Take a Hike!

Sorry, did that sound rude? I mean, try to incorporate a little more walking into your life and see if that makes you feel better. But that’s not a catchy title!

Last year I took part in a charity midnight walk over 13 miles, and in preparation walked most days. One of the side effects of the walking was time to think but it was also helping me in other ways.

The repetitive activity of walking, studies show, triggers the body’s relaxation response and so helps reduce stress; at the same time even a 10-minute walk provides an immediate energy boost and improves mood. Nietzsche wrote, ‘All truly great thoughts are conceived while walking. Research supports him; exercise-induced brain chemicals help people think clearly. I often encourage people to walk during breaks in my courses.

And then the snows came and I lost my habit of walking several times a week. Snuggling down by the wood burner was far more attractive!

Sometimes it seems easier to break habits that are good for you rather than the ones we wish we could lose! I am now resurrecting the walking habit (no snow, lighter evenings, should be a doddle!).

Walking isn’t an option for everyone, but there will be things we can all do to enhance our time to think and quality of life. What good habit would you like to rediscover this week?

What is Important in Your Life?

The advertising world is very good at telling us what we want to eat, to read, to look like, to wear, how to decorate our homes and so on. It has a vested interest in us ‘wanting’ things so it creates needs we didn’t know we had until they told us! Very few of us are immune ( I speak as someone who has just acquired a flat screen TV- yes, we are very late adopters!)

Most of this is relatively harmless (unless you buy from companies which exploit countries, employees and use child labour!) as long as in our hearts we know what really counts.

Policy, Procedures, Politics & Overload

It’s not just advertising though. In our work we can get dazzled (or dazed) by policies, procedures, promotions,  and politics and start to lose sight of the really important things in life. In the scramble to do our job well, get noticed, fight our corner, we can forget why we work in the first place, what our own bottom line is. Sometimes the higher up the organisation we go, the more disconnected we can feel with staff delivering service on the ground. This disconnect can lead to feelings of dissatisfaction which we fill by trying to do more of the things which took us there in the first place, or buying things to booster our self esteem and provide a justification for what we’re doing all day long.

No One is Immune

I experienced this myself. I started out in my social work career to make a difference, to help people have better lives. Yet the more I advanced the further away I found myself from my original aspiration and the more involved I seemed to get with minutia. It was very seductive for a while, feeling important.

My awakening came when I tried to evaluate just what contribution I was making to the very people I had started out wanting to help. It didn’t feel enough. Occasionally, despite being my own boss, it still doesn’t, and I have to go and reconnect, irrespective of whether this is a good move for my business or my purse!

I  see symptoms of disconnect sometimes when working one to one with senior managers. They can get so fixated on their own roles that they forget what their organisation is there to do, what it’s like for those directly in touch with the public or customer. For example, a while back, while acting in a consulting role, I made a comment that staff would be pleased with something we had agreed (the agreement was achieved with some hearty debate).

“Oh well, as long as they are happy” a senior manager said in a voice heavy with sarcasm, entirely missing the point. The point was not to make senior managers happy but to improve service delivery on the ground; front line staff deliver service on the ground, either through sales, or service. Unhappy, demoralised staff give bad service and do not work well in my experience. Lose sight of that and you are on a hiding to nothing.

By the same token,  your own personal satisfaction falls when you lose sight of your own personal values.

Go Back to the Floor

One remedy for managers is to get back out on the ‘shop floor’, whatever that might be. Actually go and visit staff, spend a day on the ground. get a real up to date feel for what goes on. I know one chief executive who spent a day on a public enquiry desk to better understand what staff were dealing with. It was very enlightening!

It’s a remedy for all of us, when we’re getting caught up in work battles and politics – remember what is really important to us. Keep your foundations solid.

What is really important in your life, and are you giving it the care and attention it deserves? How do you make sure that you keep yourself connected?

How To Make Bad Times Better

Do you find yourself waking up, listening to the news and beginning to feel gloomy about everything? The state of the world, economic misery, people losing their jobs, sexism from sport presenters…

Unfortunately it’s really easy to make yourself fed up; it’ll creep up on you unawares and before you know it you’re succumbing to the grumpy stereotype and tutting indiscriminately. It requires a bit more effort to do the opposite. I am not about to advocate that you turn off the radio, TV, stop reading papers etc (although as a change that is temporarily refreshing) because I believe we should engage with the world and try to change things for the good, as much as we are able.

However, I do think we are in the midst of great change, change over which we have little control and which can cause us to feel the classic symptoms of anger, distress, helplessness, and melancholy. I am as susceptible to this as anyone, despite what I do for a living!  I frequently work with people in huge distress about what is happening to their jobs, to the services they provide, prospects for their children, etc. Their despair is genuine and valid, and I often share it.

But I manage the effect it has on me and you can too!

Manage the Effects of Change

One of the keys to dealing with change is to find an area where you can exert some control. Depending on your circumstances and outside events that will vary wildly from individual to individual. One thing you always have some control over is how you feel and respond to the negative stuff that comes your way. No one has yet cut that! 

I am not suggesting that you get all happy clappy and Pollyanna like and come across like someone who hasn’t a clue what is happening! I don’t want you to stop caring about what is happening to others, or to yourself. Keep taking action on what you believe in, direct the anger to an appropriate cause, try and make a positive difference in the world.

A ‘Control Your Feelings’ Exercise

What am I am suggesting is you try this simple exercise each morning and consciously manage your feelings, don’t let them be managed for you!

• As you start your day, pause and think to yourself  ”How am I feeling? How am I feeling emotionally? Happy? Sad? Angry? Guilty? Nostalgic? Vulnerable?
• What has provoked that feeling this morning? Is it an air of general malaise? Is it something happening in my life? Is it something I think might happen? Was it a chance remark? Did my bum look big this morning? (Honestly, when you stop to analyse it sometimes the most insignificant of things can set you off on a grumpy path!)
• Can you do anything about what ails you at this particular moment?
• Can you do something about it later? If so, make a mental note to do it.
• Do you want to feel like this all day? Is holding onto this feeling going to help or hinder you?
• Decide to take control. Consciously decide how you want to feel, don’t let others control that.
• Smile. Research has shown even a pretend smile can make us feel better about ourselves.

I try to do this most mornings; I like to see it as my own personal act of rebellion!

How do you cope with the current uncertainties of life?

Self Help is Indulgent ClapTrap?

If a sign of a good radio programme is that it provokes you to action, then BBC’s Radio 4 Women’s Hour is very good as it has provoked this post!

The programme had a short debate recently between a life coach and an author. The discussion was around whether self help actually makes anyone any happier, given that the majority of self help book buyers are female, and yet the numbers of women with mental health problems are going up.

I found myself (to my own irritation) sat between the two. The coach made many valid points about the value of coaching in helping people to stop seeing themselves as victims, but weakened her authority (in my opinion) by over-advertising her own courses.

The nub of the argument from the author was that coaching is too self centred, too individualised and encourages people to think they can control anything, regardless of external factors. Her view was that this stopped them doing something to challenge the status quo, stopped them becoming active agents for change for the greater good (I am paraphrasing here). She likened it to reality TV which, she believed, encouraged everyone to think they could become a ‘star’ with very little work.

I am sympathetic to the idea that working on issues of one’s own can make us less aware of what is happening in the wilder world leaving us stuck into a ‘I deserve better‘ mentality. Very occasionally, when working in larger organisations, I see this attitude from staff. They are angry about what is happening but don’t always make the connections between what is happening in the world today and what is happening to them. Equally, I KNOW working one to one can be highly effective in helping make positive changes, and also that many of the people I have worked with have made very positive contributions to society as a whole. Coaching done well is not merely self interested new age clap trap!

The author also criticised self help for being a recent phenomenon and symptomatic of our ‘me-me’ times. Well, there she is definitely wrong! You only need to look back at some of the world’s philosophies to see that the idea of choosing how you view what is happening in the world (making the best of it) has a long and venerable pedigree. My personal self help model comes from a Stoic philosopher, Epictetus. He said:

“We are not touched so much by life events themselves but by the view we choose to take of them”

That surely is the founding statement behind all self help philosophies and he made that in AD55!

What do you think? Is self help, or coaching, or personal development indulgent nonsense which helps no one, or does it have a credible role to play in helping people change and achieve to their full potential? I think you can guess my view!

If you’d like to discuss further with me how our working one to one might enrich your life, do give me a call! My confidential number is 01761 438749 or you can use the contact page and I’ll call at a time convenient to you!

Be Happy All The Time? No Thanks!

Regular readers of this blog will know that I do not promote the school of perpetual happiness – that way madness lies! Well, for me anyway…

When I was about 17, a friend sent me a postcard of the type very popular then, which read:

‘Into every life a little rain must fall’. It was accompanied by a kitschy drawing.

I can remember thinking,” Oh I hope not!” But, umpteen years on from that seventeen year old girl, I am very grateful for my periods of rain. They have taught me the meaning of happiness, contentment, and living in the moment.

Happiness means many different things to each of us, and the older I get, the more happiness I seem to find unbidden in the strangest of places (another benefit of ageing!). Like love, you can’t use it all up.

People often say to me that my posts are always so positive, always upbeat, and am I like that? Obviously I’m not all the time. Things get to me the same as everyone else and I have had my fair share of problems. But I know dwelling on what doesn’t work is a very good way to make yourself miserable. So when I am down, I dip into my happiness bank and pull out a happy memory to make me smile, and my mood soon alters.

I often ask my ‘inspirational women‘ when are you happiest? Today I’m asking you! Please tell me, When are you happiest?

Do You Keep A Diary?

There is a current radio programme where guests in the public eye are invited to read extracts from their teenage diaries and talk about their lives. Very courageous! I’d blush to my roots to air some of my teenage witterings in public…and my Mum might be listening!

It does, however, illustrate beautifully just how far they have come, how they have grown and developed over the years. It’s a real benchmark of their progress in life.

Now I am not suggesting that you air your innermost thoughts to the listening public (!), but in difficult times it can be very uplifting to remind yourself just how much knowledge and experience you have accrued over the years.

Feeling Low?

Next time those feelings of low self esteem invade your thoughts, or you get a knock back at work, take a few moments to reflect. In your mind’s eye conjure up an image of you as you were just before you entered full time employment. In my case, wet behind the ears and convinced I could save the world by being the best social worker ever. I was pretty sure that coming from my working class roots, with my 5 years of further education, meant I knew it all!

And of course, I didn’t. In retrospect I blush. My real learning began when I acknowledged that I didn’t know it all and that the people I worked with were adding in significant measure to my education.

You’ve Come a Long Way

It is almost impossible to go through life with out developing and learning but sometimes we don’t give ourselves enough credit for how far we have come. Whether you kept a diary or not, imagine you are on that radio programme. What knowledge and skills does your teenage self have? Contrast that with the knowledge and skills and experience you now have. Many of those skills, attitudes and knowledge will have been gained in the hard times. In fact, some of my best life learning (in retrospect) has come because of those hard times.

Try asking yourself this question: What three things would you tell your younger self from the perspective you now have on life?