Many of you regular readers will notice that you haven’t had anything new to read here in months! It’s confession time for me. I am dealing with my success! Yes, it’s true! I have achieved the latest element in my long term goal of going to college. It’s a goal that has been on my list for many years and now it has come to fruition.
Remember earlier this year, I told you that I was applying to go to college, now that my children are older and more independent? Well, I’ve been accepted into the college of my choice here in Dublin. I am thrilled. I am proud of myself. I’m even a bit gobsmacked that I’ve been accepted (old bad habits die hard!), but I have!
All my time since February has been college related. Not just on my own account, I should say, but this family is just at a college-phase of our existence. My daughter was busy submitting projects, studying for finals and then, in May, sitting her finals. My son was busy planning his college path and making his applications, based on how his exams go (they are ongoing - so fingers crossed) and I have been applying, doing aptitude tests, interviews and then waiting… and waiting … and waiting … until finally I got the letter that said “We are pleased to inform you …”
I’m struck daily by the difference in the way school leavers and mature students approach the idea of college. Firstly, when I was applying, I got a terrible fear of “What if I don’t get a place?” But my daughter, who’s been through it all, said simply “They you’ll apply again next year”. It had felt like a do-or-die issue to me, until she made me see that, while there is a lower age limit for mature students (23 in this case) - there is no upper age limit. I need have no fear that my time was running out!
I wrote a letter accepting the place. I asked my daughter if she thought I had given enough information. She smiled and told me that a school-leaver would have said - “Yes thanks, I’ll take the place” - whereas I said “Thank you for the offer of a place. If you need any more information please contact me at home (number) on my mobile (number) or at this e-mail (address).” And I signed off with “Looking forward to seeing you in September”.
Attitudes on exams also differ. My childrens’ exams give them the feeling that they are somehow being personally judged in their exams, whereas at this stage of my life I see them more as useful benchmarks of progress (or lack of) and I know that - win, lose or draw - life goes on after exams. I am not my work. It is just one expression of who I am.
A friend of mine told me: “Mature students always sit at the front of the class. They really appreciate being there. They want to see and hear everything that goes on.”
I agreed.
She said: “But, sitting at the front, you don’t see the people behind you. When you put your hand up to ask your very interesting question at 12.50pm, you don’t see the murderous looks of your classmates who were watching the minutes till lunchtime ticking slowly by!”
Apparently that’s one of the quickest ways to lose friends in college! So now I know.
I could keep on rambling on here about my college hopes, dreams and realities, but then this blog would never end. All I will say is that from Sept/Oct, I will no longer be actively pursuing my life coaching business.
This blog may continue. Or maybe someone will pay me to blog on the experiences of a mature student? Who know? My future awaits me!
Maybe I should say “give yourself a GOOD talking to”! What’s your inner voice saying to you most of the time? Is it saying: “I’m a truly wonderful human being” or “I am worthwhile” or “I’m always good enough”? I’m guessing that, most of the time, it’s more likely to be “Oh no, I failed again” or “Loser” or “What can I do/say/think in order to be accepted and loved?”
I’m a life coach, not a psychologist, so I can’t tell you why we do it, but as a member of the human race I can vouch for the fact that we definitely do it. Here in Ireland, maybe we even have an extreme habit of doing this. Our historically Catholic ethos does not promote our ability to be proud of ourselves, congratulate ourselves or speak confidently of our own achievements.
So with that sort of background and schooling, I’m guessing that most of you know the kind of self-talk that I’m getting at here. Fair enough. But what can we do about it? In my life coaching business, I regularly come across people who are very keen on positive thinking, affirmations, visualisations etc. Great. Great for about the 20 minutes that you are doing your affirmations/visualisations etc. What about the other 23hrs 40mins of the day? Hmmmm?
Here’s where I’ve got to so far. I started out doing yoga when I was about twenty. I thought it would change my life. I enjoyed doing it. I loved meeting other people who were interested in yoga. But it didn’t change my life.
Years later I trained in massage and aromatherapy. I thought “This is it! This will change my life.” I loved/love being a massage/aroma therapist. It’s very fulfilling. It’s part of who I am. Helping people is what I enjoy. It didn’t change my life.
I studied Life Coaching. Now - if ever there was something that would change my life - this would be it! I trained and practise now as a life coach, helping clients, blogging and writing an e-newsletter. I LOVE it. I get great feedback from readers and clients. It didn’t change my life.
When I started learning/studying NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming) I began to see what was going on in my life. I read books by Richard Bandler, John Grinder, Michael Neill, Paul McKenna, Owen Fitzpatrick and Brian Colbert, among others and these writers helped me to make sense of my life so far. Things that fall into the “DO” category, do not change my life. They are actions I take in my life. I can use them to help me make positive changes. But they are not the changes, they are just the tools.
Things that fall into the “BEING” category, are the ones that change everything. When the things that I DO are in tune with the person that I AM, then my life starts to flow in a way that no amount of training can achieve. I am very proud of all that I have studied and achieved (although even being so proud of myself took years and lots of positive self-talk), but most of all I am proud of the person that I am. That is who I am 24hrs of the day. So, while I may spend time visualising, time meditating, time doing positive affirmations, the most useful thing I can do is to tell myself, 24/7 that I am loved, that I am worthwhile and that I am always good enough, just as I am.
Try telling yourself that, 24 hours a day for even a week, and see how you feel. You’ll sleep better, feel more relaxed and more positive about each new day.
Some schools are receiving the results of their “mocks” this week, so tread carefully around the teens in your family. You don’t need the advice of a Life Coach to know that!
How do we find the right balance of things to say? We want to encourage and support our kids, but we don’t want to be so soft on them that they don’t get to grips with the reality of facing the end of their school career and the beginning of the next phase of their development. We’re all afraid that, by being too gentle on them, we may fail to help them cope with the normal disappointments and knocks that every life is prone to.
I tend to err on the side of stepping back and looking at the fact that life continues after exams, one way or the other. The proof is that millions of people are doing it, and have done it for generations. I can point to my parents and to myself and husband as the most immediate examples that, for good or bad, the end of school - while significant - is not the end of life as we know it.
This post is not a “How to understand your teens” or a “10 steps to guiding your children to success” because I don’t have the answers for you. You have. I am busy working my way through it for myself. All I can suggest to you, from my own experience, is:
do a lot more listening than talking
assume the best about your kids - it gives them something positive to live up to
use the phrase “how do YOU feel about that?” in place of telling them exactly how you feel yourself
remind them that no exam changes how you feel about them
tell them you love them, don’t assume they “just know” it
tell them again
and again
and again
…
and remember - you, as the responsible adult, have seen many things come and go, so you can afford to be philosophical and know that - this too will pass!
There is a lot of fear going round at present about possible unemployment and job cutbacks. It’s alarming because it has brought to the fore an issue that has often been associated with men who lose their jobs late in their careers and realise that they don’t know who they are, apart from their job. This is a very important fact to keep at the front of your mind - you are not your job, you have a job, or do a job. But you are not the job.
We all do it all the time though. We ask “Who is that guy?” and the answer will inevitably be “He’s a plumber/programmer/lawyer/insert-your-job-here”. But that’s not who he is. It’s what he does. Before you had a job - did you exist? Yes. Before you had your current job, did you have another job? Probably. Do you imagine that when you retire you will cease to exist? No. Most likely you are imagining, for your retirement, all the things you’ve wanted to do for years, the places you’ve wanted to go and didn’t have the time off. And now you do.
Think about it. Before you had a job, were you real? Did you have love and happiness, hopes and dreams, fears and upsets? Yes. Did you have people who loved you and cared about you? Yes. Did you have friends who you knew were there for the good times and the bad and that, during the bad times you would need them even more, and they would be there? Yes.
If you are unlucky to have lost your job, or be on reduced hours or income - keep reminding yourself that you are still the same person. You are a person who is loved and cared about. You are a person of worth. You have friends and family that love you, not based on your job, but simply because you are lovable and loved by them. And at difficult times, they will want you to know that even more. Because our common humanity is something that is not dependent on what job you hold, or how much you bring home.
We are all in this together (not in the smarmy, hypocritical way the politicians keep telling us) and there will be times when we need help and times when we will want to help others.
Talk to each other. Even more than usual, when times are hard, communication is essential. Resist the temptation to avoid people because you feel raw and abused by your circumstances. Trust in the understanding of the people you have gathered round you over the years. Friends are not just for the good times. They are for all time.
This is where the talk stops and the commitment takes over. You see, we could all sit about all day meditating on our best selves, our life purpose, our vision. That’s all very well, and it’s necessary. But at some point we have to put our money where our mouth is. Where are you at present?
Have you dreamed the dream? Have you set the goals? Have you envisioned your future the way you want it? Now - are you ready to take the steps to get yourself there?
I’m sure lots of you are bored to tears with the YouTube video clip of Susan Boyle at the “Britain’s got Talent” show. It’s not a show I watch, but a colleague pointed me at the video clip and I have to say it brought tears to my eyes. Yes, I know some of the acts DO bring tears to the eyes, but Susan was not like that. It just made me feel all tingly that this woman had never given up on her dream and here she was getting the chance to shine.
We all deserve the chance to shine in our own area of genius. What is your unique genius? What is the world waiting to see/hear/learn from you? And have you any right to keep it all to yourself? Get like Susan Boyle and “dream a dream”.
Just a quick mention that April 25th is World Malaria Day. I found this link on the Care2 website www.care2.com . Take a look and see what you can do to help. When half of the world is complaining about recession and depression, it’s a good idea to put it all into perspective and value our health, our privilege in living in first world conditions and our joy in the quality of our life and health.
When you watch this Unicef video, make sure to watch to the end. As usual it starts by looking at the gloomy situation, but it’s worth watching for the hopeful ending. I love happy endings!
It seems, from responses to the blog and newsletter, that confidence building is high on everyone’s list of priorities. I’m right there with you. I think confidence is something we’re born with, and it grows and diminishes with different events/cycles in our lives. If you’re lucky you’ve had confidence boosting parents and siblings, teachers, church leaders, friends, classmates, colleagues, bosses etc. (you get the picture - the list is endless). So with such a list, I’m guessing most of us have had knocks to our natural confidence.
Inside our heads we all have an idea, or picture, of how we look as confident people. Otherwise we would have nothing to measure our lack of confidence against. When I ask someone to visualise themselves as a confident person and they say they can’t see it - it’s not true! Sounds harsh maybe, and I would not come right out and say “You’re not telling the Truth. You Are Confident!” But pause for a second and listen.
First of all how do you know you lack confidence? Somewhere inside your head you do have a picture of what confidence is, what it means, and how it would feel to be like that. Otherwise you wouldn’t know that you don’t have it. See? To know you’re missing it, you have to know what it is and what it looks/feels/acts like.
That’s a fantastic start. So you DO know what confidence is/feels like/looks like. Great! Now you know what you’re working towards. Maybe you just haven’t connected with it for a long time. It’s time to start.
Listen to what Jack Canfield (Chicken Soup for the Soul book series, The Success Principles and many more inspiring books) has to say about it. What do you think?
1. Stop doing it to yourself. What do I mean by that? Well, if you’re looking for 5 ways to boost your self-esteem, you must feel that it needs boosting. Which means that, somewhere in your mind, there is a tiny voice telling you you have low self-esteem. This seems like a bit of a catch 22 situation, doesn’t it. But the important thing is to focus on how much self-esteem you already have. Start looking for all the things you have already done brilliantly, succeeded at, achieved. A good way to acknowledge (mainly to yourself) your successes is to journal them. Every night, to wind up your day on a positive note, jot down all the successes you have had during the day. You’re not allowed note the things you didn’t succeed at. Nor are you allowed to look negatively at what you did achieve (i.e. If you walked two miles for your daily exercise, but had hoped to walk farther, your journal should say “I walked two miles as part of my commitment to my increasing good health and fitness” and not “I walked two miles, but really I wanted to walk three but I didn’t have the time …”. How you look at your achievements, both past and ongoing, is a major contributor to your sense of self-esteem.
2. Change your self-talk. As a continuation of part of point 1, start to notice what your inner voice is saying to you most of the time. Is it positive and encouraging, or is it harsh and critical? Most of us have a little critic that lives in our heads telling us constantly when we are not good enough, not measuring up. Change it. I don’t care whether you visualise bright rays of sunlight melting away the critical voice, or whether you imagine the little voice as a person that you then say goodbye to. You created the little voice (I agree you had help from parents, teachers, “friends”, critics of all sorts) over all the years of your life. But if you created it - you can change it. It’s yours. Take charge of it. Turn it around. Make it work FOR you from this moment on.
3. Find someone you admire and copy their attitude. When you want to learn something new, what do you do? If you’re like me, you rush out and buy a book. Good place to start. Read up on the theory. Then when you have covered all the theory, what’s the best thing you can do? Find someone who does it well, and copy what they do. Now, hold on. I don’t mean stalk them! I mean observe them. If it’s someone that you know, ask them. “I really admire the way you seem so confident when you …” (give that speech, make that presentation, whatever). I’d like to talk to you about that because I’d really like to be able to do that in my life (or business, or presentation, or whatever)”. If it’s a famous person, see if they’ve written autobiographies, or books about their particular skills. It’s the next best thing to asking them face to face.
4. Stretch yourself. Take some action that moves you out of your comfort zone. If the zone you’re in is not filled with self-confidence, begin to stretch yourself outside that zone to increase the amount of self-esteem you have. It may be scary, uncomfortable and unnerving. That’s ok. That feeling will pass as soon as this new area becomes familiar to you. Everywhere is going to seem new at first. Try to think of it as an exciting new place to go. Think of it as a great new holiday destination. You haven’t been there before, but you know people who have and you just know it’s going to be great!
5.Surround yourself with confident people. Get yourself involved with people who have the type of self-confidence that you want for yourself. You will find that you will raise your expectation for yourself. It will seem more normal to you to have a higher level of self-esteem. Think of the opposite. Is it going to help you to hang around with other people who need to build their confidence? No. Because you’re not going to see it, how are you going to learn it? See it. Do it. Be it. And at every step of the way, do like in step 1. keep track of all the successes you have as you progress towards unshakeable self-esteem.
How many times a day do you hear or read those words? People even say it to each other when they meet. It’s becoming a catchphrase. Now, if you’re reading this, you’re probably a positive thinking person. Maybe you do affirmations, positive visualizations, sending good wishes and thoughts out into the world or universe when you meditate or pray. That’s great. But what are you doing the rest of the time?
You all know the belief that we get what we focus on, right? Well if you are positive thinking at specific times each day, but then meeting your friends or neighbours and doing the “Ain’t if awful” conversation, which are you doing more of? Will your one hour’s meditation swing it against the three hours you moaned with your friends about the economy, the banks, the unemployment etc.? I’m not saying stick your head in the sand and ignore it. It’s real. It’s happening.
But looking only at the bad means that we focus on the bad. And if you believe that you get more of what you focus on … what do you think you’ll get? A pay rise? An offer of a great new job? A big lotto win? I don’t think so.
So, even when things globally look bad, or perhaps even moreso when they look bad, we need to focus on positive things. They are always there. Maybe we have to look harder. For starters, lots of things have actually come down in price. Lots of foodstuffs are cheaper than before the recession. Buying locally can help support your own community. Petrol (depending on where in the world you live) is cheaper than it was (though it’s creeping up again I notice). For some people their mortgages are coming down.
So can we look at the real things please? Have you lost your job? No? Then look out for ways you can support jobs in your neighbourhood. That can be anything from paying a neighbour’s kid to mow your lawn or wash your car to employing local workers to build your house extension. If you still have enough money coming in, try to spend it in your community and support your local economy.
And my favourite - barter! I’m a big fan of exchange. You can exchange goods e.g. why not have a “garage swap” instead of a “garage sale”? If you have a service that you provide, why not exchange it for services others provide? I don’t think there’s any law against it (if you know otherwise, please let me know because I’ll be in big trouble!). It’s a fair exchange of services. No money involved. Just people helping each other out.
And finally, or perhaps it should be first, gratitude. I know you’ll say it’s all Pollyanna-ish, and new-age, but there are always things you can be grateful for. Start with the obvious - if you have good health, be grateful for that. If you’re well enough to have a job in the first place you’re better off than people who were already unemployed and now have little or no hope of work. If you can no longer afford to eat out, be grateful that you have friends that you can arrange dinner parties with. Take turns to have dinner in different houses maybe once a month or so. You may find that your friendships broadens through meeting new people at house parties.
I could devote an entire newsletter to “Things to be grateful for”, but you know the best ones in your own life. If you’d like to share your favourite ones with me, I’ll be delighted.
Let’s stop pretending. Of all the things going on in the economy, the world banks, the welfare systems of many countries, unemployment, lay-offs etc. let’s just stop pretending. People are going round speaking in whispers about “the R word”, as if we daren’t say the word RECESSION. Stop it people! This is like not saying the name of a disease in case you might catch it just by speaking about it. It’s not going to happen. You are not going to lose your job because you talk about the jobs situation where you are. You are not going to keep your job just because you never said the R word. It’s real, it’s here and it’s here for a while. So let’s stop pretending it isn’t, or that whispering about it will make it go away.
Another I’d really like is that - if you have notbeen affected by unemployment, or your pension going up the swanee, or the bank going boom with all your savings - I’d really like it if you would stop pretending that the recession is hurting you. Stop being embarrassed by having a good job, that pays you well, and gives you enough money to continue to enjoy the good things. You’ve worked for it. Enjoy it! Don’t buy into the drama of everyone having to suffer together. I don’t mean you should gloat about your good fortune. But you should be grateful for it and acknowledge it.
What you can do is to continue to spend as you would have before. Support your locality by shopping in your local stores, use local tradespeople when you need jobs done, go to your local theatre, cinema, clubs etc. Keep the economy moving as much as you can. Keep employment going by paying fair wages to staff. Keep morale high by not buying into the “ain’t it awful” brigade. Don’t join them. It will not help anyone.
Let’s look at what we can do, that might be useful. How about volunteerism? Why not look at volunteering in your neighbourhood. You’ll find some activity that will suit your time and your nature, while serving the needs of your community. It might be helping out with a local sports team, coaching, doing meals-on-wheels, being a driver for a day-care centre, collecting, fund-raising. There is a huge range of things going on right now, in your own neighbourhood, that you can help with. It’ll be good for your self-esteem, good for your self-development and great for your community. How satisfying is that going to be?
