One of the first places I begin with, when working with coaching clients is getting their energy levels consistently higher and that often means clearing energy drains.
Tolerations are quite simply all those annoying, aggravating, frustrating, energy draining things that you are tolerating, or putting up with, or suffering. They drain time, money, love, patience and so on. They take up space and eat up your energy. When your toleration count is high your energy levels are frequently low, your enthusiasm wanes and everyday challenges hit you too hard.
All these things can come from people’s behaviour, situations, unmet needs, crossed boundaries, loose ends and unfinished past business, frustrations, problems and even your own behaviour.
They could include a cluttered desk, family members who do not respect your decisions, clients who don’t pay on time, a dripping tap that annoys you. And if that tap has been dripping for months or even years it has a direct sapping link to your ability feel good.
Right now you may even have repeatedly told yourself the story that these things are just part of your life and there’s no point paying any attention to them as they’re not quite at that point where you simply have to do something about them, just get on with the rest of your stuff.
The wonderful thing is there is an opportunity for you to access huge boosts to your energy, productivity and general ‘feel good’ state, by following a gentle process of becoming toleration free.
Simply recognise that tolerations exist and begin to eliminate as many as possible. By sweeping these away, your path to reaching your goals will become clearer and easier to travel.
Write down everything that you are currently tolerating. Common areas where they show up are in our homes (the various rooms in which you spend time), with our family and environment around us and in our work life and situations. Keep adding to this list as you think of the tolerations in your life. Then start sweeping them away, one at a time. Start with the easy ones, if you get stuck get support from your coach or a close friend or colleague.
To get you in motion, I challenge you to start that list right now and then pick three from your list and wipe them out. You’ll feel so energised by doing so that you’ll carry on, to become toleration free!