September 2008

Just what does a positive mindset do for you? When you have a slew of negative thoughts, does that mean your life is about to crash? Is there a way to measure the impact of thinking positively with a right frame of mind?

Consider this analogy. A mental attitude is a pre-disposition, a leaning toward a type of thinking. It’s much like a preference. For example, I like to eat snacks and if all I eat is candy, then that is all that I know what is available as a snack. My mental attitude is tuned in whenever I pass the candy aisle in a grocery store or the candy trays next to the check out. All the positive thinking about eating apples and grapes goes south when the thought of eating candy is dominant.

The same is true of a positive mental attitude. Through repetition of positive thoughts, positive thinking takes over. An affirmation that plants those positive thoughts in the subconscious mind builds that mindset. Healing affirmations that focus on better health work the same way.

Do you feel a little under the weather? Is your health and life at a crisis. Healing affirmations can help provide a positive frame of mind that can benefit you and even move you toward health.

What are healing affirmations and how do they affect a person’s health? Let me explain in just a moment. But first, let’s define what a healing affirmation is not. A healing affirmation is not a magic spell. It is not magical thinking. It is not a way to escape reality.

A healing affirmation is the process of saying the power of words in a relaxed state of body and mind to program your subconscious mind with positive thinking. Many people throughout the world use a healing affirmation to help build up the power of faith and engage the body to accept health and well being.

What was he thinking? Why did she do that? Chances are that healthy positive mindset or negative thoughts are behind almost every human behavior. Ever since the self-help industry was launched by Earl Nightingale’s recording of The Strangest Secret, self-help gurus advocate positive thinking.

Even the famous author and pastor, the deceased Reverend Norman Vincent Peale wrote about and preached on the power of positive thinking. So what do positive thoughts do and how do they affect positive affirmations.

For example, a very simple positive thought is “I can do it!” instead of “There is no way I can do it.” Go ahead, repeat each statement 10 times each. Listen to yourself. Which felt better? The odds are that you help empowered when you said “I can do it!” and depressed when you said the other one.

By purposely creating and repeating positive thoughts a daily habit, you can create a habitual power that will propel you to action and positive results.

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Many successful people today have borrowed a strategy from the hypno-therapy world called conversational hypnosis. Although usually used in a clinical setting with patients to help them solve issues, this tactic is often used by sales executives, parents and singles to get others to do what they want them to - whatever that may be.

Traditional Hypnosis Treatment

In a clinical setting, conversational techniques are intended to get the patient thinking and talking about their situation in a comfortable, safe setting. By starting casual interaction with the patient, the therapist can begin to build rapport and trust. By encouraging active engagement in the discussion, the therapist will often lead the patient to make their own conclusions that will result in healing or finding a solution to the problem in question.

Understandably, when a person comes up with their own resolutions through a thoughtful process like this one, their decision is more powerful since it is their own. The therapist didn’t listen to the problem and give advice. But rather, the patient was skillfully lead to the answer and thought it was their own idea and became committed to the solution. Don’t underestimate how powerful this is.

Gain An Edge With Conversational Hypnosis

How successful could you be if you already had the ability to talk to someone and make them believe the point you were making - without them realizing you were making a point?

For example, if you are a salesperson you may have used this technique with a bit of success. You start by getting your lead talking and you try to lead them to the conclusion that they want whatever it is you’re selling. If you think back on successful sales meetings, you might see that a bit of customers just seemed to sell themselves. Whether you realized it or not, you may have used some of these conversational techniques. Imagine if you realized all the tactics and could make this happen on command?

Others have successfully used these strategies in the dating game. Don’t you think it would be better to build a relationship with someone who decided on his or her own that you were the greatest catch to be found rather than you telling them it was so? When a person decides something for themselves it has more meaning than if someone else were to give them an opinion. By the practice of conversational hypnosis, you can persuade someone to make the conclusion you want them to and they’ll think it was their idea all along.

If you’re looking for a way to improve the way people react to you and increase your chances for success - however you define it - then learning hypnosis strategies like those used in conversational hypnosis may be just the thing you need to turn your life around.

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Effective Leadership Skills

A common question many people moving up the ladder in their career have is about effective leadership skills. Though I believe these can be learned, I also believe that this is something that you are born with. There are certain traits that every human being has, and every person is different. Everyone has their strengths and their weaknesses, and we often have to learn to deal with what we are given. Leadership is one of those things that is so abstract that no one can really put a finger on the reason it is so strong in some and is existent in others.

I have always thought that effective leadership skills were something that you saw in a person at a very young age. If you have a four or five year old child who seems to be very natural at leading other children in play, you can expect that when they grow up they will have effective leadership skills. Though there are some circumstances in life that may negate this talent, for the most part, these children will be the ones who will maintain this sort of confidence later in life.

I have read many articles on effective leadership skills, and I have seen that many people like to disagree about what exactly that means. To me, effective leadership skills are ones that draw people together without negativity or force to move towards a common good or goal. These people who have effective leadership skills can do this very thing with relative ease. It is not a skill that they learned anywhere, it is something that they have and have always had with them.

However, I do believe that effective leadership skills can be taught to a point. If you must learn the skills, you may not have the natural grace and power of someone who was born with them, but you can be an effective leader. You can learn how to lead people in a positive way, but you cannot learn self-confidence. If you’re working on your effective leadership skills, perhaps the first thing you should work on is your self-confidence. You have to learn to believe in yourself and your ability to make snap decisions. You also have to believe that you can make good decisions, and that people will want to help you. Once you get the confidence part taking care of, the rest may come naturally to you.

More article that Define Leadership

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We shouldn’t unnecessarily flatter, but we must encourage.  Unfortunately, we tend only to appreciate results as opposed to effort.  And many of us criticize much more than we praise, thereby dampening enthusiasm and squelching confidence.  One father who was counseled about his nine-year-old son, Jonathan, exclaimed, “He never does anything right!”  Anything? Impossible!

Adults do it to adults as well.  Why do many of us so focus on another’s missteps or failures?  Oftentimes, it is because you want to prove that you are smarter than me, that you are better than me.  Or, you want to prove that you were right and that I was wrong.  Or, you want to demonstrate how much more integrity you have than I do.

There is another common reason some of us are very critical and impatient.  Unhappy people vent their frustrations and resentments at handy targets.  Criticism often serves as a ready made vehicle for the expression of your anger and your sense that the world has dealt you an unfair hand.  Furthermore, when you criticize, you don’t have to acknowledge your reservoir of anger.  You can cloak your comments in noble robes, for example: “I was only trying to help.”

People need guidance.  We need feedback designed to keep us moving in a healthy, productive direction.  I don’t want you simply to be my cheerleader - I need you to tell me when I am being unreasonable and unrealistic.

There is one kind of criticism, however, whose effect is solely destructive.  It is when you find fault with something they can do nothing about.  There is no point in ever allowing your dark haired, brown-eyed spouse to know that you prefer blond hair and blue eyes.  It is cruel to comment to your slim wife that you find large breasts a real turn-on.  It is insensitive to go on and on about how articulate and charismatic you find your male friend to be, when your husband is an unassuming man of few words.

Criticism, delivered properly, can be helpful when change is within our grasp.  Asking a person to change what is already etched in stone will only cause them to feel unworthy and resentful.

One change, however, requires that we simply shift some of our energies and become aware of somewhat different priorities.  We teach our children to respect the environment and set aside days for recycling in order to demonstrate that respect.  Adults dutifully separate their garbage, putting aside paper, aluminum, glass, and plastic products so they can have another life.  Why not then, propose a nationally recognized day each year on which we are especially mindful of treating others with dignity, when we relate to others as humans not objects, as equals not inferiors, as people who encourage and not criticize, as people with the same desires for recognition?

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You can’t delegate encouraging the heart.  Every leader in the organization (every person, in fact) has to take the initiative to recognize individual contributions, celebrate team accomplishments, and create an atmosphere of confidence and support.  It’s not something we should wait around for others to do.

“Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” clearly applies here. The foundation of leadership is credibility.  What is credibility behaviorally?  Over and over again, people tell us credibility is “doing what you say you will do.”  Leaders set the example for others.  They practice what they preach.  If you want others to encourage the heart, you start by modeling it yourself.  Set high standards, believed in others, and invest your attention in them.  You can’t expect others in the organization to follow your lead if you don’t take the first step yourself.

Personal involvement is also a genuine expression of caring.  It helps foster trust and partnership.  Leadership cannot be exercised from a distance.  Leadership is a relationship, and relationships are formed only when people come into contact with each other. 

Effective communication, if you’re serious about it, requires dedication and self-control. Public displays of emotion are not for the fainthearted.  It’s become well known that people are more frightened of public speaking than they are of dying.  Supporting others, particularly in times of great change, can be physically and emotionally draining.  It may seem easy, but we have learned that encouraging the heart is one of the two most difficult of the five practices of exemplary leadership.

We’ve found that it’s much easier for leaders to challenge the process, for example, than it is for them to encourage the heart.  There’s still a lot leaders have to learn.  We begin to see from all this that the main essential of encouraging the heart are core leadership skills.  We are not just about showing people they can win for the sake of making them feel good.  This is a curiously serious business.  When striving to raise quality, recover from disaster, start up a new service, or make dramatic change of any kind, leaders must make sure that people experience in their hearts that what they do matters.

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Most managers unintentionally treat their subordinates in a way that leads to less than desirable performance.  Many leaders have difficulty delegating responsibility.  There seems to be the programmed feeling that the only way to get the job done right is to do it yourself.  While doing it yourself may appear to work, it tends to be a breeding ground for apathy, non-involvement, low motivation, and loss of commitment and enthusiasm.  Sharing the work can be a great motivator, thereby strengthening the organization. 

The way managers treat their subordinates is subtly influenced by what they expect of them.  If a manager’s expectations are high, productivity is likely to be high.  If his expectations are low, productivity is likely to be low.  It is as though there is a law that causes an employee’s performance to rise or fall to meet his manager’s expectations.

1. What a manager expects of a subordinate and how he treats the subordinate will combine to profoundly influence the subordinate’s performance and his career progress.  What is critical in the communication of expectations is not what the boss says, but what he does.  Indifference and noncommittal treatment communicate low expectations and lead to inferior performance.  Most managers are more effective in communicating low expectations to their subordinates than in communicating high expectations, even though most managers believe exactly the opposite.

2. Superior managers create high performance expectations that subordinates can fulfill.  Subordinates will not strive for high productivity unless they consider the boss’s high expectations realistic and achievable.  If they are pushed to strive for unattainable goals, they eventually give up trying.  Frustrated, they settle for results that are lower than they are capable of achieving.  The experience of a large printing company demonstrates this.  The company discovered that production actually declined if production quotas were set too high, because the workers simply stopped trying to meet them.  “Dangling the carrot just beyond the donkey’s reach” is not a good motivational device.

3. Less effective managers fail to develop high expectations for their subordinates.  Successful managers have greater confidence than ineffective managers in their ability to develop the talents of subordinates.  The successful manager’s record of achievement and self-confidence grant credibility to his goals.  Thus, subordinates accept his expectations as realistic and try hard to achieve them.

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