People change. Sometimes they change for the better, sometimes they change for the worse.

There’s a person in my family that I haven’t seen in a number of years that I had to spend time with recently. We tend to avoid each other. We don’t get along. However, we managed this time to be civil to each other…to actually have a conversation–not about anything too important–and to be in the same room and not to laps into yelling and screaming.

It was nice.

Now, I supposed the change in behavior could have been an act. I prefer to think that possibly this person has changed a bit…or had a desire to get along. That would be nice.

It’s good to forgive, move forward, get along.

Are there people in your life with whom you need to mend fences? Could you simply decide to try harder to get along? Could you find it within yourself to change your energy around them or to behave just a bit differently so you could have an enjoyable time rather than a stressful one? Could you try to change…just a little?

People do change. It’s possible.

Yesterday my 17-year-old daughter graduated from high school. Thursday marked her last day of classes, Last night we attended the graduation ceremony. I know she is graduating, but to a certain extent, I feel I am as well. We are both graduating to the next phase of our lives together. She goes off to college and I go off to life without one “child” at home.

There’s something odd about that. I didn’t feel that old turning 50. I feel a bit old though when I think about having a daughter in college. I’ll still have one child at home for another two years, but I still feel as if something has changed.

This graduation marks the beginning of a new life for my daughter. It marks the end of something for me; I’ll never stop being her mother, and she’ll never stop being my daughter–but she’s become an adult. She won’t need me as much. She’ll be independent. Her graduation marks the end of my role as her mother.

Oh, I’ll always be her mother. And she’ll need a mother but not quite as  much. In fact, I saw that already this year. That’s how I knew she was ready to go off to college. She already is independent and responsible. And that’s what good parenting is all about…making our children self-sufficient.

She’s already not around much, and I don’t normally think too much about that, but when she’s 3,000 miles away in college on the East Coast and I’m still on the West Coast, I’m really going to miss her.

I’ll have to figure out how to live without her. I wonder if that will be as hard for her as it will be for me? So who is really graduating?

I’ve always known that the writing and speaking I do in the area of human potential and personal growth contains an element of spirituality. Of course, my writing and speaking on the topic of Judaism, Kabbalah, and practical spirituality has a spiritual nature as well. I never saw the spiritual nature of my work as a writing coach and publishing mentor, though….until yesterday.

I was speaking with a woman who told me that as I inspire others to write their books, as I create passion within them to tell their stories from the page (and through social media and from the podium), I am doing spiritual work. She explained that the passion I impart and instill involves spirituality. Indeed, passion comes from our spiritual nature. It’s comes out of our soul and connects us to something higher, bigger, creative. It’s our link to Source energy.

By helping others become creative beings and supporting them in expression their passion, I assist them in getting in touch their souls, their souls’ purpose, and with Source. That’s a spiritual pursuit.

Ah. How relieved I felt. Until that moment I had felt as if this part of my work life was quite removed from the other part. One felt spiritual and the other secular. Now I could see how they were linked, how one feeds into the other and back again.

If you would like to find spirituality in your work, maybe you need only discover your passion–or how you help others find passion. Discover how what you do fulfills your soul’s purpose or how it allows you to express your creativity. Then allow yourself to feel passionate about that.

Or simply ask God, Source, the Creator to act through you as you work. That brings spirituality into the workplace.  Then proceed with passion.

This week I celebrated my 50^th birthday by attending a three day writing retreat. I treated myself to two extra days on the site.

Everyone just left but one woman who is staying an extra day and my roommate, who is also staying the two extra days.

Turning 50 didn’t really make that much difference to me. However, I had some writing projects I wanted to finish, and the idea of going away to finish them seemed efficient and enticing.

It also seemed a great way to affirm a few things to myself and to the world at large. It affirmed that I was worth spending time alone with. It affirmed that my writing was important—to me and in general. (This was important for my family to understand as well.) It affirmed that I was a writer. (You would think I would know this after all these years, but sometimes we need to restate what we know.) And it affirmed that if I put my mind to getting some writing done—if I set writing goals—I could meet them.

I’d never been on a writing retreat before; I’ve been writing since my early childhood years. Going away for the express purpose of only writing seemed exciting and daunting. The first few days I had the distraction of 24 writers and social time.  Now, it’s time for some serious writing, contemplation, meditation…and more writing.

What do you want to affirm to yourself? What have you not done before that you want to do?

My husband watched my daughter walk by a group of boys today after a swim meet. She had gotten dressed for a dance at school and was wearing a short skirt and a bright red top with bright red pumps. One of the boys watched her walk by and asked the other boys, “Who’s that?” In four years, he’d never noticed her before.

Actually, my daughter managed to go through three years of high school being fairly invisible. She kind of liked it that way much of the time. This year she took off her “invisibility cape” and started doing things to get noticed. She changed her style of clothing. She put on make up. She joined some school activities. She became more outgoing. She participated in the school musical. All these things made her get noticed.

What she doesn’t realize is that she also changed her energy. Her invisibility cloak extended to how she put herself out into the world energetically, not just with her clothing and activities. When she began to energetically want to get noticed, she did.

I find that I can be as invisible as I’d like to be. I can sit in a coffee shop where I want to do some work and have no one talk to me or pay any attention to me. I put up an energetic shield, if you will, that says, “Leave me alone.” When I go to a conference, however, I want to be the opposite of invisible. I want people to see me and to approach me. I project me energy outward. I smile. I also wear things and do things that definitely draw more attention (in a good way).

Someone just told my husband, who is sitting next to me, that he is in an invisible mode. She didn’t see him sitting next to me. He is wearing black and grey. He is hunched over his computer. I don’t really think he wanted to talk to anyone. She said the fact that his energy is in the invisible mode means he is going through a transition. Maybe we don’t want to be seen when we need to go inward and work on ourselves, when we need to create a change within ourselves. Maybe we need to be invisible, like a seed underground gestating and getting ready to break though the soil before we come out and show the world our new greenery and flowers.

My daughter definitely came out with new flowers this year. And she got noticed. She continues to get noticed.

What gets you noticed? Do you choose to be invisible and for what reasons?

I gave a talk this past week to 55 people. Most people gave me good reviews; a friend said he didn’t think I shared my true self or my passion.He wanted me to do a better job of revealing myself to the audience. He felt disappointed that they didn’t get to know “me.”

Two days ago I coached a client. He told me later that my passion and knowledge came through clearly. He could feel it over the phone. He could sense my true essence.

Today I taught a workshop, and I was told that my passion and expertise came through loud and clear. Another friend told me he could see “me” clearly and my true love for my subject matter, for sharing my knowledge, and for helping others.

What made the difference between revealing my passion and my true self? Am I just not as experienced at speaking before an audience? Do I feel more comfortable one on one or with a small group? Do I hide myself in some situations and not in others?

How about you? Do you reveal your passion to others? Do you share your true self? Do you let others really know who you are?

In the moments when we reveal our passion and our true selves we give others a window into our souls. We let them see who we really are and what we really care about. It’s a shame when we don’t do that.

I understand why my friend was upset that I hadn’t revealed myself to all those people; he said  he wanted them to “know me” like he did. I wanted them to know me in that way as well…I need to learn to allow my passion and my true self to shine through no matter what the situation. How about you?

I’m one of those people who is perpetually late. I’m usually not enormously late…just about 10 minute or so. I don’t plan on being late. I just am…late.

Even now, I really should be out taking a bike ride before the sun starts to go down. I don’t have to meet anyone or anything like that. In my mind, however, I had it planned to take a bike ride around 3:30. It’s 3:32, and I’m just starting on this blog post. Why? Because I want to get it written before I go–and while the house is quiet. Soon my family will storm in. That means I’ll be on my bike racing against the setting sun rather than enjoying the sun.

Most days I’m racing somewhere in my car rather than getting their leisurely. I never prepare to go somewhere leisurely; I’m always running late.

Every day it’s the same story. I’m squeezing in one last thing at the last minute…and then I’m late and apologizing to someone.  It’s horrible really.

I asked myself why I do this to myself (and to others). I came up with a few reasons, but, honestly, I’m still struggling with this issue.  Here are the few answers I came up with:

1. This is a birth pattern for me. My mother induced labor with me for convenience sake. She had two other children and wanted me to arrive at a convenient time–when the other kids had childcare already arranged. I’m fighting against being induced to go or do anything I don’t really want to do.

I don’t want t do or go anywhere. Well, I just want to stay home and write and work on my own projects. I don’t want to do the other stuff.

If I’m late, people get mad at  me or think poorly of me. This allows me to perpetuate my belief that I’m unlikeable–or to give people a reason not to like me.

I don’t want to show up. By this I mean, I don’t want to be seen in the world. If I stay home, I don’t have to play in the world and have people see me and who I am. I can hide away at home. This is especially true when I have to speak or teach. Many times I arrange these engagements, but I am still resisting. I’ve induced myself, and then I fight back and don’t want to show up. I don’t want to play big.

When it comes time to leave the house, I suddenly think I haven’t done enough; so I try to do a few things prior to leaving–a few extra emails, a load of laundry, clean up the kitchen–to get approval from those people who matter to me and who might disapprove of me otherwise.  This makes me late.

Do my reasons for being late ring true for you? Do you have reasons of your own you’d like to share? I’d love to hear them. I’m sure I have more reasons…unconscious ones, too. I’ll be working on this…trying not to be late. Exploring  some of these reasons helps; sometimes just having a better idea of why we act the way we do helps us change our behavior. Bringing those reasons into our consciousness from or unconscious mind helps, too.

On that note, I’m off for that bike ride. I might be able to get it in.

About a month ago I went to see a medium. I asked if my father, who died when I was seven, served as one of my spirit guides. I asked if a freind of mine who passed away 17 years ago guided me as well. I was told both of them were with me all the time and I could call on them for specific types of advice.

Two days later I went to a class about mediumship. The woman teaching the class, a doctor in metaphysics, looked at me and suddenly stopped teaching. She said, “Do you realize how many guides you have around you? There’s a crowd!” It seemed, in particular there was a well-dressed man related in some way to my father standing nearby and taking quite good care of me.

Do you believe in guides? Do you believe, like the American Indian and the African religions and spiritual traditions, that our ancestors remain nearby after they pass on to assist us–especially if we call upon them to do so? Do you believe we have angelic and animal guides?

In Judaism, we can look in the Torah. There unnamed “people” are said to be angels; Jacob wrestles with an angel.

I know we have more than five senses. I know the prophets of old experienced six senses and the ability to receive messages from beyond their conscious mind–possibly from guides (or God).

The medium who taught that class told me my guides won’t let me move backwards anymore…only forward. I can feel their gentle prodding; I feel so driven and inspired to move forward with my life.

In Judaism we talk about hearing the Still Small Voice. We call this God’s voice. That’ s the voice we truly want to hear, but when we ask a question–via Tarot cards or to our guides or to our ancestors or to God–and we hear an answer (a whisper, a shout, a voice that sounds like our own but that possibly calls us by name…), do we know who’s talking to us? Could it be our guides? Could it be God? Maybe we need to hear our guides before we can hear God.

I know we must first want to hear…believe we can hear. (We have to believe there is someone to hear…)  Then if we listen, someone will, indeed, talk to us.

I think of myself as a pretty grateful person. Most of the people I know consider me someone fairly focused upon gratitude. So, imagine my dismay when a friend called me onto the carpet for being…well…ungrateful.

Ack! I was horrified. How could that be, I wondered? It seemed that I hadn’t said I was grateful loudly or clearly enough-or enough time (sometimes once isn’t enough), and some other words and actions had simply overshadowed my gratitude causing it not to be felt or heard.

So, today I spent some time sending out emails saying “thanks” to some people who have done nice things for me recently. I showed up on Facebook and posted on my friends’ walls telling them I was grateful for actions they have taken on my behalf. And I reiterated to my friend–the one nice enough to tell me what she thought about how I was behaving (and to tell me she knew my heart and that my actions weren’t “who I really was”)–how grateful I was for what she had done for me recently. And now, I’m going to be sure to thank her for being courageous enough to speak up.

It is so important to feel grateful. However, it really is important to behave in a grateful manner and to speak words of gratitude all the time. While we say prayers of gratitude all the time for everything God gives us (in Judaism we call these blessings because we say, “Blessed are you, God, who…”), we need to remember to also say thank you and bless those people around us and with us ever day who…give us friendship, tell us the truth, help us obtain our goals, listen to our problems, play with us, support us, remember our birthdays, love us, feed us, get us where we are going, join us for meals, cook for us, work with us, etc.

Ask yourself now: When was the last time you expressed gratitude? Then go express…loudly and clearly.

As I watched the Super Bowl half-time show I considered whether or not Roger Daltrey and The Who weren’t singing to people all over the United States and asking them an extremely important question: Who are you?

Now I’m not a big Who fan. (I’m also not a football fan, but my son and husband were watching and I was working on my computer nearby.) As I listened to the medley of Who songs and watched the great light show (I did appreciate that…), I thought, “Could it be that Peter Townshend, the band’s songwriter, wrote lyrics that we really should pay attention to today? (Did anyone really pay attention to them when he first wrote them?)

Most of us rarely consider who we are…or who we are becoming. However, we really should. To reach our full human potential we must stop occasionally and evaluate where we are along the path to becoming who we truly want to become.

Of course, it’s important simply to get a handle on who you are and the roles you play–and to decide if that is who you want to be. Mother. Breadwinner. Artist. Dancer. Writer. Father. Poor person. Rich person. Someone alone.  If it isn’t who you want to be, who do you want to be?

To know who you wan to be, you must know who you are.

Today, let The Who’s singing of one of their most famous songs (or at least part of it) during the Super Bowl half-time show remind you to ask yourself, “Who am I? As a person, who am I…really?” You might be surprised at your answer.