Self-awareness

Why You Aren’t Reaching Your Goals

I have an extremely persistent child. She wears me down with questioning and reasoning and she is relentless in going for what she wants. She exhausts me and she is very smart.

She is not unlike the voice in our heads. Our Inner Critic.

Our Inner Critic is also extremely smart and knows exactly how to keep us precisely where we are now – safe, comfortable, not stretching ourselves. Our Inner Critic is good at her role and she has many ways of convincing us that she is right. She has many different arguments for us to listen to. It is often easier to go along with her than to fight with her.

I’d like to do a quick experiment with you. Today, in our Spring Clean Your Life Challenge, I released a “Goals” worksheet. It’s easy, write down a big goal for yourself.

Think about your goal. Notice what starts to go on inside your head.

Did you get to write down the big goal or did your Inner Critic get to you before you even got to writing? “There’s no point in thinking big”, “as if you have time for this”, “keep it easy so you can move onto something else instead”.

If you managed to write the big goal, what is your mind saying now? “Sure, we’ll start that tomorrow”, “I’m never going to be able to…..”, “I just need to be …….. first, and then I can do it”.

Listen to what your Inner Critic is saying to you. Without judgement. Just notice.

There are many ways to tackle your Inner Critic. As a life coach I’ll share a few I use but first I can’t stress enough that you need to first be aware of your Inner Critic, and know it is not telling you the truth. I have never had a coaching client that didn’t have their Inner Critic come up repeatedly in a coaching session and the client was totally unaware of it.

Once you are aware of your Inner Critic you take back your power from it and, more importantly, get to the truth.

Here’s how:

Firstly, you can thank and soothe your Inner Critic. Tell it you appreciate it trying to keep you safe but that “you got this”.

Secondly, you can look for the 5% truth in what it is saying. Ditch the part that is fear based and listen for that 5% wisdom, for example if it’s telling you that you have no idea what is involved in getting the promotion so don’t even try, you can pull out the wisdom that you have learning to do AND go for that promotion.

Thirdly, you can repeat what your Inner Critic says and respond. For example: “I notice you (Inner Critic) are saying I should eat the cake, and that it won’t make a difference in the long run. I made a commitment to myself and my actions DO matter in getting the results I want. Thanks, but no thanks to the cake.”

There are many ways to deal with the Inner Critic but I CANNOT STRESS ENOUGH, you must be aware of it first.

So, get to work on dealing with yours and step out from under its protective dome. You know there’s something you’ve been waiting to go after. Go for it.

Hugs, Vicky xxxx

The Voice In Your Head

Ugghhh…..I’m tired, hitting snooze…..I can’t believe I hit snooze again, what’s wrong with me?…..will I never be able to commit to myself?……I look like crap……I didn’t give myself time to make a healthy breakfast, again!!!…….I’m never going to lose the extra weight I gained ……my car is such a mess, how hard is it to keep clean, it’s like 10 square feet – I’m so messy……my desk is not much better, I’m going to clean it now……what the…….I’ll clean tomorrow, I really am messy, or am I just “a mess”?……I don’t think i have the energy to get groceries…..no energy? pah, suck it up…..I look really chunky…..double chin AND wrinkles, is that even fair?….why is my hair so bad?……am I ruining my children?…..my wardrobe sucks… why am I still up?….I even failed at getting to bed at a decent time…..how hard is it to go to bed????…I’m crap.

Has anyone ever been as relentlessly mean to you as your own voice in your own head?

So much for loving yourself!! Can anyone actually do that with the mean girl chatter that never relents.

My chatter is what I started this post with.

And I truly believe that I’m a pretty awesome person.

Hard to believe with that tirade going off.

There are probably women that you know of that to look at them you would never guess that they have their own monologue going off in their own heads. Surely it’s not happening to them??

It sure is.

So, what are we going to do about it ladies?

Firstly, you have to be aware of it. You cannot correct a voice you have accepted.

Secondly, don’t accept it.

You will no longer be resigned to this way of speaking to yourself.

I’m not going to tell you to insert positive affirmation instead. That is one solution, but unless you truly believe the affirmation it falls flat and becomes something else that gets caught up in the negative chatter in your head.

Instead, try just noticing the thought. For example: “I notice I think I look like crap.” I find if I reframe my thought in this way, as opposed to just having the thought and accepting it as fact, my mind will often come to my defence. And if the thought doesn’t come naturally, I can purposely find something kind to say to myself.

If a friend was beating up on herself you would defend her. It’s time to put more attention on defending yourself.

It will take work. Being mindful always does. And you are worth it.

Hugs, Vicky xxx

If you haven’t already please join us for the Spring Clean Your Life Challenge. Free printable worksheets everyday in April.

i don’t know how to help you

Now I’ll add a bit of grammar (don’t message me if I get it wrong :)).

“I don’t know!!”
How to help you……

Coaching clients commonly answer “I don’t know” to my questions. When I dig deeper 98% of the time they TOTALLY DO KNOW. So what prompts this answer which stops the learning?

It is the easiest answer to give.

They are not being lazy or flippant. Their brains are doing what they are supposed to do – take the easiest path. With all the millions of decisions your brain is making every day which don’t require your conscious effort, it will absolutely try and avoid the deep thinking.

I don’t let that brain get away with short cutting, because getting a client to discover their own answers is incredibly powerful work.

Do you want to learn how to coach yourself to avoid giving yourself the “I don’t know answer?”

It takes practice and dedication because NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming) is a fact, you will follow the path most travelled, which means it’s easy to fall back into old habits.

The answer is actually quite simple, it’s the implementation that is more difficult.

Ask yourself better questions.

As a coach I’m trained to ask questions, but alone in my head I still sometimes ask dead end questions.

Why do you let that person talk to you/treat you like that?

It is way too easy to answer “I don’t know”, resolve to do better next time and move on. Hey, I’m very efficiently moving away from the discomfort of the WHOLE situation. Crafty move, yes?

How likely do you think there will be a repeat of being spoken to or treat badly?

What if you did know why you let that person treat you like that? Or what would be your best guess as to why?

These are extremely simple follow up questions to “I don’t know” and they are extremely effective. The client, in this case yourself, realizes that they aren’t getting off the hook and look a little deeper, almost always coming up with an answer, something that they can work on.

We let ourselves off the hook a lot. And that’s OK when it’s not important. When it is important, when something is having a negative affect on our lives, it is in our best interest to get the answers which allow us to move forward.

How to make a Dream Board Wallpaper for your Computer

I have wanted to make a vision board for years. Countless people have sworn to the value of it and the incredible results they have received for having gone through the process of creating it and putting it in a place they can see it often.

Who wouldn’t want their dreams to come true?!? So why did it take so long for me to do?

Because the idea of making a dream / vision board felt like a lot of work.

Leafing through magazines. Cutting out inspiring images, quotes and words and hoping they match up enough to my dreams, which incidentally, I wasn’t too sure of either because I hadn’t spared it too much thought.

Once I put some time and effort into my hopes and dreams I saw what an exciting future I could have.

As the saying goes, “time will pass anyway”, so I may as well give it some direction.

I thought of making a Dream Board in Pinterest but I won’t look at it everyday, which is when I decided to make the wallpaper on my computer screen my Dream Board. Perfect.

screen

Extra bonus here is that I get the images online which means I can find exactly what I’m looking for.

If you are not familiar with Picmonkey or want a refresher then try squishing my nose with your curser below and watch the video to see how I created my Dream Board Wallpaper for my computer. And below the video is a PDF printable you can sign up for which includes a worksheet with prompts for getting your dreams out of your head and on to paper.

Click Here to Get PDF and Worksheet

I would LOVE, LOVE, LOVE to see your dream boards, please come and share them in the Facebook group.

Until then, hugs, Vicky xx

Will You Answer the Door?

Take time to dream. Dream big. Dream often.

But don’t leave it at that. You must go beyond where most others turn back.

Once you have a dream, there will come a knock on the door.

Should you choose to answer this knock, it won’t be your dream sitting nicely packaged there on the step, no, it will be your “Dream Project Manager”, waiting and ready for action.

I think it is important to keep you dream consistently in sight. It’s like when you are thinking of buying a new car. All of a sudden you notice all the car commercials on TV, on bus shelters, in the newspaper, EVERYWHERE. Have they always been there? Yes, it just wasn’t relevant to you until now.

If you keep your dreams top of mind you’ll start to see opportunities to go after them. So, put them on a board or write them out and carry in your purse or simply commit to going through the vision daily in your mind. I believe the vision will help you stay on track and remind you why you need to stick with your “Dream Project Manager”, because what comes next may not be pretty.

Your Dream Project Manager is gonna make you work.

Dream Project Mgr small

Your Dream Project Manager will need you to get out of your comfort zone.

This is why we are not all “living the dream”. It takes effort to break the magnetic pull of our comfort zones. We get to the outer edge of that comfort zone and feel the resistance.

It is a conscious choice EVERY TIME we feel that resistance. Do we push through?

Or do we go back to our comfort zone?

I personally don’t know anyone who hasn’t gone back to their comfort zones. We’ve ALL done it. We’ve all given up on something.

And we’ve all experienced pushing through our resistance.

What feels second nature to you today was once a huge deal. When you booked your first vacation for yourself, when you got your first job, when you purchased a home or started a family, you likely had to learn a lot and move way out of your comfort zone.

Now it’s time to claim the dreams that are special to you.

And it’s time to do the work.

You’ve worked hard for everyone else. Now it’s time to put your attention on yourself and do this work for you.

Do this once and you will feel more confident dreaming bigger in the future.

You will no longer dread the knock at the door.

Aaaaannnndddd, I’ve made you the printable pictured above. Yaaaay.

Click Here to Get Printable

Put your thoughts on paper. Pretty it up with pictures, colours, whatever works for you. Make it relevant for you. Get prepared to do the work.

As always, I’d love to hear how you are getting on. Get in touch with me and come join in the facebook group.

Hugs, Vicky xx

This Book Helped my Self-Awareness

My perspectives have changed so much over the last 5 years. I like myself soooo much more now. At least as much as I liked myself at 10 years old. It was downhill from there.

And I have good ol’ self-awareness to thank for this new self-lovin’.

Having picked up a love for reading later in life (don’t tell this to my kids, they must do as I say, not as I did ;)) I was stunned that I’d be so affected by a book. This book – The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz.

Four Agreements 800x800

2 of the agreements are pretty standard.

Be Impeccable With Your Word
Always Do Your Best

It was the other 2 that we life altering for me.

Never Make Assumptions
Never Take Anything Personally

They’re so understated yet powerful.

So obvious that I thump my head wondering why I hadn’t thought of these before.

To never make assumptions often goes hand in hand with not taking anything personally.

How somebody behaves is all about them.

I personally can’t think of any exceptions on this.

There was one time when a woman almost reversed her car into my daughter. I bent my ring banging on her back window to stop her. Needless to say my emotions were running high. I shouted at her. I started repeating myself in my rant before I ran out of emotion and let her go. I kept it clean, my kid was watching, but even without profanity, shouting just made me scary to her, not necessarily heard and understood.

Had I said to her, more calmly, “you came too close to hurting my daughter, and scared the living daylight out of me” she would have undoubtedly been mortified and apologetic. She would never wish to hurt anyone. She would have been able to respond from feeling my fear and not from fearing me.

Neither scenario gets her off the hook of her own personal responsibility. She is in charge of a great big hunk of metal that can be lethal. She MUST be careful, ESPECIALLY around a school. There is nobody else to blame for her mistake. How I responded to her mistake is the part that is not to be taken personally. Those were my emotions and I could have responded a million different ways.

The fact that I lost my best friend at age 10 to getting hit by a car has made me that crazy parent that screamed at her children in parking lots for being more that 2 feet away from me. I have relaxed on that a little as my kids are now ages 9 – 14 and would never go out with me in public again if I didn’t get a grip on that. But other people in those parking lots (I’m probably notorious in a few) may have made assumptions of what life might be like at home for my kids. “Poor kids with a mother that bellows at them like that”. Which would be a horribly wrong assumption. Just a mother who has a story that makes her a tad crazy in this one situation

So how does this tie in with self-awareness? Because, as well intentioned as we may be, we will still take things personally and we will still make assumptions. And we will slip on being impeccable with our word and we won’t always do our best.

However, as I like to say, when you know better you do better. And now you’ve had these gems brought to the forefront of your attention (and by the way, I love you for reading this far), when you do fall off the band wagon there are gold nuggets of information there.

Where do you still make assumptions?

What do you repeatedly take personally?

What causes the slip in impeccability?

How are you falling short of doing your best?

Aaaaaand I’ve made you a printable. Aaaaand I’ll send you a copy of my own real life examples on there in case you need a prompt.

Download it below and as always feel free to get in touch with me. And we’d love to see you in the facebook group.

Click Here to Get Printables

Katy Perry Spoke to me About Self-Awareness

And in “spoke to me” I mean through her music.

Could you imagine……Katy Perry on speed dial. “Hey Katy, you don’t seem too busy right now, tell me, what are your thoughts on self-awareness?”

And she’d say, “Vicky, my main girl, are you not hearing my message in my song?”

And then I’d say “oh, you mean this one…..”

Self-aware3-Katy Perry “Thanks Katy. Talk to you later.” If I were texting I would just say “TTYL” but this is a conversation so let’s keep it real, yes?

Anyhooo, I LOVE this message. It so beautifully states that if we are not solid in knowing ourselves and what we stand for, we can so easily be carried along with a crowd, or one dominant person.

There are great leaders all around us, ones that are worthy of following. What we need to be clear on is when not to follow. By checking in with our own values.

It’s easy to know we shouldn’t join the hate campaign on another woman just because our friend / boss / colleague is upset with her. But the lines are often more blurred than that.

Let’s imagine, your office / group / organization is wanting everyone to join their fundraiser – run a half marathon to save the rainforest and the millions of animals being left with little chance of survival. A very worthy cause, no doubt.

Meanwhile, you rush past the homeless person sleeping on a subway grate for warmth EVERY morning because it hurts your heart to think of their suffering.

Do you “sit quietly, agree politely”? Or make a “choice” to suggest that you raise money for blankets and hot meals for people living without a home in the cold months. This may not be a cause close to your heart, but when you put your attention on what matters to you, you will stir up something you could sink your teeth into.

Katy has another genius line;

I went from zero, to my own hero.

And we don’t all need to be trailblazers and save the world. It’s often hard enough just saving the day for the people in our lives now.

The message I really wanted to get across was that self-awareness will save you time, energy and regrets. You’ll feel so much more fulfilled in 10 years time if you have been making choices based on what matters to you and you truly want to take a stand for.

I personally think this is a big, juicy, worthwhile topic and as always, feel free to get in touch with any questions or comments and also pop by the facebook group.

Until next time. Hugs.

Vicky x

I’m guessing; you’re too soft

I’m not talking soft around the middle, although who doesn’t wish for some extra firmness around there?!? I’m talking about softening the negative stuff so you don’t have to do anything about it.

Some of my clients are extremely motivated to make big changes, and the more honest they are, the better their results. Easy – yes? Well actually no!

It is much easier to soften the edges of a hard truth.

The self care swing says “don’t be so hard on yourself”, “be kind”, “be gently”. All good advise, just not when you are trying to make a change.

Lets take that soft middle that we started out talking about. If you really want to lose 40lbs then softening the edges, by reasoning that you still have a month until summer, or that you aren’t as heavy as your sister, or that your yoga pants still fit so all can’t be that bad, lets you off the hook. It lessens your resolve to change.

So, what’s a girl with a tendency for softness to do?

What about this for a visual? A board of Snakes and Ladders.

The winning square on the board is the change you want to happen. The snakes are all the pitfalls on the way there that slide you in the opposite direction of where you want to be.

When you reach a square with the head of a snake you must:
1. Be aware. The snake is a snake and not a fun slide with a foam pit at the bottom – no more softening – it WILL take you in the wrong direction.
2. Remember. What makes climbing the ladders worthwhile? What is it you want and why is it important to you?
3. Check your thoughts. What thoughts do you need to be having to carry out the actions that will keep you climbing?

We all wish our progress looked like a steady straight line incline to our ultimate goal but real life looks a lot more like a game of Snakes and Ladders.

The beauty of real life is that you have a lot more control than the roll of a dice.

So, keep it real and honest. Plan for the climbs and welcome the challenges. It all starts with a change in mind.

Do the work. You’re worth it.

Hugs, Vicky.

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