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Happy New Year!

This year is full of potential. Every moment is full of nothing but potential and how you decide to live in that moment determines your experience of life. This year, my wish for you is that you reach your highest potential. Let go of anything holding you back from achieving this and thrive with peace, love and gratitude for every moment.

I’ve created an audio recording MP3 to help you to tap into this part of you that is pure abundance. Enjoy.

With love,

Brenda

PS. To receive this audio download, enter your details and an email will be sent to you with the download link. I will be recording a special podcast message for everyone later this week! Why not subscribe so you don’t miss anything? Click here to subscribe.

Everything has a life span and that depends on its purpose. A loaf of bread has the purpose of nourishment, but it’s not intended to nor expected to be eternally in your life. But we do expect some things to be. Once we emotional invest ourselves in a relationship of any description whether marriage, job, friendship or project.

This emotional attachment makes it difficult to understand that when a thing has served its purpose, it will go away. It may break or simply die off. Perhaps it will fall apart and the pieces and fragments remaining make it impossible to put things back together. You may struggle with this, trying to understand why things ended the way they did. You may even blame yourself. You may have regrets. You may be hurt and blame others and hold resentments about what happened.

Holding onto something that has gone and is over only continues to hurt you in the present moment. The energy you use both emotionally and mentally, only continues to refuel the pain from the past. Holding on to your past means you do not move forward in your life. Until you surrender your attachment to people, things, situations or events from your past you struggle to hold onto you fail to recognize the importance of their purpose being served. This is the same as trying to drive your car towards a place of happiness, peace and joy, while your head is bent back over your shoulder fixed on what’s behind you.

Until now, you may have been holding onto feelings, thoughts or someone not realizing their purpose has been served in your life. So for today, just let go and surrender to this moment and be open to what you find right now that brings you peace, happiness and joy. You will be open to see the end is only a new beginning if you allow it.

In this moment, I am devoted to releasing everything and everyone which do not serve a divine purpose in my life.

Love,

Thanksgiving always had a special significance for me growing up. It was a time that all my extended family from far and wide would gather at my grandparents’ house. It was only on Thanksgiving that we did this. I always remember watching football,  playing football with my cousins, tuning into the televised Macy’s Day Thanksgiving Parade and my great Aunt’s waldorf salad and “heavenly hash” – not as intoxicating as it might sound as it’s a blend of fruit with marshmallow fluff and coconut shavings.

I am thankful for having these memories and being able to continue to share this tradition with other people who normally wouldn’t experience this. Just wish I could get them out in the field to pass around the pig skin too!

Thanksgiving is so much more than family, friends, football and food, it’s really the spirit of being Thankful for everything that matters most. Gratefulness or gratitude is one of the most powerful mindsets we can cultivate in our daily lives. Being thankful is not just for special occasions!

It really is about an ‘attitude of gratitude’ – when we are thankful for all we have, we get more to be thankful for. This is not about magically attracting ‘stuff’ into your reality through cosmic forces, it is about being here now and feeling grateful for being alive, for everything you have, even the challenges – when we are in this state we are open to possibilities to grow and tap into opportunities we would have otherwise missed by looking at the lack or what is perceived to be missing in our lives.

A recent study (Toepfer, S. M., Cichy, K., Peters, P. Journal of Happiness Studies, published online April 2011)  suggests that there are strong psychological benefits to expressing thanks to people on a regular basis.

Researchers divided 219 adults into two groups. Each week over four weeks the participants were asked to report their levels of  gratitude, happiness, life satisfaction, and depressive symptoms. In the subsequent weeks half of the participants wrote letters of gratitude to someone they knew to express appreciation whilst the other half did not.

Over the course of the study results show that happiness and life satisfaction increased significantly whilst symptoms of depression decreased for the writing group and there was no significant change for the non-writing group.  The findings suggest that gratitude may just be a fixed quality, but the action of writing with gratitude generates overall positive feelings that increase happiness and life satisfaction and reduced the chances of developing depression.

So how grateful are you? Take this quiz to find out: http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/quizzes/take_quiz/6/

Need to become more grateful? Read this excellent advice from the Greater Good Science Center “10 Ways to Become More Grateful” http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/ten_ways_to_become_more_grateful1/

THANK YOU FOR READING. Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!

I was beside myself this morning when I woke up and noted that there were several comments left of my facebook pages from someone who I guess is Ms Canada 2011. She was calling me a spammer and was pretty aggressive and rude about it. Of course, I deserved it because I spammed her, plus as nothing more than a hypnotist, I am just a scam to begin with… It was all a bit of a rude awakening so to speak.

Natural Weight Loss WIN!

Being new to the whole facebook page thing, I’ve turned over this responsibility to helpers who know. I guess a comment was left on their community page about 21 Days to a Slimmer You program and Ms Canada, the guardian of comments on this page was not too pleased. She gathered momentum with other people joining in bashing me and even went out of her way to go to my professional clinic pages and left me condescending comments as well. I was impressed she had so much time and energy to bother!

I did contact her directly and apologized for the comment and reported her comments as spam to facebook. I suggested she do the same and  just tick the upper right hand corner of comments such as this as spam and let her get back to fulfill the duties of her title. I would after all feel horrible to know that guarding spam took her away from much more pressing responsibilities!

Which led me to look at the site she was promoting. It seems before her crowning she was a bit heavier and had a gastric surgical procedure to help her to shed those pounds that have given her the means to achieve her crown. She is now the spokesperson (and guardian of spam) for this company whose slogan is: “Obesity is not your fault.”

There are also other claims on the website such as: The only permanent treatment of severe or morbid obesity is bariatric surgery.” and ”In general, for weight loss, exercise is pretty useless.”

WOW. I’m gonna try to push through speechlessness here… OK. It’s safe to say I’m feel aghast at these claims and the slogan. ANY WEIGHT LOSS THAT DOESN’T PROMOTE PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY IS A FAIL IMO.

What kinda of age do we live in where people would be so blind to think that they are not responsible for their size, weight, lifestyle, eating habits, exercise routine or lack of it? Where companies would promote lack of personal responsibility and teach people that obesity is not their fault? That nothing they do will work? Where SURGERY would be the logical conclusion before changing eating habits and exercising?

To subject yourself to the RISK, the EXPENSE and the RESTRICTION that having one of these surgical procedures entails, is really beyond my comprehension. It preys on the vulnerable and hopeless stuck in a cycle of unhealthy thoughts, feelings and behaviors — and is UNETHICAL and IRRESPONSIBLE in my opinion.

Surely, it is much more rational to change your relationships with food, improve your self image and your thoughts and feelings towards yourself so you feel more empowered to make healthier choices like eating when hungry, stopping when satisfied and moving your body with moderate exercise? I do realize in some situations and people the surgical option is a viable option, but for the majority of us it is not.

Color me confused. But if you are interested in the latter option – please download my free Ebook – 21 Days to a Slimmer You! – and to clarify – this program doesn’t suggest you will lose everything you need to in just 21 Days, but what it does do is put you on the right path towards permanent and effortless weight loss.

http://www.21daystoaslimmeryou.com *

*NOT sponsored by Ms Canada

In order to gain more self belief, you can follow these 5 easy steps:

Step 1: Identify what you currently believe about yourself. Ask yourself and fill in the blank “I am ____”. From here you can begin to think about other areas of your personality. Look at the things you are having difficulty with, not what you think you should be. Be honest. Reveal your truth. How does lack of self belief express itself through you?

Step 2: Once you identify limiting beliefs you hold about yourself, you can then dismantle them. A belief is only a thought you’ve accepted 100% at an emotional level. It doesn’t have to be true. Ask yourself: “How do I know this is 100% true?” So, what would happen if you didn’t believe that? What are you afraid would happen to you if you let that limiting belief go? What does holding onto this limiting belief cost you? This may bring up some uncomfortable emotions. Let that be okay. Acknowledge the feeling and give yourself permission to feel it so you can release it.

Step 3: Reverse the belief by making it the opposite of what it is. For example: “I have no confidence” can be “I am confident and capable.” Make the opposite image bright, vivid like a movie in your imagination – see yourself doing what you want, the way you want, where you want and what that means about you. Then step inside this image so you can look through the eyes of you. Feel how good it feels, notice what you believe about yourself. Make it strong, vivid, compelling.

Step 4: Find someone you look up to — that you admire. That if you had what they had, you know you could believe in yourself. Write down their attributes: How do they hold themselves? How is their body language? How do they speak and interact with others? What do they believe about themselves? Now imagine this person doing what they do, how they do it and where they do it. Notice all the details. Step right inside so you can feel how they feel, notice what they believe about themselves. Make it strong, vivid, compelling.

Step 5: With your new statement for what you want to believe. Your new compelling imagery of yourself and the person you would like to model, bring these things together in you imagination. Play around with this, you can imagine your head at first instance on their body or their head on yours – have fun it’s your imagination! Merge these two images together and make a compelling, vivid movie of  this new you, feeling great, happy and really believing in yourself. Play this again and again and notice how the thoughts begin to become something you know is true about you.

If you’d like help with letting go of limiting beliefs and developing resourceful ones that really give you the experience of life you want, please contact Brenda Bentley on 01527 853 424 or 0794 880 1229.

The end is a dying of an old belief system and understanding of yourself as you understood it before… It may be difficult to understand but your fear and your resistance is a good thing… It’s an indication that change is coming. Pay attention and keep moving through this. In other words, let it be okay you are feeling uncomfortable.

Nobel prize winning scientist Ilya Prigogine outlines this natural process of change in complex systems. Humans are complex system. This is the principle of chaos and reorganization. This means as a biological system, you are always in a process of irreversible structural changes. What this means for you is that you go into temporary chaos in response to too much input, or your threshold being too low to deal with the stimulus affecting you and it falls apart and reorganizes or reforms at a higher level of functioning.

Consider this: you have a map of your reality — this map includes all the ideas, meanings, experiences, judgements, generalizations, emotions, understandings, learnings, knowledge, beliefs, attitudes and values. This map is our concept of ourselves in relationship with everything outside of ourselves in the universe.

When we experience dysfunctional feelings and behaviours, get stressed out to the point we are causing emotional and mental suffering to ourselves, we are in fact using coping mechanisms to resist our internal map of reality falling apart. We feel ourselves going into internal chaos and we fear that WE are falling apart. We defend to hold onto our current internal map failing to realize that a new and better map will take its place.

We believe that the  map is who we are, rather than just a handy conceptual tool we use to help us through life. We get so used to using our concept of reality when making decisions about what to do, how to feel, how to act, and so on, that we forget it’s just a tool and that who we really are is much more. In fact, it’s like having an actual map from the turn of the century and trying to figure out a way to go from here to Glasgow and getting stressed because the map doesn’t include information on the M6. It’s not US ourselves that is deficient, it’s our map. Our map isn’t who we are. Treating your map as though it is real is like going to a restaurant and trying to eat the menu.

How does this work for you in real life? Firstly you have to accept that chaos precedes change. Whenever you experience chaos or stress in your life, this means your map is unable to handle current stimulus you are experiencing. At which point, you can remind yourself that A) a new map would be pretty handy right now and would in fact solve the problem and B) chaos is a sign that I am getting ready to create a new map and if I get out of my own way its creation will happen faster and easier.

This is a simple process to make inevitable change happen efficiently and without suffering. By clinging to and resisting change you create suffering in your life. Change becomes a pain in the arse and you fear it. Also you suffer through it. People rarely take responsibility for the chaos or stress they feel in their lives. They project it onto others with blame “I’m stressed because of my kids/parents/partner/finances/health/whatever.” Blame is the greatest pastime for those who dislike responsibility!

Many people instantly self-medicate whenever they begin to feel stressed. They reach for a drink, a joint, a cigarette, food, a sexual partner, anything to mask and distract them from what they are feeling. They do not realize that the chaos they feel is a growth opportunity and that by not taking advantage of it they are condemning themselves to repeat the stress and chaos over and over.

Change is a natural process. Here are the steps you can follow to ‘let it be okay’:

Step 1. Notice and acknowledge that you are in chaos or stress.

Step 2. Realize it is coming from YOU. Stress is not because of something outside of you. Yes there is stimulus or a trigger but it is not the CAUSE.

Step 3. Remind yourself that this is a GOOD thing which means you are in a place of growth to a higher level of understanding.

Step 4. Give acceptance and thanks for this process. Let it be okay that this is happening.

Step 5. Notice how this is happening, if you have resistance, fear or worry, then go back to Step 1.

If you need help creating a new map, raising your threshold, learning these steps or anything, then please contact Brenda Bentley, Cognitive Hypnotherapist and Psychotherapist in Birmingham, Solihull, Stratford upon Avon on 01527 853 424 or 0794 880 1229.

I hear clients all the time telling me the reasons they struggle with their problem, be it a weight, gambling, alcohol, cigarettes or other addictions is that they ‘have no willpower’.

Willpower – what is it?

Willpower is a Myth

Let’s break it down. Will (force) Power (strength) so will power in essence is about forcing yourself to be strong to make choices that you feel you should make. For example, you’re on yet another diet. This diet says you shouldn’t eat biscuits. By sheer force of will you have to use mental energy to choose a banana (or something you could eat) over the biscuit. All the while you’re trying to avoid thinking about the biscuit, using up more mental energy. I’m getting exhausted and a bit peckish just thinking about this myself!!!

When we use mental energy to make choices, which we do all throughout the day, we are using the conscious part of our minds — our awareness, our cognition. This mental energy takes EFFORT, which is why after a short period of time, diets fail. We just cannot continue to exert this much effort, mental energy into any activity for long. Our conscious minds are moment to moment decision making facility such as ‘left or right at the junction’, ‘coffee or tea’, ‘biscuit or banana’… Once we made the decision we move on to the next thing engaging our senses with the environment – everything we see, hear, taste, touch and smell – and our thoughts in that moment.

Making an Effort is Exhausting!

Our consciousness is very limited in what it can be aware of in any given moment. Neuroscientists suggest that we can only pay attention to 7-10 bits of information at any one moment. Try it now and count how many things you are aware of… So when you fill up your awareness with having to choose between one thing and another thing, you are using up precious awareness and mental energy — and it’s exhausting!

So if you want to make better choices, you must create a new habitual pattern of behaviour and automatic response, so you still make the effort, but it’s effortless.

Effortless Effort is Where it’s At!

Remember when you learned how to drive a car? Or maybe ride a bike? Or swim? Or tie your shoes? Or play an instrument? It was a lot of effort to learn those things right? You probably thought ‘I’ll never get this’ but you persevered now you do those things without even having to think about it. It’s automatic. You don’t think about the process of driving do you? Or riding a bike? Or tying your shoes? It’s still an effort to do those things, but it’s EFFORTLESS as you are not expending precious mental energy to do it. That’s because it’s a learned behaviour. This is one of the things the unconscious does for you.

Creating New Learned Behaviours

How do you create these wonderful ‘willpower’ free ways of effortless effort I hear you cry?! You practice them! Over and over again until it becomes automatic. There’s a catch. In order to learn a new behaviour you must ensure this behaviour does not clash with another other intentions of other behaviours you have… Let me demonstrate: You want to lose weight, you’ve tried before and find yourself falling back on old patterns of behaviours. All behaviour has a purpose so even the limiting behaviour that you are doing has an intention. This intention is part of what the unconscious mind does for you. You experienced something, your unconscious mind applies and meaning to that experience forms a new behaviour to adapt yourself accordingly. You know you have a limiting unconscious behaviour pattern when you consciously try to change and find you can’t and this repeats over and over again. There’s not enough repetition in the world to put that new behaviour in place this is because of the unconscious mind and the way it applies learnings.

Your unconscious part of your mind is responsible for 90% of what we do. Healing, breathing, digestion, bloodflow, heart beating, blinking your eyes. Also learned behaviours such as driving are the responsibility of this part of our mind. Anytime we experience a significant emotional experience, our unconscious applies a meaning, makes a decision on our behalf (which is always about safety and protection) so we adapt ourselves in any future, similar situations or circumstances. It’s cause and effect – this happened which means that.

By giving the unconscious what it needs to learn instead, it can fulfill the intention of that behaviour without the limiting problem. You’re clear to use repetition to create new healthy habits which actually serve you!

It’s worth knowing that the unconscious part of your mind is completely accessible to you. It’s your inner knowing and friend and by learning self hypnosis – or working with a therapist which can help guide you – you can be clear to make those changes without dragging with you limiting behaviours rooted in your past.

Self Hypnosis for Positive Change

Please visit my shop here http://www.buildingbelief.com/selfhelp/audio-downloads/

One to One Treatment with a Therapist

If you’re interested in working one to one with myself to help overcome any unconscious learnings getting in your way then please contact me (numbers at the top!).

Eating with chopsticks or using a utensil in your non-dominant hand

Eat silently for at least five minutes and think about the energy it took to create your meal

Take small bites and chew well

Check to ensure you are really hungry before eating
Being mindful in your eating ritual can bring many benefits  and with several studies on mindful eating are underway across the country, the Harvard newsletter stated and as this national dialogue on healthier lifestyles continues, expect to hear more about mindful eating.

Can you think yourself slim? Dr David Hamilton speaks about how thoughts affect us – and how this can applies to weight management.

The training, which teaches patients to focus on “present-moment experience” and to have “non-judgmental awareness of body sensations and emotions”, was tested on 36 women for eight weeks.

The control, involving 39 women, consisted of a support group that had previously been found to produce similar expectation of benefit as other psychological interventions in IBS.

Following earlier studies showing cognitive behaviour therapy to be highly effective in reducing IBS symptoms, the researchers from the University of North Carolina in the US thought mindfulness training might be “uniquely suited” to treating the condition.

Writing in the American Journal of Gastroenterology, they said: “Recent investigations have found that mindfulness meditation induces changes in the activation of neural circuits implicated in interception, and emotion regulation, while improving attentional control.”

They said this might be particularly helpful, given that IBS patients show “heightened perception of pain from intestinal distension”, as well as selective attention on gastric sensations.

Despite both groups rating the treatment as equally credible and likely to help, the mindfulness group experienced a 26.4 per cent reduction in overall IBS severity compared with 6.2 per cent in the control group.

The difference was maintained at three-month follow up, with a 38.2 per cent reduction in the mindfulness group and 11.8 per cent in the control group.

The study adds to evidence showing mindfulness training to be beneficial in a range of chronic illnesses, the authors said, including type II diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, ADHD and low back pain.

Written by: Mary Anne Kenny is Deputy Editor at IMT and Editor of its Clinical section. Reposted from: http://www.imt.ie/clinical/2011/07/mindfulness-uniquely-suited-to-ibs.html

More on mindfulness:

About mindfulness: http://www.bemindful.co.uk/about_mindfulness

10 minute mindfulness meditation – online: http://www.beliefnet.com/Health/1999/12/A-Moment-Of-Calm.aspx