Watch what you focus on. It creates your reality far more than you will ever know

I have this habit of living in a fear projected future. It starts with a worry when a program intake is about to come to an end or I am about to take a vacation. It then starts spiralling out of control “this is it, my business has had it’s greatest hour, my clients are going to run out, I am going to have to go back to the corporate world… you get the drill.” Of course these things never happen and often even more delights and opportunities lie around the corner but I know it’s because I work hard to correct the inner wolf or whatever you want to call him or her. That voice that constantly likes to take me to disaster zone and picks up a few of my old limiting beliefs to help it on the way.

For years, my inner dialogue of “I am stuck”, “What else could I ever do” “I will never make any money” kept me in a job that was making me unhappy. I bought into my story - looking for more reasons to show that I was stuck with no opportunities.  Then of course it becomes self fulfilling - I started feeling more and more stuck because I was never thinking about it differently, never thinking about what I do want and how I could make that happen.

Then things changed, the more I read about the science behind your thoughts I realised that our thoughts are quite literally like magnets - they attract back to them what they focus on. Change your thoughts, change your life the quote goes and it did exactly that for me. Your subconscious has no ability to understand what is and is not based in reality - what you think most about it takes as truth. The problem is we start believing we are our thoughts and that is not the case - we are the thoughts we pick. You get 70,000 of them a day so start choosing well. Once we realise this it can be transformational. I have had clients go from zero confidence, anxious, flat, stuck, exhausted to completely turning it around and it starts with focusing on what you do want and getting your thoughts to follow suit.

When the inner wolf [your inner critic] starts there are so many things you can do to quell it’s momentum. I have listed several below. However, before we dive in I want you to be honest with yourself - are you constantly focusing on what you don’t want and fear? What could go wrong? What went wrong in the past? Are you guilty of spiralling down a rabbit warren of self-doubt? Taking any sign and using it as evidence to back up some limiting story you are telling yourself? If so it is time to stop. It is not an easy thing to do. A bit like when we are getting physically fit in the gym, it is uncomfortable as we start getting our minds healthier too. So I want you to think of this analogy, think of your mind as a garden full of flowers then see each limiting belief as weeds. Are you standing over the weeds and watering them - angry when they don't bring you beauty and abundance. If so make a conscious effort to start tending to the flowers - attend to the positive thoughts, nuture them, spend time looking at them and noticing their beauty. As you do your subconscious will go to these reaffirming thoughts more readily, you will feel different and people will act differently to you. You will start telling yourself a better story, you will unknowingly seek out things that reaffirm the good things you tell yourself about what is possible and then from there you have the ability to be able to completely transform your world as you know it.

My top ten tips for taming your inner wolf:

1. Be honest - what limiting things do you tell yourself? Challenge them - are they really true or based in one thing someone once said to you or you did?

2. Write down the trade offs for the worry, being hard on yourself and then the trade offs if you stop doing it

3. Write down what you want. Truly want. Spend time here. When you feel yourself starting to worry about what could go wrong think about what you want to go right..

4. Use the time before you go to sleep to focus on the life you do want to create - you have 8 hours of programming time ahead of you whilst you sleep. Treat it like a computer download of all the things you do want to happen

5. Carrie Green recommends shouting ‘STOP’ when those worries & insecurities creep in. Actively choose a thought that makes you feel good instead.

6. Feeling low? Anxious? Exhausted? Journal why. What are the fears that sit behind it and what story are you telling yourself that is driving it? Are they based in the past that has gone or a fear projected future? What about in this present time - how are things really looking?

7. Use vision boards, write down goals, motivational quotes …..do anything that brings you dreams to life

8. Read Ekhart Tolle - The Power of Now

9. Watch your thoughts and start noticing the inner wolf [give him or her a name if you want to] - thank them for their input [it’s often the well meaning ego] but say I am going to choose to see this with love instead

10. Be patient with yourself - to change the thoughts you identify with takes some time but it is so very worth the work out