Mindworks Coaching Montreal

Something is wrong.

Something is very wrong in the world we live in today.

When I was young, I was depressed… depressed my entire youth. I went to a therapist in university hoping it could help. I sat for an hour and talked… He listened. He asked the odd question. And when 50 minutes was up he said, “Well, we’ll have to stop for today.”

I was STUNNED. Are you kidding me? I thought. I just told you all that for nothing? Talking about it was not a solution. I looked him in the eye and asked, “Aren’t you going to give me something… a strategy… something to help…?

He gave me a book. The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem by Nathaniel Brandon, a world leader on self-esteem. I read every last word. In that whole book there was not one thing I could do to feel better or think differently. The entire book was theory. I was no better off.

Most psychology is all theory, no practice.

I cannot tell you how many people have come to me with the same story about psychology. “I went to see a psychologist. He just wanted me to talk about my past and it didn’t help.” I hear it again and again. I cannot tell you how many people went for therapy and told me, “I understand why I have a problem… but I still have it.”

Sometimes is a case of thousands and thousands of dollars to paid to talk about a problem they still have.

An entire field of people who believe that the way to help people now is to talk about things that happened 20 years ago. Or to talk about things now as if having a shoulder to lean on will free us of our most consuming problems.

I don’t know about you but I don’t know anyone who went for therapy, talked about their past for an hour a week and then suddenly said, “I’m cured.” Instead we live in a society ridden with problems. The number of cases of anxiety is unbelievable. How many people have to stop working every day? How many people are incapacitated by depression, burnout… and how many people decide suicide is the only way out?

I talk about this more here:

Psychology does not work. If it did, we would live in a much better world.

The question becomes: Why do people still use an approach that doesn’t work. Something is very wrong.

Why? Because they believe it is the way. It’s what the books said. It’s what they learned at school… and if you get conditioned to believe something through 4 years of university, it’s not so easy to give up.

But if you had a business that wasn’t working and you brought someone in who said, “Let’s talk about the company’s past. After hours and hours of talking you’ll understand and suddenly the business will be transformed,” you’d call the people in the white coats. It’s insanity that we let something so ridiculous remain a standard approach to helping people.

Why? Because we have real problems today in a real world today. IT DOESN’T MATTER WHERE THEY CAME FROM. What matters is how we get rid of them and how we can live the experience we want.

People accept the establishment. They think that since there is an order of psychologists and since they have a piece of paper and they sat through lots of school and wrote lots of papers they must know how to help people. But my mechanic can get better results with people.

Quebec medicare pays for treatment with one psychoanalyst in Montreal. Psychoanalysis is some two hundred years old, there is ABSOLUTELY ZERO scientific evidence of any effectiveness whatsoever… and Quebec medicare will pay for it. That really makes me wonder – do the people running the show even care if we have problems? Do they even want us to be able to get help?

I went to the CLSC once after a breakup long ago. I wanted help. I needed help. I poured my heard and soul out to the woman there. I was hurt, broken, I couldn’t function. For a whole hour she wanted to play “pin the name on the emotion.” Whatever I said, she would respond with, “Oh, there is a lot of anger there…” “Oh, there is sadness there, isn’t there.” As if this was supposed to help. I left there feeling no better off that when I came in.

We live in a world that teaches us to look for the solution to every problem in a pill. If you are depressed you need a pill. Don’t even think about solving the REAL problem, just buy a pill and be done with it. If you have anxiety, just get a prescription. Don’t find out what’s really going on that is creating anxiety. Learning disability? Take a pill, and make sure we don’t help teachers learn how to teach better. Give the kids the pill and let’s still use a 19th century school system.

We brush problems under the rug while we nurture the cause. We look for the quick fix instead of solving the real problem.

Who wants us to believe religiously in medication? Pharmaceutical companies. Who else? They love this mentality we have bought into because it makes them BILLIONS. Every day researchers scrambled away to create the next pill. They are looking for a pill to treat compulsive gamblers and addicts and everything else because everything is a biological problem. That is what they tell us, and when we believe it, they cash in.

When new methods that promise to be able to cure problems come along, the establishment says, “Oh it must be hocus pocus if it can actually cure something.” If your doctor said that about a medical treatment you would find another doctor.

What is missing from the field of psychology is an absolute dedication to finding what works and to stopping doing something if it isn’t working.

Something is wrong and we have been led to believe a lie. I believe it is a lie that we cannot cure our most common problems. I meet people all the time who were able to crush their own anxiety, beat their own depression and do incredible things.

Almost everyone feels that inkling inside that we are capable of so much more… But we have bought into the conditioning of society… A conditioning that is slowly dying with the cultural shift.

One day a number of years ago I got lucky. I met a woman who was called a “Meta-Coach” and told me about something called “coaching.” She said it was about the how in psychology instead of the why. It was doing instead of talking… and so I decided to try it.

The day after our session I felt amazing. I felt free. I felt empowered. What the $%#@? Could this really be true? It was the first time something had worked… I could not believe it. I had struggled for years to find this… And I knew then that I would dedicate my life to this. Then I found countless other methods that worked as well… and that no one knew about!

Did you know that electric shock therapy is still used in placed in North America? Think about that one for a while. It blows my mind.

What is going on in our society?

Most people still suffer because most people have not found what works. They have not looked for what works and they have not looked for what works for them. They have blindly accepted what they were told by someone who didn’t really care or didn’t really know.

Shopenhauer said that “All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.” This is precisely what will occur in psychology until the current generation is replaced by a younger generation of people who believe in the human spirit, the human will, and the human mind.

Some therapists and psychologists are brave enough to defy the establishment. They look for what works, they do what works for each client, and if what they are doing is not working, they change. They have evolved with the times, learned from what they did and what others have discovered, and I commend them for having the strength to truly fulfill their calling.

But society still believes a lie. What are you going to do about it?

I woke up this morning and with my morning coffee, set out to check out the news online. I was shocked by what I found.

Just a few days ago an acquaintance told me about Randy Pausch. A university professor whose last lecture made him world famous, Randy is witty and whimsical and frankly his last lecture is inspiring. In it he speaks of zero gravity and captain Kirk, among other things, helps listeners reconnect with their childhood dreams, and learn how to make them reality.

This talk got him coverage in the Wall Street Journal, which made him an internet sensation. And with good reason. In just the first few minutes of hearing his lecture, I wanted to hear more. Despite being diagnosed with a short time to live due to pancreatic cancer, Randy spoke with energy, enthusiasm and levity. His attitude with regard to his fatal condition is surprising – in the talk he gleefully asks the audience to excuse him if he is not depressed and morose about his plight and apologizes if that disappoints anyone. Randy is proof that losing your health doesn’t have to mean losing your happiness.

When it comes to achieving your dreams, the topic of Pausch’s last lecture, Randy had some good advice. We all come up against brick walls and according to Randy, those walls aren’t there to keep us out, but rather to stop “the other people.” They are there so we can prove how badly we want things. I was glad to find out that all those walls will be stopping the others because I will be scaling them.

Randy’s unique wisdom is evident in his talk, his book, and even on the Wikiquote page, a page dedicated to his most ingenious remarks.

I found out today that on July 25, Randy succumbed to his condition. When I heard him speak with such lightheartedness, he seemed invincible. Indeed, I think he was in spirit.

The name Randy Pausch will live on and so will his legacy. His empowered response to a debilitating condition and his time spent awakening others to their potential will continue to captivate people around the world and his inspiration will continue to spread as more and more people check out his last lecture on YouTube and buy his book, The Last Lecture.

Here’s to Randy.

Why is it that so many people believe that change is not possible? Everyday I speak to people who feel stuck, powerless and unable to make the changes they want. They tell me all the reasons why they cannot change and no matter what I say, they answer it with another reason why things can’t be changed….

Until I help them shift their thinking. Just the other day I was having the “I can’t change” conversation with someone. Heres’s what I said: “Pause your thinking, and step back and take a look at what you’re doing. You are looking for all the reasons why you cannot change. What would happen if you looked for all the reasons why you can?”

His thinking did a 180 degree turn and he responded, “It could be a challenge!” All of a sudden the change became possible for him.

The idea that change is difficult and it must be slow and painful is so prevalent, but it’s simply not true. In reality we change all the time… (more on that in my article, All You Are is Change)

A belief is essentially a command to the nervous system. If you believe you cann’t, you won’t even try. When you believe you can, you act in accordance with that belief and work to make what you want happen. A belief becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

When I help people shift to thinking that change is possible, their whole paradigm is transformed. The obstacles they face take on a whole new meaning and possibilities open up. And suddenly they find themselves able to make all kinds of changes in their lives and acting on what they want.

Throughout history, humans have achieved incredible things… and when you think of the things you want to change, do they not pale in comparison to all the unbelievable feats and exploits that individuals have accomplished?

When you see things as they are change becomes easy… because all you are is change.

I spent the weekend at the Ultimate Self-Actualization workshop with L. Michael Hall, renowned speaker, psychologist, specialist in self-actualization psychology, author of over 35 books and creator of Neuro-Semantics (just one of the systems I use through Mindworks Coaching).

Hall picked up where Maslowe left off and has created a system of practical tools and patterns that can be used to self-actualize. His work leaves theory in the past and reveals the “how” of self-actualization. And indeed, it was quite the weekend.

Hall sent us into a personal crucible of transformation; our own inner space where we took old “meanings” and transformed them. One of the themes of Halls works is that the meanings we give things determine our experience. Meaning does not exist out there in the world; things have no inherent meaning. Everything we experience is processed through our mental filters and we give it an interpretation based on our experiences, our values, and the perceptual lenses we wear. When we access higher parts of ourselves, we can give things new and empowering meanings. Hall revealed this to us by asking the question, “What does that mean to you?” The quality of our life is the quality of your meanings. And what is an emotion? An emotion is the feeling of a meaning; any emotion can be backtracked to an interpretation. When we take ownership of our interpretations, things take on a new sense and life changes.

I could see the changes in others as the weekend went on. By Sunday night, people seemed more at peace with themselves, more accepting, more appreciative of themselves and more empowered.

Hall will be back in Montreal in May of 2009 giving two workshops: one on accessing personal genius and the other on reprogramming the mind and body for optimal health.

I have been thinking a lot lately about a tendency we all have. It’s so common, perhaps because it’s just what happens naturally, but the solution is simple if we just do a bit of quality control on our thinking.

All of us have things in life we have been trying is accomplish, resolve or overcome and no matter what we’ve done, we can’t seem to make it happen. Self-help books, seminars, various techniques- the works… and still, no luck!

And how about the secret? Align mentally and emotionally with what you want and it will show up on your doorstep. But it’s not so easy, and the reason is because a two hour movie cannot reveal all the secrets of life.

I have been reading “The Key,” the most recent book by Joe Vitale (from The Secret). Joe starts of by answering the question on the mind of anyone who has read or seen The Secret: If I do what they say in the book/movie, why am I still stuck?

The book focuses on the issue of clearing: if there are things you want to accomplish or resolve, you need to clear out whatever stops you, be it beliefs, fears, inner blocks etc. I use this principle in my own approach; the first thing I do with clients is clear out the garbage from the past.

I stumbled upon something super in “The Key.” It’s called the option method (created by Mandy Evans) and it’s great for letting go of limiting beliefs and negative emotions.

According to the Option Method, behind our negative emotions lies a belief. Find the belief and you will find beliefs that don’t make much sense… and then you can let go.

All you do is ask yourself the following questions to get clear:

1. What are you unhappy about? (or upset or angry or guilty…)
2. Why are you unhappy about that? (Our reasons are beliefs)
3. What are you concerned would happen if you were not unhappy about that?
4. Do you believe that?
5. Why do you believe that?
6. What are you concerned would happen if you did not believe that?

When I did this, I found that at question 4, I did not believe it at all. I let go immediately and I didn’t need to go any further.

To your happiness!

I spent an enlightening weekend at the annual conference of the Canadian Association of NLP. John Overdurf gave quite the pre-conference workshop. One of his main themes was that of focus.

The idea of focus is very popular in personal development literature. Where you direct your attention determines largely how you will feel. If your focus is on all your troubles (the “bad stuff”) you will probably not feel so great. If you focus on good things, solutions to problems and things to be grateful for you will feel good. We all have “good” and “bad” things in life, but our focus is crucial in determining our emotional state. So, what are you paying most of your attention to?

John added a new twist to this. He explained that when we have a problem, we often make it our focus – it becomes the foreground of our experience and everything else is in the background. But if you think of that problem in comparison to everything else in the background in that context, everything that is not the foreground, the problems seems quite small.

Test this out. Take a problem you have and notice what you are focusing on. Do it now while I wait. Ready? Now, consider everything else in that context that you were not focusing on.

And let’s take this one step further. Consider EVERYTHING else hat you were not focusing on; everything in existence that is the background; the weather, what you had for lunch, the sky, the planets, your goals, your friends and family, squirrels… EVERYTHING!

Any problem you have is tiny compared to the totality of existence. By recognizing this you can balance things out instead of making a mountain out of a mole hill.

John created a simple technique based on this which I used to assist a client this evening. He had had an unpleasant discussion with a family member and couldn’t get the conversation out of his head. In about 90 seconds he was feeling completely different and a moment later was telling me about the great night he had last night out with friends as if nothing bad had happened.

So, out of all of existence, what will you focus on?

Finally, word is getting out! www.mindworkscoaching.net

On April 5 an article (a long article!) on NLP, appeared in the Montreal Gazette. April 11 begins the annual conference of the Canadian Association of NLP and to celebrate the occasion, the Gazette interviewed some international names and some local practitioners.

The columnist of “The Saboteur Within,” Stephanie Whittaker, summed it up well by heading the article: “The use of neuro linguistic programming is rising as people try to live happier lives.” But as the article revealed, people are doing more than trying.

Besides providing some of the ideas behind NLP from the mouths of NLP professionals themselves, the article detailed the cure of one woman’s elevator phobia and created quite the buzz. The all too common fear of public speaking was explored as John Overdurf, an NLP trainer from the US, talked about the unconscious aspects of any fear. Needless to say, my phone has been ringing all day and I will be ridding some people of fear of public speaking next week. It’s about time the public was told!

Even Timeline Therapy (now known as Time Empowerment Techniques) was given it’s moment in the spotlight and recognized for its power to create rapid change, in this case, with a client prone to bouts of road rage.

Thank you the Gazette!

In recent blog entries, Roger Ellerton, a Canadian NLP afficionado has been interviewing some of the speakers at this year’s annual conference of the Canadian Association of NLP. The nlpforeveryone blog has interviews with Paula Engels, a local master practitioner of NLP and Shelle Rose Charvet, an internationally renowned NLP trainer. There are also interviews with Ariel Garten, Patricia O’Reilly, Julie Fillion, all speakers at this year’s conference.

See you all at the CANLP annual conference this weekend.

Human potential never ceases to amaze me. Last week I worked with a young woman who has been suffering from PTSD for over six years after a traumatic event (we’ll skip the details). She has not been able to function, can’t work and is afraid to leave the house. She has felt hopelessly depressed for all these years. In one session we neutralized the traumatic memories and she says she’s been feeling great. In a second session we worked on her anxiety and fears. After that she says she is feeling even better and is going out of the house. Check out what she said here: (http://www.mindworkscoaching.net/testimonials.html)

I worked with another young woman with a stuttering problem. In one session we reduced her stuttering by half.

Sure, I have learned some pretty incredible change technologies, but these changes aren’t just because of me. They are the result of the readiness, willingness and commitment of my clients. I couldn’t do this without them. Attitude is everything. I just wonder, what else is possible, and what else is in store !

But the problem is that most people do not know that things like this are possible. Many have lived traumas in their past that continue to haunt them. They go for years with anxiety, depression, fears, stuttering and a long list of other common problems, unknowing that solutions are all around.

What are we going to do?

Byrne is a competent actor, but this show hasn’t created much of a therapist. Perhaps that is the point?