THRIVE OR SURVIVE - WHAT IS IT FOR YOU?

In light of recent Global events and the consequent fall out from them, never has there been a more important time than NOW to speak about developing COLLABORATIVE societies that have as their goal, to:

further expand their communities for the benefit of each individual as much as for the benefit of the community. 

The sentence above may be long and a bit convoluted in its wording but I am sure you get what I mean. 

For some time now there have been people who have been constantly researching, writing about and delivering presentations about how destructive human beings have been and continue to be, it seems, at an individual level, at a local level, at a global level etc; that destructive tendency appears to be transferring across all aspects of life. We seem bent on destroying things whether it be through the way we think, the way we act, what we say, what we eat............etc.

What is heartening to know, however, is that to the degree that we have suffering, we also have the opposite happening - it just does not get reported on and often the rejoicing & celebration, the respect and collaborative nature of human-ness is dismissed. It doesn't sell, does it!!!

Recently I heard an interview with Dr Srini Pillay during which he explained that according to studies by Freud and many subsequent Psychologists:

the human brain is wired to master disappointment but not necessarily to thrive out of it.

This has been processing in my brain for some time now and this is why:

Those who perpetrate harm onto others use the powerful tool of FEAR to maximize that harm. 

Such people are not only 'terrorists' as we have seen recently, they include those who are violent in communities in all sorts of ways.

Maybe they know that the people they target will not only suffer the psychological harm & physical hurt, they will also have ongoing consequent
FEAR that will put a halt to any thriving.


If this is so, then such perpetrators have been successful not only in the harm and ongoing fear they set out to inflict; they have succeeded in stopping the Global Community in its tracks from THRIVING for the GOOD of all and for the good of the planet in a COLLABORATIVE way.

So my questions are:

Do you as an individual want to just manage disappointment or do you want to thrive out of it?

Do we as a diverse Global Community want to just manage disappointment, manage the harm and hurt or do we really desire to THRIVE out of it on a Global scale?

What is the answer to be?

What does 'to THRIVE out of disappointment' as opposed to 'managing harm & disappointment' mean:           for you?
                                               for your community?
                                               for the Planet?

I agree with Gregg Braden and others when they say we are at a turning point rather than a tipping point. 

Warmly
Lilly

DON'T LINGER AT THE CROSSROAD............

So, you have come to a crossroad - metaphorically speaking; a fork in the road and you find yourself in a position requiring you to make a choice between two paths, a choice of direction.

• Which way?
• What road or direction should I take?
• What if it isn't the right decision, right direction?
• OMG, what do I do?

You find yourself agonizing over the fact that the choice you make might fundamentally alter your life - and it might not be the best decision, the best choice, the best path. 

You find the weight of having to make a decision or choosing between two paths, very difficult.

Does this sound familiar??

I would be surprised if it doesn't. There would not be one person reading this that has not been in this position - AND if you haven't yet, you will at some stage in your life.

• You wait - waiting buys you time and you hope it will all go away, perhaps solve itself.
• You think it over....and over....and over; time passes. You become ambivalent;  ambivalence creates inner conflict.
• You weigh up the options.

Fear sets in AND that's another whole story, another BLOG!!

KNOW THIS:
When a path presents itself - however frightening it might be to follow - it may be the best path to take. YOU WON'T KNOW unless YOU TAKE SOME ACTION.

AND KNOW THIS:
The action you take WILL BE THE RIGHT COURSE OF ACTION, THE RIGHT DECISION.

I read just recently that "in Medieval times, crossroads - intersections of ancient highways and by-ways - were places to fear, to move through quickly; places not to linger for too long."

I also read just recently that "in Irish folklore, crossroads were between worlds where witches met and spirits passed."

SO AVOID LINGERING AT THAT FORK IN THE ROAD - AVOID LINGERING AT THE CROSSROADS.  If you allow it, ambivalence will keep you down, immobilize you.  SO MAKE A DECISION; TAKE ACTION!

Here's to helping you at that fork in the road, that inevitable crossroad!

Lilly
www.lifecentric.biz
www.nitts.biz
Authoring forthcoming book - "How to Get the Most out of Me"

DO YOU REALLY LISTEN.......& HEAR?

I received this in my email inbox just recently. It was from a person called Amish Shah to whose newsletters I subscribe. It relates his wife's interaction with their daughter and it explains VERY WELL how so often in life, we listen to respond \ react rather than listen to hear............Do you agree?

Enjoy the read!!

"My wife Puja is really into Buddhist and Zen philosophy and I recently overheard her telling our daughter a story that was told by a Zen master.

She said, "Nan-in, a Japanese master during the Meiji era, received a university professor who came to inquire about Zen.

Nan-in served his guest tea. He poured his visitor’s cup full, and then just kept on pouring.

The professor watched the overflow until he no longer could restrain himself. “It is overfull. No more will go in! Stop!”

“Like this cup,” Nan-in said, “you are full of your own opinions and speculations. How can I show you Zen unless you first empty your cup?”

Like this story depicts, we often approach life situations with our own views and ideas, without taking off our opinionated lens. How then can we truly live life if we don’t release judgments?......"

When we judge something as either only positive or only negative, we are blocking ourselves from understanding the complete picture. No situation or circumstance is ever only positive or negative - however, each individual may have a PERCEPTION that it is.

Your perception then is KEY in understanding that every negative has an equal and opposite positive and every positive has an equal and opposite negative. 

An intellectual understanding of this concept is one thing; applying it to your life is another!

Where are you seeing something ONLY as positive or ONLY as negative?

Who are you seeing as ONLY positive or ONLY negative?

To living life fully,

Lilly

YOU, MOSTLY YOU, can make a DIFFERENCE TO YOUR LIFE!!!

Anxiety attacks are created when YOU have trained YOUR Mind to be aware, to be vigilant, to be on the look out for and be prepared for an ANTICIPATED STRESSFUL experience. 

This is what fight \ flight \ freeze is about. 

We were never designed to remain in that state of being, in that state of Mind, for prolonged periods of time. Yet for many, that is the state of play.

It is often the very thought of these stressful experiences that creates the anxiety rather than any event or experience itself! That in itself tells you how powerful your thinking is and can be. Keep that in the forefront of your Mind. Interesting isn't it, the expression 'forefront of your Mind'? The forefront of your Mind - your frontal lobes - is the operating system of your body!

So why is it wise to keep the sentence "that in itself tells you how powerful your thinking is and can be" in the forefront of your Mind? Read on.

Have you ever experienced, what you considered to be an 'over-the-top' reaction to a certain event or situation, either by you or someone else?

The 'over-the-topness' of the reaction is evidence that your brain (or the brain of someone who is reacting in an 'over-the-top' way), alerted by thoughts, has activated familiar inner chemistry and has sent it cascading throughout your body. "You feel the thoughts" ; you physically experience them throughout your body!

Those thoughts are often a memory of a perceived traumatic \ fearful \ extremely sad etc

event or experience of the past that created the chemicals you are experiencing now, in the first place. 

By association, feelings - triggered by thoughts, therefore emotions, therefore the resulting inner chemical mix that has been repeated over and over in your life - seem to be an automatic response - the automatic response being the same synaptic connections firing over and over and hence the brain releases the same chemicals over and over - which then becomes a familiar pattern for you. That is why you literally feel the thoughts through the emotions (chemical responses) throughout your body.

Hence, your brain has become "neurologically hard-wired as well as chemically dependent" over the years, to the emotions experienced by the initial perceived stressful experience and when they are triggered by thoughts and by association, it is as if you are reliving that same experience over again internally, in your Mind and throughout your body. 

This is a physical manifestation of a habitual pattern of thinking. 

This is the power your Mind has. 

That being the case, you can utilize that same power to break the habitual pattern of thinking and therefore feeling. 

Remember that. Know that. 

Each and every person is empowered to alter habits. It is knowing this information, understanding it and the acting on it that enables a different pattern to emerge and evolve.

Use this information as a stepping stone towards creating a different response (as opposed to reacting to a particular situation!). Become empowered!

For you!

Lilly Fitzgerald

INSPIRED TO ACT

I have just read a quote by John Demartini (founder of The Demartini Method©) – it says, “When you are truly inspired by something you cannot fail because you don’t give up” – so true! 

However, when I reflect upon leaving education, re-training and setting up my own business as Consultant\Counsellor (as opposed to a Coach even though some of the work I do is often described as ‘Coaching’), I have had an enormous number of ‘pot holes’ along the way.

 

What I realize when I reflect on these pothole situations is that I have continued on my journey despite them and that those pothole situations presented themselves to me to learn a lesson in order to move forward; those pothole situations have served me and have been significant in my growth.

Where I differ with John Demartini’s quote is in the use of the word ‘fail’.  I don’t use ‘fail’; in my Mind there is always a result; it may not be the one you want but unless you actually do nothing (and even then it is the ‘doing nothing’ that is a result, an action, a choice, in my opinion) there is ALWAYS A result. Once you acknowledge that, you come from a different Mindset that enables a position to move to another level of action - if that is what you want -  and if you are INSPIRED (in spirit) you WILL want to do that.

 

So, the quote in my Mind is this:

“When you are truly inspired by something you WILL succeed and you WILL continue to succeed because you won’t give up; inspiration is a powerful driving force, an internal state of being.”  That’s a Lilly Fitzgerald adaptation!

Reflecting on that quote I believe it is important to acknowledge and be grateful for all the macro as well as the micro steps you have taken from the inception of your undertaking to where you are now; when you acknowledge those steps, big or small, major or minor, you place yourself in a Mindset that appreciates you for you; your heart opens, your vibrational frequency alters and you see opportunities that you ignored previously or just didn’t acknowledge even though they were always there!!!

To your success!!

Lilly Fitzgerald

NEGATIVE SITUATIONS

Now here is an interesting interpretation of Negativity:

Negative situations are simply experiences you have not yet mastered. The negativity is the attachment to OLD thinking patterns that no longer serve.

These old thoughts create your current reality which you LIVE out. 

Old thoughts are habits that are deeply embedded in your sub-conscious and are the default position you return to whenever you are in a situation that is similar to the original trigger of these thoughts MANY, MANY years ago.

This gold way of thinking \ old habitual pattern \ old sub-conscious patterning is like a really comfortable BED - easy to get into & hard to get out of!!

Blame Excuses Denial = BED
comfortable  BUT  challenging to 
get out of. 

It is not necessarily where you want to be yet you default to.

A negative thinking pattern, has its foundations in fear. Fear blocks your capacity to think. It disengages your Pre-Frontal Cortex - the CEO of thinking and decision-making within your brain. Neurologically, fear reduces the blood flow and electrical activity in the pre-frontal cortex.

So, when you attempt to think your way of negativity, it DOES NOT WORK!  

When you find yourself in a negative position that you feel overwhelmed by, use a pattern interrupt and do something different:  

• do something physical
• something that is fun
• something that will change your focus 
• something that will exert you

That is just the first step! The first step is however, an important step!

Why not take it!

Lilly Fitzgerald

WE REPRODUCE WHAT WE ARE!

We teach what we know and reproduce what we are. 

What we are is what we have learned to be. 

What we have learnt to be are the stories we have accepted as being true. 

What we know and teach reflects those reproduced stories of what we are!

What are you constantly reproducing?


The answer to this question will tell you 
about the stories you are telling yourself - 
and they are only stories!


Lilly Fitzgerald