awareness |

December 8, 2020December 8, 2020

Our Fear Response

Here we are again.

More COVID, more pandemic, more isolation, more uncertainty, more fear.

Are you someone who is succumbing to the fear?

Look at your behavior.

Are you GLUED to the news and can’t get enough?

Are you going beyond your normal stocking up at the store and actually OVER buying things…like toilet paper?

Are you resisting the fact that you need to wear a mask in public and practice social distancing?

Are you short-fused, when that is not normally your response reaction?

How about your money situation…are you worried you don’t have enough?

Ladies!!!!

This is ALL a good indication that you are operating out of FEAR!

Let’s look at how this fear is affecting your life.

You may be procrastinating more.

What goals did you set your sites on and now, they seem unreachable because you have taken to staying glued to your television or other habits that keep you distracted from taking action?

If you experience anxiety, it may be heightened because of all of the uncertainty there is in our world right now and you can’t let go of what if xxx bad happens?

If you were someone who grew up in a world of uncertainty-not enough money, not enough food, not enough jobs, etc.-you may be triggered by the state of the world now.

Let’s look at how this affects your health.

Fear prepares us to react to danger which in turn causes our body to release hormones that:

Slow or shut down functions not needed for survival. Things like the digestive system.
Sharpen functions that might help us survive (such as eyesight).
Increased and blood flow to muscles so we can respond faster and remove ourselves from the impending danger.

Our body also increases the flow of hormones to an area of the brain known as the amygdala to help us focus on the presenting danger and store it in our memory.

The brain reacts to signals from the amygdala, hindering rational thinking

When in this overactive state, the brain perceives events as negative and remembers them that way, storing them for future reference.

The brain stores all the details surrounding the danger—the sights, sounds, odors, time of day, weather, etc.

These memories tend to be very long-lasting, and may also be fragmented.

The details will act as triggers later and in severe cases causing PTSD

As you can see, fear serves a purpose, however, we are generally responding in a state of fear that can lead to greater, hindering responses and can ultimately affect your health and wellness and cause long-term effects.

So what can you do?

First of all, fear is normal.

Our fear response is designed to keep us safe.

Yes, we are in a pandemic and we all want to be safe, but when we operate out of fear, we are succumbing to responses that aren’t serving us mentally, physically, and emotionally.

2020 has been difficult for everyone.

Everyone has been afraid.

Sit back and look at how the world is responding.

We went from the toilet paper hoarding to stories of people actually hurting each other over wearing a mask or not.

What???

How is that a solution?

This CLEARLY is not rational behavior!

And seeing other people do it is contagious!

No wonder we are struggling!

We want to feel in control and shopping makes us feel more in control.

Trying to control others makes us feel more in control.

When the truth is, we have no control.

The only control we have is how we respond.

So I encourage you:

Create some awareness
- Look at your habits and behaviors-how are you responding to situations?
- Take a deep breath-are you reacting rationally or are you responding based on someone else’s response?

Do things that make you happy-what brings you joy?
- Make that list now!

Stop watching the news!
- The news is designed to keep us in a fearful state because it increases ratings and gives them stories to report on.
- Find other reputable sources to obtain the FACTS

Maintain a routine
- This involves creating positive habits that keep you functioning in a higher resonating state which will help keep the fear at bay

I hope that that this helped create some awareness of your fears.

If you are ready to DETOX 2020 and let go of your fears by creating lasting habits and working through the hard stuff, let me know.

I have a 6-week program designed just for you and it starts Monday, January 4th.

We will be eliminating fear, ending self-sabotage and procrastination, creating lasting habits and so much more!

Click here to sign up!

July 21, 2020July 21, 2020

Perspective vs Mindset

Today I want to talk about perspective vs. mindset.

Let’s first look at what perspective is.

Perspective is the way you see the world around you.

We gain our perspective from our past experiences.

Each person will have their own perspective about things based on past experiences.

Let’s take the idea of building a business during a pandemic.

My perspective is that NOW is the time to start building a business.

This is based on MY past experience of knowing things are hard.

Things will always be hard during difficult times.

But I don’t believe that anyone should shy away from adversity and growth because my truth is that I always succeed even when things are hard and so can you.

Someone else may say now is NOT the time to build a business because their past experience has been that they have tried during hard times and have failed, so they gave up and won’t even try.

Let’s create some awareness around your perspective.

Think about a situation that is happening now.

What is YOUR perspective?

Ask yourself these questions:

How you feel now and have you felt like this before?

What has made you feel this way in the past and how is it affecting you TODAY?

Now, mindset, on the other hand, is what we THINK about what we see.

There are two kinds of mindset.

Fixed and growth.

A fixed mindset is based on thinking you already have all that you need and that is all you are going to get.

A growth mindset is based on the belief that there is always a way to do or get more.

Having a fixed mindset means that you don’t always see different perspectives where, having a growth mindset, you see many perspectives.

Knowing this, what is keeping you from having the mindset you want?

It’s the “what ifs”.

Let’s take the starting a business example.

Someone with a fixed mindset’s “what ifs”

What if I don’t make any money?
What if I don’t have any clients or customers?
What if I go all in and lose everything?
What if I fail?

Someone with a growth mindset’s “what ifs”:

What if I make enough money to afford everything I need and can quit my j.o.b.?
What if I have so many clients or customers that I have to put them on a waiting list?
What if I go all in and grow so fast that I have to hire help?
What if I succeed?

As you can see, having a fixed mindset really limits your ability to achieve anything.

Now, if you are comfortable with where you are and you don’t have any goals you are trying to reach, having a fixed mindset is fine.

But, also know that if you don’t grow, you will die.

There should always be places in your life where you are aspiring to grow.

But with growth comes change and most people with a fixed mindset fear change.

And that fear is based on the unknown, things that haven’t happened yet.

So much of what we fear is NOT going to happen, and in fact, focusing on so much fear can cause you to manifest it happening.

So be very careful here.

People with a growth mindset embrace fear.

They also embrace failure because they know that when they fail, they GROW!

This is because they fail, pick themselves back up and go again taking what they have learned and applying it to the next time.

They also know that comfort is the casualty of fear and growth so they get comfortable with being uncomfortable.

So I encourage you to take a look at your perspective.

Do you have the mindset you want?

If you have a fixed mindset, where are you going to aspire to grow in your life so that you don’t stay stagnate?

If you have a growth mindset, what are you working on now?

Where are you headed?

If you are looking to start a business, let me know. My 90-Day Courage to Launch program may be a fit for you.

We do a ton of work around mindset so that you can be ready for growth!

As always, if you would like to talk more about this or any other topic, book a call with me.

The link to my calendar is here.

April 1, 2020April 1, 2020

Surviving a World of Uncertainty

The world is CRAZY right now! Many of you are thinking “How in the heck am I supposed to keep a positive mindset when I don’t even know if I am going to have food to put on the table right now?”

The key IS your mindset.

I am always saying thoughts become things.

Your THOUGHTS create feelings and your FEELINGS create your ACTION.

So think about the toilet paper situation-yes, the toilet paper. It’s what is happening right now and it’s a good metaphor to see how this all transpires.

When someone starts to think “what happens if the world shuts down and I run out of toilet paper?” That thought then creates a feeling of fear and lack. So, in response to that feeling, said person decides to take action and runs to the store to buy as much toilet paper as he or she can to ensure that he or she will not run out, thinking this will dissipate the fear.

Did the fear go away? No!

Because it isn’t about the toilet paper at all. It’s about how the person is thinking about what is going on.

How could this have been different?

By reframing the original thought.

Now, I want you to know that I am not looking at this situation through rose-colored glasses and not believing this is a real pandemic. Quite the contrary.

I am fully aware of the severity of the situation. I am being affected by what is going on around me directly.

I have elderly, not well parents that could be literally taken out if they caught this virus.

My Tai Chi center closed until further notice so that we can participate in the social distancing.

We have a friend that stayed with us a couple or weekends ago and was not aware that his mother, who lives with him, has not been feeling well the past few weeks. Her doc asked her to come in and there was a good chance she may have needed to be tested.

Which meant our friend would have had to be tested and in turn, if that test came back positive, we would have had to be tested.

Good news, Mom only had one of the symptoms and actually had a sinus infection causing her to feel yucky.

A couple of weeks ago, I was laid off from my job. Fortunately, I called back and a week later, was told that we were all going to start working from home because of the state mandated Stay at Home order.

Everything is still uncertain for me as to if I will have a job tomorrow.

Does any of these scenarios cause fear within me? A little, sure.

However, the difference with how I am CHOOSING to respond is how I look at the situation. My thoughts around what is going on may be quite different than yours. I am NOT living in a state of fear and allowing it to consume me.

Am I concerned about our medical system? Am I concerned about my future and how I am going to come out of all of this, especially since I just launched two program offerings RIGHT BEFORE this all went down?

Sure I am! But it is NOT dictating my life.

I am carrying on, business as usual, with even more passion, vigor, and drive. I know this is all temporary. We will come out of this.

And, I look at this as an opportunity. An opportunity to educate, create awareness, and hope that I can make a difference in someone else’s outlook, which is life-changing.

I am the beacon of light in a dark situation. I know this. This is my gift and what better time to burn the light even brighter?

I went live last Sunday in my private Facebook group, from my bed (because it was self-care day) and again Monday morning and talked about the state of fear we, as a society, are operating in and how we can survive the state of uncertainty. I also posted about gratitude and how gratitude is the antidote to fear.

I practice gratitude every. Single. Day. All. Day.

It is the number one way to stay resonating at my highest power and combat fear or any other feelings of uncertainty.

In addition to gratitude, here are 4 things that you can do to make this time a bit more bearable:

Move your body-exercise is the number one top thing you can do to mitigate depression and anxiety. It releases all of the feel-goods that we need in our bodies to maintain a healthy outlook, not to mention it makes us physically feel good.

Talk about your feelings-holding in is never good no matter the situation. My husband and I talk every night about the things that transpired during the day and discuss how we feel about it and what our next steps will be.

Be hyper-aware of what you are consuming from the media and eliminate that which does not serve you. The media is not necessarily your friend. Don’t take their updates as truth. Question everything. The news is here to instill the fear so that you stay glued to the TV which increases ratings. That’s all. Do your research. Stay educated but not through the news or what people post on social media.

Only focus on what you can control. You can’t control what is going on “out there”. You CAN control how you respond. You CAN control if you wash your hands or keep the social distance. You CAN control if you are bombarding your thoughts with fear-based information.

So, check-in and see how you are responding to what is going on around you. If you are stuck in a state of fear, choose to get out!

Start implementing gratitude and the 4 recommendations and start to thrive in this horrible situation.

As always, you can contact me anytime. I am here for you. If you would like to get a bit deeper with this topic and are considering hiring a coach, contact me! Here is the direct link to my calendar. I offer FREE 30-minute breakthrough calls to see where you and how to get you to where you want to be. Just click Here-http://bit.ly/TiffenysBreakthroughCall

March 4, 2020March 4, 2020

How to Survive Anxiety

There are so many people in my life that struggle every day with anxiety, including myself. I have worked with several clients on how they can manage their anxiety. It almost seems like an epidemic in this world we live in.

When I first learned about my own anxiety, I felt helpless. I felt broken. I felt out of control.

I was, what I thought at the time, in a good relationship. What I didn’t know, was that relationship was going to trigger so many things in my life to cause me to start spinning out of control.

The biggest contributor was his inability to hold down a job and our ever-growing debt.

I was a control freak and I could not MAKE him get a job. I could not MAKE him keep a job. I could not MAKE him stop spending our money as if we had it.

The more I tried to control this and MAKE him do things, the more OUT OF CONTROL I became, and the MORE I tried to control.

I was spiraling deeper and deeper into the “oh my God, how are we going to pay this…how are we going to pay that…” mindset.

I was exhausted. I was scared.

At the time, I had no idea what was causing my anxiety or how I could make it stop.

I also kept my anxiety a secret because of the “mental health stigma”, which caused me even MORE anxiety. My God, what if someone found out!

Now, this was many years ago. Before there was an open awareness of this affliction, so I turned to my doctor for help and she prescribed medication and told me to get a therapist.

I was really hesitant to take the medication. My mom was addicted to pills and I have extreme sensitivity to almost every medication, including Advil, so I was hesitant.

I had already done therapy so I knew how therapy worked. I didn’t need to look at my past anymore and I knew enough about what was going on to know that I needed help with right now so I could stop worrying about the FUTURE.

So I took the meds which helped enough to allow me to research my anxiety.

So, what is anxiety?

Anxiety is your body’s natural response to stress and a feeling of fear or apprehension about what’s to come. The what if’s of the FUTURE.

This can lead to physical things happening within our bodies. Rapid heart rate, fast and shallow breathing, sweating, feelings of nausea, and other things. And, one of the big ones…the fight or flight feeling.

Of course, anxiety can affect everyone differently so you may or may not experience some or all of these physical responses.

Anxiety can be normal in stressful situations such as public speaking or taking a test. But, anxiety can also manifest just from thoughts we have or situations we are in where we feel fear. Real, honest to goodness, fear.

And then, everything can spiral out of control and the anxiety takes over, causing you to literally become debilitated from the fear.

But rest assured, no matter how bad the anxiety gets, it won’t kill you. So out of anything you take away today, I really want you to know this. ANXIETY WILL NOT KILL YOU. Even though it can feel that way sometimes.

When someone suffers from anxiety, it’s not enough to change negative thoughts into positive thoughts. Actually, this is probably the LAST thing they need to hear because it is something that can be literally impossible to do depending on how severe the anxiety is. What needs to be addressed goes a bit deeper than just a positive thought.

It starts with awareness. One thing I can say for sure, is I now KNOW when my anxiety is coming on. People with anxiety tend to be hyper-aware of the feeling once they can identify it. Where there is a lack of awareness is what is CAUSING the anxiety. And THIS is where you can actually stop the anxiety in its tracks!

So, how do you get to the root cause?

Some things that you can do when you feel your anxiety kicking in:

Take some deep breathes

Sit with the anxiety. Remember, it stems from the FEELING of fear or apprehension about something in the FUTURE

Try to identify what that something is

Check-in with your thoughts.

I then recommend writing it down, acknowledge it. This way, it is somewhere that you can refer to and no longer swimming around in your head.

Understand that your mind is playing tricks on you, and in fact, could be lying to you so question it!

And bring yourself back to the present using affirmations, gratitude, and meditation.

Find someone to talk to. Someone you trust that can help bring you back to your present self.

Lastly, Remember, diet and exercise with adequate sleep are great ways to manage anxiety.

You don’t have to suffer!

If you are ready to dive deeper into this or any other subject you are working through, book a call with me here and let’s get you on your way!

February 19, 2020February 19, 2020

Shift Your Mindset and Let Go of Beliefs

Are you struggling with something in your life that is holding you back from moving forward? Do you want to change something about your life but just don’t know how?

Check your thoughts.

Are you stuck in a loop of negative self-talk and beliefs that no longer serve you? Do you have big dreams but “something,” tells you that you can’t ever achieve them because you aren’t worthy, you don’t have the experience, you don’t have the money…etc.?

How’s your mindset?

Mindset plays into everything we do or want to do in life. Here is why…Every ACTION is because of a FEELING and every FEELING is because of a THOUGHT you are thinking.

Let me repeat that. Every ACTION is because of a FEELING and every FEELING is because of a THOUGHT you are thinking.

It’s important to watch our thoughts because they:

Can send us down a rabbit hole
Can send us into the darkest realm of our mind
Can cause us anxiety
Can cause us to respond to things in a not so nice manner

What we put out to the universe, we get back because THOUGHTS BECOME THINGS! That’s right, manifestation right here. Negative attracts negative, positive attracts positive. Don’t believe me? Reflect on a “bad day”. It all starts when you miss your alarm and it all spirals from there. Chances are you, you are thinking “OMG! Can this day be over already? I just can’t win?” And more bad things keep happening. Now, reflect on a day when your mind was vibrating in a positive light and something goes wrong. You probably shrugged it off and said “It’s ok, I will get through it. It’s just something that happens” and you move on. This time, there is no bad stuff happening because you stopped it in its tracks. I originally discussed this specific example in a prior post Having A Bad Day?

So, what can you do to shift your mindset? First, it starts with awareness. Without awareness of what is, it is next to impossible to identify where the change needs to happen.

Finding awareness includes looking at your beliefs. A belief is an acceptance that a statement is true or that something exists. It can also be referred to as an agreement. Something that was presented to you and you agreed to it or accepted it.

Your subconscious is fueled by your beliefs. Your subconscious mind actually creates your reality. Remember, thoughts become things. This has been proven with Quantum Physics. If you have a negative belief about something, then that negative belief will manifest through your subconscious and become your reality.

So how do we go about impregnating our subconscious with the thoughts and images that you WANT because THAT is what will show up in the physical reality of what is called YOUR LIFE?

Your subconscious mind is READY to receive when your conscious mind is not active. So right before you wake up or right before you fall asleep, that’s when you want to upload or install into your subconscious mind. Our subconscious just records what we put in and then plays back out into our life. So anything you DON’T want that may have been recorded, say when you were a child, is just in there playing back on a loop and hasn’t been taken out and replaced with a new belief.

The next step in shifting your mindset is recognizing your achievements. List out ALL of your achievements, yes, even those little wins because no matter how little, they still brought you that feeling of WINNING!

Next comes gratitude. Having a daily gratitude practice is probably the most important contributor to changing your mindset. Gratitude does not have to just be about the big things in your life. Actually, you should recognize all of the little things throughout your day because it keeps you in heightened awareness and resonating at a higher level within the Universe, which helps fuel the Law of Attraction. (Are you seeing a theme here?)

Now it’s time to talk about affirmations and mantras. I am going to tell you a secret…these only work if you BELIEVE them. Just saying them with zero emotion or feeling attached to them and “going through the motions” is an absolute waste of time. You may as well not even bother. BUT…if you are seeking a FEELING and can tie an affirmation or mantra to it…THAT is gold and when the magic starts to happen and the beliefs that no longer serve you will be replaced.

Finally, changing your mindset will not happen overnight. It takes consistency and practice every single moment of the day. It takes work but the result is so worth it!

I challenge you to sit down and examine your thoughts and beliefs. Make a list of those that no longer serve you and start the process of letting them go. It takes courage to look within ourselves and make a decision to change. Just remember, if you want something, you have to work for it and this is no different. I believe in you.

This is just the tip of the iceberg. If you would like to dig deeper, click here to schedule a free 30-minute breakthrough call with me and let’s get started.

Not ready to take the plunge but want to be inspired, click here to join my free Facebook group Women Taking Action for Change.