Coming off the disappointment of 2020 and the promise which initially seemed to lay ahead, more and more in the 209 are looking to 2021 as a reset and opportunity to reclaim their life. 

“Coming into 2021 what I do, is I teach people how to create a vision,” she said. “Live into the vision. The most successful people have the end in mind.”

Yet as one’s balloon may remain deflated via job loss, personal illness or family setbacks, Mitten shared it is well within the individual’s grasp to live their best life.

“Start with the question, “What would I love?”, Mitten shared from her Escalon home, “because when you ask yourself that question you get very different answers than ‘Well what does my bank account say I can do? What does my current situation say I can do? What do other people say I can do?’”

According to Mitten it is through the mindset and the vision of the individual that can lead them to live a life of default or live a life of design. One must (mentally) design a life which they would love versus settling for one of default. A skill which requires both focus as well as unwavering positivity. 

She likens the idea to driving down a freeway and having the end of the drive in mind. If you don’t focus on the destination, one can be “distracted by the bug guts.” If one is focused on destination, they see past the bug guts.

“Howard Thurman, Dr. Martin Luther King’s mentor, said, ‘Figure out what makes you come alive, and then go do that, because the world needs people who have come alive’ and that has never been truer,” Mitten said. “The world needs people to live the person that they are called to be, and a vision will get you there.”

The life coach emphasizes the importance of thinking thoughts to design a life that one would love, resisting the temptation to be negative or come from a place of ‘that can’t happen for me.’ In her words, when working from one’s vision working backwards from the vision (end goal) is the best way to live your best life. 

“It changes your whole thinking process,” she said. “One of the things I teach my clients is, our results that we have in our life are the direct reflection of the thoughts that we’ve been thinking — everything.”

Yet not everything always goes the way one would like in life, a fact not lost on Mitten, most especially post-2020 and shifting into 2021.

“There’s a Napoleon Hill quote, ‘Every adversity, every heartache, every failure carries with it the seed of equal or greater value.’ Success comes to those who are curious as to what the setback has come to teach them,” Mitten emphasized, noting we must look for the seed in the apparent obstacle and plant the seed.

“Find it, plant it, nurture it, water it, you will harvest it and you will grow it,” she shared. “Everyone has ‘stuff’ that’s content. Use the content to grow and nurture oneself to the next level.”

While the idea of a “best life” may be simple, it takes both commitment and desire which will make it so. Using one’s own life experiences as the curriculum of their life novel to catapult them to the next level as they lean into their life of design versus despair. 

“Our subconscious mind doesn’t know good from bad, right from wrong. It just knows,” Mitten stated. “What you focus on expands. Where your attention goes, energy flows. If one focuses on this is ‘bad’ you’re telling your subconscious mind it’s bad and it will be bad.”

Not one to simply sell rainbows and butterflies, as a life coach Mitten acknowledges that there are indeed circumstances beyond one’s control. Unquestionably, one cannot change the circumstance, they can however, alter the mindset of how they navigate through it, such as with COVID-19.

“The facts are that we have COVID. The truth is that we are far more powerful than any circumstance, situation or condition outside of us,” she stated. “The fact is we are stuck at home, but the truth is something is seeking to emerge here.”

Mitten added that there is an increased need for individuals to focus on being vibrant, healthy and energetic. Rather than make an effort to learn how to feel better, she recommends they shift their focus to a mindset of simply feeling better. 

“My goal moving into 2021 was to help people realize if they don’t create this vision, if they don’t create a vision of the life they want to live then they will default back to the same old patterns,” Mitten explained.

“We’re going to breathe another 365 days; I mean that’s not up to us. But if we’re going to breathe another 365 days, if we’re lucky enough we’re going to create a pattern of life. We’re going to create it whether we want to or not, so why not create something that we love,” she passionately stated. “Why not create a life of design and live into that.”

The key remains in positivity and maintaining this from leaning into a place of love, placing the focus on the positive and the desire, versus the default of defeat and despair.

“Our quality of life is determined by the quality of the questions that we ask,” Mitten simplified. “So if you continue to ask how am I going to get to the end of the month and pay all my bills, you’re going to continue to stay stuck in that lack, limitation and scarcity mentality. Versus what can I do to make some extra money, will be given answers and solutions that answer that question. It’s really all about what you’re focusing on.” 

A life coach as well as a realist, Mitten recognizes not all days are good days. The trying moments are the ones in which the focus and the drive are most crucial to optimum success in one’s best life. Hence her commitment to the design must prevail over the despair. 

“Let me end by saying that we are not here to live a mediocre life,” Mitten stated. “We have two choices – we can live a life of default ... stuck in the current patterns of our life, or we can create a life of design.

“We have the power to do that but it starts with our thinking – thoughts become things and everything is created twice. Our results in our life are the direct reflection of the thoughts we have been thinking – thoughts create feelings create action create results,” she concluded. “We must change our thinking, and what our thoughts are creating, to live our best life.”