Author: Judy Wilkins-Smith

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The Real Meaning Behind Difficult Events

Difficult events in your life aren’t train smashes or limiters, they’re portals, clues and pivot points!

As I write this blog, I am struck yet again by the numbers of people I hear say: “My life will never be the same again” or “I will always carry this with me.” Yes, that’s true—but it’s how you carry things with you, or how your life changes that matters.

We break a bone, it heals. There’s a scar and that bone will literally never be the same again. We are scarred for life but in a way that often strengthens that bone. Yet something happens to us emotionally, or even physically, and we label it as terrible and then suffer greatly, sometimes forever. Why?

The simple answer is that often we are looking through the lens of what we are told we should think and feel. It’s a multi-generational meta-pattern, but when we look through a systemic lens at patterns resting and emerging our perspective can change completely. We might ask:

  • Did anything like this happen to anyone else in my family?
  • If there is a pattern, is it one that’s trying to stop? Or is it a new one trying to emerge?
  • What is the hidden strength or information here? (And there is always both.)

Ever noticed how a heavy event cripples one person and launches the career of another? You can see that beautifully depicted in the film Saving Mr Banks. One thrives and the other crumbles. Why?

Systemic patterns are clues to what’s operating in our systems. Events create reactions which generate decisions, thoughts, emotions, language, actions, patterns and mindsets. Sound familiar? Here’s the kicker though, you get to decide how you will carry that scar. A scar, by the way, is simply a mark that shows an experience.

If you choose to suffer, it is a result of what you are making the event mean – or what generations of family or organizational members have made it mean. But if you choose to use it to thrive, something remarkable happens. The portal opens to a destiny. You use it as a pivot point and often your purpose is revealed. A new pattern can now emerge, and you are ready to write a remarkable chapter.

We are really good at suffering greatly, but do you dare to succeed incredibly? 

Today you get to look at a scar that limits you and see if you can find the systemic portal or pivot point from struggle to success.

Remember your systems are your gifts, not your curse. Your families, professions, groups are all designed to support you, once you know how to look. If you are ready to allow yourself to shift, scroll down to my freebie exercise, using a constellation, ofcourse, to look, feel and choose your shift.

Putting It Into Practice: Portals, clues and pivot points

Now for the constellations piece. We are, as usual, going to engage multiple sense and make the unconscious, conscious and the invisible, visible. Get yourself several pieces of paper that you can write on, a marker and a pen. Find yourself some floor space and take a few good breaths just to focus.

Today I want you to write down an event that you have never forgotten, something that may have felt like it scarred you, limits you and you carry that with you. Next, I want you to write down 2 things you tell yourself about that. Each on a separate piece of paper. Then write down 2 ways in which it limits you also each on a separate piece of paper. Place them on the floor in relationship to each other as it feels for you. Take that event you wrote down and place it in relationship to the other pieces of paper.

  • Stand on each piece of paper and notice what you feel or tell yourself.
  • Did anyone in your family ever experience a similar event or set of feelings?
  • Do you see a pattern and does this belong to you or is this a multigenerational event that you need to set down?
  • Do you see this as a limiter or something that makes you sad?
  • What meaning have you given this and how does it serve you?

Now ask yourself:

  • How might you turn this ‘scar’ into a strength?
  • How might your insights and pivot serve you and others?
  • How might this give you success and purpose?
  • For what do you owe this event thanks?
  • What one word or sentence might you use that writes a new chapter for you and your systems?

Finally:

  • Take that word or sentence and place it in relationship to the other pieces of paper and stand on that until you feel something shift for you.

Now you are rewiring the meaning you originally gave that event and if you do this fully and allow yourself to shift, your life is going to change!

Please feel free to contact me and tell me how this worked for you! Or attend one of my workshops where we will deep dive into systemic work and constellations. And sign-up for my newsletter to stay in touch.

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Breaking the Systemic Trance and Multi-Generational Spell

Relationship DNA

People are a little surprised when I tell them that magicians, magic and spells are alive—and spells are cast every day and quite possibly you are under one too. Let me explain.

In the last two blogs, we spoke about orders and principles in systems. We also spoke about multigenerational patterns and systemic trances, the things that keep you stuck and limited. They often begin with inherited patterns that you accept as though they were the absolute truth when they are in fact, just your truth.

Teacher says: “Tammy, you are great at drawing but don’t ever speak in public. That’s not your thing, you stutter a little.” Tammy always loved speaking to people but the teacher knows best and so Tammy’s truth becomes that she is no good at speaking in public and she passes up any opportunity to do so.  When we look at her history we find that grandma and mom stuttered and now, so does Tammy. We call this a systemic trance – or as I said in the beginning – what the ancients probably referred to as a spell.

To break a systemic trance or a pattern, you first have to acknowledge that it exists, in the way it exists without wishing for it to be different. That doesn’t mean loving it. It just means acknowledging it. Now you know where ground zero is.

Once you acknowledge the pattern you will begin to notice how much it affects your life. It’s the ‘spell’ that has you stuck. And maybe generations of family or company members are stuck in a similar manner.

By having a deep desire for something different and feeling it and growing it, you begin to make a stronger case for yourself to be able to go there. Or– if the pull isn’t strong enough you see it as just wishful thinking and subside into the systemic trance or spell.

You do this all the time by the way. “I want to go to Hawaii on vacation. I’ve always wanted to travel and do something exciting but my mom and dad have always said this state has all we need. Never mind, I’ll watch travel channels. That’s good enough for me too. Maybe one day…”

And then there are the wonderful times when you exceed your inherited Emotional DNA and go the other way. “I want to go to Hawaii on vacation. I know Mom and Dad say this state has all we need but I have a deep desire to see a little more.” So off you go and before you know it mom and dad are along for the next vacation too. When you ask why they never went before they tell you that their parents couldn’t afford it and so they all did vacations close to home and saying “what’s in this state is good enough” was a systemic sentence they created so that everyone felt good and belonged.

When you change a pattern, it has an effect going back and forwards. You move the system in a new direction and many times the pattern that has become a limitation can now rest and a new one can emerge. Your heart’s desires are the system’s way of encouraging you to move beyond the limiting or redundant patterns that no longer serve the system. Sometimes a solution in one generation becomes a limiter in another. It has outlived its usefulness and it needs someone to change it.

You have just shifted from being limited in the same way, to doing things differently, remembering that everything that came before this has a place and a purpose and it led to you and to this moment of the switch. The systemic trance is broken and the ‘spell’ is no more.

Putting This Into Practice

Today I want you to write down a place where you feel really stuck or you keep bumping into the same brick wall over and over again. Put that onto the floor as a floor anchor – to make the invisible, visible and answer these questions:

  • When did you first notice you were stuck and how did that feel?
  • What did you tell yourself about that?
  • Is or was anyone in else your family stuck in the same way?
  • Are there family sayings or mottoes around this?

Now ask yourself how you would really like things to be and write that down and place it on the floor a little bit away from the first floor anchor. Stand on the first floor anchor and look at this new one and answer these questions:

  • How much do you want this?
  • What old pattern would it be breaking?
  • How might that change your life?

Final step still standing on the first floor anchor.

See if you can create a new thought and a new emotion strong enough to move you from where you are to where you want to be. When you feel that, allow yourself to move over to the second floor anchor and stand there. Now feel that and notice what thoughts and emotions you have at that new place.

If you keep investing in those new ways thoroughly, you will move out of the old systemic pattern and into a new neural pathway that you are creating consciously. Now you are breaking the old cycles and creating new Emotional DNA.

In our workshops, we take a much deeper dive into your systems, what makes them tick, how they affect you and how to change your life and dimensionalize issues and desires but this allows you to start getting a sense of your head, heart, gut and family systems working together. Good luck.

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Live Call: Rewiring Your Emotional DNA, Changing Your Life

Just as you inherit your physical DNA, your emotional makeup is also handed down from generation to generation. This Emotional DNA is a blueprint for the family system that we and our ancestors have created, a unique set of patterns and outcomes based on past events and decisions we made about them.

Emotional DNA is inherited–and it’s yours to change.

I can help you rewire your Emotional DNA and change your future through systemic constellations. Systemic work and constellations are used by Fortune 500 companies and top executives to explore complex issues, facilitating deep insights and breakthroughs.

Listen to the Live Call here (start at 17:00)

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How Multi-Generational Patterns in Systems Shape Your Life

Science shows that your brain is shaped and changed by your choices about your experiences every day. This is referred to as neural plasticity. Understanding what lives in your systems, beginning with your family system, can help you to change patterns, increase happiness, health and success.

Now, the theory piece. How does my ability to choose play out in theory?

What are multi-generational patterns in systems?

Patterns aren’t created by events in your life but by your decisions and actions about them. Events trigger reactions, thoughts and emotions that lead to decisions and actions. You create words, phrases and actions to support those decisions and they become mindsets or patterns. You think this is the truth when in fact it is just your truth.

Take it a step further. Your primary pattern maker is your family and your pattern may actually be a multi-generational one. (Remember you inherit your emotional DNA). Over time details of events fade but patterns get stronger until someone sees them and decides to change the Emotional DNA.

Example: You get divorced. Your siblings are all happily married. You tell yourself you are bad at relationships. That thought becomes your reality and it now governs your relationships. Let’s look a little deeper. In your family there are three generations of women who have all divorced at about the same age. This may be a multi-generational pattern and you might ask, who called themselves bad at relationships first?

How do they shape my life?

The bad news is that when a significant event frightens or stresses you, you tend to default to an old, maybe even multi-generational pattern, in times of stress. You may experience heightened states of anxiety and failure that seem inescapable. We call this a systemic trance.

Can I use them to create the life I want?

The good news is that you are able to change your Emotional DNA.

The extraordinary news is that once you understand what lives in your systems, you can shift limiting patterns and enhance successful ones transforming your life and creating success on a continual basis. Constellations and systemic work facilitate these shifts.

Often when you say you are stuck we call that the pattern that is trying to rest. Your heart’s desire and deepest wish often contains the pattern that is trying to emerge. The two patterns frequently sit alongside each other.

In our workshops, we show you how to access and process these patterns consciously to set down long held struggles and create success, happiness, peace and joy.

Exercise: Putting Patterns Into Practice

Now for the constellations piece. Again, we are going to use a simple exercise to dimensionalize what you are feeling and thinking. We are making the invisible, visible and the unconscious, conscious.

On a piece of paper, write down the one thing you would like to stop doing or experiencing in your life. Place it on the floor. Notice what you tell yourself and how you feel about it. You might even have a facial expression, a saying or an action that happens for you around that. Good. This is the pattern you are trying to stop.

Ask yourself are you the only one in your family who has had this experience? Or is it just like your father, mother, or perhaps someone else in the family?

Now write down your heart’s deepest desire or highest wish on another piece of paper. Place that on the floor in relationship to the first piece of paper. What does that feel like? What do you tell yourself or feel about that? Where do you feel it in your body?

Now take your place in relationship to these two pieces of paper. Notice: How close/distant you are to or from each one. Ask yourself how much do I want this? Do I really want this or do I just want to want this? Or am I even allowed to want this?

In my next blog, you will see there are things you can do to shift from the pattern that want to rest to the pattern that’s trying to emerge. One contains your fate, the other holds your destiny.

In our workshops, we take a much deeper dive with you but this allows you to start getting a sense of your head, heart and gut working together. Good luck.

Write to me with questions or insights or attend a workshop to learn more.

 

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Use Systemic Work to Create Your Own Success

Over the next twelve months, I am going to show you how to use systemic work to create your own success and you are going to learn to use basic constellations. I will share a small piece of systemic work and then invite you to use the exercises at the end of each month’s blog, so you can begin to shape the life you desire.

First, I want to give you a broad overview of what systemic work is and show you how constellations can create change in your life…

What is systemic work?

Systemic work is the framework for exploring your systems and creating growth and shift in your life. It contains a lot of the information around why you struggle and how to succeed. These systems include: your family of origin, your current family, your profession, your organizations, etc.

You unconsciously form patterns in all areas of your life based on events, decisions and unconscious loyalties. Clues to what lives there lie in words, phrases, mindsets and actions that you use and exhibit, playing your part in the system. Understanding what lives in your systems provides valuables clues to your success and failure and allows you to switch fates into destinies. For both individuals and organizations, this work causes profound change and shift.

What is a constellation?

A constellation is a 3 D experiential approach to interacting with an issue or a goal in a way that engages multiple senses, so you can see, feel and shift at a much deeper level. Experiences add value and dimension to our lives because they engage our bodies and our minds. They facilitate insights, shifts, and expansion. We tell ourselves who we are and are not through experiences and our thoughts and feelings about them and this constantly shapes our possibilities and limitations.

Can I use this approach to improve my life and career?

Systemic work and constellations are gaining wide attention from and use by Fortune 500 companies and top executives to explore complex issues, facilitating deep insights and breakthroughs

How do they help me to live the life I want? Can this approach really help me to change years of struggling or failure?

When you combine an intention to shift with an insight into what lives in your system and the higher emotion of possibility, you are able to go deeper and see more clearly. And when an experience is heightened or activated in a way that catches your attention, in a mind changing way an inner shift occurs. The brain is activated and the new way of thinking and feeling begins to lay down a new neural pathway, leading to new outcomes. Constellations provide such an experience.

Science and epigenetics are now demonstrating that we are quite capable of changing our lives and circumstances. Neuroscience shows how rewiring our brains can rewire our lives.

You do indeed have within you what you need to create what you desire.

Ancestry.com shows you where you belong but they don’t show you how that matters to who you are and who you want to become. Multigenerational patterns matter! They create your Emotional DNA whether you know your family or not—and depending on you, they become your fate or your destiny! Patterns occur in three ways:

·   You inherit them – often unconsciously

·   You repeat them – often unconsciously

·   You create them – often unconsciously

No matter which way they occur, a pattern is a pattern and it can tie you up in knots or catapult you into success. The difference between the two lies in your willingness to look, see and shift and your commitment to make it happen!

Once you understand the hidden patterns and unconscious loyalties that operate in your life, you can turn obstacles into steps to the future you want. Constellations and the systemic lens show you why those patterns matter and how they are always in service of you.

You will learn how you got here and then step into, feel, see and experience the shifts that allow you to disentangle from struggle and create more of what you want. It is well known we are able to rewire our brains and thereby our genes and circumstances.

We also know that a felt or embodied experience of either a trauma or a victory, changes us profoundly. We revisit them because they are so meaningful to us and so a neural pathway is laid down. Constellations and systemic work combine to invite a journey into deep shifts that create conscious neural pathways in service of our purpose and growth.

You will understand how some people do the seemingly incredible and then you will have the opportunity to do it yourself.

You will learn to physically map and step into the issues or goals you have and design the future you want. With eyes, heart and mind wide open, you will teach yourself to achieve breakthroughs, insights and success. Growing your inner world – grows your outer world. You will learn that you are capable of living a remarkable life if you choose to do so.

You will discover that you have a rich and deep inheritance waiting to serve you. You will realize that not only do you inherit your physical DNA, you also inherit your emotional DNA and with that, all the ways in which you can become stuck and limited. You will also discover that you can create the emotional DNA you want and become the remarkable being you dreamed of becoming.

Consider this: A traumatic incident creates an experience that leaves you shaken and permanently marked. A neural pathway is laid down instantly and the after effects are there for years, if not forever. However, exactly the opposite also occurs. You have an incredible win or experience that is so profound that it changes you forever. In this case a neural pathway is also laid down and the after effects may also last forever. Both shape the life you live. Which would you rather experience?

Imagine being able to rise to greatness on a consistent basis and live the life you want to live. You weren’t born to suffer, you were born to excel and constellations show us how to consciously create the emotional DNA we want.

They show us how to:

·   Disentangle from the limitations that keep us stuck

·   Change our mindsets profoundly and thereby our circumstances and lives

·   Lay down a neural pathway during a constellation with a keenly felt sense of inner shift that is life changing, profound and lasting

Whenever I work with a new client, I ask them one simple question. “How big are you willing to be?” Invariably they ask me if that isn’t egotistical and the answer is no.

We were born to and are quite capable of being, doing and achieving the remarkable. The day that we agree to be the biggest version of ourselves is the humblest day of our lives. In that moment we agree to become fully responsible for who we are in the world and for growing ourselves as much as we can. We agree to all that is possible for and through us and we dedicate our lives to achieving our maximum potential and sharing it with the world. That is discipline. Not ego.

Systemic work and constellations put the ability to grow and create the life you want in your own hands. Once you begin to understand the patterns, mindsets and hidden loyalties that got you here and keep you stuck, you can begin to consciously create the lasting change you want to experience.

Putting This Into Practice

Over the next twelve months, you and I are going to go on a voyage of discovery. Along the way, you may decide to come and take one of the workshops or certification programs I offer around the world and experience a constellation for yourself. Perhaps I will see you in one of the workshops I teach in a corporate setting to leaders and entrepreneurs who now use this approach to change lives and to solve complex issues.

Constellations use a highly interactive and experiential approach to explore your inner and outer worlds. They show you how to create new mindsets and lay down new neural pathways that serve you. And with constellations, you will learn to use multiple senses and multi-generations to connect the dots and shift from stuck to flying.

Systemic work takes the whole system into consideration and teaches us to think in layers and connect dots in ways that change our lives and the lives of those who come after us.

Putting This Into Practice: How can I use systemic work and constellations to create the life I want?

It’s important to realize that most of us think we only use our brains to navigate life. High performers and visionary leaders consciously do it differently. They maximize the knowledge in their head, heart and gut. I am going to teach you to do what they do, using a systemic lens and a constellation so you can make the invisible – visible and achieve your own insights and shifts.

So here we go. The theory bit. It’s critical to be aware that you don’t just inherit your physical DNA, you also inherit your emotional DNA. Sometimes through many generations. The difference is that you can change your emotional DNA, thoughts and possibilities—and as studies show in neuroscience, possibly even your body and genes. You can most certainly change your life and your destiny.

There are 3 principles that frame a systemic lens. I use this in boardrooms and with my clients to unravel even the most complex issues, achieve breakthroughs and remarkable success.

In systems, most issues resolve into these 3 basic principles:

  • Order – you get too big or too small
  • Belonging – in, out or on the edge of the systems with which you interact
  • Balance of give and receive – you give too much or receive too little

This makes it simple to see what kind of issue you are dealing with and how to restore balance, resolve issues and create success.

If you get too big or too small in your systems, you go out of order and may carry too much or become too small and invisible. When you struggle with belonging, you may struggle to find your place, or figure out how to fit in. With an imbalance in give and receive, you may give too much, or receive too little.

Issues in any of these areas may limit your ability to achieve full success, but be aware that issues in your life sit right next something remarkable that wants to emerge through you.

Exercise

Okay constellations time! Remember constellations engage multiple senses and this is a super simple one. It will start to give you a felt sense of your systems and that’s what we want here. Let’s use the 3 principles to start your journey. (Keep what you write down with you, so you can expand upon it with each subsequent monthly blog this year.)

Write down 3 different systems that you belong to, on 3 separate pieces of paper. One must be your family of origin. Another might be your friends and a third might be your career or place of work. Place them on the floor from left to right. (It’s okay even my top executives around the world do this). Now walk towards each piece of paper and notice:

·       How close can you get to each piece?

·       Where do you feel it in your body?

·       How do you belong in your family?

·       Are you in or out of order – do you get too big or feel too small?

·       Do you give too much or receive too little?

·       What do you tell yourself about this? (Write this down)

·       Which one of the 3 principles is dominant for you and how?

Write to me with questions or insights or attend a workshop to learn more. Vist my Workshops page for more information.

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Unleashing the Emerging Pattern in Your Life

{% load account_tags %}Often, we are deeply loyal to the failure and suffering that may run generations deep in our family systems. It’s interesting how this loyalty to failure often makes us blind to the gifts that are also ours from our systems.

In systems, there are 3 principles that are entry and exit points for most of the issues and struggles we experience:

  • Belonging
  • The balance of give and receive
  • Order

This means that we can often hold ourselves back in these areas—but we also can find our gifts in these areas too. In other words, what ails us sits right next to the solution to our happiness and fulfillment.

In your own experience, there are patterns that you picked up from your systems that are running in your own experience. Some might be causing you to suffer while others may be the key to your success.

There are two parts to these patterns: 1. the patterns that want to rest and may be generations over and ready to stop—and 2. the patterns that are trying to emerge—through you!

We are often so unconsciously entangled with the challenging patterns, that we cannot see the winning patterns that are right in front of us – trying really hard to attract our attention through our wants and desires. Life is truly remarkable if you only know how to see it.

Let me share two examples of unhealthy patterns which transformed once we took a systemic look to see what new pattern was trying to emerge.

I worked closely with someone who had struggled with money since they were a child. Another client was always sad and wanted very much to be happy, but was afraid it would cost her everything. For both, the common denominator was a family pattern around belonging.

In each case, events in their lives had created thoughts, emotions and actions that had them trapped and feeling their sense of belonging in an unhealthy way.

As we looked closer at these patterns, we could see that the ways in which they were stuck had begun generations before and cycled down through them. Their family history was becoming their likely future.

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Now let’s take a systemic look at each one.

The money struggle. As a child, this person had been left alone but was able to find just enough money to be able to eat. History revealed that many family members had struggled to stay alive. The words they heard most were “Money is a struggle.” When they could notice, instead, that they were resilient, resourceful and creative, they could say “Money is always there for me.” Now rather than it being a struggle, money could become a desired friend. Through them, money could finally flow.

For the one who was always sad and afraid of losing everything, they were mostly afraid of losing their family if they were to be happy. A terrible event in the family generations before had resulted in the sentence: “We will never be happy again”—and everyone had quite unconsciously followed that declaration. They were all caught in a systemic trance. Breaking it might mean exclusion or not belonging. Acknowledging what had happened, they could do something to remember the event and agree to use it, with gratitude, as a catalyst for a good life. Their gift was to finally bring happiness back to the family system.

Being in these old patterns and places of doubt can be scary. We are stuck and often scared but we don’t know why. This indicates a pattern that’s trying to rest. Yet in that same place, our wonderful ability to desire more is the clue to the pattern that’s trying to emerge. That tug isn’t greedy or selfish – it’s the system’s way of trying to get you to grow. You may feel it as a heart’s desire to be, do or have more. That is the gift, your legacy, your voice and your destiny.

Often places of struggle indicate the system’s deep desire to create positive change in the system. Learn to love your struggles and your desires. They are the places that unlock your life!

Start your journey now by diving into my Flight of Transformation: Unleashing the Emerging Pattern workbook. If you’re traveling somewhere, download it and take it with you. Transformation could literally be a flight away for you. Click here to download the workbook now!

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Interactive Genealogy Is About to Change Your Life

Genealogy is more than a record of your ancestry. It holds the clues to where you belong, and how and why you struggle or succeed. And if you know how to look at what’s in your lineage, it may just change your life–now and for generations to come.

Using what you know to decode your Emotional DNA and recode your future

This is a shout-out to ancestry.com, 23andme.com, and all of you who have eagerly pursued your roots (myself included). It’s exciting to find out where you come from and to whom you’re related but the question is, what do you do with that information?

Most of us connect, smile and close the computer. Some of us are driven to trace our roots back as far as we can, and we’re even a bit fascinated by the similarities we may uncover. However most of us don’t realize that clues to our own success are contained in events and decisions made by our ancestors. They shape who we are for generations–until someone chooses to be the changemaker.

Applying systemic work and exploring family constellations can show you what to do with what you’ve learned about your ancestry through interactive genealogy. By exploring our ancestry through a deeper systemic lens, we begin to see that actions, language, mindsets, successes and failures often repeat. In fact, you might ask yourself if your limitations and failures began with you.

The conscious awareness of what lives in our system stops our history from becoming our future.

You’ve heard me say many times not only do we inherit our physical DNA, we also inherit our Emotional DNA. You may want to look at your thoughts and points of view and see if indeed they belong to you and if they serve you. If the answer is no, then also know this. The future is yours to change!

Decisions about the significant events in our families create patterns that can affect our success and failure without us realizing that the inheritance has trickled down to us. So sometimes when we feel stuck or lost it may pay us to do more than just look at where we belong. In fact, it may not even be our stuck-ness!

Using the systemic approach and constellations, we can illuminate hidden patterns, and work to resolve or reframe them. We can turn our limitations into the gifts and opportunities they were meant to be.

You are the changemaker. Once you know what lives in your systems, beginning with your family system you can consciously decide what to keep, what to change and what to leave behind.

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Explore the next step on your journey of discovery with me, and dive into Emotional DNA and Your Genealogy in my 1-day workshop at Disney World in Florida.

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Tapping Into Your Success DNA

Be a changemaker. Create your own Success DNA.
Success is delightful. It generates that feeling of can-do, a sense that we’re fulfilling our potential. It’s like a door has opened and we’re making a real difference. You find yourself wishing you could feel that way every day.

Yet as much as we crave success, for many people, success is a real fear. Some of us are afraid our success might suggest an inflated ego or a less spiritual path. We’re frightened of losing friends. By contrast, we seem to have no trouble creating our failures and repeating them with annoying frequency.

It’s as though we’re somehow sabotaging that which we desire most. We may find ourselves saying things like “It’s not meant to be,” or “There’s another plan for me.” We may look at our families and think, “It’s as though we are doomed all live mediocre lives.” Sound frustratingly familiar?

Your frustration is urging you to being your own journey to success. 
As intrigued as we are by the struggles and successes of our ancestors, luck has absolutely nothing to do with it. Although we can create it based on our decisions about events in our lives, most of our Success (or Failure ) DNA is inherited, much like our Physical DNA. Patterns of success and failure are handed down through generations, created by our ancestors’ unique language, mindsets and actions. And what began as our history can become our present and unless we pay attention, also our future. In the world of what we might call interactive genealogy, you are the changemaker.

Can you mindfully create your own Success DNA? 
The brain thinks, the heart feels. The brain creates a mindset and the heart responds with an emotion that reinforces the mindset. This becomes our truth, then it becomes the truth and we live by that without stopping to consider that it may be the decisions about the events in our lives or those of our ancestors, that have created our limitations.

However, what looks like failure in one generation can often morph into success in the next. Once we know what patterns live in our systems, we can change them. Using constellations and the systemic approach to explore these patterns, we can interactively gain new insights and mindfully create new patterns and new ways of being. With new insights, feelings, language and actions, come new successes.

Explore your Success DNA now with me.
Start your journey by diving into the events, decisions, language and feelings that live in your system with Flight of the Changemaker printable Success DNA worksheet.

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If you want to dive deeper, come join me at Disney World, November 2-5 for an immersive and experiential Success DNA workshop. I promise you, it’ll be life-changing.

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Forget the Imposter Syndrome. You Have Pioneer DNA.

Working with leaders across diverse business sectors, I often hear this: I’m afraid people will find out I’m a fraud or imposter–and the game will be over. This little voice inside is common, and imposter syndrome is a constant, nagging fear.

Prepping for a workshop recently, I pored over my notes to see what drove those feelings, and an insight emerged. When viewed through the systemic lens, people with imposter syndrome are actually in the process of breaking limiting cycles–and stepping beyond the rules of the system can feel disconcerting. With good reason.

Order, belonging, and the balance of give and receive.

If we look at the three components inherent in all systems, we might notice a few commonalities among leaders with imposter syndrome:

With order: A leader may have had to step up at an early age and take a position that didn’t really belong to them. For example, filling in for a missing parent, stepping into shoes that felt too big.

In belonging: Leaders might feel lonely–or like an outsider entirely–until they learn to inspire supportive growth and create great teams.

Balance of give and receive has it own set of dynamics which determine the kind of leaders we will or can become, and whether we will be burdened, demanding or balanced leaders. With respect to imposter syndrome, many leaders feel like they may be overpaid and will either work tirelessly to justify it or feel guilty or even fail in order to restore what they perceive as balance.

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Turns out, people like this aren’t suffering from imposter syndrome at all.

In order for a system to grow, its members must extend the systemic boundaries, breaking limiting cycles and boundaries. These leaders may feel like imposters, or be viewed as mavericks and renegades. Truth is, there’s another more accurate descriptor for them.

They are pioneers. And they have the courage to do what others have not, to look at the world differently, and to take the steps to find the answers that are needed. Good leaders have to be more so that their teams can do more. It’s a crucial step for growth.

So, the next time you feel like an imposter, remember it’s the pioneer effect. You’re willing to be bigger–and the world gets to benefit.

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Re-coding your Emotional DNA

Why is my family system so important to me?

We all belong to a family system–from before birth to after death. It’s our primary pattern-maker. We succeed or fail in collusion with, or reaction to, what has happened to those before us and the ways they think, act, feel, succeed or fail and even die. Following patterns is often our way of belonging to the system. It is deeply unconscious, yet faithfully and blindly repeated. And until we understand what lives in our family systems and the purpose it serves, we’re reacting to events in our lives through old and outdated patterns rather than creating our own lives.

How is Emotional DNA created?

Events create decisions. We support these decisions through unique language and actions with ourselves and others. What we tell and teach ourselves creates the way generations now react in similar situations. And that’s how systemic patterns are created. For example, an event might lead to you say, “I will never speak my mind again–it’s too dangerous.” This can become a pattern of withdrawal and a repeated behavior of not sharing thoughts or feelings.

In the very same way, positive patterns also emerge from events in our past and our ancestors’ lives, for example showing up as: “In our family we all become successful doctors.” We’re continually creating imprints that become blueprints for the way our systems act and react. Once we realize what lives in our systems, we also realize that we can break free of limiting cycles and make different choices.

How can I use Emotional DNA to achieve success, fulfillment and happiness?

Healthy Emotional DNA is created through first understanding and acknowledging the past exactly the way it is without wishing for it to be different. We need to know who and what belongs–all of it, its correct order or place, and the correct balance of give and receive. Once we achieve those three components of Emotional DNA then we can learn to make mindful choices going forward.

Physicians and mental health professionals have known for a while that our minds can influence our physical health, but we’re beginning to discover that our minds can also change a fate into a destiny. Once you learn to see patterns and understand what they mean to your system, you can begin to choose what you wish to repeat, grow and do differently in your life. You’ll find that even one simple word or small repetitive action can be an important part of unlocking and rewiring this system.

When you put these concepts into action, you begin to lay down different neural pathways. New insights and perspectives lead to new emotions and thoughts, which in turn lead to new language, choices and actions resulting in new outcomes. Research shows, that you may even be able to activate or deactivate the physical genes that you carry. So instead of being a helpless passenger, you can drive your future–and change your Emotional DNA for generations to come.