From Covid Anxiety To A Compelling Future In 3 Steps | Ep 86

People seem to forget if you change today, today will change your life. Hello, welcome to the next episode of the Self Belief Chief podcast. You're here with life coach and author David Holman. And I think this is probably going to be one of the most important podcast episodes I'll ever do. At the moment, we've got this really unique situation in the world where people are struggling. I want to do something, I want to share something that seems to be working with my clients during this difficult time. And I've had to learn, I've had to learn how to be a better coach. I've had to learn how to provide even greater value for people. And I want to share some things to really help you with your well being at the moment, but also something that allows you to change people's lives yourself as well and create a positive ripple effect, hopefully from this particular episode where those difficult conversations you're having with family and friends, how you can make it easier for them as well, and that they can share what they learn and from you and etc. Etc. And that's why I say this might be one of the most important episodes I'll ever do. And I want to start with a story which I think kind of explains the, or describes the context and the environment at the moment when people, you know, people reach out to me each day. They schedule some time with me to speak on the phone before we agree whether to work together or not and to bring them on as a client. This one woman, she scheduled a call and I, you know, I rang her and the phone didn't even ring. She picked up straight away. Basically, she was waiting by the phone. She was that eager to speak to me, she was waiting by the phone and she was already in tears and she felt isolated, but it's one thing to be isolated. But something had happened in her life which was sort of quite life changing in multiple ways and she didn't really know what to do. And she came across my work and she just thought she wanted to have a conversation, see if I can make an impact. And she'd been speaking with a counselor through her work, but it wasn't really making a difference and it was just sort of a listening tool and she, she just needed something. We spoke for maybe an hour, hour and a half. I said to her, how has this conversation gone for you? She said, can I be honest with you, David? I said, yeah, of course you can. She said, I've, I've struggled for a long time and this, this madness at the moment, it keeps Me feeling isolated, I feel locked in. I'm sort of staring at the walls. I don't feel like I've got enough people around me. I don't feel like I've got the support right now. I don't have family nearby either even, you know, despite the fact I wouldn't be able to see them anyway. Just be nice to know that they're there. I felt quite alone. And I've been speaking to this counsellor and yet like it's okay, but it's not really impacting me or changing anything. She said, but speaking to you, I'm amazed at how good I feel right now. She said, I didn't realize that that subtle shift that we've created during this conversation. I have hope and I've not had hope for a very, very long time. And that's when I realized that maybe creating something for you where you have that same sensation of hope and what I call a compelling future. Something to actually look forward to, which is difficult at the moment, but is absolutely possible and absolutely within your control to do so. And so what I want to talk about is the three steps to overcoming this kind of anxiety around the coronavirus and build a compelling future future. Something that you can work on now and take action on now, even during isolation, that we are ready, that we could hit the ground running when life returns back to normal, whenever that is. But also take actions now that improve our well being now. So what I'm going to do is going to show you the exact strategy I use with my clients. And it comes in three really simple steps. Three really simple steps. The first thing is you have to break your pattern. You have to break your pattern. What do I mean by that? If we try and take action when we feel tired, when we feel stressed and we're slumped over and we don't feel good, and this and that and the other and the other. And just whatever kind of from that place, we're either not going to take action or the action is going to be poor or the decision making is going to be poor. And then that negatively impacts our life, obviously. Okay? So it doesn't make much sense. So we have to create a shift. I always call that mindset. I always call it the filter. The filter at which you see the world. And we've got to break the pattern that might keep you stuck in life. So how do you break the pattern? I'm going to share a few ways you can do it, multiple ways you can do it. But some of the best ways of this, a Radical shift in your body. When you move your body, it changes the blood flow. It changes the biochemistry in the body and therefore changes your mental state and also, you know, releases endorphins. It creates a completely different perspective. So you've immediately shifted the filter. You may have heard of power poses before. There was a study done by Harvard a while back. But for those of you who aren't familiar, power poses like Wonder Woman or, you know, imagine someone sat back in their chair, leaning back with their hands behind their head. Any of those sorts of poses, if you do those for just two minutes, increases your testosterone level by 20%. So the hormone related to confidence, it decreases your cortisol levels. Cortisol is the stress hormone by 18%. And you have a 33% greater chance of taking a riskier decision or a more important decision. In other words, something that can actually change your life rather than be too cautious. So that shift in your body is one way. A second way is to introduce something completely out of context. I had a client a while back, and they had a fear of public speaking. And all of a sudden I said, can you imagine a snake making the sound of a pigeon? They were like, what? I said, can you imagine a snake making the sound of a pigeon? David, what are you talking about? You know, a snake making the sound of a pigeon. They start laughing and they're like, this is so stupid. What are you talking about? This is the most ridiculous thing ever. I said, I know, but how much have you been thinking about public speaking right now? I'd completely broken their pattern. Previous to that, they'd just been talking in a very stressful state about public speaking. And now what they've, you know, told me, or they sent me an email saying every time they speak in public, they think of a snake making the sound of a pigeon first. And it just gets them laughing, and it gets them relaxed, and it makes them feel good. And it's the same thing as, like, thinking of people sitting in their underwear. It's completely just weird and out of context. Okay, a third way to break a pattern. Humor. Humor. Something that makes you laugh. Imagine that sensation you're feeling when you. When you laugh. It completely changes everything in the body. Humor, what you listen to, what you watch, who you speak to as well, who you're connecting with still via video or on the phone. Introduce humor. It's just such a powerful way to break your pattern. But here's a really, really simple one to do. A lot of people at the moment are focusing on what they don't want, I don't want to feel this way. I don't want this to happen. I don't want this person to say this. And actually, every day, it's not just right now, every day, in all situations, this is what people focus on. They focus on what they don't want. Because our brain is not designed to make you happy. It's designed to help you survive. Brain is not designed to make you happy, it's designed to help you survive. At the beginning of time, when you had fire and wild animals and, you know, constant threats to your lives, the brain had to be designed to help you survive, spot the dangers, spot the bad things, spot the negatives, things that might impact you so that you learn and understand and grow. So it's not designed to make you happy. So your brain is going to focus on the things that you don't want, so you learn and grow from those in it. You know, at some point that's been helpful for you, but it's not helpful for when you want to feel happy and improve your well being. So how do we shift our focus not onto what we don't want, but shift our focus to what we do want. So imagine right now if you sat down with a pen and paper and I asked you the question, if in six months time, let's say you had everything that you wanted, your life was heaven, all the madness around the world had stopped as well, you just had heaven, what would that look like? And if you write those things down and it's in such specific detail as possible, and you keep asking yourself the question, what else, what else, what else? Because most people write one or two things down, but then I go, what else? They write another thing down, what else? A fourth. Turns out there's 10 things. Write all those things down and then tell me how you feel. Because you're simply focusing on what you do want, not what you don't want, that's a really good way of shifting and breaking your pattern. So any of those ideas to summarize in terms of breaking your pattern, first we've got to break your pattern. Shift your body, introducing our context, humor. Shift your focus. All of those things will break your pattern and imagine doing those things together. So let's just take three. For example, if you shifted your body, that there was something that made you laugh at the same time and therefore shifted your focus as well. So radical shifting your body was introducing something that gives you, you know, makes you laugh. And shift your focus in terms of what you do want. I mean, you'd be a completely different person within 10 seconds. And from that place, once we've broken that pattern, we can move on to the second step, which is selecting a strategy. What area of your life would you like to improve right now? Whatever your life could you work on or make a plan for? At least put a plan in place. Do you want to grow your social circles? Do you want a new job? Do you want to make more money? Do you want to be in this relationship? What is, what goal do you have? Do you want to go on more adventures in the future? Whatever it is that would really change your life if you got massive results in it. Select a strategy in that area, adopt it over the long term. Most people will go, I've tried everything. You know, in health and fitness, for example, people want to lose weight. I've tried everything. I go, okay, well, you know, tell me what you've worked on. Okay, I've only, I've worked on three things. Okay, tell me. Okay, maybe I worked on this one thing. I tried it for a week, it kind of worked. Didn't really work, and then I gave up. We tell ourselves a story that we've tried everything so we have an excuse for not getting the results that we want. Get rid of the excuse and you can put a plan in place. And there will be things even from home that you can do right now that can move that goal further, you know, move that goal and get us closer to that goal. So just do one thing. There was a study that was done that basically said if we adopt one commitment at a time, we have a 90% chance of turning it into a habit. In other words, something we don't think about, just do it, okay? And that's what we want. But if we introduce two commitments at a time, we only have a 33% chance of keeping one of them. See, the reality is we try and do too many things at once and then we don't really stick with any of them and then we kind of give up. But if you just pick one strategy, one strategy that we know works, and adopt it over a long term period, we say, you know, whatever happens, I'm going to do it for the next four weeks, I'm going to do it for the next eight weeks, I'm going to do it for the next three months, six months, whatever, I'm gonna keep it up because it's not gonna work straight away. But if I stick with will work. And let me give you an analogy to really, you know, nail this home. Imagine having a picture of what you wanted a literal picture, a painting of life being magnificent. Imagine that. And imagine that it hangs up on the wall. Okay, now all that picture needs is one nail. That nail is your strategy. Okay, that picture just needs one nail. But people act like they just random, you know, in life. They go, I'll pick this strategy. Pick the strategy, pick the strategy. Oh, no, this didn't work. This didn't work. They try all these different things in a really short space of time. That would be like randomly hitting your hammer all over the place, hoping that you might hit the nail. Select one nail. Because if you don't keep hitting that nail on the head with the hammer over and over again, the picture won't stay up in the wall. Where you can see will be on the floor and it won't be in your line of sight. One nail, one strategy, and hit it over and over and over again. And that is all that is needed to hold at that picture. So you can see it every day and you can focus on what you want. Okay, but some of you might be saying, yeah, but David, what. How do I know what the right strategy is? Here's something really simple that you could do whatever area of life you're looking to improve in, and you've got the Internet, right? Books, Internet people, you know, whatever. Find the five people that do it best, whatever it is, find the five people that do it best and cross reference what they do. Okay, what do each of them say? What are the three things each of them say? Okay, what's the common denominator? What's the. What's the thing that lines up with all of them? Then select that thing. You know, if it's. If you can summarize it and say three points, here's what all of them do in three points. And then adopt that as your strategy. And you know that will work for you. So if you want to succeed in anything, that's something that you can do. Happiness and fulfillment, however, is more of a unique thing, unique to all of us. And so you need a strategy to help you find. If you want happiness and fulfillment, you need four GS. A goal, growth, gratitude, and giving. Okay? So that's the secret for that. So if you want to succeed at something, you want to model it, you want to look at what other people do. But if it turns a. Happiness and fulfillment, get a goal, find some growth, be grateful and give more. Okay, so those are the things you do to. So to summarize that second point. So first point, we've got to break the pattern. The second point is we've got to select a strategy, model what others are doing. Select a strategy and adopt just one strategy and then adopt it in the long term and stick with it. That's how you get massive results and massive growth and massive progress. And here's the real beauty of life. And we move to the third and final step. Here's the real beauty of life. Share your success. People want to know what you know, they need what you know. In some cases people will pay for what you know. But right now people really need help. And I can do as much as I can from here, but also I want to help people so that they are a positive influence on, on their loved ones, on their community. And the best way you can do that is share what you learn. That strategy, you've broken your pattern. Then you select a strategy and with that strategy, what are the lessons that you learn and how can you share those things with other people? How can you share your success and how to do something with other people so that they can improve their lives, so that they can have less pain, so that they can do it in quicker time, Whatever's required, whatever they need. What do you know so from what strategy you're going to adopt? Then work out your lessons and learnings and teachings and teach it to other people. That is how you will have amazing sense of value and significance and importance from this world and can give and can contribute to other people. Instead of help, instead of being in your own head, help someone else instead. That's what I always say, instead of being in your own head, help someone else instead. Because there are people all over this world, many of who you'll think, I'm worse off than you are right now, get out of your head and help someone instead. The big thing is, I think for a lot of people at the moment is they're having conversations with loved ones and friends and points where they are struggling emotionally and they might be a bit teary eyed and as an individual you don't know what to say to them. Every form of communication is one of two E's. Empathy or expectation. Empathy or expectation. Have a think about it. Either we're showing a caring and an understanding or you know, there's an. Or it's an expectation in terms of an ask or a suggestion or you know, they should do this or a critique or whatever. Even if we don't say anything to the other person, the person reacts and we have an expectation in terms of, oh, they should have reacted like this. No, they shouldn't talk to me like this. They should talk to me like that. No, actually, they shouldn't react like this. They should react like this instead. In our mind, we have expectations of how everyone else should be. And if we lead with expectations and we lead with judgment, we not only does it affect the other person if we share that expectation, but it affects us because we then judge how we are, if we're good enough, and our results based on are people going to respond the way we expect them to, and if they don't, then we go, there's something wrong with us. I want you to think more often, not just in this time, but generally going forward with your communication. At points there is going to be expectations. Expectations aren't always a bad thing. That's sometimes a part of life. But can you try and lead more often with empathy? In other words, simply put, this way, a really simple way to remember this. Whatever conversation you're going to have, even if there's going to be something part of that conversation where it's going to be about expectation, lead with this. I understand if they're, you know, responding in a negative way or they're emotional, if they're sad or whatever, I understand why you'd feel like that. And I understand that you've got this going on and this going on. You can completely disarm people with empathy. And people need empathy right now more than you probably realize. Because in your own moments, in your own time, in your moments in the dark when you're working behind closed doors and you have those down moments when many, many, many, many people are having exactly the same moments. So they really need empathy right now. So go with empathy. Go with empathy. I understand. Show them that understanding and then have the conversation. Now, what I want you to do is for the people in your life who are struggling and you don't know what to say, I want you to do the following. Because this is what. Just to simplify even more, this is. This is really how you can make a difference in people's lives. I want you to lead with empathy. I want you to say, I understand. And the second thing I want you to do is go, you know, I've been thinking about how my life would look if life was amazing when all this coronavirus stuff is over. And actually, you know, imagine in six months time or whatever time period, in six months time, if my life was heaven, it would look like this. And I would have this, and this would be. This would be there, and this would be there, and this would be there. And Then ask them and then go, you know, it really makes me feel different. It makes me feel better. And then ask them, you know, if. Imagine if in six months time, you, life was just great and you had everything you wanted and you had heaven there, what would that look like for you? It's not an intrusive or interrogative question. And yet the other person go start to think about the things that they do want, and they'll feel a shift and they'll feel an emotional change, and you'll have done that for them. That's one really simple thing you can take from this podcast. If someone is emotional and you don't know what to say to them, tell them, I understand. And then get them to think about what would life look like if it was amazing right now? And the thing is, once they do that, it's an amazing thing because once they list all that down, all of a sudden it doesn't feel like it's an impossibility. The things that they want, they are absolutely possible. I understand. And then shift their focus with, where would you like to be in six months if everything was amazing? And give them a break from focusing on the things that they don't want. And that little break is a break in pattern. And that little break is what they're missing at the moment. It's what you're missing at the moment. It's what we're all missing. So I spend a lot of time working on myself in terms of keeping that picture, as I spoke about that picture up on the wall and hitting that nail to keep that picture up every single day. Because I know that if you keep hitting that nail on the head with that strategy so that you keep that picture on the wall so that you can see that picture every day, one day that picture will be a reality. My name is David Holman. If you change today, today will change your life. So enjoy the rest of your day. Enjoy the rest of your life. I hope to see you on the next episode.