Letter to my 4 year old self about "Playing"

Dear 4 year old me,
   
    I'm going to describe to you what playing means to us throughout every phase of our growth until this very day.  Because I never heard it then, let me just tell you how cute and adoring you are. You'd be a prideful lil girl to know how fun you're going to turn out to be :)
   
    As a four year playing is like fluttering around from flower to flower touching all limits of imaginary realms. There's an absent-minded side of it where imagination completely overwhelms attachment to linear reality. "Where do you go when you do that?" you'll later be asked…
   
    As a nine year old playing feels like competing and running an playing defense and making touchdown catches and 3 point baskets and balls, Balls, BALLS!! But as a fourteen year old, I play lots of sports though I'm not really playing at those.  Playing feels like laying in bed with my headphones, listening to Hot 97 radio. Hearing hip hop through head phones late at night is going to be your favorite thing ever. You'll also learn a lot about sex from the radio around this time too and thank goodness Dr. Judy talked to you about sex because mommy isn't really going to talk to you about relationships or mechanics or logistics.
   
    When you're nineteen playing is going to be learning to love beaches for the first time in Australia. Its also going to be secretly making out with another girl (I know! I freaked out too, its ok though and is actually pretty obvious to a lot of your life long friends. Surprise!) It will also be driving through London with the first boy you'll be in love with. You'll actually see Pink Floyd's Factory - you'll know exactly what I mean by then too. This is an important one because it stays with you - playing will mean learning how to laugh at your "failures" because they aren't really "failures" you're just really "hard" "on" "yourself."
   
    By the time you're twenty three playing is like a mash up of all the best parts from before…with beach time too! You'll be playing lots of basketball, adventuring through South Dakota, laughing endlessly with roommates/future life mates - that's right, we're a clan! Playing is going to be making up games in an old convent in rural South Dakota while horses occasionally graze on the ridge outside your dining room window. Playing will be discussing colonization and land rights and human rights and philosophical decency until there are no more thoughts to be thought in those brain fractals and this will become the essence of your ability to synthesize experience and context. You'll also spend a month playing in Central America, it won't always feel like playing but please believe it most certainly is and you get some good angels guiding your journey with prevalent frequency.
   
    Playing at twenty seven involves a lot of glitter, make-up, and playing dress-up.  Oh yeah, I know. We're into dressing up now but trust me, come on out your imagination girl and throw on some costumes to jazz it up out here too! You'll relive being in marching band playing your trumpet and you'll dance in multiple streets, not just "the streets" but literally lots of streets…you'll dance in lots of streets. I know! It is as fun as it sounds and its that much more fun because everyone else is dancing in the streets also. So playing is really rad at 27. Playing is also throwing house parties and having lots of interesting people circulating through our party spaces.
   
    As you get to be thirty two, playing involves bicycles - riding them, fixing them, making up fairy stories about them, you know... all the things we love doing with our brain! We love camping and being under the stars and can see mommy again. She's there, we both had trouble seeing each other for a while and we both played our parts in making that true. But it all happens in the order it is going to happen to go in. :)
   
    Playing now includes board games. Nothing close to the vast realms that Candyland and Chutes & Ladders brought us to, but epic for sure! Playing definitely feels different, I think our self-awareness fills its way out over the years of experience and context.  But playing also doesn't feel all that different because it makes me giggle and lose my breath laughing and joy sure feels like its a whole lot similar to how it felt then.
   
    So there's that. I'm proud of all the fractals you've yet to see and happy for the ones you won't see. :)
   
Sincerely,
Me


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What would you write your 4 year old self about playing?

Coaching Session 1

Working with the artist and healer Jenelle Leigh Campion, I facilitated my first life coaching session last week. Over a two hour period, we articulated realistic yet challenging goals to grow her current business model. The session focused on identifying barriers that inhibit her business' growth, visualizing how her time is distributed among tasks, framing her vision for how her business will grow, and creating goals to overcome identified barriers in support of her vision. As a result we developed several achievable goals, milestones, and deadlines that will propel her into the next phases of her art and healing businesses. We also created a series of affirmations that will reinforce her intentions to meet these goals.

Emphasizing compassion I reminded Jenelle that the goals we created are self-imposed and can be adjusted if necessary, though I will follow up on the established milestones to evaluate her progress in meeting her goals. I find that part of the difficulty in setting goals is staying motivated to move through discouraging obstacles and staying focused to achieve the goals. The affirmations we created are touchstones to maintain her intention of meeting these goals and supporting the gains from this phase of growth.

I developed this framework from a variety of facilitated workshops that I've participated in as well as my experience in mind mapping, intention setting, and elements of the SMART goals paradigm. My influences are many and varied including Starhawk, Dr. Bill Rushbrooke, and several other non-profit management coaches. As a means to support other small business owners and anyone looking to set goals for themselves, please see below for the activities that I guided Jenelle through in her coaching session.

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Light it Up – Coaching with Virginia

*Supplies: 6 large pieces of paper (11x18 or larger); markers; masking tape

1. Using one of the large pieces of paper, write down all words/phrases that can describe barriers to your growth. Specifically, what are all the present impediments to growth you consistently face? Take about 5-7 minutes on this, color code if that is helpful, and tape the sheet of paper to the wall. (Sheet 1)
2. Using a separate piece of paper, write down words/phrases that describe your current projects. Take about 5-7 minutes on this, color code if that is helpful, and tape the sheet of paper to the wall. (Sheet 2)
3. Using another sheet of paper, write down the various tasks that you have to pay attention to in order for your business to function, i.e. logistics, creative, financial, etc. Take about 5-7 minutes on this, color code if that is helpful, and tape the sheet of paper to the wall. (Sheet 3)
4. Using a fourth sheet of paper, write down descriptions of your vision of this next phase of growth. Specifically, identify tangible and intangible feelings to be realized by meeting your goals. Take about 5-7 minutes on this, color code if that is helpful. (Sheet 4)

5. Now that you've identified where you are in terms of your current situation, take a look at your page four of feelings and find your 'strengths of business and self.' Are any of these descriptions currently being realized in some form? Circle all the descriptions of feelings that you can claim and then tape that sheet of paper to the wall.
6. Pull down sheets 2 & 3 from the wall. Identify categories and themes from the task list of page 3. On another blank piece of paper, make a pie chart of how you devote your energy and time using these themes. (Sheet 5)
7. Organize the descriptors of your projects from sheet 2 within each appropriate section of the pie chart.
   1. Are there areas of the pie chart that you could devote more time/energy to actualize your visions for growth?
8. Tape pie chart (Sheet 5) to the wall and take down sheet 1. Choose 3 barriers.
   1. Barrier 1 – Least challenging to overcome
   2. Barrier 2 – Moderately challenging
   3. Barrier 3 – Most challenging to overcome
9. Leveraging the strengths that we have previously identified as well as the realistic structure of balancing your work days shown in the pie chart, create achievable goals for moving through each barrier while also pushing you to the next level
   1. Determine clear and specific goals to address these barriers that you can keep track of by setting milestones
   2. Create action steps with time frames and deadlines
   3. Determine how to keep track of how well you are doing in meeting these goals
10. Create 2 affirmations for each goal to incorporate into a daily practice for supporting intentions
    1. Affirmations are succinct, declarative statements about your process, behavior, and ability to achieve goals that positively reinforce your intentions
    2. Avoid self-hating thoughts and behavior especially if action steps encounter barriers
    3. Love yourself