THE DRAGON - FEAR IS JUST A THOUGHT

I love this story - I heard it told by Michael Neill and I think you'll enjoy it too.

Once upon a time there was a dragon. The dragon was incredibly fierce and the people of the land were terrified of it. They spent their lives in fear and did everything they could to avoid the dragon's bite. To keep themselves safe they built themselves castles to live in.

Some people built their castles out of money. The more money they got the higher their walls became and the safer they felt. Some built their castles out of respect, feeling that the more people respected them, the higher their walls would be and the harder it would be for the dragon to get them. Others built their castles out of fame. The more famous they became, the higher their walls grew and the safer they felt. The people spent every day in fear, running around trying to get more and more money, respect, fame etc to stay safe from the dreaded bite of the dragon.

But what if you woke one day and realised that there was no dragon? There would be no need to waste your time chasing after money, fame or respect. All that fear would simply disappear and you could live your life with freedom and joy. Fears are just thoughts. Drop the thought and the fear disappears. Try it - you will be amazed how liberating it feels.

BE WITH YOUR EMOTIONS

Here's a great distinction that I want to share with you. It has it's roots in Buddhism and has an important message for us all. I love it and it's something I think you'll really enjoy too.

So often when we feel negative emotions we describe them as if they were part of our identity. I often hear patients describe themselves by saying for example; "I am depressed" or "I am angry." These are identity statements and make it sound as if the emotion is all that they are. Someone who describes themselves as a depressive is so much more than their depression, likewise one who says "I am sad," has much more to them than their sadness.

Think instead of being with the emotion rather than being the emotion itself. For example, "I am with anger" makes the distinction between the person and the emotion much clearer. It also makes it easier to let go of the emotion and heal yourself.

This is a subtle distinction but sometimes that's all it takes to set someone back on track. When many of us have problems it's as if we are a stick that's floating down the river of life and become temporarily stuck. We don't need years of therapy - all most of us need is a little nudge. Think of coaching as that little nudge.

GO BOLDLY!

I live and work near Watford. What's that you say? "somebody's got to." Cheeky! Despite the way it is sometimes portrayed, Watford's a great place to be. So why am I telling you this? What I'm focusing on today is boldness - inspired by my daily sightings of the Watford town motto - Audentior, which latin scholars and locals (I qualify both ways) will know means Go Boldly!

My favourite boldness quotation has to be:

      "Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it.
        Boldness has genius, power and magic within it."

This quote is attributed to both Goethe and to William Hutchinson Murray, the Scottish Himalayan explorer. I don't really care who said it first, I just love the sentiment of it.

I love the idea of starting something and fully committing to it. Until you do this, whilst you remain in the talking and planning stage, there is always a chance to change your mind and pull back. Once you are committed, you have decided to give it your all and will give 100% effort and dedication. That is when great things start to happen.

Strange as it may seem, this is what goes through my head when I see the Watford sign. It inspires me, it fires me up, it makes me want to get out there and give my all to the things I am passionate about. Obviously doesn't take much to get me going, even on a wet Wednesday morning! Have a great day.

STILL SMALL VOICE

Today is likely to be a busy day, as I'm sure it will be for you too. I'll be up at 5.30am for commuter surgery. It's likely to be a hectic morning after the long weekend. I'm on-call too so that'll add to it. Then there is the lunchtime meeting with the nurses and then training on the new coils. I might manage half an hour or so off before it all starts again for evening surgery.
 I'm sure this is much the same as your day will be. Life is busy, there's always stuff to do.
What we need to be careful of though is ensuring that we make time in our busy day for ourselves. When you're pressed for time it's easy to feel rushed and to take quick decisions. Situations demand that we do this and sometimes it's the right thing to do but at other times, we need to remember to ....... slow down ...... to pause . ....... and to listen to our own intuition, to that still small voice within. Even though when we are busy it seems like we don't have the time to do this, ironically I think that that is when we need to do so the most. Gandhi was once asked if he was going to have time to mediate because the day ahead was going to be so busy. He apparently replied that when the day ahead was that busy he'd need to meditate twice as long. What I'm asking you to do and what I'll be doing myself, is to take regular tiny breaks during the day. These might just be a minute or so but use them to check in on yourself and note how you are feeling, what's going on for you at that moment. Listen to what your intuition is telling you. Learning to follow this makes life easier; it begins to feel like you are moving along easily, not forever fighting against the flow of things. So no matter how busy you are today, try just stopping for 30 seconds and being still with yourself. You'll be amazed what you will learn.

DOG GONE HAPPY!

I'm currently reading "Happiness Now!" by Robert Holden. It's an excellent book which you won't be surprised to hear from the title is all about being happy. The central message of the book so far is that happiness is something within us, not something that we can ever find externally. Being happy therefore involves realising this and just allowing the happiness that is within us to shine through.

With this in mind I took my dog Sox out for a walk yesterday lunchtime. I left home feeling really happy and was determined to stay that way. We had a lovely walk and after an hour or so, instead of heading back home I decided we'd head in the opposite direction and get a coffee at one of the canalside cafes.

I tied her up outside the cafe and went inside to order. Little did I realise that my resolution to be happy was about to be tested. Having ordered a cappuccino, the woman took my money and handed me the change without making any move to make my drink. When I didn't walk away she said - you've already had it haven't you, aren't you just paying? I told her very politely that no, I'd just got here and hadn't had a drink yet. She eyed me slightly suspiciously, even more so when I pointed out that she'd given me change form a fiver when I'd just paid with a ten pound note. I went back outside to sit at one of the tables alongside the towpath with Sox, to wait for my drink and enjoy the peace and quiet. It was a nice day, if a bit overcast and all I could hear was the gentle sound of a barge moving along the water  a few yards away. Less than a minute later, an elderly couple walked towards the cafe from my right. The old lady was full of complaints - telling her husband very grouchily that she was too cold, too tired and that he was holding her arm too tightly and walking too fast. She then turned her attention to us as we sat quietly minding our own business and muttered loudly "what a stupid place to bring a dog."

Now Sox is pretty smart and I'm sure she knew she was being talked about. She looked up at me then turned and growled at the woman (really out of character for her). The woman responded by calling her a "spiteful little bugger" and shuffling off into the cafe. Now once upon a time I'd have reacted to that, either by politely challenging the woman or more probably by keeping quiet but feeling irritated inside. Instead today, with that central core of happiness firmly in place, it just made me want to laugh. Sox picked up on this too as she turned and looked up at me and I swear she grinned. If she were able to I think she might even have high-fived me! As you can see from the picture above, she's a pretty special dog. Hope that story made you smile too. Enjoy the Bank Holiday.

MAKING BIG CHANGES

Big changes are happening for me right now - and I'm very excited to tell you about them.
For the last year and a bit I have been running an NLP training company with my friend and business partner. We've decided to call it a day and go our separate ways which frees me up to lots of really exciting possibilities.

I'm directing my energies to doing what I love - coaching. I'll still be a six session partner in my practice, that's not going to change, but when not there I'll be coaching individual doctors rather than running NLP courses. I feel that coaching has so much to offer the medical profession and I have a burning desire to share this with my colleagues.

The decision to make this change hasn't been an easy one but I am sure that it is the right one. My challenge now is to enable my colleagues to understand the benefits of coaching. Being coached has made a huge difference to me, not just in what I have achieved but more importantly in whom I have become.

I feel happier and more authentic now than I have ever been. The road ahead will certainly contain many challenges but I am very clear about my destination and feel certain I am going to enjoy the journey.

WHAT IS SUCCESS?

I'm currently reading "Success Intelligence" by Robert Holden. It's a fascinating book and one which I'll review properly once I've finished it. For now though I wanted to share the question that the author asks early on, what does success mean to you? It seems fundamental yet it's really not so easy once you begin to think about it. No two people will answer that question in the same way I'm sure.

For me I like the idea of success as a journey and not just as a destination. I want to enjoy the getting there and not just the arrival. Success is also about who I am becoming, it's more than just about what I'm getting or achieving. In fact the more I write, the more I realise that my own ideas are still at the evolutionary stage - let's call them a work in progress. Once they are more fully formed I'll share them with you in a future post.

Recently I talked about following your joy though and I wanted to share the fact that I really did live up to that yesterday. As a part-time GP I now work in the surgery only three days a week. The rest of the time is my own to pursue my other interests and today I did precisely that. I'm working on an article for one of the medical magazines about coaching. I wrote it on my laptop whilst sipping cappuccino in the coffee shop in my village. I spared a thought for my partners at work on what is undoubtedly the busiest day of the week in general practice and as always I smiled inwardly at the thought of being somewhere else on a Monday. But it was more than just being elsewhere, it was about doing what I truly love doing. Coaching is my passion and something that I care deeply about. This latest article was about coaching doctors and is really at the core of the sort of work I love; so yes, today; I really did follow my joy. When I was doing that work it felt effortless, I loved it. I felt inspired and somehow almost guided. I had a strong sense of being in the right place at the right time.

I haven't yet figured out my full answer to the success definition question but if I was to look just at today I'd have to say I think I came pretty close.