Do you set the bar high for yourself in your professional life?  Do you demand only the best from your relationships.  Do you strive for perfection in many areas of your life?  If you do, then you are motivated by something that you value.  Something that drives you to be the best.  Coaching is pretty much all about being the best that you can be.  It works really well when you recognise the drivers for performance and you examine people's personal expectations.

Like most things in life, there are exeptions to the rule.  If you find that no matter how much effort you put in, and the results that you get, somehow don't fulfil you, then it is worth examining what is driving you.  If you are attempting to achieve perfection when perfection is not required, chances are you are expending a lot of unnecessary energy that could be channelled into something far more rewarding. 

During my secondary school education a fellow pupil was made to swim every single morning by his over zealous parents who had ambitions for him to become an Olympic swimmer.  It was not what he wanted.  In later years he discovered that no matter what he did, it was never good enough.  It never met his personal expectations.  Arguably you might then examine if those expectations were really his in the first place, or, if they were borne out of his parents desire to push him to be something better.  

I refer to this as the 'report card syndrome', i.e. "must try harder!".  You might remember having seen that written on a report card from school days.  Remember that the desire to better yourself in some way is for the most part healthy, provided that the motives and reasons for improvement are not destructive or drain you of valuable energy and peace of mind.  Check your 'feeling state' if it feels exciting and worth stretching for, you are probably on the right track. 

I wonder if you, like me, felt a reticence to let go of the summer season as we began to slip into autumn?  Here in the UK, the end of British Summer Time (BST) was marked by the usual change of the clocks as they dropped back by one hour last weekend.  Lighter in the morning for a while but darker, quicker in the evening.   The lure of hibernation is just as real for human beings as it is for the animal kingdom.  There are a few differences of course, we watch a little more TV and punctuate the darker months with a series of festivals to keep us in a cheery mood.

We adapt very quickly.  Within a couple of weeks of experiencing a change in the daylight hours, we are used to our new reality.  The anticipation of change of course, is often far more daunting than the reality when it arrives.  By the time spring arrives, you may find yourself lamenting about the wonderful times you spent warming yourself by an open fire, reflecting on the positive aspects of the winter season.  It is interesting to think about how much resistance we experience from day to day in anticipating change and wondering how we are going to adapt.

If you could harness all of the insights that you have gathered over the years, about how things work out much easier than you had anticipated, what would you do with all of the recouped energy?  Acceptance is a key component of adapting to anything.  When we learn to accept that perpetual change is the norm and that we somehow adapt, we can reclaim a sense of reconciled peace of mind.  Carry that thought with you in everything that you do.  Learn from past experience and approach your challenges and changes and in a much gentler way.  Remember that you have an extraordinary ability to adapt to any situation and to choose your own reality.

I keep a file of inspiring or thought provoking material that I am sent.  Clearing through paperwork a couple of days ago, I came across this.  I have no idea who the author is so I am unable to acknowledge the creator by name.   It is simple and poignant and goes like this:-

An old Cherokee is teaching his grandson about life.  "A fight is going on inside me", he said to the boy.  "It is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves.  One is evil - he is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies,  false pride, superiority, and ego.  the other is good - he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith.  This same fight is going on inside you - and inside every other person, too"  The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather which wolf would win.  The old Cherokee simply replied........"The one you feed."

Isn't it amazing how much time and effort is expended in fulfilling the desire to be right?  Businesses have gone bust as a result of it and relationships have fallen apart.  I think there is an important distincition to be made between doing what is right and being right. 

Doing what is right is often a far greater stretch to make than yielding to the temptation of being right.  Childhood indoctrination and eductation may have re-enforced some of those burning desires to be right.  Being right for some, is a means of validation, some ritual that has to be completed in order to prove something personally.  If this resonates with you on any level, avoid worrying, it is commonplace, just about everybody will be able to relate to that overwhelming desire to be right.

If you are driven by this desire, you might like to ask yourself what it has cost you to be right over the years.  How many relationships have you damaged?  How many bad decisions have you made professionally?  What has it cost you financially?

The truth is, the desire to be right is a way of feeding the egoic mind, whereas doing what is right feeds a much deeper  place in your being.  As you go through your week this week, consider how many of your actions are driven by the desire to be right.  See what happens when you step back, take a deep breath and then make a decision to do what is right, or to do the right thing.  Notice the results that you get personally, professionally and financially.

This is one of my favourite quotes from Virginia Woolf - The English Novelist 1182 - 1941.  I had dinner with a friend and fellow therapist last night and we reflected on the poignant nature of the film 'The Hours' portraying the lives of three different women from three different eras, one of them being Virgina Woolf.  I love the kind of films that leave you thinking for days and weeks about them. 

I also use Virginia's quote in training courses and seminars.  When people are faced with change, especially change that may seem unwelcome, the first reaction can be one of resentment, resitance or powerlesness.  The one thing in life that you can be certain of is perpetual change.  If your life is changing and you are not entirely sure which direction you are taking, examine the pieces that you have available.

You might put your pieces into categories such as: relationships, wealth, job/career, health, contribution, fun & recration, family etc.  Only when you have them laid out before you, can you begin to arrange them in a way that somehow satisfies somthing within you.

If you play scrabble or card games, you will be used to making the best of your hand or your letters.  The changing events in your life are you pieces and as you learn to arrange whatever come your way, you will always have a good feeling of being in control.  

It is really easy to lose perspective when you look at things in a certain light.  You may discover that the job you have been in for a number of years is under threat or is moving elsewhere.  You may be experiencing shifts in your personal relationships.  Remember that it is at these times of change that the gravity of the past is perhaps at its strongest.  There may be a temptation to sink back into old feelings of being powerless or feeling a sense of some despair. 

It is important to take a step back and remind yourself of what is true and what is actually imagined.  What are the facts?  When you deal with fact, you get your sense of perspective back.  If you are the kind of person who 'feels' their way through life, this may be more of a challenge for you.  Your experience is likely to be based on how you are feeling right at this moment or how you recall having felt in a past situation.

Remember that moment by moment a new reality unfolds and you get to choose how that reality looks and feels.  When you feel you have limited choices, the choice you will always have is to decide how you are going to let circumstances affect you. 

The recent Tsunami and the earthquakes in Sumatra reminded me yesterday of some of the things that are really important.  Life!  Having the choice to get up every morning and make a decision about how great your day will be.  Most of us live in an environment that is free from natural disasters, famines and war.  We are luckier than a great deal of the world's population.  Reflect, be grateful for all that you have and get a sense of your personal perspective back.

I have blogged a lot about beliefs and also wrote about them in my newsletter.  Why, you might ask? - Well, because what you believe is so pivotal to how you shape your reality.  Dr Wayne Dyer even wrote a book entitled "You Will See it When you Believe it".  Think about that for a moment.  How many times have you been blind to something until you shifted your belief structure? 

Choice comes into this too.  What you choose to believe will determine how your reality is modelled.  I want to take a look a the anatomy of a belief.  Not because I am a scientist, far from it, because I want you to question some of the things that you believe to be true. 

I think there are number of stages as follows:-

1. You are given some information from a source that you trust
2. You adopt that information
3. You transform it into an idea or ideas
4. You gather some evidence to make it real for you
5. You talk about it
6. You re-enforce the idea
7. You believe it
8. You get to be right about it
9. You validate it whenever you can

The same framework works to replace negative beliefs with positive ones.  If you take the 9 steps above, you can use this to 'install' some more valuable, a belief that supports you, better feelings and better outcomes.  What are you beliefs costing you?  Look beyond what you see and consider alternatives.  How will you world look when you replace your limiting beliefs?

I had lunch last week with a friend and ex-work colleague Minu.  We had not seen each another for at least 5 years, although we have kept in touch via email and my newsletters.  We picked up right were we had left off and I always think that is a measure of a great friendship.  She responded to a request that I made to discuss contract assignment possibilities within the company that she works for.

We had lots to catch up on and the conversation flowed.  We could probably have spent the rest of the day and that evening chatting.  One of the things that I love the most about Minu is that she has the ability to look beyond your words and sense what else is going on (coupled with a wicked sense of humour).  Minu had lived in the US for some time and whilst there she worked with Landmark Education running and facilitating the Landmark Forum.  I did the Forum here in London back in 1992.  Admittedly, I was not wholly ready for the lessons in total responsibility at that time.  Looking back though, this course laid a very valuable foundation for many things.  I noticed how valuable that was when I was with Minu.  I realised that we speak the same language, in fact everybody I have met who has done the Landmark Forum has that appreciation. 

During conversation, she asked me if my game was big enough and I immediately knew the answer, no, it wasn't.  That realisation was so valuable.  It was almost as if she had looked inside of my very soul and noticed that something was missing.  Every now and again we need people to ask us those great questions.  So I am now asking you also, is your game big enough?  If it isn't then what do you need to do to get energised and exacted about your future and to make the present even more valuable. 

The very next day I went to a 50th Birthday celebration of a friend who has a very big game. He is founder and owner of an organisation called ICROSS or the International Community for the Relief of Starvation and Suffering.  Mike Meegan had a vision when he was a young man that he could make a real difference in the world to people who were suffering.  His dream was big and after having spent over 30 years in Africa he has raised millions and helped countless people who have experienced suffering of the kind that hopefully you and I will never experience. 

I am not saying that your dream needs to be of that magnitude, it does need to be big enough to excite you, give you butterflies in your stomach and get you out of bed in the morning before the alarm sounds. 

It struck me a while back, whilst working on the cross-trainer in my local gym, just how easy it is to create a highly attuned relationship between your thoughts and your body's behaviour.  I noticed that every time I got on that particular machine, I would go through an almost robotic routine of entering; the desired programme, i.e. cardio, my weight and then my age.  When I turned 46, I was still anchored into keying in 45 when I got onto the machine.  It was so automatic.  Interestingly, when I did increase to the age of 46, my target heart rate was reduced.  I didn't like that.  So I decided to stay at 45 for another year. 

What you project in life will invariably determine the results that you get.  For me, projecting a feeling and a mindset of being younger than my measure of years, I got a far more fulfilling work-out, both physiologically and psychologically.  I also decided to project the desired weight that I wanted to be.  I dropped my actual weight by 2 kilos and focused on that every time I got on the machine.  The intensity of that focus produced the desired result within 4 weeks.  Admittedly I ate sensibly and continued to exercise.  Something wonderful happens when you give yourself a set of repeated instructions - they are accepted by your unconscious mind.  Thoughts become things!  Seeing my age and weight 3-4 times per week just re-enforced my inner belief about my 'state' and of course it produced a great result.  Although I am not actually a year younger, I probably feel a good 2 years younger and my weight dropped to exactly where I wanted it to be.

What are you projecting?  What do you want to project?  What is the desired result you are looking for?  How can you remind yourself of where it is you are heading?  Take some action today and project something that is worth stretching for and then keep looking at, imagining it and feeling it. 

If you subscribe to my newsletter you will already have seen this thread.  If you don't and you would like to, send me an email with the word 'Subscribe' in the subject line to: info@a-wonderful-life.com .  How much of your time do you spend in fear?  An hour a day, a couple of hours, half of the day or more?  How much of that time could be spent enjoying peace of mind, joy or laughter?  Think about it.  I came across this acronym a few years ago and had filed it away in a little drawer in my mind, until a colleague of mine reminded me of it again last week.  Remember that 80-90% of things that we worry about will never actually happen!  I will say that again, 80-90% of things that we worry about will never actually happen!  Fear is just False Evidence Appearing Real. 

The next time that you find yourself being fearful remember this acronym.  Examine the facts, the evidence.......and remember that it may appear to be real AND there is a very good chance that it is just an illusion.  If you have learnt to make scary pictures in your mind that disturb or frighten you, it might be time to do something else, after all, you know how to make pictures that give you a good feeling don't you?  Yes, of course you do, so what is preventing you from doing that more often?  People are amazed when they discover that they can control their state just by making better quality pictures that make them feel better.  What do you need to think about to make yourself feel good.  Think about all the things you can do with the reclaimed energy you will get from getting off the worry wheel.  You deserve to feel better and now you know the odds of bad things happening, it's time to relax a bit more.