S.R. Crawford's Blog, page 59
July 1, 2019
Podcast: You Are What You Believe
Your thoughts and feelings come from your deep-rooted beliefs. Knowing what these beliefs are can change your life, for you are what you believe. You see through the lens of your beliefs about yourself, your life, and your world. Get some perspective and widen your view through a change in your beliefs. Here’s how…
Click to play!
https://srcrawfordauthor.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/you-are-what-you-believe.mp3
Don’t forget that you can follow my podcast on Spotify and Apple Podcasts, alongside most podcast platforms! Thanks for listening!
June 28, 2019
What Is Self-Help?
“Give a Man a Fish, and You Feed Him for a Day. Teach a Man To Fish, and You Feed Him for a Lifetime.” – Proverb
This quote perfectly sums up what self-help is all about. It’s also why I love it and do it myself. It’s all about helping people to help themselves.
Fixing things for people isn’t helpful. It takes their struggle away for a time, but they will always come back to you to help them again and again. They become dependent on you and feel that they have little to no power to fix their situation themselves.
Instead, if you help someone to help themselves, they can learn to trust themselves to do what needs to be done.
Empowerment. Self-knowledge. Resourcefulness. Strength.
We all use self-help and value it, we just don’t like the genre, the term. Because we all teach ourselves things (help ourselves to learn). We all recognise the need to shape our mindsets. We all write things down and try to organise our lives and thoughts. We all try to work on habits, health, and happiness to better our lives.
These are all areas of self-help.
What self-help books and content can help with:
Confidence
Habits
Goals
Emotional health
Mental health
Physical health
Spirituality
Self-esteem
Financial situation
Reframing thoughts
Emotional Intelligence
Lifestyle
Passion and Purpose
Motivation and Inspiration
Self-care
Holistic Health
Self-management
Psychology
AND MORE!!!
There are so many areas of self-help. It is a very broad, umbrella term for things that help us to help ourselves. People think that it is just about life problems or mental problems. It’s not. It’s about betterment. It’s self-improvement, self-knowledge, self-awareness, and all areas of the self that needs help! Simple.
Self-help content just comes from a person sharing ideas, techniques, or information about the world, life, and themselves to help you think differently, take action, and be inspired. They cannot do the work for you. They can’t reach inside of you and take the pain and reshape your mind. You must do that.
Don’t blame the creator of the content because your life didn’t change when you didn’t put the work in! Self-help content will only take you so far, it’s up to you to do the rest.
Some great resources and names for self-help content (that I’ve found value from):
Elizabeth Gilbert talks and her book Big Magic
Brene Brown’s work
Emotional Intelligence information
Lavendaire YouTube
Erin May Henry YouTube
Muchelle B YouTube
Kalyn Nicholson YouTube
Oprah Super Soul
Jen Sincero books
Gabrielle Bernstein
Marianne Williamson
Pema Chodron
I hope I have given you some new ideas and perspectives about self-help content and books and speakers. There is some nonsense out there, but that’s true for all genres, all content. Don’t dismiss self-help because of the few, for there are many useful resources out there that you can use to better your life.
What is self-help? Helping the self.
Don’t forget to like, comment, and follow my site for more inspiration and insights!
If you need any help in bettering your mental health, or better coping with anxiety, depression, and stress, then my book “You’re As Mad As I Am” may be for you. Check it out here, and download a free sample to see what it’s all about.
If you want to hire me to write about mental health (or other), then don’t hesitate to get in touch!
June 27, 2019
Video: What the Life Gunk Workbook is all about
Here’s how the journaling workbook works, what it’s all about, and how you can benefit from it…
Click to play!
Get your copy here! Life Gunk Journaling Workbook
Don’t forget to follow my site and subscribe to my YouTube channel so that you don’t miss a thing!
June 26, 2019
How to Stop Caring What People Think of You
Truthfully, I don’t believe we can “stop caring what people think of us” or that we even should. Instead, we need to do something slightly different:
Stop giving so much power to what people think of you
So, here’s how to do that…
See from their P.O.V.
It is important to view life (or yourself) from other people’s point of view at times. If someone you care about is sharing their opinion, or giving advice, or criticism, or judgement, then before reacting emotionally, take a breath. Step back.
Then, ask yourself what they see about you, your life, or your choices from their POV.
Say it’s your mom who upset you with a comment about your lack of money. Take a step back and see from her eyes. She probably cares about you, right? Or maybe she’s making a judgement with little evidence. After all, she’s not living your life, you are, so she doesn’t have that insider scope to view through.
Now, with this view, we can react with a calmer response or not react at all because we realise that it’s not a personal attack, per se, but a comment with good intentions; or at least a lack of information about the truth of your situation. It’s up to you whether you then want to give more info or not.
Remember, we all see life differently through our own unique lens. We don’t always mean to hurt people or upset them with our words or actions; it’s sometimes down to a perspective that we have that the other doesn’t.
With this view, their comments and actions hold less weight and in turn have less power over us.
Assume Positive Intentions
As I briefly said, it can do us so much good to view interactions with others as being said or done with the best of intentions. Even if it’s really hard, try to think of what that person might be really saying and how it’s positive. Maybe your aunt saying you’ve put on weight isn’t a dig or judgement or anything else.
Maybe she just loves you and wants to ensure you’re healthy. Or maybe she is worried about her own weight gain and so she witnessed yours and spoke out about it without thinking.
Not everyone is out to get you, and even if they are, it could be due to something they need to fix inside of themselves.
With this view, we realise people can say things wrong at times, or mean something different than what we interpreted. We can realise that people are flawed, which takes the weight away, and has less power over us.
Critique yourself with kindness
With a gentle hand, it may be a good idea to take what others say and see if there is any truth in it. Try to sidestep the emotions attached to a comment or action, and then think about it logically.
Have I gained weight unexpectedly?
Have I been bad with my money/work?
Ask yourself hard questions and if there’s any truth, deal with it. Don’t blame yourself or beat yourself up, just hold yourself accountable and make a plan to make a change.
All with kindness, wholeheartedness, authenticity, and honesty.
Remember, the only real reason that we have a deeply emotional reaction to what someone has said about us is because we fear that it’s true.
With this view, we take emotions out of it, take the person out of it, and just look at the problem honestly and find a fix where necessary. This takes the weight away and the power it had over us.
Self-worth and self-power
At the end of the day, if you ensure that you have a sense of self-worth, then you won’t let others determine your worth for you. You won’t put your worthiness up for debate or trial in front of others.
The same goes for your power. It should always be in your hands. With self-worth and self-confidence, you know who you are and you’re stable in that belief. Words and actions may shake you, but they never take all your power away.
Practice self-worth and you won’t give power to what others think too often. You are the sole authority when it comes to who you are.
Conclusion
If you want to be someone who doesn’t care what others think, then you need to practice taking their power over you away. That’s the key. All of us care what others think, which stops us from being reckless or lazy or whatever else, and this is good. But caring too much can paralyse you.
Instead, we must learn to think objectively, change points of view, find any truths, and dismiss the rest. All while holding onto our self-worth and never giving anyone else the power to determine who we are.
Bonus tip!
*Note down what things make you feel a negative emotional reaction. This is a key indicator of insecurities within you and emotional wounds that you can work on for yourself.
If you need any help in bettering your mental health, or better coping with anxiety, depression, and stress, then my book “You’re As Mad As I Am” may be for you. Check it out here, and download a free sample to see what it’s all about.
If you want to hire me to write about mental health (or other), then don’t hesitate to get in touch!
June 25, 2019
Video: I’m SO Grateful!
I’m so grateful to all of my readers, watchers, and listeners! Your loyalty and attention means the absolute world to me. I will continue to bring you value for as long as I can!
Click to play!
Don’t forget to subscribe to my YouTube channel to get my videos. And, of course, follow my site, like, comment and stay tuned for more.
I’m so grateful to you all!
June 24, 2019
Introducing “Mindset Managed”
As you may begin to notice, I have started using the phrase “Mindset Managed“. This isn’t random, or just a slogan I’m trying out, it is now the name of my brand, my content, my crew!
Mindset Managed
I thought of it because of “Mischief Managed” from Harry Potter and the fact that I believe everything in life comes down to your mindset. Who you are, what you do, what you believe, what you say, how you feel; it all comes from your mind.
For some time now, I’ve been thinking about rebranding my content. I started asking myself, who am I? What is my message? Why am I trying to help people? What do I bring to them each week?
And the answer I got was this: Inspiration.
Inspiration to look after yourself in new ways. Inspiration to get to know yourself from the inside. Inspiration to look at and tackle life differently. To think differently.
And this led me to think that I’m inspiring people to change their mind; shape their mindset.
And so, Mindset Managed was born.
Inspiration to think differently and change your mindset with a little magic!
Where to find Mindset Managed:
(Also available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and other podcast platforms)
I hope you enjoy my content across all these mediums! Let me know if you can do anything to bring more value to you all.
Welcome to the Mindset Managed Crew
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Introducing The Life Gunk Journaling Workbook
It’s here everyone! My FREE downloadable workbook to help you be more self-aware and witness emotional wounds:
The “Life Gunk” Journaling Workbook
This workbook leads you on a journey through your inner world. Through the murky, dark, cold, sticky parts of your emotional wounds, your psychological foundations, and your limiting beliefs.
This workbook is a gentle journal prompts book that helps you to better understand:
Emotional Scars
Your Inner Voice
Your Belief system
Self-Worth
Confidence
Ideal Self
Emotional Triggers
And more!
We at Mindset Managed (with me S. R. Crawford), we believe that emotional freedom is through a three-step process: Self-Awareness, Self-Knowledge, Self-Management.
If you can witness your inner world, you can understand it. If you understand it, you can manage it!
This workbook is a step towards that…
Download and get working on your inner world:
Podcast: Why You Need to Journal (gift announced!)
Journaling can change your life! It is a brilliant life tool to have at the ready for introspection and awareness. Here at Mindset Managed, we believe that there is a three-step process to emotional freedom: self-awareness, self-knowledge, self-management.
Journaling helps us to accomplish this.
Click to play!
https://srcrawfordauthor.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/why-you-need-to-journal-gift-announced.mp3
How Journaling Can Change Your Life (gift inside!)
*Read to the end for a special surprise!*
Journaling has changed my life! It is now a regular practice to get my thoughts out on paper, but it is also how I work through emotions and tough situations.
Journaling is not “Dear Diary…” at all; instead, it is how we can get to know ourselves, understand life, and gain a connection to the universe.
Here is how journaling can change your life…
Emotional health
Journaling is a key component in developing good emotional health. This means that your emotions aren’t continually negative, erratic, or controlling you. Emotional Intelligence is all about understanding, witnessing, and dealing with emotions in a healthy way.
The exercises they give you to develop better emotional intelligence nearly always tell you to write things down! This is what journalling can do for you. You regularly capture emotions, emotional reactions, and the thoughts and situations that go with them to then better understand what’s going on inside of you.
Mental Health
In a similar way, journaling helps with our mental health because it helps us to do two things. One, we can organise our thoughts. And two, we can bring thoughts into the real world.
I know that I am someone who can be driven to the edge by overthinking. With journaling, I am able to take my thoughts out of my head so that they can’t do me any harm. From there, I can work through the thoughts and 9 times out of 10, I can see that they aren’t serving me and so I rewrite them into something helpful and true instead.
This mental decluttering is great for a sense of mental wellness. It is a great stress reliever!
Spiritual health
I am trying to become a more spiritual person; someone who looks within and searches the soul and the universe for answers. Journaling is a brilliant way to do this, as you can write out questions and you often end up answering them yourself.
This is because you’re in tune with your spirit and a greater source (name it what you like; I like “universe“).
Growth & Self-Development
Journaling is a key tool for mindset shifting. You work out where your mind is at and then work on changing it. It also helps with organisation and chasing goals. Many people use journaling for visualisation practices to help them manifest their ideal self and life. This is the “act as if” idea or Law of Attraction.
Healthy Routine
Journaling is a healthy routine activity for a lot of people. It is a way to clear your head at the beginning or end of each day. Some people call these “Morning Pages“, where you write in your journal Stream of Consciousness style and see what comes up when you’re in flow.
This is a great practice for writers, too. It flexes that writing muscle, gives you insights into your mind (always good for inspiration for characters), and it helps you to articulate yourself better, too.
De-Gunk
I like the phrase “Life Gunk” to describe the baggage, the emotional wounds, the psychological foundations, the trauma, the experiences, the past build-up that has left footprints in your mind and your spirit over time. This stuff, when left unattended, can grow and fester and create a very dark, cold space inside you.
I now have a Life Gunk Journal where I work through these dark spaces inside of me. The heavy stuff, the hard stuff, and the ugly stuff. Insecurities, limiting beliefs, things I haven’t forgiven, and lies I told myself.
It all needs to go but it can only go when worked through and replaced with beautiful, new beliefs. Journaling helps us to do that.
(Continue with this post for a free tool to help you do this too…)
Introspection & Understanding
Understanding yourself, situations, other people, the universe, what you want, and everything in-between. Learning about yourself. Reflecting. Digging deep. Many people don’t do this and in doing so, they are robbing themselves of the opportunity to gain empowerment, self-trust, confidence, authenticity, and self-control.
With a journaling practice, we can begin to see an accurate self-image and work on it or finally accept it. We can give ourselves power, by simply knowing who you truly are. Self-awareness is key, as I always say!
Do you know yourself? Because I don’t think most of us really do…
Journaling can be your ticket to self-knowledge, good health, strength, understanding, self-control, clarity, better decision-making, better writing ability, truth, and mental and emotional freedom.
Do not dismiss it…
***
I have a special surprise for you! I have created a “Life Gunk” Journaling Workbook for you to download for free!
Life Gunk Journaling workbook (Click to download!)
It will help you to get into journaling by working through tough emotions and thoughts with a helpful, friendly guide. I’ve used questions that I’ve worked on myself so I know they work!
Download it now, print it off, and fill it out!
(I didn’t want you to be able to type in it because I believe we are freer with our thoughts when hand writing things. Plus, typing it out gives us the option to self-edit which isn’t helpful for this kind of exercise! So, print it out or use it as a guide as you write in your own journal).
*Also, you don’t need to print the front cover! Save your ink (as you don’t need to see my face) and just custom print the other pages*
Good luck and let me know what you thought of it. I’d love to keep providing you all with useful tools to help you grow.
How Journaling Can Change Your Life
*Read to the end for a special surprise!*
Journaling has changed my life! It is now a regular practice to get my thoughts out on paper, but it is also how I work through emotions and tough situations.
Journaling is not “Dear Diary…” at all; instead, it is how we can get to know ourselves, understand life, and gain a connection to the universe.
Here is how journaling can change your life…
Emotional health
Journaling is a key component in developing good emotional health. This means that your emotions aren’t continually negative, erratic, or controlling you. Emotional Intelligence is all about understanding, witnessing, and dealing with emotions in a healthy way.
The exercises they give you to develop better emotional intelligence nearly always tell you to write things down! This is what journalling can do for you. You regularly capture emotions, emotional reactions, and the thoughts and situations that go with them to then better understand what’s going on inside of you.
Mental Health
In a similar way, journaling helps with our mental health because it helps us to do two things. One, we can organise our thoughts. And two, we can bring thoughts into the real world.
I know that I am someone who can be driven to the edge by overthinking. With journaling, I am able to take my thoughts out of my head so that they can’t do me any harm. From there, I can work through the thoughts and 9 times out of 10, I can see that they aren’t serving me and so I rewrite them into something helpful and true instead.
This mental decluttering is great for a sense of mental wellness. It is a great stress reliever!
Spiritual health
I am trying to become a more spiritual person; someone who looks within and searches the soul and the universe for answers. Journaling is a brilliant way to do this, as you can write out questions and you often end up answering them yourself.
This is because you’re in tune with your spirit and a greater source (name it what you like; I like “universe“).
Growth & Self-Development
Journaling is a key tool for mindset shifting. You work out where your mind is at and then work on changing it. It also helps with organisation and chasing goals. Many people use journaling for visualisation practices to help them manifest their ideal self and life. This is the “act as if” idea or Law of Attraction.
Healthy Routine
Journaling is a healthy routine activity for a lot of people. It is a way to clear your head at the beginning or end of each day. Some people call these “Morning Pages“, where you write in your journal Stream of Consciousness style and see what comes up when you’re in flow.
This is a great practice for writers, too. It flexes that writing muscle, gives you insights into your mind (always good for inspiration for characters), and it helps you to articulate yourself better, too.
De-Gunk
I like the phrase “Life Gunk” to describe the baggage, the emotional wounds, the psychological foundations, the trauma, the experiences, the past build-up that has left footprints in your mind and your spirit over time. This stuff, when left unattended, can grow and fester and create a very dark, cold space inside you.
I now have a Life Gunk Journal where I work through these dark spaces inside of me. The heavy stuff, the hard stuff, and the ugly stuff. Insecurities, limiting beliefs, things I haven’t forgiven, and lies I told myself.
It all needs to go but it can only go when worked through and replaced with beautiful, new beliefs. Journaling helps us to do that.
(Continue with this post for a free tool to help you do this too…)
Introspection & Understanding
Understanding yourself, situations, other people, the universe, what you want, and everything in-between. Learning about yourself. Reflecting. Digging deep. Many people don’t do this and in doing so, they are robbing themselves of the opportunity to gain empowerment, self-trust, confidence, authenticity, and self-control.
With a journaling practice, we can begin to see an accurate self-image and work on it or finally accept it. We can give ourselves power, by simply knowing who you truly are. Self-awareness is key, as I always say!
Do you know yourself? Because I don’t think most of us really do…
Journaling can be your ticket to self-knowledge, good health, strength, understanding, self-control, clarity, better decision-making, better writing ability, truth, and mental and emotional freedom.
Do not dismiss it…
***
I have a special surprise for you! I have created a “Life Gunk” Journaling Workbook for you to download for free!
Life Gunk Journaling workbook (Click to download!)
It will help you to get into journaling by working through tough emotions and thoughts with a helpful, friendly guide. I’ve used questions that I’ve worked on myself so I know they work!
Download it now, print it off, and fill it out!
(I didn’t want you to be able to type in it because I believe we are freer with our thoughts when hand writing things. Plus, typing it out gives us the option to self-edit which isn’t helpful for this kind of exercise! So, print it out or use it as a guide as you write in your own journal).
*Also, you don’t need to print the front cover! Save your ink (as you don’t need to see my face) and just custom print the other pages*
Good luck and let me know what you thought of it. I’d love to keep providing you all with useful tools to help you grow.
