In this 54-minute video, I want to discuss moving to decision-making mindsets that might help you step forward and address what needs to be changed in your life.
So many people think they need to overcome anxiety before they can make changes in their lives, and I think this is a very big trap.
If you feel anxious about being stuck, you may as well feel anxious doing something about it! Anxiety is just anxiety, and what’s important are the attitudes you adopt to break those old fearful patterns (and see life differently).
In this video, I also share how I motivated myself to create this course and what I learned from making it.
Information about this video
I’ve called this video ‘Coming up for Air‘.
And I am asking the question. How might we create the time and space to recharge our bodies, reflect on our needs, assess (and access) our resources, and contemplate what we truly desire from this short and precious life we’ve been gifted?
This will be the last of my long-format videos for a while, though I will be making short videos, animations, and written posts as I take a (well-earned) break to recharge after fifty months of continuous creativity, which has exhausted me; therefore, I’d be foolish not to recharge my six-month emotional energy battery!
I’m going to enjoy the Summer, catch up on all the work that needs doing around my home and garden and deeply contemplate what phase two of this course might look like, as I still have so much knowledge I wish to share with you.
Even though my videos outline hundreds of tools and techniques, one of the hardest questions for a person to answer is, ‘What do I want to do with my life?‘ Or, ‘How might I make it happen?‘
So, I thought it might be interesting to share with you thoughts and ideas about how I went about creating this course and fought my inner demons, thoughts, beliefs and fears, which tried to sabotage me from taking action.
Over the last twenty-five years, I’ve read hundreds of books, watched countless videos, and almost obsessively listened to a handful of teachers whose messages inspired me as they seemed to be living their lives in line with their teachings.
I really like that, because anybody can give advice, most people have an opinion, but did that come from what they were taught, or from a real-world experience of that subject?
So, I enjoy learning from teachers who share their emotional struggles as well as their life successes and connections with nature or divinity.
Therefore, I am naturally drawn to people who are doers, creators, facilitators, story-tellers and (more playful people) who can laugh at themselves and not care too much what others think of them.
They seemed to have discovered that calmness, purpose, happiness, and desire were attitudes that could be developed, and they tried to take responsibility for themselves and their circumstances to the best of their capabilities.
They seemed to perceive the World slightly differently from the average person.
So, in my mid-thirties I began to wonder if I could adopt some of their perspectives to see how it might affect my life and my happiness.
For example; (in an ideal world) I’d like my doctors to be inspiring, healthy, relaxed, and setting an example of how I might live a healthy
life.
In my unique, individual (and certainly weird) John Glanvill, idealist inner reality, if I phoned to make a doctor’s appointment and the receptionist said, “Hi John, sorry the doctor is off for two days. He was feeling a bit stressed, so he decided to go fishing. – He’ll be back on Tuesday and can see you on Wednesday. Is that OK?”
At one level, I think I’d smile and think there’s an intelligent person I might learn from.
Surely, it’s not optimal to trust your health (or well-being) to someone who is stressed, overworked, or fatigued – be they a physician, nurse, lawyer, chef, waiter, policeman, air traffic controller or yourself!
If I need to see a doctor immediately and the UK’s National Health Service can’t accommodate me for a week or two, I simply buy a private consultation for a hundred pounds or so.
That way, I get an immediate response, and if an action is required, it’s fast-tracked back into the National Health System, so I’ve sensibly saved myself two weeks and lots of stress.
Now, even though I can’t afford to do this, I do it anyway – because I made the conscious decision to prioritise my attitude towards my health and well-being above my attitude towards financial debt.
This changed my inner iStory from ‘The NHS are responsible for my health’ to ‘I am responsible for my health, and the NHS is one of many options.’
Can you see that taking responsibility for your life starts with evaluating the old stories that run (by default) in your brain, which may be out-of- date or sub-optimal?
Let me give you an example: Last year, Jen needed a very intrusive medical procedure that would have taken around ten months of painful (and stressful) waiting in the NHS queuing system.
Now, I’m not trying to discredit the NHS; the people there (mostly) do a brilliant job; it’s just that the whole process is not done in a very common-sense manner when viewed from a wellness perspective.
However, from the perspective of investing in healthcare-related fields like medical teaching, regulation, pharmaceuticals, logistics, IT systems, PPE, and facilities management, it makes a lot of financial sense.
So, when I’m handling a big decision like this, I try to detach from my horsey’s emotions and stories of what might be right, wrong or fair (as best I can) – then, I explore my options, then refer to my decision making hierarchy to form a strategy.
Because Jen is higher up in my needs hierarchy of decision–making than being in debt, we went private and put that £7000 operation on my credit card. The surgery was then carried out in a first-class manner and within two weeks!
But, here’s my point: thirty years ago, that sort of strategy wouldn’t have even entered my head because I was so brainwashed just to follow the NHS process.
Whereas, these days, I’d worry less about owing my credit card company money (and even paying extortionate interest rates) than the death of my wife or subjecting us both to the horrific metabolic distress of ten months of stressful waiting.
Fourteen days versus three hundred days – that’s seven thousand two hundred hours of fear, worry, stress, anger, and frustration, distressing and exhausting our biological health systems and depleting our natural immunity! So, even if it takes me two years to pay that off, it’s worth every single penny – because Jen’s well-being is at the top of my needs and decision-making hierarchy, as she is priceless to me!
Of course, there needs to be balance, too – which is why I am striving to build a new revenue stream by creating this course (in addition to my day job as a therapist).
Although I am not naturally driven by money, I should not use that as an excuse to not actively try to earn more money for our convenience and quality of life.
The more financially savvy people know all this, but the average brainwashed person of Slavelandia tends not to think in these ways; certainly, my parents and school never taught me how to think in financially practical ways!
I truly believe that if people find ways to better understand themselves – and think about who they might wish to become – what they desire to do – and who they’d like to do it with, their decision-making will become far easier.
By asking myself, will this decision (I’m about to make) keep me on my desired compass-setting for who I wish to become and what I wish to do – or will it pull me away and delay me?
Will this action keep me trapped in anxiety and doubt, or will it take my life forward in new ways?
I also think that sometimes people can’t see that not making a decision (or procrastinating) is actually making a decision – to not make a decision! And, perhaps, it’s better to flip a coin if you are unsure, but at least do something to address a negative life situation; otherwise, your life will (likely) remain the same – and that continued exhaustion fuels anxiety and depression.
One of my inner mantras is, “Even though the world is forgetting what common sense is – I must not!“
So, following that line of reasoning, I’d like to share with you what’s going on in my brain in the hope that it’ll provide you with some concepts, techniques, and perspectives that might help you find more calmness within your inner reality—regardless of what’s happening in your external reality.
But, of course, what you may need to modify within your inner reality may be very different from mine because we are all wonderfully unique individuals.
So, let me share with you (as best I can) my thought processes about why I created this course, where I am right now, and what might happen next.
And, of course, how can I know what will happen next? Because anything may happen – as long as I try.
Hopefully, you’ll catch some tips that might work for you based on how I try to optimise (and balance) the relationship between the (linear and tangible) matter-based needs of my animal body and the (non-linear, intangible) energy-based desires of my Soul.
And concepts that might release you from limited left-brain logical thinking and open up the power of some right-brain imagination, creativity and connection.
So, about twelve years ago, I woke up to the realisation that I wasn’t an average human being.
And I don’t mean that in an egoic “How great am I?” kind of way, but in a more subtle manner – I seem to think, feel, intuit, and see life a little differently from others.
(And I think anybody who is naturally attracted to my work is not an average human being, either!)
It’s like I’m wired up differently from the average person, I think it might be similar to others who might have been labelled with ‘conditions’ such as ADHD, Autism, Bi-Polar, Super-intelligence or Savantism.
Personally, I don’t think these should be seen as diseases or malfunctions but rather as differing varieties of brain configurations, which (I think) are necessary for humanity to thrive and flourish.
It allows mankind to always evolve by seeing every situation from many different perspectives, so the more variations the better!