From Surviving to Thriving: A No Tools, No Techniques Shift from Stress and Overwhelm to Fulfilment

Resilience!

That's a big topic.

It's so big that if you search 'How to build resilience' on Google you get ....

206 000 000 results!!

Yes!!

Two hundred and six million!!

Fancy ploughing your way through that lot?

If you do that search and start reading you might see what I saw.

The help being offered is based on a model of lack.

That somehow we can lack resilience.

That we need to add it in!

But what if you turned that upside down.

What if you knew resilience was always there.

Set at 100% in each and every one of us.

Right from birth.

Now I am not saying you can always see it ...

... the power of thought sees to that!

But it is always there.

Like a rope round your middle pulling you through life.

Wouldn't it be nice if you could see it all the time.

I really can help you do that!

Self-consciousness!

I have been seeing something about this recently.

Google says: 'Undue awareness of oneself, one's appearance, or one's actions.'

And the part of this definition which stands out to me is 'undue'.

Not to make this end up like an English lesson but here is the meaning of 'undue' - unwarranted or inappropriate because excessive or disproportionate.

So self-consciousness could be defined as 'Self-consciousness!

I have been seeing something about this recently.

Google says: 'Undue awareness of oneself, one's appearance, or one's actions.'

And the part of this definition which stands out to me is 'undue'.

Not to make this end up like an English lesson but here is the meaning of 'undue' - unwarranted or inappropriate because excessive or disproportionate.

So self-consciousness could be defined as 'excessive or disproportionate  awareness of oneself.'

And where does this start?

Where does it come from?

JUDGEMENT!!

We are bound to have some level of awareness of how we are.

That seems like a human thing to have.

But when judgement gets involved, that thinking about ourselves goes into overdrive.

If we accepted everything about ourselves, there would be less inclination to be self-conscious.

If you want to be less self-conscious, please get in touch.

Happiness!

That's a topic which is often discussed isn't it?

Where does it come from?

How do we get more of it?

What does it even mean?

When you contemplate your own happiness ... what do you see?

The Google definition of happiness is 'a state of well-being and contentment.'

It can often look like we have to create this state.

By doing things in the outside world 

OR

Doing things to ourselves.

But what if we have got that backwards?

What if well-being and contentment are our natural state?

I truly believe this is the case.

Our natural state is happiness ...

And then there is thought.

Thought stops us seeing our well-being sometimes.

Perhaps you have noticed that in yourself ...

When your mind is busy, you tend not to feel content.

When you are quiet and present, well-being naturally emerges.

Less doing

Less seeking

Less thought 

EQUALS

More contentment

More well-being

More happiness

If you want to experience more of your innate happiness get in touch.

Enough!

When I consider the word 'enough' it feels like a chasm. 

A hole which would be unfillable if we tried to fill it. 

It's impossible to measure what is enough.

Maybe in fact everything is. 

Maybe everything is perfect just as it is. 

We can sit in a place of seeing that perfection. 

Or we can end up sitting in a place of seeing lack. 

The former feels light and free. 

A place of less on my mind.

A space where the next thing to do will occur to me.

Enough is impossible to measure.

Who makes those rules anyway.

Maybe you are ready to make your own rules!!

Prescription!

I spent a long time searching for the right one.

Thinking that there must be an answer out there.

That thing that would make me 'better'.

It seemed like there were so many wise people.

They were wiser than me.

They knew how to fix me.

It was never ending.

Some things worked for a while.

Then they didn't.

Some things didn't work at all.

I blamed myself not the tool.

I saw myself as unfixable.

When would this end?

I wonder right now if you can relate.

Are you searching too?

Looking for the prescription?

It turned out in the end that I didn't need a PRESCRIPTION.

What I needed was a DESCRIPTION.

Once I understood where my feelings came from.

Once I could see my own innate wellbeing ...

It all fell away ... beautifully ... naturally ... easily

It was my wisdom which got me there in the end NOT everyone else's.

Mistakes!

It looks like we all make them but do we really?

Here's a different take.

In the moment when you do something it looks right!

It is the best thing to do.

In that moment there isn't anything else.

That's the thinking which looks real.

Later that can change.

Oh dear! Turns out now, I don't like what I have done.

A new perspective has emerged.

New thinking looks real.

Then the regret

Then, 'I should have known better'.

Then self-criticism.

But the self you are criticising was doing their best.

Can you see that?

Can you bring compassion to how you see yourself?

In any moment you are doing your best.

We all are.

If you would like to live without regret, you can make a start with a conversation with me.

You can't do that!

Is that something you have heard before?

Who said it first?

A teacher

A parent

An older sibling

That's not relevant as it happens

Because they are not here now are they.

But that voice in your head still is isn't it.

The one which makes it look like they took away your confidence.

They didn't though.

It's still there.

And you don't have to do too much to see it.

You just have to stop taking that thought seriously.

The 'You can't do that thought'

Turns out your thinking doesn't know what you are capable of.

Who knew eh?!

Are there other thoughts you would like to take less seriously too?

If you want to change your relationship with what passes through your head get in touch.

Mental health!

Are we really talking about it?

It looks like we are.

Wherever we look there are news articles, posts, memes, quotes.

But just notice for a moment.

Are we talking about mental health or mental illness.

It's the latter I fear.

We are looking deeply at mental illness.

We are pointing people to mental illness.

We are telling them what it looks like, how it feels, how to know they have it.

Don't get me wrong, I see where this has a place.

But how about if we pointed people to their mental health.

That which is always inside them.

Their inner calm, resilience and confidence.

That which they were born with.

How different would the conversations be then?

I love to have conversations where I show people where they are mentally healthy.

Nicer for them and nicer for me!! (Oh! And much more effective too)

Fancy a conversation like this or know someone who might?

Feelings!

I spent ages trying to solve them!

If my circumstances are x, I will feel y.

If they stop doing a I will feel b.

If I don't have c experience I will feel d.

It was exhausting.

But then I heard something new.

There isn't a solution to a feeling.

Just allow yourself to sit with that for a moment.

Feelings do not have solutions.

So everything we have based society on is a lie then!

It certainly is!

But in many ways that is a relief.

Because in knowing the source of our feelings (thought in the moment by the way), something wonderful opens up to us.

Perception!

Otherwise know as thought in the moment.

It is creating our reality 100% of the time.

There is a real world out there.

There are real things happening inside me.

But my experience of those comes to me through thought!

And I begin to wonder; how much is real and how much is perception.

And then I realise that I can never know that.

But I can see the ease which comes from knowing that's how it works.