Bryony’s 15th – those are boys on the Sofa!

I had two good reasons to celebrate last weekend: one, it was my daughter’s 15th birthday Friday and I welcomed assorted emo teenagers into our home Friday night for a barbecue/guitar hero party!  (The other one I’ll talk about in another post.) They’re all quite harmless really but they look worse than they are!  The motley assortment of long hair over the eye and black eye kohl faces are a sight to behold.  They know me.  They kinda would include me if I made them! But just like a small but significant herd of sheep, all they need now and again is a nudge in the right direction from a loud but benign mother sheepdog!  So me and my friend sloped off into the warm and sultry evening (just outside the back door) with our bottles of cider and discussed life the universe and everything…until they all spilled out into the street to say goodbye to each other leaving just one victim, erm, I mean, friend to stay with us for a sleepover.  So while I went to bed around 12.30am, they then decided it would be a good idea to watch a video! Youth eh?  Can you guess which one is mine?

Oneness of self and environment

However, one of the greatest developments for my daughter these last few months is her newfound ability to not worry what other people are thinking of her.  She has gained an inner confidence and surety about herself which means most of the time she’s much more happy.  Teenage years are challenging at the best of times, so I was so pleased to hear her describe her realisation which has given her such peace of mind.  Some of her development has mirrored a change in me which accords with the buddhist concept of oneness of self and environment which I continually try and educate my clients about. That is, our children are a product of ourselves and if we want our children to grow and change, we need to work on ourselves first.

My growth has been launching this online business earlier this year which was a huge challenge.  Knowing that I’m delivering value to those that choose to subscribe was of huge importance to me.  While I wanted to gain a steady income from working this way, my promise to my students and supervisees is that they get the best of me and my work and that they can use the benefit in all ways in their lives.  Making no severence between who I am at home and who I am in my therapy practice, what I learn about me, directly translates to how I treat my clients.  If I have blocks in my consciousness, I won’t be able to see my clients issues clearly: that is, I can only take my clients as far as I have come myself.  So clearing out another block to the growth of my business was a painful but essential part of my growth earlier this year.

Only some of the people some of the time….

I realised that I couldn’t please all of the people all of the time. Nor could I please all of the people some of the time.  I’ve had to settle for pleasing some of the people some of the time, and even in my chosen elite group in Soul membership, all of the people ‘only’ most of the time.  So I’ve had to grow to realise that if I’m going to reach all the people who want to join me, there’ll be a large majority who I put myself in front of, to whom my way of working may not appeal right now or may never appeal.  These realisations have created a shift in me….a shift that you’ll probably be experiencing if you’re on my email list and are following my work even if you’ve not consciously realised it.  That shift is a philosophical shrug at the inevitable knock backs, and a strong faith that the direction I’m going in is right for my business, my Students and my CPDers.

Pushing outside of my comfort zone

Curious how I have a very comfortable, easy approach with my clients and their personal development which was directly born of my having to face challenges in the past that were thrust upon me.  And that’s because these experiences illuminated by my buddhist practice and my therapy training, taught me how to understand the human condition and to take things in my stride.  However, this time, I’m deliberately placing myself in the way of challenges; inviting judgement, inviting comment from others, inviting evaluation from others, pushing outside of my comfort zone and continually learning I’m more than I thought I was.

This is all part of my buddhist practice – my personal development – my journey to creating as much value as I can in my life for me and all those whose lives I touch.  It’s a journey I’m incredibly proud to be making.  I want to share the benefits of that journey with you.  Consider coming on my one day intensive on 15th July where I’ll share some insights that could profoundly change the way you see your therapy practice.  You may even find that you want to join my growing movement of Open Mind Therapists by subscribing to one of my membership levels, two of which – Mind and Heart, you can access from anywhere in the world.