When you feel lost...Tips for getting out of the woods

So the new year has begun in earnest and I am plunged into the world of finding my own wage for the month and all the months to come! It's a scary business really, being the only person responsible for keeping a roof over our heads, feeding us and giving us a future can be overwhelming!

So, in order to take a break from the whirlwind of making contacts and bringing in new jobs, I have been thinking about how to handle that feeling of being lost and overwhelmed...

These are my top tips for finding a way through the woods in order to see the trees that are all around you...

1) Take one day at a time...what can you do today that will help you along your journey? What call can you make? What email can you send? What boring chore can you tick off the list? What friend can you chat to? Find one thing that you can do that will give you a sense of having achieved something, even if it is really little. This gives you a sense of purpose and a sense of motivation to keep going because you will be moving forward and going forward is better for your mind and wellbeing than standing still when you are lost. 

2) Review where you are going and know why you are going there...you need to know why you are doing what you have chosen to do. Does it still fit? Are you still sure of your choices? Is there a better alternative that has come up? Is there something you would rather do? Have your choices got you nearer to your goal or further away? Do you know what your goal looks like? How can you rectify this? Look carefully at your journey so far and see if it is still on track to bring you the life that you want. If it is, then no matter how difficult things get you will be motivated by the knowledge that you have a reason to keep going and a goal in mind that inspires you. Without a reason to carry on  in any direction, it can be extremely difficult to cope with any sudden changes or brick walls that you might come up against (and we all do!). Remember too that being lost can be a good way to find new pathways...

3) Appreciate where you are...many decisions led to where you currently are, perhaps some of them weren't yours and the only decision you had was whether to love it or hate it, but each situation brings at least the choice of how to handle it. The decisions you have made may have scared you, excited you, worried you or inspired you but they have made you the person you are today and it's important to recognise that you have done the best given the circumstances you are in. No one does anything that they don't have good reasons for at the time - appreciate that you are the same, you've been doing the best you can. 

4) Find your inner strength...The hardest times for me have also been the times when I have found a strength I never thought I possessed. The times when you may have been lost completely, when you may have drowned in the worry or the despair...but you made it through...those are the things that show you how much you are capable of experiencing and still coming back from. Finding that strength might come in the form of just giving yourself permission to be powerful enough to state who you are and what you want and carrying it through. It might come from knowing that you are loved and that love allows and helps you, to be strong. It might just come from reading something that reminds you who you are, what you can do, how brilliant you can be. Sometimes it comes from asking for help, for being courageous enough to admit that you can no longer do it alone and allowing people to help you. Whatever you need in order to find your inner strength you are worthy of it, you are allowed to feel happy even if others are not when they see that you are changing your world. It's ok to be who you are.

5)  This is a tricky one...and it's...knowing that you are not responsible for the happiness of anyone else, including your children...controversial I know. When your children are still children (and even when they are adults) they need you, they rely on you. You are there to care for them, love them and raise them in the best way you know how. A parent is there to show a child how to relate to the world, how to find their way in the world and to love them and nurture them. If you show a child that it is ok to be unhappy as long as someone else is happy you teach them that their needs are not as important as the needs of others. 

To sacrifice something you truly want and would truly give you a sense of deep happiness, so that your child will not have to experience any change or disruption is simply unhappiness waiting to seep into the corners of the lives involved and leave a mark that will be hard to erase. I'm pretty sure that this is not good for children. I have always put my son's happiness before my own and felt adamant that I was being the best mother possible in doing so. Now, I'm not so sure...I'm not sure that putting my own wants and dreams on the backburner has been good for him at all, despite the fact that I tried to hide every worry or stress or negative fleeting emotion from him he still sensed that I was not enjoying life much. Children are clever, they know you as well as you know them, they sense the slightest change, the smallest look of worry in your eyes and they love you as you love them. Even if they cannot voice it or are not mature enough to put a name to it, they want you to be happy in life. Think of your own parents and remember how you would maybe catch them looking sad and desperately wish you knew how to make it better or how you felt sad just being around them even if they didn't look all that sad - as though the sadness was catching.

I once told my son, that if your soul cries out for something that you are giving up and your heart feels heavy when you walk away then you have made the wrong decision. It is a sure sign that you have sacrificed your happiness for the sake of another and eventually, the other will know or sense it, they will feel the weight of your sacrifice on their shoulders and instead of at least one person getting what they want, no one will. If you would be happier to make the decision not to do something, because you feel it might upset another, then give up what you wanted willingly, happily, peacefully and with a smile on your face or not at all. 

I hope that my son will feel that I am his safe haven when he is older, but I also hope that he will spread his wings and fly with no regrets and with a heart full of anticipation...he is not mine to own or control, only my utter delight to love and nuture. I love him with every step I take and every step has him in mind, but that includes the knowledge that if I am generally miserable, or even just have an ensuring sense of dissatisfaction (we are not talking about the odd bout of unhappiness, we all have those) then it will seep into him too. If I am being true to myself I will be seeping joy and excitement and authenticity into his life instead. I will be teaching him that it is ok to follow his own truth. Of course the caveat to this is that your happiness is not more important than keeping your child safe, healthy and loved - would you really be happy if any of those things were put at risk anyway? Of course not. If they are safe, they are healthy and they are loved and know that they are loved then go ahead, be happy, make changes, help them feel excited about the changes, reassured about them and then go for it!!! 

I offer one other caveat: sacrifice is a beautiful thing if it is done in the spirit of loving contentment. I definitely would sacrifice my life, my happiness, my everything for someone I love, especially for my son...I would do it in a heartbeat if I thought that it would lead to happiness or safety for him or for them. Just be sure that you do not misplace the idea of 'happiness' with the thought that you can stop your own soul calling you back to where you need to be...if where you need to be is in a place of loving sacrifice, you will feel at peace with your decision. If you know that your soul will ache at your sacrifice then you have not really served another's happiness at all, you have handed them a time bomb.

Be happy...

Love Nova xxx

An invitation to have the year of your life...

2014 will begin with me being fully self employed...the Quitting the 9 to 5 journey has truly begun! I'm approaching it with a heart that is racing in anticipation of the life I can now create for myself and my son and it has reminded me how important it is to be fully authentic in your choices. It's been a good time I've had teaching...I've learnt so much...but the future feels more 'me', more of a feeling of it being 'right'.

Living a good life is not the same as living the right life for you...sometimes a reminder is needed that we don't get to turn around on our last day on earth and in a panic suddenly realise we still want more time to do the things we REALLY wanted to do. Those things we dreamed about but never really felt we could pursue...

I went to my bookshelves today to find a book to read and found the perfect book in the perfect moment...no doubt you might have read this before but it say's everything I have been thinking in a far better way than I ever could. Happy Christmas and have a wonderful New Year, full of exciting new things that make your heart sing!

Enjoy...

The Invitation

It doesn't interest me

what you do for a living.

I want to know what you ache for

and if you dare to dream

of meeting your hearts longing.

It doesn't interest me how old you are,

I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool

for love

for your dream

for the adventure of being alive.

It doesn't interest me what planets are

squaring your moon...

I want to know if you have touched

the center of your own sorrow

if you have been opened by life's betrayals

or have become shriveled and closed

from fear of further pain.

I want to know if you can sit with pain

mine or your own

without moving to hide it

or fade it

or fix it.

I want to know if you can be with joy

mine or your own

if you can dance with wildness

and let the ecstasy fill you to the 

tips of your fingers and toes

without cautioning us to 

be careful

be realistic

to remember the limitations of

being human.

It doesn't interest me if the story 

you are telling me is true

I want to know if you can disappoint 

another

to be true to yourself.

If you can bear the accusation of betrayal

and not betray your own soul.

If you can be faithless

and therefore trustworthy.

I want to know if you can see beauty

even when it's not pretty

every day.

And if you can source your own life 

from its presence.

I want to know if you can live with failure

yours or mine,

and stand on the edge of the lake

and shout to the silver of the full moon,

"yes!"

It doesn't interest me 

to know where you live or how much

money you have.

I want to know if you can get up

after the night of grief and despair

weary and bruised to the bone

and do what needs to be done

to feed the children.

It doesn't interest me who you know

or how you came to be here.

I want to know if you will stand

in the center of the fire

with me

and not shrink back.

It doesn't interest me where or what

or with whom

you have studied

I want to know what sustains you

on the inside

when all else falls away.

I want to know if you can be alone

with yourself

and if you truly like the company

you keep

in the empty moments.

By Oriah Mountain Dreamer

Love Nova xxx

Retreat reflections

I spent last weekend at a wonderful retreat giving Spiritual Balance Counselling to the guests. Mellulah in Milton Abbas is a special place and the retreats that are held there by my gorgeous friend Saira Francis are always a treat.

The guests each had a session with me and it was a very special experience that I am very grateful to have been a part of. For obvious reasons I can't share with you what happened with each person but I can tell you that it taught me a great deal more about how we all share the same vulnerabilities, worries, hopes and fears. Sharing those with another person, an impartial person who is not there to judge but to listen, can be all that is needed for the burden to be lifted for a while and for the beginnings of clarity to arrive. You don't actually need another person in order for this to happen, counselling is simply facilitating - it is allocated time and space for you. It helps you to address the things that you have kept bottled up waiting for that moment called 'when I have more time'. The benefit of counselling, is that it gives a specific date and time for this to happen - it is an appointment with yourself. Having another person there, though not necessary, does help. It can be hard to work on yourself alone, to force yourself to look at things.

The other thing that counselling does is it gives your feelings an actual voice. So often we deal with things in our head, the voices go round and round as thoughts and they are never said out loud. There is great power in hearing your own voice say words that previously have only been thoughts. Saying things out loud allows you to analyse them properly - when you say it out loud does it still feel true? Or has your voice reminded you that this thought has been magnified to such an extent in your head that actually you do not have the strength of feeling about it that you thought you had. You can also find the opposite, saying something out loud has suddenly enabled you to face a deep truth and it is from this point that you will be able to move forward.

Acknowledgement of your feelings is important. It doesn't mean that acknowledging them will make them harder to shift or make them true - it simply allows you to 'try out' their truth and see whether they are still valid for you. If the feelings are valid and voicing them tells you that, yes, this truly is how I feel you can then get to a point of choice. You can choose whether to act on this truth, to hold it a little while longer until you know what you want to do, or to ignore it completely. The power is in the choice and knowing that you have the choice. Choosing to do nothing when you have fully acknowledged the truth of what you feel is still a choice that you have made in full awareness and that is far more beneficial to your well being than an unconscious choice to ignore something.

Love Nova xxx

Serendipity

How much does luck feature in our lives? How much do we owe to 'fate' or 'serendipity'? Have you ever seen your life take a dramatic change because of something unplanned that came about just because you were in the right place at the right time?

This is something I have been thinking about a lot recently, not least because of the place that luck has had in my own life and the unexpected twists and turns that have come about and changed the course of my life. There have been many chance meetings, chance discussions and opportunities that have suddenly appeared. It has always fascinated me and formed (in part) the basis of the idea for my book. Luck, I have learnt, doesn't come about entirely by chance, you have to be in it to win it as it were! Whenever I am open and whenever I am pushing myself to be in contact with as many people as possible on a regular basis, this is when things start to happen.

My latest exciting opportunity came about at a party. I had not planned to stay long at the party, feeling tired and like I wanted to go home early. In the end I decided to enjoy the moment and ended up staying the entire night! The following morning I was very glad that I did. I got involved in a conversation with someone that led to some fantastic work in a field I feel really passionate about and hope to be able to tell you more about very soon!

I also find that I have to be in a certain frame of mind to be receptive to things, I'm not even sure if I can describe it but maybe you already know what I mean? When I am feeling strong, sociable, confident and positive things move in the right direction without much help from me, they just 'flow'. On the other hand I am sure that there are opportunities that I have missed when I have just not been in this frame of mind for one reason or another. It's impossible to maintain a vibrant sense of optimism all the time but it is during these times of optimism that things come to us, in my experience at least!

If you want to improve your chances of increasing your luck there are plenty of articles on quitting the 9 to 5 that talk about how to improve your mood, have a look and see if this can get you into the mode of 'serendipity'.

What experiences of serendipity have you had in your life? How has it changed your life as a result? 

Love Nova xxx

www.lovelivingevents.co.uk

You are 5 times less likely to EVER feel fear after reading this.

I have been reading a really interesting book called 'Risk' by Dan Gardner. He looks at fear and how it affects our reactions and our memories. It examines how much we are driven by fear and evidently it is quite a lot.

In business and in life it is easy to react to scaremongering that tells you all kinds of facts and figures about the economy and the state of business in general. How often do we read that businesses are failing and things are generally all going wrong? That the end of the world is nigh? That we are all going to die from a terrible new disease? A ridiculous amount of the time. Does this mean though that it is really happening? What can we do to stop ourselves acting out of fear?

The book offers some fantastic insights into the way that our mind works and how we are fooled into believing things simply because our brains are wired to respond in a certain way.

For example: 

Which seems scarier?

• You have a 1 in 100 chance of getting Cancer before the age of 50?

• You have a 1% chance of getting Cancer before the age of 50?

Apart from the fact that I just made that up, I'm betting that you found the first statistic more worrying. Of course the truth is that they both say exactly the same thing. A 1% chance appears to be minuscule, you have a 99% chance of NOT getting it. Looking at the first assertion though, you suddenly equate that with real people, do you know 100 people? You probably do, which means one of those people will get it before the age of 50 and that could be you.

Another interesting fact is that although I told you I had made those figures up, part of your brain will recall these figures and start accepting it as a possible truth.

Here is another little challenge:

Was Micheal Jackson over the age of 15 when he died? Wait, that's a bit stupid...ok...How old was Micheal Jackson when he died?

For those of you who didn't google it or who didn't automatically know the answer - you will have been heavily influenced by the fact that I mentioned the number 15, you will have answered  lower in age than if I had first asked if he was over the age of 60 when he died. Even though I said it was stupid to say 15, your brain  will have been influenced as it made a best guess. Astonishing isn't it?!!

This happens when we go into shops - people buy more if there is a sign saying 'purchases limited to 10' and they will buy more than they expected because their brain is thinking '10' instead of say '2'. The number can be completely arbitrary and irrelevant and you will still link with it in some influential way.

So you can see how statistics in the papers and on the news can make us wary and frightened.

50,000 pedophiles are online at any one time, did you know that? 50,000 of them! Someone official said that so it must be true. Actually the truth is that we have no idea how many are online at any one time. This is a real life example of figures gone mad. Lots of different sources quoted this very specific number around the world. It was on the news, in the papers, online etc but the number was never credited to a source. When the original source was finally traced it turned out that it was a comment from someone who took a guess. It may be higher than the actual reality, it may be lower - the fact is, we don't know. It was a guess, a guess that was quoted and re-quoted in so many different places that it became fact. It bred fear, it made people afraid and the fear grew and grew.

Look at what happened with the millennium bug - there were whole news programmes dedicated to following the disaster and nothing happened even though lots of people of influence believed that it would.

Learning how fear works allows you to know that it is a useful, but limited emotion. It holds you where you are and doesn't allow you to move forward or to take risks. Some risks are very real - these are often the ones that we ignore because they happened a long time ago and the most time passes since the last time a risk didn't pay off the more we forget and assume it is safe. Take for example the MMR vaccine. Many many parents (myself included for a while) didn't get the MMR jab because we were told how dangerous it could potentially be in a small number of cases. What we forgot, because it had been so long since anyone died from Mumps or Measles, was how much more of a risk these diseases were compared to the small risk of a link to Autism. As a result the logic got twisted as a result of fear mongering and Measles again became a real risk and even resulted in deaths. The Autism scare was eventually shown to be exactly that - a scare, not a reality.

So...fear governs so much of our lives, maybe it is time we stood back and checked the facts, weighed up the logic and break away from the heavy and often inaccurate influences of the media and make our own minds up? What do you think?

Love Nova xxx

Top Ten Ideas for How Every Business Can Benefit from Making a Film!

Here's an idea for all of you who want to promote your business....why not get a DVD made?! You might want to showcase your services to people on your website or through YouTube or you may want to have a physical DVD that you can sell or give out to people as a promotional tool.

Here are my TOP TEN IDEAS for what to do with your DVD

1. Make a 'How To' guide for your target market

Do you make cakes? Do a short cookery programme! Do you sell property? Do a short programme on how to get your property ready for sale! Maybe you are a fitness instructor...do a short instructional DVD to sell to your customers so they can do the routine at home when they aren't at a class! There are so many possibilities here!

2. Make a training DVD

If you employ staff, if you sell to schools, if you run a franchise and need to train up new recruits, a training DVD can be the perfect way of introducing your business to new staff or to further train people that buy your services.

3. Showcase yourself

If you are your business you will need to create a brand that centres around you. If you are a public speaker, a healer, an actor, a writer, an artist or anything that involves selling yourself then use a DVD to show the world who you are and talk about what you do. Introduce yourself on a personal level to many more people than you can meet in person by creating a personal message that you communicate through the medium of a short film. You can then direct your customers to your film so that they can learn more about you and your style of communication.

4. Explain what you do

Perhaps you want to back up your marketing materials with something that is more immediate and easy to digest? Why not explain your services through a advertorial type of DVD? You can tell and show at the same time. One big advantage of this is that you are creating an intimacy with potential customers, they will have met you on screen, seen your premises on screen and perhaps met some of your staff - this can make a customer feel much more comfortable contacting you because they feel like they already know you on a different level to just having read about you on a screen.

5. Make a fictional film or a documentary to show your work in action

Sometimes the best way to show what you do is to document it in action. Maybe you want to create a metaphor that people can relate to and a fictional film can create this for you. If you work with young people you might want to create a fictional tale that relates to the work that you do and explains more about what the outcomes might be and how your services can be transformative. McDonalds made a very successful documentary showing how their burgers are made and why they look different in the pictures than they do in real life. This was a great way of engaging customers and giving them an insight into the business that made them feel like they had a special 'behind the scenes' tour. Or what about making a comedy version of what poor customer service looks like and compare it to the customer service people will receive if they choose your business?

6. Make a video diary

This is similar to a documentary but more of a 'day in the life' idea that can help customers understand the way you approach business. You could follow one of your staff for the day and do a warts-n-all type of film, or you could do a short daily snippet of your thoughts or activities over a month and edit it all together so that people can see what a month is like in terms of all the different things that you do.

7. Create a campaign

This is a fun one to get your teeth into if your business is in a position to support it. Why don't you start a fun campaign and film it? Perhaps you could campaign for people to love their teeth more (if you are a dentist for example), or create a campaign for people to make their grass greener (if you are a landscaper), make their fridays a family day (to promote your destination or restaurant etc), there are a million ideas! By creating a fun campaign you are promoting yourself and your services, giving valuable information out to people (you will need the campaign to be educational in some way for this to work), showing your business as caring and approachable and as the leader of the pack who thought of the campaign in the first place!

8. Raise money

If you run a charity or a social enterprise you can use a DVD to raise money. You could make a heartwarming film, a hard hitting film, a funny film etc and sell it to raise some cash. This can just be within your organisation or can be part of a wider community offering. Show you and your colleagues doing something unexpected - a dance, a song, a play and then sell it to their family and friends to raise some funds.

9. Show the success stories

If you are a hairdresser, why not do a whole lot of before and after stories? Get customers (with their permission of course) to tell you how they feel about the new hairstyle. Maybe you specialise in therapies such as acupuncture and can interview those customers who have had a particularly successful treatment and would love to be an advocate for what you do. If you run a mobile disco business, create a set-up where you can show everyone having a wonderful time (again, with permission). Virtually every business can create a film with satisfied customers to help promote what you do.

10. Introduce a new idea

Do you run workshops? Do you have a new idea that you want to promote? Why not film the workshop and share it with people via a DVD that they can purchase? If you have a new idea that is not well known yet then make a DVD so that people can learn more about it and start talking about it. If you are up for showing yourself as an authority on a certain subject then make a DVD and start selling your expertise to others who might need it. It can be an add on to an existing business or it could be the basis of the business itself - sell your expertise as a course available on a series of DVD's.

But how much will that cost??!

The cost of making a film these days can range from nothing at all (if you have the right equipment) to thousands for a properly edited film with presenters and actors. Geek Media have a very cost effective solution if you are looking for an affordable way of making a professional film that has been put onto DVD for you. They offer 5 days filming, a finished, properly edited film put onto DVD with a bespoke cover design for £10 a DVD. If this interests you please watch the film below (which co-incidentally has me as the presenter ;-)....).

The story so far...

Here is an article that I wrote for Motherhood Diaries about my journey. It covers my story of what it was like to make the big changes in my life that have occurred so far! Have a look and let me know what you think!

http://motherhooddiaries.com/motherhood-businesses-jobs-and-family-life-one-mothers-account-of-juggling-the-every-day-obstacles-life-throws-at-her-family/

Love Nova xxx