By Irene Hansen Savarese.
The idea of a few days off work and sky-high expectations about having a “jolly good time” with family and friends sometimes has the opposite effect. We find ourselves anxious, depressed, overwhelmed, stressed out, and wondering why we can’t seem to relax and enjoy the holidays. We expect to be happy, be together, give and receive love and gifts, but instead we find ourselves increasingly distressed, arguing with the people we love. Perhaps we don’t have a family to celebrate with and get reminded of what we don’t have. The holiday season is often a time where wants and needs surfaces and where we suffer if they are not being met. For many people the holiday spirit is being taken over by the holiday blues.
In times when expectations run high, we set ourselves up for disappointments. Moreover, we start to recognize a feeling of dissatisfaction – a feeling of disappointment that we are not living the life we have dreamed about living. Most of the time we are too busy making a living, helping kids with homework, running errands, etc. We hardly give ourselves time to think or feel. Given a few days off our busy schedules combined with expectations of peace and joy and family togetherness we have a recipe for the holiday blues.
Take this opportunity to empower yourself. In times of crisis opportunities arise for you to reflect on what you have, what you miss, and what you need in order to grow and live the life you dream about. We are always creating. The question to ask is: Are you creating the life you want? When you regard yourself as being valuable and capable of creating the life you want, you have started the process of gaining personal power.
Make a New Year's Resolution
Be proactive. Write down hopes and dreams. You can use this outline:
“The vision I see for my future is …”
Your New Year Resolution needs to have objectives, which are steps for you to take to reach your goal. The goal needs to be measurable so you know when you have reached the goal or parts of it.
Happiness is a great goal, but happiness means different things for different people at different times in their lives. You need to write down what you exactly mean by being happy. What can you see yourself doing when you are happy? Who are you with? What are you thinking about, planning to do, working on and so forth? The more specific, detailed and concrete your goals are the easier it will be for you to find steps to take. Avoid wage and abstract goals. Do the work to figure out and describe in down to earth terms what it is you want.
Make a Plan Of Action including all steps you need to take to reach your goals and live your dream. Review and renew your plan when needed.
Getting started doing the necessary work is easier when you pick baby steps to do daily.
Every time you work on a baby step and achieve a part of a goal, you move closer to whatever it is that you want. The more steps taken, no matter the size of the step, the more you can appreciate your best effort. Sometimes the best step taken is to relax with family and friends. Other times important research needs to be done to get information concerning your goal. An important step is to review goals and objectives as you go along to make sure you are going the way you want. Ask the question every morning: “What can I do today to get closer to living my dream?
On-Going Empowerment Group
Program
Ability Spotting. Bring the best you have to the future!
Affirmations and Empowerment Workbook
Goal Setting - Dreaming and Planning
Developing a Plan of Action
Obstacles to Empowerment - Fear
Obstacles to Empowerment - Depression
Obstacles to Empowerment - Anger
Intimacy and Relationships.
Compassion and Self-care.
Program goals and objectives:
Support empowerment by increasing awareness of strengths and abilities.
Raise self-confidence and self-esteem by using empowering affirmations.
Work with dreams and visions for the future.
Make a plan of action and start taking steps towards living a more satisfying life.
Investigate obstacles to empowerment.
Investigate how important relationships support or stand in the way of empowerment.
Support thoughts, feelings and beliefs that promote self-compassion and learn to take care of self.
Increase awareness of how the inner life of thoughts is connected to feelings and bad moods, and experience how controlling thoughts can control feelings.
Who is IRENE
Irene Hansen Savarese is a writer and psychologist from Denmark (Cand. Psych.). She moved to Florida 11 years ago with her American husband and two small children. She is a licensed mental health counselor (10 years) and a licensed marriage and family therapist in private practice in Fort Lauderdale. She is specialized in working with empowerment/personal growth, relationship issues, eating disorders, depression, anxiety and crisis intervention.
You can reach me at
(954) 776-0406 Ext 3
or email me at irenesavarese@yahoo.com
For more inf go to
www.irenesavarese.com
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