10 Journaling prompts to decide when to push through fear (and when not to)
There are a lot of people out there who believe pushing through fear is the key to success. A quick search for fear-related quotes brings up statements like feel the fear and do it anyway, don’t let fear win, everything you want is on the other side of fear. Of course, there are times when this advice is accurate. Those times when self-doubt is holding us back from what we…
Seedling Ep 20. It’s OK to go slow
In this episode I want to talk about feeling as if you’re wading through treacle when everyone else seems to be running past you effortlessly. I want to encourage you to get to know your brands of treacle and, if you can’t change them - accept them - and if you can change them, wash it off. So if you find you’re constantly comparing yourself to others and feel like…
Seedling Ep 19. How to get out of a negative thought cycle
On the podcast this week I wanted to talk about negative thought cycles - you know, when you find yourself staring at the wall thinking one negative thought after another and feel utterly paralysed. I recorded this a couple of weeks ago, before the coronavirus pandemic started, so it honestly wasn’t planned but I do feel like it’s good timing. I’m sharing an example of when I found myself in…
Seedling Ep 17. How to be OK with not being the best
This week on the podcast we’re tackling perfectionism and how to be OK with not being the best at something. This is something (as you’ll hear) I’ve always struggled with. But more recently I’ve felt better able to lower my insanely high expectations of myself. In this episode I’m sharing five steps that can help you be more comfortable with being a beginner at something. I hope it helps. You…
Why are we scared of taking risks?
Are you a natural risk taker? I am 100% not, but it’s something I’m working on. When I say risk here, I don’t mean jumping out of a plane type risk, I’m talking about social and psychological risks. Doing new things, doing the things that your self-doubt tells you you can’t. I’ve been learning a lot about the brain lately, through a science of wellbeing course I took last year…
Picking yourself up after a fall
Last month I wrote about some mistakes I made when I first started coaching, sharing the lessons I learnt along the way. Today I want to take a broader look at that situation and talk about how we can cope when something doesn’t go the way we thought it would. Maybe you’re a business owner and your latest offering didn’t do as well as you hoped. Maybe you made a…
Growth spurt
I’m posting an extra blog this week to tell you about an email challenge I’m running in August called Growth spurt. I feel like August can be quite a quiet month, filled with dappled sunlight and al-fresco dining. It occurred to me that this time of year might be a good one to work on self-belief. The days are deliciously long and give us some space to reflect before we…
The discomfort of success
Well, this is a bit of an ominous title isn’t it? It’s an idea that’s been niggling at the back of my mind for a while now. It started when I listened to an episode of Sara Tasker’s podcast Hashtag Authentic where she interviewed Farrah Storr, editor of Cosmopolitan magazine and author of the book ‘The Discomfort Zone’. In the episode she discussed why it’s important for us to get…
How to build a self-belief evidence bank
When I talk about building self-belief, I often talk about building an ‘evidence bank’ and I realised recently that having a blog post dedicated to this (how to build one, when to use it etc.) could be super helpful. The idea of an evidence bank is to hold onto the positive things people say to you or about you, and to refer back to it when you’re struggling with self-doubt…
The relationship between self-care and self-doubt
One of the reasons I’m so passionate about self-care is because of the impact it has on other areas of our lives, including the way we feel about ourselves and our capabilities. Think about those times when self-care slips off your list of priorities. When you’re not taking the time you need to give yourself what you need, you’re not valuing yourself. When you’re not practising basic self-care, you’re quietly…