MAKING USE OF YOUR RESOURCES (YOU HAVE MORE THAN YOU THINK)



In this posting I will discuss how we make best use of all the resources that are available to us to achieve the outcomes that we want.

SELF-BELIEF IS A STARTING POINT

When finding all the resources you need for any outcome the obvious place might be to start with google, Facebook, LinkedIn and all the other social media methods of getting people, capital, equipment and ideas. But actually, the starting point is YOU.

If you do not believe you should or can then that belief will stop you before the use of any of these tools of the mental tools I will explore later.

Two influential theories that have shaped our knowledge of self-confidence are William James self-esteem formula, and Banduras Self-Efficacy Theory, Thanks to William James, we learned that self-confidence is an important predictor of success. His formula for self-esteem (a related, but slightly different construct than self-confidence) proposes that it is built on the foundations of two elements:

How we feel and what we believe about ourselves (our self-confidence/self-belief)
How well we actually perform

Banduras theory states that self-efficacy is built on ones beliefs in the likelihood of future success those who believe they have the ability to influence the events of their lives have high self-efficacy, while those who feel they are not in control and have little to no impact on what will happen to them in the future have low self-efficacy

While self-confidence is also concerned with beliefs about the future, there is a definite link to the pastafter all, our self-confidence is built on our past experiences. On the flipside, when your self-confidence is low, you generally get the opposite of the benefits listed above: you struggle in your relationships and at work, you dont feel very happy, you dont cope well with stress, and you probably lack energy and motivation.

You may also suffer from self-limiting beliefs these are beliefs that limit or constrain us in some way, and keep us from thinking, saying, or doing the things we want to do and the things that can help us grow.

These self-limiting beliefs generally fall into one of these categories:

1) I do/dont limiting beliefs regarding how we define ourselves.
2) I cant limiting beliefs in terms of our self-image and self-efficacy.
3) I should/shouldnt limiting beliefs that keep us stuck in self-judgment and even self-shame.

4) I am/am not limiting beliefs that centre on what we are or are not (e.g., I am intelligent vs. I am stupid).
5) Others are/will limiting beliefs that focus on other people and what we assume they are thinking.

REVIEW AND REVISE YOUR EXPERIENCES IN A DIFFERENT CONTEXT

Our senses give us information about ourselves and the world. The better we listen, see, feel, (and taste and smell) the better chance we have of understanding whats going on.

Submodalities are some of the qualities of our senses. They add more information and richness. For example, some qualities of sight are light or dark, focused or unfocused, colour ormonochrome.

Our memories are built from sensory experience. Memories arent fixed, they change as we gain new experiences. By exploring the qualities of the sensory language of our memories, and changing them, we can change the memories themselves in ways that are useful to us.
The same can be said about imagination both how we imagine things within our own minds, and how we paint a picture, through language, as we communicate our ideas to others.

For example, if the internal image you see representing a big, overwhelming problem is actually a very large image (size being a common visual submodality) you can shrink the image in your mind. When you see the same problem in a much smaller size, it may reduce the sense of feeling overwhelmed.

Being aware of sensory language can help us change how we think and behave. A musician, an artist, a triathlete and a businessman are likely to describe memories in different ways. They have different sensory experiences and this is reflected in their language.

A first step is understanding some of the qualities, or submodalities, of our senses.

Visual
Association (associated or dissociated)
Size (large or small)
Motion (still or moving, slideshow or movie)
Colour (colour or black and white)
Brightness (bright or dark)
Distance (near or far)
Focus (focused or unfocused)
Clarity (clear or fuzzy)
Location (top, bottom, left, or right)
Depth (2D or 3D)
Frame (framed or panoramic)
Number of images

Auditory
Location (mono, stereo, surround)
Tonality (flat or engaging)
Tempo (slow or fast)
Pitch (high or low)
Pace (fast or slow)
Intensity (intense or soft)
Clarity (clear or fuzzy)
Volume (loud or soft)
Rhythm (regular or irregular)


Kinesthetic
Location (Where do you feel it?)
Vibration (Is it still or pulsing?)
Movement (Is it still or moving? If its moving trace the movement with your hands.)
Pressure (Is there any pressure? If so, is it light or intense?)
Shape (What shape is it?)
Size (How big is it?)
Temperature (Does it have a temperature? Is it warm or cool, or something else?)
Direction (Does it have a direction? If so describe it.)
Steady or intermittent (Is it steady or intermittent?)
Taste / Smell (Sweet, Sour, Aroma, Fragrance,Salt, Sweet, Essence, Pungence.)

Key points

When we access a memory and identify its submodalities in closer detail, we tend to bring back the details of that memory and amplify its associated feelings. When we change the submodalities of the memory we also change the memory and its associated feelings.

By making our images brighter, more colourful and closer, we amplify the power of the memory over us. By making them less bright, less colourful and further away, we weaken its power.

By associating into the image, we connect with how we felt. Disassociating and looking at ourselves in the memory makes us become more analytical and more distant from how we felt.

We can learn to spin our feelings sometimes, emotions present themselves as physical sensations that seem to move and loop somewhere in the body. By first recognizing this feeling, and then amplifying the movement through visualization, we give ourselves the opportunity to be bathed and massaged by good feeling

The more we can influence our own feelings, the more we can influence the feelings of those around us.

Suggested Senses and Submodalities Exercise

Write down 5 activities that you enjoy. Explore the submodalities of your most recent experience of each. Then explore the submodalities of your most intense experience of each. In what way are the submodalities different?

ANCHORING

In NLP, anchoring refers to the process of associating an internal response with some external or internal trigger so that the response may be quickly, and sometimes covertly, re-accessed.

This is the science behind superstition, touching wood, lucky pants, of other habits, rituals or behaviours that make us feel confident.

Anchoring is a process that on the surface is similar to the conditioning technique used by Pavlov to create a link between the hearing of a bell and salivation in dogs. By associating the sound of a bell with the act of giving food to his dogs, Pavlov found he could eventually just ring the bell and the dogs would start salivating, even though no food was given. In the behaviorists stimulus-response conditioning formula, however, the stimulus is always an environmental cue and the response is always a specific behavioural action. The association is considered reflexive and not a matter of choice.

In NLP this type of associative conditioning has been expanded to include links between other aspects of experience than purely environment cues and behavioral responses.

A remembered picture may become an anchor for a particular internal feeling, for instance.

A voice tone may become an anchor for a state of excitement or confidence. A person may consciously choose to establish and re-trigger these associations for himself. Rather than being a mindless knee-jerk reflex, an anchor becomes a tool for self empowerment. Anchoring can be a very useful tool for helping to establish and reactivate the mental processes associated with creativity, learning, concentration and other important resources.

The combined use of submodalities (seeing things differently) and anchoring (being able to recall feelings of confidence by trigger) are extremely useful tools.

AFFIRMATIONS

Another element of confidence building to create personal resourcefulness is affirmations

The opportunity to use affirmations and create a life you desire is a big one, and takes a lot of energy to accomplish. When we see that affirmations really do work, we want to start affirming everything under the sun, in hopes that it will manifest itself into what we want. While it sounds good to repeat affirmations in every area to quicken the result of our desire, spreading ourselves too thin can often take away from our creative ability.

Much like accomplishing goals in real-time life, if something is to be accomplished, a focus must be placed on it and that focus must not be permitted to stray. If too much focus is placed in other areas, goals are not met. The same goes for affirmations. Affirmations create results in the future, and if they are scattered youll see scattered bits and pieces of your desires coming through, rather than a complete manifestation.

Fulfilling the Affirmation

When you begin to consciously utilize the power of I AM statements, your life will transform. This isnt something that works for some and wont work for you it works when you WORK IT! What I mean is that affirmations dont actually bring you what you want. Instead, affirmations bring you the opportunity to take action to build your desire from the ground up. And do the opportunities always come? You can bet on it.
Here are some extra tips to help you along on your manifesting journey:

Start Small

Affirmations take some time to get used to if youre not used to them. Start by affirming the small things that may already be in your life, but you dont always realize. Affirmations like I find and enjoy the simple pleasures life is offering right now, work great in helping you see new perspectives. To put it another way, its going to be a bit easier to focus on and manifest a good parking space than to have a Porsche in your driveway tomorrow morning.

Repeat, repeat, repeat

Its said that a habit takes twenty-one days to catch on. When you create affirmations, repeat them daily. Youll be amazed at how quickly things come together when youre constantly repeating the affirmation of your desired experience.

Believe!

Since youre repeating affirmations to create the future, it may sometimes feel like youre not telling yourself the truth or that youre not worthy to deserve what you desire. What is the truth of the future? Its what you make it to be, starting right now. Who is worthy? Who decides to feel worthy, starting right now.

USEFUL REFERENCES

12 Tips For Building Self-Confidence and Self-Belief (PDF Worksheets)
https://positivepsychology.com/self-confidence-self-belief/

Submodalities
https://www.nlpworld.co.uk/nlp-glossary/s/submodalities/

NLP Submodalities Heres a Revolutionary Way to Use Them in Coaching
https://inlpcenter.org/nlp-submodalities/

NLP Technique | Senses and Submodalities
https://www.nlp-techniques.org/what-is-nlp/senses-submodalities/

Anchoring
https://www.crowe-associates.co.uk/coaching-tools/nlp-anchoring-technique/

Affirmations
https://inlpcenter.org/why-affirmations-dont-come-true/

Key NLP Techniques Section Index
https://www.nlp-techniques.org/what-is-nlp/nlp-techniques-list/

1: NLP Techniques 2: Affirmations 3: Amplify feelings 4: Bad memories (Dissolving) 5: Bad memories (Exploding) 6: Beliefs and belief change 7: Perceptual positions 8: Fast phobia cure 9: Hypnosis and meditation 10: Luck 11: Metaprogrammes, Profiles and Preferences 12: Modelling 13. Progressive dissociation 14: Self Compassion 15: Senses and Sub-modalities (This page) 16. Six step re-framing 17: Storytelling 18: Strategies 19. Swish 20: Time and timeline 21. Visual Squash 22: Values and value rules 23: NLP Techniques Summary

ABOUT THE BLOG

This is a series of coaching blogs that eventually will become a book. By blogging each item I hope to share each element in easy to read bite size chunks, maybe invite some people to subscribe to see the next posting and hopefully encourage some comments, feedback and suggestions which will improve the content for the blog and eventually the book. All comments and feedback are therefore welcome.