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Holding Space For Others


We have all been called upon at one time or another to help a loved one through a difficult time. When the help required consists of concrete actions, such as running errands or making phone calls, we know what to do. But sometimes we are called simply to hold space for the person as they go through whatever they need to go through. They may need to express anger or grief; they may need to talk or be silent. They may need us to hold their hand; they may need us to give them time alone. Whatever the case, when we hold space for someone, we offer ourselves up as a container for the overwhelming feelings they may be encountering due to their circumstances.

Dealing with emotional abuse

When we offer ourselves in this way, the more centered and grounded we are, the better. Our steadiness allows our companion to lean into us for support, as our presence provides an environment in which they can be free to move. We can also help by being responsive, allowing them to dictate the flow of action from talking to not talking, from anger to grief, and back again. By being aware and open, we can help them confront their feelings when that feels right, and back off from them when they need a break. Holding space requires humility, conscientiousness, and the ability to step out of the way, to honestly understand that this is not about us.

When we love someone in this way, we provide a space in which they can simply be. Able to feel what they need to feel without worrying about how they are being perceived. We can provide this offering in person, over the phone, or even from a distance, through meditation. However we do it, when we hold space for someone in need, we are offering a gift of the highest nature.

New for 2013. From confusion to clarity – Becoming ME again

If anything resonates with you from the above, I will be delighted to hear from you, and of course happy to help you.

I offer coaching and mentoring to you – for you to make changes if you want to in your life. To help you to have more fun, more freedom and less stress. That is it. There is no catch. I believe in you.

Maggie Currie

maggieheart
Professional Transformational Coach, Consultant
Founder of MAGGIE CURRIE COACHING

Website:       http://www.maggiecurrie.co.uk

Facebook:    https://www.facebook.com/maggielifecoach/

Email:            hello@maggiecurrie.co.uk

 

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Attitude Follows Perspective

Shifting our mood.

We all have days when we are faced with chores, errands or responsibilities that we don’t want to do.  At times like these it is easy to get into a bad mood and stay in one as we tackled these tasks.  However, given the fact that our bad mood will not change the fact that we have to do these things, and will most likely make things worse, we could also try to shift our attitude.  Many wise people have pointed out that it is not so much what we do as it is is how we do it that makes the difference in our lives. 

windowcleaning

It is important when we are facing something that is really hard for us, whether is doing tax returns, paying bills or visiting a challenging relative, that we lovingly support ourselves through the process.  The more supported we feel, the easier it is to open our minds to the idea that we could change our way of looking at the situation.  In truth, most of the chores we don’t like doing are intimately intertwined with our blessings.  When we remember this, we feel gratitude which makes it hard to stay in a dark mood.

We can shift our attitude by considering how much we love our home as we clean it and how lucky we are to have a roof over our head.  Any task can be transformed from a burden to a necessary aspect of caring for something we love.  All we have to do is shift our perspective, and our attitude follows shortly behind. 

If anything resonates with you from the above, I will be delighted to hear from you, and of course happy to help you.  

I offer coaching and mentoring to you – for you to make changes if you want to in your life. To help you to have more fun, more freedom and less stress. That is it. There is no catch. I believe in you.

Maggie Currie

maggieheart
Professional Transformational Coach, Consultant
Founder of MAGGIE CURRIE COACHING

Website:       http://www.maggiecurrie.co.uk

Facebook:    https://www.facebook.com/maggielifecoach/

Email:            hello@maggiecurrie.co.uk

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You are stronger than you realise

Our capacity to cope successfully with life’s challenges far outstrips our capacity to feel nervousness.  Yet in the weeks, days and hours leading up to an event that we believe will test our limits, we become nervous.  While we have previously regarded ourselves as equal to the trials that lie ahead, we reach a point at which they near and our anxiety begins to mount. We then become increasingly worked up, until the moment of truth arrives and we discover that our worry was all for nothing.  We are almost always stronger and more capable that we believe ourselves to be.  But anxiety is not rational in nature, which means that in most cases we cannot work through it using logic as our only tool.  Reason can help us recognise the relative futility of unwarranted worry but, more often than not, we will find more comfort in patterns of thought and activity that re-direct our attention to practical or engaging matters.

 

donotfeedthefears

Most of us find it remarkably difficult to focus on two distinct thoughts or emotions at once, and we can use this natural human limitation to our advantage when trying to stay centred in the time leading up to a potentially tricky experience.  When we concentrate on something unrelated to our worry – such as deep breathing, visualisations, pleasurable pursuits or exercise – anxiety dissipates naturally.  Meditation is also a useful coping mechanism as it provides us with a means to ground ourselves in the moment.

concept

The intense emotional flare up you experience just before you are set to challenge yourself is often a mixture of both excitement and fear.  When you take steps to eliminate the fear, you can more fully enjoy the moment.  Though you may find it difficult to avoid getting worked up, your awareness of the forces acting on your feelings will help you return to your centre and accept that few hurdles you will face will be as high as they at first appear.

If anything resonates with you from the above, I will be delighted to hear from you, and of course happy to help you, please contact me .

What I offer is coaching and mentoring to you – for you to make changes if you want to in your life. To help you to have more fun, more freedom and less stress. That is it. There is no catch. I believe in you.

Maggie Currie

maggieheart
Professional Transformational Coach, Consultant
Founder of MAGGIE CURRIE COACHING

Website:       http://www.maggiecurrie.co.uk

Facebook:    https://www.facebook.com/maggielifecoach/

Email:            hello@maggiecurrie.co.uk

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Family life and looking after YOU.

Many of us have a hard time balancing taking care of ourselves with taking care of our family responsibilities. For people with young children, this can be especially challenging, but even people without children may have obligations to care for extended family, partners, pets, and the home in which they live. It’s easy to lose track of our own needs as we give ourselves to the people, pets, and places we love. However, it is essential to their well-being that we take care of ourselves, filling our own wells with water so that we have something to offer when we return home each day.

sisters

 

It is easy to get caught up in the demands of home life because they never stop. There is always one more thing you can do, another dish in the sink, a work surface that needs wiping, or a person who needs a ride somewhere. If you don’t set some boundaries, you will find yourself on an endless journey of housework and doing for others. Eventually, you will probably feel drained and out of touch with your inner life force. Instead of waiting for this to happen, integrate self-care into your daily schedule. Even if it is only half an hour to yourself each day. There are times when even that will not be possible—for example, with a new baby or a sick relative. At times like this, retreating inward energetically can be a lifesaver. You can always find five minutes to close your eyes and breathe consciously. Or take just ten minutes to read a few paragraphs of a book. This will help you to relax and rebuild your strength.  Make sure you spend at least ten minutes, preferably thirty minutes, on yourself during the day.  Or even have two or three ten minute breaks just for you.

 

wiseowl


Most of the time, though, it is possible to set aside a full hour for yourself each day. In addition, scheduling a longer interval of time, perhaps on a weekly basis, can really help to restore your energy. Get a massage or go to see a film or have an evening out with a friend. Taking time to experience the world outside of your home makes returning home all the more wonderful. In the same way, taking care of yourself is a natural complement to taking care of your home and family.

If anything resonates with you from the above, I will be delighted to hear from you, and of course happy to help you, please contact me .

What I offer is coaching and mentoring to you – for you to make changes if you want to in your life. To help you to have more fun, more freedom and less stress. That is it. There is no catch. I believe in you.

Maggie Currie

maggieheart
Professional Transformational Coach, Consultant
Founder of MAGGIE CURRIE COACHING

Website:       http://www.maggiecurrie.co.uk

Facebook:    https://www.facebook.com/maggielifecoach/

Email:            hello@maggiecurrie.co.uk

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Get out of your own way

When you are facing obstacles that you perceive to be blocking you from achieving your goals, try not to get discouraged. It is so easy to feel “stuck” or that “life” is creating obstacles preventing you from getting what you want. It is also easy to look to everyone else for the problem, perhaps even wanting to “get rid” of that person we may feel is blocking us. Often the best course of action to take is to look inside ourselves first.

It is amazing how often we can get in our own way without even being aware that is what we are doing. Even though we truly want to succeed, there are many reasons why we may sometimes block our own efforts. It may be that we are afraid to succeed, so we subconsciously create circumstances to keep ourselves stuck. Or it may even be that we are afraid that we will succeed, so we block ourselves by making the achievement of our goals more difficult than they really are. We may even approach our goals in a way that keeps creating the same unsuccessful results. Everything we do is a choice that we make, whether we realise it or not.

yourchoice

If you believe that you’ve been getting in your own way, you write down how you’ve done this. Write down the choices you’ve made that have hindered your efforts and the fears that may have prompted you to make these decisions. Take note of any thoughts and feelings that arise. It is important to be gentle with yourself during this process. Don’t blame yourself for getting in your own way. When you are finished, throw the paper away while setting an intention that you are getting rid of any obstacles you’ve created to block yourself. Start again with a clean slate. Doubts and fears are going to be natural, but with this new awareness, you should be able to prevent yourself from subconsciously thwarting yourself. Besides, now that you’ve decided to get out of your own way, the part of you that has always wanted to succeed can allow you to do just that.

If anything resonates with you from the above, I will be delighted to hear from you, and of course happy to help you, please contact me .

I am helping people to become the very best version of themselves and would love to work with you too.

Maggie Currie

maggieheart
Professional Transformational Coach, Consultant
Founder of MAGGIE CURRIE COACHING

Website:       http://www.maggiecurrie.co.uk

Facebook:    https://www.facebook.com/maggielifecoach/

Email:            hello@maggiecurrie.co.uk

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Make sure you are ‘being’ as well as ‘doing’

My clients often tell me that one of the added benefits of coaching with me that they hadn’t considered before they started, is that their  sessions can often be the only time in a busy week that they feel able to step back and truly focus 100% on themselves.  Hand on heart, how often could you say that you allow yourself to do that?

A lot of the time we get so busy ‘doing’ that we forget about ‘being’.

This was a revelation of sorts for me some years back.  I had something fantastically inspiring to aim for, I had the focus and drive to work really hard and I was making good progress.  And yet, I wound up feeling ill, stressed and fairly disillusioned.  If this was what achieving my goals was about, I wasn’t sure I wanted them after all!

Talking through how I felt with a friend one day, I was brought up short when she said “oh yes, you’ve become a human doing instead of a human being” and I thought about that all the way home.

As I reflected on the previous few months I could think of few times when I wasn’t ‘doing’ and even fewer times when I’d consciously decided to take time out and just be.

 

So how much of your time do you spend ‘doing’ and how much do you spend ‘being’?   If you had to divide a circle up with how much time you give over to each, what would it look like?  How big would your ‘being’ slice be?

piechart

With our busy lives and time-poor society it can seem nearly impossible to take more time for ourselves, but at what cost do you choose not to?  My decision those few years back was to invest more time in myself and I’m certain that I’m much more productive as a result.  I get more done in my ‘doing’ time now than I ever did when I was ‘doing’ every waking second of the day.  Plus, my ultimate decision was that it couldn’t all be about the doing and the destination or I’d miss the journey altogether.

What time could you make for yourself to just be?  When could you next set aside an hour or two, a whole day or even more than that to relax and recharge?  How much better would you feel if you did?

Could you do with some regular time set aside to focus 100% on you and on making your life how you want it?   If you’d like to see how working with me as your coach could help you, call me for a free conversation on 01983 754666.  Make time for yourself to work on you.

concept

When you coach with me you will discover your authentic, true self,  find and live your passions, live the starring role in your own life, not the ‘support act’ in someone else’s. How much value do you put on your life?

My coaching will give you all you need to become self-assured so that you can face life head on.  Expect to be challenged, excited, to laugh, to cry, learn new things, relearn old things in new ways, step out of your comfort zone and make some minor and some significant changes.

One to one coaching or group coaching is available.  Call me to find out more. This could be the first step you take to transform the look and feel of your life — forever!

Maggie Currie

maggieheart
Professional Transformational Coach, Consultant
Founder of MAGGIE CURRIE COACHING

Website:       http://www.maggiecurrie.co.uk

Facebook:    https://www.facebook.com/maggielifecoach/

Email:            hello@maggiecurrie.co.uk

 

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Bouncing back

Life happens.  It doesn’t matter how positive you are or how balanced and centred you are, there are going to be times when you are knocked sideways. Times when your carefully organized life is turned upside down and you get knocked for six.  Life happens!

You may be challenged with any number of situations that will leave you feeling like you were kicked in the stomach.  It may be the loss of a loved one, a divorce, the loss of a job.

Let’s face it. Things happen. They’re part of life and no matter how you try to explain them away with the idea that “everything happens for a reason,” they hurt. And they hurt a lot!

They hurt at the very core of your being. The pain begins in your heart and radiates throughout your entire being. Repeating positive phrases does not make it stop hurting.

emotionalwoman

At times like these you’re probably going to feel down, maybe depressed. You will probably feel anger or some other manifestation of your pain. Whatever you’re feeling, it’s ok. It’s ok to feel hurt, sad, angry or whatever your true feelings are. You cannot deny pain any more than you can deny fear. The only way through this is to give yourself permission to feel the feeling.

The question is not whether or not you will feel down. The question is for how long will you stay in this state?

The difference between people who get through life’s challenging moments, regardless of the seriousness, and those who are immobilized by the events is their ability to bounce back.

How quickly can you bounce back?  Of course, the severity of the event will have a lot to do with the time it will take you to get past the pain and on with your life.

Take the example of two people being downsized from their job, something that is becoming a natural occurrence these days.  One is floored by the news of his dismissal.  He expresses his pain by becoming angry at his employers, his colleagues and the system in general.  He spends his days telling anyone who’ll listen, about his “problem.”

Usually from a barstool!

As he sees it, his life is ruined and he’s blaming everyone for his troubles.  People who react like this spend weeks, even months or years, wallowing in despair until, if they’re fortunate, someone close to them convinces them to seek professional help.

screaming

On the other hand, the other person reacts very differently.  Although they have gone through the same experience, and have pretty much the same issues like living expenses, etc., they choose to react differently.

After a brief period of feeling a loss of self-esteem, self-pity and anger, they decide to get back in the game. They begin contacting their network of colleagues, avail themselves of the courses and other services their former employer offered everyone and starts actively looking for a new position.  In a short time they find their “dream job” with an exciting new company.

While both people in our hypothetical example had the same experience and both went through a period of hurting, the time each allowed themselves to remain in that dis-empowering state was vastly different.  While one remained “stuck” in their problem, the other handled their loss and moved on with their life.

This is the key. It’s not whether life occasionally puts you into a tailspin, it’s how long you choose to remain there.

dosomethingtoday

When something devastating happens to you, allow yourself some time to grieve your loss.  However, don’t allow yourself to get stuck there. Take some action. Join a support group, talk about your feelings with a trusted friend or your spiritual advisor.  If necessary, seek professional help.

In the case of a job loss, perhaps you might want to take some time to re-evaluate your career goals. You may even consider a change in career altogether. When you’re ready, you can begin networking and making new contacts.  Attend social or networking events. Call people you know. Do something!

One of the most important things to remember in high stress situations is not to allow yourself to become isolated. While spending some time alone is normal, even necessary, isolation can be dangerous and should be avoided at all costs. Get out and be with people as soon as possible.

As a friend recently reminded me, “life is for the living.” It’s important to get back to your life. In time, the pain will pass.

If anything resonates with you from the above, I will be delighted to hear from you, and of course happy to help you, please contact me .

I am helping people to become the very best version of themselves and would love to work with you too.

Maggie Currie

maggieheart
Professional Transformational Coach, Consultant
Founder of MAGGIE CURRIE COACHING

Website:       http://www.maggiecurrie.co.uk

Facebook:    https://www.facebook.com/maggielifecoach/

Email:            hello@maggiecurrie.co.uk

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Clarifying Your Values

What do you stand for? What are the organising principles of your life? What are your core beliefs? What virtues do you aspire to, and hold in high regard when you see them demonstrated by others? What will you not stand for? What would you sacrifice for, suffer for, and even die for?

What are your values?

These important questions are only asked by about 3% of the population, and that very small minority tends to be the movers and shakers in each society.

When I began this exercise some years ago, my list had 165 qualities that I aspired to.  I think I wrote down every virtue, value or positive descriptive adjective that referred to personality and character contained in the dictionary.  And I agreed with all of them. I felt they were all important and I wanted to incorporate every single one of them into my character. Then reality set in.  I realised that it is extremely hard to learn even one new quality, or to change even one thing about myself, let alone hundreds of things. So I scaled down my ambitions and narrowed the values down to a much smaller number that I could manage and work with. Once I had settled on about five core beliefs, I was able to get to work on myself and start making some progress in character development.

iStock_000004706304XSmall (2)

 

This is something everyone can do.  Firstly,  write down the five values that you feel are the most important for you to live by. Once you have those five values, then organise them in your order of priority. Which is the most important value in your hierarchy of values? Which would be second? Which would be third? Which would be fourth? Which would be fifth?

Every single choice or decision you make is based on your values. Whenever you decide between alternatives, you invariably choose the alternative that you value the most. And because you can only do one thing at a time, everything you do is a demonstration of what you consider to be the most important at that moment. Therefore, organising your values in an order of priority is the starting point of personal strategic planning. It is only when you are clear about what you value, and in what order, that you are capable of planning and organising other activities of your life.

Here are two things you can do immediately to put this into action:

First, clarify your core beliefs and your unifying principles. Write them down and compare your life today with the values that are really important to you. How do they compare?

Second, organise your values in order of their importance to you. Which of your values is most important? Which is second? And so on. Do your current choices reflect this order of values?

If you anything resonates with you from the above, I will be delighted to hear from you, and of course happy to help you, please contact me .

I am helping people to become the very best version of themselves and would love to work with you too.

Maggie Currie

maggieheart
Professional Transformational Coach, Consultant
Founder of MAGGIE CURRIE COACHING

Website:       http://www.maggiecurrie.co.uk

Facebook:    https://www.facebook.com/maggielifecoach/

Email:            hello@maggiecurrie.co.uk

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Maintaining our positive energy

The people with whom we have the most contact and hang around with will have either a positive or negative effect on our levels of self-esteem and confidence.  We all know those people who are positive, happy and joyful to be around.

How do they make you feel?

Yes, they make me feel the same!  The positive thinking people can put zest into a boring atmosphere and can fill the room with ‘can do’ vibes that has a knock on effect onto everyone else. They are a joy to be around and bring our energy levels up and increase our self-confidence.

We also know of those people who drain the energy from a room! You know the ones I mean, as soon as they walk into a room the atmosphere changes for the worse.

It is their perception that they never had the opportunities, they are always putting people down, they don’t like others to be successful, they are jealous and are negative thinkers – need I go on?

These people have the power to drain our energy and try to bring us down to their level, a million miles away from the level that WE want to be operating on. But they only have that power if we allow them to.

Some family members can be a lot like this as well.  We can always choose our friends, we can never choose your relatives! We can choose what are prepared to listen to though.

tiredwoman

So what can we do to make sure that the people who we hang around with empower and support what we stand for, rather than bring us down all of the time?

  1. We have the power to choose who we hang around with. Ideally we want happy, vibrant and positive people. If we hang around with those types of people, the negative ones will disappear as they won’t be able to cope.
  2.  If we have good friends who are negative and yet we still want to hang around them, make a point of letting them know how it feels  – if they are a true friend they will respect this. If they are negative from time to time just acknowledge that this is what they are like and block out the negativity.
  3. The same can be said with family. Our more mature family members have behaviours that have been conditioned for years and years and from different eras. They have learned their behaviours from their parents and grandparents. Appreciate where they have come from and, as in number 2 above, acknowledge that this is what they are like and block out the negativity.
  4. Remember, that nothing has meaning in our lives except the meaning that we give it.

We are in control of our positivity and negativity, and nobody can take that away from us, unless we allow them to.

If you anything resonates with you from the above, I will be delighted to hear from you, please contact me .

I am helping people to become the very best version of themselves and would love to work with you too.

Maggie Currie

maggieheart
Professional Transformational Coach, Consultant
Founder of MAGGIE CURRIE COACHING

Website:       http://www.maggiecurrie.co.uk

Facebook:    https://www.facebook.com/maggielifecoach/

Email:            hello@maggiecurrie.co.uk

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Fear of crowds

Fear of crowds is very common for a lot of people whether they are single, married, male, female, high flyers, students, teachers, old or young .

I know how it feels to be alone in a crowd. I often feel totally overwhelmed in a large crowd of people, especially if I don’t know anyone in that crowd. It can feel like I am on the periphery and not allowed into the inner circle, and that, of course, makes the fear even worse. I wonder if the fear is actually of the crowds themselves or is it a fear of feeling lost or being unnoticed amongst a large number of people?

I know when I am in a large crowd of people entirely ‘on my own’ I feel nervous; I have an irrational fear that nobody will even notice that I am there.  I look at the little groups of people who do know each other within that large crowd enjoying themselves and the company of each other and that somehow increases my nervousness and the fear.  Of course they may feel just like I do but when I feel that fear, it certainly looks like they’re having a great time and I’m not. When I am in a large crowd of people and I have my own ‘group of people’ with me I feel safe and secure and know that I am noticed and therefore I don’t have those same feelings as when I am alone in a crowd.

Business people communicating with each other against white

Did you grow up in a house where “children were seen and not heard”? I know I did. That might be the root of these feelings of nervousness and insecurity as they are for me. I can ultimately relate feeling like this to my childhood when I was constantly told that I should be seen and not heard.  So I would sit in the corner with my toys and only speak when I was spoken to.

Having worked hard on discovering my authentic self, discovering, acknowledging and accepting those unexpressed feelings and emotions of when I was told to be seen and not heard,  I now think and act differently.  I know there is a solution to this fear of crowds.  Based on what I know to be true about fear.  I know that FEAR is:

False

Expectations

Appearing

Real

I have found the solution that works for me and this might work for you too:

  • Don’t worry about pleasing anyone else. Just be you.
  • Here’s what I do – I take three deep breaths and take the plunge.
  • I walk amongst the strangers in the crowd and I expect to be noticed. I’ve decided not to expect to be or feel lost.
  • I make eye contact with people and smile at them.
  • I say hello to people I have never met before and strike up conversations.  They aren’t always long conversations, just long enough to introduce myself and be friendly and to listen to the other people.  Sometimes they are much longer, it depends on the person of course. Once the conversations start to happen, other people start to talk to me and to each other and before long I am part of the ‘crowd’ and not isolated on the periphery.

Even if being you just says it’s ok to not talk to anyone – which is a good friend of mine’s solution for her fear of crowds.  She’s decided to not push herself and just enjoys watching people. Funny thing is, she reports people come and talk to her.

New for 2013. From confusion to clarity – Becoming ME again

I know that I am not alone in feeling alone.  There are other people who are in the same position as me and I make a special effort to speak to them as well and include them in the conversations.  The energy and dynamics of the crowd change visibly and it becomes much more enjoyable.

The most important thing is to find a way to feel comfortable being you whether you decide overcoming the fear by talking to people is your way, or overcoming the fear by giving yourself a break and just allowing others to talk to you is your way. Bottom line, stop pressuring yourself to be like everyone else and just be you.

If you anything resonates with you from the above, I will be delighted to hear from you, please contact me .

I am helping people to become the very best version of themselves and would love to work with you too.

Maggie Currie

maggieheart
Professional Transformational Coach, Consultant
Founder of MAGGIE CURRIE COACHING

Website:       http://www.maggiecurrie.co.uk

Facebook:    https://www.facebook.com/maggielifecoach/

Email:            hello@maggiecurrie.co.uk