the stars were aligning when the artist, Max Koch, of Bowler Hat Productions, gave me all the rights to the drawings, so it seemed as though it was meant to happen.

So, by the time you get this letter, Phoebee will have taken flight. You can get the story at www.LuvMyStripes.com and if it is in your heart please pass it along to as many people and organizations, schools, churches, etc. that you can think of so we can meet our Million-plus free give-away goal.

We are also offering the hard copy books, t-shirts, bracelets, etc. for people to buy and 25% of that will go back to the “Luv My Stripes Foundation” where we will create learning programs for kids.

While we both still enjoy running our other businesses we knew this was something we just had to do, and wow has it been an adventure.

If you know in your soul you have something that you have not yet done…

I would highly recommend it!!!”

Karen Schaefer is Founder & CEO of The Born Leader, www.thebornleader.com, a worldwide organization dedicated to Innovative, Creative and Inspired Business Leadership Training For Small Business Owners, Entrepreneurs and Visionaries.

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“Another Life Lesson REVEALED: Guilty Conscience?”

Posted on Mar. 23, 2010 by Baeth.

Today’s article is the fourth installment in my Life Lessons REVEALED series. Your Life Lesson is your blind spot – and your doorway to your Life Purpose.

One of the most misunderstood Life Lessons is the guilt / lost self-worth / ‘what’s my niche?’ conundrum. I will attempt to explain how this conundrum operates. When I tell a client that ‘guilt’ is their Life Lesson, they almost always deny it – and then feel guilty afterwards.

As a technical reminder, the Life Lesson is determined from the Life Purpose Blueprint in your fingerprints. If your Life Lesson is guilt / lost self-worth / ‘what’s my niche?’, it is indicated by the fingerprint on your left middle finger.

In general, the information on your right hand indicates how you show up out in the world and the information on your left hand reveals more of your inner world and personal life.

I once coached a small group of clients that collectively shared the guilt Life Lesson (with groups, I can run the numbers and determine the group Life Purpose and group Life Lesson). Watching them operate while this lesson had them running blind was fascinating. Not only were the individuals incapable of admitting responsibility for their own outcomes, they hid behind each other to justify their failings. While it was uncomfortable to witness this level of denial, I knew that the short-term high that comes from thinking you’ve gotten away with something would soon give over to a ball and chain of guilt that I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy. The guilt ball and chain are heavy!

Of course, the ball can swing on that chain in the opposite direction and the guilty person starts taking responsibility for everyone and everything. Instead of focusing on their own behavior and simply taking responsibility for their own contribution – whether a positive contribution or a negative contribution – they go all out to wash away their own sense of inadequacy. The person might say, “The award-winning project was ALL my idea and hard work!” or “It’s ALL my fault the project failed!” The pendulum swing from “I’m the BEST” to “I’m the WORST” is caused by a loss of self-worth.

Lost Self-Worth

All kinds of situations can cause temporary feelings of worthlessness. A romantic break up, a job failure, family problems, and financial issues often trigger the insecurity that makes us doubt our value and worth. We are all susceptible to bouts of low self-worth. However, when this is your Life Lesson, low self-worth can feel like a chronic condition. You are constantly wondering if your work, your appearance, your skills are any good.

What’s My Niche?

This confusion about your value is what causes the “what’s my niche?” challenge for folks with this lesson. If you feel guilty about being good at anything (because that might make you seem ‘better’ than someone else), you’re going to have one hell of a time announcing your specialty in business and how you can create a transformation in the life of your clients. It’s VITAL that you take ownership of your skills and passions and practice sharing them with others.

Guilt, Guilt, Guilt

You may feel guilty for being born. One woman I knew felt guilty for giving birth to her three beautiful children. She said, “I feel so guilty I brought them into this horrible world. What kind of future will they have?” Wow. Needless to say, her best friends were Chardonnay and cigarettes. Her own low self-worth was being projected onto her innocent children.

If you doubt your value, you place your worth in the hands of others. If others approve of you, you feel good. If others disapprove of you, you feel bad, guilty, wrong. The danger with this kind of behavior is that you will feel very, very guilty when you discover that the others don’t always have your best interests at heart. Oh no, if guilt is your kryptonite, you are easily used as a pawn in the schemes of others.

You might feel guilty because you’re really good at something or you’re really beautiful or really rich. Noblesse oblige – “nobility obliges.” You feel obligated (read: guilty) that you were given more by fate than others. The actual implications of noblesse oblige is that to those who have been given much, much is expected. However, it can be taken too far… so far in fact, that you feel guilty having fun, taking time off, just simply being. If you’re working, you feel guilty you’re not at home with your family. If you’re with your family, you feel you should be at work.

Marianne Williamson has written the quintessential poem for folks suffering – unnecessarily – from guilt.

Our Deepest Fear

By Marianne Williamson

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness
That most frightens us.

We ask ourselves
Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?
Actually, who are you not to be?
You are a child of God.

Your playing small
Does not serve the world.
There’s nothing enlightened about shrinking
So that other people won’t feel insecure around you.

We are all meant to shine,
As children do.
We were born to make manifest
The glory of God that is within us.

It’s not just in some of us;
It’s in everyone.

And as we let our own light shine,
We unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.
As we’re liberated from our own fear,
Our presence automatically liberates others.

Coach’s Challenge: Make a list of 3 things you are brilliant at. Now, are you using those skills every day? How could you incorporate these three skills into your business?

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