Category Archives: Strengths

Simplify to Care

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Here in St. Louis spring is in full bloom. Many gardeners are tilling the soil, pulling up old roots and planting new seed. Spring is a time when we can create new visions for our home and family life. What do you want to plant in the garden of your life? This is a good time to reflect on caring for ourselves and others by simplifying our lives.

Simplify to Care

We live in a materialistic consumer oriented culture. Often the focus has been on money and stuff. We believe that our things reflect our importance in the world. The deeper truth is that who we are as persons has a much more powerful impact. Let this spring be a time to acknowledge the gift that you are. What are the gifts and strengths within yourself that you can now begin to express? What purpose would you like to serve? When you acknowledge the gifts that you have and that which gives you meaning, it is easier to let go of material items that no longer serve you.

Honor Your Relationships

Research over the last years has shown that our relationships bring a greater sense of well being and joy than status or the accumulation of stuff. Releasing your extra stuff allows you to share your compassion and feel connected to community. It gives a renewed sense of appreciation for others and yourself. It helps you feel connected to a broader purpose. Enjoy your community celebrations. Take a moment to acknowledge your value as a person, connect with your strengths and share. Happiness comes from connection.

Appreciate Nature

Take time to get out and appreciate nature. As we enjoy the sun, the air, the blooming flowers and the trees, it helps us to slow down and become more grounded. As we appreciate nature, we are reminded that we are a part of a much larger whole. Nature can give us a sense of awe. It helps us to reduce stress and put things in perspective.

You Matter, Take Action, Make a Difference

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You Matter

Many of us have good ideas. We want to make a difference, but the action needed seems too big and the ideas get tucked away. Then we feel frustrated, angry and depressed because the problems did not get solved. Today, more and more people are taking action to make a difference. It is spreading like wildfire.
More and more people are waking up to a deeper truth. Ordinary people taking action has an effect. When our actions stand for our deeper values and principles, as justice, opportunity, fairness, and dignity, it serves a critical purpose. It helps to define and defend who we really are. Then ordinary people become heroes and heroines. This e-newsletter focuses on the importance of everyday heroic acts, and what you can do.

Inspired Action Counts

Taking action to make a difference is important. With the many challenges before us, global warming, unemployment, declining resources, we cannot always wait for an expert or leader’s permission to act. Sometimes, you just know what you have to do and may have no other authority than the good intentions and caring in your heart. It may not be the most perfect solution. Still it is the best you can do. You face disappointments and setbacks and still, you find the courage to keep on.

You may not even be aware of the impact that it has. Yet, when aligned with your deeper character strengths it has an impact because it serves the greater good. When you do so, you access a higher power for life and you become a hero for just being who you are. It enhances the happiness and well being of us all. This is much better than complaining, feeling overwhelmed and depressed. I call this a heroic act

Story Power

When you take action it is important to share your personal story. Often we hear statistics and information on the need to make a change, only to find it overwhelming. Other times we may feel guilty for not doing anything. When you take action and tell your story, it is important because it shows it CAN be done. Even more it gives concrete ideas on HOW to do it. This inspires and fuels the action of others.

I once worked with a lady who came to me for serious depression. When she discovered her strength of generosity, she decided to help with volunteer projects at work. At first only a few volunteered, but soon it caught on, and many others began volunteering too. She got over her depression and made new friends. Her efforts and those of her co-workers helped to create a more humane environment.

We learn and become inspired by each other’s actions. When we share our stories, it amplifies our efforts. It gives us ideas and opportunities to reflect on the deeper truth. This creates more opportunities for change and builds the grass roots community.

You matter. Your story matters. Make a difference.

Dr. Alice

Empower Yourself: Align Your Intentions and Goals With Your Strengths

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January is a month for setting new intentions and goals. These intentions reflect our higher aspirations. A major challenge in carrying them out is handling the obstacles, disappointments, and setbacks that inevitably occur. Success is more than setting an intention and visualizing the positive. It requires us to persist in following our goals, transforming our challenges into a positive direction.

When considering your intentions for this year, consider aligning them with your character strengths. Your strengths are the places where you naturally feel happier, are in the flow, and are enthusiastic about developing projects. When you align your intentions with your strengths, your setbacks can form the corner stone for the further development of your character. They help you to see the deeper truth about yourself. You can discover your strengths by taking the VIA strengths test at www.authentichappiness.org.

For example, one of my intentions this year is to focus. One of my big challenges is dealing with techology. Technology is not my strength. It frequently leaves me overwhelmed, seeing myself in a negative light. My strengths are in the areas of perspective and wanting to serve a higher purpose. By working with web master, I found I could better meet my challenges with technology. This allows me to honor my intention with a spirit of adventure and purpose rather than hesitation and fear. Then when setbacks and obstacles occur, instead of constricting or avoiding dealing with them, I can face them with co-creative teamwork and a sense of purpose.

Honor your strengths, use them to help you accomplish your intentions and goals. You will find yourself more productive, happier and joyful in the process.

Warm Regards,

Dr. Alice

Tips for Managing Family Differences

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I recently visited my roots, my family of origin. We had a successful gathering. We enjoyed being with each other, and also had to make decisions regarding our larger family goals, such as managing the family farm. In almost every family, individual members often can have different views. While this can give rise to potential conflict, it can also lead to stronger and more effective teamwork. The challenge is to stay positive, working in individual perspectives, while also looking at the best interest of the whole. Here are three tips for managing differences so as to create success.

Focus on the Positive

Celebrate your strengths. We all have individual strengths and at the same time share deeper values and strengths with the people we love. Recognizing your character strengths, such honesty, love of learning, sense of humor, is important because it focuses on what you love to do that also serves the greater good. Family is a good place to discover and share them. When you can use your strengths to serve a cause greater than yourself, it is deeply gratifying. You can learn more about the power of the character strengths in my article, “The Hidden Power,”

Express your appreciation and gratitude. It builds positive energy, broadens your perspective, and facilitates your productivity and creativity. It will help you become more inclusive, considering the views of everyone, rather than fighting over one solution or another. Over time, the positive is more powerful than the negative. When you express your appreciation, it brings out the higher positive power of life.

Be Aware of the Ghosts

Every family has ghosts. These are old patterns from the past, not fully resolved, that threaten to destroy the family unity and joy. Suspect a ghost if you are picking up negative vibes, gossip, blaming, or a constricted view. Be curious, is this really true? Then work to take positive action. You cannot change another person, but you can change yourself. Facing challenges and choosing to transform them is deeply empowering. A major success in any family is to keep the ghosts away.

Ask yourself, what can I do to create a more positive solution? Often, negativity stems from false assumptions from the past. When you release them, it creates a much brighter future and helps you to communicate more effectively. Even better, the work of any one person in the family has a positive impact on the whole.

If you are having difficulty staying positive, check out Barbara Fredrickson’s positivity website, www.positivityratio.com and take the online test. Fredrickson discovered that experiencing positive emotions in a 3-to-1 ratio with negative ones leads people to a tipping point towards flourishing and resilience. Successful businesses have a positivity/negativity ratio 2.9/1. Successful marriages have a positivity/negativity ratio of 5/1. If you find your ratio is negative, then look for ways to raise it. If you need help, call me.

Let Solutions Emerge

I have found in my family that decisions are much easier when we have short and long range goals. Some decisions need to be made immediately while others can wait. Think through your priorities and sort out your short-term goals from the long-term goals. Then create a holding space for the longer term goals. When you are positive, this holding space allows for the goodness of life and necessary time for new solutions to emerge. It keeps you minds open, allowing for creativity and resilience, rather than fighting over one or another position. You will be surprised at the success of your ability to work together.

Warmly, Dr. Alice

© 2015 Alice Vlietstra. All rights reserved.

Become Empowered: Accept and Define Yourself

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One of the keys to success in your personal life, your family life, and in your business is to be able to accept and define yourself. This is called differentiation. It is your ability to define your own life goals apart from the influence of others. You see it when you stand up for what you believe when others are pressuring you. For example, if you are being pressured by the kids to buy products you are not comfortable, you can firmly and calmly give them an alternative and tell them, “no.”

When you are differentiated, you can remain calm in the midst of upsetting situations. You hold your own, being an “I” while still being connected to the “We.” The ability to stand in our own truth while interacting with others is the basis for effective leadership. When different views are shared, each individual can take leadership according to his or her unque strengths and the requirements of the situation. Effective solutions to problems then can emerge because power and leadership are shared.

One of the best ways for you to differentiate yourself is to identify your unique character strengths. When you clarify them and how you like to use them, you know your area of contribution and can better appreciate the contribution of others. The same strengths show up in all areas of your life, personal, family, and business. It makes it much easier to make meaningful decisions and have mor positivity and joy in your life.

Celebrate Your Strengths

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What is it that enables you to cultivate your talents, build deep lasting relationships with others, feel pleasure, and contribute to the world? What is it that allows you to develop a sense of well being? We all have character strengths that empower our lives. When you tap into your strengths, it leads to a solid foundation of self esteem and increases your optimism, enthusiasm, and joy. Here are some ways in which they show up.

During the day, when do you feel the most strong, enthusiastic, and deeply absorbed in your work? These are the times you are in your strengths. Your strengths are the areas where you can become deeply engaged. When you use your strengths more frequently, it increases your happiness, sense of well being, and joy.

Look around your surroundings. What aspects of your home touch you the most deeply? Do you have favorite pictures, favorite sayings? What about your plants? Take a moment to connect with them and savor them. You will discover that they relate to your strengths. When placing items in your home, take notice how you connect with them. Do they make you feel stronger? Keep those items that give you meaning and joy. Other aspects of your surroundings you may not enjoy. Clear those out. It will make you much happier and help you to get things done.

When faced with challenges, what strengths bring you through? Is it your sense of humor? – Your ability to put things in perspective? – Your ability to learn new information to solve your problem? All of these reflect your underlying character strengths. Acknowledge them. They will help you to accomplish your goals.

Watch for the qualities you appreciate in others. Notice when your friends get excited and what gives them joy. Then ask them to tell you more about it. These are the areas of their strengths. When you give others feedback, it helps them see their strengths. You will discover it builds your relationships.

What gives you a deep sense of purpose and meaning? Are there institutions that give you deep sense of purpose? When you get to together with your family and friends, what are the activities that give you the most joy? Honor these moments. It helps you connect in a positive way and also helps you appreciate your ancestors.
Celebrate Your Strengths

July is the month when we celebrate the Declaration of Independence. It states that we are all “endowed by our Creator with certain inalienable rights, and that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” It is the character strengths that help us to exercise these rights. Take a moment this month to discover and celebrate them. If you would like to take a survey to help you identify the strengths you use most frequently, take the VIA survey of character strengths at www.authentichappiness org.