POWER Tool for Life Goals E-Book

Amanda Craven

• Herausgeber: Valley Press
• Kategorie: Ratgeber
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 92

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

Want a life coach in your pocket? Whether you know what you want to change, or just have a feeling there's more to life than what you've got now, this is for you. Using real-life examples from Amanda's career as a life coach, hypnotherapist and psychologist, and backed by evidence-based science, the P.O.W.E.R. TOOL will help you to take the steps towards change. No matter the size of the goal, Amanda will hold your hand throughout the process. From defining the goal itself to breaking it down to the smaller steps, you won't find any unnecessary "fluff" in here – just useful stuff! This easy-to-follow, 5-step guide will show you how to clearly define those changes and make them your new reality. A unique guide in its combination of practical steps and the limitless power of your mind, the P.O.W.E.R. TOOL opens up endless possibilities and encourages you to dream big. Readers of this book have free access to supplementary materials and podcasts to help you along your way.

Leseprobe

—————

P.O.W.E.R. Tool

for life goals

—————

Amanda Craven

Lendal Press

I dedicate this book to my inspirational parents, Joe and Anne, and to my amazing daughters, Lucy, Alice and Rose, who patiently understood my need to regularly disappear into my office to work and write.

With thanks to Giulio for letting me share his story and to all my clients over the years for allowing me to be part of their journey.

‘Can you help me grow a beard?’

A few years ago, when I was a newly trained hypnotherapist, I received a Facebook message from a man asking if I could help him to grow a beard. I actually thought it was a joke as I’d had a few ‘wind-up’ enquiries in the first few months of qualifying, but I decided that I would reply in my usual professional way, and we arranged a short phone consultation to establish whether we were ‘a good fit’.

During that conversation, I understood how desperate this very genuine-sounding gentleman was to grow a beard. Giulio had tried, unsuccessfully, to grow one since his late teens, but at each attempt his unconscious habit of plucking out the hairs around his mouth created a very strange-shaped mass of stubbly hair. Once he realised what he’d done, and his girlfriend (later his wife) caught sight of the ‘beard’, he was dispatched to the bathroom to shave the whole thing off. And so it had gone on for decades. Hence the distressed Facebook message.

It took us just two hypnotherapy sessions to uncover and eliminate the root cause of this unfortunate habit, and over the next few weeks I was delighted to receive weekly photo updates of a very handsome beard. This ‘goal’ of having a beard was so much more than just growing facial hair; once he had achieved it, this lovely man stood taller, oozed confidence, lost weight, bought new clothes and thoroughly enjoyed his smart new look.

The chances are your goal or goals don’t involve growing a beard, though they may be connected in some way to how you look – or how you feel about yourself. You might want to achieve ‘something’ – a qualification, a promotion, a new fitness level – or acquire ‘a thing’, like a house or car, for example. You might not even know what you want, but just ‘know’ that there’s more out there and that you want some of it. Whatever ‘it’ may be.

And this is where I, and this book, come in.

I believe that everyone has the right – and the power – to change their life and to reach for the stars, if that’s what they want. I have been honoured to help hundreds of clients who have wanted to create change in their life. Once clients work through any ‘obstacles’ (from anxiety to addictions, phobias to past trauma) they are ready to start a new chapter, follow their dreams, and become who they truly wanted to be. I want to accompany you on your life journey, too, and hear about the successes you’re about to enjoy! Just like Giulio, and countless other fabulous human beings I have met. Like one amazing lady who came to see me with a fear of heights that had mushroomed over decades into agoraphobia and a complete lack of self-esteem. Her world had become a very small, yet scary, place. After our work together she celebrated her new lease of life by dyeing her hair purple (to the horror of her grandchildren) and her husband began commenting on the amount of petrol she now consumed as she confidently zipped around the countryside in the car that had spent much of its life till then on the driveway!

The techniques covered in this book have been developed through years of helping clients like the ones I’ve described above and have been the reason for my own goal-setting successes. Even before formalising the 5-step process I realised I had reached many of my life goals – getting my dream job abroad, achieving several promotions, starting my own business, moving to the seaside, and getting distinctions in my studies as a mature student, to name but a few – by intuitively taking the actions now defined in the P.O.W.E.R. TOOL FOR GOALS ® process. It’s also how I actually wrote this book and got a publishing deal! I have personally had to work through many challenges (including the untimely loss of my mum to cancer, getting cancer myself at forty-one, divorce, single-parenthood and financial difficulties) and self-sabotage issues (stemming from what I see now as a suffocating Catholic education in the 1970s). Having a structured framework was invaluable at these times and helped me to keep looking forwards.

This book gave me the opportunity to draw on all these personal and professional experiences and bring everything together ‘under one roof’ as an effective, easy to remember 5-step process that will also help YOU to change your life.

This P.O.W.E.R. TOOL FOR GOALS ® method will therefore ensure that, whatever your goals or your desired changes, you have all the ingredients you need for your success.

How to use this book

Chapter 1 will guide you through a series of exercises to help you define your life goals. Once you have a clear idea of the changes you want to make, Chapters 2 to 6 will walk you through the P.O.W.E.R. TOOL. To make this tool easy to remember, each of the five letters in the word ‘POWER’ represents a step of the process:

Picture Your Goal Strategies for visualising your goals and dreams, plus the science behind this.

One Step at a Time How to break each goal down into manageable steps and keep focused.

When Are You Doing This? Understanding the importance of committing to time frames and ways to do this.

Evaluate and Measure Your Progress Techniques to check in on the strategies you’re using and assess whether you’re on target.

Reason You Are Doing This Understanding the importance of ‘owning’ your goals to keep your plans on track.

In order to optimise your success, I recommend that you cover the chapters in the following order: 1, 6, 2, 3, 4, 5.

After working through these chapters, you will then be ready to create your very own 28-Day P.O.W.E.R. Action Plan (Chapter 7): a step-by-step guide that you can use to create a personalised week-by-week / month-by-month action plan, helping you to create goals you can smash. The tables discussed in this chapter will cover the crucial first twenty-eight days, but your tools will enable you to take as long as you need. This plan covers up to three goals, but the tool is completely flexible, and you have everything you need to do more – or fewer – goals. You can download – for free – all of the tables discussed in this book as many times as you like from:

resources.amandacraven.org/powertoolforlifegoals

If you get stuck at any point during the above stages, Chapter 8 (Feeling Stuck?) looks at the obstacles you may face when working towards goals and contains techniques and tips on how to overcome them.

Whenever you see the headphones icon (🎧) this means you can download an audio version of the text from the above website.

It’s now time to get yourself a nice notebook (or folder for your printouts) and some coloured pens that you enjoy writing with, and make sure they’re accessible at all times.

I hope you’re as excited about your new chapter as I am for you! What are you waiting for?? Turn the page and let’s get you started!!

What’s this chapter about?

This section is a chance to go under the bonnet by looking at why it’s important for us to set goals and what we get from this process.

After that, there are five easy-to-do yet very powerful exercises that will help you create a working list of life goals for yourself.

We are wired to set goals

The fact of the matter is that we humans are wired to set goals for ourselves: to explore, stretch our capabilities, and generally to improve our lot. If we weren’t, we’d still be living in caves with only our hands as tools.

In addition to the survival responses hard-wired into the oldest parts of our brain, humans have a large, well-developed and relatively ‘modern’ section called the pre-frontal cortex (PFC). It is our PFC which enables us to carry out many complex thought processes which include (amongst many other functions) evaluating the past, considering the present and actively planning the future. This is what distinguishes us from other animals. Researchers1122 have established that animals have a much smaller PFC and tend to react and adapt to their immediate environment and circumstances, lacking our pro-active, planning and appraisal abilities.

According to psychologist and goal-setting expert Edwin Locke, goals are a biological need for humans, fundamental to our survival and happiness.33 This means that if we’re not working towards a future goal, we are under-performing. If we are just coasting through life or living each day like it’s Groundhog Day, we will likely feel dissatisfied or uneasy, or have a vague feeling that something is lacking. But it’s only when we stop and consciously take stock that we are able to identify what is lacking and be clear on what we want. And that’s exactly what this first chapter will help you to do.

Before we move on to the different ways you can use this opportunity to identify and define your goals in the most effective way, let’s just take a peek at all the benefits you will get from this process.

What do we get from goals?

Research has identified key benefits linked to goal setting, and it’s interesting to note that we benefit most from setting clear goals that are meaningful to us and will stretch us.

So, what happens when we set, and achieve, our goals?

We…

increase our self-esteem

gain self-confidence

tend to make more effort in all areas of our life

improve our overall performance in life tasks

boost our energy levels

grow as a person

fulfil our potential

experience positive emotions and increase our general sense of wellbeing

reduce boredom

create a sense of purpose

improve our ability to focus

feel more satisfied and accomplished

develop resilience and persistence

Studies have shown that setting goals leads to improvements in performance of all kinds – personal achievements, sporting events, exams, lifestyle. The action of goal setting creates a sense of purpose and a momentum that creates energy and powerful vibrations, which leads to more action, excitement and achievement.