The Power of our Thoughts

For the last few days, I have let myself think, feel and behave like a victim.

I made a Facebook post yesterday expressing my opinion on how I believe Gavin Newsome – the Governor of California – is failing. I shared the challenges my daughter has had with the unemployment system there. People supported me and offered ideas and help and empathy for our frustrations.

Despite feeling justified and “right”, I woke up this morning and still felt off. I still felt frustrated. So, I sat down and worked on the cognitive self-coaching model I teach others.

The basis of the model is that we all have situations or circumstances that are fact and we cannot change them. In this case mine was that after 72 days of being furloughed, my daughter still has not received any unemployment, nor has she been able to talk to a single person that can assist her.

Those situations mean nothing until we attach a thought to them. In this case my thoughts, which I so boldly shared on Facebook, were “Gavin Newsome is failing”.

Once we have a thought about any situation it automatically creates an emotion. My emotion was clearly frustration.

The next thing that happens is our emotions cause us to take some sort of action. My feelings of frustration were causing me to sit in victim mode and have lots of ruminating thoughts and anxiety. And my daughter was in the same boat.

Here is where it gets interesting. Our actions create a result and that result almost always ties back to our belief. We will always take actions that support our beliefs. Only, usually that belief is something in us we need to work on. In this case, because of my thoughts, I was failing as a mother; or, at least, failing at being the kind of mother I want to be.

Our situation stayed exactly the same – still no unemployment and we had still not been able to get through to anyone that could assist. But I shifted my thoughts to ”We can handle whatever comes our way.”

This thought was very believable to me and it created a feeling of empowerment in me.

That feeling of empowerment gave me the confidence to show up in player mode with myself and my daughter. I told her I would no longer be a victim to this unemployment crap and that I knew that she and I can both handle whatever comes our way. She voiced that she was still frustrated, and I let her know that she is welcome to think and feel whatever she likes; however, I am done being a victim to this.

I want to be the kind of mother that shows my daughter what I know to be true. . . that we all have everything in us to succeed no matter the circumstance. The end result was that I showed up for her exactly how I wanted to. Even better, 15 minutes later she walked into my office with confidence and let me know she had made a decision on a situation she had been having a very challenging time managing. She went on to have a wonderful day today spreading love and joy to herself and others.

We can all chose our thoughts every single moment of everyday. Wayne Dyer said it best, “When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.”

If you want more information on the self-coaching model I teach, I am offering complimentary life coaching through the end of May and am happy to help any way I can.

As always, sending you all much love!

Hugs

Heather