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HOLIDAY SPECIAL -- Three Coaching Sessions during the month of December or January for $100.00. Get ready for the New Year! Tie up all of those 2001 loose ends and set your goals for 2002.

This would make a great stocking stuffer! Do you know someone who could benefit from having a coach? Coaching can be a wonderful gift with benefits that last a lifetime.
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Table of Contents

1. Welcome Notes
3. Article: Focus on Being the Gift
4. Words of Wisdom
5. Resources

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1. Welcome Notes

Dear Friends,

Welcome new subscribers! I always feel honored when someone new subscribes to One of a Kind News. And, I appreciate every one of you long time subscribers! Several of you have taken the time to give me feedback and I appreciate it. I have set a goal of 1,000 subscribers by March 1, 2002. If you know of someone who might enjoy this newsletter, please forward it on with a note about why you like it. For those of you, who have already done so, thank you!

At this time of year, many of us are shopping for gifts. I'm reminded of the bumper sticker "I'd rather be shopping". It seems that a lot of people love to shop. I'm not one of them. In fact, I could wear a sticker that says, "I'd rather be doing anything else." We put a lot of time, energy, and focus on buying special gifts. What if we were to put as much time, energy and focus on "being the special gift"? How might that change the experience of the holidays for others and ourselves?

For Christmas, Christ was the gift. There are so many ways that we can "be the gift". One of them is to see and point out the greatness in each person. In this issue, I am sharing my favorite story, The Rabbi's Gift. I hope you like it. It's a great reminder of the power of seeing the God within each of us. Note: I use God-- please substitute whatever you call your higher power. It is never my intention to be exclusive; rather I strive to be inclusive. I have saved this story for years for just the right time to share. This feels like the right time.
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Finding Inner Peace in an Unpeaceful World
3. Focus on Being the Gift

"Love is to people what water is to plants."
--Marianne Williamson

Coaching is a positive profession. One of the things I like most about it is the opportunity to help clients see the greatness in them. We all have greatness within; sometimes it's covered over and hard to see, but it's still there. Looking out my window right now, the skies are gray with clouds. But, I know the beauty of the sun, blue sky and mountains is still there, just temporarily covered over.

What does this have to do with inner peace? There are no neutral thoughts. We are always either thinking love thoughts or fear thoughts. And, we have the choice of which we focus on. When we are judging and criticizing another, or ourselves we are focused on fear thoughts ñ our inner terrorists. When we are thinking about what's wonderful about another or ourselves, we are focused on love thoughts. We are only at peace when we are thinking love thoughts.

Seeing and pointing out another's greatness, specialness, or uniqueness is a meaningful gift that we can give others that will last a lifetime. It is something that money can't buy. We don't have to go shopping for it.

What we focus on does expand. When we share our love thoughts with another, we help to expand their self-knowledge, self-esteem and self-confidence. What greater gift could we possible give?

What we give, we receive. When we are focused on love thoughts, we give to ourselves--greater peace, joy and happiness.

If you choose to give this gift, here are some ways you might go about it:
1. Tell them what you like about them.
2. Tell them how they make you feel when you're around them.
3. Tell them what they do differently/better than others.
4. Point out the strengths and gifts you see in them.

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4. Words of Wisdom

"Welcome home! That's what I want my life to say to everyone whose path crosses mine. I want to create an atmosphere of serenity and joy, blessing and belonging, that embraces people and draws them in-that makes them feel loved and special and cared for."
--Emilie Barnes

The Rabbi's Gift

The story concerns a monastery that had fallen upon hard times. Once a great order, as a result of waves of anti monastic persecution in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and the rise of secularism in the nineteenth, all its branch houses were lost and it had become decimated to the extent that there were only five monks left in the decaying mother house: the abbot and four others, all over seventy in age. Clearly it was a dying order.

In the deep woods surrounding the monastery there was a little hut that a rabbi from a nearby town occasionally used for a hermitage. Through their many years of prayer and contemplation the old monks had become a bit psychic, so they could always sense when the rabbi was in his hermitage. "The rabbi is in the woods, the rabbi is in the woods again," they would whisper to each other. As he agonized over the imminent death of his order, it occurred to the abbot at one such time to visit the hermitage and ask the rabbi if by some possible chance he could offer any advice that might save the monastery.

The rabbi welcomed the abbot at his hut. But when the abbot explained the purpose of his visit, the rabbi could only commiserate with him. "I know how it is," he exclaimed. "The spirit has gone out of the people. It is the same in my town. Almost no one comes to the synagogue anymore." So the old abbot and old rabbi wept together. Then they read parts of the Torah and quietly spoke of deep things. The time came when the abbot had to leave. They embraced each other. "It has been a wonderful thing that we should meet after all these years," the abbot said, "but I have still failed in my purpose for coming here. Is there nothing you can tell me, no piece of advice you can give me that would help me save my dying order?"

"No, I am sorry." the rabbi responded. "I have no advice to give. The only thing I can tell you is that the Messiah is one of you." When the abbot returned to the monastery his fellow monks gathered around him to ask, "Well, what did the rabbi say?" "He couldn't help," the abbot answered. "We just wept and read the Torah together. The only thing he did say, just as I was leaving--it was something cryptic--was that the Messiah is one of us. I don't know what he meant."

In the days and weeks and months that followed, the old monks pondered this and wondered whether there was any possible significance to the rabbi's words. The Messiah is one of us? Could he possibly have meant one of us monks here at the monastery? If that's the case, which one? Do you suppose he meant the abbot? Yes, if he meant anyone, he probably meant Father Abbot. He has been our leader for more than a generation. On the other hand, he might have meant Brother Thomas. Certainly Brother Thomas is a holy man. Everyone knows that Thomas is a man of light. Certainly he could not have meant Brother Elred! Elred gets crotchety at times. But come to think of it, even though he is a thorn in people's sides, when you look back on it, Elred is virtually always right. Often very right. Maybe the rabbi did mean Brother Elred. But surely not Brother Phillip. Phillip is so passive, a real nobody. But then, almost mysteriously, he has a gift for somehow always being there when you need him. He just magically appears by your side. Maybe Phillip is the Messiah. Of course the rabbi didn't mean me. He couldn't possibly have meant me. I'm just an ordinary person. Yet supposing he did? Suppose I am the Messiah? O God, not me. I couldn't be that much for You, could I? As they contemplated in this manner, the old monks began to treat each other with extraordinary respect on the off chance that one among them might be the Messiah. And on the off, off chance that each monk himself might be the Messiah, they began to treat themselves with extraordinary respect.

Because the forest in which it was situated was beautiful, it so happened that people still occasionally came to visit the monastery to picnic on its tiny lawn, to wander along some of its paths, even now and then to go into the dilapidated chapel to meditate. As they did so, without even being conscious of it, they sensed this aura of extraordinary respect that now began to surround the five old monks and seemed to radiate out from them and permeate the atmosphere of the place. There was something strangely attractive, even compelling, about it. Hardly knowing why, they began to come back to the monastery more frequently to picnic, to play, to pray. They began to bring their friends to show them this special place. And their friends brought their friends.

Then it happened that some of the younger men who came to visit the monastery started to talk more and more with the old monks. After a while one asked if he could join them. Then another. And another. So within a few years the monastery had once again become a thriving order and, thanks to the rabbi's gift, a vibrant center of light and spirituality in the realm.
M. Scott Peck, M.D., The Different Drum

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5. Resources

Join me for a one day workshop to learn and experience a simple, powerful, rapid (often within minutes), tool that can help you "Find Inner Peace in an Unpeaceful World."

Benefits of using EFT * are:
--Greater calmnessófeeling centered & grounded
--Increased energy
--Reduced stress, neutralized anxiety
--Improved relationshipsóless reactivity
--Raised consciousnessóincreased presence & awareness
--Improved self esteem
--Increased success
--Stronger personal performance
--Elimination of phobias
--And much much more!

For those of you who live locally, I am offering EFT workshops on the first Saturday of most months. Details as follows:

Upcoming Saturday EFT Workshops:

--January 5, 2002
--March 2, 2002
--April 6, 2002
--May 5, 2002

Time: 9:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m.
Location: My home in West Seattle
Cost: $45 (includes handouts & a continental breakfast)
Note: The book "Adventures In EFT, The Essential Field Guide to Emotional Freedom Techniques", by Silvia Hartmann-Kent will be available at my cost of $17.55.

Each workshop is limited to 6 participants. Call me on 206-938-1867 to reserve your spot.

For those of you who don't live locally and would like to learn EFT over the phone, email me at Sharon@sharondemarte.com with "EFT by telephone" in the subject line. If there's enough interest I will set up a teleclass.

*To learn more about EFT, visit the EFT website at
www.emofree.com.

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Until we meet again, remember to:

Count your garden by the flowers,
Never by the leaves that fall.
Count your days by golden hours,
Don't remember clouds at all.
Count your nights by stars, not shadows.
Count your years with smiles, not tears.
Count your blessings, not your troubles.
Count your age by friends, not years.
--Author Unknown

Blessings to you and yours,

Sharon

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Copyright © 2000, 2001 all rights reserved.
U.S. Library of Congress ISSN: 1536-5891
Permission is granted to reproduce, copy or distribute One of a Kind News so long as this copyright notice and full information about contacting the author is attached. The author of this newsletter is: Sharon L. Demarte, M.A.