Happy New Year lovely!
For those of you who joined in Your Life Journey 2016 – a huge massive heartfelt thank you! It has been such an awesome and heartwarming experience to know that we were joined by such a big group (over 150!) to look back at the past year and create a compelling vision and plan for the coming year! For those of you who couldn’t join in but are still interested, please don’t hesitate to drop me a line at info@naomisaelens.com and I’ll be sure to send you the material.
The last weeks have been jam-packed with the Journey, and a little break is in order to get some rest and get energized for what looks like another thrilling year to come. And super excited to say that I’m writing this from Hong Kong where love B took me for my birthday trip! So once this post is up, I’ll be logging of this computer and logging into HK life & adventures!
This time of year is so reflective as I find myself moving from the old into the new year, and on top of that, it’s my birthday! So what better time to write a little piece on the year that has been.
And oh hello what a year! It involved – amongst others – packing up in Amsterdam & moving to the other side of the world, setting up my own business, launching a blog & website, as well as a first online progamme with soulsister coach Hanna, seeing orangutans in Malaysian Borneo, watching the sunrise in magical Borobodur, learning to ski, and being the witness at my best friend’s wedding.
Also included were a spectrum of emotions ranging from panic to exhilaration to nauseating fear to jump-for-joy happiness – and everything in between. But most of all, it conjures up an overwhelming sense of gratitude and amazement at all that is possible.
Thinking back even just a few years ago, secretly dreaming of becoming a life coach, and quickly renouncing the idea that that would even be an option. Only seeing the obstacles ahead, and giving in to thinking that it wasn’t going to be possible. It was too late, I would still need to do so many things before I could even think of becoming a coach, who was I to even think that I had anything to offer? I still remember the day when I told my own coach in a quiet voice, I want to do what you do. Waiting for her to laugh at me and say, that’s just ridiculous.
Instead, she helped me to listen to that voice inside, to honour it, to remove the obstacles that I had created in my mind and to ultimately see a path that I did not believe possible. And that my dear is the magic of coaching. To open up to possibility.
I took my first steps by enrolling into an intensive year-long coaching degree – a pretty big leap at the time – and ultimately while there was still a long way to go, that was the start of a new career and a secret desire that was being turned into reality. If you would have told me then, that 3 years later I would be moving to Bali to pursue another dream of living abroad again and setting up a business as a coach, I’m pretty sure that I would have laughed in your face.
But here we are.
This is not to say that this has all been easy. The road here has been paved with fear of failure and self-doubt of all kinds. But I felt compelled. The voice inside grew louder and louder, life handed out a couple of hard knocks, and ultimately l felt I didn’t have a choice anymore.
Not trying to pursue this dream, not listening to that voice inside, staying put in my comfort zone, would have meant failure.
I find that people often comment on how brave we were to pack things up and move halfway across the world. But the reality is that this is not about bravery (and I can assure you there have been plenty of moments that I’ve wanted to throw in the towel). It’s about the realization that not trying to pursue my dreams, not answering this calling and giving it my absolute best shot, would have been the biggest failure. That even if this path doesn’t turn out as I had hoped, at least, I know I have tried and what a ride it will have been!
So as I sit here in the lobby of my hotel in Hong Kong, I wonder what the coming year will bring. What a rollercoaster ride it will be, somewhere balancing on that tip between excitement and fear – but I know that this is what it feels like to be fully and wholeheartedly alive. I also feel extremely lucky and grateful to have love B at my side, who is awesome beyond words and the love, connection and support of family and friends across the globe.
So with that lovely I wish you the happiest of New Years, and I ask you to answer the question: What can you do to listen more to that voice inside and become even more fully alive this day? What is it that you have secretly been dreaming about? Big or small, it doesn’t matter, but take one step closer to where you want to be, one step out of your comfort zone and into the life of possibility.
Take that leap!
With love,
Naomi
