Posted on

The Most Powerful Question to Ask Yourself

In my coaching calls with my clients, all of whom work with me to enhance their performance, be more effective in business or to experience the life that they dream about, I ask many questions.

I have found that by asking the right questions, my clients are able to center on the issues that either get in the way of their goals or propel them to new insights and towards what truly matters to them.

Within these questions there is one that always is the most powerful. That question is:

“If you were not afraid, what would your life look like?”

I do not ask, “If it was easy, what would your life look like?”

I do not ask, “If it felt safe,what would you achieve?”

I do not ask, “If you felt comfortable, what dreams would come true?”

I ask:

“If you were not afraid, what would your life look like?”

We all rationalize, make up excuses or put off going for what we want simply because we are scared to death to take the steps necessary to make a business presentation, to try out for an athletic team, audition for a stage performance, ask someone on a date, or start writing our book.

Fear stops us dead in our tracks with all of the many things we believe will happen if we go for it.

The same fear that makes us afraid becomes the single biggest obstacle to our success in life, no matter what it is that we desire to go for.

Ask yourself the question, “If I were not afraid, what would my life look like?”

Replace the image in your thinking of all of the scary things that might happen (things such as anxiety, rejection, feeling like an imposter, failure, etc.) if you go for your dreams and goals with a clear and specific picture of what your life would look like if you went for your goals. This, then, becomes the new foundation for for future success.

This is possible because fear keeps us from even trying, of even taking the risk.

The book doesn’t get started, the audition isn’t scheduled, the opportunity to speak in front of others leads to anxiety that is felt as too terrifying to even try and the social event opportunity is turned down as too risky.

The first step in creating meaningful change in your life is to ask yourself the right question. Not, is the opportunity too risky to go for but, rather, what would my life actually look like if I went for it, if I wasn’t letting fear get in the way.

The great news is that the answer to this most important question that leads to emotional freedom is in your thinking!

Today, ask yourself, “If I were not afraid, what would my life look like?” Take the answer to that question and have it become the foundation to take chances, to risk and to have the absolute best opportunity to live the life that most only dream about.

Posted on

Five Behavior Patterns That Lead to Stress

General patterns of living or behavior play a major role in determining whether or not you develop stress, anxiety or burnout. Research studies consistently show that those who live a life of specific stress-filled patterns of behavior experience a greater risk of serious physical and emotional consequences.

One of the keys to reducing your susceptibility to burnout and poor health is to examine your current behavior patterns and lifestyle.

The following lifestyle patterns will help you gain an awareness of your own personal susceptibility to stress.

1) Sense of Time Urgency

Impatience

  • Is it hard for you to wait in line?
  • Do you find yourself hurrying the speech of others?
  • Do slow drivers in the fast lane make you boil?
  • Do you move, walk and eat rapidly?

Scheduling More and More in Less and Less Time

  • Do you unrealistically try to schedule too many tasks without regard to the time available to you?
  • Are you experiencing overload due to poor time management?

Feeling Guilty While Relaxing

  • Do you feel like you always have to be doing something and can’t ‘do nothing’ for a few hours?
  • Is your self-talk full of the ‘shoulds’?
  • Is it difficult to do something that isn’t work related and is just for fun?
Posted on

Completing Your Creative Work Through Perseverance

Finishing things that matter to us is often easier said than done! As a creative, there are times when you find yourself feeling challenged to stay engaged with your projects and to persevere without giving up.

Most often, in order to complete our creative projects, we need to practice the power of perseverance and ‘hang tough’ until the end. Yes, because this is a mindset issue, then ultimately the solution is actually under our control. What, then, is the thinking needed to develop perseverance when our negative mindset leads to unfinished creations?

It is probable that your lack of perseverance is connected to negative self-talk that causes doubt in what you are creating or desiring to complete.

Maybe you’re not persistent because you are afraid of what others might think. Other times, things are simply difficult and it becomes hard to keep moving forward through the challenge.

In fact, the more you actually go for your goals as a creative, the greater the struggle with being persistent in your journey towards completion. This is because a lack of persistence is most often fear-based, and to keep pushing ourselves forward can lead to anxiety and stress.

Posted on

Cancel Your Guilt Trip and Demand a Full Refund (Encore Post)

Guilty

Today I would like to share some great news with you.

You are guilty.

(Not quite what you were expecting to hear, was it?)

Yes, believe it or not, accepting that we are guilty is powerful and can be the beginning of growth and change.

Determining if we are truly guilty of something can be the initial step towards resolving our offense and moving forward. Whether we have hurt someone we love, procrastinated working on our next important project or made excuses to ourselves about what we are capable of, we are guilty.

But … being guilty of something does not mean that we need to feel shame. Whereas guilt says that I have broken a law, or have done something that hurts either myself or another, shame goes deeper – much, much deeper.

In fact, the difference can be summed up in the following:

Guilt says, “I made a mistake.”
Shame says, “I AM a mistake.”

Wow, the implications between “I made” and “I am” are HUGE!

Destructive feelings of shame focus on past failures, feelings of wrongdoing, deserving punishment or that I am no good.

Constructive guilt focuses on the person I have hurt, the mistake I have made and the possibility of FUTURE CHANGE.

Yes, shame holds us hostage to a focus on the past, on ME instead of the future and what I can do differently next time. It keeps us from learning when we mess up or from being a part of healing an injured relationship.

“Shame is a soul eating emotion.”
~ C.G. Jung

Shame focuses on how bad I am while true constructive guilt focuses on the other person and what next step I must take.

In a strange way, shame is actually selfish. It’s about me and rarely leads to any meaningful change. It is kind of like confessing a sin, feeling better afterwards and then continuing to repeat the behavior.

Shame does not lead to change, only a beating up of one’s self.

Only a true acknowledgment of guilt leads to the possibility of becoming a new person.
So, the question becomes what do I do to keep from beating myself up with shame when I blow it?

Here are 3 things needed to identify and overcome destructive feelings of shame:

1) Determine If You Are Wrong

This sounds so basic, yet it is so easy to assume that we did something wrong. If we have low self esteem, we might assume that if a relationship is going poorly, then it must be my fault. Or, if I fail to follow through on a project I am working on, then it must mean that I am lazy – I am “guilty” of being a failure.

Ask yourself, am I really wrong. Did I actually blow it or am I assigning all the blame to myself when there might be many other variables involved in things not going well. It’s possible that the guilt that you feel is based on numerous ‘shoulds’ that you grew up with.

“When we played softball, I’d steal second base, feel guilty and go back.”  ~ Woody Allen

Maybe you’re not a lazy person, but rather afraid of rejection if you complete your project and put it out for the world to see. There is absolutely NO room here to feel shameful. Ironically, feelings of shame will lead to a greater possibility of not finishing … leading to more shameful feelings until you give up completely.

2) Discover Where You Are Wrong

Yes, there are times that we blow it (for myself, there are many times!). The key principle is that once we become aware that we are actually guilty, then we can use this awareness to discover exactly where we went wrong.

For example, maybe you were hurt by something said to you, leading to defensiveness and then saying something hurtful back. Take time to discover your part, knowing this kind of honesty can set you free to change.

3) Decide What You Need to DO About It

In the example above, you might feel a ‘right’ to be defensive, yet need to take responsibility that you hurt the other person and apologize to them. You are guilty and can help repair the injury by taking action. Again, there is no room for shame, but rather to take charge and do something about it.

Maybe you are feeling terrible about yourself for putting off something you made a commitment to finish. Acknowledge you have blown it and then decide to take charge and get back on track without any further negative self-talk.

 Make a commitment today to acknowledge when you are guilty, take steps to learn and heal and stop shaming yourself when you blow it. And remember that you are never, ever a mistake!

Posted on

7 Steps to Self-Esteem & Confidence (Encore Post)

Most of us carry pictures of those who matter to us in our wallet, purse or on our cellphone. I carry pictures of my wife and kids on my phone and iPad to look at and remind myself of how important they are to me.

As meaningful as these pictures are to us, we all carry another picture, one far more powerful than those in our wallet, etc. It is the mental picture that we carry that represents the opinion that we have of our self.

This picture is our self-image, a perception that has, from early on in life, influenced us in terms of our self-confidence, and in what we accomplish in our life, relationships and business.

Author Josh McDowell once said,

Your self-image is like a set of lenses through which you see reality. The healthier your self image, the more accurately your lenses let you see reality, and the more appropriate then is your behavior in response to that.”

If, for example, you picture yourself as a failure, then you will find some way to fail in your art, business and life, no matter how much you want to succeed. By looking through a lens of self-deficiency, you will act accordingly.

Dr. Joyce Brothers says,

You cannot consistently perform in a manner which is inconsistent with the way you see yourself.”

What, then, is the picture of yourself that you carry with you all day?

I would go so far as to say that all of our behavior is guided by the picture that we have of ourself. Self-confidence must have as its foundation a picture of someone of worth and potential.

Research has made it clear that success is not based on IQ, skills, age, education or gender, but rather is built on a foundation of a belief in one self.

In his remarkable book, Peak Performers, Charles Garfield concluded,

The greatest single characteristic of those who achieve their goals is the simple ‘belief that you can do it’.”

My challenge to you is to develop a healthy self-portrait by changing the mental picture of yourself that you have been carrying all of these years.

Here are 7 Steps to Self-Esteem and Confidence:

1) See Yourself as You Really Are

Begin by taking a realistic inventory of the best and the worst in yourself. If you are really good at something, shout it out to yourself (and the world). If you could improve in a particular area, commit to changing it without beating yourself up.

On a spiritual level, I believe that God sees us as highly significant and greatly loved, even when we blow it.

2) Take Time and Look Back

It is important to take a look at what I call your ‘emotional roots’. I am not talking about looking back as a victim or to blame anyone, but rather gaining an understanding that somewhere between your birth and today you accepted lies about your value.

Awareness is always the beginning of change.

3) Adopt a New Motto: “To BE, rather than to SEEM”

Stop basing the picture you have of yourself on whether someone else is smiling or frowning at you. Accept your uniqueness. Stop giving power away to what others think of you. Decide today that you will live authentically rather than in terms that you allow others to define.

4) Lose Your Fear of Perfect People

They do not exist. Period. The good news is that everyone, even those that we look up to, struggle and doubt at times. The goal is not to be perfect but to be growing and moving towards greater things. Eliminate thoughts such as “If only I could be like him …” and replace it with “Who do I want to become?”

5) Take Responsibility for ONLY What is Under Your Control.

Life is challenging, so why take on an even greater burden by believing you are responsible for things that you cannot control? Focus on those things that you can take charge of and go full force towards them, one at a time.

6) Develop Positive Self-Talk

Stop your self-critical thinking. If you are a creative person, nothing will destroy your ability to create amazing things more than self-criticism. Eliminate words of shame that you tell yourself. Quit beating yourself up. Listen for the ‘shoulds’ and tell them where to go! Commit to becoming aware of the lies in your thinking. Work with a coach and say, “It’s time for me to stop getting in the way of my success.”

7) Acknowledge & Affirm your Strengths and Accomplishments

My experience is that most of us keep a ‘Failure Log’ in our heads of all of the times things don’t go well or when we screw up. Instead, keep a (literal) ‘Victory Log’ – Every time you experience a victory, no matter how seemingly small, write it down. Build your Log so that on the day you get discouraged, you can pull it out as a reminder of how far you have come. Never stop filling up the Log!

Remember that your self-image is based on old experiences and perceptions. Do not allow yourself to stay a slave to that image. You are valuable and have amazing gifts to share with the world!

Question: Which of the 7 Steps are the most challenging to you? Are there any other steps that have helped you with self-confidence that you would like to add to the list? I’d love to hear your thoughts!

While most people live either in the regret of the past or in the anxious anticipation of the future, real living, as I share in this video, occurs in the present moment, in the NOW.

Click here to watch. I hope that you find it valuable!

 

Posted on

Creating a Mindfulness Routine

The process of staying present on a daily basis is such a challenging one. Our mind, from the moment we wake up until we hit the pillow at night, is FULL of so many thoughts, emotions, plans and fears, that it is a wonder we ever accomplish anything at all! And even if we do accomplish things, there usually is a price to pay of stress, burnout, anxiety and exhaustion.

With the rush of the Holiday Season, and everything that surrounds it, we are even less prepared to slow down and enjoy the moment.

To help with the everyday tendency to emotionally and mentally be ‘on the go’ with a busy overthinking mind, I created a very simple, yet powerful, guide to help you stay focused throughout the days ahead.

I will be sharing more posts in the months ahead and ways to stay present, but to help right now, click here to receive your free PDF and begin your journey to create a Daily Mindfulness Routine.