Jun 09
Let’s Stick Together
How supported do you feel in your life? Do you have enough people to share the good times and the tough times?
Recent research says most of us have no more than three individuals we can call ‘good friends’. You might even think three is pushing it!
One thing’s for sure – life is a lot easier when you feel supported. Whether you’re handling redundancy, a relationship breakdown, bereavement or any of life’s inevitable challenges – it’s easier when there’s good people to share it with and take strength from.
I saw this recently when I returned to Ireland for my aunt’s funeral. I spent time round the kitchen table with cousins, aunts and uncles. The support and warmth I felt there is with me now.
We all have a profound, human, need to connect with others.
The explosion in social networking through the internet is proof of this. You can be part of a community and connect with like-minded people anywhere in the world.
The wonderful writer and teacher Caroline Myss talks of how a gathering of soul companions, to assist each other, can help each person imagine and create new possibilities that they might never pursue.
She recently said, ‘Whenever two or more are gathered – we gather under the belief that we have a divine purpose on this earth which governs this journey that is our life.”
My fervent wish is to provide you with a place to gather with companions to enhance and support your journey through life.
Those who gather on my site are like-minded. We’re do-ers! We take responsibility for our lives. We are committed to fulfilling our greatest potential and making the most of life – and to helping others achieve the same.
We’ve made some wonderful changes to the site, making it brighter and easier to use. I’ll be coming up with more ways to support you over the coming weeks. I have this blog and you can follow me on twitter!
Crucially, I’d love to hear what you’d like to see on the site, what services you would welcome. Let me know in the comments section below.
Hi Fiona,
Another Irish person who’s been getting your mails for years, would love to read your blog if it was your observations on life and not continually trying to sell something, either a course or a book, by you or through you.
Right now people have more need for connections with people than ever, in Ireland for the last god knows how long the connection has been with houses, cars, holidays and clothes, these have been eulogised via mainstream media and we have forgotten about “people”.
So let’s focus on people skills and connecting people, these are your skills, I’ve bought your books, but that’s not what’s needed right now… not book..People… so give us your thoughts on psychology, philosophy, sociology and community, it’s never been more important!
Paul.
Hi Paul,
My website funds itself through quality products that people choose to buy. That’s the only way we stay in business and are able to provide a brilliant facility such as this blog and the forum that has been connecting people, at no cost to them, for nearly ten years.
I think we offer a good amount of free, useful, well-written content in our Newsletters and on the site. There’s always an option for people to buy a course or product, but you certainly don’t have to.
I am completely committed to providing a space here for people to connect and support each other. Will that sometimes include me recommending products, services or books that I think useful and relevant? Absolutely. Is the blog merely a covert means of selling by any means? Definitely not!
Slainte,
Did I mention the word “covert”?
My observation is not a personal slight, it’s merely a suggestion that innovation is more needed now that at any time in the last 10 years, and perhaps it’s time to be thinking of those who are seriously affected by their “reaction” to the economic downturn rather than recommending books and products that their bookshelves are already stacked with.
As to how much it costs to run a website? and how that’s funded?
A debate for another day perhaps?
But if staying in business depends on things other than providing a valuable service, relevant courses, active listening and insightful advice, then maybe I’m in the wrong business.
I’ll leave the books to Amazon!
Go raibh maith agat.
Slan
Paul.
Hi Paul,
I can only refer you to my earlier post. I’m losing your thread here! I am in the business of “providing a valuable service, relevant courses, active listening and insightful advice.” I also write books and love books.
I think I’m done with this particular theme,
Slan Agat,
Fiona
Interesting thoughts Paul. I’m kind of intrigued to know why you think having “thoughts on psychology, philosophy, sociology and community” or providing “valuable service, relevant courses, active listening and insightful advice” in some way precludes earning a crust? Do you mean only online or in the offline world also? Are we all to provide what ever services we provide free gratis and hope that ’somehow’ we’ll get by?
The opposite of greed (which I fully agree with you has been all too much to the fore over the last few years) is not to live with some sort of attitude that we are above money. Making a living matters, if you are running a business making a profit is kind of the point – not a dirty side effect.
I’m involved in running an online business (not anything even remotely related to life coaching, but it is like this one membership based) and I really think you are confusing a website with an online business – they are not the same thing. Running an online business is a very different animal to having a website or a personal blog, or even a website/blog that exists primarily to support an offline business.
You’ve thousands of registered users and providing them with a range of services and a support structure to back all that up is neither free nor particularly cheap. People have to be be available to answer customer/user emails, to deal with enquiries from partners and a myriad of other stuff that comes through, software has to be kept up to date, marketing has to be done, new products have to be developed – I could go on. Actual people have to be paid real money to do these things.
I’ve never felt victim to a hard sell in the years I’ve been getting the newsletter and hanging around here. In fact it’s sometimes kind of eerie how the newsletter seems to be on a theme that’s relevant to what’s happening in my life and I like seeing it come in. I’ve bought a course and as I buy books a lot anyway will check any that are recommended out and buy them IF I WANT TO.
As Fiona said, whether I buy something or not is my own affair, but if I do I am happy if she gets a few bob out of it – it’s all the same to me.
Fiona – keep doing what you’ve always done only more so. And may you prosper while you’re at it.
Monica
PS I’m in Ireland too – this is beginging to look like an exclusive club!
I love your books, as I said earlier I have the friggin things, this was not a personal attack, I’m sorry you perceived it as such…and great attempt at the Irish…it’s Slan Leat… but you made me laugh a lot.
Paul.
Dia duit, Monica!
I love your eloquence and clarity – thank-you. I couldn’t have put it better myself. And, Paul – my Irish is the Northern type – a little different from yours in the South!
Have a good day,
Fiona
Lol… Fiona it’s called the Free State in your part of the world.
The interpretation of my blog has been interesting and strange, firstly there was no mention of free gratis either, I was simply making the point that “balance” between both may be achieved, there are many who cannot either afford or face professional guidance, and they can still have access to insight from someone like Fiona who has many years of practical experience in this field.
My suggestion was simply that there be more of “Fiona” on the site, I would not dream of “precluding anyone from making a crust” or “somehow getting by”, business is business, but let’s also include the potentials, who provided with pro bono insight may well become clients in the future.
Yeah it’s an exclusive club…. or in Irish terms an exclusive pub.
Paul.
A very good point… sometimes when you’re embarking on abit of a reinvention, people around you don’t dig it- they can’t stand your change.
It’s good to know there’s a place to come where all are encouraging and like-minded when those around you aren’t- like colleagues you have to put up with while you’re working on bigger and better things
)
Hi Fiona,
You have no idea how much I love Be Your Own Life Coach. I just keep reading it over and over. I’m so intrigued to know where exactly you come from in Co Armagh as that’s where I come from, near Tandragee.
But anyway you have given me so much inspiration and at times comfort just by the shere amount of encouragement that is in every page. I’m totally a fan of your work.
Thank you!
Maggie
Hi Maggie,
Thank you! I’m from lovely Lurgan, then we moved to Craigavon when I was about thirteen. It’s strange that I’ve lived away, in London mostly, for longer than I lived in Ireland. But – there’s no escaping where you come from; it’s a big part of you.
Slainte!
Fiona
Fiona, I love what you said here – “My fervent wish is to provide you with a place to gather with companions to enhance and support your journey through life.”
I think you have your wish. This is a great community.
Amanda
Coaching for career, business and personal success
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