There comes a time when we have to relinquish who we think we are; to leave behind the person behind the masks. Masks keep you fear filled. Creates knots in your belly. They stop you from living a full life. It then usually means that you are not fully seen, you don’t bring all of yourself to whatever you are doing.

As I understand it, living this way is no picnic. Masks can be so burdensome, don’t you think? Constantly slipping, but we have a sense of when we want to let it go, like when the effort that it takes to hold it in place outstrips the effort to let it go.

For those of us longing to step out from behind the masks, there is usually a longing. There is usually a knowing that where you are is not where you are meant to be. Do you recognise the feeling?

I too have lived in that space. In fact, I know it intimately. When “the knowing” came, I knew that in order to live my most authentic life, it would require me to change, to embrace fierce self honesty, and to stare into the barrel of my own being. Over the years I had tried to do much of it by myself. I would take a one dimensional snapshot of my challenges and work on that. I would make some headway, but it was always limited. I found myself achieving goals, but not building lasting competences that held me.

I found out that looking at anything one dimensionally is extremely limiting. Life happens on multiple levels, domains and streams. You could say that when I began to view my challenges from multiple angles and perspectives, an amazing unfolding happened. I began to manage challenges differently and with more skill, I could establish clarity quickly and release that which was not serving my life. Self-deception disappeared and I developed increased competence in all areas of my life.

This journey, I privately call the “Warrior’s journey”, but through it all, I have been and continue to be held with tremendous skill, kindness and support.

It is this which I now bring to you; the gift of Integral Coaching. This is a way of exploring your emotions, attitudes, thoughts, feelings and intentions from multiple perspectives, enabling you to bring all of yourself to your life as authentically as possible.

In a world where being super busy is glorified, Downtime is where you create your Power so you can live from that place.

First you must plant seeds that can form roots and grow.  If you take the example of planting a tree, you bury its seed in the soil so that it can germinate where it is dark, quiet and solitary.  The seed is nourished by the nutrients in the ground.  The time in the soil is vital for the growth and development of the tree to be; Yes?  Everything the tree to be requires, for its potential journey above ground is being put in place at the start of its growth.  Below ground, it is taking root, nourishing itself from the nutrients in the soil, absorbing the rain that falls and the sun that shines.  All of those things prepares the tree to experience life above ground with its rain, winds, frost and snow.

And so it is that when we put aside time to meditate, pray, contemplate and learn, we are creating the roots of our own personal Power so we can be emotionally, psychologically and spiritually nourished.  We stop glorifying Busy and spend time Being as opposed to Doing.  Stopping in order to BE, provides for fresh insights and revelations to happen, to still the mind and actually notice what is happening in our inner world.  Since our inner world shapes our outer world (thoughts happen first, before action), it makes sense to cultivate the roots of our Personal Power by just making time to stop.  I can promise you that whatever happens outside of you happened inside first.  Chaos without is very often an indication of chaos within.  In a world where there is so much pressure to stay informed and be in the know, make time to Know thyself first and foremost.

  

According to Stem Cell Biologist, Dr. Bruce Lipton, a prominent and highly respected cell researcher, “Stress is the cause of at least 95% of all disease.”

http://www.synergies-journal.com/synergies/2015/3/30/bruce-lipton-the-biology-of-belief

In a stressful situation, your body gets ready for emergency action, causing certain hormones to flood your system. This “fight or flight” reaction increases your blood pressure, breathing and heart rate.

Fight or flight literally squeezes the blood away from your vital organs to your arms and legs in readiness for action (usually ‘flight’).  A natural product of our evolution, this response was very important for our ancient ancestors who faced real “life or death” situations.

The problem is, modern man’s common relationship issues, job problems, and financial difficulties are unnecessarily eliciting this same chemical cocktail of harmful hormones.  Even worse, because these aren’t true fight or flight situations, we often “suck it up” and internalise the stress, making us feel helpless and powerless, surging our systems with even more nasty stuff.

Long-term stress (chronic) can exhaust your entire nervous system, releasing cortisol and adrenaline in a vicious cycle, eventually causing you to “burn out.” The result? You age faster, your immune system weakens, and your vital brain tissue shrinks.

Soon, anxiety and depression set in, causing you to seek out an escape mechanism (usually an addiction). Without an effective stress antidote, things can spiral further out of control, opening the door up to disease of all types.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RBvIPxZmW_s

Meditation is the Key. From physically changing the structure of the brain (neuroplasticity), to releasing stress neutralising chemicals, to quieting the anxiety-creating mind-chatter, here’s how meditation can work as the very best stress-neutralising tool.

A swimmer who has trained himself to do 20 lengths of the pool is unphased by a now petty 3 lengths that seemed difficult in his first week. Likewise, practicing meditation regularly will also push your mental and emotional thresholds to higher limits. The stress that once left you anxious, depressed, and possibly reaching for your favourite escape mechanism (meds, alcohol) will simply not carry anywhere near the same weight as before.

In addition, all of the anxiety and depression, building up over your lifetime gets melted away, session by session, layer by layer – even if you have tried everything else without success. In the end, your “nerves of steel” will be impenetrable to stress and all of its nasty side effects.

 

Meditate for GREATER HEALTH.

“Don’t just do something, Sit there”!

Meditation strengthens our “inner-Rocky-Balboa”.  What is that? Well its your Anterior Cingulate Cortex (ACC); responsible for pain resistance, willpower, motivation, focus, clarity and emotional resilience.  This powerful brain region ticks all the gritty, mentally toughness boxes.

Then, to increase grit, strengthen the ACC, right?

RIGHT! The University of Montreal researchers (Grant et al) compared the brains of 17 experienced meditators to 18 “normal” brains. What did they find?

The meditators’ brains had much “thicker” grey matter in the Anterior Cingulate Cortex (ACC), with the degree of thickness of grey matter linked to years of mediation experience.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20141301

In other words, meditation fortifies the brain’s “grit” center.

Harnessing the power of meditation to literally “grow” and strengthen the “grittiest” brain region of all takes the idea of a “growth mindset” to a whole new level. Neuroplasticity is a powerful thing.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2944261/?_escaped_fragment_=po=77.2727

Many leaders and chief executives are often frustrated by how their personal effectiveness is perceived by their teams. This frustration is amplified by not knowing how to take this hurdle.

Do you wish to know THE scientifically proven predictor of outstanding leadership?

Recently, I worked with a chief executive who had poor interpersonal relationships with his direct reports. He relied solely on intellectual knowledge and ignored all other resources available to him.

Above all, he was unable to see himself objectively. He was unable to observe both his own emotions and those of others.

What he urgently needed was to use his Cognitive Intelligence together with Emotional Intelligence. The combination of these two modes of understanding leads to outstanding leadership.

Why was this exposure to Emotional Intelligence necessary for this person?
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Do you know one of the best predictors of success at work and personal fulfillment in life?

Here is what happened when I worked with a chief executive to build a greater level of personal awareness, which in turn transformed his level of effectiveness in leading his organisation.

For 12 months we worked on mastering mental and emotional processes.

I trained him in Mindfulness techniques to build his levels of self-awareness.

I trained him to enhance his abilities to monitor his own feelings and emotions and to observe those of others.

I taught him to enhance his abilities to self-correct unhelpful behaviours, to guide his own actions.

Briefly put, I worked with him on Mindfulness.

Why were those practices necessary?
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