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Category: NEXT: An Empowerment Series

Attorney and life coach Susan Koenig guides, supports, and inspires you on the journey of creating a life you love.

NEXT: An Empowerment Series

Attorney and life coach Susan Koenig guides, supports, and inspires you on the journey of creating a life you love.

Texas Beauties

I told myself I wasn’t going back. The last time I spent a week drinking wheatgrass juice and eating plates of sprouts sprinkled with seaweed I said I was satisfied. No need to return. I’d find some other way to cleanse my body and mind. But here I was. Back again. The chance to join both my best friend and my life coach in warm weather while winter overstayed its welcome in Nebraska was irresistible. A taste of the Texas beauty I was about to experience in the week ahead first appeared on the drive in the country from the
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It’s Only Me

“Why should I bother? No one is going to see it. It’s only me.” As I listened to my friend make his case for never making his bed, I immediately understood. Why rush to do the dishes when there’s no one but you and your pet rabbit to see it?  Who cares if there are crumbs in between the sofa cushions, when only you know they are there? If a friend is dropping in for a chat, I dust the table top, trim the wick so the candle will light, and hang a fresh towel in the bathroom. Clothes slung
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Nebraska Love

I’m glad John isn’t alive to see this. Devastation in three-fourths of our state’s 93 counties.  Three people killed.  Entire towns underwater. Breached levies and flooding rivers mix to form toxic pools. They say the damage in Nebraska is well over a billion dollars. That doesn’t begin to measure the loss. John loved Mother Earth.  He prohibited all poisons in his garden. A genuine tree hugger, this six foot three man tenderly cared for the tiniest green blades poking out of spring soil. He taught school children how to compost with little red worms. He was a member of the
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Got Lucky

The longer I live the luckier I get. My working parents didn’t know a lot of prosperity. Sleeping on a bed in the dining room, receiving powdered milk from the government, and learning how to transfer buses were a part of my growing up. I got lucky that for the rest of my life I never took a car that runs, a decent bowl of soup, or having my own bedroom for granted. When my Catholic parents could no longer afford the parochial school tuition, my siblings and I transferred to public school. Most of my classmates were not college
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Endless Winter

Searching for hope, I checked my weather app. With the month of March  a day away, I was certain I’d see some good news. Our Midwestern winter seems endless. The average temperature for the past week is typically 42, but instead is was mostly 4s and 2s, sometimes below zero.  The first heavy snow of the season that closed schools brought smiles, sledding, and Instagram photos of snowpeople.  The most recent brought traffic jams, multiple cancellations of meaningful events, and many an aching back from ceaseless shoveling. I was seeking some solace in a future forecast of sunshine. Instead I
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Wednesday Women

On an ordinary winter Wednesday each woman revealed her fear. Keeping them up at night in three different states across the country were uncannily consistent concerns throughout the course of the day. Each was well-educated, bright, and hardworking. All were achievers in professional careers—one running a financial institution, one running a law firm, one running a classroom.  All three were loving and devoted mothers. They were stylish and smiling. The demons they dealt with daily were invisible to the outside world. Each knew that their life as they knew it could not remain. None were certain of their path forward.
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Our Mother of Perpetual Hope

“I’d like to go with,” I say. “Don’t you have something on Saturday?” “Just another funeral,” I say, stifling a small nervous laugh. Five funerals in six weeks is a record in my world. For the first time I grasp a glimmer of what it must have been like for my brother Tim during the AIDS crisis of the 80’s when deaths of his friends kept coming, warning him of his future. As we walked in bitter cold toward the luncheon of ham and cheese sandwiches and hot coffee, another mourner remarked, “I don’t remember temperatures this cold since the
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Warmed from Head to Toe

Standing behind me he said, “I’m going to place my hands on your hips. Now as you walk forward, I am going to be behind you, slightly lifting up either side of your hips. Are you ready?” Wearing only my bra and underwear, I sought to set aside my nervousness. I focused. I began to step forward. I tried to remember everything he’d taught me.  Breathe.  Relax your shoulders. Connect your feet to the floor. Lead with your heart. It was day 10—-the final day of an intensive program to realign my body. Deep massage of the fascia– the body’s
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Winter Icky Guy

I pull the thick flannel sheet a little higher over my shoulders without opening my eyes. As I lie on my side in the morning darkness, the temperature is in the single digits and the wind chill puts it below zero. Winter is really here. I roll on to my back with my eyes still closed. I snuggle more deeply into sheets and try my usual tricks. I mentally scan my body to notice how it feels. I consider the good that lies ahead in my day to have a flash of gratitude. I slowly wiggle my toes. My body
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Winter Retreat

I slowly unpacked my essentials: Journal √ Stack of books√ Yoga mat√ Candle√ Herbal tea√ White satin slippers√ Each winter I take a solo retreat for reflection. While living alone gives me ample opportunity for solitude and sitting on my sofa, I know myself.  Without a boundary of distance and drive time, my mind quickly reverts to my To Do list telling me I still have not hung that picture, organized those photos, or cleaned beneath my bed. Any call from a friend  to see a good film easily becomes an excuse for not allowing myself time to ponder. I
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