About

Running on Autopilot?

I remember that feeling well. Having spent more than 25 years as a busy corporate pharmacy executive, I was very familiar with lunches at my desk, conference calls from dawn to dusk and racing from meeting to meeting. At the end of the day, I was exhausted and not even sure what I’d accomplished or if it mattered at all. I was disconnected from what was important to me and only focused on getting through the day. My coworkers voiced the same frustration. We were all too aware that much of our lives were spent on autopilot just to manage the overwhelm.

It was crazy-making.

Noticing the Overwhelm

As I began to pay attention, I became aware of my scattered thinking and how little I was engaged in my own health and wellbeing. I’d been so focused on keeping all the plates spinning in my busy corporate and family life that I’d neglected what was most important to me. I often couldn’t even articulate what was missing from a financially rewarding and interesting career. I longed to reconnect with joy, vitality and meaning in my life and work again. I wanted to remember how it felt to work in a way that was aligned with my values.

Hitting the Wall

As I began talking to others, I realized that we were suffering deeply in our busy lives. We’d longed for meaningful contribution and stability, but felt that was missing because of the constant churn of work, work and more work. We were exhausted from relentless self-perfection. We took on too many projects, patients, activities to prove that we really could do it all, have it all and be all things to too many people. And then we hit the wall. Many of us couldn’t even remember what felt like fun or play because it had been too long since we allowed ourselves the time to do it.

Standing at the edge of burnout

Perhaps this sounds a bit like you. You’ve found that you’re at the edge of burnout and worried about your stress and lack of balance in your life. You feel trapped in your job because your calendar and mountain of work is all-consuming. You make excuses for why you’re not engaging in activities and things that bring you happiness because you just don’t have time and you’re feeling exhausted. You struggle sometimes to figure out how to be present both at home and at work and feel like you’ve lost a sense of who you really are. Sometimes you wonder how you got to this point of being so disconnected and discontent.

There is a better way.

Taking stock: Minding Your Minutes

After a few rounds of mergers, acquisitions, downsizing and right-sizing, I was no longer satisfied to check my heart at the door, put on my black suit and race through the day. So I stopped and took stock. I wanted to show up more fully with my head, heart and gut aligned with what’s truly important to me. Mindfulness meditation helped me pay deliberate attention to present moment joy and to notice the thoughts and beliefs that weren’t supportive of what I wanted in my life and work. I dug deep to define where I was spending time that wasn’t in alignment with who I wanted to be and what I truly valued.

Integrating Work + Life

I began to think less about work life balance and more about integrating what was truly meaningful. In short, I shed my Superwoman cape and dropped my perfectionism at the curb. I learned how to prioritize my work and life in an integrated fashion rather than approaching each separately and feeling like I was failing at both. I came to realize that this integration was the key to feeling like I was both aligned and engaged with my vision of optimal vitality.

Aligned Engagement

It’s the way I work with clients now. We start with a big vision of what’s meaningful and important to YOU. We’ll create an Aligned Engagement roadmap that’s in integrity with what you truly value. More than a “to do” list, it’s an integrated life strategy that honors who you really are – not some perceived version of what you “should” do.

We’ll use the roadmap and Minding Your Minutes integrated planning tools to craft specific practices that support your vision optimal wellbeing. Sometimes that’s a movement or nutrition practice. Other times, it’s a stress management or productivity practice. Many times we focus on relationships, connection or what feels like fun or play. We’ll look at where you might be spending time on activities that aren’t even important to you. Together, we’ll align on what makes you feel the most alive, the most engaged and the most vital.

Take the first step

If you’re interested in learning more about assessing your own health, vitality and wellbeing, you can start with the Core Areas of Health and Wellbeing Assessment.

I’d be honored to guide you through the journey of finding your own map of meaning in life and work again.

Credentials & Experience