By Colm O’Reilly, Certified Two-Brain Business Mentor and founder of TheMentalHealthPlan.com
Part II
When talking to your clients about mindfulness, you can start by addressing their misconceptions. Yesterday, I shared the top four misconceptions about mindfulness. Here are the rest of the of the top eight.
5: Others Need This, Not Me
Everyone agrees that mental health is vital and I bet you’re thinking of someone who could really benefit from knowing how to take care of themselves or improve their way of thinking.
Guess what? That person needs to be you!
Focusing on trying to change others is pretty futile and frustrating.
We can all see how others are getting in their own way so it’s vital we take the time to see ourselves objectively so we’re not doing the same!
We’ve got to be the ones to take the first step and take care of ourselves. By doing so we become a good example for others to follow.
6: I don’t have the time
Very few of us have the luxury (or inclination) to go sit on a remote mountain until we can find enlightenment!! We’ve boiled down the real impactful aspects of mindfulness and mental skills into a practice that takes 3-5 minutes TOTAL daily. Instead of being another thing on your already too full to do list, we’ve developed this to fit seamlessly into your morning routine.
More importantly, the 3-5 minute daily investment ends up SAVING you time throughout the day.
How does this work? By becoming clear in your mind and with what’s important to you, you’ll save so much wasted energy debating what to do, how to structure your daily habits, and in reducing time spent on things that really don’t serve you. A couple of minutes can save you a couple of HOURS in wasted time and frustration!
7: I’ve Tried This Stuff Before, It Doesn’t Work For Me
If you were told that a few minutes of meditation would instantly boost your happiness, solve all your stress and anxiety, and deliver perfect focus, it was always going to fail as a strategy. That was unfair to you to set unrealistic expectations like that.
Mindset work is like brushing your teeth, taking your vitamins, or saving some of your paycheck each month. The results aren’t often instantaneous or miraculous.
Sometimes we’ll feel the benefits straight away, we’ll have a revelation and see how our thoughts haven’t been serving us as well as we’d like and be able to change them straight away. Other times we’re building up a buffer of health, and a toolkit of mental skills we can benefit from the more situations we apply them.
Some of us love running and some of us loathe it. Some of us love lifting weights, or yoga. We all agree that movement is important for our health. The same holds true for mindset. It’s important we explore the different mindset tools available to build our own ritual that works best for us.
8: Only Weak People Need To Work On Their Mindset
The best athletes in the world go to physios, and continue to work on their strength, conditioning and sport specific skills. Top level CEOs get business coaching and research trends in their market/industry.
But there’s the destructive belief out there that only weak/broken people need to work on themselves, heal past traumas, and improve their mental modes of thinking.
This myth holds us all back. Firstly, you’re not broken if you have a pattern of thinking that is no longer helpful or you have a need that is unmet. Secondly, getting outside assistance to help you over your blind spots and stumbling blocks is admirable.
Without taking quiet time for yourself you may not even know you have these unmet needs. Everything starts with pausing to look at what’s going on, and then you can decide what you’d like to work on. And we all have blind spots that others can point out for us, and help us improve.