Jill Ethier

3 Plumbers later…why knowing and working in your wheelhouse matters.

So, our pipes in our master bathroom are freezing up at varying degrees of temperature. The trades are all blaming each other (it’s a new house). The plumbers think it’s the insulators fault, the insulation guys think it’s the framer’s fault and the framer’s blame the plumbers or something like that…you get the idea. A lot of finger pointing, a lot of consults and not a lot of fixing going on.

Me? I just want it fixed. ASAP.

And most of them think the garage needs to be heated (not the solution…just a bandaid so I said a big NO to that one as the first action we take).

Finally, plumber #3 shows up. He’s the solution guy. He’s the plumbing strategist…the ninja! He’s unassuming but on it. He knows what he’s talking about, he asks if everyone is blaming everyone else and he explains why there is a pocket of cold air that is making everything freeze. This guy WORKS in his WHEELHOUSE.

He’s smart enough to know that he can’t hold a candle to the rough-in guy (plumber #2) when it comes to doing rough-ins but he KNOWS that he is the solutions guy and that is why he just had a 70 hr work week. (Note: the 3rd plumber arrived at 10 am on a Sunday. Dedication to the work.).

Moral of the story: KNOW YOUR WHEELHOUSE. Work in your wheelhouse. (Listen in to Episode 42: Are you wasting your time and your talent to explore why this is so important.)

What’s your wheelhouse? What you are truly good at. Your skillset. Your unique talents and abilities. What people ask the most for.

Showcase them. Exploit them. Use them to your advantage and to make more money. Hire the rest of your tasks out or spend minimal time on them during your day. And, don’t waste too much time training on what you are only kind of good at. Focus on what you are GREAT at and get even better.

Be plumber #3. He SAVED the DAY, provided the most value (he knew what he was good at and he exploited his skillset) and I could tell he loved his job. (And, he made the most money.)

Shift the energy…change what’s happening in your life

What do you do when you are stuck or feel stuck in one of the areas of your life?

Maybe you are experiencing a tricky relationship where communication is off, your revenues numbers for the month seem to be slowing or the bills seem to piling up or that weight that you are wanting to lose is rising instead of falling.

When things like this are happening in my life, I always take a look at what is happening energetically.

The first energetic area is MINDSET.

How are my thoughts? I know that if I’m focused on the negative or the chaos that is what will continue so I will shift my mindset using very specific tools like:

1. Extra gratitude and appreciation at the end of the day or in the moment where my thoughts are negative.
2. The Work by Byron Katie that she describes in her book Loving What Is.
3. Adding in another meditation to the day or just taking a few extra moments to breath.

The second energetic area I focus on is what is happening in my physical space (because the state of your home reflects the state of your life). Here’s what I look at:

1. What area in the home or office is piling up with clutter (this can be seen and unseen clutter)?
2. Is the unfinished project list at the house or in my business growing? What do I need to address right now.
3. How does the space feel?

What do you do then? Declutter, finish the projects and light some candles, use essential oils in a diffuser or do a salt space clearing to clean up the energy in the space and promote a positive flow.

The third energetic area I look at is my Soulset© (my purpose and the action that I’m taking). I review what my days have been like to see how much time I have committed to living and acting based on my purpose and the call of my soul. I adjust accordingly if I have been too consumed by the busywork and the draining menial tasks.

So, if you find the energy stagnating in any area of your life, it’s time to review your mindset, free up the energy in your space and focus on spending more time living based on your purpose. This will increase your energy and improve the effort that you are taking on a daily basis to go after what you truly want.

You are in CHARGE of the ENERGY in your SPACE and LIFE. Reclaim it and use it to your advantage!

(If you need to reduce the clutter in your space so that you can free up the energy in your life, join me in a “5 bags in 5 days” decluttering challenge that begins next week. Click here to get in on the fun.)

All that MATTERS is what’s NEXT

You are likely experiencing one of three things right now:

  1. Your life is AMAZING and you have everything you want it but…. (you fill in the blank).
  2. Your life is really good in all areas but you want it to be really GREAT and you aren’t sure how to get from good to great (click here for help to bridge the gap).
  3. You are thriving in one or two parts of your life (like your business, your relationships, your health and well-being or your personal growth and self-discovery) and the others are failing miserably or not where you want them to be.

So, which is it? Are you 1, 2 or 3? or a bit of a combo?

Right here, right now, ALL that matters is “What’s NEXT?”.

What is the next step, the next action, the next thing you have to do change it, and to create a shift and to go after what it is you truly want in that particular area(s) of your life.

What you may be wanting to do right now is one of these things:

  • Blame someone else for where you are at.
  • Say you don’t have enough time to change or you’ve already tried.
  • Give up on the dream and the desire of how you want it to be and just resolve yourself to the fact that this is the life you were dealt or it’s good enough.

OR…

You could CHOOSE to drop all of the stories of blame and realize that you chose your way to this state and that’s okay.

You could admit that you didn’t really go ALL IN, you just tried a little harder than you had before and you could actually GO ALL in this time.

You could realize that this is your LIFE and you can create whatever you TRULY WANT.

So, what’s next for you?

Will you continue to blame, moan and complain or will you go ALL IN, take the next necessary required ACTION and realize that you are COMPLETELY CAPABLE of creating whatever it is you truly want and you ALWAYS have a CHOICE.

It doesn’t matter about your past successes or failures, your past choices, or where you are right now, all that matters is what you DECIDE TO DO NEXT.

Create and LIVE the LIFE you TRULY WANT.

Live Powerfully, Do YOU!

Jill Ethier, Your Energetic Ninja with a BComm

Why I believe KNOWING your PURPOSE matters

So, I get asked a LOT about how to determine what your purpose is. While I believe that the purpose in life is really to grow daily, for me that means living based on the call of my soul.

Purpose is a combination of of who I am, what I truly want and my reason why.

A little (okay a lot but it’s important) back story:

Rewind about 20 years…I followed my passion for business and got a business degree with a major in marketing and finance. Corporate jobs with lots of responsibility and big budgets followed. I loved it. LOVED IT! I was a strategist machine and got off on working huge days. During that time, I had one child and then a divorce. Brief interruption with a major surgery (should have listened to the signs…they are always there) and then a new marriage and relocation.

Life took over and continued too…purpose…what was that and why was it important? Wasn’t I living my purpose? Hmmmmmmm.

Then, my second daughter died during delivery. Full stop. Quit my corporate career that day in the hospital and haven’t put on a suit since.

That was my first big wake up call and I thought long and hard about what mattered most…

My family.

I began to hear the call of my soul once again and it wasn’t to be a marketing strategist for big business (I even turned down my “dream” job (VP of Strategic Development) because it was no longer my dream).

Then, I had two more babies. I began a personal growth consulting business on the side while was raising three kids with a husband who was away most of the time…

My purpose once again got lost a little along the way and the consulting business became more of a hobby than a daily focus that is for sure with all of the daily to-dos of raising the girls and keeping the household running (those tasks became the priority and I worked late into the night while the girls were sleeping).

Fast forward a few years, I got sick. Really sick. I tried to recover for about a year using different modalities and then I found myself in the ER having a hard time breathing, having a massive food reaction and realizing that something was really going on that needed to be addressed by a Functional Medicine Doctor.

Diagnosis: Severe adrenal fatigue…worst stage possible.

Treatment: Take a year off of my life. Doc told me to keep the kids alive and that was it. Verbatim. Word for word. My mouth gaped open but I was too tired and sick to even argue.

During that time of copious amounts of supplements (like up to 60 a day), the vast percentage of my day laying on the couch, bio and neurofeedback to retrain my stress response, yoga, meditation, salt baths daily….etc etc…there was a lot of reading and self reflection that happened.

This (determining my purpose) was what my doctor considered to be the MOST important part of the protocol and it required me to revisit what I thought my purpose was, what my priorities on a daily basis had been and what they should be and decide what I TRULY WANTED for my life as ME. Not as a wife, mother, friend, daughter, …. you get the idea.

Stunned silence for quite a few weeks…I didn’t really KNOW my purpose anymore. I had become a shadow version of the person I was once with that dream of who I would become. My life looked nothing like I would have imagined it to be. What did I TRULY WANT?

I began to have a vague idea of what my purpose maybe looked like but I was still exhausted and how could I find the time. The daily work with the kids had consumed me and was it really possible to live based on my purpose with all of my other responsibilities….I was about to find out.

Here’s why: the doctor said (he had a lot to say as you can tell) I can get your body healthy in 1-2 years but if you don’t adjust your life to live based on YOUR purpose, I will see you again in five years.

My response: Oh HELL NO!

Love him but don’t ever want to sit in that office again except to tell him how much he changed my life.

So, I got quiet and really defined my purpose based on what I wanted and my reason why. And, as I got healthier and off the couch more, I began to spend more and more of each day living based on it. I made it a priority to live based on my purpose and the call of my soul on a daily basis (and this work and experience takes up the vast majority of each day…the daily tasks don’t consume my life anymore. They get done but they aren’t the most SIGNIFICANT actions that I take).

That brings us to today and where you come in:

I want to share what I have learned and discovered along my journey so, I have developed a system and a structure to determine your purpose, live more based on your purpose and create the life you truly want. (Basically all the stuff I have been posting about if you have been following me for awhile). And, I am embarking on a journey to share all of that with you in a much bigger way. Some of it (the beginning steps) already reside on my website and there is more to come.

Before you do anything else, you must FIRST assess how MUCH you are living based on your purpose right now.

So, because I love a good assessment (that is the strategist in me), I created one for you, click here to start your assessment. This is a life changer. You will understand more about where you are at and where you need to go based on what you score means.
Don’t be me. Don’t waste any more of your time, energy and effort.

And if you are tired, worn out, a little lost or just want more, this is a MUST for YOU. Your body, your mind and your spirit is telling you to make a shift and change what you are currently doing.

Use this as the first step. Take the assessment on how much you are living based on your purpose now. Click here.

Love and appreciate you.

You are the reason why I get to fulfill my purpose and live my days out doing what I love.

Remember, I am a PM, email or comment away with anything you need and even closer over in Life MAKERS (my private FB group).

Live the life you want, DO YOU!

Jill Ethier, Your Energetic Ninja with a BComm

 

Fear and discomfort…they will STOP YOU every time if you let them.

Is there something in your life RIGHT NOW that you want but don’t have?

It could be in your relationship with your partner, your kids, your family or your friends.

It could be in your profession or your business.
It could be with your health and well-being.

Why don’t you have it? 

Usually it comes down to one of two things: fear and discomfort.

Fear that you can’t do it, it won’t work or you aren’t capable of accomplishing it.

Discomfort from being outside your zone of comfort or because you are in a situation that you don’t want in one of these areas.

What can you do about? 

Decide what you want.
Make a strategy.
Take action. 

The only way to shift your reality, is to do something different.

So, where in your life are you feeling fearful or experiencing discomfort. Write it down. Then, write down all of the possible solutions. Pick the one that feels the best. Take the first step.

When you DO THIS, your fear and discomfort will start to recede BECAUSE your personal power, energy and capacity will start to increase.

The two latest episodes of Ninja Jill KNOWS delve deeper into fear and discomfort. Subscribe to iTunes to listen to both here OR click on the link to each episode:

Episode 34: You will likely have to do it scared
Episode 35: What are you most uncomfortable with right now? 

Go after what you TRULY WANT. That’s what this life is all about.

If you are really READY to take action but need a new strategy to achieve what you WANT, click here.

Live POWERfully, do YOU.

Jill (your Energetic Ninja with a BComm)

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