Angela Rae Bushman

Why me? Why now?

I remember years ago, the first time a professional colleague trusted me with a challenge she was having. After an informal lunch conversation, she said: “You should think about becoming a coach. You’d be great at it!”

I’ve always loved helping others. But I had a corporate job, small children and a family who relied on my steady income and benefits. And while I continued to see opportunity and grow my career, my passion for mentoring, coaching and helping others continued to grow as well. If you’ve read the “About” section on this site, you know I’ve been on a personal growth kick from way back.

Then, in the fall of 2020 — six months into a global pandemic — my job was eliminated. I received a small severance, my children’s college funds were in a good place, my mortgage payment was comfortable… in other words, the timing was as good as it was ever going to get. I finally decided to pursue my dual goal of stepping into a career of coaching and shifting to work that’s location and time zone independent.

The further into my formal coaching training program, the more committed, determined and passionate I became. I’m here to serve, and I know I can help you live a fuller, richer life!

What do you want now?

I recently connected with a girlfriend over happy hour. I ventured from my home, excited to have an evening out on the calendar. My girlfriend met me after her first day back in the office.

As we conversed on the patio, I felt calm, focused and intrigued by all the energy and activity around me. My friend confessed she was feeling sensory overload. Not only was it her first day back in the office and amongst her co-workers, it was a job she’d begun during the pandemic, so she was meeting colleagues in person for the first time — both people she worked with and folks on other teams she’d never met. It was a much different, more scattered energy than she’d experienced for several months of working at home in yoga pants.

We talked about this adjustment — how “back to normal” is really stepping forward into something entirely different from what normal used to be, and we bring with us a collective trauma of having been through a pandemic (are we through it, though?) — something that changed us all in ways we may not yet fully understand.

And we’ve processed these changes on a rolling basis over many months, at first eager and curious about working, schooling and everything from our homes. I had colleagues who lived alone and were isolated; I enjoyed a new routine of playing cards with my teens after dinner each night. Proms and graduation ceremonies were cancelled and we began wondering when we might emerge. I sent my daughter off to college with her anxiety and strict new rules amidst all of this.

Each of us will go forward with new understandings about ourselves and what we want, and it’s important to recognize our deep truths. Some of us are eager to get back to work in an office, and some of us have found a productive rhythm in working at home. Some of us are vaccinated; others cannot, have not yet or will not. Some of us have recognized a shift in priorities — or perhaps a long emerging swell of something made more clear and stark by what we’ve witnessed and experienced over the past 16 or so months.

Whatever is emerging within you, acknowledge your feelings, sit with them, surrender to any new understanding about yourself and your place in the cosmos. Know deeply there is no right way or wrong way to have changed or processed what may have changed within you. Have grace for yourself and others around you, who may be processing differently.

As we each finished a glass of wine and our nosh, my girlfriend couldn’t contain her urgency to return home to a quieter, more familiar energy. I could have easily stayed longer, enjoying our socialization, so I stopped at the market on my way home to be in the energy of others for a bit longer. In the end, we both found a way to honor what we wanted in that moment.

What do you want now? In this moment? In this era?

Let’s talk about affirmations

Affirmations are those positive “I am…” statements self-help personalities have been suggesting we practice as we look in the mirror to make ourselves feel good — and to change our life. I’ve been thinking about them since I read this excellent article about affirmations circulating on LinkedIn.

But what about when they don’t seem to be working for you?
If we declare “I am [something that we are clearly not],” then we are out of alignment — and our brains know it! For example, my unconscious mind knows that I’m neither a billionaire nor a supermodel, no matter how much I may wish those things were so. And as intelligent beings, we can feel that dissonance or resistance as we say things that are not true. You might even look in the mirror, say your affirmations, and hear the voice inside your head talking back.

First, if that’s the case — great! You’re getting good information as your unconscious beliefs step forward and express themselves. Sometimes, awareness is all it takes to release outdated thoughts about ourselves. If not, you can try tools like tapping, meditation, hypnosis or other clearing exercises to let them go.

If you’ve ever struggled with using affirmations, here are some ways you can shift from or adapt traditional “I am…” affirmations to make them work more effectively for you:

Give it time. Before Napoleon Hill wrote Think and Grow Rich, he made a deal with Andrew Carnegie, who told him to write down a statement, tape it to a mirror and read it to himself twice each day. The statement was: “Andrew Carnegie, I’m not only going to equal your achievements in life, but I’m going to challenge you at the post and pass you at the grandstand.” Even if the horse racing analogy made sense at the time, Hill was a journalist and Carnegie was one of the nation’s richest men; Hill becoming more successful than Carnegie was unlikely. But Hill did what he had agreed to do. You can imagine how his response might have gone from a sneering “yeah, right!” or “no chance of that” to “I wonder how…” until, as Hill recounts in the book, he heard the voice in his head say, “Could happen.” Our brains, our beliefs, and our habits all take time to change and, from what I’ve read, it can take anything from 21 to 244 days for us to adopt new thinking.
Draw it in. We use “I am” because it’s present. We don’t want to keep our desires or manifestations out of reach or always in the future by saying “I will…”, because something that will happen will always be in the future, somewhere just out of reach. But we can add “growing more and more” or similar to make phrases like “I am growing more and more abundant each day.” Now there’s a thought I can embrace! Another example: “Every day in every way, I am becoming more loving.”
Appreciate what you can. So many of us want to change our bodies, but it rarely works to tell ourselves we’ve reached our target weight when we haven’t. Start by developing a better relationship with your skin suit by appreciating all the wonderful things it can do — walk, hike, run, move, feel pleasure, etc., e.g. “Every day I am becoming stronger and healthier.”
Ask yourself questions. Our brains are wired to seek answers. If you look in the mirror and ask, “how did I gain so much weight?”, your brain will quickly remind you of that piece of chocolate cake you ate earlier, or the chips you dipped into as you were making dinner, or how you were so into bingeing that series with your boo that you didn’t make time to work out. When we ask questions, we get answers. So try asking the questions you actually want the answers to. (Noah St. John calls these “afformations.”) Ask: “Why is it so easy for me to release extra weight?” or “Why is my boss so pleased with my work?” Your brain is going to run around looking for answers, and that’s going to help you achieve the results you want.

How do I know if affirmations are working for me?
Affirmations are intended to help us feel positively about ourselves or to create positive change. Notice how they feel in your body, whether you feel heaviness, lightness or other sensations. Notice what your mind is telling you. Do you hear backtalk, objections — or resounding agreement? Statements or questions that are working for you should feel aligned, light, congruent, resonant and positive.

It’s all in your head

Our magnificent brains generate thoughts all day — an estimated 60,000 of them! These thoughts shape our perceptions and create our experience of the world.

Memories = thoughts
Plans = thoughts
Beliefs = thoughts
Judgements = thoughts
Problems = thoughs

You get the idea. And an estimated 85% of these thoughts we think are the same thoughts we thought yesterday. Is it any wonder we feel stuck? Or that we’re not growing or changing fast enough?

We can’t control our thoughts. But we can devote more time to consciously choosing where to place our focus, We can choose which thoughts to engage with.

If we could shift even a little from that estimated 85% of repetitive thoughts, how quickly could we change our lives? How might we transform?

Let’s talk about what you’d like to shift. You can email me to arrange a free discovery session.