Be Mythical

Steve Light suffered with anxiety from a very young age and then discovered something that changed his experience of life for the better. Steve's passionate about helping others to free themselves from anxiety and other mental health issues and has founded self-help groups and creates online resources.

Steve was his usual beautifully honest self, here's were the key points:

Searching for the answer
Steve thought if he looked hard enough he would find the reason for his anxiety in his genetic make-up, his biochemistry or maybe his past. He didn't find the answer until he discovered that his anxiety was coming from his thoughts moment to moment.

The addiction to self-help
Steve tried lots of courses, including NLP and other selp-help techniques, to try to rid himself of anxiety. He found each of them gave a temporary improvement before he went back to feeling anxious again but that was enough for him to attend course after course in the hope something would help.

Beliefs vs understanding
Steve's finally let go of the beliefs he had about being 'an anxious person' when he began to understand the ever-present underlying calm and happiness beneath his thoughts.

 

Direct download: Steve_Light_Interview_mixdown_Final_02_01.mp3
Category:Interview -- posted at: 3:00pm EDT

The best parenting questions in the world... with Jack Pransky

 I'm delighted to share this conversation with the utterly wonderful Jack Pransky about a subject he is awesome on: parenting.

Dr. Jack Pransky is a Three Principles Author, Trainer and Practitioner: a Coach of Coaches and a Counselor of Counselors. Jack's worked in the field of prevention and community organizing since 1968. He wrote the fabulous parenting book "Parenting from the heart" which I highly recommend.

Jack talked about these questions to ask ourselves when we're speaking to our children:

  1. Am I feeling love in my heart in the moment?
    If I'm not, now is not the time to discipline.
  2. What is my child learning from what I'm doing?
    Is that really what I want my child to learn?
  3. How am I seeing my child in the moment?
    I am the one who is making up what my child is like in this moment - and I'll get more of what I see.
  4. Why is it important to me that my child does this thing I'm asking?
    Why would this be important to my child?
  5. Do I really know what's going on in the mind of my child that driving the behavior?
    How can I observe and listen to better understand?
Direct download: Jack_Pransky_Interview_mixdown_Final.mp3
Category:Interview -- posted at: 2:31pm EDT

How to treat anxiety... with Chris Morris

Chris is a well-known coach and a meditation teacher who suffered from anxiety from childhood and has spent years exploring a tonne of different self-help techniques and 'thought-based' approaches to understand how to treat anxiety.

Chris didn't shy away from being his usual naughty self. :) Chris said things which are a bit contentious but we wanted to give you a different view point to many of the guests we have on the show.

Chris doesn't solely work with his clients using a three principles approach, he uses other techniques and approaches (including A Course in Miracles, meditation, Byron Katie's The Work, and NLP) to treat anxiety in his clients. Techniques like this can work well in a one to one setting, when the coach has the level of understanding that Chris has.

These were the main points:

  • Our sense of self is built around the beliefs that we've decided define us
    We cut ourselves off from certain types of experiences, beliefs or types of thoughts - often without realising we're doing it. Sometimes we've experienced things in our past that have scared us so we shut down that part of us then we're only able to experience life from within the frame of thoughts that we haven't cut ourselves off from. If what we're left with is anxious thoughts then that will be our experience of life.
  • The actors that we cast
    We are entities made up from a collection of thoughts. We cast a character in a film but then we forget and let the character run the show, we forget that the one watching the character is us!
  • We can't see what we can't see
    We tend to have no clue about the underlying beliefs we have about ourselves and the world. We're only aware of the thoughts we're aware of - which sounds obvious but is something that we forget moment to moment. If we can find a way of holding up a mirror to ourselves, which could be through talking to a coach or a good friend, we get a glimpse of the beliefs that we have.
Direct download: Chris_Morris_Interview_mixdown_Final.mp3
Category:Interview -- posted at: 8:15am EDT

On this week's show I get to speak to the fabulous Jill Whalen. Jill is a professional conference speaker, trainer and writer, she's a retired website marketing consultant who underwent a huge transformation from being a bit of a coach potato with an allergy to vegetables to someone who is now into yoga, running, spirituality, and healthy eating! Jill now shares her experience of personal and business transformation with others.

Before Jill came across the three principles, she'd suffered with years of anxiety so I thought she'd be a super person to speak to see what's changed for her and how that change happened!

Jill was great! These were my best bits:

  • Anxiety is so often caused by not feeling good enough. That feeling often leads to all kinds of addictions too - basically ways of making us feel better about ourselves. It's so freeing when we see that it's only thought making us feel not good enough and we're actually always perfect inside
  • Just start to look inside and you'll realise that it's NOT the outside world creating your feelings! That can be difficult to begin with as the ego can have a tight hold on you but the more you notice that your feelings are coming from thought, the more layers of 'ego slime' drop away
  • Start noticing how made up all your labels are. Jill talked about realising that she'd made up all these beliefs about herself - that she couldn't sing in public or that she hated healthy foods - seeing the thought-created nature of her labels, was a big clue to the thought created nature of her experience.
Direct download: Jill_Interview_mixdown_Final.mp3
Category:Interview -- posted at: 11:47pm EDT

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