5 Tips to help you to achieve your goal.
1) If you haven’t yet been through the planning stage of HOW you will achieve your goal. Do that now. Schedule an hour to set up some mini goals and all of the steps that you need to do to ensure that your goal becomes a reality.
For example, in my case I needed to ensure that I changed my diet (which included not being caught out without the correct food in the house), added in more exercise 3 or 4 times a week, and on a calendar I did a list of mini goals for my weight loss, so that rather than just aiming for the big goal, I can aim for each mini goal. A little planning goes a long way.
Map out what you want to achieve, one goal at a time, and brainstorm all of the ideas that will help you to get there. Include the realistic ones in your plan. I knew that I would not want to go to a gym (see previous newsletter!), so I didn’t include this in my plan, but I am happy to exercise at home. There is less chance of me making excuses to avoid exercise now that I have taken out the unrealistic expectations of going to a gym.
Goals are dreams with deadlines.
Diana Scharf Hunt
2) Do NOT let people monopolize your time or energy when you should be working on your goal. You know that you need to work on it every week, every day preferably, but if you don’t get time to work on it for a month at a time because you are always busy with work, family, chores etc How will it ever become a reality? Schedule time in your diary. It is the only way that you will get people to leave you alone if they know that you are busy.
Whoever wants to reach a distant goal must take small steps.
Helmut Schmidt
3) When you commit to scheduling in your diary, make that commitment a regular one. At least once a week to brainstorm all of the things that you need to achieve for the next week to take you a step closer to your goal. This is not a To Do list, you will need to do that too to keep you focused, but first you need a specific brainstorming session to focus on the bigger picture for 1 hour every week.
Once you have your weekly brainstorm information, THEN and only then can you start your daily To Do lists. Get rid of the tasks that are either not important or are not helping to get you closer to goal. Tip; Never have more than 7 items on each To Do list, unless they are all smaller tasks that can be completed quickly/easily. Complete the harder or more detailed ones first as it will give you more motivation to complete the rest.
Crystallize your goals. Make a plan for achieving them and set yourself a deadline. Then, with supreme confidence, determination and disregard for obstacles and other people’s criticisms, carry out your plan.
Paul Meyer
4) Is there a reason that you are not achieving your long term goal? Self Sabotage? Lack of confidence? Negative thoughts creeping in or dips in motivation? Find the resources that will help you or get the support that you need.
There are lots of tips and articles on the Healing That Feeling website. For example, if you would like a weekly confidence tip, have a look at the Healing That Feeling blog for quick tips;
http://healingthatfeeling.com/tag/increase-confidence-2
Also, here is an article I've just posted on the blog about Affirmations/positive thinking. If you’ve ever tried affirmations and they didn’t work, you need to read this!
http://healingthatfeeling.com/how-to-use-affirmations-to-boost-confidence-and-self-esteem
People often say that motivation doesn’t last. Well, neither does bathing – that’s why we recommend it daily.
Zig Ziglar
5) Don’t let the negativity, jealousy or insecurity of others derail your efforts. I will never forget coming home from an hour of torment at the gym and my partner had baked me a cake! Yes that’s right, a bloody cake!! Now as much as I love cake, and particularly home baked cakes, even I could not believe the stupidity of someone baking a cake for someone who is trying to get fit and lose weight. I let him know it too 
When things had calmed down, we chatted and he admitted that he was worried about me losing weight and losing interest in him, which is ridiculous as I was slimmer when I met him. I put that silly insecurity out of his mind and he has been very supportive ever since, but sometimes it is not as obvious that someone is trying to de-rail you from your end goal.
Beware of negative comments and nay-sayers, they are only speaking from their own insecurities which is NOT your problem. Don’t tell them about your goal, until you are absolutely confident that no matter what they say or do, they will not put you off your plan of action.
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Please feel free to leave a comment but please use your real name and NO SPAM. What is your favourite tip that has really helped you to achieve your goal?
Every week in 2012, I will be posting a simple, effective tip on how to increase confidence.
Trying just 1 tip every week will help your confidence levels to explode within a couple of months, so imagine what you could achieve if you commit to this for the whole year…
Week 4 – Be grateful for your good bits!
Most people that have low self esteem and low confidence never actually take the time to be grateful for their good bits. But everyone (including YOU) has something to be grateful for. Something that is a positive and something that is unique or special.
This week's tip is a simple one, which will help to get you focused on your positives. Every night before you go to sleep, think of at least 3 positive things about you, or about what you have done that day or things that have happened to you during the day. It could be something as simple as 'I received a compliment about my hair' or 'I felt full of energy today' or 'I achieved all 5 things on my To Do list'.
Try it; If you have a journal, use it to write down 3 things that you are grateful for every day. It doesn't have to be about you, but it does have to be something that makes you feel good. For example; "I am really grateful for the flowers that are now coming to life in my garden" or "I am really grateful for smile that a stranger gave me today" or "I am really grateful for having fantastic legs!".
Celebrating your positives will encourage more of them to appear.
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Feel free to add your comments, confidence tips or stories of how you have increased your confidence over the years. NO SPAM will be accepted and please use your real name
Every week in 2012, I will be posting a simple, effective tip on how to increase confidence. Trying just 1 tip every week will help your confidence levels to explode within a couple of months, so imagine what you could achieve if you commit to this for the whole year…
Week 3 – Do something that you love.
This week's tip is specifically aimed at people who are really suffering from a dip in confidence in all areas of their lives, new mothers fit this bill perfectly, but it could be because you have just come out of a long term relationship, or been made redundant. Basically any big life change can shake confidence and until you find your feet again, it can be tough.
Doing something that you love, a hobby or volunteer work for example, will help you to massively boost your confidence – especially when you get good at it.
When we do something that we love, we have passion and it gives us a sense of achievement. When it is a hobby, that sense of achievement is reflected back at us and it really does make a difference. It helps to increase positivity, which helps to increase self esteem and confidence.
Try it; is there a hobby that you have always wanted to try but never got around to? Try it for a few weeks and notice the difference that it makes to your confidence levels.
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Feel free to add your comments, confidence tips or stories of how you have increased your confidence over the years. NO SPAM will be accepted and please use your real name
Anyone that knows me or has visited this blog before will know that although I am a huge believer in positive thinking, I’m not necessarily a believer of affirmations*.
But affirmations can be useful; as long as you use them properly and stick to a few basic rules.
Confidence and self esteem are linked with a positive mind, so those of you that are trying to overcome negative thoughts may find it useful to say some daily affirmations. Here are some tips of how to use affirmations to their best potential.
1) Make sure that you always say them in the present tense, not past and definitely not future. “I am calm and in control” for example.
2) Sometimes, an affirmation such as “I am calm and in control” is a stretch too far, in other words your mind automatically rejects it. The way to get around this is to say “I am calmer and more in control every day”. Still in the present tense, but now you are easing yourself into the affirmation and it will not be automatically rejected as unbelievable.
3) Make sure that you say the affirmations in a positive tone (either out loud or in your head). This is a time to be bright and breezy not monotone or bored! Sound confident and you will trick your subconscious into believing that you ARE confident.
4) Do it a lot! You can’t just say the affirmation once or twice and then give up. Positive thinking is a habit, just like negative thoughts are. So rinse and repeat many many times.
5) Don’t give up. Eventually if you stick to the above 4 simple rules, the affirmations will start to have an impact on the way that you think and your confidence and self esteem will grow.
You may not notice this improvement as it will be gradual and long term, but try keeping a journal to keep track of your thoughts and you will really notice an improvement.
You can also use your journal for making notes of really good affirmations that you can use.
* When affirmations won't work; when you have a past trauma or negative event that is 'stuck' in your energy field which needs to be cleared.
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Please feel free to leave a comment, your favourite affirmation or tips of how you have increased confidence or self esteem. Please use your real name and NO SPAM!
Every week in 2012, I will be posting a simple, effective tip on how to increase confidence. Trying just 1 tip every week will help your confidence levels to explode within a couple of months, so imagine what you could achieve if you commit to this for the whole year…
Week 2 – Use visualisations to 'see' your confident self.
If you have an important business meeting or a big social event that is worrying you, using visualisations will help you to 'see' your confident self dealing with the situation and having a good time, rather than being stressed.
I've wrote a lot about visualisations and how to use them (use the search function at the top of the website to find more about visualisations). The reason that I am so fond of them is because they work!
Clients often tell me that they find it difficult to visualise, but if you are getting stressed at the thought of how badly the event is going to go, you are already using visualisations – in a bad way!! Start using visualisations to create a more confident and pleasant situation by imagining how the event will go if it was perfect and you were at your most confident self.
Try it; Spend a couple of minutes now closing your eyes and imagining the event that is worrying you. Imagine you are at your most confident, happy and in control. Don't worry if you can't see images or a moving picture yet, you can use the Tell a Story technique. The brain cannot tell the difference, so just do what works for you.
What is different about this time to how you have previously imagined the event would go? Which option do you prefer? Doing this exercise will show your brain that you are capable of being confident and in control, it will only take a few times to really feel the benefit of this exercise.
Feel free to add your comments, confidence tips or stories of how you have increased your confidence over the years. NO SPAM will be accepted and please use your real name
