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WEEKLY COACHING TIP #131 THE MENTAL DIET If you have a garden, have you ever noticed how quickly the weeds grow if you dont keep on top of it. Its an on-going task isnt it? Yes, it can be accomplished extremely quickly if you attend to your garden often, however, if you leave it too long, it can also be a laborious, tedious and sometimes daunting task. Well our minds are a bit like that. Have you ever noticed which parts of your mind you water the most? Are you watering the roses and daffodils, or the weeds and poison ivy? Chances are most people are over-watering some parts more than the others. If its the wonderful blooms, fantastic, if its the weeds, well maybe its time to focus on some serious gardening! Recently I was on a flight to France and I picked up from my bookshelf some books I havent delved into for some time. I love doing that, you just never know what you are going to be reminded of, and often, I find its relevant to my life currently. One of the things I came across was The Mental Diet by Emmet Fox, written in 1935! After reading it, I was inspired to give it a try and in fact, it did help in a few situations over the following days. Basically, its about interrupting limiting patterns in your mind. Its an opportunity to detox the mind of the negative and destructive patterns of thinking and feeling that have just become habitual. If you decide to go on this mental diet you will be on it for at least 7 days! 7 days of never having a negative thought! Let me tell you, that is a pretty tall order. Imagine, youve just missed the bus/train and NOT thinking Oh xxxx, the public transport system stinks, the boss is going to go down my throat when I get in, etc. The trick is to put notices everywhere on the computer, desk, car, kitchen, bedroom, EVERYWHERE! It could just be DIET or 7DMD (7 Day Mental Diet), anything you like just to remind you to do it. Then when a situation comes up where you catch yourself thinking something negative and maybe even beginning to feel emotionally negative, you STOP and ask yourself one of the following questions such as:
After 7 days of this diet you would have conditioned your nervous system to think and behave differently. You cannot be anything but better after it, and hopefully you may want to adopt this for the rest of your life! I used this in one particular situation in France, when a very heated discussion broke out around the dinner table between my husband and his father and I was sitting in the middle of them. Suddenly, I felt very tense and although my French is not fantastic yet, I got the gist of what was being said. I then started to feel very unresourceful and somehow a nuisance until I remembered the 7DMDiet ; Then I thought, What do I need to do right now to make me feel better? The answer was immediate, sit back and relax. I did just that, and not only did I feel heaps better but I actually started to smile and was slightly bemused by the situation. I also got a bit of a kick over the next few days telling myself I was on a Mental Diet, somehow it made me smile inwardly and I really felt empowered whenever I put this strategy into play. All you have to do is 7 consecutive days and if you find yourself holding onto negative thoughts even after you have spotted them, you must start again from the beginning, even if its day 5. Got it? Any successful person will tell you: If you always focus on the solution, it will keep you very positive. So dont spend more than 10% of your time on the problem but do spend 90% on the solution. So how about it, are you up for the 7 day mental diet? If you find that too much of a stretch, try 3 days per week, then next week 5 days. The chances are you will feel so resourceful, like having an inner secret, which you will probably want to keep it up. Let me know what happens. Until next week Onwards and Upwards and HAVE A GREAT DIET this week! 2004 INSPIRIT & Denise Bosque All Rights Reserved |
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