Self Improvement

FAST RESULTS ARE DANGEROUS

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Ellis) — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 14:21:00 +0000

The spur to writing this was the comment I overheard at a mini-workshop run by a psychotherapist, who said '… and right there, the way she reacted to this process, has several sessions worth of exploratory work within it.'

The key to many models of psychotherapy – of which this psychotherapist will be an expert in one – is the bringing to the conscious awareness of hidden beliefs, values, internal strategies and other stuff. By bringing it to conscious awareness, and staying with it in conscious awareness, deep and lasting change occurs.

The problem with it, especially if your issues are complex, is it takes an expert psychotherapist (with the right tools) to facilitate that change AND a few years of costly sessions. This isn't to take away from the great benefits that can occur.

Please note, I can be classed as a psychotherapist myself, so the following remarks are generalisations about the majority of the profession. Your psychologist or psychotherapist or hypnotherapist may be one of the exceptions, as may the psychotherapist I met at the mini-workshop.

Thankfully for the profession, there has been a precedent set: the greater the expertise the greater the fees per hour, AND they get paid by the hourly session, and NOT on results. I’m not picking on psychotherapists specifically here, as almost every therapist of any kind has adopted the same pay structure. They also subscribe to the medical premise: there is no such thing as a cure. I’m not saying there cannot be significant progress made in a short period of time with psychoanalysis, or that it will not be a lasting change. But:

the paid for time & not results = no incentive to reduce client’s suffering ASAP – in fact more sessions = money in the therapist’s pocket.
the premise of ‘no cure’, means you must learn to deal with your suffering – lessening one’s expectations, and lowering the bar for ‘results’.
the amount of time it takes to develop the client-therapist relationship and look (consciously) for those things deep in the subconscious that need to be taken out of their hiding place (possibly buried) so we can be consciously aware of them can take years – even with an excellent psychotherapist.

Anything that short-cuts this process is deemed quick & dirty, and therefore dangerous, by the profession.

Along comes Dr Roger Callaghan, who was an Associate Professor of Psychology at a University in the USA for many years, who (over thirty years ago) decided to explore techniques using the acupuncture points. He discovered a ‘cure’ for phobias that only took a few minutes to administer. From this fist discovery grew a new field in psychotherapy called Thought Field Therapy (TFT).

Along comes a number of people who developed a new set of tools for psychotherapists and others called Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP). Within this toolbox is an effective ‘cure’ for phobias that can be facilitated within one session.

If either the NLP tools or the TFT tools are used by a competent therapist the real and lasting results are fast, yet the dangers are eliminated.

Over the last 30 years, there has been many other discoveries (or re-discoveries in some cases) of tools that work in amazing ways to quickly bring real & lasting results for clients. They do NOT need the client to be fully aware of what is happening down in the depths of the subconscious mind in order to get the required results. They do NOT need the client to fully understand their psychosis, in order to make the appropriate and beneficial changes.

These are NOT short-cuts, but a different way to get the same results, in a fraction of the time. These methods can resolve issues where the client has no idea where the problem lies (or has an idea but doesn’t want to go there!), allowing the powerful subconscious mind to do the necessary work beneath the conscious level. NO ‘several sessions to explore the issue’ required. If we then use the psychologist’s toolkit to check, we find the necessary changes have been made.

I’ve always felt uneasy with the ‘pay me for my time and let us see what happens’ fee structure, and have also continually searched for methods that would reduce peoples' suffering sooner, rather than later. This is why I am now confident in adopting a “I get paid for results!” policy for my therapy clients.

Hypnotherapy Professional Bodies Accept a 'Cat' as a Member - BBC story

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Ellis) — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 18:33:00 +0000

Hi

This morning I was at a 4Networking business networking meeting. I had volunteered to give the 10 minute 4Sight presentation on the topic "Stop Smoking or Become a Non-Smoker". Which was fine because I could promote my Become a Non-Smoker programme without trying to 'sell'.

The problem arose when I asked how many smokers there were in the room - ZERO!
So I immediately changed the topic to "What to ask a hypnotherapist to make sure you get a good one". Obviously, I mentioned that one should ask what Professional Body they are in, and check that organisation's website for their name.

The BBC news article ==> Cat registered as hypnotherapist states clearly why this is not good enough.

Thankfully, when I was giving my presentation this morning I did also suggest the potential client should check to make sure the Professional Body the hypnotherapist is a member of, is itself a member of the umbrella organisation, the UKCHO

NONE of the organisations mentioned in the BBC report is a member of the UKCHO.

See a list of the organisations registered with the UKCHO - here I'm in the BIH.
80606 - is my registration number with the UKCHO, and you can see my registration details:
http://www.ukcho.co.uk/register-search.asp?search=80606

I hope this clarifies the situation with regard the BBC report.

Colin :-)

Tools I Use When Diagnosing Specific Metaphors

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Ellis) — Thu, 21 May 2009 22:07:00 +0000

I’ve been asked about the diagnostic tools I use when diagnosing specific metaphors for clients with deep issues that are effecting many areas of their life.

One thing to understand about these particular clients is they do not come to me instead of their GP or before trying everything the NHS or health professionals can give them. They come to me after everything else has NOT WORKED for them.

Admittedly, my typical client in this bracket is on no drugs at all when they come and see me – having given up using them because the drugs were not curing anything, just hiding the symptoms behind a numbed mind. This might mean they are in some way more resolute than the norm. However, now they have come off the drugs that kept their mind sedated but without the symptoms, those symptoms of panic, general anxiety, worries, flashbacks, and depressingly negative thoughts have returned. But this time they want to try an alternative to drug-therapy. These clients have often tried Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) but found they were among the high percentage for whom CBT is ineffective.

It does seem the NHS may be pretty impoverished if the only choices they have for people like this is either to see a psychiatrist – who only gives drug-therapies; or a psychologist – who these days only offers CBT. See this article in the Times Online: Therapies That Help Are Being Ignored

By the way, I don’t have anything against CBT. I learned the principles of CBT over a decade ago and taught it within the Coping With Stress courses I developed. However, I found (as does everyone else who uses it with clients) not everyone is able to use the tools effectively so I continued my search for tools that would help those people.

The diagnostic tools I use with these particular clients… There are two.

One uses ideomotor responses and the other Voice Technology. An ideomotor reflex is an unconscious movement or physical response. Examples would be a nervous eye twitch, or when someone tries to look and sound happy but their sad eyes give them away. Ideomotor responses are often used in Hypnosis to gain insight from the person’s subconscious mind by asking for (or suggesting) an involuntary physical response which would indicate a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer from the subconscious mind.

I set up a suggested involuntary response while the person is completely awake and conscious and use this to get 'yes' and 'no' answers without having to put my client into any kind of trance. The results can be surprising to the conscious mind! Yet, when the client goes along with the metaphor the subconscious has indicated, then (within minutes and without the conscious mind having to believe in the metaphor) real healing and progress is made.

Such is the power of the subconscious mind. In these sessions the client's own subconscious mind takes control of what work we do and which therapeutic methods are most appropriate – making progress even quicker. There are no psychological ‘models’ to get in the way, and I find the client’s mind often creates new ways to integrate many therapeutic methods (combinations of NLP, Time Line Therapy, EMDR, etc.) to produce outstanding results.

The other diagnostic method, Voice Technology, was devised by the founder of Thought Field Therapy, Dr Roger Callaghan, so clients can get the same help over the telephone. You know that a lie detector will measure your pulse, sweating, and voice patterns (these are all ideomotor responses) to establish if you are lying or not. This is because emotions and thoughts in the subconscious often have an ideomotor effect on the body and your body cannot help but change in ways which can be measured! These ‘signals’ may be too subtle for normal detection by our eyes and ears, but if we can find a way to ‘tune in’ to them we can measure truth from deception, yes from no.

Voice Technology is a way of tuning in to those subconscious signals – via the voice over the telephone. And once calibrated, we can start the diagnosing of metaphors (and other things) via a different (but just as precise) ideomotor response mechanism.

So does that answer the question of what methods I use for diagnosing the metaphors my clients use for their own healing - or have I made it as clear as mud? Let me know.

Be well

Colin :-)

The Self Improvement Community

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Ellis) — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 17:14:00 +0000

Hi

I'm going to do another blog post on Metaphors, but first I'd like to put right a little error in a previous post.

One of my earlier posts (SICIC Premature) I mentioned that the Self Improvement Community Interest Company (SICIC for short) is situated at www.self-improvement.org.uk This is no longer the case.

SICIC has a little website at www.sicic.co.uk, where you will find a few details about what it is and what it is trying to do. Eventually, there will be a lot more information there, including highlights of what SICIC has done over the year for the community.

SICIC has created, as it's first project, a community website for everyone interested in personal growth, self help and/or personal & spiritual development. SICIC.org the main portal for people to become involved with what SICIC is doing, and to find out about future courses, workshops, research and other events and activities the Community Interest Company has planned.

See you at www.sicic.org

Colin :-)

Diagnosing Your Metaphor

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Ellis) — Sun, 20 Jul 2008 19:17:00 +0000

The use of metaphor - in the form of creative and imaginative but simple analogies, anecdotes, parables, myths or stories - can be a very powerful therapeutic tool.

Recently I’ve been wondering how to reconcile the different philosophical leanings of my friends; some of whom are pretty straight with a belief in science and psychology but feel that chakras, angels, and new-age stuff is just fluffy nonsense, and others who truly believe we are spiritual beings having a human experience.

You might think that I should just fall on one side or the other – become connected with my divine self, and communicate with my higher self and soul and wear crystals to protect myself from astral entities and pray to the Arch Angels; or only believe in the supremacy of science and nothing exists outside it.

The problem arises when science, and medical science in particular, fails to provide a remedy to a chronic condition; yet a non-scientific method based on dowsing comes up with a weird scenario of what the condition is at its core – and the prescription of visualisation and messing around with the chakras WORKS!

Of course, the psychologist will be quick to explain away the phenomenon by saying that the person must have wanted a remedy so bad that their HOPE made them suggestible and therefore their BELIEF made their subconscious mind do the back-flip it needed to cause a cure.

The problem with this kind of explanation – often said with a non-malicious but quite evident sneer – is that it totally undermines the person’s experience. The scientifically unproven tool of dowsing (in whatever form) is immediately brandished as pseudoscience and unreliable so the person is also brandished a fool (by association) by the science believing friend. After such a demolishing of the basis of the person’s cure, it is a wonder the remedy (remember it was only based on a HOPE in the first place according to the psychologists explanation) doesn’t wither and die so they end up in the same state they were previous to the remedy (possibly for many years without any help from science).

This isn’t supposed to be a blog bashing science. What I want to explore is the possibility that Metaphor is more powerful than we might imagine.

You see, one way of looking at the concepts of the soul, chakras, angels, entities and other things that are unseen but some people believe in strongly, is to say: maybe they are metaphors.

In Hypnotherapy, we use metaphors a lot. The subconscious mind somehow gets the message and does the necessary work. One such metaphor is to imagine that a vacuum cleaner made of light is driving through our blood vessels and sucking up any viral infection or unwanted (diseased or cancerous) cells. Of course, there is not REALLY a tiny vacuum cleaner, so we say the subconscious mind activates our white blood cells or other mechanisms that science can agree to, and thus our blood is cleansed.

So we use a metaphor the subconscious mind can utilise as a catalyst for change and every psychologist will agree that this is how it works.

Back to the person with the dowsing, or other diagnostic method, that comes up with some weird and wonderful explanation for our malady. Maybe what they are diagnosing is the best metaphor for our circumstances? Maybe the mind uses metaphor to a much greater extent than we previously thought?

Some of my friends are going to be upset with me for ‘explaining away’ their hard-held beliefs as metaphors, but I think this is actually a really exciting possibility. If Angels, for instance, are not real in the scientific sense, but metaphorical, then we do not have to PROVE their existence. However, being USEFUL metaphors, they play an important role in being a catalyst for change.

The mind is exceptionally powerful, and it can not only cure us of chronic disease (having been given a metaphor to work with) but it can also change our personality – making us more confident, assertive, dynamic, positive, and even charismatic – when it takes the message from a metaphor.

I have been experimenting with diagnostic techniques lately (although more sophisticated than dowsing) and finding it extremely useful to explore weird and wonderful metaphors so as to find one that really works for individual clients. At the end of the day, I could fall on the side of my science based friends and say I’m too much of a professional coach and therapist to use such metaphors – and limit the healing of clients – but my compassion is too strong to do this. It looks like I’ll just have to stay on that metaphorical fence.

Be well

Colin :-)

Power of Mind

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Ellis) — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 18:21:00 +0000

The subconscious mind is so creative, masterful and resourceful that it is hard to believe how powerful it actually is. Psychologists have proven that the mind is so immensely powerful that it can create sunburns on one side of the face without any sun, or produce the symptoms of any disease where there is no cause (no virus or bacteria etc.), and can even make a person die for no more reason than they were told they would (by a witch doctor) or for some other reason they believe they are going to die.

The mind – and really I'm talking about the subconscious mind here – can also heal ailments that have been said to be impossible to heal. People are now walking around who were told they would never walk again; people are alive ten-twenty years after a prognosis of death within a few months; people have overcome cancer and every other kind of incurable or terminal illness.

There are literally thousands (if not tens of thousands) of medical cases that have the words “Immediate Remission” written at the end to designate an inexplicable healing of a condition that was thought to be chronic or incurable. Many of these statements of “Remission” hide the fact that due to the little or no real help with the condition from the medical profession (other than drugs with hideous side effects that cover up some of the symptoms but not curing any causes to the problem so leaving the person in as just a mess as when they went to see their GP/MD but with slightly more bearable numbness rather than chronic pain) the patient has turned (at their own expense) to Complementary & Alternative Medicine (CAM).

Many CAM therapies have their own theories and philosophies about dis-ease and the healing process. These philosophies sometimes contradict and confound medical scientific research. The scientists cannot find any way of reconciling these theories with their hard scientific methods.

Yet, the NHS did a clinical trial on Spiritual Healing* (in partnership with the NFSH) where everyone involved (except the Healers) were astounded at the 80% success rate in providing measurable benefit (the other 20% died more dignified deaths but cannot be included in the success rate) for people with terminal cancer - where no more medical hope of recovery was available. Unfortunately, after the three year trial and then two year wait for the statistical analysis, the whole of the trial documentation was mysteriously lost. I know all this because I was a Trustee of the NFSH at the time and met healers involved in the trial.

Despite the alternative philosophies and the non-scientific approach to medicine, many CAM practitioners have better success rates than the drugs industry.

* Also the Which? consumer magazine's Best Buy!
* Penny Brohn Cancer Care in Bristol has a team of NFSH healers working with patients.
* University College Hospital London has recruited another two NFSH healers to join its CAM team and work in its Cancer/Haematology unit.
* For a longer list of Healers working within the NHS go to the NFSH website
There are ways of overcoming the dichotomy of 'science v CAM' and I’ll discuss that in my next post, right here.

Be well

Colin :-)

Biggest Barrier?

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Ellis) — Fri, 16 May 2008 16:56:00 +0000

One of the biggest barriers people face when it comes to their personal growth, is that they are more likely to do absolutely anything and everything other than work on themselves. This is one of the great tragedies of the world as far as I am concerned. The fact that you have come to this blog – to learn about self improvement and develop your self-awareness puts you head and shoulders above the majority of the population.

Even those who come to the correct conclusion that personal growth is a good thing, find it extraordinarily hard to do any of it on themselves. They are very willing and able to go to University and learn everything there is to know about helping others. But when it comes to working on themselves in any way more meaningful than for career development – well, they are too busy learning about how to help others.

There is a myriad of things we can use to distract ourselves from taking a close look at ourselves. Everywhere we turn there is something screaming for our attention - politics, disasters & crisis, fashion, economics, inflation, housework, lifestyle, education & CPD, friends & family, internet & social networking, emails, crime & grime, local issues, regional issues, country issues, global issues, terrorism, activism (the same as terrorism according to the police), National ID cards (did you know the council will be able to fine you if you cannot produce it?), advertising boards, advertising everywhere... and the list is endless!

When I was teaching at a college not so long ago, I found myself in an impossible position with too much to do and more being asked of me. I realised I needed to prioritise my time and make sure whatever was most important got done (since there was no-one to help me) so I went to the supervisor and asked what was the PRIORITY? She said it was ALL priority!! And it can feel like this for most people, I feel, when we are asked to do so much with our limited time and take into account so many issues... and more demands upon our time, our attention and our pocket, just keeps coming at us daily.

It wasn't my intention when I started this entry, but I now feel like I need to go on a little retreat. And it is almost as if we need to be on retreat before we can have the time and energy to look at ourselves, and start the journey of awareness that is needed for deep personal growth.

Be well and have fun :-)

Self Awareness IS the Foundation

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Ellis) — Tue, 06 May 2008 19:57:00 +0000

What do we stand for, what do we value, and what type of person we aspire to be?

Self awareness is a great starting point for developing self esteem and building confidence. Self awareness may also be the foundation that needs to be rebuilt if our personal development seems to take a backward step at any point.

Personal Values for Self Improvement

Self awareness can help us to know where we are now, so we can make better decisions on where we want to go next. In other words, if we have no self awareness then we are lost!

Before we decide upon what we want, we should first ask ourselves 'what do I value in life?'.

Usually, we do not realize what we value until it is gone. Sometimes familiarity with something, or someone, decreases the value we once saw there. It is prudent therefore, to decide upon what we value before we lose it forever.

Self awareness success tool:

Ask yourself - what do you value and why?
Then,
Priorities your top twelve

We can often tell what a person values by how much time they give to it; so how much time do you give to the things you value?

Now you can use this list as a guide to action in the future, and to help you prioritize your goals.

There is an old saying that goes 'If you want something, you must first give it away'. What this is saying, is that if we want to be appreciated, then it is no good taking others for granted. If we want to be popular, then we need to ask ourselves, do we recognize others?

If you value a quality - give it away!

Block Stopping Goals and Acheivement

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Ellis) — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 19:59:00 +0000

I has been trying to establish a new website called sicic.org for some time.
If you have been to this website over the past few months, you may have seen reference to it.

The truth is, although I had these plans and goals - and I completely believe goals are a hugely beneficial personal development tool - I also had to learn a few things about being unable to work on them. At first, it seemed I was just being lazy and not putting enough effort into it. Then it became harder and harder to focus, or find the energy to go forward with my plans, and at every corner there were blocks to progress - within me and in the outside world. Even the simplest things seemed to take enormous amounts of effort and still didn't work out the way I wanted, if at all.

So the website still is not ready - it isn't even fully functional, never mind the content.... But maybe we are coming to the end of this saga, as I have learned lots about what stops some people from being motivated and also been finding what works - and what doesn't - when it comes to overcoming huge obstacles to attaining our goals.

You might not recognize what I am talking about in this paragraph if you have never experienced it - but if you do, please be assured that you are not alone - and there IS a way through. You may have to check to see if your symptoms are similar to this:

Physiological reactions to looking into the future (such as flinching).
Unable to see anything of the future or a reaction to trying to look (such as flinching).
A compulsion to look away, or do anything other than look at, your future, goals, or plans.
Whenever you try to be positive, or optimistic, your mind immediately shows you a lot of negative things from the past.
When you think of the past, your mind quickly remembers a lot of bad times and situations.

The end result of your mind doing all this to you, in collaboration with your body, is you feel terrible whenever you think of tomorrow or yesterday so you are stuck with reacting in the moment, but without a plan or any way of getting things accomplished (even if you can think of things you would like to accomplish, fleetingly). Part of the problem is, you CAN think of the things you would like to do, accomplish and have. So you CAN set a goal - up to the part where you need to set a deadline (which necessitates you looking into the future) which is when the unpleasant feeling arise in your body and your mind goes blank.

The good news is, the past six months has not been pleasant but it has also NOT been in vain. I am now at the stage of learning how to overcome it.

If you are interested in finding out how to avercome the symptoms I've listed above, it would really help if you could let me know. You can contact me via my website at www.self-improvement.org.uk or leave a comment here.

SICIC premature...

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Ellis) — Mon, 15 Oct 2007 20:37:00 +0000

You just never stop learning... I sometimes get a little irritated with
having to learn the hard way, or feeling like I'm banging my head against
the wall when I realize I have been hear before and still not learned the
lesson.

Yesterday, I was getting upset about the workload I am putting myself under
in order to create something I want to be special for all those who join me
at the Self Improvement Portal at www.self-improvement.org.uk
Today, I realized I have made a fundamental - and utterly avoidable -
booboo. Instead of Managing the company (see below), I have been trying to
do almost everything myself - and getting nowhere!

SICIC's launch last week was a disaster.
The website isn't completed properly; there is little of interest for people
when they go there, and it definitely is nothing like what I want it to be.
But what are the alternatives? Well, one alternative is to hire some
software and website designers to create the web site I really want. The
other, is to find people who will do an article for the site. In tandem,
these two solutions will create a website that functions properly, looks
good, and is populated by interesting articles. The best bit is I get to
work on the business of creating a community rather than running around like
a headless chicken dealing with the minor, time consuming problems
associated with software integration and the like.

SICIC, although a not-for-profit company, is not a charity so cannot get
funding. It needs to be a viable business so that it can deliver to the
community it is set up to serve. My funds are now very limited - or "frugal"
as one person put it lately. But I'm determined to make this venture
succeed. I feel it is a worth while cause and people interested in personal
development will appreciate it once it is up and running properly.

You could help out!
If you are a writer, feel you have something to say, or have little to do on
a cold winters evening. You can write a 300 - 1000 word article on a
self-help topic and submit it under one of three categories: Book Review,
Personal Experience, or Factual/How To/Educational, and win a prize. The
best will be published on our NEW website with your name. The best articles
will be get prized.

Software/PHP designer?
I am looking for a kind hearted, personal growth enthusiast who is also a
PHP scripter or designer to help out with upgrading my pitiful effort, to
something resembling a community website people will be proud to be a part
of. If this sounds like you, and you are willing to do it for the kudos and
admiration of (hopefully) thousands of community members, let me know.

Self Improvement Community Interest Company

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Ellis) — Fri, 12 Oct 2007 15:42:00 +0000

Most people have heard of personal development, but most do not think of the people who engage in personal growth activities as being a part of a community. Just as those who are interested in Yoga (for instance), can be said to be a section of the personal growth community - in that they are interested in a particular route to self improvement and seem to gravitate toward each other by joining courses, retreats and the like – so too do people interested in their (and others’) personal growth.

The Self Improvement Community Interest Company (SICIC for short), was set up by me to cater for the needs of the personal growth community. A Community Interest Company is a particular kind of company (registered in the UK). It is a not-for-profit company dedicated to working in the interests of the community it serves. The "community" is a community of like-minded individuals who share an interest, or even a passion, for personal growth - especially for themselves but also those engaged in guiding others.

What I am going to share in this blog is some of the reasons why I think this company is needed, and who is setting it up. Starting with a list of what (in relation to this company) the term ‘personal development’ is not.

What Does Personal Development Mean?

When the company talks about Personal Development, it is NOT talking about:

Medical improvements
Education of children or youths
Further or Higher Education of adults toward Vocational or Academic qualifications
Career or CPD (except where it might relate directly with personal development skills/knowledge)
Religious or New Age Personality Guru worship

Therefore falls outside mainstream funding from government for education, medicine or career development.

When the company talks about Personal Development, it IS talking about:

Empowering people through their lifelong process of self improvement
Developing self esteem, confidence, assertiveness, stress management, emotional intelligence, self awareness, and numerous other skills
Using NLP, relaxation, meditation, goal setting, creative visualisation, TFT, and a myriad of other techniques, with an emphasis on self-help
Being advocates of using safe therapeutic processes as self help (not denying there may occasionally be need for professional therapeutic (or medical) intervention)
An interest in human potential

Who Runs Self Improvement Community Interest Company?

There are, at present, two members who are also the Directors. The CEO is Colin Ellis (yes, that's me). I have been studying personal growth for over two decades, teaching personal development within Adult Education and Further Education for over 10 years, and also a fully qualified and insured therapist for over 3 years.

Are Your Thinking Strategies Really Keeping You Safe?

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Ellis) — Tue, 26 Sep 2006 12:31:00 +0000

Some people confuse relief for happiness… They use certain thinking strategies in order to feel ‘relieved’ if something goes well for them; in order to save themselves from the feeling of disappointment if it should NOT go their way.

For instance a person might go to an interview with the expectation they shall not be successful – in order to NOT feel disappointed. This has the bonus, so they say, that they will feel relieved if they actually get the job; and only then will they allow themselves to feel excited about being in employment.

Except the same thinking strategy used for the job will make them feel ‘relief’ each day at work if they get through a day without something going wrong… Thinking strategies perpetuate themselves!

Sometimes people develop useful, or harmonious, thinking strategies by accident and are using them successfully without realising the subtle effects their way of thinking is having on their life. Unfortunately the same goes for those people who have mistakenly adopted thinking strategies that have unhelpful effects.

For instance, I know someone who has adopted the above strategy and feels it keeps them SAFE from disappointment. The problem is, due to the subtle effect of telling our subconscious mind we expect to get turned down for the job, the person wonders why they are still out of work!

The thinking strategy is keeping them SAFE from disappointment, but in the long term they will suffer from long term lack, a slow fall into the despair that comes from prolonged expectation of loosing out – which due to how the mind effects reality (plus the phenomena psychologists call the ‘self fulfilling prophecy’ and other normal psychological patterns).

So what to do if you have a thinking strategy that is unhelpful? The first stage is to identify it – become aware you are using a particular thinking strategy and that it is not as useful as you would want. That is the hard part, and most people will need help in identifying them. The next step is to find the supporting beliefs – those beliefs that indicate why it is safer to use this thinking strategy rather than another. We can then utilise certain tools – such as NLP, Time Line Therapy, etc., to melt the incorrect beliefs. Once they do not have a stranglehold upon your thinking pattern we can introduce new Harmonious Thinking strategies via one or more methods including hypnotherapy, NLP, affirmations, visualisation, or present moment awareness, etc. – whatever is most appropriate to your belief system and preferences.

One way to help you identify thinking strategies that are unhelpful – apart from present moment awareness, which is the best method – is to use affirmations. Affirmations in the way of “I am delighted to be applying for this job because I know I can get it” will through up an objection that makes us aware of the strategy. So, if there is a part of your life that doesn’t seem to be working out properly, try using very positive affirmations about it – then listen! See what objections come up – these are your thinking strategies, or pointers toward them, so you can recognise them when the situation arises. Start listening to what you say to yourself.

The only problem with this approach (if we are not getting guidance from a professional coach) is that we will rationalise our way of thinking so it sounds perfectly reasonable. And no doubt, within the constraints put upon you by your beliefs, this IS perfectly reasonable in order to keep you safe. But what if you could have a more harmonious thinking strategy and still be safe? What if you could use success tools and other techniques that would help you cope well enough to use Harmonious Thinking strategies and be safe? Thereby reaping the rewards of subtle shifts in your unconscious mind. Paving the way to a more resourceful and fulfilling life.

Subtleties of Self Improvement

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Ellis) — Tue, 05 Sep 2006 10:06:00 +0000

I thought of writing a book called “The Subtleties of Personal Growth”. The only thing is, there is so many levels of Personal Growth, and so many subtle nuances within each success tool, that it would quickly expand into a multi-volume (Encyclopaedia Britannica size) epic! This is why I prefer to run courses, so people can ask questions and get the answer most appropriate to their situation.

I must admit though, even within the courses I run there are restrictions of time as well as other students to take into consideration, so I cannot go into the depth I’d prefer, or give the personal coaching that is required. Thankfully, I am also a professional coach and although it costs more for 1 to 1 coaching than to be a part of a class, it is hugely more valuable to the person receiving the benefits. It is well known in sports that a professional coach can make a huge difference to our game, so how much more valuable would a professional coach be to us in the game of life?

Anyway, back to the subject. Half a decade ago I was still under the illusion that positive thinking was the answer to everything – and I still believe it is an essential part of every successful person’s toolkit (although I call it Harmonious Thinking now to differentiate the subtleties involved in my definition). Since then I have found several things that can interfere with our harmonious thinking, our personal growth process, and our ability to cope.

This seems at odds with my firm conviction that we create our own reality, but when we look into it deeper, there is no contradiction: we just need to create the necessary gap within a previously manifested, physical (or emotional) situation.

For instance: a few years ago I manifested depression. Only when I paid a therapist to help me find the causes of my depression, did I discover the link between Seratonin (and Tryptophan) and my lack of motivation, low moods, etc. Using the best vitamin supplier I could find I created a gap in my manifestation of depression so I could have the energy to utilise the success tools I already had. I’ve also been blessed with knowledge about other things that can stop us – and their remedies.

It is a part of the subtleties of self-improvement that there might be some underlying physical or emotional symptom that needs to be addressed before the success tools will work, but also that overcoming the physical/emotional barrier is only part of the process. There is often more depth to success tools than what we can find in a book. I try to give the greatest value I can to my students by using whatever slack I have planned into my courses for answering personal questions, but there are usually a few who could get lots more value from personal time to look at their own particular thinking strategies and receive guidance on the subtle aspects of their personal development.

To Be a Success

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Ellis) — Thu, 31 Aug 2006 11:02:00 +0000

I think you may now have firmly grasped the idea that to be a success with building one’s confidence, or any personal growth pursuit, one needs to:

learn the techniques thoroughly
make sure we carry out ALL the baby steps completely
build the muscle of the success tool, starting with small goals
be persistent until it starts working for us.

There is an attitude you can adopt to help you with the first two suggestions above. The last point can also be expanded upon.

To avoid becoming over confident with regard the simple success tools I shall share with you on this site and on the online/face-2-face personal development courses, we can decide to have the attitude of:

someone who is wanting to learn
someone who hasn’t got any of the answers
and is keen to try out everything more than once!

I find that the people who adopt this attitude – and some of them have lots of qualifications and knowledge about personal growth – are the ones for whom my workshops and courses work to the greatest degree. Those who do not adopt this attitude – whether they have knowledge or not – find it all hugely interesting but do not get the same results…

As I said on my first post, I find it a great tragedy that only 10 – 20% of people who join personal growth seminars around the globe actually get the results they are after. I want you to get the most from any self improvement training you may undertake, so I’m going to persist with this, until all the baby steps are revealed.

Persistence is a key ingredient to building confidence in any sphere of life, including personal development. Just like anything that is new to us, when we start to learn the new skill for the first time, we are hesitant and make lots of mistakes. When you learned to walk: did you fall down a few times or were you up and running the very first time you tried? When you learned to ride a bicycle: were you speeding around and doing wheelies or riding with no hands the first time you tried, or did it take time to develop the necessary balance and skill?

It’s the same with techniques for personal success and well-being. The success tool may appear to be very simple, and we are familiar with similar techniques. Just as there is only a subtle difference between being balanced upon two wheels and being unbalanced, there are often subtle differences between recognising a technique, and its successful implementation.

The subtleties of success tools are usually not apparent until we have tried it a couple of times. For me, this is one of the most satisfying times of any personal development course: when someone comes back with questions after they have tried a particular technique and now find new layers of enquiry (sometimes stated as a problem) – wonderful, we are now getting to the subtle aspects that will make it really work!

Reasons for a Success Tool NOT to Work

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Ellis) — Tue, 29 Aug 2006 19:20:00 +0000

To be a success, takes more than a familiarity with the ideas – a recognition that we have heard something like this before – it takes ACTION!

I suppose over confidence comes from a familiarity with certain ideas. As I’ve mentioned, there is a lot of popular psychology out there, and techniques are bandied around like confetti.

Sometimes a student on a confidence building course, or assertiveness training will say they have tried such-n-such a technique and it didn’t work for them. Why might this be?
It might have been the wrong technique for the result they wanted, or the timing wasn’t right for it to work. It may have been they needed the help of an experienced therapist to make it work (i.e. in the case of EFT, NLP or Hypnotherapy), or the tape/CD didn’t hit the right button or was made by an inferior therapist. It might have been that they didn’t get shown how to do it accurately so a vital ingredient was missing. There are many reasons for a technique not to work the first time it is used.

Two of the most common reasons for a success tool NOT to work are because we didn’t build the foundation of the baby steps and/or we didn’t put the effort in to build the muscle of the new behaviour/attitude.
Someone on one of my personal development training courses was absolutely adamant that goal setting and affirmations do NOT work and action is the key. What they missed was the fact that goal setting and affirmations ARE actions, and if we dismiss them – or any of the other success tools I’m going to share with you – then we may be missing a crucial ingredient to our self-fulfilment and well-being.

Intermediate Level of Personal Development?

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Ellis) — Tue, 29 Aug 2006 19:18:00 +0000

Since this may well be the case, I need to ask: why does the 60 year old lady going to a computer class for the first time feel terrified of computers - she has been around 60 years and surely must know a thing or two? If you are saying 'just because she has been around a while and has lots of different experience doesn't mean there isn't something (such as computers) she doesn't know about and has to start at the beginning', then why do people presume they are at an intermediate level of personal development?

I think they have been conned! There is so much cliché about personal growth, and so much tripe within magazines (popular psychology) with their 10 Ways to Catch a Man, and How To Be a Successful Supermum, or the personality trait questionnaires. Everyone thinks they are an armature psychologist, yet on my courses I get students with a psychology degree (as well as Reiki Masters, Counsellors, NLP Practitioners and Life Coaches).

If we decide to wait till we are going to be challenged, we may find the techniques do not work for us - we haven't built the necessary foundation due to thinking we are above it (we might be, but with the wrong muscles for this technique to work...). I suppose what I am saying is that there is such a thing as over confidence. When we are over confident we miss out crucial steps to success, thinking we do not need them.

We need to start with baby steps to build the muscle, or build the new behaviour/belief/self-image/etc., and it is crucial to build the right muscles - whatever your personal development level, have you built the right muscles for your next step?

Build The Muscle of Self Esteem

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Ellis) — Tue, 29 Aug 2006 19:02:00 +0000

So why is it that so often, when presenting personal development workshops and the like, I keep meeting people who have a particular goal in mind, their ultimate goal, but do NOT wish to create baby goals for their personal growth (confidence, self esteem, assertiveness, etc.) in order to build the muscle? I say to students, "build a list of all your good qualities and achievements and read it to yourself every day for one week" - very simple and anyone can do it. Yet a week later they want the next step to being successful and confident but haven't taken the initial step to build the muscle of self-esteem...?!

I'm just thinking out load now but maybe people think they are already at an intermediate stage in their personal growth, so they do not need the baby steps - or to use our earlier analogy, they feel they need larger weights to be challenged?

Building the Muscle of Self-improvement

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Ellis) — Wed, 16 Aug 2006 16:12:00 +0000

Personally, I find it a great tragedy that only 10 – 20% of people who join personal growth seminars around the globe actually get the results they were after. This is why I am going to dedicate some web space, time and effort into giving you sound guidance on how to be one of those who gets more out of life.

We cannot treat self-improvement in the same way as retail therapy... The joy of instant gratification is not the way to long-term confidence, enhanced self-image and greater fulfillment.
To become confident, we need to take a different route. Let’s take, as an analogy, the example of a weight lifter. The most successful weight lifters have muscles upon muscles and are just huge! The weights they lift are also huge and the bar bends when they lift it. So, if I were to find some weedy person who has decided their GOAL is to be a successful world champion weight lifter - just as the present world champions must have been at some point - then could they become a success in their chosen sport if they ONLY tried to lift the immense weights the present champions throw above their heads? They, in fact, would NOT be able to shift the bar and could NEVER build the muscle in order to lift it!! What they would have to do is start by lifting small weights to begin the process of building the muscle. In this way their confidence builds also.