Personal development and coaching for real people

The Simplest Way to Change your Life for the Better

by Marion

The simplest way to change your life or to make changes in your life, career or business is to change how you think about uncertainty.

This is probably not the answer you thought that I was going to give you – but stick with me.

Give me the answer to the following two questions:-

1. If you could wake up tomorrow and know that anything was possible, what one thing would you change about your life?

2. What would need to happen for you to make that change?

I might not know your answer to question number one but I can have a very good guess at the answer to question two.

Person X (boss, colleague or co worker, family member) needs to change.

I would need more confidence.

I would need to be out of debt.

I would need to be younger.

I would need to have more experience.

I would need to be in a good relationship

I would need to know that I could do it – that it would work out.

Have I guessed any of your answers yet? I could go on because I have heard so many of the reasons why we don’t make the changes in our lives that we would really love to.

The truth is we are all frightened of something, be it looking stupid, getting hurt, making a mistake or disappointing someone. But all of these fears could be wrapped up into one major all encompassing fear – we are afraid that we can’t handle what life may throw at us.

Not only that but in our attempt to protect ourselves from the dangers we believe lurk in the unknown world outside of our comfort zone we are actually feeding that fear and keeping it in place. So we don’t change our lives for the better.

In our comfort zone we may be bored, frustrated, broke and severely unhappy but in our minds we feel that we know where we are and we know that we can handle our lives. We feel we have some guarantees some certainty.

Stay here – it isn’t great but at least we are in control.

We are not in control and deep down we know it! We are trapped. We are held in place by the gatekeeper of the comfort zone. Who is the gatekeeper of the comfort zone?

Fear is the gatekeeper of the comfort zone

Rhonda Britten

Many years ago I suffered very badly from panic attacks. They can be terrifying and debilitating. If I was shopping I needed to get out of the shop as [click to continue…]

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Give a dog a bad name – What’s on your label?

by Marion

in Life Strategies

It is not only your own beliefs about yourself that hold you back. Sometimes the limiting beliefs that others have about you can be just as damaging.

“I am the worst behaved boy in the whole class”. That is how Sam (not his real name) introduced himself to me on the first day I helped out with a local primary school vegetable gardening club.

Over the following weeks Sam lived up to his title. He did exactly the opposite of everything he was asked to do and he was always in trouble – with staff and with the other children. If there was a raised voice you could guarantee that it was directed at Sam.

Then one day, as the class teacher automatically told Sam off, I realised that Sam had not been at fault – he had been at the other side of the classroom.

That day I saw something I had never noticed before – I saw pain, frustration and helplessness in that little boy’s eyes.

Over the next few weeks I watched the same thing happen – when there was trouble Sam was automatically blamed for it. Other children would disown their actions and blame Sam too.

It was almost the end of term and children were in the gardening area. There were lots of high spirits and mischief was a foot. Sam had been working with me and saw the opportunity to join in with the others.

I turned to him and said “You know the times when you get the blame for things that you haven’t done?” [click to continue…]

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The Cherry on the Top

by Marion

in Team Talk

You may have noticed that I am displaying with much pride a Cherry on the Top blog award which was bestowed on me by Raul Ojeda

There are 5 rules for the recipient of this award to follow!

Rule 1 – Answer the following question

If you had the chance to go back and change one thing in your life, would you and what would it be?

I know the answer to this question only too well as it is the biggest regret I have in life. I would go back in time and know that to accept is more important than to understand. I would realise earlier that sometimes you simply require to accept a person’s view in life even though you feel that they should support and agree with you.

I wasted too many years being angry and disappointed with someone, who came from a different world, because that person could not accept choices that I had made. I could not understand why he could not share my happiness. If I had been more compassionate I would have realised that he just did not have the ability to. It didn’t mean he didn’t love me – it just meant that he was being true to himself.

The morning he died I heard this song on the car radio – Send in the Clowns [click to continue…]

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How to be assertive confidently

by Marion

in Life Skills

I hate the word assertive and I believe that I am not alone. Many people want to know how to be assertive but they struggle to see how they could pull it off.

Assertiveness is one of the first steps to gaining confidence, possibly because when you are assertive your self esteem gets a boost. The higher your self esteem the easier it is to boost your confidence. Unfortunately you may feel that you need a lot of confidence to be assertive.

I know that there are many misconceptions about assertiveness. It is not about stamping your foot on the ground demanding your own way. It is not selfish or bad to be assertive – it is honest to be assertive.

On a scale of emotions and behavior assertiveness lies between the extremes of aggressive – where you get angry and lose your temper and passive behavior- where you put other people before yourself and try to do things for a “quiet life”.

However the word assertive still brings fear to my heart. Assertiveness conjures up pictures in my mind of a fearsome woman standing sternly demanding to be heard. It conjures up pictures of a woman who is most definitely not me. For many people being assertive is a step too far.

Assertiveness is often described as the art of saying no and frankly I don’t want to spend my life saying no.

On the other hand I don’t want to be walked over, put down or taken for granted. I hate the feeling I get inside when I know I have done something to maintain the “quiet life” or I have allowed myself to be manipulated.

It strange though that in some circumstances we are quite comfortable about being assertive. My friend Rhonda has absolutely no problems taking even slightly defective items back to shops or asking for a discount on a dress that has slight stain on it which she knows she will be able to remove. She is excellent at sending cold dishes or disappointing food back in restaurants. Yet she stresses about turning down invitations to shopping trips or lunches with people she does not want to go out with. [click to continue…]

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Have you turned into a Frog?

by Marion

in Inner Game

Did you know that if you drop a frog into boiling water it will jump out? If we touch something that is very hot or very cold our natural reaction is to pull away. Just like the frog we are averse to pain.

However if you put a frog in a pan of cold water it will sit in the pan. You can even put the pan on the cooker and turn up the heat. That frog will stay there quite happily even as the temperature of the water gets higher and higher.

Eventually the water gets so hot that the frog passes out and dies.

For many of us – that can be how we live our lives.

Sammy is a retail manager of an absolutely beautiful shop. I got to know Sammy when the shop opened three years ago. She was full of life and so excited and enthusiastic although she had never managed a shop before. She went on courses and even learned skills to allow her to maintain the shop’s website. Basically Sammy is completely responsible for the shop and simply reports back to the owner.

I visited the shop last week. It’s still a beautiful Aladdin’s cave of gifts but something has changed. The atmosphere in the shop is different. Sammy is different.

“How‘s life?” I ask.

“Not bad!” She says. (I always think this is a really strange thing to say – but I say it too!”)

“Shop still as busy?”

“Yeh – has its quiet days. But it’s ok”

“Still enjoying it?”

“Nothing else for it – just have to get on with it”

If Sammy were a frog I think she would be about to pass out before being cooked. [click to continue…]