For many years, I commuted, fitted into desk life, rode the
ups and downs of office politics and tried very hard to be the model of
sophisticated success. I now realise I,
and those around me, were consistently sabotaging our potential for
experiencing deep happiness in our lives.
Sure, we regularly ‘had a laugh’ but this masked misunderstandings about
happiness. Here’s what I’ve learnt….
You have nothing to
prove.
Quite likely you haven’t consciously thought about your
desire to prove yourself to those you love and admire. We can find ourselves driven to show how we
can be responsible and reliable, earn good money, be a perfect
daughter/girlfriend/wife, have lots of friends or party wildly. Or perhaps even that we are better than
…………….? This drive comes from a belief
we built up as children that we need to be a certain way in order to deserve approval
and love.
A coaching tip to bring to the surface your desire to prove
yourself is to consider the key achievements of your life so far. For each one ask yourself- If this
achievement was a message for someone, what would it be communicating and to
who?
The next step is to ask if the assumptions you made about
getting love and approval are true. When
we overtly ask our loved ones if we really must to be in a certain job/relationship/earning’s
bracket to win their love and approval the vast majority drop all requirements
and confess that they just want us to be happy.
And those who don’t, do you really want to give control of your precious
life to them?
We sabotage ourselves by focussing on pleasing others and
that keeps us from getting in tune with our deep desires and asking ourselves
what we really want, the starting point for true happiness.
Choose your habits
wisely.
We all have habits or rituals that we adopt as short-cuts in
our lives. We use them to take care of
ourselves and others (cleaning our teeth morning and night, doing the washing
on Saturday), to make sure we keep our obligations (getting the 7.30 train to
be at work on time, paying our bills on time) and to connect in relationships
(calling Mum on Sunday night).
We might also have habits like eating too much, drinking
alcohol or coffee, smoking or getting ultra-busy that deaden our feelings and
help us avoid fully experiencing our feelings.
These can help us to feel better in the short term but have a negative
effect in the longer term. They sabotage
our happiness by creating health problems and keeping us from experiencing life
to the full. We need healthy ways of handling
our feelings and this means developing new habits. Habits that help with feeling and processing
our feelings might be meditation, wild dancing, walking or running in nature. We may need to experiment to find out what
works best for us.
It seems a paradox that habits can also develop our creativity
and keep life fresh. Have you tried
going somewhere new each week, buying and cooking a new ingredient each shop or
taking a different route to work on a specific day?
Falling into habits that don’t serve us sabotage our happiness
and keep us from habits which would lead us to experience more happiness. Changing them can be a challenge. One of the best strategies is to investigate
what that habit helps us with in the short term and then find a healthy,
sustainable way to meet that need.
Your best friends
might not be as good for you as you think
Talking through problems, having a good moan and putting the
world to rights; in the workplace and in our private life communication helps
us express ourselves and find solutions.
However, it can also keep us stuck.
Often the impetus to follow our heart’s desire comes when we
experience a low in our lives. Friendship
and a feeling of belonging can go a long way to convincing us that life isn’t
that bad and change is not worth the risk.
Nights out with friends keep us feeling just good enough or we are on the
brink of leaving our job/relationship/town when a heart to heart with a friend
encourages us to give it another try.
We need to realise our friends are not as unbiased as they
sometimes seem. Most often friends have
a vested interest in maintaining the status quo. If you made the changes you wanted to, they
could lose your friendship and, what’s more, they might run out of excuses for
the changes they need to make. Without
any intention to, our friends can sabotage our happiness.
My suggestion is to enjoy your friendships for heart to
hearts, celebrations and sharing and to have independent help with learning the
life strategies that will work best for you.
In nearly 10 years as a Life Coach, I have helped many professional
women discover their personal passions and use their unique strengths to build
rewarding careers and relationships.
Come and meet me at the Crawley Mind Body and Soul Fair on Sunday 7th
and connect through the social media links below for news of an exciting new programme
for making 2015 your happiest ever.
start@deborahreeds.com
07702 737019