A Simple Approach To Improve Your Communication

Miscommunication issues commonly arise when we can only see our own perspective and when we make wrong assumptions about the perspectives of others.

I am reminded of an incident years ago during my first couple of years living in the Netherlands when I used to take my daughters to swimming lessons. The cafe in the building formed a waiting area where all parents and children converged and waited in between lessons. One waiter served the entire cafe and everyone complained about how rude and unfriendly he was. I had recently finished my NLP studies and was starting to view the world differently. It was true that the waiter’s behaviour was rude and unfriendly however I was curious to explore beyond the surface impression so I took my focus from him and onto the surroundings.

The environment was that of total chaos. Noisy children running riot and school bags strewed everywhere. I thought to myself that if I had his job I would probably also be grumpy and possibly rude. That shift in perspective affected my behaviour such that when I went to order coffee and snacks I spoke to him from a place of compassion instead of animosity. Before I made my order that day I acknowledged the difficulty he faced regularly in managing such a crowd. His body immediately changed. He softened and agreed that yes it was difficult. He felt seen and heard. His situation was acknowledged. He then sweetly told me to take a seat and, to the astonishment of all the other parents, he brought my order to my table. On many future occasions he even helped my daughters with their Dutch homework which they did while waiting for their swimming lesson. The grumpy waiter was a nice person after all.

The reality is that we have no control over the behaviour of others but we have total control over our own. Often you can have an influence on the behaviour of others by starting with changing your own. Newton’s third law states that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. By changing the action you can ultimately change the reaction. 

I changed my focus and perspective in order to view the world from the waiter’s perspective. That produced a shift in my thinking, feeling and therefore behaviour, which in turn impacted the waiter’s thinking, feeling and therefore his behaviour. Our communication was much improved because it came from a place of compassion, understanding and a wider frame of reference. We were able to really see each other as we were in that moment in time. I could see his viewpoint as a waiter managing a difficult crowd and he could see me as a parent navigating children between home, school and after school activities. We empathised with each other instead of taking out our frustrations on each other. 

Many of my clients tell me about their communication issues. They often feel hurt that they get negative responses when their intentions were positive. They tend to put their focus on blaming others and wanting to change them. In our work together I bring them back to themselves. What can they change in their thinking, feeling and behaviour in order to get a different outcome? How can they change their actions in order to bring out a different reaction? Are they able, for a moment, to embody the other person and view the world from their perspective? That often, on its own, brings positive results.

Of course there are other aspects that influence our communication that are connected with regressing into our past where we use present people and situations to resolve past issues. Transactional Analysis offers many concepts that can help process and resolve those issues. However the simple approach I mention above can on its own bring profound change. 

Please get in touch if you are experiencing communication issues and would like to explore resourceful ways of enhancing your interactions with others.

The Benefits Of Failure

Photo credits: Hicham Boumediane | @hicham_boumediane

Those of you who know me will know that my youngest daughter is a fairly high level athlete. As her mother I have witnessed closely her journey from the start to where she is now. She is hoping to make it to the Olympics. She might… and then again she might not.

I observe on a regular basis the benefits she gains from the many perceived failures and disappointments she encounters. She learns something valuable with every single run and competition that fails to meet the desired targets. I witness that her positive approach to setbacks is what has got her so far in her athletics career. There is a lot to be learnt from children and young people.

To be able to support her I read a lot about the subject of success and failure, of winning and losing, and on fear, which depending on how we manage it, can motivate us or paralyse us. I can tell you that fear of failure has played a big part in my life and in the lives of many clients that I have worked with.

I happen to be reading now a book by Dr. Pippa Grange, a renowned psychologist, called Fear Less.

Dr Grange says that there are many myths surrounding our concept of failure and success: the main one being that losing turns you into a loser. She believes that this is wrong.

She goes on to say this about failure:

“Really you shouldn’t see failure as part of you, but just as giving you a puzzle to solve. Yet that’s not the message most of us absorb. We let failure leave behind a smear on our character, rather than simply being an indicator of our performance on a given day. And that makes us reluctant to show imperfection or vulnerability, in case it’s mistaken for weakness. The truth? Losing is for winners. “

And I say that failures are the path to success. 

I agree with Dr Grange that it is not how we fail or lose that matters but our attitude towards it. 

How do you handle failure? 

My grandmother taught me early on how best to manage my failures. When I came home to her crying and disappointed at failing an exam, she would lovingly comfort me and then ask me a very important question: where do you think you went wrong Rawia? What can you learn from this experience that you can take with you to the next one?

Your willingness to examine closely the failure, see where you went wrong, where you can improve, reassess, re-think and then move forward with this added information is key. If we do this then failing becomes a valuable lesson because it allows us to learn and simply provides us with information about the areas where we need more growth and development. Failing might feel uncomfortable but by perceiving it differently we can reap the benefits.

Dr Grange goes on to say that the best attitude to failure is the one that willingly invites it. 

So how do you willingly invite failure in your personal and professional life?

How about by daring to step out of your comfort zone and do the things you so much desire to do but some old fear or limiting belief has been holding you back. I still remember how terrified I was the day I walked into the chamber of commerce in 2012 to register my coaching practice.

What if I fail? What if I am not good enough?  I felt the fear and did it anyway.

I confess that I have made mistakes and have failed many times on my journey. I am human after all. However through it all I have learnt to face my fears, fully identify them, name them and check which ones are truly mine, and which ones I have inherited from parents and carers and the environment. This has allowed me to do some growing up, and let go of limiting beliefs and decisions around those fears. The result is that I fear less as Dr Grange entitles her book. My failures have been extremely beneficial.

Fear of failure can explain a plethora of human behaviours. It can explain why many avoid public speaking roles and why members of an organisation hesitate to engage in a new scheme or procedure. As a team manager and a coach my experiential understanding of this fear helped me to be more supportive of members in my team and my clients who happen to have a similar experience. I was better equipped to guide them to a place where they felt encouraged to take a chance.

I encourage you to explore your fears and beliefs around failure on your own or with the support of a coach or counsellor. Dare to step out of your comfort zone and do the things that you find most challenging in your personal life or your business.  And let go of the idea of being perfect. Perfectionism is boring. Instead look forward to making mistakes and failing because that is where the most growth and learning occurs. At some point you will succeed. Ultimately in life we win some and lose some. I certainly have not reached the end of the road yet. However I am enjoying every minute of the journey.

My journey to becoming a coach and a counsellor has given me so much more than I had anticipated. It has allowed me to experience the joy of finding myself, expanded my human experience, broadened my frame of reference, and increased my compassion and connection to others. It allowed me to transform pain into power, and poison into medicine as someone in my network once told me. I am very excited about sharing all of this knowledge and experience with others through my work.

As the saying goes “ it’s better to try and fail than fail to try”. Life is so much richer that way. My daughter’s attitude to setbacks constantly reminds me that we live and we learn.  She is always a winner in my eyes whether she makes it to the Olympics or not.

Survival Tips Through Conversations With My daughters

I have a close relationship with my daughters and in this challenging time we make up for this lengthy physical separation through regular group video calls. We have open conversations about what is happening in the world and how it is impacting our personal lives in our various locations. We give each other support and encouragement when one of us feels down. They are a continuous source of inspiration for me as I witness them navigating their lives during this crisis. In my role as a parent, I do what I can to support them drawing from my own life experience and from what I have learnt about human behaviour and change.

My eldest daughter, a science journalist, has been reporting on daily coronavirus news since the pandemic hit Europe in March 2020. While you and I can choose to take time out from the news of the pandemic, she as a reporter ends up facing these scary realities on a regular basis. She was the one who guided us through the sensible yet difficult decision not to meet at Christmas as originally planned. I was so moved by her sense of community and global responsibility in doing the right thing. Under the circumstances, she of course is working from home, away from the physical support of fellow colleagues and mentors.

On the other hand, my youngest was one of the students who did final university exams during the pandemic. Shortly before her graduation, the UK plunged into the March 2020 lockdown. The reality certainly did not meet her expectations of how her bachelors’ degree would come to an end. There was no graduation party or a celebratory conclusion to three years of hard work as is customary. Instead, we had an intimate celebration at home in our garden. Like many in her shoes, she is applying for jobs in an environment that she had not imagined in her wildest dreams. For people like her, staying positive and motivated can sometimes be a struggle. Here you are, armed with your degree, your fresh talents and skills, and your dreams but with nowhere to go. Frustrating! As she is also an elite athlete with a realistic possibility of going to the Olympics, the cancellation in 2020 was a blow. Now she and her fellow athletes are training hard for 2021, which could also face cancellation.

“We must accept finite disappointment, but we must never lose infinite hope.”

– Martin Luther King, Baptist Minister & Activist.

How does one stay motivated in such an environment of uncertainty?
These are the tips that we collectively came up with during the many conversations that keep us motivated and lift our spirits up:

• When job applications do not lead anywhere then keep your thoughts realistic and avoid making hasty decisions about your personal capabilities. Realise that the world is facing an economic crisis that has a huge influence on recruitment and employment. The rejection does not define you. How you respond to the rejection and the lessons you choose to take from it can help shape you.

“Problems are not stop signs, they are guidelines.”

– Robert Schuller, Author & Motivational Speaker.

• Having a purpose is important in staying motivated so set yourself some weekly tasks to help you structure your week and avoid being purposeless. Getting up at a regular time in the day and getting dressed for the work you are planning to do can help with that structure.

“He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how.”

– Friedrich Nietzsche, Philosopher

• Think skills and do some online workshops that teach you something new and different. It can also be something unrelated to your studies like learning how to code, a writing course, or painting, all good for your mental and emotional wellbeing.

• Stay connected with your peers so you realise that you are not alone. Sharing is caring and also a problem aired is a problem shared. This also allows you to offload to each other, exchange tips and ideas, and cheer each other up.

• Plan in some time out and away from your stressful daily job, where you can take walks in nature and disconnect from what is happening in the world for a short while. Choose to do this in your lunch break, especially in the winter months when the light is at its best at midday. Find some quiet, sit in stillness and breathe. Press the pause button on your problems. Everyone deserves a break. This can help to recharge and energise you.

• Start a journal, in which, you can write about your experiences and reflections. Difficult times teach us valuable life lessons that are important to record. Your thoughts and reflections might be an inspiration and motivation for others and you can look back one day and remind yourself of your strength and the challenges you have overcome.

• Last but not least remember that nothing is permanent and this time too shall pass.

“Sooner or later, every last echo fades. Even the loudest thunder in the deepest valley.”

– Brian K. Vaughan, Comic Book & Television Writer.

You Are Not Alone

 When I established my coaching practice nearly 10 years ago, I did not expect fear and anxiety to be the most common issues that my clients would present with. I remember my trainer saying, during one of my NLP certification courses, that, often we end up attracting the clients that experience the very issues that we ourselves have dealt with in our lives. As counsellors and coaches we can only take our clients as far as we have taken ourselves. As someone who has experienced fear and anxiety, I am able to understand and relate to my client’s experience. As someone who has gained understanding on how I create this state of mind and learned how to manage it, I am in a better position to support my clients in understanding and managing their own fears and anxieties. Persistence and patience are key here, as behavioural change is a gradual process.

 “The best way to not feel hopeless is to get up and do something. Don’t wait for good things to happen to you. If you go out and make some good things happen, you will fill the world with hope, you will fill yourself with hope.”
― Barack Obama, former president of the United States

 I have come to realise that the issue of fear and anxiety being so common is really not that surprising because it is the underlying cause of many other problems that clients struggle with. At the heart of low self- confidence is essentially fear of failure; at the core of avoiding relationships is fear of rejection, the act of shying from promotions could be linked to fear of presenting and public speaking; underneath social anxiety is fear of being judged; you please others at the cost of discounting yourself because of fear of being abandoned and hypochondria can be related to fear of death. The list of fears that underlies surface issues is endless. 

 Often fear and anxiety hold a person back from living an authentic and fulfilled life. I am reminded of a couple of clients that I worked with in the past. They both lived with and were held back by their respective fears. One suffered from fear of flying and the other from fear of small confined spaces. At some point an opportunity presented itself to each of them that meant getting on a plane and flying to an exotic location. They had the possibility to do something that they strongly desired and dreamed of but the fear formed a big obstacle in their way. However, their desire to live out the dream finally motivated them and gave them enough leverage to work on their fears and make a change. These were stories with happy endings.

 “Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less.”
— Marie Curie, physicist who conducted pioneering research on radioactivity

 Fear and anxiety can sometimes be so strong and paralysing that the person experiencing them can end up feeling confused and unable to perform simple tasks. One client I am supporting right now during these difficult times told me that they no longer recognise themselves, and so instead of reaching out to others for help, they shy away and isolate themselves, because of shame and embarrassment at letting others see who they have become. This isolation can take a person from being fearful and anxious to experiencing full-scale depression and even becoming suicidal. It can also put a great strain on their relationships. In such situations, conversations with a professional may be necessary and even life-saving.

 “Knowing is not enough. We must apply. Willing is not enough. We must do.”
― Bruce Lee, actor, martial artist and philosopher

 How proactive are you when it comes to your relationship with yourself and your relationships with others? Being proactive is now more important than ever before. Take action and check regularly on family members, friends or neighbours and ask how they are feeling. Do the same for yourself and monitor your thoughts and feelings frequently. Listen to yourself and others with compassion rather than judgment. If you deem it necessary then do reach out to a professional or advise others to take that necessary step. It might seem like a small and insignificant action to you, but it could mean the world to someone who is feeling alone and hopeless. Connection now is more important than ever and it can save lives.

 According to Bessel Van Der Kolk, a world-leading expert on traumatic stress and author of The Body Keeps The Score, being able to feel safe with other people is the single most important factor for maintaining mental health.  He also said that numerous studies of disaster response around the globe have shown that social support is the most powerful protection against becoming overwhelmed by stress and trauma. We are unable now to be there for each other physically, however we can still provide a lot of social support from a distance.

 “How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.” – Anne Frank, a diarist and a victim of the Holocaust

Physical Lockdown Need Not Be Emotional Lockdown

“Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.” -Viktor E. Frankl, neurologist, psychiatrist & a Holocaust survivor

 When I started my learning journey in Transactional Analysis a couple of years ago, as participants in those workshops we were encouraged to take part in a ritual. We started and ended each learning day with a “Check-in” and “Check-out”. This, it turned out, is a practice to teach us to pause and look inward, checking in on how we are really feeling at any given moment in time. We were then given the chance to “name” how we are feeling and process those feelings in a safe and supportive environment. Naturally some participants found it easier than others to engage in this practice. In the beginning I used to dislike this ritual. I viewed it as unnecessary and a waste of learning time. However in time, like the others, I learnt to appreciate and understand its value and importance.

 How are you feeling?

 When was the last time you asked someone this question and meant it? Or vice versa, when were you asked the same question from someone who genuinely wanted to know how you really felt and actively wanted to listen to your answer? The reality is that most of us engage in a meaningless ritual where we ask the question “How are you?” and expect the standard answer of “I’m fine.” We interact and look at each other, but sadly, we rarely take the time to see the person within the person.

 The lockdown is forcing many of us to slow down. Maybe that is not such a bad thing. Perhaps you can use this unexpected available time to pause and look inward. “Check in” on how you are feeling during this unprecedented time. Direct your focus for a while to your inner world instead of the external world and gather some very important information that you might have been missing previously. Check on your emotions, thoughts and feelings. You might then choose to name that feeling and share it with the other members of your household. You might choose to have an honest exchange about how you are each feeling at the moment. Even if you happen to be in lockdown on your own, the internet means that you can still reach out to a family member, a friend, a neighbour or anyone who might be in a vulnerable position and check on how they are feeling right now. Physical distancing does not necessarily mean social distancing as, thankfully, technology provides many possibilities that allow us to connect with others. You still have the possibility to reach out to others, especially if you know that they are alone and in need of support at this difficult time. Reach out, not only to talk, but also to listen without judgement and give each other the time and the compassion that you might not have bestowed on each other when life was fast and furious. Use this physical lockdown in order to free yourself from emotional lockdown.

“Everybody has a home team: It’s the people you call when you get a flat tyre or when something terrible happens. It’s the people who, near or far, know everything that’s wrong with you and love you anyways. These are your people, your middle-of-the-night, no-matter-what people.”
― Shauna Niequist, an author and a blogger.

 Why is it important for us to pay attention to how we feel? Why is it important to understand those feelings and feel comfortable in expressing them? More importantly, how many of us give ourselves permission to actually feel, let alone name those feelings? Instead, we distract ourselves from addressing our emotions and processing our feelings. 

“Emotional sickness is avoiding reality at any cost. Emotional health is facing reality at any cost”.  – M. Scott Peck, psychiatrist and best-selling author.

 Research has shown that emotions affect many aspects of our being. Emotions have an influence on our attention, memory and learning; our decision making process; our relationships; our health and our creativity. The evidence around us is plentiful. So imagine what you stand to lose if you ignore your emotions and deny them room to be expressed. 

“All learning has an emotional base.” – Plato, Greek philosopher

 The truth is that many people struggle with expressing their emotions or finding “feeling words”. A contributing factor could be the way we were brought up and the culture and society we were raised in. Sometimes the reasons relate back to traumatic life experiences that led us to shut down and protect ourselves from further hurt and pain. However keeping our emotions under lock and key can lead to the loss and impairment of all of the life skills that I listed above.

 Psychologically speaking there are four main emotions: Joy, Sadness, Fear and Anger. In some families and cultures, certain emotions are allowed and encouraged while others are frowned upon and discouraged. Sometimes this can be gender specific, “boys don’t cry” or “girls should be nice”.  Certain phrases allude to the prohibition of certain emotions: “Stiff upper lip”, “tough it out”, “Get over it”, “Don’t be so sensitive”, “Time to move on”, “Cry baby”, “don’t be so aggressive”, “Scaredy-cat” and so on. Therefore your life experience could mean that you end up finding it easy to express some emotions and difficult to express others.

 I grew up in a family and culture where expressing fear and sadness was acceptable and plentiful. However when it came to joy and anger the permissions to feel those emotions were different. Do you recall as a child how sometimes you can laugh your self-silly? I remember comments from grown ups shushing us laughing children with superstitious phrases that suggested doom scenarios if we laugh too much. Perhaps it was an attempt to bring order and reduce noise but hearing such comments repeatedly can certainly impact one’s freedom to express joy. Anger was another emotion that was frowned upon in the environment where I grew up. It was viewed as negative, aggressive and certainly unbecoming of a woman. Thankfully with everything that I have learnt and experienced in my adult years I now know that all emotions are important and okay to be expressed within a certain healthy framework. I am now able to express joy without reservation and I am still working on expressing healthy anger, the kind that sets boundaries and protects one from abuse. How were things for you growing up? Were you lucky enough to grow up in an environment that taught you early on the power of facing into, rather than avoiding, difficult emotions? Take a moment to reflect. 

“Emotional agility is a process that allows you to be in the moment, changing or maintaining your behaviours so that you can live in ways that align with your intentions and values. The process isn’t about ignoring difficult emotions and thoughts. It’s about holding those emotions and thoughts loosely, facing them courageously and compassionately, and then moving past them to make big things happen in your life.”– Susan David, Instructor in Psychology at Harvard University.

 Professor Marc Brackett, founder of the Yale Centre for Emotional Intelligence, said, after years of research in this area, that feelings are a source of information and they report what is happening within us in response to the internal and external events we are experiencing. He stresses the importance of being able to - or learning to- access that information and interpret what it’s telling us. This global crisis that we are experiencing right now must be bringing up very strong emotions for many of us and with the absence of the external distractions we are no longer able to avoid these emotions. I invite you instead to face them, name them, be curious about the information that they carry about the things you care about and be creative about how you can find ways to process those emotions and stay grounded.

 Yes we are in physical lockdown but we need not be in emotional lockdown. Stop standing guard at the door to your emotions and give yourself permission to feel. Below is a list of resources in case you want to explore this topic further. You have now the time to make a change.

 Emotional Agility by Susan David

Permission to Feel by Professor Marc Brackett

When Panic Attacks by Dr David Burn 

7 Tips to Stay Calm in this Frantic Time

working from home

We all at some point in our lives probably experienced fear and anxiety. At the moment with what has been happening in our world we are all probably worried, anxious and afraid. Some of us might even be experiencing panic attacks. I thought it might be useful to share a few tips that might help you manage your emotions in order to stay more calm and rational in these difficult and unprecedented times.

 “If you’re always focused on what you can’t control you’re going to feel overwhelmed. You’re going to feel fearful. You’re going to feel frustrated. You’re going to feel stressed. You’ve got to focus on what you can control, not what you can’t control.” -  Tony Robbins, Author, public speaker, life coach.

 1- Cognitive technique

As cognitive theories have explained, our feelings reflect our thoughts. So one way of managing how we feel would be to manage our thoughts. Often fear and anxiety result from distorted and illogical thoughts. At the moment we are constantly interpreting what is happening and this process happens without our awareness. Our thoughts just flow through our minds and create powerful and strong positive or negative emotions. Therefore if you were feeling anxious and afraid at the moment then I would invite you to take a step back and check on the kind of things that you are telling yourself. What kind of thoughts are you engaging in that are leading to your feelings of fear and anxiety? Once you become aware of those thoughts then take each thought one at a time and check on how realistic and true it is. What is the evidence if any that supports it? This will hopefully lead you to separate between neurotic fear and healthy fear. 

 “The greatest weapon against stress is our ability to choose one thought over another. “ -  William James, philosopher & psychologist

 2- Fantasy versus reality

Why is it that some people are more vulnerable to feeling fear and anxiety as compared to others? This relates to your imagination and the fantasies you might be creating that are leading to your fear and panic. One technique that helps bring these fantasies or horror scenarios into your awareness is the “What If” technique. The way it’s done is by starting with a negative thought that you may have and writing it down then you draw an arrow underneath it and ask yourself “what if this were true, what’s the worst thing that can happen?” A new fantasy will pop into your mind. Write it down under the arrow and continue asking yourself the same question and repeat several times until it will lead you to the core fear that is triggering your fears. Knowing your core fear can help you process it and hopefully arrive at a healthier way of managing and thus avoid panic. For example, my daughters are in a different country to me at the moment and my core fear is that one or both of them might get seriously ill and have no one as caring as their mother to look after them. If I stay with this thought it can drive me insane. However, I challenge it with the reality that they are with their partners and friends who are as loving and as caring as myself. This new thought diffuses my fear immediately.

 “To experience peace does not mean that your life is always blissful. It means that you are capable of tapping into a blissful state of mind amidst the normal chaos of a hectic life. “ Jill Bolte Taylor, neuroanatomist, author & public speaker.

 3- Compassion technique

The reality is that most of us are kinder to others than we are to ourselves. This technique invites you to talk to yourself the way you might talk encouragingly and kindly to a family member or a friend who is having anxious, depressive and negative thoughts. Be willing to talk to yourself in the same compassionate way that you use with others.

 “Choose to be optimistic. It feels better. “ - Dalai Lama, spiritual leader.

 4- Virtual community

Stay connected, as physical isolation these days, thanks to technology, does not mean emotional and mental isolation. Use the various means available to you to get in touch online with friends, family, work colleagues and your coach or therapist. There is plenty to choose from: Zoom, Skype, FaceTime, WhatsApp, Messenger, Linkedin, Instagram and so on. Through technology we can be there for each other virtually if not physically and support each other and feel a certain degree of comfort. All my group activities have moved online plus I regularly do a group video call with my daughters and my sisters and feel very happy and comforted after such calls.

 5- Mind your language

If there was ever a time to pay attention to your words then it is now. Your brain is always actively listening so make sure your language is clean so you can re-enforce a positive and enabling attitude at all times. We are constantly engaging in self-talk so bring that internal dialogue into your awareness and choose your words carefully. Some words and phrases will enable you and others will bring you down. Instead of saying “Quarantine is going to drive me crazy”, you can say “Now I will have the opportunity to do the re-organising that I never had time to do before”. We are all forced to slow down. Look at this time as an opportunity to start a new hobby like writing or meditating. Engage in a family activity like sorting and looking at old photos. Be creative and use this time to reflect and perhaps make some important changes in the way you have been living your life.

“ A different language is a different vision of life. “ - Federico Fellini, film director & screenwriter.

 6- Exercise

We know that regular exercise helps release happy hormones so do it daily. You don’t need a gym as you can do fitness anywhere, even indoors. Dancing, skipping, hoola-hooping , yoga or running up the stairs several times. There are many videos again online that can give you creative ideas on how to stay fit indoors so keep on moving.

 7- Humour

Don’t forget to laugh as laughter teaches us something that words can only allude to. When you laugh you stop taking your self so seriously and therefore can see the absurdity of your fears and distorted thinking. Laughter delivers a message of self acceptance as well as acceptance of others. There have been a lot of funny videos and captions being passed around online at this difficult time and some have made me laugh till tears came rolling down my face. Laughter still remains the best medicine!

 “The human race has only one really effective weapon and that is laughter. “ -Mark Twain, writer.

 I hope you find these tips helpful. If you have any other ideas then please share in the comments. Stay safe and calm in this frantic time.

To Volunteer Or Not To Volunteer, That Is The Question.

I joined ACCESS as a volunteer in December 2018. At that time I had recently separated from my partner of 30 years and was going through mediation and divorce proceedings. I also saw my youngest daughter off to University in the UK where her older sister had gone some years before her. In addition, the coaching practice that I had established six years earlier was going through a stagnant period due to the lack of attention I had been giving it. I found myself at a loss as to what to do and where to start. So I did what I always did in the past in such life situations. I started volunteering.

 “The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.” — Mahatma Gandhi, Lawyer & anti colonial nationalist

 Through volunteering at ACCESS, a non-for-profit organisation that offers guidance and support to Internationals arriving in the Netherlands, I instantly found myself thrust into a community of like-minded people. Two days a week, I woke up and had a sense of purpose. This unlocked my brain’s creative channels, which had been blocked from recent negative emotional experiences. A month into my volunteering role I soon discovered that, as a coach, I can join the ACCESS Trainers network which plunged me into yet another community of entrepreneurs who were facing similar challenges to me and willing to exchange skills and support one another.

Seven weeks into my volunteering I moved to The Hague International Centre, which is part of the many expat centres in the country that ACCESS serves. I loved the face-to-face support that we as volunteers were providing there. Furthermore, working alongside the Dutch municipality staff was an added bonus as I was trying to grow and develop my Dutch language skills to a higher level.

 In July of that year, I became Project Manager at THIC. Through networking events I attended via the ACCESS community, such as Rise and Lead, a yearly event to advance women in leadership, I connected with Stephanie Ward, a business and marketing mentor, who was instrumental in supporting me and offering guidance that got my coaching business again off the ground.

 For some people volunteering may conjure negative images of unworthiness and lack of appreciation. On the contrary, I have found that volunteering has huge benefits to my mental and physical wellbeing as well as leading to new and sometimes, unexpected, career opportunities.

 “Volunteers don’t get paid, not because they’re worthless, but because they’re priceless.” – Sherry Anderson, Author

 Before completing the year at ACCESS I moved from a position of wondering what could I do, to a place of feeling involved, productive and content. I had a sense of purpose and a goal. Gratitude plays a huge role in volunteering work. I was grateful for the connections and friends that I made and the networks I became part of, not to mention the personal fulfilment that I felt at playing a part, however small, in an organisation that made a positive contribution to the lives of others.

“Remember that the happiest people are not those getting more, but those giving more.” ― H. Jackson Brown Jr., Author

 Research has revealed that volunteering has many health and social benefits. Belonging to a group and regularly interacting with people can increase your lifespan, strengthen your immune system and fight off depression. Volunteering can also sharpen your mind because you are constantly learning new ways of doing and being. I personally don’t need research to prove to me the benefits of volunteering as I have experienced it first hand on many occasions in my life.

 “You give but little when you give of your possessions.  It is when you give of yourself that you truly give.” – Kahlil Gibran, writer & Philiospher

 My job at ACCESS was not the first time I did volunteer work. My first experience with volunteering was in my early twenties in the UK when I took on a voluntary summer job as part of the work experience demanded by my Pharmacy degree. As I was an overseas student at the time I was not allowed to get a paid job. This volunteer summer job led me to secure a year’s internship that I was required to do after graduation in order to become a member of the pharmaceutical society and thereby practice as a pharmacist in Great Britain. During that internship I developed a great friendship with my mentor whose advice and guidance led me to secure my first paid job as a pharmacist at St Thomas’s hospital in London, where I worked for the next 5 years. That first volunteer job cascaded into a sequence of positive events that were very beneficial to me on a personal and professional level.

 “It’s easy to make a buck.  It’s a lot tougher to make a difference. ” – Tom Brokaw, Journalist

 The next opportunity for volunteering came my way when I was married and a first time mum in Aberdeen in Scotland. I decided to become a stay at home mum and take a career break. Unknown to me I was suffering from postnatal depression and, at the suggestion of a neighbour, I started attending a toddler group where mothers gathered with their children and created together a fun and playful time for the children and an opportunity for stay-at-home parents to bond and be part of a community. Volunteers, who were amongst the parents that attended, ran it. At some point when a volunteer was needed to continue running this group I put my name forward. I realised how helpful the group had been in combating my depression and I wanted to do my part to support other parents who might have been in a similar situation to mine. My daughter and I experienced happy times in the two years that I volunteered there and made lasting friendships.

 “We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.” — Winston Churchill, Politician

 Later on, in Oman, volunteering called again and I became a member of an information centre that was part of the Global Shell Petroleum network, which supported internationals relocating to and from Oman. Through this volunteer work, I learnt new skills and made great friendships, while making the transition of relocating to a new country easier for others.

 When back in the Netherlands, and shortly before I started with ACCESS, another opportunity to volunteer came up. This time it was in a municipal organisation that was set up to help with refugees following the war in Syria. I was one of many who gave some of their free time to supporting refugees with the settling-in process in this new country that was offering them a safe home away from their war-torn country. It was a very humbling experience.

 Should you ever be faced with the question of to volunteer or not to volunteer, I would invite you to consider saying yes.  Perhaps, like me, you might experience health and social benefits as well as developing personally and professionally.

Your Past Could Hold The Key To Unlock Your Future

Many of my clients tell me at some point during our intake session that they don’t want to look back at their past, that they just want to shut the door on the past and never look back. For whatever reason, they have a great fear with regards reflecting on their past. 

 “I just want to move on”, they often say to me.

 However in some situations, just like driving a car, to move forward you need to glance backwards, to make sure that no obstacles are in the way.

 “Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.“

Søren Kierkegaard, Philosopher

 There is no denying that sometimes examining the past can be painful. However, sometimes the issues that we take to a coach, counsellor or therapist can be deep rooted in our past.  Reflecting on the past, as painful as it might be, will most probably be less painful than suppressing it and pretending it’s not there.

 “The past is never where you think you left it.”

Katherine Anne Porter, Writer

 When we want to just shut the door on the past we might be in denial of the suffering that this past is causing us today and maybe by not processing it we may end up carrying that suffering into our future. 

 “We are products of our past, but we don't have to be prisoners of it.”

Rick Warren, Author

 What I usually tell my clients is to have courage and to be brave. To dare to look back at the past, because this time, they will be looking at it from a grounded ‘here and now’ place. They will be looking at it with a new lens and a fresh perspective.

 “Study the past if you would define the future.”

Confucius, Philisopher

 This healthy way of reflecting on the past will allow them to gather knowledge and arm themselves with important lessons from their past.

By shutting the door on the past we are missing out on a wealth of resources that can help us navigate our present and in turn our future.

 “We leave something of ourselves behind when we leave a place; we stay there, even though we go away. And there are things in us that we can find again only by going back there.”

Pascal Mercier, Philosopher

 By looking and learning from our past we can discover how to make the necessary changes so our past doesn’t necessarily equal our future.

 Personally, it’s not the thought of looking at my past that I find scary, rather the idea of walking into my future without the back up knowledge and wisdom from my past.

 “My scars remind me that I did indeed survive my deepest wounds. That in itself is an accomplishment. And they bring to mind something else, too. They remind me that the damage life has inflicted on me has, in many places, left me stronger and more resilient. What hurt me in the past has actually made me better equipped to face the present.”

Steve Goodier, Writer

 I always invite my clients to let go of their fear of the past as it maybe holding them back from making the changes that they desire in their life.  To let go of fear and experience true freedom.

 “Everything has a past; everything; a person, an object, a word; everything. If you don’t know the past, you can’t understand the present and plan properly for the future.”

Chaim Potok, Author

My Story With Self-Esteem

“ No way” said the lady incredulously, “She can’t be your daughter!”

“Yes, she is,” insisted my stepmother, looking a bit uncomfortable.

“Then why is she abdeh and you are not?” retorted the lady smugly.

Abdeh is an Arabic word that literally means a slave. It is the word that ignorantly was and perhaps still is sometimes used to mean black.

These were the kinds of encounters that I repeatedly experienced during my childhood and teenage years in Lebanon in the 1970s. Sometimes instead of my stepmother, it would be one of my half sisters being challenged. It was understandable as I was black and the rest of my family members were white. Without my Ghanaian mother’s presence in my life, strangers outside our family could not figure out the connection.

It is then not really surprising that I grew up feeling like I didn’t belong. I stood out even amongst my own flesh and blood, the only kid with black skin and frizzy hair. My parents divorced when I was a baby and my paternal grandmother, whom I called Teita, brought me up in The Lebanon.

Even when I later moved to live briefly in Ghana for few years, this common scenario still took place as I lived within a Lebanese community. I remember a particular time when Baba, (dad in Arabic), took the whole family swimming at the pool at Tesano Sports Club, just outside Accra. You had to have had membership to use the pool and dad was a member. As always the person at the reception looked at the whole family and spotted me, the odd one out, and pointing at me said to Baba,

“Who is that?”

It was often assumed that I was, perhaps, the maid and it was against club policy to admit maids . Usually Baba would patiently explain that I was his daughter. This question always brought an awkward feeling in everyone, especially me. It was a constant reminder of my difference. On this particular occasion Baba just lost it and screamed at the receptionist for asking such a stupid question. I think dad felt bad at the fact that I had to endure such an inquisition on so many occasions when we went out as a family. But by screaming and attracting more attention he actually made me feel worse. I remember vividly the scene at the entrance to the club with all seven of us standing there patiently. The children looking longingly at the shimmering and inviting blue water of the swimming pool, which was in full view from the reception area. Baba was shouting at the top of his voice and various people entering the club looked at us disapprovingly. I wanted the earth to open and swallow me up.

That is why when I got older I often volunteered the information to save everyone feeling awkward or guilty and pretended in the meantime that it didn’t hurt and that I could handle it. This was a theme that stayed with me for most of my life, pretending not to be hurt by other people’s actions and insensitivities. No one needed to know how I felt inside. I cared more about protecting others from pain than acknowledging my own emotions.

Somehow these experiences made me feel inferior. I was the ugly duckling amongst the swans. I truly believed that I was ugly, that I was beyond hope. So much so that I dared not look in the mirror in public lest I was ridiculed. As there wasn’t much that I could do about my physical appearance in order to blend in, I just accepted it. However I could do something about my mind. I focused on my studies and as a result did very well at school.

The brief time I lived in Ghana at least made me realise that there were a lot of people out there who looked like me. I wasn’t that inferior after all.

I always felt that people looked at me and all they could see was my black skin and frizzy hair. They did not linger enough to discover the girl within. Remember, it was still the 1970s and black identity and pride was still in its infancy.   I don’t know how the child in me coped with that rejection. I just buried those emotions deep in the dark centre of my core and denied them entry into the light at the surface. It was easier that way.

Perhaps that was the reason that I became someone who was eager to please in order to be loved and accepted. I did a lot for others and in the process neglected my own needs. So much so that after sometime I had no idea what my own desires were. Later in life when I read so many psychology and therapy books in order to make sense of my experience, I always found it difficult to answer questions such as “What do you want?” and “What makes you happy?” I had no clue, since I never ever put myself first in any situation.

It was a lot later in my life, at the age of 36, when I was already married and a mother that I began the journey of finding who I truly am.

My story is not unique and there are many young people today who because of gender, sexual orientation, religious beliefs or physical appearance, feel unaccepted or have a sense of not belonging. As children if we repeatedly hear verbalised or non-verbalised messages about ourselves while growing up, we eventually internalise these messages and accept them as the truth. These internalised messages become the pillars on which our self-esteem rests. We start comparing ourselves to others and start doubting ourselves. We start valuing other people’s opinion of ourselves more than our own. In today’s world of social media this becomes 100 times worse.

In his book Emotional First Aid, Guy Winch writes the following: “Having low self-esteem is akin to having a weak emotional immune system: it renders us more vulnerable to many of the psychological injuries we sustain in daily life, such as failure and rejection, Further, people, with low self-esteem are often less happy, more pessimistic, and less motivated than their higher-self-esteem counterparts. They also have much worse moods; they face a greater risk of depression, anxiety, and eating disorders; and they experience their relationships as less fulfilling than people with higher self-esteem do.” Therefore, low self-esteem is one of the reasons for the rise in depression and eating disorders amongst teens and young people today.

Through learning NLP all those years ago, I was introduced to some tools and techniques that slowly helped build up my self-esteem, and as a result I began to feel more confident and assertive. I began to believe in myself and in my abilities. I dare say that NLP unlocked the key to my happiness. In this blog I would like to share what NLP taught me about self-esteem.

Change your beliefs about yourself
Beliefs are really powerful. They can drive you to the heights of success or drag you down to the depths of despair and failure. Your beliefs, especially about yourself, are formed in all kinds of unconscious ways. I believed that I was bad at mental arithmetic because of a comment from a teacher. As a child when you hear such a comment you delete any opportunities you may have had to learn to be good at anything, be it arithmetic, drawing, singing or dancing. After all, you were told that you couldn’t be good at it. Beliefs begin as a tiny seed in your mind and with time you begin to find instances which validate them. Over a period of time the seed grows to become a concrete belief that you live by. In NLP we say that one must choose their beliefs carefully because they have a tendency to become self-fulfilling prophecies. Start questioning those beliefs about yourself. Are they really true? Are they your own beliefs or have others imposed them on you? I find Byron Katie’s four questions quite useful for challenging beliefs:

1. Is it true?

2. Can you absolutely know that it is true?

3. How do you react, what happens, when you believe that thought?

4. Who would you be without the thought?

As a child I was lead to believe that my Afro hair was unsightly. For years I did all kinds of horrible chemical treatments to smooth it out. Now I leave it as God intended and happen to believe that it’s gorgeous!

Stop defining yourself by what others think or say.
Generally, what someone says about you says more of him or her than it says of you. In NLP we say Perception is Projection. The idea of this comes from the psychologist Carl Jung who said that what we perceive is who we are. In other words, people are not so much perceiving the external world as they are projecting what they carry inside out onto the world around them. So those who perceive you to be insecure are projecting their own reality about themselves on you. So what others do and how they act is their choice, just as much as how you perceive their actions is your choice.

Individuals have all the resources they need to achieve their desired outcomes.
In other words, everyone has the potential to change develop and grow. Self-esteem is a habit: through repeated negative experiences we acquire the low-self-esteem habit and if we do not take action we will be stuck in it for the rest of our lives. Instead we can learn a new habit, the high self-esteem habit. This can be achieved by changing our habitual way of thinking. How? First, we must become aware of our internal dialogue and pay attention to our negative self-talk and self put-downs. We can then replace those with more positive internal dialogue and affirmations. Model someone in your circle who has a good sense of self-esteem and observe how they act and get information about the kind of self-talk they engage in. I bet they don’t say phrases like: “I am such a loser!” or “No one cares about me!” and the like. If they can do it so can you.

Celebrate your uniqueness              
As Ellen DeGeneres said, “What makes you different right now, makes you stand out later in life. So you should be proud of being different. Proud of who you are. ″    
 
Through NLP I finally understood, that in order to be loved I need to love myself first; and to be able to bring up children with high self-esteem I need to experience first hand what that feels like. The fairy tale is true. The ugly duckling can indeed change into a beautiful swan.

Develop a Useful Attitude With NLP

In this short blog, I would like to share a Tedx Talk with you. Please watch it. I believe it will be worth your 20 minutes and more.

The reason I feel compelled to share it is because it reminded me of a very basic thing I learnt during my NLP training. One of the first things I learnt about NLP was that it teaches us an attitude of curiosity. By simply being curious when we are faced with difficulties and set backs, we can produce a change in our circumstances and find new solutions and see new possibilities. This talk demonstrates that very well. I hope you find it enjoyable.

What Influences Your Communication?

I first came face to face with Transactional Analysis about 6 years ago at a networking event where Jacqueline van Gent from TA denhaag, gave a short talk about the topic. I remember sitting amongst the audience listening to her talk about ego states and life script and something just clicked into place. What I heard her say made so much sense in my world, and it was there and then that I decided I wanted to learn more about TA.

The opportunity to start learning TA finally came round last October when I attended an Introduction to a TA workshop in Oxford, TA101, given by Rosemary Napper from TA Works. During that long weekend, I started my journey of learning about Eric Berne’s theories relating to human behaviour and became more and more intrigued.

So what is Transactional Analysis (TA)?

Transactional Analysis, like NLP, is a model for understanding human personality, relationships and communication. It was first developed by the late Eric Berne, MD. To put it more simply, Transactional Analysis is a method for studying interactions between human beings.

In his book Games People Play, Eric Berne described a transaction as “A unit of social intercourse. If two or more people encounter each other . . . sooner or later, one of them will speak, or give an indication of acknowledging the presence of the others. This is called transactional stimulus. Another person will then say or do something which is in some way related to the stimulus, and that is called the transactional response.”

Like NLP, which rests on a set of presuppositions, TA rests upon certain philosophical assumptions. These assumptions are:

• People are OK.
  This is the most fundamental assumption of TA. It means that you and I both have worth, value and dignity. I may not like your behaviour but will always accept who you are. Your essence as a human being is OK with me even though your behaviour may not be acceptable to me. This is very similar to the presupposition in NLP which says that you are not your behaviour; you must accept the person even though you may reject their behaviour.

• Everyone has the capacity to think.
  Again, this relates to another NLP presupposition which states that, each person has the resources they need available to them at the time. TA states that it is the responsibility of each of us to decide what we want from life and we will each ultimately live with the consequences of those decisions.

• People decide their own destiny, and these decisions can be changed.
  In other words, if we have been following strategies or acting on decisions that we have taken in the past that no longer serve us then we are not stuck, and we can change those decisions at any moment in our lives. TA, like NLP, believes that people can change. If at some point in our lives we realise that the decisions we made about ourselves in the past no longer represent who we are or what we want from life then we can make some changes. These changes can be achieved by first, gaining insight (referred to as awareness in NLP) and then, taking actions to change those old patterns and adopt new ones. These changes can be real and lasting. In NLP we say that if you are doing something and it’s not yielding the results you want then it’s time to do things differently.

The Ego-State Model

In TA the analysis of transactions relies heavily on the use of the ego-state model. This model is used to help explain how communication takes place – or, sometimes, fails to take place.

Berne defined an ego-state as “a consistent pattern of feeling and experience directly related to a corresponding consistent pattern of behaviour.” In other words an ego-state is a set of related behaviours, thoughts and feelings that make up our personality at a given time. Berne devised this model after treating and observing hundreds of patients during his practice as a psychiatrist in California in the 1950’s.

Berne observed that a person could behave, think and feel in a way that is copied from their parent or parental figures. He referred to this as the Parent ego-state. Alternatively, a person could behave, think and feel as they did during their childhood. He called this the Child ego-state. He identified a third way of acting and that involves behaviours, thoughts and feelings from the here and now and this he called the Adult ego-state. Therefore we can behave from three different ego-states, The Parent, The Adult or The Child. In some literature, the ego-state model is referred to as the PAC model.

Transactional Analysis suggests that we shift between these three distinct ego states during our interactions with others. This shift is influenced by what is going on around us at the time, who we are communicating with and the ego state they happen to be in.

The purpose of using TA is to gain autonomy and to realise our full potential as grown-ups. To gain autonomy we need to update the old strategies and decisions that we made as infants or children and adopt new ones. In NLP, we say “reprogramming” ourselves so we can become the best that we can be. In TA, we say that we need to move out of script.

Needless to say, this introduction was enough to wet my appetite and so I am already booked to do the foundation course in February. Watch this space.

PHOTO CREDITS:
MATUS KOVACOVSKY/UNSPLASH
AARON BIRCH/UNSPLASH

Tagged as: change, Communication, Ego, Interaction, Model, NLP, Personality, Relationships, state,Stimulus, Transactional Analysis

Tips For Revision The NLP Way

1. Find a suitable, quiet and well-lit place to work in. Preferably with enough space to allow movement and where you have a table or desk and chair so you are able to do some writing as well. It is ideal if you have such a space at home but if this is not possible then studying at your local library might be an option.

2. First and foremost draw up a timetable. List the subjects that you have to revise and check the number of days that you have available for revision. Allocate a number of days per subject depending on the subject load and then allocate a certain number of hours per topic per subject. In NLP we call this chunking down, breaking things into bits. This is important because for you to process information it needs to be in chunks of the right size. Here is a great way to diffuse that overwhelming sensation that you have when you are faced with a huge task such as revising for your exams. When a huge task is broken down into smaller chunks, it becomes more manageable and as you work through your timetable you will finish the huge task that seemed to be overwhelming earlier, in no time at all.

3. Set realistic goals especially when you plan your revision timetable. Your revision plan should be something you can stick to daily. Plan in your breaks and meal times. It is important to set realistic and achievable targets each day, which you can tick as you finish. This gives a good feeling and a sense of achievement and propels you on to the next target. Achieving your small targets or set goals is motivating, adds to your confidence and this in turn puts you in a positive state, something that is extremely important in NLP as the next point will outline.

4. Get yourself into a positive state. When you are feeling happy, relaxed and positive, learning becomes easier and more fun. Being in an agitated and anxious state makes learning hard and you are less likely to retain what you have learnt. Using NLP to put yourself in a positive state involves using your senses. One great way is to make a future movie of yourself having passed your exams. Perhaps you are celebrating with your friends. You are both the star and director of this movie. As the director of your movie make any necessary changes to make it more powerful and compelling. Perhaps add colour, sounds and happy noises. Close your eyes and transport yourself to the future: see what you can see, hear what you can hear and feel what you can feel at the end of the successful completion of your exams. Doing this exercise is also great to get your motivation back. It reminds you of your ultimate goal, the goal beyond the goal — the benefits you stand to gain on passing your exams. This can be exciting and energising.

5. Peripheral vision: In life we very much see things in a kind of tunnel vision. We focus on one thing and we tend to ignore everything else around it. To understand this think of when you are watching TV, on your computer or I-pad, or reading a book. You tend to just see the screen or the page and you are totally unaware of what else is happening in the room around you. This kind of vision also goes with an inner tunnel vision where we tend to focus or get fixated on a problem or issue and tend not to notice the other possibilities surrounding it. This can often lead to worry, anxiety and even panic attacks. NLP teaches a technique that helps to expand our vision to the periphery, to what is happening at the edges. This is what we call peripheral vision. This helps to slow down negative internal dialogue, achieve a calm and relaxed state that is more conducive to learning and retaining information. This is how it is done: sit somewhere where there is movement going on around you such as a park or café. Look at a point straight ahead but without focusing. Without moving your eyes to the right or left, become aware of what is happening around you. Take in your full field of vision simultaneously. Soon you’ll start recognising the movements around you. Repeat this exercise regularly in order to improve your peripheral vision.

6. Incorporate your learning style. Take a good look at yourself and determine whether you are you a visual, auditory or kinaesthetic learner? A visual learner needs to see things in order to learn them. An auditory needs to hear it first and a kinaesthetic needs to feel it. If you are visual then it helps to make notes or mind maps using different colour markers. Also putting up posters with information around your room for you to look at is also useful. For the auditory learner, reciting or even recording your own voice so you can play it later might be helpful. For the kinaesthetic learner, writing down notes, which involves using your body, and walking around the room, while you recite, can help. Some people, like my daughters, find it useful to do all three. If you are a morning person then get up early and make the most of the early hours. Alternatively if you are a night person then get up later and work later into the evening hours. In any case make sure to get enough sleep, as this is necessary to integrate what you have learnt. Some people find that it helps to discuss what they have learnt with someone else. Using rhymes or mnemonics can be useful to trigger your memory.

7. Apart from sleep and healthy eating, physical activity is very important. Exercise offers a change of scenery to sitting down all day in your room. The fresh air and oxygen is invigorating. If you are organised and disciplined there is no reason why you can’t keep doing your sporting activities alongside your revision. Factor this in your timetable.
   
   My last tip is directed at parents…

8. Help your child by creating the ideal environment in which they can revise. I personally do not host any guests during my children’s revision and exam times. I feel it is unfair and distracting to have people around when my daughters are working hard and exercising discipline. Give your kids healthy meals, snacks and fresh drinks. It is a time to pamper and not scold. Often students feel extremely stressed and under pressure so I feel that it is important as parents to make sure that our kids feel loved, understood and supported in this overwhelming time. Exercise some tolerance of mood swings. Be there to listen to their worries and help diffuse those worries by showing them a different perspective. Listen to them discussing what they have learnt as it helps them integrate it. And in those moments when they are so tired and overwhelmed, give them a shoulder to cry on and remind them that it is but an exam, not a matter of life or death. Remind them of their earlier successes so you can reinforce their positive belief in their abilities and remind them that they can only do their best and their best is good enough.
   

You Can Do It!

At the moment both of my daughters are sitting various exams. So again our lives are tinged with exam fever. As a parent I can’t help but feel their aspirations, their hopes, their doubts and anxieties, their joys and sometimes their disappointments.

Yesterday my eldest daughter who is in her second year at University did her first paper in the series of her end of year exams. It was a two-hour paper and at 5:30pm I received this Whatsapp from her “Exam did not go well, on my way home”. I could feel her disappointment the instant I read her message.

Of course I called her immediately and listened to what she had to say. My main concern was that her present state does not cause her to make a limiting decision and influence negatively the rest of her exams. It turned out that she did answer four questions as was required but they were not questions relating to her favourite topics, the topics that she learnt well and enjoyed writing about. The good thing is that she stayed calm and relaxed and used her knowledge and common sense to answer those questions that she thought she did not know that well. I told her that she has done her best, we don’t know for sure how the results will be but now it is in the past and she should look forward and focus on what is to come without letting this one experience influence negatively her expectations of the rest. An hour later she sent me another Whatsapp, “I am feeling better. On to the next one.” I was very proud of the fact that she was able to turn her emotional state around and react positively to what she perceived as a negative experience.

What I am trying to say here is that our state of mind has a huge influence on our behaviour and therefore our outcomes. For all those students out there who are undergoing exams at the moment I would like to urge you to use your “seven nations army” to fight any negative thoughts that you might have about your abilities, performance and outcomes. When you feel anxious or panicky, stop for a moment and look inside and notice what your inner thoughts are? What self talk are you engaging in? What pictures and images are you creating in your mind? And ask yourself this, “Are these thoughts and images positive? Do they make me feel good about myself? Do they make me feel empowered?” and if the answer is no then simply, change them.

I say simply because it is that simple. If you have read any of my previous blogs you will know that in NLP we believe that your brain can’t process negative statements and as a result we can end up focusing on the very thing that we do not want.

Therefore if you find that you are saying things to yourself like “Oh God I am going to fail”, you can say instead, “I am going to do my best to succeed” and so your brain focuses on succeed rather than fail and you are more likely to achieve what you ultimately want.

Again the state you are in when you do something influences the outcome. So why not use your brain to put yourself in a positive state when you need it. So take a moment before you enter the exam room and do the following:

Close your eyes and go to a time in your past when you felt happy or empowered, a time when you felt a great sense of achievement and on top of the world. A time when things went exactly as you wanted. Conjure this memory in your mind’s eye and make it as vivid as possible, see what you saw, hear what you heard and feel what you felt. Open your eyes and take that positive feeling and that positive state of mind into the exam room and you stand a better chance to perform well. Provided of course you also did your revision.

These days instead of saying “Good luck!” to my daughters when they are off to do their exams I tell them instead, “Enjoy it!” I say that because I feel that sometimes we tend to forget the joy that comes with learning. Exams are simply one way of monitoring what we have learnt. Being in a positive state is half the battle won. Remember the famous Nike slogan “YOU Can DO IT!”

Do you suffer from anxiety, fear or panic attacks?

Why is it that so many people suffer from anxiety? The majority of my clients come to me to resolve issues directly or indirectly related to fear, anxiety and some times panic attacks. Whether it is worrying about an upcoming presentation or exam, getting on a plane, performing on stage or at an interview, giving birth, dying and leaving a family behind, getting the next promotion, failing to meet Mr Right or like me thinking that harm would befall my children if we were separated for a lengthy period of time, feeling anxious is normal and every one of us has felt anxious or afraid every now and then. It is when the anxiety is so intense and chronic that it cripples you and prevents you from leading a normal life that it becomes a problem that needs to be addressed.

For as far as I can remember, my dad, was an overly anxious man. He worried constantly and was mostly in an agitated state of mind. So  when in turn I suffered from anxiety I didn’t really give it much attention and just thought that it was genetic. I worried about everything and anything and spent sleepless nights tossing and turning in my bed churning all kinds of negative thoughts about future events. I used to envy people around me that looked calm and relaxed and wished that I was born with such a gene.

Then at the age of seventeen something terrible happened. I said goodbye to my cousin, who was also my best friend, as she was going on a holiday to London with her parents the next day. The next morning my cousin was dead. I was in shock. No one had prepared me for such a catastrophe. One-day life was normal; the next day life for me came to a standstill. I found it difficult to make sense of this new reality. So I buried my feelings deep within the crevices of my unconscious mind and somehow found a way to move on.

When I became a parent for the first time, a new kind of anxiety was added to my previous lists of anxieties: separation anxiety. I found the prospect of being separated from my child extremely unbearable. I felt anxious and afraid that something terrible would happen to her and I won’t be present to save her. This anxiety not only affected me personally but also had a great negative impact on our family life and stood in the way of my husband having the chance to naturally bond with his daughter, as I felt terrified leaving her even with him. It was insane! I first assumed that the way I felt was part and parcel of motherhood. However as I listened to other mums I realised that something was seriously wrong with the way I felt and behaved. I needed to do something about this and fast.

I dealt with this fear the way I have dealt with all my other fears and anxieties, I took a plunge. At first I started slowly to do the very thing I feared the most. I allowed my husband to take my child for a stroll in the pram and I stayed home. I allowed my neighbour, who had been offering countless times, to babysit my child while my husband and I went out for a meal one evening. And when my daughter was two I dared to send her to nursery for three mornings a week.  There was one problem with this solution. I suffered immensely in those few hours when I was away from my daughter and didn’t really have any quality time. I wanted to find a way to be comfortable in those situations. I wanted to be anxiety free. The real solution to my problem came much later when I came across NLP.

According to Dr David Burns, there are many forms of anxieties: fears/phobias, performance related anxieties, obsessive-compulsive behaviours, social anxieties and post-traumatic disorders. And there are also many theories and therefore treatments relating to anxieties. Many people prefer taking a pill to get rid of their anxieties. But since anxiety relates to our thoughts about a future event, it makes more sense and perhaps a more lasting and empowering solution if we were to change those thoughts about those upcoming events in order to get rid of our anxieties once and for all. That is exactly what NLP offered me.

Discover your strategy

If you take my case for example, my anxiety came as a result of my having thoughts of all kinds about horrible events that might happen to my daughter while she was away from me. I was extremely creative in this respect and my over active imagination served me well by giving me the most horrific scenarios. I felt that as long as she was with me she would be safe as I would be able to save her. Through NLP I became first and foremost aware of these thoughts and images that I made inside my head. Awareness is the first real step to change. It might seem obvious, but in reality these processes that took place in my brain were very fast and outside my conscious awareness. The process we do in our brain to produce a behaviour is referred to in NLP as a strategy.

This strategy is very common in cases of extreme fear and panic attacks. In most cases the strategy is played so fast in our brain that the only thing we are aware of is the fear or panic, which is the final step in the strategy- the end result. Using NLP the client can discover the strategy that they make in their head to produce the fear.  By discovering the individual steps and sequence in this process, the client is then aided to change it. By changing it, we change the end result. In other words, anxiety, fear or panic disappears. The easiest way to understand this is if you think of it like the recipe for a cake. There are certain ingredients, and they need to be added in a certain sequence to get the perfect cake. If one ingredient is missed or the sequence of steps jumbled, the end result will be different.

The brain doesn’t know the difference between real and imagined thoughts and therefore, my body reacted physiologically to my imagined thoughts as though they were real.  So changing my thought pattern ultimately had an effect on my physiology.

Change your belief

The second thing that I needed to work on was to challenge the validity of my thoughts, the beliefs I had surrounding the issue of what might happen when I am separated from my daughter. Often anxiety results from unrealistic and distorted thoughts or beliefs. And some of my thoughts were certainly just that! This is done by what is referred to as Meta programming. These are simply questions that are designed to challenge your perceptions and beliefs. In his book, When Panic Attacks, Dr. Burns uses what he calls Truth-based techniques to examine the evidence for our negative thoughts. What was the probability that something terrible would happen to my daughter when she was away from me, and was it really true that I am the only person in the world able to protect and save her? Sometimes this work can hint at an underlying root cause or past trauma that might be linked to one’s anxiety. If this is indeed the case then Time Line Therapy can be used to heal such a trauma.

Time Line Therapy

The root cause of my separation anxiety was of course the death of my cousin when I was 17 years of age. I just buried my feelings instead of processing my emotions and making some sense of this tragedy. My traumatic experience made me think of doom and gloom every time a loved one was late, or for some reason didn’t answer their phone. In such a situation I would conjure up in my mind the worst possible disasters, when in reality there could be so many innocent, non-sinister reasons to explain the situation. I believed that I needed to be always prepared for disaster. Fate will not catch me unaware again!

Through Time Line Therapy I was able to mentally travel back in time and view the past with a fresh perspective, learn what I needed to learn to heal and come back to the present with new skills and more empowering coping mechanisms.

NLP simply changed my life. This doesn’t mean that I do not feel anxious. It means that my anxiety is normal, realistic, transient and  appropriate to the situation. It meant I was a more relaxed and calm parent the second time round and when the time came for my eldest daughter to leave home and go to university I was able to cope well with this separation. Although emotional, I was able to let her go and have my mind conjure up all the wonderful and positive experiences awaiting her in the years to come.

Recommended reading: When Panic Attacks by David D. Burns M.D.

Be A Better Parent With NLP

I don’t know about you but when I became a parent for the first time I found myself having to do the most important job in my life without prior training or a manual. I also did not have a role model, as my parents did not raise me. My personal childhood experience made me determined to be the best parent I can be so I read a lot of books about raising children. Some were very useful and some were not. However the thing that had the most profound positive effect on my parenting style was NLP.

NLP is based on a number of presuppositions. These presuppositions are simply assumptions or generalisations about the world. If you were   to practice and adopt these presuppositions, it would help to ease your journey through life.

In this blog I will explain some of these presuppositions in relation to parenting.

The map is not the territory and people respond according to their map of the world

We each perceive the world through our five senses –the external territory. We then take this external phenomenon and make an internal representation of it –the map. This external map we create of the world outside is influenced by what we call filters in NLP. These are our perceptions, our beliefs and values. It follows then that what is outside can never be, the exact same as what we create inside our brain. Furthermore, each person, according to his or her own filters, will create a different map of this same world that we perceive. In other words, we each have our individual map of the world and in order to communicate effectively and easily, it is important to understand the internal reality or the map of the person we are communicating with. In this instance the other person is our child. As a parent it is extremely important that we are able to look at the world through the eyes of our children. See what they are seeing, hear what they are hearing and feel what they are feeling. It is only after meeting them at their own map of the world that we can gently steer them in a different direction if need be.

This presupposition was useful for me when helping my daughter overcome her childhood bedtime fears. Instead of being dismissive, through key NLP questions I was able to view the situation from her position and together we figured out a way that would make those fears go away.

What helps you as a parent to understand your child’s world is, for example, watching their favourite TV programme, listening to their favourite music, laughing with them at the latest viral video on YouTube, and familiarising yourself with the material of their favourite author as these things are big influencers in your child’s world.

You cannot not communicate

 “I see communication as a huge umbrella that covers and affects all that goes on between human beings. Once a human being has arrived on this earth, communication is the largest single factor determining what kinds of relationships she or he makes with others and what happens to each in the world.”                                                                                                                (Virginia Satir)                                                                                                                                                                                     
Virginia Satir, a renowned family therapist, goes on to explain that communication is learned and babies learn all aspects about communication from those people who are in charge of them from birth.

When you interact with your children, be aware that your communication is not only verbal. Actually what you say has a very small impact compared to the tone you use and how you hold your body. The influences in percentage terms are as follows:

Verbal 7%
Tonality 38%
Physiology 55%

Satir also adds that the above three elements are also influenced by our values, our expectations, our knowledge and our past experiences.

So when you communicate with your children be fully present in the moment so that you make sure that you are not sending confusing messages to your child through a mismatch between your words, your tone and your body language. The words “ of course I love you!” through clenched teeth do not convey a loving message. Make sure that you are responding to the present situation and not to something or someone from your past that your child’s actions or words happen to remind you of. Be aware of how your voice sounds and how loud or soft you are speaking. I am often surprised when my husband and children point out to me that I have been shouting. To me it sounds normal but on hearing a recording of my voice once I perfectly understood what they meant.

Another underestimated aspect of communication is that of touching. “Touching is the most telling means of conveying emotional information between two people”, says Virginia Satir. Be aware of how you use your hands to handle your children and that every single touch has a feeling connected with it whether it is a loving caress or an angry slap. What is your touch conveying to your children? Is it love, uncertainty, fear, weakness, excitement or anger?

The meaning of communication is the response it elicits

 The responsibility of communicating with your child lies with you as the parent. So if you say something to your child and he/she seems to misunderstand you, do not blame your child. Just think of a different way you can communicate the same thing until your child understands you. It is so much easier to blame others than to accept responsibility. Accepting responsibility might be painful at first but it is so much more powerful than blame and is conducive to change.

What can help here is finding out what your child’s preferred representational system is and using that system to communicate with him or her.

I remember how on one occasion my husband, whose preferred representational system is auditory digital, was getting frustrated at his failed attempts in explaining a homework assignment to my eldest daughter, whose preferred representational system is visual. I intervened and employed a few visual aids and used visual predicates to explain the very same thing and my daughter got it from the first attempt.

 If what you are doing is not working, do something different

 Take a moment and reflect on how you react when your children misbehave. How do you respond when there is a conflict between you and your child? Is this response appropriate and in proportion to the situation at hand? More importantly is this response working for you? If not then isn’t it time to try something different?

On one occasion my daughter came back from school in a foul mood. She was being quite rude. As a parent I could have done several things. I could have reprimanded her and sent her off to her room for example. What I chose to do was this:

“You obviously have had a bad day and you could do with a hug.” I said to my daughter as I embraced her very tightly and gave her a kiss.

I could feel her tension instantly leave her body. We then sat and talked about what happened at school to put her in such a foul mood. At the end of our chat she spontaneously apologized for taking it out on me.

Sometimes doing the unexpected gives an element of surprise and in turn can bring unexpected positive reactions. It can lead to what is called a pattern interrupt in NLP. One story comes to mind that illustrates this technique and that is of a mother who reacted to her two year old lying on the floor and throwing a tantrum by doing the same. The child was so surprised by her mum’s reaction that she stopped dead in her tracks! For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. If you want to change your child’s behaviour, start by changing your own actions and their reactions will change in response to your changed actions.

You can learn to do things differently no matter how long things have been going in the wrong direction.

Every behaviour, has a positive intent

 This is a challenging presupposition as many people find it difficult to understand why some individuals often behave in a bizarre or destructive way. In NLP we believe that underlying every behaviour, is a positive intention. This applies even to seemingly bad or non-productive behaviours. What is important here is to uncover the positive intent, the purpose, of this behaviour, as there is always a reason. Once the purpose is established we can teach or help the person, our child in this instance, find healthier and more ecological ways to satisfy his/her intention.

Children do what they do to get your attention and getting a parent’s attention for a negative behaviour is better than getting no attention at all. As a parent, think how you can give your children that attention without the need for unacceptable behaviour. So the next time you catch your teenage child smoking or drinking, take time and understand your child’s intention behind this behaviour and see if together you can come with a number of other, healthier, behaviours that can satisfy this same intention.

This also applies when we examine our parenting behaviours. As parents we all have the best intentions towards our children. However, we sometimes get it wrong. So by being creative we can think of other healthier behaviours that can bring about what we originally intended to bring in our children. We all want to bring up confident children with high self-esteem, yet sometimes the manner we use to discipline our children can cause damage to their self worth. What helps here is to keep the end outcome in mind especially when you are punishing your child for unacceptable behaviour. Think what specifically you want your child to learn or pay attention to when disciplining them and check whether that specific form of discipline achieves the outcome you have in mind. For example slapping your son for hitting his sister does not teach him that physical violence is unacceptable because you are committing the very thing you’re telling him not to do.

People are much more than their behaviour

 This presupposition tends to make us separate the behaviour from the person. You are not your behaviour. Here you tend to accept the person but not their behaviour. So instead of telling your screaming child “you are a naughty boy”, you say instead “ I love you but I don’t like the way you are behaving right now”.

This is best explained by quoting a response that Martin Luther King gave to a journalist on how to deal with racists.  He said,

“I’m talking about a type of love which will cause you to love the person who does the evil deed while hating the deed that the person does.”

Children or people in general sometimes behave badly because they find themselves in an environment that stops them from being the best they can be. Change the environment and you change the person.  This is explained further in this next presupposition.

We have the resources within us to achieve what we want

 Every one of us has the potential to develop and grow. This presupposition asserts that you, as a parent, and your child can bring about change or achieve your outcomes by using the rich pool of skills and inner resources you already have inside you. What you need to do first is, identify those skills and seek them out from other areas of your life and then apply them to your parenting situation. For example, if you are faced with a problem at work, how do you go about solving it? What skills and resources do you use? Can any of these be applied in your home situation, to solve a problem you have with your child?

When I am faced with a problem I research it. I read a lot of books about the subject and talk to experts or other people in my situation and see how they have resolved it. I don’t tend to give up until I find a solution because I deeply believe that every problem has a solution. I adopted these same skills in my parenting style. I never ever give up on my child. We go on working together until we find a solution.

Virginia Satir suggests that if you as parents discover that something is going wrong in your family, then treat this as you would when a red light in your car indicates that something isn’t working right. Stop, investigate, share your observations, and see what can be done. If you can’t change it, find someone you can trust who can.

 There is no failure only feedback

 Remember that as a parent you are human and humans make mistakes. When things go wrong, recognise that, learn from the mistake and see what you can do differently next time. Forgive yourself and try again. Keep on trying until getting it right becomes second nature. Listen to your children and use their comments as feedback. It is amazing what you can learn about yourself from the mouths of your own children.

As Virginia Satir outlines in her book The New People Making, we as parents are in the business of “peoplemaking” and for this business to be successful we must follow this pattern that she writes about in her introduction. A pattern she saw absent in troubled families but evident in untroubled and nurturing families. These patterns are:

-Self Worth is high
-Communication is direct, clear, specific and honest
-Rules are flexible, human, appropriate, and subject to change
-The link to society is open and hopeful, and is based on choice

Fear Of Flying

Are you afraid to fly? I certainly was. I don’t quite remember at what age I developed this fear of flying but I did notice that it got progressively worse after having children.

Becoming a mother made me think more about this fear as I didn’t want any of my children to inherit my fear of flying or anything else that might hold them back from living life to the full.

Although I am able to manage this fear while on a plane journey, it did influence my choice of destination when we were planning our family holidays. Any destination that would involve a long flight was out of the question. The only long flights that I have taken were those of the necessary kind like a new work posting, a wedding or visiting a sick loved one. I often envied people who always said that the best part of the journey for them was the time they spent on a plane.

“It is so exciting!” they would say to me, “Don’t you think so?”

“Definitely not!” would come my shocked answer.

I always thought that there isn’t much I could do about this fear until I learnt about NLP. NLP has made it possible for me to be able to have a reasonably relaxed plane journey, to stop fretting and worrying weeks before the upcoming journey and to be comfortable with the fact that I have techniques at my disposal that will instantly calm my nerves should I experience any signs of panic.

The interesting thing about fear is that it is quite personal. What I mean by that is this:

Not everyone who is afraid of flying experiences this fear in the same way. This becomes evident when we use NLP questions designed to get to the root of the fear.

For example, the root of my fear of flying was linked to a fear of heights. The awareness that I am suspended in mid air, thousands of kilometres above ground, was extremely unnerving. Even a simple NLP technique that involved replacing this negative image that I held in my minds’ eye was enough to make me instantly calmer. It is really the thought here that counts.

For some people, like my sister, the underlying fear is being in small closed spaces where, it is not possible for them to get out at will. They feel the same way in a lift as in a plane.

Some individuals become afraid of flying following a negative experience while on a plane. A client of mine developed fear of flying after she heard the news about 9/11 while flying back home from a holiday in Turkey. That was when she experienced her first fear. Since then her fear got so much worse that she needed tranquilizers before she could board a plane. In this case playing around with the submodalities of the images she created in her head in relation to flying was helpful.

Another client I worked with experienced fear of flying for a completely different reason. His had trust issues. He had a problem with placing his life in the hands of a complete stranger, the pilot.

“Are you afraid of riding on the train?” I remember asking him.

“No” came his quick response.

“Is that because you are friends with the train driver?”

“No, he is a complete stranger to me.” my client said.

“So you are trusting your life in the hands of a complete stranger!” I said with an element of surprise, “why not on a plane?”

“Wow! You are absolutely right!” he said with a smile. “I never realised that I indeed have been trusting strangers with my life on a regular basis and am still alive and well.”

This simple belief change was enough for my client to get rid of his fear of flying, just like replacing the picture in my head of a plane suspended in mid air with that of my living room, was enough for me to fly comfortably and without fear.

What are the reasons underlying your fear of flying? What thoughts, pictures, sounds or feelings do you associate with this fear? Did you  ever stop to consider those? You might find a clue that will help you get rid of this fear or at least control it instead of being controlled by it.

Have a pleasant flight!

Recommended reading: The Easy Way to Enjoy Flying by Allen Carr

Write Your Way to a Happier and Healthier You

I was one of the candidates who took Jo Parfitt’s “The Naked Writer” course in October 2012. The course was made of six two and half hour sessions where we learn how to write from a place of pain. Incidentally, or perhaps this was orchestrated by my unconscious mind, two weeks prior to the start of the course I saw my eldest daughter through her move to the University in London. The experience of having to let go of a child to the care of the universe knocked me out of balance. I came back home and discovered that my mental/spiritual/emotional system was paralysed. I was able to carry out the basics but nothing more. My creative mind was at a standstill and I felt like an engine that had suddenly ran out of fuel, and no matter how many times I turned on the ignition, I couldn’t get it functioning again.

On my first session at “The Naked Writer”, I was raw with emotion. There was about 10 or 12 of us who made it to the first session. As fate would have it, Jo shared a poem she had written as part of her introduction to what it really means to write nakedly, from a place of pain. The poem was to do with how she felt when her son left home and went away to University. On hearing it I was so overcome with emotion that I had to rush to the powder room and compose myself. Since my experience was still so fresh, Jo suggested I write about this very thing that hurts as my homework for the next session. So I did. It was not easy and I started and stopped on many occasions, as sobbing sometimes made it impossible for me to continue writing. Somehow I persisted and finally I was able to finish my piece just in time to share with the class on our next session. Then something interesting happened. I turned the ignition on my life and I was able to function again! I felt peaceful and re-charged after being able to write about my experience. I was healed. This was the second time that I feel a sudden surge of energy and a feeling of peace within me after writing about a painful experience. It got me thinking about writing as a tool for healing, and how that tool is applied within NLP.

In NLP the first task we assign clients is ask that they write a personal history related to their issue at hand. We ask clients to write anything and everything that comes to mind in relation to their problem and when done to look at what they had written and see if they can see any patterns there. It is amazing how this exercise already makes a huge difference on the mental and emotional states of the clients, and how certain things they did not see before suddenly come to their awareness. In other words writing their personal history becomes the first step towards the positive change they are seeking — the first step towards healing.

Again, In NLP, we encourage clients to write down their goals. It has been proven time and again that you are more likely to achieve your goal if you have it written down.

Some lines of therapy suggest writing a letter in which you put down experiences or words that for one reason or another you weren’t able to say. In “Letters Never Sent”, Ruth Van Reken did just that, and she did admit to the fact that writing the book was extremely healing.

Niamh Ni Bhroin is another example of someone who experienced healing as a result of writing “The Singing Warrior” which tells her life story.

‘When people are given the opportunity to write about emotional upheavals, they often experience improved health” says Dr James Pennbaker of the University of Texas at Austin.

Dr Pennebaker has conducted studies for 20 years about the effect of writing as a healing tool. He gave people assignments to do with writing about an emotional upheaval in their lives for 15-20 minutes a day for 4 consecutive days. Those that did experienced positive changes such as a strengthened immune system, improved grades or even a total life change.

Mr Ron Capps, a war veteran used writing to make sense of his ten-year war experiences and used it to heal himself from PTSD. He was so inspired that he used what he learnt to help others by starting The Veterans Writing Project to help other Veterans transition into civilian life.

In order to write as a form of self-healing, grammar and punctuation is not important. What is important is using words that truly express your emotions.

Here are some tips on how to write to heal:    

• Set a time daily where you can have 20 minutes in which to write uninterruptedly.

• Practice free writing, writing anything that comes to mind regardless of the grammar or sentence structure.

• Sometimes sharing can help in the process of healing. Share your writing with a trusted person or persons. Your writing can help inspire and heal others.

• If, however, you do not want to share then perhaps take your piece of writing and burn it and scatter the ashes in nature during a forest or beach walk as a final step to healing.

So why not start now? Pick up a pen and write your way into a happier and healthier you.

Recommended reading: Writing to Heal by James W. Pennebaker, PH.D.

8 steps to ensure that your New Year's goal is achievable

It is January, the time of year when the partying is over and reality hits. Most people will be reflecting on the past year and planning on the year ahead. It is a time when people make resolutions and set goals and outcomes. Some goals will be achieved easily, others will be more challenging and some will be almost impossible. NLP offers you 8 steps that increase the likelihood of achieving your goals.
Here they are:

1. State the outcome in positive terms

This is simply to focus on what you do want rather than on what you don’t want. As I explained in earlier blogs, the brain cannot process the negatives. Therefore if you were to express your goal by saying, “ I don’t want to smoke anymore”, your mind will have to focus on smoking first before processing what not smoking is. In other words you end up focusing on the very thing you don’t want to happen and that is not your intention. Stated positively, this goal would be “I want to stop smoking”, “I want to spend more time with my children” or “I want to lead a healthier lifestyle”.
The question to ask is:

• What do you want? Or, what would you rather have?

2. Ensure the outcome is within your control

If your goal depends on the actions of other people then it is unlikely to be achievable in NLP terms. For example, “I want my son to get top grades in his final exams” is not totally within your control as it depends on the actions of your son. Alternatively the outcome,
“ I will do everything I can to support my son in getting top grades in his final exams” is within your control as it relates to your actions of say creating a peaceful environment at home that is conducive to studying.
To make sure that your outcome is within your control ask yourself these questions:

•  Am I doing this for myself or someone else?

• Does the outcome rely solely on me?

3. Be specific and define the evidence procedure

 In NLP, by specific we mean to be sensory specific – what can be seen heard or felt. Most people state their goal vaguely. For example “I want to be rich”. To get more specific in NLP we should ask the following question: “What do you mean by rich?” Rich in money, friends or knowledge?” How rich do you want to be?”  Answering these questions provides more detail, leading to a vivid and realistic goal.
When I see clients for the first time and they reveal to me the outcome they want to achieve from the sessions, I usually ask them the following:

•  How will you know when you have achieved your goal? What will you see, hear and feel when you get it?”

This helps the client to define his/her evidence procedure in a sensory-based manner. The more specific details we can provide the more likely it is that we will get what we want.

4. Make sure it is appropriately contextualized

 The question to ask here is:

•  Where, when, how and with whom do you want to achieve your outcome?

This is to check for the existence of conflict. For example, “I want to spend more time with my family” might mean less time at work. Are you fine with that? Maybe some boundaries need to be established for the outcome to be achievable.

5. Have access to resources

 The main aim in NLP is to support people in moving from their “current state” to their “desired state”. So the question is “Where are you now in relation to your goal and what resources do you need to achieve it?” Resources can be internal such as skills or knowledge, or external such as money or contacts. The questions to ask are:

• What resources do I have now?

• What resources do I need to acquire?

• Have I done something similar to this before?

• Do I know someone who has?

• What happens if I act as if I have the resources?

The last question helps to shift any beliefs that maybe holding you back.

6. Ensure the outcome preserves existing benefits

 This step ensures that the outcome once achieved is long lasting. For example if getting that promotion means less time with your children, an existing benefit that will be lost, might mean losing your motivation in the long term. In NLP such benefits are referred to as “secondary gains”. Ask yourself this:

•  What will I lose if I attain my outcome?

7. Check the outcome is ecological

 This is to check on the consequences achieving your goal would have on the environment around you.  Do you want this outcome no matter what? The four NLP questions to ask yourself here are:

•  What will happen if you achieve this outcome?

• What won’t happen if you achieve this outcome?

• What will happen if you don’t achieve this outcome?

• What won’t happen if you don’t achieve this outcome?

8. Define the first step

“A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step”
Lao-Tzu, an ancient Taoist philosopher

That is a saying worth remembering as change is not always dramatic but more of a slow progress towards what you want. The question to ask is:

•  What action can you take today that can get you nearer to achieving your outcome?

Breaking down your plan into achievable steps is necessary for the achievement of your goal. Some people find it easier to start with the final step, which is their goal, and work their way backward. If your outcome is to start your own business then maybe your first step is to sit down and write a business plan. Defining that first step is a final and important part towards achieving your outcome.

Recommended reading: What’s Stopping You? by Robert Kelsey

The Power of Beliefs

I woke up with a jolt. It was 7am on the 16th of August. The A level results are out. I knew that my daughter was probably already up trying to access her results online. I got out of bed and went looking for her. As I rounded the corner into the living room and heard her sigh I wondered for one split second whether it was a sigh of joy and relief or disappointment. I got my answer almost immediately as she turned her head round from the computer screen  and said to me, “ Two A* and an A!”

“Well done darling!” I exclaimed. “What did you get in chemistry?” I then asked.

“A*”, she said as she laughed knowingly.

My interest in her chemistry grade was related to something that happened seven weeks ago when my daughter was deep in the middle of her exams. Two days before her chemistry exam she broke down in tears and was in a kind of panic. On questioning her she told me that she believes she won’t be able to get the A grade she was aiming for in Chemistry.

I was really surprised that my daughter had such doubts. Her grades had always been excellent and her teachers had every confidence in her capabilities. I believed that she was more than capable of getting the grade that she was aiming for. However what I believed didn’t matter, as I wasn’t the one sitting the exam. It was what my daughter believed that was going to have a huge influence on her outcome. It was time to find out what was really holding her back from achieving what she wanted.

After using NLP type questions and techniques we finally arrived at the root cause of her problem.

“ I am not really smart and chemistry is the most difficult scientific subject. A high percentage of people fail it. I don’t know what I was thinking! How could I have, remotely, entertained the idea that I could get an A in such a subject!” my daughter finally blurted out.

“What makes you think that you are not smart?” I asked her eventually.

“Well…its because I always need to work hard to achieve good grades. Smart people don’t need to work hard.”

“Really?” I said. “Do you happen to know a smart person whom you look up to and admire?” I added.

“Yes”, she said after thinking for moment. “My dad”

“Right, apart from being smart, does your dad work very hard as well to achieve his excellent results?” I asked

My daughter took a few minutes to evaluate this question. I could see a change in her physiology. Her face became flushed and a smile slowly spread across her teary face.

“Oh my God! Dad works extremely hard! I was totally wrong. Smart people also need to work hard to get excellent results. What was I thinking?”

“In light of this, what do you believe about your chemistry exam now?” I asked

“ I can totally ace it!” she said confidently.

And she did.

What we believe has a huge impact on our mental state, behaviour and therefore our achievements and outcomes. What we believe to be true is unique to each and every one of us. What I believe to be true might be different from what you believe to be true. By beliefs I mean our perception at a deep, often unconscious, level. Beliefs operate out of conscious awareness, and we’re not aware of the degree to which they guide our behaviour and together with our values shape our personality and define our identity.

Some of the beliefs we have can be empowering, but many are limiting and so hold us back from doing what we want and achieving our goals. Beliefs are learnt and so they can be changed if they are working against what we want. Some beliefs change naturally with time – you no longer believe that Father Christmas is real.

One of the reasons that we don’t realise our beliefs are illogical is that they’re largely self-fulfilling. In some cases we act in such a way as to validate what we believe. That’s true whether it’s a positive or negative belief. The life we create and the experiences we have are determined to a significant degree by what we believe. When we believe we can’t do something, our behaviour will be such that we fail, perhaps by not trying hard enough or by sabotaging ourselves in some way.

Take as evidence the Placebo Effect. Placebos are pills that contain sugar or starch and no active ingredients. Research has shown time and time again that a significant proportion of patients who are given placebos and believe them to be therapeutic actually get well. Other similar studies show that our beliefs can determine the way things turn out. Our beliefs are not mere thoughts, they’re instructions. Believing something sends a psycho-neurological message through your entire mind/body system that seeks to make it happen.

NLP offers a set of tools and techniques that help you discover, understand and, if you so wish, work on your beliefs to ensure that they support you. 

So what is stopping you from getting what you want in life? Could the answer lie in your beliefs?

Recommended Reading: Beliefs: Pathways to Health and Wellbeing by Robert Dilts

Discovering The Root Cause

Twelve years ago, I was sitting on the steps leading to the conference room that was being used for our NLP, Time Line Therapy and Hypnosis practitioner course. We were having a morning break after having had a lecture on Time Line Therapy and discovering the root cause of present behavioural problems. I was drinking a much needed cup of coffee and pondering what I had just learnt.

For as long as I could remember I suffered from low self- esteem, fear of failure and a sense that I didn’t have what it takes to succeed. This was despite the fact that the evidence in my life pointed to the contrary. So what was the root cause of this problem? Just like that and without warning a memory was presented to me that had the very answer I was looking for.

It was early morning and I had just been woken up by a noise in the bedroom, a room I shared with two of my cousins. It was my aunt waking us up to get ready for nursery school. I sat up bolt upright, flung the bed covers off and looked down at my bed. I was instantly filled with dread as I realised that I had wet my bed yet again. At the same time my aunt could sniff the faint smell of stale urine and so looked at my face, filled with guilt and said:

 “You did it again, didn’t you? Shame, shame on you!” she shouted disapprovingly.

 My cousins threw pitiful glances in my direction. I felt so worthless, so ashamed. I have failed once again in the simple task of keeping my bed dry during the night. My cousins who were younger than me could do it. Why can’t I? I haven’t got what it takes to succeed.

 I came back to the room and was astounded. So that was it. That was the answer.

And so it happened that an incident in the first five years of my life has led me to make a limiting decision that influenced my thoughts and actions in adult life.

Becoming aware of the root cause of my present behaviour and using Time Line Therapy to remove my limiting decision was the start for me to regain my self-esteem, to let go of my fear of failure and be able to see that I had all the resources I needed to succeed.

Wouldn’t be great if you could also discover the root cause of what is holding you back from achieving what you want in life?

Time Line Therapy helps you do just that.

Why go back to the root cause?

 Depending on our experiences we sometimes make decisions early in life as a way of coping or surviving with the existing situation.

“Often, decisions that are made early in childhood persist into adulthood, long after they have become obsolete, and interfere with our relationships and our happiness”, says Chloe Madanes, an internationally regarded innovator in family therapy.

In other words, decisions that were made in the past offer some sort of protection and serve as a kind of coping mechanism in difficult circumstances but then later in life when that situation is no longer present they, at an unconscious level, become limiting and stop us from achieving what we desire in life. . Therefore decisions such as “I’m not good enough,” or “I can’t get things right,” or in my case “I don’t have what it takes to succeed,” create false limitations and hamper your ability to create reachable and attainable goals and outcomes.

Becoming aware of what leads us to make such a decision is the first step towards change.

So what is Time Line Therapy®?

 Time Line Therapy®, developed by Tad James, is a specific process designed to trace a particular negative feeling, belief or limiting decision back to the first time in memory that it can be found. 

The theory behind this is that problems in the present day are likely to have their roots in the past.  So, what is bothering us now is not what is happening now but what it has, at an unconscious level, reminded us of from the past.

Time Line Therapy® allows us to go back to the very root cause of a problem and resolve the problem at that point in time. This process allows you to gain emotional balance in your life and brings to your awareness choices that you were unable to access previously.

Recommended reading:
Relationship Breakthrough by Cloe Madanes
Time Line Therapy by Tad James & Wyatt Woodsmall