Author: shaunassisters

Have you ever tried to change somebody else? How about trying to change yourself? It is so hard! For starters you cannot make somebody else change, and it’s pretty hard to change yourself. I have had some powerful positive change happen over the past 4 years on the inside so I know change is possible with hard work, sweat and a lot of tears. Where I find myself today is needing to now take those same steps to have that powerful change on my outside and get healthy overall. I’m not getting any younger and I want to enjoy every single day I have left. As you age, you realize that the old saying that life is short, is true.

If you read my last blog, you see I am on my journey to regain my physical health. I don’t know if it’s the fact that I am now approaching 50 and I realize that over half my life is over, if it is a mid- life crisis because I realize I am not where I want to be, or if I am finally just getting smart. Whatever the reason, guys I’m just feeling miserable! Anybody feeling me?

I have always been an emotional eater. At various points in my life, I have had it under control, and have been very healthy and in shape. At others due to medical conditions, meds, stress in life, I have not been in control or in shape. That’s where I find myself today. First Covid, and the stress of being laid off from a job, and now it’s a lovely condition women go through…menopause and hormones. Young girls, just wait for it! It comes for us all at some point.

I need to digress for just a minute. Let’s talk about this menopause thing. What in the world happens to our bodies? I have a rubber ring around my middle. A rubber ring! I have always had a small waist and flat stomach and over night it totally disappeared. Puff! Gone! I also have fat in areas nobody ever talked to me about and my thighs rub together. On top of that, I’m tired 24/7, not sleeping and brain fog! I cannot remember anything and I used to have the most amazing memory! Seriously, I will spare you anymore details, but things change!

Back on track to our subject at hand. So, I decided to get back in shape and called my trainer back. Last week was week one. Day one, I woke up at 4:15 and was in the garage doing my cardio. I was on it. Day two, I say to myself I will do my cardio Monday, Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday so I will sleep in. Wednesday, wow busy morning, my routine was thrown off, didn’t get to the garage for cardio. Thursday, feeling really guilty so I do get my weight training in and felt so freaking good. Friday rolled around, Saturday rolled around, Sunday rolled around. The weekend was crazy busy and yep, you guessed it, I got two whole workouts in last week.

You may be asking did she have any wins last week? The answer is yes, I did. My eating was mostly on point, until the weekend, which is the hardest for me. I thrive with routine in my life and my weeks are pretty routine so it’s easier for me to stay on target, but I struggle on the weekends, and I know that about myself. Weekends don’t have a set schedule and it throws me off everything. Here it is a new week. This week I will try to do a little better. 

Here are my thoughts after week one. It’s a journey, right? Not a sprint to the finish line. It’s the daily habits and changes to get us to the changed mindset and to the results we desire. I won’t beat myself up. I will just shoot for more wins this week. More workouts, and better choices in the weekend. My changed mindset internally did not change overnight and I know it won’t this time either. One must study themselves and truly know themselves to make the necessary tweaks and changes to be who they ultimately want to be. I know myself enough to know that I must move the needle just a bit every day and in time it will be second nature, and it will be a healthy habit that guides me through every decision. If you are one of the lucky ones who makes a decision to do something and just does it, well I applaud you, and would love for you to send that good energy my way! For those who are like me, just create some routines and do things to move the needle a little every day and we’ll get there together. We must simply remember, we have just this one life, just this one body. 

With love for you all,

Shauna

Last week as I was traveling a very familiar road from my home to the airport, things suddenly seemed so unclear and the path seemed so unfamiliar! It was 5 a.m. so very dark, but in the many years I have been driving, I have made this exact trip more times than I can remember. I know the curves and sites along this path very well, yet it seemed as if I had never traveled this path at any point in my life. As I dropped my mom off to return to CA, hugged and said our goodbyes, I couldn’t shake the way I was feeling. Again on the entire trip back home, everything seemed so unfamiliar.

I tried to tell myself that maybe this feeling was because I had just returned from an amazing conference in Florida. Maybe the path I am on is uncertain right now. Maybe I don’t know what my future holds or where I am going. Have you ever felt this way? Maybe it feels this way because I know my path at this point in my life is very different from what anyone in my past would have ever predicted I would ever do. I couldn’t make any sense of my feeling, but this was a feeling I truly have never experienced in my life.

In 2018 I began to have this stirring in my spirit, in the very pit of my stomach that I knew change was coming for me, and even though that felt so uncertain and the path so unclear, this realization last week that I truly felt on an unfamiliar path felt different. You want to know the biggest difference? Last week driving on that dark and unseeingly unfamiliar path, I was not fearful, I was at complete peace in that moment. Honestly, I almost felt excitement feeling like I was experiencing this uncharted territory for the first time, and seeing new sights.

Just this morning I read something that my friend Douglas Cox wrote where he said “The thief of your future uses so many flimsy walls to keep you away from God’s plan.” Those walls for me have been fear, judgment, feeling insecure and incapable. Those walls for me have been shying away from these dark and unfamiliar paths. That’s kept me from so much, but today, as I remember that feeling of uncertainty from last week, I feel inspired and ready for the journey ahead. The old Shauna would have ran from this dark and uncertain path. The old Shauna didn’t like change and not knowing what path I was on, but I have learned to trust God and trust that although I cannot see the path, I know who guides me.

Maybe you find yourself in a familiar place today. Maybe the road you are on, the season you are in, seems dark and unfamiliar. Maybe you feel as if you don’t know where you are, or where you are going. Maybe like me, you are not enjoying the journey, but rather want to be focused on the destination. Let me urge you today to spend some time in prayer, or reading, or mediating, or whatever that thing is that brings you peace and clarity. You see, we don’t have to see the entire staircase, as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. so brilliantly wrote, we just have to take the first step. Clarity and direction come with faith and action. Just taking one step at a time, trusting and believing that some day we will have a clear vision. Some day we will be able to look back at that road we just traveled by faith, and see we ended up exactly where we were supposed to end up!

Don’t live in fear today of the change that’s taking place inside of you! You see, to bring change, we first have to be changed! Turn your headlights on bright, put the car in drive, and start on your journey. Exciting things come in uncharted territory! Our eyes are opened, we see new things, our vision becomes clear and our future bright!

With love for you all,

Shauna

Do you have people in your life who still judge you by your past? People who still judge you by the old you? People who want to keep everyone reminded of those things you did to keep a poor opinion of you out there? You are the exact person I want to speak to today! We all have people that don’t see us now, who don’t see the change, who don’t see the growth, who don’t give us the benefit of the doubt that we have even changed and grown! Everybody wants to judge people on the past version that they know rather than seeing the possibility that maybe that person isn’t the same person they once knew. I know it can be difficult! I have dealt with it, and continue to deal with it. Here’s a secret though. Not everybody has to see how far we’ve come! It’s okay that people don’t know the version of us now! It’s okay if they want to judge our past. Here’s a thought. There are people who may see the change in you but wouldn’t give you credit if it killed them! You know why? They don’t want to see a better version of you. Their story is better when they talk about your faults. Here’s where I am at though. Only God knows the real me, and truly that’s all that matters!

I am sure there are people in your life who know the good, the bad and the ugly and love you in spite of those things because they know they are not perfect either! Those are the people we should focus on! That’s who we want in our lives! We should stop focusing on playing it small, keeping our focus on people, but rather focus on being better every day. We should focus on growth! We should focus on using our gifts and talents to add value to other people every single day! You see those things that you might be embarrassed about, those things you wish people didn’t know, those things can be turned around and used for good, and used to help other people in the same situation! It’s easy to be sympathetic for somebody, but until you truly understand it, it’s harder for us to help Most times we have to experience things ourself to truly understand somebody. Use those scars from your past to make a difference for somebody else! Let there be a purpose to your pain!

We must realize that here will always be people who misunderstand us and who think we should be ashamed of our past. The beautiful thing though is that our past and our scars can be turned into something so great if we allow it! Nobody has to stay the same! Nobody! You don’t have to stay the same! I haven’t stayed the same! I have been doing the work to do what I’m talking about here! I know my shortcomings! I know those things I’m embarrassed about, and those things I wish I had never done, but I can’t go back and change the past! I only have a future and I can make a difference there! If you woke up this morning, if you took another breath today, you have one more opportunity for growth! You have one more opportunity to make some changes in your life if you need to! You you have one more opportunity to make some wrongs right! You have many more opportunities to change your world!

Why not live life to the fullest? Why not apologize if you need to? Why not be better and make a difference? Why not truly live out your God-given purpose for being on this earth? We can make excuses all day long but that will simply keep us stuck and complacent and not living life to the fullest! Know none of us are perfect! We all do and say things that we don’t like about ourselves. We all have habits that we want to break! How about showing yourself some mercy and then getting to work on changing those things! If you find yourself being too judgemental, stop yourself when you start to say something to somebody else. If you gossip too much, stop yourself before you gossip about somebody else. We all have the opportunity to change, grow, be better and be different! We all have the opportunity to build people up with our words, not tear them down. This world is full of critics, don’t be one!

There’s a lot of things about myself that I work on daily, that I’m not proud of, and that I want to change! I continually ask God for help! I read, I practice a pause, I try every day to set out to live a life adding value to other people. I try really hard to be a plus rather than being a minus in others lives! So you might have a past too that has some things you’re not proud of. Stop listening to others and focusing so much on that, and rather spend more time in your day focusing on your future! I believe anybody can change! You know why I believe that? Because I have!

With love for you all,

Shauna

Have you ever witnessed someone doing something that was wrong and it really upset you? Sometimes that thing we think is wrong isn’t really even hurting anyone, it’s just something we know is dishonest or unfair. I’m sure we all have had that experience in our life at some point, and as certain as I am sitting here writing this, it will happen a million more times in the future. So what do you do? How do we deal with the fact that it’s so upsetting to us? Is it something within us that needs some work? Could we actually be jealous? Is it making us better?

I have found myself in this exact state of late. I have been upset with a situation that a person is “getting by with.” It doesn’t really have anything to do with me per se, but I am around it. Recently I was unloading my frustration with said situation on my best friend. Thank goodness she is so honest and in my face when she needs to be because I need people to shake me from time to time. People who help me wake up to my thoughts or attitude that need to be changed. Well, let me tell you, she did just that!

As I set and thought about what she said, it dawned on me that quite possibly the reason I was so upset was that deep down, I was jealous that this person is getting away with what they’re doing. For a minute, I wish I could get away with it. Wow!! That’s hard to admit! One thing my growth is teaching me is to get brutally honest with myself! So am I actually jealous because I can’t get away with it? Yes, maybe, but am I really? Would I really be happy getting by doing this thing? Is that thing going to push me farther in living a life of significance even if I could get by doing it?

If we are to grow, we have to get to a point where we can really evaluate our feelings and emotions. We must evaluate why certain situations are really consuming any amount of our time and judgment. Is it serving us? Is it making us better? I’m going to go out on a limb and say that most likely it’s not serving us in any capacity whatsoever. At the end of the day, where we’re striving to go is far from situations and thoughts that bring us down rather than push us forward. Being jealous, or even giving a second thought to what someone else is doing, isn’t doing one thing to get me to the life of purpose that I want to live.

So like I am advising you to do, I spent the day, just one day, letting myself think about this situation. Why was I jealous? Why did I care? Would I really do this thing if I could? Where was my judgment coming from? Then I dug deep enough, peeled back the layers of that onion, and was honest with myself. This jealously was only serving as a deterrent to keep me stuck and stop my growth. You see, I can only control myself, my thoughts and my actions. I don’t want to walk this person’s journey, I want to walk mine.I wouldn’t do this thing I am upset about even if I could. So what do I do? I let it go and change my focus to something that better serves me so I can serve and add value to others. I want to be unstoppable. I want to live my purpose. It is my hope that if you have a situation that doesn’t serve you well taking up too much of your focus and energy, that you too come to the same realization, and do the necessary work to be better, and to become unstoppable.

With love for you all,

Shauna

Those who read my blog, or know me well, know that in 2021 I lost my papaw, my dad and my father in law. My papaw within six month of my dad and my father in law, and my dad and father in law within days. We had two funerals in one week. I have blogged about it before, but I felt it a worthy topic again. Grief is so very tricky and sometimes hard to understand. Everyone deals with it differently, and that’s okay. There’s no one right way that everyone should deal with grief. Today on my Sessions with Shauna I am dealing with this very topic and wanted to share something with you all that a dear friend of mine shared with me recently. By his permission, I use his words below. There’s wisdom in these words, and I believe maybe some solace for someone.

Grief

 Throughout my life, as with all of us, I have experienced varying degrees of grief when loved ones passed away, but never had I experienced the full impact of grief until my father and wife passed away within 10 weeks of each other last year.  This past year has been a forced process, so to speak, in discovery.  Discovery in the process of grief.  Discovery in what it means to love.  Discovery of me.

In our human condition, to truly live is to love, in all of its various forms.  Love comes in many shapes and sizes.  We are told we should love our neighbor, and hopefully we do, but that love is different than a love we might have for a good friend.  It is certainly different than our love for a grandparent, sibling and parent.  Even more, it is different than our love for our children and significant other.

Grief is a product of that love.  Grieving is an expression of our love.  It follows then that our grief when a loved one dies has its own varying forms just as love does.  And just as no two people love the same, no two people grieve the same.  Likewise, we can also be assured our grief for a friend or extended family member, for example, is likely to be different than our grief for our child or parent.  I discovered this when my father and wife passed away while trying to process why my grief for each felt different.  It wasn’t that I loved either more or less than the other.  It was simply because my love for each was a different form of love.

Understandably, when my father and wife passed away I was devastated.  Looking back I know I was going through each day in a fog just trying to get to the next day.  I was operating on autopilot.  I recall foolishly designating a period for my grieving during which I would allow myself to go through the ‘grieving stages’, after which I hoped to complete my grieving.  I even scheduled a week long getaway to seclude myself to get the process started.  The getaway was very beneficial for my emotional state but was absurdly naive in its intended purpose.  I have learned over this past year I have no more control of my grieving process than I do over controlling the tides of the oceans.  

Speaking of the stages of grieving, we are told there are five stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance.  In my personal journey this past year I have not experienced all five stages for either my father or wife.  And the stages I have experienced for each were not all identical and those that were present for both were in different forms.  For example, with regards to the grief for my wife I cannot say I experienced anger but I absolutely did in the grieving for my father.  I experienced forms of denial for both but in different ways.  With my father my denial was in the form of refusing to think about his death.  The denial with my wife came in many forms and in some ways continues to this day, but another form of denial has been my refusal to consider the possibility that my grieving was impacting my life more than I realized.  I did not truly understand it’s impact until attending Christmas midnight Mass when all of my grief was unleashed in an emotional realization of the grief I had been denying for so long.

One other thing I have learned over the past year is that there is no time period for the grieving process.  In fact, I now believe we will always grieve for the person who has passed.  If love is forever, this only makes sense when we understand grief is a product of love.  But that is not to say this never ending grief will always be the debilitating deep emotional sadness that is part of our grief when our loved one first passes.  I have found in my own experience the first stage of grief has a very large component of self-sorrow focused on the reality of our loved one not being with us again.  Slowly, however, my grief transformed to the point of where it is today with a focus being a means of our loved ones being kept alive in our memories.  So where grief in its early stages was full of pain it now brings the warmth of love to me full of wonderful memories. Written by Paul D. Baugh

It is my hope today that I can help others, and shed some light on the pain that grief causes. I hope you do the work to find some peace and love throughout the process, regardless of the type of hole the death of your loved one left. I do believe that peace can co-exist with your grief.

With love for you all,

Shauna

I am currently sitting in my second airport of the day, one more to go. Due to flight changes, I am sitting longer than originally planned, but I am thankful to get out and get to my family so I won’t complain. Instead, I will grab some food and a drink and watch people and write stories about their lives in my head.

I saw a couple get really upset on my first flight because the overhead storage bins were full, even though the flight attendant warned that the flight was full, and told people they may consider checking their bags. A lady trying to read so she cracked the window only to have the girl a seat ahead slam it shut like it was all about her. I saw a gentleman help an elderly lady who couldn’t lift her bags up. In the airport, I watched a young in love couple having the best breakfast and talking, and a couple cuddling their baby. I saw a ton of military, people who looked like they were in their pj’s, who probably had not been out of bed long, and women in heels whom clearly couldn’t walk in them.

Are you anything like me where you sit and make up stories about people? That’s the most fun part. I saw a chauffeur dressed so neat. I saw an insecure lady trying to walk in heels and she couldn’t, all the while she was watching all the other women. I saw people that I questioned, purely judging by their looks, how they afforded the expensive bags they were carrying. I saw a Jewish Rabbi and a man who I thought looked like a preacher. Are any of these scenarios true? Possibly, but I made them up purely by observing.

I love what you see in airports, but what I used to love the most were the smiles I would receive at the airport. Today I can’t see any because of masks. There’s hustle and bustle like pre Covid and people in a hurry to get somewhere. I wonder where are they going? Some look like vacation, some traveling for business, some could be traveling to family events they wish they weren’t, some for weddings and births of babies.

I have no idea anybody’s story, or where they are going, but here’s what I can say though. We are all the same! No matter where we’re from, or where we’re going, we’re all the same. I saw insecure people watching other people. I saw secure people who you could tell in their eyes were smiling and were excited about where they were going. Some looked tired and some even sick. Here’s the thing though, at the end of the day, we’re all just trying to get somewhere! At the end of the day, we all have the same insecurities and fears. So no matter what I saw today, or what I made up, humans are the same everywhere. As you journey on this thing called life, slow down, enjoy the journey, show kindness and smile at strangers! Because guess what? We’re all alike, no matter our story! We all need each other no matter our differences. And everybody really is just trying to get somewhere in life.

With love for you all,

Shauna

On this New Years Eve 2021, I sit at my desk just as daylight is starting to break through allowing myself to do some reflection. It’s been a hard year. Normally this day excites me, but today my heart is heavy, and the future seems unclear. I read my last devotional in my Joy book and put it on the shelf, I write for the last time of this year in my gratitude journal, and I ponder what will 2022 look like. I ponder what I did in 2021 to make the world around me better.

2021 has been hard. I lost my grandfather, my dad and my father-in-law. My eyes were opened to some people who I thought were my friends. I questioned my path and where I found myself. I questioned my future. I questioned was I doing anything that God put me on this earth to do. Yet 2021 was good as well. I grew more than I could have dreamed possible. I got the most beautiful grand daughter. I started my sessions and had the opportunity to have some quality interviews and meet some amazing people through those. Hopefully I impacted a life as well. I met some amazing people, coaches and friends along my journey that are changing my life, and pouring into my life. I learned so much about myself and had some intense self reflections about who I am, who I want to be, and more importantly who I don’t want to be. You see, I get to write my story. What shall it say? That makes a hard year somewhat better, but we must realize time isn’t always on our side. We waste so much time.

2021 taught me that life is so short and in a moments notice our entire life can change. We may not get the chance to make a wrong right. We may not get the chance to say sorry. We may not get the chance to speak kindly to someone we’ve spoken angrily to. We may not get the chance to say good-bye. We may not get the chance to pour into a life we were supposed to. I watched someone pass who lived a life of bitterness and regret. I watched someone pass who spent too much time on people who didn’t really care about them. Someone recently told me that we’re always going to have haters who are simply in our lives to sabotage, or use us, but we still must go on, and do good despite their efforts. You see I am learning that life is 10% of what happens to us and 90% of how we react. So what are you reacting to that is taking too much energy? What are you focusing on that is causing you to lose focus on what really matters? I am asking myself those questions today as well.

The only thing I am sure of today is that I want to make some consistent changes in 2022. I want to do more and talk less. I want to impact more lives and live a life of total significance. I want to go to bed each day knowing I added value to somebody and that I devalued no one. I had a friend/coach tell me recently that I had a work to do and I needed to keep my focus on that, not on the things going on around me trying to steal my focus. So my prayer for 2022 is that I can remain focused on the journey laid out before me, and less on the distractions that will try to stop me. My prayer for 2022 is that I somehow influence some changed lives and make a real difference. My prayer is that my heart remain open and my mind clear on my purpose! What shall you do with the blank slate laid out before you? Only you get to answer that, and only you get to make some real significant changes if you need to. Don’t wait, tomorrow is not promised. We don’t always get a second chance so let me ask you in closing, what will you do with the life you’ve been given? Use it for good, or spend it tearing people down, gossiping, partying, just living for today and not for real change? I can’t answer that for you, but I know what my answer is today. Happy New Year to you all!

With love for you all,

Shauna

This is a blog I never wanted to write. I know some people have dealt with a great deal of death, but fortunately, I have not had a great deal of it in my life. I don’t take that lightly at all! I see the blessing in that statement! I wish I wasn’t writing on this subject, but here I am writing about it. Six month ago I lost my papaw. Tuesday I lost my father suddenly, and Friday, I lost an ally. I lost my father in law. While I thought 2020 was bad, 2021 must go out with a bang, and prove to be even harder.

I sit here tonight, yet another night of not being able to sleep. I am thinking about these three men who were taken. Two within a few days of one another. I am tired, and I know the days ahead may get worse before they get better. I am going to be grateful and attempt to see some positive in this season. I will pick up the pieces of what they all three instilled in me and be better!

They always say death comes in threes. I can’t wrap my head around the fact that three men were taken out of my life in such a short period of time. One I had a hard relationship with, yet he still taught me so much! As I sit here thinking about what I learned from them all, I must see the blessings in having them all in my life. If I choose to focus on any bad there may have been, it will only bring bitterness that I refuse to take on.

My Papaw was a hard man, but lived his convictions. I had the blessing of traveling with him a great deal. Being the eldest grand child, I had a different relationship with him. The biggest trait I inherited from my papaw is the importance of preparation before you address people, and research. We both shared the love of schedules as well, and the burden of leading people. He left me his Franklin Covey day timer. I loved my papaw, he was the only one I knew. My papaw had a deep desire to help people and that was honorable.

I had a challenging relationship with my father. I wish things had been different, but I realize I couldn’t control that. I learned the value of hard work from my father! I inherited his outgoing personality and his incredible ability to connect with people. Because of him, I met some pretty amazing people and had some amazing experiences. From watching him I had a strong desire to heal and grow and rise above my past. I wish he could have done that for himself. No matter how difficult things were, I still loved my dad and tried up until the day before he died to be there for him. My dad had years of pain that he was never able to heal and I find that so incredibly sad! Without taking on your pain dad, I will go be better and leave the world a better place in your honor.

My father in law, well, you see, Keith and I were the “steps” in the family. He was my husband’s step-dad. Keith and I had a kindred spirit. He was always willing to listen, understand, see my tears flow, and then say a wise-crack to make me laugh. Keith was caring, giving, funny, but above all things he cared about us all. Keith and I shared in the fact that we never had biological children of our own and understood each other. He taught me about gardening, and this year we had big plans. He was going to help me grow my tomato seeds. He would sometimes come out to the garden knowing I was hot and tired and help me pick beans. Oh geez he would say! That’s our favorite Keith saying. We would talk health and exercise and he’d tell me about a show I needed to watch about what was in our food. I would tell him that was gross and I couldn’t, and he would tell me I needed to. I hope you know that I loved you and thought you were the best father-in-law anyone could have. It is my hope the kids brought you joy, and that you knew they were all four your grandkids!

With love for you all,

Shauna