Are you feeling frustrated taking loads of actions

Please do not interpret the language of ‘hard work’ in the same category of ‘persistent inspired actions’. If you are a self-managed person (meaning managing how you spend your time instead of it having control of you) that is when you know you are living your life and business vision success.

Yes, action is the vital key word towards achieving success and maintaining momentum in closing the gap from where you are in life to where you want to be. Yet action alone will only see you depleted if you do not have a matching belief in what you want to achieve.

For example, if you are a business owner working long hours and your belief is that you need to put in the long hours to succeed at the detriment of you missing out on time with your family (and vice-versa), then you will automatically set your business schedule up matching that belief. Do you notice that each year you tend to be spending longer hours with little reward financially, emotionally and physically. As the years go by you will feel yourself even more frustrated and lacking energy (not to mention loss of passion for your dream in setting up a business in the first place).

I am sure you can relate to this!  What you need to do is to take inspired action combined with changing your beliefs and then your results will be as you want them to be. Yes, it takes a conscious effort and practice each day to change your beliefs. So set up a reminder system i.e. set your alarm every hour as a reminder to repeat your new affirmative statement. One of mine is “I am a millionaire money magnet with money flowing easily to me each day”.

Begin to challenge your beliefs by looking at your results. Whatever your results in life are IS your Belief!

Thoughts + Action + Positive Self-Statements + Reflection (repeat)  ===  Vision Success

a)  over commit yourself to take actions in an underestimated

time frame and with an unrealistic ‘to do list’.

b)  say ‘yes’ to everyone and everything, not wanting to let

people down.

c)  do not take time out for yourself, feelings of guilt if you do have

5 minutes to spare.

Time Management versus Self-Management

One of the challenges I often hear from clients is ‘how do I fit it all in?’ When you manage what is most important to you, based on your values first, this will always give you space and energy to achieve the other most important things. It never ceases to amaze me how the three main areas we let go of when the ‘busy cycle’ appears, are normally exercise, quality time with loved ones and our own self-care.

Imagine if you looked after all these first as a priority. Think how great you would feel with more energy and focus to take care of new habits you would like to create. I notice that whenever the higher percentage of my focus is on my business projects, my exercise routine gets pushed to one side. As soon as I become conscious about this and start to pick up the exercise routine, my business projects become more creative, with a natural flow about them.

3 Steps to Self-Management: Breaking it down

1. Career/Business
2. Foundation/Nurturing
3. Time Out for Self

Planning your time is often a combination of tasks scheduled in your diary and a to-do list for you to get around to when you have spare time. The more you can schedule the most important things, as well as your daily tasks, into your diary with a time and date set against each one, the more likely it is that you’ll achieve them.

A big tip is to leave plenty of white space scheduled in your diary, to manage the unexpected, or things you may have forgotten about in your day. This is normally a challenge for most of my clients, as they are trying to fit so much into their day and invariably wonder how they can ever leave ‘white space’ in between scheduling. My challenge to you is to ‘give it a go’ for at least 30 days and notice what happens. Do the important things first and be responsible about your choices to stop wasting time.

Every Friday afternoon I sit down with my weekly schedule list and place every activity into my diary against an allocated time. This also includes the action steps for my committed goals. Create your own self-management plan by filling out the weekly schedule below, using the 3 breakdown steps.

Career/Business covers all roles/responsibilities required to be completed on a weekly and monthly basis, e.g. weekly meetings, accounts, client contact calls etc.

Foundation/Nurturing covers all areas that are important to you for developing a healthy and happy foundation, e.g. quality time in relationships, exercise, shopping, family time etc.

Time Out for Self covers what is important to you based on personal development and time-out for yourself to recharge your batteries, e.g. reading business and personal development books, meditating, journal writing etc.

Are you Living in the ‘Full On’ or ‘Not At All’ Cycle?

Do you find yourself wasting heaps of your precious time procrastinating over something you know will move you forward?

Are you waiting for the time to appear before you start to take action in a big way?

I want to tell you that you are not alone as I find myself speaking to many people who work with me about this very same subject.

Decide what you want to do and take action – sounds easy doesn’t it! Yet, you may be asking yourself why don’t I just do it – like the Nike slogan says? Good question.

Let’s take away the ‘Full On’ or ‘Not At All’ syndrome from your life. We all have cycles in life. The problem is that we always tend to make ourselves wrong whenever we are not in a certain cycle like being ‘Full On’ about something. What I learnt when I played sport at a National level was that we had to listen to our body energy cycles when training for an event. The cycle was low, moderate and high depending on pre-season, mid-season or post-season. This is a great analogy that we all can take on for sustainability in our own life and business choices.

Have you noticed at times there is something that needs to be done and you really do not feel like doing it, that when you get started slowly into it – how all of a sudden you find yourself really into it and actually enjoying what you are doing. This is because you are in the moment (out of your head) staying focussed on what you are doing. You will not enjoy doing things when you are thinking about everything else that has to be done as this causes pressure and overwhelm on yourself. This is also one of the main reasons why we do not start something that we know needs to be done or we really want to do, because we are too busy complaining inside about everything else instead of focussing on one thing at a time.

Whenever you move your body you are shifting your own energy levels and also your own way of thinking in the moment. Using the analogy of sport and any form of exercise – generally there is a warm-up phase that is required which not only prepares your body for exercise, it also prepares your mind. This happens through movement.

When I was a personal trainer, I would always ask my client this one crucial question ‘On a scale of 1-10 how does your body feel in energy levels right now?’ They would normally answer something like ….’well I have had a hard day at work and I am feeling about a 5 out of 10’… my response was always – Great! Let’s work a 5 out of 10 in your warm up – choose which cardio equipment you want to work on? This is a very different approach to the old school way of pushing and driving yourself, which is what I use to do by the way in my earlier training days and this would totally exhaust me by the end of the season.

So looking back and changing my way of doing things as I got older and wiser, I always found this was more of a sustainable approach. It certainly took away the mindset with people thinking that doing exercise meant hard work. It is only hard work when you push yourself into it from the start having a high expectation on how you should be (yes should be) doing things instead of listening to what your body is telling you first in order to allow your mindset to catch up and enjoy the process.

My client would always be concerned when I would say to them to work a 5 out of 10 because they would respond by saying that they are paying me to push them. Mmm! Interesting isn’t it – because they have been pushing themselves in their own minds and sometimes physically for years and where did it get them. You need the mind to be working in unison with your body, otherwise you will not get the desired results with ease. You will forever feel like you are pushing and putting out heaps of energy with little result to show for it. Anyway, let’s continue. As soon as the client started working a 5 out of 10 on their selected cardio equipment, after 5 minutes I would ask them. ‘Now how do you feel out of 10?” “About a 7 out of 10” they would answer. Great keep going and let me know when you feel like an 8 out of 10. As soon as they responded 8 out of 10.

This was the time I knew their body and their mind was totally present and working in unison ready for the workout.

I’ll never forget the day when I had an insightful moment recognising that this same cycle also applies to life and your business when taking action every day. I began practising consciously connecting all 3 aspects of myself when setting up my business and making time for my family. Everything changed. I noticed how I instantly became much more present when I was at home with my husband connecting with him after work instead of staying inside my busy head thinking of everything else that had to be done. I noticed myself connecting more to my gut feelings when making business decisions instead of listening to my head saying ‘you really should do this or that’.

Life became an instant balance for me with peace of mind knowing that I had plenty of time to do the important things in my life and my business.

This is what is known as Body-Mind-Soul Connection. Are you connected with your Body-Mind-Soul or are you pushing through your day feeling exhausted with no time to scratch yourself?

If you want true success in your life and business, then make the change today and get to know your success cycle using this same process inside your business choices and when you spend time with your family or even making time for yourself.

How to get started:

1. 1. Set up your Day to Win the Night Before

Diarise your priority actions inside realistic time frames. Make sure you have plenty of white spaces for yourself to expand on any new opportunities coming in.

1. 2. Observe Yourself and Your Feelings (Ask this 1 Vital Question)

When you look at your next day’s schedule (the night before) – Ask yourself…

“Do I feel free, excited and accomplished when looking at my day set up for tomorrow”

Yes it is possible to set your day up like this…I know because I will not step into my day without feeling this way first.

If you do not feel free, excited and accomplished about the day you are setting up, then I strongly suggest you cancel, change, re-arrange, add….whatever you need to do to fulfil this.

1. 3. Make Time for Yourself every day

One of the main reasons people feel overwhelmed about their day is because they do not make time to do the important things for themselves. Make this a PRIORITY.

1. 4. Visualise your Ideal Day

When putting your head on the pillow at night, as you close your eyes, visualise your ideal day seeing yourself flowing through your day attracting ideal clients, making more money, plenty of time for exercise, spending time with your husband etc. Then gently nod off to sleep.

1. 5. Notice your First Thoughts in the Morning

Are your first thoughts in the morning positive or negative. Whatever they are for you will be the theme for the day unless you take control of your thoughts and change them. Begin to be grateful from your heart for everything you have today in your life. Begin your Day with the most powerful words in the universe “Thank You” and keep saying Thank You until you notice your energy shift into a natural flow of enthusiasm and excitement about your day.

Yes this is a daily practice and is one that took me a while to change. So hang in there – you can do it.

A Final Thought:

Never under-estimate the Basics. I cannot tell you how often I hear clients say to me “I just want to get back to Basics”. It is the basics that create an extraordinary life. It is the basics that add up to you achieving your life and business goals and vision. Persist and be patient with yourself. Keep on doing the important things for your Body-Mind-Soul Connection for every day success.

How often do you find yourself losing focus and energy because you keep thinking that you must get around to fixing or changing this or that?

How much money is slipping through your fingers because you are not organized inside your busy day?

How often do you feel frustrated when all you want to do is make more time for yourself and your family?

Melissa is a small business owner who came to me for coaching because she wanted to increase her profits and her client attraction. She expressed her feelings of overwhelm and frustration because she wanted to get more organized inside her business and found herself not being very productive at all – in fact she felt like she was wasting a lot of her time, energy and money.

One of the first places Melissa started was in cleaning up her environment. This mean’t clearing all the clutter in her office, home, car etc. I explained to Melissa that ‘anything that is not organized – will always orgnanize her’. She told me that she could relate to this because she felt like all her time was being chewed up with unproductive patterns and she did not want another year to go by without making time to work on her business instead of getting stuck inside the day to day putting out of fires.

At Melissa’s next coaching session she was a new person. Much more relaxed, confident and enthusiastic about her business. She has now found time to do things that she had been putting off for years just by clearing the clutter and making space in her life. Melissa found that by organizing her time, she miraculously found more time in her life to choose. A big one for Melissa was to spend more time with her children and has now put systems in place that work for her lifestyle and business style.

Melissa recognized that because she was so used to working and living inside of clutter, she had never experienced the difference before. She is also noticing how much more present she is when at home as she did not realize just how much of her time was caught up with not really be there. She was physically there – but not emotionally because her mind was always on work. Melissa is now living her life fully and loving her new founded lifestyle and business style.

Melissa admitted to me that she was skeptical about the effects of de-cluttering and most thankful that she took the actions because she had no idea that it would give her all of what she has now gained in her whole life.

If you want success in your life and business, then get started and clear the clutter. Give this gift to yourself, just like Melissa did by spending the time to de-clutter every area of your life – home, work, car, computer, garage, cupboards etc. and you will be amazed at your results.

How to get started:

1. 1. Plan your time to de-clutter (yes stick it in your diary as an appointment)

Make this time a priority and be realistic as it may take a few days or even longer.

1. 2. Break it down into chunks

Write down your areas to de-clutter and choose one area at a time.

Choose the highest energy and time drains first.

1. 3. Choose what you are going to do with your clutter

~  Sell it or have a garage sale

~  Give it away to a friend or someone in need

~  Place it in a gift box if it is something you have never used and wrap it for a friend

1. 4. Clear out your computer

Use the 3 D Motto – Do it – Delegate it – Dump it

Make sure you do a back up first.

1. 5. Keep up-to-date

Book in your de-clutter time ahead each year and place it in your diary.

A Final Thought:

Never under-estimate the Basics. It is the simple task of de-cluttering that will support you to achieve what you want in your life and business success.  This is the very thing that will give you more time and more energy to free you up to do the important things that will help you to live your whole life with ease, flow and clarity.

The Winner’s Creed

If you think you are beaten, you are.

If you think you dare not, you won’t.

If you like to win, but think you can’t.

It’s almost certain you won’t.

If you think you’ll lose, you’re lost.

For out in the world we find,

success begins with a person’s will –

it’s all in the state of mind.

If you think you’re outclassed, you are.

You’ve got to think high to rise.

You’ve got to be sure of yourself

Before you can ever win a prize.

Life’s battles don’t always go

to the stronger or faster person.

But sooner or later the person who wins

is the one who thinks they can.

- Unknown -

I looked up at the trainer and he said… ‘You have trained your body, it is even more important to train your mind and to think like winners’. That was the start of my introduction to the psychology of winning and the power of the mind. That sheet of paper handed to me 24 years ago was one of the first major turning points in my life to which I share this same philosophy with many people I work with.

It is as simple as… ‘what you focus on in life – is what you will create’. Creating a positive and healthy mindset is so important to support you in attracting what you want in life. Observe how often you catch yourself talking or complaining to others about what you don’t want to happen or what has happened. Do you resolve it or do you find yourself repeating the same pattern.

As you move through your day you are constantly talking to yourself, whether you are aware of this or not. You are constantly telling yourself what you think, and feel about your experiences and interactions. These self-statements are absorbed and retained by your subconscious mind for future use. They form powerful directives that are subliminally put into action.

If you tell yourself, ‘I am successful’, then the message you are passing on to your body is ‘be successful’. Your subsconscious mind does not interpret this as, ‘he/she really does not know what he/she is talking about! It responds literally to the directive it receives from the conscious mind. In turn, the message the body receives is, ‘be successful’!

Words trigger off powerful associative images, especially if they are backed up by strong emotive feelings. Whether they are favorable or unfavorable it is taken in as truth. How you communicate with yourself determines your outcome.

In the computer world there is a saying ‘garbage in, garbage out’. The same applies to your mind. Quality input = quality output. You deserve the best. Be the guard of your mind and play ‘positive FM – not negative FM’.

Think about what it is you want to attract in your life and hold onto that vision with unshakeable faith. Take small achievable steps towards your vision and acknowledge yourself along the journey. Remember that the fullest contentment and enjoyment is in the journey – not the destination.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

‘A person cannot directly choose his circumstances, but he can choose his thoughts, and so indirectly, yet surely, shape his circumstances.                      – James Allen -

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

My initial reaction was… ‘What has this got to do with training for the National Titles?’ Maybe I heard him wrong (my inner voice said) as I could feel the excitement rise telling myself ‘It may be a new tactical play’ (which was what I loved creating and making happen). I then turned the paper over and much to my surprise I read these words…

The Winner’s Creed

If you think you are beaten, you are.

If you think you dare not, you won’t.

If you like to win, but think you can’t.

It’s almost certain you won’t.

If you think you’ll lose, you’re lost.

For out in the world we find,

success begins with a person’s will –

it’s all in the state of mind.

If you think you’re outclassed, you are.

You’ve got to think high to rise.

You’ve got to be sure of yourself

Before you can ever win a prize.

Life’s battles don’t always go

to the stronger or faster person.

But sooner or later the person who wins

is the one who thinks they can.

- Unknown -

I looked up at the trainer and he said… ‘You have trained your body, it is even more important to train your mind and to think like winners’. That was the start of my introduction to the psychology of winning and the power of the mind. That sheet of paper handed to me 24 years ago was one of the first major turning points in my life to which I share this same philosophy with many people I work with.

It is as simple as… ‘what you focus on in life – is what you will create’. Creating a positive and healthy mindset is so important to support you in attracting what you want in life. Observe how often you catch yourself talking or complaining to others about what you don’t want to happen or what has happened. Do you resolve it or do you find yourself repeating the same pattern?

As you move through your day you are constantly talking to yourself, whether you are aware of this or not. You are constantly telling yourself what you think, and feel about your experiences and interactions. These self-statements are absorbed and retained by your subconscious mind for future use. They form powerful directives that are subliminally put into action.

If you tell yourself, ‘I am successful’, then the message you are passing on to your body is ‘be successful’. Your subsconscious mind does not interpret this as, ‘he/she really does not know what he/she is talking about! It responds literally to the directive it receives from the conscious mind. In turn, the message the body receives is, ‘be successful’!

Words trigger off powerful associative images, especially if they are backed up by strong emotive feelings. Whether they are favorable or unfavorable it is taken in as truth. How you communicate with yourself determines your outcome.

In the computer world there is a saying ‘garbage in, garbage out’. The same applies to your mind. Quality input = quality output. You deserve the best. Be the guard of your mind and play ‘positive FM – not negative FM’.

Think about what it is you want to attract in your life and hold onto that vision with unshakeable faith. Take small achievable steps towards your vision and acknowledge yourself along the journey. Remember that the fullest contentment and enjoyment is in the journey – not the destination.

“A person cannot directly choose his circumstances, but he can choose his thoughts, and so indirectly, yet surely, shape his circumstances.”                      – James Allen -

For example, you may have set up a goal of wanting to spend more time with your family, but you keep allowing work to get in the way. In this situation the natural habit is spending extra time doing work.  The first step in changing this habit is to design a new behaviour (action) that will allow you to spend more time with the family. For example, you might allocate Sundays to doing something special with the family, plus you could agree to turn off the phone so that you can fully enjoy the experience. Make sure you communicate this plan to your family, so that they can keep you accountable to your commitment.

I work with many people who want to also have a life outside of work, yet the recurring pattern I see and hear is that they never seem to get on top of things and before they know it, time goes by and they miss out on a lot of what’s important to them. The most common things my clients say they want to spend more time on are: ‘exercise for my own health and energy’, ‘spend quality time with my wife/husband’, ‘time to listen and play with my children’, ‘quality time with my family’, ‘time out for myself’.

Notice how easy it is to spend time doing the unimportant things first. You may be concerned about the paperwork that has built up and think that ‘if I just get on top of this one, then I will make time for me and my family’. What do you notice happens?

There are 3 Steps to Changing your Habits

Step 1 – Awareness

The first step to change is becoming aware of your habits and what your triggers are. Most of the time we are so busy ‘doing’ life that we do not take time out to become aware of who is it we are, what is it we are doing, how we are doing it and why we are doing it. You will never become aware if you keep on doing whatever you are doing, without becoming consciously aware of your actions. Awareness is the first major step towards change. Once you register your awareness, then you can go to step 2 to accept and release your habits.

Step 2 – Accept + Release

When you become aware of your habits and triggers, it is only then that you can accept and release the habits that do not support you in your life. You accept and release a habit purely by stating that this habit does not support you in your life and you choose to now let it go. It is easy to be attached to a habit because this is the only way you consciously know how to manage your life. The good news is that you taught yourself through habit in the first place and you can choose a new habit at any time. It is normal to feel as though you are stepping into the unknown, because that is exactly what takes place in the releasing of habits. This takes us into step 3 of re-creating a new habit to replace the old habit.

Step 3 – Re-Create

This is the fun part, of re-creating your habit. It is important to remember that when changing a habit you must replace it with a new, consciously supportive habit. Consciously choose the new habit you would like to start practising in place of your old habit.

Let’s say your old habit is ‘not listening to people fully’ and you are always ready to speak over them, even before they have finished saying what they wanted to say.

You then may decide for your new habit, that every time someone speaks to you, you will stay totally present, listening to what they have to say – and that you will only answer them after they have stopped speaking. Sounds easy, doesn’t it? Try it yourself and notice what happens. The next time you are speaking to someone, you will probably jump right into the conversation and repeat your old habit. You then might walk away, noticing that you did it again and didn’t fully listen. The second time you notice, you want to jump in and you catch yourself. Great; this is the power of becoming consciously present to your actions and reactions. The third time you will become fully conscious and choose your new habit at the beginning of the conversation.

To speed up the process of re-creating yourself, take on the practice of visualising yourself living the new habit in its perfect form now. See yourself being the person you want to be and see yourself having the results you truly desire.

What are your re-occurring Habits?

Start to become aware of your habits by choosing your re-occurring patterns from the list below. Then choose your top 5 habits and begin to change these in a way that supports you in your life by using the 3 steps above.

- Lack of money
– Relationship problems
– Career I do not like
– Not sure of what direction I want to go in
– Health problems
– Never enough time to do the things I want to do
– Always feeling under pressure
– Not always being honest
– Lack of energy
– Family problems
– Lack of confidence
– Lack of commitment
– Being overweight
– Being argumentative
– Always worrying about something
– Giving too much to other people
– Sense that I have to get ahead
– Plan to get fit but never do
– Always wanting to be in control
– Feeling of being lonely
– Comparing myself to others
– Feeling of not being worthy
– Weak and submissive behaviour
– Aggressive and domineering behaviour
– Not allowing other people to support me
– Not being organised
– Not doing what I say I’m going to do