July 2016 - Take the Lead and Get A Life Elements

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Sliding Doors

by Amy Slattery

Have you seen the movie Sliding Doors with Gwyneth Paltrow and that lovable Scottish actor John Hannah (yes I have a slight crush...I think it's the accent)?

I love the idea of the movie that any choice, decision for any situation (within or out of your control) that may seem very insignificant at the time of making it, can lead to a completely different turn of events in our lives.  *Spoiler alert - in the movie the character Helen runs for her train, in one scenario the movie continues as if she had missed her train, watching the sliding doors close and the other, her life in which she had just made the train in time, beating the sliding doors and making it on the train.

The chain of events then plays out in both situations.  This gives a bit more of an ‘out of my control’ concept slightly, but it did get me thinking, what decisions or choices have I made that led me in the direction to be here at this point today?

It was actually over the Christmas holidays, surrounded by all the festive cheer, spending time with family & friends and feeling genuine gratitude for the life that I live.  That I was reminded of this movie… I had one of those ‘what if’ thoughts.

“What if I’d made the decision to live overseas again”, “What if I didn’t leave that job”, “What if I didn’t say yes to this or be open to that”…then I wouldn’t be right here, right now having the best time of my life!

WHAT IF!

The words WHAT and IF are two pretty innocent words, not much happening when they are by themselves… but then we humans decide to put them together and it can start a whole chain of events (but that’s another blog for another time).

At the time, I was more reflective of how I'd gotten to this point in my life, what decisions brought me here?  I have a wonderful loving husband, great family, and friends, my own business with my best friend and a genuinely pretty amazing life!  I see opportunities everywhere.  But what got me here?

So I thought I would share my 7 (yes it has to be 7) Sliding Doors moments, of course, there have been plenty more but these are the ‘bigger’ ones in my life.

7 Sliding Doors Moments

1.    Trying out for the Primary School Basketball Team – now this was many, many, many moons ago, however, I remember it because I was in primary school at the time when my year 6 teacher said I should try out for the town basketball team, all the other schools had people trying out.

Now I had NEVER played basketball at the time but thought (reluctantly) ‘ok if you think I should’ (I was probably more scared of disappointing the teacher if I said no haha).  So I tried out and amazing I got in!  It was one of those moments that's stuck with me as really did learn to appreciate the faith that others can have in you, it completely pushed me out of my comfort zone (especially at an age where the worry of what the other kids think and fitting in is very high). But it was great fun, I made new friends and going away on a sporting trip is always good!

2.    Saying no to a 'traditional' University course - you go to school, you get good grades, so you can get into University, so you can get a good job, then settle down, then start a family and live happily ever after right?  Not that there is anything wrong with that at all...it's the path I thought I would take, but then I changed my mind (eeek)!

I decided to go to hospitality school/college it was presented at an info session and that was it!  I was in (you would study on campus for 6 months – the college was run as if it was a hotel and then the next 6 months would be on placement… and it could be anywhere in the world, wherever you could get in!)  This sounded amazing to me!  So after a little nudging of my parents, I was able to attend.   I got to study and live 3 other cities while getting my qualifications, at the end I was offered a working visa in the USA and jumped straight on a plane for Chicago!  Definitely a small town girl in a big city there!  I remember landing the same night of their first heavy snow fall…coming from Katherine, NT I still remember the tears thinking what have I done...and OMG it is freezing!!!

3.    Taking on a role at a leadership company – after coming back from Chicago (September 11th happened while I was there = no visa extensions so I was homeward bound) I found myself working at a beautiful hotel in Adelaide.  I realised however that the way I was going to continue to grow and move up would be to move out!  So I started looking!  I was offered a job at a leadership training company, organizing and managing their events.  This was by far my biggest learning curve in life!  I learnt so much about myself in the 5+ years at that organisation and I loved working there.  When you get the opportunity to listen and learn from some of the most amazing presenters in the country you can't help but take it on board and grow yourself, I was definitely stretched and given amazing opportunities (again the faith they had in me...unbelievable)!

4.    Getting a Life – probably the biggest sliding door moment of my life, my 7-year relationship ended around the same time by Dad fell sick with cancer, and then suddenly passed away within a matter of months (as I write this it is just after the anniversary of his passing).  This led to a spiral of avoidance!  I did not deal well with what happened, I was working ridiculous hours during the week and then partying ridiculous hours on the weekend, I was completely running myself into the ground!
The turning point was when the company I worked for held a leadership conference in Adelaide – one of the speakers was Martyn Newman and he spoke and shared a story about Snow White Syndrome (the concept that for some of us we are lying on a slab waiting for Prince Charming to rescue us).  Where Jodie (my now business partner) had one of her famous aha moments!  We need to get off the slab!  The way we did this was through starting a goals club, you can read more about that here www.the7effect.com

The simple choice to move on from where I was lead to the biggest changes in my life to this point, I met Jodie, I worked for a wonderful family business, I grew personally and professionally more than I ever had, the goals club stretched me and kept me accountable to myself and others every month, every year and I achieved so may amazing things through it.

5.    Moving On – sometimes you need to make space for amazing things to happen!  That happened to me in 2013, the goals club that we had created came to an end and the possibility of making it a business came into play!  I remember Jodie messaging one day to catch up for dinner one night as she wanted to chat with me about something (Jodie had never done that before, so I thought it must be about getting The 7 Effect as a business off the ground).  I might have ruined Jodie’s well thought out speech by pretty much jumping in with a “yep I’m in” before we’d even ordered!  To be honest, I probably didn’t really know what I was getting myself into at the time, but I knew saying yes was the only option for me!  So the planning commenced.

I was still working at the leadership company, but it had started to become harder for me to align my values to what I was doing…so this was one of my harder moments… I resigned!  It was one of the hardest decisions I'd had to make, there was a sense of loyalty, a family culture, a reasonable amount of guilt…all of those emotions (the ones that are below the line and don't really serve us...but I still had them)!

I think it was about 2 weeks into ‘not working’ that I started to panic (what was I going to do! I needed some income until we were ready to get this business off the ground…I had money saved but didn’t really want to eat into that).  So I got the word out that I was looking and ended up talking to an event company, however then came the guilt!  I knew I wasn’t planning on working for them long term, I would be working on OUR business on the side until that was ready to move into.  So after some great advice from, Jodie who quite simply said: “tell them your plans, what you can offer and what you will do, and see what happens”…WHAT??  Tell them that I could work for 6 months, maybe more... as I am really working on starting my own business!

Well, would you believe it…it worked!  That was just what they needed to get through a crazy busy business time…BINGO!!  Huge life lesson learnt there...sometimes you can ask for what you want!

6.    The 7 Effect – so in May 2014 we launched full time with The 7 Effect, learning every day how to run this business, grow it and love the life that we live!  It is unbelievable that we are coming up to 2 years.  I know there were plenty of skeptics when we started – some well-meaning comments “wow that’s brave starting a business in this climate”, “so your just going to start full time in it”, “do you think it’s the right time”?

Well, I am glad I didn’t dwell on those What if’s!  We survived the dreaded 1-year milestone of starting a new small business and we have huge plans for the future!

7.    Saying Yes – There are so many moments, choices, opportunities and offers that have come my way over the past 30+ years, this blog post could be 10 pages long!  However, the general ‘theme’ is that most of the time I just said YES!

This yes would more often than not push me right outside my comfort zone!  Which my most recent sliding door has done...we come across so many people we work with who live in that infinity loop of time and money (not having enough of each or sacrificing one for the other), so when Jodie came to me after meeting one of our now clients with the opportunity to be independent distributors in a new business I just said yes!  It’s trying something different, it's out of my comfort zone, it's a new challenge, constant self-development and self-reflection but the huge opportunity is well worth it, using my leadership and coaching skills to develop a team which is very exciting and I am constantly learning something new!

So overall I have had 100’s of sliding door moments in my life (as we all do) and they have all taken me on different path's and lead me to where I am today, sometimes it's good to reflect on how you got to where you are, what you would do again, what you will say yes (or no) too, what you have learnt and come at it all from a place of gratitude.  If you are not where you want to be right now what doors can you open (or close) to get there?

Start by thinking about what it is you want to be doing, where do you want to be and what are some of the things you want to get out of this life…and let's have a look at how to get there!

Remember, Live life by design…not by default

Why do we care what other people think of us?

By Amy Slattery

 

It can be a bit of a confronting question as it's pretty easy to come out with “I don’t care what people think!” but when it really comes down to it…do you?  Do you really?

Why do you think we are so concerned with what people think of us?  Unfortunately some of the things we work though today are hard wired from too long ago to think about it, the need to be liked goes all the way back to the times of tribes…where literally if you were an outcast you could be excluded from the group and in those times alone could mean DEATH!

So its not unnatural to have the fear of acceptance and hence worrying what other people think of you, however if the fear is debilitating or stopping you from success or living to your full potential then its time to ask your self WHY!

When the fear of being judged, laughed at, talked about or excluded is there it can stop you from grabbing opportunities that come your way (sometimes stopping to think about what others will think can lead to an opportunity passing you by).  This can be true for things that bring us success even in times of wealth, money can be that dirty word sometimes – will people think I’m a snob if I earn a certain amount, live in a certain suburb, drive a certain car.  You can see how this can become a problem!

We focus a lot on goals at The 7 Effect and this fear really can stop people from achieving their goals…or setting goals around what other people will think, which tends to mean small and easily achievable goals.

You’ve probably heard that the number 1 fear for human beings is speaking in front of groups, this is before death which comes in at number 5 and loneliness coming in a number 7!  Which is scary to think that we are less afraid of dying all alone compared to the odd chance we might make a fool of ourself in front of others.

So although we have this hard wired aspect to ourselves there are things we can do!

Like most things the first step is self awareness – just stopping to ask yourself why you are feeling a certain way in situations can be a great start, than uneasy ‘gut’ feeling we sometimes have is a great physical symptom to get you to stop and access what is really going on. 

Focus on what in life do you value?  Getting clear on your values not only helps with that gut feeling of decision making but also the clearer you are, the more you will focus on what matters, if one of your values is happiness, focusing on that and why it’s a value can in turn stop you from worrying about how others see you in the happiness space.

Now’s the harder part – stop worrying about what others think!  Yikes how do I do that? I’ve come across people who will ask everyone they know for their opinion before making a decision, we all have the answers within us so why take a survey of all your friends before you make a decision?  This can also have a negative  affect on your friendship, if you then don’t take that persons advice (because you’ve asked around until you’ve found the answer you wanted) they might feel affronted “why did they bother asking me if they weren’t going to follow my advice?”  that’s a whole other blog so wont go into too much there!

This is going to be hard at first – but like anything the more your awareness grows, the more your confidence grows and you’ll probably find you start caring less about what others think when it comes down to it.  This is of course not in a cold hearted way at all (that’s again worrying that other people will think you aren’t caring and compassionate…the thing is if they are thinking that its really nothing you can do about it, that ball falls in their court and their belief system).

So to leave you with some actions:

1. 1.     Don’t ignore that gut feeling when a new opportunity comes your way
2. 2.     Ask yourself WHY you feel that way?
3. 3.     Does that feeling serve or hinder you?
4. 4.     Look to yourself for the answer rather than others
5. 5.     Get clear on your values and make them a focus
6. 6.     Let people see the real you
7. 7.     Be kind to yourself!  People will always have an opinion but the key is choosing what you do with that opinion!

“Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind.”

Dr. Seuss

Live life by design, not by default!

 

Do you have the X Factor?

by Amy Slattery

Ok I’ll admit it…I love the X Factor *oh the shame…

But it did get me thinking about what we expect our life to become?  We live in a world where thanks to the various media streams we are bombarded with what seem like overnight success stories (or the chance of overnight lottery wins)…the high school kid making over $300K trading on his mobile phone, the email app that went from $0 to $200mil in 18 months, homeless artist now selling sketches for thousands! 

Don’t get me started on the various reality shows that seem to propel the normal everyday person into a superstar in the flash of an eye!

However what doesn’t shine like a neon light are all the hours and hard work along the way, the failures, the risks, the criticism, dusting yourself off and getting back too it.

When Jodie and I were launching The 7 Effect I was surprised on a lot of corners that well meaning contact “wow your brave launching a business in this economic climate”, “have you ever run your own business?”, “what will you do if it doesn’t work out”, “oh yeah I’ve seen lots of similar business online”.

Well meaning for the most part, but if I choose to listen to all of those comments with fear I would not be celebrating the life I live now.  We didn’t go into the business blindly, but it was a risk and we have learnt a lot along the way, but what didn’t waiver was our confidence that we will make it work and the worst case if it didn’t work out I’d find another job, or start something new.  There are always choices we can make with the information we are provided with.

So that brings me back to “What is your X Factor?”

Sometimes we can get a bit caught up in the fact that you need some superstar hidden talent with a back story to match the sadness of all of life’s tragedies to have something to offer, that we need to be ‘different’ to everyone else and have that edge.

Well I strongly believe that is not the case!

It makes me think of Thomas Edison and his invention of the light bulb…Edison didn’t actually come up with the whole concept, his was just the first to be proved practical, and affordable for use in the home (electric lights already existed on the streets).  So he improved on something that was already in play in the world rather than inventing something completely new.

Of course if you have a completely new idea then absolutely go for it…but if your innovation is improving on a need then that can be even better!  Check out the team at www.dreamfarm.com who’s business is completely on improving everyday kitchen and household appliances!

So if you can do anything today, set aside 10minutes to have a complete brain dump of what your strengths are, what skills do you have, what do you love to spend time on, if you could change something what would it be, how do/would people describe you…don’t let yourself get caught up in any if’s or but’s or negative self talk (play a bit of Eye of the Tiger just before if you need to).

After the 10 minutes is up give yourself a 5 minute breather, just walk around move around, stretch, star jumps (no judgment here).  Then come back to what you have written down.

Highlight 3 points you’ve put down and flesh them out with 3 actions underneath each that are things you can do to strengthen that description of yourself.

I.e. you might right down you are great at organizing things and love spending time with family and friends…so you might want a action item to set up a Family BBQ or a girls/boys night out?

Each week keep reviewing and developing from your initial list are focus on your strengths, skills and what you enjoy doing, the confidence will come and perhaps even a new idea!

Live life by design!

Amy 

I want what she's having...

 

by Amy Slattery

Sound familiar?  Of course the line “I'll have what she’s having” was made famous by the movie When Harry Met Sally, however I found it became a regular comment I used to joke about wanting what someone else had ‘because that would make me just like them’ so there was the familiar "I want what she's having".

Its taken me awhile to move past the need to have the right ‘things’ to create change in my life (you know the voices in your head that convince us…when I have the right workout gear, car, house, partner etc. I will be fitter, healthier, smarter, more people will like me…essentially I will be happier).

Of course in reality we know having the right gear alone wont make us happier (deep down), but it's even easier to then rationalise in our minds with excuses or blame as to why that new car you bought had to started to loose its shine after a the initial thrill wore off.

It really is interesting to me that over the past 18 months of working with clients at The 7 Effect I am hearing a similar phrase “oh but that’s you…I couldn’t do that”, “I’d love to do what your doing...but (insert excuses)”.  So I’ve recently found myself thinking wow some people out there want what I’m having??

I am very excited to say that I am having the best time of my life right now, and its not the money or things that are doing it.  It is that I am truly HAPPY (and its not the "oh no, now that i've reached this place what bad things will follow") and I feel that it's resonating with people I come into contact with each and every day.

But the thing is...there wasn’t a magical pill (dammit), its taken work, sometimes confronting and hard work, but it truly is worth it.

The majority of my working life had been in hospitality with the adage “if you’ve got time to lean, you’ve got time to clean”, in that the harder you worked the more successful you would be which is how a lot of us are brought up – the more successful you are in life the happier you will be.  If I can just get that qualification, that new job, move into that house/suburb, loose 5kg then I will have reached success and I will definitely be happy.

Unfortunately or fortunately (however you choose to look at it) findings are that happiness actually drives success.  When we are happy we have more energy, we are more motivated, engaged and productive.

Have you ever noticed when challenges come your way it can sometimes lead to a vicious cycle of depression, anxiety, stress or sadness?

I've had those times in my life…I had a period over 2008/2009 where my 7 year relationship ended and my father was diagnosed with myeloma only to pass away 2 months after the diagnosis, it was a horrible time and I completely fell into a dark hole of depression…I wasn’t eating or sleeping and an overwhelming sadness took hold of me.  It didn’t take me long to realise this would not be a sustainable place to stay!  So I set some goals to get myself outta there!

Knowing what I want and the ability to set goals and work towards them is one of the main tools that has lead me on my path to happiness!

I have mostly been a positive person through out my life…but there was always that ‘worrier’ side to me that I've worked on and has now also changed, as it really was the white noise in my head about things I really had no control over that I was worrying about in the first place!

I believe that a true sense of happiness makes us more resilient and stronger to the everyday challenges life brings us, so why not set yourself a goal to work on those aspects of your life when and where you are happiest?

When I get the comments “oh but that’s you” or “I couldn’t do that”, I can confidently reply with yes you can…but you are going to need to get real with yourself and make it a focus.

At the moment I am listening to The Happiness Advantage by Shawn Achor which I am loving and would highly recommend!  The best part?  He has 7 Actionable Principles he shares to help capitalise on this advantage of happiness (how about that…would you believe there are 7).

What I was really excited about most is that I am already utilising some of the principles naturally – you might be too!

The ones that resonate with me are:

• Falling Up – when those negative moments in life happen I am well aware of finding a path out and up and how that event can make me stronger.  This completely rang true for me last month when I had a miscarriage.  The extreme happiness high to a heartbreaking low was devastating, however it wasn’t the end of the world and I found myself comforted in taking the positives out of the situation (knowing that I can fall pregnant and it was a trial run!)
• The Zorro Circle – this is a no brainer for me over the number of years of setting goals and working towards them.  At times of chaos I can reign things in by focusing on small, manageable goals getting stronger and stronger.
• Social Investments – this is where I excel ha-ha, I really do invest a lot of time and energy in my friends, peers and family.  Not only for times of need, but when those times do come up, I have one of the most amazing support networks anyone could wish for.

Shawn mentions that all 7 principles are important, however “research has shown that the 7^th one, Social Investment is perhaps the most crucial to long term happiness, health and success”, GoodThinkInc.

So what are you doing in your life to increase happiness?

1.    Start to look at the signs, thoughts and feelings that come up when a negative event happens in your life.

2.    Set some goals around your social networks, spending quality time with family and friends (really connecting, not just looking at a screen of some sort while your all in the same room).

3.    Set yourself a 30 day challenge of a positive activity (exercise, meditation, journaling etc.

4.    Look at the balance of positive to negative influences in your life…you might need to have some tough conversations with people or reduce the time spent with them?

The world can be a tough or wonderful place depending how you choose to look at it, the benefits of being happier and having a positive mindset really can lead to success.  We always have a choice so choose to be happy!

Live life by design…not but default!

Do you have an Upper Limit Problem?

by Amy Slattery

What are Upper Limits?  

I've just finished listening to The Big Leap by Gay Hendricks...I loved it!  So much so that I began to drive my business partner Jodie crazy with my claims of "wow its my Upper Limit" "it's your Upper Limit" "its his/her Upper Limit!

Gay's book talks about how every single one of us carries with us entrenched, unconscious ideas of just how happy and successful we can be.  These ideas can lead to self-sabotage in all aspects of our lives.

I likened it to the stories of the lottery instant millionaires, the ones who came from nothing or were struggling to suddenly finding themselves flushed with cash...more than they could have ever dreamed of.  That is the problem they never thought they were 'entitled' to have so much money and that is then when you hear the stories of some lotto winners losing it all, or even ending up worse off and in total debt!  They reached their Upper Limit!

Do you ever hear yourself saying things like "I always find the same girl/guy", "I don't know where my money goes", "oh my business isn't worth that much", I never have enough time or money".  Maybe these are instances of reaching your Upper Limit?

So why do we do this to ourselves?

We all have this little gauge (sometimes voice) in our heads that determines how much love, happiness and success we allow ourselves to enjoy and this is normally established when we are young.  Once this is set it can hold us back from enjoying all the love and success that is ours!

Now how does this all work and what can we do about it?  Like anything I believe it all starts with awareness, so Gay details that the Upper Limit Problem is set around 4 hidden barriers:

1.    Feeling Fundamentally Flawed

This can be a really big barrier - you have a belief that you are flawed in some way, so the fear is that if you start to use your talents, you could fail, so you tend to just play it safe with small 'risks' so at least if you so try something and fail it is only a small set back.

2.    Disloyalty & Abandonment

Here you have a feeling that if you succeed "it would cause you to end up all alone, be disloyal to your roots and leave behind the people from your past"

Gay gives a couple of questions you can ask yourself to find out if this is one of the barriers you have:

"Did I break my families spoken or unspoken rule to get where I am?"

"Did I fail to meet the expectations my parents had of me?"

I the above questions brought about a yes then you might feel more and more guilty the more successful and happy you become, the guilt then makes you stop and holds you back.

3.    Believing that More Success Makes you a Bigger Burden

You might be thinking that doesn't even make sense!  How can success be a burden?  Gay gives a personal example of this one that sums this barrier up so well "This barrier held one of the biggest challenges for me. When I was born, I was greeted with two mixed messages: You’re a burden, and you’re a celebration. I was a burden to my mother, but a cause for celebration to my grandparents. My father had died a few weeks after my conception, leaving my mother with $300, my older brother to raise, and me in the womb. Starting out my life as a combination of burden and celebration caused me to repeat this combination often in adult life. I would have a positive breakthrough, then immediately start feeling I was a burden on the world. But the guilt I felt for being a burden was for crimes I hadn’t committed. If we remove the guilt of the crimes our parents and siblings convicted us of before we walked into kindergarten, we are liberated from the Upper-Limit Problem"

4.    The Crime of Outshining

This barrier comes with the worry and guilt that if I succeed I would outshine someone else and that would make him or her feel bad.  A good example is seen with children, parents can unconsciously pass on a thought that if once child is more gifted they should turn down their success so that they don't outshine the other family members.  This can then carry on to adulthood, you might see it more in adults where they are still very successful but really play down their success and don't talk about it.

So spend sometimes looking a situations and thought, is it an Upper Limit Problem?  Spend some more time on looking at where that really comes from, so be aware, find the root cause, understand it and don't let is top you from reaching your full potential for love, success and happiness!

Live life by design... not by default!