You are creating your own results

Take a moment and look around at your life --- notice your relationships, your work, your family --- take a quick stock of what is.

Then consider for a moment that you have created all of this with your thoughts.

How so?

There are many scholars and philosophers and business books and self-help books that all point to a similar model which is the Thought > Feeling > Action cycle. The Life Coach School (where I certified) expanded this model to include Circumstances and Results so the model looks like this:

C: Circumstance happens
T: You have a thought about the circumstance
F: Your thought creates a feeling
A: Your feeling creates your actions
R: And your actions create your results.

If you want to change your results, you have to change your model.

But not just any part of the model.

Most of us make the mistake of starting with the action line. We want to force a diet or workout regime. We try to control how people in our family should operate. We think that if we take more or bigger action at work, we should have our intended results.

But, that misses the critical part of the model which is the thought/feeling cycle that precedes your actions.

If you are taking action out of fear or shame you will struggle to be successful and suffer your way through the experience. If you are taking action out of connection or confidence, your chosen actions might be different, and your experience certainly will.

And with different thoughts > feelings > actions will come different results.

Try it.

When a circumstance happens (any circumstance or situation no matter how big or how small), PAUSE, and then notice where your thoughts go: "He's a jerk", "She shouldn't cut me off", "My mom never listens to me", "My boss sucks"... and so on. Those types of thoughts typically create feelings of anger, insecurity, fear, disconnection. And when we are angry or disconnected, we act from that place and might respond with force, or not respond at all. The whole cycle is tremendously disempowering, and the result is that you continue to feel terrible, not the other person.

Oof.

Instead, give yourself a minute to think about how you want to think about what's happened. What other thoughts are available to you? What are some 'neutral' thoughts you can think about the person or circumstance?

For example, "This is not about me", "Maybe they're having a bad day", "They didn't understand but I can help explain it", "That is my mom just being my mom and I don't have to take on her criticism"... and so on. See how those different thoughts create different feelings in your body. Which leads you to take different aligned action. Which leads to a better result for you.

There will be more to come on this but try it on and let me know what you think. All of your thoughts and feelings have led you to take action to get you to where you are. The good news is you can change your thoughts and feelings to help you take action to lead you somewhere else!

You got this!

And if you need help, I am here. My mission is to help women untangle all the patriarchal bullshit we've been silently trained to adopt and help you live a more focused and balanced life on purpose.