Hi Everyone,
It's been a while, and I wish I could explain why it took so long to come back to sending these, but I honestly don't have any profound explanation for my absence. As I missed sending these out week after week, it got harder and harder. I made up excuses about having a lot on my plate and being busy (sure I was), but I realise this is usually the same excuse we give when we start missing days at the gym, and eventually weeks, then we realise we haven't been to the gym in 12 months! The sad thing about pausing things for so long is that we miss out on the compound effect that comes with consistency because we've let perfection be the excuse for procrastination.
However, I'm back to share a few nuggets of wisdom learned over the past months.
Consistency is improved through goal-setting: To maximise the power of the compound effect, you need a goal. A goal attached to something to lose will motivate you enough to stay consistent. For example, I didn't have a specific goal for starting this newsletter. I knew I wanted to share my wisdom, knowledge and experience with others, but I didn't have anything to lose if I suddenly stopped writing. I might lose subscribers and gained momentum, but it wasn't going to be a severe loss (I thought). However, if I probably realised that I could lose the opportunity to grow to 1000+ subscribers (if I consistently wrote for six months), which could help me build a community of potential clients for my coaching, I would have done my best to stay consistent. This goal could have been brought to life if I strongly wanted to invest in my Executive Coaching business this year and generate a more substantial side income to prepare myself even better for the looming recession. Another example of this principle in action is this: I want to stay more competitive in the job market and prepare myself for work assignments in Spanish-speaking communities. This is a fact and a goal I had at the beginning of the year, and I knew I could lose several jobs or growth opportunities if I didn't take action. So, I decided to learn Spanish, which I practice for 10 mins every day, watch Spanish news, tv shows and listen to Spanish podcasts. So far, I have completed a 100-day streak on Duolingo and will continue to improve until I meet my goal. I have now applied this principle to other goals and areas of my life - diet, exercise, self-improvement, spirituality, and writing! Set goals for yourself, but not just for the sake of goal-setting; find something important you could lose if you don't meet your goals, and decide today to use that as motivation to stay consistent.
Resilience or toxic positivity?: There's a bit of controversy about the concept of "resilience" these days. While a band of woke humans on the internet and in real life believe "resilience" is a capitalist organisational strategy to keep us working despite harsh working environments and unfavourable practices or a concept that has been used systemically to deny marginalised communities the luxuries of 'soft life', self-care and respect, I believe resilience has to be reintroduced and left alone to find its way back to what it is - a tool for building mental strength. Resilience has taken a lousy rep outside of "work wellbeing programs". Nobody wants to be resilient anymore. It has been mistaken for "toxic positivity" (a concept of approaching life issues with 'bravado'. It often fails because your brain is shocked when it realises it isn't prepared to handle the problems). Resilience proposes self-compassion and awareness of your energy sources. It moves us away from solely depending on self-reliance to finding other sources of joy and replenishment. In the past four months, I have kept a resilience journal consistently—daily answering self-reflective questions about my perception and understanding of challenges. I read my entries and saw a trend from being completely conflict-averse and overwhelmed to a steady, stable and optimistic approach to life issues. To slowly accept the concept of resilience as a thriving strategy (not a coping mechanism), you must perform a character audit diligently. Attempting to build resilience while dealing with insecurity and lack of self-confidence is like mixing oil and water - it's never a fine consistency. Building resilience is also almost like working out to build muscle - you have to watch your diet, do cardio, hydrate, and sometimes practice mindfulness to stay in tune with your mind. A holistic wellness plan not only targets the physical but also considers the mental, emotional and social. This principle can be applied to building resilience - it works alongside other activities like anger management, controlling impulses and anxiety, self-awareness of triggers, and in advanced cases, cognitive behavioural changes.
Faking it till you make it: One of the beautiful experiences I've been engaging in for about one month now is guided visualisation therapy/meditation. When I do this, I focus on my imagination and create an imaginary happy and safe place for myself. I bring it to life gradually by improving the details of this image every time I transport myself there. For me, it's usually a future scenario or something in my life that I'm looking forward to. It is a space and time where I am absolutely happy - the troubles of this world do not exist in that image. Over time, I believe we start manifesting these images by connecting to that feeling and carrying it within us in real life. This way, we know when something or someone does not bring peace of mind, security, happiness or that feeling we experience in our happy place. We begin to cut off negativity and monitor (and eventually change) self-destructive patterns because we long to bring that feeling into our daily reality. I use an app called Headspace for this, but I also have another app called Asana Rebel that aids my holistic wellness journey with great visualisation exercises.
I know we didn't speak about career today, and you have probably missed that, but I promised to bring you great tips to help you take a chance on life, and that's what I shall be doing consistently, moving forward.
Xoxo.
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