“When there is a hill to climb, don’t think that waiting will make it any smaller”.

We’re in the last term of school now and heading towards the summer holiday, and for me that just means loads to do before I switch off for the summer. Where there was procrastination last term, I need to get going now and not let anything get in my way. I mean, what else can prevent me from getting started on those things that need to get done? It’s time to do those things I have been putting off until ‘one day’ – did you know that ‘one day’ isn’t on the calendar. I looked!

For all of us procrastinators, and at least 95% of us procrastinate occasionally, it’s time to kill procrastination before it kills us.

But to be fair, procrastination is not always a bad thing. Instead of reacting immediately to every situation and action point, it gives you a ‘safety zone’ of time to let things settle and analyse decisions. It does however also stop you getting on with life, fulfilling your true potential and performing at your best to get the results you deserve in every area of your life.

“Procrastination is the grave in which opportunity is buried“ Lovely quote, not sure who wrote it but it sums up what happens when you do nothing – nothing happens.

How many opportunities have you let slip through your fingers because you didn’t act on them?

What could you have done that would have significantly improved your life, but you didn’t quite get around to it?

Procrastination is a 4-letter word: FEAR

Fear of starting, afraid of keeping going, terrified of finishing, the fear of failure or the fear of success. Whether that fear is real or imagined – the mind doesn’t know the difference – it stops us in our tracks. So what can we do?

The first thing we can do is identify what it is we are procrastinating about. Then in one list identify why we want to do whatever it is, and a second list identify why we don’t do it. This will help identify where the fear is. Is it in starting? Knowing where to begin? Ability to do it? The actual result? Consequences of achieving it (or not)?

If this doesn’t give an answer then we can think about whether what we’re procrastinating about is something we really want to do – or is it on someone else’s agenda?

Assuming it’s something we want to do, the best strategy is to identify one small action that would start moving us forward and break the inertia. The first step can be the hardest and once started it gathers momentum and becomes a lot easier.

It also really helps to think about the outcome, and identify how we’ll be feeling once it’s achieved. What’s the benefit and why is it important? This should give the inspiration to start.

The physical sensations of fear and excitement are virtually identical, but excitement gives you energy and fear holds you in place. So if the feelings are the same, let’s choose excitement and move forward in a positive frame of mind.

With love and gratitude

Nadine.

“I’m starting with the man in the mirror
I’m asking him to change his ways
And no message could have been any clearer
If you wanna make the world a better place
Take a look at yourself
And then make a change”

From Michael Jackson’s “Man in the Mirror” first released in 1988, and re-released after his death.

Whatever your thoughts and feelings about his life and death, Michael Jackson has left a legacy to the world. Millions of people have been deeply touched by his life, his contribution to music and by what he accomplished. Whether you felt love, anger or complete indifference about him, he will be remembered for making a difference.

This always makes me think about my legacy too. What will I leave behind and will the world be a better place for my contribution?

You don’t need to be famous, in the public eye or have lots of money to make a difference to just one other person or many people, but we are all here to contribute to our world.

The purpose of life is to have a life of purpose. “We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give” Sir Winston Churchill

We are born, we live and then we die. Each day we wake up and at the end of each day we go back to bed. But what happens in-between? It’s called living, but why do some really live and others just exist?

As Braveheart put it: “Every man dies, not every man truly lives”

Taking Churchill’s quote a little further, one of the six human needs that we all share is that of ‘contribution’. In other words we all have a need to contribute in some way to something or someone in order to feel fulfilled and happy with our life. This need is higher up in our hierarchy of needs, but once all our base needs are met we then turn to our need to contribute to attain a sense of living and purpose in our lives.

But what to contribute? I’m not just talking about giving £10 a month to your chosen charity (if you want to please choose The Autism Directory!), but something more that gives a true sense of passion and purpose in your life. Something that gets you out of bed with excitement and sends you back to bed with satisfaction. For some this is very much aligned with their work, so making a living is very much a part of making a life. Others are not so fortunate and the focus on making a living has overshadowed understanding their purpose in life.

Why is having a life purpose important? Just like any goal we set it gives us direction and focus. But it also gives us a sense of purpose which leads to passion and fulfilment in what we do. Imagine being very clear about what you want to do, about what choices to make, why obstacles need to be overcome and challenges taken on with certainty and belief you will succeed, because you are clear about your outcome.

Having a life purpose also gives a sense of wellbeing and is one of the greatest roads to sustained health I can think of.

How do we find our purpose? It could be a simple acknowledgement or a journey in itself, but it has something to do with what makes you happy and creates joy, what you value, what moves you and how you would like to be remembered.

For most of us having a life purpose is an alien concept, but the realisation that we all have a purpose and finding it creates an unbelievable desire and focus to our lives. Everything we have achieved so far, all the unpleasant things that have happened to us, our life journey to date becomes clear and purposeful.

So if you want to make the world a better place, just take a look at yourself and then make a change.

With love and gratitude

Nadine.

For my birthday last year I wanted a purple hat.

I had read the poem below and it resonated with me so much that I didn’t want to wait until I was 80 to get one. My lovely husband picked one up for me (the one in my avatar) from the local Marie Curie charity shop. The funny thing is that I found this poem on a poetic website in support of Marie Curie. I love serendipity.

Purple Hat
Age 3: She looks at herself and sees a Queen.
Age 8: She looks at herself and sees Cinderella.
Age 15: She looks at herself and sees an Ugly Sister (Mum I can’t go to school looking like this!)
Age 20: She looks at herself and sees “too fat/too thin, too short/too tall, too straight/too curly”- but decides she’s going out anyway.
Age 30: She looks at herself and sees “too fat/too thin, too short/too tall, too straight/too curly” – but decides she doesn’t have time to fix it, so she’s going out anyway.
Age 40: She looks at herself and sees “clean” and goes out anyway.
Age 50: She looks at herself and sees “I am” and goes wherever she wants to go.
Age 60: She looks at herself and reminds herself of all the people who can’t even see themselves in the mirror anymore. Goes out and conquers the world.
Age 70: She looks at herself & sees wisdom, laughter and ability, goes out and enjoys life.
Age 80: Doesn’t bother to look.
Just puts on a purple hat and goes out to have fun with the world.

Maybe we should all grab that purple hat earlier.

I believe it was written by the lady who also wrote this:

IF I HAD MY LIFE TO LIVE OVER - by Erma Bombeck
(written after she found out she was dying from cancer).

I would have gone to bed when I was sick instead of pretending the earth would go into a holding pattern if I weren’t there for the day.
I would have burned the pink candle sculpted like a rose before it melted in storage.
I would have talked less and listened more.
I would have invited friends over to dinner even if the carpet was stained, or the sofa faded.
I would have eaten the popcorn in the ‘good’ living room and worried much less about the dirt when someone wanted to light a fire in the fireplace.
I would have taken the time to listen to my grandfather ramble about his youth.
I would have shared more of the responsibility carried by my husband.
I would never have insisted the car windows be rolled up on a summer day because my hair had just been teased and sprayed.
I would have sat on the lawn with my grass stains.
I would have cried and laughed less while watching television and more while watching life.
I would never have bought anything just because it was practical, wouldn’t show soil, or was guaranteed to last a lifetime.
Instead of wishing away nine months of pregnancy, I’d have cherished every moment and realized that the wonderment growing inside me was the only chance in life to assist God in a miracle.
When my kids kissed me impetuously, I would never have said, “Later. Now go get washed up for dinner.”
There would have been more “I love you’s.”
More “I’m sorry’s.”
But mostly, given another shot at life, I would seize every minute…look at it and really see it .. live it and never give it back.
Stop sweating the small stuff.
Don’t worry about who doesn’t like you, who has more, or who’s doing what.
Instead, let’s cherish the relationships we have with those who do love us.
Let’s think about what God has blessed us with.
And what we are doing each day to promote ourselves mentally, physically, emotionally.
I hope you all have a blessed day.

So, pick up your hat, get out there and start living your life. Oh and send me a picture too to nadine@forautismfamilies.com and I’ll start a collection of fabulous women who know just how life should be lived. Feel free to add a short story about it too for sharing with others.

With love and gratitude

Nadine.

How do we get to be where we are right now?

I mean how do we get from being born with no preconceptions about life and no fear, except that of falling, to being where any of us are right now, full of beliefs about all sorts, different values about what’s important and more specifically, how do we get accepted in this society and fit in to what others deem as normal.

If we all start life with a blank sheet of paper what it is that starts filling in the details on that paper that creates the masterpiece of who we are at any age and stage of life?

My thoughts are that we learn most of it from others. Our parents and carers begin the process of filling in the blanks as we observe their behaviour, begin to learn what we can and can’t do, and take from them our first beliefs about the world we live in.

As a child one of the very many things I learnt was that it wasn’t good to make mistakes or do something that others didn’t approve of as it resulted in a bad feeling. This negative feeling was also a learnt response from the behaviour of others towards me when I did anything that was wrong or disapproved of.

This thing about not making mistakes was a key one for me – At around the age of 5 I clearly remember leaving the classroom at school one lunch-time and as I walked down the steps I started to walk towards to school gates and home as I would do at the end of the day. I then realised it wasn’t the end of the day, but instead of turning around to head back to the school dining area for lunch, I continued walking as the fear of being seen to have made a mistake was too great. Of course I had to face that at some point as it wasn’t the end of school and so I did have to go back, however at the moment I realised I was walking the wrong way, turning back was too obvious of a mistake and I couldn’t even do that for fear of disapproval.

Now where did that behaviour come from? What was it that installed that belief in me that making mistakes was so bad that they had to be covered up as best you could regardless of the consequences?

This particular fear in me continued as I grew up and another clear memory of this was while waiting at Cardiff Central train station with a ticket in my hand awaiting the train. Something happened that resulted in me dropping the ticket on the floor a little way in front of me. Now others would have just stepped toward and picked it up and thought nothing more – but I couldn’t do that. I couldn’t be seen to pick it up for fear of others seeing my mistake of dropping it in the first place. I stood there looking at it on the floor ahead of me and knowing I needed it, yet still couldn’t pick it up, not even when the train came. Instead I got on the train and told a complete lie to the conductor about the ticket checker at the station taking it off me. I didn’t seem to mind others hearing this as I think I thought it was convincing at the time, and I even had to pay again. But that was obviously better than the embarrassment of being seen to have made a mistake of dropping my ticket in the first place.

I am so pleased to say I am no longer fearful of making public mistakes, and that has needed a lot of re-training to get me here now. But the point is how did I learn that fear in the first place and learn it so well that it had such consequences in my life through my childhood, teenage years and early adulthood. How did it get to be such a barrier for me, more so than one would expect from a fear of looking silly?

I cannot recall at all where that particular belief came from or who gave it to me either, however I do believe that there must have been a significant anchor moment in which this was taken on board in my subconscious as something to fear. These key anchor moments happen at a very young age, typically from age 3 to 7, and end up creating the pattern for the rest of our lives.

That is how we all end up where we are right now. A lifetime of ‘anchor’ moments that we cannot even be consciously aware of, learning what gives us pain and what gives us pleasure. Until we can consciously change these beliefs they will continue to dictate to us as a set or rules that we instinctively obey whether we want to or not.

In recent years I have trained and become a Master Practitioner of NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming). An amazing set of tools and techniques to help myself and others become aware of these installed beliefs (our programming) and be able to re-programme those behaviours that no longer help or serve us. That is how we can set ourselves free.

Do you recall any of your anchor moments?

With love and gratitude

Nadine.

“Life is not how it is – it’s how we perceive it…

A personal disaster to one person is a priceless lesson to another.” This is from another of my great mentors in life, Richard Wilkins. It’s true. Change your perceptions and you change your life.

Greg Anderson also said “The perfect no-stress environment is the grave. When we change our perception we gain control. The stress becomes a challenge, not a threat. When we commit to action, to actually doing something rather than feeling trapped by events, the stress in our life becomes manageable”

Understanding this has been a revelation for me.

I was interviewed a couple of years ago on Red Dragon Radio and asked why we weren’t we any happier now than we were in 1971. Apparently, statistics show that we are healthier and live longer. But no happier. “So why is that?” I was asked

My initial response was that we are about as happy as we make up our minds to be. But then realising this wasn’t going to fill the two-minute slot, I expanded.

We all have basic needs and once these are met we seek ways to become further fulfilled in life. Think of a hierarchy where at the bottom are our basic needs such as food, shelter and water. Once we have satisfied those needs we move on to wanting greater things. We move up the hierarchy where other needs are required to fulfil us and make us happy, such as relationships, family, friends, home, cars; and we each have our own version of what’s important to us. As we continue to move up the hierarchy and meet those needs we continue to seek more and more, and so happiness and fulfilment seems as if they are always just one step away.

But what happens when some of our needs further down the hierarchy are challenged? We may lose our job, our home, or find that we can’t put food on the table. All of a sudden what it takes to be happy is now satisfied at a much lower level than before, until of course we get back on the cycle of wanting more and more again. Our perception of what it takes to be happy is constantly changing, and it seems the more we chase it, the more we make it something that is always just out of reach.

So what’s at the top of our hierarchy? Where does it end and when will we be happy?

At some point in our lives we come to the realisation that we are chasing happiness away, and just by standing still for a moment and appreciating all that we have, we begin to realise that we already have all we need to be happy, and that we had it all along.

Yes, the nice home, cars and holidays all contribute to our happiness, but they cannot make you happy unless you are in some way happy first.

Our happiness has a direct connection with our expectations. When we expect either positive or negative things to happen we switch on our ‘radar’ to seek out those things that support our expectations. We change our behaviour based on what we expect so we either display self-defeating or self-motivating behaviour. Then, as a direct result of our behaviour, we get the results we seek.

When happiness is expected we essentially ‘filter-in’ to our lives the things that will support our happiness, and ‘filter-out’ those things that don’t.

You can decide to be happy right now. If you have ever been happy before you know what it looks and feels like so you can choose to get into that “space” right now and feel it again. Sound impossible? Just trying standing up, reaching high into the sky, putting a big smile on your face and shouting YES as if you really mean it. But this only works if you choose it to work. It’s your decision entirely.

If we live in the present instead of in the past or the future, we can be as happy as we make up our minds to be.

Ingrid Bergman said “Success is getting what you want, Happiness is wanting what you get”

With love and gratitude

Nadine.

Thinking about your goals and resolutions for 2013, are they more reflective of your fears than your desires? Do you want more money because you fear not having enough? Do you want to lose weight because you fear your partner won’t love you as much?

“Successful people focus on what they want, the rest focus on what they fear.” This is a quote from an amazing super coach Michael Neill, he made this point about most people’s stated goals are more about their fears than their desires.

This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, because at least you’re focusing on a solution, rather than a problem. But while some of the details about your life might change as a result, you are still the ‘limited’ you that creates your problems and fears.

What this means is that while you can improve some things with the achievement of your goals, for example creating a better life with more money, new job, better house etc, YOU are the same person living with the same fears about not having enough money, not getting the recognition you seek or wanting social status etc. It’s just “rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic” so to speak.

So how do we escape those limiting thoughts and begin to see beyond our fears?

Recognise that you are already enough. Not because of what you’re achieved but because of who you really are. While there may be skills you wish to learn, things you want to change and goals you still want to achieve, who you are is already enough.

Recognise you are already there. What you think you’ll get once you’ve made some changes or achieved the goals, you already have – and you’ve always had – you’ve just stopped yourself from experiencing that reality by thinking you should be somewhere or someone else. Let go of the struggle and know that you are already there.

Recognise that there is nothing you need to be, do, have, learn or change in order to be happy, complete and whole. You are already amazing, wonderful and brilliant.

When you recognise that who you are has nothing to do with what you achieve, a lot of what you thought you wanted tends to go away, and achieving what’s left becomes a lot easier.

So accept yourself exactly as you are. When you accept yourself you relax and the process of personal growth and development becomes easier too.

I sincerely hope that you’re still on track with any resolutions and goals you have set yourself for this year. If you have come across a challenge then just re-focus on the reasons you wanted to make that change. Connect with the emotions of having achieved your goal and just start to take action again. Changing our behaviours and habits is like learning to ride a bike! You are likely to fall off a few times, so just get back on and go again.

With love and gratitude

Nadine.

The new tax year arrived in April and while we are busy (thinking about) completing our tax returns, now is also a good time to focus on how we could be much better off this time next year.

Do you earn well but don’t know where your money goes every month?
Do you make money for your company or boss, but would rather make money for yourself?
Do you work for your money, or does it work for you?

Some say “money is evil”, “money’s not everything” “you can be happy without money”. Well, I believe money is neither good nor evil, but it is the person with the money who can do good or evil with it, and there is an awful lot of good that can be achieved with money. The latter two statements I tend to agree with, but life is a hell of a lot easier with money than without.

So what stops people succeeding financially and having abundance in their life? Financial success first depends on a belief that it is a possibility. Many people create barriers to prevent them having abundance at an unconscious level which can hamper efforts to succeed. At a conscious level you can do everything possible to achieve your goals, but if there is an unconscious part of you that doesn’t believe, it will continue to find obstacles – until you address it. These beliefs can form unconsciously from childhood and you may not even know you have them.

We all have different conscious beliefs about money. Some of the common ones are that you need money to make money, or it’s too late in life, or that you don’t know what to do or finances are too complicated. These are all cause/effect beliefs which have little to do with achieving abundance. These types of beliefs limit people because they’re looking for the answers outside of themselves, when in reality the keys to prosperity exist within ourselves. Abundance is not was a person has – it is a state of mind.

So why is the pursuit of money often met with derision by others? Why do we compare ourselves with others on the basis of what we have? Why do we get jealous when someone else has something that we want? It is common to compare our financial status with others, but this is often the root of much emotional pain. Thinking about what you don’t have makes you angry and resentful, which in turn creates more limiting beliefs and barriers to your prosperity. Once we stop equating our self-worth with money the doors of possibility swing open because we are willing to try more things, since we feel better about ourselves. Having a strong inner sense of self is what is truly important because when we have this, having money is no longer a question of self worth. Money doesn’t determine who you are, it’s simply a resource.

Many people have positive beliefs about prosperity and abundance. By thinking “What is possible?” you can move to a whole new level of thinking. Your possibilities start with a dream, then it’s a matter of turning that into reality. As you embrace your own self worth and open up to the idea of what is possible, you’ll attract abundance and prosperity. If you feel good inside it will show on the outside and positive will be attracted. That’s the way life works!

No-one will ever care as much about your financial well-being as you do..

It is good practice to keep on top of your personal financial situation, and even more so in times of some uncertainty. Regular focus or reviews to ensure you are in the best possible ‘health’ with your finances is common sense and provides a good foundation on which informed financial decisions can be made.

Given the so called ‘credit crunch’ we’ve been in you would be forgiven for thinking that the next few months / years could be a little difficult. Well if you listen to all the doom and gloom merchants out there you could easily start to believe this. The issue here is that we attract into our lives what we focus on and persistently think about, so thinking this only fuels your negative expectations, which drives your self defeating behaviour which in turn results in a negative outcome – going to prove those doom and gloom merchants were right – and that you were right to believe them!

On the other hand, you could choose to believe in prosperity, and that there are numerous opportunities to generate money and increase your personal wealth over the next few months and years. Believing this will build your positive expectations which will drive your self motivating behaviour which in turn will result in an excellent outcome – proving that you were right to believe in prosperity as a possibility.

So, the process is the same, it’s just a question of which you choose to believe, and whichever you choose, you will be right!

What if you want to believe in prosperity but it’s difficult to find the evidence to support it? Well you just need to start looking for it. Money is an abundant resource and there is plenty of it around. Recent estimates place the wealth of the world at over 44 trillion dollars – that’s 6 million dollars per person (ish).

There is a very simple economic principle:

- The scarcer the resource, the more people are willing to give up in order to get it.
- The more common the resource, the less people are willing to give up in order to get it.

A fundamental mistake a lot of us make is thinking of money as a scarce resource, and we inconvenience ourselves to get it. As soon as you create yourself as the scarce resource, the money will inconvenience itself to get you!

With love and gratitude

Nadine.

“You can complain because roses have thorns, or rejoice because thorns have roses” – Ziggy

It’s all well and good knowing we should be positive all the time. But sometimes, knowing we should be a little more positive doesn’t help us become positive. There are times when you just can’t shift from the mental and physical state of being a little sad, unhappy, worried, anxious or even depressed. And often there is good reason for us to feel that way.

But the longer we stay in the negative state of mind, the more negative we are attracting into our lives as our negative thoughts just attract more of the same. When we have negative thoughts our life experience is also impacted as we are ‘looking out’ for all the things around us to support the belief that life is not great – and when we look for it, we can sure find it. This in turn leads to self-defeating behaviour and ultimately a poor outcome in whatever we are doing.

It takes a conscious effort to shift ourselves into a positive frame of mind if we can find the energy, focus and desire to do so. You may think that it isn’t within your control to change the way you think, and that it is just external circumstances that control whether you feel positive or not. But what if you did have that control? What if you did believe that you could change your state of mind in an instant and be positive whenever you wanted? For some that’s just too scary as it means that you have nothing else to blame but yourselves for the state of mind you are in!!

So how do you turn on positivity in an instant?

Firstly, know that it is a choice. As the amazing Richard Wilkins says “if you could choose to be happy or sad, which would you choose?” If you would choose happy but you are sad, then it’s not you who is choosing, as sad is not what you would choose to be. So who chooses that for us instead? In essence it’s what we’ve been taught about how to behave and what we should think about certain situations all the years we’ve been living. We think it’s who we are, but it’s not.

It is all in your thinking. Once you have chosen to be positive it is about thinking good thoughts, as it is impossible to have good thoughts and feel bad (try it). Similarly it is impossible to have bad thoughts and feel good, so if you are feeling bad you know it’s because you are thinking bad thoughts.

To shift your thoughts you might need some “secret shifters” which are pre-programmed memories that turn on the good thoughts. Just think of a few great times you’ve had in the past and how you were feeling at the time, and use these to shift your thinking when you need to. Different ones can shift you at different times so just move on to another if one doesn’t do it for you straight away.

Once you have shifted yourself back to positive, then your positive thoughts just attract more of the same. Your life experience is then impacted as now you are ‘looking out’ for the things that support the belief that life is good – and when you look for it, they can be found too. This in turn will lead to self-motivating behaviour and result in a great outcome in whatever you do.

When you have the ability to shift your thoughts to positive at any time, you are in control of your mind, your thinking and ultimately your life experience.

With love and gratitude

Nadine.

Over this month of blogging I have touched on fear, procrastination, forgiveness, happiness and more…. and I now just want to go a bit deeper.

One of the insights I have had recently is that when we are most happy and joyful in our lives, we are ‘in flow’ with the Universe and connecting back to our source completely open and allowing all that we want and desire to be received. Now when I speak about our ‘source’ I am referring to whatever you might regard as your creator in either a religious, spiritualist, scientific or whatever way you see it sense. I choose to call it the ‘Universe’.

At times when we are in fear or reacting in a negative way we block that flow and it becomes a barrier to that joyful stream of happiness in which we can achieve anything and be, do or have anything we desire.

Over the years we have learnt what makes us happy and unhappy, we’ve also learnt what we like to move towards (desire based) and what we prefer to move away from (fear based). As were learning these things we formed many new beliefs about ourselves and the world in which we live. Like a network of connections, our brain is being wired all the time as we take on these new learnings and establish new beliefs. Some of those connections are the type that stop us from living the life we would choose as they come from fear. In fact, it’s those fearful ones we install quickly and effectively and so it’s no wonder that it becomes so much more difficult to be in that flow of life when there are so many blocks in the way that we have created consciously or otherwise.

I can recall a significant childhood memory when one of these fearful connections was made for me. I was actually being in that moment of ecstatic joy when the full flow of the Universe and my source energy was surging through me. I was around 5 years old and playing ‘catch’ in the school playground. I was completely in the moment and full of happiness, joy and energy at the anticipation of this game. So much so that it got to a point where it overloaded and I couldn’t contain all this excitement. In that moment I grabbed the arm of the nearest child and bit it hard. My intention was not to hurt another. My intention was purely a reaction to the heightened state of excitement and having to let some of that ‘energy’ out.

The outcome of my action was to be publicly scolded in front of the entire school ground of children. I think at the time the teachers believed in public humiliation as their basis for teaching me that biting was wrong. Little did they know or understand of the long term effect this public scolding would have on me throughout my life.

From a deeper understanding of the laws of the Universe I now realise that my inability to be in that complete flow of life with the feelings of ecstatic joy and happiness stems from that key anchor point which created the belief that being in that joyful state leads to great pain and therefore is to be avoided.

In fact only recently have I come to understand why I have the habit of whenever I am pleased with myself or feel deep happiness or joy, that I hold both my hands in a right grip over my mouth. For years my family just thought it was just an odd habit I had picked up and I have been mocked for that too.

I am learning new responses now and re-programming my ability to be excited, joyful and happy and be able to fully express these emotions too without fear.

We all have our journeys that consist of a series of learning points and anchor moments that cement in the beliefs we hold, and as these are mostly taken on at an early age it is our parents, teachers and significant others around us that provide them and set up our programming. But where they get it from to pass on? I guess from their parents, carers, teachers and significant others in their lives.

That being so, does it mean we are continuously passing on the same old beliefs and values down the generations and is there a ‘get out’ clause that can alter this sometimes inevitable process?

It seems that as we grow older and wiser ourselves we begin to see how some of the beliefs and values we inadvertently took on can be, and need to be, changed in order for us to fulfil our own lives the way we feel more at home with. By this I mean beginning to understand what is really true for us and noticing when some of those beliefs that pop up start to feel a little out of sync with who we are. Now it takes some courage at times to acknowledge this and change as the very thought that we could be wrong sends us into all kinds of emotions that challenge our ego.

I also think we can only do this when we surround ourselves with other inspiring people that didn’t grow up in the map of the world we did and therefore have their own view of the world. Sometimes we come across a viewpoint or way of thinking that seems better than what we know and our mind is expanded in a way that can’t be retracted after that. Once you realise something and it resonates with you it seems you cannot un-know it again.

It is my amazing group of friends that inspire me and have supported me through all of it. A group of friends that see the very best in me when I can’t see it for myself. I have learnt over the years to kindly say goodbye to those people in my life that just drained me instead and now only choose those I feel a soul connection with.

It is wise to surround yourself with people who lift you up and can provide that blanket of positivity when you need it. Such a group of friends allow you to do the same for them too. Choose them wisely.

With love and gratitude

Nadine.

What connects us as friends, acquaintances, followers on social media is this sense of having something in common.

We are naturally attracted to people we like who share a bond with us.

Have you had the experience of being in a physical space with people and you felt a natural attraction towards someone? Now this doesn’t have to be romantic or sexual attraction (although that is probably the best example) but an attraction towards other people that become good friends?

I have found this extends to social media too. With so many people I don’t know popping up on my Facebook news feed there are a few that I stop to read even though I don’t know them. Now I must explain here that the reason I ‘friend’ so many people I don’t know is because we have a common interest, which in my case is autism, personal development or business. These communities across all social media is huge and I find myself making good friends with people I don’t know because of this mutual interest and also because there is something about the things they post, what they say and how they show up in the world that attracts me. There are others that I really should unfriend too even though we have a mutual interest they disengage me for the opposite reasons.

How someone portrays themselves is neither right nor wrong and I am not making judgement here just pointing out that I am attracted to some people for the things they say and the way they are and repelled by others for the same reasons.

So want is it that attracts or repels us to other people either in the physical or digital world?

It is our values. We all live our life to a set of values we have acquired over time and which can change over time too. Our values are the things that are most important to us and give us the feelings we seek to make us feel good every day. As an example I will share with you some of my values when online.

I value people having:
Honesty, authenticity and integrity.
A sense of presence – someone who can shine a light on themselves without the ego needing to show off.
A graceful, grateful and vulnerable disposition (what I believe to be personality strengths).
A positive outlook.
The ability to put across a sales message without a loud and brash approach to sales – if someone really values what they sell and trust that it helps others then they can be authentic with this and attract the right clients.
Good manners.
The basic skills of spelling and use of appropriate grammar (I am not perfect here but I appreciate good use of language).

These are my filters that attract people I want to connect with more and they have been pretty good so far in helping me to make some really great friends I wouldn’t have otherwise met, and my life is so much richer for them being my friends.

During this month of April and autism awareness I have blogged every day as part of a challenge with others I have met online. The experience has been fabulous and I have met even more new friends along the way. I hope it has given you the chance to get to know me a little better too and get a sense of where I am coming from. If what I have written over the last 30 days resonates with you then I am pleased and hope it has been a help in some way

With love and gratitude

Nadine.