The first month of this year has been joyfully unfolding. One of my favourite parts of the past few weeks has been a gratitude practice, inspired by Superhero Andrea.

A wonderful woman that I was fortunate to meet last year at Startup Weekend Okanagan and I have been exchanging 3 things we are grateful for on a (ahem) daily-ish basis. Across the mountains, there is an open door and we pass little notes of thanks, tidbits of our lives, and gently get to know each other’s hearts.

Connection is what anchors us. Are you feeling disconnected? Try this out and let someone see into your heart.

Cynthia

P.S. The perfect song to go with thoughts of gratitude:

Reaching into all of your available resources immediately makes you a super power.

Whether those resources are people, groups, education, opportunities or your very-own-brain: spreading out into the things that can support your learning instead of flying solo will have you moving in ways you never thought you could!

That’s why dream boarding is so powerful: visual and kinesthetic learning reaches into your beautiful brain and allows for expression of desires that verbal language can’t quite articulate.

Taking dream boarding to the next level, you might want to try Art Journaling . A reflective and creative  process connects directly to your heart and turns the chaos in your head into order.

Wonder how to start? Get the how, what and why to get going here in heart journaling. It is the perfect solo or group activity over the holidays to reconnect you to what is important to you.

I would love to see some of your (he)art journaling pages: upload them and share for a super power-punch!

Happy November my friends! With the change to winter time, it’s dark mornings and early sunsets, I felt the need to kick up the sparkle, focus on what’s moving and shaking and what I want to bring more of in my life and work. Soooooo….I did  my Full Moon Dreamboard a week early.

For those of you looking to start a dreamboarding practice, here is a quick tutorial about how to whip together the board of your dreams (the lo-fidelity version).

I have been using Pinterest for the last year or so to create my monthly dreamboards (so much inspiration, so few paper cuttings to clean up!) and suggest you give it a try too!

Here is my November Dreamboard:

I am feeling a lot of warmth and home-y-ness, sparkle, light and love in this board and can’t WAIT to see how the month evolves around these images. What do you see in this board?

Using this dreamboard image as my screensaver for the month keeps me fully engaged with my vision. If you would like to download a copy for your own screen, it’s my gift to you!

Happy dreaming!

Cookie Monster is a kick-ass muppet. Not only is C for Cookie (and that’s good enough for me), he gets to play with all the cool kids. Song of the summer 2012? The Top 40 Version of Cookie Monster’s remix “Share it Maybe” topped the charts for kids and kids-at-heart.

I love that furry little cookie-eating freak and here’s why you need to get in touch with your inner Cookie Monster:

1. Fierce Intensity:  Coffee cake with frosting, doesn’t phase Cookie Monster. He loves cookies. Cookies, dammit! What if you loved, learned, lived and led with that sort of fierce intensity?

Laser focus: Cooooookie. *pew pew* (<–laser gun noises)

He’s going out to get his cookies.

2. Gluttonous Satisfaction: The website 1000 Awesome Things named Eating Cookies Like Cookie Monster it’s #935th Awesome Thing. According to 1000 Awesome Things:

Eating cookies like Cookie Monster is great because, more than anything, it represents freedom. Yes, free thought takes you to the pantry, free will makes you grab that cookie package and sit down on the couch, and free Wonder Years reruns keep you company while you sit down and enjoy. You’re the Executive Chef in your personal Dessert Kitchen here. Just tell me that’s not liberating.

It doesn’t need to be cookies, but what do you just go to town on because it represents freedom? Paint? The dance floor? Sunday gameathons? Y’know what I am sayin’?

3. Love love love: Amongst pieces of cookies flying, mashed into his black mouth and tossed overhead in the revelry of cookie acquisition, there is always a moment with Cookie Monster. The moment when he realizes that he has been in a cookie-makeout coma and that there are other friends (plush, virtual or other) around. His googley eyes say:

Oops. Sorry, I got caught up there. Want some of the thing THAT I LOVE MOST IN THIS WORLD?

For that, you are a muppet among mice, Cookie Monster. May we all share so willingly.

Happy Friday. Get fiercely intense, gluttonously satisfied and give love, love, love.

Do you have a dreaming or visioning practice? As a coach, I work with a lot of folks to just take the time to sit and take inventory of what the next big picture looks like.

That’s part of why I am such an advocate of dream or vision boarding practices. (My personal blog is even called The Living Dreamboard!)

And sometimes people draw, collage, sing, and glue the things that they cannot say. These writings, collages, songs, and glue-covered things turn the chaos: all of the things running through our brains, into order.

This is my dreamboard for September: interpret it as you will. It feels light and inspiring, adventurous, playful and wise. Thank you Jamie Ridler, for reminding me September is a special month for dreaming: with two full moons.

As you get back to school and work and routine, it is a great time to check in with yourself and your goals. Even taking 15 minutes to reflect on what you would like more of in the coming month is a step in YOUR direction.

Want to download my dreamboard? I made it into desktop wallpaper for myself and thought I would share!

Happy Change of Seasons!

Your first time. The first time. The first step.

All great things start with that first step, but that first single step is often the hardest to take.

You should probably avoid it! Hide! There is always some reason why you will never have to face getting what you want.

First steps kick up gremlin-storms, bringing your brain into freak-the-fuck-out zone.

But the best news is that once you take the first step, it’s OVER! Now, you are walking. I used that mantra “one step, one bloody step, one step” all the way up the hill to Neuschwanstein, in the Bavarian Alps (pictured above).

But about Your First Time…

What if your first time [fill-in-the-blanks]-ing was exactly as you want it to be? Imagine: what would it feel like? What would it mean for you? What’s important?

Jump onto the other side of that first step and enjoy the view from the top of Mount Awesome!

Imagine: you are starting a new job. It is a great opportunity. You are really pleased to be doing this work!

…then your brain makes up the WORST case scenarios. Your colleagues might be awful. The job is not what you thought it would be. THERE ARE BATS! (errr….)

Some time before you begin to make up things about bats infesting your new basement dungeon office, stop. Think about the best case scenario. 

At the end of the first month of this new work: how do feel about your colleagues? What has been surprising? How stimulated are you by the work you are doing? What’s the energy like?

Your first time. The first time. The first step.

If you are standing before your next first step, ask yourself: what is the best case scenario? What do I really want from this?

P.S. I betcha you get it.

You know those special people in your life who act like messengers? Not in the “voice of the universe” kind of way (well, maybe that too), but the ones who send you seriously KICK ASS resources just because?

I have a couple of those people, and among my favourites is Shane Lawrence. Shane keeps me afloat on user technology news and events and personal development tidbits that he scours from the ends of the interwebs.

Shane is amazing, his picks are amazing and I am trying to figure out how to make him a guest columnist. (hmm..hrrr…) TBC.

This treat is a share from Shane. In this TED Talk, Jane uses gaming methodology: superheros, missions, earning points, etc. to explain her thought process through her recovery from a traumatic brain injury. Moving on, she used the same methodology to develop a game called Super Better: a game that gets you super better! Cute.

Makes me understand the gamers in my life a lot better and what a cool and effective tool!

In this episode:

We tackle staying organized in this digital/analogy information world and always moving the ball forward in our projects.

The Pinterest Vision Board Desktop Wallpaper tutorials that were FAILED to be delivered on time are rescheduled for a September Launch.

I refer to Noomii, an awesome new gig for Gunsinger Coaching and a chance to build awesome coaching community!

DOWNLOAD your printable copy of the Mini-Project Organizer here.

Looking forward to your comments!

]]> http://gunsinger.com/archives/835/get-your-shit-together-managing-and-organizing-your-projects/feed/ 0 http://gunsinger.com/archives/829/nice-ass-kicking/ http://gunsinger.com/archives/829/nice-ass-kicking/#comments Tue, 22 May 2012 19:07:02 +0000 Cynthia http://gunsinger.com/?p=829

Gunsinger Coaching clients do hard work to get where they want to be. YOU do hard work to shift your life and work in ways that are more in line with who you are and the impact that you want to make.

But I am noticing a distinct lack of celebration out there. Scoffs of “How important is taking time to celebrate what seems like something so insignificant in the grand scheme of things?” and “My little movements don’t deserve celebration.”

Your little movements are EXACTLY what deserve celebration. Because they don’t come easy and they don’t come cheap. And because you will make many more, so fill up your bucket in celebration: however that looks for you!

How will you champion yourself by celebrating the work you do?

]]> http://gunsinger.com/archives/829/nice-ass-kicking/feed/ 2 http://gunsinger.com/archives/825/just-a-quick-reminder/ http://gunsinger.com/archives/825/just-a-quick-reminder/#comments Tue, 15 May 2012 16:45:18 +0000 Cynthia http://gunsinger.com/?p=825

How can you make your inside voice match your outside voice? Because I am damn sure you wouldn’t be saying the things you say to yourself out loud to other people.

]]> http://gunsinger.com/archives/825/just-a-quick-reminder/feed/ 2