TSHP325: Do You Need a Life Plan?

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What’s Coming This Episode?

Life can flash by in the blink of an eye, so is it best to have a plan? A list of things you want to see and do? Sean and discuss the ins and outs of a life plan…

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Do You Need A Life Plan

I have just been reviewing and editing my new book, that will be published next year. “Out Of The Blue”. I was going over the part about free will. It seem very relevant that I am now writing this blog. One of the big issues that I deal with in the consulting room is the ‘what shall I do with my life?’, question. Or the same things from the other way around is ‘why does this always happen to me?’ This raises the issue of is life predetermined or is it something that we create? Are we the victim of circumstances or the author of our own fate.

I live in a world that takes into account neuroplasticity but also psycho-spiritual-plasticity. I think that we all, at any age and at any time, have the ability and the capacity to change, grow and develop. I do not believe that life is predetermined. I know that we have choice. These choices effect us all. We may be on a path of learning that can make it feel that it is predetermined but unless we are aware and awake we will miss the opportunities and the lessons that are presented to us. In a very real sense it is never what happens it us that is important it is how we respond to what happens to us that counts.

Right now planet Earth is in crisis, that is a crisis of our own making. It may be that our ecological mismanagement catches up with us, it maybe that we plunge into another world war or die from pollution and lack of oxygen. If we wake a little and use the other option of choice we might just choose piece and act in ways that reverse the adverse pollution that we have inflicted on the planet. This would suggest that I do not see life as predetermined but I do us as the authors that do have choices.

If life is not predetermined it would also suggest that to have an aim or a direction might be a good thing that can take us nearer to where we want to be because we are enacting our choice. So from my point of view a plan of action is a good thing. The problem is that most people do not know what it is that they want or need to do. So I have suggestions as to how we might discover what that is.

The first is the classic of projecting forward to your hundredth birthday, there is a reception and someone is calling assembled throng to silence because they want to say a few words about you and your life. What would you like them to be saying? If you were to write that speech right now it might give you some pointers as to what you need to do with your life to fill in the space between now and then. This is your plan.

The second is to honestly look ate your life and the lives of those around you, maybe check the media and do some googling. What things that observe catch your attention? What things do or would make you feel good if you did them? There is a seed of a plan here. If you do things that make you feel good you will live a happy life that will take you towards your own fulfilment.

The third is to meditate. We can spend so much time asking the question of what should we do that we never shut up long enough to hear the answer to the question. When we are quiet in meditation we may begin within a question. If we are then quiet and listen the answer can come to us ‘out of the Blue’ so to speak. This can be the beginning of the plan.

Over all planning things that make you feel happy leads to a happy life. This is the enactment of choice. Being a victim of circumstances does lead to happiness.

Take care and plan well

Sean x

TSHP324: How to deal with exam result stress

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What’s Coming This Episode?

Exams may be a distant memory for many, but those in the thick of it they can be a huge source of stress. Not getting the results you need might give you the idea that you’re future is on the line. Spoiler alert: it’s now. Still, managing the stress can be tricky so Sean and Ed thought they’d have a chat about it.

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TSHP323: Time for some tough love?

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What’s Coming This Episode?

In a recent show we talked about the importance of valuing our time with our kids before they grow up. This week we’re talking about tough love. Sometimes the people we love need a nudge… and sometimes we need to dish out some tough love on ourselves.

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TSHP322: Why Do We Fall For Populism?

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What’s Coming This Episode?

It’s fair to say that our politics is a little fractured at the moment. Everything is black or white. Yes or no. In or out. Leave or remain. There’s a certain type of politician that seems to promise the world even though we know what they are saying cannot be delivered… so why do we allow them past the starting gate?

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Why Do We Fall for Populists?

OMG it has actually happened. I thought that somewhere along the line people would wake up and reject this idea. May has departed and BOJO has arrived and amazingly Trumpy says that BOJO is the British Trump and that we all love him….help….!!!!

Somebody once said something like, ‘those that want to be leaders should never be allowed to do so’. This was something that I didn’t really understand until I began working with managers. Oh my, there are some awful managers out there and many of them are supposed to be looking after our health and our wellbeing. I now feel that those that want to be leaders should be automatically banned immediately from applying. 

There is a part of me that feels we should just stop talking about Brexit, after all what is the point?  There is also the part of me that is both intrigued and annoyed with it all. I am appalled at what a total mess our leaders have made of the whole Brexit business from Cameron onwards. We have had disaster after disaster. May seemed so weak. Corbyn on the opposite bench has just been avoidant. Now we are in such a sad state and we now have yet another leader and we still haven’t resolved Brexit.  The big question will BOJO be able to do so?

I am very clear that I think Brexit is one of the stupidest things we could possibly do. I do not think that the EU is perfect and I believe that it needs reforming and developing. However the idea of people coming together and working together makes total sense to me and fulfils the aims of the European project that is creating the peace and not yet another war.

As I watch the mad people take over the asylum we have Putin, BoJo, Trumpy and Kim. The egos of the world have come out to play. Trump has managed to get Iran stretching its muscle and Korea is wondering what to do next. The Chinese are at financial war with Trump and most of the Arab world has turned its back on Qatar. I could go on but I will climb off this hobby horse.

Okay, to me to looks like this, leaders by definition should be there to lead. With a big bit of hope and a good wind they may will lead us in a positive direction. The problem is that to be a positive leader you need to have insight and empathy. Around me I can not a see a single leader who has insight and empathy.

The spectrum of psychopathy begins with those around us who lack insight and empathy and are generally insensitive people and ends with murderers, mass murders and, sad to say, some politicians. For someone to say something or tweet something and then completely deny that they did, does not suggest a person with insight. To feel able to lie about the funds that would supposedly be freed from EU contributions and used to save the NHS does not suggest insight. And to be a socialist leader who has got splinters in their bottom because they are unable to get off the fence does not suggest insight.

I think that we are in the era of the successful psychopaths and they are now taking power. Because these psychopathic traits of insensitive leadership are gaining in popularity they are now on the rise. We find them in organisations and the public services at all levels of management and leadership. This draconian approach to social interaction and management moves clearly away from the socialist models that developed after the last war with the NHS and the welfare state. This all suggests to me that society, in the normal ebbs and flows of social change, is lurching to the right. When this happens it can so easily lead to fascism, nationalism and isolation. This is exactly where we were, in Europe, before the Second World War. After all that horror ended we thought that we had learned that lesson. It was then that we created the United Nations, and eventually the EU.

This is one of those times in the social cycle when we need a leader to appear. A real leader who has both insight and empathy and can truly represent the ideals of all humanity and not be stuck social or religious factionalism.

My favourite phrase of…

…if we all look a few each other we will all be okay… 

…is needed now, it is just that we need an inspirational leader to lead it!

Take care and be happy. 

Sean x

TSHP321: Why Holidays Are Bad For Us

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What’s Coming This Episode?

What if we’ve been getting it wrong all this time. What if holidays are actually making us more stressed, less healthy and with poorer relationships?? Happy holidays, folks!

Enjoy the show and take care, it’s The Self Help Podcast!

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Happy Holidays

Wow!, it is the summer. We generally are hoping that it is hot, but not too hot. 

In the colder climates of Northern Europe people are heading south to the sun. Topping up their vitamin D and replenishing their energy before the darkness and the cold of the winter to come. In the hotter humid climates of the Middle East people are heading north to cool down a bit. Turning their back on the sun and the humidity. I only realised recently that people from the Middle East suffer similar vitamin D deficiency to those people in Europe. In europe there is either not enough sun or people are smothering themselves in suntan lotion to avoid getting burned or developing skin cancer. In the Middle East it can be so hot and humid that people stay indoors in the pleasurable heat of the air conditioning and avoid going out in the open. The result in vitamin D loss is the same.

The adaptability of human beings is truly amazing. We have been able to make a life in the frozen wastes of the north and the sun scorched deserts of the equator. Yet, wherever we live we crave the difference of being somewhere else, to get away to take a holiday. Holidays come in two main types. There are those that need to simply get away from something, taking a break or chilling. Then there are those who need to be doing something and take the activity holiday. 

Whether your holiday is a ‘stop and chill’ or a ‘start and do’ event what is it that makes a holiday happy for you? 

I know so many people who have a tough time, living a tough life. They spend their entire year saving for the break or they just get their holiday on their plastic. Then they have to struggle through the airport with the kids screaming onto a three or four hour flight to the sun and the all inclusive break. The next ten days is spent by the pool semi piddled on the all inclusive booze, telling the kids off for disturbing them and arguing with their partners.

Well, maybe that sounds a little extreme but, do you realise that, the divorce season begins in September just after the holidays. For many, the pressure of being together for that long proves to be too much and the split follows. The same thing happens just after Christmas in the New Year. But, I digress.

What is your ideal holiday?

For me it is the Italian art of doing nothing and, the place that I prefer to do nothing is, of course, in Italy, “La Dolce Far Niente”. My life is intense and sometimes extreme when I travel for work the reality of being on the plane for a few hours is a welcome oasis of stillness in the everyday madness of life it is my dolce far niente. When I go on holiday that sense of nobody needs anything and nobody wants anything is magical. If I am honest I do not need to leave my house to do that. A chill day in the house can, for me, be a holiday. 

There are many people who do not know where their off button is so that everyday becomes a list of things to be achieved. Even the act of exercising becomes another task on the list to be ticked off. The art of being able to simple sit and be, “La Dolce Far Niente”, perhaps with a meal, as a couple, as a family, as a group of friends and to genuinely do nothing and genuinely feel that you allowed to do nothing is becoming a lost art. I see so many people in various organisation who have forgotten how to stop. Perhaps we should change the concept of ‘work hard play hard’ to…

Work hard, but know when to stop

We say that one person’s meat is another person’s poison. We could say that one person’s holiday is another person’s nightmare.

The one thing we do know is that when we take a break that is good for us and feeds our individual needs it has a positive effect on our system right down to the cellular level, reducing stress hormones, blood pressure, anxiety and so on. It is important that you take a break that will work well for you. But the most important is that you do take a break, that you give yourself the value of being important enough to look after.

Wherever you go and whatever you do this year be happy and enjoy it.

Take care

Sean x