As I listened to her story and watched her compete, I couldn’t help but get a few life lessons from Lindsey and her gold medal victory:

Don’t give up. Lindsey was totally zeroed in on capturing gold. When she fell, Lindsey got back up. How clear are your goals? How motivated are you to push forward?

Obstacles will appear that need to be overcome. Lindsey’s bruised shin bone happened at the absolute worst time, yet she didn’t throw in the towel and showed up as planned in Vancouver. How resourceful are you when an unforeseen circumstance raises its head prior to a big event? For instance, before an important speaking engagement, or when product has been promised at a key supplier and there is a mishap at the manufacturer. Or maybe an obstacle arises one day before leaving on vacation?

Love what you’re doing and let it show. Lindsey clearly loves skiing and continued to smile and show grace under pressure, especially when she wasn’t sure if she would even be able to ski! How do you show others how much you love what you do?

Try some of Lindsey’s qualities out for yourself. I’m sure they will have a positive impact in all areas of your own life — work and personal.

Karen Hodges

So let’s take a look at the most common and annoying styles and how to handle them.

• Inexperienced HR folks: Remember how it was for you in your first interviews. You are both trying to do the job as best as possible. If you come across disdainfully or recklessly, the nervous interviewer is much more likely to move on rather than advance you to the next step of the process. HR folks are interviewing for culture and fit. You need to think about how you will talk to them in ways that give them the confidence to keep your name in play.
• Peers: This is awkward. Someone with whom you were an equal, but now is in position to hire you. Put them in a good position by focusing on specific, positive accomplishments. When you are specific about what you increase, decrease or maintain, they are able to relax.
• Inepts: You know them. They have a list of questions but don’t really seem to know what they are asking. It’s rough, but you have to stay on your toes and help this interviewer get to know you. One way is to ask good, non-threatening content questions. For example, you might ask, “How did this job come about?” or, “Describe a typical project.” or “What do you want completed in the first six months when you hire someone?”
• Steamrollers: You just can’t get a word in edgewise? Probably 85 percent of the time, if you just sit and listen to the steamroller, you will get called back. The truth is the best conversationalist is usually the person who listens to me. If you listen, I’ll feel great. It is your interview, but you’ve got to give them some air time. Remember, there will be pauses when the interviewer needs air. You have to stay in touch with what’s going on, bring it back gently, “You know when you talked about XYZ, it reminded me of a situation I faced in my last job…”
• Picky-Pickys: These interviewers are so detail-oriented they can’t see the bigger picture. This is why you need to have several anecdotes ready to present about your most important accomplishments. The big thinker will want to hear about strategy, the Picky-Picky will want numbers, statistics, details.
• Wanderers: They drift off. They follow obscure conversation paths. Much as with the steamrollers, you need to bring the conversation back by using your examples to relate to their points. They may be the interviewer, but you can still control the direction of the conversation.It should go without saying that you need to know your own style. Check your ego at the door because if you start thinking you are better than the interviewer, you’re going to have a problem. Reveal your own intelligence slowly and focus on the interviewer intensely. Listen to what the person says, how the person speaks, and what the underlying concerns might be.

Last night a solution appeared in the form of a dream. My dream was about Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz  and was clicking on her ruby slippers three times.  Ahhhhhh Haaaaa!

This dream held some clues and seemed to be telling me that help was there for me if I asked for what I wanted.

I am once again humbled ,and at the same time amazed, by the wonder of The Universe. So often guidance can come to us in a dream, a song, or even from an off-handed comment from a friend.

The ruby slippers are a magical talisman from The Universe reminding me that aid is right at my feet, ready to help me find my way out of the maze I’m stuck in.

What has come to your aid during your own adventures to transformation™?

Karen Hodges

I know that Winter has truly set in when it gets dark so early. Suddenly I feel sluggish and unmotivated and my usually sharp mind seems to go fuzzy. All of this is more difficult because the calendar says “January” which means and New Year and time to get moving.

Yet look at what Mother Nature is doing at this time of year. Many of the animals either go into hibernation or experience a reduced metabolic activity. Notice the trees and the plants — they too slow down or stop during the Winter.

All of this slowing down is great, except the huge rub is that our culture has the “always on” or “go, go, go” mentality. To me this translates that I should be getting up at 6:00 am, like I do in the summer, blogging and writing always, reading industry sites to stay on top of the latest trends………yep, you get the picture.

Winter is about s-l-o-w-i-n-g down, reviewing the growth of the past year, feeling around in the dark, toying with solutions without knowing if they will work or not.

What I notice is that when I let to and go with the winter wisdom I drop what is unimportant and inconsequential. Suddenly I begin to remember what really matters and to connect to that. This way of being takes time, presence, and quiet.

Just for today, what would it be like for you to give yourself the true gifts of winter’s wisdom? I’d love to hear from you.

Karen Hodges

When I recently worked with one of them, we began to talk about how she would talk about herself and what would she say made her unique? Well, you know, at first it was hard.

(As we may all remember, at that age, we don’t usually like to think of ourselves as different, we want to fit in, but on the other side, we as adults know that college admissions interviewing looks for not only academic standing but who the person really is.)

So, we talked about something I have coined, “specials” which is the word I used, years ago, when my own two daughters were dealing with similar issues, to help them get a handle on what made them unique.

“Specials,” I said,” are those things that make you. They are yours only. No one has them in the way you do and no one can take them away.”

So, I asked her a simple question to help her surface her “specials.”

“If someone had to be you for a week, what talents, skills, personality traits, likes and dislikes, abilities would someone like me have to have if I were to take your role? What would they have to be able to manage, tolerate, and understand? What would they have to have as strengths, in other words, ‘specials?’”

We began talking and she became my casting director, she began to discover and describe her attributes which included her intelligence, her patience, persistence, initiative, good work ethic, community service and being a very hardworking student.

She was surprised, almost amazed, that once she stepped out of herself and thought about someone else doing all that she does, and by the way, does well, then she was able to see herself more clearly.

Next, as she articulated the list, I wrote her words down, verbatim. After that, I read them aloud to her, just to check if we missed something or wanted to reword something. She seemed to beam and light up.

Finally, I asked her to read them back to me, out loud, in a very specific way.

“Please read each quality out loud to me, and put together a sentence that starts with , “I am..,” or “I can…” or “I know…” or “I have…””

She began, “I am intelligent, I am very patient, I have persistence, I have initiative….”

I bet you can imagine what she looked like and felt: empowered, self aware and self-appreciative and amazed that this grouping of skills were indeed her “specials.” Her smile was a mile long.

So, do you think that question might help you get out of yourself and recover and rediscover your “specials?”

What are yours, dear readers? Think about it, ask yourself the same question, “If someone had to be me for a month, what would that person have to have, know, manage, tolerate? What skills would your understudy have to have? What attributes must they possess?

Then, make a list of words that come to you but don’t forget the best part. Read it out loud to yourself and see how that makes you feel when you honor your “specials.”

©2010 Judy Rosemarin

A lot of magazines and websites have tips on how to get yourself moving in the direction of change and reinventing your life.  Tips are awesome, but how do you make it happen without falling into the abyss during the journey?  In my experience what really trips most of us up is the mental and emotional stuff.

The journey from where you are to where you want to be is not a 1-2-3 turn on the dime deal. Parts of the journey are murky with no clear sign if you’re even moving anywhere at all! This time of confusion and doubt can happen when we’re taking steps and holding onto our new vision without the buds of manifestation showing us visibly that anything is really happening.  I like to think of this time on the journey as Winter.

Take a look at your own life for a moment. There may be one or even two areas of your life where you’re in Winter and other areas where you’re in Summer. Maybe you’ll notice that your financial situation and work are humming along. However, in your love or relationship sector you see that Winter is indeed here. Maybe you’ve recently connected with a new love in your life – you’re having fun and flirting with this possibility – but not totally sure yet if this is indeed what you’ve been waiting and looking for. Or perhaps you’re an entrepreneur working diligently on your business and wonder if your recent business building activities are the “right” ones to produce the results you need.

Winter is all about feeling around in the darkness. Know that as you grope and feel around without answers that there are other adventurers on their journey doing much the same. Courage is needed to stay with it and continue to ask yourself all of the open-ended questions that spring from your heart.

To your adventures to transformation™ — may they bring you blessings beyond measure.

I’d love to hear back from you on where you are on your journey!

Karen Hodges

I suppose the question was raised because the person asking was over 50 and she didn’t want to be seen as “threatening” or not be viewed as valuable.   She must have been thinking, “times are tough, scary, uncertain, so play it low, play it small, minimize yourself.”

Oh dear.

Needless to say, my answer was a “no.” Actually, it was a big emotional “no” because the idea of down selling yourself is first and foremost, a comment on your self-esteem and I don’t like it when women demean themselves. You mean to say that after you have worked all these years, learned and taught so much, made differences to the bottom line, or in others’ lives, you now want to put that in a corner?

What that means to me is that for some reason, you think your talent, your wisdom; your expertise is not valuable.  If you take that belief and hold it to be a truth, which it is not,  then you will come across just as what you fear; not being valued.

Down-selling means that you are changing your story in hopes of being more acceptable. Whoever got a satisfying job that way? Let me tell you that if you change your story, you will have to change your interviewing. You will have to learn a whole new character, as in a play, and then learn new lines and a new outcome. And that means if you change your interviewing, you will have to show up as someone other than yourself. And that means that you are bending and twisting to “fit it” instead of standing up straight and be counted as someone who counts.

Interviewing with others is a chance to tell a story that has some impact and influence on the listener. If you are telling a watered-down version, it will not feel authentic to you and I can promise that the listener will pick up on the lack of congruence. If, for example, you were really pleased about turning a disgruntled client around which re-invigorated $5mm in sales, why in the world would you not tell that story?

Frankly, in my opinion, down-selling a resume is the twin to lying on one. Puffing one up with falsehoods is always frowned on. Taking the air out of one is just as false. I recommend neither.  If you want to be seen as yourself, and be hired as yourself, then you have to show up as yourself in your resume and then in the interview. And, for the record, a resume should be a projective job description, not just a history.

The question should be, how can I show up in a convincing and compelling way that connects with the interviewer’s needs?

It’s not about showing off, or belittling yourself. It’s about showing up as who you are! After all, you need to be yourself,  because no one else is qualified.

Listen, it sounds something  like this: I wish I were…and rest of the sentence is filled in with things like, “employed again,” or “I wish I were making more money, “ or I wish I were younger,  or have more time, or thinner, or taller, or even wishing that “I were happier.” But the wishing alone doesn’t cut it. And yet,  people think that by saying and wishing these things, magically they will happen.

Try it. Just wish away, “I wish I were….” and see how you feel. You decide.

On the other hand, there is another way to  pick up your spirits, energize yourself a bit more, begin to appreciate what you already have, take it from the opposite side. Look at it as an alternative to the “I wish” song and try this new tune.

Try this sentence completion: “I am glad I am not…”  and see what happens. Yes, “I am glad I am not….” takes a whole other view of your life.

When times are tough, most people yearn for a better time, a better feeling. Most people don’t realize that they have much more than they realize and the way you can discover it for yourself is to fill in the blank,  with your own words.

You might find that you fill it in with “I am glad I am not sick,” or if you are not well, “I am glad not alone …” or “I am glad that I am not 23 years old anymore because I have wisdom,“ or I am glad that I am not house-bound,” or even better,  “I am glad I am not worse off  than I am and as so many others are.”

You see, I had a grandfather, whom I called Poo ( because that is what came out when I tried to say Grandpa)  who used to tell me that there were many less fortunate than I and he made sure that I learned it. He would take me on subway rides in New York city, that still had leather straps, which I could not reach and we walked through very poor neighborhoods. Other grandparents might take their grand kids to shows and sightseeing highlights, but instead,  I saw people living in slums,  in  clothing that  were in tatters, where holes in pants were not designer-placed but from the fact that it was a third hand-me-down. It was a huge eye opener for a young girl of nine or so.

“Just remember, Judy, you are a lucky girl and appreciate what you have.”

I suddenly in that moment realized that I was making myself miserable because friend of mine got a fancy pair of dress up shoes and I wished for the same. Oh it hurt, how much I wished for them. So, those subway day trips taught me a very important lesson. It was simple yet profound:  the greatest way to make yourself feel miserable is to compare yourself with those who you think have it all. It’s a sure fire, guaranteed 100% non failure rate process to make you feel “less than.”

But, if you try the other side, and begin thinking about “I am glad I am not…” then your spirits may change, lift up and bit and get you ready for taking action on the wishes that you have for the New Year!

“The contented man is never poor; the discontented never rich.”—George Elliot

Oh and Poo would have been pleased for you, and so will you.

Happy New Year to all!

©2010 Judy Rosemarin

A huge change in my own life occurred when my first husband passed away from leukemia just 13 days shy of our baby’s first birthday. And, of course, I see the impact of change with my clients no matter what type of change is happening in their lives — getting married after being a long-time single, a job loss, a divorce, or experiencing an empty nest for the first time.

What I’ve experienced and learned in my own life is that Change — no matter how difficult or unwelcomed – is always an opportunity. And here is where the rubber meets the road — you get to choose! Good old Webster sums it up perfectly: transition is defined as a passage from one state, stage, or place to another; transformation is defined as an act, process or instance of being transformed or changed.

Quite honestly, for some changes a transition might make the most sense and suit you just fine. In my own life, I choose transformation and with it the promise that at the end of the tunnel my life would emerge even better than before.

Be honest with yourself. Take a few moments to think about whether you want your change to be a transition or a transformation.

I’d love to hear about your own Adventures to Transformation ™.

Karen Hodges

Remember the all consuming fear of Y2K of  10 years ago?  People were “what-if-ing” everywhere.

All bells and whistles would stop. Computers would crash, unable to calculate the changes. Even I  went out and bought a wind up radio  just in case all the air waves got jumbled and I would be cut loose from the rest of the world. I also know someone who took $10K out of the bank and kept it stashed in his house, for fear the banks would seize up. So many greeted that turn of the millennium with dread. It was possibility thinking from the dark side.

But, there were others who greeted it with glee.  They were the ones who saw  possibilities from the other side, the brighter one: opportunities. Yes, those in IT were the ones with the smiles on their faces, true, but others too were open to the notion of possibilities, unbridled, perhaps.

So, let’s not make resolutions for this year but instead, gear up our possibility thinking, from the bright side. I wonder if this will be the year that you finally get your finances in order? Will it be the year that you decide that you have great value and will begin to think about new positions or partnerships? Will 2010 be the year that you finally get that networking list into action and make rich connections?  Are you going to become more proactive and finally say to  yourself, “I can, “ as compared to “It’s impossible?”

I have a friend who hates new things. She stays put. She knows two restaurants and those are the ones that make her feel comfortable; everyone knows her there and she is always assured of good service and attention.  Nice, cozy and predictable. She does not like to stray from her comfort zone.

While that is fine for dining, she also has that pattern in her professional life. She has remained in a job that is incredibly wrong for her, as she is bored to tears and has moved way beyond her job description.  But the fear of changing is greater than the actual daily stomach distress that she has been treated for for over two years, the short temper she has developed with her family and the diminishing self esteem that is continually ebbing away.

How will she look at 2010? Will  it be a time that she decides “yes”  to taking better care of herself?  Could it be a time when she says “no” to fear that is only a thought and not a fact? Will it be a time when she begins to remember her value and her values so that others begin to see them too? Will she ring in the New Year with bright possibility thinking? I sure hope so and I think she can. Do you think you can? I sure hope so.

©2010 Judy Rosemarin

###