How to Stop Chocolate Cravings

It is a fact that 95% of my clients say that chocolate is their no. 1 craving. It is the guaranteed diet saboteur. It thrills me when I can stop that craving for good in just 10 minutes. When I talk to prospective clients about this, their eyes light up and they want to know more.

I would love to help you too. Get in touch, believe me, it is harmless, painless but the effects will change your life, for the better, for ever.

No More Chocolate

I have now helped many men and women to end chocolate cravings! Honestly, it is true, sign up to my newsletter and I can help you too.

How To Lose Weight Easily ?

This is the big question, can you lose weight easily? Well to be honest we each have a different pain threshold don't we? So it stands to reason that we each have a different weight management threshold to. That's why some of us are thin, some are ok and some are fat or obese. We have different motivations around food and these motivations often carry a lot of unwanted baggage and that's not just the fat around our middle.

I have found that most people who want to to lose weight have emotional eating issues. They use food as a crutch, helping them to find something that is missing in their lives. Often loneliness is a major culprit, linked with boredom, low self esteem and a multitude of other hidden factors.

I help people to understand what is going on in their head and how their thoughts drive food into their mouths, I help them to understand what true hunger is and to recognise when their hunger is emotional.

What I often find is that people use food as a temporary control measure. They try to fix problems with food indulgences. Once they realise this and break the cycle they are able to change this learned behaviour for good, easily and effortlessly.

If you would like to learn more about these techniques contact me, weight have you got to lose?

How to ask Open Questions

I have found that one of the main problems that people have is how to ask good questions. Most people know that open questions are better than closed questions to get at the route of a problem. Yet it is still so easy to fall into the closed question trap.

Well what is the difference?

Open questions draw the client out as they offer the opportunity to look at the braoder picture. they are designed to encourage creative thought and allow the client to explore their ideas. Open questions ask for a more descriptive answer. they are non-judgemental. For example, "What are your plans to address this issue?" Your client/employee, feels unthreatened and can voice their ideas in confidence. Open questions cannot be answered with a simple Yes or No.

The opposite closed questions limit the person answering. They generally elicit simple one word answers or a yes/no response. They bring an end to the line of questioning and you have to start again.

Words like Who, What, How, When and Where are often used to start open questions. Openings such as , 'tell me' or 'describe to me' are also effective. Opening questionings like do, have, has, is and are lll tend to impose limits on the conversation.

Empty Nest Syndrome

My youngest daughter left home at the weekend. I never thought it would happen. When she first told me she was leaving I never thought it would happen. But believe me it has.

I have cried for the past two weeks, off and on, not in her presence, but usually in the evening when I am on my own. Today I cleaned her old bedroom as a sort of drawing a line under the sand kind of way. I am trying to be positive and looking at all the positive outcomes of this new life I have.

Cheaper food bill, electricity etc. get to keep make up, shampoo, pants to myself, a quiet house, no more cigarette smoke.

But I am fooling myself, I will miss our girlie chats, having a giggle sharing a bottle of wine, being naughty and jointly demolishing a bar of chocolate, saying to each other no, you don't look fat in that!

I am looking forward to going around to her house and having her cook me a meal, I wonder if I can escape the dishes.........................

Letting Go Of The Past

This exercise will help you to reorganise your past and bring memories to the conscious mind from the unconscious. You can then dismiss memories that you don't like and disgard them, they are no use to you so let them go.

1. Close your eyes and recall a time where you were most comfortable and at ease, this could be a beach, your garden or anywhere at all. Visualise the colours, hear the sounds, feel the feelings.
2. Now you are relaxed, think of a memory from your childhood, one that is clear and focussed. Now take your first footsteps and as you do so recall that time when you were a child. If there are any unhappy memories visualise them drifting away into the distance, geting smaller and smaller, dimmer and dimmer. You will now be free of them for ever. The happier memories you will keep and they will become brighter and brighter.
3. Go through each year of your life in the same way until you reach the present.
4. When you have reached this point you can have a fresh start.

It is no longer time to live in the past, if you have made mistakes, you are amongst the biggest band in the world. Noone is perfect. Enjoy building beautiful memories.

How To Influence Anyone and Everyone

Secret number 1 is to build rapport. The dictionary definition of raport may go something like this "A harmonious or sympathetic relation or connection". A more appropriate definition would be. "Your ability to enter into someone's model of the world so that you can give them the feeling of being totally understood".

The key word here is 'understood' because understanding is at the core of relationships, sales, coaching and many other areas where interpersonal skills are used. Rapport, is about effective communication. In this area, Dr. Birtwhistle's 1970s' reasearch is often quoted. He determined that 55% of your meaning is communicated by your physiology, 38% from your tone of voice and a mere 7% from the words you use.

To establish and build rapport, you must speak the other person's language, here is an example:

A music tutor was trying to explain how to play a particularly troublesome piece of music to a student. "Look at the music sheet and get a picture inside your head of where you come in and keep an eye on me"

"It doesn't feel right" said the student.

The tutor continued painting the picture but the student still did not get the point. His pal whispered to him. "You know when you are skateboarding. You turn in mid air and hold out until the very last second. That's the feeling he wants you to get with the music"

The student got it at once. His friend knew the words that connected with the students thinking process. The tutor did not.

Human beings process information by using their five main senses of seeing, hearing, feeling, smelling and tasting. These allow the mind to code and understand what is happening. Although everyone has these senses, some will be more developed or favoured than the others and it is these preferred senses that will be used to represent the world.

Once you are aware of this, you can detect the preferred sense of anyone that you are talking to. In the earlier example, the music tutor was clearly a 'visual' person as revealed by him using the words, look, picture and eye in his teaching. the student was a feeling person, in fact he used the word feel to his pal. His pal picking up on this used the same feeling speech pattern and there was immediate understanding.

How To De-Clutter Your Mind

The Interior Clean Up - what do you do when there is a big black cloud hanging around you and your life. I see this as an opportunity to have a good old clear out of the cobwebs and dust in my interior loft. I find some space when no-one is going to interrupt, lie down and close my eyes. It is now time to get out my duster and give my mind a good old spring clean. I search through memories good and bad, sort them out into piles - just like clearing out a cupboard. I then throw out the memories that are painful, old jealousies, bad decisions, any thoughts which hit the pit of my stomach. Next, I put them into black bin bags ready for the skip. I find this leaves room for the good memories, thoughts and decisions to stretch and grow, be at the forefront of my mind, and be easier to access when the going gets tough.

Try it - it works!

Positive People - How to Be One

Have you noticed that most people are afraid of negativity, the catch is that whilst they are afraid they can't fight negative thoughts. Fact is that we all feel down some of the time and when we are down it is easy to imagine that everyone else is having a fantastic time, have fantastic jobs, brilliant relatioships, beautiful houses, fast cars and amazing bodies.

But, how do you know that everyone else has all this positive energy and trappings, well, you don't. It is just your imagination winding you up, because you don't actually know what someone else is feeling or thinking. It is all in your head. In fact, the next person to you probably thinks that you have got it all and they haven't.

So how do we cope with our internal dialogue and train our mind to be more upbeat and positive so that we can get on with life more freely leaving us to deal with challenges more easily.

You have to change your negative thoughts into positive thoughts, and create positive energy from negative energy.

For example a negative thought such as I don't believe in myself becomes I believe in myself,
Instead of thinking I am a Victim, think I am in control, change I am a failure into I am a success, in fact in this way you can easily challenge any negative thought by changing it into a positive one.

Changing your thoughts will change you energy. the more you practice the easier it will be.

So why not start right now? I have.

How To Be A Winner

Winning isn't always about being number one - winning is a state of mind - Zoe Koplowitz



Zoe is a 50 something American woman who is a diabetic and multiple sclerosis sufferer, she completed the 26 mile London Marathon on a pair of crutches - it took her 30 hours to complete, the winner completed the race 28 hours earlier. If you check on her website you will find that she has completed 22 marathons, coming last in each one, in her book "The Winning Spirit" she writes "There are times when last can truly be your first"

Sometimes, we need to look at what others are doing to realise that winning is indeed a state of mind. To be a winner is to recognise your strengths, start by writing them down, even the small ones, everything you are good at or proud of for example, I can make a really good curry!

Once you have listed everything, write them out again on post it notes and put them around your home, car, workspace.

Then start a list of things you would like to achieve, again put them on post it notes but give yourself a date that a) you will start and b) you will complete.

Next compile a list of things from the past you want to forget, then rip it up and throw it away.

From now on you will concentrate on your strengths and new challenges. With each step you take on your journey you will become a winner.

Family

I spent the week planning my eldest daughter's 30th birthday party. The list of invitees kept growing and I realised how much my extended family has grown in the time since my daughter's birth. New relatives in the mix of boyfriends and girlfriends becoming husbands and wive, new in laws, additional nephew's and neices, new friends, and new friends of old friends and I still haven't got any grandchildren yet (one on the way though). After recently losing my mother it was comforting to know that the legacy that she and my father started in the form of family is still growing and they are remembered every day for the part they played in the creation of our family.

Family is important, especially now in the recession, as we worry about paying bills and keeping our jobs or finding new jobs to replace old ones it is to our foundations we must look to find solace and warmth. I want to thank my family from the bottom of my heart for just being there and for being part of my life.

Wedding Speeches - How to Make a Good One.

I attended the wedding of my neice on Saturday and it was lovely, beautiful bride, handsome groom, great food, wine flowing and fantastic speeches. My nephew gave away the bride, his sister and was given the task of making a speech. He had obviously prepared well and included a mixture sadness, memories and laughter. Upon reflection today I considered other weddings I have attended where speeches haven't been so good, I can recall bridgrooms, bestmen and father of brides crumbling under the weight of the task. Most people detest public speaking and in polls it has come out more stressful than the thought of dying. Pretty drastic eh!, so I thought I would put some suggestions in this blog for would be wedding speech makers.

• Do a mind map of all the key points, remember its a wedding speech not a seminar
• Choose a funny story for the beginning
• Thank the bridesmaids, mother of bride and groom etc.,
• Remember to thank the guests
• Don't stress most people will expect you to be nervous
• Have some prompt cards prepared with the key points
• Keep it brief, keep it simple, and keep it clean!
• Most of all enjoy!

It would be useful to rehearse the speech in front of a mirror a couple of times. If you are very nervous you could always visit a life coach or seek some similar support to help you cope with nerves. Neuro Linguistic Programming provides excellent tools to help with pre-speech nerves.

Coaching At The Sharp End

Line Managers are increasingly being asked to fill the role of coach.  However, are they trained to be a Coach.  What behaviours, qualities and characteristics are required for effective coaching?, Can a lline manager also be a coach? What factors encourage this and what factors make it difficult or impossible.  Do companies ask themselves this question, particularly in the current economic down-turn.  Now, more than ever, SME's in particular need to ask this question and invest in the training of line managers to be effective coaches,.  A coaching culture in an organisation brings many benefits, If quality coaching is a priority in your organisation your business will have the following attributes:-

• People in the organisation exhibit change-readiness in response to new economic circumstances.  
• Constructive relationships are fostered  within and between teams.
• Managers exhibit confidence in their abilities to cope as part of a 'slimmed down' organisation
• Talent management strategies are in place to ensure the development and retention of high performers to ensure a rapid response to economic recovery
• A participative style of management is the norm at all levels in the organisation

    

Sleep On It

What happens when you sleep, your conscious mind is resting, giving you a break from your daily routine, tasks and worries, but what else is going on, your unconscious mind is sorting out your thoughts and worries from the day and putting them into some order, your dreams help you to do this too.  That is one of the reasons a good nights sleep is important.  If you have heard the expression "Sleep on it" it is because a problem "slept on" can be looked on with a new perspective, you can begin to look at problems and worries differently because your unconscious mind has had the time to check through your minds' filing cabinet and sorts through consciously forgotten memories, so that when you awaken you will look upon yesterday differently.