MINDY AMITA AISLING
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A Blog for Big-Hearted Overthinkers

Canid Commentary & Useful Hacks on Being Human

The Unacceptability of Continuous Testing in Relationships

2/21/2023

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Building a strong and healthy relationship requires trust, understanding, and mutual respect between partners. However, some individuals may engage in a pattern of behavior known as continual testing, which involves constantly pushing their partner's boundaries, loyalty, and commitment. This article aims to shed light on why continuous testing is unacceptable and how it can be detrimental to the overall well-being of a relationship.

Defining Continuous Testing:
Continuous testing in a relationship refers to a repetitive cycle of challenging and questioning a partner's fidelity, loyalty, or commitment. This behavior often stems from deep-seated insecurities, fear of betrayal, or a need for control. It involves setting up scenarios or deliberately creating situations to observe and evaluate the partner's reactions or responses.

The Damaging Effects of Continuous Testing:
  1. Erosion of Trust: Trust is the foundation of any healthy relationship. Continuous testing undermines this trust, as it suggests a lack of faith in the partner's commitment and honesty. The constant questioning and doubt can erode trust, leading to insecurity, defensiveness, and strain within the relationship.
  2. Emotional Distress: For the partner being continuously tested, the experience can be emotionally distressing. Constant scrutiny and suspicion can cause feelings of anxiety, frustration, and a diminished sense of self-worth. Over time, this emotional distress can have a negative impact on their mental well-being.
  3. Communication Breakdown: Continuous testing often leads to a breakdown in effective communication. The focus shifts from open and honest dialogue to a defensive stance, where partners are constantly explaining or justifying their actions. This lack of healthy communication prevents the growth and resolution of deeper issues within the relationship.
  4. Loss of Individuality: Continuous testing often creates an environment where the partner being tested feels suffocated and unable to express their true selves. The constant need to prove loyalty or commitment can lead to a loss of personal identity and individuality. This stifling environment inhibits personal growth and satisfaction within the relationship.
  5. Unhealthy Power Dynamics: Continuous testing perpetuates unhealthy power dynamics in a relationship. The partner conducting the tests often assumes a dominant position, exerting control and manipulating the other person's emotions. This imbalance can lead to resentment, emotional dependency, and an overall unhealthy relationship dynamic.​

Addressing Continuous Testing:
If you find yourself in a relationship where continuous testing is present, it is crucial to address the issue and establish healthy boundaries. Here are some steps to consider:
  1. Open and Honest Conversation: Initiate a calm and non-confrontational conversation with your partner. Express your concerns and feelings about the continuous testing behavior, emphasizing the importance of trust and respect in a relationship.
  2. Encourage Self-Reflection: Encourage your partner to reflect on their own insecurities and fears that may be driving their need for continuous testing. Suggest seeking therapy or counseling to address underlying issues that contribute to this behavior.
  3. Set Clear Boundaries: Establish clear boundaries regarding what is acceptable behavior within the relationship. Both partners should agree to respect these boundaries and work together to rebuild trust and create a healthier dynamic.
  4. Seek Professional Help if Necessary: If the continuous testing behavior persists despite attempts to address it, consider involving a couples therapist or relationship counselor. A professional can help facilitate communication, uncover underlying issues, and guide both partners toward a more secure and trusting relationship.
  5. Leave the Relationship:  It is always okay to leave a relationship that is no longer serving you. 

Continuous testing is a harmful behavior that undermines trust, erodes emotional well-being, and damages the foundation of a healthy relationship. It is important to recognize this behavior as unacceptable and take proactive steps to address it. 
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Start Living With Intention

2/14/2023

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Stop Living On Auto Pilot & Start Living With Intention

Start Living With Intention

Coaching With Mindy Amita Aisling
​Personal growth and development is the transition from experiencing life happening to you to experiencing a life created by you.

Living with intention requires the practice of paying attention.

Paying attention means that you are actively living your life on purpose.  It means that every thought and every action, no matter how small, is a choice.   This means that you can no longer pretend to be asleep, it means that you become conscious.  What you eat, what you say, the habits you make - it is all done with awareness of the choice.  This level of living requires the knowledge and awareness that you are 'at the helm' of your life, fully responsible for where you are and where you go. 

One of the most powerful ways we can do this is by taking control of our time, and continually increasing moments that we are living our life on purpose. In a recent study commissioned by Marks and Spence, a whopping 96% of people surveyed reported that they were living their life on autopilot.

In my life, I use the terms “default self” and “intentional self”. My default self is the person that operates from her base stories, fears, and general unconsciousness. This is my “programmed” self, who lives by the rules and values defined by her family, peers, and culture. In contrast, my intentional self is the person that operates from her chosen stories, courage, and intentional consciousness. My "deliberate" self lives by her own rules, defined by her alone. ​
As a coach, I’ve worked with thousands of clients. When people begin working with me, I would say about 60 - 70% of them don’t yet know their intentional selves, and they are strictly living life as they have been pre-programmed to do. The other 30-40% know their intentional self, and are in the process of learning how to live a greater percentage of their life, and time, in alignment with that deliberate self. Here are some examples of how these two selves might show up in your life

Living With Intention: Default Self vs. Intentional Self

Living From Your Intentional Self Vs. Your Default Self

Living From Your Intentional Self Vs. Your Default Self
​Below you’ll find a free download that will allow you to do an audit on your time (and life). You can also download this worksheet as a Word Document or Google Doc.

Here is how to use this spreadsheet:

#1 – Fill in how you would LIKE to spend your time. Complete the chart from your intentional self, and design your time in alignment with your values, desires, and joys.

#2 - Track how you spend your time for a week or two. I suggest doing this at lunch, and again at nighttime before you go to bed so that you don’t forget what happened in your day. If you can track your activities in real-time during your day, even better. The more accurate your tracking is the more opportunity for insights and transformation.

#3 – Make necessary adjustments in your life.

I suggest doing this audit at least twice a year. I like to do it quarterly to keep myself on track, and assure that I am living the life that I want to live. 

If you're interested in discovering your 'intentional self' and building habits and routines that support that self in being 'at the helm', schedule a free coaching consultation and let's discover if we're a good fit for working together. 

Time Analysis Worksheet

Time Analysis Worksheet

Free Download

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Related Blogs:
How To Become A Better Listener
What You're Missing When It Comes To Reaching Your Goals
Signs That You're Disconnected From Your Authentic Self
NEWSLETTER SIGNUP | How to be Human: Vital Skills for an Authentic Life
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6 of the Best Quotes on Love

2/14/2023

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6 of the best quotes on love
My work as a Life Coach focuses on How To Be Human, the vital skills that we all need to learn in order to lead authentic, fulfilling lives.  Of course, LOVE is one of the core needs and most vibrant experiences of Being Human ...  but what is love, exactly?  The 5 quotes below from my fellow epiphany hunters shed some light on what love might be, + I've included one of my own quotes on the experience of love.  
Quotes, Quotes on Love, Quote by Victoria Erickson
Victoria Erickson is a poet, author and writing coach.  You can learn more about her work on her website, and make sure to follow her on Facebook & Instagram.
Quotes, Quotes on Love, Quote by Jeff Brown
Jeff Brown is an author and coach.  You can learn more about his work on his website, and make sure to follow up on Facebook and Instagram. 
Quotes, Quotes on Love, Quote by Paulo Coelho
Paulo Coelho is an author and alchemist. You can learn more about his work on his website, and make sure to follow him on Facebook and Instagram. 
Quotes, Quotes on Love, Quote by Glennon Doyle
Glennon Doyle is an author and visionary.  You can learn more about her work on her website, and make sure to follow her on Facebook and Instagram, and check out her podcast, We Can Do Hard Things. 
Quotes, Quotes on Love, Quote by Brene Brown
Brene Brown is an author and research professor.  You can learn more about her work on her website, follow up on Facebook and Instagram, and check out here podcast Unlocking Us.
Quotes, Quotes on Love, Quote by Mindy Aisling
Mindy Aisling is author and Life Coach, you can follow her on Facebook and Instagram.

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Related Blogs:
The Best Quotes on Luck (& Life)
The Hands-Down Best Quotes About Self-Care
Signs That You're Disconnected From Your Authentic Self
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Can You Expand Your Capacity To Feel Love?

2/2/2023

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CAN YOU EXPAND YOUR CAPACITY TO FEEL LOVE? Coach Mindy Aisilng

Expand Your Capacity To Feel Love

This week brings February into view on our calendars. Sweet, sweet, February - the month that is known for pink hearts, milk chocolate, and over-priced roses. To tell you the truth, I’ve never been a big fan of the traditional, commercial celebration of Valentine's Day. It always seemed a bit silly to my quirky neurodiverse brain: why would we celebrate love more on one day than any other?  Why would we put huge intentions of love on a single day, rather than consistent intentions of love every single day?​​
HOW DO I BECOME MORE LOVEABLE
For many years now, instead of following the traditions designed by a capitalist society bent on monetizing love, I have made my own rules for February. I’ve seized this month as an annual check-in with myself, with the intent of discovering the areas within myself, and my life, where I can expand my capacity for experiencing love.   
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I've been engaging in this practice for years, and I can attest to the fact that it has positively improved my life experience. Like all personal growth and development, it is an ongoing pursuit and a never-ending practice. For this, I am grateful. I love the “layers of my onion”, and the self-discovery and personal expansion that I enjoy day after day, month after month, and year after year.  It is a becoming. Evermore becoming who I am at my core as I shed the layers (thoughts, habits, belief systems) that prevent my full expression of self.
​​
This year, in service of supporting our collective expansion, I thought I’d share some of the practices that I’ve cultivated to expand my capacity to experience love.

I WANT MORE LOVE

Expand Your Capacity To Feel Love Tip #1 - Update Your Self Talk

I have found that the quality of my self-talk has a drastic impact on my life.  Therefore, when I look at ways to increase my experience of love in my day-to-day life, updating my self talk is low-hanging fruit.  Updating my self-talk helps in two ways - first, it increases my self-love and second, it removes barriers to experiencing love from others. I've created a worksheet that outlines my process, and I hope that you'll also find it useful.  You can download it for free here. ​

Expand Your Capacity to Feel Love Tip #2 - Remove Barriers

The second thing that I do is identify areas for further healing.  Rumi said, "Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it."  I find this statement to hold great truth, as it aligns with my direct experience.  As we go through life, we encounter trauma, betrayal, abandonment & suffering.  There is no getting around this, but it is possible to integrate our pain so that it doesn't become a roadblock to what we want in life.  Instead of allowing our pain to stagnant and harden us, we can use it to strengthen and expand ourselves.  This allows for more love (and joy and wonder) to enter into our beings.   To do this, we first have to identify where we have allowed past betrayals to harden within us.  Then we must create a safe space for healing, and get the support we need on our healing journey.  Finally, we must do the work to heal ourselves, and find the gifts that are in the darkness. ​

Expand Your Capacity to Feel Love Tip #3 - Define Your Edges

The third practice that I engage in to expand my capacity for love is defining my edges.  When I am unconsciously people-pleasing, accommodating, meek, unobtrusive, or submissive - I merge the boundaries between who I am and who others are.  I lose my ability to have clarity around my needs and wants, I mismanage my time, and I limit my experiences of love and joy.  To experience more love in my life, I must define my edges, hone my perimeter, and know what is me and what is other.  If you're an empath like I am, this can be particularly important and double as challenging.  At the start of this exploration, there is defining work for us to discover who we are (sign up for my newsletter to be notified of the next release of my DIY Coaching How To Be Human course which will delve into this topic).  After we've done the deep work, it is a matter of reminding ourselves who we are, so that this crazy, busy world doesn't jumble and bewilder us.  I do this through meditation.  Expanding my capacity to experience love includes dedicating time to daily reestablishing my personal boundaries.  In this way, I can see and appreciate others - loving them more, and I can honestly and authentically reveal my full self to others, and allow myself to be fully loved and appreciated. 
Expand Your Capacity to Feel Love Tip #4 - Raise the Stakes
The fourth practice that I have cultivated to expand my capacity for love is my favorite - for it is the most juicy and delicious.  It also requires the most courage and grit.  The choice to intentionally experience more love means that we have to take action in the relationships that matter the most to us.  We have to show up.  This means first and foremost that we have to slow down and take time for our relationships.  The feelings of closeness, acceptance, safety, connection, and love, I would call "emotional intimacy", and these feeling take courage to invite into your relationships.  In American culture, the word "intimacy" has been given very narrow connotations.  When people hear the word they think that it has something to do with sex, or the marriage/partnership relationship.  Nothing could be further than the truth.  A healthy life includes emotional intimacy with your friends, your parents, and your children.  These emotionally intimate relationships produce feelings of wholeness, safety, and meaning.  If you are in a primary sexual relationship, developing emotional intimacy with others deepens the intimacy in your primary relationship.  This is important to note, because there is an erroneous belief system that promotes the idea that intimacy is limited and therefore if you give it to one person, there is less for other relationships in your life.  The opposite is true.  The more you develop emotional intimacy, the more it grows in ALL areas of your life. 
For me, my friends, I know beyond a doubt that I want to experience as much love as possible in my human lifetime. Just like every other human on this planet, I struggle to be open to all the areas in my life where love is possible, and I experience fear when deepening love in the relationships that matter most to me. The practice of intentionally cultivating our ability to experience love has many benefits, here are some of the results of this practice that have had the largest positive impact on my life:
​
  • The world feels safer
  • I discover more of myself
  • I am more successful
  • My delight in life increases

I invite you to share with me your unique experiences of expanding your capacity to feel more love by commenting on this blog, or sending me an email. I adore talking about being human, and I’d love to hear from you.

Most of all, I hope that you can confidently say at the end of 2023 that you experienced more love this year than any other previous year of your life. Because, my friends, that would be truly incredible.

FREE MINDSET COACHING CONSULTATION MINDY AISLING
Related Blogs:
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What You're Missing When It Comes To Reaching Your Goals
Signs That You're Disconnected From Your Authentic Self
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Questions to Further Your Personal Growth & Development

2/1/2023

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Questions to Further Your Personal Growth & Development
Life coaching is all about the questions. Use these questions to unlock the wisdom inside of you! 

​Mindy Amita Aisling, MCC, is a professionally trained and board-certified life, leadership, and entrepreneur coach. Mindy exceeds all requirements set forth by the International Coaching Federation (ICF) for Master Coach certification. Through her innovative approach, she assists clients in examining their limiting beliefs, questioning their assumptions about how the world works, and releasing the notion that they are anything less than perfect. As a result, individuals who work with Mindy cultivate the ability to stand firm in their beliefs, live authentically and decisively, and discover an experience of life that is easy and graceful. 


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Find Your Life Coach
Related blogs:
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What is Slow Living?
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    Mindy Amita Aisling

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    Mindy Amita Aisling, is a professionally trained and board-certified leadership, authenticity, and entrepreneur coach.

    Mindy exceeds all requirements set forth by the International Coaching Federation (ICF) for Master Coach certification.

    Mindy is also a licensed mediator, communications coach, and conflict resolution practicer.  As a mediator, she has worked both in private practice and as a court appointment mediator at her local county courthouse.

    Through her innovative approach, she assists clients in examining their limiting beliefs, questioning their assumptions about how the world works, and releasing the notion that they are anything less than perfect. As a result, individuals who work with Mindy cultivate the ability to stand firm in their beliefs, live authentically and decisively, and discover an experience of life that is easy and graceful.

    In 2021, Mindy founded How to Be Human and Entreprenerd. These programs have enabled her to share her wisdom and knowledge with a broader audience in service of her vision of helping others live authentic lives This, in turn, has empowered more individuals to lead their most TRUE and COURAGEOUS lives.

    ​When she is not working, Mindy can be found playing outdoors in the beautiful Pacific Northwest, creating art, spending time with friends & family, or with her nose deep in a book.

    ​You can sign up for her newsletter here.

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Est. 2010. ICF Certified, OMA Certified, Licensed and Insured.
© Mindy Amita Aisling 2010
  • Coaching
    • What to Expect | The Coaching Relationship
    • Authentic Career | Coaching
    • Authentic Marriage | Coaching
    • Authentic Life | Coaching
    • Authentic Neurodivergent | Coaching
    • Coaching FAQ's
    • Coaching Inquiry
    • ICF Code of Ethics
    • Coaching Agreement
    • Mediation
  • Courses
    • Live Online Courses >
      • Authenticity Empowerment Series >
        • SHED
        • ENVISION
        • ALIGN
        • FOUNDATION
        • LOVE
        • CONFIDENCE
        • COURAGE
        • HARMONY
        • RESILIENCE
        • INTEGRATE
    • DIY Courses >
      • How to be Human >
        • Before You Begin
        • The Stories We Tell Ourselves
        • Navigating Needs
        • Hacking The Human Brain
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