REPROGRAMMING YOURSELF

Your brain and mind are the most powerful instruments you will ever encounter. The statement that we only use 10% is wrong. The brain is actually always working. It works hard enough to power a ten-watt light bulb, 24/7. 

The statement that we (the human race – we) under utilize our brain is mostly true. I have read scientific articles about Buddhist monks who meditate in 39 degree (F) rooms. They not only keep themselves warm, but also when wrapped in semi-frozen wet blankets, are able to dry the blankets within an hour. That truly is mind over matter.

Now, you may not want to learn mediation to dry your laundry. But, think about all the things that could improve you and your life if you had better use of your brain.

At many hospitals, there are Mind-Body studies. Out of these have come the “relaxation response” techniques to overcome stress and many illnesses. As the name implies, you teach your body to relax in the face of a stressful event. It has been used to treat anxiety, depression, high blood pressure, heartbeat irregularities, excessive anger, insomnia and even fertility problems. It works by producing changes in metabolism; breathing rate, heart rate and thermoregulation. These Mind-Body centers are studying other ways meditation can help the mind control physical processes once thought to be uncontrollable.

Brain 101
There are three main parts to the brain. There is the mid-brain. This is where the brain stem resides. There is a lot of “stuff” here. It is from this area that most of your unconscious bodily functions (or autonomic processes) are controlled (breathing and heartbeat for example). This is also the seat of your emotions. The cerebrum (the large gray mass of wrinkles we see in pictures of the brain), controls our conscious actions via the central nervous system. It also controls cognitive and conscious functions such as memory, language and motor function. Then there is the cerebellum. This works with both of the other systems to fine-tune your responses. For example, I think, “write my blog article” which becomes hundreds of thoughts and instructions (lift hands, hover over keyboard, push down over appropriate keys, etc.), of which I am only aware of a few. All those thoughts and instructions involve the entire brain. (Does this mean I'm a brainiac?)

Placebos
“One of the major contributors to maintaining health and removing disease is the attitude of the patient”, says Professor Oakley Ray, a psychologist from Vanderbilt University in Tennessee. “Words can have the same effect as drugs.”

The healing properties of a positive expectation are widely accepted today, because of the use of placebos in drug trials. Volunteers react physically to substances that contain nothing, as if they contained the actual drug. The responses elicited by placebos indicate a mind/body interaction that is guided by subjective factors, such as expectation, beliefs, meaning and hope for improvement. The effect is very specific and depends on the information given to the recipient. Tell me this pill will help me, and it usually will.

The next time you are cut-off in traffic. Think about all your responses, reactions and feelings. There is the danger response. The adrenaline flowing through your veins, your heart rate speeds up, your breathing quickens, you may get angry, and so on. What if you had a different response? What if, we can make the unconscious and the conscious brains tune-into each another and produce a different, a better, response?

A Better Response
The brain learns and it can unlearn and relearn. This ability to ‘change its mind’ is called neuro-plasticity in neuroscience. We learn to get angry at being cut-off in traffic. We can learn to take a more detached response and say to ourselves, “That fellow must not have seen me.” And, then we continue on our way without the adrenaline flowing, heart palpitations and heavy breathing.

You can also retrain your brain to be happier. Simple techniques can retrain the brain and body. Traits that appear fixed (mood, temperament, personality) are not permanent. Experiments have shown that experienced mediators have more activity in the left frontal lobe of their brain. It is in that part that happiness and other positive emotions reside. These findings imply that happiness is something we can cultivate through mental training, such as meditation. Mind over matter, intentionally.

Meditation
“One of the most basic mental trainings is the cultivation of mindfulness, especially performed on the basis of observing one’s breathe.” His Holiness the Dalai Lama said this in his book, “The Universe in a Single Atom.” He went on to say, “One of the most crucial elements of training in mindfulness is the development and application of attention. ... In Buddhist psychology, attention is defined as the faculty that helps direct the mind to a chosen object among the variety of sensory information we experience in any given moment.”

Meditation is a practice. That means the more you do it, the better you become. It also means even master monks (who can dry wet blankets in cold rooms) have “off” days. Be gentle with yourself and be patient. Take a class or two. A ritual, such as setting out and lighting a candle, can very helpful in telling your self and your body – time to meditate.

Essentially, meditation is sitting comfortably in a quiet place. Place your hands in your lap. Focus your eyes on an object (e.g., the burning candle), or close your eyes. Breathe. Count to five between your first several breathes. Breathe in for a count of five and then out for a count to five. When that becomes comfortable, just breathe normally. In the beginning, or when you feel overwhelmed, just observe your thoughts. Observe without judgments. Not even a, “why am I thinking about that?” Just observe. The more you just observe, the less activity there will be. Later, focus on a single object. You are going for prolonged attention and a clarity or vividness of which you perceive the object. In the beginning, only sit for ten minutes. Increase the sessions at a pace that is comfortable for you.

Et Voilá! You are meditating. Meditative practices provide a settled and disciplined mind. As a bonus, you are creating happier neurons. More happy neurons mean you become happier. You can retrain your brain to be happier. To make meditation a habit, tie it to something else that you do every morning. For me, I began by tying it to my morning coffee. Make the coffee, turn it on, and go meditate while it brews. Pour the coffee and get on with my morning routine. I often find my cat has curled up in my lap when I go to get up. She meditates too!

This Week’s Coaching
Try meditation. Take a class. Google it and learn more detailed information. I cannot emphasize the benefits enough. Things that bothered you in the past will cease to bother you. By letting go of morning traffic, you'll work better and be in a better mood at work. You'll respond to situations with a more appropriate response. Appropriate for you.

Try it! You’ll like it!

All things are possible,

Elisabeth

Elisabeth Adler-Lund
Executive and Life Coaching
Telephone: 916 • 803•1494
E-mail: eal@EALCoaching.com

CHANGE IN 7 EASY STEPS

So you want to make a change. How’s it working for you so far? Hmmm. Yes, change can be hard. It can be scary. It can be uncomfortable. It can also be rewarding. Change can be joyful. Change can be the best thing ever to happen to you.

“We can’t solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them” – Albert Einstein

You are here. You want to be over there. You can’t get to “over there” with the same thinking that got you to “here.” Einstein was right. It is your thinking that got you here. To get where you want to be, you have to think differently. Your current thinking recognizes you need to change. To actually make the change, you will have to adopt a different way of thinking, or at least a different approach or perspective.

1. Getting Outside the Box
How do you change your thinking? One way is to get a different view of your situation. A new perspective may be all it takes. By looking at the situation from a critic’s viewpoint, and trying to understand their point of view, you will gain valuable information. Don’t stop there. Check out the view from a supporter and again from someone totally unfamiliar with your situation. How does the situation look to a venture capitalist? If you had to sell your situation to someone, how would it look to that person? All these various viewpoints will provide you useful information.

Let’s say I want to leave my job. It is boring and filled with administrative trivia. A critic might say, “Perhaps, but, all jobs have elements of that. And, it is a steady paycheck. You’re crazy to leave.” An objective, third party might talk about the parts of the job I do like. The objective, third party would also talk about future opportunities in the job versus what my new venture would look like in five years. A venture capitalist might say my skills are wasted at the job and I definitely should break out on my own. If I had to sell my job options (stay and go) to someone, she might say the only one she’d buy is the solo gig. This was a very simplified version, but look at all the information gathered.

2. Overcoming Inertia
Some days, change is easy and just … flows. Other days, we question why we are putting ourselves (and family) through all this. Change clots up and doesn’t happen. That resistance to change should be expected. By expecting it, you will be prepared when inertia lifts its ugly head. The bigger and more drastic the change, the greater the inertia. Somewhere on the scale of small change to drastic change is your sweet spot of change. Aim for your sweet spot of change.

Let’s say you want to lose 20 pounds. Somewhere on the scale, (no pun intended) of a pound a day to a pound a month is your sweet spot of “one pound every X days.” Besides being bad for your health, losing a pound a day is just not sustainable. Nor is the weight loss this brings. If you choose the other end, at a pound a month, you will lose momentum. It will take too long for you to see results. Something sustainable for me is to lose a pound every four to five days. That way I build in the needed exercise and can modify my food intake without hardship or drastic lifestyle changes that won’t be sustainable.

Smaller changes also have the advantage of being easy to start. Sometimes the enthusiasm for change gets you going. The smaller changes are also more sustainable. If inertia does show up, make a small (micro small if necessary) step towards your change. It may feel ridiculously easy. Good. That’s the point. A step forward, no matter how big or how small is still forward.

3. You Can Only Change Yourself
Often the people in our lives do not want the change we want. Their inertia can be harder on you than your own. They may be negative, pessimistic or even try to stop us from changing. What to do? One strategy is to ask for their help and get them on your side. Or try to find a way to make the change without disrupting their lives too much. If necessary, you may have to cut them out of your life for a short time.

Recognize this truth and save yourself grief and frustrations. You may be able to control someone for a time, but you cannot force them to change. Instead, model your change. Be a good example of your change. Inspire, influence, encourage, support and help your important others. Realize their change is up to them. Find peace in that truth. Let go of your need to control others.

“The Serenity Prayer” by Reinhold Niebuhr is often quoted for good reason. Here is the beginning of it:

God grant me the serenity

to accept the things I cannot change;

courage to change the things I can;

and wisdom to know the difference.

4. Change What You Can
Life is messy. Sometimes you’ll want to change something you just can’t change. Learn to accept that. As Mr. Niebuhr said, “Change the things I can…” Find those areas where you are in control; where others will allow you to change; and focus on those. Learn to accept that. This is part and parcel of sharing your life with others. You don’t have complete control. That is part of the joy and wonder of having these people in your life.

5. Finding the Joy in Change
The secret for successful change is the joy of your change. Find the joy in your activity and you will keep at it. If you hate jogging, you won’t sustain your running program. If your heart sings in the shower afterward, focus on the shower. You will keep your running program to sing in the shower. Honest. You are golden when you have integrated the change into your life. You have found an activity you love doing or you have found something to love in the activity.

Humans like variety. So now that you are singing in the shower, how do you keep that joy alive? You nurture it. Find a way to vary it. Be one with your activity so that you enjoy it fully. This reinforces the joy you do get. Try a new perspective, a new angle. Find new people to share the activity or the joy. Be grateful. This is all an art form. A book or technique on sustaining joy has not yet been invented.

6. Celebrate and Celebrate Often
Celebrate all the victories – big and small. Discouragement is the acid that erodes change. We think we should be further along. Celebrate all your progress. Staying the course, not giving up, is a reason to celebrate. Celebrate how far you’ve come. Tell the world – Tweet about it, post it on Facebook. If you have promised yourself a treat for hitting a milestone, be sure to give yourself the treat. If you promised yourself a massage after losing ten pounds, give yourself the massage. If you don’t you’re betraying yourself, which will cause motivation problems down the road of your life.

Remember, you are a human being. That means that you will sometimes fail. You’ll eat cake instead of salad, you won’t run, you just can’t face the change today. Be prepared for it. Expect it. Those who don’t fail don’t attempt to do things. Rejoice in your failure – it means you are trying. Learn from it so you’ll do better the next time. Celebrate the failures too. It is all good.

7. Keeping It Up
Big change or little change, permanent or temporary, change has value. You learn from it. You get joy or satisfaction. All good. To keep the change around, you have to incorporate it into your life. It has to become a habit, part of your routine. If you can tie it to an existing habit, that is even better. To add walking into my life, I tied it to getting the mail after work. Everyday, I park my car and walk down to the mailboxes to get the mail. I tweaked that routine by parking the car, changing into shorts and walking shoes, walking three miles on the long way to the mailbox.

You CAN do this. Change is what makes life such an adventure. Enjoy the journey. Not all seven of the steps are easy. But they are all do-able. Get out there and do them.

This Week’s Coaching
Work on the step above that is hardest for you in the change you are trying to make. Map out your plan. Then, take the first step. Celebrate that step. Take the next one. Yeah! You’re going strong now.

All things are possible,
Elisabeth

Elisabeth Adler-Lund
Executive and Life Coaching
Telephone: 916 • 803•1494
E-mail: eal@EALCoaching.com

5 STEPS TO AN ABUNDANT LIFE

What do you believe? Your thoughts make up your world, your life, your reality.

The thought manifests as the word;
The word manifests as the deed;
The deed develops into habit;
And habit hardens into character;
So watch the thought and its ways with care,
And let it spring from love
Born out of concern for all beings…
As the shadow follows the body,
As we think, so we become.

Buddha, Dhammapada

If you think you don’t have enough, you won’t have enough. I was reminded of that fact as I read the business section in the newspaper this morning. I was reading about special savings accounts that help break poverty’s cycle. The article began with a case history of Dametria Williams. She attributed her turn-around to two things: a new attitude and the special savings account (read the article here).

“I used to walk through the world thinking there is never enough,” she said. “There was not enough money; there is not enough food; there is not enough time.

“When you are in the mind-set of thinking there is not enough, you aren’t even looking for help. But when you realize that there is enough – that money is a manageable tool – you start to see what help is available to you.”

If you focus on what you don’t have – that is what you will get. As you go throughout your day, you are preoccupied with what you are missing. So when an opportunity presents itself, you won’t see it as opportunity. Like Ms. Williams when she was in her “not enough” mind-set, she didn’t have enough money to save any. Heck, she didn’t have enough to pay the bills! When she first saw the special savings account offer, she didn’t see it as an opportunity to get her out of poverty. She had the change of attitude and is on her way out of poverty for herself AND her daughter. All by a shift in attitude!

To help you shift your attitude into the “abundance” gear, here are five steps to an abundant life.

1. You Choose What You Believe

Everyday, you wake and choose to believe something. You choose to believe it’ll be a great day, or that you “woke up on the wrong side.” It is not what you are that will hold you back. It is what you think you are not, that will. What you believe to be true is what will happen to you. Believe good things and good things will happen. Actions come from belief. You will act in a manner that is consistent with your innermost beliefs. You believe you don’t have enough money, you won’t see the offer of help. It IS that simple.

What will you choose to believe today? Tomorrow when you awaken? Change your mind and you change your world.

2. It Isn’t Black or White, Good or Bad

When life happens to us, we tend to label the incident. It was a “good time” or it was a “bad day” on Tuesday. In hindsight, maybe it was neither. It was just “life.” Sometimes what seems bad at the time may not be so bad later on. If you didn’t buy a house in the last four years, maybe that is a really good thing for you today.

When we are in the midst of life’s messiness, things can become distorted by an apparent crisis. Take a step back. Use a wider perspective. Don’t just look at the fragments in front of you. Notice what is actually happening without labeling or judging. This will give you a completely new operating perspective.

3. Deciding To Act

Life, in all its glorious shades of gray, has just happened to you. What’s a person to do? You can’t jump ahead a year and use hindsight. How do you make a decision? You do the best you can with what you know at the time. Then you act. Once you have made the decision to act, possibilities will open up. Your decision to act will be backed up by your belief in your decision, thus you will see possibilities and offers of help you may not have noticed before.

Only hindsight will tell you if this is the best decision for you. Do not listen to others. Do not second guess yourself. The experience and life lessons you will learn based on this decision will help to develop and refine your gut reaction or intuition to future decisions. The more you hone this skill, the more confidence you will gather.

Look at what you know. Look at what is missing. Look at the whole situation from different angles. Look at the parts from different angles. Visualize various outcomes: worst case, best case, and all the rest in between. What is real? What is “False Expectations Appearing Real”? All problems have solutions. Trust your intuition.

4. Think Vs. Feel

Feel your feelings. We are emotional beings who think. One third of our brain is still primitive and operates totally on feelings. This is scientific fact. Your ‘flight or fight’ adrenaline rush comes from your limbic brain. That is raw emotion. Deal with it. If you try to ignore or stuff your feelings into a box, they pop out at unexpected times in what can be overwhelming amounts. That is not good for anyone. You can’t think your way out of an emotional problem. Sometimes, you can feel your way out of a rational, thinking problem. That is the power of feelings. Use this power to your advantage.

It is when you acknowledge and deeply understand your feelings, will you begin to know yourself. It can be difficult to feel our feelings when they are sadness, hurt or anger. There is so much value in them. Without sadness, you wouldn’t know what happiness was. If you never were hurt, you wouldn’t know pleasure. If you didn’t know anger, you wouldn’t know peace.

There is a secret here. To learn your feelings, sit quietly with your eyes closed. Take a few deep and slow breathes. Feel your feelings, but do not become carried away by them. Feel the sadness in a situation. Detach from it. Observe it. What does this sadness make you want to do? Is there a better response? When you can identify your feelings without becoming the feeling, you are demonstrating a certain mastery of your life. By becoming a student of yourself, you will learn much. This in turn, will give you more access to yourself. This deepens your reserves so that when challenges arise, you are better able to cope and provide a better response for your life. This is a fabulous skill to develop. It only takes practice to develop.

The next time you feel something, pause and breathe. Really notice the feeling. What is it? Hurt or sadness? Anger or resentment? Frustration or annoyance? What do you learn? What insights does this give you? What is really going on here? Do you need to do anything other than what you are doing? Use this knowledge to grow and live your life with greater ease and freedom. That is what insight really is – seeing inside ourselves.

Acknowledge when you follow your intuition. Say to yourself, “I listened, I acted and it worked.” Repeat. As you develop this part of yourself, you are actually multiplying abundance.

5. When the Student Is Ready, the Teacher Appears

As you understand who you are, you will also begin to see what you really want. Then, you will see the abundance all around you, because you are ready to see it. You have shifted your attitude towards abundance. Henry David Thoreau said, “"It's not what you look at that matters, it's what you see.” See the abundance all around you.

I am going to end with a series of quotations. This is to reinforce that other great thinkers have these same beliefs and know (and feel) them to be true.

“Accept yourself as you are. Otherwise, you will never see opportunity. You will not feel free to move toward it; you will feel you are not deserving.” – Maxwell Maltz

“There's a saying among prospectors: “Go out looking for one thing, and that's all you'll ever find.” – Robert Flaherty

“It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are.” e.e. cummings

“We are constantly invited to be who we are.” – Henry David Thoreau

“We cannot become what we need to be by remaining what we are.” – Max Depree

“Man becomes that of which he thinks.” – Upanishad Proverb

“Change your thoughts, and you change your world.” – Norman Vincent Peale

“Human beings, by changing the inner attitudes of their minds, can change the outer aspects of their lives.” – William James

This Week’s Coaching

As you go about your week, notice your feelings. Ideally, twice a day, sit quietly with your eyes closed. Take a few deep and slow breaths. Feel your feelings, but do not become carried away by them. Detach from the feeling. Observe it. What does it make you want to do? Is there a better response? Identify your feelings without becoming the feeling. Develop a level of mastery of your life. By becoming a student of yourself, you will learn much. The more you practice, the higher level of mastery you will develop. Enjoy the greater ease and freedom you will have in your life.

I'm curious, what do you notice? What helps you? What are your challenges? Send me an email, or enter a comment below and let me know how this exercise works for you. I’d love to know. Thanks!

All things are possible,

Elisabeth

Elisabeth Adler-Lund

Executive and Life Coaching

Telephone: 916 • 803•1494

E-mail: eal@EALCoaching.com

HOW TO GET GOING AGAIN

I am at a crossroads. I thought I knew what I was doing. As it turns out, maybe not. So here I sit, not knowing which road to take.

Have you been here before? Are you here now, at your own crossroads? What do you do when you are unable to move forward?

I am sure you have been stuck at some point. It is such a common dilemma. You can feel trapped. You may also feel unmotivated, which can be a vicious cycle of hopelessness about your situation. That, in turn, leaves you unfocused. Then you begin the vicious cycle all over again. Whew!

This is often a reason for a person to hire a coach. So, I decided to hire myself. Yes, coaches get stuck too. The process I am about to share is a result of years of working with clients and my own personal experiences of getting going again.

What Is Really Going On?

This is the first question to ask. I thought I knew what I was doing. That implies some research, or at the least some thinking about my choices. Am I really trapped? Or, is something else going on that is stopping me? As you know from reading me, coaching is all about the questions. Here are some to see if you are really stuck or if it is something else.

• Is it really fear? What am I afraid of?
• Do I really know how to begin doing it?
• Am I really just overwhelmed?

If those questions don’t get to the core issue(s), then perhaps thinking about these statements will help you.

• I know I can’t change someone else. If they would just … then I could …
• I don’t want to leave my comfort zone. We stay stuck when our fear of change is greater than our fear of pain. So, we stay the same, or go into a holding pattern.
• I just don’t want to deal with this right now. (Is it procrastination?)

Getting Going Again

Step one – stand up. Step two – open the door and talk a walk around the block; go to the gym; crank up the music and dance (no one is watching). Yep, the first step to curing what ails you is to begin physically moving. Look at the words we use: “being stuck” and “getting going.” It is all about movement.

It’s also time for a reality check. If you aren’t willing to move physically, you are choosing not to be helped. If that is your choice, take responsibility for it and go back to “What is Really Going On?” Figure out why you are making this choice. This sounds harsh. Sometimes the truth is harsh.

Getting your body moving will shift your energy from “can’t” to “can” do it. All sorts of possibilities and solutions will emerge. New ways of thinking and approaching the problem will surface.

Micro Steps

If you are still stuck, break it down into teeny tiny little steps. Really, so small that it feels silly. But, that one micro step will still move you forward. Taking one forward micro-step is closer to your goal than no step at all. Small steps become bigger steps. If you have two or three together, you have momentum. That’s when you become unstoppable.

Get a Carrot

What reward will get you going? Choose a meaningful reward so that it motivates you. Post a picture of it on the fridge. It can be one reward for the whole project or smaller rewards for goals along the way to the finish line.

Very important – when you accomplish your goal/project, give yourself the reward! The thing is, if you don’t give yourself the reward, you’ll stop believing in yourself. Don’t put yourself in that position.

Evaluation Time

Do you really need to do this thing? Do you “have” to do it? Or, would it just be “nice” to get it done? Sometimes, we forget about life as we now know it. Life has a completely new “normal” about it. Things we did five years ago might not be as valuable or meaningful to do now. The question now is, “What will happen if this doesn’t get done?” Imagine the range of the worst that will happen to the best outcome. Make your decision on that information.

Do YOU really need to do this thing? Can someone else do it? Can you trade with someone else? Can you delegate it to a family member, neighbor, or co-worker? If you know someone who loves to do “this,” it is really a favor to let them do it for you. Can you pay someone to do it for you? Make a decision based on this information.

Can you make it more pleasant? For example, if you are the only one who can do the gardening, get the new matching garden tools. Get a sturdy wheelbarrow for moving things and a gardening chair to sit comfortably while you work. The task is the same, but now you can enjoy the event.

Follow Up

It took longer to write this article than it usually does. I was practicing as I wrote, you see. Yes, I made my decision. You’ll hear about in the next two months. If I reveal too much now, you’ll just keep wondering, “Where is it?” Stay tuned.

This Week’s Coaching

Use the process above to determine your next step. Then ask yourself, “What single step can I take today (right now), to move myself forward and closer to my goals?” Then do it. Today.

What is your strategy to get going? Please share it below so we can all benefit from your experience.

A dream with a plan is a goal. A goal without a plan is just a dream.

All things are possible,

Elisabeth

Elisabeth Adler-Lund

Executive and Life Coaching

Telephone: 916 • 803•1494

E-mail: eal@EALCoaching.com