The Key To More Authentic Confidence

The Key To More Authentic Confidence

There was a time in my life when I would see someone who looked amazing and "put together" and I assumed they were confident too. I mean, how could they not be, looking like they do?!

Then I learned that confidence -AUTHENTIC CONFIDENCE- is something completely different than “looking confident” or “coming off confident.”

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10 things you never thought you could do. Here are mine.

10 things you never thought you could do. Here are mine.

When you are pushing against your own comfort zone, want to expand, and see new opportunities (or just gain a little confidence), it’s a good idea to do a bit of reflecting to see when and where you have surprised yourself in the past. Trust me, we all have!

Especially in times of growth and expansion into unknown territory, it’s easy to get caught up in self-limiting and doubtful inner dialogue. 

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How to believe in yourself: 3 areas you need to look into

How to believe in yourself: 3 areas you need to look into

A few weeks ago I got an email from a woman who wrote “I want to walk in the true ME. I want to love freely and give freely in all that I am so I can help others and actually enjoy my life. The problem is that I know I am able but I can’t seem to believe enough in myself to really go out there and achieve it.”

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Are you learning the lessons from your past life chapters? It’s never too late. Start now.

I hope you all had a great Mother’s Day and if you are a mommy yourself, happy Mother’s Day to you. You rock <3 I spent last weekend in North Carolina for my brother’s graduation from his MBA program (I’m such a proud older sis, it’s unbelievable:)), so I got to spend some time with my family, including my mom, dad, and aunt who flew in from Europe to celebrate my brother. It was really sweet and fun!

On my flight back to NYC, I began thinking about life chapters: graduations, marriages, career shifts, break-ups, moves, spiritual milestones… the list is really endless. 

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Guestpost: Good Mood Foods by Jessica Cording

Guestpost: Good Mood Foods by Jessica Cording

Personally (& I know many of you feel similarly), I have tried out a lot of different diets, "miracle cures" etc. in my life already. I just wanted to believe in them so badly that my filter for what made sense and what was totally ridiculous was somehow off. I remember a time in my early-mid 20s when I was obsessed with trying to lose weight and as a result ate only very specific -dare I say sugar-free, non-fat, fake crap- foods. The result was not only more pounds on the scale, but worse: tons of anxiety, irritability, sleep problems, and so forth. Sound familiar to anyone?

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Do you need an awakening + LIVE event in NYC

Do you need an awakening + LIVE event in NYC

I recently received a note from a lovely woman sharing with me that she feels too incapacitated in her life to chase her ideals and follow her dreams. This stuckness creates substantial anxiety and leads to this uncomfortable feeling that the world is just passing by and you are running out of time.... ekkk, sound familiar? 

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Do you like your own body? 3 powerful ways to feel more beautiful.

Do you like your own body? 3 powerful ways to feel more beautiful.

I remember being a little girl standing on a stool in my mom’s bathroom and looking at my own reflection in the mirror. All I could see were ENORMOUS shoulders, so I asked my mom in my sweet little girl voice if I could get parts of them “hacked off” when I got older. Silly as it sounds, I was serious. I thought I needed them to be smaller.

This is the first memory I have of disliking my body and expressing the need to find some way to solve its “unpretty” parts. Clearly I wasn’t shying away from violent thoughts to “fix my body.” As I got older my body complaints and insecurities only grew both in number and urgency. It seemed like I had a special eye that would pick out everything that was possibly wrong and ignored everything that was right.

What’s your first memory of disliking your body? How old were you? Which part of your body did you attack and wanted to fix?

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Is fear of LOSING IT keeping you from LIVING IT? [+ a chance to win a FREE 1 hour Strategy Session]

If you have been following my blog for a while now, you know that my coaching is based on the principle that embracing your own authenticity (aka. knowing and loving who you are as a woman, friend, daughter, mother, girlfriend, worker, money-maker, care-taker,…) is the key to creating a life you love. I have discovered this over and over again in my own life. When I was stuck and had no clue what I actually wanted to do with my professional life, I first tried to maneuver my way out of confusion by “following the rules” or “doing what I should do.” Guess where I ended up? Yup, you got it… in even more confusion plus added feelings of guilt and self-dislike for still not being happy.

 

Geneen Roth on change

The way to true bliss, flow, and happiness always led me through my own authenticity and that meant that I had to tune out the could-s, should-s, and ought to’s and tune into what actually made me happy as the individual I am. It was through discovering and ditching old patterns and believes about myself that I was able to let go and emerge with confidence, clarity, and direction. From there I could strategize and create opportunities for myself that would take me where I actually wanted to be. Do you see how this is the only way you can be totally on board with the decisions you are making for yourself?

Stepping outside of the box like this often generates a lot of fear in people –fear of the unknown, fear of embarrassment, fear of failure, AND YES, fear of actually getting something and then losing it.

 

To clarify what I mean, here are examples for what this might look like in your life:

  • being in a relationship but not deeply surrendering into everything it has to offer for fear of doing something wrong.
  • putting off making a decision or trying to get other people to make decisions for you, so that you won't feel responsible.
  • being in a job that you worked really hard to get to but then not really speaking your mind for fear that your ideas might be rejected or that the outcome might be different from what you anticipated.
  • not letting yourself fully enjoy the present moment because you don’t know what tomorrow will be like. 

 

Basically, you deny yourself the honey life has to offer from the get-go (by not fully participating in your current life) because you are afraid that there might not be enough honey for the rest of your life or that you might be disappointed because the honey won’t taste as sweet as you expected.

 

Check in with yourself:

Do you make yourself small first so that nothing (love, work, health) and no one (your partner, boss, neighbor, parents) can do it later on?

Do you tend to never let life get really really good so that you cannot be disappointed afterwards?

Is your fear of LOSING IT keeping you from LIVING IT?

 

So, before this blog post gets too depressing, there are good news: You are still the boss in your own life and once you recognize what you have been hiding from oh so badly (love, romance, work expectations, body image…), once you recognize these powerful ways in which you have chosen not to show up for yourself, you can begin to release, to befriend, to let go, and to change these patterns. You can begin to lead your life with more awareness, more confidence, and more zest so that you can stop sabotaging yourself and actually get what you want.

 

I have to honestly tell you that I could not have done this work of unveiling, re-vamping, letting go, and strategizing in my own life without the help of mentors and coaches who guided and challenged me through this process.

 

Patterns are super strong (which is why they are patterns in the first place) and when you add fear on top of it, you got yourself in a pretty sticky situation. Think about it, we repeat patterns (most often unconsciously) over and over for years and sometimes generations, so choosing a new and different path that uniquely suits YOU can be pretty intimidating.

 

As you can probably sense by now, I am so passionate about sharing this concept of personal authenticity as the fundamental framework for creating a life you love, that I am giving away 5 1-hour long Strategy Sessions (value: $150 each). In this hour, we will laser in on what is currently most challenging for you and what is keeping you stuck. I will help you get really clear on what the next steps are that you need to take in order to move into a direction that feels most authentic to who you are and what you want.

 

(Why am I giving away 5 sessions NOW, you wonder? Honestly, the last few months have been so busy with getting my new website up and getting all my coaching materials and assignments polished and ready, that I simply didn't have the time to focus on more than a few clients. The last thing I want to do is not deliver the highest standard possible. Afterall, I, too work to set myself up for happiness, balance, and success.)

 

Ok, here is how you can enter to win one of my 5 FREE Strategy Sessions: All you have to do to qualify for one of these strategy sessions is to email me at Caroline@carolinezwick.com by 12 noon this Thursday, March 21st and let me know what topic, difficulty, or problem you would like to hear more about in a future blog post. I will then randomly select 5 winners and email you with a few different time slots for YOUR personalized Strategy Session. Sounds good? Click here to contact me now. (Subject line: Free Strategy Session with Caroline)

 

I am so excited to hear from you.