Soulspring Groups' "Soul-spiration" Newsletter Named Finalist in "Next Top Newsletter" Contest

Isn’t that great news? We couldn’t be more excited! Winning the Next Top Newsletter Contest would allow us to inspire even more women and the possibility makes us giddy! Imagine a planet where every woman knows their worth and has the strength and courage to pursue their passions, achieve their goals, and make changes in their communities that ripple around the world! Sounds amazing, doesn’t it? But what will it take to make it possible?

We need your votes!

While “Soul-spiration” has made the list of top 20 finalists, we haven’t won yet! The winners will be chosen on August 2. Would you please take a moment right now to vote for us by clicking on the link below, scrolling down to the 2nd comment/post, and clicking on the “thumbs up” icon next to our names?

VOTE NOW!

And if we can ask just one more tiny favor…Would you please share this request with everyone you know and ask that they do the same! It takes just a moment but would mean so much to us.

We are so excited to have “Soul-spiration” recognized from among so many entries! Thank you in advance for your support and votes!

Kim, Jenny and Becky,
The Soul Sisters

Empower Yourself Through Life-Long Learning

Quite often my kids comment about how they can't wait until they are done with school. I remember feeling that way, not wanting to be in the classrooms, doing the homework, taking the tests, etc. I had had enough and was ready to move on to the next step and get out into the world where we didn't need to learn anymore. Oh, but how wrong I was. How boring life would be and how short we would fall from our full potential if we stopped learning.

Learning is the one thing that we have the ability to continue doing no matter our age, financial position, or employment status. When we dig deep into those areas that interest us we gain not only knowledge, but also self confidence and power. Just by being avidly inquisitive and curious you keep your brain alive and open to receiving an abundant amount of information. Are you a life-long student?

You can never run out of new things to learn. The ways are simple. Read books and articles about those areas and topics that interest you. Surround yourself with intellectual people, strike up conversations and ask questions, visit points of interest and historical sites, start or join a Soulspring Group where you can begin the process of teaching and inspiring others with your life experiences and in turn learn from other women.

The subject of learning is a life-long course. It isn't just the reading, writing, algebra, and chemistry. It's as simple as finding the little interesting nuggets in our everyday life that we didn't already know.

Scratch more than just the surface and you'll uncover a whole world of new found interests, hobbies, and talents waiting to help you become who you were meant to be.

Jenny,
Sister of Soul

Soulspiration of the Week:
"Get over the idea that only children should spend their time in study. Be a student so long as you still have something to learn, and this will mean all your life." Henry L. Dohertye

The Newest Trend in Women’s Empowerment: Host a Party for Personal Development

Let’s face it ladies, we all love a party! We have parties for jewelry, parties for skincare, and parties for no other reason than to just be together. But, what if you could have a party to fulfill a greater purpose?

Imagine gathering together with a few of your closest friends to explore an interesting topic…throw in some deep conversation, a little time for some personal reflection, maybe a tasty treat or two? Now that’s what we call an Empowerment Party!

We’re sure the concept of self-improvement is nothing new to you; you’ve probably been involved in various training programs at work. But when was the last time you focused your efforts on improving yourself in an area that was important to you and your personal life? Topics like positive mental attitude, service, and time management take on a whole new meaning when approached from a vantage point outside of the workplace.

Now, as you consider taking workplace training from behind the confines of work and applying the concept to your personal life, it may cross your mind that there are a few missing ingredients; a trainer, a topic, and training materials.

Never fear, Soulspring has got you covered! Many of our Soulspring Groups use our tele-class events as another reason to join together to make a positive change in their lives. This is one opportunity however, that isn't limited to our Soulspring Group members alone!

We invite all women to hold their own Empowerment Parties in conjunction with any of our free Tele-class Training Events. Gather your friends, sisters, mothers, and daughters together to learn about a subject of special interest to women such as busyness and overwhelm, limiting beliefs, and many more. You just need a telephone with speaker phone capabilities and long-distance access.

6 Steps to a Successful Empowerment Party:

1) Your Empowerment Party can be any size, although two to ten is ideal!

2) Invite your friends by sending traditional invitations, or via email, Facebook, or with a phone call. Your invitation might say something like this:

Hi Jane,

How many times have we said, "I'm too busy!"? Soulspring Groups is holding a complimentary tele-class event called “Overwhelm: The New Epidemic”. Visit this link for the full details: http://www.soulspringgroups.com/index.html#eventlink

They suggest having an Empowerment Party to work through this training class together. I know we could all use some help in this area and doing it as part of a party sounds more fun than tackling it alone. What do you say; you want to join me? Reply back and let me know and I'll get you the details (time, place, etc.). Also, follow the link and get registered for the class so you will receive the training tools. You'll want to print them and bring them with you to the party.

3) Your friends will receive your invitation and can then R.S.V.P. Since each will be registering for the class on their own, they will receive their own confirmation and training materials by email 24 hours prior to the tele-class, which they can then print and bring to the party.

4) Your last step will be getting the final details to the guests who R.S.V.P.'ed (party time, location, etc.). We encourage you to make your Empowerment Party the easiest party you've ever hosted so you and your guests can keep the focus on learning, sharing and having fun! Consider asking each of your guests to bring a snack or refreshment to pass; trust us, everyone will be most happy to contribute.

5) We recommend incorporating some social time prior to the tele-class to give guests time to arrive, catch up on the happenings of the day and enjoy refreshments. When it’s tele-class time, gather your guests around the telephone to enjoy the training and take notes. At the conclusion of the call you can take some time to work through any exercises included in the training materials and discuss the training topic, challenge areas and any “aha” moments attendees experienced! You’ll be amazed at the insight and wisdom you can share with each other! As you bring your party to close, ask each guest to commit to one “change” or “action step” they can take immediately to implement something they learned through the training.

6) Lastly and most importantly, acknowledge your role in inspiring, motivating and empowering the most important women in your life. Who was the person who was most impacted by the experience? Don’t be surprised if that person is you!

An Empowerment Party is similar to the kind of experience our Soulspring Group members experience every month within their groups, but you don’t need to be a member to get in on this secret to personal development! Throw an Empowerment Party of your own and you’ll see firsthand what all the excitement is about and how something as simple as women joining together to support and inspire can cause a ripple effect that reaches so many more!

The Sisters of Soul

Soul-spiration of the Week:
“It’s important to strengthen the ties between women all over the planet and support and encourage each other. Then life in turn will support and encourage us.” ~Louise Hay

Question your Assumptions

I was watching an episode of Dr. Oz a while back (I love Dr. Oz!) and the topic of the show transitioned to a particular woman who was very unhealthy. They followed her through a typical day which consisted of working a full-time job, taking care of her elderly parents, and doing the stereotypical “wife duties” of shopping, cooking, and cleaning. And on top of all that she picked up a part-time job to work in the evenings to make ends meet due to her husband being unemployed for many months. This woman’s life made mine look like a vacation, that’s for sure! Keeping a lifestyle like this was taking its toll, though. She was overweight, not getting enough sleep, over-stressed, suffering from high blood pressure, and the list went on and on.

They then welcomed to the show a professional life coach. Clearly in this woman’s case, she needed to get her life under control before they could work on the food and exercise areas of health. As the coach listed out the steps to take to get her life back to a healthy level, there was one step that particularly stood out to me: Question your Assumptions.

How often are our “have to’s” really things we have to do? We place certain assumptions on how things are supposed to be; what a good parent should do, what a perfect wife should do, what it takes to be successful. It’s easy to play the blame game when we’re stressed, busy, or unhappy. But in most cases we’re probably assuming things need to be a certain way when they really don’t.

What kind of assumptions are you placing on your life? Try this eye-opening exercise for yourself by listing out everything that is putting a strain on you right now. Then self-debate the possibility that they are not necessary. You might just be amazed at what you discover.

Becky,
Sister of Soul

Soul-spiration of the Week:
“Begin challenging your own assumptions. Your assumptions are your windows on the world. Scrub them off every once in awhile, or the light won't come in.” ~Alan Alda

Without a Pre-Plan Checklist you may be Sunk

I learned a very good lesson this past weekend. I learned how important it is to always conduct your “Pre-Plan Checklist”. The purpose of a checklist is to make sure you cover all the imperative steps upfront in order to get to your destination or intended result safely, timely, accurately, with the least amount of setbacks or delays due to conditions that you have control over.

Now I bet you are dying to hear what events brought us to this little talk on pre-plan checklists. We all know that at Soulspring we are all about learning from one another so I’m not at all embarrassed to share this story of mishap with you because I know it will be very educational, and maybe a little entertaining, to many women.

Like I alluded to earlier, my story begins with 3 women, a boat, a busy boat launch and you guessed it, no pre-sail checklist. We pulled into the parking lot of the boat launch and saw trucks and boats parked every which way. We maneuvered off to one side in order to be out of the flow of traffic. As we passed what appeared to be the waiting line, my friend kindly waved at one of the gentleman waiting in line and said, “I guess were behind you?” He was a friendly guy and quickly responded, “Feel free to sneak in ahead of me.” It was like when you are the grocery store and someone with an over flowing cart gestures to you to go ahead because you only have a gallon of milk. But, it didn’t quite make sense in this instance because we all had the same number of boats on our trailers. Not objecting, we quickly made our way toward the launch site.

Everything was going smoothly…. Boat was in the water, the motor was running, we boarded and was just about ready to pull away from the dock when we noticed the boat was taking on water. Stunned we looked at each other and almost simultaneously said, “THE PLUG!” A friendly voice from the end of the dock, obviously talking from experience, instructed that we’d have to reverse our procedure and take the boat back out in order to the drain the water and fit the plug snuggly in the hole. Now picture this, lines of boats ready to go in the water, lines of boats ready to come out of the water, boaters and families antsy to get on with their day on the water, and we were standing in their way. Some folks looked obviously put out, but others shared some comforting words. “We’ve all done it!” “You’ll only forget this once.” And, “Thanks for the reminder!” were just some of the comments.

After a little rocky start my story ends with a spectacular day spent with great friends and a boat that stayed afloat. Completing a checklist is a vital step in any plan, be it a pre-flight, a pre-win, a pre-conquer, a pre-achieve . . . and especially the one I learned first hand, a pre-sail.

PLAN? CHECK!

Jenny,
Sister of Soul

Soul-spiration of the Week:
“Developing the plan is actually laying out the sequence of events that have to occur for you to achieve your goal.” ~George L. Morrisey

Independence or Interdependence?

As we head into the "Independence" Day holiday weekend we bring you this inspirational video and make our "Declaration of Interdependence"! Women, when we come together and support each other, there's nothing we can't do! Set yourself free and be all you can be!

OH, THANK GOODNESS VIDEO


Enjoy your holiday weekend!

Kim, Jenny, and Becky,
The Soul Sisters
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