by Janelle Legge | Dec 11, 2015 | Wild Woman Archetype Series |
“There is no greater blessing a mother can give her daughter than a reliable sense of the veracity of her own intuition. Intuition is handed from parent to child in the simplest ways: “You have good judgment. What do you think lies hidden behind all this?” Rather than defining intuition as some unreasoned faulty quirk, it is defined as truly the soul-voice speaking.
Intuition senses the directions to go in for most benefit, it is self-preserving, has a grasp of underlying motive and intention, it chooses what will cause the least amount of fragmentation in the psyche.”
Clarissa Pinkola Estes
The Power of Intuition
It’s easy to get tripped up and ignore the power of intuition when someone who you think knows more than you suggests something that just doesn’t feel right. For whatever reason. When this occurs press PAUSE and give yourself some time to make a decision that feels in total alignment with you.
Don’t just override that little voice inside that instantly responded “No, I’m not too sure about this” and let someone else make a decision that impacts you. Ask yourself “Are they in autopilot and not taking all of me into view? Is this more for their benefit or convenience than what’s best for me?”
Always pay attention to that powerful little voice and check in with yourself first. Then ask more questions until you’re satisfied you’re heading in the right direction.
Intuition is powerful. It’s often underestimated. Yet that powerful, quiet little voice inside that is so easy to ignore or override is 9 times out of 10 ALWAYS right. The more you pay attention to it the stronger it gets. Understanding the power of your intuitive guidance keeps you in the correct flow of decision making for you and your life.
Janelle Legge is a Psychotherapist, Leadership, Mindfulness and Wellbeing Consultant and Coach who specialises in Relationships, Career Success, Work-Life Integration and Wellbeing. Janelle sees clients in person in Sydney and works with clients around the world via Skype. To book a skype session with Janelle click here.
by Janelle Legge | Sep 28, 2015 | Wild Woman Archetype Series |
“In the parents’ fantasy whatever child they have will be perfect,
and will reflect only the parents’ ways and means. If the child
is wildish, she may, unfortunately, be subjected to her parents’
attempts at psychic surgery over and over again, for they are
trying to re-make the child, and more so trying to change what
her soul requires of her.
Though her soul requires seeing,
the culture around her requires sightlessness.
Though her soul wishes to speak its truth,
she is pressured to be silent.
…When this happens, a girl begins to believe that the
negative images her family and culture reflect back to her
about herself are not only totally true but also totally free of bias,
opinion, and personal preference. The girl begins to believe
that she is weak, ugly, unacceptable, and that this will
continue to be true
no matter how hard she tries to reverse it.”
Clarissa Pinkola Estes
Were your ideas and ways of expressing yourself and responding to things totally different to your family and tribe growing up?
The journey of self-actualization in adulthood helps repair and positively reset the impacts of not feeling heard, seen, or understood as a child. Of being a red ant in a black anthill growing up.
It’s about learning to take your feelings, sensory impressions, and intuitions seriously. Having a voice. Unconditionally loving and accepting yourself – the REAL and natural version of you with your shoes off, relaxed, at home when no one else is around. And finding kindred spirits that ‘get’ you and value your ideas and presence.
Nourishing the wild woman archetype is about you showing up for YOU. Loving yourself. Embracing and honouring how you look, how you think, and taking your passions and creative ideas seriously. It’s about going for what you really want, regardless of what other people may think.
Image by Romain Briaux
by Janelle Legge | Sep 24, 2015 | Wellbeing |
Are you sick and tired of negative self talk that at times just seems to go on and on relentlessly inside your head? You know, the critical and dismissive negative voice that picks everything (including you) apart, and is never satisfied. Ever.
If you’re ready to send your negative self talk off on a permanent vacation, then you’re in the right place. Because I’m going to share with you one of my most deft manoeuvres for outsmarting and defeating negative self talk once and for all. Mastering this skill is a total game-changer.
But first of all let’s look at what absolutely doesn’t work when you’re wanting to break free from negative self talk:
1. Trying to debate your negative self talk – and win
This is a common tactic. But trying to debate and argue back with negative self talk to show it who’s really the boss is an ineffective and pointless exercise. It’s a bit like trying to win an argument with a highly opinionated, “know it all”. And when you fall into this trap, the arguments become circular, more and more irrational and ridiculous, and go no where.
2. The “I’m not listening to you” approach
Image by Jan Vašek
Trying to ignore negative self talk and replace it with sweet positive thoughts instead doesn’t work for very long either. As just about everyone who’s tried this finds out. Negative thoughts are simply more powerful and usually win in the end. Often doing this just makes them come back even stronger. And they’ll totally shoot down and crush the positive thoughts you’ve tried to embrace instead.
So why don’t these tactics work?
Because negative self talk is driven in part by your lizard brain that’s been primed to only see danger and threat. It’s primary job is to keep you alive and safe. But it hates change and especially risks, no matter how well calculated – seeing them as potential threats. And it’s this part of your brain that totally backs and supports all of those subconscious self-limiting, negative beliefs you’ve absorbed from other people and your tribe as a child.
In fact around 90% of your negative self talk doesn’t even belong to you, or the reality you’re in. It’s been shaped and formed in a different time and place. So if your ancestors lived through difficult times, negative self talk, and a lack of optimism, can become a way of coping with life. It helps justify how bad and disappointing life and other people can be. Negative self talk usually masks feelings of powerlessness to be able to change the course of your life.
But that’s not you. Right. You’re living in different times.
Defeating Negative Self Talk – Fast
Image by Anthony Delanoix
Okay, so let’s get to the fun part. We’re going to send your negative self talk on a long, well deserved vacation. After all, it’s been working day and night, often going all out to keep you stuck in exactly the same place.
Because this is your time, your life, and it’s time to leave the old version of your inherited ‘negative self talk’ behind.
Now this is going to sound counterintuitive, but hang in there because it works.
The fastest and most effective way to outsmart negative self talk and send it on it’s way is to “thank it” for it’s input. You need to imagine that the part of you that’s driving your negative self talk, actually thinks it’s being helpful and keeping you safe. It doesn’t want you to make any kind of change that will take you beyond where you’re at now – which is the only reality that it knows. And optimistic, expansive thinking leading to a bigger, more exciting version of your life is its nemesis.
So you need to give this part of you some recognition and validation. That’s right. The next time your negative self talk chimes in, you need to dialogue internally with it as if you’re talking to a well-meaning relative or friend. Graciously and politely thank it for all of it’s opinions, and negative cynical advice. After all, it’s just doing it’s job, right.
Then watch what happens next. Silence. Pause. There’s no back-chat, or counter arguments with the usual circular and repetitive scripts going on inside your head. Your negative self talk has suddenly gone all quiet. You can think clearly again, and move forward.
So start thanking your negative self talk and then just feel it melt away. Doing this consistently will bring you more freedom, wellbeing, and optimism, and change your life in powerful ways.
© 2015 Janelle Legge
Title image by Luis Llerena
by Janelle Legge | Aug 19, 2015 | Living With Purpose |
Becoming purpose-led is high on the radar for businesses that want to survive and thrive in an increasingly complex world. Why? Because smart people in business know that sustainable business growth, talent retention and achievement of strategic goals relies on having purpose, meaning, and enduring motivation. At the end of the day, bottom line results depend on how engaged your people and customers are.
Salary alone is not the top driver for ambitious, talented people who want to have a positive impact in the world. Eventually, top performers seek out other opportunities if there is a disconnect between the organization’s purpose, values and goals and their own. I’ve seen this happen time and time again as a consultant and executive coach.
In a rapidly changing world and constantly changing business landscape, being purpose-led is becoming more and more essential. It’s what makes everyone prepared to go over and beyond in order to achieve meaningful and compelling visions and goals. It’s an inner and shared-collective-group orientation that breeds certainty and confidence, rather than constantly looking over your shoulder to see what the competition is doing.
Purpose driven, constructive cultures lead to the attainment of an organisation’s mission and positively correlate with desirable organisational outcomes, such as, high staff and customer satisfaction, sales growth, profitability and shareholder value (Cooke and Szumal 2000).
So if organisations are beginning to realize that having a shared purpose is what powerfully guides and positively impacts the achievement of its goals and success, why is it that people often don’t have a clear purpose in their own lives?
Exactly the same purpose-led principles can be applied to achieve your own goals, and have fulfilment and success in the areas of life that matter the most to you.
I’ve seen clients over the years who appeared successful and together on the outside, yet inwardly doubted themselves and under-valued what they were doing in the world. Because they weren’t clear on their purpose and were still questioning why they were here, and what they were meant to be doing with their life. Helping them figure out their purpose gave them the self confidence to go for bigger goals and accelerated their success across a whole range of areas.
Living with purpose, knowing you’re on the right path in your life and work, is not a new trend or phenomenon at all. It’s something that’s been seen as essential to living a meaningful and well-lived life by philosophers and spiritual traditions since ancient times. It’s been central to my work over the last 16 years. Now businesses are increasingly seeing the value of being purpose-led, particularly with the success of brands like Virgin. It’s having a shared collective purpose that inspires everyone to go beyond what’s required to achieve meaningful goals. The improvement in people engagement and staff satisfaction levels, business results and organizational culture show that it works.
On a personal level, having a clear purpose is energizing and inspiring. It encourages you to be more creative and resourceful and it’s good for your wellbeing. You’re able to stop doing the things that waste your time and take you off track. Being purpose-led gives you a more zen-like focus and brings you more inner peace and cohesion.
Image by Joschko Hammermann
Knowing your purpose gives you a roadmap, a strategy and a meaningful plan in life and in business.
Title image by Kalen Emsley
by Janelle Legge | Aug 2, 2015 | Wellbeing |
Are you constantly other and outer focused? One of the biggest roadblocks to happiness and success I see people struggle with is being constantly focused on what they imagine other people have, do, or think.
What I often refer to as the ‘compare and despair’ or ‘grass is always greener’ syndrome is keeping women unhappy, inauthentic, and feeling isolated. This type of repetitive thinking is toxic to your self esteem, identity, and self-worth.
When you’re trapped in this kind of faulty globalizing thinking pattern everyone else is happier, more successful, luckier, gets everything they want and lives happily ever after. Even when reality glaringly points out otherwise!
This is because you are so fused with this faulty thinking pattern you can’t see the abundance and good already in your life, or what’s possible for you.
And it’s not only hurting you, it’s keeping you stuck and playing small.
So what’s behind this type of thinking?
If you’ve been stuck in these repetitive ‘compare and despair’ cycles just be aware that your subconscious mind will probably not like what I’m about to share, and will try and get you to reject it.
Here’s 2 reasons why:
- Your subconscious mind is designed to keep you exactly where you are. It will do everything it can to stop you moving in a direction that it perceives to be threatening because it is new and different to what you have always done.
- ‘Compare and despair’ thinking is a form of avoidance and distraction from getting on with what you need to be doing to have the things you really desire. It’s stopping you from taking responsibility for the choices you have made, and the results you currently have in your life.
At a core level, these subconscious beliefs and fears are driven by low self esteem, not knowing your value, or not believing deep down that you can get what you want. Somewhere in your past you’ve had experiences that made you feel not good enough, not worthy enough, or wrong in some way.
3 Powerful Steps to Break This Cycle
Image by Demetrius Washington
- Get into the present moment, now. Staying fused with negative repetitive self talk and old stories keeps you stuck in the past, anxious about the future and not in the Now. It’s actually not possible to be in the present moment and feel anxious or fearful at the same time.
- Stop trying to fill every spare minute. Less is often more. Stop, be quiet, connect to your inner wisdom and divine guidance and just listen. Learn to follow your own inner compass.
- Practice daily gratitude. Energy follows thought, what you put out comes back to you. So if your focus is constantly on what you don’t have, can’t have, will never have … guess what you will get more of. That’s right, exactly what you don’t want.
By solving these self-sabotaging patterns you’re going to find yourself moving towards what’s right for you – which is what always brings you more happiness, abundance and success.
Title image by Casey Kiernan
