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Inspirational people, Paul De Gelder, a Shark attack survivor who has overcome horrific injuries to resume.

After a vicious shark attack in 2009 left Paul requiring Amputation of his right leg and right forearm he has overcome adversity to the triumphant. What is truly amazing is Paul’s belief in himself and mental strength which she attributes to his military training.

After being discharged from the hospital two months after the attack, Paul had to rebuild his life by learning how to walk and reestablish the life he once had. While many people could easily succumb to depression, Paul overcame the initial negative feelings and thoughts of how he could possibly resume his life as it once existed.

The pivotal moment was the realisation that no matter how he felt about the situation, at the end of the day he would still be without limbs. While facing his own mortality and not being held back by the fear of death, it gave him a sense of freedom. This gave him the strength to cease taking the painkilling medication and prepare himself both the mentally and physically, it’s about leaving your comfort zone.

What is truly inspirational is Paul taking control and not dwelling on a medical negative aspects of the situation. Like many people negativity can quickly spiral out of control and fortunately Paul acknowledged the lethalness off negative thinking at an early stage. It was all about not giving up and not seeing failure as an option but rather holding onto his goals and keep trying no matter what. As Paul said it was easy to say but hard to do.

After starting his own rehabilitation with very intense physical training and setting small goals of how far he would walk or how many stairs he would climb. This echoes the best strategy in achieving those big hairy audacious goals, those goals that seem insurmountable at the time that are achievable when broken down into small pieces. As Paul’s goal was to walk eventually, his immediate goal wasn’t to walk but rather a mini goal of moving so far.

We all have these negative little voices saying he can’t perform if it’s too hard, I can’t be bothered Paul had positive thoughts of not giving up and being stronger.

While there are those moments of remorse and questioning that moment with the shark he turns this around just as quickly and looks at the situation more philosophically that there are many other opportunities in his life we made being impaired or killed such as his motor bike riding or being deployed to work in Afghanistan as a clearance diver.

While it may be in the case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time the overall experience made him stronger and to perform at a higher level than he may otherwise have. Paul goes on to say about the mind being like a hammer, that can push a person far beyond what their own expectations are. So rather than focusing on what is happening, it’s more about focusing on the outcome, about having the right attitude to overcome these hurdles placed infront of you.

The once invincible athlete Tigers Woods has his lost belief on both a professional and personal level.

Currently ranked 7th, while this is a truly awesome effort, for someone who was number 1 for 11 years, only missing out in 2004, one can hypothesise what lead to the current situation. Ultimately it’s all about your belief system.

Tiger’s belief system was constantly reinforced with daily affirmations made 3 times per day:

I will my own destiny
I believe in me
I smile at obstacles
I am firm in my resolve
I fufill my resolutions powerfully
My strength is great
I stick to it easily, naturally
My will moves mountains

So with 623 weeks at number one and Tiger’s nearest rival, Greg Norman at under half with 331 weeks, what went wrong?
Well Tigers extremely risky behavior was of a person who believed no matter what they did, they would succeed, even if this was of an unacceptable nature.

Tigers affirmation’s gave an indication of his resolve, that no matter what the situation, he cannot be beaten. Think about a time in your life when everything you did was perfect, no matter what you did, I liken it to playing a game of billiards. There have been times when no matter how I held the pool cue, the ball always went in. However once you lose your confidence, the situation can quickly change and the negative thoughts and self belief quickly spirals out of control.

Once you lose your belief, you lose that road map that shows you the way to your goals, it can be difficult to get back on the path.
At some point we all confront this situation, while some can prevail above the uncertainty, some never quite recover.

Your goal may be weight loss but once you lose that belief in achieving the goal, you can quickly lose your way. If you have changed your belief system, you need to change your mind set.

When people talk about their emotional drivers behind the urge to go shopping, we could have just as easily substituted the word eating.

We often find ourselves as emotional eaters or frequent shoppers which when we have a closer look shows 2 distinct parallels.

A lot of socialising is associated with catching up at cafés and eating, and when we catching up with our friends will often meet at a café will come around to our house and have a tea or coffee with cake.
Quite often shopping is also a social event to catch up with friends.

Shopping can make ourselves feel better, to feel better about ourselves and to reward ourselves.

So before we know we have created that downward cycle of needing that hit of excitement which quickly dissipates once these items are in taken home.

Then we may experience buyers remorse as to why you spent the money on these unnecessary purchases when your wardrobe is full of clothes. Similarly you may go out and eat plenty of yummy food which may not necessarily be healthy for you.

Some time passes and your purchases or what you have consumed is forgotten and you get into that downward spiral of feeling down or needing a lift so you go shopping again or o buy some food.

Like any habit that we are trying to break and introduce healthier habits, we need to find the underlining driver behind our behavior.
But first we need to acknowledge that our behavior is a be added control or not manageable or more importantly acting on our house or our financial position.

So we really need to take ownership and identify how much we are actually spending on shopping or alternatively what and how much we eating per day so we can actually quantify the effects of our behavior. This is the first step in bringing about change.

Once we have reprogrammed our minds, we achieve success:))

When people say it’s too difficult to quit smoking, I often wonder whether the person is consciously and more importantly unconsciously ready to take the next step. After talking to the owner of a local restaurant, she decided to quit smoking after 25 years of smoking one packet a day.

So the restaurant owner, lets call her “H” commented that the first 24 hours were extremely difficult with the regular withdrawal symptoms being experienced however once the discomfort passed she managed quite comfortably to maintain being smoke free. Whenever we set ourselves goals, be it giving up cigarettes or weight loss, we really need to be happy within our own life both emotionally and physically to undertake the change.

People trying to achieve the goals with everything in life is moving in the right direction, life is good, they find it easy, nothing is too hard and everything is very positive and bright. However once the situation around and the person is stressed, suffering from anxiety or the pressures of life, suddenly achieving the goal is impossible. Suddenly everything becomes too difficult, too hard and the energy and time involved to achieve a specific goal becomes unattainable.

The amazing thing is that since quitting smoking, H is looking fantastic and has become more physically active, she sold her motorbike and purchased a bicycle that she commutes with up to 30km per day. H looks a lot healthier and her complexion is noticeably improved with more vibrancy and energy.

The single most important factor in achieving this goal was that H was ready and everything in her life was aligned in a more positive light.

But often we will set goals for the wrong reason, in many cases people make peacemaking due to convenience their partner pressure from friends and family while really the person accepts the risk of cancer and is perfectly happy to continue knowing the risks.

So when you are really at a conscious/subconscious level then anything is possible

Our busy urban lives are now being characterised by a new byproduct of our urban existence called urban stress syndrome or urban mental health syndrome.

With a reported 20% of the Australian population experiencing some form of mental disorder, our crazy lives are creating additional pressures on our mental health.

The modern lifestyle of our urban cities are creating additional stresses that impacts on our long term mental health; congested roads and public transport and the various forms of interaction we now have in the digital space, i.e. twitter, Facebook, social media, SMS, e-mails, mobile phones, we are stretching ourselves very thinly to cram everything into our day and spending more time getting from A to B.

On top of this our communities are moving from real life to cyberspace.

As our lives become increasingly busy we are becoming increasing isolated with our neighbours and family.

Whether you’re in an apartment block or living in the suburbs we are becoming more disengaged with those people around us and moving our attention to consuming digital media or interacting with online communities.

According to mental health Council of Australia getting to know your neighbors and establishing a sense of community have a very positive effect. Lacking a sense of community not only leads to sadness but has negative effects on the body’s immune system.

With time becoming a precious commodity and the stresses of everyday life increasing the chances of experiencing some form of mental health disorder.

So what can you do to reduce your urban stress?
Allow yourself an hour or two a day whereby you disconnect from the phone or internet and engage in some other form of activity.

Try:
1. Reading a book
2. Join the local sporting club all activity group
3. Go dancing
4. Check out an art gallery
5. Create new friendships
6. Get to know the neighbors
7. Play some music
8. Go for a walk around the block
9. Try yoga or some other form of meditative class
10 Once a day to do a random act of kindness, even try smiling at those people around you. It may seem like a crazy thing to do but you will feel a glowing warm fuzzy feeling afterwards.

Just remember even though we may feel pressured to perform all these tasks in a day, if we don’t the world still continues and life goes on.