Seems like some people celebrate New Years as a holiday... but carry the same old problems.
When you look at your life do you see continual growth or the same old stress?
The secret to a better life is to make the Next Right Choice, (or NRC for short).
Are you mapping out a great year?
If so, then rememberr to utilize NRC as your key strategy for lasting success.
Showing posts with label holiday stress. Show all posts
Showing posts with label holiday stress. Show all posts
Saturday, January 7, 2012
Monday, October 19, 2009
Will God still love me if I have a Low Credit Score?
Will God Love Me if I have a Low Credit Score?
By Dwight Bain, Nationally Certified Counselor & Life Coach
Someone asked me this question recently, “Will God love me if I have a low credit score?” I couldn’t believe it! They were under so much pressure to be financially perfect they made the wrong connection between having limited financial resources and experiencing spiritual abundance. Your worth as a human being isn’t based on the amount of stuff you have or how you may appear to have it all together on the outside. The Bible says that God loves you, just because it’s you. Not because of wealth, good looks, a big house or great job. You don’t have to be perfect to experience God’s love, but you do have to reach out in dependence knowing that you need a relationship with Him. Prideful, independent people who push through life don’t stop to recognize their need for God until they are facing some type of crisis, (and in the crisis it’s always easier to reach out for God’s help). So the answer to the question is Yes, Yes, Yes!
God will love you if you have low credit, no credit or are homeless. His love for you isn’t based on your bank account. Consider this true story of some of the most powerful men on the planet before the US Great Depression in the 1930’s to see how fast wealth can go away, and how wrong priorities about money can end up destroying life.
The Great Depression changed the definition of Success
The 1920’s were referred to as the ‘roaring twenties’ because the US economy was doing so well after World War I. A group of the world's most successful and wealthiest men met at the Edgewater Beach Hotel in Chicago on a sunny day in 1923. Collectively, these powerful tycoons controlled more wealth than there was in the entire United States Treasury at the time. For year after year magazine and newspaper headlines had printed the stories of their business and financial successes and challenged the people of the world to follow their fine example of wealth management. However, here is the rest of the story of how their life ended after experiencing the financial collapse of the Great Depression.
1 - Charles Schwab - The president of the largest independent steel company - lived on borrowed money the last five years of his life, and died penniless.
2 - Richard Whitney - The president of the New York Stock Exchange - served time in Sing Sing prison.
3 - Albert Fall - A former member of the US President's Cabinet - was pardoned from prison so he could go home to die.
4 - Jesse Livermore - the greatest bear in Wall Street history at the time - committed suicide
5 - Leon Fraser - the president of the Bank of International Settlement - committed suicide.
6 - Ivar Krueger - the head of the world's greatest monopoly - committed suicide.
Worth is more important than Wealth
There have been countless numbers of powerful people since the Great Depression who have ended up with the same fate. When they lost their wealth it was like they had lost their worth. Your self-worth should be based out of your true identity inside… not based on your net financial worth on the outside. If you base your self-worth on your net-worth, then your moods will change by the day, perhaps even by the hour as financial markets are continually shifting with changing market conditions. If your self-worth is based on things that are eternal and unchanging, then your outlook on life will remain stable in spite of changing financial or career circumstances.
All of the men listed above learned how to make a great living for a while, but not one of them learned how to manage their life. They started well, looked strong but finished the race in disgrace. It is a terribly sad reminder of how true the words are spoken by Jesus thousands of years ago about people who put wealth ahead of worship. “For what does a man profit if he gains the whole world and loses his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26)
God loves you and wants a relationship with you, no matter what you have in your wallet. Rest in that good news as you make wise choices in your daily decisions that base your worth on who you are, not what you have. We all need to be aware of our finances, and to be good financial managers, as part of being a responsible and mature individual. However, money management isn’t the most important thing to God, you are! To give you some eternal perspective consider the rest of what Jesus taught on this subject, who said,
19"Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. 20But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. 21For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
24"No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money.
25"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? 26Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? 27Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?
28"And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 30If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?
31So do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' 32For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.
So, does God just not care about money and financial stewardship? Of course not- God cares so much about wise financial management and accounting that there is an entire book of the Bible called “Numbers”. God sets a standard to be a wise financial manager of the resources He has placed in your hands. A good credit score is a reflection of a person who has been responsible to manage their bills and pay their expenses on time. It’s a reflection of financial discipline, not a reflection of personal value. And most of all, never forget that you are much more important and much more than just a number to God.
What can you do if your credit is shot because you’re behind on your bills?
Once you know God loves you in spite of low credit, it doesn’t take away the financial realities of being behind on bills. Yet what can you do if you are financially strapped without the resources to pay your bills on time? People feel pressure or even panic when they are out of control with money. It is a helpless feeling to have more bills than income so here are five principles to consider if you are facing money pressure to regain a feeling of control.
1) Mindset
You can control your mindset about finances by managing your intake of information. Don’t sit and watch financial shows on TV that make you more aware of your debt or your lack of income. That only drains away your mental energy to take positive action and can set you up for a spending relapse. Rather, focus your mind on things that will empower you to make positive changes.
2) Mood
You can control your mood about finances by choosing to manage what you do with your emotions. If you dwell on things that make you worry you will feel miserable and powerless. Instead take positive action to pray, journal, or talk to friends who have come through a tough time. Telling your story and listening to the stories of others will give you new strength.
3) Motivate
You can control your motivation by taking positive action. Being in a financial hole tends to rob energy to get up and do what you need to do. The longer you sit alone in the dark feeling afraid the further behind you will fall. Get up and reach out for help. There are wonderful organizations and individuals who can guide you to a stronger place financially without condemning you or making you feel like a failure. Google search groups like Crown Financial Concepts or Consumer Credit Counseling to find a support group near you.
4) Morale
You can control your morale, and that of your family who may be feeling overwhelmed financially by not letting every conversation be about money woes. Connect to positive people of faith, or read books of people who overcame incredible odds to find financial freedom. Author Dave Ramsey shares his testimony of how his family were near bankruptcy, yet worked together to find financial freedom, and now he travels the country to encourage others that they can make it out of a tough time by working together as a family with God’s help.
5) Message
You can control the message that you send by facing the truth of your financial situation with courage, instead of shame. Talk to your spouse, older children or close family about the changes that may need to take place to get back on track financially. Make calls to your creditors to let them know what’s going on because often they can provide some temporary financial relief through renegotiating the debt service. This will give you a sense of control of your finances, instead of your finances controlling you. Plus, it will help your family to grow along with you in faith, instead of you feeling like a failure alone. Stuffed emotional fears about finances can lead to desperation or isolation. Sharing those feelings will help you see that life is about more than money and that you are not facing your situation alone.
Finding greater Value because of great Pain
Finally, here are some encouraging words from my friend, psychologist Sandy Wilson in her book “Released from Shame” about how God can use a tough time to bring something positive on the other side. Listen to her words about Pearls.
“Pearls are the product of pain. For some unknown reason, the shell of the oyster gets pierced and an alien substance – like a grain of sand - slips inside. On the entry of that foreign irritant, all the resources within the tiny, sensitive oyster rush to the spot and begin to release healing fluids that otherwise would have remained dormant. By and by the irritant is covered and the wound is healed - by the pearl. No other gem has so fascinating a history. It is the symbol of stress - a healed wound... a precious, tiny jewel conceived through irritation, born of adversity, nursed by adjustments. Had there been no wounding, no irritating interruption, there could have been no pearl.”
God loves you and God can bring greater value to your life on the other side of a tough financial time, often by helping you see that what matters in life are the things that money can’t buy. As you gain a deeper spiritual faith, your life will feel more in control and you can feel peace instead of panic when facing a financial test, or any other test for that matter. And remember that there is no testimony without a test. So whatever you are facing today, may you be encouraged to walk through it with God. His love will always be there for you.
Reprint Permission- If this article was helpful you are invited to share it electronically or in print with your own list at work or church, forward it to friends and family or post it on your own site or blog. Just leave it intact and do not alter it in any way. Please include the following paragraph in your reprint and thanks for helping us to help others by spreading the word. "Reprinted with permission from the LifeWorks Group, www.LifeWorksGroup.org eNews (Copyright, 2004-2009, by the LifeWorks Group)"
About the author- Dwight Bain is dedicated to helping people achieve greater results. He is a Nationally Certified Counselor, Certified Life Coach and Certified Family Law Mediator in practice since 1984 with a primary focus on solving crisis events and managing major change. He partners with media, major corporations and non-profit organizations to make a positive difference in our culture. Access more counseling and coaching resources designed to save you time by solving stressful situations by visiting his counseling blog with over 200 complimentary articles and special reports at www.LifeWorksGroup.org
By Dwight Bain, Nationally Certified Counselor & Life Coach
Someone asked me this question recently, “Will God love me if I have a low credit score?” I couldn’t believe it! They were under so much pressure to be financially perfect they made the wrong connection between having limited financial resources and experiencing spiritual abundance. Your worth as a human being isn’t based on the amount of stuff you have or how you may appear to have it all together on the outside. The Bible says that God loves you, just because it’s you. Not because of wealth, good looks, a big house or great job. You don’t have to be perfect to experience God’s love, but you do have to reach out in dependence knowing that you need a relationship with Him. Prideful, independent people who push through life don’t stop to recognize their need for God until they are facing some type of crisis, (and in the crisis it’s always easier to reach out for God’s help). So the answer to the question is Yes, Yes, Yes!
God will love you if you have low credit, no credit or are homeless. His love for you isn’t based on your bank account. Consider this true story of some of the most powerful men on the planet before the US Great Depression in the 1930’s to see how fast wealth can go away, and how wrong priorities about money can end up destroying life.
The Great Depression changed the definition of Success
The 1920’s were referred to as the ‘roaring twenties’ because the US economy was doing so well after World War I. A group of the world's most successful and wealthiest men met at the Edgewater Beach Hotel in Chicago on a sunny day in 1923. Collectively, these powerful tycoons controlled more wealth than there was in the entire United States Treasury at the time. For year after year magazine and newspaper headlines had printed the stories of their business and financial successes and challenged the people of the world to follow their fine example of wealth management. However, here is the rest of the story of how their life ended after experiencing the financial collapse of the Great Depression.
1 - Charles Schwab - The president of the largest independent steel company - lived on borrowed money the last five years of his life, and died penniless.
2 - Richard Whitney - The president of the New York Stock Exchange - served time in Sing Sing prison.
3 - Albert Fall - A former member of the US President's Cabinet - was pardoned from prison so he could go home to die.
4 - Jesse Livermore - the greatest bear in Wall Street history at the time - committed suicide
5 - Leon Fraser - the president of the Bank of International Settlement - committed suicide.
6 - Ivar Krueger - the head of the world's greatest monopoly - committed suicide.
Worth is more important than Wealth
There have been countless numbers of powerful people since the Great Depression who have ended up with the same fate. When they lost their wealth it was like they had lost their worth. Your self-worth should be based out of your true identity inside… not based on your net financial worth on the outside. If you base your self-worth on your net-worth, then your moods will change by the day, perhaps even by the hour as financial markets are continually shifting with changing market conditions. If your self-worth is based on things that are eternal and unchanging, then your outlook on life will remain stable in spite of changing financial or career circumstances.
All of the men listed above learned how to make a great living for a while, but not one of them learned how to manage their life. They started well, looked strong but finished the race in disgrace. It is a terribly sad reminder of how true the words are spoken by Jesus thousands of years ago about people who put wealth ahead of worship. “For what does a man profit if he gains the whole world and loses his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26)
God loves you and wants a relationship with you, no matter what you have in your wallet. Rest in that good news as you make wise choices in your daily decisions that base your worth on who you are, not what you have. We all need to be aware of our finances, and to be good financial managers, as part of being a responsible and mature individual. However, money management isn’t the most important thing to God, you are! To give you some eternal perspective consider the rest of what Jesus taught on this subject, who said,
19"Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. 20But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. 21For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
24"No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money.
25"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? 26Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? 27Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?
28"And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 30If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?
31So do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' 32For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.
So, does God just not care about money and financial stewardship? Of course not- God cares so much about wise financial management and accounting that there is an entire book of the Bible called “Numbers”. God sets a standard to be a wise financial manager of the resources He has placed in your hands. A good credit score is a reflection of a person who has been responsible to manage their bills and pay their expenses on time. It’s a reflection of financial discipline, not a reflection of personal value. And most of all, never forget that you are much more important and much more than just a number to God.
What can you do if your credit is shot because you’re behind on your bills?
Once you know God loves you in spite of low credit, it doesn’t take away the financial realities of being behind on bills. Yet what can you do if you are financially strapped without the resources to pay your bills on time? People feel pressure or even panic when they are out of control with money. It is a helpless feeling to have more bills than income so here are five principles to consider if you are facing money pressure to regain a feeling of control.
1) Mindset
You can control your mindset about finances by managing your intake of information. Don’t sit and watch financial shows on TV that make you more aware of your debt or your lack of income. That only drains away your mental energy to take positive action and can set you up for a spending relapse. Rather, focus your mind on things that will empower you to make positive changes.
2) Mood
You can control your mood about finances by choosing to manage what you do with your emotions. If you dwell on things that make you worry you will feel miserable and powerless. Instead take positive action to pray, journal, or talk to friends who have come through a tough time. Telling your story and listening to the stories of others will give you new strength.
3) Motivate
You can control your motivation by taking positive action. Being in a financial hole tends to rob energy to get up and do what you need to do. The longer you sit alone in the dark feeling afraid the further behind you will fall. Get up and reach out for help. There are wonderful organizations and individuals who can guide you to a stronger place financially without condemning you or making you feel like a failure. Google search groups like Crown Financial Concepts or Consumer Credit Counseling to find a support group near you.
4) Morale
You can control your morale, and that of your family who may be feeling overwhelmed financially by not letting every conversation be about money woes. Connect to positive people of faith, or read books of people who overcame incredible odds to find financial freedom. Author Dave Ramsey shares his testimony of how his family were near bankruptcy, yet worked together to find financial freedom, and now he travels the country to encourage others that they can make it out of a tough time by working together as a family with God’s help.
5) Message
You can control the message that you send by facing the truth of your financial situation with courage, instead of shame. Talk to your spouse, older children or close family about the changes that may need to take place to get back on track financially. Make calls to your creditors to let them know what’s going on because often they can provide some temporary financial relief through renegotiating the debt service. This will give you a sense of control of your finances, instead of your finances controlling you. Plus, it will help your family to grow along with you in faith, instead of you feeling like a failure alone. Stuffed emotional fears about finances can lead to desperation or isolation. Sharing those feelings will help you see that life is about more than money and that you are not facing your situation alone.
Finding greater Value because of great Pain
Finally, here are some encouraging words from my friend, psychologist Sandy Wilson in her book “Released from Shame” about how God can use a tough time to bring something positive on the other side. Listen to her words about Pearls.
“Pearls are the product of pain. For some unknown reason, the shell of the oyster gets pierced and an alien substance – like a grain of sand - slips inside. On the entry of that foreign irritant, all the resources within the tiny, sensitive oyster rush to the spot and begin to release healing fluids that otherwise would have remained dormant. By and by the irritant is covered and the wound is healed - by the pearl. No other gem has so fascinating a history. It is the symbol of stress - a healed wound... a precious, tiny jewel conceived through irritation, born of adversity, nursed by adjustments. Had there been no wounding, no irritating interruption, there could have been no pearl.”
God loves you and God can bring greater value to your life on the other side of a tough financial time, often by helping you see that what matters in life are the things that money can’t buy. As you gain a deeper spiritual faith, your life will feel more in control and you can feel peace instead of panic when facing a financial test, or any other test for that matter. And remember that there is no testimony without a test. So whatever you are facing today, may you be encouraged to walk through it with God. His love will always be there for you.
Reprint Permission- If this article was helpful you are invited to share it electronically or in print with your own list at work or church, forward it to friends and family or post it on your own site or blog. Just leave it intact and do not alter it in any way. Please include the following paragraph in your reprint and thanks for helping us to help others by spreading the word. "Reprinted with permission from the LifeWorks Group, www.LifeWorksGroup.org eNews (Copyright, 2004-2009, by the LifeWorks Group)"
About the author- Dwight Bain is dedicated to helping people achieve greater results. He is a Nationally Certified Counselor, Certified Life Coach and Certified Family Law Mediator in practice since 1984 with a primary focus on solving crisis events and managing major change. He partners with media, major corporations and non-profit organizations to make a positive difference in our culture. Access more counseling and coaching resources designed to save you time by solving stressful situations by visiting his counseling blog with over 200 complimentary articles and special reports at www.LifeWorksGroup.org
Tuesday, December 16, 2008
7 Strategies to Survive the Holidays
7 Strategies to Survive the Holidays
By Dwight Bain, Nationally Certified Counselor & Certified Life Coach
Have you ever wondered why traditional holidays are so stressful? Instead of being called the ‘most wonderful time of the year,’ it seems that we should rename it to be more accurately called the ‘most difficult time of the year’. I believe you can break the pattern of stressful holidays by realistically changing your perspective to directly deal with predictable daily pressures and then by using strategic coping skills to steer around or even better steer away from the bigger problems that tend to ‘pop up’ this time of year.
Face it. There are as many factors to cause our stress levels to build to an explosive level as there are people on the planet. Everyone has complexities and challenges different from others, yet there are some universal pressures everyone has to address no matter their age, gender or marital status. Stress tends to go up as we age because there are more factors to consider, more people to deal with and more responsibilities. The older you get, the more you are forced to change and deal with issues directly, or get stuck in the habit of repeating the same problems over and over again until you die. Yuck!
Is this bad news for everyone? No, because I believe that God designed you to have a healthy and balanced lifestyle, and that He will always provide you a way to move past daily pressures to live out your real purpose. You control the choices needed to change and improve your life more than you realize. Understanding the pressures, (counseling insight), and then using a strategic approach to achieve greater results, (coaching application), will position you to break out of the unhealthy patterns of the past to have a balanced and better future.Here are the four most common factors that steal joy away from the holidays followed by seven strategic ways to finish the year healthy and strong. Use these insights to move from barely surviving the holidays to really thriving in the New Year as you enjoy the blessings of living out a lifestyle of lasting success.
#1- Loneliness-
Holidays are designed as a time to be with friends and family making positive memories. Not so for the person who wounded by dysfunctional relationships or dealing with rejection from divorce while trying to rebuild their life alone. The continual holiday music, movies and television specials aren’t comforting to people feeling detached, rather they are hurtful because they serve as continual reminders of what’s missing in their life. (Keep in mind that writers and artists tend to create entertainment material that reflects the world as they would like to see it and not as it really is to maintain some level of perspective about the many people who struggle with loneliness during the holidays).
#2- Unfulfilled-
The end of the year is a relief for some and a time of reflection for others. Wisdom says to evaluate your progress this year in light of your overall mission, purpose and core values to see if you are on track for a lifetime. Worldly culture pushes people toward being too busy so that they virtually ignore all of that journaling to live for the moment hoping that everything will just mysteriously work out “happily ever after” like the ending of a Children's story book. Many people get caught up in the busy events of the holidays to avoid having to look at the real issues in their life. Remember, the more you ignore the important and fulfilling things in your life, the more you will try to fill the emptiness with meaningless activities and materialistic stuff. Stuff can never fill the 'black hole' of being unfulfilled without purpose, but the clutter does allow people to have a logical excuse to avoid actually dealing with being responsible to spend your life doing what you were born to do.
#3- Stressed-
Everyone has stress to deal with from the cradle to the grave, its part of life. Learn to view each activity or action as either causing stress, or relieving it for you and the people around you. Now, think about many of the activities and actions that fill up our Franklin Planners from November to January. Things like, waiting in line to buy a gift, then waiting in another line to have that gift wrapped; or sending out hundreds of cards to people at the last minute, who may not even have time to open it and see who it’s from during the midst of their own holiday stress; or sampling a little bit of every type of food at holiday parties and still expecting to not gain weight; or spending an extra thirty hours putting up decorations and still getting enough sleep. Stress is emotional pressure from things feeling out of control, and it’s easy to get out of balance when so many things are being thrown at you this time of the year.
#4- Tired-
If you aren’t already exhausted from trying to squeeze more and more seasonal events and decorations into less and less available time, just wait five minutes and you will be. Everyone has a certain amount of these very limited resources to manage…energy, money and time. While the amounts of each may vary during different stages of life, it’s usually just from a trade of one for another. (Example- If you work more hours, you make more money, but give up more energy to get it. If you are carefree and have all the time in the world, you probably had to give up financial stability to get it. Kids are allowed to sleep late, but they don’t have to make the mortgage payment at the end of the month).
Fatigue isn’t limited only to a loss of physical energy it can overlap into emotional burnout or spiritual emptiness, which then negatively affects our personal and professional relationships as well. The more tired we are, the more we tend to have a negative outlook, experience low morale, feel moody and un-motivated to change.Okay, now that you have seen some of the most common reasons we end up feeling so much stress, let’s move forward to understand and apply a new approach to achieve a greater result in your personal and professional life.
Here are seven strategic and proactive steps you can take to move from feeling holiday stress to experiencing a memorable experience of holiday success for you and those you care about this holiday season.
7 Strategies to Change from Holiday Survival to Holiday Success-
1) Celebrate- laugh, rejoice, giggle, gather, sing and count every blessing as you enjoy all the good things in your life instead of just focusing on the pressures and problems. Then join in with others who are so busy celebrating the wonders of life that they don’t have time to stop and criticize the weaknesses and flaws. Like the old saying my mother used to tell me, ‘two men looked through prison bars- one saw the mud and the other saw the stars.
2) Connect- with people instead of being alone. There are more community activities this time of year than you could ever imagine. Visit special programs through churches, or by asking friends and family what they are doing, or where they are going and see if there is an extra seat on the bus going there. We were designed for relationship instead of isolation, so if you aren’t plugged into a healthy environment of positive people, use this time of year to ‘shop’ all the options available to see where you best fit and then plug in to connect with others who are likeminded to enjoy a stronger connection all year long.
3) Care- about people instead of caring about material things. One of the most memorable things you can do is to come alongside to add value to others in need during the holiday season. You might help a needy family, or ask groups like Hospice, or the Salvation Army, or a woman’s shelter about a person or family that you might be able to help with special gifts of food, encouragement or time. The memories you make will be greater than any gift-card you have ever received.
4) Choose- to be healthy with your intake of food, sugar, caffeine and alcoholic beverages which are more common during the festivities of the holiday season. You can solve a lot of the ‘let down’ feelings that are common this time of year by maintaining your regular schedule and daily routines. Especially make the positive choice to get enough sleep and protect your body from wearing out from exhaustion, or getting weaker from sleep deprivation, which makes you more prone to catching the cold or flu this time of year.
5) Cash- instead of credit is a better way to solve a lot of the after holiday stress of opening up statements full of debts staring you in the face. The impulsive purchases you make in December may take years to pay off, so solve this stressor by sitting down to list our your expectations of the holidays and then factor in how much this is going to cost in real dollars. Working from a planned budget will protect you from the huge temptation to buy more things than you intended from stores overflowing with commercial appeals of great deals. If you can’t afford it, it’s not a gift rather it’s just one more impulsive debt to repay.
6) Contact- Use the holidays as a time to reconnect with the people that you may have lost touch with through the year. Use festive postcards, greeting cards, or our family's favorite, a photo greeting card to see a recent picture of how big the kids have grown! Some people take time to write out detailed letters of what happened during their year, which are great to read. (Remember that the letter should be written as to share blessings and praises to bring hope, not full of prideful bragging to somehow using Christmas as a platform to show how much better your kids are than their peers.) The Internet makes it easier than ever to stay connected with others through emails and e-greetings. Use these tools as a strategic way to stay connected in building a stronger relationship and you may develop a deeper friendship that opens the door to enjoying a new friendship long after this years holiday season is repacked back into storage boxes for next year.
7) Creator- The holiday season is rooted in rich spiritual traditions. The best strategy to overcome holiday stress is to replace it with the deepest level of meaning that a person can experience in their heart and soul and spirit. I challenge you to allow the holidays to draw you to God in a new way so you might experience what choirs of angels sang over a stable thousands of years ago, "peace on earth and good will to men." Developing a personal relationship with the Christ of Christmas will move you from feeling alone in the world, to being part of something bigger than yourself, and something that will live on forever. When you sense God's presence, you can feel His peace and power every day.Look at it this way, experiencing God's presence will be like opening a present every day from someone who loved you so much that He would rather die than live without you.
This is the real reason hundreds of millions of people on this planet will stop everything to bow their heads and quietly pray on Christmas Eve. If you already know the true meaning of Christmas, enjoy the season with your family and friends. If you aren't sure what this all means, I challenge you to let God's love come into your life today so that you never have to feel alone again.Balancing these strategies will speed you on your journey from stress to lasting success which is the best gift you could ever receive because it lasts forever! Once you have mastered these key areas, make sure that you tell others so they can enjoy a better quality of life with you as well.
Reprint Permission- If this article helped you, you are invited to share it with your own list at work or church, forward it to friends and family or post it on your own site or blog. Just leave it intact and do not alter it in any way. Any links must remain in the article. Please include the following paragraph in your reprint.
"Reprinted with permission from the LifeWorks Group weekly eNews, (Copyright, 2004-2008), To receive this valuable weekly resource visit www.LifeWorksGroup.org or call 407-647-7005"
About the author- Dwight Bain is dedicated to helping people achieve greater results. He is a Nationally Certified Counselor, Certified Life Coach and Certified Family Law Mediator in practice since 1984 with a primary focus on solving crisis events and managing major change. He is a member of the National Speakers Association and partners with media, major corporations and non-profit organizations to make a positive difference in our culture. Access more counseling and coaching resources designed to save you time by solving stressful situations by visiting his counseling blog with over 150 complimentary articles and special reports at www.LifeWorksGroup.org
By Dwight Bain, Nationally Certified Counselor & Certified Life Coach
Have you ever wondered why traditional holidays are so stressful? Instead of being called the ‘most wonderful time of the year,’ it seems that we should rename it to be more accurately called the ‘most difficult time of the year’. I believe you can break the pattern of stressful holidays by realistically changing your perspective to directly deal with predictable daily pressures and then by using strategic coping skills to steer around or even better steer away from the bigger problems that tend to ‘pop up’ this time of year.
Face it. There are as many factors to cause our stress levels to build to an explosive level as there are people on the planet. Everyone has complexities and challenges different from others, yet there are some universal pressures everyone has to address no matter their age, gender or marital status. Stress tends to go up as we age because there are more factors to consider, more people to deal with and more responsibilities. The older you get, the more you are forced to change and deal with issues directly, or get stuck in the habit of repeating the same problems over and over again until you die. Yuck!
Is this bad news for everyone? No, because I believe that God designed you to have a healthy and balanced lifestyle, and that He will always provide you a way to move past daily pressures to live out your real purpose. You control the choices needed to change and improve your life more than you realize. Understanding the pressures, (counseling insight), and then using a strategic approach to achieve greater results, (coaching application), will position you to break out of the unhealthy patterns of the past to have a balanced and better future.Here are the four most common factors that steal joy away from the holidays followed by seven strategic ways to finish the year healthy and strong. Use these insights to move from barely surviving the holidays to really thriving in the New Year as you enjoy the blessings of living out a lifestyle of lasting success.
#1- Loneliness-
Holidays are designed as a time to be with friends and family making positive memories. Not so for the person who wounded by dysfunctional relationships or dealing with rejection from divorce while trying to rebuild their life alone. The continual holiday music, movies and television specials aren’t comforting to people feeling detached, rather they are hurtful because they serve as continual reminders of what’s missing in their life. (Keep in mind that writers and artists tend to create entertainment material that reflects the world as they would like to see it and not as it really is to maintain some level of perspective about the many people who struggle with loneliness during the holidays).
#2- Unfulfilled-
The end of the year is a relief for some and a time of reflection for others. Wisdom says to evaluate your progress this year in light of your overall mission, purpose and core values to see if you are on track for a lifetime. Worldly culture pushes people toward being too busy so that they virtually ignore all of that journaling to live for the moment hoping that everything will just mysteriously work out “happily ever after” like the ending of a Children's story book. Many people get caught up in the busy events of the holidays to avoid having to look at the real issues in their life. Remember, the more you ignore the important and fulfilling things in your life, the more you will try to fill the emptiness with meaningless activities and materialistic stuff. Stuff can never fill the 'black hole' of being unfulfilled without purpose, but the clutter does allow people to have a logical excuse to avoid actually dealing with being responsible to spend your life doing what you were born to do.
#3- Stressed-
Everyone has stress to deal with from the cradle to the grave, its part of life. Learn to view each activity or action as either causing stress, or relieving it for you and the people around you. Now, think about many of the activities and actions that fill up our Franklin Planners from November to January. Things like, waiting in line to buy a gift, then waiting in another line to have that gift wrapped; or sending out hundreds of cards to people at the last minute, who may not even have time to open it and see who it’s from during the midst of their own holiday stress; or sampling a little bit of every type of food at holiday parties and still expecting to not gain weight; or spending an extra thirty hours putting up decorations and still getting enough sleep. Stress is emotional pressure from things feeling out of control, and it’s easy to get out of balance when so many things are being thrown at you this time of the year.
#4- Tired-
If you aren’t already exhausted from trying to squeeze more and more seasonal events and decorations into less and less available time, just wait five minutes and you will be. Everyone has a certain amount of these very limited resources to manage…energy, money and time. While the amounts of each may vary during different stages of life, it’s usually just from a trade of one for another. (Example- If you work more hours, you make more money, but give up more energy to get it. If you are carefree and have all the time in the world, you probably had to give up financial stability to get it. Kids are allowed to sleep late, but they don’t have to make the mortgage payment at the end of the month).
Fatigue isn’t limited only to a loss of physical energy it can overlap into emotional burnout or spiritual emptiness, which then negatively affects our personal and professional relationships as well. The more tired we are, the more we tend to have a negative outlook, experience low morale, feel moody and un-motivated to change.Okay, now that you have seen some of the most common reasons we end up feeling so much stress, let’s move forward to understand and apply a new approach to achieve a greater result in your personal and professional life.
Here are seven strategic and proactive steps you can take to move from feeling holiday stress to experiencing a memorable experience of holiday success for you and those you care about this holiday season.
7 Strategies to Change from Holiday Survival to Holiday Success-
1) Celebrate- laugh, rejoice, giggle, gather, sing and count every blessing as you enjoy all the good things in your life instead of just focusing on the pressures and problems. Then join in with others who are so busy celebrating the wonders of life that they don’t have time to stop and criticize the weaknesses and flaws. Like the old saying my mother used to tell me, ‘two men looked through prison bars- one saw the mud and the other saw the stars.
2) Connect- with people instead of being alone. There are more community activities this time of year than you could ever imagine. Visit special programs through churches, or by asking friends and family what they are doing, or where they are going and see if there is an extra seat on the bus going there. We were designed for relationship instead of isolation, so if you aren’t plugged into a healthy environment of positive people, use this time of year to ‘shop’ all the options available to see where you best fit and then plug in to connect with others who are likeminded to enjoy a stronger connection all year long.
3) Care- about people instead of caring about material things. One of the most memorable things you can do is to come alongside to add value to others in need during the holiday season. You might help a needy family, or ask groups like Hospice, or the Salvation Army, or a woman’s shelter about a person or family that you might be able to help with special gifts of food, encouragement or time. The memories you make will be greater than any gift-card you have ever received.
4) Choose- to be healthy with your intake of food, sugar, caffeine and alcoholic beverages which are more common during the festivities of the holiday season. You can solve a lot of the ‘let down’ feelings that are common this time of year by maintaining your regular schedule and daily routines. Especially make the positive choice to get enough sleep and protect your body from wearing out from exhaustion, or getting weaker from sleep deprivation, which makes you more prone to catching the cold or flu this time of year.
5) Cash- instead of credit is a better way to solve a lot of the after holiday stress of opening up statements full of debts staring you in the face. The impulsive purchases you make in December may take years to pay off, so solve this stressor by sitting down to list our your expectations of the holidays and then factor in how much this is going to cost in real dollars. Working from a planned budget will protect you from the huge temptation to buy more things than you intended from stores overflowing with commercial appeals of great deals. If you can’t afford it, it’s not a gift rather it’s just one more impulsive debt to repay.
6) Contact- Use the holidays as a time to reconnect with the people that you may have lost touch with through the year. Use festive postcards, greeting cards, or our family's favorite, a photo greeting card to see a recent picture of how big the kids have grown! Some people take time to write out detailed letters of what happened during their year, which are great to read. (Remember that the letter should be written as to share blessings and praises to bring hope, not full of prideful bragging to somehow using Christmas as a platform to show how much better your kids are than their peers.) The Internet makes it easier than ever to stay connected with others through emails and e-greetings. Use these tools as a strategic way to stay connected in building a stronger relationship and you may develop a deeper friendship that opens the door to enjoying a new friendship long after this years holiday season is repacked back into storage boxes for next year.
7) Creator- The holiday season is rooted in rich spiritual traditions. The best strategy to overcome holiday stress is to replace it with the deepest level of meaning that a person can experience in their heart and soul and spirit. I challenge you to allow the holidays to draw you to God in a new way so you might experience what choirs of angels sang over a stable thousands of years ago, "peace on earth and good will to men." Developing a personal relationship with the Christ of Christmas will move you from feeling alone in the world, to being part of something bigger than yourself, and something that will live on forever. When you sense God's presence, you can feel His peace and power every day.Look at it this way, experiencing God's presence will be like opening a present every day from someone who loved you so much that He would rather die than live without you.
This is the real reason hundreds of millions of people on this planet will stop everything to bow their heads and quietly pray on Christmas Eve. If you already know the true meaning of Christmas, enjoy the season with your family and friends. If you aren't sure what this all means, I challenge you to let God's love come into your life today so that you never have to feel alone again.Balancing these strategies will speed you on your journey from stress to lasting success which is the best gift you could ever receive because it lasts forever! Once you have mastered these key areas, make sure that you tell others so they can enjoy a better quality of life with you as well.
Reprint Permission- If this article helped you, you are invited to share it with your own list at work or church, forward it to friends and family or post it on your own site or blog. Just leave it intact and do not alter it in any way. Any links must remain in the article. Please include the following paragraph in your reprint.
"Reprinted with permission from the LifeWorks Group weekly eNews, (Copyright, 2004-2008), To receive this valuable weekly resource visit www.LifeWorksGroup.org or call 407-647-7005"
About the author- Dwight Bain is dedicated to helping people achieve greater results. He is a Nationally Certified Counselor, Certified Life Coach and Certified Family Law Mediator in practice since 1984 with a primary focus on solving crisis events and managing major change. He is a member of the National Speakers Association and partners with media, major corporations and non-profit organizations to make a positive difference in our culture. Access more counseling and coaching resources designed to save you time by solving stressful situations by visiting his counseling blog with over 150 complimentary articles and special reports at www.LifeWorksGroup.org
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