THE BIGGER PICTURE
A blog to explore what it means to live life from a spiritual perspective - the bigger picture. Using personal stories that uplift, inspire, encourage and celebrate our incredible lives.
In my work as a Life Fulfilment Coach and Personal Empowerment Mentor, I help others identify their dream and achieve it. I love helping people reconnect with themselves & their values and seeing how they can purposefully create and live fulfilling lives. Not only do I use all the coaching tools I have to hand, but I also come from the perspective that when we are aware of the bigger picture, aware of who we are, what we think and how we feel, we have influence over what we bring into our life. The next trick is to keep that awareness in everyday life. This blog is to share my experiences in the pursuit of conscious awareness and inspire you to do the same.
If you enjoyed this blog please do feel free to forward it to someone you think would enjoy it to.
I remember chatting with a friend a few years ago and she looked very
down in the mouth, "What's wrong?" I asked her, "I'm suffering from
expectations!" was her reply. I loved this answer, it was so honest and
demonstrated that she was taking 100% responsibility for the
experiences in her life.
I had a bout of expectations at the
weekend. It was my 50th birthday party, well actually it was a 90th
birthday party as I was celebrating it with a close friend who was 40.
He very generously had lent me five years so were saying we were 45
each! Anyway, here we are in the south of Spain, two very good friends
had lent us their magnificent villa overlooking the marina and I had
built up in my mind this wonderful party around the pool. Sunshine
sparkling on the water and a balmy evening with us outside under the
stars.
It rained! Not only did it rain, but it rained cats and
dogs and horses, and donkeys and mules! At the same time it blew, a
lot, rather like the wind tunnels that they test cars in. Get the
picture?
Where were my expectations then? For a while I got very
disappointed and because of that wasn't really enjoying myself. I was
like the little girl who won't play 'cos it's not the game she wanted.
All I could focus on was the fact that it wasn't as I had planned.
Luckily someone pointed out early on that I was surrounded by the same
good friends who would have been outside had the sun shone, and instead
were all around a roaring log fire and were having fun. At that point I
was able to drop the bout of expectation I was putting myself through
and join in the party – and it was fun!
Where do your
expectations trip you up in life? What are they stopping you enjoying
or participating in? How different would your every day experience be
if you weren't caught up in the expectation of how it should be? Can
you drop them and join the party?
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Our world is as we see it, that is a statement that is made a lot by
people nowadays. What does it mean though? Does it mean we can make our
own judgement on what we see happening in the world? Or perhaps it
means that we give our own meaning to what we see happening. Either of
these statements is true but there is also a literal meaning to this.
We
have over 2 millions bits of information coming towards us every second
of every day. Now if we were aware of all those bits of information we
surely would go mad. In fact we only become aware of around 130 bits of
information per second. What happens to the rest? Well, we filter it
out. Our attitudes, beliefs, programming, decisions, memories language,
values and even our energy in this time space continuum act as filters
to most of this information coming our way. We even have this in our
language – the phrase of the 'rose tinted glasses' allude to the
filters in front of our eyes.
So truly, yes, the world is as we
see it and we see it through our own personal, individual, unique
filters. No wonder we can't agree on what is going on! However once we
are aware of this filtering process we can become aware of the filters
we have. And, once we become aware of them we can change them.
A
good friend of mine, Matt, told me a story that is a great example of
once you start looking for something, then you often notice it more
than you ever did before. He told me that his next-door neighbour was
building a birdbath in his garden and using a whole load of little
broken off tiles. Matt asked him where he got the tiles from and the
neighbour said from the street corner – there is lots of building going
on and they are everywhere. Now Matt had never noticed this before and
said so but the neighbour said that because you weren’t looking for
them. Ever since that day Matt sees hundreds of little broken off tiles
in street corners. Once it entered his awareness he could see them,
whereas before he simply didn’t have that filter on his vision.
This
applies to everything in our lives. And the great thing is that once
you get this idea you can begin to see the filters you have in place
that don’t serve you very well. Are you looking for triumph or
disaster? Abundance or lack? Laughter or sadness? What filters do you
have running right now? Are they serving you well? Would you prefer
some new ones?
What are you seeing in front of your eyes?
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Well it has been a while since I have written, busy times right now, but it is nice to be back.
I’ve
had an interesting situation develop in the last week that has gotten
me to thinking. I have had someone book two sessions for coaching and
not turn up or even acknowledge my phone calls. Naïve I might be, but
this always shocks me when someone doesn’t honour my time or my
contribution.
But in the time old way of tradition of self
enquiry it also got me to thinking that this, on one level, is a
reflection of me. So, who or what am I not honouring? I cast around for
the answer and it didn’t take me too long to see what it was showing
me. I have just entered a very busy phase of the year and I have been
planning out my time to ensure that I can cover all that needs to get
done. I did some goal setting and action steps and put some timelines
to them and then promptly ignored rather a lot them! I didn’t honour my
own commitments.
These experiences are always a good wake up
call. By using the specifics of the situation, i.e. not feeling
honoured, and doing the inner enquiry – what is that showing me – I get
a much deeper insight and see that it is mirroring something I am
doing. Once I see this I can correct it. This a good reminder that our
outer world is always a mirror, it’s just whether we are willing to
look into it and learn.
What’s your mirror showing you right now? Does it need polishing or is it sparkling?
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Just had a lovely lunch with a friend and at one point we were talking
about indulgences. This was mainly because she had brought a lovely
chocolate pudding – one of those scrummy ones where there is cake
outside and melted chocolate inside – and we all agreed that sometimes
indulgences are simply a good thing! Good for the mood, good for the
emotions and good for the soul.
In the world of “this is bad for
you and that is bad for you” life can become a bit bland. However life
is much more fun when we allow ourselves to indulge and enjoy things
occasionally. It is also much easier for us to change our patterns of
behaviour when we give ourselves a bit of slack. If an iron rod is
being used to enforce change we will, very easily, go into the rebel
position and run off fast in the other direction. If however we allow a
bit of latitude it is much easier to stay pretty much on the path we
have chosen. All things in moderation can be a great motto.
Take
chocolate for an example – I could very easily eat it daily. In fact I
have done this and seen tighter trousers as the result! But to ban it
totally from my life would feel very harsh and I would be more likely
to go on a chocolate binge. But to allow it in occasionally, and really
enjoy it totally guilt free when I do, has allowed me to cut back on
the chocolate by at least 90%. Result? An occasional indulgence of
chocolate and I don’t resent the lack of it at other times in my life.
This
way of being is helpful in many areas of life. I always say to my
clients that if they wish to find a way to change an old habit or
pattern find the way of least resistance. And - this is really
important - really enjoy the indulgences you allow yourself. There is
no point in having them and feeling bad, relish them to the full. You
end up being more relaxed about what you wish to change in your life,
really enjoying the things you do have rather then feeling bad about
them, and that in itself is a huge improvement.
So go on enjoy those things you love when you chose to indulge and feel your world lighten up a bit. Go on – you’re worth it!
I
won’t be around for a couple of weeks as we are travelling in
Switzerland and then a week on the ski slopes. See you again at the end
of the month.
I invite you to the Breakthrough to Success seminar mentioned in previous blogs please click this link
and you can enrol for free for the next event either in the UK,
Ireland, USA or Australia. Please feel free to pass this invitation
onto as many people as you like.
If you would like to
explore how coaching can empower you to make the changes you truly want
in your life please feel free to contact me to arrange a time for me to
call you for a free introductory session. Tel +34 958 639 593 or
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I had an interesting conversation this week about finding the balance
between living a simpler lifestyle and still being fulfilled on all
levels. Often we can bring different elements into our lives;
downsizing, working part time to spend more time with the family,
reducing our carbon footprint, sustainable living, growing your own
veg, and on one level it can be very fulfilling.
However as
human beings we are also set up to want to face challenges, to have to
think outside the box, find solutions, learn new things. Without that
expansion in our lives we can feel stagnant. In the conversation I was
having it was evident that although the lifestyle was great there was
something missing and eventually the phrase intellectual challenge
popped up.
We are designed to achieve, our self-esteem soars
when we do and we get stimulated with more thoughts and ideas. I know
from my own experience that when I see no new challenge ahead I feel
uncomfortable as though something is missing. It is like I have no
forward focus and although I love what I do for a living I need to keep
adding to that to expand and grow.
Expansion – in this ever
expanding Universe - is our essence. When we are stimulated we
constantly send off rockets of desires for new things or experiences
and achievements. We need these to feel as though life is moving
forward. Not in a frenzied, without this I am nothing feeling, but in a
deep feeling of inner growth.
So if you don’t have a new
horizon beckoning this year maybe you’d like to have a think about what
you would like to add to the mix for 2008? What one thing have you been
talking about for a while now but never actually started? What
challenge would you like to take on and conquer? It could be anything,
a new skill, a new hobby or deeper learning. Part of our fulfilment is
this expansion – give it a direction.
To help focus that
challenge perhaps you’d like to attend the Breakthrough to Success
seminar mentioned in previous blogs please click this link
and you can enrol for free for the next event in either the UK,
Ireland, USA or Australia. Please feel free to pass this invitation
onto as many people as you like.
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