Don’t Know Your Healthy-Best-Self? This Can Be Dangerous!

Tom was certain he was not a smart guy. He just didn’t seem to think as fast as other people. The truth was that Tom had never given his brain a chance to find out what it could do. He barely got by at school and he had no interests outside of watching endless TV or playing video games. Current brain research, however is on Tom’s side. 

New studies show that his brain can make important changes. So can yours. Depending on the experiences you give your brain, it can rewire itself. This is called “neuroplasticity.” Just think, you can program and reprogram yourself with every choice you make! What does this mean for you?

Understanding the amazing power of your brain to change gives hope that it’s never too late to change. It’s never too late to discover your true identity as a unique person with special gifts and a healthy-best-real-self. Your healthy-best-real-self is the authentic, honest, compassionate, and curious part of you that sees reality clearly and is a problem-solver.  

When you operate from this part of you, you have a strong core, or personal identity, and you can set good boundaries. You are willing to take reasonable risks that lead to personal growth. Your life reflects balance and joyfulness. You don’t compare yourself to others. Instead, you strive for excellence, not as a perfectionist, but from your personal best. Here’s the best news of all! 

When you express your health-best-real-self and operate from your unique area of giftedness, you are the healthiest, most successful, and joyful. Gallup, a major assessment firm, even suggests that when you operate from your gifts, almost every one of your performances will be superior quality. If not. . . 

In contrast, failure to know and use your gifts, constantly forces you to function in a part of your brain where you are less gifted. This can be hard work that requires a greater expenditure of energy. PET scans show that your brain may be working 100 times harder when you are using skills outside of your natural giftedness! This is a dangerous situation that can cause you to feel confused, tired, and unfocused. It can hide the best of who you are, undermining your confidence, self-esteem, and sense of self-worth. There are other problems. 

As a result of overworking your brain because you are operating outside of you gifts, you may experience a lowered immune system or difficulties with your memory. Do you think you have a bad memory? Consider that you may have trouble with your memory simply because stress is causing the release of the stress related hormone cortisol that puts holes in your memory. It can turn it into Swiss cheese. So, here are some questions for you:  

• Have the struggles of life and difficult circumstances led you to make unwise choices so that now you  are uncertain about who you really are?
• Do you sometimes feel as if life is a prison that robs you of your freedom and keeps you from discovering  who you really are? 
• Are the treasures of giftedness and a healthy-best-real-self buried under stress, fear, fatigue,  pain, addiction, anxiety, and depression?
• Do you live with so much stress that problems have become the focus of your life. Have overcoming problems and just getting through the day and become your “purpose?”
• Are you on a deadly merry-go-round living without meaning and purpose in your life?
• Do you feel stuck? 

The danger here is that focusing on problems and difficulties leads to more issues and to self-defeat. It’s the law of sowing and reaping, “Whatever you focus on gets you more of the same.”

You can find a challenge and a meaningful purpose that flow from your giftedness and from the best of who you are.  Yes, this may take effort, but think of this as short-term pain that leads to long-term gain. 

For you, for Tom, and for anyone who is willing to make the effort, it’s never too late to discover the best of who you are. You can change, and become the person you were meant to be. *** You are programming yourself with every choice you make. *** Why not wake up, take responsibility for your choices, and make some healthy changes?

The Choice-Cube Method, found in the innovative self-help book, Become the Person You Were Meant to Be – The Choice-Cube Method: Step by Step to Choice and Change, (http://amzn.to/ZGnDKc) can provide you with self-understanding, tools, and four dependable steps to help you stay aware, give you choice, and help you change. 

You Can Retrain Your Brain To Use Your Innate Talents and Strengths...Start Today!

THE BRAIN REWIRES ITSELF CONSTANTLY

Current brain research shows that your brain is capable of rewiring itself based on your experiences. Understanding this concept of “neuroplasticity” can give you hope that it’s never too late to change what you are experiencing. It’s never too late to discover your true identity as a gifted and healthy-best-real-self. It’s never too late to find a meaningful purpose for your life. 

DO YOU OPERATE FROM YOUR STRENGTHS?

LIke all humans, you will be the healthiest, joyful, and most successful when you operate from your unique area of giftedness. Failure to know and use your gifts forces you to function in a brain quadrant that is not your gift and requires greater expenditure of energy. PET scans show that your brain may need to work 100 times harder when you are using skills outside of your natural talents and strengths.

YOU'LL HAVE PROBLEMS IF YOU DON'T 

This is stressful and can lead to fatigue, a lowered immune system, and trouble with your memory as a result of stress related cortisol release. Often there is a tendency to isolate and self-medicate. Ignoring your areas of talent and your strengths can undermine your confidence, self-esteem, and sense of self-worth. It can hide away the best of who you are—your healthy-best-real-self. 

TAKE A LOOK AT YOUR HEALTHY-BEST-REAL-SELF

Your healthy-best-real-self is the authentic, honest, compas­sionate, and curious part of you that sees reality clearly and is a problem-solver. When you express your healthy self, you set good boundaries with others but can also be intimate. You strive for excellence, not as a perfectionist, but from your personal best. Your life reflects balance and joyfulness. You want to make a positive difference in the world.

WHY SUCH LOSSES?

You may have these two treasures of giftedness and a healthy-best-real-self buried under stress, fear, fatigue, pain, addiction, anxiety, and depression. Difficult circumstances and the struggles of life may have led to unwise choices so that now you feel stuck, unable to break free. Life may feel like a prison that robs you of your freedom and keeps you from discovering who you really are. 

Problems may have become the focus of your life. Perhaps you find yourself on a deadly merry-go-round where just getting through the day and overcoming problems have become your “purpose.” The danger is that focusing on problems and difficulties leads to more issues and to self-defeat. Remember, whatever you focus on gets you more of the same. It’s time to change your focus and become your own best friend instead of your your own worst enemy. 

A FIRST STEP

Consider finding a challenge and a meaningful purpose in life that flows from your innate talents and strengths and from the best of who you are—your healthy best real self. Yes, this may take effort, but think of this as short-term pain that leads to long-term gain. It’s never too late. 

Using the Choice-Cube Method for Choice and Change can help clear away blockages that hide your talents and strengths. You can discover your healthy, best-real-self.

Check out Become the Person You Were Meant to Be - The Choice-Cube Method: Step by Step to Choice and Change on Amazon http://amzn.to/n0ztzX, Barnes&Noble http://bit.ly/16F3Dhi,  and IndieBound http://bit.ly/ZoTPsk

4 Steps You Can Take Right Now To Change Your Life

Are you feeling stuck? Do you want to make some changes? You may feel conflicted, uncertain, or unequipped to make changes. You may even have felt this way for a while. But there is a way out. It's not complicated either. If you want to make changes to your life take the following 4 steps of the Choice-Cube Method. They can make a world of difference. But there's a secret. The four steps won't change you.

THE SECRET TO CHANGE     Guess what will... Truth and compassion * Yes, ultimately in all situations, it is not tools, techniques or steps, but truth and compassion that bring genuine change and healing.

BUT FIRST! Before you begin to use the Choice-Cube Method's tools and 4 steps for choice and change, I would like you to do two things. First, get an idea--a vision--of the best of who you are. Second, take the Choice-Cube Assessment Quiz  to find out how your body, emotions, mind and will/desires may be blocking you and holding you back from becoming who you were meant to be. Now, take a look at the Choice-Cube Method

THE CHOICE-CUBE METHOD'S 4 STEPS FOR TRUTH AND COMPASSION, CHOICE AND CHANGE   Step 1 - Body: Pay attention. Stay aware. Be an objective observer of your thoughts, feelings and behaviors. What truth is your body trying to tell you? If you feel stressed, have some tools on hand to help you manage your stress and move on to Step 2.

Step 2 - Emotions: Don't be afraind to know the truth of what you feel. Allow yourself to feel your emotions and label them. You do not have to act on them. Emotions are signals from your body that tell you to pay attention and decide if what you are doing, or what is being done to you, is helpful or harmful. If you don't have tools to interrupt negative emotions and replace them, learn some. Then use them. Emotions can enrich your life if you know how to manage them well.

Step 3 - Mind: If you manage your stress and negative emotions it's time to look for the meaning you are attaching to the person, thing, action or problem that is upssetting you. Now is the time to look at yourself and see what needs to change within you. Be honest and patient with yourself  and others. Can you you stop focusing on something or someone outside of you that you think is the problem? Are you willing to take responsibility for your part in the problem? If so, you give yourself choice.

When you can see the problem and the meaning you attach; if you take responsibility for what you think, feel, want, and do; you can see the problem but also look for your options and strengths. When you can see both, try to seesaw between the two until you are ready to choose which one you prefer to focus on. This choice is critical because whatever you focus on will result in more of the same. Your focus will cause you to see what you are already looking for! This causes the formation of new mental and behavioral habits, healthy and harmful. 

Step 4 - Will/Desires:  Now, if you have managed your stress, negative emotions, and the meaning you attach--Steps 1 through 3--you can stop trying to avoid or control everything inappropriately. You can do something different. You can make changes and take action to resolve issues win-win--so that you and others feel fairly dealt with. You can replace the negative and act on the positive.

These four steps are the steps of the Choice-Cube Method for choice and change found in Become the Person You Were Meant to Be. In addition to the four steps, the book also provides a mental framework for self-understanding and tools for choice and change. Once you learn the steps and tools you can use them over and over to find immediate relief in the present and to make long-term lasting changes.

*Truth is defined here as a relatively realistic and complete picture of yourself, others, and the situation.Compassion is defined as consciousness of others’ and your own distress with a desire to alleviate it.

Does Your Body Hijack Your Mind?

When Jack feels upset, he tries to figure out what’s going on. Sometimes, he can, but more often he can’t find the answer. Janice in contrast, doesn’t even try to understand what’s happening. She just looks for someone to criticize or blame. 

Tom simply is not interested in trying to understand. He thinks that if he just forges ahead and works harder and harder, things have to get better. But usually they don’t.

These are all examples of people caught up in efforts to control people, things, actions, and problems.  

At the other extreme, are the people who try to avoid difficulties. Fran, for example, escapes her problems by getting high. Jack stuffs his thoughts and feelings about the problem, while Alice collapses, submits to the problem, and wallows in it. 

We have failed to understand and manage the overwhelming power of our body and emotions to hijack our mind and negatively influence our everyday life.  

Instead, for years, our efforts to help people with problems have focused on changing how they think—on their minds. We have ignored the role the body plays in driving us to avoid or control things that make us uncomfortable or threaten us in some other way. 

Why would we prefer to focus on the mind? Because honestly confronting our stress and emotions can be uncomfortable, even painful. In fact, we often choose to feel stuck and unable to change rather than deal directly and honestly with stress and negative emotions. 

This is dangerous. When we refuse to consciously and appropriately[1] manage stress and our emotions two things happen. First, stress and our emotions lock in warped and distorted thinking. Second, they hide the whole truth—the big picture--from us.

We then tend to use the avoid/control survival strategies, mentioned above, to keep stress and negative emotions from overwhelming us. The problem is that each time we repeat an old strategy, we strengthen it and create habit patterns of negative beliefs, reactions, and dysfunctional behaviors. 

Like Jack, Janice, and Alice, we reach for old, familiar strategies that prevent healthy resolution of issues. We strengthen the stress and negative emotions attached to them and create habit patterns that we mindlessly repeat and reinforce through repetition. 

It’s time to awaken to the role the body plays in what we think, feel, want, and do. It’s time to learn how to manage our stress and emotions moment-to-moment, instead of allowing stress and negative emotions to take over and control us. 

A first step is stress management training. This approach makes us aware of our body and often enables us to stay present in the moment. Body awareness and knowing how to use our mind to stay present is foundational. But there’s more, much more. 

Can you imagine a dependable method for choice and change that provides a simple framework to help you immediately recognize and label stress and negative emotions; tools that equip you to make wise choices and changes; and 4 steps to guide that change? 

Such a method would create an internal sense of safety as follows. I can trust the framework to help me recognize my stress and negative emotions, I can use the tools to help me take responsibility and make wise choices and changes. I can follow these 4 steps and do something different that leads to positive action.

The framework, tools, and 4 steps are like a tool kit that keeps you moving through problems and difficulties to a win-win resolution of them. 

When you can recognize your reactions and take responsibility for them, hopefully you have some simple tools to help you manage them. The tools should help you let go of crazy, hurtful thoughts--distorted information—and the emotions attached to those thoughts. 

Both the thoughts and the emotions--energy in motion--are embedded in the nervous system of your mind and body. It’s this distorted information and energy and that create the stress and negative emotions in the first place.

I would like to offer you the Choice-Cube® Method framework, tools and 4 steps to help you move through confusion, anxiety, anger, shame, and feeling overwhelmed to honesty and compassion for others and yourself. 

Would you like to learn how to use the framework, tools, and 4 steps in your life? They are found in, Become the Person You Were Meant to Be - The Choice-Cube Method:  Step by Step to Choice and Change, by Dr. Beth Blevins Cujé. You can learn more about the method and sign up for a free copy of the first chapter of Dr. Cujé’s book. Just click here:  http://www.choicecube.com.

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[1]  “Appropriately” means managing our stress and emotions without hurting ourselves or others.

Take The Edge Off Aging

Frank, a handsome, athletic man in his early 50’s felt old. He didn’t seem to have the same energy and drive he had when he was younger. His kids teased him about losing his hair and he had put on twenty pounds. He felt out of shape and unattractive. 

The “story,” or “meaning attached” by Frank to aging, was negative and only part of reality. He was dwelling on his losses and living with a one-sided negative story. 

Even worse, he was telling himself that his wife of twenty-five years was still beautiful and sexy and that she was losing interest in him. He was so focused on his losses--the negative side of reality--that he had lost track of his strengths and options. His self-talk was making him feel worse and worse and he didn’t even realize it.

 Frank's negative story had taken over his life, and he was in a downward spiral.

Let’s imagine that Frank continues this way. He gives up and continues to focus on his losses, including the loss of his athletic youthfulness and physique. Oh, don’t forget his hair. He may ignore how stressed he feels and continue to stew in regret. He may dwell on his anger, and his fear that his wife will reject him. Then to make himself temporarily feel better, he may drink a little more, hang out at Hooters, flirt with the new girl at work, or buy a “muscle” car.

These behaviors can give him a temporary lift, but none of these strategies get to the root of his problem--the story he is telling himself. In fact, they may make things worse.

If Frank continues to focus on his losses, his anger, fear, and regret, it’s likely that he will create situations that cause the very thing he fears to become more and more real. As a result, he will become increasingly stuck and unable to change.

What can Frank do instead? The answer is not to pump himself up trying to be positive. The answer is to see reality clearly—the big picture--and have the tools to choose whether he wants to continue to focus on the negative side of reality or to shift his focus to the positive side of reality.

Once he makes up his mind that he’s ready to change, there are many ways to do this. One such way is the Choice-Cube® Method, a new, time-tested, step-by-step system for choice and change. This approach would give Frank a mental checklist, simple tools, and 4 steps that work together in a logical, but compassionate way to help Frank manage his thoughts, feelings, and behaviors.

If Frank wakes up and admits that he’s in a bad place, he can use the method to change his focus and the story he’s telling himself. He can get his thinking brain and his emotional brain to work together and find the freedom to make wise choices and changes. This approach can be found in Become the Person You Were Meant to Be – The Choice-Cube Method:  Step by Step to Choice and Change.

Let’s imagine that Frank challenges the negative meaning he’s attaching to aging and takes a more positive focus. Let’s assume that he uses the Choice-Cube to tools to stop his current story cold and do something different. What would be the results?

Perhaps he would stop being a couch potato and drink less so he could lose some weight. He might go back to work on that antique car in the garage or write words to the rock-and-roll tune that keeps running though his head. Frank needs a challenge in his life.

Regarding his wife, maybe he could start going to the gym with is her or find some other interest outside of work that they could share to put some excitement back in their lives. He could make an effort to spend more alone time with her so they could know and appreciate each other on a deeper level.

So, how does Frank uncover and change those meanings—his story?  The way to do this is always the same. First, he needs to stand back and objectively look at what going on inside of him. He needs to become a “conscious observer” of how he reacts and the meanings he attaches to his wife, aging, his losses, and his life in general. Obviously, he can’t change what he’s not aware of.

Equally as importantly, he can use the tools and 4 steps to expose and change the inward reactions of his body (stress), emotions, the thoughts and pictures in his mind, and his will/desires. The emphasis is on Frank’s inward reactions because in the end, no matter what he tries to change, behaviors or beliefs, his four inward reactions will have to change.

Note: Will/desire is a little tricky because Frank has only three choices. He can want to: (1) avoid or (2) control a person (including himself), a thing, action, or problem. Or he can want to get to the root of the problem with honesty and compassion and  (3) resolve an issue—“win-win”--everyone feels they get a fair deal. What he wants—his will/desires--determines what he does.

The benefits of changing inward reactions are huge! Let’s imagine that Frank decides to take responsibility for his thoughts, feelings, and behaviors and becomes a conscious observer. At first, he will probably be uncomfortable, maybe sad, angry, or feel shame. But he won’t be stuck!

He can use the tools and 4 steps to change his inward reactions and get immediate relief from painful thoughts and emotions. He can let go of feelings such as fear, anger, shame, and feeling overwhelmed and numb. Then instead of doing the same old thing with the same results, he can choose to do something different.

Now, he can get to the whole truth of his situation.  (The truth includes not only his losses, but also his strengths, options and possibilities.)  This allows him to shift his focus and the meanings he’s attaching, He can begin to choose how he wants to handle himself and his situation. This is life-changing!

You can have the same freedom of choice. You can change your story. You can stop focusing on your losses and difficulties. You can start focusing on your options, strengths, and possibilities and choose different behaviors. Staying aware and changing your inward reactions will give you choice, and freedom of choice opens the door to change.

You can stop being your worst enemy and begin to be your best friend. Furthermore, when  repeatedly change all four inward reactions, you can change yourself in ways you never imagined. And your changes will last!

Frank is at a critical choice point in his life. Will he take the easy way of “short-term relief/gain but long-term pain?” Or will he screw up his courage and go for “short-term pain but long-term gain?” What about you?

How can the Choice-Cube Method help? Using the tools to take the following 4 steps of the Choice-Cube Method can help you change your four inward reactions.

Step 1:RECOGNIZE - Focus on your body and use the Choice-Cube tools to manage your stress.

tep 2:INTERRUPT/RELEASE - Label your emotions and use the Choice-Cube tools to let go of those emotions safely and appropriately. (Your emotions lock in limited and distorted thinking. So, after you use the tools to release your emotions appropriately, you will see both the negative and positive sides of reality more clearly.)

Step 3:  REFOCUS - In your mind, Look at both sides of reality. Imagine holding one on your left side and one on your right side. Now, seesaw between the two until you can choose which side you want to focus on, negative or positive. Then use the Choice-Cube tools to help you make the healthy choice. Remember, this is an important choice, because, whatever you choose will get you more of the same!

Step 4:  REPLACE/ACT - Once you have managed your body (stress), your negative emotions, thoughts and pictures, you can direct your will/desires. You can choose what you want to do. Do you want to do something fresh and different and resolve the situation “win-win,” Or do you want to repeat the same old inward reactions trying to control or avoid the person, thing, action, or problem inappropriately. Be as specific and detailed as possible.

To help you get a handle on your inward reactions: body, emotions, mind, and will, you can take the Choice-Cube Profile on my website www.choicecube.com. To learn how to use the Choice-Cube tools or gain a deeper understanding of the method, check out my book, Become the Person You Were Meant to Be - The Choice-Cube Method. Click here  http://amzn.to/Xw2YMZ.