Mindset is a powerful thing

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Mindset is a powerful thing, isn’t it? It's all very well someone telling you to have a positive mindset rather than a negative one, but it's just not that easy, is it? The human mind is a powerful tool that shapes the way we perceive and interact with the world around us. Our mindset, or our mental attitude, can greatly influence our personal and professional success. In this week's blog, we will explore the reasons why mindset is important both personally and professionally. Let’s look at personal and professional mindset separately. Personal mindset A positive mindset can help us to overcome challenges and setbacks. When we have a growth mindset, we view failures as opportunities for learning and growth. This allows us to bounce back from adversity and approach life with resilience and optimism. On the other hand, a fixed mindset can lead us to give up easily and avoid

Self-Improvements Lead to New Possibilities

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I wrote a blog a few weeks ago about being accountable, however this week I wanted to focus more on how we can be more adaptable and improvise more than we do in our everyday lives and see how we can incorporate positive changes. Being Ready: If we are open to change, happy to make improvements in ourselves and what we do then we are more open to learning and becoming a better person Being Mindful: Trying to press the ‘pause’ for a moment and being more self-aware. Awareness of our thoughts, feelings and our surrounding environment Being Supportive: Being busy can often cause us to be more self-focused rather than others-focused. Being supportive of how we can help others helps us too Being Empathetic: The ability of being able to understand another person’s thoughts and feelings of a given situation is a great skill to have, as we see

What Would You Do Today If You Knew You Would Not Fail?

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What would you do today if you knew you would not fail? Wow! Doesn’t that conjure up loads of ideas for us? Doesn’t it make our minds just zoom into action with all sorts of visions and generate huge creativity. Why is it then that we fear failure and let that stop us taking chances and being creative and stopping us doing things just because we fear we may not succeed? Name me one entrepreneur that didn’t fail at least once and hugely in some cases, but just kept trying different ways and never doubting they would get there in the end. What might we say to children if they say they fear they will fail if they try something new? I bet your answer would be different to what you might tell yourself! It’s too easy to say what would you do today if you knew you would not

Inspired Action is Effortless

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Benjamin Franklin was said to have quoted “Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and and I learn.” What did he mean by this quote? It means that often when we are told something, it is fleeting, we’re not paying attention, hearing rather than listening, and so unlikely to remember what we’ve been told. Being taught something might and should be more memorable, however, when we learn something it’s unforgettable or more likely to be. We know there are many learning styles, and we know that invariably our brains can only hold so much information, and hold attention for any length of time, particularly when we are busy with very full lives. Referring to this quote can help us, I believe, in so many ways. Here are some areas we can make a difference and make changes: Personal and Professional Development – How can we

Our Past and Our Future

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I recently saw a quote by Daphne Rose Kingma which read “Holding on is believing that there’s only a past; letting go is knowing that there’s a future”. This conjured up all sorts of images visually for me as there is so much that can be teased out from this quote. We are often trapped in our past because and due to all sorts of things and for various reasons, making it hard to break free and focus on the future. Focusing on the future can also be tarnished because of our experiences, particularly bad or unpleasant ones, which taint our view, opinion and picture of our potential future. These thoughts, whether looking back or forward are riddled with ways in which we see the world, and which can often be the reason we make wrong, or misjudged decisions, or even avoid certain people, events, or tasks. If we agree

How You Can Be More accountable

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How do you demonstrate that you are accountable? There are various ways to identify and demonstrate how you are an accountable person. Let's just look through some of those steps. Know your role - If you understand your responsibilities and your role properly, then you can be accountable for them and to others. Knowing your role will help you to be more accountable to yourself and your team Be honest with yourself - Sometimes it's hard to let others know that we are struggling, or we've messed up. However, if we put pride aside and be honest with ourselves and others, then at least we can be more accountable to ourselves and our team Apologising - We will mess up, things will go wrong and if you're a responsible person, then part of that is to be accountable. Just apologise and let the people who need to know what's happened,

Are You a Great Leader?

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Are you a great leader? How might you know if you are a great leader? There are a number of different attributes, signs and signals that can enable us to determine whether or not we are truly a great leader or not. Being a coach: How much we might actively be like a coach? A coach believes in empowering people, removing obstacles and helping them to be successful in what they do and who they are. Understanding our weaknesses: Being a great leader is to understand our own weaknesses, focus on our own strengths. Great leaders realise they have strengths and weaknesses, and by understanding our own weaknesses we can show others it’s okay to embrace and work on these and be a great leader. Embracing our vulnerabilities: Being able to embrace our vulnerabilities sends out a positive message as a great leader to others. We are showing them we

Do you have time to relax?

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I read a quote recently which read: “The time to relax is when you don't have time for it”. Sydney J Harris which led me to putting this week’s Wednesday Wake-Up! together. I’m not sure how many times I’ve heard people say, I’ve not got time to sit around, I’m just too busy. Or others will feel that relaxing is just a waste of time, and perhaps have a degree of guilt because they feel they will be perceived as being a time-waster and not pulling their weight. For some, it’s been the ‘message’ they’ve been given since childhood about not being lazy and keeping going no matter what. We should all have time ‘out’ to relax, chill, reflect, rest, play, read, meditate or many more pastimes I could list, but do we? We usually put ourselves last, feel we are having to get things done for others and don’t want

How good a team player are you?

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Whether we are in business as a single-person enterprise or running a large business; whether we are part of a team large or small we are still part of a team somewhere. Even in families, we are often a team. Teams are either functional or non-functional due to various personalities and how we manage the roles we play and the emotions that affect our behaviour. Usually the only time we are asked how good a team player we are, or what type of team player we are is at an interview. For some people they’ve already thought about the answer whereas for others they haven’t. Of course, it’s easy to just say that it depends on the day, the team, what type of mood we’re in. But we really should all be clear in what way we are a team player and determine exactly what makes a good team player,

Creative Goals

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Did I really use the word creative and goals in the heading for this week’s Wednesday Wake-Up!? I did, and it was intentional. We can be great goal planners and be creative about what we set, when for, how we do it as well as being mindful of challenges along the way. I use a great template called The Great Goal Planner, which is among many templates I use for and with clients to help determine obstacles and identify or consider solutions to tackle or fix these. The more we really dig deep to ensure we aren’t just making a wish list which isn’t SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and timebound). What should a great goal planner consider when setting goals? We should first start using the creative side of our brain and our thinking so we are thinking outside the square or outside the box, otherwise we won’t grow