PRISM Brain mapping

Di and I had a great time test driving a new 4sight all about PRISM Brain Mapping at 4N Coventry last week.

Subsequently, one of the attendees Leigh Stallard, told his family all about Brain Mapping and they all tried out the free introductory brain map.

Here’s what Leigh said:

“Over the weekend I’ve had my family all take the PRISM brain mapping test which led to some fascinating results and 2 hours of great conversation. I’ll certainly be pointing lots of people towards the free test and hopefully some will “upgrade” to the full PRISM reports.“

Leigh noted that his profile was not that of a typical accountant. That probably makes him a more rounded person. One of the facsinating aspects of brain mapping is that you can see how well your innate behavioural preferences match different types of roles. Have you ever felt like a square peg in a round hole? Is your preference to be:

• analytical, logical, detailed and self-contained
  (mainly operating from the front left quadrant of your brain)
• expressive, creative, impulsive, imaginative, fun loving and easily bored
  (mainly operating from the front right quadrant of your brain)
• stable, empathic, kind, patient, cooperative, avoids conflict and tough decisions
  (mainly operating from the rear right quadrant of your brain)
• driven, competitive, direct, forceful, impatient, decisive, a risk taker
  (mainly operating from the rear left quadrant of your brain)

Here’s some of the brain map profiles that would suit the roles of your typical 4N entrepreneur:

The full PRISM Report breaks your preferences out into unique map of 8 fundamental dimensions of behaviour (innovating, initiating, supporting, co-ordinating, focusing, delivering, finishing, evaluating), broken out into 26 underlying work preferences. It also shows your position on the 5 scales of emotional intelligence and where you score on the ‘Big 5′ personality traits of introversion-extroversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, emotional stability and openness.

PRISM Professional Brain Mapping is uniquely powerful tool for recruitment, team development, training needs analysis and 360 degree appraisals.

More details and a link to the free Introductory PRISM Brain map are here:

http://www.connecttoyourpotential.com/prism-behaviour-profiling.html

Have fun with it, Andy

The answer is Love. Now what is the question?

Here’s a couple of extracts from Di’s new book.

How much do you love yourself?

Do you feel that it’s immodest to love yourself?  Could this perhaps be one of the biggest limiting beliefs you hold?

There are two facts about love… the first is that no one can love you more than you love yourself.

The love you create and experience in your life will be in direct relation to the amount you love yourself.  If you do not love yourself, then how can you ever believe that anyone else can love you?  Truly, ask yourself that question, because it will be enlightening for you.  It creates a ‘push/pull’ energy.  You will ‘need’ love from others to make you feel complete, whilst rejecting it at the same time, not understanding what it is about you that there is to love.

The second fact about love, is that it will have a say in how you respond to anything. When life squeezes you, then you will respond with love, compassion and understanding if you are filled to the brim with self-love.  If on the other hand you are filled with bitterness or resentment, then with each person who responds negatively to you, instead of seeing through the eyes of love and understanding, you will see and feel their response as a personal insult, failing to see that they are dealing with their own fears and beliefs which they are projecting onto you.  This is when we choose to take every negative thing on board and allow everyone else to control how we’re going to feel on any given day… this is a very fearful place to be indeed…

Projection

One of the most amazing things is that whatever we’re feeling about someone, we will project onto that person. If you subconsciously don’t like someone, they will sense it very subtly from your eyes, the way you look at them, from your body language, and from something in your energy.  We find it very difficult to feel comfortable in the presence of someone we feel doesn’t like us, yet we’re often not quite sure how or why we know, we just do. 

I remember working with a client whose employees had a grievance against him, and he said to me ‘I’ve no idea why everyone thinks I’m bullying them, because I walk around all day at work with a smile on my face’.  However, the smile was hiding something – his energy was angry, frustrated, it came from his eyes, I felt it from him too.  Yet, trying to explain this is like trying to explain how or why electricity works.  We know it’s there, subconsciously we understand why we connect more with some people than with others, why we relish being around some people and can’t wait to get away from others.

One of the most powerful things I learned when I moved in with Andy was that the way in which he generally expected me to behave, was the way in which I inevitably ended up behaving in his company.  I was naïve to expect that I wouldn’t have to go through some ‘stuff’ after removing myself from a life and identity of 21 years, all my possessions and friends and plonking myself into a brand new life, with very few of my own things around me, into someone else’s home as opposed to my own, and into a brand new life and relationship.  Did I go through stuff… oh yes!  It was like being stripped down and having to start again.  Although I loved myself unconditionally before entering into the relationship with him, no one warns you that you’re going to have to start all over again when you go into a new relationship!  So, Andy would often wake in the morning wondering whether I was feeling good or not, and the moment he looked at me in expectancy of a possible bad mood, it was instantly created.

If on other occasions we went out and something would happen which Andy felt was likely to upset me, he would begin to behave in a manner in which this expectancy flowed from his eyes and it was actually that, not the occurrence, that upset me!  I learned very quickly that my behaviour around Andy generally reflected exactly what he seemed to be thinking about me.   These were such powerful lessons about projection for both of us…

We have now mastered the art of keeping ourselves happy, and allowing the other person to be exactly where they are, without any expectation of behaviour, or by joining the other of us in feeling bad… this is the quickest way to help those around you lift their spirits again. 

I then began to realise that I had also looked at others with expectancy in the past, resulting in my creating in them exactly the behaviour that I didn’t want!  Others would somehow read my expectations towards them in my energy the moment they came into my presence, and would then begin to behave accordingly. Each and every one of us does this regularly, however, the difference was that I began to notice it … and as soon as I noticed it, I realised that I had the power to change it!  My goodness… was I literally creating my relationships with other people simply by what I was focusing on in their behaviour?  Yes, I was! 

This was the biggest learning for me in how to diffuse a situation with love.  If someone is angry at you, or you are expecting angry behaviour from another, the way to help change the energy of the situation is to begin to look at them through the eyes of love.  When people are angry it is because they are struggling with something.  We, however, more often than not choose to see this as a personal insult.  If we choose to be understanding instead, it creates alternative behaviour in others…

So it dawned on me little by little that I was with absolute certainty creating my life with the energy I was emitting.  When I first learned about the Law of Attraction, it taught me that all I had to do was ask for something, believe it was coming and then receive it.  Basically all my thoughts became things… so if I thought about a black Mercedes, then would one inevitably appear in my driveway the following week?  No, most likely not, although a great deal of what I do think about does seem to magically flow to me. I believe that the Law of Attraction works on a much deeper level still.  It is created within our own energy – what we emit, we create.  This applies in relationships (intimate or otherwise), with animals, in job interviews, with sales… you name it!

What we are thinking about, however angry or frustrated we are, we draw like-minded people towards us.  Energy attracts like energy.  Negative people don’t enjoy being around positive people one little bit!  Not unless they’re ready to begin the journey that is… I remember when I first became so excited about positive thinking, my usual group of friends when I had loved moaning and complaining about everything soon began to resent my entering into a room, even saying ‘Oh great, here comes Miss Positive again!’… it was hurtful at the time, but a very necessary and powerful learning for my journey.  As my journey progressed I began projecting that I wanted happiness, I loved being around happy people, and they loved being around me – I had changed.  Our energies no longer matched… and with an understanding of how and why energies attract each other, it all makes perfect sense.

It is for this reason that it is absolutely essential to love yourself fully before entering into a relationship.  If you do, you will attract someone who loves their own company too… if you love your company, your partner certainly will.  Someone who loves themselves would never be attracted to someone they needed to ‘fix’ or someone whose energy drained them.  You may say this happens… but I would disagree.  The self-love would not be from a place of genuine authenticity if so.  For instance, many people take on partners that need ‘fixing’.  Now this is a sign that the ‘fixer’ gains something by ‘fixing’ another, they generally get to feel better about themselves, feel worthy, feel superior… make sense?  So yes, they may say they love themselves, but realistically if they still need this sense of stimulation to feel good about themselves, then how can that possibly be true self-love?…

I am loving this journey… sharing my truth… and saying it exactly as I see it!    ♥♫♪

Why it can be a good thing to ‘crash and burn’ !!

Here is a video of us being interviewed at the Starting Over Show in London recently. Whilst only 4 1/2 minutes long, the video captures many of the fundamental keys to our Authentic Transformation process. Thanks to Suzy Miller, the organiser of the Starting Over Show (http://sosvillage.org/)

From Frustration, Anger and Divorce to Authenticity, Love and Acceptance

Hi, I’m Andy Nicholson, relationship and authenticity coach and personal development trainer.

I’m living the life of my choosing, I have learned to love and accept myself, I have learned to love and accept others (although I’m not always as wonderful at this as I might like!! – I am still a work in progress).

It was not always like this…. Five years ago after redundancy and divorce, I was mainly angry and frustrated – I was not in control of my life or my emotions. I was stuck, disempowered.

Then I came to realise that I could become very empowered. I was in fact at a crossroads in my life. Before me was a blank sheet of paper, on which I could design the life that I wanted…

But what did I want? What was possible for me?

I did not know. All I knew was what I did not want. The truth is that I was proud of knowing what I did not want. I felt that it gave me direction, helped me to make choices. I even gave myself kudos for this strategy in life. In my 20s it seemed to work, I seemed to be happier than some of my peers who perhaps did know what they wanted (or thought that they did) and were angry, fearful or depressed for not achieving their desired outcomes. Some even looked up to me for doing what I did.

Then, in my 30s, after my entrepreneurial businesses had ‘failed’ I knuckled down into a career, got a mortgage, a pension, got married… I did all the ‘normal’ stuff. I felt that I did not have enough fun and took life too seriously – but I believed I ‘had’ to, I was conditioned to think like this – the good old protestant work ethic…. So I made attempts to be more fun, more outgoing, I even chose a wife who was very much a fun, party animal, extroverted, the life and soul, needed at least three expensive holidays per year…. She warned me against marrying her, as she felt that she may be too much (for me, for many men) – her statement “I’m a nightmare, don’t marry me” fell on deaf ears. I felt that I was a match for her concerns. Boy, was I deluding myself! Now don’t get me wrong, my ex-wife is a wonderful woman, we just had different expectations, a different pace, differing priorities, values and beliefs. The truth is that her life works for her. Mine was not working for me and in many ways, I unwittingly tried to use her to fix me.

So there I was, 39, uninspired by my job, divorced, directionless. At this point, I bumped into an old friend of mine. After listening to my tale of woe (I poured my heart out – dumped all my frustration onto him), he suggested that I go along to a monthly meeting. No, it was not religious, it was about personal development (PD). I’d actually come across a few ‘PD’ and self-help books in previous years, and whilst interesting and inspiring, like most people, once read, I just carried on as normal, deluding myself that I did not need to change me – I just needed the world to change and give me a break!

I enjoyed the personal development get-togethers. Some great speakers started to challenge my mind-set and my beliefs and gradually open me up to new possibilities. I also enjoyed being around people who were more positive. Of course, I believed that some of the speakers, who had achieved great things, had some special talents that I did not possess and could not possess, so I did not intend to try to emulate them. It was safer and easier that way.

Then, after 10 months of attending the PD meetings, two relationship coaches gave a talk that would cause me to change my life. I’d been separated for nearly a year. My divorce had come through, yet the feelings were still raw. I felt like the marriage had been a waste of time, effort and a lot of money. I had yet to be able to take anything positive from the experience, especially any learnings. I felt like I was likely to make the same mistakes all over again (and I was).

I had been going out on lots of dates, courtesy of match.com and Dating Direct. Initially, this was just to get me out of the marital house and have some fun – living under the same roof for 10 months whilst separated was not much fun. I quickly found that I was able to feel more like my old self when out flirting. Yet after a while, there I was again, seeking the answers and my happiness outside of me, from others – seeking recognition and affirmation.

The 2 ½ hour talk by the relationship coaches, who were married, blew me away. It challenged so many of my beliefs about relationships and challenged my very identity and behaviour as a man. I had to know more. I signed up for their four day retreat at their base in Austria. Three months later, I had the most enjoyable and eye-opening four days of my life. I loved their teachings, it all seemed to make so much sense and yet was so contrary to how I ran my life. I recognised for the first time that I possessed an awesome set of values, and a lousy set of beliefs. I was living my life according to my beliefs, out of alignment with my values – hence I was unfulfilled and frustrated.

Picture – Andrew on top of the world (well, a small mountain) in Austria.

While in Austria, I also started to recognise that only I could take responsibility for my life and achieving better outcomes and more happiness. No one could do it for me. It sounds obvious now, yet how many of us are kidding ourselves…? On the Sunday, over breakfast, whilst discussing the meaning of life… I had an epiphany!  The work of the Retreat was completely in alignment with my values. I found the Retreat owners to be inspiring and I felt passionate about their purpose in life. I wanted to help them to help others like me. Plus, I had all these business, marketing and IT skills, which their ‘cottage industry’ could benefit from – I could help them to spread the word.

So to cut a long story short, 6 months later I moved to Austria, lived and worked at the retreat for 20 months, and almost by osmosis (and by attending over 30 days of training that they offered), my outlook on life transformed. While in Austria, I still liked female attention. I dated a couple of girls and flirted with a couple of others. While I was gradually awakening to myself, I was still in some denial. I was denying my potential. Although I felt that I now had my ideal vocation, I still would not face up to what I wanted in an ideal relationship. I underestimated and under-valued myself.

After 12 months in Austria, I decided that it was time to stop playing games. It was time to claim what was rightfully mine – the life of my dreams, a life and a journey that I wanted to share with my soul-mate (whoever she was). My role in Austria was not stretching me enough and I did not feel that the opportunity to grow at the same pace would remain open to me.  I also put out my intention to meet my soul-mate and I trusted that I would find her when the time was right. This was in April 2007.

Around the same time that I went to Austria, I enrolled to train in NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming), a branch of psychology and personal development that is based around how the brain works and how we think and behave. NLP introduced me to the concept that we all a have wildly different values and beliefs. Along with our innate talents and learned skills, this is what makes us unique – who we are and how we behave.

Andy’s Values
2006	2008
Love Happiness Integrity Connection Growth Health Humour Passion Affection Creativity Family Freedom Abundance	Happiness Pleasure Zest for life Balance Connection Health Purpose Freedom Direction Contribution Congruence Growth Creativity

Having identified my values, I started to want to be more congruent with them and to act with integrity. This lead to two things: firstly, a desire to go back to the UK in order to create my life how I wanted it, living my purpose rather than supporting someone else’s and secondly the desire to find my soul-mate.

You can see in the table opposite how my values changed over two years. I discovered more purpose, energy and enthusiasm, placed myself my purpose and my freedom above the need to please others and seek approval. This shift in values reflected what I had learned from my mentors in Austria about ‘turning up my masculinity dial’.

Being a kind, empathetic and supportive person, I’ve never had too much trouble getting in touch with my feminine side. We all have masculine and feminine aspects to our character. Many would say that to be a balanced and whole person we have to embrace and integrate both these energies, i.e. the yin and yang.

At the end of a 10 day relationship coaching training course in Austria with 12 other people, we were each rated (by the group) on our behaviour and how we outwardly expressed ourselves in terms of masculine vs. feminine energy. This was a fascinating and nerve wracking experience!! My score came out as 59 masculine and 44 feminine. Both scores are out of 100, the theory being that we will typically spend 70-80% of our time displaying the core energy of our gender, i.e. I would typically be 70-80% in my masculine and 20-30% in my feminine. As I said, a fascinating and not un-controversial subject! Again, to cut a long story short, I reckon my energy is now more like 75-80% masculine and 30-35% feminine. This shift has definitely helped me to become more authentically myself.

This is another great example of how I have transformed my experience of life. From all of my study and learnings, I have created what I call my model of Authentic Transformation. This is not a process of re-inventing yourself, or swapping one false self, for a slightly better false self. This process of true personal and spiritual (with a small ‘s’) development is about identifying who you really are and learning the tools that allow you to be authentically you, in all situations and roles. Whilst what I learned and how I turned up my masculinity certainly helped me a lot as a single man, when it came to putting this into practise within relationships, it was not without major challenges…

Towards the end of my stay in Austria, in July 2007, I received an e-mail from one of the dating sites that I had been on a few months earlier. A lady in America had read my profile and sent me an email. I’d not been on the site for several months and my membership had lapsed. I had no desire to start a transatlantic relationship. Whilst online, I looked at who else was also online – there were only a handful of people. I immediately resonated with one of the profiles, a lady from the Highlands of Scotland. We connected and clicked straight away. I happened to be back in the UK the very next week, for the first time in a year. I cheekily invited her to fly down and meet me. She did, and the rest is history… I’d been looking for my soul-mate and I’d found her. Six months later, I moved back to the UK and Diane left her life in Scotland to come and live and work together with me. We had only spent three weeks together in those six months. The fact that we had both done a lot of work on ourselves, and were able to be ourselves without any egos, masks game playing, without the need to try to impress, made all the difference. Our story is featured in other articles.

By loving ourselves 10 out of 10, we were able to accept ourselves and speak our truth to each other without any neediness and falseness. Some people may thing that loving yourself at a ‘10’ is arrogant, egotistical, selfish or even narcissistic! It is not. In fact it is the most self-less thing that you can do. For when you are full of love, you only have love to give others – you lose the need to blame, criticise, judge, hate…

Now it may seem like I am painting a very idyllic picture and everything has been plain sailing. That is definitely not the case. Intimate relationships are one of life’s most challenging things. Not only do you have to master your own behaviour, you have to learn to do so in close proximity to another, very different being. Diane and I are very different. We seemed to accept each other in principle, there were still aspects of each other’s behaviour that we each found challenging. Whilst we share many values, beliefs and our purpose in life, our personality styles are very different. This caused us some challenges, especially living and working together 24/7. Throughout, we have remained convinced that we are soul-mates or ‘twin flames’ and we have experienced amazing connection, synergy and love.  We have had to learn new tools and insights to enable our love to flourish and achieve its true potential.

Ten months into our relationship we enrolled on a training course about the Enneagram personality ‘typing’ system. I had been aware of a variety of such systems; whilst interesting, they all seemed rather complex, confusing and hardly earth-shattering. The Enneagram was different, it dealt with the whole person, you could really identify with it. For us, it was like the missing piece of the jigsaw. It finally explained why Di and I were so different and it allowed us to understand, accept and embrace those differences. We now use the Enneagram with many of our clients.

The other missing piece of the jigsaw for most people is their fears, underpinned by limiting beliefs. Whilst working in the PD industry, I noticed ‘pareto’ at work; only 20% of people seemed to take what they had been taught and use it to transform their lives and achieve the results that they wanted. They other 80% did not – they unwittingly seemed to treat the process as an intellectual exercise, ticking boxes, perhaps becoming ‘course junkies’. When I met Diane, she was Susan Jeffers first and only ‘Feel The Fear And Do It Anyway®’ tutor. I now teach this incredible workshop, based on the best selling book, with Di. It is the most powerful agent of change. It is also the first step that most people need to take in their journey; a step once taken that enables anyone to play full out in all aspects of life, taking and applying the most from any other training that they do.

With these tools and experiences, we believe that we have created a framework that can enable anyone to turn their lives around, overcoming fear, limiting beliefs and unhelpful models of the world; connecting with their values, personality style, emotionality, purpose, personal responsibility and accountability. It is an holistic approach – one that can deliver both immediate benefits and a transformation that takes months rather than years and hundreds rather than thousands of £s.

So in summary, growing up and learning to take responsibility for your life is a process of:

SELF AWARENESS to SELF-ACCEPTANCE to SELF-ACTUALISATION

Self-actualisation is a term used by the famous psychologist Abraham Maslow, who created the wonderful model ‘the hierarchy of human needs’ – this is another powerful tool of self-discovery that we use. For me, self-actualisation means being the best that I can be. During this process of authentic transformation, you also learn to accept and value others and their differences. This journey can also be thought of as evolving from:

DEPENDENCE to INDEPENENCE to INTER-DEPENDENCE

When life goes according to plan, most of us learn to move successfully from dependence to independence. When life gets hard, we may become fiercely independent, not letting others in, or we may relapse back into co-dependency seemingly unable or unwilling to take responsibility for ourselves. Inter-dependence is being able to accept, cooperate and collaborate with others, learning to give unconditionally and also to be able to ask for help and to willingly receive.

Some of the key learnings from my own journey include:

•    I am way more than my fears, beliefs and alter-ego
•    No one else can do it for me; they can help me to see more clearly and find ‘my way’
•    The answers are not outside of me
•    The answer is not to seek an intimate relationship to fill me up or fill the gaps in my life
•    Be open to new learnings, new perspectives and to challenge my beliefs – constantly
•    To become free of ego, opinion and judgement
•    To accept and embrace that we are all different
•    Real love is free of fear
•    Unhelpful behaviour and unresourceful emotions are largely habitual
•    More empowering behaviour and emotions can be learned
•    We are all innately good inside. We all have a ‘higher self’

Much has been written in recent years about the importance of ‘emotional intelligence’, yet there is little practical help out there to achieve it. Everything that Di and I have learned and developed in our coaching and training business is about helping people to become emotionally intelligent, to be able to live and love with others in inter-dependence, and to live the self-actualised life of your dreams.

We are giving at talk at the ‘Starting Over Show’ in London on Sunday March 7th 2010, where we will also have a stand. Do come and see us.

Andy & Di x

www.executive-relationship-coaching.co.uk www.dimacdowall-lifecoaching.co.uk

‘Feel The Fear And Do It Anyway®’ is a registered trademark of Susan Jeffers, PhD and is being used with her express permission.

How to create a beautiful intimate relationship – lessons for Starting Over

So many people assume that their relationships just happen to them, with little understanding that it will in fact unfold in direct reflection of their own thoughts and feelings about themselves. You see, we all take a certain amount of ‘baggage’ into our relationships with us in the form of conditioning from our past which creates our beliefs and sense of self-worth if we allow it to. Most of us are blissfully unaware of what these patterns of behaviour are, but they will all be subtly reflected in our behaviour towards our partner.

There are two facts which will help you understand how your relationships unfold; the first is that no one can love you more than you love yourself; the second is that you teach others how to treat you.

Loving Yourself and Putting Yourself First

Many of us continually put our own needs behind those of our partner, whilst secretly harbouring resentment about doing so. This in fact teaches our partner that we do not value ourselves, yet we are so surprised when they begin treating us in the same way. When we learn to love ourselves and fulfil our own needs, then we have an abundance to give and share with others. Remember too, that your partner will always be able to sense and feel your underlying energy or ‘state’, whether you have a smile on your face or not… What lies beneath your surface will show itself in seemingly subtle, yet powerful ways…

It’s vitally important for you to be aware of who you’re taking into the relationship with you. By this, I mean you… Understanding and loving yourself fully is the biggest gift you can give to yourself, to your partner and to your relationship. When you love yourself you take no neediness into the relationship with you. If instead, you make your partner responsible for creating your happiness and fulfilling your needs, a huge burden is placed upon them. Not only that, but you will always be in fear of what may happen if at any time they don’t fulfil those needs. It puts a great strain on both of you… When two partners behave like this it is known as a co-dependency.

Loving yourself brings many wonderful virtues into the partnership with you… Firstly, you enter into the relationship as your true self, without putting on any kind of act or mask to try and be what you think your partner expects you to be. You wouldn’t even entertain being anyone other than your true self, because you’d know without doubt that you are worth loving for who you are. You would also know that being single is far better than being in a fake relationship simply for the sake of it. When we put on this kind of mask, not only is it exhausting to keep up the act, but it builds a great deal of resentment beneath the surface because we feel we can never really be ourselves… ironically! Yet, so many of us do this sub-consciously. You will never feel truly loved for who you are when you’re not being yourself. Many enter into a game of ‘fake love’ by doing and being things that will gain us love and appreciation… Life becomes a game of acting so that we don’t experience rejection or disapproval… How different life would be though, if we didn’t fear either of these things in the first place. Well, this is exactly the essence of why loving yourself is so vital.

It’s hugely important to real-ise, that when two people hide behind a mask, the masks will eventually fall away, revealing two complete strangers. Most people call that initial stage the ‘honeymoon phase’… and then wonder why things are never as exciting as they were in the beginning, or they wonder what they ever saw in their partner and the ideal of the relationship.

When you love yourself, you will be able to gift your partner with a huge amount of freedom. You come into the relationship from a place of unattachment. By this I mean unattached to any outcome – you do not place the burden of “I expect you to be with me for the rest of my life, whether you like it or not!” on your partner… get the picture? This is what attachment looks like… You will not be fearful of them leaving you if they choose to because you’ll know that no matter what happens; you’ll handle everything just perfectly. Such fears often destroy relationships with ‘bad’ energy.

By simply choosing to be together, rather than needing to be together, this allows you to place a huge amount of trust in your partner. By also trusting in yourself to deal with anything, it allows you to ‘give’ yourself to the relationship from a place of vulnerability. The strange thing is, that if your partner senses this kind of vulnerable energy in you and sees it reflected in your behaviour, they are not likely to want to leave you or give you any reason to mistrust them… it’s amazing how it all unfolds. On the other hand, when you attempt to trap your partner through your mistrust of them because you couldn’t handle it if they ever left you… and you continually question them and take away their freedom, they are far more likely to respond with exactly the behaviour you’re most fearful of… by leaving you and/or by ending up in the arms of another…

So are you beginning to understand how we create our relationships…?

Where Is Your Focus?

One of the most magical things about sharing yourself with another is that what you focus on in your partner is what will transpire. If you focus on all the good, you will see more of it. You partner will sense that you are seeing the best in them and their behaviour towards you will reflect that. If on the other hand, you’re focusing on everything your partner does wrong, or are expecting negative behaviour from them, they will also sense this and reflect it straight back to you with exactly what you’re expecting.

One of the most beautiful things you can gift your partner with is a list of all the wonderful things they do for you, letting them know just how much you appreciate them. This creates a beautiful loving bond between you both. Not only that, but it opens your heart to true love lets them know just how valid they are in your life. In doing so, please don’t demand that they reply with a counter-list, because this is not giving from a place of authenticity… this is giving in order to receive, which will also leave you in a fearful energy. So many of us tend to work on a hidden barter system when we give; a great example of this is to ask yourself how you felt the last time you sent your partner a loving text or e-mail and didn’t receive a reply? If you were disappointed by their lack of response, then was your gesture truly authentic, or simply because you needed to hear their reply? Giving with no expectation of how or if they should respond according to your rules is indeed a very loving thing to do.

Dangerous Assumptions

Another biggie in terms of relationships is to learn never to make assumptions about anything…ever! When your partner says or does something, their patterns of behaviour and ‘model of the world’ won’t necessarily match yours. Whatever the assumption has been made about has been transferred from their beliefs and perception of the world into yours, which will of course be entirely different. But instead of always assuming the best, we tend to make negative assumptions about what’s just happened, then either don’t say a word and resent it, or launch into an argument.

The best way to make assumptions if you must make them and want a loving, committed relationship, is to always make the best possible ones about your partner’s behaviour and intentions. If he or she says something that has hurt you, express your feelings in a loving way immediately and without blame. Andy and I agreed from day one that if either of us said anything which hurt the other, we would say “Ouch” and explain what had hurt us. We were staggered by the number of times we found ourselves saying “Ouch” when in fact, the other meant something entirely different from the way it was perceived and most certainly not intended to hurt. You might be surprised to find that you make far more negative assumptions that you’d ever imagine… Be aware that if these build up without resolution, they will create a huge amount of tension, resentment and animosity between you…

We often feel infatuated during the early stages of a relationship. This is generally the case when we don’t love ourselves fully and feel that burst of love and appreciation from a new partner which takes our ‘love score’ up to a 10 out of 10. These are the times when we usually become the person we think they want us to be, purely to ensure that we keep receiving that burst of love. This is the mask I mentioned earlier, and it can become an addiction. This is also unfortunately very fearful behaviour, because if they don’t provide the love we need in order to feel great about ourselves, we tend to take an emotional dive into the depths of despair. If, on the other hand, you have genuine love for yourself to begin with, then rather than thinking “Thank goodness someone loves me”, you can remain more realistic and evaluate whether that person is indeed right for you. It may seem unromantic… how romantic is a 46% divorce rate, rises sharply second and third time around?

The Big Differences Between Men and Women

Most people don’t have a clue how differently men and women think, feel and communicate. Women tend to imagine that men think in a very similar way to them… a very mistaken assumption indeed. On the whole, men are more logical, whereas women are more emotional and much of their respective communication will stem from these two different viewpoints. Men focus on one thing at a time, while women can multi-task. While women need to talk to reduce stress, men will want to find a solution to your problems – this often drives women crazy. Simply telling a man that you want him to listen and not provide a solution will appeal to his logical mind and allow the woman to talk… something this simple is sure to reduce arguments and frustration.

Many women aren’t aware that men generally feel emasculated when their woman points out a solution, yet in today’s society, women have high powered jobs, are often the main bread-winner in the house and it can be difficult to know how to maintain the right balance. So you see, learning about the differences between men and women’s thinking, behaviour and methods of communication is a powerful key to learning how to create an ideal relationship…

The Languages of Love

Another wonderful recipe to creating a fantastic bond between you is to know and understand your and your partner’s ‘love languages’. People give and receive love in one or more of five main ways – words of affirmation, touch, quality time, acts of service and gifts. If you know what your love languages are, then communicate them clearly to your partner so they know what makes you feel loved… then leave space for them to fill that gap without placing demands on them to do so. It’s vital too, to learn what your partner’s languages of love are, so that you in turn can also fulfil their needs and create a beautiful relationship.

Soul-Mate Relationships

I truly believe that a soul-mate relationship is something that is created between two people who share a genuine love, respect and truth with each other. Two people who choose to be committed to being together in a loving, trusting and unattached way, and who implement the key points I’ve mentioned above, will learn to love, respect and admire their differences.

You can become each other’s greatest teacher simply by allowing your partner to be exactly who they are and learning from them, rather than demanding they change to fit in with your model of the world. When we try to fix or change our partner, they will never feel good about themselves in the relationship – how could they, when you keep reminding them how they need to be more like you, because who they are simply isn’t good enough for you…

In essence, real love is created when a relationship becomes stronger, deeper and more fulfilling through time… it doesn’t wear off or become less exciting than it was in the beginning… quite the opposite.

It’s certainly food for thought…

By Diane MacDowall

http://www.dimacdowall-lifecoaching.co.uk

Some and see us and listen to us talk at the Starting Over Show, London Sunday March 7th.

http://www.startingovershow.co.uk/

THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS THE LAW OF ATTRACTION

Di and I spoke last night at the Tree of Life Inspiration Group in Moseley. Our talk was called ‘Cosmic Attraction – A Life Without Limits?’. I made a somewhat controversial statement…

THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS THE LAW OF ATTRACTION

‘cos I do like to be a bit controversial, make people think and cut through the hype.  Di and I presented an interesting debate with a very interactive audience…

Here’s what I wrote on Facebook this morning, for those who could not make it:

I don’t believe there is a LAW of Attraction (LoA), not the way it generally gets described and over-simplified and over-hyped:

• Thoughts don’t just become things. Thought can definitely sabotage our ability to harness what gets called the LoA and get into ‘the flow. Thoughts also greatly influence our feelings and it is this ‘feeligisation’ (as Dr David Hamilton calls it) which has a much greater impact.
• Like attracts like sometimes… also opposites sometimes attract.
• There are many so called natural laws, laws of spirituality, attraction, vibration etc, some for me are more believable than others. Your beliefs do have a tendency to create your reality – so pick good ones – they must be authentic for you though! People like Deepak Chopra explain such ‘Laws’ very well.  Its not concrete though and such perspectives don’t work well for everyone.

So does this mean that only certain types of people can get into the flow and harness the LoA? I’d say definitely not. I am a hugely different personality style to Diane, yet we both manage to get into the flow regularly, we also work very well together, although it has taken some work to achieve this. We have become each other’s greatest teachers, because we are so different, yet have a common purpose.

There most definitely is an observable phenomenon, which gets referred to as the LoA. There’s lots of evidence to support how we connect with our energy, unfortunately much of it seems unreliable and unrepeatable. That does not mean it is not the way things can work, especially when you believe it. People have made a quantum leap between quantum physics and the LoA. Quantum physics proves nothing as yet, but is surely opens our minds to some amazing possibilities. We certainly have to be open and ‘calibrating’ highly in order to attract and connect with similarly highly calibrating ‘things’.

The way to tap into this phenomenon successfully is different for different people. We are all masters of the LoA – we generally attract and connect with what we focus on. We are conditioned and taught to focus on what we don’t want and to sabotage the good stuff with negative thinking and lousy beliefs. Identifying and acting according to your higher self, being authentic, identifying and aligning to your true values, finding ways to ‘be’ with authentic beliefs that serve you. Your beliefs do have a tendenacy to create your reality – so pick good ones – they must be authentic for you though!  All of this gets you connected and into the flow.

I’ve worked with hundreds of people who want to believe in the LoA and have invested in themselves. Many are trying to force it to work. They have no powerful and authentic ‘why’, no true passion. For me, the real ‘Secret’ for many people has been found through the ‘Feel The Fear and Do It Anyway®’ workshops that we teach. The letting go of limitations and connecting to true and authentic potential has consistently been an incredible transformation, from which magic has flowed.

Contact us to find out how we can help you to identify your authentic self and to CONNECT TO YOUR POTENTIAL.

Hi, it’s Di here… and now I’ll share with you some of my experiences of how the Law of Attraction has shown up in my life…

I completely agree with Andy’s outlook on how it works – he is a very logical male and has such an incredible mind. He has challenged many of my own beliefs, just as I have challenged his… and together we have opened each other up to a Universe of possibilities…

For me, particularly after teaching the workshops that we’ve shared over the last 2 years, I know without doubt that we create our lives with our beliefs. I also firmly believe that we teach people how to treat us, so if someone has a belief that they’re not worthy, then that energy will come through in their body language, words and actions in their communication with others.  People are less likely to respond favourably to us when we don’t feel we’re worthy… thus, we generally create our own outcomes with others by the energy we take into any situation and in the way we choose to respond to it.  Respond with love and you will attract a very different outcome than if you respond with anger. Of course you will…

When we shift our limiting beliefs and step through our fears, then our energy calibration rises and we become one of those people who lights up a room when we enter it.  Don’t you just love being around people like that..?  These people teach others that they deserve love and respect, simply because they love and respect themselves.  They will create very different outcomes for themselves because others will want to love them, help them, give to them, buy from them and so on… it all makes such perfectly logical sense.  Andy is completely right; there really is no ‘secret’ to it…

However… in saying this, I have also experienced what I can only describe as magic and miracles in my life – so many incredible ‘coincidences’ that have flowed my way with such synergy and perfection at exactly the right time, and always just a short while after I’ve thought to myself ‘I’d really love that’… that I simply can’t explain the phenomenon away.  I know it can’t just be down to just my beliefs – these perfect coincidences are far too significant for that.  I agree completely that I was open to recognising them because I had recently wished for them, but the synergy of them showing up in the ways that they have is not explainable in my book.  I do know for sure that when I make my wishes, the less attachment I have to the outcome, and the deeper the sense of fun that I make the wish with, the quicker and more accurately the perfect thing comes my way.  I consider myself to be one of the luckiest people alive… a very empowering belief to have gifted myself with indeed.

For me, the LoA is a combination of the two elements – the energy within me, and the energy ‘out there’. I am definately responsible for creating the former, and I strongly believe that I am also responsible for the power of my connection to the latter. I’ve learned that magic and flow happens for me when: -

• I feel an overwhelming sense of love and gratitude for everyone and everything in my life…
• I have empowering beliefs that are completely in alignment with my values…
• I act with intention after an inspired thought… this opens unbelievable doors…
• I just know within my heart and soul that it’s on its way… and at the same time…
• By having no attachment to the outcome… instead, just feeling a sense of fun about life…

I feel so connected to this Universal energy that I know in my heart that I would be doing myself a huge disservice by saying that it’s simply all down to my own beliefs… they in themselves could not have drawn the perfection and synergy into my life that I’ve witnessed.  In my personal experience, there is far more to it than that.  Either that, or I am just the luckiest person alive!…

I adore having an open mind on the whole perspective, and I adore listening to and learning from everyone else’s perspective too… one thing I know for sure is that life is utterly amazing and I love every second of it.. the good, the bad and the indifferent – it’s all amazing 

Power Up Your Life workshop, Oxford Sat Jan 9th 2010

We are presenting, along with a great line-up of speakers on Saturday 9th January 2010 in Kennington, Oxford.

LIVING THE ULTIMATE RELATIONSHIP
9 January 2010 – 9.00am – 5.30pm
Kennington Village Centre, Kennington, OX1 5PG
Click here to book – lunch included in ticket price

Life’s Most Amazing Experiences… ♥ ♫♪

Here’s a wonderful article from my amazing Diane……

Isn’t life completely amazing? I look back over the last 7 years at some of the lessons that have had such a powerful impact on the way I now embrace life. I know without doubt that I, like you, am an incredible human being, connected to everyone and everything around me, with the power to create my life.

Fear is disabling, and if it’s present in your energy, then it doesn’t matter what you want to create, whether it’s a loving relationship, a new job or a successful business – the beliefs you have which cause your fear are what will tend to expand in your life. People can often see and feel the fear in you, although they can’t always pinpoint exactly why, somehow it comes through on a subconscious level. Over the last few years I chose to step through each and every fear that held me back, changing every aspect of my life beyond recognition. The only thing that now feels fearful to me is the thought of lying on my deathbed many years from now, looking back with regret at how unfulfilled my life has been, wishing I’d had the courage to play full out and achieve my true potential. That thought is far more frightening than stepping through any fear now…

There is no failure, rejection or disapproval in life, absolutely not – all of these things are ego driven and created within our own minds. I gave up worrying about what others thought about me years ago (such a burden lifted!), and therein disappeared any concept of failure in my life. In fact, making mistakes is an essential part of growing and learning, and the only people who ‘fail’ are those who refuse to step out of their comfort zones for fear of being judged, and then ironically sit in judgement of others who step up and out. Fact – if you choose to live your life through someone else’s eyes and expectations, then you will always be in fear, and you will certainly never experience true happiness.

I learned, with astonishing impact, how much my beliefs formed my experience of life. When I told myself I could achieve something, then miraculously, I could. So I changed my beliefs and embraced every challenge. I now live my life without limits. I realised that blaming others is giving away my power and any control over my experience of life. So I chose to take full responsibility for my emotions, regardless of the behaviour of others – after all, their behaviour is their stuff and they’re quite entitled to have it, without judgement from me.

I learned that my experience of any relationship, intimate and otherwise, was a direct reflection of my relationship with myself. I realised that trying to be what I felt others expected of me was in fact, simply a form of imitation love, which could only leave me in a place of fear… because what if that imitation love wasn’t returned?

Learning how to forgive by looking back over my past and finding lessons and gifts in every experience is the most empowering gift – I learned to thank those people who had caused me pain; they had become my greatest teachers by giving me the most incredible opportunities to master my emotions. Without them, I wouldn’t be teaching today and living life to the full.

I learned just how vital it is to love myself unconditionally. The moment I began to love myself, the more love I had to give and share with others. I was also able to receive more love. But then it’s not surprising really, because no one can love you more than you love yourself. You teach others exactly how to love and treat you by how you love and treat yourself. Yet most of us think that we’re being good and kind by putting ourselves last, whilst eventually secretly harbouring resentment.

I have learned that happiness truly is inside of me… it is not created by anything on the outside. By walking away from a majority of the material possessions I owned, I realised first hand that everything can be taken away except what is on the inside. Within this experience was the most beautiful lesson in acceptance. Now, I feel no fear in my ability to stand alone in this world, knowing without doubt that I can, and will, handle anything… and it was in truly knowing that I am capable of standing alone, that I found the most beautiful relationship and realised that I was the furthest from being alone that I could ever be.

I learned how to go from being in a loving relationship with myself, into being in a loving relationship with another. It was through the ups and downs that the most beautiful and powerful lessons were learned, which ultimately strengthened us beyond words. With Andy, I learned the essence of what it takes to create a deeply loving relationship – a Soul Mate relationship – which I now know without doubt is something that we can all create, not something we stumble upon when we meet someone who makes our heart skip a beat.

Essentially, I realised with absolutely certainty that I create my life – no longer does life simply ‘happen’ to me. Those events that are destined and not within my control, well, I can choose how to respond to them – with love or with fear. I choose love now, because I see what happens when I choose to respond with fear instead.

My truth is this: – I can choose to step out of my comfort zone as often as I wish, I can choose to step through fear, I can choose to have empowering beliefs, I can choose to allow others to hurt me, I can choose how to respond to any situation, I can choose to take responsibility for my life and my emotions, I can choose to be in great energy…… I can choose to create the life of my dreams… or… I can blame others for making my life unhappy. And even as I write that last sentence, I truly trust that you will connect with how ridiculous the latter option is.

I choose happiness… and now, I cannot see any aspect of my life that I do not create. Empowering beyond words!

Di xx

Is Happiness a Disease or a Disorder?!!

I’ve been studying (unofficially, unscientifically) about mental health. The desire amongst ‘the profession’ to classify various ‘conditions’, and then to set about labelling so many of us in order to (i) justify their existence (the profession, not the ‘condition) and (ii) to prescribe medical solutions is, at best, highly questionable. Yes, it has its place in more extreme cases, even then it has shown to be only part of a long term answer.  Read more about such classification here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diagnostic_and_Statistical_Manual_of_Mental_Disorders

Here’s something almost unbelieveable:

Research paper ‘A proposal to classify happiness as a psychiatric disorder’ Jnl Medical Ethics, 1992, by Richard Bentall.

It is proposed that happiness be classified as a psychiatric disorder and be included in future editions of the major diagnostic manuals under the new name: ‘major affective disorder, pleasant type’. In a review of the relevant literature, it is shown that happiness is statistically abnormal, consists of a discreet cluster of symptoms, is assocated with a range of cognitive abnormalities, and probably reflects the abnormal functioning of the central nervous system. One possible objection to this proposal remains – that happiness is not negatively valued. However, this objection is dismissed as scientifically irrelevant.
[End]

The use of the word normal and abnormal is fascinating. Pathologists often look for so called ‘normal ranges’ of health indicators. What they mean by normal is average.

What if we live in a world where average health (both mental and physical) is decidedly sub-optimal? This would make optimum health ‘abnormal’ according to such measures.

As such I entirely agree – happiness IS statistically abnormal, consists of a discreet cluster of symptoms, is assocated with a range of cognitive ‘abnormalities’, and probably reflects the abnormal functioning of the central nervous system.  In the sense that in the modern world, driven by time, outcomes, money, ego tends to block us from happiness – our cognitive ‘normality’ is far from happy.

In Robert Holden’s great book on Happiness, ‘Be Happy’ he makes the link between happiness and authenticity. Most people believe or feel that you cannot be inauthentic and happy. When people are authentic, they are happy. If only more doctors, psychiatrists, politicians, teachers, counsellors, coaches, leaders and HR Managers… knew this!

‘Eat Pray Love’, Spirituality and Enlightenment. Is it just for girls?

I’ve read a few books about spiritual journeys and gurus. The only thing I’ve become convinced about from reading their books is it seems to be a long hard journey with no guarantees of a definite outcome and no real knowledge of what the outcome is or ‘should be’. I recently read ‘Eat Pray Love’ by Liz Gilbert – it sparked some thoughts about my journey and my beliefs.

I share these with you in the knowledge that: beliefs are easy to change (that’s a belief), are transient and are largely responsible for creating your reality. My words are written with little first hand knowledge of what often gets described as spiritual practice, and with plenty of observation of those who do practice (and write about it). Through my own journey, I have learned how to find relative peace and let go of the negative ‘chatterbox’ or ‘monkey mind’.

Now I don’t claim to be a very spiritual person, or to want to be – I’d rather just be authentic. My partner, Diane, has said the opposite, that I am very spiritual… Who knows, who cares? It’s just a label. I’ve known many people who actively seek spirituality as some kind of sanctuary from their other ‘real’ world. If you buy into living in the moment, the power of now, then your sanctuary is real while you are there, and its absence, or the absence of very spiritual feelings is also real when you are not there. Unfortunately, not being there for so many people is a frustrating and painful place to ‘be’.

If you feel the need to escape, then this is what we call an ‘away from’. We often need powerful, almost debilitating ‘away froms’ in order to have sufficient motivation to make change. However, to see change through to a much better alternative, there needs to be an equally powerful ‘towards’ motivation and vision for your future. When you can step into that future, it can become your new reality in the moment.

To me, detachment and enlightenment are polar opposites. Surely an ideal and enlightened life could be easy, not hard, or necessarily devoted? Requiring discipline yes, involving the sacrifice of vices that hold you back, but not abstinence on a grand scale. Gilbert describes devotion as “diligence without assurance” – a kind of blind faith. I fear all too often it is the blind leading the blind… You can choose to have faith in yourself and in ‘the process of life’. To me this is not very far removed from being rational, may be slightly instinctual and intuitive. It is a long way removed from the kind of irrational ‘blind’ faith of many doctrines. Sure, use rituals if they help, but only if they help you embrace life as opposed to hide from it.

It seems to me that enlightenment “should” be something that you carry easily with you at all times, rather than some place, a nirvana that you go to as some kind of escape from that other world that you occupy. Just look at the word ‘avoid’ – a void – are you simply escaping to nothing. Sure it can represent a respite. Is it really a valid, authentic long term solution? Or simply a different kind of jail.

I keep seeing teachers claiming that you can step into enlightenment in a moment and that your level of enlightenment is measured by the number of moments that you spend in enlightenment. They tell me that it is possible to move from a place of pain and suffering to a place of enlightenment. Personally, I think this is a bit of a con. Are you conning yourself?

Here’s how I see it. Your pain and suffering is largely self-inflicted. It is actually a choice, however, the choice only becomes clear and real when you understand and accept that there is a credible alternative. Now for me, the credible alternative is not avoidance, escapism, meditation, satsangs etc. At best these are just possible tools that you can use to help find your true, higher self (but not the answer, not your higher self), at worst they are pure escapism, a surreal distraction. The pain and suffering are lessons, which once you accept them as such, lead to genuine growth of you as a person, they are part of the experience of human being. It does seem as though ’the universe’ continues to gives us these lessons until we ‘get it’. I do not believe that human ‘being’ is that permanently meditative ‘escape’ state.

Real human ‘being’ is being an expression of your true self, one that requires you to let go of fear and limiting beliefs; to let go of the need for escapism, be it though worldly addictions or more meta-physical ‘trips’ satsangs etc. Being your true self is about taking action, it is about being authentic, it is about acting (actually its about not acting, but keeping it real) from a place of love and trust, not fear of judgement or fear of not being good enough. It is about acting out your values as an expression of your true self. I admit that for most of us, choosing to express our true values will feel like an act to start with, as it is such unfamiliar territory.

So, the choice that I mentioned, for me is a choice to ‘Feel The Fear And Do It Anyway®’ as we teach on our workshops, stepping through your inauthentic and egoic ‘lower self’ to take massive action as an expression of your higher self, your true values, your dreams, the best of you…

I look upon life’s journey and the journey of self-development or spiritual development as one of increasing awareness and acceptance. It is a kind of ascention, stepping up through increasingly higher calibrations of emotional and energetic states, rather like rungs of a ladder. What I all too frequently observe is (rather too) desperate seekers of some kind of spiritual salvation, trying to take short cuts, jumping the whole ladder, only to slither down a long snake, back to the place they are running away from.  Their fears sabotage the temporary nirvana and ‘monopolise’ their heads – go to jail, do not pass go, do not collect £200… to continue the analogy.

As you move your calibration steadily up the ladder, you are moving your average point of emotional and energetic calibration. By doing so, as your natural range or variation in emotions shifts, you are also moving up the base level, your lowest point of calibration. As a coaching client said to me only yesterday, “It’s like a ratchet, each time I slip, I go to a higher base/place than before”.

Here’s two different perspectives – you can diminish, downside and disempower your ego, or as Debbie Ford would say, embrace it and merge it with your higher self. Do what ever works for you, just don’t be a slave to it.

So if you are bored with board games, there is this alternative. For me, it could well be that the ultimate destination of this ascention is the same, I am just drawn to what for me is a more authentic path, one full of growth, humility and humanity.

Back to the book… I loved the honesty of ‘Eat Pray Love’ and the credibility of the some of the advice from Elizabeth Gilbert’s gurus. The way that she writes is refreshingly honest, her feelings laid bare, and also very funny and expressive. It’s definitely not just a book for girls!

Elizabeth embarks on a year’s journey into her soul, through three very different experiences in Italy, India and Bali. She learns how to make choices rather than being a slave to her emotions.  Finally, she learns how to stop “brooding over the past” or “worrying about the future”. One of the gifts she receives is being present in her life. Liz learns how to ask God, the Universe, her higher self (whatever, however you wish to see it) for answers and to trust that they would come when she truly needed them. Finally, she learns how not to rely on anti-depressants, which she knows can only be a temporary answer to life’s challenges and not the solution with the learning/life lessons. Some interesting questions are asked about the nature of SEEKing enlightenment and DEVOTION to supposedly enlightening rituals.

This and other books that I have read beg the question ‘Do we need a guru?’. I certainly feel that we generally need guidance out and away from our lower selves. This does present us with the opportunity to connect with our inner guru, the higher self, at which point for me, over reliance on any external guru is likely to become counter productive and dependent or co-dependent.

There are many brilliant passages in ‘Eat Pray Love’. Here’s a link to just a few of my favourites. Do go and read the book.

Note: ‘Feel The Fear And Do It Anyway®’ is a registered trademark of Susan Jeffers, PhD, used with express permission, under licence.

A few brilliant passages in ‘Eat Pray Love’

 

There are many brilliant passages in ‘Eat Pray Love’. Here’s a link to just a few of my favourites. Do go and read the book.

[1] Depression and Loneliness [low calibration energy & emotion, your egoic lower self – Andy] track me down after about ten days in Italy… They come upon me all silent and menacing like Pinkerton Detectives, and they flank me- Depression on my left, Loneliness on my right. They don’t need to show me their badges. I know these guys very well. We’ve been playing a cat-and-mouse game for years now. Loneliness, the more sensitive cop, says “I’m sorry ma’am. But I might have to tail you the whole time you’re travelling. It’s my assignment.”

Then they frisk me. They empty my pockets of any joy I had been carrying there. Depression even confiscates my identity; but he always does that. Then Loneliness starts interrogating me, which I dread because it always goes on for hours. He’s polite but relentless. He asks why I am all by myself tonight, yet again. He asks (though we’ve been through this line of questioning hundreds of times already) why I can’t keep a relationship going, why I ruined my marriage, why I messed things up. He asks why I can’t get my act together, and why I’m not at home living in a nice house and raising nice children like any respectable woman my age should be. He asks where I think I’ll end up on my old age, if I keep living this way. “It’s not fair for you come here,” I tell Depression. “I paid you off already. I served my time back in New York.”

But he just gives me that dark smile, settles into my favourite chair, puts his feet on my table and lights a cigar, filling the place with his awful smoke. Loneliness watches and sighs, then climbs into my bed and pulls the covers over himself, fully dressed, shoes and all. He’s going to make me sleep with him again tonight, I just know it.

[2] The Yogic path is about disentangling the built-in glitches of the human condition, which I’m going to over-simply define here as the heartbreaking inability to sustain contentment .  Taoists call it imbalance, Buddhism calls it ignorance, Islam blames our rebellion against God and Judeo-Christian tradition attributes it to original sin. The Yogis say that human discontentment is a simple case of mistaken identity.  We’re miserable because we think of ourselves as mere individuals, alone with our fears and flaws and resentments and mortality.  We wrongly believe that our limited little egos constitute our whole entire nature.

Yoga is the effort to experience one’s divinity personally and then to hold on to that experience forever.  Yoga is about self-mastery and the dedicated effort to haul your attention away from your endless brooding over the past and your non-stop worrying about the future so that you can seek, instead, a place of eternal presence from which you may regard yourself and your surroundings with poise.  Only from that point of even-mindedness will the true nature of the world (and yourself) be revealed to you.

[3] Like most humanoids, I am burdened with what the Buddhists call the ‘monkey mind’– the thoughts that swing from limb to limb, stopping only to scratch themselves, spit, and howl. From the distant past to the unknowable future, my mind swings wildly through time, touching on dozens of ideas a minute, unharnessed and undisciplined… Your emotions are the slaves to your thoughts, and you are the slave to your emotions… The other problem with swinging through the vines of thought is that you are never where you are.

[4] Your ego’s job isn’t to serve you. Its only job is to keep itself in power. And right now, your ego’s scared to death cuz it’s about to get downsized… Pretty soon your ego will be out of a job and your heart’ll be making all the decisions.

[5] My sense of helplessness was overwhelming. What I wanted to do was pull some massive emergency break on the universe… I just wanted to call time out, to demand that everybody STOP until I could understand everything… what Richard called ‘control issues’… There’s only two questions that human beings have ever fought over: “How much do you love me?” and “Who’s in charge?” (love and control).

Video Out-takes and introductory webinar recordings

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• Do you know just how awesome you truly are?
• How much of your potential are you really living up to?
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• How much of your behaviour is driven by ego?
• Do you love yourself 10 out of 10? Would you like to?
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• Never mind intellect – how emotionally and spiritually intelligent are you?
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Here is our first ever YouTube video together, introducing our new monthly PD service:

The recording of Part 1 of our introductory webinar from Wednesday 21st October is available by clicking on the word ‘Recording’ in the blue box below:

As promised, here’s the funny out-takes from our first ever YouTube video:

The recording of Part 2 of our introductory webinar from Thursday 29th October is available by clicking on the word ‘Recording’ in the blue box below:

Sign up for our amazing monthly Holistic Persponal Development Support package here.

Like everyone, we hate spam. You details will be kept confidential, your email will not be shared with anyone else. We will only contact you with regard to these webinars and our holistic personal development service.

Mind, Body & Soul Webinar – Holistic Personal Development

Thank you for visiting our stand at the Mind, Body & Soul show in Cheltenham.

We provide fantastic and transformational workshops and coaching with many many very satisfied clients who have radically improved their lives.

Now you can access support from us online with our all new webinars and monthly private members support service.

Join us on Wednesday 21st October for part 1 of a free webinar which explans our non-nonsense, eye opening approach to holistic personal development and Authentic Transformation. Juss enter your details below – if you can’t join us live, we will send you a link to the recorded webinar. All you need is a PC with sound an an internet connection. You will be able to see us, and our presentation, interact with us

Like everyone, we hate spam. You details will be kept confidential, your email will not be shared with anyone else. We will only contact you with regard to these webinars and our holistic personal development service.

Sign Up for our Webinar and see our very 1st YouTube video!

• Do you know just how awesome you truly are?
• How much of your potential are you really living up to?
• Do you like, understand and accept yourself completely?
• Could you like, understand and accept all others?
• How much of your behaviour is driven by ego?
• Do you love yourself 10 out of 10? Would you like to?
• Can you/do you expect anyone to love you more than you love yourself?
• Did you know there are at least 9 types of intelligence?
• Never mind intellect – how emotionally and spiritually intelligent are you?
• How emotionally and spiritually intelligent would you like to be?
• Are you in charge of your wellness, health and energy? Would you like to be?
• What does your higher self look, feel and sound like – are you in alignment?

We are re-running Part 1 of our introductory webinar this Wednesday 21st October at 7:15pm – please register below. Part 2will follow on Thursday 29th October again at 7:15pm (GMT), again – please register to receive joining instructions. You can use this page to access a recording of each webinar after the event too.

Like everyone, we hate spam. You details will be kept confidential, your email will not be shared with anyone else. We will only contact you with regard to these webinars and our holistic personal development service.

…this comes from of our model of holistic personal development:

Testimonial - The material is taught in such a simple way, which makes it so effective. Di and Andy deliver it in such a heartfelt way that creates so much added-value in the workshop. They are truly amazing people who I will never forget. Dan, Warwickshire
Click this link for many many more amazing testimonials.

This is a monthly membership service which takes you through a process of Authentic Transformation, where you get to really understand your true self, how and why you operate the way you do, and how to be your best and connect fully to your potential.

As Andy would say… “Humans are the most complex thing on the planet. 50 trillion cells, driven by emotions, instincts and thoughts from 100 billion brain cells. We are each in charge of the world’s most powerful super computer, with more memory capacity than all other computers on the planet (10⁸⁴³² MFLOPS to be precise!). In turn, our complex thoughts and emotions are in charge of the planet’s most sophisticated pharmacalogical laboratory, regulating much of our state and our health.”

We are going to show you how to love yourself and why where there is fear, love is not and where there is love, there is no fear.

Over the past 6-7 years Andy and I have both been on an incredible personal development journey. We have trained with and studied some of the world’s top motivational and developmental experts, each giving us great distinctions. We have discovered that the very best teachers are actually teaching the same things and that real, lasting positive change comes out of a holistic and balanced approach, partly intellectual and conscious, partly energetic, intuitive and subconscious.

In spite of and because of these great teachers, we have actually experienced the most growth over the past two years of being together. Combining our individual knowledge, styles and approaches to life, we have become each others greatest teachers. In the process, we have created and delivered fantastic workshops and coaching.

Now we want to make this easily affordable to you. Whether you are new to personal development easily and affordably available, or seeking ongoing support for your journey, this unique holistic approach will provide great insights and progression.

OK – so what is in the package? It is a monthly membership scheme.

• Every three weeks we will be holding a live webinar, with a presentation and discussion – you will be able to ask us questions live.
• The webinar will be recorded so that you can watch it again as many times as you like.
• We will also be posting highly educational videos for you to watch
• You will have access to all of our posted material via a private members social network, where you will be able to interact with us and our other members.
• On the members network we will be building up a library of supporting materials to help you on your journey of self-discovery and self-actualisation.
• This is all our own network and material – we will be inviting guest speakers on specialist subjects that we are not so familiar with such as Feng Shui and Nutritional Therapy.
• All of this material will be provided in bite sized chunks, easy to assimilate, simplified and put into context of our holistic framework for personal development.

These webinars are ongoing. Our journey has lasted 6-7 years each and is ongoing. Our core material will be presented over the next 18-24 months, in a way that you can understand very easily and incorporate into your life.

Three key distinctions regarding personal development are:

1. Everyone is different – therefore not all purported solutions will work for everyone.
2. Personal development or Authentic Transformation is a journey – not everyone is at the same point in their journey, not everyone is ready for some of the more advanced concepts… until they have grasped the fundamentals…
3. Many techniques and subjects taught under the umbrella of personal development, great as they are.. are tools and concepts, not solutions in themselves. Things like goal setting, NLP, meditation, Law of Attraction, EFT, special diets, some spiritual practices and teachings… To be truly useful, these tools need to be used in a more holistic context and framework.

Our webinars embody these three key principles.

Subscribe now. It is only £27 per month, you can cancel at any time, so there is no risk. We know you will feel that you are getting way more than your monies worth.

Our Soul & Spirit magazine ‘Cosmic Ordering’ article Aug 09 issue

Did you catch our three page spread in the August 09 issue of Soul and Spirit magazine?

If not then you can download and view a PDF of the Cosmic Ordering article by clicking on the image to the right:

Find out what journalist AnneMarie Flanagan learned on our Cosmic Ordering/Law of Attraction 2 day workshop; plus read the amazing results that Lynne Edwards has achieved with her life, in only 12-15 months, since attending our workshops.