Italy has a way of soothing our souls. Sallee, one of the women who attended my Italy Retreat last year, calls it Italy Shakti.
I know Italy is not perfect, but I think George Clooney summed it up perfectly. In this article he simply said that moving to Italy has changed his life. Working hard in Hollywood, he didn’t care how his personal life was going.
When he purchased a villa in Laglio on Lake Como in northern Italy, he thought he’d be there a couple weeks a year. He soon realized how beautiful life was in Italy and it helped calm him.
I think the result of spending a week on my retreat in Italy does just that. The course participants will all agree that it ‘calmed their lives.’
Usually, the hiking trails I choose in the Cinque Terre are the tame ones. By taking a steep climb up the paths or steps you are instantly rewarded with jaw dropping beautiful scenery.
On the day we visited Riomaggiore, the southern most village of the Cinque Terre, the young women at the Tourist Information Center suggested we walk through the botanical gardens because it was a 25 minute walk and we’d end up back at the center of town, where we’d take a gelato break, and then do another 20 minutes walk on the famous Via Dell’Amore (path of love) to arrive for dinner in Manarola to watch the sunset over the Mediterranean. (Photo of the seven of us at Ristorante Marina Piccola.)
However, I forgot that when someone says something, especially in a different culture, it might have a completely different meaning to me. I love gardens and I had waited since last year to visit this botanical garden, but this was no ‘walk in the garden’. I did notice some signs describing cacti and trees by their Latin names on the concrete walking path.
However, none of us knew how difficult the trail was going to become, and then we discovered why no one else was walking it. It turned into a rocky uneven narrow trail, many times on the edge of a sheer mountainside, lots of stairs, and it was raining for part of the hike. There was a railing but it jutted out at a 30-degree angle sometimes or it was so loose you didn’t feel safe holding onto it.
One of the women in our retreat group was afraid of heights and I myself, felt a bit woozy if looked down all of the time at the sea below. Sometimes, we could see through the path to the sea below. In order to make it to the end, she had to walk sideways, face the mountainside, her back to the sea, and manage her panic.
It was breathtaking but it felt more like taking our breath away. *The top photo is taken from the height of the rocky path as we began our ascent to the center of the town toward the beach, and the last photo is near the end, so it’s much closer to sea level!
My courageous student later said that no one in her family would ever believe her when she tells them what she did. It was an epiphany for her to face her fears and her belief that she could never do this. That mountain is her metaphor for life now and her life will never be the same. For the rest of the workshop her victory was our symbol for change.
I did not plan this hike to force the course participants to face her fears. I thought it was a walk in the garden to add to our experience to live la dolce vita near the Mediterranean. My idea of facing fears is usually done in the Option Method Dialogue work that we do in the meeting room during the retreat– it’s gentle and you’re comfortably sitting in a chair! But, sometimes life gets organized for us, and we enjoy the ride.
Here’s to calming our lives and living la dolce vita (the sweet life) wherever we are!
Have you hiked the Cinque Terre trails? What is your favorite one? Want to join me next year in Italy for my Italy Retreat for women to live la dolce vita?
Lenora's Italy Retreat blog | Lenora's Change Limiting Beliefs Website
Letting Go . . Again
Some years ago, I accompanied my husband on a business trip to The Cayman Islands, which are known for some of the best snorkeling in the world. He decided to teach me to snorkel by having me jump from a low wall into rough water wearing my snorkel gear. I began thrashing and almost drowned the two of us. We made it out of the water alive, and then noticed a group of beginner snorkelers swimming in a barrier reef that looked like a shallow pool.
That’s where I finally learned to breathe through that ridiculously narrow tube. I don’t do well when I am thrown in over my head. I like to wade in with my feet touching the bottom, if needed, at least at first. This makes it easier for me to let go of my fears.
Once I got the hang of it, my husband would wake up in the mornings, startled to see me standing beside his side of the bed with my snorkel gear ready to go. I had surrendered to the ocean.
That’s what I felt like when I was thrown into India last week. I again traveled with my husband for this adventure. This time for ayurvedic health purification treatments.
Even though this was my fourth trip to India, the accommodations were more third world than I expected. My room was without windows and had a broken air conditioner with no one available to fix it. The electricity went out every day at noon for a couple hours without any regard for the 100+ degree temperatures. And did I mention the roaches in my room, including one climbing out of my toothbrush?
I know it sounds strange to many people that I would even go to India for rejuvenation treatments,but it is the home of an ancient health treatment called panchakarma.
.
In the same breath, I might add that India is not for wimps, but it is a great place to burn off karma, stretch your boundaries and let go of limiting beliefs. In my clearer moments, I watched preconceived perceptions wash down the drain.
It’s a country of opposites — beggars, poverty, deeply spiritual citizens and holy people in the Himalayan mountains are quite common.
The scene outsidewas interesting — an empty lot filled with trash, that was burned on a daily basis, filling the air with choking smoke. Right next to the lot, was a small country club with a beautiful swimming pool filled with water, but no swimmers. Indian chants were blasting over a loudspeaker in the lovely park on the other side of the trash lot. The clinic is in a nice neighborhood, so there were no beggars on the streets, nor smoke from cow dung burning at night.
Their standards of cleanliness, however, are different than mine. I won’t even go into detail. Each day I would let go of my notions of what I needed to feel comfortable.
In each moment I had to die to my beliefs of cleanliness, of fine customer service, of being in control of my environment.
India was a gift that gave me practice allowing the death of my ego, the surrender of how things SHOULD be. The little deaths we go through when we fail, or find ourselves in deep water outside our comfort zone, create a more open-hearted, compassionate, enriching life.
For me, I find that coming up for air to find solid familiar space under my feet every once in awhile, supports the practice of letting go.
LETTING GO is a fast track to experiencing strength, growth and freedom. When we choose to try something different, we learn to stay flexible.
Grab change by the hand, maybe get a lifejacket, and swim.
What is your ‘India’? How have you learned to let go? I’d love to hear from you.
Lenora's Italy Retreat blog | Lenora's Change Limiting Beliefs Website
“What would you do if you weren’t afraid?” my friend Jana asked me over a year ago. (She actually recorded a song with that same title and performs many other wonderful motivational songs). I answered, “I’d have fun in Italy and teach a women’s retreat there, but…. how would I do that?” When I asked one of my client’s the same question, he said, “I’d take more risks in my business, but… I might fail.”
Listen to the words that follow your ‘but’. They reveal your doubts and limiting beliefs. This is the pivotal point from which you take courage to leap, or at least walk through the flame of fear.
Over the years, I’ve asked people about their courage. They seemed so confident and together. Usually they say that they’re afraid but they just make themselves take the baby steps needed to do the task.
That’s why I’m inspired by what Martin Luther King, Jr. said, “We must build dikes of courage to hold back the flood of fear…”
I started skiing when I was 43 years old and I’ve never really lost the fear of speed or of getting hurt. I just do it to be social and to hang out with my friends, kids and husband. When I told my husband I was too afraid to really enjoy it, he said ‘that fear is part of the excitement and fun.’ Being afraid is not my idea of fun, but I kind of know what he means. Courage can be fragile. It does not mean being fearless.
I’m more like a reluctant adventurer in life. I ease out of my comfort zone, but contract for longer times than I expand, like a turtle who tucks her head neatly inside her shell, then sticks her neck out and moves out of the water, slowly crawling through the sand, knowing that her destiny is to lay eggs every 30 days, only to return to the sea for a month of frolicking in the warm Costa Rican waters.
I think change requires courage, maybe fragile courage. Otherwise, how could we leave our security to try something different? Like the turtle, we don’t know exactly how or if our actions will be rewarded.
The turtle doesn’t know if the eggs she lays will be taken by the locals for their dinner, or by animals on the beach, but she sees the moon beams and knows that change is calling out like a wounded friend who needs her. The strings of change pull our hearts and we swim, walk, drag our limp legs, and claw our way toward hope, waiting, wanting more and carrying the fear on our hardened shells that cover our tender hearts.
When we conjure up the notion of courage, the slow moving turtle may not be the power animal that comes to mind, but I think she’s very brave to stick her neck out and move.
What would you do this year if YOU weren’t afraid? Can you do something every week that you’re scared to do?
May your new year be filled with all possibilities as you walk through your fears!
Lenora's Italy Retreat blog | Lenora's Change Limiting Beliefs Website
They say that the fear of speaking in public is greater than the fear of death.
It usually turns out that many of us fear what others will say about us. We are afraid to look stupid, mess up, lose our train of thought or God forbid, appear to be boring. When we are nervous, it’s usually because we are worried about ourselves. However, the minute it stops being about “you” and starts being about the content and the audience, the better you’ll feel.
Join a group like Toastmasters International which has been around since 1924 and consists of 11,700 clubs in 92 countries around the world. I am a member of Golden Speakers Toastmasters Club that is one of the 95 clubs in District 19 of Iowa. I enjoy being a member because it’s inexpensive, offers a proven and enjoyable way to practice and hone my communication and leadership skills, while speaking to an encouraging audience.
A few months ago, one of our club members, Ed Hipp, won the Toastmasters State Humorous Speech Contest which means he won first place out of 95 clubs in our district (entering speech contests is not a requirement). Last month, he presented his winning speech to a packed house that included our club members and outside guests. I was his evaluator. The beauty of Toastmasters is that we not only practice speaking from specific speech manuals with different purposes, but we evaluate each other’s speeches. It’s all done in an encouraging manner, commenting on the strong points and giving a few suggestions for improvement.
This is a youtube video of my evaluation. You may want to watch Ed’s speech first by clicking the Humorous Speech link above.
Are you ready to tame the fear of public speaking?! You can, you know. Anyone share how they deal with fear of speaking in public?
photo: Toastmasters International
Lenora's Italy Retreat blog | Lenora's Change Limiting Beliefs Website
Lenora's Italy Retreat blog | Lenora's Change Limiting Beliefs Website
Beliefs sure do affect all of us in every aspect of our lives. Judgements made or insinuated are insidious. America is supposed to be a melting pot. After all, our forefathers came to America with the intention of practicing religious freedom. I am always amazed that so many Americans are still prejudiced. Why are they? I think because of fear. Fear of change. Fear of losing control. When we have a vice-presidential candidate, Sarah Palin, speaking to a crowd, and allowing them to shout out about Senator Obama, “kill him” “, “off with his head”, and then NOT speak up. WE each must stand up and stop this. She is not necessarily responsible for what they might say, but she is responsible to stop cries of hate. In my opinion, she is stoking anger and division. Each of us has a responsibility to create more acceptance of differences. HOW? Voting will be one way to speak our minds. Are you registered? Vote for what you stand for, without tearing down the other candidates. It is a practice to choose what we want, not focus on hate.
David Gergen of Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government, CNN commentator, and in my opinion a deep-thinking fair man, who has been a presidential advisor to Republicans and Democrats, from Richard Nixon to the present, has expressed his concern. He recently said “there is this free-floating sort of whipping around anger that could lead to some violence.”
In this global financial crisis, our focus must be on what we want, not on what we fear. Our beliefs blind us and sometimes make us do crazy things. When Barack Obama spoke in Ohio yesterday, he encouraged the crowd to reject panic and division, and instead focus on resolve and steady leadership. Of course, I know all the candidates are criticizing each other, but there is a line that Palin has crossed, in allowing hate threats. I want to acknowledge John McCain for defending Obama, one time, when a woman said Barack was an Arab and she did not trust him. McCain said “No, he’s a decent family man and citizen.” But that raises the question, does McCain believe all Arabs are not decent?
Lenora's Italy Retreat blog | Lenora's Change Limiting Beliefs Website
This past week I was one of the speakers at a conference for women. I really had fun meeting women from all walks of life–whether they were fellow-speakers or attendees. One of the speakers shared with us a list of the top 10 fears of adults, so I thought I’d share the list with you:
1.) Speaking in public
2.) Heights
3.) Insects/bugs
4.) Lack of money
5.) Deep water
6.) Sickness
7.) Death
8.) Flying
9.) Loneliness
10.Dogs
Lenora's Italy Retreat blog | Lenora's Change Limiting Beliefs Website
Subscribe by RSS
