Part 1-Coaching Solutions to Live by: Live Your Life

Recently, I was out on a run trying to process my frustration over changes that have been forced upon my life by the pandemic. The longevity of the quarantine is taking its toll on the strongest among us and I was nearing my own breaking point. As I ran along the dirt trail near my house, I remembered the book Oh the Places You’ll Go by Dr. Seuss that I had read to my kids many times. I could see a specific page in my mind and I could hear my own voice reading the words, “The Waiting Place… for people just waiting… waiting for the phone to ring, or the snow to snow, waiting for a Yes or No, waiting for their hair to grow….Everyone is just waiting.” I could see my stubborn self in my mind’s eye; holding my breath and waiting, doing my best not to think too much or feel too much.

During this perpetual pause, we are collectively holding our breath and waiting. We have been doing this for months now and it’s not working. We are stressed, depressed, and utterly numb. This unhealthy state of numbness and waiting is taking a toll on our minds and bodies. With the longevity of the pandemic looming out before us, maybe it is time to stop waiting and start figuring out how to fully live abundant, healthy lives inside the new normal. That means we embrace the stuff that sucks, we sit with the discomfort of the losses, pain and lack of control, and then we find a new path forward that rekindles in us the thrill of living again.

This series will offer you four game changing coaching solutions that will transform the way you approach change and give you your life back.

Coaching Solution Part 1: Commit to Live Your Life

Making the commitment to live your life is stronger than simply making a choice. Choice is making a decision between pizza or salad, while commitment is willfully aligning yourself to what matters most to you.  It means saying “yes” to what brings a full and healthy life, while also making the commitment to saying “no” to the things that no longer fit. Many of my clients forget that with every “yes” we are also accepting an impending “no.” I often ask them, “And what will you be saying ‘no’ to?”

It’s amazing to me how many people don’t say “yes” to living. They drone on in a partial existence choosing between things of less importance without committing to a path that leads to health and fulfillment. Part of producing an amazing life on the outside is grounded in healing your life on the inside. I often remind my clients that they have to inhale before they can exhale. We can’t continue to pretend to live on the outside when we are literally dying on the inside.

“You have to inhale, before you can exhale.”

Highly productive, resilient, creative people often come to me for coaching in mid-life when they have repeatedly tried and failed at overcoming their health-related challenges or they are buckling under the stress of poor work/life balance. They are caught in the cycle of meaningless choosing between pizza and salad and they’ve lost touch with the power of their commitment to themselves.

These same successful, tenacious individuals often feel hopeless, defeated, and stuck trying to make changes in this particular area of their lives because the demands of committing to good health don’t align with their current lifestyle. In many cases, their fear is mounting, and their prescriptions are multiplying because they have received a medical diagnosis like diabetes or heart disease. As time marches on, their health becomes increasingly burdensome and even begins to feel out of control.  Their fear is mounting because they lack confidence in their ability to turn their failing health around.

I honor these courageous clients and I understand that there are many obstacles that get in the way when it comes time to make life altering changes. Rather than talking about all of these obstacles, I am going to go straight to the biggest one.

The most profound and inescapable obstacle to living a healthy lifestyle is dying!

I am stating the obvious here, but you can’t live a great life if you aren’t here. In fact, research suggest that even with the threat of dying, nine out of ten people don’t change their lifestyle. We are spending 60 billion dollars a year for patients to undergo painful and traumatic coronary bypass graft or angioplasty procedures that cost upwards of $100,000. What is stunning is that in only 3% of cases, these expensive and difficult procedures shield patients from future heart attacks and prolong their lives. In fact, two years after having heart surgery, ninety percent of these folks have not made lifestyle changes.[1]

A vast majority of our healthcare budget is consumed by conditions that are “behavioral” which means we are sick because of how we are living our lives. We refer to these illnesses as “lifestyle related diseases.” Dr. Raphael Levey, founder of the Global Medical Forum, said that “eighty percent of our health care budget is consumed by five behavioral issues.”[2]

What are the five behavioral issues that are numbing your life?

Too much smoking, drinking, eating, and stress and too little exercise.

The truth is that we are dying because we have stopped living. Look around the COVID world right now and notice the increase in stress, depression, and anxiety that are directly connected to the “go-to numbing behaviors” of smoking, drinking, and eating. Also, when we are in stress, depression, and anxiety it makes regular exercise seem daunting. Numbing is a faux escape from stress, pain, and the prevalent loss of control many of us are feeling in a global pandemic.

The problem is that we can’t selectively numb; we numb all the bad and with it we also numb out the good.

Numbing is a quick fix and false sense of control, the high price for numbing is that we stop feeling, thinking, and passionately living our lives. In the volley to balance this numbed-out state, we stimulate our senses with caffeine and sugar. We stretch our bodies, like tight rubber bands, across the inexhaustible tension between the demanding highs and lows of both wanting to feel something and wanting to feel nothing--all at once; in the very same day, at the very same time. Maybe this sounds familiar to you; At 8am you ask caffeine to make you feel alive and productive and at 6pm you ask alcohol to make you stop thinking and feeling.

Yes, it’s okay to have a glass of wine or a cup of coffee. I am suggesting what we all know—that these chemicals aren’t used as coping mechanisms to get through the day. There is a vast difference between enjoying a glass of wine with dinner and having half a bottle or more to quiet your COVID stress. The problem lies in the excess paired with the motivation to numb out. This daily tug-o-war separates us from what our bodies truly need, our minds and bodies grow further out of alignment and it is literally killing us.

Yes, I am proposing that the biggest obstacle between you and optimal health is your willingness to focus your energy on living well rather than exhausting your precious resources on numbing out your life.

If your first response to living your life well is to make a list of behavioral changes like; go on a diet, exercise more, or do a daily meditation, then you’re normal. It’s true that what does prolong your years and bring lasting change are simple and essential lifestyle changes; eating good food, not drinking and smoking, reducing stress, and moving your body in exercise. But knowing that and doing it are two vastly different things. That’s where coaching comes in!

Inhale. Feel the life in your lungs and then choose to live it.

[1] FastCompany.com, The Three Keys to Change, Jan. 2007, by Alan Deutschman

[2] FastCompany.com, The Three Keys to Change, Jan. 2007, by Alan Deutschman