Marc Chernoff's Blog, page 55

7 Things You Should Insist On Today No Matter What People Say

Do more than just exist. We all exist. The question is: Do you live?

Throughout a decade of life, relationship, and small business coaching, Angel and I have witnessed people reinventing themselves at all ages — 48-year-olds starting families, 57-year-olds graduating from college for the first time, 71-year-olds starting successful businesses, and so forth. How did they do it? They insisted on making gradual progress in their lives.

Obviously though, it can take some time to get yourself into the right rhythm. And I am no exception. About 20 years ago I had an intervention with myself. I sat down at the local library on a Saturday morning and read through hundreds of archived entries in my journal. Specifically, I was looking for all the unfulfilled goals and visions for the future that I had jotted down over the years. It didn’t take long before I realized that the entire course my life had taken up to that point had been the product of (more…)

10 Wake-Up Calls People Receive Too Late in Life

There is a big difference between empty fatigue and gratifying exhaustion. Life is too short not to focus more on what matters most.

Before you know it you’ll be asking, “How did it get so late so soon?” So take time to figure yourself out. Take time to realize what you want and need. Take time to take calculated risks. Take time to love, laugh, cry, learn, and forgive. Life is so much shorter than it often seems.

In our line of work we speak with people on a weekly basis who have been forced to ‘wake up’ to life’s fleeting nature. Consider these two excerpts from people’s stories that we recently received in our email (more…)

18 Things I Wish Someone Told Me When I Was 18-Years-Old

This morning I was reading a book outside my favorite beachside coffee shop when an 18-year-old kid sat down next to me and said, “That’s a great read, ain’t it?” So we started chatting.

He told me he was getting ready to graduate from high school next week and then immediately starting his college career in the fall. “But I have no clue what I want to do with my life,” he said. “Right now I’m just going with the flow.”

And then, with eager eyes, he began asking me one question after the next:

“What exactly do you do for a living?”“When and how did you decide what you wanted to do?”“Why did you do this? Why didn’t you do that?”“Is there anything you wish you had done differently?”etc, etc, etc…

I answered (more…)

27 Simple Things to Start Doing for Your Happiness this Summer

It only takes one person to make you happy and change your life this summer: YOU.

I am endlessly fascinated by the link between the way we choose to live our lives and the happiness we enjoy on a daily basis. There are choices you make every day, some of which seem completely unrelated to your happiness, that dramatically impact the way you feel both mentally and physically.

Over the years, through our coaching practice, live events, and coursework, Marc and I have literally spoken with hundreds of people who are struggling to find happiness in their lives. And what we’ve found is (more…)

20 Things My 90-Year-Old Grandma Told Me to Stop Worrying About

Some people wait all day for 5pm, all week for Friday, all year for the holidays, all their lives for happiness. Don’t be one of them. Don’t wait until your life is almost over to realize how good it has been. The secret to happiness and peace on the average day is letting this moment be what it is, instead of what you think it should be, and then making the very best of it.

Go ahead and sing out loud in the car with the windows down, and dance in your (more…)

9 Rules for Turning Life’s Endings into New Beginnings

Every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end.

When you can no longer think of a reason to continue, you must think of a reason to start over. There’s a big difference between giving up and starting over in the right direction. And there are three little words that can release you from your past and guide you forward to a positive new beginning. These words are: “From now on…”

So, from now (more…)

12 Things My Grandmother Told Me About Life Before She Died

When my grandmother, Zelda, passed away fifteen years ago at the age of ninety, she left me with a box of miscellaneous items from her house that she knew I had grown to appreciate over the years. Among these items is an old leather-bound journal that she aptly named her Inspiration Journal.

Throughout the second half of her life, she used this journal to jot down ideas, thoughts, quotes, song lyrics, and anything else that moved her. She would read excerpts from her journal to me when I was growing up, and I would listen and ask questions. I honestly credit a part of who I am now to the wisdom she bestowed on me (more…)

10 Things We All Hold On To (Long After It’s Time To Let Go)

Oftentimes you don’t even realize you’re blocking your own present blessings by holding on to everything so tightly. It’s time to start letting go.

Letting go is not giving up. Letting go is surrendering any obsessive attachment to particular people, outcomes, and situations. Surrender means showing up in your life with the intention to be your best self, and to do the best you know how, without (more…)

9 Life (Saving) Choices Too Many People Wait Too Long to Make

They always say time changes things, but oftentimes you actually have to choose to change them yourself.

Maybe it’s the life lessons I was forced to learn the hard way, or the toll of loss and failure I had recently endured, but fifteen years ago in the midst of a panic attack on my 27th birthday, I had to admit to myself right then and there that the youthful world of possibility I once felt now seemed dead inside me. I wanted to feel light and free and ambitious and passionate again, but I didn’t know how. Luckily my wise mother, who has always been a true lifesaver, gave me some good advice. She told me (more…)

4 Ways to Actively Practice Letting Go (When You Catch Yourself Holding On)

If you worry too much about what might be, or what might have been, you will ignore and overlook what is. Remember this. On the average day happiness is letting go of what you assume life is supposed to be like, and sincerely appreciating it for everything it is.

Over the past decade, as Marc and I have gradually worked with hundreds of our course students, coaching clients, and live event attendees, we’ve come to understand that the root cause of most human stress is simply our stubborn propensity to hold on to things. In a nutshell, we hold on tight to the (more…)