Visualise yourself achieving your goals

I had identified that my goal was important to me, just like I explained in the linking exercise in the `Living your life according to your values' section. It was my job to help my clients link the importance of their goal to the discipline that they needed to be able to reach it. I was able to use my journey to relate to them. You are your clients' leader. When you lead your clients from the front, they will follow; What do your clients think when they know that you don't really train, when they know that you don't follow a diet or have any goals? Do you think that creates any challenge for them? Of course it does. As a coach, I believe that to teach discipline you must show that you have it, too. Think about your portfolio and reputation. Think about what automatic thoughts or practical problems might get in the way. The single most important question to ask clients to assess the probability that they'll complete their Action Plan is this: How likely are you to do this, 0-100%? Identify Obstacles and Do Covert Rehearsal When clients say they are less than 90% sure that they'll do their Action Plan, you'll need to find out what could get in the way. On one occasion, ELSIE was only 75% sure. I asked her: What's the 25% part of you that thinks you won't do it? I could also ask: Why are you 75% sure and not 50% sure?

The next time you hear the negative in your mind, turn it to a positive affirmation right away and hold it up until it reaches the level of a lift of self-confidence. Be prepared Know all you need to learn about your industry, career, presentation -- whatever's next on the to win list. If you're confident and have the skills to help it, your self-confidence will grow. For tough times, when all else fails: Create a great list Life is full of obstacles and there are times when our self-confidence is hard to keep up. Sit down now and make a list of all the things you're grateful for in your career, and another list of all the accomplishments you're proud to do. When your lists are full, paste them on your fridge door, on your office wall, on your bathroom mirror-- somewhere you can easily remember what an amazing life you've had and what a wonderful person you really are. When you find that your self-confidence is dwindling, take a look at those lists and let yourself be encouraged by you all over again. HOW TO IMPROVE YOUR SELF-ESTEEM Before you rush to the victim's side, always check the surroundings for safety. Will you be risking your own life if you offer assistance? Remember, you won't be any help to anyone if you become injured yourself. REMEMBER YOUR ABCS Airway, Breathing, Circulation--also known as vital signs. These are the first things you need to check when you are administering first aid. Is the victim's airway open? Is the victim breathing? Does the victim have adequate circulation, or in other words, a pulse? If the ABCs are checked and dealt with, the victim will have a greater chance of surviving until help arrives.

Are you going to be known as someone who achieves results if none of your clients are displaying any level of discipline? The more discipline I displayed throughout my career, the more it impacted my reputation and what people would say about me. People would arrive at a consultation knowing about me; You have the opportunity to instil behaviours and beliefs in your clients with your own actions. This is why it's so important that you commit to your own journey and experience everything that you expect of your clients. Hire a coach Have you ever been coached? To be a true master of your craft, you must experience high-level coaching. How can you Level Up if you have no level to aspire to? In my early days as a coach, I genuinely thought that I was developing at a fast pace - I thought my coaching standard was way higher than it actually was. What could we do to get you from 75% to 95%? What are the advantages and disadvantages of doing the Action Plan? Depending on your client's answers, you can I use several techniques with ELSIE to increase the likelihood that she will complete an Action Plan item. First, I ask about obstacles. Then I ask her to commit to when she would do it. Next, I use covert rehearsal. I ask her to visualize carrying out the Action Plan, and I help her respond to an interfering thought. I ask her to imagine that she is reading the response. Finally, we talk about what she would like to remind herself to respond to another automatic thought.

Use positive affirmations correctly Positive statements like I'll be a great success! They are extremely popular, but they have one critical problem-- they tend to make people with a low self-esteem feel worse. Because when we are weak in self-esteem, these claims are actually too contradictory to our existing beliefs. Interestingly, for one subset of people, optimistic affirmations work-- those whose self-esteem is already high. Tweak them to make them more convincing for affirmations that work when your self-esteem is lagging behind. For example, I'm going to be a huge hit, for starters! I will persevere before I excel! Identify your competencies and develop them Self-esteem is created by showing real potential and success in areas of our lives that matter to us. HOW TO TREAT A BLOODY NOSE Nosebleeds are common among children and even though they look scary, most of them are more of a nuisance than a danger. Follow these steps to stop the flow: Have the victim tilt his head forward, not back. Using a clean cloth, pinch both sides of the nose together, just under the bony part. Apply a cold pack to the nose and cheeks. Hold this position for ten minutes. Check to see if the nose has stopped bleeding. If not, pinch it for another ten minutes. Most nosebleeds will stop after twenty minutes.

For the majority of coaches reading this article, you'll be the best coach at your facility, so naturally you're going to think you're more skilled than everyone else. It's likely that the rest of the coaches are asking you for advice all the time. This isn't going to help you to Level Up. You need to allow yourself to be a small fish in a big pond. Would it surprise you to learn that nearly 90% of the coaches that have passed through our practical coaching courses hadn't received any form of professional coaching until they attended our event? When asked to take someone through an exercise in front of the rest of the group the majority of coaches would panic, simply because they'd never been challenged before. Every coach who receives coaching for the first time will always tell me that it's been a complete game changer for them. They say it's like they've been given a new set of eyes. My first experience of high-level coaching was at my Level 1 Poliquin certification. The attention to detail while we were training was beyond anything I'd ever seen before. PAULINE: Do you think anything will get in the way of your asking Randy for help? ELSIE: I'm not sure. PAULINE: [getting her to specify and commit to a time] When would be a good time to call her? ELSIE: Saturday morning, I guess, because she won't be at work. PAULINE: Can you imagine it's Saturday morning right now? Can you picture it? What time is it? Where are you? ELSIE: Around 10 o'clock, I guess. I'm in the kitchen.