You Can Define Progress On Your Own Terms - My Story And Here's How
In January of 2013, on what seemed like an ordinary day, I called my mom, 80 years young at the time, as I usually did on my way to work. But on this morning I sensed something was off. By 10:30 that night, I was watching paramedics trying to keep my mother alive.
That night, I clung to the belief that she would defy the odds – again. Mom’s 5’2” frame was a monument to defying the odds. During her lifetime she survived things that would crush most of us. Her final miracle was surviving Stage 3 ovarian cancer by more than 6 years past her expected survival date, with a better quality of life than many her age who were in perfect health.
But this time, sitting in ICU dazed and frightened I couldn’t shake the feeling that it was time to start saying goodbye...but not just to Mom. The monuments of my comfort zones, and life plans were slipping away with every beep of Mom’s heart monitor.
I surrendered to realities I hated – not having a plan, not being in control and not making progress...and for me, all of that was like asking me not to breathe.
I had children, a husband, family members, employees and commitments – I had plans for all of them. And as I would soon figure out, those plans were also how I defined whether or not I was making progress in my professional and personal life.
In April of that same year I resigned from my corporate job as a VP of Human Resources and became a full-time caregiver. It was an emotionally crushing time in my life when I would discover just how deeply my unreasonable expectations and plans affected my sense of value, worth and progress.
With so much experience keeping the people and things in my life on track, how is it that it took a crisis to reveal just how unhealthy I was? How did I get to the point of pushing myself so hard that I missed what it meant to be productive and healthy? How did I forget to define success according to my values? And how did I miss the signals that my idea of making progress was defined by things ultimately would make me feel overwhelmed and stuck.
The reality is that whether or not I was making progress in my own life, I was heavily shaped by how well I performed and what I accomplished. Even after winning several pageants during my formative years, I still had an underlying sense that I wasn’t enough. In my early 20s, I needed a better job, a better boyfriend or a better apartment. In my 30s, I needed more money, better clothes or a bigger house.
I come from a long line of creative entrepreneurs, so even in my natural happy place - my craft room - I couldn’t just enjoy the creative process. I exhausted myself trying to create and sell things that in my first foray into entrepreneurship, didn’t match with what my heart wanted and needed. I felt like a failure and for a time walked away from creating anything.
Fast forward to considering what was next for my life and career after my caregiving journey was over, and those insecurities came rushing back.
It wasn’t until I uncovered, quite by accident, a perspective that would become the foundation of my coaching practice that I realized that the success I was looking for wasn’t a destination at all. What I was looking for was Progress. And it had to start with how I defined it for myself.
It doesn’t matter what stage of life you are in, what job title you have, what’s going on in your family or how big your business is. You define Progress based on what’s most important in your own life or career, at any given time. The key is to be intentional, and to embrace the fact that how you define Progress can shift.
Here’s how I uncovered a sense of fulfillment and purpose that I know can help you embrace what progress looks like for you:
● Give yourself permission to dream. Whether you want to change jobs, leave the one you have, or say yes/no to the biggest opportunity of your life, ignoring or neglecting what energizes you will lead to frustration, burnout and even depression.
Me and Momma (Karen Hilton and Clara Alice Price
James) One of the most powerful coaching transformations I’ve seen came during an engagement with a technology leader who had never considered that her dream of running a farm with her family was even possible. She invested 20 years of her life pursuing a career that actually never fulfilled her. When I asked her to describe what she would be doing if money, time and support were no issue, she longingly but quickly stated “I would purchase a farm and my family and I would run it as a family business …” she then quickly followed up with a dismissive, “but that’s never going to happen”.
I paused for a moment and then asked her with a smile on my face, “But what would it feel like if it could happen?” Almost as though she’d seen a ghost, she sat up and said, “I never considered the possibility that it ever could happen.” Check back next issue for the outcome of that amazing story, but here’s the point: she spent years waiting on permission to pursue a dream - from other or herself.
This creative, accomplished capable woman did what I did, and what millions of women do. She was fluent in all the reasons pursuing her heart’s desire wouldn’t work, but she had never allowed herself to imagine what life might look like if she pursued and succeeded at achieving her dream. She hadn’t considered that her prior successes and accomplishes might be transferable as a way to learn what she needed to know to pursue her dream.
● Mind the company you keep. Build a personal “board of directors” with whom you can share your dreams, fears, insecurities and plans. Select people who will give you support, insight and honest feedback that helps you make meaningful progress. Not everyone will be in your life for the long term, and that’s ok.
● Be prepared to succeed. When people ask how they can help you, be prepared to answer based on what would be a meaningful contribution to doing the work you want to be doing. For example, you might answer the question like Linda Givens, of Kalinda’s Closet https://kalindascloset.com/, recently shared at my Rock Your Vision Masterclass for Productive Women. Linda has been building her custom handbag designs while she transitioned out of a corporate job. She was at a point where she needed to get out of her comfort zone. At my challenge during the Masterclass, I asked this group of fiercely productive women where they needed support, ideas or encouragement. Linda spoke up and shared “I’d love to connect with anyone in your network who can feature my handbags”. Someone in the room quickly chimed in that she worked with the procurement director for a major retailer in an industry Linda would have never considered. It was a connection that never would have happened had Linda not been willing and ready to answer the question.
● Prepare but don’t get stuck in waiting-to-launch mode. Waiting on life to be perfect, doing a tenth revision of your website, or taking yet another class before you launch your business or product can quickly morph into stalling. Start with the product, service you have; then find authentic, creative ways to build awareness and interest in your products and services. Join your local chamber of commerce and introduce yourself. Drop off samples at your local television or radio station. Resist the temptation to be wounded by constructive feedback. Instead be curious about what you can learn about what your ideal client/customer needs. Treat your entrepreneurial venture (whether you are full-time, part-time) as you would if you worked for someone else.
● Reframe your definition of confidence. Confidence isn’t the absence of fear. Confidence is what you discover once you’ve done that thing that terrifies or tries to silence you.
● Face your stuff. Make a list of what excites you and what exhausts you, acknowledging your strengths and the things that are not your strengths. Grab a thought partner, a coach or a trusted friend and identify what it would take to get you doing more of the things that excite you, are your strengths, and what items exhaust or frustrate you. Give yourself permission to let go of the things weigh you down, and embrace the things that can help you work in your strengths.
● Acknowledge where you need help and support, then ask for it from those who are productive, positive and willing. One of my dearest friends in the world, Mimi Vold (www.voldinc.com)- busy Founder and leadership guru herself - called me during one of the most difficult weeks of my caregiving journey to say she was bringing me dinner. I declined her offer because I didn’t want to burden her, and if I’m honest, I didn’t want her to see that I was falling apart. She genuinely didn’t care that I couldn’t finish a sentence without crying, but I was still in trying-to-keep-it-together mode. I knew she would eventually keep asking so I gave in. I ate every bit of the meal she brought, in record time. I was hungry and dehydrated. My circumstances numbed my ability to understand what I needed. Because of that meal I had enough energy to get back to the hospital to check on my mom. From that moment on, I made an actual of ways I needed help and support through the weeks of mom’s life that remained. Lesson: trying to be a super woman isn’t required to make progress, especially when things get tough.
● Live your own “magazine life”. Resist the temptation to be jealous of the success of others. What I’ve learned from my own journey is that no one is exempt from the School of Hard Knocks. You have more in common with the person who appears to have it all than you may realize. Glean nuggets of insight and wisdom from what appears to be success, and also look for the lessons of what it took to get there. Shift how you see your own circumstances; not as a way to pretend or put on airs. Instead shift your perspective to create a reality that supports your new definition of progress. The sterile sight of my mother’s hospital bed in the middle of my former home office only reinforced the difficult reality of her journey, and mine. I decided to rewrite the narrative by scouring Pinterest for ideas about decorating a small space. I created a retreat like environment with simple touches like a coordinating bed set in mom’s favorite colors, framed family pictures, soft music playing around the clock, inexpensive drapes on the french doors for privacy and soft throw rugs anywhere that she might lay her feet. The energetic life force of your thoughts, feelings, and emotions can shift your behavior to create the life for yourself that reinforces a sense of wholeness and progress- whatever that means for you. Put down the magazine and take a look at what’s possible in the life you have.
● Know your own story. I struggled with this so much that I developed a system to help my clients learn how to tell their story. Stories are how people connect. Say too much and you will overwhelm them. Say too little and you’ll be a bore. People will connect with you when YOU have connected with you.
● Define progress on your own terms. A friend recently said to me, “Karen, I look at your success and think that I should be further along in my business.” I had incredible compassion for her because early on I had similar thoughts as I compared myself to other women who looked like they were making more progress than I was. The truth is that progress is incredibly personal. When I was a full-time caregiver for my mother, that role was exactly where I needed to be for that season of my life. It wasn’t glamorous or full of accolades but it was rewarding in ways that affirmed my core value of family. When I shifted my perspective and found ways to encourage and support myself while I cared for my mom, I suddenly realized that I was making progress! I simply needed to redefine it on my own terms. That perspective didn’t take away the reality of what I was going through; it made room for it. My caregiving journey was for sure a detour I didn’t expect, but how I navigated that journey was up to me.
When you’re overwhelmed, exhausted or struggling it’s easy to look around and place expectations on yourself that are unreasonable and even unkind. The truth is, progress is something you can define on your own terms.
The minute you begin to look at where you are today as a part of the journey, vs the ultimate destination, you might just discover you are exactly where you need to be.