Stepping Into Your Potential

An article in the Venus Business Women’s Magazine Nov 2018

WORDS BY MONICA SHEPHERD

When life hands you lemons, the old adage recommends that you make lemonade. It’s hard to question this wisdom. But, then, we’ve just been able to turn it into something pretty good. Why did we automatically label the lemon as bad?

When things go wrong (like receiving lemons, apparently), a positive mindset is pro ered as the ideal. We’re told to look on the brightside or to seek that silver lining. But according to Mandy Beverley, director of e Remarkable Group, many of us are approaching it wrong.

“People are living with an old paradigm about positive thinking. We’re locked into the programming out there that it’s got to be all positive, all the time. That’s impossible on so many levels, both from a scientific
and human level. It’s great to have a positive mindset, but when you unrealistically think that’s the way it is, then you end up beating yourself up when you’re feeling negative”.

While it can feel counterintuitive to think there could possibly be any ‘good’ coming from the challenges we are faced with, Mandy’s approach is to not just help people look at the benefits of negative situations, but to embrace them as necessary and strategically leverage them for guidance.

We’re locked into the programming that it’s got to be all positive, all the time – that’s impossible on so many levels. “ There is nothing but love in the universe, but sometimes it can come in the form of challenging events, situations, people and stress – the ‘stuff ’ that makes us grow. There’s so much wisdom in these situations. Its purpose is to show us where we’re off track – why would you want to try and block or get rid of that feedback?”

Stepping stones to success

As a business owner, this means finding opportunity in your setbacks or areas of perceived weakness. It’s what’s referred to as a growth or success mindset, where you see failures, setbacks or challenges as just another step on the path to success.

Mandy explains that a success mindset isn’t centred in positivity. “It’s about being resilient,resourceful, flexible and able to see both sides – negative and positive. Then you’ll never be stuck. All you’ll see is opportunity and transformation, not problems”, she says.

People with a growth mindset are constantly trying to improve their lives. They have enthusiasm to learn, and an acknowledgement that getting what they want requires some sort of effort. They are not defined by their challenges – but how they approach them.

“We’re regularly questioning our self- worth. We’re thinking about our fears, second guessing our abilities, or letting past experiences stand in the way of our future.”

The plus side of the negative

Mandy is a facilitator of human behaviour and potential. “I help people – women in particular – get out of their own way, so they can access their potential. I look at why they’re doing the things that hold them back, and bring the subconscious programming for them to the surface”.

So, why is it so hard for us to step aside to make way for our own success? According to Mandy, most of us are either living with perceptions of shame or guilt of the past, or fear of the future.

We’re overwhelmed, distracted or unfocused. We’re regularly questioning our self-worth which in influences our net worth. We’re spending more time thinking about our fears, second guessing our abilities, or letting past experiences stand in the way of our future. In other words, we’re living with the opposite of a growth mindset.

“I’m seeing smart, talented women who are used to achieving. But, when they really want to move forward, situations, challenging events or people that they thought they had already dealt with keeps coming up. It needs to be dealt with before you can move forward”. Mandy says. “We need to stop burying the niggly things and listen. In order to step up you have to have next level thinking.

Your ability to handle bigger problems is when you see growth, but if you’re still stuck on the same problems, they’re going to show up again and again”.

Transforming our thinking

As humans we’re driven to seek out pleasure (positive experiences) and avoid pain (negative experiences). We’re trying to go through life being 100 percent positive, but, explains Mandy, once we know how we can shift our mindset, we’re able to see both positive and negative equally. it is transformative.

There is science to this approach. Mandy explains that as true as gravity keeps our feet on the ground, a negative doesn’t appear without a positive. Once you understand this, the way you view situations – and the world around you – will profoundly shift, and teach you to rise above any circumstance.

Negatives as springboards in your life

Here’s how it works: when you apply a positive to a negative situation, it has a balancing effect that essentially ‘dissolves’ the perceived negative charge around the event. In other words, you dissolve the stress, fear, anxiety or overwhelm that you have long associated with a particular event or behaviour.

Think of a time when you’ve been grateful for a challenge, a heartbreak or a failure. What greatness did
you go on to achieve because of it? Most of us, at least once in our life, have said: “ Thank goodness that relationship/job/opportunity didn’t work out because otherwise I wouldn’t have…”. Those realisations exist in every challenge – but there is power in acknowledging them instantly, rather than months, years or even decades later.

Mandy uses a method that is scientific in nature and will activate your intuition. Guided by the principles of the Demartini Method® her approach is to find the event or challenge that is causing the emotions and chaos in your life, and balance this in your mind. This will change your perception of the event and therefore your reality.

“Often, we’re clouded by emotion; it takes up a lot of space in our mind. If we can dissolve that emotion and balance out our perceptions then it clears your head. When that happens, there’s more space for intuition, for accessing our internal wisdom, and for stepping into our potential”, Mandy says.

An inspired workforce

When you’re stepping up into your potential, then you’re activating more inspirational thinking in your mind. Your fears and emotion are cleared, leaving more space for creative thought. The impact of this in a professional environment has the potential to be profound. Imagine inspired company leadership that infiltrates through an organisation. Imagine a business where people love what they do, and where they are internally motivated to be of service. Where the value they receive back is not just reflected in the salary they earn, but in the pride and purpose they have in their work.

When you’re stepping up into your potential, then you’re activating more inspirational thinking in your mind. Your fears and emotion are cleared, leaving more space for creative thought.

“As a business owner, wouldn’t you want that for your business? Wouldn’t you want that for your employees? When they feel inspired they’re less emotional, more on purpose and have greater access to their creative energy”, says Mandy.

Applying your mindset to value-driven goals

Like anyone, you probably find some tasks in your business come easy, while others you have to really work yourself up for. If you find yourself procrastinating or getting frustrated, that’s when you know your goals are misaligned from your values.

Connecting goals or action steps to your values gives you the motivation you need to make them happen. “If you know what your highest values are, and you set goals according to these, then you’re going to increase the probability of your goals happening, because you’ll be willing to do what it takes when you go after them. If you set goals that align with your highest values, you’re not going to give up at the first hurdle”, Mandy says.

So where does a growth mindset lead you? To outside of your comfort zone. Our comfort zone only allows for momentum up to a point, and safely staying there restricts us from growing. We stick with what we know, resist or fear challenge or change, and stop ourselves from reaching the potential we want personally,
and for our business. By instead embracing a success mindset, we allow that comfort zone to expand.

Mandy’s view is that everything we want is just outside our comfort zone, but sometimes it’s not about taking great big leaps to get there. It’s about taking consistent steps outside your norm. “By growing your comfort zone, and getting used to that process, it will have a direct impact on your ability to have more and do more in your life. It will mean that you look for opportunity rather than say no when it is staring you in the face”, says Mandy.

When you take ownership and accountability for your actions, your choices and your life, you tend to move ahead. With a success mindset, you are taking responsibility for the outcome of the life that you want.

Mandy poses this final thought: “Imagine, on the day you die, meeting the ‘you’ you could have been, that you know is inside you, and realising you could have lived life this way all along”.

Could a fixed mindset holding you back from being that ‘you’ you want to be? Then in Mandy’s words, “It’s time to stop dimming your own light”.

For full article go here:

https://remarkablemindset.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/17827/2019/12/Venus-Magazine-November2018-web-1.pdf

info@remarkablegroup.co.nz