What can I help you with?

Welcome, and thanks for looking me up.

I’m interested in helping you to meet your potential. To help you unblock your path to what you want to become. To help you to identify how you want to live your life, and to help you move towards that goal. To help you to progress your career aims. To support you in your sporting adventures, or to help you to get and keep the exercise habit. You’re getting the idea, I hope.

But this is less about ‘fixing’ you. My approach is more about identifying your strengths and what is important to you. What makes you tick. What you value most, and what gets in the way of you living life according to those values. From there, we can start to work on the thoughts and feeling that keep us stuck in places we don’t want to be, and make us avoid the very experiences that might help to free us to do the things that satisfy us the most.

If you want to go ahead with working with me after an initial assessment meeting, a series of appointments can be arranged. In the first instance, up to six sessions of coaching can be planned to suit your needs – we can discuss your needs when we first meet and review as we go along. Usually meetings start off with weekly appointments for 30-45 minutes. If face to face meeting doesn’t really work for you – or if you’re not based in Wellington or even NZ, we can talk about how to make it work. That might be through phone calls, internet messaging, or via Skype for example.

For those of you who want more details about the nuts and bolts of how I work, I take a pragmatic approach to coaching and I try to tailor my approach to fit your needs at this point in your life when you think that coaching might be useful. Over the years I have learned from various helpful therapeutic approaches, which I integrate within a systemic framework. I am well-practiced in narrative therapy, solution-focused therapy, cognitive-behavioral therapy , and acceptance and commitment therapy approaches.

As a Clinical Psychologist (I have a current practicing certificate from the NZ Psychologists Board), I have professional qualifications enabling me to apply principles of psychology to behavioural, physical, and emotional problems. I am able to help by using this knowledge to understand a person’s current dilemmas, taking into account their past experience and future plans and hopes. I’m also a Health Psychologist and undertaking further training to become a Personal Trainer – all that helps too.

You’re welcome to leave me a message here – and I can message you back as soon as I can.

Can running can help you live longer?

I’ll give you the fact that if you haven’t run for a while (or at all), running isn’t going to make you feel like you’re going to live longer. When I started, it felt like rapid expiration was far more likely.

I started running about 3 years ago now. When I did, I could barely run for more than 60 seconds without having to stop to draw breath, and my shins felt like hell the next day. I was out of cardiovascular shape, and I was running very heavy, landing hard in all he wrong places. I did the couch-to-5km plan over a period of 12 weeks, and I haven’t stopped since. Looking back, I think managing to run 7km continuously was my breakthrough point. That would take me around 45 minutes then, which is an interesting physiological point in terms of how the different energy systems in your body are engaged.

Though I’m not in a training cycle for any particular event at the moment, I need a short to medium term goal to motivate me when I am running. I need to sign up to events, because I like the challenge, the social side of running and the thrill of the day of the race. I say race, but I am not really racing others – more the target I have set myself. Though it is fun to try and joust with people along the way.

Anyway, I digress. Back to the point. Recent research points to data indicating that regular running can lead to life expectancy gains of 6 years for men and 5 years for women. The study is only reported from a conference, so the data isn’t fully available yet. Although we know that exercise is good for us, some caution is needed in interpreting the report. Yet, the potentially promising finding is that you don’t have to be an elite or marathon runner in order to reap the benefits. Running one to two and a half hours a week at a slow-to-average pace is enough to deliver the optimal benefits to longevity. That could be as little as 2 x 30 minute runs, that is slow runs, a week.

What is the right pace? Hard to say, but I’d aim for a pace where your breathing is faster, you feel warmer, but you can still hold a conversation. At this pace, your heart and lungs are being stimulated and this will help you in getting fitter. Try talking to yourself (quietly!) as you run every now and again to check your pace. You should be able to get through a sentence comfortably. If you can only manage 3-4 words without having to take a breath, you’re probably going faster than you need to.

I know running isn’t for everyone, so you might prefer to cycle or swim, or something else. But regular aerobic activity is the key. And it seems like you don’t have to be anything like a professional triathlete to add years to your life if you exercise regularly.

Have you declined the offer of coaching? Here’s why

Often, executives are offered coaching to help in the transition to a more senior position. However, in a recent study following 41 executives through the coaching process, almost half the participants said no to the opportunity to receive coaching (Ellam-Dyson & Palmer, 2011). 

Why do we avoid doing things that might be good for us? And I’m not just talking about whether we decide to undergo coaching or not.

Previous research into avoidance behaviors has been linked to ideas such as low self-worth  or acceptance, perfectionism, and low frustration tolerance.

Let’s look at self-worth and acceptance first. We all want to believe that we are worthy and valuable, so we might tend to seek out experiences that we know we are good at, rather than exposing ourselves to experiences that remind us that we are not Masters of the Universe. We could try and do things that stretch and develop us, but we may not be so competent at in the first stages – thus possible threatening our sense of self worth. It’s OK not to be great at something, but often people find the feeling of failure so threatening to their self-worth, they would rather not try in the first place.

Perfectionist beliefs such as ‘I must never make a mistake, and if I do I am a failure‘, can result in worrying about making mistakes and what others think of us, and fear of failure.

Finally, low frustration beliefs such as ‘Life must always be easy otherwise it is intolerable‘, can predict how people cope when faced with challenging situations out of their comfort zone.

Rigid beliefs like these can lead to procrastination, avoidance, and limited life experiences as people seek to preserve of protect their sense of self-worth. People can end up living quite narrow lives as they stick to what they know is OK for them.

In the Ellam-Dyson & Palmer research, it seems as though the biggest difference between the coaching and no-thanks-to-coaching groups was a significantly lower level of unconditional self-acceptance in the no-coaching group. If you experience conditional self-acceptance, any sense that failure might be likely means that you are more likely to disengage from the task you are trying to perform. Essentially, you decide that you’d rather not do the task, or try that new experience if it means risking a feeling of low self-worth if failure does occur. You would rather preserve your sense of self-worth just as it is, thanks very much.

What happens if you focus on preserving self-worth at the expense of everything else?

• It can interfere with your relationships as you tend to focus on yourself at the cost of others feelings or needs. Not a great recipe for leadership
• It also means that you see mistakes, criticism and negative feedback as threats rather than opportunities to learn, grow or develop. This means that you are more likely to turn down learning opportunities
• It can also mean that you may start a lot of things but don’t finish them. Once it starts to look like you might not be able to complete the task ‘perfectly’, you would prefer to disengage rather that risk failure. Some leaders do this too, and can find decision-making a real challenge, or avoid getting involved in setting directions for their teams
• Only doing things that preserve your self-worth can also be very stressful and have consequences for your mental health.

A culture where it ok to make mistakes is perhaps the best way of helping people to challenge this strategy of preservation of self-worth. An environment where risk-taking is accepted and where failures are recognized as opportunities to learn helps people to embrace challenges and perhaps reduce the fear of failure.

How can this knowledge help you? Perhaps by focusing less on goals that preserve your own self-worth, but perhaps instead encourage a curious approach to new learning that also contribute to others’ successes could be helpful for those in leadership roles.

More generally, fear of failure is very common. Who likes to fail? But if we can see failure as an opportunity to learn how to do things better, that might help. Changing personal cultures like this doesn’t happen instantly. Coaching conversations – with yourself or others can help.

How much sleep do you really need?

In answer to the above question, probably more than I’ve had over the past three days trying to transport a tired and teething 16-month old from London to Wellington, here in New Zealand. However, several research studies seem to triangulate upon the finding that 6.5 to 7.5 hours seems like the magic window. Most interestingly, mortality risk seems to go up for those people who regularly sleep more than 7.5 hours a night – and is of more concern than those who sleep, say under 7 hours a night. This finding seems to be replicated using different methodologies and studying different population groups, suggesting that this appears to be reliable.

However, a lot of these earlier research studies relied upon self-reported sleep. More recent studies have used wrist monitors to better measure actual sleep – though it isn’t fail proof. Using this method, it looks like women who slept less than 5 hours a night, or more than 6.5 hours were less likely to be alive 14 years after the study ended.

So, thinking of cutting back on your sleep. Wait a minute. There is also evidence to show that cutting back too much on your sleep has an impact on your fat loss potential. Losing sleep boosted production of a hormone called ghrelin, which has been implicated in interfering with fat-burning processes and can stimulate hunger pangs. Sleep deprivation is known to raise blood pressure and reduce glucose tolerance, which can both increase the risk of artery damage.

So, how much sleep do you need? Depends what you are trying to do – but I try not to sleep more than 7-8 hours a night, and have to try to get more than 5 if I can (travel schedule and crying baby allowing). And with that, I am heading off home for an early night.

How much sleep do you believe you need?

Service will resume on Thursday, NZ time

At the moment, I am in transit in LA with a grizzly, teething 16 month old who is clearly telling her parents that she isn’t enjoying long-haul overnight travel. So, you might picture yourself as me without a lot of time or brain capacity to post right now. I’ll be back on Thursday though, so be sure to check in then.

Thanks!

Is a sleepy brain a creative brain?

Do you sometimes come out with slightly off the wall ideas when you feel tired and sleepy? I know I do and have always done. I’ve always called it a ‘loosening of the lobe’. The fore parts of you brain – the frontal lobes – are responsible for planning and keeping you on task with analytical problem solving, as well as other things.

It seems that, according to this report in Scientific American, when you are sleepy, this inhibition relaxes a bit and allows unrelated information to float around more freely. In these experiments, although there was no time of day effect for analytical tasks, people were consistently better at the creative tasks at “non-optimal” times of day. That is, when they were sleepy.

So, those ideas you get when you’re falling asleep? It seems like that’s our most creative stuff – thoughts that would normally get filtered out are allowed to mix together to maybe generate other, novel ideas and solutions in these precious hours. Prepare that notebook and pen before your head hits the pillow.

Play with action and reflection

At the end of a long busy week, I thought I would post a few words on action and reflection, and the benefits of switching between the two.

Even when we feel like we are in the zone, experiencing that total absorption in the task at hand and ticking all the boxes on the to-do list, it is possible to have too much of a good thing. Taking a brief pause to reflect on your experience can help with your planning and decision-making. Similarly, a long time spent theorising and exploring options can lead to inertia. Switching to action can help to re-set the balance.

You can help yourself to regularly switch between these two modes of reflection and action. Set yourself a gentle reminder every 30 or 60 minutes. A gentle alarm, perhaps, or maybe when you hear the news bulletin if you’ve the radio on in the background. You don’t have to stop your flow. But changing mode can help you notice things you didn’t see before, sparking your creative side. You’ll also feel less tired, get less bored, and I’m betting you’ll be more productive too.

It works for me.

A little more about my disaster support work

The work of our team at the Joint Centre for Disaster Research was featured in an ad for Massey University in the NZ Herald, Dominion Post and Manawatu Standard yesterday. If you’re interested, you can check out a PDF copy here, or just check out the scanned page below.

Tackle toxicity – be grateful

Six hours. That’s how long the effects of strong emotions last in your body. That’s a big portion of your day. Anger, frustration, anxiety – they can ripple around your body producing ill effects long after you think you’ve moved on from that toxic emotion. Bu the good news is that positive emotions also have similar effects.

How do you counter the effects of the toxic strong emotions? Simple. Count your blessings. Be grateful. You don’t need other people to bring you positive emotions and energy. By practicing feeling grateful, you can set up a habit and emotional circuitry that helps to protect you from the toxic strong emotions that crop up from time to time.

Try practicing twice a day. Once in the morning, and top up again in the afternoon. Spend just 3 minutes.

Notice the warmth of your duvet when you are in bed. Hear the laughter in your child’s voice. Smell the coffee as it brews.

Notice the small things. Things that give you pleasure. Things that make you feel lucky.

Be careful with what you think. It is more powerful than we yet know.

What you need, what you value, and the difference between the two

Let’s start with needs. Some of your basic emotional needs might be:

• Being loved
• Being safe, secure and certain
• Being comfortable and experiencing pleasure
• Feeling special
• Having new and different experiences

You also have higher needs that may also benefit others and make you feel good and develop in some way. These can include needs like the drive to make a difference in the world.

Meeting these needs all of the time can be a tough ask, and you may pay a price. Your need to feel loved might mean you try so hard to please people that you don’t stand up for your best interests, or you may not try new things because of your need for safety.

Your higher needs like making a difference in the world might lead to better results for you, but they might also get you into trouble. For example, your desire to get a group of runners together to raise money through a charity marathon run could get you into trouble if your stronger need to feel special causes you to push noses out of joint and cause friction in the group. The good you do isn’t fully canceled out, but it does mean less pleasant results for you and others because of the way you feel you need to behave in order to get the recognition you deserve.

Your needs can steer you off course as much as they can act as a compass in your life. The trick is to recognise the needs that drive you, and to ensure that these are met by acting in accordance with your values.

Your values are the principles that are nearest and dearest to you. You’re likely to have many, and each value has a different meaning to you – for example, to be compassionate, or to provide for your loved ones, or to create wealth. However, there is one difference between your needs and values. A true value helps to drive your forward, helping you to enjoy life, develop yourself, and benefit those around you.

You might get some pleasure from sitting and watching that DVD boxed set for hours on end- we all need that escape and laughter- but it doesn’t change your horizons much. On the other hand, something more challenging – that book or film you’ve heard about – helps you to feel more fully engaged with the world around you. To be challenged – that’s your value.

Feeding only your needs takes you further into yourself so that you behave in an insular, and sometimes possibly more selfish way. When you live a life in tune with your values – your own values, not someone else’s – you often find the world a much happier place to be in. It takes time, and you don’t synch with your values overnight. But, once you start to tune into them and live your life according to them, you enjoy your life so much more you want others to experience the same feeling of alignment and happiness too. Living life in accordance with your values helps you to reach out and connect with others.

Living life in this way is not an easy task. Painful, tough decisions are part of the process. But not doing so is more painful, in ways that may not be obvious to you at first. Your body and mind will tell you more about that balance once you start to notice the signs and playing with your value control settings.

Coaching conversations can help you to identify your values and to start living a life in line with them.

How is negative feedback ever useful?

Last week, I was working with a great running coach I know in London (James Dunne) as I honed my technique. It was gratifying to note that my running style was looking much better than it did about 6 months ago, but there was still some room for improvement. James suggested we did some strength training exercises, but focused mainly on increasing my cadence – the number of times my feet turnover, or strike the ground, per minute.

I was hooked up to a metronome which started bleeping at 184 beats per minute, or a cadence of 92. And off I ran, up and down a short stretch of the Thames path near Richmond. At first, I found it difficult to keep up and felt like I was prancing like a show pony. However, once I brought my speed down a bit and the cadence to 88, I felt sharp and snappy, especially when I compared it to how I ran when I tried to ignore the insistent bleep.

This little experience got me thinking about how we seek and use feedback in our everyday lives, especially when we are trying to learn a new skill or improve our practicing of a skill we already know. I was also thinking about how it can be hard to seek critical feedback to help us improve.

The research tells us that the impact of positive or negative feedback depends upon whether you are a novice or not. People learning a new skill tend to be concerned about evaluating their commitment. They are much more likely to stick to a goal after receiving positive (rather than negative) feedback. However, experts are most concerned about checking their progress towards reaching their goal. They are more likely to stick to a goal after receiving negative feedback, because it gives them information as to how they can improve their performance to achieve their goal.

If we follow this, people new in a particular job or taking on a new task will most likely seek positive feedback that they can reach their goal, like meeting a deadline. However, more experienced people will seek negative feedback which will help them stay on task and overcome distractions. It also seems like people seek feedback to try to manipulate their moods is a strategic and complex ways. For example, people may make themselves feel bad about their progress towards a goal, which – for some – acts as a motivator.

Most interestingly for me, these effects of feedback have implications for teachers or managers. For example, a manager can encourage goal pursuit by giving positive feedback to new people in roles unfamiliar to them, and increase negative feedback as the employee gains expertise. It’s a tricky balance though to gauge the type of feedback needed to motivate others, and also tricky when trying to understand the right time to ask for critical, and possibly negative feedback.

I’m glad James thought that I was skilled enough in my running now to take on the negative feedback offered by the metronome drills. I did find it motivating, and it made me think about why I found it so interesting.

James offered a careful balance of positive feedback when I was still learning how my body coordinated itself to adopt a new running style, while increasing the negative feedback as my level of skill increased. Coaching conversations aim to do the same.

Let me know if I can help. In the meantime, I’ll be sorting out an audio metronome of my very own.