Great Expectations – Get The Balance Right

This week I had the fortune to meet a lady called Hayley Bennett – she is a wellbeing coach and we will be sharing more details with you over the coming weeks on who she is, what she does and how you can attend one of her fabulous workshops. One of the many things we discussed is life and perception of, we were both so animated and passionate that I asked Hayley to write something on the subject. Here it is, sit back, enjoy and I hope it resonates with you.

Is the world really that bad?

Life can be full of negativity, we hear it on the news, we hear it from the people we spend time with, but does it have to be that way? Is it really that bad? Or are we just hearing about more bad things, than good?

Over the last 10 months I have travelled the world, moved countries and I’m re-juggling my business, but I haven’t seen or experienced all this negativity and bad in the world. The world is a beautiful place, while travelling I met some of the most lovely and caring people, people I didn’t even know opened their homes to me. Friends and family have help me and things are falling into place. Is this because I see the world differently or is it because I don’t make one little thing become a big thing?

If one person isn’t nice, it doesn’t mean the nation is bad. If something wasn’t delivered in one piece, it doesn’t mean all the delivery companies are bad or that my whole world has come to an end.

So, why is it we have all started to see the world as a bad place, an unsafe place, a nothing ever goes well, place?

OK, I can hear you saying because people are not nice, people are angry, things are not made as good as they use to be, things don’t happen when they said it would… and all these things are correct. But have we stopped to look at the bigger picture? Have we stopped to look at ourselves? There is a saying that if you point one finger at someone, there are three fingers pointing back at you! Try it……

The world has become a faster place and we are living in a culture of instant and more! We can get hold of someone instantly, we can get something delivered instantly, we have more choice, more freedom, more money, more potential, more opportunities, more storage and we definitely have more expectations.

In today’s world we are being told we need more, but the more we get the more we need. This merry-go-round goes from a calm, joyful ride to a never-ending treadmill, we start off enjoying the excitement of the new ‘more’ but then it becomes something you are trying to keep up with because you feel it makes you happy and you are worried if you ever stop everything will come tumbling down.

‘More Expectation’ is one of our biggest problems. Yes, it is good to have high expectation in life but needing everything to be prefect is not realistic. No one is perfect, life isn’t perfect, we all have ups and downs, we all have things go wrong, we all fail at something at some point in our lives and we should not hide these things, we should learn from them.

The Chinese Yin and Yang symbol is a great example; the Black, the negative merges into the White, the positive but there is also a Black spot on the White side and a White spot on the Black side. We need both to have balance, we need to accept this and change our mind set, it is how we deal with it and let go of it, that makes life easier.

P.A.I.N.S – Positive Attitude In Negative Situation.

This isn’t easy, it’s a challenge we all go through, there are times when we want to scream and shout, lash out, blame others or ourselves, self-criticism, self-hate. We can cycle into a spiral. This is perfectly normal but instead of staying there we are meant to ride through it. Stop and look at where we can improve and take little steps. Be proud of every step we take no matter how small and be proud that we sat in our pain, looked it in the eyes and said thank you for showing me what I needed to see to move forward.