Those of you that listened to Episode 10 of The Conshy Coaching Podcast heard me discuss the concepts of Acceptance, Conscious Choice, Vulnerability, and Hope.

Hope is a beautiful thing. It’s beautiful because it can be learned. It’s a feeling of trust that comes from learning that we are strong enough to survive. It comes from reflection on the past, acceptance of the present, and our vision for the future.

When I reflect on all that we’ve experienced thus far during the Coronavirus Pandemic, I am hopeful that we, as a society, will learn and grow from this experience. I am hopeful that when this is over there will be a slower pace of life. One where family dinners and walks will be prioritized, one where we give ourselves permission to not shower, or dress up, or have our schedules packed so completely full that we can’t even breathe.

The late C.R. Snyder, an American psychologist with a specialty in positive psychology, explained in one of his books that hope isn’t an emotion, it’s a way of thinking. It’s a cognitive process made up of goals, pathways, and agency.

In short, by accepting where we are in the present moment, we can create hope by setting realistic goals and having a clear vision. We can then fuel hope by figuring out ways to achieve those goals and being flexible enough to develop alternate ways to achieve our goals when faced with roadblocks. And, lastly, we can solidify hope by believing in ourselves, owning our worthiness, and knowing that we are enough.

Hope comes from within, and while I am hopeful that as a society we will change, the work starts with me, it starts with you, it starts with each of us individually.

Creating Hope – Part 1: Goal Setting

When it comes to setting goals, it’s important that we:

Evaluate and accept our current situation and energy levels
Set smaller, mastery-oriented goals that are focused on the process rather than the outcome
Position ourselves for little wins
Practice forgiveness if things do not turn out as planned.

I personally believe that accepting who we are as individuals and the situation that we are in is the first true step to setting realistic goals and cultivating hope. Acceptance allows you to remain present at the moment, see the bigger picture, and engage all of your energy into whatever it is that you’re doing so that you can maximize your chances for doing well.

Look at the stay-at-home order that we’re living in right now. Our energy is being drained in more ways than anyone can count. Our environment isn’t optimal with stay-at-home orders, socially, we’ve had to adapt to virtual hangouts; mentally, we’re being inundated with news, and we are having a lot more time with our thoughts and emotions which is a weird and uncomfortable space to be in. Wishing quarantine is anything different than what it is, and wishing it was over sooner and that life would “go back to normal” is also causing conflict with the current situation and draining our energy. However, if we consciously choose to accept quarantine and the situation for what it is, then we can stop the energy bleed. We can energetically shift our mindset from “being stuck” to recognizing that there is so much freedom in knowing that we can create our own experience, for likely the first time since we were kids. We can make our own rules and find new creative ways to fulfill our needs, align with our values, and frankly new ways to just navigate this new normal.

A quick note on mastery goals. As a society, we’ve been trained to set performance goals – goals with a specific outcome that we can clearly distinguish if we succeed or fail. But what if we changed the goal from being focused on an outcome to being focused on the process?

In coaching, I always encourage my clients to set mastery goals. A mastery goal is focused on learning and improving yourself. Like a performance goal, there is a clear vision and objective in mind, but the goal is focused on the process which allows you to easily adapt to changing situations, maintain higher energy levels, and always succeed.

Fueling Hope – Part 2: Creativity and Adaptability

At a vision board event, I held in January one of the attendees commented: “The vision and goals are yours, but the “how” is none of your business. That’s up to the Universe.”

I think that statement ties into the second step to cultivating hope perfectly, which is the ability to pivot and adapt to changing situations so that you can still achieve your goals.

As I think about what the participants put on their boards, I am amazed at all the things that have still manifested during, and as a result of, quarantine. Maybe not in the way that the participants expected, but the universe works in mysterious ways, and by adjusting our sails and tapping into our creative resources, we've been able to come together as a community, as a family, and accomplish great things.

Here are some of the things that the participants put on their vision boards:

“Anything but ordinary.”
“The power of community.”
“A generous helping of humanity.”
“Family.”
“Take time to reflect. The moment is now.”
“Make your own history.”
“Your life’s journey is about becoming more of who you are.”
“Balance is everything.”
“Make space for happy vibes.”
“I am the next chapter.”

I also look at just a handful of other creative things that have happened during quarantine that would have never happened before, because we didn’t need them too.

Car parades for birthdays
My 90-year old grandpa getting on zoom video (pictured here with his pup Mittens)
Distilleries making hand-sanitizer
Free face masks available in the Little Free Library’s Around Town
And so, so many more things that I could go on for pages…

But my point is, this pandemic has forced us to pivot and adapt. It has forced us to reevaluate our goals and creatively come up with new ways to get what we want. It has taught us that we can be resilient, we can be flexible, and that we can still achieve anything that we want bad enough to fight for it – anything that we believe has value.

Solidifying Hope – Part 3: Owning your Worthiness

Owning your worthiness stems from having a strong sense of self-love, and self-esteem.

As a culture, we often tie our self-love and self-worth to our self-efficacy, and the result is that we look for validation of our self-love from others. But self-love is not the same as self-efficacy.

Self-love is much deeper. It is based on unconditional acceptance of who we are at our core. It’s based on truly understanding, owning, and fulfilling our core needs and core values, without any traces of self-judgment. As Brene Brown discusses in Daring Greatly, self-love and owning your worthiness about moving away from the thoughts of “what will people think” to the complete belief of the statement “I am enough.”

The moment we can make eye contact with ourselves in a mirror and say, “I love you,” without any traces of doubt or judgment, is the moment that we can truly own that worthiness and solidify our hope. Because hope comes from believing, wholeheartedly, that you deserve to achieve your goals, that you deserve to live greater, that you deserve whatever you are hoping for. And let me tell you – owning that is hard, it is hard because owning our worthiness means being vulnerable.

Owning our worthiness, fighting for what we believe in, and cultivating hope through the three-step process above is vulnerable because it means stepping out of our comfort zone and risking failure and disappointment. But, that is the great thing about hope, because hope means that we have something worth fighting for, it means there is potential for more, and for greater.

Putting this into practice and cultivating hope for life after COVID-19

As you begin to look forward to life after COVID-19, how can you use this three-step process for cultivating hope to your advantage? How can you clarify what it is that you are hoping for, set clear mastery-oriented goals, adapt to your surroundings and truly own your worthiness? As I mentioned in my last blog post, life after COVID-19 is a blank canvas, and you are holding the paintbrush. Get painting my friends.

If you need help with finding clarity, cultivating resilience, or staying accountable to your plans, please reach out. As a coach, I help my clients’ cultivate hope by setting mastery-oriented goals, challenging their expectations, coming up with creative plans to achieve their goals, and empowering them to believe in themselves by putting the 10 Disciplines of Energy Leadership into practice.

If you’d prefer to take the journey alone, here are some prompts to help you further consider the content of this blog post.

Clarification Prompts

What lessons have I learned/do I want to learn and carry forward into life after COVID-19?
What do I hope for, as it relates to me personally?
What do I hope for, as it relates to my family?
What do I hope for, as it relates to my community?

Goal Setting Prompts

How much energy can I devote to creating this vision?
What about the current situation can I accept and control?
What about the current situation is difficult to accept or is out of my control?
What are mastery goals that I can set for myself to start making progress towards creating this vision?

Creativity and Adaptability Prompts

What roadblocks do I see getting in my way?
What’s my plan if those roadblocks occur?

Owning Worthiness Prompts

When I look in the mirror or reflect on my personality, what faults do I see? Why do I see these things or believe these to be true?
What would it take for me to truly love myself and believe in myself? What I can I start doing today to practice self-love?
What is holding me back from expressing or living my dreams?

Interested in working with me? Head over to the Work With Me page and schedule your free coaching exploration call today!

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