Vafa expressing joy gratitude and freedom infant of Donnington castle in Newbury, UK

Create Opportunities

 

“To hell with circumstances; I create opportunities.”  Bruce Lee

 

I love this quote.  I heard it and it resonated so deeply I had to share it!

When you start dreaming about a better future, hold onto that dream; make it bigger, better and brighter and walk towards it.

Don’t look for excuses to stop making progress and blame circumstances when the going gets tough. YES! Change isn’t easy, but well worth the discomfort in the long run.

Your unconscious mind is constantly looking for evidence to support your thoughts, your words and your feelings. It wants to ‘keep you safe’ by getting you to repeat the same unresourceful behaviour, and instead, it’s sabotaging your growth.

Your words become your world, and your thoughts become your actions. So, be mindful of creating excuses that are responsible for YOU standing in your own way of success, happiness and fulfilment.

When thinking about a better future, look for opportunities, not obstacles and laugh in the face of fear to keep the momentum going.

Does this quote resonate with anyone else? What’s your story?

This is a picture of me looking for opportunities of growth in every conversation.

Call me when you wish to create more opportunities

 

Love and strong coffee

Vafa

How Do You Colour?

 

“Imagination is everything. It is the preview of life’s coming attractions.”

Albert Einstein

When was the last time you coloured outside the lines?   I mean, when was the last time you pushed outside of your comfortable boundaries?

I’ve been colouring outside the lines for a number of years now.  It all started when I began to challenge my beliefs and values that were deeply ingrained.

And when lockdown was imposed, I wanted to stay connected with my network.  So I decided to become visible on social media and started doing videos.  Something I had shied away from, partly because of my limiting beliefs of not being able to do a good enough job!

Not only I’ve grown used to sharing my views on video, I’ve been able to help many people who contacted me.   I’ve also been invited on fb and IG lives to share insights.  So, I’d say that I’ve fulfilled my purpose of providing a safe space for my audience to talk and make sense of their stories.   It just goes to show that good stuff happen when you step outside your comfort zone.  

I often challenge my clients on their limiting beliefs by asking them to “imagine” how they would be if they were less afraid?  It’s only by exploring different experiences that we build new habits.  Who knows what great opportunities you may stumble upon if you chose to be different!

So I’m curious; how are you building new habits during these times?

What have you done differently that you couldn’t imagine doing before lockdown, and how have you felt about your new experiences?

 

Love and strong coffee

Vafa

“Life Is An Evolution”​

 

“Life is an evolution, isn’t it mum” asked mini me on one of those bygone days when we used to travel to school.

Yes.  Life is indeed an evolution.  We are the product of the environments we grew up in.  The people we grew up with.  The beliefs and values we adopted.  The sense of connection and belonging we felt and still feel at every step of the way. 

Every new experience and interaction helps shape our reality and the lens we see the world through.  For some people, evolution is a slow process.

For some of us however, certain circumstances arise in our life at the most unexpected time.  They force us to re-evaluate our lives.  

Mine came when I suffered with burnout when I was juggling far too many balls in the air at the same time.  The overwhelm I felt paralysed my logical left thinking brain I so faithfully relied upon until then.  

I clearly remember articulating this as “my amygdala having hijacked my brain” to a friend.  I had averaged 3 hours of sleep each night for the previous 5 months and I was simply incapable of making even the simplest of decisions.

That’s when I was forced to take time out and rethink the path I wanted to travel on.  As difficult as it was to go through that period, it was a blessing in disguise.  It may have seemed like a huge “failure” to have lost the ability to be the old resilient me and keep on ploughing forward regardless.  But it afforded me a great opportunity to get to know myself.  To allow myself to get vulnerable and share “my story”.  That’s when I discovered that I wasn’t the only one who felt like that.

That’s when the real transformation began for me.  To allow myself to believe my own truth.  To start the process of change which wasn’t a walk in the park, but so worth the pain and the discomfort.

Perhaps the period of discomfort we’re experiencing now is also a blessing in disguise.  Not that many would recognise it as that YET!

You see, with change comes growth if you allow the vulnerability out of the box.  And with growth, transformation into an individual who lives a fulfilled life.  A life that’s congruent with one’s core values.  I’m not suggesting it will be a fairytale “happily ever after” life, but a life on your terms.  

It’s only then that you feel a certain amount of peace and gratitude you didn’t know existed when you lived your old life.  And hence, a newfound resilience and resolve which helps you deal with the unhappy times with a different kind of mindset.

And this is what I take my beautiful coachees through.  I encourage them to find themselves and what makes them tick.  What’s truly important to them.  Their truths, and how to reach for them unapologetically.  They learn to evaluate how they communicate their desires to their community.  

The realise what they’ve been tolerating.  The learn how to embrace and emanate their values in every communication they conduct.  I give them the tools to become attractive to themselves first and foremost, and to the people they cross paths with.

Trying to master the unknown we have faced for the last few weeks is yet another unexpected event where many of us have been forced to think and act differently from the time of life we called “normal”.

Isn’t this a brilliant time to redefine that “normal” as you knew it.  Why not make it what you want it to be?  To examine who you are, what you stand for and what you’ve tolerated unquestioningly during the time of life you used to call “normal”.

At this time of national lockdown and media frenzy, various stimuli are embedded in our subconscious on daily basis.  Be it the stories we tell ourselves or the propaganda and the scaremongering the media portray.  

Why not take a conscious effort to be different?  This is the perfect opportunity to switch the negativity off and put your creative, big blue sky thinking hats on and look at life differently.  

Let’s admit it… Many of us haven’t had time to get creative since we were kids; some of us had even forgotten what it was like to be creative till isolation happened.

Many people have lost their vocation, but admit openly how proud and fulfilled (as described by their social media feed) they feel in their new roles as healthcare assistants, supermarket employees and delivery ninjas.

Some business owners have had to think differently and take their businesses online.  Families have had to get creative with budgeting as they’ve faced financial challenges.  Look how many different recipes of bread are going around and the vast population who have attempted to make bread on fancy skillets to keep busy and sane.

I bet there have been many moments of laughter and pure joy as families have succeeded in making bread that’s half edible.  Who had time to bake bread pre CV19?  That’s such a great example of getting creative and living differently by many.

If I was to encourage you to see this period as an opportunity to grow into a better version of you, what would you say?

Would it be a good time to evolve and reinvent yourself, even a little bit?

Why not make a list of all the things you’ve been tolerating in your pre CV19 life as a first step?  Look for what you could eliminate from your new life?  Don’t forget to involve your loved ones and take them on this wonderful journey with you, so you can grow as a family and thrive together.

And please get in touch if you’d like any further exercises in the quest to start your wonderful and exciting personal revolution journey.

Stay connected and stay safe.

 

Love and strong coffee

Vafa