Holiday Stress Management: How to Reduce Stress and Experience Peace of Mind this Season

With holiday plays and parties to attend, cards to mail, gifts to buy, baking to do, guests to prepare for, and a slashed budget to boot, you may find yourself tied up in ribbons. Yet focusing on the essence of what you want is one of the most powerful ways of thinking to reduce stress and bring about peace and happiness during the holidays.

During these stressful times, we may find ourselves consumed with thoughts of worry, self-criticism, frustration, and even anger. Thinking about the essence of what we want, on the other hand, raises us to a new level of consciousness, gives us the ability to discover what truly matters to us, receive ideas on what to do next, and experience peace and happiness.

Here are some practices to help you discover the essence of what you want:

• Stop thinking, “I have to,” “I need to” or “I should” thoughts. As soon as you catch yourself thinking one of these judgmental – and exhausting – thoughts, restate your thoughts using the words, “I choose,” “I am committed to,” “It would be great if” or “I wonder how I can” and notice what happens. These powerful thoughts help us relax, discover what we really want and open us to the many ideas on how to achieve it.



• List everything you think you want to accomplish during the holidays, and ask yourself, “What does this bring me?” for each item. Keep asking and answering the question “What does this bring me?” until you get to the essence of what you want. If the essence of what we want brings us peace or inspires us, we open ourselves to the myriad of possibilities on how to fulfill what we truly want. If the essence does not bring us peace, then we can cross the item off our list or choose another way to think about it.



• Take a deep breath focusing on the exhale and think “I wonder what truly matters in this moment?” Reinvoking the state of wonder is a sure-fire way to reduce stress, spark creativity, and keep us fully present and focused on what really brings us peace and joy.

©2009 Managing Thought. All rights reserved.

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Practicing Thankfulness…Even in Difficult Times

As we continue to experience difficult times, it may feel like a tough time to be thankful. Yet practicing thankfulness is one of the most powerful ways to bring about a change in our circumstances. During difficult times, we may find ourselves struggling with thoughts of fear, self-doubt, worry, anger and depression. Besides negatively impacting our health and vitality, these thoughts don’t move us in a direction that serves our purpose -- in fact, they make matters worse.

One of the quickest and most powerful ways to create a change in our circumstances is to practice thinking thoughts of thankfulness. Thankfulness is one of the highest levels of consciousness, giving us the ability to see the myriad of possibilities, discover what we truly want, receive ideas on what to do next, and create and realize a vision for the future.

When you practice thankfulness, a physical and mental transformation occurs. Your brain begins perceiving even more to be thankful for. You find yourself focusing on your strengths. You’re smiling. Your spine straightens. The muscles in your face and neck relax and your breaths deepen. Your creative juices begin to flow and you get creative ideas on how to turn your situation around and move in a direction that inspires you.

Thankfulness takes practice, and just one of these practices brings dramatic improvement in our lives, our families, and our organizations.

1. List everything you are thankful for -- in your life, career, family, relationships, your body and its functionality, your strengths and skills, your values and personality, your home. If you are a business, list everything you are thankful for with your customers, suppliers, investors, employees, the industry, and specific customers, suppliers, investors and employees. Be sure to find something to be thankful for with respect to what you may be most unhappy about. If we hold contempt for anything we wish to change, we actually block our ability to change it.

2. At the end of each day, work backward and think of everything you are thankful for from that day. Our spirits are lifted when we are appreciative of even the smallest things.

3. Take note of what you are thankful for throughout the day—before or after a conversation, a telephone call, a meeting or a new task, and be thankful for each experience.

4. When you catch yourself thinking a worry, self-doubt, anger or other self-defeating thought, take a deep breath, first exhaling deeply, and ask yourself “What can I be thankful for in this moment?”

5. See what happens!

©2009 Managing Thought. All rights reserved.

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Boost Your Immunity this Cold & Flu Season – through Self-Awareness and Managing Thought

It’s that time of year—what we have come to know as cold and flu season. We speak of it with such certainty, as if it were an impending doom. And that’s the problem. We think of the cold and flu season with certainty—as if it’s reality—and it is not reality. It is the reality we have created for ourselves.

Right now your brain might be saying, “Hey! That’s not true! Practically everyone I know gets a cold or the flu at this time of year.” It may even be citing statistics. Please thank your brain for sharing and remember, just because something is common, doesn’t mean it is normal, or natural, or true for you.

We act as if we are victims of cold and flu season. We aren’t. We are victims of our thoughts about cold and flu season, a slide we have put in our ViewMaster® And we can change the slide. We can start looking at our thoughts instead of from our thoughts and focus on what we want (good health and a strong immune system) instead of what we don’t want (cold and flu).

If you are thinking thoughts such as “I get a cold every November,” “Whenever I get a cold, it always turns into bronchitis,” or “When the kids come home sick, it’s just a matter of time before I catch it,” you are focused on what you don’t want. You are also instructing your brain to cause your body to get a cold every November, get bronchitis, and get sick with whatever your kids bring home. And your brain has no instructions to follow to help you cultivate health or strengthen your immune system. It’s too busy looking for evidence that it’s flu season!

So when you catch yourself with the Cold and Flu Season slide in your ViewMaster, take a moment to replace it with your Great Health and Strong Immune System slides and see what happens. Choose the I drink eight glasses of water a day and I add lemon juice to my water slide. Choose the I wonder what vegetables I can eat for lunch? or the Which cup of coffee can I replace with green tea? slide. Choose Where can I take my walk today and get some fresh air? slide. You can create slides that focus on taking time to be quiet each day, relaxing, laughing, practicing thankfulness, or doing the things you love to do. Choose the I notice I am in fight, flight, or freeze, exhale deeply, and choose a powerful thought slide.

When your brain receives these instructions, it searches for opportunities to make what you want a reality i.e. generates ideas to schedule your water breaks, notices vegetables on the menu, and finds the time for you to take walks, breathe, relax, or connect with your family and friends.

The information contained herein reflects only the opinion of the author. The information is made available with the express understanding that it is not to be considered medical advice. Never disregard or delay seeking professional medical advice or treatment because of information contained herein. This information is in no way meant to treat, cure or prevent any disease or illness from happening. IF YOU HAVE ANY QUESTIONS OR CONCERNS ABOUT YOUR HEALTH AND BEFORE STARTING OR STOPPING ANY TREATMENT OR ACTING UPON INFORMATION CONTAINED HEREIN, YOU SHOULD CONTACT YOUR OWN PHYSICIAN OR HEALTH CARE PROVIDER.

©2009 Managing Thought. All rights reserved.

For more on this topic and how to manage your thoughts in everyday circumstances and how to deal with the challenges you face in practicing self-awareness and being on purpose, Click Here.

More on Positive Thinking Day: Why Positive Affirmations Don't Work and Powerful Affirmations Do

My last blog, It’s Positive Thinking Day: Don’t Think Positive Thoughts, Think Powerful Thoughts, generated some questions from readers wondering why affirmations wouldn’t work. I am writing this blog to answer these questions.

Many folks swear by the use of affirmations, or positive affirmations, as they are often called. Then there are those
who use affirmations as a form of positive thinking to no avail and those who don’t use them at all because they do not what to be that Stuart Smalley character from the Saturday Night Live television show. Psychotherapists have told me that there are clinical studies that show that positive affirmations do not work. This doesn’t surprise me.

Affirmations don’t work when they are not true or sincere. We are all about telling the truth. It is impossible for us to be at peace or inspired and to receive ideas on how to bring our “happy thoughts” or positive affirmations to reality if we do not feel true to ourselves.

For example, if I repeatedly affirm, I am calm, and I am really not calm, the affirmation will not move me one step toward being calm. If I find myself thinking thoughts such as There’s no way you’ll ever be calm in this situation…or When pigs fly!, while I am affirming, I am calm, then affirming, I am calm, won’t work because I cannot imagine or believe in the possibility of being calm. If I believe I should be calm and I am masking or distracting myself from my true feelings, then the affirmation, I am calm, is not true or sincere and won’t work.

In addition, affirmations won’t work if we cannot see what is, for example, affirming to go east looking for a sunset. (It is comforting to note that when we are thinking powerfully, we know in which direction to look for the sunset.)

Affirmations don’t work when they are not inspiring. We are not inspired when we are focused on what we don’t want (for example, being less stressed), instead of what we do want (for example, being calm.) And we are not inspired when we can’t imagine or tell the story with enough detail to picture how we can live the word calm in the moments of our day or move in the direction of being calm and the good that results for us and others.

So I don’t use the term “positive affirmations.” I use the term “powerful affirmations,” which, to me, are positive affirmations done right!

When we think powerful affirmations, we feel good. We feel at peace. We feel a sense of inner power. We feel lit up and energized. We feel inspired. We feel true to ourselves.

We are all different. Affirmations that work for others may not work for me. Affirmations that work for me in one situation may not work in another. This is where self-awareness comes in. It is up to me to choose my affirmation, say it out loud to test it, feel it, practice it, and make adjustments, until it serves my purpose.

Do you feel inspired as you are thinking your affirmation? Do you feel at peace? True to yourself? Do you feel you can make a difference? Do you feel a sense of wonder? If not, there is another way to think the affirmation to make it powerful and serve your purpose.

©2009 Managing Thought. All rights reserved.

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It's Positive Thinking Day: Don't Think Positive Thoughts. Think Powerful Thoughts.

Hello and welcome to my first blog, just in time for Positive Thinking Day this Sunday, September 13th.

Many folks say that positive thinking works and an equal number say that positive thinking does not work. And guess what, everyone’s right! For this reason, I don’t use the term positive thinking, I use the term powerful thinking.

There is a distinct difference between a positive thought and a powerful thought.

Positive thoughts often do not work (remember the Stuart Smalley character on Saturday Night Live who made positive affirmations in the mirror).

Often, if they do work, they work only temporarily. We've all experienced this when we get all motivated to make a change after we have listened to a speaker, read a book, made resolutions, or heard a rah-rah pep talk. Two weeks later, we're back to the way we were.

Powerful thoughts, on the other hand do work. Powerful thoughts inspire us, spark creativity, access our highest awareness, and bring us ideas that move us in a direction that serves our purpose.

So how do we know if a thought is powerful or not? Very simply, by noticing how we feel as we think a thought. When a thought is not working for us, we don’t feel good as we are thinking the thought. Our head and neck are tense, our eyebrows are furrowed, our breath is short, our chest and stomachs are tight. And we don't feel true to our selves.

When we are thinking a powerful thought, we feel good. We feel at peace. We feel a sense of inner power. We feel inspired.

Powerful thoughts include thoughts with vision and purpose, thoughts of wonder and possibility, thoughts of thankfulness and thoughts that are true to who we really are and what really matters to us.

When we think powerful thoughts, we are in tune with our highest awareness and in touch with our creativity. It is when we are inspired that we achieve significant results. It is when we are inspired that we transform and achieve significant results.

Make it a practice to notice how you feel in body and spirit as you think a thought or say it out loud. (For those of you in business, notice how you feel as you state your mission statement, your goals, or communicate with your customers or employees.)

Do you feel inspired as you are thinking the thought? Do you feel at peace? Do you feel true to yourself? Do you feel that you can make a difference? Do you feel a sense of wonder? If not, there is another way to think the thought to serve your purpose.

We can take positive thinking to a whole new level, think powerfully, and be creative, inspired, and impactful in all we do.

©2009 Managing Thought. All rights reserved.

For more on this topic and how to manage your thoughts in everyday circumstances and how to deal with the challenges you face in practicing self-awareness and being on purpose, Click Here.