Empower Newsletter – June 2019

‘accepting change is therapeutic’

In the past few months there has been a lot of change at the gym I go to. It is growing, with more memberships, the appointment of a Manager, new rules and a new timetable layout. This has created some annoyance for some people for one reason or another.

If we let it, this annoyance can fester and turn into frustration and/or anger. When this happens it creates a lot of negative energy in our communication and also our bodies. And when we hold onto negativity it creates physical stress and if we continue to hold onto the stress, it will turn into physical ailments.

It doesn’t matter whether we see some change as catastrophic like losing a job or a life partner, how we handle change for one thing translates to how we handle it for everything. The bigger we see the change, the more it will affect us, just on a bigger scale.

Change is a part of life, there is no way to avoid it. What we can do though is when something changes we can get upset about it or we can choose to accept it.

“Accepting it doesn’t mean you endorse whatever it is your accepting; rather there is a recognition that you can’t change the situation at this exact moment, but accepting manages anxiety and helps to calm the mind.” ~ Author unknown ~

Younger people seem to handle change a lot better. This in part is because they grew up with constant change in a world of technology where things changed all the time; it is just a part of life for them.

We can really learn a lot from this generation. They expect change and then when it happens they embrace it, in fact they are often the ones that instigate it in the first place.

So if you find yourself fighting change, instead of seeing it as a threat to your normality, why not take a leaf out of the younger generations’ book and choose to accept it. By doing this you will feel better, stay relaxed and calm, and also continue to feel positive and content.

Your body will thank you for it!

Accepting

1. Able or willing to accept something or someone: inclined to regard something or someone with acceptance rather than with hostility or fear.
2. Tending to regard different types of people and ways of life with tolerance and acceptance.

Embracing change is not a difficult skill to learn. And once you start looking at change as a good thing, you’ll be amazed at some of the benefits that can follow.

1. Change helps you grow
2. Change teaches you to be flexible
3. Change can challenge your values and beliefs
4. Change reveals your strengths
5. Change makes you more compassionate
6. Change breaks up routines
7. Change offers opportunities

~https://www.attitudeisaltitude.com/blog~

“Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes. Don’t resist them; that only creates sorrow. Let reality be reality. Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they like.”  ~ Lao Tzu ~

‘I easily accept change.’

Empower Newsletter – May 2019

‘a shift in mindset is like a pothole becoming a puddle’

I often cycle along a dirt road that has lots of potholes, some are really large. Sometimes I don’t see them until it’s too late because I’m moving so quickly and go straight through them, ouch.  But when the weather changes and it starts to rain the potholes that were hard to see have become clear as day because they have filled with water and have become puddles.

It’s the same with a mindset change. Just as the puddles make the potholes clear, a shift in mindset brings with it the same clarity. Things become clear and you start to see things that you didn’t see before. It’s not that they weren’t always there, it’s just that you didn’t see them before.

For instance a mindset shift can come in the form of a change in the way you saw, thought or felt about something or someone.

It could be changing the way you think about a situation.  A friend of mine decided that instead of getting irritated and frustrated about tourists taking over her town in the holidays because she lives in a desirable coastal town, she decided to be grateful that she gets to

live in such a beautiful place.

You can choose to feel irritated or choose to feel grateful.  In other words, you can choose to be angry or happy by changing your mindset.

Another major shift in mindset can be to realise that you are responsible for where you are in your life, that your actions and choices have created your reality, both good and bad.  That we are our own masters!

For example, no one can make you happy. You decide when you smile, laugh, have fun, feel energised, sad, frustrated, angry or any other emotion.  It’s up to you to create your own happiness.  A shift in mindset to decide, and then to start seeing things in another way will change your reality.

Next, exploring and discovering what it is that makes you happy will allow you to see these things when they present themselves.  Just like when potholes become puddles.

Mindset

A mindset is a belief that orients the way we handle situations — the way we sort out what is going on and what we should do. Our mindsets help us spot opportunities but they can trap us in self-defeating cycles.

“Christie is a student who is being raised by parents who tell her that if she works hard, she can do well.  There is no smart Christie or dumb Christie, there’s just Christie who, if she works hard, can do well.  The parents are very careful not to label Christie.  They just tell her that if you work hard, you can do well in life.

So she does do well in life because she works hard.  Instead of saying “I’m dumb” after setbacks, or “I’m smart” after successes, she just says “I didn’t work hard in this first situation and I worked hard in the second situation.

So if I want to do well in life, I need to work hard and I need to apply effort.”

~ psychologytoday.com ~

“Once your mindset changes, everything on the outside will change along with it.”

~ Steve Maraboli ~

‘If I work hard I can achieve anything.’

Empower Newsletter – April 2019

‘if your batteries are flat you cannot be at your best for others’

Life has a funny way of keeping us busy and sometimes without even realising it we stop/sacrifice doing the things we love, and quite often the things we love doing are the things that recharge our batteries and give us energy.

There is always something that needs to be done, like going to work, housework, washing, dropping off and picking up kids, family responsibilities, shopping for ingredients and preparing meals, yard maintenance, etc.

All of these things can be very consuming and tiring and unless we take time for ourselves our battery can run very low and/or even go flat.

If a car battery is neglected and not given what it needs to recharge itself, it will not run.  It will become flat.  And if it is left uncharged, it will eventually become lifeless.

We are like car batteries, if we don’t recharge our batteries we won’t have the energy to run or to be at our best for ourselves, our loved ones or the people around us.

What do you need to do to make yourself feel refreshed?

Some ideas to help jump start your battery may be to take a walk each day, chat on the phone or catch up for coffee with a friend, meditate, go to the gym or beach, a manicure or pedicure, a day out with family, a craft project, a weekend away, a nap, or even putting aside an hour or two to do absolutely nothing.

Everyone is different.  Some people might need to recharge daily whereas others may only need a weekly boost.  There is no wrong or right amount of time out, whatever you need is the perfect amount.

In taking time out of your busy life, it may feel like you are being selfish or taking away from someone or something, but in actual fact with the energy gained, you will be able to give more and in turn gain more.

If it were our children, parents or partners we wouldn’t think twice about making sure they get to do the things they love.  All we want is for them to be happy because their happiness makes us happy.

If you were to ask your loved ones what they want for you, I bet they would say that they just want you to be happy.  Because, that’s right you guessed it, when you are happy it makes them feel happy.

Recharge

In any area of your life, in order to recharge and get motivated, it’s important to give yourself permission to pause. These pauses provide you with the time and space needed to redirect your focus and energy. Over time, you’ll learn to take breaks and focus your attention on mini-activities that quiet your judgemental left-brain and ignite your inner passion. After these little timeouts, you’ll discover that your productivity actually increases, as does the quality of your work and relationships.

“We survive on too little sleep, wolf down fast foods on the run, fuel up with coffee and cool down with alcohol and sleeping pills. Faced with relentless demands at work, we become short-tempered and easily distracted. We return home from long days at work feeling exhausted and often experience our families not as a source of joy and renewal, but as one more demand in an already overburdened life.”

~ Jim Loehr ~

“To be fully engaged, we must be physically energized, emotionally connected, mentally focused and spiritually aligned with a purpose beyond our immediate self-interest.”

~ Jim Loehr ~

‘I take time for myself and I feel recharged and energised.’

Empower Newsletter – March 2019

‘we don’t do anything unless we get something from it’

Have you ever been in a situation and asked yourself “Why am I doing this?” or “Why do I continue to put myself through this?”

Well the answer is because you get something from it!  And the thing is whatever you are getting doesn’t even need to be positive.  That is, it can be a negative gain.

For example, if you keep pushing people away, it may be giving you a sense of safety.  Because if you let someone get too close the fear of losing them can quite easily take over.

These reasons are usually unconscious; they are not something we decide to do after carefully weighing up the situation.  If we did weigh up the situation we would ask ourselves, ‘what we will get’ or ‘what will it give us’ from making that decision.

Using the example above about unconsciously pushing people away, you would ask yourself “What is it giving me?” or “What will I achieve when it happens?”  In this situation it could be that you would get to feel safe by avoiding the emotional hurt if the relationship didn’t work out.

And of course the opposite side of this is that you would miss out on the wonderful feelings, fun, adventures, support, love and all the other things the friendship brings.

So next time you find yourself doing or saying something that is not serving you, ask yourself ‘what am I getting from this’ or ‘what is this giving me?’

The answer/s will give you an understanding about why you do something.  This understanding will then enable you to consciously choose to stop the behaviour and allow you to move forward to get what you do want.

If you are having trouble establishing your reason/s, another useful question to ask is ‘what would happen if I didn’t do it?’  In the example above if you didn’t push people away you would probably still feel the fear, but you would also reap the rewards and benefits of a close friendship or partnership.

If you are having trouble establishing the reason/s why you are doing something you want to change I am more than happy to help you work through it so you are able to create the situation the way you want it to be.

Change

1.     Make or become different.

2.     Take or use another instead of.

3.     An act or process through which something becomes different.

The minute that you understand that you can poke life and actually something will, you know if you push in, something will pop out the other side, that you can change it, you can mould it. That’s maybe the most important thing. It’s to shake off this erroneous notion that life is there and you’re just gonna live in it, versus embrace it, change it, improve it, make your mark upon it.

~ Steve Jobs ~

“Change your thoughts and you change your world.”

~ Norman Vincent Peale ~

Change the way you look at things and the things you look at change.”

~ Wayne Dyer ~

‘I focus on my inner strength and power – I have the ability to change my life.’

Empower Newsletter – February 2019

‘we will do more to avoid pain than we will do to feel pleasure’

For example if you want to become healthier, you might see dieting and exercising as being more painful than not looking and feeling good.  If this is the case you probably avoid them like the plague.

The thing about this pain is that it’s only perceived pain! And the good thing is that we can change our perception of what equals pain and what equals pleasure.

So why not trick yourself into creating less pain around something you want to achieve and creating more pain around doing something that you are currently doing that isn’t serving you or giving you what you ultimately want.

By changing your perception of not liking to diet and/or exercise from painful to pleasurable, and eating unhealthy food and/or not exercising to being painful you will ultimately get what you want.

So how do you change something you perceive as being painful to seeing it in a more positive way?

You can start by seeing it as more pleasurable than the alternative.  And the alternative in this case is continuing to be unhealthy, overweight, feeling flat, not living life to the fullest, etc.

So when you think about eating something unhealthy, instead of thinking that it will be nice, think of it as something that’s going to stop you from getting what you ultimately want.  Maybe you can think that if you eat it it will be the equivalent to one hours’ worth of exercise.  Surely you work too hard to waste it with something that will give you 1 minutes’ worth of perceived pleasure by eating it!

It doesn’t matter what you need to think or say to yourself as long as you perceive it as more painful than the alternative.

If you perceive exercise to be avoided at all costs, you can start by thinking up ways to at least make exercise okay.

Arrange to walk with a friend, go to a group fitness class at the gym so you can socialise at the same time, look forward to walking so you can catch up on your phone calls or listen to a talking book or your favourite music.  Whatever you need to think or say to yourself to make it okay is perfect.

Do the opposite for eating unhealthy foods or not exercising.  The more pain you can create around it the better!

No matter what it is you want to achieve, changing your perception of what is painful and pleasurable will start you on the right track of ultimately getting what you want.

Avoid

1.     to keep away from; keep clear of

2.     to avoid a person; to avoid taxes

3.     to prevent from happening

When it comes to motivation and why people do the things that they do, it comes down to the simple science of pain versus pleasure. In its simplest form, all decisions that human beings make are to either gain pleasure or to avoid pain. Any act can be broken down this way. Why do you brush your teeth? Why would a woman spend precious time applying makeup before going out? Why would someone go to the gym every day? All of these actions can be sliced down to an individual trying to attain pleasure and/or avoid the pain that an action is going to bring. It’s all pain and pleasure.

~ titaniumsuccess.com ~

“They say though that we do more to avoid pain than we do to gain pleasure. So it is when the pain becomes too much that we finally find the courage to make changes.”

~ Bronnie Ware ~

‘As my brain is focused on the moment, to achieve my goals I come up with ways of making future pain seem more real now.’

Empower Newsletter – January 2018

‘how to find & hang onto the love of your life’

Have you set the intention for finding the right partner for you?  Not just anybody, somebody who will compliment your life.  I believe that knowing what qualities you want in a partner is a must.  If you are consciously aware of what you want at least you will know what you are actually looking for.

Making a list is a good place to start because you have to think about what qualities you want in a partner.  Make sure the list is specific because you WILL get exactly what you want.  It’s like going to a restaurant and placing this order with the waiter, “I’ll have a meat dish with a side of vegetables,” you’re leaving yourself wide open to being served cow tongue with a side of creamed spinach, and you probably won’t be happy with what you get.

Also make sure your list is full of qualities you do want as opposed to ones you don’t want.  For example if you want a partner that isn’t selfish or a liar you would put considerate and truthful on your list.

Once you have found the love of your life it doesn’t stop there, the next step is to hang on to them.

Relationships take work they don’t just take care of themselves, they require constant effort and need to be worked on every day.

One question you can ask your partner to help keep you on track is ‘How do you know that I love you?’

They may answer, when you do a particular thing like cooking for them or maybe it is telling them how good they are.  It might be when you spend time with them or buy them something, or it could just be that little physical touch of affection when they walk past.

Whatever it is, it’s got to be how they feel loved by you not how you feel loved.  It’s human nature that we would do, say and show people that we love the same way as we feel loved but it doesn’t work that way. How they feel loved is quite often different than what needs to happen to make us feel loved.

Once you’ve established what you can do every day to make your partner feel loved, then you can tell them how you know that they love you!

Actively

1.     engaged in action

2.     being in a state of existence, progress, or motion

3.     involving physical effort and action

4.     having the power of quick motion

Did you know that behavioural-emotional change will encourage your partner to do the same?

1.     Think patterns not people – don’t make it personal. It’s something they do not who they are.

2.     Think how not what.

3.     Be responsible with your emotions. You need to fix your own problems.

4.     Think about problems as bad solutions. Eg “Help me understand why you leave your socks on the floor.”

5.     Think present not past.

6.     Think behaviour not emotion.

7.     Think about what you can do to fix the problem, not what you want the other person to do.

“The starting point of all achievement is desire.”

~ Napoleon Hill ~

‘My actions get me closer to what I ultimately want.’

Empower Newsletter – December 2018

‘things will go wrong’

Sometimes things go wrong in our lives and whilst it is just a part of life our reactions can make all the difference.

It’s just like this saying “Whilst you can’t always control what happens in your life, you can control how you react and then respond to it.”

A good place to start is to ask yourself ‘What do you want the overall outcome to be?’

This is one of the simplest questions we can ask ourselves yet a lot of us don’t know what we want so we just react in the moment without thinking about the big picture.  That is, we only react with no regard for what we ultimately want.

For example your big picture may be that you want a harmonious work or home environment.  Knowing that, if someone was rude to you, how would reacting in the same manner give you your ultimate goal of harmony?

What would get you closer to what you want is by asking yourself questions like: -

How am I going to get that outcome?

What do I need to do, think or say in order to get what I want?

It may be a matter of doing something you don’t want to do or it may be as simple as apologising.

I can hear you saying “why should I apologise or do something I don’t want to do?”  And you are right!

You’ve just got to way up what is more important to you, doing something you don’t want to do short term or ultimately getting what you want long term!

I’m not talking about manipulating people in a way that is deceitful,  it’s more about adjusting your own behaviour to create more fulfilment in your life by getting the outcome you desire.

So next time you find yourself in a situation you are not happy about, remember ‘it’s all about the big picture.’

Do you know what you want?

Reaction

A reaction is instant. It’s driven by the beliefs, biases, and prejudices of the unconscious mind. When you say or do something “without thinking,” that’s the unconscious mind running the show. A reaction is based in the moment and doesn’t take into consideration long term effects of what you do or say. A reaction is survival-oriented and on some level a defence mechanism.

A Hypothetical – Two people go through the same event (a minor traffic accident perhaps). One emerges from his vehicle wielding an iron bar, frothing at the mouth, screaming obscenities and threatening violence, while the other calmly searches for a pen and paper to exchange insurance details. The psycho gets arrested for attempted assault and battery with a weapon, while Mr Calm drives home with a small scratch on his car, kisses his wife and kids and carries on with his happy life.

~ Lifehack.org ~

“Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to it.”

~ Charles R. Swindoll ~

‘My actions get me closer to what I ultimately want.’

Empower Newsletter – November 2018

‘how often you put yourself first’

Most of us know how it feels to put everybody and everything that is happening in our lives first before our own needs are met.  Our partners, kids, friends, family, work and household chores to name just a few, can take up a lot of time and leave our tank feeling empty.

It is also quite common for people to feel stuck, like there doesn’t seem to be a way out.

It could be time or money restraints, or emotions that are causing the feeling of being stuck.  It could even be ‘not knowing’ when you should put yourself first.

So how do you know when to put yourself first?

It could be when you are feeling flat, uninspired or out of sorts.  It could also be when you find yourself saying and doing things that leave you feeling anyway but good.

It is imperative to put yourself first in order to fill your tank.  It could be just a matter of sitting down and asking yourself what you actually want.

It is really common for people to know what they don’t want or like, the trick is to work out what you do want, then deciding when you will do it.  Set a specific day and time.  You may schedule it daily, weekly, monthly or yearly.  There is no right or wrong, it just depends on how often you want to do it in order to keep your tank full.

It could be as simple as meditating, walking, catching up with a friend in person or on the phone, a family outing, researching and registering for that course, creating a budget or making that call to someone who can help you do it, or even ‘having that conversation’ with yourself or someone in your life.

When you do put yourself first there are all sorts of rewards for you and others around you.  Because if you are feeling good, recharged, inspired, happy and revived, people in your life and your loved ones are also reaping the benefits of that.  They are continually getting the best of you.

A good question to ask yourself when you’re not at your best because you are putting yourself last is, “Are you actually being selfish by not taking what you need for yourself?”  Choose you!

Self-care

Self-care means honouring your body, mind and, spirit. Making it a priority to take care of your physical, mental, emotional and spiritual needs. It’s not feeling guilty or selfish for taking time out to recharge your battery and take care of your basic needs.

How to put yourself first?

1. Listen to Yourself

2. Get Started

3. Make Yourself a Priority

4. Learn To Say “No!”

5. Make Time for Yourself to Do What Fuels Your Soul

6. Don’t Let Your Pride Get In the Way

7. Shift Your Perspective

“Putting yourself first doesn’t mean you don’t care about others, it means you’re smart enough to know you can’t help others if you don’t help yourself first.” ~ Unknown author ~

Life becomes beautiful when you learn to be as good to yourself as you are to others.  ~ Unknown author ~

“One of the greatest regrets in life is being what others would want you to be, rather than being yourself.”  ~ Shannon L. Alder ~

‘I choose me.’

Empower Newsletter – October 2018

‘thoughts are the key to action’

Have you ever been in a situation where you felt you couldn’t control yourself? It could have been not having that extra bit of chocolate, or not making it to the gym or maybe it was saying something inappropriate to someone or even doing something you know you shouldn’t do! I’m sure we have all done it at one time or another.

Lacking self-control may happen in some areas of our lives and not in others. We may be really disciplined with our exercise regime or our diet.  Maybe it comes easy to spend quality time with friends and family and generally doing what you’d said you’d do.

Your thoughts are the key to controlling your actions.

By looking at what sort of things you are thinking or saying to yourself in relation to what you currently control, you will notice there is a big difference in your thoughts and self-talk in the things you don’t seem to have the same control in.

For example, you may think it’s important to exercise a few times a week to maintain your health, whereas you may think it doesn’t matter if you have that extra bit of chocolate.  The difference in this scenario is that one thing is thought to be more important than the other.

Some thoughts that make exercising important to us may include, ‘I will feel good after it’ or ‘It will keep me looking good and healthy.’  ‘If I don’t do it, I care that I may stop doing it and then I’ll miss out on the benefits of it.’

Whereas eating the extra bit of chocolate may involve thoughts like, ‘one more won’t hurt me’ or ‘it will taste so nice and make me feel good.’  ‘If I have one it won’t matter, it’s only one.’

So if you control what you think and find a way to place more importance on the things you want to achieve, you will control what you do.  That is, you can better control the outcome.

By applying the same amount of willpower, drive and determination to the things you have trouble controlling you’ll get the same results in the areas you are more disciplined in.

Thoughts

1. The product of mental activity; that which one thinks: a body of thought.

2. A single act or product of thinking; idea or notion: to collect one’s thoughts.

3. The act or process of thinking; mental activity: thought as well as action wearies us.

The human mind does not care about the sort of life you lead. Its focus is your survival.  It’s always looking for the negative. It doesn’t like change, it doesn’t like uncertainty and doesn’t want risk.  Give your mind a chance, and it will make your head a terrible place to be.  So, if you don’t control what goes in, and what goes on in your mind then it will control you and life will just start happening to you.

“Whether you think you can, or you think you can’t–you’re right.” ~ Henry Ford ~

“If you can’t control what you think you can’t control what you do!”  ~ Unknown author ~

“You can control one thing and that is your thoughts.”    ~ Debesis Mridha ~

‘I consciously control my thoughts.’

Empower Newsletter – September 2018

‘healthier equals happier’

I recently read an article where research showed that happier people get sick less often than anxious, hostile or depressed people.

Over three hundred healthy volunteers were assessed for how happy, pleased, and relaxed they were, or how anxious, hostile, and depressed.  Subsequently, they were given nasal drops containing cold rhinoviruses to see who would be more likely to come down with the cold.

One third of the gloomy participants became sick. But only one fifth of happy volunteers were not able to fight the virus off.

It was found that the people in the happy, pleased and relaxed group actually had a higher immune system.

There are many ways to elevate moods and to create happiness.  Exercise can elevate one’s mood by producing endorphins.

Other ways include laughter and music.  And the beauty of these potential benefits is that they come without any risk.

The final way is not commonly related to creating happiness.  It’s achieved by eating healthy food such as lots of fruit and vegetables as it boosts our immune system which has a direct correlation with health and happiness.

In another article, eating fruit and vegetables made the study group feel more content, calmer, happier and more energetic and more positive the following day.

So in other words healthier people are happier and happier people are healthier.

By making changes to increase our positive and relaxed way of being will improve our immune systems and happiness!

Self-regulation

Bouncing back from stressful challenges and knowing that things will eventually look up again; choosing healthy behaviours such as physical activity and eating well, and avoiding risky behaviours.

In modern Western society, we deeply value good health, yet we have created a society and way of living so out of balance that damage to our long-term health is the inevitable result. We rush around and push our bodies beyond their capacities. We ignore our bodies’ messages of pain and fatigue until they turn into more serious medical problems. We seek quick fixes and ways to mask the symptoms so we can keep on going, not losing an ounce of productivity. It seems we have forgotten the wisdom of the ages that good health is not just the absence of disease, but involves healthy lifestyle, healthy mental attitude, and healthy ways of relating to all living beings and nature.

~ psychologytoday.com/us ~

The root of all health is in the brain. The trunk of it is in emotion. The branches and leaves are the body. The flower of health blooms when all parts work together.

~ Kurdish Saying ~

‘I am healthy and happy.’