Mental Moment-Appreciating the Small Stuff
In my last blog I talked about appreciating successes, accomplishments and the positives in each and every situation. Since I wrote that blog it’s stayed with me, mainly because I’ve gotten some good feedback about it.
It’s necessarily the big things
This morning on my personal Facebook page I wrote a status update:
Great clients-check
Learning Spanish-check
Great friends-for sure
Getting better at rowing- check
Wife, dog & 3 cats (no picket fence)-yep
Take the time to see all the great things in your life. When you are able to come from that perspective it’s priceless!
I think this came up because I was thinking about my blog from yesterday but as I sat and thought more about I wanted to clarify: that when I talk about finding and appreciating successes, accomplishments and the positives in each and every situation it’s not necessarily the big things in life that are important. Don’t get me wrong, these things are great and I am very fortunate to have these things but can be more important is finding successes, accomplishments and the positives in our daily life.
What does this look like
In having trained numerous fitness staff and personal trainers throughout the years I would talk to them about affirming clients. Here is how part of the conversation would go. Affirmations show appreciation for your client and their strengths. For example, client: I did put a workout in my schedule yesterday even though I wasn’t able to follow through with it. Personal trainer: I know it’s been challenging for you to schedule your workouts. It’s great that you were able to do that yesterday. As a personal trainer you must listen carefully to know what to affirm. If you were going to affirm your client, it is important to genuinely affirm something the client personally values. For example, affirming your client’s workout clothes, sneakers, or heart rate monitor might be appropriate but generally, people will feel more validated by positive comments about their thoughts, plans or skills; not necessarily whether they were able to follow through.This does not have to come from an external source but you can affirm yourself.
Where do I begin
You begin with conscious aware. In every situation even if it didn’t turn out exactly the way you wanted it to find a nugget or two of good and positive things. If you are comfortable putting them on paper write them down. You will remember the things you need to change or do better but you probably won’t remember the good and positive things. Keep a running list of things that are good and positive. Revisit that list at the end of the day. This will help your brain start to see situations from a more positive perspective and give you increase your overall confidence.
Happy Saturday!
Dr. Michelle
Photo credit: facebook.com
