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8 steps to finding your purpose

December 1, 2017 by Sara Jane Lowry Leave a Comment

hand holding pine cone in front of a forest of pine trees with words 8 steps to finding your purpose

8 Steps to Finding Your Purpose

Some of my clients come to me because they want to find their purpose. They may have lost their passion, or maybe they’ve always been searching for their life’s purpose. I too had a hard time figuring out what my purpose in life is, and I’ve tried many paths. So, I am sharing this in the hopes that it helps you in your own search.

Moving towards a purposeful life might sound complicated. But it doesn’t have to be. We all think it’s supposed to be a major “aha” moment, and that it should immediately be clear to us. But that’s not often the case. It can often be a slow journey and exploration, a purpose that you work into and builds in your life over time.

To help you, here are 8 steps to finding your purpose:

Pay attention to curiosity

Curiosity is extremely powerful. It doesn’t demand action, it invites it. It’s not stressful or demanding, it’s easy to follow. And it can lead you toward your life purpose — it’s magical in that way. So, stop looking for your passion. Instead, follow your curiosity.

Envision a compelling future

Right now, stop for a minute and close your eyes. How do you want your life to look like 3 years from now? As you envision it, really feel it inside as you ask yourself some questions like these: envisioning your future symbolized by looking upward in a grove of trees with sunlight highlighting their tops

How are you spending your days?
Where are you living?
Who are you spending time with?
What kind of energy do you have?

Envisioning your future is a key ingredient in finding your purpose in life. If we know where we’re going, it’s easier to know what to focus on and why it matters. I also ask clients to consider what qualities they most enjoy expressing, and in what ways they enjoy expressing them.

Know your “why’s”

Of the 8 steps to finding your purpose in life, this is probably most important. green fern unfurling symbolizing know your whys

Life isn’t just about what you do. Or how you do it. It’s about why you do it, the purpose of it. Simon Sinek wrote a book on the importance of why as well as gave a TEDx talk about how it’s important to leadership, to your values, to your impact on others. Why do you do what you do now? Do you have one or several “why’s” connecting to it? And are the “whys” something you chose at one point that no longer has meaning or purpose to you? What about your choices? Are they more about pleasing others? How are you spending your time? Do you know your “why”? Why gives you meaning and purpose.

Find your own mission for your purposeful life

My mission is to creatively inspire and support others through a journey of courageous choices and changes toward living an authentic life. I’ve made that my mission because I know the pain, stress, and frustration that comes with living a life that feels empty or false and not your own. And I know that it takes courage to change. Having a mission greater than yourself brings focus and purpose. It’s something to return to when things get tough or when fears get the best of you.

Begin with the end in mind. What would you like to serve others with? What pain have you experienced, or great joy that excites you? These are clues to your purpose.

Start today, take a step

I know what it is to keep putting off my authentic life. Some people wait until their kids are grown or they’re ready for retirement. Thus, it’s a “waiting for ‘some day’ in the future” when everything will magically fall into place. Then, you’ll be ready to take action. But, that day never comes unless you make the decision for it to come. Finding your purpose, and then living it starts with a decision. And a first step.

Stop waiting for better times or circumstances.

Things will never be ideal. And, you’ll always be able to point at something to say “that’s why I never did it”. Why things won’t work will always there, but so will the reasons why it will. Anxiety or fear sometimes masks itself as “reasons why.”

So, start taking steps, no matter how small, in the right direction today. Be consistent – it’s more important than distance.

Focus on one thing at a time

Finding and living your purpose is a journey of many steps. How can you build these steps into your life now? Start with one thing. If you try to make too many changes at once you may become overwhelmed and confused and burn yourself up. Rather than trying to do it all at once, become aware of your limitations. Move into it gradually. Do ONE thing at the time and dedicate time, energy and commitment to it.

Say “no”

Learning to say “no” is a skill taught in productivity webinars and books. There are a lot of ways you are probably good at prioritizing everything BUT what you want because it’s difficult to make changes, or because you “don’t want to offend” someone. But people who successfully move into what they see as their purpose had to learn to say “no” to the things (or people) who no longer fit that deeper purpose.

To create a purposeful life, you need to make time for the things that bring purpose and meaning. And in that process, you need to say “no” things that aren’t aligned with that.

Obstacles are bound to come your way

Today, most obstacles are internal. Obstacles can show up in your life in the form of fears, beliefs, people, or situations. You might see obstacles as proof that what they were planning to do isn’t working. But actually, successful people have learned the discipline of turning obstacles into opportunities. It starts with: snail stretched out crossing open gap between two rocks

perception (how we decide to see and understand what occurs around us, and what we decide it will mean;
action (dismantling the obstacle step by step with courage and creativity); and
will (invoking our power to push through challenging times with flexibility and resilience

This is where we get tested, and where we must know our “why” in order to be open to new insights, and course correcting to get to our desired goal.

You are now on the threshold of moving into an authentic life.

You may have been allowing your stories of how you got to where you are today to affect your choices and behaviors. It can be difficult to find meaningful patterns within the complexity that is your life. Your life isn’t a problem to be solved. Your purpose is present even now in all that complexity. We can wait to figure out our purpose, for what we want, or go out and create it. The choice is yours.

If you need someone to help hold space for you as you take on this journey, please reach out for a consult.

Negative self-talk is a habit you can break

November 2, 2017 by Sara Jane Lowry Leave a Comment

Stop sign to end negative self-talk

Negative self-talk – stop the habit.

All of us are subject to negative self-talk in the form of an inner critic. And that inner critic can talk faster than we can externally: 1300 words to our 200 words. Some of our self-talk is about things outside us. For example, when we find our lost keys, we might say to ourselves, “There they are.” But another part of our inner dialogue is about ourselves. For example, when we can’t find the keys, we might say something like, “You idiot; you’re always losing things.”

Self-talk is a habitual way of responding to our experience and unfortunately, it often takes the form of an inner critic who is very negative and pessimistic. For example, if you feel like you’re not getting the contract, the promotion, or the new job, your inner voice might say something like, “You’ll never get anywhere. You don’t know what you’re doing. Every time you try something, you fail.” Or, you assume someone else’s behavior or actions are about you and have a negative meaning. For example, if someone you know doesn’t greet you at the store, your inner voice asks, “Why did I do? They are rude.” Or, “they don’t like me. I just can’t win.”

Negative thoughts make you feel anxious, sad or hopeless. These feelings, in turn, make it difficult to act constructively. And preoccupation with your negative emotions may even intensify them and trigger more negative thinking.

How our negative self-talk triggers our behavior

There are three ways our negative self-talk manifest in behavior:

Overgeneralization or Catastrophizing
Drawing a broad conclusion based on a single incident or insufficient evidence.
Jumping to Conclusions (Mind Reading)
Assuming we know what others are thinking and feeling.
Shoulds
Using inflexible rules about how we or others should act. We feel guilty when we violate these rules.

Confronting negative self-talk patterns

In order to confront our negative self-talk, we need to take some steps.

Creating Distance

We can start by creating a bit of distance from them in order to recognize when and where we are having them. This means some self-reflection is necessary, and it can be done through journaling about your day and noticing your most extreme moments that you notice. Pay special attention to when you are exhausted or feeling depressed about your day because the self-talk at those points is a clue to your habitual thoughts. In creating distance, you can ask yourself whether you’re seeing things in a balanced way of both positive and negative experiences in our lives.

Testing reality of the self-talk

The next step is to begin to test the reality of the thoughts. In order to test whether your automatic thoughts are valid, ask yourself what is the evidence for and against your thoughts. Try writing down the evidence, both pro and con, to help you gain some distance from your thoughts as you become curious about whether things are as bleak as you think. For example, if your thought is “Things are always a mess in my life” you might list on the pro side the times when things were going smoothly and successfully.

Seeing alternative options, or “coming back to reality”

If you worked through the first 2 steps, you will arrive at an alternative interpretation of your experience (if you refuted the thought) or a more balanced thought that summarizes the valid points for and against (if the evidence was mixed).

By being curious about our self-talk, rather than refuting or indulging it, we can learn to see our situation in an accurate, yet hopeful, manner, and move our habits of thought toward more realistic reality. From there we can begin to practice positive self-talk.

You have the power to change negative self-talk. Take a month-long journey to reprogramming your mind with tips delivered to you daily, and change your self-talk from negative to positive. Please sign up today and take back your mind.

Overwhelmed? Just 6 minutes to focus and get productive

October 9, 2017 by Sara Jane Lowry Leave a Comment

Overwhelmed and Overcommitted?

Feeling overwhelmed is daily life in the nonprofit world. Too much work and too few people. To me, nonprofits are suffering as much as the people they are serving. There are no simple answers on how to manage your time daily to achieve more impact when resources are tight and demand is great.

Yet, unified in our desire to impact the world for the better, we seek ways to take back control of our daily schedule so that at the end of the day, we know we are traveling lighter and faster in our quest to help others. And, we feel human again… we feel alive… and we feel connected to our mission.

Click here to sign up to receive a daily email for a month that takes 6 minutes to read and gain focus and get productive, and take back your work day.

Here are some tips that will help you change the way you live your days so that your days aren’t controlling you.

Overwhelmed

Start each day with listing what 3 goals you are working toward, not with looking at your to-do list. Then start a new to-do list based on those goals.
Take a fresh look at what’s on your previous to-do list, and what shouldn’t be there, to begin with. You need a way to sort out those projects, tasks, and meetings that should never be on your to-do list and begin to look at whether they align to accomplishing the big goal or goals you have set for yourself.
As you look at your schedule and your to-do list, start asking yourself whether the task you are doing is really the task to be focused on to achieve the results you want.

Overcommitted

I’d like to challenge you on taking a look at whether you’ve overcommitted yourself. First of all, recognize that you have done this to yourself, but you’re not alone. We all do it. But you have to start taking responsibility for creating the situation. Changing your patterns of choice can be hard or easy.

Say no. Ok, so you hate to disappoint someone, or you’re afraid of getting fired if you say no to the board chair (rather than negotiating). Or you’re afraid of missing out on an opportunity. The question is whether the time is right for you, not for them.
Look again at your calendar – can you reschedule? I bet there are some you can. Can you Skype rather than traveling? Think through what will be accomplished at that meeting or lunch or trip.
Learn to delegate. I know, everyone who doesn’t delegate says the same thing: “Nobody can do it as well as I can.” Or this one: “I can’t afford it.” Have you actually done the math on that? Or, “I am a one-person office.” Get an intern, or better yet, a volunteer that you can train. Seek out competent volunteers that work for you on a regular basis that you can trust. I know a nonprofit that trained a community volunteer to do all their donor data entry, and process thank you letters. At year-end giving, it was over 1,000 gifts. If someone can do it 80% as well as you let them do it.

Control the distractions

I’ve saved the best tip for the last: Control the distractions. Schedule the time you spend on email, phone calls, woman's hand holding phone with analog alarm clock in background with a time of 7:00 feeling overwhelmed and open office hours. Set a limit for yourself to answer emails and voicemails, and interact on social media, to two main times per day. Check once in the morning, and once in the early afternoon, with a short check-in for urgent items at the end of the day.

I’ve got lots more tried and true tips that nonprofit executives and managers use. You can have days where not only more gets done, but what gets done has true impact. Sign up today!

Storytelling Guide for Nonprofit Appeals

September 9, 2017 by Sara Jane Lowry Leave a Comment

It’s that time for year-end appeals. And there are lots and lots of nonprofit storytelling articles and advice for you to read. To make life simpler for you, I’ve created for you an infographic, a storytelling guide for nonprofit appeals, to help you remember all the ingredients that make an appeal successful. The pointers in the infographic are key steps that I have used to help non-profits I have worked with raise more than they did previously.

I want to remind you that you need a plan, a goal, and a timeline. You can read more about that here. You will need a strategy for your letter campaign, and one for your social media campaign. But, the heart of every good appeal is the story or stories you tell.

Think of your story as a short picture book. Use images to break up your text, and to tell your story. Even if someone doesn’t read the email or letter, they will look at the images.

Every good story has an audience

Before you write your story, you need to know:

Who are your audiences (and are you treating them all the same)?
Do you know what they value?
What do you need to know about them to write the story for them?
What do you need them to know and do? Besides investing in your work, how can you empower them to re-tell your story and share it with others? When do you need them to do it by? How will you share the results of their efforts on your behalf?
There should be a different style and tone to an acquisition letter to new donors. Help them get to know you.
A renewal letter should include how you’ve used their last donation, what good you’ll do with another donation and why there is urgency in making a donation at this time. Also, always include a message of gratitude for the gift they’ve given in the past.

Your storytelling template

Start with an exercise known as the 5 WHYs? Why are you doing this work? You question each previous “so that” in order to get to the heart of it, the core of what you do, the impact you have, a simple answer that is compact.

Why? So that . . .

Why? So that . . .
Why? So that . . .
Why? So that . . .
Why? So that . . .

Does your final answer reflect inarguable value and impact? Will your “Why” help someone make the decision to say “yes” to your cause?

In what ways can the story be linked to something the reader (or viewer) cares about?
By supporting your appeal, will they see themselves as a better person personally or professionally (self-interest/personal identity)? This works best through images that are like them. Help people imagine the benefits they will receive. Use strategies like “Image . . .” or “Did you know . . .” or “What if?”
Will your “Why?” help someone make the decision to say “yes” to your appeal?

Whose stories will you tell?

Choose stories that will engage people emotionally. This is where you pick a character(s) that allow them to see:

Whose life will be impacted?
Use names, protected if necessary
Be descriptive
Use real images if possible

When you focus on the one (or few) you make the problem solvable. Because when the problem seems too big to solve, they find it harder to get involved. At that point, it becomes a statistic.

Grab attention with something unexpected

You can grab, and keep attention with surprise, and deep interest. Your opening statement or segment is the best place for something unexpected to get them to read/view further,

Use a surprising fact(s) that will grab the reader/viewer and make them pay attention

What is “uncommon” or counterintuitive about your work?
What are the unexpected implications of the “Why” message?
Why isn’t this work already being done in your community?

What is the challenge?

What is the challenge, and will be solved for your character?
In what ways can the reader/viewer relate?
Put the story in the larger context, but be concise.

Help people to understand and remember. What concrete images can you use to describe the challenge and the solution? Think of an image you can “imagine” with you senses (feel, hear, see, touch, smell). What concrete, visually descriptive nouns describe the challenge and solution?

Action!

Every story has action. The hero (donor, not the agency) resolves the challenge, and without that support, what would happen?

What will happen if no action is taken?

And, what will happen if the solution is applied?

What might the reader/viewer do to help?

Your focus is always on “you” the person reading/viewing. Make sure to use the word repeatedly, after all, they are seeking to make a difference. Donors want to solve problems. Note: please don’t call the donor “the hero” in your narrative. This is more a reminder to you to remember to see that the donor is who makes solutions possible.

Setting

Where does the story take place?
Has the reader/viewer been in a similar setting?

Making it credible

This is where you help people believe and agree. In what ways can the story be linked to the person reading the appeal? Or, can you link the story to an experience the audience can have for themselves?

Is there an honest and trustworthy person with authority who can serve as a spokesperson in telling the story?
What are the vivid, core, compelling details that boost credibility?
What statistics can be used to illustrate the story?

Decision-making isn’t logical, it’s emotional, according to the latest findings in neuroscience.Thus, their ultimate decision is based on self-interest. That’s emotional.“I want this.” [They want to have hope that they can make lives/the world better.] This is where we have to dig deep to understand donors’ real motivations, connecting with them on the level of shared values, and showing how they can create real, lasting change. But, you need to establish credibility in the speaker, or the agency, as authentic and worthy of the investment, and for that, you need some facts. So, this strategy follows an “if” “then” logic – “if” this is true “then” would this not also be true?

Impact

Impact in your storytelling is essential. People who want to have a positive impact in the world, want to know that their support will bring a change to others or the world. Hope is a key ingredient of impact. When they see something that agitates and disturbs them, they strive to know more, understand the contributing factors, and support new solutions. Your storytelling showcases the solution you are applying to the challenge. Is it working? How well? How much change can be made? With this much support, how much impact is possible?

Make the ASK

This is the call to action. You’ve got to make an ask and make it specific. Tell your reader/viewer what you want them to do, how to do it, and create urgency so they take action now. Suggest donation amounts. Remind them what their gift will do and how you will use it. Ask them to share your message with others. Reiterate the ask in the P.S. at the end.

Be bold in your storytelling and you will see results that support your mission. Please share your comments!

3rd party fundraiser: should you accept the offer?

August 27, 2017 by Sara Jane Lowry Leave a Comment

two hands holding a dollar bill so back side is showing with caption how do you respond when someone wants to do a 3rd party fundraiser for your organization in order to promote their business?

3rd party fundraiser events are common today. That doesn’t mean you should accept one. So should you accept an offer of a business to do a fundraiser for your organization?

The answer is: it depends.

On the surface, it seems like a wonderful idea doesn’t it? Wow, someone wants to raise money for you?

But it’s not that simple.

First, it’s your reputation, so choose the company wisely – do your own research and vetting. What if the business isn’t aligned with your mission? And, what’s the likelihood of the event being successful?

Second, what do they want from you? It might truly be something where they do all the work with no involvement from you, and they just send the check for the proceeds. But in many cases, they only want to give you a percentage of the proceeds (as low as 10%).

Red flag the offer if these are part of the 3rd party fundraiser request

They want to:

use your social media to broadcast the event to your followers (or even worse, want you to use your staff’s time to promote the event, create and send emails, postings, and fliers.)
use your staff and volunteers on the day of the event to manage activities.
send thank yous and receipts to everyone who participates financially. (if you’re a small staff, this is particularly challenging).
use your liability insurance for the event.
get you to invite all of your supporters to the event – if you’ve been busy cultivating your donors and their engagement, imagine what a confusing message this sends!

Will they sign a 3rd party fundraising agreement?

This is a board-approved document that outlines:

the permissions to use organizational materials, logo, or any indication of affiliation only for this event including a point about not altering the logo for their purposes, or not.
your discretion as to whether you are able and or willing to post the 3rd party fundraiser on official organization social channels and website.
how charitable receipts will be handled. For example, cash must be accompanied with the identifying donor’s information, address, etc. And, that donations must be given to the organization within 30 days of the end of the event. Or, that you will not provide receipts, and the dollars raised cannot be considered a charitable donation for individuals but only to the business.
most importantly, that your organization will not be held liable for any issues, injuries, damages to persons or property, or any other incidents that arise during your 3rd party fundraiser event.
get it signed in advance of the event. And make sure your board approves the event.

Third party fundraiser events can be a wonderful thing if the business really has the charity’s best interests in mind. But the charity must weigh the “cost” in time, staff, and donor engagement/confusion before acceptance. If it seems too good to be true, it just might be.