Audacious Freedom Live anywhere. Travel everywhere.

Whether we are in our country of birth or in a foreign country we cannot escape the fact that we take ourselves with us. It is far easier getting rid of unwanted stuff and downsizing our belongings to fit into two suitcases than it is getting rid of unwanted behaviour, attitudes and experiences. Clearing out a house in preparation for moving can take between two and six weeks depending on how ruthless you are. Clearing out attitudes and beliefs requires patience – it can take weeks or months to completely break old habits and form new ones.

Travel as Escapism

Moving or travelling may only temporarily hide ‘us’ from ourselves but sooner or later ‘it’ will appear! We can only mask unhappiness, resentfulness, negativity, frustrations etc for a little while. What is masked will eventually be unmasked. Sometimes we use travel as an escape. In essence we are running away from routine drudgery trying to find the cure all to a boring life. Running away has never solved problems – in most cases it only makes it worse.

In my own life I have instigated moves because I have been unhappy and lonely where I am. Surprise, surprise the move worked for a while but then life settled in and once again I was faced with unhappiness and loneliness. I have spoken to many other locals and travellers who have believed the same thing: When they are in Spain they will be happy or when they are motor biking through Morocco they will be a different person. We have believed a lie – that our environment or external forces will change us, make us different and give us our dream life.

Learning to live with ‘me’

However, if I don’t like ’me’ here I won’t like ‘me’ there either (where ever there may be!). If I am frustrated by underachieving here – I will still be underachieving there. If I can never find the perfect work situation here I won’t find it there either. Two weeks into the new job the cracks of imperfection will start to appear again.

It takes courage to face who you are now and that you are not what you where you would like to be or who you would like to be. It takes strength to analyse your here and now in terms of reality without excuses or justification. And it takes a lot of bravery to accept that only you are responsible for who you will be in two years or five years time. People, environments, cultures can all impact you but they can never force you to become a better or worse person.

Sometimes I wish it was as simple as putting ‘me’ into storage along with all my other stuff and then going off and really enjoying myself. But I have learnt that never happens, and never will. In order to truly enjoy life where we are, we need to learn to be the person we really want to be now. Right here, in this country, this town, in this situation. This is probably the biggest challenge and adventure we can ever embark on.

Life has a way of throwing the unexpected at us. This can be anything from messed up travel plans to denied visas, long queues, unfriendly help desk assistants, stern custom officers, maps that incorrect, unhelpful staff etc. This can place inhuman amounts of stress on an already tense situation. It is easy in these situations to have emotional outbursts.

Break down in an airport

The worst melt down I ever had travelling was on a return journey to the UK. Our flight had been overbooked which meant we had to return the next night to see if we could get onto another flight which was also overbooked. After fighting our way through other angry passengers, some who had been stranded for four days already because of flights being overbooked we managed to board the plane. When we eventually departed the flight took us to Madrid, Spain. Originally we should have caught our connecting flight in Barcelona. So here we were in the ‘wrong’ airport without assistance and the help desk refusing to speak English to us. After some lengthy conversation in sign language we finally understood that even though they had stuffed up our flight they were not willing to help us and the earliest flight they could give us was two days away.

It was at that point I had a melt down! I was exhausted, emotional and didn’t want to be dealing with this type of hassle at 4am in the morning. I had also just said good bye to family and I didn’t know when I would see them again. All I wanted was to go home and get into bed and sleep. How hard could that be? Impossible,  according to the unsmiling ticket officer. Right there I started crying –I sunk down on to my knees and cried. I was so distressed that a British Airways ticket officer came over to find out what was going on.

I tried through sobs to tell her – my husband eventually had to take over because I couldn’t get two words out. I was so upset they had to close that ticket counter. Those emotions overwhelmed me. They were unexpected and the depth of emotions was not relevant to the situation. Emotions can unbalance us – that is exactly what road rage is! And they can come out stronger in situations where we are made to feel helpless and at the mercy of someone else. It is so frustrating when your fate is in the hands of someone else that couldn’t care a hoot about you and is not at all interested in even attempting to help you. It can feel like the situation becomes a power struggle.

In order to resolve a situation we need to be in control of our emotions. Yes sometimes strong emotions on our part do create a positive outcome. But for most they only make the situation worse. The biggest culprit that causes emotional intensity is expectations. When we are able to let go of expectations and go with the flow, being adaptable and flexible we are better able to control emotional outbursts. That outburst was some years ago now and in a way I am glad it happened. I have since been able to work on a more ‘positive response procedure’. One that over time has matured and I have found to be invaluable in enlisting the co-operation of otherwise unhelpful people.

To end my melt down story. In the end the BA ticket officer got us on a BA flight at the cost of the airline we had booked through. Not only that but she booked us in first class and gave us access to the first class lounge. So at least even though this was the worst emotional outburst I have had and one that is quite embarrassing to think of now – the story does end well.

Are you a perfectionist? I was! It is a habit that has taken me a year to break and get comfortable with the idea that nothing has to be perfect in order to enjoy life. Every meal doesn’t have to be a five star gourmet dinner. I don’t have to park a car exactly in the middle of a designated car park. I don’t have to have all the knowledge about something before I make a decision or take some type of action. I procrastinated because I was a perfectionist. Perfectionism stifles growth.

Perfectionism is counterproductive

Always waiting for the right time, the right amount of knowledge, the right opportunity, the right words etc means you will always be waiting. Always wanting a perfect house, perfectly ironed clothes, perfect hotel room, perfect organised accounts means you will always be wanting. All that perfectionism does is create untold frustration, anxiety, hesitation and fear.

What happens if it is not perfect?

In most cases – nothing! Strangely enough people don’t laugh, don’t talk about you, don’t mock you and don’t speak behind your back. In fact most times people don’t even notice. Unfortunately perfectionists often don’t make much progress, miss opportunities, don’t get promoted and make life uncomfortable for others.

To create consistency of growing we need to develop a different mindset. A mindset that is comfortable with not knowing everything that is comfortable with change and is flexible. It is replacing the beliefs of inadequacy, being wrong and not measuring up to standards with beliefs of confidence in your ability, trusting your intuition and you have all you need inside you to succeed.

I believed that the whole world was against me, I have had a fair share of things happen which were out of my control and yet greatly influenced my life. I was a victim of circumstances, powerless to do anything.

This attitude has the power to lock us in a prison that we can’t escape. Fragile and frail we approach life with fear, worry, insecurity and a desire for sympathy. Because of our beliefs we waver between thinking life owes us something and we deserve nothing good. The sad fact is life is giving us exactly what we believe – heartache and pain, loneliness and depression.

Stopping the cycle

Getting out the vicious downward cycle that was sucking the life out of me, my career, my relationships and my health has taken time. And it is important to give yourself permission to take as much time as you need to change – as long as this doesn’t become an excuse for never changing!

There were four things I had to in order to take back control of my life

1. Accept responsibility for my behaviour, thoughts and actions. Okay let’s get really honest here – I whined, complained, moaned, wrote negative emotional poetry, listened to sad songs, consoled myself with heart wrenching victim books and mixed with people who did the same. I had to take responsibility for the fact that I was taking part in behaviour that reinforced my ‘victim’ mentality and got angry when someone didn’t play along with me.
2. Become aware of my thought patterns: this has been a continuous learning process. I have learnt techniques such as meditation and NLP to help me become aware of what I am thinking, how I got to this place and how to reverse what I am thinking. I have noticed a very strong correlation between what I think and how I feel. So often I will check in with my feelings in order to know if I am in an old thinking pattern.
3. Taking positive action – this included breaking habits. This has been about renewal – I have replaced old songs with new uplifting ones, replaced movies and books with inspiring ones. I have said good bye to relationships that were negative and harmful and found new friends that want to grow and live life to the full.
4. Removing triggers from my life. I was amazed when I walked into a shop about two months ago and within minutes was so upset I wanted to cry. I walked myself through my change strategy to find out what had caused it – was it the shop, something I was looking at, something I had been unconsciously been thinking about. It turned out to be the song playing. It was a song that a very long time ago I had sat with a friend and cried with because life was ‘so bad’. It is things like this that I take note of and then put a plan in action to be able to handle it.

It is actually tiring to be a victim. You have to work at it and ensure that everybody around you also knows and sympathises with you. It is no fun and you miss out on so much that life has to offer. So if you are caught in this position I would like to challenge you do what you need to in order to break your self-made prison and find a new freedom that is so much fun to experience.

You ever been told that you are irresponsible and need to wake up? Here are some phrases that I have been told numerous times and what they actually meant:

Be responsible – ie take out the garbage and be home by 10pm!
It is your responsibility – ie because you forgot to buy milk it is your fault and you need to sort it out! Take responsibility – ie make a decision that lines up with what the person is requesting!

We have all heard that we need to take responsibility at some point in our lives. We have probably heard it so much that it is easy to take this phrase for granted. But do we really understand the concept of responsibility and how it impacts our lives?

What does it mean to take responsibility?

Taking responsibility and the principles of success are connected. To be successful in every area of your life you have to understand what you are and are not responsible for. Only once you understand what true responsibility is and act on it, can you take on the characteristics of those who are consistently making progressing and achieving their vision for their lives.

Let’s start with what responsibility is not: it isn’t taken blame and it isn’t giving blame. It isn’t taken charge of something that is not your problem or situation. It isn’t taking on a burden or a weight. It isn’t trying to sort things out in order to make yourself or someone else feel better.

Taking responsibility is more about taking control of your life. It is fully accepting that you are the only one that can make yourself shout, lose your temper, be rude, forget to buy milk, not achieve your goal, finish a difficult task or break up with your partner. Responsibility is accepting that you have the power to respond, react or think in such a way that can harm or benefit yourself.

It isn’t my fault – I am the victim

Contrary to popular belief a traffic jam does not make us mad – we allow ourselves to get mad in traffic. A child throwing a tantrum in a shop does not humiliate and embarrass us – we allow the tantrum to embarrass us. When our partner who is four hours late and didn’t phone to let us know doesn’t make us worried, angry or cause us to have a fit when he walks through the door – we allow ourselves to get worked up into a state that causes us to have a worry fit.

It is very difficult to say I am 100% responsible. But that is because we think in terms of situations and events. No I am not 100% responsible for the event – it could have been totally out of my control. But I am 100% responsible for how I reacted, for what I thought, for how I responded.

We are only victims when that is how we see ourselves. We are only victims when we give control over our lives to someone else by refusing to take responsibility and blaming them. In order to step into the future projection of yourself that you would like to be – in other words to become the you that you would like to be means accepting responsibility for your behaviour and actions, thoughts and words but not taking on false responsibility of the other persons attitude or reactions.

You can believe what you want to. This is a human right. However, here is my challenge – what you are believing, is it empowering you or disempowering? There are some common beliefs that we have all grown up with, that are totally ingrained within us to such a degree that we don’t even recognise them as beliefs – instead seeing them rather as part of our inner character and personality.

Common belief 1: You are not responsible for your feelings.

You have grown up in a culture that teaches that you are not responsible for your feelings. Instead this culture has taught you to defend yourself, to make excuses. If you are not responsible then who is? If someone else is responsible for how you feel and behave it means they are in control of you. We all hate others trying to control us – yet the very act of not taking responsibility means you are dependent on someone else to determine your outcome.

Common belief 2: Labelling yourself is okay

Who are you? Do you have neat little descriptions which you use on a regular basis to describe yourself such as ‘I am clumsy’, ‘I am scared of heights’, ‘I am a carpenter’ etc. Often the labels we place on ourselves can be traced back to something that we have learned in the past. The very act of labelling yourself diminishes any control you have over your life to change because you begin to accept this label as ‘That’s just me’ or ‘I have always been that way’. What these phrases really mean – is that is me and I intend to carry on being that way, leaving no room for you to grow or change.

Common belief 3: The unknown is dangerous

Moving from what is known and comfortable to the unknown can be an uncomfortable and scary experience. What happens if the place you move to, whether a new thinking pattern, a new job, house, country etc turns out to be worse than where you are? It is far easier to remain where there is certainty than risk exploring. Yet staying comfortable will only give you the same results they will never bring about that secret desire you long for.

Common belief 4: Social conventions shouldn’t be broken

All of us are rebels at heart and there are certain social conventions that we laugh at, but there are others that rule us. Social conventions are not the same thing as the Law of the Land. Laws are there to keep society living together in a reasonable harmonious way. Social conventions can be thought of more as traditions, peer pressure, or acceptable behaviour within a group for example as a teenager at school it was unacceptable for girls to wear socks that went above their ankles, if they did they were ridiculed. The world is full of ‘shoulds’ that people apply to their own and others behaviour. There are just as many ‘should nots’. ‘Shoulds’ produce strain in you because you are unable to fulfil yours or someone else’s expectations. This means you are using so much energy trying to please others that you have no energy left to explore your dream, being, goals or happiness.

You are free to believe what you want – but are your beliefs taking you to where you want to be?

I read a post recently where the person commented that she walked around ‘waiting for a piano to fall out of a window and hit her’ and most days it did (not quite literally the piano but disastrous events). In order to change her life she had to change her thinking patterns.

Tip one: To get the best outcome – change your thinking patterns

There is no one I know that I have met in person or via online communities that have made any significant changes without changing their thinking patterns. Changing your thinking pattern varies from breaking the negative cycle of thoughts to exposing yourself to different thinking styles such as critical thinking or lateral thinking.

Tip two: To get the best outcome – learn how to problem solve

Telling your best friend how bad things are going with you – so bad that you need a buddy to go shoe shopping with is not problem solving. It is actually just part of the negative thinking cycle that will keep you were you are. Find out how to think about problems differently – ie see them as a challenge. Jim Rohne said “don’t wish that you that you don’t have problems wish that you had better skills”. In other words, the reason this challenge seems impossible is because you don’t have the required skills to solve it in your favour – maybe you need a support group, need to take a course, need to go for counselling etc.

Tip three: To get the best outcome – write your desired outcome down

There is magic involved in writing down you desired outcome. But not the type of magic where a wand is waved and the desire becomes a reality. The magic here is your desire of what you want is verbalised and put in front of you. Every day (or at least several times a day) read your desired outcome and remind yourself where you want to be. But don’t stop their – that is only wishful thinking…

Tip four: To get the best outcome – make small continuous improvements every day

Unless you actually put your new thinking patterns and problem solving skills into practice every day and work at improving, you will never see any difference. As Einstein said – doing the same thing every day expecting different results is the definition of insanity. If you aren’t continuously changing, growing and improving then your stagnating, staying where you are and dying.

It sounds so easy and simple writing these tips like this. But it does take dedication – every day not just once in a while when you remember. However, the victory at watching yourself grow, improve and be bigger than what is going on around you week by week is wonderful. Reward yourself. Now that you know how to handle the situation, know how to make improvements and have grown – you can go shopping with your friend!

Except now you will have fun…

Creating lasing improvements takes time and patience – two things that by nature we are don’t like. If I want to loose weight – I want the weight gone by the end of the week, I don’t want to take three months to get to the right size. If I want to be happier and more bubbly – I want it now, I don’t want to practice and make the changes over the next 21 days for it to become a habit.

But if you want to create lasting quality changes in your life then you need to master these five main areas: emotion, physical, relationship, finances and time.

Why do you need to gain control over your Emotional being?

1)      To gain mastery here alone will take you forward by leaps and bounds. When you feel more attractive, settle or sure of yourself you will find your confidence and self- esteem will soar. The higher your self esteem the easier situations are to deal with.

2)      Everything we do – is to change the way we feel. How much training do you have to do this quickly? And to do it effectively? It is far more common for us to work ourselves into an unresourceful emotional state forgetting about all the talents and abilities we have to make a difference.

3)      Unless we gain control over our emotions we remain at the mercy of outside events and relying on short term fixes.

Why do you need to gain control over your Physical being?

1)      What is better – to have everything you ever dreamed of and bad health where you spend every day in pain, on drugs and in bed? Or to wake up powered, energized and ready to take on any task, any situation the day has to offer?

2)      Is your current lifestyle making you a statistic – will you be another number that the health care system has to deal with? One in every two people in the West dies of coronary disease – which one will you be?

3)      Are you digging your own grave by eating empty foods, foods that poison your systems and sitting passively in front of the TV? Whether we like it or not, if we want health then we need to take note of what it means to live a healthy lifestyle.

In short by mastering your emotions you will set yourself up for success and by mastering your physical being, you will be able to enjoy your success. These are the two most important areas to master. And if you can’t then you will not succeed or live a with success long term. These two areas are also the hardest to gain control over because we are directly dealing with what we feel like doing verses what we need to be doing. Eating a burger and chips in front of the TV is far easier than cooking a whole plant meal after coming back from the gym.

Emotions can be empowering or disempowering, if you want the best advantage, if you want all the ‘lucky breaks’, if you want your life to be a powerful tool that helps you achieve your highest potential then you will need to put in the effort to master these two areas. If you don’t have the time and will power – no matter what programs you join, what pills you swallow, what books or seminars attend you will remain mediocre forever…

There are two things I believe we need in order to achieve:

• Accountability
• A Role Model

Why Accountability?

As you set your standards higher and hold yourself to those new standards it is easy to ‘slip’ every once in a while. Not only is this disappointing because you have let yourself down, but it can also pave the way to more slippage until you are back to square one. However, having someone that you are accountable to, someone you trust that will encourage you to reach your goals but also not accept any excuses for underperforming will help you keep on track.

Practical example:

I wanted to improve my sales ability. As a business owner I discovered that business is about sales. Though my actual work was web design and internet marketing – I couldn’t do that unless I had a sale first. I started going on courses and seminars to learn. But it wasn’t until I hired a sales coach that my sales skills started taking off. Why? Because I would meet my sales coach once a week and he would want to know why I was paying him and not doing what we had agreed to do! Ouch!!  I don’t know what was worse making 20 cold calls a day using a script he had helped me with or facing him over a coffee saying I didn’t.

The great thing was that he gave me encouragement, guidance, honed my skill and helped me see where I was strong and where I wasn’t. For example cold calling wasn’t a strong point but sales presentations were. So we got a telemarketer to make a appointments and I did the presentations. Result: Fantastic!

Why a Role Model?

First let me say this. Choose a role model wisely.  Make sure that your role model has excelled in the areas that you want to achieve. For example I want to excel in personal growth so choosing a highly successful business role model is not going to give me the same results. And vice versa.

A role model is someone that you learn from, that you absorb their way of doing things, thinking patterns and strategies. For example one of my role models is Tony Robbins – and though I have never met him I have studied his books, courses, read about him etc. I want what he has got and so have put his strategies into practice.

It is even better when you can find a role model that will work with you – as in the example of my sales coach. The benefit here is they will show you how, work with you, challenge you, note where you are successful and where you aren’t.

However, whether you choose someone that you will meet or not – have a highly successful role model. And then aim for that standard. After all they are not super human, they just believed they could be world class and didn’t settle for anything less.

And neither should we…!

How often have you decided to do something starting … Monday next week? Isn’t it frustrating to make a decision to do something only to have to set a new start date?

We have all disappointed at our inability to stick to our decisions. We are so accustomed to not sticking it out that we treat it as joke with our friends. For changes to be of any real value they need to be lasting. Often it is not for a lack of trying that we haven’t succeeded – because we do try, and we do try hard!

Raise your standards:

Raise your standards is one of the lessons I have learnt from a Tony Robbins course on how to create change that lasts.

It is challenging to raise our standards. We fall for the status quo – everybody does this so I am okay. Why should I raise my standards when all my friends behave this way? Raising my standards could mean more guilt, more pain, a bigger sense of failure. What happens if I can’t live up to my new standards? Yet while we accept the status quo as a standard we will never have lasting change

Practical application

Sugar dependency

After feeling nauseous, dizzy and queasy after eating too much sugar at a baby shower I made a decision to cut out sugar. However, I have a sweet tooth. And life without sweets, sugar or pastries was not worth even considering.

Here is how I made the transition from total sweet to minimal sweet:
1) I listened to talks, videos and audio books on the research and the results of too much. This helped me gain perspective on what I was doing to my body.

2) I started with one sugar free day per week working up to only one sugar my sugar item per week. What surprised me is how much more energy I had. I thought sugar gave me energy?

3) If I do have a sweet tasty thing at a party or friend – I only have one serving.

4) When baking I only add two tablespoons of sugar in or add dried fruit. That way it is still tasty but healthier for me.

Coffee addiction

Since a teenager I have loved coffee. Life without coffee seemed worse than life without sugar. Over time however, I noticed coffee (even decaffeinated coffee) made me feel unwell, dizzy and nauseous. However, I loved the taste of coffee so much that I was willing to put up with a couple of hours in bed for a cup (crazy I know!). I applied the same principles above until I was ready to stop drinking coffee. To mark the end of my coffee drinking my husband took me out for a cafe latte (my favourite). And here is the fifth principle I learnt. When raising your standard, do it with someone that wants you to succeed and you are willing to be accountable to

What do you want to achieve? Then start raising your standards. You don’t have to feel guilty while you work up to your standard – but don’t allow yourself to settle for anything less than what is best for you. It is a wonderful feeling to get that break through…