So it stands to reason that no matter what you wish to create in your life, applying a consistent daily practice — a routine — that will promote good thinking habits can only serve you in creating more of what you want in life… and help to make you much more proficient at the same time.

In my experience, I’ve come to see the power of applying five very basic practices into my daily routine that have become strong habits and that have served to strengthen my ability to deliberately apply Law of Attraction in my life.

No doubt you’ve heard of all of these, but have you made them a daily habit for yourself in order to benefit from their combined power? Perhaps not.

If one or more of these elements is missing from your routine, you may find yourself struggling in one or more areas of your life.

1: Regular self improvement time every day.

As John Henry Newman said, “Growth is the only evidence of life.” So contribute to your growth as a leader in your own life by spending focused time on your personal growth and development every day.

Or don’t, in which case you are really choosing to stop living.

Spend even just 20 minutes writing out your goals and affirmations. Listen to a CD. Read an inspiring book. Learn from the masters. Feed yourself every day with positive thoughts and messages.

Begin to integrate these things into your day and develop the habit of doing so daily. By doing so, you are feeding your mind in a positive way.

2: Quiet your mind and then visualize your success every day.

Professional athletes and top business leaders know the power of visualization. Self help teachers through history have extolled the virtues of learning to quiet your mind with meditation.

At least once a day, take the time to quiet your mind and connect with whom you intend to be — the CEO of you, the leader of you, the inspiring leader of your own life who has massive results and success at whatever you choose.

Use a brief meditation to quiet the rampant mind chatter… take a couple of deep breaths, close your eyes, and focus on your breathing for even for just a couple of minutes. That’s all it needs to take.

Then visualize in your mind that you are achieving your goals. The goals needn’t be major; just ensure they reflect something you really want. Is it a new car? Great… visualize yourself looking at new cars. See and enter the dealership in your mind. Sit in the car in the showroom. Visualize yourself taking the car for a test drive. Where are you driving? How does it handle? How does the new car smell? Now visualize completing your offer sheet and choosing all the options you want. Picture yourself picking up the keys and taking delivery of your car.

Professional sprinters will visualize their entire race from entering the starting blocks, right through to the finish line. There’s incredible power in doing that.

You, too, will experience tremendous results just from taking five minutes each day to visualize yourself achieving what you want in specific detail. So find a time when you can be alone for five minutes and do it.

3: Schedule one hour of core time.

Set aside one hour, which you’ve explicitly scheduled in your day, which is your uninterrupted time spent only on activities that will move you closer to your goals.

What are those activities? The more time you spend visualizing, the clearer the path to follow to get there will become. You will find yourself inspired to take actions — your inner voice will begin to guide you.

Perhaps it’s taking a course, or undertaking a project, or starting a home business… whatever the appropriate steps happen to be, they will become clear to you.

Just be sure to set aside the time to actually do them. If you can’t find the time, then get up an hour earlier or go to bed an hour later. No matter what, find the hour. And protect that hour jealously.

It is in this time that you ultimately make your dreams come true. It is this time that you are taking the action that needs to be taken.

4: Lead yourself in everything you do.

Set the expectation of leadership in everything you do. What does this mean?

Simply, it means holding yourself accountable for actually doing what you say you intend to do. What’s the one action you can take today that helps to move your forward in the direction of your goals? You already know what it is because you’ve done the visualization. So the next thing for you to do is to actually do it.

Don’t wait for someone else to do it for you. Action is what makes it all come together. Consistently taking the action you’ve identified (which you can do in your scheduled core time) puts you in integrity with yourself and sends a clear signal to the Universe that you’re ready to begin receiving what you want.

5: Mastermind with other people.

Spend time with others who are successful in what they do and are effective leaders. These may be people you already know, such as business associates, friends, or co-workers. Or you may need to start to make new friends and build new networks in your community.

Other leaders are easy to spot. They are successful. Build relationships with them. Exchange ideas. You learn the most from people who are already accomplishing that to which you aspire.

Make a point of hanging around with people who will help you get better. Spend at least 30 minutes masterminding every day. It may take the form of a phone conversation. Or a lunch. Or exchanging emails. Or listening to a presentation. Or joining a club or association.

It doesn’t matter so long as you make a habit of doing some kind of masterminding every day.

Consistently applying these five daily personal development habits will ensure you maintain a healthy mindset and high energy. They will make you more effective in all aspects of your life.

Article written by Warren Wojnowski

The case for optimism is a very strong one indeed. Optimists are happier, more successful, healthier, experience less stress, have better relationships and live longer. Crucially, there is plenty of evidence to support the fact that pessimists can learn to be more optimistic.

Optimism is all about how you explain the world around you. Psychologists call this your explanatory style. Your explanatory style refers to the way in which you explain the events that happen in your life, and the meaning you give to that explanation.

Your explanatory style is more than likely to determine the decisions you make and actions you take in your life. Optimists define themselves by their strengths and successes, and because of this they expect good things to happen to them. Pessimists on the other hand define themselves by their weaknesses and failures, and therefore don’t expect good things to happen to them.

In order to become more optimistic, there are two things you need to work on:

1. Close down your pessimism patterns

2.  Open up your optimism opportunities

Closing down your pessimism patterns means minimising the space you allow for negative thought patterns, and maximising the space you allow for positive thought patterns.

Martin Seligman, a renowned expert in optimism, uses the following techniques to get you out of a negative frame of mind. These act as quick fixes in moving your thinking from a negative perspective to a positive one. So, next time you start thinking negatively, ask yourself which of these techniques would work best for you.

• Remind yourself regularly off things that you have done well and are proud of.

• Activate an internal STOP mechanism, which means you shout STOP yourself if you start thinking negatively.

• Practise a positive thinking mantra – in other words, affirm positive statements about yourself.

• Stop berating yourself. Commit to accepting and learning from your mistakes.

• Write down your negative thoughts. This is a good way of getting them out there, rather than niggling away in your head.

• Write down your positive thinking mantra and keep it with you.

• Have a stack of positive thoughts at the ready. Write them down if necessary.

Quick fixes are important because optimistic (and pessimistic) thought patterns can turn into fixed ways of thinking. However, a more long-term approach to challenging your pessimistic thought patterns will reap long-term benefits.

Optimism is much more than positive thinking. While positive thinking can enhance certain situations, it does not overall improve your life experience. Optimism, on the other hand, has been shown to enhance both specific and general well-being.

Also, you need to proactively choose to be happy and seeing the good in situations. Train yourself to think “I am going to find something positive in this situation”, and you will be guaranteed great results. Try it, and see how it goes. I would love to hear more about your views on this subject, so please leave a response here.

Please get in touch with me if you would like more support with being optimistic, or try the free interactive coaching session by clicking on the blue banner on the Homepage.

Have you heard about Byron Katie and her transformative practice for all those interested in spiritual growth and personal development?

Byron Katie has known great pain and suffering in her life. In highly unusual circumstances she woke up one morning to a sudden and dramatic shift in awareness, which brought her an inner clarity. Since then she has been travelling the world demonstrating the value and simplicity of four very special questions, and how they work.

Byron’s practice, known simply as The Work, allows you to go inside yourself and find your own happiness, to experience what already exists within you, unchanging, immovable, ever-present, ever-waiting. She strongly believes that anyone is capable of ending their own suffering, whatever it may be. Have a go at the following exercise, which very much sums up what The Work is all about and can be applied to many situations.

Choose a person or situation and write down, using short, simple sentences, who or what it is. Point the finger of blame or judgement outward. Write from your present position and your point of view.

1. Who angers or saddens or disappoints you? What is it about them that you didn’t or still don’t like?

2. How do you want them to change? What do you want them to do?

3. Do you need anything from them? What do they need to give you or do in order for you to be happy?

4. What do you think of them? Make a list.

5. What is it that you don’t ever want to experience with that person, thing or situation again?

Now, one by one, put each of your answers up against the four questions below, and then turn around the statement you’re working on. Throughout the process, practice being open to possibilities beyond what you think you know. This is a way of discovering your don’t -know mind. Keep asking the question and wait. Let the answer find you.

Here are the four questions of The Work:

1. Is it true?

Take your time. There is no right or wrong answer. Just listen for your answer.

2. Can you absolutely know that it’s true?

This is an opportunity to go into the unknown, to find the answers that live beneath what we think we know.

3. How do you react when you think that thought?

Make a list. How do you treat yourself, how do you treat the person you’ve written about, when you think that thought? What do you do? Be specific.

4. What would you do without the thought?

Close your eyes and wait. Imagine yourself just for a moment without that thought. What do you see? How does it feel? How is the situation different?

Now turn it around – rewrite the statement. This time write it as if it were written about you. Where you have written someone’s name, put yourself. Instead of “he” or “she”, put “I”. Consider whether or not the turn-around statement is as true as or truer than your original statement.

Now it’s time for you to continue applying the four questions and the turnaround to your own judgements, one at a time. Read all the sentences that you originally wrote and then one by one investigate each statement by asking yourself the four questions.

For more information about Byron Katie and The Work visit www.thework.org. If you would like try her online coaching programme, just click on Start Now! on the banner below. Good luck with The Work.

Please leave a response if you would like to ask me any questions about The Work, or indeed if you would like to share your experiences of implementing it.

The boxer Muhammad Ali used this technique frequently. He called it a ‘future history’. When Ali agreed to fight somebody, he would run through the fight in his imagination right up to the moment when he had won. He would then freeze the winning mental image and become aware of all the senses as if he were there at that very moment. His future history was experienced in such detail that subconsciously he believed it had already happened.

You can use this technique on anything in your life. For example, on a day at work – what do you absolutely intend to achieve today? Or if you’ve got into the habit of letting weekends slip away not having done very much, you can use this technique to change all that. How would you like things to be on Sunday night when the weekend comes to an end? How would you like to be feeling? How about the other people in your life? Partners? Children?

And then there are the things in your life you don’t want to do – that tax return, that tricky piece of DIY, the difficult phone call you have to make. Visualising how you will feel when the thing is done is a fantastic way to get you focused and motivated. This is one of the major techniques I use with my clients in all my coaching.

So basically, if you don’t like what you see in your life, then you can change it by imagining how you would like it to be. What I would like you to do now is answer the questions below. Write the answers down. The questions are in no particular order, and don’t worry if there is some overlap between the answers to the questions. The main purpose is to get you thinking about the alternatives to what you are doing at the moment. Good luck.

1. How would you like things to be? What would be the best possible outcome when you make the changes you’re going to make?

2. Who are the other people involved in all of this – people like your boss, your spouse or partner, your children, your customers?

3. How would these people be affected if things were to change? What would it mean to them?

4. Would each of them have to buy-in to the change? Would this be a problem if so?

5. Why would they want to buy into it?

6. Why do you want things to change?

7. Imagine life when you have made the transition. What would a typical day/week be like? Be specific. What will you do? What will be your routine?

8. Think of each of the people you have identified in the answer to question 2 above. If you make this change, what will they be saying about you?

9. How will you feel?

10. Will you have changed as a person? If so, how?

11. What will be your ambitions/hopes/dreams once you’ve accomplished this change?

12. Will your standard of living have changed? Is this a good thing or a bad thing?

13. Will your view of yourself have changed? If so, how?

14. Do you think it would be difficult to accomplish this change?

15. Would it be worth doing?

16. Could it fail?

17. How would you feel if it did? What would you do?

Has visualisation brought you success and achievement in your life? If so, please leave a response. I would love to find out more.

In the meantime, I strongly recommend you read Rhonda Byrne’s The Secret, which has a whole section on visualisation.

Sometimes it can feel as though eating a healthy diet, getting enough exercise and finding the time for yourself is impossible. But learning to live a healthier lifestyle is easy when you change one small thing at a time. Follow this advice and you will soon be full of beans.

1. LET IT BEET

It sounds bizarre but beetroot could be a secret weapon against high blood pressure. The condition is a major cause of heart disease and stroke, but many people aren’t aware they have it as it has no symptoms. Now, researchers from Barts Hospital and the London School of Medicine say drinking 500ml of beetroot juice could dramatically reduce blood pressure after just one hour. So drink up the pink stuff. (Get yourself a juice making machine. I juice 2 apples, 1 raw beetroot and 2 broccoli florets every day. It’s delicious!)

2. THINK OUTSIDE THE BOX

Us lazy Brits will spend 17 years of our lives on the sofa, with 7 years of that devoted to watching TV. Next time you hear yourself saying, “I haven’t got time to go to the gym” or you opt for ready meals because you’re too busy to cook fresh food, think about switching off the box and doing something healthy instead.

3. DON’T TAKE THE BISCUIT

It may be a good idea to steer clear of the biscuit tin before you go shopping. A team from the University of Singapore recently discovered that the smell of chocolate chip cookies could make women splurge on unnecessary clothes when they hit the shops. The smell activates the part of your brain that wants instant gratification.

4. EMBRACING GOOD HEALTH

Giving your partner a good hug doesn’t just warm the heart, it can protect it too. A study by the University of North Carolina in 2005 found that hugging your other half for 20 seconds could lower blood pressure and reduce levels of the stress hormone cortisol. High levels of cortisol have been linked to heart disease and other conditions such as diabetes.

5. POURING SALT ON THE WOUND

We eat around 9.5g of salt a day, but the Government wants us to cut this to no more than 6g, as high levels of salt can push up your blood pressure, raising your risk of cardiovascular conditions. Many food labels only list salt as sodium however, but you can do a simple sum to work out the real salt content; just multiply by 2.5. So 0.8g of sodium becomes 2g of salt.

6. SUNNY SIDE UP

Get outside in the sunshine for a natural boost. The sun’s rays on the skin help your body produce vitamin D, which has been shown to fight heart disease, depression, osteoporosis and even some types of cancer. So make the most of the sun when it is around!

7. ONE IS THE MAGIC NUMBER

One of the largest studies into diet and cancer – the Europe-wide EPIC study – found that eating just one extra portion of fruit and vegetables a day could cut your risk of dying early from any cause by 20%.

8. HOLDING BACK THE YEARS

Add 14 years to your life by following four very easy principles; don’t smoke, take regular exercise, drink sensibly and eat five portions of fruit and veg each day. These simple steps can have a huge impact on your life expectancy, say scientists from Cambridge University. If you only manage one thing, give up smoking as the study found this had the biggest impact on your health.

9. A STEP IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION

Previously experts thought taking 10,000 steps a day was enough to control your weight, but a world-wide study has just established that women up to the age of 40 and men up to 50 need 12,000 steps a day to help shift that middle jiggle. Invest in a pedometer to make sure you’re hitting your target.

10. LAUGHTER IS THE BEST MEDICINE

Become a glass half-full person! Studies have found that those with a positive attitude suffer less from conditions such as heart disease. Find something to laugh at every day to give your feel-good hormone a boost.

I like Number 10 most of all, so why not share some of you ways of bringing more laughter into your life. I would love to know, so please leave a response.

You have beliefs about yourself (your skills, your values, your dignity). You have beliefs about other people (what makes them tick, what they want, how to relate to them, etc). You have beliefs about work, play, recreation, hobbies and volunteer activities. You have beliefs about the world (politics, education, crime, police, the justice system, other countries, wars, journalism, and environment). You have beliefs about a thousand different concepts (time, history, the past, the future, causation, personality, emotions and destiny).

Further, because you have these beliefs, you operate from them as one uses a map to navigate territory. Beliefs as mental maps govern our life, emotions, health, skills, and everyday experiences. So where did these belief maps come from? How did we develop, create, or absorb them? How much validity do they have? What compromises these beliefs? How would we change them if we wanted to?

Beliefs develop over time out of our experiences. We construct our beliefs via the ideas, thoughts, feelings, meanings that we bring to bear upon various concepts.

At birth, we have no beliefs. Rather, beliefs arise as our perceptions, understandings and learning grow and solidify as a form of focused awareness. In this way, they develop into some durable internal maps about the territory out there.

Structurally, a belief involves thoughts about some thing or another plus validating, affirming, and accepting thoughts about these primary thoughts. This explains why merely repeating an empowering belief statement will not have the same effect as believing an empowering belief statement.

Now, it is useful also to have some understanding of disbelief. To disbelieve a statement, we essentially bring thoughts of doubt, uncertainty, and questions to bear on the primary thought. In other words, we think: “I have questions about that idea”. Hence, we are in a state of doubt about a particular thought. Thus, if you question anything enough eventually you will disbelieve it, including yourself. Part of the process of being coached is to encourage the client to question some of their own assumptions and ideas.

The natural growth of beliefs starts with vague representations of what we experience. We ‘think’ about but don’t ‘know’. We have questions and doubts about how to organise our thinking into constructed and logical concepts and assumed ‘knowledge’ about a particular thing. Yet as these representations gain more and more clarity, we develop various forms of knowledge about things. As that knowledge solidifies, it takes the form of knowing ‘what we have learnt’, what we understand about life, then progressively the idea takes greater hold in our mind.

At this point, when an idea is more solidly engrained in our minds, we have fewer doubts, less questions, and more of a sense that the idea itself is reality. Now we believe in the idea considered. we feel convinced about it. Eventually we feel so convinced that it becomes a conviction in our life.

Unfortunately, negative beliefs can become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Negative expectations create negative outcomes, and naturally, positive expectations create positive outcomes. The good news is that we are all capable of creating new empowering beliefs. Several of my coaching sessions are based on the idea that we can eradicate limiting beliefs and create new empowering beliefs. Anything can become a belief. All you need to do is establish what you want to believe, or what belief would support you in achieving your goals and look for instances in your life that support this belief.

“There are two primary choices in life: to accept conditions as they exist, or accept the responsibility for changing them.” – Dr. Denis Waitley

Here is a useful exercise you might like to try

First of all, think of a goal you have in your life. You might like to write it down to help make more sense of it. Then you need to write down three beliefs that don’t support you in achieving your goal, such as “I am lazy” or “I am frightened about facing my fears”.Then, for each negative belief, write down the answers for these two questions:

1. What has this negative belief cost me so far?
2. What will this negative belief cost me in 5 years time?

Next, I’d like you to think about the hidden benefits of not getting you goal. These are often the excuses you make to not take action. Can you think of three hidden benefits? Then ask yourself what is the true cost of keeping this ‘benefit’ in your life. Write it down.

The next step is to write down three empowering beliefs that are going to help you get your goal. Now it is worth bearing in mind that there are five different ways new beliefs can be installed, from:

1. Past outcomes (remember a time)
2. Events (is there an area of your life you already do/are this)
3. Creative Thinking (could you dream/imagine it)
4. Education (what could you learn)
5. Environment (who could you model)

The final exercise is for each of your new empowering beliefs, write down two different ways you could do something to strengthen them. You may need to think of other areas of your life where you have already demonstrated having one of these beliefs. If you have the belief in another life area, then you most certainly can transfer it to another.

Good luck with the exercise, and hopefully it will leave you feeling good and motivated.

To find out more about my coaching work on beliefs, why not get in touch or leave a comment here and I will get back to you.

The Secret by Rhonda Byrne talks about how the process of visualisation has been taught by all the great teachers and avatars throughout the centuries. Think of the great inventors and inventions such as Thomas Edison and he light bulb, or Alexander Graham Bell and the telephone. These things were only created because the inventors had a picture in their minds. They saw it clearly, and by holding that picture of the end result in their minds, all the forces of the Universe brought the inventions into the world, through them. The secret also is to not just create a static picture in your mind, but to create lots of movement in the picture.

Genevieve Behrend (1881-1960) said: “Everyone visualises whether he knows it or not. Visualising is the great secret of success. We all possess more power and greater possibilities than we realise, and visualising is one of the greatest of these powers.”

Now of course, many people find this a very difficult process, and therefore I would like to share some ideas with you about creating vision boards. The idea behind these boards is that by surrounding yourself with images of who you want to become, what you want to have, where you want to live, or where you want to go on holiday, your life changes to match those images and those desires. Before you set about making a board, you need to sit quietly and set the intent. With lots of kindness and openness, ask yourself what it is you want. Images should start coming into your head and slowly you will begin to create your vision. The process can be quite a deep experience. Some people like to put on music as they are doing this.

The next step is to find the images you would like to use. You may have some photographs, but your best bet is to go through magazines, newspapers, catalogues and brochures. It is also a good idea to look for key words and phrases too. Some people like to type their own favourite quotations or powerful words to incorporate into the images on their vision board. You can have lots of fun doing this, but ultimately you need to make a pile of appropriate images and words.

Then you need to start putting your favourite images onto a board. This could be poster board, thick cardboard, or even a piece of plywood. Start to discard the images that you don’t think will work. As you begin to lay the images on the board, you will begin to get a greater sense of what you want to achieve. Some people like to asign different corners of the board for different aspects of their lives, or you might prefer to have a series of small boards. I personally prefer to use images that summarise my overall goal that I am working towards. Then you can start sticking onto the board. You can add writing, which you can paint on, or write with markers, or use printed words. Make sure you leave a space in the middle to put a great photo of yourself – although this is optional. Then hang your board in a place where you will see it often.

There are many different types of vision boards for different purposes. One such is the “I Know Exactly What I Want” Board. This would be where you are very clear about your desires, or you want to change your surroundings, or if there is a specific thing you want to manifest into your life. People who are trying to lose weight often use images of people to illustrate their perfect body type. I know of someone who wanted a new bathroom, so she had images of her perfect bathroom suite and decor.

The “Opening and Allowing” vision board is for when you are not too sure what you want, or if you have been in a period of depression and grief. In other words, you may have some clear vision of what you want, but are unsure about some aspect of it. Or, you may know what you wantto change, but don’t know how it’s possible. With this type of board, you need to collect images that give you a great feeling of happiness and joy. Don’t question why, just collect the pictures spontaneously. Then, look at each picture and ask what it is telling you about you. It may not give you an answer straight away, but in time it will. This type of board can be a powerful guide for you and can go much deeper than the first type of board, as it goes much deeper than just getting what you want.

A third board is the “Theme” board. This works well if you are working on one particular area of your life, such as love and relationships, or work and career. It’s also effective for starting a new cycle in your life, such as the New Year or a birthday.

You can use a combination of all three boards. It might start out as one and then develop into a completely different type. It’s important to be creative and go along with the whole process and where it takes you. Good luck if you decide to give this a try, and let me know how you get on with it. Even better, email me some photographs of your board(s).

Take a look at these, and see if any of them apply to you:

• You want others to know that you have had a bad time
• You think everything that happens to you is ‘unfair’
• You believe it is always other people who get the breaks
• You feel secretly pleased when others feel sorry for you
• You see the world through the eyes of defeat

If you can identify with most of the above, then I suspect you are one of those people who believe the world is out to get you. You probably feel that you are at the mercy of everything. The media doesn’t help, as newspapers and TV programmes are saturated with people telling us what terrible lives they have.

There is a growing blame culture out there. For many, it’s always the fault of someone else that their partner left them, that they are overweight etc. We are surrounded by images of ‘normal’ life as never having problems, difficulties, obstacles and arguments. But the truth is that the challenge of life is actually about overcoming the difficulties to get the things you want.

It’s not always easy to get what you want out of life, but whoever said that life had to be easy? Sometimes, even when you put 100% effort into something, it still doesn’t turn out how you want it to. That’s just how things are sometimes. Unfortunately, many so-called victims believe that what has happened to them has nothing to do with their own actions – largely because they have chosen to take a certain view of the world. Victims believe that the world revolves around them.

Victims frequently appear to not care so much about others because they are self-absorbed. They are always ready to tell you how much harder their life is.

At the end of the day, victims may feel like the world has screwed them up, but ultimately they need to sort their lives out. If this is you, why not try these:

• Give yourself a different label: Change the way you think about yourself in a more positive way. If you are a self-pitying, overweight alcoholic, then you will remain one. People who think in a more positive way actually believe they can become what they think they are.
• Rid yourself of destructive behaviour: Try to be around people who can support you, and not those who are negative influences. Involve yourself with people who are also interested in self improvement.
• Act instead of talking about it: Stop making excuses all the time. If you feel you are about to start moaning or complaining about something, change the subject and/or your thoughts straight away. Try the 20 Second Rule, where you focus completely on something positive for 20 seconds.
• Stop comparing yourself to others: Don’t measure yourself by the achievements, successes, deeds and possessions of others. You may admire some of these people, but you don’t need to waste valuable time worrying about what others have got. Focus on your own life and goals, and put all your energy into building the life you want.
• Make the most out of the worst: Successful people tend to be able to use times of difficulty to reinvent themselves and change their lives. They don’t think like victims, instead they learn from their misfortunes, bad luck and mistakes.

So, don’t let self-pity and feeling like a victim take control of your life and destroy all the chances you have of being happy and successful.

John Bird (2006) states:

You are no longer a victim if:

• You do not believe the world owes you a living
• You know you have to go through thorns to find roses
• You refuse to hang around with victims
• You know the grass is not always greener on the other side
• You refuse to use your past as an excuse
• You take setbacks as an opportunity to gain strength
• You spend more time thinking about others
• You replace excuses with action.

It would be great to hear your views on this post, so please leave a response.

If any of these issues are affecting your life, please get in touch with me.

Like most coaches, I spend a lot of time helping clients eradicate their negative beliefs and then form new empowering ones to enable them to achieve their goals. This is crucial as hanging on to destructive negative beliefs can result in a great deal of unhappiness, lack of confidence, and low self-esteem.

When I read The Key by Joe Vitale, I was struck by a section written by the author Mandy Evans. I would like to share some of this with you. I have tried her strategy myself several times and have personally found it a very powerful and effective tool. Some of you may be familiar with it, especially those of you who have incorporated elements of Cognitive Behaviour Therapy into your coaching methods.

As we all know, coaching can help improve anything in a person’s life, from relationships to finances, but this is only truly possible when the person discovers the hidden beliefs that hold him or her back. As soon as they have been identified, then they are more able to start questioning them to see if they are still true to them in the clear light of day. It is completely possible for anyone to free themselves from painful emotions like fear, anger or guilt by finding and breaking down the beliefs that cause them and keep them stuck inside.

The beliefs that block happiness and success are among the most limiting and self-defeating of all. If you can get rid of them and feel happy and clear, you are much more likely to make choices and take actions that lead down a very different path from one you take in anger or fear.

Mandy Evans suggests the method of a question-and-answer Option Dialogue. It’s a bit like an interview with yourself. I would strongly recommend to my clients that they use a journal to record their answers, as this is an excellent way to track progress made.

Before you start, it is important to accept yourself just as you are. If you start judging yourself too much as you delve into those feelings and beliefs, it will then be more difficult to see clearly or tell yourself the truth. Go through the process slowly and use this time to discover as much as you possibly can about your feelings and beliefs.

Mandy Evans says that “You have to be willing to go through some confusion. As your beliefs change, your version of reality breaks up and reforms – disorienting, to say the least! These questions and answers weave around sometimes. They make more sense when you ask them about your feelings and your beliefs.”

Here are the questions:

1.    What are you unhappy about? Or angry, guilty, worried, for example. This question helps you get specific about your feeling and what it is about.
2.    Why are you unhappy about that? Our reasons for feeling bad are different from what we feel bad about. Our reasons are beliefs.
3.    What are you concerned would happen if you were not unhappy about that? This odd-sounding question helps you find any fear or concern you have about the feeling going away. We are often reluctant to part with a feeling even if it is painful.
4.    Do you believe that?
5.    Why do you believe that?
6.    What are you concerned would happen if you did not believe that? Sometimes we hold on to a long-held belief even if proves limiting or causes unhappiness. What are your concerns? Do they still seem real to you?
I would now like to share with you the outcome of doing an Open Dialogue with myself.

What are you unhappy about?
Answer: Young people in our society and how they have a lack of respect for others and seem to have little focus, purpose or direction.

Why are you unhappy about that?
Answer: Nobody seems to be able to get to the root of the problem, and parents and schools appear to be helpless in giving these young people the right support.

What are you concerned would happen if you were not unhappy about that?
Answer: That perhaps I wouldn’t speak out and give my ideas and suggestions, and that things would get even worse in the future. I fear that we may end up with a generation who are unable to care for one another.

Do you believe that?
Answer: To a large extent yes.

Why do you believe that?
Answer: I read so much about it and listen to reports on the radio about disaffected young people, street crime and lack of discipline at home and at school.

What are you concerned about would happen if you were not unhappy about that?
Answer: That I wouldn’t bother to do anything about it. That I wouldn’t be motivated to work on developing effective coaching programmes for young people.

Doing this exercise was enough to make me start to be more proactive in my quest to help these youngsters. I have been saying for months that I must get the ball rolling to start developing appropriate coaching programmes. I wrote down a list of contacts I know who would be interested in this field of coaching; a teenager coach, a coach who already has a programme in place, learning mentors that work in schools, and the list went on. If you know of anyone to add to my list, please do get in touch.

Clearly, this process has spurred me on to take more action and look for ways to make a difference.

Mandy Evans says “If someone asked me to review everything I learned in my whole life and give just one piece of helpful advice, it would be this – always question unhappiness. Never take feeling bad for granted. Happiness is the grand prize in the game of life, and you can award it to yourself!”

I would encourage you to try out this type of Open Dialogue in a journal. Use this process on an emotion you may be feeling right now. Think of something you want to be, do, or have. If you haven’t attracted it yet, how do you feel about it? Take that emotion and work with it in your journal.

Good luck, and it would be great to hear your views on this technique.

1. Talk about your feelings

Talking about your feelings can help you stay in good  mental health and deal with times when you feel troubled. Talking about your feelings isn’t a sign of weakness. It’s part of taking charge of your wellbeing and doing what you can to stay healthy. Talking can be a way to cope with a problem you’ve been carrying around in your head for a while. Just being listened to can help you feel supported and less alone. And it works both ways. If you open up, it might encourage others to do the same. It’s not always easy to describe how you’re feeling. If you can’t think of one word, use lots. What does it feel like inside your head? What does it make you feel like doing?  You don’t need to sit your loved ones down for a big conversation about your wellbeing. Many people feel more comfortable when these conversations develop naturally – maybe when you’re doing something together. If it feels awkward at first, give it time. Make talking about your feelings something that you do.

2. Ask for help

None of us are superhuman. We all sometimes get tired or overwhelmed by how we feel or when things go wrong. If things are getting too much for you and you feel you can’t cope, ask for help. Your family or friends may be able to offer practical help or a listening ear. Local services are there to help you. Your GP may be able to refer you to a counsellor, or you may decide that getting a life coach and planning for a better future might be a better option. You should consider getting help from your GP if difficult feelings are stopping you from getting on with life; or having an impact on the people you live or work with; or affecting your mood over several weeks. Over a third of visits to GPs are about mental health. Your GP may suggest ways you or your family can help you. Or they may refer you to a specialist or another part of the health service. Life coaching is becoming increasingly popular these days, as unlike some counselling, the coaching focuses on uncovering limiting beliefs and planning goals for the future. It is proving to be very effective in overcoming mental health issues.

3. Take a break

A change of scene or a change of pace is good for your mental health. It could be a five-minute pause from cleaning your kitchen, a half-hour lunch break at work or a weekend exploring somewhere new. A few minutes can be enough to de-stress you. Give yourself some ‘me time’. “Sometimes when I’m sitting on the bus, I let my thoughts flow and it really helps me.”Taking a break may mean being very active. It may mean not doing very much at all. Take a deep breath… and relax. Try yoga or meditation, or just putting your feet up. Listen to your body. If you’re really tired, give yourself time to sleep. Without good sleep, our mental health suffers and our concentration goes downhill. Sometimes the world can wait.

4. Accept who you are

Some of us make people laugh, some are good at maths, others cook fantastic meals. Some of us share our lifestyle with the people who live close to us, others live very differently. We’re all different. It’s much healthier to accept that you’re unique than to wish you were more like someone else. Feeling good about yourself boosts your confidence to learn new skills, visit new places and make new friends. Good self-esteem helps you cope when life takes a difficult turn.”Being happy with who I am now means I enjoy living in the moment.” Be proud of who you are. Recognise and accept what you are not good at, but focus on what you can do well.  Work out if there’s anything about yourself that you still want to change. Are your expectations realistic? If they are, work towards the change in small steps.

5. Do something you are good at

What do you love doing? What activities can you lose yourself in? What did you love doing in the past? Enjoying yourself helps beat stress. Doing an activity you enjoy probably means you’re good at it and achieving something boosts your self-esteem.Concentrating on a hobby like gardening or the crossword can help you forget your worries for a while and change your mood.”I’m learning the guitar.You have to really concentrate on getting it right so there’s no room in my head for worries.”It can be good to have an interest where you’re not seen as someone’s mum or dad, partner or employee. You’re just you. An hour of sketching lets you express yourself creatively. A morning on the football pitch gets you active and gives you the chance to meet new people.