Forward Into Growth Back Into Safety!
Driven by my personal journey in overcoming the adversity of a bullied childhood and personal demons. My resilience and tenacity to turn my pain and anguish into the drive to succeed.
I know what got and still gets in the way of me becoming my best self. From a lack of confidence and self-belief, to and my own self sabotage.
2500 years of wisdom and 30 years of research, now distilled into my book The Woman Beyond – Six Secrets to Success and the powerful, ASPIRE© Model to help women to achieve their Biggest Most Audacious Goals for their Life, Business and Career.
“Nobody is perfect, and I know, I certainly won’t be the first, but why is it that women, particularly feel we need to be?”
It’s a rare woman that I meet that doesn’t suffer at the hands of some level self-doubt, low confidence or imposter syndrome, thinking that she has to be successful in every aspect of her life. I for one believe that it is this thinking that sets us up for failure and the striving for perfection and trying to please everyone – accept ourselves - is the number one cause of stress, anxiety and not feeling good enough and this alone is the enemy of our success.
I am so, so, so excited to have the opportunity to share this amazing platform and welcome you to the inaugural #TheWomanBeyond post. This column is the antidote, my aim to share some of the most simple, practical, powerful tips, tools and life hacks to help you change your thinking, create some new habits and optimise your life, one tiny but powerful step at a time.
Please do share with me your thoughts and let me know what you want to hear about.
For starters I know if you just have a play with some of the tips and tools I’ll share, I know I’ll help you to Discover Your Purpose, Be More Productive, Build Better Habits, Have More Energy, Feel More Connected and Feel Happier.
Today is about - self actualisation
– simple but powerful wisdom from the grandfather of positive psychology, Abraham
Maslow. He studied the greatest people of his generation. People like Eleanor
Roosevelt and Albert Einstein.
He told us about the importance of actualizing our potential. In fact, he said that “What one CAN be, one MUST be.”
This need to self-actualize is, at a certain stage of development, as important as our need to breathe.
It’s like soul oxygen. As humans we have an innate drive to want to achieve the next goal, to build on our successes and to achieve our dreams. And as women we can often leave these on the back burner, and put the needs of others, our family and loved ones before those of our own.
And in that gap between what we are capable of being and what we are actually being is where we create that feeling of being ‘ill at ease’, or start to notice a level of discomfort, I have heard this articulated so many times as ‘there’s more to life than this’. If we let this continue, this is where stress, anxiety and depression live.
So, stop for a moment while I ask you to answer - What must YOU be? ….Really, Think about that for a moment… What MUST you be?!
It’s easy to allow all the reasons why we can’t achieve or BE what we’d love to be to block and stop us, and the gap can often seem like a chasm!! I have heard myself and so many other women say, ‘I don’t have a choice’.
Maslow also told us that in any given moment we ALWAYS have a choice. We can step forward into growth. Or, we can step back into safety.
Forward into growth or back into safety.
This is like plus 1 or minus 1. In every moment we have a choice do we step forward and grow or step back and be safe?
Step forward. Or go backward.
How we feel at the end of the day is largely determined by these micro decisions (CHOICES), how often are we letting these minus moments trickle into our lives? If you are like I was the answer is too many!!
Think about the alternative, what if we sprinkle our days, (weeks and months and YEARs) with a load of PLUS’ +++++++? I can PROMISE you, you’re going to feel more alive and radiant in life.
AND, for the mathematicians out there (I am not including myself in that – I went to a school where they sent us girls to typing instead of maths – so I can touch type, but I don’t know my times table!!). Aggregate and compound these micro-decisions into days and weeks and months and the power is infinite.
What’s your destiny? Choose wisely.
Plus1. Plus1. Plus1.
Lastly a powerful quote from the man himself (Maslow that is)
“If you deliberately plan on being less than you are capable of being, then I warn you that you’ll be unhappy for the rest of your life.”
WOW!!!!
Signing off for now, stay focussed, keep positive and choose to Plus 1 in every moment.