SigmaU Blog

Change we choose is exciting and exhilarating. Change chosen for us can feel terrifying and destructive, but it doesn't have to be that way.

Change allows us to...

Shift focus

Perhaps change has been dumped on your lap today. Perhaps it’s loss or heartache. Forced change makes it necessary to shift our focus. When I recently suffered loss, it made me shift my focus to deep gratitude for the people around me and shared experiences at a deeper level. I shifted my focus as best I could from grief to deeper connection with the people still around me.

New Growth Opportunities 

Nothing will make us level up faster than necessity. When we're thrown in the deep end of disaster, we figure it out. It always amazes me how masterful we can become at something in a short amount of time when we have no other choice! What growth opportunity have you been avoiding or delaying that you could develop now and choose to change before it's forced on you?

New Beginnings 

Our minds crave...

Jim Rohn famously said, “You’re not a tree.”  One of my colleagues says, “Your feet are not cement.” Both mean that you and I can change our circumstances should we chose to do so.

What holds most of us back? Fear of change, fear of the unknown?

In High Performance Coaching™ we dive into the psychology behind what holds most people back. It comes down to three primary things… process pain, loss pain and outcome pain.

Process Pain

What if uprooting my life and moving to another country is going to be painful? What if there’s mountains of paperwork, foreign languages to navigate and massive risk? What if moving towards that degree means that I will step into rooms where if feel unqualified? What if all of the steps involved to move on from this relationship are overwhelming? We can get caught up in the process, the tasks and steps and this is where most of us become paralyzed with fear and don’t move forward.

Loss Pain

What...

When was the last time life blew up in your face? Like really blew up. During that time, did you think “well this is a character-building time in my life” or did you think “holy crap, get me through the next 24hours”?

If you’re anything like me, it’s the latter because it’s hard to see and appreciate the lesson during a storm. It’s often when we’re on the other side of it that we can appreciate that the situation happened to help us, develop us, or steer us on the right path.

I was listening to my coach and mentor today describe a rocky situation in his life. He had just purchased land which was to house his dream home. He sunk most of his savings into it and people told him he even overpaid for it. When he went to start developing the land, he was told that the land was no good for building. He persevered and found a developer willing to literally use dynamite to blow up the existing space so he could build his dream home. ...

I was on a group coaching call last night and my coach and mentor made a statement that made me stop dead in my tracks.

He said, “Same distractions, same year”! BOOM!

What a concept and so incredibly true. He was walking us through an exercise to evaluate our distractions and things we needed to eliminate to focus on our goals in the coming year.  When he said that, I literally said “WOW” out loud, put down my pen and shook my head.

It got me thinking.  We will continuously have a carbon copy of the year before unless we shake things up! I once heard someone say something to the effect that people who live the same lives over and over each year stop living well before their dead!

As I reflected on this powerful statement, I started substituting distractions for other words.

Same distractions, same year.

Same associations, same year.

Same nutrition plan, same year.

Same workouts, same year.

Same date nights, same year.

Same habits, same year.

I...

Accountability starts with you! That can be harsh to hear, but it’s true, and a lesson that I’ve learned over the past couple of years.

No one is coming to hold your hand, or mine, to make sure we get stuff done.  The person who cares the most is standing in the mirror.

We may have friends that support us, accountability partners we check in with and coaches who champion us along; at the end of the day, its up to us to get the work done.

I’ve found that friends and even accountability partners can let us off the hook too easily.  We make a big claim about our fitness, and we falter. Often, we’re met with niceties such as “don’t be so hard on yourself”, “you needed a day off”. While this feels good in the moment it’s not what we need and it won’t challenge or change us.

We make the change every time we decide to make a promise, set a goal, and then do it no matter what. Coincidently, every time we keep that...

I’ve been thinking a lot about legacy lately and a new dream is forming on my heart.  I want to impact tween girls so that their lives are forever changed through personal development.

As an eleven year old girl, I was 5’2” and 210lbs. Not exactly the epitome of health or confidence! I always had great friends in school, but I was also always very self-conscious and would longingly look at my friend’s tiny waistlines and wonder what it was like to be skinny. I would long to be the one running the track and “own the room” like some of the popular girls in my class.

Looking back, I’m so glad that I went through that awkward period in my life because I believe it has shaped me to be the person I am today. I can have compassion when people struggle with their weight. I know what it’s like to feel stuck, not knowing where to start.

I’m sharing this because I believe that most tween girls are experiencing the same pain and...

As I was preparing for a group coaching session on the topic of Courage, I had a massive aha moment! This often happens when I’m preparing for workshops and sessions. The very thing I’m preparing for is often the message I need to hear.

During our session on courage, we’ll be talking about why we don't pursue our dreams or chase our goals to our maximum ability. Sometimes we hold back or even self sabotage. Why is that?

In High Performance Coaching™, we know that there are three reasons that hold us back from chasing after our goals and our dreams and having that courage to persist or pursue through something you’re currently facing.

Loss Pain

Loss pain is that sense of fear that stops us because we tell ourselves that by changing, we're going to lose something. We get in our heads and think we’ll lose something important to us. As I journaled about my specific dream, something funny happened. When I wrote down my...