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January 28, 2011

Can you ‘Change Your Life in 7 Days’? (Part 8/8)

Filed under: Life Coaching — Tags: , , , , — urbandeva @ 8:45 pm

(Click here to read part 1/8.)

(Click here to read part 2/8.)

(Click here to read part 3/8.)

(Click here to read part 4/8.)

(Click here to read part 5/8.)

(Click here to read part 6/8.)

(Click here to read part 7/8.)

Day Seven: Happily Ever After

Live the secrets of life-long happiness — now!

So, here we are at the end of my week-long quest to see whether it’s really possible to Change Your Life in 7 Days. Been quite interesting, actually. I’m sure on some subliminal level I’ve been brainwashed (please know I say that with tongue firmly in cheek). But judging by what’s happened this week and, in particular, today, perhaps that’s not been such a bad thing.

For one, it’s forced me to commit to writing on a daily basis, flex my creative muscles — something I haven’t done for some time. Since being published, I’ve hid behind my book writing only the odd freelance piece from time-to-time. But committing myself to write on a regular basis has reminded me just how much I enjoy writing about subjects I’m most passionate about. I’ve climbed down from atop my High Horse of Authorship and started frolicking about in the blogosphere again.

It’s also caused me to churn out other pieces for various different things which, in turn, has opened up several opportunities. I’ve always known I most enjoy the process of writing when I share subjects closest to my heart. But this process has served to remind me that I do have something to say, something to offer the world, and when I give of it freely and honestly I’m at my happiest and most fulfilled. And if someone else enjoys my ramblings, well, that’s the cherry on the cake.

I’ve also set myself a couple of challenges this week (this is something McKenna suggests in today’s chapter). By focusing on past successes (this too is something he suggests in today’s chapter — not such a silly idea considering I’ve completed four Marathons and written a book), I set myself a challenge last weekend to achieve by this Sunday night. Although I wasn’t in a financial position to achieve it, I knew I had the resources within to think creatively and find other ways to make it happen — all I had to do was widen my circle of thinking, cast my net as far and wide as possible, and ask the question. Sure, several people said ‘no’ and others ignored me altogether. But did that stop me? No.

You see, as a child I was a tenacious little bugger. I was forever writing letters, asking people for things, opportunities. If someone said ‘no,’ it didn’t stop me and I certainly didn’t take it personally. I’d just double my efforts and write to twice as many people. But somewhere along the way, I lost touch with that determination. When someone said ‘no,’ I began to roll over and accept defeat, give up. If one person wasn’t interested, it automatically meant no-one else would be interested — right? Erm, wrong.

This week, eyes locked on my goal, I’ve gone all out to achieve it. And today, someone finally said ‘yes.’ Cue giddy, excitable running through the house. The fact it was a challenge just out of my reach made the success all the more sweeter, because now I have something to build on — now I have momentum.

So, has Paul McKenna helped Change My Life in 7 Days? Perhaps. Sure he’s full of clichés that make my toes curl. But he’s also reminded me of a few basics I’d long forgotten. And he’s certainly given me food for thought. And although mind-programming or hypnosis is not my bag in any way, shape or form, I’m sure the daily injection of positivity hasn’t hurt. And as a friend said to me very recently, “Thea, you know, perhaps not everything in life have to be as difficult as you think.”

Very true.

UD~

(To read more about how Thea transformed her life from the bottom-up and inside out, buy her inspiring book here.)

January 26, 2011

Can you ‘Change Your Life in 7 Days’? (Part 6/8)

Filed under: Life Coaching — Tags: , , , , , — urbandeva @ 8:16 pm

(Click here to read part 1/8.)

(Click here to read part 2/8.)

(Click here to read part 3/8.)

(Click here to read part 4/8.)

(Click here to read part 5/8.)

Day Five: Healthy Foundations

Creating and maintaining a healthy body, mind and spirit


Considering I was dreading today’s chapter (enough writing work on my plate as it is), I really enjoyed it. Good sound advice — basic stuff such as, ‘listen to your body.’ Sounds obvious, but few do. This is something I’ve monitored in my body during the last few years. There are some foods my body likes and others it doesn’t. I’m never quite sure why it has its particular ‘phases’ with regards particular foods, but it does.

Like right now — I can’t stomach alcohol. Last week I had a couple of small glasses of bourbon. My god, did I pay for it the next day. Felt awful. Not touched a drop of anything since. Aubergines and me don’t mix very well either. I like them, but my body’s been retching at the mere sight of them recently. Goodness knows why. Thing is, next week it could all have changed again. Most odd.

When I read the sentence ‘… just as the mind influences the body, so the body can influence the mind,’ I nodded along in absolute agreement. When things got really bad for me a few years back (Dec 05/Jan 06) and I hit rock bottom (and my ever-increasing bottom hit the floor), I took up running. Well, perhaps it could be better described as shuffling. Galumphing. I had a three mile circuit and my only aim was to get around it. But I tell you what, the increased confidence and transformation that soon followed was nothing short of miraculous.

Those three miles helped me shift a lot more than just excess fat. Chunnering away to myself on those dark, bitterly cold mornings I sorted through long lost thoughts and feelings as the issues in my tissues began to rise to the surface. Sometimes, the best thing for any upsetting, challenging, or tricky situation is to take it for a good, brisk walk. Doesn’t even have to be that far. Twenty minutes is enough.

He also shares the Taoist technique of the ‘Inner Smile’ which is easy to do and leaves you with an inner glow:

1)      Sit comfortably — ultimately, you can practise the inner smile anywhere, in any position.

2)      Allow a smile to dance into your eyes. If you like, raise the corners of your mouth ever so slightly, like someone who knows a really cool secret but doesn’t need to tell.

3)      Smile into any part of your body that feels tight, or uncomfortable, until it begins to ease or relax.

4)      Smile into any part of your body that feels especially good. You can increase the smile by expressing gratitude to that part of the body for helping to keep you healthy and strong.

5)      Allow the inner smile to reach every corner of your body. Here are some specific suggestions:

a)      Smile into the organs of your body — your heart, liver, pancreas, kidneys, sex and adrenal glands. If you don’t know where these organs are, it’s OK to pretend — your body will redirect the energy for you.

b)      Smile down through your oesophagus and into your stomach. Smile all the way through your large and small intestines and out of your bottom. (If anyone can think of a more delicate way to put that, answers on a postcard, please!)

c)       Smile up into your brain, then down through the base of your skull and all the way down to the bottom of your spine.

You can smile into your life as well as your body. Try smiling and expressing your gratitude into a relationship, an environment or a project you are currently working on, and notice how the energy around that situation begins to shift!

(By the way, that was one of McKenna’s many, many exclamation marks, not mine.)

(Click here to read part 7/8 — Creating Money)

UD ~

(To read more about how Thea transformed her life from the bottom-up and inside out, buy her inspiring book here.)

January 24, 2011

Can you ‘Change Your Life in 7 Days’? (Part 4/8)

Filed under: Life Coaching — Tags: , , , , , — urbandeva @ 2:54 pm

(Click here to read part 1/8.)

(Click here to read part 2/8.)

(Click here to read part 3/8.)

Day Three: The Power of a Positive Perspective

The Art of Reframing

Before each chapter, McKenna runs through a (steadily increasing) checklist of things to do to get you feeling all positive and revved up about the day ahead. Included in the preface for today’s chapter was the following:

“Think about the rest of the day ahead, feeling and imagining things going perfectly, going the way you want them to go. See what you’ll see, hear what you’ll hear and feel how good it feels.

Congratulations! You have just programmed yourself to have a great day.”

Now, not wishing to cause offence to any McKennites out there, but while this may work on the majority of the herd, those of us who’ve unplugged from The Matrix beg to differ. What I find implicit in the above statement is fear, insecurity, and a lack of trust. It says, “I don’t trust Life; therefore, I’ll attempt in my myopic, ego-centric way to control it, get it to do as its told and to go my way because the omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent All Seeing Eye that I am, knows what’s best for me in the Grand Scheme of Life.”

The last line in particular really grates: “You have just programmed yourself…” Oh, purleease. What teeny-tiny ego really believes they can control the direction Life takes? Let’s put it another way: think back to when you was a child and your parents/caregivers told you to do something that was in your best interest and for your Own Good. Now, being the perfectly flawed human beings they were, sometimes their advice was for the best (even if it didn’t feel that way at the time) and sometimes it wasn’t.

Those individuals who go on to achieve a certain level of ego maturity as they grow older, understand Life can be a bit like that at times. Life often puts us in situations we’d really rather avoid, throws down challenges that stop us in our tracks, and places seemingly insurmountable obstacles before us. Left to our own devices, we’d likely never choose 99.9% of such scenarios. But Life does. Why? Because whether we like it or not, at some strange, twisted, warped level (that’s how it often feels to me), Life knows what’s best for us. I appreciate that’s a bitter pill to swallow, but that’s what I believe. I’m not saying I necessarily agree with or even like it, especially when it involves tragedy, illness, and loss (I doubt those moments ever make sense to any genuinely loving and compassionate heart); but ever so occasionally, on deep, honest reflection, often begrudgingly and with a little Grace, I may catch a glimpse of the method in the madness.

The deep aspect of consciousness that originally gave rise to our ego is omniscient, omnipotent and omnipresent. It sees past, present and future, because it all exists right now, in this moment. So, no — I don’t believe you can ‘programme’ (ugh, hate that term) yourself to have a great day because… in fact (climbs on High Horse), just pause for a moment and think about those last two words — ‘great day.’ How do you even know what a ‘great day’ looks like? The likelihood is, you’ll be basing it on previous ‘great days.’ Is that what you want your life to be? A re-run of previous ‘great days’? Don’t you want your life to be mind-blowingly magnificent in ways you could never, ever have imagined? Or are you happy with more of the same?

Thing with ideas such as this is they don’t take into account the glitches in The Matrix; the coincidences, synchronicities — the ghost in the machine. The wave particle which, when observed, doesn’t behave the way it’s expected. Or what I prefer to call ‘fate’ — those fated, fateful circumstances there’s no getting away from, no matter how positively framed our outlook. I believe what ultimately matters, is how we choose to respond in such situations.

Speaking for myself, I’d rather surrender to each day and hope I have it in me to meet it with as much curiosity, courage, compassion, dignity, and grace as I can muster. When I awaken in the morning, the best way I can imagine framing it is with an open heart and mind, polished off with a deep breath and a Bring It On.

(Click here to read part 5/8 – Dreamsetting)

UD ~

(To read how Thea transformed her life from the bottom-up and inside out, buy her inspiring book here.)

January 23, 2011

Can you ‘Change Your Life in 7 Days’? (Part 3/8)

Filed under: Life Coaching — Tags: , , , , , , , , — urbandeva @ 9:05 pm

(Click here to read part 1/8.)

(Click here to read part 2/8.)

Day Two: A User’s Manual for Your Brain

Master your emotions and release your full potential


I’m doomed.

I think this brainwashing malarkey may be working after all. Having said that, I was already determined to shake things up this year. Before starting this book I was regularly using visualisation techniques during my nightly 4 mile power-walk. I think the old skool term for it is daydreaming. Marching along, iPod blaring, I’ve been running through scenarios and situations I want to experience. Only, I run over and over and over the same situations. But then, I have been prone to obsessive compulsive behaviour from time-to-time.

The idea for one particular scenario arrived all-of-a-sudden-one-day without any prior thought. My initial response was, “Meee? No way. I’d never be able to do that. Not in a million years.” Two years later, however, it’s hatched, grown legs and stalks me on a daily basis. Last Friday it reached critical mass when I finally gave in to its incessant daily pecking and started making phone calls, sending emails, just to get the damn thing off my back. In short, a dream has worn me down. Seems it’s settled on me as a host and come Hell or High Water, it will be manifest as a physical reality. Scary thing is, things are now happening…

This has caused me to wonder about one of the ideas discussed in a favourite lecture of mine by spiritual philosopher Alan Watts entitled, Do You Do It or Does It Do You? The idea, from Buddhism, is called interdependent origination — also known as pratītyasamutpāda. Rather than one event being the cause of another, the idea is that both events arise at the same time interdependently of one another.

For example, a woman decides she wants a baby. She shacks up with someone, is impregnated and, if all goes well, a baby arrives nine months later. In the west, we would say she intended to have the child; therefore, her intention caused the creation of that child. The theory behind pratītyasamutpāda, however, says at the same time the woman decided she wanted a baby, a new life intended to manifest in human form and chose her as its mother, thereby causing the desire she felt in wanting to get pregnant. (Do keep up.) This concept messes with our western way of thinking which typically moves in a linear, cause and effect direction. Personally, it makes a lot of sense to me.

Anyway, as usual I digress. McKenna shared an exercise in today’s chapter which, as a writer, I really rather like — a natty tactic to help silence the Inner Critic:

1)      Stop for a moment and talk to yourself in your critical voice, saying all those nasty things in that unpleasant tone.

2)      Now, notice where you make that voice. Does it seem to be coming from inside your head or outside? Is it at the front, the sides or the back?

3)      Extend your arm and stick out your thumb.

4)      Wherever the critical voice was, move it down your arm to the tip of your thumb, so it’s now speaking to you from there.

5)      Next, slow it down and change the tone of it. Make it sound sexy, or speed it up so it sounds like Mickey Mouse.

It sounds much less threatening like that, doesn’t it?

Good eh?

(Click here to read part 4/8 — The Power of a Positive Perspective)

UD ~

Read how Thea transformed her life in her inspiring book here.)

January 22, 2011

Can you ‘Change Your Life in 7 Days’? (Part 2/8)

Filed under: Life Coaching — Tags: , , , , — urbandeva @ 4:00 pm

(Click here to read part 1/8.)

Day One: Who Are You, Really?

Discover your true potential and become the person you really want to be

I have a confession to make — I’d already listened to the Mind CD a couple of days ago. Good job really, as I spent the entire 29 minutes in a fit of giggles. Really, I must take these things more seriously. Thing is, on the CD McKenna sounds like a bad Barry White impersonator. I’m not sure what they’re trying to achieve with the effects, but if you don’t set the volume quite right it borders on the disturbing. Knowing what to expect, however, made things a lot easier today.

Anyway, today’s Key Lesson is:

The reason you are not yet living the life of your dreams is that you are wasting so much of your time and energy hiding your negative self-image from the world.

Before I elaborate on the above statement, I’d like to say a couple of things about McKenna’s approach in the book. Those familiar with NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming) will spot McKenna’s use of these techniques from the outset: the subtle highlighting of particular words, the use of positive ‘framing’ etc. Basic, but essentially powerful stuff. I won’t go into the ins and outs of NLP here; suffice to say, there are many useful techniques which would enhance your effectiveness in the world if you began implementing them today. The most successful, most influential, most inspired individuals employ these techniques naturally. The founders of NLP studied the underlying patterns of behaviour and thought in outstanding people and, from their findings, devised the system which would come to be known as NLP. Anyway, enough on that.

The book is accessible and written in a easily digestible manner. Much of what he says makes sense and his approachable style means you can start making positive, proactive changes today. If you’re new to this stuff, I can see no harm in picking it up and having a go.

However, I’ve been in this field long enough to know it takes much more to transform your life than traditional positive thinking — something McKenna himself acknowledges. As he says, imagination and habit are far more powerful than logic and willpower will ever be. But from what I’ve read and heard so far, the book and CD will help dust off your imagination and get you thinking about what you want your life to look and feel like.

Only thing is, and I hate to be the bearer of Bad News, you must then bring those daydreams and visions down to the grounded, grit-level of daily life. There’s more to it than Descarte’s  ”I think; therefore, I am” dictum would have us believe. We are not just our thoughts, but our actions also. And that’s where most people fail. Imagining what you want your life to look like is the easy part. Seeing it through to a tangible reality, is where the majority fail.

When they start the visualisation process, imagining what they want their life to look like, a lot of folk focus on the material stuff — the house, the car, the relationship. White Noise, I call it. White Noise which, ultimately, won’t make you happy and bring feelings of contentedness and fulfilment. Now, you can argue with me, tell me a new car would bring untold happiness to your life. But I stand firm in telling you that that’s ego-based fantasy crap. When it comes to transformation, you’ve got to start from the inside-out.

You are imbued with innate talents, gifts, and qualities wholly unique to you. Yes, there may be other writers, poets, dancers — but they will never interpret a dance the way you will, write a book or poem the way you would. In fact, no-one else in all of time will be able to do what you do, the way you can do it. If you don’t act upon and live out whatever is climbing the walls within you; if you don’t share those talents, those qualities, your uniquely bestowed gifts with the world, they will be lost — forever.

Worse still, they’ll rot inside, eat you up, and be projected outwardly as jealousies, insecurities, and resentment towards those who do have the courage, patience, and wherewithal to pursue their grandest dreams and creative talents.  The unearthing of this innermost authentic self is what McKenna encourages with his initial questions and simple exercises. Another way I encourage individuals to tap into their innermost, authentic self is to start recording their nightly dreams. Journalling, too — reflecting on those moments and experiences when we felt most vital, most alive, before someone came along and shat upon us from a great height with their negativity, disapproval, and scorn.

So yes, dream. Begin with the End in Mind. Imagine it in glorious Technicolor. But as my fella often reminds me when I get too ahead of myself, Next Steps. Concentrate on your Next Steps. After all, you don’t go from being a couch potato today to completing a Marathon tomorrow. Talking/imagining is fun; but Doing gets Done.

(Click here to read part 3/8 — A User’s Manual for Your Brain)

UD ~

Read how Thea transformed her life in her inspiring book here.

January 21, 2011

Can you ‘Change Your Life in 7 Days’? (Part 1/8)

Filed under: Life Coaching — Tags: , , , , , , , , — urbandeva @ 6:08 pm

Last week I passed a billboard with TV hypnotist Paul McKenna staring back at me and the words I Can Make You Happy emblazoned across the bottom, the title of his new book. The hairs on the back of my neck bristled. Being honest, I can’t abide stuff like that. As open-minded as I am (and believe me, I’m pretty open-minded), mind-programming/reprogramming and brainwashing techniques are not my bag.

You see, I’m a headstrong so-and-so. When I was six, I had an operation which required anaesthesia. Lay on the operating table, the surgeon — looming over me — explained they were going to place the rubber mask over my nose and mouth and by the time I’d counted to ten I’d be out for the count and wouldn’t feel a thing. Inside, a little voice said, “Oh no I won’t.” By the time I’d reached eighteen (seconds, not years that is), the surgeon, by now showing signs of impatience said, “Look, just go to sleep.” That pretty much sums up my relationship with hypnosis. Even with added anaesthesia, it didn’t work. That’s not to say hypnosis per se doesn’t work. I’m sure it does for many. Just not for me.

I’ve not watched McKenna’s shows or read any of his books. So while reading up on I Can Make You Happy, I came across one of his earlier books, Change Your Life in 7 Days. If the first title irritated me, the second inched things up several notches. Change is not achieved overnight. Inside-out, bottom-up transformation takes time. A long time. Time the majority of folk are not willing to commit. And I should know.

As a life coach, I’ve sat in front of plenty of people who’ve paid me good money to help them navigate the often precarious Straits of Change. Many, but not all, of those individuals approached me with the hope that I could change their lives for them and make it as quick and as painless as possible. But if there’s one thing I’ve learnt from first-hand experience — pulling the rug from beneath my previously shitty, rote routine of a 9-5 existence and pursuing my dreams (literally) — it’s that transformation does not happen in seven days. There are no quick fixes, no easy solutions. It takes persistence, dogged determination, courage, and, most of all, time.

But because I’m an open-minded soul I thought I’d check the book out, turn it into an experiment, and share my ongoing findings With the Group. Hell, why not? It’s a New Year and for those of you who haven’t noticed, I’m on something of a mission to quit being such a hermit, stop hiding behind my book, and put myself Out There. I’m also conscious there are folk this stuff will appeal to and may genuinely help. Regardless of my opinions, I believe people should be armed with all the necessary information so they can decide for themselves whether it’s something they’d like to try. Horses for Courses and all that.

I bought my copy (book & CD) for just one pence from Amazon UK’s Marketplace. My copy arrived as good as new with the Mind CD in equally mint condition. This afternoon, I settled down to Day 1, reading the book and listening to the CD. How did I get on?

Find out tomorrow… (Click here to read part 2/8)

~

Read more about Thea/Urban Deva in her book: http://www.runningintomyself.com/

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