Being thankful and grateful are qualities, strengths, and states that go beyond the month of November and Thanksgiving (the US holiday). These make a difference in the experience of our life. People tend to look outside themselves and to external factors to feel good and have a happy life. They believe that happiness is dependent on their circumstances… But time and again researchers, scholars and thought-leaders have shared that happiness is an internal state and a choice. One that can be cultivated and nurtured…
Happiness, life satisfaction, and longevity are all impacted by gratitude, connection, and purpose… These are the ingredients for creating our long, healthy, and happy life… A good life. Our Best Life.
~ Purpose is simply pursuing what is meaningful to us, that keeps us engaged and having a zest for life… We are always in-charge of our own internal world assigning meaning to everything in our external one… We have a choice as to what meaning we assign things and how we choose to look at everything, and what we choose to pursue. As exemplified by the work of Viktor Frankl, a psychiatrist that developed his theory while a concentration camp prisoner during WWII in his book Man’s Search for Meaning.
~ Connection to loved ones give us security and a sense of belonging… It gives our life further meaning and purpose… This is what keeps us going and what we live for… Robert Waldinger explains this in his TED Talk about what makes a good life describing the longest study on happiness.
~ A Gratitude Practice makes a big difference inour overall Happiness– Shawn Achor lists the key ingredients of this practice in his talks. This is what I’m calling embracing a #GratitudeAttitude. Which is looking for the good in things, focusing on the positives, seeing the blessings, appreciating the beauty in others and so on, adding dimension to our experience. It puts us in a different frame of mind. It raises our vibration. It transcends the minutiae and the mundane…
How about we take the pursuit of happiness seriously… And, by this I mean we take it easy in our approach to life and focus on the things that are actually important to creating the life we desire… Pursuing what gives us meaning including creating a successful relationship with our partner and minding our internal world including developing a #gratitudeattitude…
Let’s take being grateful to new heights by increasing our appreciations, acknowledgements and thanks-giving this month and going forward…
PSS: Do you need support taking yourself, your relationship, and your life to the next level- actually living a healthy, happy, harmonious and overall abundant life?
Copyright (c) 2023 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 the Successful Couple Strategy™ that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly connection notes in your inbox with Personal Development and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com.
What are we to do when we feel we tried it all to create change in our relationship, but nothing is working? I wager that there is actually a ton more that you can still do, without much effort…
I know that when we are frustrated and tired of the same arguments and conflicts that we are likely to feel hopeless and like giving up. It seems that everything we tried hasn’t worked and therefore like there is nothing left to do… But I promise that is just not the case…
It usually feels like there is nothing else we can do because we keep looking at our situation with the same lens on and the same filters. Which usually flow from an ego pattern and are negative. How are you supposed to see possibilities by looking at things in the same old way, and a negative way at that?
The way out of this conundrum is to realize how much power we actually have… We have tremendous power to impact and influence our partner and our relationship… Both positively and negatively…
But we are intentional about how we yield this power both partners can stand to reap amazing benefits.
This Month’s Theme is IMPACT, helping partners take their power back, fully own, and properly yield it.
If we want to create change in our relationship and in our life, it is time we take charge of creating what we desire. And we do it by fully owning our impact…
In today’s video I cover, how to: ~ Mind your Effect ~ Own your Shape ~ Optimize your Influence
So you have a positive impact on your relationship to create the relationship and life you want…
PSS: Do you need support taking yourself, your relationship, and your life to the next level- actually living a healthy, happy, harmonious and overall abundant life?
Copyright (c) 2023 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 the Successful Couple Strategy™ that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly connection notes in your inbox with Personal Development and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com.
The way we allow ourselves to experience and view our world, is exactly what we experience and what we see… This has tremendous implications for our relationship…
Our relationship is our PLAYGROUND where we recognize our growth areas, notice what skills we still need, practice what we learn, and try out who we are becoming…
When we take our relationship for granted not only does it wither and die, depriving us of the joy and love that our relationship can bring, but with it goes the built-in mechanism for our evolution…
As it is no longer available for its essential purpose of being our playground, we have to find an alternative way to continue evolving to ensure our best human experience…
I say we focus on nurturing and enriching our relationship for its own sake and our own…
In this video, I show how to expand your consciousness, how to better show up to your relationship, to expand your Love…
Feel amazing and create your best relationship…
I talk about:
💗Aligning with Oneness
💗Opening up to More
💗Allowing Love
Let’s live in Love…
Watch other Monthly Theme videos on our YouTube channel
PSS: Do you need support taking yourself, your relationship, and your life to the next level- actually living a healthy, happy, harmonious and overall abundant life?
Copyright (c) 2023 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 the Successful Couple Strategy™ that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly connection notes in your inbox with Personal Development and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com.
We still live in a pretty hectic and grind focused world… The recent pandemic helped us wake up a bit to the reality that we were not living our best life. That we were living by doing, accumulating, numbing, and yes, wasting away… And, to some extent, we haven’t really course corrected that much… We shouted from the roof tops that we wanted to “go back to normal”… But is that really want we want? I know we are craving a richer and more meaningful existence…
I have made it my business, literally, to show people a better way… The old mindset around this no longer cuts it… The grind mentality, the 10x all your efforts, the focus on external achievement, the default of neglecting ourselves and our loved ones is no longer acceptable. Why would we choose to have this kind of life?
The result of that kind of life is high divorce rates and broken homes, financial struggle, addictions, diseased bodies and minds, fatigue and exhaustion, and a lack of inspiration and zest for life… This is when people are robotic about life and it shows in their eyes, in their speech, in their focus… This is when people don’t have a great answer as to the purpose of life… Their purpose…
Regardless of where you stand on the above, I bet you still do some grinding… It’s ok, we still live in this kind of world…
But I want to offer a simple reprieve to that today, and that is to open our eyes to Joy… If you are rolling your eyes, bear with me… You see, we tend to focus on all the doing and getting things done, that we don’t stop to smell the roses. I know this might sound cliché at this point, but it still applies…
What if we created a life where we focus on our life first and then on work? I know, it sounds crazy… And don’t get me wrong- I love my work and working… I could be as much on this boat as the next person… Because my work is such a part of me, and my purpose and my mission, it is even harder to detach from it and chill… It is so ingrained in my being that it becomes difficult to distinguish work from life… But still, I’m taking on this challenge as I know there is even more… I’m intentionally shifting this focus and basking on what’s on the other side…
What does it mean to focus on our life first and then on work? What does it mean to stop and smell the roses? What does it mean open our eyes to joy?
Open Your Eyes to Joy
This would look different for each of us, as we all have different habits, needs, preferences, bodies, histories, things that delight us, and so on and so forth. But it could include some of these or some version of these:
Creating a rich self-care morning routine
Embracing a mindfulness practice
Experimenting with different ways of having movement in our day
Expending times outdoors in the sun and in nature
Having fresh flowers in our office and home
Having live plants in our office and home
Eating delicious nutritious meals
Feeding our mind and soul
Honoring our feelings and addressing our needs
Becoming more who we are
Pursuing interests and hobbies
Pursuing a higher calling
Creating quality time with our loved ones
Having great sleep hygiene (hooked up bedtime routine)
You see, it doesn’t have to be that difficult or such a strange concept… When we prioritize these and work our work around them, that’s when the seas part…
Right now, we do it the other way around, we do work and fill in the rest if we can… This is a terrible way to go about life…
I encourage you to prioritize your life first, sprinkle the little things that give you joy into your routine, then get to work.
What I experience when I do this, is that I’m much more creative and productive. My life feels amazing and works much better. I can truly say I’m living my best life…
PSS: Do you need support taking yourself, your relationship, and your life to the next level- actually living a healthy, happy, harmonious and overall abundant life?
Copyright (c) 2023 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 the Successful Couple Strategy™ that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly connection notes in your inbox with Personal Development and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com.
It’s amazing how often I hear that people don’t have the time to do self-care… When their lives literally depend on it… I’m not sure if they look at self-care as a luxury – like having a spa day or laying on a chaise eating bonbons – that they shouldn’t have?
But really, in this day and age to not prioritize self-care when it at the very least increases resilience? I look at self-care as a duty and a responsibility to ensure our wellbeing, and our ability to show up with our Best Self and create the relationship and life we desire… It is our duty to Embrace the Art of Self-Care…
When we embrace self-care as part of our daily responsibilities, we experience a shift in how we prioritize, how we approach our day and how we are able to create the time for it…
A rich Self-Care Practice ensures we:
~Optimize our functioning and wellbeing – health, vitality, energy, mood, focus and bandwidth…
~Are grounded and Connected with our self, that we are solid in our core and operate with authenticity…
~Are in Alignment with our Purpose, that we are creative, progressive and productive.
When we invest on our Selves in this way – we are showing ourselves Love and Compassion. Nurturing. We have our own back… We are there for ourselves, we don’t abandon ourselves…
It is very interesting to witness that the partners that suffer or struggle the most, feel overwhelmed and unsupported, and complain that their partner are not there for them enough – are the partners who least focus on having their own back… They focus on what the other is doing or not doing for them, as opposed to what they are doing for themselves…
The focus on the other triggers them making the whole thing even more challenging, and self-care even more important for its self-regulatory properties…
When partners don’t approach their day with intentionality and some self-love (self-care) and rush into their day putting out fires and allowing themselves to be pulled in 100 different directions, they will get banged about and thrown off what they want to accomplish. This is one of the meanest ways for us to go about our day and to treat ourselves, second only to beating ourselves up with our own thinking…
We want to be kind and nice to ourselves, so that we can attend to becoming the best version of ourself and showing up with our Best Self, Authentic Self, more and more consistently. So, we can show up well to create our best relationship and best life – our Successful Relationship and Meaningful Life… So, we can have our Best Human Experience…
When we invest in ourselves with a rich self-care practice, we are more regulated, contained, grounded, patient, responsive, motivated, happy, compassionate, present, peaceful, resourceful, enthusiastic, appreciative, open, flexible, solid, secure, sensitive, sensible, joyful, forgiving, giving, generous, and so much more…
It behooves us to take care of ourselves to have a real good life…
I get that making time for self-care might feel frivolous when we have what seem like more important to-dos on our agenda… I can still fall into this misconception sometimes when I create very ambitious agendas… Believe me I get it. When one is a super-achiever, one can be one’s own worst enemy…
But I challenge you to give this a serious try for when you realize that you can actually be more productive in less time with more ease and joy, save your marriage and raise amazing children, then you get hooked!
You can start slow, you don’t have to flip the switch and start with radical and extreme self-care. There is a whole range, a spectrum in embracing the Art of Self-Care. Your Self-Care Practice is what you make of it and what you want it to be.
In mine:
-I have my basics that I totally miss and feel the impact should I skip them for some reason.
-Then I add another layer as I’m willing to create the time for it.
-And, then I can really step it up when I feel the need for more or just for kicks to take things to the next level…
I know that when one is struggling, it’s very challenging for them to even think about this and never mind take action toward implementing even the simplest activity.
The key to get over the hump is in proactively and preemptively expanding our mindset, to take responsibility for our wellbeing, and in tweaking our daily routine so the Self-Care Practice becomes automatic… This is the Art of Self-Care…
Your Self-Care Practice can include any activity that recharges, restores, rejuvenates and gives you Joy… Activities that reconnect you to your Higher Self are the best… These tend to give the most bang for the investment… They usually fall within a Mindfulness Practice…
The activities can be physical, mental, social, and spiritual and can take on any form. The key is to break from the usual noise and to intentionally do something for yourself. Some activities give you little value and positive impact, others are super rich… More is not necessarily better… It’s up to you create the flavor of your Practice and decide how much you want to invest in it and what benefits you are looking for.
A rich self-care practice improves vitality, youthfulness, longevity, happiness, connection, love, success… It’s up to you how you want to do your life- Do you want to struggle or flow with ease?
Embracing the Art of Self-Care ensures you do you, your relationship and your life effortlessly, gracefully, and joyfully…
ASSIGNMENT: Make a commitment to uplevel your Self-Care Practice, to Embrace the Art of Self-Care…
-Make a list of activities that interest you in the 4 categories: Physical, mental, social and spiritual. Be open to different things to create a rich repertoire.
-Take a look at your DailyRoutine and carve out some time to integrate an activity.
-Select something new or that you’ve been trying to add into your lifestyle from your list and add it to your carved-out time.
Copyright (c) 2020 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 the Successful Couple Strategy™ that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly connection notes in your inbox with Personal Development 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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