You Already Know What To Do

“You have a wisdom inside you – listen for it and give it voice. You have a light inside you – feel it’s glow and let it shine.  You have the power to speak and act and make things manifest in the world – let your wisdom and light guide you as you do.”

-Michael Neill, SuperCoach

One of the concerns I get the most from my clients is some version of the phrase, "I don't know what to do," or "I don't know how to handle this situation."  It's so common that people generally get stuck here and give up on their dreams, projects, and goals.  One of the interesting things I have found as a transformative coach is that not knowing what to do, is very rarely a limiting factor.  In fact, most people know exactly what to do, they just have been ignoring their inner wisdom.  Or sometimes people try to convince themselves that they don't know what to do because they actually know, they just don't like the answer.  In order to create something new and wonderful in our lives, it is going to require taking some actions that are pretty frightening for most people.  It requires us doing things that we have previously been unwilling to do in the past.  It requires that we step boldly into the unknown, where we have never been before.

We have been conditioned to believe that the unknown is the worst possible place we could hang out in.  It's so scary to most people, that we avoid it at all cost.  We are so uncomfortable no knowing what the future holds, that we try to control the heck out of our circumstances, and busy ourselves with menial tasks that basically just play as a distraction to the fact that none of us know what's coming next.  I'm not a naysayer, I'm a truth seeker. As far as I can tell, I don't know the future definitively, and I don't know anybody who does.  This tells me, we spend a whole lot our time and energy avoiding something that is just true.  Kind of like death, we busy ourselves to the point of burn-out, so that we don't have to take a look at our own mortality.  It's the same with the unknown.  Here's the good news though, the unknown is not just a place where our worst fears hide, it's actually the place where possibility lives.

However, just because our futures are absolutely uncertain, that doesn't mean that we don't know what to do to move us in a direction of creating a life of wonder and joy.  If you don't believe me, take a look for yourself around a goal or project in your life.  Check-in and ask yourself, what do I know to do, that I have been previously unwilling to do?  What would I do if I wasn't afraid?

Here's what came up for me. Notice what comes up for yourself as you read what came up for me. When I look at building my coaching practice, I know that if I want to create more clients for myself, I simply have to make more calls and have more conversations with referral sources and potential clients.  I know that I have to actually ask people to hire me.  I know that the more I practice saying my fees out loud, the more comfortable I'll be saying them.  I know that showing up as a coach out in the community will support my business.  I know to communicate directly with people and make clear appointments for complimentary sessions.

If I want to improve a relationship, I know that I could say "I love you", and "I'm sorry," more.  I know to speak softer and kinder.  I know to express what it is I appreciate about the other person.  I know to have important conversations when I'm in a place of well-being.  I know that if I want something, making a clean request for it, is the best way to get it.  I know to come from a place of curiosity instead of fear. I know to share authentically.  I know to take responsibility for my own thoughts, words, and actions.

If I want to lose weight, I know I need to eat healthier, move my body more, get more sleep, and drink more water.  If I want to learn to run faster and longer, I have to run more often, faster, and longer.

If I want to access more of my innate well-being, I know to take time every day to read from A Course In Miracles, to listen to inspirational music and podcasts, to meditate, receive hugs, dance, laugh, exercise, journal, and snuggle with my cat.  I know to let go of the past, and let go of those things that I don't have any real control over.

Now, check back in with yourself.  What did you notice? What do you already know to do, that you haven't been doing?  What are you afraid of.  Remember, fear lives in the unknown, but that's also the only place that possibility lives.  If you want to create the life of your dreams, you're going to have to be uncomfortable from time to time.  Recognize that your fears are just based on your thinking, and you don't need to think those thoughts.

Now that you've re-discovered that you know what to do, take a deep breath, acknowledge the fear if it's there, and take the action anyways!

Until next time, learn heaps, live boldly, and love always!

Coach Ty

P.S., Don't forget to check out my holiday special on coaching that will be running out soon.  Now is the perfect opportunity to sign up and create your life from a place of purpose and possibility in 2012.  Make it the year that you transform your life for good.

Love vs Fear

"The opposite of love is fear, but what is all-encompassing can have no opposite."

-A Course In Miracles

As the holiday season is in full swing right now, I want to share with you one of the most useful distinctions I've ever come across.  This is the distinction between seeing the world through the eyes of Love versus through the eyes of Fear.  I first came across this in the hugely inspiring book A Course In Miracles(ACIM) several years back, and it has stuck with me ever since.

According to ACIM, there are really only two places that we can come from at any given time, Love or Fear.  Where one exists, the other cannot.  I've written about fear quite a bit, and by and large, it is not useful at all.  It clouds our thinking so that we see the world and the people in it, in the worst possible light.  When we see through the eyes of fear, we are looking at a very surface level picture of the world.  We think we're looking at a very real very solid world of form that can hurt us, so of course we should be afraid; when in reality, we're only looking out onto the world through the filter of our own thinking.  We can't actually see anything outside ourselves that isn't us.  We're caught up in a dream of our own thoughts. We aren't afraid of what we think we're afraid or, we're afraid of what we think.  The nature of fear is illusory. When you get up close to them, and poke your finger through them, they go POOF, and we realize there was never actually anything real to be afraid of.

Also, if you're thinking, I'm not experiencing fear or love, what I can tell you is... yes you are, you're just not aware of it.  Our mind experiences things in layers, and the bottom layer of every internal experience is either love or fear.  If it is any kind of uncomfortable emotion like anger, sadness, frustration, irritation, or anything else, it is being driven by fear.  If you don't believe me, think back to a time when you were really angry or really sad, and ask yourself what the fear was underneath that emotion.  If you look hard enough you will always find an answer.  Love on the other hand tends to be a little less hidden, so you don't have to dig quite as deep to find it.

Let's look at some of people's primary fears in life and pick them apart a little bit.  I'm not doing this to make light of your suffering, my intention is to show you that you are most likely suffering needlessly:

• Death
• Rejection
• Loss of a relationship
• Failure
• Humiliation
• Endedness
• Change
• Success
• Being found out
• Intimacy/Vulnerability
• God

Let's start with the big one, death.  If we look closely, what is there really to be afraid of?  It's a process that seems to occur for pretty much everything on the planet.  The physical body stops working.  We all know it's coming, although most of us pretend as if it's not.  So what's the fear about? In it of itself, it's not scary... until our minds start telling stories about it such as: 'I can't die now, I unfinished business' or 'I'm too young to die' or 'God will send me to hell when I die'.  When I start  making up these kinds of stories in my head, then yeah, I can make it pretty darned scary.  In other words death is not inherently scary, and neither are any of the things on the list above.   It's all to do with our thinking.  Check out the article I wrote called The Source of All Fear to learn more.  

How about rejection?  You can't actually be rejected, can you?  Sure somebody can tell you to go away, or that they don't like you, but rejection is only ever a story that we make up.  How about loss of a relationship?  Well, I hate to break it to you, but relationships don't exist.  We talk about them as if they were a thing, but relationships are simply the process of relating to another person or thing.  Which means, you can never actually lose a relationship, it can only ever change form.  We primarily relate to things in our minds, so you can't stop relating, can you? Alright, what about failure? Story! You can't actually fail, outside of your own mind. Humiliation? Our Thinking! Endedness? Story! Change, Success, Being found out, Vulnerability, God?  Story, Story, Story, Story, Story!

This of course leads me to the second half of the equation, which is Love!  As the quote at the beginning of the article suggests, fear is the opposite of love, however because fear is just an illusion, all that's really left over is love.  Fear is the illusion, love is what's real.  Sure we have the capacity to have an experience of fear, but it is only ever kept alive inside our own minds.  Love however is eternal.  Love is what's real and as ACIM says "Nothing real can be threatened. Nothing unreal exists."

Alright, let's get practical shall we?  If love is what's real and fear is an illusion, then we should be all having a wonderful experience of life right?  Well, not necessarily.  Think about when you have a scary dream. Just because you are dreaming and it's not real, doesn't mean that you can't have an unpleasant experience.  What it does mean is that there is no real threat to the truth.  All you have to do is wake up and see that it was all a dream.  This article as well as A Course In Miracles, is dedicated to the practice of waking up to the truth.

What if only love existed?  What if our most fundamental nature, our very essence was unconditional love?  What if everything was either an expression of love, or a call for love?  What if you could only look upon your fellow human beings through the eyes of love?  What would you see?  Could you harbor resentments?  How would you treat people?  

If you no longer had other people to be upset with, how do you think that would impact your life?  How would that effect your health?  How would that impact your level of joy?  What do you think your relationships would look like?

Look for the truth of who people are and you will remember who you really are.  You will know yourself as you begin seeing others as the presence of Love.

Let's start small shall we?

Ty's Coaching Tip of the Week:

1. Think of one person in your life who you are upset with or quarreling with and would like to shift the relationship.
2. Acknowledge that if you aren't in a state of love when you think of them, than you are in a mindset of fear.
3. Identify the fear by asking yourself, 'What am I afraid of in this relationship.'
4. Listen until an answer shows up, or several.
5. Recognize the fear for what it truly is, an illusion. Poke your finger through it?  Ask, is this fearful story true?  Can I absolutely know that it's true??? Of course you can't, so it isn't. It's just a story.
6. While doing some deep breathing ask if you're willing to release yourself and the other person from the bondage that fear has over you.  It is keeping you stuck and stagnate. Your mind is not free when it is afraid
7. Stay with it until you are willing to release the desire to hold onto the fear.
8. Next, create the intention to see this person or situation as they really are, which is a divine loving being.  Ask to see through the eyes of love.  
9. These questions can help guide you. 'If I saw this person through the eyes of unconditional love, what would I see, what would I do?' 'If I knew only love was real, could I take what this person has done personal, could I experience anger or frustration?' and finally 'If this individual is either expressing love, or calling for love, what's my appropriate response?'  

To learn more about love and taking things personal please read, It's Never Personal, and What Would Love Say?

Until next time, learn heaps, live boldly, and love always!

Coach Ty

SPECIAL HOLIDAY OFFER: 1 ON 1 COACHING

“I absolutely believe that people, unless coached, never reach their maximum capabilities.”

 -Bob Nardelli (CEO of Home Depot)

Hello, Coach Ty Readers!

I am offering a very special holiday deal for 1 on 1 coaching with yours truly, and I wanted you all to have first dibs.  I want to create as much value as I can in your lives over the next year, and so I am offering ONE FULL MONTH OF COACHING FREE.  I work with people for a minimum of 4 months at $550/month, and so if you sign up for a 4 month contract or longer at anytime during the month of December, one of those months will be completely free.  That's A $2,200.00 VALUE for ONLY $1,650.00.  That's a savings of $550.00 OFF my usual price.  

This a wonderful opportunity to move powerfully and peacefully through the holidays and into the new year.  Create 2012 the way you want it with purpose and intention!  This is also a wonderful chance to give a truly valuable gift to somebody you love.  Instead of some inanimate object where the excitement will wear off in a day or two, just imagine the kind of lasting gift this would be. What if, for instance, you permanently transformed your relationship with money, created work you love, or re-created your romantic relationship to be truly wonderful?  What if you got your body light, fit, and healthy and learned how to keep it that way with ease?  What if you truly learned that peace, joy, well-being, and love are available to you in every moment?  What else would be possible in your life? These are truly wonderful gifts to give, are they not?  

Call my office today to have a free consultation and sign up for the most transformative year of your life!

Phone: 503-389-3778

Email:  CoachTylerThurman@gmail.com

May your holidays be full of Love and Light.

Until next time, learn heaps, live boldly, and love always!

Coach Ty

On Giving Thanks

“And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music.”

  -Friedrich Nietzsche

As I sit here in my office, on the evening of Thanksgiving here in the States, I have been contemplating just what giving thanks is all about.

When I was growing up, I was always told that it's very important to say 'thank you' for just about everything that we had, or was given to us.  Suffice it to say, I got pretty darned good at saying those two little words.  What I never spent much time doing, was actually contemplating what for?  What's the purpose of expressing gratitude? It can't be as simple as a polite saying that is programmed into us from a very early age can it?  Well, In my experience, no, it's not that simple and in fact, it's far more valuable than most of us realize.

Giving thanks, is really just expressing gratitude, or showing appreciation for what somebody has done, or more importantly who they are being.  It is an acknowledgement that who somebody is to you is meaningful and that they make a positive difference in your life.  Giving thanks is more about who we are being than what we say or do.  This means that it can take just about any form. We might express our appreciation through hugs and kisses, or cards, or a smile, a soft touch, a written message, kind words or gestures.  I think it can honestly be boiled down to an expression of love.  

If your youth was anything like mine, saying 'thank you' was more of an obligation than a privilege.  I think that can pretty much be boiled down to the fact that few people actually enjoy doing what they are 'supposed' to do. Nobody likes to be forced into anything, even if it's something really wonderful, like gratitude. 

Let's give you some new reasons to give thanks that may just change your mind about the whole thing.

When you develop an 'attitude of gratitude' and begin to make a practice of appreciating much more in your life, much more of what you want shows up.  The reality is that when you spend more time focusing on what it is you really love about your life, you get more of it.  This absolutely works, but exactly why is something of a mystery that is well beyond my pay grade.  Let me share with you the two most common theories and I'll let you draw your own conclusions.  The first of which is called harmonic resonance or the law of attraction.  This theory recognizes the vibratory and energetic nature of the universe and says that those things that vibrate like one another, will attract each other.  A common case study supporting this, is that of the grandfather clocks.  If you have a room full of grandfather clocks, they will all eventually synchronize themselves to the clock with the dominant rhythm.  It's pretty cool if you ever have the opportunity to check it out.  This theory says that "that which is like unto itself is drawn" or 'like attracts like'.  In other words if you align your thoughts, words, and actions with what you want and love, you will begin the business of creating and manifesting that in your life.  Expressing gratitude is a huge part of that because you place your focus on what you are thankful for, in turn attracting more of that into your life.  If you want to learn more about this,  I highly recommend the work of Esther and Jerry Hicks.  I'd start with their book called "Ask and it is Given".

The second theory has been called a lot of different things, but I particularly like the name 'The Perceptual Snowplow' which I first heard from Super Coach Michael Neill.  This theory can basically be summed up with the saying, you'll always tend to see whatever it is you are looking for.  Most people have experienced the phenomenon of deciding on a car that they liked or maybe a friend got a new car, and suddenly they see that model of car everywhere. It's not that there were suddenly 100's more of those cars on the road, it's that you began looking for them.  In the field of Neuro-linguistics we call this sorting or filtering.  Usually this occurs at a pretty unconscious level, but we actually sort through and filter out all of the extraneous data and keep that which we are looking for.  The reality is we can't be aware of everything there is to see anyway, so we may as well sort for the good stuff, right(To learn more, read my article on The Power of Focus)?

Here's the cool thing, it doesn't matter what theory you buy into, it is a very real phenomenon.  When you switch your point of focus, you experience of the world differently.  So, when you deliberately spend time appreciating those people and things in your life, they grow and expand.  

Another reason to hold an energy of gratitude is, other people love to be authentically appreciated for what they have done or who they are being in your life.  It will make people's day when you take the time to outwardly acknowledge them.

Finally, one of the wonders of expressing appreciation is that it feels good.  When you spend time noticing the beauty in your life, or the love, or the wealth, it feels good.  Also, it is a multiplier, the more you appreciate, the more you notice things to appreciate.  You are never taking away from someone else in order to give thanks to others.  

A bonus result of appreciating people, is that it makes your relationships much more wonderful!  When you spend time noticing and expressing everything that is wonderful about your spouse, or your kids, or parents, they will transform before your very eyes.  Often times, those things that they did that annoyed you, will just lose their significance.  

I know these are bold claims, but all I can say is, do it!  Make a practice out of it and see what happens for yourself.

Coaching Tip of the Week:

• Spend 15min. at the end of each day with a pen and paper writing down everything in your life that you can think of that you appreciate. If you can't get at least 10, you're not trying.
• If there is a particularly troublesome person or situation, spend time, finding anything and everything that you can genuinely appreciate about it or them.  I promise, if you look, you'll find something.
• Be authentic and honest in your appreciations.  It will feel forced and awkward at first, but that's just because you're not used to it.  Pretty soon it'll be the most natural thing in the world.
• Do this every day for 30 days
• Watch as your focus shifts, and your experience of life transforms!

Until next time, learn heaps, live boldly, and love always!

Coach Ty

Seeing The Big Picture

"The problem is not that we have mental models, it is that we don't recognize that we have mental models.

-Srikumar Rao

When I was first exploring the nature of the mind, and how our thoughts create our experience of reality, I thought the best I could ever do was to switch from a very unpleasant way of seeing the world, to a positive way of seeing the world.  In the fields of NLP and Coaching, we call this re-framing.  When you change the frame size or location of the picture you are looking at, or in this case the circumstances in your life, then you will actually have a different experience of whatever it is you are looking at.

A common example of this in the personal transformation field, is the deliberate shifting of ones perspective from seeing something as a problem, to seeing it as a challenge.  Most people have a more empowered relationship to the world challenge than to the word problem.  We tend to think about problems as things that happen to us that we have very little if any control over, and in turn we are unlikely to do anything about them except lash out in anger, sadness or fear; which is what we do when we feel trapped.  Challenges on the other hand are often thought of more in terms of obstacles that we can overcome, so with that simple switch in how you are framing a situation, you will not only hold it differently in your mind but speak and act differently as a result.

You can even take this example one step further and see the challenges as opportunities.  They could be opportunities for learning or growth, or to practice love or forgiveness.  You can literally chose to see anything and everything in your life as an opportunity.  Re-framing takes practice though, and is usually much more effective with the assistance of a skilled coach.  However if you want to get good at seeing things differently, my favorite questions to ask myself are, 'How might I see this differently?' and 'How would I love to see this(situation, person, etc.)?'

This is the essence of positive thinking. Changing the way you look at the world to have a more pleasant experience of life.  It's just like the saying, 'if you're going to make stuff up, you might as well make up good stuff'.  Herein lies the problem with this whole approach though.  It still keeps people trapped inside their own thinking; it's just that instead of making up a crappy story about the circumstances of their life, they make up a happy story.  Never mind the fact that it takes a whole lot of work and practice to continually attempt to re-frame everything in your life.  Plus, sometimes it just doesn't work due to the surface level nature of re-framing.  In essence we're trading one story for another.

There is actually a way to step outside of your story, and transform your experience of life without trying to control your thinking.  All you have to do is see the truth of how the whole thing works.  This simple transformation occurs not by changing your thinking but in simply recognizing that as human beings we think.  When you know that your thoughts create 100% of your experience of the world, then your life will begin to transform from the inside out.

When somebody is getting really worked up about something in their life, it's often magnified because they are mistaking their thinking for being real.  In other words, when we're seeing life as though we are the victim of circumstances, it's not actually the circumstances that cause us suffering, it's our thoughts about the circumstances.  The sooner and more fully you recognize that it's just thought, the easier it will be for you to let those unpleasant thoughts go.

It's not that you won't still have an emotional experience of your thinking, because that just seems to be how the mind works.  We have a thought and then we experience an emotion.  But even when you are experiencing some really crappy thinking, if you know in the back of your mind that it's not real it's just a story in your head, that will make life much less scary.  When you know that you can only really experience your thinking,  and that your miserable thoughts will always pass through if you let them, than life gets really gentle really quick.

I once heard a story about Super Coach George Pransky working with a client, and he was explaining these very same concepts to her.  She then asked him "So, are you saying that my thinking isn't real, it's just a mirage?"  To that he replied "Well, lets put it this way, it's a real mirage."  The only danger is in not recognizing the illusory nature of our thinking.

At this point you may be questioning whether there are any practical applications to these ideas at all.  So, in the spirit of that, let me share some of the shifts that I've experienced, and that people have reported to me.

When you realize your thoughts are just that, thoughts, you might just find yourself:

• Experiencing more peace and well-being
• Making bold requests 
• Asking more people to hire you
• Asking more people out on dates
• Asking for more honesty
• Asking for forgiveness
• Asking for sex 
• Asking for a raise at work
• Asking for someone to sponsor you
• Asking for people to invest in your idea
• Asking for support and accountability
• Asking for acknowledgement
• Forgiving those people who you 'thought' wronged you
• Experiencing much more love for others
• No longer taking things personally
• Realizing that circumstances are just circumstances
• Connecting more deeply with the people in your life
• Having more meaningful conversations
• Living in the present moment
• Taking actions that you previously were too afraid to take
• Saying things that you were previously too insecure to say
• Experiencing much less fear
• Saying no to things that don't appeal to you
• Experiencing less guilt
• Laughing and playing more
• Slowing down and enjoying your life
• Taking really wonderful care of yourself

...just to name a few.

Coaching Tip of The Week:

This weeks experiment is simple but not necessarily easy.  I invite you to practice recognizing that your thinking is creating your experience, not the outside world.  When you find yourself upset, or in a foul mood, just simply acknowledge that it's everything to do with how you are 'SEEING' the situation, and nothing to do with the facts.  If you get stuck, just remember, you are never upset for the reasons you think; you are upset because you think.

Until next time, learn heaps, live large, and love always!

Coach Ty

The Power of Community

"It is one of the most beautiful compensations of this life that no man can sincerely try to help another without helping himself."

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

I've been in the game of creating my wonderful life for the last several years now, and I've only recently discovered a hugely important element, Community.  

When you think about creating the life of your dreams, how many of you think about it in terms of doing it all by yourself?  If you said yes, you're not alone.  That's pretty much the default setting for most people.  We have been taught from a very early age, that the highest mark of success is to not only make it in this world, but to be a self-made individual.  To have done it all on your own, without the help of anybody!  Fortunately, we don't live on that planet.  Here on Earth, nobody, and I do mean NOBODY, does it alone. 

Even the highest performers in the world such as top athletes, and world leaders all have support.  In fact, they have support teams.  These individuals know they can't do it alone, so they have coaches, mentors, advisers, and team-mates to support them in creating what they want in the world.  

The more quickly you are willing to embrace this, the more you can get to the business of enjoying your wonderful life.  Plus, at the very least, don't you want someone to share your success with?  I've realized I can't do it alone, and... I don't want to.

When you have a team of people who you can call on for support, a community, your life will transform.  Imagine when you need support, you actually get it, and from people who are willing and capable of giving it. One of my mentors Michael Neill, talks about it like this.  Think of something in your life that you want to create. Now, imagine that doing it by yourself is like trying to carry a canoe on your head, barefoot, down a dry river bed.  It's going to be slow, and hard, and painful, and you likely won't get there at all.  Now imagine that having a team to support you in creating what you want is like floating down a full, gently flowing river in your canoe. On this journey you get to experience ease, and joy, and beauty, and grace.  The choice is yours!

If you want to begin assembling your success team today... here's what you do:

Weekly Coaching Tip:

1. Make a list of the people in your life that love you no matter what.
2. Make a list of the people who are raving fans of your work
3. Make a list of the people who know more about creating what you want, than you do.
4. Make a list of the people who you would love to have on your support team including coaches, mentors, team-mates, brilliant minds, family, friends...etc.
5. Now that your list is compiled, ASK these people to be on your team.  Most people never ask for support, and it's very difficult if not impossible to get the support you want and need, if you are unwilling to ask. Ask who you want, and for what you want.  If you want accountability, ask for accountability, if you want acknowledgement, ask for that, if you want a kick in the pants, ask for that.  (For more on asking see my article Clean Requests)
6. Those who say yes, will make up your success team!(P.S. it's okay if some people are on your team and they don't know it ;-).
7. If you are struggling to come up with a list, come join Accomplishment Coaching's 'Coaches Training Program', and you will get set up with an instant support team the likes of which you have never experienced in your life.  Please check it out... your life will never be the same.
8. If signing up for a whole program is too much for you, please consider me as a potential member of your success team.  Contact me for a complimentary coaching session to see just how powerful the addition of a transformative coach can be for your success team.

Until next week, learn lots, live more, and love always,

Love and Light,

Coach Ty

From Traumatic Times To Peaceful Minds

"The best thing about the past is that it's over"

-Richard Bandler, Co-Developer of NLP

This weeks tip comes to you in the spirit of Halloween, which is today here in the States. Halloween has become a holiday that is based primarily on two things, candy and fear.  This article will be focusing on the latter. If the candy part is more of a problem for you, you may want to check out one of my recent articles titled How To Actually Lose Weight & Keep It Off.  

I was sharing with a friend recently the irony of how, on days like Halloween, people often fork out money to scare themselves, and then they turn around and pay me to help them overcome their fears in life... it's a strange world out there.  In this article I'm going to be talking about a specific kind of fear that is generated from a trauma; known as either a phobia, or as post traumatic stress disorder(PTSD).  

Besides being a coach, I am also a certified practitioner of Neuro-Linguistic Programming(NLP), which is a personal change technology that is particularly adept at overcoming and eliminating fears and traumas quickly and permanently. So in this article I'm going to be speaking from my expertise in this field.  

Alright, my handy dictionary defines a trauma as, "An extremely distressing experience that causes severe emotional shock and may have long-lasting psychological effects."  So, in other words, something really scary and potentially life threatening happens, our emotions and physical sensations get peaked to the max, and then there's what we call an imprint or an anchor that is formed.  This simply means an association is formed between the emotional state at the time of the event, and an external trigger. For example if somebody were to get into a serious scary car accident, afterwards, the person may associate cars with fear, so that every time they see a car, or get in a car they experience that fear again. This is also true of positive emotions.  Our strongest memories are formed based on our strongest emotional experiences.

Next, let's briefly distinguish what fear is in this context (if you want a longer, more detailed discussion, check out my past article titled The Source of All Fear). It's important to make the distinction that all fear is being generated not from the external circumstance, but from our thinking.  If there was actually an inherently scary situation, then every single person in that situation would experience the same fear.  We know right away that that is not true, because if you talk to trauma victims, they very often have completely different experiences and emotions.  Another way of looking at it is that we can only ever experience our thinking not our circumstances.  The external trigger can only set off the thought process.  A famous psychologist once said, "Whether there is actually a poisonous snake by my foot, or I just think there is, I react the same."  It's the thinking that makes all the difference.  

Our thoughts aren't just generating the fear either, they are keeping that traumatic experience alive in the present moment. When the crash has past, or the battle is over, or the spider is gone; replaying the event over and over again in our minds keeps us trapped in the trauma.  If you have ever been traumatized, or know somebody that has, you'll recognize just how debilitating this can be for people.  

Now for the cool part.  Most people actually learn to be traumatized based on a single experience, often referred to as 'one-trial learning.'  What most people don't immediately recognize is that this is actually a testament to how quickly the mind can learn something really well. So think about somebody who has a phobia of elevators.  If you talk to them, you'll figure out that they likely had one bad experience, and then they have never ever forgotten to be afraid of elevators since then.  You don't hear about elevator phobics accidentally getting in an elevator and then half-way up remember to be afraid.  No, it is 100% of the time, every time.  This capacity to learn very quickly and very well, means that we can actually learn a new response just as quickly!   All you need are the tools and some know how!

Okay, let's look at how to actually create a new more empowering response.  We know it's all in our heads, but what then?  Well, the first thing to recognize is that there is a method to the madness.  There is a structure to your internal experience and how you are currently 'doing' fear.  In order to create fear, you actually need to replay your memories in a very specific way.  In other words it's not just the content that you are playing back; what we call the submodalities, things such as the size, brightness, speed, direction, and association of the images have a huge impact on how scared we get, or if we even get frightened at all.  Because our experience is based on our thinking, I can actually guide people through a process and literally create a new experience for them by changing the submodalities.  Often times simple one-trial trauma's and phobias can be cleared up in a single hour long session.  I recommend that you not try this on your own without the supervision of a professional so as not to re-experience the trauma unnecessarily.  So, if this is relevant for you, or someone you know, please contact me and we can schedule a session to actually guide you through the process.  *Note: This is not immersion therapy where somebody is slowly introduced to the stimulus over a period of time and attempting to desensitize them to it. Having people re-play the trauma is what's causing the problem, not the solution!*

Also, a word of warning, anything to do with repetitive trauma over time often has a much more complicated structure that takes more time to work through. 

Have a very happy Halloween, and remember that the fear really is all in your head!

Until next week, have fun and live from you essence.

Love and Light,

Coach Ty

  

The Sea Of Cubicles

"Miracles are shifts in perception"

-A Course In Miracles

Several days ago, I was speaking with one of my clients and he was describing to me what it was like working at a company where the main offices consist of a huge sea of cubicles.  He shared with me that when shorter people walked through the halls of the cubicles, all they would see is walls, and it was like an endless maze that was very difficult to navigate without assistance.  He said that he was personally at just the right height so that when walked, on the low point of his stride he would see nothing but walls, but on the high point, he could see above the entire maze; describing it to me as though he was seeing a whole new world.  When he took the time to look around on the high point of his step, he could see across the entire sea of cubicles, and it became infinitely easier to navigate his way through them.  He could see where he wanted to go, and he could choose any number of routes that were to his liking to get there.  There was no panic or urgency either, because the simple ability to see the truth, was enough to put him at ease.

For my client, all it took was a slight shift in perception for his entire experience to change.  I recognized this phenomenon right away, because it is eerily similar to the stages that I see people go through in my work as a Transformative Coach.  

At the first level there are people who are just plain lost, and they are completely unwilling to admit it or ask for assistance, so they just wander around their lives aimlessly, hoping they find what it is that they are looking for.  

On another level, there are people who are still pretty lost, but are willing to stop and ask for support or directions, and if they ask the right person they can, with some effort and struggle, navigate their way through the maze of life.  

Then there is the third level, where something happens to the individual to facilitate a shift in perception.  Perhaps, they read a book that inspires them, or work with a coach to guide them, or maybe it's as simple as putting on a slightly taller pair of shoes that day.  Whatever the cause, that ever so slight growth, can create an enormous shift in perception.  They find themselves with altitude, seeing more clearly, and navigating what used to be a maze, which now appears to be just a path of their choosing  

This is what transformation looks like.  It can be very subtle at first, with nothing appearing to change on the outside, all the while, everything is different with our internal experience.  Over time, this internal shift begins to be reflected in the world around us as people, places and things begin to shift and change and rearrange.  

Let me share with you some of the principles that I've found give people that little boost that allows them to see and experience the world in an all new creative and empowering way!  If you don't want to change your life for good, I suggest you stop reading now.

Transformative Coaching Principles

1. There is nothing you need to do, be, have, or change, in order to be happy and experience well-being.
2. 100% of your experience of life is being created through the way that you think about it.
3. Unkind words and actions are NEVER EVER personal.
4. The essence of who you are is Love.
5. Real Love bears no grievances.
6. You are not your story, character, persona, actions, or body.
7. Forgiveness is always appropriate.
8. Holding grudges is like drinking poison and hoping the other person will die.
9. There is no point in arguing about matters of personal taste, and you'll find that almost everything is a matter of personal taste.
10. Suffering is always a result of arguing with what is and mistaking your miserable thoughts for reality.
11. You will always tend to see, whatever it is you are looking for, so start looking for good stuff.
12. Listen for, trust, and follow your inner wisdom. 

And finally let me end with one of the most beautiful things I've ever read from Michael Neill, in his brilliant book SuperCoach.  

"You have a wisdom inside you - listen for it, and give it voice.  You have a light inside you - feel it's glow, and let it shine.  You have the power to speak and act and make things manifest in the world, let your wisdom and light guide you as you do." 

If you are interested in making these kinds of shifts and taking these principles on in your own life, then please go to my contact page and get in touch with me to set up a complimentary coaching session.  It is my life's passion and work to facilitate people seeing the world with new eyes, and in turn having their outer worlds transform.

Until next time

Love and Light,

Coach Ty

How To Actually Lose Weight And Keep It Off

"True health requires a lifestyle dedicated to the wellness of the mind and the body.  Without one, you cannot truly enjoy the other!"

-Unknown Source

Let's talk about weight loss shall we?  Recent estimates by the CDC place the United States average obesity rate at 33.8%.  That's 1 out of every 3 adults in this country that are over weight or obese.  Now, as a transformative coach, I want people to live happy, healthy, love filled lives.  If people are genuinely able to do that with large bodies, then I'm all for it.  I also think it is entirely possible to experience inner peace in the midst of difficult circumstances, and yes, having large bodies that don't work as well as we like, are difficult circumstances.  Let me just start by putting that out there.  There are plenty of miserable people in thin bodies, and plenty in fluffy bodies.  Given that, let me speak about my experience in working with people both as a personal trainer and as a life coach.

First, here's my quick disclaimer: I am not a medical doctor, and so nothing I say should be taken as medical advice.  You should always check with your physician if you are unsure if something is appropriate for you. Always trust your own inner wisdom over my advice.

Warning: The information I'm about to share, is useful for most people most of the time.  If you aren't interested in losing weight, keeping it off, and enjoying your life more and more of the time, then don't read any further.  

The first question I will inevitably ask people who are interested in losing weight is, 'for what purpose?'  Now, at first glance this may seem obvious, but I think you'll find upon further reflection, it's not as simple as it sounds.  Go ahead and answer this question for yourself if it's relevant, and you're going to want to be really honest about this.  Here's a few of the answers I get from people:

I want to lose weight because:   It will make me happy.  Other people will like me better. I will be able to get a better partner.  My life genuinely will be better.  Then I'll be able to do what I really want.  I'll feel better in my body.  I won't hate myself so much.  It will make everything okay.  I won't have to be depressed anymore.  I don't want to die young.  And this list goes on and on.

The purpose of this question is intended to draw your attention to what you think having a smaller body will do for you.  If it's anything other than feeling lighter and getting around easier, than you are tricking yourself.  A thin body will not make you happier, it won't make everything okay, and it won't get you more love.  It won't make your self-esteem issues go away, and it won't make you like yourself anymore.  Sorry to burst the bubble folks, but that is not how it works.  Sure you can get more attention and approval from the people around you, but do you really want to hang out with people who only like you because of your body?  Even if you have an attractive body, how long will it be attractive, 20 years tops?  What then?  Why do you think so many people have affairs later on in life with younger people, because they identify with the body... but it's awfully fleeting.

Here's the next question I ask people, 'Are you your body?'  Most people have some sense that they aren't their nose, or their arm, or their toes we simply have a nose and arms and toes.  Are you your body, or do you just have a body?  Let's pretend for a minute that you aren't your body.  Who are you then?  Are you your brain, or do you just have a brain?  Are you your Mind?  Are you your Spirit?  Obviously, this quickly becomes a spiritual conversation.  For purposes of this article, I invite you to consider that you are not your body, and spend some time asking yourself the question, who am I?  For me this question has yielded many answers over the years, the one I keep coming back to is, that I must be whatever part of myself that is changeless.  To me, that part is love.  I invite you to do your own exploration though.

My experience is that when we begin to let go of identifying ourselves as bodies, it takes much of the charge out of the whole weight loss conversation.

Next, I want you to put down the big stick that you've been beating yourself over the head with in an attempt to motivate yourself into action.  We often attempt to motivate ourselves by telling ourselves that we are terrible for being fat, or we are a horrible ugly people that just need to get up off the couch, or if we don't put the bag of chips away, we're a worthless piece of $&!?.  This kind of self talk can admittedly work in the short term.  But ultimately it is just demoralizing.  For most people it doesn't work at all, and if it does, they lose a couple pounds and say you know what, I'm still a horrible ugly person, and then give up.

You put down the stick by practicing self acceptance and self love.  Most people want to lose weight to get more acceptance and more love and just feel better about themselves.  What I'm suggesting is to make that the beginning and now the end.  Start by giving yourself acceptance and love right now.  Take a minute at this very moment, go get in front of a mirror, or close your eyes, and just imagine giving yourself acceptance and love.  You can even throw in an affirmation if you want like 'I deeply love and accept myself.'  I've seen people begin to lose weight over time from just this step alone, so don't skip it!

When you are no longer attempting to lose weight to get more happiness, love and acceptance, losing that weight gets really simple really quick.

Okay, now that you've put down the big stick, started to accept yourself just as you are now, and are no longer identifying yourself as just a body; you're going to want to create a vision for your life that is inspirational and compelling.  In that vision you might want to include things that involve having a healthy fit body.  If it's not sufficiently compelling, it won't propel you forward to make the changes you want to make.

The next piece of the weight loss puzzle, is examining how you got there in the first place.  The extremely rare answer is an unalterable metabolic problem, in which case, if it really is unalterable, you might as well spend your time focused on something else anyway.  The vast majority of people have simply taken in more calories(units of energy) than they consume.  In other words, you have an eating strategy that doesn't match how much you move your body, which has a direct impact on your metabolism.

Addressing the first part of the equation is simple.  Move your body more.  Find something you love doing where you move your body continuously for a period of time, 20-30min preferably, and you get your heart rate up.  That's it.  If you haven't found something you love yet, explore, try new things.  Go dancing, try hula hooping, or bike riding.  If you haven't found an activity it's likely because you haven't spent much time searching and experimenting.

The other half of the equation is your eating strategy.  In my field of NLP(Neuro-Linguistic Programming) we talk about how as humans we have unconscious strategies for just about everything.  We have buying strategies, selling strategies, emotional strategies, success strategies, and the list goes on.  There are actually naturally thin eating strategies that work for most people.  Usually when I bring this up, people think I'm speaking about for instance a low calorie diet, which is an actual strategy that can work for a time... if you want to feel starved all the time and have a miserable relationship with food.  I personally prefer the gentler more enjoyable approach to eating healthy.

If you are interested, you can elicit your current eating strategy by asking questions like how do you know when it's time to eat, how do you know how fast to eat; how do you know how much to eat, and how do you know when to stop eating?  However, in the end, knowing your old strategy isn't particularly relevant to creating a new one.

The most useful eating strategy for people waning to lose weight and keeping it off that I've ever seen, comes from Paul Mckenna's best selling weight loss book, I Can Make You Thin. I'll outline the basic four step process, but if you want more details, I highly recommend you go read Paul's book.  I don't get anything for recommending it, it's just the best I've found available.

Step 1. Eat When You Are Hungry.  Starving yourself can actually make you fat by creating a horrible yo yo affect with your metabolism.  When your body get's less food than it needs, it actually goes into starvation mode, and starts storing as much fat as possible, because it doesn't know when it will get more food.  And then if you go back to eating normally, you will actually be storing even more fat than before.  Your body doesn't care if you are attractive, it just wants you to survive.  This is also why people who go a long time in between meals have predictably slow metabolisms, because their bodies are storing up for the next mini famine, from breakfast to dinner.

Step 2. Eat What You Actually Want, Not What You Think You Should Eat.  When we create forbidden foods for ourselves, they begin to have power over us.  These unnatural cravings come from self imposed limitations and that then blocks our bodies own natural intuition about what foods it wants and needs.  Paul McKenna references a study done in the 1930's where kids were allowed to select from a huge array of foods with 24/7 access for a 30 day period, and what they found is that over that 30 day period the kids naturally ate a healthy balanced diet, even though they ate different things day in and day out.  So it's time to get rid of the whole notion of forbidden foods.

Step 3. Eat CONSCIOUSLY, and Enjoy Every Mouthful.  Essentially, slow down. Also stop with the distractions like TV,  or reading the paper, or listening to the radio while you eat.  When we aren't paying attention, we often will eat so quickly that we will not give our bodies enough time to get the 'full' signal to our brain, before we put an extra 8 or 10 bites in.  And by that time it's too late, we've over eaten.  Try slowing down to eating at about 1 quarter of the speed that you were at before.  Also be sure to thoroughly chew every bite.

Step 4.   When you THINK you are full, STOP Eating.  If you've been ignoring this signal for a while, it's going to take a couple weeks for your body to re-calibrate itself to what's natural.  Also the slowing down is key for this fourth step, because you'll have much clearer access to your full signal when you are going slow and paying attention.  Remember it's not, stop when you're about to puke, it's stop when you think you are full.  And then if you wait a while, and decide, oh I'm still hungry, then you can always go back for more.

One thing I want to invite you to keep in mind is that you can't just do a couple of these golden rules and skip the others.  It is a system that has to be done as a whole.  For instance you can't simply skip the slowing down part, or the stopping when you think you are full part because it won't work as a strategy unless all the pieces are working together.

Alright, the final piece of this weight loss puzzle is overcoming Emotional Eating.  That's right, stuffing our emotions with food to avoid them.  Let's face it, food, is America's drug of choice.  Just like people use other drugs to change how they feel, most American's use food in an attempt to change how they feel.  This has been one of the leading factors in the obesity epidemic.  It's actually more of an emotional avoidance epidemic because it goes far beyond just food... but we'll save that conversation for another time.

In order to change our tendency to eat or over eat in an attempt to stuff our feelings, we've got to find a healthy outlet for our emotions.  Paul Mckenna actually has a great CD in the back of his book that helps with this.  In addition though, I want to encourage you to brainstorm some different practices that you could begin to play around with in order for you to get your emotional needs met.  It could be anything from getting more hugs every day to writing in a journal, to telling your pet everything that went wrong that day.  I don't care what it is, just find something that works for you.  Because if you get the eating thing down, and you lose weight, but you don't address your emotions, a whole new problem will likely manifest.

Alright, there's quite a few different steps, so let's review.

Weekly Coaching Tip:

1. Acknowledge that losing weight and being thin will not give me more love, peace, happiness, or make everything okay.
2. Recognize that I am not my body
3. Get in touch with who you really are.  Essence, Spirit, Higher Self, Love, Joy... (explore)
4. Put down the stick and stop trying to motivate yourself with negative self-talk
5. Practice Self-Love and Self-Acceptance daily.  I like doing it in front of the mirror
6. Create an Inspiring and Compelling vision for your life.  What would make you go WOW!  It's useful if the creation of that life will be aided by you having a fit healthy body
7. Move your body 20-30 min. a day doing something you love and getting your heart rate up
8. Take on a natural intuitive eating strategy like Paul Mckenna's
9. Find new ways of meeting and expressing your emotional needs.  Write in a journal, hire a therapist, talk to your pet, practice saying what you feel, etc.
10. Watch as the pounds melt away, and at the same time you just find yourself caring less and less if they actually do.

Although this may seem like a lot of work right now, I promise this will be a project well worth your time and energy, because it will almost certainly positively influence all areas of your life.

And always remember, there's never a good reason not to love yourself, even having a few extra pounds.

Until next time,

Love and Light,

Coach Ty

On Getting It Right

“If you didn't musterbate, then you wouldn’t awefulize, terribilize, or catastrophize, say, ‘I can’t stand it,’ and put yourself down.  If you only stuck with, ‘I’d like very much to do well, but I never have to,’ you wouldn't then disturb yourself … musterbation is evil and pernicious.  

-Albert Ellis

Have you every asked yourself some variation of the question, what's the right thing to do here?  If you are a human living on earth and speak English, i'm going to guess that you have.  We have been taught to guide our lives based on should's.  This basically means we are trying to do the best/right/smartest thing in the situation that is before us.  In my experience, making decisions based on 'getting it right', can get us into a world of hurt.

First of all, most people haven't spent much time asking themselves, 'get it right according to who?'  Honestly, who is the one that you are trying to get it right for.  Yourself?  If it was yourself, you'd think you would know already wouldn't you? So who then.  Is it your parents?  Friends? Co-workers? Spouse?... Is it God?  Does God have a carefully written rule book that if not followed to a tee, you are going to burn for all eternity?  Boy, talk about putting on the pressure.. and the heat.  I'm not here to challenge your beliefs, but that's doesn't fit my experience of an all loving and forgiving force in the universe.  Plus, even if there was a real divine rule book, which one is it?  How are we supposed to know?  Is it the Bible, The Qur'an, The Tao De Ching, The Upanishads, The Torah, A Course In Miracles?  If so, which version of these holy texts is the right one? Who is right?  And how many billions of people on the planet are wrong?

Let me be clear, I consider myself a pretty spiritual guy, and I do have a spiritual practice which brings me a tremendous amount of peace.  I'm all for it.  Choose whichever ones you like.  I'm just saying, life gets really complicated really quickly when you start trying to base your decisions on something external like a book or based on what another person thinks you should do.  You are the expert on you, not me, or anybody else.

I want to invite you to kick the tires on this idea with me.  Let's pretend that God(Higher Power, Spirit, Universe, Big Mind, etc.) Really doesn't care what we 'Do' and loves us no matter what.  I know it's radical, but go with me for a minute.  What if there was no such thing as getting it right?  And in turn there was no such thing as getting it wrong either.  What if all you had to go on, was that some result will come from this decision?  Let's also assume that you don't know what the future holds.  Often times that's what people are trying to do when they are shoulding themselves, they are attempting to know the future in advance, and unless you are a very gifted psychic, the best I can say is, good luck with that.

So, if we can't get it right, we can't get it wrong, and we don't know the future outcome what criteria do we use?  Well the most useful thing I've come across is, 'what would you like to do?'  What appeals to you?  What does your inner wisdom tell you?

Even though I don't believe we can really get it right, one of my favorite questions to ask myself in the moment is 'does this feel right, for me, for now?'

What if it was as simple as asking yourself, what do I want to do?  Now let me make a distinction before we go any further.  Let's distinguish between want, and feel like.  If I based every decision in my life on the criteria of what will feel good, my life would be a train wreck.  We don't always feel like doing the things that we really want to do.  Because our feelings change with our mood, and they are constantly shifting.

For example, I usually want to exercise, but I don't always feel like it.  I usually want to connect more with my family, but I don't always feel like it.  I usually want to call more people to talk to them about coaching, but I don't always feel like it.

Here's another really important element in making decisions.  Often times they seem so daunting because we think they are final.  There are very few decisions in life where we can't actually go back and say, 'you know what, I changed my mind.'  When you know that, it sure takes the pressure off.  Because if you know it's not absolutely 100% final, you're going to be much more peaceful as you make that decision.  And good internal states, always make for better decision making. Another way to say this is that what you decide is almost never as important as how you handle the consequences of that decision.  So if you take a job and realize it's not right for you, you can look for another one, or you can sit around and mope for the next 20 years.  If you ask someone out on a date and realize they are not the person for you, you can either continue dating them and resenting them, or you can end it and chalk it up as a learning experience.

Here's the last useful piece to the decision making puzzle.  Make sure you are paying attention to where you are making the decision from; and I'm not asking if you are making the decision from your home, or from work.  I'm speaking about our internal state.

A Course In Miracles says there are really only two different places we can come from, Love or Fear.  Always, always, but only always, check in with yourself and ask, 'am I making this decision out of fear, or from a place of love, well-being, and peace?'  If it's from love rest assured that it will be as good a decision as you can make in that moment.  If it's from fear, wait until you return to love.  One of the most useful things I've learned throughout my life and in working with other people is that when we make decisions in a panicked, rushed, or urgent state, they are almost always poor decisions.

So remember, always check in with love.  Some people call this intuition, insight, or inner wisdom.  The Quakers call it the still, small voice within.  Be sure to check in with that deeper place inside yourself. You might just find that it presents itself remarkably like common sense.

If you really do need an answer in a quick pinch, ask yourself, what would love do? (or read my past article titled 'What Would Love Say')

Until next week,

Love and Light,
Coach Ty

What If You Were 'The One'?

“You’re in business to spread love.  Your screenplay should spread love.  Your hair salon should spread love.  Your agency should spread love.  Your life should spread love.  The key to a successful career is realizing that it’s not separate from the rest of your life, but is rather an extension of your most basic self.  And your most basic self is love.                                  -Marianne Williamson

I'd like to start today's tip with a story from Michael Neill's book, Feel Happy Now. This is an old spiritual teaching story, but I particularly like his version.

"Many years ago (or so the story goes), in a time of great war and consternation, there was a monastery which had fallen upon hard times. There were few monks left and they tended to squabble amongst themselves. Everyone was convinced their path was the right path and the peaceful ways of the past seemed little more than a dream. 

In a last-ditch attempt to save the monastery, the abbot went to seek the wisdom of an old rabbi who was reputed to have great wisdom and insight into the ways of men. 

When the abbot told the rabbi of the situation, the rabbi shook his head with great concern. ‘It is imperative that you find a way to resolve this situation before it is too late,’ said the rabbi. ‘For what you do not realize is that among you is the One who will deliver us all from fear into love.’ 

The abbot asked who among them was the One, but the rabbi would tell him no more. On the way back to the monastery, he wondered who the One could be. ‘I bet it’s Brother Arthur,’ he thought to himself. ‘He is kind and good. Or perhaps it is Brother Thomas – he is young but already shows great wisdom. Or could it be … no … I mustn’t even consider that it might be me!’ 

On his return, the abbot shared the news with the monks. While they were startled, there was the ring of truth to what the abbot had said. The One was amongst them! 

As they contemplated which of them it might be, the monks began to treat one another with a very special reverence and respect. After all, someone among them might really be the One. And, on the off-chance that each monk himself might be the One, they began to treat themselves with extraordinary respect and reverence as well. 

As time went by, the monks developed a gentle, loving quality about them which was hard to quantify but easy to notice. They lived respectfully, in harmony with themselves and nature. An aura of respect and reverence seemed to radiate out from them and permeate the atmosphere. There was something strangely attractive, even compelling about it. 

Before long, people were coming from far and wide to be nourished by the life of the monks, and young men were asking to become a part of their community. Within a few short years, the monastery had once again become home to a thriving order – a vibrant centre of light and spirituality in the world."

I think this story provides beautiful insight into what  a simple shift in perception can do to our energy as well s behavior.  As Wayne Dyer says, "When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change."  and I would take it one step further: when you change the way you see your fellow human beings, they will transform before your very eyes.

Imagine for a moment that your romantic partner was, the One, in disguise.  How would your experience of them change?  What would you do and say differently?

What if your children, friends, co-workers, clients, and patients were, the One?  What would transform?

What if the stranger you bumped into on the bus, or the homeless person begging on the street was, the One?  How would you treat them?  How would you look at them?

Finally, I want you to imagine that You are the One, sent to move the world from fear to love.  How would you live?  How would you treat yourself?  How would you treat others?  What would you spend your time doing?  What would you make your life about?


Weekly Coaching Experiment:

• This week I want to invite you to treat everyone you come into contact with, including yourself, as if they were 'the One' in disguise(feel free to substitute whatever spiritual language you would like here, Jesus, Buddha, God, Avatar, etc)
• Notice how they shift, change, and transform as a result
• Finally, notice how you shift, change, and transform as a result.  If you like it, keep it up!

Until next week,

Love and Light,

Tyler

The Source of All Fear

"If you realize that all things change, there is nothing you will try to hold onto.  If you aren't afraid of dying, there is nothing you can't achieve."

-Lau Tzu

The number one thing holding people back from living bold, passionate, fulfilling lives, is FEAR.  Take a moment to look in your own life... where does fear stop you? Does it stop you from taking action, does it stop you from having certain conversations, does it stop you from taking certain actions... or does it stop you from even considering creating something new. If you're having trouble locating fear, just look in the opposite direction, look at where you are stopped in life, and I can pretty much guarantee if you dig enough, you'll find some fear.

We're scared of lots of things really.  The Fear of falling, fear of spiders, fear of airplanes, fear of rejection, fear of pain, fear of loss, fear of poverty, fear of what others will think, fear of confrontation, and fear of disease.  The list could go on and on, but you get the idea.

Let's take a look at what fear is.  Fear is another one of those processes that we talk about as if it was a thing. In linguistics this is known as a nominalization.  So there is actually a process or 'strategy' that we go through in order to scare ourselves.  Usually it involves an external trigger, although it is not necessary.  Then we go up into our heads and make big scary pictures or movies of things that we've learned to be frightened of.  There is also often times a scary voice narrating the movies in our heads to add an extra layer of fear.  Finally we feel it in our bodies.  Increased heart rate, tightness in the chest, dry mouth, and a rush of adrenaline.

In essence, fear is created 100% through our thoughts.  If we couldn't think, we wouldn't experience fear.  This is of course usually a very unconscious process.  We're not usually sitting up in our heads saying, okay it's time to be scared let's access a fear thought.  I know... I'll think of a bear mauling me, or being pushed off a cliff, or my mother in law calling.  No, it happens in a split second, but if you're feeling afraid, and you look, you'll find the thoughts behind the fear.

Okay, so now that we've cleared  up that fear isn't a result of circumstances it's a result of our thinking about circumstances, now it's time to look at the usefulness of fear.  Is it useful?    Fear is used in an attempt to either motivate us or an attempt to keep us safe.  I want to challenge the usefulness of both of those uses.

Let's explore motivation.  Look at where you are using fear in your life to move yourself forward.  It often sounds something like, "If I just scare myself enough, I'll go get a better job, or relationship, or body." First of all, how's that workin' for you?  I'm guessing that it's not.  However, if it is helping you move toward what you want, guess what? You get to live in fear!

Fear is just not a great strategy for motivation.  I'm personally a big fan of inspiration.  Create such a compelling vision for your future that you can't help but move toward it.  And guess what, inspiration feels good.

Okay, the second of the two uses of fear is safety.  Most people will argue with me up and down that if they weren't afraid they'd go do something stupid or crazy.  My question is always, why do you think that having no fear would suddenly make you stupid?  There is a distinction here worth making, which is worry vs. awareness of danger.  What most people think of as fear, is really just superstition or worry.  Those worries are made up, extremely unlikely, worst case scenarios in our heads, that we use to apparently keep ourselves safe.  So we have worry, and then we have the awareness of danger, which looks remarkably like common sense.  For instance, if I am standing on the edge of a cliff, I don't need worry fear to keep me from jumping, I just need to have the awareness that if I jump, I will likely die or be very badly injured.  Similarly, when I'm cooking, I don't need to be afraid of the burners on the stove in order for me to not put my hands on them.  I'm simply aware of the consequences. The awareness of danger is extremely useful, worry is not.  Here is my favorite analogy about worry that I first heard from one of my mentors, Michael Neill:

Imagine you are walking along, and you see this guy who's swinging a tiger by the tail.  This is obviously very strange so you ask him very curiously, 'hey what are you doing?'  

And of course he says, 'What does it look like I'm doing, I'm swinging a tiger by the tail.'  

'Well, yeah I can see that, but why?'  you ask.   

He says, 'Oh, it's to keep away the lions.'   

So you look around and of course see no lions, so you very astutely point out, 'but there are no lions.'   

And the guy says, 'see, it's working!'

That analogy sums up worry in a nutshell.  It's like, well, I'm having all these scary thoughts, and nothing really bad has actually happened yet, so they must be working to keep me safe.

The reality is, worry-fear actually decreases our intelligence and our resourcefulness.  Imagine for a moment that you've got this math problem that you've got to solve, and it's pretty complicated but it's within your skill level of doing.  So in the first case scenario you are doing it because you love math and want to improve your skills.  Now imagine the second scenario, somebody comes to you and says they have kidnapped your family and if you don't solve this math problem correctly and soon, they are going to be killed.  Which scenario are you going to have more facility and creativity? Would you perform better or worse without the fear?  If you really thought about it, of course you'd do better without the nerves, because you're head is not clouded up with all the fear thoughts.  You can actually focus on the task at hand.

Now that you can hopefully see that, what people normally think of as fear, which is worry, is not particularly useful.  It rarely keeps us motivated, and even then, it's not sustainable or enjoyable.  And we don't need it to keep us safe.  How can we begin to decrease the amount of fear in our life?

Because fear comes from our thinking, changing our circumstances isn't really going to help much.  Of course, if you are living under constant threat of attack, then you might want to do something about that. However, if you're reading this, I'm willing to guess that that isn't really a concern for you right now.

That then leads us to cultivating a couple of understandings.  The first understanding I mentioned already, which is to just recognize fear for what it is, thought.  I'm not suggesting you try to control your thoughts, or wrestle your fear thoughts to the ground in a choke hold when they try to enter your head, because all of those things tend to make the fear bigger and even more significant.  All I'm suggesting to begin to alleviate your fear is to make a practice of recognizing your thinking for just that, thought; not reality.  And remember, I'm not saying your fears have no basis in reality, it's just that they aren't useful, in fact they are often harmful and get in the way of you creating a wonderful life for yourself.

The second realization is that if you trace almost any fear thought back to it's origins, you will continually bump into the fear of your own physical demise.  In other words, the fear of death is the root of all fears.  For example a simple digression might be.  My fear of rejection comes from my fear of being alone, and my fear of being alone comes from my fear of not being able to cope, and if I couldn't cope, and I'm afraid of not being able to cope because I'm afraid to die!  Or something like that.

The moral of the story, much like the quote at the beginning of this article, as long as you are afraid to die, your life will be relatively full of fear.

What is there to do?  Make peace with the fact that all of our bodies will stop working some day.  George Bernard Shaw once said, “Be Patient with the poor people who think they will live forever, which makes death a division instead of a bond.”

In my experience, it is worth spending time in your life, making peace with the fact that you are going to die someday and you don't know when.  I believe it was the old Samurai culture where they began every day saying 'today is a good day to die'.  It's not a wishing for death, but more of an acknowledgement and a peace making of what is the truth.  Because the reality is, we just don't know when our time is up.

Now I know that the affirmation 'I'm going to die someday and I don't know when' might not be at the top of your list of positive things to say to yourself... but what if it was?  Imagine how your life might be different.  If you were fully aware that you are going to die someday and you don't know when, would you keep putting off making amends with a loved one, or asking your partner to marry you?  If I'm going to die someday and I have no idea when, am I going to stay in this job that I hate because it's safe and it has good benefits?  If we are all going to die someday, and we don't know when, is there any reason to not tap into as much joy and connection and service as we possibly can in each moment?

My invitation to you is to spend some time with this.  It's not an over-nighter. You might be asking yourself, how do I make peace with the end?  And, for me it was by exploring how it might not be the end.  How, in fact, it might be the real beginning.  Death may be as simple as walking in one world, to walking in another.  However you find peace with it, will be up to you, but it is absolutely a worthwhile endeavor.  It may take you on journey's you never could have imagined.

For me personally, I find myself taking more time to breathe, connecting more authentically, experiencing more vividly, and loving more deeply than I ever did before.  I find myself not worrying so much about what other people think and more about what my inner wisdom is telling me.  I find myself with more compassion for the human condition, and wanting to share insights.  I spend less time in the past and the future, and more time in the only moment we every have, right now.  And maybe, just maybe, if you explore for yourself and get out of your head and into your heart, you'll discover what I did.  That the world isn't so scary, in fact, it's only as scary as our thoughts.

Love and Light,
Tyler

Unconditional Acceptance

"I know everybody loves me, I just don't expect them to know that."

-Byron Katie

This weeks tip is in response to one of my best friends asking me to share with him my thoughts on 'acceptance'.  He's compiling a book of people's past experiences of feeling accepted or not, its significance in their lives, and what they've learned about it over the years. If you are inspired to do so, write about your own experience, contact me, and I'll put you in contact with him to so he can consider your entry for his book.

Early on in my life as a child I really struggled with this whole notion of acceptance.  I really wanted everybody to like me, and so I would often times pretend to be somebody I wasn't in order to get that.  Over time I learned, that it actually kept me somewhat safe, however it also fueled my sense of being alone and disconnected from the world.  As I made my way through college and began studying different modalities for personal transformation, my perception began to shift.  I now realize the importance of being unconditionally accepted within a community, as well as being able to authentically express ourselves in the world.

As a coach and really just a human being, here's the best of what I've learned so far about being and feeling Accepted.

Let's first take a look at what it is to be accepted.  My trusty dictionary defines 'accepted' as:

Generally approved; usually regarded as normal, right, etc.

This definition fits what people generally think of as being accepted.  They just want approval, or to be considered normal; however, my experience tells me there is much more to it than that.  Let's dive a little deeper, shall we?

When we have the desire to be accepted, we don't usually stop to think about what we want to be accepted for.  Do you want acceptance for the way that you dress, for your body shape and size, for what you own, what you say, what you do, how much money you have, or for just being a human being?  And how many people do you need to be accepted by before you can be okay? Is it 1, 2, 5, 10, 100, or 1,000.  Or are you stuck in the trap of thinking you need everybody you come into contact with to accept you?  If so, do you know anybody who has ever actually pulled that off?  If you stopped to think about it, would you really want everybody on the planet to like you and want to spend time with you?

Another thing worth considering on this subject is, do you accept yourself?  Do you have your own approval?  If not, what do you think you have to change about yourself before you can accept yourself?

One of my favorite theories for why we have this hardwired desire for approval and acceptance from others, dates back to when we lived in tribes.  The harsh reality of living in a tribe was you had a pretty high degree of dependence on the other members of the tribe to pull their weight, and work together so that you could all survive.  If you ended up being rejected by the tribe, you would be cast out, and left to fend for yourself, which in most cases meant certain death.  So if being accepted by the people around you feels like life or death, it's because historically it was.  The only problem is, that's not really true anymore.

Now, don't get me wrong, I'm a big fan of being accepted; just not at the expense of my own authentic expression.  Having a community of people that love you and accept you for who you really are is a beautiful thing.  But, if you have to put on a front or a fake persona to be liked, then you may want to question the people who's acceptance you are seeking?  Are they really your friends if you have to do that?

Here's the problem with pretending to be somebody you are not, in order to be accepted by others.  You aren't actually being accepted!  A fake version of you is accepted, but not the real you.  So, you don't actually get what you want, and you have to fake it.  Here's the other problem.  So long as you are putting on a false persona, you never even give people to opportunity to accept you for who you really are, so you end up ensuring that it never happens.  Because even if people accept you, you're always left wondering, 'if they knew the truth, would they still love and accept me?'

Sure you could be turned down, or told to go away, but there are 6 billion people on this planet; I think you could find somebody who appreciates you for your authentic self, could you not?  Wouldn't you rather be you, and loved and accepted. That way, you don't have to walk around feeling like a fraud, and you can rest easy knowing that people get to meet the real you. This is how you get to experience real, genuine love and acceptance.  That means, true acceptance can't actually occur unless you are showing up as your authentic self.

Let's take a quick look at the other side of the equation now, which is your acceptance of others.  The beautiful thing about acceptance, is you don't have to wait until you run into human beings that fit your criteria before you can accept them. We all have the capacity to accept anybody for exactly who they are in the moment.  Even if they are behaving in a way that you don't like, you can still accept them as doing the best they know how to do, given what they've been through and their current perceptions of the world.  Accepting somebody for who they are isn't saying, It's okay what you are doing; it's saying I love and accept you as a fellow human being doing the best you know how to do.  Accepting yourself and others is a choice we have available to us in every single moment.

So for today, just as an experiment, what if you gave the people around you the gift of unconditional acceptance and love?  What a rare and beautiful gift that truly is.

This is a process that I'm still learning and practicing every day.  Some days, I still want to hide and pretend I'm somebody I'm not.  Some days I'm incredibly judgmental and don't want to accept anybody; but more and more I understand that neither of those options is ultimately serving me.  So my invitation to you is to begin practicing today, knowing that it's a life long experiment.  Rest assured that you can't get it wrong and you can only get better.  

Act and speak from your essential self today, knowing that you are giving people the opportunity to accept the real you, and giving yourself the opportunity for real love.

Weekly Coaching Experiment:

1. Think of somebody you care about who you haven't been completely yourself around.
2. Know that they can't truly love and accept you unless you stop pretending
3. Keep in mind if they don't like the real you, there are 6 Billion more people to go connect with and it is most likely not actually a life or death situation.
4. Speak or take action from your authentic self around this person when you are next in contact with them.
5. Notice how often, people love and respect you for being who you really are around them.
6. Let the ones who don't, fall away. They're not your real friends.
7. Finally, take one minute to give yourself love and acceptance for being your authentic self! Wahoo!

Love and Light,

Tyler

Clean Requests

"You can have anything you want in life if you are willing to ask 1,000 people for it"

 -Byron Katie

When it comes to having what we want in life, the most powerful tool we possess is the ability to ask for it.  It never ceases to amaze me how often we are only a couple clean requests away from having what we want. Whether it is asking for a raise, asking a client to hire you, or asking your partner to mary you, you are much more likely to actually get the results you want if you ask for them.  Equally amazing, is how unwilling we are to actually make those requests. Let's look at this a little closer.

The best book I've ever read on the power of asking is The Aladdin Factor by Jack Canfield and Mark Victor Hansen.  In this coaching article, I'm going to be introducing some of the key factors outlined in this book.  If you'd like to explore these ideas further, I highly recommend you read the book.

The first question worth asking is, why are we so unwilling to make requests for what we want?  The Aladdin Factor, highlights five primary reasons people don't make requests:

1. Ignorance: We don't ask because we don't know what to ask for, we don't know what's possible, we don't know what we really want, and we don't know how to ask.
2. Limiting and Inaccurate Beliefs: We don't ask because we don't believe it will do any good, because we believe we shouldn't have to, and because we believe we will be taking advantage of somebody else.
3. Fear: We don't ask because we are afraid of rejection, what others will think, what others will do, and what others will say.  We're afraid of what asking will mean about us: we're stupid, we're weak, we're helpless, and we're a bad person.
4. Low Self-Esteem:  A lot of people in the world, in their heart of hearts, don't think much of themselves.  In turn, they don't believe their needs and wants are important or relevant so they don't ask for those things.  If you feel worthless, you're not likely to ask for what you want because. 
5. Pride:  This probably shows up more frequently for us guys, but we've all avoided asking for help or assistance because we don't want to appear a certain way to others.

This is a pretty compelling case for not asking.  However, there is an even more compelling case for asking.  The odds of you actually creating what you want in your life goes through the roof.  

Here are some of the benefits of asking that Canfield and Hansen discuss in the book.

1. You Can Literally Ask For Anything: "You can ask for a hug, comfort, listening, forgiveness, attention, time, intimacy, caring, respect, love, nurturing, a massage, healing energy, prayers, an explanation, loyalty, sexual fidelity and a 100 percent commitment..." To name only a few.
2. You Will Take Control of your Life:  When you begin to ask for your needs and wants, you are moving from being a victim of life to a creator of your life experience.
3. You Will Have Better Business and Personal Relationships: We rarely get what we want in relationships when we don't actually ask for them, because believe it or not, people can't actually read our minds.
4. You Will Have and Give More Love:  It can be difficult to ask for more affection, more kindness, and more love because of the fear of rejection; but, love is worth it!
5. You Can Enrich Your Lifestyle: You can ask for things like an upgrade to a first class flight, or a better hotel room.  You can also ask for people to hire you and for more money for your services.  You never know, you might just get it.
6. You Will Maximize Your Talents and Skills:  Often times opportunities are created only when we ask for them.  So if you want to really get the most out of your gifts in life, ask, ask, ask.

This article is called Clean Requests because often times when people think they are making a request it is actually a demand or a threat in disguise.  It isn't clean.  For example, if you ask your partner to do the dishes, check if there is an unspoken "or else..." hidden at the end.  Much of the resistance that people have to being asked for something is that they feel pressured or pushed, and remember, when we are pushed, we push back.  So the next time you are wanting to make a request, first ask yourself if you are making it okay for them to say no.  A clean request means you are simply asking for what you want, neither a 'yes' or a 'no' means anything about you or the other person, and nothing about the relationship is at stake. If you want to be a master of asking, practice clean requests. 

Next, let's take a look at why we might get a 'no' to our clean request, and what that means.  There are essentially three different reasons that you will get a no, and this comes straight from another one of my favorite books, SuperCoach, by Michael Neill:

1. Other people's fear that you will make them hear something they don't want to hear or do something they don't want to do.
2. A lack of understanding about how what you're asking will be of benefit to them, either directly or indirectly.
3. A genuine awareness on their part that they don't want to be, do, or have what you are requesting

The beauty of all three of these is that none of them are personal.  If people are afraid, that's to do with their own thoughts and fears.  If people don't understand, than that's to do with their own lack of understanding, which you can address or not.  And if it's a genuine no, than it's nothing to do with you, it's simply them being aware of their own inner wanting and trusting that.   One of the most important realizations I've ever had, is that a 'no', is never personal. Receiving a no does not mean that you are somehow unworthy or have no value as a human being.  The reality is a 'no', is just a 'no', and doesn't mean anything about you unless you make up that it does. Your willingness to receive a 'no', will increase your willingness to ask.

Alright, so far we've explored why we don't ask, why it's worth asking, and why we might get a 'no' response and what that means. The last piece of the puzzle is looking at how to ask so that you maximize your chances of a yes.  I'm going to take this straight from The Aladdin Factor because I love how the authors put it:

1. Ask as if you expect to get it
2. Ask someone who can actually give it to you
3. Be clear and specific in your requests
4. Ask with humor and creativity
5. Ask from the heart
6. Be prepared to give something in order to get something
7. Ask repeatedly
8. Be gracious in accepting a 'no'

There is a lot of breadth vs. depth in this weeks article, so if you want more information, do check out the two books highlighted in this article.  This will get you started though; so get out there and start practicing your clean requests today.  You might just be surprised at how often people say yes.

Love and Light,

Coach Ty