Our global society

I've recently returned from a weekend family get-together.

It's the second time we've enjoyed something similar - a great idea as, without these weekends, the only time we'd otherwise all see each other is at a wedding or a funeral....and why wait till then?

The gathering took place in the UK, but was mainly organised by my uncle who lives in Germany. He's married to a German lady and he and his sons think nothing of travelling the globe. My uncle regularly travels to Africa in his work, one of his sons has just flown in from Australia and another has been living and working in Zimbabwe for some time.

Thinking about the far-flung places that different members of the family had travelled from made me think about the incredibly global nature of today's society.

With the technology we now have access to, we can contact people in an instant, all over the world. A sister-in-law sent me texts from her recent holiday in New Zealand, we can download information through the Internet from almost anywhere, and I can speak to and coach people living on the other side of the world.

I have subscribers to my newsletter from as far afield as Saudi Arabia, the USA, Australia, India and Fiji.

What an amazing world we live in and what a huge amount of opportunities there are - which were never available to our grandparents.

I guess it's our place to make the most of these opportunities and to look after this wonderful, yet sometimes very small, world of ours.

Love is in the air

I'm thinking of setting up a dating agency.

OK, not really, but two of my recent clients have successfully proposed to their partners and are doubtless, as I write, getting their plans for the Big Day in order. How great is that?

The first, you may remember, was a lovely lady who took the opportunity of this Leap Year to pop the question on February 29th (see my blog entry of Thursday 6 March 2008).

The next is a great chap who I coached towards the end of last year. He'd hit a really low phase, his social life and love life were in tatters, and he'd lost confidence in himself.

Six months on and things have never looked better for him. He contacted me to let me know his good news: "I couldn't be happier. So much so that I proposed yesterday, and she accepted! ...... It's amazing that my life has changed so much in a year. Anyway, just really wanted to share the good news with you as you have played a part in how my life has changed."

You know, it's fascinating how, when we start to take control of our lives, and to find the positive, things tend to just fall into place.

It's also true that we need the 'dark' bits in order to give shade to our 'light'. Maybe this chap's low period, unpleasant though it was, was just what was called for to give him the impetus to move forwards. And now things are going well he can appreciate them so much more.

It's a real pleasure and delight to be part of a person's growth from the less good bits to the much better (if not fantastic) bits.

Maybe I should call my coaching practice ej life coaching and matchmaking?

Fear of flying

It's approaching holiday time and many of you may be thinking of jetting off somewhere soon. Or not...

A client of mine recently told me about her fear of flying and how she overcame this. She explained how her dislike of flying had prevented her visiting some amazing places and ruined many holidays. Her anxiety became so great that she stopped flying altogether. Instead, she and her husband used to travel by either motorbike or car - her longest and most ridiculous journey being from England to Sardinia!

Since then, she's done a lot of work on positive thinking and taken some positive action. She recognised the need to get take control of her fear of flying. So she enrolled on the Aviatours Fear of Flying course at Manchester airport. It is a day course split into 3 parts - the first taken by a BA pilot who talked through practical matters, aviation laws etc, the second led by a psychologist and the last part a 40 minute flight around the Isle of Mann.

The course had dramatic results. In her words: "Today I returned from a 5 day golfing break with 15 other ladies from the golf club. We have had a marvellous time - faultless. I handled the flights (3 hours each way due to head winds) very well. I completed 2 puzzles on each journey (never done before) and am now looking forward to trying places I have never done before."

The course obviously had a profoundly positive effect on her. More than that, because she had grown as a person, and recognised the impact of taking charge of her life, she was able to make important decisions that meant she could overcome barriers and get the most out of her life.

I don't know where she's off to this summer - but you can bet she will no longer be hampered by her fear flying.

Overcoming procrastination

My husband's currently applying for a job. He's really interested in the job - even excited about it. Trouble is, he's finding everything else he needs to do instead of just getting on with it!

Sounds familiar?

I guess we all suffer from procrastination at times. Usually when we have other things we'd much rather be doing, or when we simply don't enjoy the task in hand. Or maybe, like today, when the sun's shining, it's a glorious day, and we'd much rather be outside!

I'm writing some tips for avoiding procrastination in my newsletter this week (sign up on the form on my website to subscribe - it's free). In short, key tips include making sure the task is something important to you and that you can benefit from (even if the task is your job, so if you don't do it you might get fired!), break big things down into small steps, add in some rewards (e.g. how will you treat yourself when it's complete?) and don't try to be perfect, just good enough, in what you do.

I also stumbled across this webpage that has an article on how to overcome procrastination, which speaks a lot of sense.

OK, I'm off to help my husband with his application. Oh yes, that's the other tip - get help from someone else to kick-start things!