CURIOSITY: THE PERFECT ANTIDOTE TO FEAR

GUEST POST:  WRITTEN BY BRIDGET THOMPSON

Read the original post here

"The cure for boredom is curiosity. There is no cure for curiosity" -- Ellen Parr

"Replacing judgement with curiosity is a key element in becoming unstuck" -- Francie White

CURIOSITY IS...

+ A state in which you want to learn more about something

+ An emotion related to inquisitive behaviour

+ The tendency to ask questions, investigate or explore

+ The desire to know what is happening or has happened

It is the 'cure' for boredom, as in the quote above. It is also a cure for anxiety, "stuck"-ness and feeling overwhelmed. It focuses attention on the subject of the curiosity.

When we are anxious about the unknown, it is useful to focus our attention on what we do know. We can do this using curiosity.

CURIOSITY CAN SOOTHE FEAR

Shifting in to a curious state has the effect of pulling apart the elements that contribute to anxiety or "stuck"-ness or feelings of overwhelm, thereby reducing those emotions.

Fear and curiosity cannot exist together. Curiosity is absent when we are overwhelmed with anxiety or fear. Conversely, when we engage our inquisitive nature, fear rarely comes up.

Our natural curiosity comes out when we encounter something of interest to us.

It can be challenging to tap back in to curiosity periodically when some thing is familiar to us eg: a person, a place, a feeling etc. We may assume we know everything about this thing/person/emotions, so we miss out on discovering completely new elements and perspectives on that thing/person/emotion.

There is always more to discover.

If we stay OPEN, CURIOUS, UNASSUMING, everything in life that may feel boring or dull can become completely NEW and WONDROUS again.

Shift back over to that place of not knowing; of pure curiosity. Inquisition.

HOW TO HARNESS CURIOSITY TO OVERCOME FEAR

+ BE LIKE A CHILD

Consider a child.

They constantly ask questions, unashamedly seek answers. They don't know a lot and are not afraid to admit that. Consequently their world remains EXCITING, STIMULATING and FASCINATING. They do not get caught up in FEARS. Instead, they are always CURIOUS.

Sometimes we are ambivalent about making the changes we know will serve us, and so we get stuck.

Often we do not know what keeps us stuck. Change can slowly emerge only when we choose to actually look at the different elements of our fear or our ambivalence.

Exactly WHAT IS IT we are afraid of? Explore. Be curious.

We do not need to worry about "fixing" or "making better". Just explore what is lurking there.

+ ACCEPT WHAT IS

Curiosity can also have the effect of encouraging acceptance of what is.

A great way to change behaviours that we find problematic is to accept the behaviour and, with open curiosity, observe it to learn what drives, triggers and reasons are behind it.

+ ASK THE RIGHT QUESTIONS

We can adjust our self talk, thoughts and language to encourage curiosity.

In areas we feel rigidly stuck in terms of our perspective, we can try reframing the situation.

For example

+ "I wonder..."

+ "Imagine..."

+ "Hmm, that makes me curious about.."

+ "Can I explore this more?"

Change is least likely to happen when someone is feeling judged or is judging themselves.

"Why" questions are usually heard as a judgement. Even when our questions come from genuine curiosity, sub consciously we still feel these as judgement. We when re-word our questions to "How..." and "What..." questions, our curiosity is elicited

Practice your curiosity today and observe the difference it makes.

Curiosity is free of JUDGEMENT, FEAR and ANXIETY

Curiosity is purely OPEN, INNOCENT and GENUINELY interested

It will truly change the everyday experience of your life, yourself, others and situations.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Bridget is an accredited practicing dietitian (APD) with a special interest and passion for transforming lives. Having being an overweight and bullied child herself, Bridget understands only too well how excess weight can impact on the quality of a person’s life. 


Read more from Bridget on her New Leaf Nutrition website and blog. Or connect on Facebook and Twitter. 

10 KEYS TO A SUCCESSFUL RELATIONSHIP (PART TWO)

This is Part Two of a series of posts on creating successful relationships. Please read Part One first.

The 10 Keys To A Successful Relationship

1. Know Thyself
To be in a good relationship with someone else, you first have to be in a good relationship with your self! It is important that you take time to get to know who you are, and to know what it is you are bringing to the relationship. Do you really know yourself? This in itself can be a life-long journey, but the process of self-inquiry and inner-reflection is a beautiful tool that can be incredibly healing and empowering.

Think about who you have been in your past relationships and how you have acted. Think about the types of guys/girls you have previously attracted and how they have treated you. Identify any patterns that arise and think about what is inside you that may be creating these patterns. Are there certain beliefs that you have about men/women, about what love means, and about what a relationship is? Do you have any behaviours that you think could be potentially sabotaging a relationship?

Think about what you want from a relationship. If you are in one already, think about what you actually want from it, or if you are not in one, think about what you want from your next one. Taking some time to get really clear about who you are and what you want, will make a huge contribution to the success of your current/future relationship.

2. Love And Accept Yourself
I am sure you have heard this saying before - How do you ever expect anyone else to love you, if you do not love yourself? How many of us go in to a relationship looking for love, because we do not love ourselves? How many of us need that validation from someone else in order to feel loved?

You cannot get something from someone else that you do not already have inside you. If you do not love yourself, you will attract a man /woman who cannot truly love you either. You must learn to love and adore who you are, even if you have faults, flaws and imperfections.

Even if you are already in a loving relationship, you should never stop working on the loving relationship that you have with yourself also. As soon as there is imbalance, and you expect more love from them than you are willing to give to yourself, your relationship will suffer. 

3. Communicate With Love
Honest, open, genuine communication is paramount to having a good relationship, but the one key factor in successful communication is learning to communicate from a place of love.

I think there is nothing more important than communicating your thoughts and feelings to your partner, even if they may not always be what they want to hear. However there is a big difference between communicating from a place of love and communicating from a place of fear. Make the intention behind your communication to always be love - either a love for them or a love for yourself.

When you authentically communicate your feelings simply because you need to acknowledge and express them, that is a beautiful thing and your words will be well received. When something is upsetting you or bothering you and you tell your partner, then you are simply expressing your truth and there is nothing wrong with that. Even if you have to say something that may not be very nice, you must connect with the intention of saying it with love first, and then speak. It will make a huge difference to how that person receives your message.

When you communicate from fear you often have the underlying motive to create pain in another. You may be trying to prove a point so you are right, you may be trying to say something that will hurt them or you may be criticising or blaming them. This type of communication separates you from your partner and destroys relationships. If you are ever in a place of anger, fear, jealousy, hatred or hurt - it is not the time to communicate. Take some time out, take a deep breathe and work through the emotions before you start communicating with your partner. 

4. Ask Yourself - What Can I Give?
Relationships are about both giving and receiving. However, there is often an imbalance in our minds between the two. Many of us look to our partner to give us things and to make us feel a certain way. As soon as we are not getting what we want from the person we become upset at them .

Shift your thoughts for a moment from 'What can I get from my partner?" to 'What can I give to my partner?" Do they need love, care, emotional support, physical affection, supporting words, encouragement or for you to help them with doing certain things?

Have you ever thought about what your partner wants from their relationship? What do they want or need from you? Perhaps you can ask them, if you are not sure. Shifting from a getting to a giving mentality will pump a beautiful energy in to your relationship. You will realise that relationships are about loving and serving your partner, not just taking and getting what you need from them.

We need to to learn in a relationship to not only give to our partner but to also give to ourselves. When we give to ourselves enough, we will not be looking to our partner for what we need to get from them. We will already feel complete and will therefore feel inspired to want to give more.

5. Make Yourself Number One
While it is important to give to your partner, it is equally as important to give to yourself. I have made it very clear to my boyfriend that I have to put myself first in our relationship, and I expect him to do the same. It is not about being selfish at all, it is about ensuring that you do not lose touch with who you are. It is about making sure your own needs and wants are being met, as well as the needs and wants of your partner.

You relationship will reap the benefits of you taking care of yourself first. When you do this, you firstly are not looking to your partner to meet them for you, and you are bringing a much more awesome version of yourself to the relationship. A relationship is a partnership which requires cooperation. If you work together, you should be able to find ways to achieve your own goals individually as well as the mutual goals that you share together as part of your relationship.

I have been in relationships in the past where I have put all my own desires to the side in order to make my partner happy. As a result not only did I lose myself completely, but I ended up resenting that person and becoming angry at them. It is a lose-lose situation. If you are with a partner that you do not feel you can truly be yourself with, then you are not with the right person. 

6. Have A Life Outside The Relationship
Life is about balance. You need to have a range of things in your life that make you happy, fulfill you and give you that buzzing, positive feeling. You cannot just rely on your relationship to do that. When you are in love with someone, it is easy to want to make that person your world. When they make you feel that good, you want to spend all your time with them. But you must remember to put everything in perspective and not put too much pressure on one area of your life to give you everything.

Dedicate your spare time to finding other things that make you feel equally as awesome as your relationship does. Maybe it is just about spending time quality time with your friends, or maybe you have passions and hobbies or sports that you play that give you that feeling. It is important to have activities that you can do without your partner that make you feel good. You need to support yourself in a variety of ways and learn to find happiness in a range of sources. Not only will this make you a more fulfilled person in yourself but your partner will find you a lot more attractive as you will bring a much higher and more positive energy to the time that you do spend together

7. Be Vulnerable
I recently watched a beautiful clip by Brene Brown on vulnerability. In it she says that you cannot have true connection with any other human being unless you are willing to be vulnerable.This has been one of the biggest lessons I have learned in my relationship, and I have no doubt that there would be many people who can relate.

How often do you let yourself be truly vulnerable with someone? I mean real, raw, honest, authentic vulnerability. How often do you let someone see who you really are? And I mean who you really are?

Our whole society is built on facades. We are taught to put on a smiley face and hide our emotions when we are sad. We are taught to be tough and strong during hard times. We are taught that being beautiful and perfect gets you love and approval from others.

We are not taught that tearing down our walls, revealing all our imperfections and showing someone the deep truth of who we are is ok. It is up to each of us to be willing to open up our hearts and release the fears to let ourselves get really real with another human being. I know from first hand experience that this can be absolutely petrifying. But unless you are willing to do this you will never have the deep, honest and beautiful connection with your partner that you crave.

8. Learn To Receive
I know I talked about the importance of giving in a relationship, but what is equally as important is the ability to receive. For some people who have issues around self-worth and self-love, receiving love can be difficult.
Do you receive compliments easily, or do they make you uncomfortable? Do you enjoy receiving gifts or do they make you feel guilty? Do you feel comfortable receiving physical affection such as loving touches, cuddles and kisses or does it make your skin crawl?

For some people, receiving love can be difficult. It does not matter whether that love comes in the form of a bunch of flowers, a loving embrace or a sweet compliment. For some people receiving these things completely and fully can be hard.

I never realised this was an issue for me until recently. While I was chatting to one of my dear friends about my self-sabotaging behaviours she said to me "Connie, just let yourself be loved" . That comment stopped in me in my tracks. The fact that what she said had such an impact on me, made me realise that this must be something that I need to do some work on. It is amazing how we can block other people from loving us when we do not even realise we are doing it. Be willing to receive love in all its forms, and when it comes your way open your arms, embrace and say a big thank you, because you deserve it. 

9. Forgive And Release
Carrying around resentment in a relationship is a sure fire way to destroy it. Do you ever bring up things from the past that your partner has done, and hold it against them, even if it was from years ago? Do you ever replay past hurts or stories in your mind over and over again? We cannot carry around unresolved issues, as they are just like buttons sitting in us waiting to be pushed.

It is important to heal and release the past, as otherwise you are likely to just re-create it over and over again. We need to practice forgiving anyone and anything that has happened that is causing us to carry around pain. It is not about excusing what the other person did. In fact, it has nothing to do with them. The pain that you are carrying around is hurting no one else except yourself. 

Forgiveness will set you free. It will release you from the bondages of the past. It will give you closure. Even if it is something tiny, practice forgiveness. Every time your partner does something that upsets you, forgive them, release it and move on.

If this is an issue for you, I highly recommend you seek out some forgiveness meditations and do some energetic cord-cutting exercises. It will help you to heal old wounds and forgive and release those people who have hurt you.
 
10. Appreciate Your Partner
When you first fall in love with someone, they can do no wrong. You love everything about them. They may have strange little quirks or habits but you find them endearing and cute.Over time however, things seem to change. There seems to be more about that person that bothers you, and their little quirks and habits are suddenly extremely annoying.

The more that you focus on something, the more it will grow. So the more you fuss and complain about what you do not like about your partner, the more you will experience these aspects of them. On the flip side, the more you appreciate what you love about them and focus on all the great things about them, the more you will experience these aspects of them too.

So, if you ever find yourself feeling a bit negative, some appreciation is all you need to is shift your perspective. Start thinking about all the things you love about that person. Think about all the things that are great about them. Write lists of all the really positive aspects of who they are. Replay memories in your mind of when they did wonderful things for you and you felt so much love for them. Express gratitude for having met such an amazing person. Shift your focus to all the positive and great things about them. Not only will you feel better, but you by seeing that person in a more positive light, you will be lovingly supporting them to then be the best version of themselves when they are around you.

10 KEYS TO A SUCCESSFUL RELATIONSHIP (PART ONE)

One of my darling readers , contacted me requesting I write a post on love and relationships. It is funny how the Universe works - only a few days earlier I was feeling drawn to write a  new post, yet I could not find inspiration on any particular topic. I asked my inner guidance for direction on what I could write about that would serve my readers and provide them with information that would support them. But nothing came to me. And then a few days later, my lovely little angel contacts me requesting this post.


How perfect everything is!

It is also quite interesting timing that the request for this post came now. As, for the first time in months, I have actually been experiencing challenges in my own area of relationships. As with all my posts on this blog, I usually write about a particular topic during the time that I am learning about it myself as I like to be able to share my first hand experiences. I would never normally have wanted to write a relationship post when I was going through some challenging times. However, I usually gain quite a huge amount of learning as a result of writing my posts here, and I have no doubt that this particular situation will be the same.

My Beautiful Relationship
At this particular stage of my life, I am very blessed to be in one of the most amazing relationship's that I could have ever asked for. I can truly say that I have never experienced anything like it in the past. It is a relationship built on authenticity, trust, honesty, a deep genuine connection and heart-filled communication. The success of our relationship is also based on the fact that we allow each other to be who we need to be and live our lives outside of the relationship. We do not need play games or use emotional manipulation. It just a genuine partnership that compliments each of us on our own way. Being with each other brings out our strengths and supports our weaknesses as we both enable the other to become better versions of ourselves. Neither of us came in to this relationship 'needing' anything. There was no void that needed to be filled or problem to be solved. When we met we were both already happy in ourselves and in our single status. We simply came together because something clicked and we liked how we felt when we spent time together. And as they say, the rest is history.

There Will Always Be Challenging Times
In saying all of that, there are always going to be challenges. And yes, I am experiencing a few at the moment. What I have learnt though, is that very often the challenges you experience in a relationship have nothing to do with that other person, and everything to do with yourself. This is where I feel a lot of relationships go wrong - people place all their happiness on this other person, they expect great things from them, they demand they do things that make them happy, and then when they don't they get angry. They criticise and blame and make them wrong, when really all they have done is just be themselves.

Take Back Your Power
The best way we can work on relationships is to first work on ourselves and realise that any problem that occurs in a relationship, is usually a problem that actually starts in us.

The empowering thing about taking this viewpoint is that you are no longer at the mercy of that other person. You no longer have to wait for them to change in order for you to be happy. You simply have to shift your perspective. You have to identify what the real cause of your upset is. You have to remember that you are the creator of your life, and whether you realise it or not, you are playing a role in how that person is acting with you.

It is very easy to get caught up in a lot of emotion when we face a relationship challenge. But it helps to drop the emotional drama for a minute and stop and identify what the actual cause of your upset is. You may start off thinking that it is 'them' that has done something that has upset you, but if you can work backwards, you might soon be able to see that it is perhaps a certain way that you are 'thinking' that is causing the upset. If you can work on yourself, and work to change your thinking about a situation, then you take back your power and you now have the ability to actually heal this issue once and for all.

Be Aware Of Your Self Sabotaging Bulls**t
These problems that start in you, and then flow in to your relationship, very often occur when your 'shit' comes up. It is highly likely when you are in a relationship, that old patterns and past hurts may be triggered and may then be re-ignited in your current relationship. It is your job to not let your past crap, enter in to this current relationship and sabotage it or ruin it. How often do you project the ideas, memories, experiences, hurts of past partner on to your current partner?

So, here is the golden rule - do not let yourself sabotage the relationship when your shit comes up. I am learning this one first hand at the moment. Instead you have to work through it and clear it out. Working through your shit can be hard work. Sometimes it seems easier to just quit and run. But that will never get you to where you want to be. You will simply end up sad and lonely.

However, if they remain unconscious you will continue to act out the same patterns and cause the same problems in your relationship over and over again, and you will not even realise you're doing it. Have you ever had the experience where you seem to attract the same type of person, who causes you the same type of problem, and the relationship tends to break up in the same type of way? Your unconscious sabotaging patterns, could be the reason why!

So step one is to become aware of them and to learn how to catch them and work through them. Step two is to do the exact opposite of what your self sabotaging behaviour wants you to do. Sabotaging behaviour is driven by fear. If you do the opposite you will be choosing love over fear, and that is what you want. When fear comes up and it tells you to do something - do the exact opposite. When fear tells you to shut down and not tell him how you're feeling, then it is time to sit down with him and tell him everything. When fear comes up and tells you to run away because you're scared you're going to get hurt again, it is time to stay put and face it. When fear tells you to put your walls up and protect yourself, it is time to tear them down and be totally vulnerable. As scary as it may feel, the only way to overcome your fears, is to face them.

Please read on to Part Two of this post where I give you my 10 Steps to a Successful Relationship

FEEL GOOD NOW

"A change of feeling is a change of destiny" Neville Goodard

I do whatever I can to ensure I feel good most of the time because I believe that how you feel is everything. If you are a follower of the Law of Attraction as I am, you will know that whatever you feel, you attract. You get back what you give out. You attract in to your life whatever you think about and focus on. The emotions you feel an indicator of whether you are attracting good or bad things in to your life. When you feel good, you get more that makes you feel good, and when you feel bad, you get more that makes you feel bad.

I remember reaching a point in my life where I decided my happiness was more important than anything else. It was my number one goal. I decided that above all else I wanted to feel good all the time. I soon realised that in order to achieve this continual feeling of happiness, I was going to have to give up my addiction to negative thinking.

I used to have quite the negativity addiction, and in order to get over that I had to let go of a lot of habits that were not serving me. There was a long list of things I had to kick to the curb including; complaining about things I did not like, placing blame on others when something went wrong, bitching about things that I did not like about others, abusing other drivers on the road, needing to be right and make someone else wrong, nitpicking at my body and finding all my faults, blah blah the list goes on...

All of these negative behaviours totally blocked me from happiness. While I still succumb to them sometimes, I can honestly say I have radically reduced the amount of time I spend indulging in these activities And, even when I realise I am doing it, I am self aware enough to catch myself and reverse it.

However, for some reason today was a slight exception. I had a bad night sleep and woke up feeling really off. It was rainy outside, I was tired and moody and I could just not seem to shake this heavy negative feeling lingering inside of me. My mind felt foggy and I could not reach any clarity or lightness in my thinking. Seeing I know the power of feeling good, I knew how important it was to shift this feeling. And I also know that, the number one way to shift your feeling is to shift your thinking.

It took me the entire day, but I have finally been able to shift this heavy emotion and I can honestly say I am now feeling really good again. But the experience I had today inspired me to write a blog post about it. While this off day was a rare occurrence for me, I think it is the way that a lot of people live everyday of their life. So often things happen and we just react to them, without realising that we have a choice about how we feel and respond. I want to share some of the tools I used today to shift my feeling in the hope that others will too apply these techniques to help increase the level of happiness in their life.

1. Get out of your head and in to your body
After about an hour of feeling funky this morning, I realised that not much was going to work, so I decided to hit the gym. So often when we are feeling yuck it is because we are thinking yucky thoughts. It is easy to get stuck in our heads worrying, complaining, over analysing. Sometimes the best thing to do is to just switch off your mind completely and get moving.

So, this morning I went an did an amazing one hour body combat class and WOW it totally blasted my negativity out the window. I came out of that class feeling powerful, strong, determined, clear headed and incredibly light. When you exercise, not only do switch off your negative thinking, but you change the whole energy of your body to a much higher vibration! You don't necessarily need to hit the gym to use this tool. It can also be as simple as going for a walk in the park, doing some stretching at home, or even putting some music on and having a dance.

2. Baby step your way out of it
A great tool to use is what I call 'baby step thinking'. I have also heard this tool called many different things including bridging and climbing. Basically what it involves is changing the way that you are thinking by taking small baby steps out of negative thinking and in to positive thinking. When we are feeling really crap and our mind is stuck in the gutter, it is virtually impossible to jump straight up to a really happy positive thought. So, instead baby step your way there. Start this process by reaching for any thought that feels even a tiny bit better than the thought you are thinking. Pay attention to how you feel as you are doing this, as you will know you are thinking better thoughts when you find that you are starting to feel a little better

For example: Let's say you are trying to get a new job, and you are stuck in some funky negative thinking and you are feeling tense, anxious and scared. Your thoughts may be something like "I really want this job, but I don't think I will get it. I am not good enough for it. I don't have the skills, or the experience and I do not think I am smart enough. I am sure there are heaps of other people who will apply who are way better than me"

Rather than wallowing in this place, you can start to baby step your way out of this thinking place in to a better feeling place. For example: "I am not sure that I can get this job, but perhaps I should just apply anyway and see how I go. I may not have all the skills needed for this job, but I do actually meet a couple of the selection criteria. I have actually applied for jobs in the past where I didn't think I had all the skills but then I got an interview and I got the job. Plus, I am a pretty quick learner and I am sure I could pick it up quickly. The idea of doing this job really makes my heart sing I know that I would bring so much to the role. I would really love to do it, and I know that my passion for this job will really shine through. I am definitely going to apply because I actually think I could do a really good job and I have a lot of what they are looking for"

I do this type of stuff all the time. It is almost like talking yourself out of the negative thinking and baby stepping your way in to positive thinking. Not only will you start to feel better, but the positive thinking you are putting out will dramatically improve your chances of having a positive outcome.

3. Focus on what you love, appreciate and are grateful for
I did this exercise today, and it really boosted me from feeling kinda ok, to feeling great! All I did was sit in my room and look around, and find things that I saw that I loved. I started with simple things like; I really love my bed, it is so comfortable. I really love my laptop computer, I love that I have so many nice clothes in my wardrobe... Then I started to think about other things in my life that I love like; I really love where I work, it is such a nice office with great people. I really love living in this house because it is so affordable and I am saving so much money....

Then I started to move on to things that I really appreciated and was grateful for in my life. "I am so grateful to have such a supportive and loving family. I am so blessed to live in such a beautiful city. I love and appreciate the amazing friends that I have as they as so supportive and beautiful. I am so thankful that I have a healthy strong body to move around in"

I did this for about ten minutse, and by the end of it I could not stop smiling! It is a beautiful tool to really shift yourself to a higher level of thinking and feeling.

So, next time you are feeling low, stop yourself from wallowing in it or reaching for that tub of ice cream, and instead turn it around. Don't forget that if you continue sitting in that negative feeling, you are just going to attract more negative experiences and events in to your life. So change it NOW! There is nothing more important than feeling good. And remember "it is not what happens to you, but how you react to it that matters" (Epictetus)

BE YOUR OWN CHEERLEADER

There is no one that is tougher on me, than me. I sometimes wonder why that is? No matter how well things are going in my life and how well I am doing, I always seem to be able to find something that is not good enough. Why is it that I am so good at cheering on other people, and encouraging them to focus on the things that are great about them, yet I cannot seem to share the same positivity for myself?

If I were to trace it back through childhood, I could find many reasons for why I have ended up the way I am. While I can recognise this, I am not placing blame or holding resentment. Resentment eats away at you and the only person that it causes damage to is yourself. It is a pointless waste of energy. If you feel like you are holding on to resentment towards anyone the most important thing you can do is heal that and let it go. Forgive that person and stop carrying around the past with you every day. When I was able to forgive my mother our relationship completely transformed.

So, what do you do if you are in a situation like me. I may have resolved some of the issues that created my problem, but how do I now heal the effects that still tend to linger in my life. The paralysis that self-criticism creates in my life is sometimes unbearable. I can sometimes focus so strongly on the things that are wrong that it completely shuts me down. I lose motivation to achieve, I give up on my goals and everything feels pointless.

I recently began thinking about the idea of becoming my own cheerleader and learning how to support myself rather than continually tearing me down. At the end of the day self-criticism, like resentment, is a complete waste of your precious energy. It does not serve you in any way, it definitely does not make you feel good and it also completely disconnects you from who you truly are. Continuing to beat up on yourself is going to change anything, so instead perhaps it is better to take a more positive approach.

For those of you out there who like to indulge in victim thinking (and I am at times one of them) you may not like this positive approach. On some level I am sure self-criticism can be self serving as it keeps you safe in your comfort zone without any need to have to put the effort in to change. But if you, like me, are tired of being your own emotional punching bag, here are some tips to turn yourself from a self-critical tyrant to a self-loving cheerleader....


Praise yourself
Tell yourself when you do something well, just like you would to someone else. Sometimes if we have not learnt how to praise ourself as a child, we may not know how to do it as an adult either! Sing your praises whether you do something perfectly or not.


Stop comparing yourself to others
You are on your own journey. Remain focused on where you are going and what you want. Sometimes we can sway from our path when we become too influenced by how someone else is doing something. True self empowerment comes from listening to your own inner guidance and living out your own unique journey


Be patient
I often become self critical when I am wanting something to happen faster than it is. If I am not getting the results I want, I may blame myself or tell myself it is because I am lazy or unproductive. Trust that everything is unfolding at the time that it should and relax and be patient as your dreams blossom in to realities


Use positive self talk
Be kind and gentle on yourself. Speak to yourself in empowering and loving ways. Remind yourself that you are doing the best that you can in this moment and kick that nasty critical voice to the curb


Recognise the baby steps
Even if you only make small improvements or take one tiny step closer to where you want to be, it is still progress. Don't wait until you acheive your end result to sing your successes, make sure you do it along the whole journey too


Stay in the present
We sometimes become critical when we bring up stories from the past of previous failure or when we think about the future and feel like we will never get where we want to be. Remember to come back in to the present moment. Take a moment to take a deep breath and bring your awareness back in to your body. Place your feet firmly on the floor and ground yourself in to this present moment. Right here and right now, all is well


Keep track of your achievements
I started giving myself stickers to keep track of my achievements. I would place them in my diary so that I could quickly scan over my week and see what I had achieved. I gave myself stickers for the times that I exercised, went to yoga, made a green juice, wrote on my blog, meditated etc.. It was a huge confidence booster for me when I looked over my week and it was filled with colourful stars.


Celebrate your success
When I was receiving life coaching, my coach would ask me at the end of a successful session - so how are you going to celebrate this? When you do something well or achieve something new it is important to celebrate it. Find out what works for you, but for me it was as simple as doing a little happy dance around my room. Not only did it really lock in that good feeling, but it also made me laugh

CHANGE YOUR MIND... LITERALLY!

There is a bit of a common theme in my blogging at the moment, and it is a pretty clear reflection of what is currently going on in the journey of my life. I am all about change! True, long lasting change. Transformation. Growth. Healing. Renewal. Change.

As a result, I am becoming increasingly fascinated by the HOW of change. After years of self help books, personal development seminars, and trying every tool and tip under the sun, I have come to the very root of what I believe creates change in our lives - it is our mind.

Now, this is not a new idea, and in fact it is something I have known for a long time now, but I am only really starting the grasp the real power of it. Quite simply, the only way to change anything in your life, is to first change your mind. Inner work = outside results. The outside world in a pure reflection of what is going on inside of us.

When I talk about what is going on inside of us, I mean your...

• Thoughts and Beliefs
• Feelings and Emotions
• Perceptions and Interpretations
• Stories
• Self talk
• Attention and Focus

This is what determines if you are rich or poor, happy or sad, loving life or hating it. We may think that it is the things in the outer world that determine whether we are living a good life or not, but that is not purely true. It is the way that we think and feel about those outside things that determines if we are happy or not. The only way to change anything in your life is to start changing those above mentioned things going on inside you.

As a bit of a catalyst to get you to start looking inside, rather than outside of you for ways to change, try pondering some of the questions below. Inner change comes from introspection and taking the time to get quiet and conscious about what is actually going on inside of you. You can either sit and think about these questions, or even get out a journal and just record the answers that come to you.

Pick an area of your life that is not working for you at the moment and look at the questions below. Refrain temporarily from trying to do something to change it. Don't try to fix the problem. Go inside yourself and ask how and why you are creating this in your life?

What are you thinking about this area?

• What thoughts do you have on a day to day basis about this area of your life?
• What do you believe to be true about this area?
• What are you believing about this that is supporting its presence in your life?
• What are you believing that is making change impossible?
• Do you believe that you can have what you want?
• What are some new beliefs you can start to take on to create change?
• If you didn't believe all these limiting things, who would you be?
• If you didn't believe these limiting thoughts anymore, what could you do?

How do you feel about this area?

• Are you living from a place of fear or a place of love in this area of your life?
• Do you frequently feel powerless, angry, fearful, frustrated, hurt or sad in this area?
• How can you shift your emotions so you feel better about this area of your life?
• What are some positive things happening in this area of your life that make you feel good when you think of them?

How are you perceiving this area?

• Do you tend to only see all the negatives in this area?
• Are you looking for all the things going wrong or all the things going right?
• What could possibly be some lessons you are learning from this current challenge?
• Can you see any positive or benefits to where you are now in this area of your life?

How are you speaking about this area?

• Start to pay attention to your self talk. Listen to the way you talk to yourself about this area of your life
• Are you only talking about all the things going wrong?
• Do you often complain to others about all the bad things about this area of your life?
• Are you speaking in loving and empowering ways or are you speaking in negative and critical ways?
• What are some positive things you can start to say to yourself and others about this area?
• Is your self talk supporting you to make the changes you want?

Who are you being in this area of your life?

• What type of person as you in this area?
• Are you acting as someone who has everything they want, and who is empowered and happy? Or are you acting as someone who is constantly struggling, feeling negative and dealing with problems?
• Choose who you want to be in this area of your life.

This exercise helps make you more present and mindful. It takes your attention off the outside world and brings it back to you. It helps you start to take 100% responsibility for your life.

This process can be hard, as it often suddenly makes you aware of a whole heap of thoughts that have just been running unconsciously on autopilot. It can be quite confronting when you start to become aware of them, especially when they are nasty limiting ones.

I have previously written some tips for how to create change from the inside out, and what it is that stops us when we attempt change, so feel free to check them out if you need more support.

Happy Changing!

THE EMOTIONAL CAUSES OF PHYSICAL CONDITIONS

Is there a link between what goes on in your mind and the health of your physical body? The practice of mind-body medicine works on the theory that your thoughts and emotions have a powerful ability to influence your physical health. Rather than treating the symptom of the disease, it is the root cause that is considered important.The location of the cause is believed to be in the mind. In mind-body theories links are made between thoughts, emotions and beliefs and the specific physical conditions manifesting in the body. Negative emotional states and mental patterns are believed to play a role in the creation of physical disease.

I have been reading about these theories for years, but it was only the other day that I started truly believing. I had an amazing experience where I was able to make a headache completely disappear in 5 minutes by releasing a negative emotion and thought pattern that I was holding on too. Not only did I make the headache go away, but I went from feeling tense, stressed, grumpy and in terrible pain, to light-hearted, happy, positive, relaxed and with a completely clear and focused mind. I will share with what I did as I would love for every person in the world to know about this tool and to be able to use it in their own life.

How I healed my headache in 5 minutes 
The technique I used is called Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT). This technique can be used to heal anything that has an emotional origin, from headaches, to overeating, to addictions to stage fright. While I will not go in to full detail here of how I used the technique, I will tell you this;

This was my 3rd headache for the week. I had terrible pain behind my eyes, down my neck, and my whole body felt tense and tight. I couldn't understand what was causing the headache. I had been eating well for the past few weeks, drinking plenty of water and getting more than enough sleep. I even tried taking painkillers (which I rarely do) but even they didn't work. I decided to try using some EFT as I felt that there may be some emotional issue or negative thought pattern than was causing this. I used this technique for 5 minutes, that was it, and it completely freed my of my headache. I cannot explain what an amazing and immediate transformation it was. I had been in pain for hours prior to this. I went from feeling tense, stressed, grumpy, moody, negative, and in terrible pain, to light, positive, happy, relaxed and completely free from any pain at all. Not only did I release the pain, but I was able to get absolute clarity as to what it was that was going on in my mind that was causing this tension. I was able to see that I was thinking fearful, disempowering thoughts that I was trying to suppress. My body was attempting to communicate to me through my headache that there was something going on that needed to be cleared and healed.

This may seem a little out-there and unbelievable, but it is true. It is worth testing for yourself. This experience was extremely powerful for me, and was enough to convince me wholeheartedly that negative emotions in the body which are suppressed and not released, manifest as physical disease, pain or ill-health in the body.

Your body talks to you 
Your body uses symptoms, pains, pangs, discomfort, aches and various other sensations to communicate to you. It tells you when something you have eaten isn't right, it tells you when you're dehydrated, when your tired and when your immune system is not being supported. It also tells you when you are not thinking right. We are so conditioned to try to suppress any negative sensation that comes up in our body. We do not want to have to feel it, so we take a tablet to make it go away. The problem is that if you keep ignoring your bodies messages and suppressing them, it is going to have to find other ways of communicating with you. It may create even more pain, more discomfort, or a more serious condition in order to get your attention.

The emotions you feel greatly affect your body too. Emotions such as love, peace, joy and gratitude, create feelings in the body of softness, ease, warmth, fullness, energy and lightness. But, if you were to think of something that worries you or makes you angry you would feel that these emotions have a different affect on your body. If you really allowed yourself to feel the negative emotion, you would feel you physical body start to change as a result. You may feel tenseness in your face or shoulders, your posture may slouch, you may feel tightness somewhere inside you, you may feel yourself clam up, close off or freeze up.

Your physical body is not exempt from the Law of Attraction. What you think about in your mind, not only manifests in the world around you, but also manifests in your physical body.

If you are interested in learning more about the connection between the thoughts you think and the health of your body, please check out the following;

Emotional Freedom Technique 
There are numerous resources available on this topic from books, websites, you tube clips, or even courses that you can take. Below are a couple of links to demonstrations and practices of EFT that you can watch and use. This is where I started out with EFT myself and it is a great place to learn how to start trying the technique out for yourself. Here are some sites with great demonstrations that you can follow along with;

http://www.bradyates.net/youtube.htm
http://www.youtube.com/user/HealingMagic
http://www.mygenie.tv/
http://www.youtube.com/user/magnustapping

Louise Hay - You Can Heal Your Life
Louise Hay mainstreamed the idea that your thoughts create physical manifestations in the body through the best selling book You Can Heal Your Life. She teaches her clients how to use positive and empowering affirmations in place of their negative thinking in order to heal physical conditions. She was able to cure herself of cancer by identifying the emotional cause behind her cancer and then using various techniques to release and heal negative memories, thoughts and emotions. Her book is a must read. She not only shares her personal story, but provides a wide range of tools and techniques that can be applied to your own life. She also details what specific thought patterns create corresponding physical conditions in the body such as back pain, arthritis, skin conditions, cancer, diabetes, digestive problems, poor eyesight and heart disease.

The Secret 
In this movie, stories are shared by people who were able to make changes to their physical bodies and heal their chronic physical conditions through the use of the mind. I recommend that every person see this movie, not just for the health aspect but because the whole movie is overflowing with wonderful wisdom on the power that the mind has in all areas of our life.

Brandon Bays - The Journey
I read the book The Journey from cover to cover in one sitting. I was mesmerised by this lady's story of how she made a tumour the size of a basketball disappear from her body without any medical treatment. Brandon tells the story of how she discovered that the cause of her tumor was an old childhood memory that was suppressed and stored inside her body. By using various natural therapies and modalities Brandon was able to heal the painful memory and release the energy that was being stored in the tumor inside her stomach. Once the emotion around the old memory was healed and released the tumor began to shrink and eventually disappeared.

The power of belief
Belief is one of the most powerful factors in healing, and has even been proven in modern medicine through the Placebo Effect. What you think and believe about your self and your body is important. If there is a condition in your body that is bothering you, hold a vision of yourself free of this condition. Take your attention off continually thinking and talking about what is going wrong in your body, and instead think about health. Notice all the things in your body that are working and that are perfect and healthy, rather than the things that aren't. Think about the healthy body you want to have and through the law of attraction you will begin to manifest the experience of a healthier body.

If you are interested in these topics, do some of your own reading and research and try out a few techniques to see what works for you. You may initially feel doubtful or skeptical of these new ideas, but I encourage you to find your own truth. Open your mind, try something new, think something different. Entertain the possibility that perhaps the thoughts you think have a much greater influence on your body than you have been lead to believe.