My Leadership Awakening: Following My Mission & Visioning the Future

I took part in an AMAZING Leadership Awakening Workshop in Dallas, TX, offered by Scott Black of Like it Matters, LLC. You can find them at www.likeitmatters.net. I can’t begin to describe the workshop beyond saying it was intense, insightful, life-affirming, and life changing. We built an amazing team in 2 days and I brought back changes I am integrating day-to-day into my life. I learned so much about myself.

One of the things I learned was that I can’t “think” my way out of or into everything. I’m an academic. I live in my mind. It’s in many ways, my greatest strength. Sometimes though, I learned I just can’t do things with my head. Fortunately, I also have a big heart. I care deeply about people. In this workshop, I had to release my intellect and focus on feeling. It was amazing!

Fear of my wrists is one of the things that has been holding me back. As you know, dear reader, I broke my wrists in a dancing accident over two years ago. I know, in my head, that the bones in my wrists have healed more strongly than before I broke them. That said, I’ve still had a lot of pain and some issues with flexibility. Until this workshop, I held stress in my wrists and hands as well. You know how you get a stiff neck when you sleep wrong, I get stiff wrists when I’m stressed about something. My wrists ached and stiffened throughout the workshop until I had my watershed moment. After the workshop, I asked to be allowed to break a pine block, something I’d done for a different purpose with my foot earlier in the workshop. I wrote “fear that I can’t” on one side of the block and “hot yoga, confidence, and no limits” on the other side. I wanted to break that board with my right hand, the one that had healed from a triple fracture. The first hit, I didn’t break it. Scott looked in my eyes and said “visualize your hand touching the floor after you break the board”. I did and I broke it. I BROKE A BOARD WITH MY WEAK, DOMINANT HAND (yes, my dominant hand was the most badly damaged)!!! I have not looked back. Since I got home, I’ve taken 2 full 90 minute hot yoga classes and I’ve done a 90 minute weight lifting session. I have not held back. Although they are sometimes still a bit stiff and ache, I have my hands and wrists back.

If you want to live your best life. If you desire to live your life as if it matters (which it does), this Leadership Awakening experience will give you tools to take forward to meet those objectives. I cannot recommend it enough. A caveat: Your experience will be different than mine. Your needs, wants, expectations, strengths, abilities, blocks are different, so what you get out of it will be different.

Every morning I read my mission statement, often looking in the mirror and into my eyes. I’ve always been great at keeping my promises to other people. I am now great at keeping my promises to myself as well.

Here’s my Mission Statement:

My Mission – By Deborah S. Ballard-Reisch, PhD

Written: 3/7/15

Affirmed: Daily

I commit to living a fully authentic life!

• I am present
  • I learn and grow from the lessons of the past but leave the emotions and experiences behind. I can do nothing to change the past.
  • I live now.
  • I am aware of how the “now” influences the future and advances my mission and vision.
• I am mindful
  • With passion and a narrow, clear focus, I make a difference in the world.
• I am open and honest in my relationships
  • I communicate clearly and establish appropriate boundaries.
  • I take time to see, to listen, and to nurture those I love.
• I have integrity
  • I commit to myself; I follow through.
  • I commit to others; I follow through.
  • I commit to act “as if” whenever I need to do so.
  • I push the “GO Button”