Big Fat Happiness...A different kind of journey

Posted on November 13, 2012 by David Ruch, One of Thousands of Life Coaches on Noomii.

Big Fat Happiness…
A different kind of journey…

Love After Love

The day will come
 when, with elation,
 you will greet yourself arriving 
at your own door, in your own mirror, 
and each will smile at the other’s welcome,
 saying, sit here. Eat.

 You will love again the stranger who was yourself.
 Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart 
to itself, to the stranger
who has loved you all your life,
whom you ignored for another,
who knows you by heart.

Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,
 the photographs, the desperate notes, 
peel your own image from the mirror.
 Sit. Feast on your life.– Derek Walcott

Feast on your life…feast on your life. Wow, what a beautiful concept. To actually sit down and enjoy the feast of “ME,” who I am and what I do. Think about it: When is the last time you approached your self awareness the way you might anticipate a fabulous banquet? Imagine the sensual tastes and smells, the visual delights and savory anticipation.

Does that sound like what you experience when you look in the mirror?

Most of us don’t often have this type of radically infectious positive perspective of ourselves or the life we are living. What does Derek Walcott, this 20th century poet and recipient of the Nobel Prize for Literature know that we don’t know?

Years ago in my quest to find my own voice and my purposeful life, memorizing the words of this simple but profound poem and getting after the truth behind it had a life changing effect on me.

I was happy … or so I thought. I worked hard at listening to my client’s issues and worked just as hard at home being a good husband and new father. I had friends and was aggressively building my practice, which was, for the most part satisfying. But looking back I remember feeling fearful and at times a deep debilitating anxiety without a clear reason where it was coming from. I felt at times I was disconnected from myself. I was moving through my wonderful life only half engaged.

I was growing more discontented with my faith; the very thing I thought was the cornerstone of my happiness. My marriage was feeling more complicated than when we had started out in college as sweethearts. I was not confident and I had an ache for something I could not put my finger on. As you can probably guess, I often had conversations with myself saying things like “David, get a grip” and “What is wrong with you?"

If you are mindful of what it means to be awake in your life then you are probably also aware of what it can be like to stress about not feeling fully at home with yourself.

Lots of questions but not the RIGHT questions.

What complicated it for me was that I was now the professional. I was the therapist, the one who was supposed to be insightful and provide guidance for my clients. At 34, I was the owner of my own clinical practice, had three great kids and a wife that loved me, but I was growing more cynical and unhappy with each year that passed. I needed insight into myself. I wanted someone to give me a map as well as tools that would make sense of my disconnected experience.

Somewhere along the way, I realized that a formal education rarely teaches you what you need to learn about yourself. In many ways my company, Big Fat Happiness, is the result of what I have learned the last 30 years on my own life journey.

Eventually, I discovered much of my fears were based on the fact that I did not know myself. The parts of me that I did know – which allowed me to be happy – often got me into trouble with people I loved and respected. My head was full of rules and programmed thinking that had been given to me by people in my life who, while clearly wanting the best for me, were ignorant as to what that was. Now, looking back, I would not be the individual I am today had I not listened to my internal voice, which ultimately led to uncovering my own true natural abilities and talents.

It has now become a passion of mine to use my natural abilities and gifts to work with people who resonate with Walcott’s images to "feast on your life.”

The pilgrimage to a truer self-awareness and a robust self-compassion usually takes risk and vulnerability and those are difficult growth steps to do by yourself.

Whether you are attempting to identify ways for you to market yourself as a business or hoping for a deeper connection with yourself and those you love, what I am about to share with you could be a doorway to a new you. Think with me as I share some insights for cracking the code that will literally catapult you into the life you desire.

What really makes us happy …
It is a strange paradox that when we are not happy we want to be and when we are happy we sometimes focus on things that make us unhappy. How easily are we driven to look around and see all that is wrong in the world? It’s like we have a magnet for negativity. In his book, Power Vs Force, David Hawkins frames it by saying, “We humans have an interesting tendency to mulch negativity for the juice we get out of it.” I have labeled this new philosophy as simply “I bitch therefore I am”.

When we have the freedom to express our true self and are connected to others, we are happy. Most of our daily stress and angst is that we are not being true to ourselves. The paradox, though, is that in seeking happiness we often seek to obtain it by being invisible and safe rather than fully exposed. So how do we get there? How do we discover who we are and what difference we can make in the world?

At Big Fat Happiness, we have spent a lot of time thinking about happiness and self directed living. We have become experts on all things happiness. In fact we know that much of the capability you have to be happy is wired in your genetic makeup. According to some of the leading experts on happiness, a whopping 60% of your happiness is relatively constant. The same research also suggests that the other 40% of your happiness capacity has nothing to do with genes or predispositions but is, in a sense, raw material waiting to be shaped by you. (Yippee…we have some choices!) So whether being happy comes easily for you or is more reticent, you DO have some influence over your happy quotient.

How about finding happiness on Google?
Surely the essence of happiness can be found somewhere on the Internet right? You only have to do a quick search on happiness to realize there are more links on how to manifest happiness than one could possibly review. But still in its simplest forms it seems to elude each one of us.

In spite of all that noise and clutter in the e-universe, Big Fat Happiness has some good news: For each person we work with, we find that the pursuit of happiness is a quicker process when our clients discover two initial truths: Simply discover who you are and fall in love with that person.

Self-awareness and self-compassion will get you a long way down the road to lasting happiness. The rest of the stuff becomes skill development that anyone can learn or outsource.

It is rarely about getting smarter, learning some new formula or adding more to your already-full plate. It is rarely about getting somewhere else than where you are. More often than not, happiness comes to you naturally when you open yourself up, let go, and simplify.

In fact we often quote the big guy here, God, Buddha, or Allah, or whatever you call him or her. “You suffer because you are attached to so many things”. Underneath all of your efforts, fears, worries and doubt is a simply a wonderful you waiting to be embraced. It is not out there somewhere – it starts from within. It’s time your Self be the Hero!

This self – with a large S – is innocent, loving, creative, talented and a pure explosion of wonder.

Right behind that, self-compassion is the next ingredient in shaping a happy life. It is this energetic self that is connected to all and has need of nothing. In Buddhism this is often what is referred to as the “no self” because it is the place where we are one with all.

So much of the struggle we associate with self-development falls away when we learn how to love and show patience toward ourselves. Our nervous activity, limiting behaviors and the “noise” from our hurried lifestyle becomes less important as we fall in love with who we are.

Of course we all have times in our lives when we forget that our happiness is not dependent on something outside ourselves.
We become fearful or angry, as we wrestle with cause/effect thinking and our feelings of lack.
We dictate to ourselves in mantra-like self talk that we will finally be happy when some other state exists rather than the one we are currently experiencing.
Some of us simply hate who we are without cause.
For others, it is a race to somewhere else.

We compare, complain, compete, and control instead of align with our true self that naturally loves to compliment, comfort contribute and create.

The truth about you and me is that happiness must always come BEFORE our success not after. And happiness is not possible without this connection to who you are. To learn more about how we might support you in your pursuit of happiness from the inside out read on …

Strengthen your focus and deepen your resolve
We do not define an arbitrary timeframe for your Big Fat Happiness Excursion. We seek to be whatever we need to be over time to get you where you desire to be . We know there is nothing magical about a time, you do what you need to do. Lessons are learned when they are learned.

Personal growth doesn’t have a deadline or timeline. While we can set goals, plan and schedule our expectations we often experience events that alter that timeframe. What matters most is the forward progress.

Whether the Big Fat Happiness ACTION Coaching experience is a few months or upwards of a year and beyond, we like to think about it in four exciting steps. Of course we start where you are but we begin to weave these for stages into your experience.

We DESIGN the life you desire uncovering your purpose, passion and mission in life.

We BUILD IT seeking to give it unique shape and definition with the roles you want to play and the way you want to use your time.

We LAUNCH IT when we support you in resolving the fears and blocks that keep you stuck. We help you get clear and honest about your team. What will you do and what you will need others to do.

Lastly, we GROW IT when we help you nurture and fine-tune your full expression.

Being equipped to thrive in these four life stages strengthens your focus and deepens your resolve. You are creating a new life if you just keep giving yourself over to the steps.

Regardless of the number of successes or the failures we face,
if we embrace them all and keep moving we are right where we need to be.

How Big Fat Happiness leads you on a Different Kind of Journey is spelled out in the rest of the article. Read on, and decide how you’d like us to partner with you in creating Big Fat Happiness in your – and for your life – ahead.

Simply Contact Us through our website, call or email. We are ready to get started.

DESIGN IT

Step One:
Wake up and find your Angst

It has been said that the path to greatness is through four easy steps. Need~Vision~Skill~Action. You can’t change until you recognize what is not working.
It’s true that some people seek change and personal growth because that is what they do, they naturally love to grow. They constantly examine themselves and find the things they want to change.
For most people though, they really only seek to grow or change when they are in discomfort or pain. They may have put off dealing with the needed change and now they are experiencing in spades what they hoped to ignore. Others have disconnected any bells and whistles that would have warned them at an earlier point of “impending danger.” Whether part of one group or another, these people they are forced to wake up and deal with years of neglect.
To draw our clients to this place of awakening I often ask them “what do you love and what do you hate”? I am looking for my clients’ heart, passion and fire in their belly. Hating is a fantastic emotion because it is Anger’s sister. Love is always right there in the room as well. If you don’t feel comfortable hating you are not too far from what you love. We help you move there.

At Big Fat Happiness, we know that sometimes the very sticking point
is that you have too long forsaken yourself and the causes that matter to you the most. We strive to uncover those passions. We remind you of your voice and the fact that you have always been and will always be a difference maker.

DESIGN IT

Step Two:
Make a Decision

Bob Proctor is a great mentor, presenter, life coach and author. I have been fortunate to have discussed some of these ideas with him and have been on the receiving end of his great coaching materials. He taught me a huge lesson on the power of a decision. He says, “You can virtually eliminate conflict and confusion in your life by becoming proficient at decision making.” Did you get that? Eliminate conflict!!

He goes on to define an unusual power that is set in motion when a person makes a decision: Commitment. We have become so casual with our words that they often don’t resonate with commitment anymore.

What is a decision anyway? How do you make decisions? Do your decisions have any staying power? Yes, there are a few, rare times when circumstances are out of our control, but I challenge you as I challenge myself every day to “Say what you mean and mean what you say.”

To make a decision is to set yourself in a particular direction and,
by the very consequences of that decision, you are saying “Yes!” to a plan of action as well as “No!” to something else.

Being decisive is not for the faint hearted, but the riches and rewards that come to the person who has the courage and persistence to make decisions and stand by them is the person who will succeed.

We stress the importance of making decisions because your very life is being shaped each and every day by the decisions you make. The decisions you make will not only determine the life you will live, but the legacy you will leave those you love.

DESIGN IT

Step Three:
Discover and Refine Your Unique Contribution

If you decide to forge a path to happiness somewhere along the way you will discover the importance of doing what you love.

Steve Jobs said, “Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don’t lose faith. I’m convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You’ve got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do.

If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don’t settle.”

Wow. Can you hear his passion? The majority of individuals, however, never do find what it is they love.

This is where engaging a Big Fat Happiness Coach is so very beneficial. Sometimes, the greatest stuff inside you needs to be drawn out and identified first. The Big Fat Happiness ACTION Coaching Program wants to help you discover your unique greatness. We love working our magic and can’t wait to show you how we do it.

When you get involved in our Big Fat Happiness ACTION Coaching, you will discover that defining what it is you DO makes all the difference. Believe me it is just as exciting for us, especially when we see people – sometimes for the first time ever – learn to put words to their passions.

DESIGN IT

Step Four:
Become a Master of Your Strengths

If you hang around our BFH offices much you will hear us say things like, “What you love to do is what will hinder you if you do not master yourself.” Or “You will never get in trouble by doing what you don’t do…you will get in trouble by doing what you do at the wrong time and in the wrong place.”

Once you are fully aware of what it is you are wired to do, the next successful skill you must master is tempering that expression in order to make room for others to do what THEY do.

Everything we do in relationships and the quality of our relationships
are in direct proportion to the ability we have to appreciate what others do
and how we can be a source of love and support for them.

A colleague of mine once participated in one of my seminars. After providing him with his unique abilities or natural identifiers for what he loved to do, everyone who knew him started laughing. He happened to have a trait we defined as “Be Famous”

This might sound a little strange but he actually lives his life everyday looking for a stage from which he can perform. He loves to be in the limelight; he loves attention. He often fails miserably in relationships when he cannot sit down and allow opportunities for others to have the stage and the opportunity to speak. If he is not extremely mindful of his need to be “on,” he will not remember to curb himself. This is self mastery.

There are many scenarios that impact self mastery.
Your gifts and natural abilities may have been judged for a variety of reasons by others as inappropriate or not as useful as other traits they may have wished for you.
You may have experienced tremendous conflicts growing up if you had your heart and mind set on being self defined, and consequently rubbed authority figures the wrong way.
You may have tamped down your desires out of fear and ridicule for long seasons of your life and now you need to take the lid off your gifts and let them shine.

Sorting out the dynamics can be challenging. At Big Fat Happiness we understand the sticky mess these discussions open up and we work with you until we get it right. We consistently support you in developing self-compassion and, ultimately, self mastery of this potentially new and exciting self expression. Simply contact us at www.bigfathappiness.com, call or email works too.

BUILD IT

Step Five:
Create your Mission, Strategy and Action Plan

No great desire or awakening can have legs unless it has a life plan. We know that most people don’t plan to fail, they fail to plan. From personal finances to physical exercise they get caught up in living at the pace the world dictates. Sadly, most of their lives are spent living at the effect of someone or something else.

If there is no defined mission, no clear strategy, no aligned goals
and no purposeful action step, there is no success. Even temporary success will be limited because of inconsistency.

Anyone who has a desire to make something of him or herself must define what that something is. Then, stop wasting time.

There is so much noise, so many ways in which our lives get stripped of the very essence if we are not careful to protect our time. If we are not mindful of our mission in life, we will not have energy or vision left to create transformational experiences that are what matter most. Extraordinary living does not happen by accident. It happens when you sit down and, by design, craft out the life you want to live.

Does life sometimes show up and make you take detours? Of course, but you still have a map and you still know where you are headed. Realignment is easier when you have your goal and can more easily determine where you have gotten off course.

At Big Fat Happiness, we spend a good portion of our coaching program together in the act of defining and designing your dream life. Then we go about helping you build it.

BUILD IT

Step Six:
Brand Yourself

What comes to your mind when you think about any brand or your favorite brand?

Here at BFH, when we talk about “branding yourself,” we are talking about defining the most powerful and effective way you can show up in the world when doing what you do. When you are able to refine this self expression and begin to package it as a unique brand, people begin to understand and associate very particular characteristics and values with your presence.
Ask yourself these questions:
Why do people call me?
When people want me, what is it they most want? A skill? A good time? A problem solver?
In many ways we already are a brand of one type or another.

There are a number of great thinkers who are experts on the subject of branding. Authors Dale and Chip Heath in their 2008 book, Made to Stick, write about characteristics that make ideas “sticky” in the minds of consumers.

Successful “sticky ideas” are branding. These authors use the acronym S~U~C~C~E~S to identify the key characteristics:
The product must be Simple to understand. It has to be defined in a way that the average person can say “I get the core idea of what it is or what it does.”
Next, they remind us that for something to be memorable it has to have an element of surprise or it must grab us in a way which makes us focus longer to catch the basic idea. They call this trait Unexpectedness. We are triggered by so many stimuli in a particular day that we shut out many of them and give others only a second or two to grab our attention. To the degree we have to linger with an idea or brand to solve the unexpected riddle we are that much more intrigued.
The next two characteristics are Concreteness and Credibility. Can I feel and see in a concrete way what a particular branded product is or how it will impact my life? How can it make my life better and, secondly, does it seem credible?
The last two are Emotions and Story. People often buy emotionally and rationalize their purchase logically. Nonetheless, creating a message in your branding that awakens emotions in others is a sure way to capture their awareness.

If you are intrigued by this idea of branding yourself a great little book, Crush It by Gary Vaynerchuk is worth the read. Gary took a family-owned local wine shop and sky rocketed it forward with personal branding tools and techniques.

The bottom line to personal branding is this: If you are not happy … really happy … find a way to begin sorting out who and what you are. We are experts at helping you do that, working with you on a regular basis to find your sweet spot and package YOUR brand.

BUILD IT

Step Seven:
Add Skills & Remove Blocks

We often hear the phrase, “Knowledge is power,” and to some extent that might be true. The truer message is that “Knowledge understood and applied at the right time and place is power.”

There are some very smart people who are also not very powerful and not very practical. I have known brilliant professors who could not find their way out of a cardboard box when it came to practical application of knowledge.

At Big Fat Happiness, we know that the sooner you can determine where you are headed, the sooner you can begin to identify and develop the knowledge and skills necessary to help you get there.

Being part of a coaching program also helps you make connections so you don’t have to learn everything by yourself. Some of my best decisions in life occurred when I was able to distinguish the logical sense of doing something myself vs. outsourcing activities more easily accomplished by others.

One of the best resources I have seen on the benefits of outsourcing is Timothy Ferriss’ book The 4-Hour Work Week. It is loaded with tips and tricks for finding help in the most unusual places.

Then, there are the people you meet through the BFH coaching program. As I, myself, have pursued coaching, I’ve been introduced to Mastermind members and like-minded people who were growing right alongside me but had talents and skills that I didn’t. These contacts helped me in ways I didn’t know I was going to need when I started.

Recently I was fortunate to meet my current Internet strategist and web site builder through these types of connections. She runs circles around me when it comes to getting our BFH web site functional and highly visible to the masses. She is highly experienced; uses state-of-the-art-skills; applies techniques that are practically trademarked to her; and connects me with others who can help me along this path. Attempting to do what she provides would take months (if not years) to duplicate.

Do you truly know and act on your greatest skills?
And do you have the ability to leave the rest to other people and their greatest skills?

The Big Fat Happiness coaching program helps you articulate your unique opportunities for growth and development. As you move into actualizing more of your great skills, there are also personality blocks that have to be identified and overcome.

Whenever we announce to ourselves and the world that we are going to do something beyond our current expression, we eventually bump into ourselves and old, limiting ideas. Growth is not easy when you have to push through personal barriers and limiting beliefs that say you have to do it all on your own. Success is possible when you build momentum and have a knowledgeable coach and mastermind members in your corner.

LAUNCH IT

Step Eight:
Surrender to the Flow of Life

Up to this point I have talked about taking risks, making decisions, setting goals and marching forward. Now I am telling you to surrender?

How can we use the power of surrender to move us forward? A great but simple poem by Rilke reminds us “Winning doesn’t temper the man this is how he grows by being defeated decisively by greater and greater foes.” To progressively move forward with our lives and dreams it is going to be necessary to become a friend to failure.

If you are going to set yourself on a course, it should be bigger than you can possibly imagine pulling off. If your dream doesn’t bring just a little fear to your mind, your vision is too small. Dreams ask you to grow and, in growing, come to embrace all the necessary power and skills to accomplish those dreams, even if it means some failure along the way.

Some of our greatest learning takes place when we are seemingly defeated. It is as if the universe is asking if we are serious. Napoleon knows this first hand. He writes, “what I had thought to be dismal failure was nothing more than a kindly, unseen hand that halted me in my chosen course and with great wisdom forced me to redirect my efforts along more advantageous pathways.”

The key is always to look at the struggles and failures with a will to find the lesson to be learned and, as Napoleon calls it, the “seed of equal benefit.” There is always a way through if you Will for there to be a way.
Big Fat Happiness weaves this principle throughout the heart of every program we design.

As you step out in new directions and hold yourself to the constant belief that you will do whatever it takes to move yourself forward. Surrendering to the flow of life will serve you well as you make your way.

Enjoy the high wins and accept the low losses all the while knowing the key ingredient will always be your persistence. If you can get to a place where set backs are part of the journey you will experience less frustration. Living in the ebb and flow of events is where you will develop character and discipline.

While we at Big Fat Happiness understand the importance of positive thinking and keeping a mind free of negative self talk we also know that you must be able to have a safe place to bring to the surface the feelings and thoughts that most stir in your heart and mind. Progress – not perfection – is the name of the game. Our ACTION Coaching is that place.

LAUNCH IT

Step Nine:
Build Your Team

The emphasis of team is vital. Anyone who has built a successful life, company or family knows that the success has occurred only to the degree that he or she has done it WITH people. As they say, “There is no I in team and there is no I in success either.”

All successful people know that winning comes when your focus in on how you can help others first and yourself second.

“If you want to go FAST go alone but if you want to go FAR go together.”
– old African proverb

From ancient religious texts to 21st century board rooms, the adage to build your team, define your partners and align your relational capital are saying the same thing: There is strength in numbers.

The core leadership at Big Fat Happiness has always set this as a high principal to be followed. We have invested thousands of dollars and hours establishing key partnerships, learning from mentors, sharpening our skills through the coaching process, and building mastermind groups of support and accountability.

With Big Fat Happiness, there is a sure way to weather the storms on the way to dynamic leadership. We partner with you, moving you forward toward your goals, through powerful alliances with like-minded people.

LAUNCH IT

Step 10:
Get Out There

All the learning we do, all the planning and goal setting we put in place is all in vain if we are not able to actually experience the fruit of our labor and get out there with who we are and what we have created. There are any number of reasons why you can work diligently to develop and create but fail on the last leg when it comes time to taking action.

When I have struggled with getting out there it’s been because I continued to think I still didn’t know enough. I would tell myself there were always a few more things I could learn before I could say I was the expert. There are some people who are wired to grow and self develop … that would be me. Since I was very young I was always putting myself in situations where I could learn how to do things … watching my grandfather fix a faucet or my mom stuff a Thanksgiving bird … I wanted to learn. It’s a strength, but it’s also a weakness!

Sometimes, I need to be pushed into stepping beyond learning and putting what I have learned into action. I point this out to you as a way of challenging you to think about what it is that keeps YOU from getting out there with your business idea or your best self.

There are probably many reasons why any of us continue to believe we are not yet ready for prime time. We can dream and plan but, when the time comes to make it happen, we freeze up. The choice to hire a coach actually can be THE first step in your action plan to ensure that you keep stepping forward.

Big Fat Happiness walks right up to and through these tough points with you, providing you insight, coaching and support to reach your goals. You can succeed and we can help. Simply Contact Us or go to our web site and click on ACTION Coaching. Complete the questionnaire to get started. Once it is uploaded we will call you to set up a consultation.

GROW IT

Step 11:
Be You

For many individuals, the process of redefining their life’s direction, reinventing themselves, or tackling a new powerful endeavor can be a daunting challenge. For others, the hard part comes just after the lights go on and the curtains part. After all they are “live” now.

Other individuals consistently find that they begin to experience fatigue and doubt when the game has begun and the dream is in motion. Suddenly, the skills they used to get ready for the game are not the same ones they need during the game.

The path to grow your best life or your budding business requires a higher level of leadership, calculated decision-making and unbridled stamina, not to mention skills to successfully multitask and execute on critical deadlines. Sometimes what we envision our dream will look like doesn’t include
the day-to-day struggles we end up experiencing.

The manifestation of our dream requires more sustained effort than what we had calculated. Game day can be a whole new experience.

Remember, we are in the process of BECOMING, and in this new and exciting life, we are newcomers. The process of elevating ourselves toward our idealized life can be overwhelming once we get in the middle of that new life and are making it up as we go.

In many ways, you are now the visionary entrepreneur, the day-to-day manager as well as the most skilled technician. There is always more work than you can do in a day and sometimes the problems are bigger. It is no longer just about your dream. Now, you must make corrections in process rather than when your dream was on the design table.

The BFH ACTION Coaching Program has an open timeframe so that we’re still around when you begin to wrestle with these hands-on experiences
of growing into your dream.

I love the analogy of the unfolding of our lives being like a garden. All plants move through the cycle of Seedling to Sprout to Blossom to Resting. As you live your life, you have some aspects of your life that are just seeding while some are resting, some are in full blossom, and some are just beginning to sprout. How well you manage these very different seasons – and the mood swings that go with them – will determine the level of your successes.

What are the decisions you need to make as you wrestle with competitive challenges and many unknown obstacles? At Big Fat Happiness we’ve been there with others … and will be there with you.

GROW IT

Step 12:
Keep Evaluating & Give Back

Where we started is where we end: It is all about the service and love we can bring to the world. If we cannot experience the sense that we are bringing something powerful and useful to the planet, the expression we put forth will wane and end. We long to contribute in a way that is self -sustaining rather than energy draining. The cure for fatigue is not rest but passion.

There is not a pace defined for you except your own.
You must create your life. You must be the change you want to see in the world.

We all learn to embrace our journey differently. Throughout the BFH ACTION Coaching, we help you map your ambition toward your magnificent life. Along the way, we believe you’ll discover that happiness has become a way of life.
There is now a mindfulness that you have learned to create in spite of your failures, struggles and circumstances.
You have learned to depend on your strengths.
You have learned to love yourself.
You have learned self-definition and self expression.
You have learned to use failure and disappointment as your success guide.
Finally, you have learned to stand with others and serve them fully. In that place you have discovered your own voice.

I can’t think of a better way to finish than with this poem by David Whyte:

Easter Morning in Wales

A garden inside me, unknown, secret,
neglected for years,

The layers of its soil deep and thick

Trees in the corners with branching arms

And the tangled briars like broken nets
Sunrise through the misted orchard,

Morning sun turns silver on the pointed twigs

I have woken from the sleep of ages

And I am not sure if I am really seeing, or dreaming
Or simply astonished.

Walking toward sunrise

To have stumbled into the garden

Where the stone was rolled from the tomb of longing.

Join us on a different kind of journey where you just might discover the secret garden inside YOU.
Contact us today to start your best life.

David Ruch M. Div M.A., Founder, Big Fat Happiness, LLC