Be Mythical

Show notes:

Yippeee! This week I speaking to expert on care and special needs, comedienne and all round super star Sarah Wood. Sarah has spoken and trained internationally on health care and social services professions - her passion is helping carers and professionals see past issues and limitations to the whole person and their unique potential.

Her son Adam has learning disabilities and has a full life of work and friends, he is a wonderful example of what's possible when we see a person for who they truly are.

I loved these points in particular:

  • When our heads are full of angry, stressful thoughts there's no room for the solutions
    It's so useful to know how easily answers come from a calm, settled down mind as it can help us let go of our agitated thoughts more quickly.
  • The relationship is everything
    When we prioritise our connection with someone, there's nothing that can't be overcome.
  • Listening in the way that the other person speaks
    Sarah talked about her son Adam drawing a picture which expressed that he'd like to have a friendship with a boy he'd lost contact with - that lead on to all kinds of wonderful outcomes for both families.
  • Start with yourself
    You can't give anything that you don't have yourself - you need to have self-worth to be able to share that with someone else. Sarah suggests taking the first step onto the path to rediscovering happiness and clarity yourself before you try to help the person that you're caring for.
  • You're doing the best job possible
    Even when life feels tough and you feel like you're failing, you're damn amazing - there's no-one who could do better than you are.
Direct download: Sarah_Lynn_Wood_Interview_Final_mixdown_01mp3.mp3
Category:Interview -- posted at: 5:21am EDT

A gorgeous conversation about another way to have a happy Christmas! Jacquie Forde is a social entrepreneur, coach, business woman, mum to three gorgeous tenacious daughters, wife and friend. She's a delight!

Here's my favourite parts:

  • Drop the differences!
    There's no right way to celebrate Christmas or to be - when we drop our judgemental thoughts of how others are different, the more we're open to enjoying everyone's unique, quirky, funny ways of being and the happier we are.
  • Nothing's personal
    Whether it's the present they've chosen, the food they've cooked, they way they're choosing spend their time or they way they're behaving - they're doing our best according to they're thoughts in that moment (just as you are!)
  • We can choose the illusions we keep
    When we see we're creating our reality through thought, we realise it's all an illusion. Some illusions serve us and others and some don't. What a gift it is when we see that we can let go of the illusions which are getting in the way of us connecting and enjoying other people!
  • The present of being present!
    When we're not getting tangled up in thoughts about stress, anxiety and all the things we wish were different, we can be really present to the happiness, joy and love that's in that moment. Is there any better gift we can give to ourselves and others?
Direct download: Jacquie_Ford_Interview_mixdown_Final_Edit.mp3
Category:Interview -- posted at: 9:13am EDT

I'm delighted to share this fabulous conversation with Dr Amy Johnson! Amy's a coach and author, and she helps people to see that they're born happy and helps people to bounce back from all kinds of life events.

Today we're talking about getting through christmas (or any family get together) with humour and understanding. Amy is seriously wonderful!

Here were my best bits:

  • Dysfunctional family bingo!
    Amy talks about playing this game with someone else in the family who you're close to. You both create a bingo card of the things you're dreading happening - maybe that's your Grandma mentioning your weight, your dad drinking a few too many whiskeys and being inappropriate or your sister being a drama queen - and then when you're at your family event, you check off the situations on your card as they happen. I love how this simple game can allow us to see something more deeply - any relationship is only ever about our relationship to our thoughts about relationship.
  • Freeing ourselves from the 'blueprint' of how we think relationship should be
    The more acceptance we have for how a relationship is, we lose our grip on the blueprint of how we think the relationship should feel. That means we become open to all kinds of surprising ways that it could develop and change.
  • The fluidity of thought
    No relationship (or anything else in life) is fixed. All relationships will feel differently according to our thoughts in each moment. That's a useful thing to bear in mind as it allow us to see that everything can change.
  • Have a compassionate Christmas :)
    When we recognise that everyone is in a sea of thought, and we're all doing our best within that, it allows us to be more compassionate towards ourselves and others. Even when things feel difficult, we'll know that everything's still working the same way for all of us and it's just that we're not able to see it too clearly in that moment.
Direct download: Amy_Johnson_Interview_Final.mp3
Category:Interview -- posted at: 3:20pm EDT

What a treat it was speaking to transformative coach Rasmus Carlsson about family relationships! Rasmus has such a great down to earth approach and a super-clear understanding of the role of the three principles in how we experience life. He shares such personal and detailed examples here that I defy anyone to listen and not hear something that's useful!

Here were my favourite points:

  • Other people's perspective on us are their business
    "What someone else thinks is never going to be up to me." The only thing that can make us unhappy is when we don't accept reality as it is - we think we can change the way someone else thinks about us.


  • Why do we try to control other people's thinking when we can't control our own?
    We don't choose our thoughts. Seeing that helps us to be more compassionate towards ourselves and others because we see that no matter how bad a thought or a behaviour looks, it makes no sense to judge it when we see that no-one chose it.


  • Being compassionate doesn't mean being a doormat
    When we recognise that 'their stuff' isn't about us, it's about them, it means we have access to our natural happy, calm state in which we're going to be much more able to deal with a situation well. That doesn't mean being passive, it means not being reactive. It only takes one of us to calm down and listen, and the other people will often begin to calm down and listen too.


  • There are no 'should's
    There's no one way we should be in relationships or life in general. When we can more easily spot our insecure thinking about worrying about what others will think about us, the 'should's begin to lose their grip on us. When we let go of our 'should's we become open to all kinds of other opportunities and experiences.
Direct download: Rasmus_Carlsson_on_2014-11-18_mixdown.mp3
Category:Interview -- posted at: 9:25am EDT

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I loved this conversation with Sue Lachman about listening - I was mind-blown about how much there was to talk about on this one subject! Listen to this and learn the transformative power of really listening... such an easy way to happy relationships!

Here are my best bits:

  • Prioritise listening fully
    We tend to think we can multi-task far better than we actually can! Put everything down so you can properly connect to the other person, listen fully and really feel what's behind their words.
  • Listening is about the other person's experience
    If someone's talking about something that's going on in their life and we notice we've taken ourself off into our own world of thinking about a similar event in our own life then we'll know that we've stopped listening to other person. Use that as a little nudge to bring yourself back to listening again.
  • We're all creating our own separate reality
    Even when we sharing an experience of the same event with others, each person will be creating their own experience of that event through their own thoughts. If we attach ourselves to own thoughts about the event we won't be so open to really hearing the other person's thoughts on it. Let go of the meaning you're giving to your version of events so you can hear theirs.
  • When we feel that the other person isn't treating us fairly
    When we feel that we're not being heard in a relationship, we can become defensive and shut down from even wanting to listen to the other person. If we're feeling in a low mood and feeling very disconnected to the other person, it's probably NOT the best time to have a conversation. If we wait until we're feeling lighter and more connected, not only are we are more likely to be able to fully hear what's going on for them, we'll be calm and clear which means that others are going to be more able to open up and listen to us too.
  • Nothing stays the same
    Without us doing a thing, thoughts change and therefore feelings change and therefore relationships change. This one isn't about listening but I thought it was a gorgeous point anyway!
Direct download: Sue_Lachman_Interview_mixdown_01.mp3
Category:Interview -- posted at: 3:21pm EDT

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