“I thought you might like to have this rusty propeller!”
It was corroded and not really anything that I wanted to touch. But I could see the sincerity in his eyes when he handed it to me and I accepted it graciously.
He had just completed Life Coaching 101 and revealed, “I came to your course just to learn how to be more effective and successful in building my business. But I quickly learned that my life was a lot like this rusty propeller, taking me nowhere! But now my propeller is cleaned up, the blades are sharp, and not only is my business soaring, but so is my marriage and my family.“
No matter the shape that you are in personally (or how many mistakes you’ve made), in your marriage (whether you have grown apart or in divorce court), in your family (even if your children are off-track), in your career/business (especially if there are financial struggles) …The key to turning it all around is to assess your propeller, sharpen your blades, and take flight to greater things.
Is it all easy and instant? No, but it is all so very worth it.
After several weeks of looking at how each of us have a life like propeller that either propels us upward or downward, causing us to soar, or causing us to nosedive…We are finally at blade four.
The first week we looked at limitless POTENTIAL and how to bust through any roadblocks or limits set on our potential.
The second week, we looked at RESPONSES. And how knee-jerk reactions cause us to nose dive, but thoughtful responses propel us forward.
Last week, we looked at how unmet needs or needs met in unhealthy ways, cause us to make less than ideal DECISIONS that can send us into nosedives.
This week we are looking at the fourth blade on our life’s propeller. That is our BELIEFS.
Our beliefs are one of the most powerful things that propel us upward and onward into purposeful destiny, or can cause us to crash.
I write a lot about our beliefs, because they truly do determine all that we do (or fail to do). They determine all that we become (or fail to become). Or they can jerk any forward progress into reverse on a dime. Or take any slump you may be in and re-charge your batteries!
They encourage us or discourage us. They help us connect with others or they keep us disconnected and alone. They cause us to find the ‘gifts’ in anger or they caused us to become a ‘rager’ distancing those who love us.
They make our relationship successful, or they make our relationships difficult, perhaps damaging both people. They cause us to believe in ourselves and others or turn us into self ‘sabotagers’, who rain on everyone’s parade.
Most people don’t even know what they believe because their beliefs were installed in them earlier in their lives by caregivers. Most of us never take any opportunity to reevaluate what was installed. And yet, they determine the quality of every single day of our lives.
This is so very important that I would like to give you an example. I want you to be very aware of your beliefs and their power.
Those beliefs that serve you and propel you toward your purpose, I want you to hold onto those … and protect them for dear life.
Those that sabotage you, hold you back, or propel you into nosedives simply must go!
Just today I received a text from a man that I see with his distressed wife for marital counseling. This is a word-for-word copy and paste of the text: “I am a goner. I can’t get anything right in my marriage. I might as well just give up! She’s probably going to file for divorce anyway.”
I’m sure he would have rather received a “poor you” response. But I knew that would further ingrain whatever limiting belief was sending him to that place.
Instead this is a direct copy and paste of my response: “If your faith and your belief is that it’s over, you are right. But if your faith and belief is that if you fight for your marriage, and that good things will come… That’s a very different story. It’s up to you!”
I asked him what he believed about handling marital difficulties. Like most, at first he said he didn’t know. But after I continued to ask questions, he eventually said: “Well I know my dad always said that problems never get solved, and the more you stir them, the worse they stink.“
Then I asked if he had apologized to his wife for his misstep. He responded: “No. It wouldn’t do any good.“ I was able to show him how his dad‘s belief had been planted deeply in him and was preventing him from being able to humble himself and admit he was wrong and sincerely apologize.
We took a few moments to scramble that belief (more on that to come) and install an empowering belief: “Not only can we resolve our difficulties, but we can use them to strengthen our connection and deepen our intimacy.”
I’m not sure exactly what he did after we installed that new belief. But about three hours later I received a text from his wife asking me if I had talked to him because he had never apologized sincerely in their 30+ years of marriage.
Yes, his marriage was in a nosedive. Let me help you review all four of his blades to see how they worked together to send this very important part of his life, his marriage, into a nosedive. (I did not learn all of this on a text conversation, I learned it in the few face to face sessions we’d already had).
Here’s what I knew about his potential blade in regards to his marriage. Although his parents had remained married, according to both he and his sister, their parent’s marriage was simply a convenience and nothing rich, intimate or wonderful.
When they first came to me for marriage counseling, he said he was sure he had no potential as a husband because he had never seen what he would call a successful marriage and his dad was an awful husband.
At some point in his life, he had placed a lid on his POTENTIAL of being a great husband. Do you think that belief propelled him upward and onward as a husband? Of course not! Since he thought he had no potential, he pretty much became self-centered and was only focused on himself. (And hid behind being a good provider).
Let’s look at how that affected his second blade, his RESPONSES. Although outsiders looking in may have thought he looked quite selfish, he actually had a boatload of guilt and shame about his inability to be affectionate, romantic, tender, and present.
Therefore, each time his wife would make a comment about feeling lonely, totally disconnected, or him forgetting special events like birthdays or anniversaries … He went into knee-jerk reaction. The knee-jerk reactions were angry monologues about how hard he worked to support the family, and how “needy” she was. All just to shut her down and cover his guilt and shame.
Do you think that propelled his marriage forward or sent it further into nosedive mode?
Let’s look at how this affected his third blade: making DECISIONS based on his unmet needs. I ascertained in the first session that his number one need is significance.
When she would try to have these discussions, he immediately went into decision-making modes that met his need for significance. (All of it out of his awareness).
They had shared with me in their first session how that on a recent anniversary that he missed, they were having a conversation about it and of course his guilt and shame emerged. In the middle of the conversation, he took a call from a friend who asked him to join him for a round of golf. (First rule: put your cell phone away when communicating with people you care about!)
Although he knew he needed to “make up for forgetting the anniversary,” instead of doing so and suggesting they spend the day together … he accepted the invitation to go play golf.
Because he was a jerk? No! Because his decision-making mode was hijacked by his unmet need for significance when having to face his failure to remember the anniversary. The need for significance overrode his healthy decision making to spend the day with his wife.
Was that a decision that began healing his marriage, moving it forward toward healing and restoration? Or did it send the marriage further into a nosedive? All three of those blades reinforced his BELIEF that he was not a good husband. And clearly left the propeller of marriage spinning in the wrong direction, into a furious nosedive.
When your propeller is spinning in the wrong direction, you can actually intervene in any of the blades to turn it from nosedive to upward and onward! Quickly!
I intervened in one blade (his beliefs) in a text message and his entire propeller turned around. Yes, we have additional work to do with each of them. But it does not take 15 years of therapy or six months of coaching to get the propeller going in the right direction. Or to recover from nosedives.
So, what do you do when you know that beliefs are holding you back or creating nose dives?
I’ve written about this multiples of times, so if you would like more details, you might want to check out an in-depth blog by clicking here.
But here are the highlights:
1. Identify the limiting or crazy belief
2. Scramble it
3. Design a new empowering belief
4. Install it
5. Proclaim it regularly
Let me describe each of them briefly:
1. Identify the limiting or crazy belief.
You can do this any time things are not going in a direction that serve you well. Or when you have feelings that you don’t really enjoy about something. Anything!
Ask yourself this question: ”What would I have to believe for things to be this way? What would I have to believe in order to have made this decision? Or to feel this way?”
Sometimes it’s easier to access the belief by looking at what you don’t like and what belief would drive you to being in a place you don’t like.
For example, I had the opportunity to go on a walk with a friend recently, who was speaking to me about how awful she felt about her intense dislike for her boss. When she explained some of the things that he was doing to her and her management team, I commented that it was 100% normal that she would feel dislike toward him. She responded that she just felt so horrible about herself for feeling that way.
I asked her what she would have to believe about feeling dislike toward him to feel so horrible about herself? Without even pausing she said, “Because we’re supposed to love everyone!” Even she laughed out loud when the words came out of her mouth.
I asked, “What if you believed that it was OK to dislike him, as long as you treated him respectfully? And that he didn’t have the power to make you dislike yourself?”
Her eyes got as big as saucers as she had an “ah-ha“ moment. “Oh my goodness! I wouldn’t have to hate myself about him, OR when I’m around my brother-in-law, OR when I am around one of the women in my Bible study who blames God for everything!”
We both laughed and now you know how to access your beliefs.
2. Scramble it
There are many ways to scramble old disempowering beliefs, and I really love teaching this part in coach training. We have the most fun in this segment.
- You can write the old belief down and say it with the last word first and the first word last. For my friend on our walk, it was: “Everyone love to supposed are we.” I had her say it out loud over and over and faster and faster and pretty soon it was scrambled. And we were laughing at her gibberish!
- You can say it over and over in Donald Duck style. So yes! I made her do it over and over while we walked, and she quacked. I’m pretty sure if anyone heard us, they got a good laugh, but we got it scrambled.
- You can play a fun song and sing the words of your limiting belief to the tune of the song. For my friend, I selected Billy Ray Cyrus’s “Achy Breaky Heart.“ And we sang together the words of the old belief to the tune and rhythm of “Achy Breaky Heart.” I’m sure that anyone who heard us did not want to purchase a ticket to our next concert! But we got it scramled!
3. Design a new empowering belief
Let me define empowering belief for you. It’s a belief that propels you forward toward great purpose and destiny. Therefore, lame beliefs don’t qualify and won’t work.
Years ago I was in one of Tony Robbins’ programs called “Date with Destiny“ in Fiji. At the time, one of my beliefs I needed to deal with was “I’m overwhelmed with stress.”
My partner for the event and I were sitting in a hammock together. We were working together on crafting a new empowering belief. I suggested what I now know was a pretty lame one: “My stress is not that bad.“
At that exact moment, the hammock we were sitting in under a coconut tree was overturned by a falling coconut! We laughed hysterically as we both flipped out of the hammock and into the sand. We joke to this day that the experience was a message from God saying “Now that’s one lame belief!”
Ultimately, we crafted a new empowering belief that has carried me far! “I am so blessed to be faced by popular demand!”
WE-CREATE OUR BELIEF!
4. Install it
The key to installing a new belief is energy. You cannot install a new belief by mumbling it out loud while lying in a recliner.
I remember that day on the beach in Fiji … we were jumping up and down together on the white sands of the beach while proclaiming my new belief loudly. Over and over and over! We did it until it was down in my soul.
5. Proclaim it regularly
You can’t just do this once. If you’ve read my work you know that I am very big on proclamations. I had my new belief written into a proclamation that I said multiple times a day out loud while remembering doing the exercise on the white sands of a Fiji beach.
At the time, this was my proclamation: “I am so very blessed to be faced with popular demand. I will accept every invitation to speak that gives me an opportunity to touch lives, while first honoring my health and my family time. I am so very blessed to have these opportunities at this time in my life, and I will cherish every moment of them. I was created to make a difference, and I will start with me, my family, and then go out and spread encouragement and hope!“
What beliefs do you need to change? How will you scramble them? What new belief will you craft? How will you install it? What will be your new proclamation? This will turn your propeller to upward momentum, and to greater things!
*******
If you have followed my blogs for the past month … CONGRATULATIONS! You have been through Life Coaching 101.
I start my training with teaching coaching students to access each persons life propeller, determine which direction it’s spinning, sending that upward and onward or nosediving.
If they find they’re going in an upward direction, I teach them to sharpen all four blades so that it is an even more powerful momentum toward their purpose and destiny. If it’s in a nosedive, I teach them how to intervene and in one, and/or in all of the four blades … in order to turn their lives toward extraordinary things.
After all, isn’t that what we all want? Deep inside, we all want to put our heads on our pillows at night and feel like we are making a difference, that we are fulfilled.
Real fulfillment comes when we not only do these things for ourselves, but for those around us that we care about.
Many people come through my Coach Training for personal growth. And as one of my evaluation sheets said from a student in my last course, “I came because I felt like my life was in a rut. Coach Training with Dr. Neecie put about a dozen sticks of TNT under my rut and blew me the hell outta there. Now I find myself soaring!“
Others come through my program in order to enhance their current career. One of my dear friends, a graduate of my program many years ago, and now my number one Executive Coach for the training, came for this reason.
She was teaching in a school district where many of the children were from unfortunate situations. Latchkey kids, some living in crack houses, some being abused. She wanted to be able to better assist them and their families.
Not only did she become known in the school district for knowing how to work effectively with these kids, she began teaching them every single tool she learned in Coach Training on their level.
Now she has young adults who come to her, and thank her, because of what she instilled in them in first, second or third grade.
Just this year, there has been a new position created for her in her school district where she will go help students (and their teachers) effectively deal with traumatic situations. I so love and admire Lisa for what she does.
The third reason people come to coach training is to make a career change and begin coaching individuals, couples, families, businesses, churches, and/or other organizations.
I tell all three groups the same thing: “When you apply these principles to your life, you will catapult yourself into extraordinary living in every area of your life. But whether you’re doing this for your growth, to enhance your current career or business, or to begin a practice, real fulfillment comes when you pass it on to others.”
I’m saying all that to say this same thing to you. I hope you will use the information that I have provided regarding life propellers in this past month (or in any of my blogs) to propel yourself into the great things you were created to do and be.
But real fulfillment comes when you pass it on. I hope that you will decide before you ever even complete this exercise for yourself (about dismantling disempowering beliefs and crafting new empowering one), who you will pass it on to.
You are a World Changer. Change your world first, and then change someone else’s. If we all did that, we could influence the world for greater things.
No, I’m not any “Miss America“ trying to create world peace. I am just someone who is passionate about seeing people become all they were created to be. And when we do that, it’s amazing how peace can prevail.
Will you join me?
