Meaning

Happy Mother's Day to all the moms out there!

Meaning is one of the five pillars of well-being described in M. Seligman's book, Flourish.    So my question today is about the importance of meaning in our lives and how as moms we communicate the importance of meaning to our children.

When I think about Maximize Wellness Counseling and Coaching LLC I love what I do.  It has meaning for me each and every day.  I enjoy working with individual clients as well as giving workshops and programs that help people grow and increase optimism.  Helping people relieve anxiety and sadness and increase overall wellbeing provides me with meaning that increases my overall well-being each day.

A few years ago my daughter had a homework assignment to draw pictures of a woman who works and write down what the they like best about their job.  I had no idea about the assignment until it came home in the completed folder.  My daughter drew a picture of me with a brief case and a suit on and said that mommy sells drugs to doctors.  What mommy likes best about her job is "when she does good she gets to go on fancy trips". 
Well, it was true, as a Pharmaceutical Sales Manager I did go on some fancy trips that were based upon sales. So why did it bother me so much that she saw that as the best part of my job?

In my mind the best part of my job was so much more than that.  I managed a wonderful team of people I cared very much about.  It meant a lot to me to coach, train and mentor them.  I was proud to see my team members have career success and gain valuable skills.  I had products I believed in.  Products which helped make people's lives better and I was able to be a leader who made sure that my team was able to appropriately communicate to physicians the ways these products can help patients.   All of those things provided meaning, yet all my daughter saw was that I went on fancy trips.  That was a bit of a wake up call for me that day.  It made me realize that as a parent it was not enough to find meaning in what I do, but I needed to take a look at myself and how I communicate what is important to me.  Clearly the message I was sending out was not what I wanted to communicate.  Maybe I had lost sight of what had meaning for me and had not noticed at the time. 

Meaning is subjective and changes over time.  Sometimes we lose sight of it and re connecting to what is meaningful to us can put us back on track to higher well-being. 
  
My question for readers today is to think about meaning in your life, reconnect to something bigger than yourself....

Please visit my website for more information on behavioral health counseling services, coaching or workshops you may be interested in.   www.maximize-wellness.com

I'd love to hear from you!