Motivational Words of Wisdom, Inspirational Words of Wisdom

Mid life for me, as most people, is a time of personal review, trying to fathom the twists and turns in life that have brought me to where I am today. Among the questions I have asked myself is: What led me to specialize in treating social anxiety? Upon private reflection, the most compelling reason is that I, like many of my clients, have suffered from that disorder. We are in good company. Just over 10% of North Americans can expect to suffer from social anxiety at some time in our lives.

Social phobia (social anxiety disorder) is characterized by excessive or unreasonable fear of being judged by others in social or performance situations such as public speaking, eating, or working. The anxious anticipation, avoidance, and distress we suffer in these feared situation(s) interferes significantly with our everyday activities, and can lead to a life of underachievement and loneliness.

The good news for people suffering from social anxiety is that the condition is entirely treatable using Cognitive Behavioral therapy. To understand how this treatment works, it is important to understand two things about social phobia. The first is that it is a learned response. This means, like any bad habit, these learned responses can be replaced with other, more adaptive behaviours – ones that leave us feeling calm and confident rather than fearful and avoidant.

The second thing to be aware of, although social phobia can seem like an overwhelmingly huge problem, it can be broken into three parts. The three parts are physical reactions in our body, distortions in our thinking, and changes in our behavior associated with high anxiety. Once broken into parts, each of these three parts may be targeted with a set of treatment techniques that can be readily taught to practically anyone.

Physical reactions such as changes in breathing, muscle tension, flushing, and sweating can be relieved through the use of relaxation techniques. Distortions in our thinking, that cause us to perceive social situations as more dangerous or threatening than they really are, can be managed through a procedure called cognitive restructuring. Last, and most important, behavior changes can be dealt with through exposure. Exposure works by teaching our nervous system not to overreact.

In my experience, the most effective way to provide the combined treatments of relaxation, cognitive restructuring and exposure is in a weekly group of 6 to 8 people, over a 12 week period. Over the past 8 years, my cognitive behavioral groups have been 80 to 90 percent successful with socially anxious people as young as 13 and as old as 85. Of course, most people with social anxiety have to be encouraged to join a therapy group. I simply tell them, “Invest your anxiety in a calmer future!”. Check out our Web page at http://www.PsycServ.com for further information.

Do you suffer from an Anxiety Disorder?

It’s normal to get anxious once in a while. It’s a problem if you answer “yes” to all of the following.

1. I often feel more tense or upset than can be explained by the level of threat or danger at the time.

2. I sometimes take extreme measures to reduce my anxiety such as drugs/alcohol, being angry or withdrawing.

3. I experience significant distress and/or loss of ability to function in important areas of my life as a consequence of my anxiety.

If your anxiety is about social or performance situations where you fear embarrassment or humiliation, you could have social phobia.

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Dr. Cook is a clinical psychologist registered in the Province of British Columbia (Registration #1025), and the founder of Aegis Psychological Services Inc.. Find your path to peace and calm through Dr. Cook’s home study programs, electronic motivational aids and light therapy products, and self-help links at http://www.FeelBetterSolutions.com.

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The psychological treatment of choice for anxiety is called Cognitive Behaviour Therapy or CBT. It is a type of talking therapy that is based on the belief that negative emotional states such as depression, anxiety and anger are often started or worsened by habits of thought and behaviour. For example, we become anxious or more anxious when we think about ourselves and the world around us, and act in ways that suggest the potential for some danger or harm. Anxiety is a feeling of apprehension, fear, nervousness, or dread, accompanied by restlessness or muscle tension. It is part of the natural process of preparing ourselves emotionally and physically for various kinds of challenging and sometimes threatening situations, using what is known as the “fight and flight” response.

Anxiety is generally considered to be an anxiety disorder when three conditions are met. The first, is experiencing a state of anxious preparedness that is excessive or unwarranted by the current circumstances. The second, is that this state of anxious preparedness causes us significant distress and/or impairs our ability to function in significant areas of our life, such as in our job or day-to-day social interactions. The third condition, is that we resort to extreme and sometimes desperate measures as a means of regaining control of the situation. For example, we may react to a panic attack by abandoning our shopping cart in a grocery store line-up and running out of the store, or we may cope with worries by self-medicating ourselves with alcohol.

An anxiety disorder is therefore a kind of “false alarm” to situations that are objectively not dangerous. We respond as if we were facing some sort of peril, when we are in fact quite safe. The role of CBT in helping people with anxiety is to tone down the otherwise overwhelming problem of false alarms by dividing the problem up into three parts. The first part is about the physical sensations associated with being tense and “on edge”. The second part concerns the mistaken information we have about our false alarms, and our tendency to engage in two main types of thinking errors. The third part stems from our tendency to respond to false alarms as if they were real, by fleeing, fighting or freezing.

CBT addresses each of the physical, thinking and behavioural parts with a set of time honoured, research-proven treatment techniques. I will be covering all three sets of techniques in the next five articles (refer to the Links section of http://www.FeelBetterSolutions.com), beginning with managing the physical sensations in an article entitled “Getting Rid of Those Heeby Jeebies”. While these six articles are not meant as a substitute for the dozen sessions generally required by a cognitive behavioural therapist to teach these techniques in a clinic, they will at least give you a start on addressing your fears. If in the meantime, you or someone you care about might benefit from CBT, check out some of our program offerings at www.PsycServ.com.

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Dr. Cook is a clinical psychologist registered in the Province of British Columbia (Registration #1025), and the founder of Aegis Psychological Services Inc.. Find your path to peace and calm through Dr. Cook’s home study programs, electronic motivational aids and light therapy products, and self-help links at http://www.FeelBetterSolutions.com.

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For many people, life zooms past once they reach their working age. Everyday, it’s the same flash routine of waking up, going to work, coming back from work, and sleeping. It’s no wonder why you’ll ask yourself, “How did I get old so fast? Where did all the time go?”

The problem is in the routine work. The human mind has this habit called deletion. Anything that keeps repeating, memory does not record, simply because it’s not worth taking notice of.

So how can we slow down our experience of time and not let our lives slip by in a flash?

The answer lies in developing mindfulness — a heightened state of awareness of one’s thoughts, feelings, and actions. But if you can’t do that yet, you can start off by practicing the 3 Magic Bedtime Questions.

As you lie in bed at night, ask and answer these three questions before you fall asleep:

1. What is one thing I am grateful for today?
2. What do I look forward to tomorrow?
3. What would I like to dream about tonight?

Why do I call these simple questions magical? Well, let me tell you the logic behind them. The first question requires you to think through your day to find something you’re grateful for. As you do that, not only will you find something to be grateful for, you will also have recalled your entire day. In Neuro-Linguistic Programming, we call this capping experience. Imagine putting your daily experience into a bottle, putting a cap on it, and giving it a name. For example, “The day I found a hundred dollar bill on the ground”. Having many of these bottles in your mind, sorts your memories into significant experiences, rather than having them as one large clump called, “My Working Years — 20 to 50 years old”.

The second question requires you to look forward in time and imagine what’s going to happen tomorrow. When you have something to look forward to, it creates a natural anticipation and drive. You will feel motivated the moment you wake up. It will be the first thing that pops into your mind.

The third question reveals your innermost desires because we naturally choose to dream about what we want and wish for. This clarifies our direction and purpose.

Perform the 3 Magic Bedtime Questions nightly, and time will slow down. You will remember more about your life, and have greater clarity of mind to do what counts, before your time runs out.

To develop a centered mind, I recommend reading ‘Mindfulness In Plain English’, by Bhante Henepola Gunaratana. In clear language, he shows you how to develop Mindfulness, through the practice of Vipassana Meditation. An insightful and well-written book.

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Discover the 9 Hidden Success Barriers that prevent you from succeeding in life and business. Overcome Success Barriers

Decisions Matter

The execution of Australian "drug mule" Van Nguyen polarised opinion in Australia. On one hand the "pro-choice" lobby said he knew what he was doing, made a risky choice and paid the price, whether they agree with the price. Others portray him as a victim of circumstances, a pawn in a much bigger game.

Generate options and find information

Whatever you think about the death penalty and personal responsibility, Van paid a huge price for his "small gamble". In hard times we often limit our view of the available solutions, and end up making choices that are very costly. If you are in a pressured situation, what can you do to make sure you’ve considered a wide enough range of options?

Heres a few ideas:

Phone a friend - say "what would you do in my situation?"
Find someone who has been through or done what you want to do and talk to them.
Visit your library.
Call a coach, counsellor or expert in the field.
Search the net (but don’t believe everything you read.
Ask better questions - like, "How can I XXX" instead of "Why is this happening to me?"
Brainstorm - write down EVERY idea you can think of to solve the problem, no matter how absurd.

Don’t forget to ask, "What are the possible long-term consequences of this" and "Am I prepared to pay the price?"
The range of choices we face in modern life can be overwhelming, so it’s sometimes scary to increase the options to choose from. In spite of the fear, we need to do it. That’s the first step.

What factors affect the decision?

The next step is to identify the factors affecting your decision. Most people do fine with the practical stuff, so if they buy a car, they know they want it to be red, get good mileage, and impress the neighbours.

One thing you should add to your decision-making is your values. So when I make a decision I factor in how the decision relates to my top 5 values:

How well does it express my creative side?
How well does it express my spirituality?
How much is it about enabling others?
How well does it express being sensitive and generous?
Does it allow me to learn and grow?

How important are they?

Not all factors will equally affect your decision, which is why you need to assign a "weight" to each factor. You tell it how much you want each factor to affect the decision.
When you’ve got a number of options, and lots of factors to consider, it can get a bit overwhelming. Thats why I use an Excel spreadsheet to help me with the maths.

A free tool to help

The free decision making tool at http://www.life-directions.net/free_decision_making_software.php will rank your options, based on your answers. You may automatically know that the top-ranked answer is best. You may also disagree. The biggest benefit of the tool is to help you ask better questions. If you disagree, ask yourself "Why?", and "What is my preferred option?" Examine the differences between the two. Have you missed something? Is there a factor you haven’t considered? Have you overestimated the importance of one or more factors?

Try it out and let me know how you went. Happy Decision Making!

© 2005 Inside Out Life Directions
This article may be reprinted or redistributed freely providing this copyright notice and the author’s information box and links remain intact.

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Ken Davis is a Time Master. With 20 years experience as an Occupational Therapist he now coaches individuals and groups to live purposeful, passionate lives. Living with Myalgic Encephalomyeltis (CFS) means he needs to live a great life in about 30 hours per week. You can get resources to live a happy and purposeful life, whatever your situation at http://www.life-directions.

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Discover the 9 Hidden Success Barriers that prevent you from succeeding in life and business. Overcome Success Barriers

Until you decide upon a “Gateway Goal” all of the ambitions you have for yourself won’t come true.

New Year’s Resolution time comes, and what do many of us do? We sit down and write out our laundry list of things to get done in the coming year.

There’s some statistic somewhere that says 95% of all resolutions don’t become reality. I’d guess that number is closer to 99%, but I’ll go with the smaller number.

Why is this the case? Is it because the people who make the resolutions weren’t serious in the first place? Possibly.

Is it because they overextended their ability to make change in their lives. Could be that as well.

I think there’s one main reason why people don’t live up to the goals they set for themselves; new year’s resolutions or otherwise.

The reason? They don’t hit the underlying problems that cause them to have the need for change in the first place.

Let’s use a typical example. Someone I do personal coaching with wants to expand his weight loss business. So far, so good.

He’s established that as a goal for the coming year. It’s a great goal, and he sees the benefits of a growing business.

What does it take to build this kind of business? Lots of things: patience, persistence, a good marketing plan, good follow through…etc.

Now, what does it REALLY take to build this kind of business? A belief that what you market - in this case, nutrition and weight loss products - is really worth the money you’re asking people to pay for it.

Here was the crisis for this gentleman. He didn’t believe in what he was doing all the way because he wasn’t getting results from his products.

And he wasn’t getting results because he wasn’t using them correctly.

Dig a little deeper. He wasn’t using them correctly because he didn’t see himself as WORTHY. He didn’t have the belief in himself, which carried over to everything else he tried to do.

So we stepped back and created a “Gateway Goal.” This was the goal that would enable all of his other goals to become possible.

We set the goal of improved self-esteem, and layed out specific steps to make this happen, with little successes built in along the way.

It starts with the infrastructure for success. That infrastructure is ALWAYS internal. The external creation is outside of yourself. It could be the coolest, hottest, most outrageous thing.

But you won’t access it until you access the power inside yourself.

Until he feels personally confident and personally empowered to go out and make the changes in HIMSELF…none of the other stuff can possibly happen.

And once that happens, look out! He’ll be unstoppable!

What goals are you thinking about for yourself?

Are you truly in a position where you can make these things come true? Or do you need to step back and work on a few things within yourself first?

Take some time and come up with a “Gateway Goal.” Work on that first, then watch some real magic occur in your life.

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Have you forgotten what it is you want to become and have? Probably you have made a few attempts, found that your strategies didn’t work and lost yourself along the way.

Why not give yourself another chance to realize your goals?

It all starts with the goal.

Define and describe it. Write down when you want to achieve it. Write down the reasons why you want it. Write down how it would feel like when you have achieved it.

Plan it.

Planning counts. Plans, strategies and actions steps show you the way. Plan what you want to do and how you want to do it. Break down the tasks. A good map makes navigation easier.

Work hard at it.

Work harder than you ever did. If you don’t get the result, try something else. If that something else does not work too, modify and try doing it differently. You may have to spend many hours, days and nights but as long as you persist, you will get it right.

Visualize it.

Use your imagination to create it first inside even before you can have it on the outside. Picture having your ambition realized in your mind. Put in the sounds and the feelings. Rerun it over and over again.

Listen to your internal dialogue.

What you are saying inside affects you physically, emotionally and mentally. Is your defense system inside trying to make you stick to your old limiting beliefs and perceptions? Take over and challenge your inner critics.

Focus your attention.

Don’t get swayed easily with the noise and happenings going on outside. Put your attention on what you are trying to achieve. Remember the goal and you will have control over the discomforts and difficulties.

Seek help.

Find the information, skills and knowledge that you need from other people, books, and audio or video programs. Speed up your learning process by emulating what other successful people have done. You save time and get results faster.

Fatimah Musa provides information, tips and quotes to help people become aware that any future success starts with their personal growth. You can visit Fatimah at http://www.about-personal-growth.com or read more articles at http://www.about-personal-growth.com/personal-growth-articles.html

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Ever wonder what it takes to make money online? Learn how to turn pennies into dollars! Make Money On The Internet