Where do you stand? You’re either backing yourself or you’re tripping yourself up, holding yourself back while others less good, less deserving, less talented pip you at the post.
If you’re truly onside – then you’re pretty rare, and you don’t need to read any further!

If you think there’s room for improvement in the self-worth, self-promotion and success department, join the club! You’re invited to my exclusive, one-off, limited numbers teleseminar next Monday evening at 8, London time. Call 0844 454 8525 and +44 20 3293 8526 if you’re outside the UK.

I’ll walk you through my 3 step-strategy to nudge you away from self-doubt and sabotage (yuck!)  towards glorious sunny success. It’ll give you a taster for the main meal – the Bounce Back! teleseminar, beginning June 7th. Numbers are limited so book now to secure a place.

Who do you think is truly onside – ‘Dave’ Cameron, Janet Street-Porter, Chris Evans, Karren Brady, Sir Alan Sugar, Marco Pierre White, Simon Cowell, Vivienne Westwood, Damien Hirst, Jamie Oliver? What do you think?

The answer – You.

Life is challenging. The best-laid plans can go wrong. There’s not a single one of us who doesn’t feel we could have/should have done some things differently/better.
What makes the difference between one person who picks themselves up and carries on undiminished and another who limps through life, forever damaged? It’s whether you forgive yourself.

This might sound melodramatic. It’s not. In working with people for twenty years, I can tell you that I’ve never met anyone who didn’t need to forgive themselves for something. And, the extent to which you blame, resent, don’t forgive yourself is the extent to which you hamper a full bounce-back from life’s inevitable challenges.

I deal with this in more depth in Indestructible Self-belief and in The 10-Minute Life Coach. I’ll be talking more about it in the Bounce Back! workshop on July 3rd. It’s the key to your happiness and success.

Here’s the questions to ask and begin a full recovery. 

Complete these statements with the first thing that comes to mind. Allow yourself to list five, ten, as many things as come to mind.

1. Something I blame myself for is:

2. Something I resent myself for is:

3. Something I can’t/won’t forgive/haven’t forgiven myself for is: (choose your wording)

Next week I’ll look at how to forgive and really begin your bounce back.

For now, here’s some affirmations to begin to work with – choose the wording that feels easiest to accept right now.

1. I am now ready to give up blaming myself for . . .

2. I am now ready to let go of resenting myself for . . .

3. I forgive myself/ I am now ready to forgive myself for . . . 

What do you think? Do you agree with me? I’d love to know.

‘If voting could change anything, they’d make it illegal.’ Emma Goldman

I’ll vote (Green, of course!) and I’ll join a good march – I did all the Stop the War ones – and put up the posters, but you have to come back to real, everyday life when the marching’s over. You have to remind yourself that the direction and outcomes of your life are down to you. You mustn’t wait for a change of council or government before you commit to your life, (unlike me in the eighties).  Do you agree or disagree?

Abdicating power, letting others have dominion over you, putting up with nonsense, waiting for AN Other to make things better – this is the same wavelength that leads you to give your power over to a council or government. 

Think about your own power base:

1. Is there a situation you currently tolerate but actually loathe?

2.  Is there someone you allow to intimidate or terrify you?

3.  How often do you say, ‘yes but, no but’? (I’m serious!), making endless excuses rather than endless solutions?

This is the real day-to-day nitty-gritty of personal power – allowing yourself to be insignificant, bullied and weak.

Stand up and fight your corner, I say!

I have put together our brand Bounce Back workshop to help you do exactly that.  I’ll announce details shortly.  Send us an email to bounceback@fionaharrold.com to register your interest and you’ll be the first to know.

More Power to You!

Our most popular online course, Indestructible Self-belief will give you the oomph you’ll need to stop tolerating the intolerable and demand more – from yourself and life. Goal Setting will get you focused on the bigger picture – and how to get there while Purpose, Passion & Destiny will get you building your most authentic life built on a foundation of values and meaning. It’s the only way to live!

The Coaching Hour

Our brand new, entirely-free-to-members Live Coaching Hour is a roaring success! This Thursday at 8, and every Thursday at 8 there’ll be a panel of my brilliant coaches waiting to take your questions. Simply post your challenges and conundrums any time and we’ll kick off at 8 on the dot. This is what Charlie said after last week’s Hour:

‘I have been inspired by last night’s Coaching Hour, and I want to thank you for giving me a supportive kick up the ass! I know that I am operating at 20% of my potential at the moment and that I need to open my mind. Thank you!’

Do spread the word – it’s entirely free for members. Post your question now.

Have a terrific week. Let me know what other ways we can help you embrace your personal power.

Onwards!

Fiona xx

DESTINY & PURPOSE IN ACTION

1.  Given my destiny and passion how can I be of service?

2.  What will this achieve:
      
         *for me?
         *for others?

3.  The best way to progress this is:

4.  The 3 actions to take immediately are:

5.  What support do I need to put in place?

6.  What might stop me or slow me down and what could I do to handle this?

7.  And what is the Really Big Picture here?

 PASSION – Getting it and keeping it!

1.  What drains my passion and enthusiasm?

2.  What belief or thought diminishes my personal power and effectiveness?

3.  What do I need to replace this with?

4.  What 3 things do I need to reduce or remove from my life, that in doing so, would lead to an increase in my passion?  What 3 things do I need to do or do more of, that in doings so, would lead to an increase in my passion?

5.  What 5 things would I like to attract into my life right now?

If you’d like to share how you get on with this exercise, please do so right here. I’m looking forward to reading about how this has helped you to focus on your passion, in getting it and keeping it into your everyday life!

xx

You need to have a clear sense of yourself to forge ahead in life. Your identity comes from knowing what type of person you are – deep down and underneath it all and your sense of worth and fulfilment comes from expressing yourself in the world. This five minute – one minute, Mission Statement exercise, will help you pinpoint the Real You. It’s taken from chapter one of The 7 Rules of Success.

Mission Statement

Answer these questions with five words or a short statement for each:

1. What do you want most out of life?
eg. to be happy and feel fulfilled

2. What do you want to see happen in the world?
eg. peace and happiness

3. What makes YOU special?
eg. my energy, drive and enthusiasm

4.  What things can you do/are you capable of doing, right now?
eg. writing, public speaking, coaching

Now write this statement as follows:

 
I will………………………………………(choose one answer from 4),
using my…………………………………………………(answer from 3), to
accomplish………………………………………….(answer from 2), and
in so doing achieve…………………………………..(answer from 1).

My goal is for every member of my site to have their own clear Mission Statement. And, when you’ve got yours, pass this on so that others can ensure they’re on the right path, all of us clearly and enthusiastically expressing our own unique purpose.

If you’d like to share your Mission Statement here, please do, or any light bulb moments that may also arise! 

xx

There’s few of us who haven’t felt this way once in a while. What’s the solution?

The solution probably entails breaking out of your routine to do something really quite different and really quite challenging. One chap who is doing just that is Sunil Mistry.

Sunil came to me little over a year ago, keen to do something exciting and challenging with his life. Having helped grow and sell his family business, he was ready to do something different.

He had heard of my brother Brian’s initiative in the Gambia to help people raise themselves out of poverty, and with a little encouragement from me, Sunil took himself off to meet Brian and his partner Pamela in the Gambia.

Seeing first-hand how they had transformed two villages and the lives of many people, Sunil vowed TO DO SOMETHING REALLY GREAT and help another village get clean water.

Flash forward twelve months and Sunil has launched Cycle for Gambia.

Beginning on the 1st November, Sunil is leading a cycle ride around Cyprus – 750 km in 7 days! Every penny raised goes to People in Need Gambia to help raise another village out of poverty and illness. Awesome!

Let’s support him. Until midnight on November 7th, I am donating all of the proceeds from the sales of our online courses to People in Need Gambia.

Four Ways YOU can make a difference today

1. Buy a course and help build a borehole!
   If you’ve never bought one of our motivating courses before this is the day to take a risk.
2. Send a donation to Sunil at Cycle for Gambia
   Every little counts! Sunil’s target is 60,000 Euros and he’s over half-way there.
3. Go straight to People in Need Gambia and donate directly
   The work they do is fantastic, and every penny of your donation goes direct to the Gambia
4. Spread the word!
   If you’ve never forwarded our Newsletter to a friend – this is the day to do it.

Over to Sunil…

I caught up with Sunil just before he set off. Here’s what he had to say:

“The hardest thing of taking on this challenge was making the decision to do it! Once the decision was made, I have just got on and done what I think is right.

Cycle For Gambia is one of the most exciting things that has happened in my life, and I think that this is just the beginning! I honestly feel that I could do anything I wanted now.

When I came to see Fiona I felt I was in an awful rut and couldn’t imagine or get excited about the next stage of  my life. I realise now that sometimes you just have to take a chance and jump.

There are no certainties, no guarantees, but I know that you have to get out there and give things a try to make life more interesting – and fun!“

The message is clear: Get Out There and Get Involved!

Find something to put your heart into and give it your all. You’ll be rewarded with a life more interesting than the average person’s, you’ll find yourself a far more dynamic, fascinating and resourceful person and life will never feel remotely humdrum.

And right now, the world needs you to dig deep and pull out your contribution. I’d love to hear of your Big Plan. Share it here on my blog.

Benjamin Disraeli said this over one hundred and fifty years ago. A new survey confirms he was right!

Children who are ambitious go on to enjoy greater career success than those with low aspirations, according to a study which followed the lives of thousands of Britons over three decades.

The study showed that, once differences of class and ability were accounted for, children did better if they set themselves lofty goals.

The finding that high aspirations has a direct link to future career success has emerged from a national survey tracking children born in 1958.

Researchers at the Institute of Education used an extraordinary set of essays in which almost 14,000 youngsters aged 11 predicted their own future, and compared them with their real occupations aged 42.

Ambition

Their analysis revealed that, even if a child is poor or less able, having high career ambitions at around the time they leave primary school means they are significantly more likely to have a professional job, though not necessarily the one they predicted.

The children were asked to write an imaginary essay in which they imagined they were 25 years old, covering the life they would be leading, interests, home life and work. Jane Elliott, leading the analysis of the essays, said:

“There is definitely an observable link between what people are aspiring to do when they are 11 years old and what they end up doing when they are older… The children seemed to have taken their task very seriously… they imagined their life at 25: it is not just pure fantasy .”

I find this wonderfully fascinating. It confirms what you probably already know – that dreams/lofty goals/grand ambitions can and do come true. The biggest obstacle is yourself.

At 11 you’re less likely to be applying “rational” or “realistic” thinking to your vision. Now, at your time of life, you may well be more, possibly much more restricted in your thinking. That’s for you to think about!

Your Ideal Life

All of our work here at FHC is geared towards supporting you to create your ideal life. Nothing less than that, because nothing less will do.

We all use a practical and psychological approach to get you to expand your thinking and take the steps necessary to take you to a better place in your life.

Both the Success Groups and the new Purpose, Passion & Destiny workshops follow this same approach.

Zarene is a recent Success Group “graduate” who then worked with me personally. Zarene’s challenge was to hold the lofty goals out in front, have faith, and take action. It’s a winning formula!

She’s now on track to follow her dream of being one of the few people in the UK to work in the new field of Equine Assisted Psychotherapy.

Develop your long term personal vision and goals. Make your goals truly exciting and inspiring.

Point Two:

Once you have your long term vision and goals, think about what you need to do in 2007 to make progress against them. Remember: the 2007 objectives need to be exciting and totally connected to your long term plan.

Point Three:

For each long term goal and 2007 objective really think about what would happen if you didn’t achieve it be honest and ask yourself does it matter to you if it doesn’t happen. When the answer is absolutely yes, then you have a compelling goal.

Point Four

Write down your long term goals and 2007 objectives I have mine typed up, laminated, and I carry them wherever I go. They are that important to me. They must be the same to you so please don’t write them on a scrappy piece of paper.

Point Five

Share this one piece of paper with one person. I sat down with my wife and showed her it’s important as not only did I get some honest feedback, I’ve made myself accountable to someone else to deliver the objectives.

I don’t want to finish 2007 and say to her I’ve failed. I also read them every night I’m obsessed about them because I’m obsessed about having a great life. Aren’t you?

Good Luck and as Fiona always says, take action now!

Five Steps To Achieve Your Goalsthis goes without saying but so many people still don’t do this. Your goal has to be permanent not something you change every few weeks.

2. Step Two

Create passion and obsession you have to really want your goal you have to get obsessed by it. Think about all the great achievers in the world they were obsessed about achieving something and that something was a clear, well defined goal.

If you can’t get energised and passionate then you don’t really care about your goal.

3. Step Three

Be resilient. For me this is a key attribute which if you can instil within you, it will lead you to greatness. How do you do this? Well the passion and obsession I’ve described above is the first block.

100% focus on your goal when things are tough is the second block and finally I would encourage you to read chapter 10 of Be Your Own Life Coach by Fiona titled When the going gets tough the tough get tougher.

4. Step Four

Take action yes, you must taken action and do it continuously. Action moves you forward. Many people I coach do a lot of thinking but never seem to get out there and do anything.

If you want success you need to put yourself out there and do something!

5. Step Five

Finally have faith in yourself. I really believe that if you are truly doing the above four points and you back yourself 100% you can achieve anything you want to.

I believe this because about 7 years ago someone told me my goal was too ambitious and that I couldn’t do it so quickly I have to say this really knocked me back until I focused on my goal and I put some faith in me.

So whatever your journey is, get focussed, get passionate, believe in yourself and have a go!

Yes, I’ve been promoted at Cadburys and I’m off with my family to Bangkok for a few years as Finance Director for South East Asia.

Apart from wanting to share the news with all of you, the reason I’m telling you about this is that my experience has taught me a lot about goals, having faith, being resilient and taking action to achieve something.

Focus

I’ve thought about the last 10 years and realised that all my actions and all of my thinking has been focused around this goal. Both consciously and subconsciously I have been totally focused on my target to the point that I have been obsessed (in a normal way!) about it. For example all of my passwords at work have been related to my new role I’ve been living and breathing it.

Along the way I’ve had some choices to make and some tough decisions to take and if I hadn’t been so focused on what I wanted I could have made the wrong choice.

There have also been some setbacks and other people have been promoted above me but I’ve believed that as long I stay focussed and take action I’ll get there and there may be some obstacles in the way but they are just minor irritations.

Victory

And then England won the Ashes! What’s this got to do with my goal? Well, as you know I believe we can learn a lot from sport and the England Ashes victory for me displayed a number of key themes consistent with my journey to my goal:

• 100% focus on a goal
• Resilience and a never say die attitude
• Passion and energy
• Obsession

So, whatever you are working on your career, building a business or making change in your life think about these five points and build them into your life from personal experience it can make a difference!