I like to get into Spring Mode early to extend the warmer seasons as much as possible… It’s harder to do when the weather wants to continue to show its winter colors though. LOL But it’s nothing that a Spring Bucket List can’t fix! Are you with me? Let’s leave winter behind regardless of what is happening out there.
I did some research on Spring Bucket Lists to prepare for this issue and found most of them a little basic and dull. I think you and I can create our own much better list. Are you up for it?
I created a Bucket List Design Process™ for this purpose. Note, the mere exercise of doing this is super empowering, recharging, motivating, inspiring, exciting and just plain FUN. Give it a go!!
Use the structure listed below to come up with things you want to do, accomplish, or experience in each area. You can play with all 10 areas, coming up with 5 things for each, or you can choose to focus on specific areas as you like, with the idea of ending up with your Spring Bucket List: 50 Ways of Living Life to the Fullest this Spring
Here is the list structure with areas to cover to help you create an amazing list, with a couple of examples for each:
1.Personal Physical – health, fitness, grooming and pampering, appearance and look, personal brand, treatments, healthy habits
Expand your skin care routine
Do a detox
2.Wellness – self-care routines, wellness and success habits, personal development practices or focus, treatments, supportive resources, tools and techniques
Start a Partner Appreciations Journal™…
Join or start a Personal DevelopmentMaster Mind Group™
3.Relational and Social – activities, outings, entertaining, experiences, adventures, service, joint project, hobby, or interest, connection habits, relationship enrichment behaviors, celebrating
Subscribe to Blue Apron to cook original nutritious recipes together
Commit to Saturdays Date Night™
4.Home and Other Indoor Spaces – decluttering and organization, making functional, refreshing, beautifying
Marie Kondo Your Home… (keep only things that Spark Joy!)
Commit to Fresh Flowers Fridays™
5.Outdoor Spaces – yard, functional structures, activities structures, variety of gardens, fun nooks, special touches, experiences
Plant a fruit tree
Create a Yard Labyrinth
6.Indulgences – baking and other treats, aromas and scents, experiences, getting that little something that’s been on your wish list
Bake lemon treats
Start / expand your aromatherapy oils collection
7.With the Kids – crafts, their rooms, activities, outings, experiences, service, new skill, new hobby, new interest, new life skill
Visit an arboretum
Build a bird house
8.Creative – writing of any kind including music, painting, drawing, designing, decorating, dancing, creating, inventing, photographing, crafting, singing
Write a collection of poems
Photograph the blooming season
9.Philanthropical – add charities to your repertoire, help plan an upcoming Gala, help in local fundraisers, contribute to a charitable endeavor, donate your time to your population of choice, start a cause
Sign up to read to children at afterschool programs or hospitals
Volunteer to be a Mentor at your local High School
10.Nature/Seasonal/Different – visiting beautiful locations, being with animals, doing outdoor activities, playing outdoors, being outdoors, outdoor sports, exploring and witnessing nature
Just writing this was energizing and fun! Juices flowing, so inspired… Yay! It’s your turn, brainstorm ideas to recharge, motivate, move forward, have fun, and enjoy the season. Inspire yourself and Spring Forward!
Remember to complete the MetroRelationsip™ Assignment below to help you effortlessly implement this, make changes and immediately start creating your Successful Relationship and Meaningful Life…
Share your experience by leaving a comment below!
Happy Springing!
~ Your MetroRelationship™ Assignment
Create your Spring Bucket List. Select a batch of items from your list you want to enjoy first. Start planning out how to make them happen.
Keep doing the same for the rest. The goal is not to stress out to have them all done, but to enjoy the process and doing as many as you like.
This is an exercise for stimulation, inspiration and enjoyment!
Add this to your Tool Kit…
Copyright (c) 2019 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.
Want to Use this Article in Your Own Website or Publication?
Be our guest! Here is how, you MUST include: Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT is the Founder and Director of Metropolitan Marriage & Family Therapy, PLLC, a private practice that specializes in working with couples, she is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and a variety of Successful Couple™ content that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly Connection Notes in your inbox with Personal Growth and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com.
We are in charge of how we choose to experience our life moments, and what we choose to do with them… This is a choice we can make about anything, at any time… Even in the face of trouble, chaos, crisis, and anything that we would usually consider negative life events. It’s all about the meaning we assign things… How we let them impact us… And, how we choose to address them…
The same goes for when others around us are having a moment… If they are spinning, we don’t have to spin with them… If they are feeling blue, cranky or mad, we don’t have to take on their feelings… If they are stressed, we don’t have to fix their stress… If they are ambivalent, we can stand in our Knowing…
We can have our feelings and experiences independently of others’. We can also choose to safeguard our wellbeing when those around us start to influence or impact us with their negative state. It’s not super easy to always stand still and not get sucked in…
It’s in our, and in our loved ones’, best interest to learn how to not get sucked in… I’ve had several sessions, and other experiences, recently where this was a prevalent theme. Partners get sucked into their partner’s mood, reactivity, and script allowing themselves, their emotional state, to be hijacked…
It’s already bad enough that we co-create our current patterns, our relationship dynamic, playing-out our unresolved issues so we have another go at them. It’s imperative we exercise more personal boundaries, self-soothing and regulating, and self-management to not take the bait and get hijacked. Consequently, this is also essential for changing the patterns themselves…
When you don’t take charge of your side of things and jump into the mud with the other, you perpetuate the negativity, collude with their perspective, entrench the limiting mindset, and create a life story riddled with dissatisfaction… You end up creating a mediocre life!
Jumping in the mud with them – trying to fix their issue, trying to make them feel better, trying to show them a different way, trying to rescue the moment and the like are all signs of Loving TOO Much… We can’t save people from themselves. They can only do this…
For when we fix things for them, we prevent them from experiencing the motivating pain, accessing their own resources, figuring it out, and possibly hitting the necessary rock bottom that would lead to the Light…
We have to be mindful not to get in their way. And, we have to be mindful not to get in our own way… When we take care of another in this way, we don’t take care of ourselves… Nobody wins!
Don’t take the bait. Don’t get on anyone’s ride. Focus on standing still. Reap the rewards!
Remember to complete the MetroRelationsip™ Assignment below to help you effortlessly implement this, make changes and immediately start creating your Successful Relationship and Meaningful Life…
Share your experience by leaving a comment below!
Happy Standing!
~ Your MetroRelationship™ Assignment
Take stock of when your interactions tend to go south in your relationship: before work, upon getting home, dinner, evening routine, bed time, Friday night, a particular time during the weekend, Sunday night, when food shopping, in the car, at weddings, at events, at in-laws’, etc.
See if you can identify a pattern as to when, and as a theme as to what about…
Do something to mitigate the when. Do something to address the what.
Add this to your Tool Kit…
Copyright (c) 2019 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.
Want to Use this Article in Your Own Website or Publication?
Be our guest! Here is how, you MUST include: Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT is the Founder and Director of Metropolitan Marriage & Family Therapy, PLLC, a private practice that specializes in working with couples, she is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and a variety of Successful Couple™ content that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly Connection Notes in your inbox with Personal Growth and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com.
I’ve been knee deep in upgrading my personal routines and Wellness, Connection & Success Habits™. I do practice what I preach! LOL I’ve been having so much fun exploring and playing with resources to assist me with this current Theme. One of my targets is becoming even more paperless, now in my personal life as well. As you might know, I’m the queen of sticky notes.
I pretty much run my life on a sticky pad (don’t judge me!). Yes, I have major platforms running my practice, teams, and even personal life – but I still need to capture, see and touch my immediate notes and to-dos on paper. Call me old fashion. This works very well for me. I’m known for my great follow through, organization, and such.
The problem is that after the immediate processing, learning, indulging, and such, somethings then become stacks of papers and folders. As you might know, I have a collection of file cabinets in my office, and the same in my home office!
So, one of my new habits is to get rid of the clutter this creates and make my information more accessible post immediate use. My new system also captures my electronic research clutter – no more capturing notes, screenshots, and links across platforms and open tabs! Yay!
Why am I sharing this? Because our external world is a reflection of our internal world… Because how we do anything is how we do everything… Because our systems dictate our level of success (in all life areas)… How we manage our life creates our life and how we experience it… Our desired Life depends on great habits and systems!
This brings me back to this Love Month we are in. Showing love, care and romance is not just for Valentine’s Day, or February if you are ambitious and take this Love Month concept seriously. Our Relationship is as good as we invest in it. It’s as good as we nurture it. It’s as good as we respect it, consider it, and safe guard it. Life is way too busy. We have way too much going on.
It’s so easy to neglect our relationship and our partner. It’s easy to live a parallel life and just go through the motions with our partner. It’s easy to get stuck in a disconnected relationship dynamic. But we don’t have to settle for this! We CAN create the relationship we want…
This means prioritizing our relationship and our partner over business and other commitments. This means establishing nurturing habits and couple rituals to enrich the relationship. This means learning skills to manage ourselves and showing up resourced to our interactions… This means learning relationship skills.
This means learning and implementing life hacks to make life easier, so you have more time and ease. This means living and intentional life, a life by Design.
Don’t let life happen to you. Don’t let your relationship fall apart. Don’t let your health deteriorate. Don’t allow yourself to age poorly. Don’t let your peace of mind go out the window. Don’t give up on your dreams. Don’t settle for mediocracy. Don’t let society norms dictate your timetables, lifestyle, roles, dreams and the like. Live your Successful and Meaningful Life!
Start by minding how you are showing up in your relationship.If you nag, demand, control and criticize, you won’t be getting anything good back for your efforts… Curtail the impulse towards this approach, and instead show up with an accepting, understanding, compassionate, curious, interested and inviting approach… Inspire your partner to show up for you… Demanding they do, does just the opposite!
The same goes for Loving TOO Much… This is a version of being controlling…
Mind how You show up. Let your partner Choose how they show up. They might surprise you yet!
Remember to complete the MetroRelationsip™ Assignment below to help you effortlessly implement this, make changes and immediately start creating your Successful Relationship and Meaningful Life…
Share your experience by leaving a comment below!
Happy Inspiring!
~ Your MetroRelationship™ Assignment
Think Habits. Think Connection Habits™.
How can you consistently, appropriately, and lovingly stay in connection with your partner to enjoy a stronger Connection? (Sometimes we are in connection/contact but not necessarily Connected…).
Create a daily ritual of staying lovingly in touch during the day, no matter how busy you are.
Add this to your Tool Kit…
Copyright (c) 2019 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.
Want to Use this Article in Your Own Website or Publication?
Be our guest! Here is how, you MUST include: Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT is the Founder and Director of Metropolitan Marriage & Family Therapy, PLLC, a private practice that specializes in working with couples, she is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and a variety of Successful Couple™ content that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly Connection Notes in your inbox with Personal Growth and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com.
I’ve been writing about stepping it up and fully embracing showering your partner with lots of love. And, I wholeheartedly stand by my position to embrace the Valentine’s Day cliché. But, I also want to warn you that there is such a thing as Loving TOO Much… Now, this does not negate the concept I’ve been endorsing and encouraging. I do want you to be Super Nice to your partner. We usually do way too little of that…
The concept of Loving TOO Much has to do with Taking Care of another to the point where they don’t take care of themselves, or their responsibilities… This is taking care of them actually at their expense at the end of the day… I’m sure you’ve heard me say, Sometimes being too helpful is not helpful…
When we are too helpful and caring, we get in the way of our loved one’s ability to access their own resources to be able to take care of themselves. In essence we create a Dummy. The more helpful we are, the more stupid they become… Have you noticed this phenomenon?
We want to make sure we love the right way:
Providing support, understanding and acceptance (not of any bad behavior of course!)– Show curtesy, respect, tolerance (non-judgement), patience, trust.
Being super nice, loving and nurturing – Be gentle, caring, forgiving, generous.
Giving love in our partner’s love language and respecting their wishes – Not giving love the way WE like to receive love…
Treating your partner like a Partner – It won’t do to treat your partner like a child, an employee or some kind of subordinate. They have a brain, treat them like they do.
Relating with your partner as the person they are – See beyond the patterns, defenses, history, habits, roles, and such. See the Man or Woman there, that was the initial attraction…
Using flirting, playing, dating, courting, wooing, seducing – You get my drift. When stuck, make believe you are Dating (each other!)…
Pulling out all the stops, make believe your life depends on your being Loving – How would you carry yourself differently toward your partner if you were being watched and rated on a Loving Scale? Where a low rating would give you the death penalty…
Hm. Look at the last suggestion again. Something to think about. Our life does depend on how we do our relationship. Our success, health, wellness and happiness are greatly impacted by the state of our Relationship.
So, while we want to be super nice, loving and nurturing, we don’t want to love too much… Do the above to step up the Loving, complete our checklist below to find out if you are Loving TOO Much…
In the meantime, have an amazing Valentine’s Day weekend! J
Remember to complete the MetroRelationsip™ Assignment below to help you effortlessly implement this, make changes and immediately start creating your Successful Relationship and Meaningful Life…
Share your experience by leaving a comment below!
Happy Loving!
~ Your MetroRelationship™ Assignment
Ok, we are in the throes of Valentine’s Day weekend, how will you make it exceptional?
Whether you go all out with a gift, an experience, or a gesture to deepen intimacy and connection, you can’t go wrong.
Make it count, celebrate your love!
Add this to your Tool Kit…
Copyright (c) 2019 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.
Want to Use this Article in Your Own Website or Publication?
Be our guest! Here is how, you MUST include: Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT is the Founder and Director of Metropolitan Marriage & Family Therapy, PLLC, a private practice that specializes in working with couples, she is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and a variety of Successful Couple™ content that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly Connection Notes in your inbox with Personal Growth and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com.
We are just days away from Valentine’s Day. Are you embracing the Love Month? Is your whole house decorated pink like mine is? Haha, just kidding! You believed that though, didn’t you? Yes, I’m known to be a hopeless romantic and to love the Love Season. Yes, I love the pink and the red. And yes, I love the cliché things about VDay.
I don’t love the commercialization of it, and when I encourage clients, subscribers and followers to embrace VDay I’m not referring to this aspect of it. I’m referring to taking advantage of this opportunity to play with Love. Why not?
How do we play with Love? There are many kinds of love and I usually cover the gambit in my writing during the season to please those that are single and those that think the holiday is stupid. But, I’m taking a risk this year and going full out and asking that you embrace Valentine’s Day as it is intended. Let’s not be politically correct. Why not?
If you go at it from this angle, what does this mean to you? How will you show up on Valentine’s Day? How will you make the day super romantical (yes, love to play with verbiage)? How will you surprise your partner? How will you treat your partner super special? How will you share love?
How will you Be loving? What part of you needs to be more available, accessible, vulnerable, open, curious to have a different, better experience than usual in regard to giving Love…? What about in regard to receiving Love…?
It never ceases to amaze me when clients are literally crying about how they don’t feel love from their partner, but they are ripping them a new one in their asking for love (even as they are crying!)… The person requesting nurturing, empathy, compassion, love is extremely critical about the partner not giving these things… They are not being very loving-lovable…
They are not inspiring tenderness and caring. They are not inspiring empathy or compassion. If they are showing up with the killer version of themselves, it’s not very easy to love or empathize with them… They create a predicament for their partner. How is their partner supposed to show love and tenderness to a fire-breathing dragon?
So, there are two things to remember this Valentine’s: One, be super loving and generous when gifting your partner, in the way your partner likes it… Two, be super nice in your interactions and expectations to inspire reciprocity. Not demand reciprocity. Not doing tit-for-tat. Not gifting with strings attached.
Not manipulating, strong-arming, shaming or guilt-tripping. You show up authentically and genuinely. You give from the heart. You do your side of showing up properly… You are cut off from fire-breathing…
When you give love this way, in your Being Loving, you are also giving love to yourself… And, this is actually the hardest part of this… The fire-breathers have a very hard time being gentle, doing self-care, giving love to themselves, and receiving love. Thus, this is how they create the self-fulfilling prophecy of not getting love from their partner either (and, of course they are usually involved with partners that have a hard time giving love anyway…).
If this is you, treat yourself this Valentine’s! That’s also for you if you happen to be single, treat yourself!
Remember to complete the MetroRelationsip™ Assignment below to help you effortlessly implement this, make changes and immediately start creating your Successful Relationship and Meaningful Life…
Share your experience by leaving a comment below!
Happy Treating!
~ Your MetroRelationship™ Assignment
Write a Deeper Love Letter™.
The purpose is to deepen your love, connection and intimacy. To let go of hurt. To forgive. To apologize. To validate. To make nice. To synchronize. To recommit. To appreciate. To shower with Love.
The style, tone, length, content can be anything you want. This is for you and for your partner, for the Relationship, for the Partnership. This is for your past, present and future… This is repairing, healing, cleansing, connecting, strengthening. This is a Gift for your bond.
You can make this a Valentine’s Day ritual going forward…
Add this to your Tool Kit…
Copyright (c) 2019 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.
Want to Use this Article in Your Own Website or Publication?
Be our guest! Here is how, you MUST include: Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT is the Founder and Director of Metropolitan Marriage & Family Therapy, PLLC, a private practice that specializes in working with couples, she is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and a variety of Successful Couple™ content that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly Connection Notes in your inbox with Personal Growth and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com.
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Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT has been in the mental health profession in varying capacities for the past 20+ years. She is the Founder and Director of metrorelationship.com a psychotherapy and coaching practice specializing in working with busy professional and entrepreneurial couples who are struggling getting on the same page and feeling connected. The work helps couples create a radiant and successful relationship and meaningful life by becoming a strong partnership and increasing their connection, intimacy, and fun. Emma is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and the Successful Relationship Strategy™.
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