When a Number is Nothing More Than a Number

Strange how a number can affect the mood. Whether it is 30, 40, 50, or some other number very often a perceived milestone birthday is a time to reassess and ask questions like ‘what have I done so far with my life?’ For some it means casting a weary eye back over times when we’ve failed or towards goals not yet achieved. The life we envisaged when an idealistic 18 or 20 year-old may seem nothing more than a taunt that spirals us into the process of shoulds. I should have done ..... I should be.... I should have by now.... And so we find ourselves facing head-on the regrets we have about our life. And yet very often we forget that a life lived without gathering regrets along the way is impossible. Worse is if we become mired in those past regrets, as it can have the effect of stultifying our present. Emotions can range from disappointment, sadness, remorse, even anger -none of them useful or helpful when it comes to our emotional or physical wellbeing.

What's Done is Done

‘Let it go’ you might have heard family or friends counsel. And while easier said than done it is possible. Begin by looking as objectively as you can at the regrets you harbour and the ensuing emotions. As you do, try to view yourself with some level of compassion while acknowledge that none of us is perfect –we all make mistakes. It’s part of living. For circumstances or events you had no control over, it’s time to let go and learn acceptance. For other times when behaviours, actions, or decisions you made hurt or negatively affected others, accept your responsibility and do what you can to make amends. Ask for forgiveness if you still have an opportunity to do so. Extend love to those closest and dearest.

As with every event, or experience there is always learning. The positive side to having regrets is what they teach us. We gain knowledge and with that knowledge we are equipped to make better choices and decisions as to how we want life to be from here on. Instead of looking back at what might have been, a milestone birthday is a chance for new beginnings, and creating new opportunities. Life might look very different from how we dreamed it at 18 but then again how many of us really knew much about life at 18?

“When one door closes, another opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us.” - Alexander Graham Bell

Is It Possible to be Happy when Unemployed?

For many the answer might be a swift ‘No, it’s not.’ And I can understand that immediate reply if like me you’re frequently checking to see what level your funds are at, and wondering if there is some magical way of making them stretch further than you know is conceivably possible. Even more so if you are someone who, up to now, has viewed being unemployed as such a complete unknown that it represents for you both fear and shame. Fear the lifestyle you became used to will change and shame that others might judge your joblessness unfairly or cruelly. For others again they will be trying to cope with a feeling of having lost a sense of self because over time they have come to see themselves as defined by their job. Losing a job for them has even bigger implications.

And yet while I can empathise with all of the above, I still think it is possible to be happy while unemployed. I certainly won’t deny money is an absolute necessity and essential in supporting our most basic needs i.e. that of eating, having a roof over our heads, and some level of security. However, according to the humanistic psychologist, Abraham Maslow,  once our basic needs are satisfied, humans will then look to others for love, affection and a sense of belonging. And neither a job or money can buy those.

However, if being happy while unemployed is too difficult a concept to come to terms with, perhaps the following might help to become a little happier.

The Practicalities

Fear has a way of paralyzing us, stunting our ability to think straight and make any decision with clarity. So, the first thing you need to do is accept what has happened. You do not have employment. This is your reality – for now. So, forget about feeling any kind of shame, there are many others just like you in the exact same position, so get up, get out, and find out about all the benefits and support that you can avail of. These are the things you must have in place in order to protect you and your family’s basic needs. Getting this in place will help by reducing your stress levels and in turn allow you focus on other things.

Reconnect with Family & Friends

If you have a family, use this time to reconnect with your partner and kids. I don’t have kids but I feel over the last while I have begun to know my nieces and nephews better than ever before. I always felt a little guilty believing they saw me as the aunt who turned up, flustered, and rushed, who always seemed to be travelling and to boot had no idea what was going on in their lives. Also, while my siblings are dealing with their own challenges around family unemployment, we’ve managed to spend time together talking about our concerns for the future and equally we’ve laughed a lot too.

When it comes to friends, generally we choose people we know will accept us – regardless of whether it’s a BMW or a Fiesta sitting outside the door. Spend as much time as you can with your friends, confide in them, trust them with your thoughts. If previously you connected over dinner parties but haven’t recently because it’s just too extravagant then why not follow the lead of my friends. We each bring a dish and a bottle of wine so no one person is left with the cost of hosting plus best of all there is less stress all round for the host with the number of chefs buzzing around in the kitchen.

Over recent times, with my finances on the floor it’s been amazing how between family and friends I’ve been to some marvellous get-togethers. All of this helps by keeping you connected with others plus it’s helps boost both morale and self-esteem.

One golden rule here: Aim to surround yourself as much as possible with as many positive people as you can.

A Time for New Growth & Development

One of the biggest contributors to unemployment depression is having the lack of routine a job provided. Most unemployed people say they dread facing another day with seemingly nothing to do. So plan your days just as if you were working. Allocate different activities to each day or part thereof. Do the things you never had the opportunity to do when working. If it’s gardening, painting the house, going to an afternoon movie with the kids – do it. But also use this time to explore whether that dream job is a viable option for you. Start doing the research. Use the library if you don’t have access to the internet, find someone who is already doing that job, and talk to them. Look for a mentor. If the job you did have is the right one for you...get better at it. Look for training courses that will keep your skills current and up to date. If there’s a cost attached...find out if you can get support to cover it. Have you got a creative side? Well, now is the time to try it out. You might also think about helping others that could well be worse off than you. Ask in your local community about volunteering. The very act of helping others can be hugely rewarding plus it can be a reminder of just how much we have ourselves.

All in all, it’s easy to fill your days, once you put a little bit of planning into it.

Networking

Being out of work is the very time that you need to connect with others in your professional network. You might not feel like doing it but it works. It doesn’t have to be the long lunches of the past; meeting over coffee is very acceptable. People know people and very often jobs come via referral. To use an Americanism, you need to get as much ‘Face Time’ as you can with others, that way you won’t be forgotten. So put on your best suit, your widest smile and work it!

A little Dose of Gratitude

Finally, I’ve often noticed others look at me quizzically when I say “But I’m lucky.” My doctor (on a fairly routine visit) said recently, “it’s ok not to be happy Carole.” But the fact is I am happy. I have family, friends, and professional colleagues that have supported and rallied round me when I needed it and I am grateful for that. I’ve had time to retrain, refocus, and discover aspects of me I didn’t have time to explore when working as I was when at full throttle. I’ve also become closer to my family. I feel I know them better now and that means a lot to me. So for me at least this time has given me a chance to recognise what’s important in my life.

So, when the economy picks up again, and it will, and I’m working flat out I know I will look back on this time with a sense of gratitude for giving me an opportunity to see that life is much more than merely a job. Mind you ..... I am looking for one!

For now, I wish you luck and good fortune in seeking employment and remember happiness is a state of mind.

Carole

Type Dynamics
Business Consultancy, Training, & Counselling Services
Tel. + 353 (0) 85 778 5615
Web: http://www.typedynamics.ie/
Email: carolesmith@typedynamics.ie

Tribalism in our Lives

Northsiders and Southsiders

Just recently, I had the fortune to bump into an acquaintance I hadn’t seen for a number of years. As we shared our history, we naturally gravitated to talking a little about our respective families. My acquaintance related a story of how her mother, an amazing woman in her early nineties with a mind as alert as ever was recently admitted into hospital. The hospital is located on the north side of Dublin and about 13 kilometres at most from the home of the woman in question whose home is on the south side of Dublin city. For those of you unfamiliar with Dublin, it’s a small city by European standards that and it is divided by the river Liffey. In the workplaces, restaurants and bars around Dublin you’ll often hear the locals ask one another, ‘Are you a Northsider or a Southsider?” and it’s usually followed by jocularity and half-hearted rivalry.

To get back to my story, my acquaintance told how when she arrived in to visit her mother, she was delighted to see that not only was her mother as alert as ever but how enamoured she was with her roommates. However, her delight turned to quiet embarrassment when her mother announced loudly (due to deafness) with incredulity and surprise, “These Northsiders are actually nice people!” My friend insisted that yes her mother truly was surprised. While this little vignette could be considered humorous, and it was at the time, later I couldn’t help but think how a belief formulated over time without an apparent need to check for veracity had lead someone to hold such a generalised viewpoint about the people she shared a city with. A city that is at peace and where no walls separate one side from the other.

Them and Us

In less recent times, I worked in a small organisation where sales were the lifeblood of the company. For the first few years, that I worked there the environment was a really healthy and cooperative one. When I look back, I remember everyone working incredibly hard, but it was also a time of high spirits and good will. However, all that changed when a decision made by the owner/manager to incentivise one sales team while excluding others became public to all. The team in question sold the most lucrative service/product offering that came with the fastest turnover. It was the quick sale, fast money department and for the owner it made complete sense to focus his energy and attention on driving up these sales by making sure the team in question was happy. And he did all he could to have that happen. However, over a short period of time, that decision had the effect of creating a divisiveness never previously experienced in the organisation and for the first time a ‘them and us’ culture was spawned. Resentments, rifts, and bickering spread like a winter cold throughout the organisation and a once happy, cooperative working environment became one fuelled by apathy and low morale.

And while I don’t really want to get into politics it’s hard not to when the UK elections were so recent and we saw how Northern Ireland had a part to play in the outcome. Yet, even after 10 years of peace and much talk of vision for Northern Ireland that is about inclusiveness, we saw instead a return to sectarianism. A vote became a vote for ‘Green’ or ‘Orange’ rather than the party that embodied positive change for all. When asked to comment one electorate was quoted as saying, “It will take another generation at least before we’ll see that change here.”

There is no doubt tribalism in all its forms, does affect how we think and behave towards others. A group or a team can becomes exclusive with those outside becoming the unknown quantity, the opponent and given time and the right set of circumstances, even the enemy. For the exclusive group, feelings of being superior are common alongside judgements that those outside the group must somehow be inferior. In its own way tribalism, be it in the boardroom, the classroom or at the kitchen table not only stifles our experience of others but also detracts from our happiness and the happiness levels of those around us. ‘Wake Up’ as Anthony De Mello S.J. might say and become aware of how an open mind is your key to happiness.

Carole

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Happiness Newsletter May 2010 © Carole Smith / Type Dynamics Tel: 085 778 5615

Love ...And the Passion Slaves

What is Love?

Love can be truly unconditional and impossible to measure like that of a love between a mother and a child. Love has also many dimensions to it and can change from one relationship to another. For some it’s a kind of madness, an adrenalin rush of emotions that makes an ordinary life seem less so and if asked to define love they may look to Hollywood for help.

Love is passion, obsession, someone you can't live without. If you don't start with that, what are you going to end up with? Fall head over heels. I say find someone you can love like crazy and who'll love you the same way back - Movie: Meet Joe Black (1998)

Love Addiction

The kind of love referred to in quote above is romantic love and it is the most powerful sensation you will ever feel. In romantic love, you develop an intense attachment to another and will do all kinds of crazy things to be with your love, to have their love, to be their only love. It’s staying up all night together talking, and whizzing through work the following day feeling energised and totally hyped waiting to spend more time with your loved one. If you’re feeling this way now about someone be reassured, you’re not completely mad. Scientists tell us these intense feelings of passion have a biological basis to them and when in a heightened state of romantic love your body is literally flooded with amphetamine like chemicals. Your focus becomes finely tuned like a heat-seeking missile with one direction only -towards that of your loved one. You’re constantly thinking about the person you’ve decided is ‘the one.’ You are love addicted

Euphoria

In this euphoric state, you idealise your loved one, bestowing on them qualities and attributes far beyond what any one human being could possess. If, through this fog you see your loved one has imperfections you minimise them, even considering them adorable. At last, you say, my dreams are finally realised; this is the person that will make me feel whole, the soulmate I’ve been waiting for. And because your feelings are so intense you convince yourself that what you’re feeling is real. This madness, this addiction you declare to all must be love.

Burn Out

However, with every high, there is a low and although the euphoric period varies with each couple, it will end at some point. It's nature's way of preventing us from burning out completely. While making all those grand gestures is fun even exhilarating it can become exhausting. And so you enter the next stage of the relationship, the low, the period of disillusionment.

Do I Know You?

For some the period of disillusionment is unsettling and questions surface like, ‘Who is this person I’m with?’ Realisation has dawned that your soulmate sees things differently to you, has opinions that are at odd with yours, and most perplexing of all they can be boring/loud/obnoxious or silly at times. This is a time for you to move on quickly, feeling justified in doing so by a belief that says without the high, something is wrong with the relationship. ‘I got it wrong, he/she wasn’t right for me.'

Acceptance
Others will move from the period of disillusionment into the next phase the ‘mature love’ stage. This is when the relationship takes on deeper meaning; it's a place of calm, friendship, commitment, intimacy and most of all acceptance of one another -just as you are. It’s having faith and trust in one another that if you’re worried, concerned, or vulnerable there is someone who will listen and hear you.

Love - A Decision?

While you might not want to hear this, when you tell yourself “I can’t help how I feel,” the truth is you can! When we speak of love, we tend to think of our heart yet love does not come from the heart it comes from the brain. It is a cognitive process...and it involves choice. 

I am making a decision to no longer love you or

I am making a decision to love you.

Love is not a feeling ...the reality is, it is an action, an activity and it requires courage, effort, wisdom and practice. 

For the passion slaves not realising this, the search for the 'real' soulmate will continue for as long as they believe the problem lies with the person they love rather than their ideas about love or the expectations they set for a partner. Equally, happiness, for them, will remain elusive as it soars and dives with each love addiction. 

Happiness Newsletter March 2010

Welcome to the Happiness Newsletter - March 2010

-From Carole Smith at Type Dynamics

Hi there,

According to Martin Seligman, if we are to achieve happiness in our lives we must recognise there are four key components:

• A Meaningful Life
• Authenticity  
• Purpose in Life
• Strengths (Signature strengths e.g. integrity, kindness)

In this month's newsletter, I am concentrating on ‘meaning.’ Specifically, what is a meaningful life and how does it contribute to our overall happiness levels?

As always, I hope the content provokes questions or thoughts for you but most of all that you enjoy the newsletter.

And don’t forget I very much welcome any comments or feedback you may have.

Regards,

Carole

Email: carolesmith@typedynamics.ie / Website: http://www.typedynamics.ie/

Happiness Newsletter Feb 2010

Hello Again,



As we’ve recently celebrated St. Valentine’s Day I though this month I’d look at some of the ideas we have about a day that is dedicated to lovers the world over.

I hope you enjoy this months newsletter and as ever I am always interested in hearing your comments or thoughts so feel free to email me as I welcome all feedback.


Regards,

Carole

Website: http://www.typedynamics.ie/

Happiness Newsletter Jan 2010

Hello Again,


As we are beginning a new year, a new decade even I want to wish you a truly Happy 2010 from Type Dynamics.

Last year pushed many of us into having to reassess and rethink our views around various aspects of our lives. For some there has been a lot of change, some good, some not so good but as we enter into 2010 there is a sense of some confidence creeping back into our communal psyche. Ever the optimist I am looking forward to 2010 as a year that will bring new challenges and with it growth and new learning for all of us.

This months newletter is about how when we connect with others it can lead to increased happiness and wellbeing.

I hope you enjoy it and as always your comments are always welcome.

Regards,

Carole