What gets my juices flowing is to imagine that my efforts may genuinely benefit someone else. I’m a caregiver at heart and always have been. It was good social-preparation for becoming a nurse ages ago and it serves me well today in the role of “helper” of any kind.
This week I got a jolt of energy when a colleague returned my call and set up a time for us to meet. He is a wizard at his craft – hospice care – and he has exactly what I need (inside his head) to help me finish the book I’ve been writing. I heard him speak last winter and I knew then that his way of understanding how we (humans) react and respond in grief was precisely what my readers need to hear.
Later this week, I’ll sit down with him and “pick his brain” so to speak, so that I can translate his years of wisdom in the field of death and dying into practical tools that my readers can understand and use. It will be an amazing conversation, I’m sure!
This book has been a labor of love for nearly a year
now. I know it has the capacity to help
other people – caregivers – deal with the common stressors that plague us when
we take on the caregiving responsibilities for someone we love. The book cannot
be an “everything you need to know about. . .” sort of book, but it can be a
starting place for people who are stuck.
Many caregivers experience their role as one of obligation – “I have to do
this!” That sense of obligation itself can add to the burden they feel. Add to that the tendency to want to do
everything (even caregiving) perfectly, and you have a recipe for stress and
strain that would wear down any one of us!
Those are the folks I want to help.
First with my book, Self-care Strategies for Family Caregivers, and
later with my coaching practice.
What gets your juices flowing? Maybe like me, it is helping someone else. Maybe it is something else entirely. Be sure to figure out what it is because, getting your juices flowing and keeping your juices flowing (for a lifetime) is what life is all about – getting ourselves up each day, so we can go out and be juicy!
