Turn Off Your Phone And Relax

Posted on 30 April 2007

I was at the gym one day last week and got on the treadmill next to a woman who was probably in her mid to late twenties. Almost immediately she made a phone call and started chatting to a friend about (it seemed to me) nothing in particular. Within a minute or so a middle aged guy got on the cross trainer the other side of me and also made a call. He was obviously making a business call and was talking very loudly and occasionally aggressively. Both calls went on for in excess for 15 minutes and I was glad that I had my Ipod to listen to and drown out the background noise.

This morning I had a dental appointment and there were 2 other people in the waiting room at the same time as me. One guy was on a laptop and talking into a cell phone and the other was just talking on a cell phone. Unfortunately, I didn’t have my Ipod with me and sat there in the crossfire of two competing conversations.

Are our lives really so hectic now that we cannot either exercise or go to the dentist without a cell phone, or at the very least leave it in the car? Will business grind to a halt and our social lives cease to exist unless we available 24/7? If so, how did we cope at little as 10 years ago when cell phones were a rarity? Probably the most pertinent question to ask here is, are our lives so much better now for this connectivity?

Next time you are tempted to take your phone into the gym, or the dentist office or anywhere else for that matter where it is not really appropriate, ask yourself whether it is absolutely necessary. If it is (and I accept for some people that may occasionally be the case), then go ahead and take it, if not, stick it on silent or leave it in the car or at home. You will be able to see who has called and people can leave messages if it is important.

Am I being a killjoy luddite about this? Well no, not really. Sometimes we need to give ourselves a break to get away from the hurly burly of life, whether that is in the gym where we can zone out or even for 10 minutes reflecting at the dentist it really doesn’t matter. This is valuable time to us and trust me when I say, your world will almost certainly not collapse and your conscious mind will thank you for giving it some time off.

www.adaringadventure.com

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Posted on 28 April 2007

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Belief Is A Powerful Thing

Posted on 27 April 2007

I am reading a book at the moment called ‘Flow’ by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi and in it he makes mention of the Tarahumara Indians of Mexico. I have heard of these people before but even so every time I hear about them again I am in awe. They can run like no other people on earth often doing so for 100 miles at a time with ease.

I once heard a story and it may be apocryphal where one member of their tribe was persuaded to run in a marathon race in the US. The sponsor of the Indian was convinced that he would win easily as this was only a sprint to him. Alas, he came in well down the field and when challenged about his poor performance explained that he thought he was still on the warm up!

So are these people genetically different to us in the West? Well no not really. They may well have slightly improved lung capacity and a higher red blood cell count to help oxygenate their blood but nothing that would come even close to explain their abilities..…except maybe one thing.

They grow up to believe that they can run prodigious distances, that it is normal and  well within their abilities, whereas we grow up to believe that people that run marathons in under 3 hours are almost super-human. Seems reasonable to expect then that both sets of people prove themselves right, right?

So on reflection maybe they do have an unfair advantage because their society didn’t tell them they should be more realistic and that they can’t do that because it simply isn’t possible.

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A Life Coach Rant On Junk Mail

Posted on 26 April 2007

Just lately the junk mail we receive seems to have gone into unabated overdrive. One day last week I got 20 pieces on one day! Everything from brochures for stores that I wasn’t aware we had ever been in to offers for houses that we have no intention of ever buying to the ubiquitous offers of credit cards and fake promises that we have been specially chosen for some unbelievable offer that I simply must take up now or my life will become a meaningless sham!

I no longer really even look closely at this junk, it is an overwhelming task that would probably waste even more time that I would rather use for more productive and fulfilling tasks. So now the mail goes straight into the trash and anything slightly more substantial goes for recycling resulting in any genuinely interesting offers (and occasionally legitimate mail) getting missed.

Was it always like this? I don’t think so but maybe my mind is playing tricks.

About 3 or 4 weeks ago I noticed that we seemed to be getting 5 or 6 offers a week for American Express credit cards and a similar amount from Citi Bank. The more I thought about this the more I got ticked off because I simply did not want them, I would never chose a credit card based on some (supposedly) artfully written unsolicited letter arriving in my mail box. So around that time I sent one application back with the words ‘not interested, please take me off your mailing list” written across the middle. Obviously this had no effect whatsoever, so I did it again and again and again. I got on a bit of a role I must say and to date I have probably sent about 25 offers back asking to be removed.

There are two ways to look at this. The first way is for me to say ‘give it up you are being childish, it’s the way of the world and you are not going to get your name removed let alone change anything of substance’ The second way would be ‘Stick with it, if more people sent this stuff back and the card companies had to pay the postage on millions of letters they would soon reassess their strategy’

We are being bombarded with millions of unsolicited pieces of mail every day and the waste is mind blowing. It’s not even as though the majority of this mail is trying to generate new market places and thus create new jobs, it is simply trying to get you to change from one supplier to another, it’s what the industry calls churn. I’m ranting a bit here I know and I am not sure whether I will even keep on with my one man stand (some would say actions like this just push up banking costs in general and maybe they are right I really don’t know) but I feel better for at least making my feelings known.

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Is It Time To Read That Book Or Join That Class?

Posted on 24 April 2007

I have been on training all weekend doing another NLP Master Practitioner Course. The great thing about NLP is that it I such a huge field that there is always new stuff to try out and learn and this weekend has been great fun. As well as learning new techniques it also gives me time to interact with other life coaches, therapists and practitioners and hear about different approaches and ways of doing things. Obviously I feel that I am a good coach, I have to otherwise I would have no right to charge people for my services. However, I also know that I am always learning, evolving and hopefully improving and the day that stops is the day they nail the lid down on me.

The majority of people that I speak to that are in a similar line of work to myself are also passionate about improving themselves and view life long learning as a bonus rather than a chore. That is in stark contrast to most people that I speak to away from a work environment who look at me rather strangely when they realize that I am actually listening to Deepak Chopra on my Ipod at the gym or have a Tony Robbins cd on in my car.

Many people think that we go to school and that is it, once we have graduated or dropped out then learning is done and dusted and we can get on with life. Of course the reality is very different to that. We may need to learn to drive, learn a new job, learn a foreign language or how to use a pc, or even something as simple as learning how to look and interact with a newborn child. Yet we often try to avoid learning because it drags us out of our comfort zone and makes us feel awkward. The fact is though, that they more you start to read, the more you try new things and the more you open yourself up to new experiences and situations the more likely you are to expand that comfort zone and make the new learning comfortable, enjoyable and beneficial.

Life is a constant process of change and none of us can avoid that so why even try, why not just embrace it? The more we use our brain for activities that we are fully engaged in the better it works and the more quickly we can adapt in new situations. To my mind it’s a win/win situation that far too many people miss out on.

 

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Posted on 23 April 2007

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An Inconvenient Truth

Posted on 20 April 2007

I finally got round to watching this movie last night and was blown away. Before I go any further I want to say that this is not a political post whatsoever. I have no intention of discussing politics per se here because it is not the place to do so in my opinion.

Anyway, back to the movie. For those of you that are not familiar with it, it is really a documentary designed for cinematic release. It is narrated and presented by Al Gore who in my opinion does a great job. I actually didn’t know how amusing he could be, maybe he should have let that side out when campaigning for the Presidency!

Gore takes a look at the thorny issue of Global Warming and makes some compelling arguments as to why we need to act now for the sake of future generations. Like many people I thought that there was doubt over Global Warming and that its causes were a long way from proven. However, the shocking facts and figures used throughout this movie do not support that view at all. At one stage they polled almost 1,000 peer reviews on the subject that had been published in the scientific community and not 1 disagreed that Global Warming was not only a problem but a man made problem. In fact the only doubt that ever surfaced was in the mainstream media and seldom written by scientists on the cutting edge.

There was a particularly poignant bit for those of us living here in Florida when it was pointed out that a very feasible 20 foot increase in sea level would result in half of Florida being under water. Orlando in fact would suddenly become a coastal resort, good for Disney maybe, but not much else.

Whether you do or do not believe in Global Warming I would ask you to rent this movie from Netflix or wherever and watch it with an open mind and then if you feel you can help, do so, future generations will thank you.

Visit: http://www.climatecrisis.net/

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A Life Coach’s Guide To Being Super Successful With The Opposite Sex

Posted on 19 April 2007

About 50% of the enquiries I receive through my website end up in a folder I have labeled ‘Non-Genuine’. This isn’t to suggest that the people are not genuine in themselves but that they are not really looking for a coach or more often than not, not wanting to pay for a coach.

The most common thing I get asked for from the ‘Non-Genuine’s is a request for information on how to become a coach but I also get regular enquiries as to whether I am looking to take on staff, open another office or in the case of an e-mail yesterday, whether I am looking to open an office in India! Well maybe some day but not just yet thanks.

Last week however, I had a feedback form that made me smile and certainly perked my interest even if I never expected it to go anywhere. I am going to type this out as I received it without the name:

>>Im 21 going on 22, and wanted to ask if you have any coaches that are very good with women.  That is really the area I would like to most improve.<<

At first I laughed and shook my head, ‘maybe this guy was another one of the people that ask me how they can use NLP to manipulate people’ I thought. Then on reflection I thought, ‘no, why the heck shouldn’t he want to improve his ‘luck’ with the ladies’. I know how clueless I was at that age and quite frankly any help would have been greatly appreciated.

So I called him up and left a message. Unfortunately, we never managed to talk as I kept missing him and although I got an e-mail after, he never called me back so I gave up. It would have been fun to find out exactly what he wanted to achieve, although I think I can make a good guess ;-)

So what was the advice I was going to give him?

It is about as basic as it gets in terms of human interaction.

Learn to actively listen.

Ask questions about the other person rather than telling them about you and be genuinely interested in their answers. The most charismatic people on the planet are fantastic listeners in the true sense of the word. Yes, they know about the power of confidence, body language (either consciously or at an innate level) and about mirroring and matching, but fundamentally they listen intently and people love this. Have you ever been in a conversation where you have talked 95% of the time to a new acquaintance and then you walked away thinking what a great person they were? Well, the fact is you probably know nothing about them other than they were willing to take the time and trouble to listen with interest to you. The alternative scenario is when we get talked at for what seems like hours on end by somebody we barely know and walk away vowing to never get trapped by that person again.

So there you have it, it really is that simple. Learn to listen. Of course it may also help to look like Brad Pitt or Angeline Jolie but I can’t really help you with that.

By the way, I think I may have over done it with the title of this post so sorry if women or men are not beating a path to your door.

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Beware - Change Causes Change

Posted on 17 April 2007

One of the things that NLP teaches us when we are looking to make changes is the need to be aware of the environmental/ecological impact that they can often have. I’m not talking about the flora and fauna but the impact on not only yourself but also those around you. So for instance, if you were going to quit your job because you were stressed all the time, didn’t like your boss, hated working long hours and wanted to follow your natural calling of caring for Duck-Billed Platypus’s in the wild, then that would be all well and good. Unless of course, you have a large mortgage, kids in school, credit card debt the interest of which could support Delaware, a spouse that likes the good life and you were about to walk away from a job that paid $200k per annum

Immediately there is a problem looming that you need to be aware of. Yes, there will be many a mortified Duck-Billed Platypus when they hear of your dilemma but would you rather let down the cute aquatic egg-laying mammal or your family? That becomes the problem you have to solve.

The example above is an extreme one but often there are smaller environmental issues that we don’t consider. It maybe somebody quitting smoking that suddenly finds themselves piling weight on or somebody that wants to get fitter realizing that all the trips to the gym cut down on valuable family time. I’m not for one moment suggesting that this should stop you chasing your dreams or trying to better yourself, simply that by knowing up front what other factors could come into play you are much more likely to be able to deal with them effectively and efficiently.

At this point I have to throw in a joke. Don’t ask me why or what it has got to do with self-development, life coaching or NLP because the answer is nothing, I just want to do it and I can because it’s my Blog.

Drum roll maestro please:

Little Boy – “Daddy, daddy, there is a man at the door with a bill”.
Father – “Don’t be silly son, it must be a duck with a hat on.”

By the way, this Blog was brought on by the fact that when I decided to stop my newsletter and concentrate my writing efforts on this Blog and a book I am trying to write, I never stopped to think that I would need to alter my website home page because it was pointing people towards signing up for me newsletter!

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Start With The End In Mind

Posted on 16 April 2007

I was lying in bed last night pondering a conversation I’d had with a friend whilst playing golf the other day. It had been a lively discussion about the corporate world and I was fairly opinionated about what I thought made a good company. The actual content of the debate is irrelevant it is what happened afterwards that really matters.

My friend pointed out that I had a couple of blinds spots about certain things and to be honest this made me a little defensive. Immediately he said that I searched for examples where he had displayed similar behavior to prove that he was just as bad! In fact I think it’s probably fair to say I didn’t hear all he said because I was already composing my response.

I often ask people when they come for life coaching what is the minimum they want to achieve that will make them think the investment in time and money was worthwhile. I like this question because right up front it lets me know what I need to do but more pertinently makes them think about what is important to them. If we have no end game in mind when we set off to do anything, no goals or targets, how do we define success? It’s a little like hoping on a plane to go on vacation but only asking where you are going when you get there.

So where am I going with all this? Well as I said I was searching for examples to prove to my friend that not only was he as bad as me but probably even worse, when he asked me to not say anything until I had thought about what he’d said for a while. Five years ago I doubt I would have even drawn breath before diving back in but now I am a Life Coach and should be able to do have a little bit of self-discipline, right? After all, if I can’t bite my tongue and listen properly when I need to, how competent can I be at my job?

So I did reflect and did my opinion change? Well not really, maybe a bit, but that isn’t really the point. What changed was the way I viewed the conversation, I no longer felt compelled to batter my point home and at the same time recognized that my friends opinion was as equally valid as mine.

So next time you are in a similar heated situation quickly ask yourself internally ‘What do I want to gain from this?’ If the answer is that you want to make the other person feel small, to learn nothing, to create a bad atmosphere and to be thought of as an arrogant **** then go ahead and win that sucker, if win is the right word. On the other hand, if you would like to exit feeling good about yourself, learning a bit more about somebody else and what makes them tick and leaving them with a favorable opinion of you, back off and listen. Try and understand what they are saying and then respect their opinion as if it were your own because, and here’s the rub, if you had been born with their genes, had their upbringing and lived in their shoes you would indeed have their opinions.

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