August 3, 2010
Sitting on the car seat next to me is 3 pages of detailed, hand-written notes. I keep eye-balling them suspiciously. They’re coming home with me but I haven’t fully decided what happens after that. These are notes I took today during a call with a dog behavioral trainer named Karen. I could tell immediately when talked to Karen that she knew what she was talking about and that the program she was walking me through would work. You know, your gut will tell you when someone is being a snake charmer and when they are truly passionate and knowledgeable, and Karen was definitely the second.
If you read the “life” section of my blog, then you probably know about my dog Buddy. We got Buddy as a five year old rescue last year, not fully realizing the extent of his separation anxiety. It’s been a challenging year – cleaning “bio-hazardous” materials out of many surfaces of my home, putting my sewing skills to the test to repair curtains, filling scratches in dry wall and last but not least, repairing teeth. (I did not repair the teeth, of course… paying for them to be repaired.) We’ve tried many different strategies, including both medicinal and multiple behavioral strategies but hadn’t had a great deal of progress in the year we had owned him. And of course, we had fallen head over paws in love with him so there was no going back – we’re pretty desperate to help our Buds.
I could tell immediately upon talking to Karen that her plan had the potential to be very effective. So why was I glancing over at my copious pile of notes with something that could only be described as hesitation?
To tell you the truth, Karen’s plan sounded like a lot of work. Not hours upon hours and not “miss a day and fail” but definitely consistent, daily effort. It would require a lifestyle change. And I couldn’t help but wonder, were Matt and I ready to commit to that kind of change? But wait… didn’t we desperately want this outcome? Didn’t I say I would do anything to make this happen? Didn’t I swear if Cesar would come visit me, I would pay for his plane ticket from LA?
It occurred to me that perhaps what I was feeling was similar to what many of my clients might feel when it first dawns on them that the outcome they so desperately want, would do anything for is going to require consistent, daily effort. A lifestyle change.
Whether it’s weight loss, a career change, creating a less stressful lifestyle or altering an anxious doggy’s behavior, we know intuitively it’s going to take effort. So how come when we hold a plan in our hot little hands we often balk?
At first glance, it seems a simple cost vs. benefit analysis. Do I want the outcome (benefit) bad enough to invest the time, money or effort (cost) that it will take to get there? The urgency of our desire weighs into that equation – if you have 10 pounds to lose, do you want the outcome less than someone who has 80 pounds? Maybe. Maybe not. And some of it depends on the cost: if it took 10 minutes a day, would you be more willing to move forward more readily than if it took 40 minutes a day? Maybe. Maybe not.
I’ve seen both of sides of that equation surprise me: I’ve seen people move forward at great cost, and halt at seemingly trivial costs. I’ve seen those with little sense of urgency blaze forward, and the most desperate freeze up. It leads me to believe there’s more at play than a simple cost vs. benefits.
I think what really determines whether or not we move forward with a plan is our readiness to face something big: the fear of failure. What if I invest the time and the money and the effort… and it doesn’t work? What if I fail miserably? What if I disappoint myself? What if I disappoint others? Embarrass myself? Frustrate myself? Fear of failure rears it’s ugly voice and says: “It won’t work. It won’t be enough. It won’t last. Don’t try it.”
What holds us back is not our lack of urgency, not the size of the goal and not even the cost, be it time, money or effort. What holds us back is our fear of failing. Look deeply into whatever change you’ve been desperately wanting to make. If you’ve stopped and started, or never started, or started and wavered – peel back some of the layers and look fear right in the eyes. (It often backs down when you do this.) Ask yourself, what do I really have to lose? Maybe some time. Maybe some money. Maybe some ego. But if I succeed, what do I gain? Not just the outcome you want, but that swagger that comes from moving past the boundary lines you’ve drawn for yourself.
If you don’t try it, then you can always blame being in the same place on that – not making any effort. You can always hold the thought in your back of your head “well one day, when I’m ready…. But until then, at least I know why I’m here.” If you try a plan and it doesn’t work, then what? What if you invest the time and the money and the effort and it’s not the right one? THEN WHAT?
A week ago, I didn’t know Karen existed. I thought I had exhausted every behavioral strategy (and medicinal strategy) for treating a dog with separation anxiety. I felt like I had read every book, every article, every perspective on rehabbing an anxious dog. I was wrong.
If the approach you try doesn’t work, it’s not your last hope. It doesn’t mean you are doomed forever to be stuck in the same position you are now. But do you know what will doom you to stay there?
Doing absolutely nothing at all.
And if you stop to think about it, that’s even scarier than feeling. Which means you really have nothing to lose if you move forward.
What's this new "plan" you speak of? Hmm?
May 23, 2009
Every day on my way to work I pass a lottery billboard that says what the current jackpot is. Many days I entertain myself on my drive by going through in my head what I would do if I won the jackpot. I must confess, I am nerdy enough to reduce the jackpot down to my approximate guess at it’s after-tax value, and then the first 3 designations of the jackpot go to the not-insignificant student debt carried by our household. Then the fun begins – often I send my parents and my in laws on various vacations (separately), I shuffle between two or three different cars for my husband, choose candidates for seed money among friends or family members who I know have school and/or business dreams, secretly gift siblings or other deserving friends, and then I usually end my spree with a pair of really fantastic jeans and the hiring of a good financial adviser. Or something along these lines.
This game amuses me, and usually occupies me for at least two-thirds of my commute. However, in nearly 3 years of the commute and the same game, I have yet to buy a lottery ticket. In fact, I’ve never bought one in my life. One more fact? I would have no idea how to buy a lottery ticket and I’m slightly intimidated by all the choices. So despite the rapture that the “how I’d spend my winnings” game brings me, I’ve never once taken pursuit towards the first step that would move me closer to being a jackpot winner.
Why? Until today, I never really thought about it, but when I got right down to it I realized that the reason I’ve never bought a ticket is that I honestly and truly believe that I’d never win the jackpot.
The more I thought about it, I discovered it goes a little deeper than that. I can dig way back into the archives of my memory and remember someone in my family – my dad? – saying “The lottery? That’s a tax on stupidity.”
Is it any wonder I’ve never bought a ticket?
Limiting beliefs are beliefs we hold to be true, without facts or proof, that stop us from taking action. My limiting belief that I’d never win the lottery is exactly what has prevented me from ever buying even a scratch off. While some might argue that my 20 minute rhapsody of “my life, jackpot winner” is nothing more than a whimsical daydream, many people spend three or four times that amount of energy mentally dwelling on what they’d do, who’d they be, where they’d go and how their life would change if they only lost weight. If they had the body they wanted. The energy. The health they dreamed of. If they won the body lottery.
Limiting beliefs exist here too. Just like my lottery fantasy, the daydream bubbles away and it’s back to reality. “Sure, that’d be nice,” I think, as I turn into the parking lot and face the day, “But, I’d never win.” “Sure, that’d be nice,” they say, as the daydream bubbles away and they’re faced with reality. “But, I’ll never weigh that. I’ll never have that body. I’ll never be able to walk up stairs without knee pain. Run a 5k. Get rid of these blood pressure medications. Escape diabetes. Wear the same size I wore before kids. Feel happy in my body.”
Is it any wonder they don’t buy the ticket? The first step towards anything you daydream about is is next to impossible if you don’t truly believe that the outcome is yours for the taking.
Limiting beliefs can hold you back from taking the first step. Here are examples of limiting beliefs I have heard my clients and others say regarding weight loss:
- It’s genetic, I’m just doomed to be overweight. (So why bother?)
- I will regain the weight I lose. (So why bother?)
- I have failed at thousands of diets before. (So I will fail if I try again.)
- Weight loss is so depriving. (So I’m not going to do it.)
Combating a limiting belief is not impossible, but it requires intention. Imagine if you were trying to help a child shake a belief you knew was not true but were steadfast believers. “There are monsters in my closet!!!” How would you do it? You might try to show them proof that their belief was not true. “Look here,” you would say as you held the closet door open wide…”no monsters!” Chances are, it would take a couple times of showing them the proof before the belief would begin to loosen it’s hold.
The same is true for our limiting beliefs. Seek proof that your belief may not be true. Are there people you know who have lost weight, despite having parents or siblings who remain overweight? Are there people you have heard who have lost weight in a way that didn’t sound so depriving? Are there people you know who have done thousands of diets and then found a different way to succeed at weight loss? (I can give you the answer to THAT one!) Yes, you may be able to find plenty of proof that supports your limiting belief. But once you also find proof that your limiting belief is not necessary FACT, you will find relief as a barrier from moving forward dissolves.
So if you’ve found yourself daydreaming of something, but not moving forward, then go and prove yourself wrong. I’ll be over here looking up past lottery winners. I might just even find myself with a ticket in hand.
April 25, 2009
Shoot, I need to get an oil change. I wonder when I can go. Maybe Thursday? No, definitely not Thursday, I’ve got a doctor’s appointment Thursday and that meeting is on Friday so I better leave some time to prepare for that. I’m so not prepared for that. I need to email Joe and see where the numbers are for that. I wonder if our tax return is ready yet. I need to pay our water bill I think. Crap, I need to get to the grocery store too. I don’t know what I’m cooking for dinner tonight. Maybe I’ll just get pizza. That’s not very healthy though, can’t eat that. But, blech, I’m so sick of chicken. I need to lose some weight. These pants are way too tight. I hate the way they look. I hate the way I LOOK. I need to go to the gym. My knee hurts. I wonder who’s going to get kicked off American Idol tonight. I’m so tired. I shouldn’t have stayed up so late watching TV last night.
What? Don’t tell me you haven’t heard a similar diatribe play in your own head before? I swear, whenever I stop to actually pay attention to the running stream of consciousness in my head, I often find if I’m not monitoring it, it’s like having an email inbox with no spam filters. It’s like a free for all of thoughts, with no limitations on what I actually want there.
There’s a concept in the field of personal development called the law of manifestation (or sometimes called the law of attraction.) The general premise of this law is that “Like Attracts Like,” or that all thoughts have an energetic field to them and whatever thought you’re putting out there creates results around the energy of that thought, whether positive or negative. If you accept that, the next premise – the negative thought attracts negative outcomes – is where I find we tend to get a little stuck. It’s like waking up in the morning, stubbing your toe and thinking “AGGGH. This is going to be a crappy day.” And guess what? It usually is.
We’re all constant thought-machines and playing the bait and switch on your thought processes all day can be overwhelming. I talk about the process of TFA for creating big picture positive thoughts (to create positive emotions) but there’s a game I play with myself on a more minute-by-minute basis to switch myself out of stream of consciousness mode when I’m focused on all the things I “don’t want” – to do lists, worries, frustrations, annoyances, stressors.
I call it “The Catch.” I call it that because the first step is catching yourself in the moment of having a negative thought… or thoughts. For myself, it’s often times a physical cue that I’m getting into negativity mode – an uneasy, tense feeling in the pit of my stomach, or I’ll find my hand has flown up to rub the back of my neck (for me: an immediate signal that my body is going into STRESS MODE, alert the cortisol pumps!!!). Or, of course, an overwhelming desire to turn the car immediately into the Starbucks drive through and get a mocha frappuchino. (Light, with no whip of course, BUT STILL.)
I slam the brakes on my thoughts (and my car) as soon as I catch them and immediately ask myself this question: So, what DO I want?
It’s an easy question to answer, and as soon as I shift my focus away from what I don’t want, what I lack, what I fear, what I worry about to what I hope for, what I have plenty of, what I celebrate, what I am confident in, the mood shift is immediate. My focus shifts to gratitude, optimism, excitement and peace of mind. The knot in my stomach releases, the tension disappears from my neck and my car stays on its due course. When you focus on what you want, you start noticing when you’re getting what you want. When you focus on what you have plenty of, you wallow in gratitude and the feeling of security. When you start celebrating, you find joy in the every day. Focusing on the positive is hardly a concept anyone can argue against for better living; but I often find the challenge is getting yourself to make the switch. It doesn’t have to be so difficult. Just catch, then ask. “What do I want?”
Whether or not you believe “Like Attract Like,” I promise you, you have nothing to lose by focusing on thoughts that generate positive emotions. Start today: Catch. Ask. Shift. Enjoy the benefits.
September 30, 2008
I was shy. I was one of those kids who turned the color of a radish whenever I raised my hand in class to talk. I actually did homework during study halls because I was too nervous to strike up a conversation with people I didn’t know.
In 4th grade, I desparately wanted to be on student council. But to get elected, you had to stand up in front of the classroom and make a speech. For the other candidates, this task appeared to be the most natural thing in the world. When I stood up to talk, I shook. I got clammy. My teeth chattered. The air turned 90 degrees and humid in an instant. To this day, I don’t know what I said. All I remember is that I lost – dreadfully. The teacher kept a tally on the chalkboard, and I had two votes. Since I voted for myself, I can only imagine that perhaps she gave me an extra tic mark so I wouldn’t feel quite so pitiful. Immediately after we raised our heads from the desk and I saw the tally, the embarassment overwhelmed me. I excused myself to the nurse’s office and somehow talked her into calling my mom to come pick me up.
This was my first experience with public speaking and it only went downhill from here for the next 13 years straight through grad school.
Yet as I write this today, I just finished leading two groups at WFU. I will do one more in about 20 minutes and then will pack up and head over to the YMCA, where I’ll lead another group after dinner. Over the last two years, I have led close to 275 classes and workshops. They have ranged from 3 people to 50 people. This is an astronomical number for someone’s who has nearly a decade of proven flight-or-fight responses to all incidents of public speaking, ranging from 60 minute thesis defenses to 30 second ice breaker introductions at book clubs.
To be honest, I am not entirely sure how this happened. But somewhere along the way it became easier and then at some point, completely comfortable. Because I so passionately love the message I am trying to share, today I would crawl up on a rooftop with a bullhorn if I had the opportunity. I truly believe one of the greatest barriers to weight management is the lack of education about the basic principles about weight loss and so the more groups I lead, the greater numbers I can reach with this message. My fear diminished when I chose to move forward when faced with the opportunity to do something I believed in.
Mind you, it didn’t disappear – it diminished. Last week I was a presenter for a conference for the Area Agency of Aging. This was the biggest group I had ever been in front of and involved a microphone and a podium and a whole bunch of people counting on me to provide their continuing education credits. Was I nervous? You bet. Clammy hands and humid room all over again. Each time I click on a power point, there’s still a little worry in the back of mind – “will they like what I have to say? will it be useful to them?” But with each click of the slide, my fear fades into the background as I grow energized with a feeling that this – being someone who shares the message of health education – is my greater purpose.
Eleanor Roosevelt said it best when she said “Do one thing every day that scares you.” For whatever reason, it is often the thing we fear the most that has the greatest reward. How many times have we fallen short of what we are divinely capable of because we choose inaction out of fear?
There is much to fear when it comes to attempting a lifestyle change as great as weight loss. What if it’s hard? What if I’m hungry all the time? What if I have to give up my favorite foods? What if it changes holidays for my family? Going out to eat with my friends? What if I lose weight and regain it? What if I fail?
Moving forward in the face of that fear is where you tap into something greater than yourself and that power is beyond measure. When you recall the moments in your life that give you the greatest feeling of pride and satisfaction, can you recall whether you had any hestitation about taking the steps towards that achievement?
Most of us will find, with reflection, that the most rewarding things we have done in our life required one gigantic leap of faith to get started followed by daily steps of faith to keep going.
There’s no guarantee that I won’t fall flat on my face in this next class. There’s no guarantee that my powerpoint projector won’t work and I’ll have to wing it. (It’s happened today.) There’s no guarantee that someone in my group won’t be vehemently and vocally opposed to what I have to say. (Has also happened.) There is no guarentee that someone won’t fall asleep. (Happens ALL the time.) Each day I stand up in front of a group, I take a leap of faith that what I have to say will empower, educate and delight someone.
And if it doesn’t, at least I can say that you will no longer find me in the nurse’s station.
Food For Thought: What one thing have you been putting off out of fear? What is the actual, worst case scenario that could happen? How likely is that to really happen? What are you missing out on by not taking action? I challenge you to try one thing tomorrow that scares you.
