Green Leaf

Feeling stressed? It's no wonder. In this stage of the pandemic Americans are left to make impossible decisions for themselves and their families. Humans are not equipped to objectively evaluate these variables. This creates an enormous amount of stress and leads to shame and judgment of our neighbors. Be kind to yourself and others. These are impossible circumstances. https://www.theatlantic.com//reopening-psychologic/613858/

At Green Leaf we work with individuals to identify and live out their values - the people, activities, or principles in their life that are most important to them. This year, our nation’s birthday comes amidst a time of extraordinary grief and hardship. More than ever, it’s a time to pause and reflect on our national values equality, liberty, freedom, the pursuit of happiness. As we contemplate what this means, it’s important to realize that these are values not goals. Th...ere’s a difference between goals and values. Goals are things we accomplish and complete like getting a degree or running a marathon. Values are ideals that we always strive towards, but don’t have an end point like being a good parent or living a healthy lifestyle. Equality, liberty, and freedom are values, not goals. We will never wake up one day and say, Done! Mission accomplished! Everyone is free and equal!! It can be discouraging and daunting to realize how far we are from this and how far we have to go, but it’s important to remember, the objective isn’t to finish. Instead, the aim is to find practical ways to move in the direction of our values. This 4th of July, my hope is that we can all pause and remember what it is, as a nation, we are striving towards. As we look forward to the next year, I encourage you to find tangible ways to live out your values as individuals, as families, as a community, and as a nation. Happy 4th. See more

Telling someone they need to tolerate uncertainty is probably my clients' least favorite things to hear. This is the information age, a time when any question can be answered with a few keystrokes and a click. We like to look ahead and we like to know what’s going to happen next. Certainly planning is a good idea. But there’s only so much prepping we can do and there comes a time when we’ve exhausted the list of things we can do in advance. Enter worry. Worry, by definition, ...is unproductive thought. This is time we spend engaged with our concerns, that doesn’t help us and doesn’t make us any more ready for what the future might bring. These days there’s no shortage of things to worry about. From kids, to finances, schools, jobs, politics, activities, vacations, events, schedules - everything is up in the air. Worry is an all-consuming activity that grows the more we indulge it. It robs us of time and energy that could be going towards people and activities we love. The trick is to figure out how to live the life we love, with activities and people that we value, while all of these unknowns are still pending. The path out of worry is tolerating uncertainty. Usually this means allowing yourself to feel vulnerable, scared, helpless, and out of control. But if we can be brave, and we can allow ourselves to feel these things, and we let go of the struggle to control the uncontrollable, this can free us, and allows us to live the life we love, regardless of what’s going to happen next! See more

We get so caught up in the day to day, we often lose sight of whether our efforts are bringing us closer to, or further away from our values. The more our behaviors are in line with our values, the more satisfied we are.