Forgiveness is about willingly letting go of past hurts so that we are able to live a happier life in the present. Forgiveness is one of the hardest things for us to do. It is easier said than done, especially when something has caused us great pain or hurt in our lives. We have all experienced events in our lives that have and will continue to affect us in a negative way if we allow it. These hurts cause us to have feelings such as sadness, confusion, guilt, bitterness and anger and can lead us possibly to wanting to seek revenge. The more that we dwell on these hurts the more powerful and destructive they become. They can poison our lives. They can also consume a lot of our focus and energy; focus and energy which could be better directed to more important things in our life that will bring us joy and happiness. While we are dwelling on the past hurts we could be missing out on wonderful opportunities in the present. In my own life experiences I have had situations where ...

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  Are you having trouble balancing your life?  This is a common challenge that most people encounter and find difficult to resolve. I hope that this article assists you in taking some steps to improve the balance in your life.  The 3 important questions that I ask my clients when they want a solution to creating more balance in their life are:  1. Do you value your time?; 2. Can you be disciplined?; and 3. Are you willing to change habits?  What are some causes for us getting out of balance?  *Dealing with the urgent and not the important * Being disorganised * Procrastination * Too much time spent on the phone or computer * Watching too much television * Changes in family roles * Belief systems * Deterioration of boundaries between work and home * Disease to please. Can’t say “NO” * Inability to delegate * Lack of planning * Longer work hours * Clutter in our environment * Time bandits  What are the consequences of not having b...

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  Many people find it extremely difficult to say ‘No’ to people’s requests and demands. I personally struggled with this for most of my life.  Why do so many of us find it so difficult to say ‘No’? From analysing my own experiences and talking to other people I have found the following to be some of the causes.   * Habit * Underestimating a task * Desire to rescue, serve and please others * Fear of rejection * Guilt * Poor self-esteem and self-confidence * Not knowing how to be assertive * Avoids confrontation  It is important to understand that always saying ‘YES’ can lead to overload and feelings of frustration, resentment, stress and can also steel you away from important activities in your life. I classify important activities in your life as activities that make you happy and healthy and that contribute in some way to you achieving your life’s goals.  It is important to understand that when you say ‘YES’ to accepting an undertaking  y...

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When we are doing things we often do the same as last time, we have habits and often times this dictates our actions. This is being in auto pilot and we just go through our actions in an automatic way without really thinking about it. Another way of looking at this is going down the path of least resistance. We go there every time and our body has an express route to get there. When we are in this habitual trance as I like to call it, we are really not thinking about what we are doing, it just happens. For example exercise, your body is trained to go there in a certain sequence and it just does it when you go for a jog for example, or go cycling. Can be any sport, your body knows what to do. So when we stay on this road of least resistance, we do not learn new ways, we prefer the old way because it is effortless and well by now a natural way to do things. If you learn a new sport, example golf, then this is a whole new category and you need to breakdown the actual task and model of ...

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  Self-image is how your perceive yourself. It comprises of a number of self-impressions that have been built up over time. Your self-image has a direct impact on your identity, behaviour and results. A positive self-image is extremely important in aiding you to achieve the results that you want in your life and ultimately your level of happiness. It has been said that you will never out-perform your self-image. Your image of yourself can be distorted in comparison to how others see you. It is very important to understand this point. We can be over critical of ourselves or think too highly of ourselves. Either way it can be detrimental to us. It is important to have a realistic image of yourself. How do you see yourself? The way that you see yourself can manifest itself in how others end up seeing you. If you project a positive self-image others will more likely see you as a positive, capable person. It is easy to be fooled in thinking that an intelligent, attractive and fi...

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It isn’t enough that society places so much pressure on us to excel in every area our lives, but when we add our own expectations to the mix, we can really be setting ourselves up for disappointment. There are so many pressures on us as young women that the reality is we can become so overwhelmed that despite our achievements we are never happy with our results. So what does it mean to be “happy” and “guilt free”? Happiness is often mistaken as being successful which can be superficially measured by how many friends we have on Facebook, how exciting we are as lovers, whether or not we’re wearing next season’s fashions now and the amount of money we hint at but never admit to having. But this isn’t happiness – happiness is the result of getting our natural human needs in just the right balance. So what are those needs? – simply put we need to give and receive love, contribute to others’ lives and to society, have variety in our own lives, feel that we’re important, experience growth a...

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When you are at a party they are normally there, talking to strangers in complete ease as they have mastered the art of communication. They engage others easily and can be hypnotizing with their language and story telling. People gravitated towards them as they have such strong magnetism, a special “je ne sais quoi’’. True communicators and relationship builders. They are interested in others and genuinely show it, they build rapport with their physiology with their usage of language and they engage others. If you are in a conversation and totally present in that moment and listen with your whole body you too will be interesting. I was a witness to this just recently, he was a master communicator it was like watching a ballet dancer on a stage, he had poise, elocution, pace, and technique and he lead the audience where they needed to go. It was a magical experience. Then you see how people communicate nowadays, short abbreviated sms, Emails that are one way dialogue that have quick,...

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