Humans are made out of strong stuff.

And us huwomen are made out of reinforced steel, barbed wire and armour plates.

We Are Hard Core.

We can face multiple life challenges … organise families, feed babies, juggle house work with workouts and paid work and personal business … and many of us will do it alone. We may off-load to friends here and there (doesn’t everyone?) but many of us have an inbuilt belief that if we tough it out we’ll eventually push through the overwhelm.

And that’s where we girls tend to f**k up.

Tenacity and determination is good.

Within reason.

The challenge comes when we take on each hurdle and tell ourselves “things will calm down soon and then I’ll have a rest, breathe, chill etc” … because, lets face it, the hurdles don’t stop. There is always another Thing around the corner.

Throughout my life I’ve been gifted a fair share of hurdles. From the sudden death of my papa during one pregnancy, the murder of my brother three years later, a sticky divorce and a demanding job (as well as the usual challenges that arise from parenting two strong, individual children) I thought that my hurdle legs were pretty damn invincible.

That was until Baba No 3 arrived.

Weeks before the birth my partnership came to a sudden end. Financial pressures suddenly loomed. My partner expanded his business from one restaurant to two, meaning he was a little absent and suddenly I had no sleep, a baby in my room, a teen daughter and an 8 year old son with high demands of their own. In the year that followed, I launched my new business, co-financed the extension to our living area, removed my teen daughter from school and home educated her for three months before she returned to private education and throughout this had little or no child care available.

And you know what? During this time, it wasn’t just the external pressures that caved my brain in … it was the internal pressures that I was laying on myself.

One loud, wailing part of me was mourning for my creativity that no longer had a look in. Ideas for writing and art continued to hammer on my mind, but I couldn’t entertain them.

My career girl, business woman aspect was insisting that I think about the business, how I was going to make ends meet and how I was even going to string a sentence together in my next workshop.

A third part was mouthing desperate pleas from somewhere in the back of my skull, whispering for time out, a Yoga session, a reconnection to my spiritual side … some space, reflection time … silence.

It was nuts.

And despite countless conversations with my partner where “let’s just get through this week and then things will be easier” became the clichéd conclusion, I realized that things weren’t going to ease up.

Things weren’t going to change unless I changed.

There is a saying that goes, “you can’t create sanity out of an insane situation.”

I can vouch for this.

There’s another saying that goes, “You can’t solve a problem with the same thinking that caused it.”

I think Einstein said that one?

He also gave us this little gem;  “Insanity: doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.”

It was during a holiday to Croatia earlier in the year that I realised that I had to change what I was doing. I knew that I had to take some time out. Everything I’d been trying to do to relieve my situation was just adding more to the pile. Would launching another product or taking on more clients bring financial peace? No, it would just add more demands to my huge fistful of lists. What I needed was space to breathe and then  deconstruct the insane mind set that was keeping me in my cycle of insanity.

Physical space.

Head space.

So I booked a massage. And another. And for a long while I just lay.

I invested in my self-care in a radical way.

I gently returned to my coaching roots and decided that the one client I could take on was here; ME.

I read.

I simplified.

I experimented.

I was then shown some wonderful new coaching concepts that allowed me to do exactly what I needed; to deconstruct and rebuild my mind set so that my actions became empowering rather than debilitating.  Gradually life took on a different flavour. Things began to elevate from my energy levels to my eating patterns, to my income to my confidence.

The coaching tool I used to do this is what is known as a meta-system. This meta-system acts as a roadmap for stepping out of overwhelm and into a different level of living. Using what I learnt, I was able to  synchronise 3  major  aspects of my being so that, rather than conflicting and sabotaging me, they were working together and complimenting each other.

As these aspects began to flow and merge, I experienced the sort of serenity, lightness, flow and fulfilment that I’d been searching for, for a very long time.

I’m going to share the tool with readers over the next month, but just quickly, I want to mention something about life coaching? For anyone who is reading this and a) doesn’t  know what a life coach does or b) views coaching with trepidation, I’d like to share a couple of things. Lots of people I’ve spoken to over the years have confused life coaches with therapists and often this is followed with in build stigma around mental health and asking for help. Other people do not understand the power and purpose of life coaching and have never investigated how working with a coach can help you to clarify new ways to achieve the life you want to be living.

Fact is that therapists work with people to help them understand their past and how underlying patterns from the past can help them to deal with their present. A life coach is like the other side of the coin, looking forward into the future and empowering clients with the mind-set and tools to create that future.

A life coach helps a client to clarify what they want, empower the internal resources to have that happen, break down the limiting beliefs that can lead to self sabotage and hold the person accountable.  In a world that is more complex, intense and pressure ridden than ever before, to have a person who is committed to your highest potential and a space to develop the mindsets to unleash that potential, is rare.

Change can only happen when you make changes in your thinking. If you are finding yourself repeating the same thing over and over again, whether that’s through diet, work, family, relationships, money, creativity or self esteem – maybe it’s time to stop the cycle and find a new way to change your life today – because, bloody hell, as I know too well and I expect you do too, there have already been enough tomorrows.

Whatever you are facing at the mo, check out the upcoming posts and have a little play with the systems I’m going to show you. You have nothing to lose and possible a big heap of gorgeousness to gain.

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See Ya Soon!