The Mind Enquiry: Recent Episodes
Paul Smith
Learn to manage your mind, from struggling to success and fulfillment. We look at how the mind works to our benefit and sometimes when it doesn't. Bringing our 35 years of experience working with individuals and organizations and interviewing top psychologists and personal growth leaders we discuss topics and ideas to help everyone move forward in their lives. Struggle is part of life but suffering is not...we hope to bring you inspirational information, techniques and ideas to lift you and propel you forward to the life you want.
People who work in your business are key to the success of your business and your peace of mind. The dream is, that everyone in the business is as focused, clear, motivated and productive as they can be. This is the number one leadership challenge.
As every leader knows, this is not as easy as it sounds because people are people and even if they have the knowledge and skills to do their jobs, they can be distracted or not as clear, motivated and productive as they have the potential to be.
Why is this and what can a leader do to counter this?
6 THINGS YOU CAN DO.
What stops anyone from being and doing virtually anything of note in their lives is fear.
Today we’re going to look at the 3 major fears that everyone, and I mean everyone, has to face in their life. It’s how you deal with and execute in the face of fear that differentiates between the people who make progress and those who stay stuck or worse still move backward.
Couple of things about fear, firstly, I am not talking about fear of actual physical harm. That is built into everyone through evolution and works automatically for us all. But I’m talking about emotional and psychological fear about the world around us and how we navigate our way through these fears to give us happy and fulfilling lives.
Secondly, I need to emphasize that all these emotional and psychological fears exist in everyone because all of us are human. The people moving forward and building happy and fulfilling lives are not immune to these fears, they feel and have felt these same fears, they have just faced, accepted and found ways through these fears. So, the good news is that if they have done it, you can do it to.
Worldwide, the percentage of adults who work full time for an employer and are engaged at work, that is they are highly involved in and enthusiastic about their work and workplace, is just 15%” The remaining 85% are either not engaged or what they call actively disengaged.
Now this implies a stunning amount of wasted potential and a stunning amount of wasted lives.
How do you begin to find and cultivate a passion for life and work?
We discuss the options and the strategies to change that for you.
Despite our desire that life should be a steady upward line towards whatever our goals are, we learn soon enough that it’s far from a straight journey. Whether personally or professionally there are ups and downs along the way, some small and some large.
Resilience is the skill that we need to develop to stop ourselves falling deep into these potholes, to help lift ourselves up over the rim of these craters and continue to move forward.
At the moment we are all facing the crater of Covid and it’s bringing all sorts of challenges and disruption to our lives. I’m very conscious that the need for resilience in these times is essential but can be very difficult to find, given the situation.
So in this episode we look at what we need to do to not only survive but thrive when facing challenges and strategies to make that happen.
Do you really want to move to the next level in some area of your life? Do you really, really want to? Not just I’d like to, but I really, really need to or I’ll go mad or end up in the manure if I don’t? This episode isn’t for those of you who would "like to" or feel "you should" do something, it’s for those of you who "must" take something forward.
It can be in any area of your life, your work, your relationships, your fitness, your finances…anything. Maybe you want to be more productive and earn more in your career, maybe it’s finding or keeping a relationship, maybe it’s getting your body into real shape for once or getting your finances under control for once and for all.
We'll show you a process to follow to make it happen and outline what you need to accept as part of the change you are looking for.
We take thousands of decisions every single day. They range from small seemingly unimportant ones to some serious life altering ones. The research estimates that the average adult takes approximately 35,000 decisions per day. Believe it or not research from Cornell University has shown we take around 230 decisions a day about food on its own.
Decisions not only play a huge part in our lives, but they dictate the trajectory of our lives and ultimately where we end up.
A seemingly small decision taken today can have a huge impact over the next decade.
Every day we are taking decisions.
Today we look at decisions, the 3 decisions we're making all the time, the 7 steps to taking tough decisions and 5 questions that can help you embraceuncertainty and make a tough decision.
In this episode, I want to tell you about one of the most powerful performance enhancing tools I have come across in 35 years of personal development education. It is a tool you already use, so it’s not something new but you probably are not consciously aware of it. But by becoming conscious of it and using it deliberately, you can improve your performance greatly in any area of your life.
It’s called “alter ego effect”. Alter egos and alternate personas have long been used by entertainers, high performance athletes and other successful people. Beyoncé has Sasha Fierce she leaned on this “alter ego” heavily when she was becoming a pop star. Since she grew up singing in the church, she felt really uncomfortable being provocative and dancing in a certain way. Enter Sasha Fierce. She was a force to be reckoned with on stage, powerful and provocative. Once she was off stage, it was right back to being herself.
The idea here is pretty simple: whenever you feel like you’re not the person you want to be in a particular area of your life, make the person you want to be up, use your creative imagination, design them, design the person or type of person you want to show up and then act as them. Literally become them, in the specific arena you want them to appear in.
We show you the benefits of using an "alter ego" and how and where you should create one to enhance performance and your life overall.
In todays episode, we're going to talk to you about why most people won’t achieve their goals in whatever they choose and why 90% of personal development courses, books, ideas etc won’t work.
Now there is a bit of reverse psychology going on here because I want to show you why these has a low chance of success so as to get you annoyed and motivated enough with yourself to make you dig in and make it happen for you.
Why do so many of us have the challenge of having a goal, knowing what to do and still don’t ever achieve them? It can be any goal in any of the key life areas such as relationships, finances, career, social life.
We explain the Comfort Zone and how moving outside it can create magic in your life but also explore the price you need to be willing to pay to get there.
Emotions, positive or negative, come from inside us and the rules we have and the meaning we give to events. What we feel is not based on what we experience, but rather on our interpretation of it. And that choice is always ours. Negative emotions are Action Signals. You can use how you feel to make your life better. While negative emotions may be painful, they may also be our best friend. We can use negative emotions to change the quality of our life immediately.
Today we learn to use so-called Negative Emotions as a Call to Action. Every emotion has a message for you. Appreciate the message. Negative emotions are a signal that change is needed.
In this episode we look at a 6 Step Process to make "Negative Emotions" a gift not a curse.
There are at least 9 influencing factors we all experience in our lives. Some of their influence is good but some are limiting and counter-productive for our happiness and success. In this episode we identify where they come from, why they creep into our thoughts, feelings and behaviors and what we can do to change them if they don't serve us. We discuss the influence of our parents, family, peers, teachers, culture, media, religion, politics and history...the major conditioning forces in life.
If you find the episode of value, please share with family, friends and co-workers.
In todays episode, we discuss the brain, how it has evolved, the Acute Stress Response and how it can be managed. Everyone has stressful things happen and can feel anxious as a result. This is perfectly natural, you are not broken or odd, and understanding our Acute Stress Response can be very useful in handling stressful situations and our anxiety. We also provide examples and ways you can manage these in your day-to-day life.
If you find this episode useful, please share with your family, friends and co-workers.
In todays episode we introduce the Threshold Sequence. 10 simple steps to change any unwanted behavior easily and quickly. You most likely have already done this unconsciously, here we show you how to have this natural process work for you any time you need it. Once you consciously understand how it works, you can change almost any unwanted behavior and replace it with a more productive one leading you towards what you want to experience in life.
Listen and share it with all your family, friends and co-workers...it could be a life-changer.
In this episode we look at 4 more false beliefs or illusions that hider us moving forward. We examine each one and why it does not help and how to get past them.
The illusions are:
- The X Factor Illusion
- The Facebook Illusion
- The Perfection Illusion
- The Comparison Illusion
Nearly all of us are guilty of believing these illusions and we're even taught to believe them but they stop our development, happiness and success. Get rid of them now and get moving.
There are many beliefs that are simply not true, they are just illusions but we believe them anyway. These false or illusionary beliefs stop people from achieving their potential. In this episode we examine 2 of these illusions...the biography illusion and the stupid illusion.
Your background and how smart you think you are can have a huge impact on how you experience life, what you will try and where you will end up. Learn how these might not be as important an issue as you might think.
To take the multiple intelligences test click here
The Success Planning Platform helps you formulate your real goals and makes sure you cover all the necessary detailed planning on how to get there.
It makes sure you are super clear about what must happen for you, why it must happen and how your going to get there. It anticipates challenges you might meet; it makes you think about who will help you along the way and also the daily practices you must cultivate to get you there.
It’s the end of a challenging year and it is around now we say goodbye to the year just gone and begin thinking about the new one to come and what we want to happen during it…to make sure it happens the way we hope, we need to sit down and create a plan for ourselves…in this episode I’m going to introduce you to the Success Planning Platform. It is a comprehensive planning structure that takes into account all the different things you need to have in place to have an exciting, motivating and achievable plan.
Remember, we are looking at 3 different, general patterns we can use to change our mindsets from disempowering to empowering. You can change just one of these areas or a mixture of them to make the shift you want or need.
We have looked in detail at changing your physiology and then the language we use. Now its time to look at the final pattern and that’s our pattern of focus.
What we focus on in any given situation or circumstance determines how we behave and act and consequently the results we get.
This is the 3rd in our series on "Managing your State of Mind"
How we talk to ourselves and the language we use both internally and externally really matter to our state of mind. In this episode we examine where the little voice in the head comes from, why it says what it does and how to teach it to behave properly and in our best interests. Our Language Patterns really matter, if you don't take control of them others will, whether you know it or not.
In this episode, we discuss the link between your physiology and your state of mind. How some small changes can make a huge difference.
We don't appreciate the link between our moods and emotions and the way we use our bodies. By becoming conscious of the circular nature of the link between how you use your body and the states we are in, you can almost instantaneously change your mood and emotions for the better.
And we show you 4 strategies you can apply to help you move from disempowering states to empowering ones.
In this, our first podcast we introduce the concept of state management, how important it is and the 3 key areas that you can focus on to create incredible changes in your mood and outlook.
The mind is an amazing thing, how you use it directly impacts your outlook, your decisions and your results. So learning to manage your habitual states of mind is critical to your success and happiness.