So Thoughts What Are You Thinking????

So it is estimated that we have between 12,000 to 60,000 thoughts per day (with statistics from the National Science Foundation), depending upon your level of creativity, personal and professional problem solving skills, your career and whether you tend to be a thinker. That averages out to approximately a thought every 2.5 seconds if you take the average person from this statistic who thinks 36,000 thoughts per day.

The question is, what do our thoughts look like right now? Boris Johnson's hair? A supermodel? The Apprentice boardroom? Your gloomy shadow? We have to identify where we are at mentally to order to correctly assess ourselves and make a change if necessary. Also, how are our thoughts affecting us as a whole person? Is there a pattern of negative thought which leads to more negative consequences in your life? Like a building a elaborate mansion in the middle of a busy motorway road?

There are serious mental conditions that can lead to racing thoughts, anxiety, consistent pessimism and depressive thoughts, which are sometimes difficult to control. From research on this issue, people have said helpful ways to combat this is often the 'Stop Technique' which is saying to yourself, "STOP", out loud until the persistent thoughts stops completely. Another technique that is used is to have reaffirming and positive quotes around you to reaffirm good thinking patterns.

I have a personal opinion, that we all need type of this intervention in all of our thinking patterns to some extent regardless of the severity of the impact of our thoughts on our daily lives. The reason I believe this strongly is I have recognised an overall positive change in my life since I have been very cautious regarding which thoughts I let enter into myself, to move the furniture around and set up home. So we should all be halting negative thoughts and reaffirming good thoughts to some extent.

I challenge many thoughts which come into my head in a very practical and logical way like, "Ok negative thought interesting you think that, why? What evidence do you have to prove that? What contrary evidence is there?" I don't let my negative thoughts get away with much, they have to be on trial, whilst the positive ones can run free in my head and they can have as much fun as they want. If the negative thought have fought hard to be there, and has given good evidence to win the case then I only let it stick around to propel me forward to become better next time, and only draw upon its nastiness only when necessary and when I have a plan of action to not let this justified negative thought win again.

It is about being honest with yourself but humans do have a tendency to dwell in the pit of despair of negative thoughts instead of celebrating achievements along the way. It is estimated that 70-80% of our thoughts on a daily basis are negative. So that is completely unfair to the good and uplifting thoughts that want to carry us through the day to make us think about a better future for ourselves.

Recently, I have had a few people comment on my confidence and how I can help them improve there's, so that got me thinking about the main things that I can attribute a healthy confidence. One thing that stood out most upon reflection is the way I speak to myself. I give myself permission to say very nice things to myself often. I know I am British and I am not supposed to say this and instead I should put myself down constantly, but really I know doing this definitely does not improve confidence. So I celebrate who I am on a daily basis and strengthen my positive thoughts by reading inspirational stories, books and quotes about the human experience. I apply them in my life where I can and I live with a smile and a very loud laugh whenever I can manage it.

Some days are hard regardless. That I do understand, but still don't let negative thoughts win your whole mind like it is a shrewd lawyer that tricked you into signing a life sentence. It is lying, tear up that contract and write yourself into who you want to be. Know that crying only happens for a short while so you can appreciate joy so much more. There is always something positive that comes out of the most negative situations. So focus on that, starting with being positive at least 50% of the time, maybe going unto to 70-80%. Now that would be a nice, peaceful mansion to live in.

“Always focus on the front windshield and not the review mirror.” 
― Colin Powell

“Our way of thinking creates good or bad outcomes.” 
― Stephen Richards

“Reality is a projection of your thoughts or the things you habitually think about.” 
― Stephen Richards

“Sometimes we focus so much on what we don't have that we fail to see, appreciate, and use what we do have!” 
― Jeff Dixon

Here are some of my genuine thoughts I tell myself on some days:

References
http://www.nsf.gov
http://verysmartgirls.com/mental-clarity-and-calmness/choose-your-thoughts-well/
http://www.anxietyguru.net/how-to-stop-racing-thoughts/
http://www.sentientdevelopments.com/2007/03/managing-your-50000-daily-thoughts.html
http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/tag/focus

Wimbledon Models Wanted: Only Gorgeous Ones Need Apply

Has to be comfortable wearing short white skirts, flashing her pants and be able to hold a racket for a desired period of time.

Every year we have record number of applications; we only choose the pretty ones.

The dress code for Wimbledon is predominately white, like the audience, with sweat shirts, sweat pants, T-shirts, jeans and cut-offs expressly forbidden. I had to Google what cut-offs were. Apparently they are short jeans that show your bum most of the time. Ok so no cut-offs; I am sure there is some health and safety reason for that. Brightly coloured pants and nude coloured shorts (ahem Venus Williams), are ok. Dresses that look more like tops, so you can actually see the pants, are not compulsory but wearing anything else is quite frowned upon. For example, Anne White wore a white body suit because it kept her legs warm as she foolishly thought it was appropriate and in keeping with the rules of the Wimbledon dress code. It was. She was asked politely not to wear it to the next match as it was distracting to the other opponent. Ok so, flashing knicker-type shorts at your opponent is not distracting at all then? Right.

Seriously, does this sound like 21st century living where women can vote, work, run FTSE 100 companies and be the last two in the finals of The Apprentice? I am surprised they even let these women use a racket, instead of standing around modelling it. To be fair it does seems most of these female players are happy to conform to these invisible rules, be it for sponsorship or for publicity. Some even thrive off it, (ahem Venus Williams). In all truth, that is part of the beauty of being a female with liberation: having choice. I am all for female empowerment as long as it does not leave you feeling empty like the seats in Wimbledon. I am all for the women in Wimbledon dressing however they like within the rules of the Wimbledon dress code. I am all for personal decisions of women deciding what they feel comfortable wearing. So, why wasn't Anne White allowed to wear her white bodysuit again, with it being deemed as inappropriate for Wimbledon?

I have reluctantly come to the conclusion that I will not get the answer to this question anytime soon. There is too much politics, money and ulterior motives involved in the media regarding sport, and women in general. It would be a bit like asking why are the majority of the audience and players at Wimbledon white? Alongside published authors, partners of law firms and CEO's of Fortune 500 companies? See, it is pointless me even asking. You won't get an answer anytime soon except maybe a shrug of the shoulders, a bemused look and then everyone continuing their life as it was before.  

The only thing I am sure of, is as individuals, we have to fight for what we believe we deserve whilst large institutions who have no interest in change for our benefit, will sit back and watch, or possibly try resist our efforts. Alongside our individual power, we also have collective power which is what I like so much about the Writers Of Colour initiative to get marginalised groups of ethnic minorities published into British newspapers, something which is not as common as you would expect.

Similar to this idea of collective power amongst ethnic minorities, Serena and Venus Williams' dad, Richard Williams, has set up his own tennis academy after discussing at length the difficulties his daughters' experienced, being from an ethnic minority to becoming professional players at Wimbledon. Mr Williams says now about the system, “It’s not that they dislike you. They just don’t want another Venus or Serena showing up.” Which I believe is quite a representative comment across the board of white-dominated professional sectors. 

It sometimes seems that being a black, female makes you go straight to the bottom of their list also. Almost as if it is not bad enough you have the struggles of being from a black or mixed heritage, now you also have the struggles of being female in a male-dominated society. It is like double whammy attack: can you get up from that! This is why I have admiration for Serena and Venus Williams to rise in this particularly difficult sector, regardless of the colour of their pants. They are icons of beautiful, strong, successful black women.

It is not always a race issue. People always think it is just a race issue. Oh no, as a woman, it is often also a beauty issue. The Wimbledon champion, Marion Baroli, showed her strength, determination and grit as a person under great pressure to succeed, and rise to the challenge to smack that tennis ball in her opponents face until she almost ran off in tears of defeat. Regardless, Baroli held in together, mind singular with focus on the task of winning at hand to become victorious, a champion! Hooray! Champagne! Glass ready to toast...  but oh no, wait, she is not beautiful enough to be champion.

She is rewarded instead with hate tweets by misogynists and a very ignorant reporter saying, "I just wonder if her dad, ...did say to her when she was 12, 13, 14 maybe, 'listen, you are never going to be, you know, a looker. You are never going to be somebody like a Sharapova, you're never going to be 5 feet 11, you're never going to be somebody with long legs, so you have to compensate for that. You are going to have to be the most dogged, determined fighter that anyone has ever seen on the tennis court if you are going to make it,' and she kind of is."

John Inverdale, is this supposed to be a compliment? Is she supposed to be on the court from intensely training since her youth, sweating her determination, practicing towards her ambitions, for you, the man who says things into a microphone, to base your comments on her looks like she is strutting across a catwalk for your approval, and is not an elite athlete who has just won one of the most prestigious titles in her field?

Many viewers have complained several times on the sexist remarks of John Inverdale, that have still gone unnoticed until now, that is probably because their complaints were going to other misogynists. There the misogynist sits in his little cardboard box of an office, saying, "These women are making a big drama out of nothing: they are probably on that time of month." 

This no disrespect to any extent to the truly, strong and brave men who stand up for what is right, to indirectly defend their mothers, daughters, sisters and wives in the process. Although, it still seems there are far too many men who are happy for thoughtless words to just slip out of their mouths like vomit from too much egotistical wine, blurring their vision of the male species being superior to the female species, allowing them to use sexism like ill-fitting condoms to protect their masculinity.

I am grateful for organisations like @EverydaySexism on Twitter who highlight the gravity of the problem, and @IShapeBeauty who try to recreate positive change and action in women. I am grateful for women centres and courses across the UK who take action to put esteem into women to fight sexism on every level, by imparting knowledge, encouragement and empowerment to each woman to be stronger in the lack of current societal change, and places like the Women's Refuge and Women's Aid, who are there to pick up the pieces of a broken society, which naturally lead to more extreme examples where is ok to degrade, humiliate and manipulate a woman's mind to submission or into a pretty skirt. 

References
http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2001/07/athletes_in_skirts.html
http://www.diversityinc.com/diversity-facts/wheres-the-diversity-in-fortune-500-ceos/
http://jobs.aol.com/articles/2012/10/16/study-workplaces-increasingly-segregated-dominated-by-white-me/
http://www.venusserenatennisacademy.org/index.htm
http://www.theroot.com/buzz/richard-williams-blacks-still-not-welcome-tennis
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/04/sports/tennis/04rhoden.html?_r=2&adxnnl=1&ref=todayspaper&adxnnlx=1283612483-dPeMXtMamNhaXeV9YWSDGA&
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2013/jul/09/john-inverdale-marion-bartoli-bbc
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/tennis/wimbledon/10164511/Wimbledon-2013-BBC-apologise-for-John-Inverdales-Bartoli-not-a-looker-comment.html

My Verdict Towards Charles Saatchi's Attack Against Nigella Lawson

Nigella Lawson Strangled - Domestic Violence

I saw the pictures today of Nigella Lawson being strangled and to be honest it bought back memories for me and made me feel quite emotional. The pictures that where released involved her husband Charles Saatchi with his hand around her neck, over her mouth and pinching her nose. His response to this attack was:  

"About a week ago, we were sitting outside a restaurant having an intense debate about the children, and I held Nigella's neck repeatedly while attempting to emphasize my point. There was no grip, it was a playful tiff. The pictures are horrific but give a far more drastic and violent impression of what took place. Nigella's tears were because we both hate arguing, not because she had been hurt," he added. "We had made up by the time we were home. The paparazzi were congregated outside our house after the story broke yesterday morning, so I told Nigella to take the kids off till the dust settled."

As a woman who has experienced domestic violence herself, these manipulations of the blatant truth is all too familiar to me. The nature of domestic violence is that it is done usually in the secrecy of the home surrounded by isolation so that the person committing the crime can manipulate the victim into believing it was their fault as they provoked them to act in that manner. Sometimes like in Rihanna and Nigella's case, an incident may occur in public once it has likely happened often behind closed doors. In addition to this, the person who commits domestic violence is often a very damaged person who needs to erode the confidence of the victim to have ultimate control. 

Now let's look as Charles' rationalisations of it being a 'playful tiff'; I would argue that it is possible it was to him! He was the one playing with her, whilst she was obviously emotional, fearful and upset that this event occurred. And his statement of there was 'no grip', justifies somehow your hands around her neck to emphasise the point? Hmm, I think not! And then having his hand over her mouth and pinching her nose is not only humiliating but disrespectful on a very basic, human level. Lastly them making up by the time they were home is exactly what domestic violence is all about… a continuous cycle of abuse, and then making up and pretending it never happened, until next time it happens.

I have no doubt that Nigella is experiencing domestic violence in her household, and so this article is not to share in the latest tabloid gossip but to discuss an issue which leads to two women dying every week. With domestic violence, victims often have low self-esteem whilst still in the relationship, as well as a skewed view of the actual truth. If they believed the truth, that they are valuable and no one deserves to treat them in a certain way, then they would find this type of behaviour utterly unacceptable. Unfortunately, it takes a lot of outside support and inner confidence to finally believe you are not "stupid, useless, ugly etc" And yes, I was repeatedly told all of these put downs and unfortunately believed them at one point in my life also. 

But back to Nigella, the parts of this story which resonate with me most involve the events after the incident, which included Nigella placing her hand on his left wrist and kissing his right cheek in attempts to pacify his anger. To her this is a normal incident that would easily have happened at home many times and it is just unfortunate it is in public instead of at home this time. The victim of domestic violence would often have ways of diffusing the situation as they will intimately know the consequences of the angry partner if the situation is not diffused quickly. They end up becoming a natural at this, even though in some situations the partner cannot be diffused at all but still attempts are futilely made.

Nigella's husband then walks off, which I also experienced many times in the destructive relationship I was in. It is a form of punishment when it happens repeatedly by the person in control. Silence in another form of punishment also, as is telling the person to leave the martial home in malicious, spiteful way. I am not saying anger doesn't happen or that arguments don't happen between couples where one might walk off suddenly, or move out for a while, but the different between that and domestic violence is the intense, one-sided control and the continuous fear of the person in control. From the many women I have spoken to who have experience domestic violence, they always say the emotional abuse was, almost always, much worse than the physical abuse. It takes a lot longer usually to heal from that aspect of abuse and for you to ultimately love yourself when you have absorbed all these manipulative attempts daily that makes you feel worthless. 

Charles Saatchi would also act in further controlling ways of punishment by rejecting Nigella's food. It may seem trivial but really he is aiming at her self-esteem in an attempt to erode her confidence in her abilities of what she is most known for. He says in an interview that he prefers nursery food such as eggs and beans on toast. She said of him, "Charles doesn't really like proper food. He prefers a bowl of cereal" You are married to Nigella Lawson, why else would you do that?! I have had experiences of this type of rejection of food linked to controlling behaviour. I remember one incident where I was home alone so I decided to do some blueberry pancakes for my partner. When my partner arrived home, he actually got very angry at me for not telling him I was going to make this in advance, for not passing the recipe by him and for using a pan which apparently I was not allowed to use (news to me) and hence stopped speaking to me. I did eat those blueberry pancakes on my own, and although they were very delicious, I could not enjoy them at all. 

Men or women who exert this level of control have been, very likely, in situations were they had no control over negative events that have traumatised them. They either consciously or subconsciously decide that this will never happen again to them and try to control every aspect of intimate relationships, which is the place they feel most vulnerable. In a way, I sympathise with these people as they are hurting too, but on no level do I give them an excuse for what they do. Everyone has the power to change and transform their lives and to not repeat the mistakes of the past. As for the women and men who are victims of domestic violence, they are anything but weak to put up with this type of behaviour on a daily basis and still be able to function and put on a confident exterior to 'protect' their partner. They are caring and genuine people who need someone to say more good things to them than bad things, until they can start saying good things to themselves. 

The Artisan Workshop with Indigo Williams

In my last article I wrote about self-development and today I want to be specific about my latest self-development journey. 

I decided I wanted to develop my writing skills in regards to poetry so my writing can be authoritative without having to be performed to bring life to it's words. I wanted to cultivate my writing to bring out it's own power on the page. I had high aspirations for them to create the same elegance and refinement in poems I have wept over in crumpled books. I wanted to finally make the transition from writing selfishly with the purpose of venting to make myself feel (a lot) better, to writing for an audience which invites them in to share these feelings alongside me. 

I was hungry for knowledge regarding the theoretical skill of writing poetry.

So I asked around.... "Where do I go to become a better writer?" 

I kept hearing the name Indigo Williams, and if I was serious about understanding the technical side of poetry then that was the person I needed to go to, and luckily for me she was having a workshop coming up in the next few weeks in London. 

I was excited. 

Here is some of her work so you can have a taster before I go on... Indigo William's Poem: Dark Black

So now you understand. 

Indigo Williams was one of the first spoken word artists I most admired when I first learnt about the art of spoken word poetry only a few short months ago. I would see a chemistry lesson's worth of colours being exploded within fire as she would perform on her YouTube videos. She had something mysterious to me about the way she put words together and I could not miss the opportunity to be in a workshop with her and unravel first hand what made her writing so powerful. 

I live in Nottingham. The course was four weeks in London with one week at an open mic at Come Rhyme With Me - (by the way an unmissable night of spoken word in London). I didn't care, I just had to find a way to be there for every session or miss out on something great. In my eyes this was the same as travelling long distances for true love, for which people would suffer intense rainstorms, exhaustion and spend their life savings, just to get to their love's front door. Except this time my "love" was poetry, as taught by Indigo. London was the rainstorm and I exaggerated a bit on the exhaustion and life savings by watching too many romantic movies. 

But the question really is.... how far would you go for self-development?

Apparently I was willing to 1288 miles and this included the journeys back and forth over the five weeks. Now, if you are sitting at home and your self-development journey involves you going 10 minutes down the road, then you really have no excuse not to go!

My gut told me that this journey would be valuable and I am glad I listened. A whole new world opened up to me where dead poets, and those that were very much alive, started talking to me from the page telling me about structure, style and meanings in their poems. Between sessions, the Poetry Library in South Bank beckoned me in also out of the rainstorms (and often snow) and told me to keep warm from all the knowledge and experience these books had to offer me. I would get my list of books out that Indigo suggested to the class to read and I would get lost again in middle of London. 

In the sessions we dissected poems like dead bodies. I use this smilie because we had to say something interesting about ourselves in the first session with Indigo and I said that I used to dissect dead bodies for my anatomy class for my science degree which always gets an interesting response from people (...big up King's College, Biomedical Sciences class of 2008!) So I feel this smilie is rather fitting for this strange reason. 

Back to the point. Indigo's class was possibly poetry habit changing, like when you realise you are an addict and need help to break your old addictions, my hand is broken now to my old poetry habits. I now will read every new poem with a suspicious eye, knowing some poems would be bad influences on me to try to entice me back to my old way of thinking but I will laugh at those poems and move forward to better poems with a promise and a future. Now I am able to analyse and break each poem down knowing how to interpret a poem and the elements and stylistic qualities it used to create it's central voice.

After all of this intense learning, I must admit that the secret highlight for me was listening to Indigo's theories of life and looking at how her brain puts together the different truths of life into one thought provoking sentence. All I am saying is that you need to get yourself down to Indigo's next set of workshops to experience this yourself. 

If you are a poet you will learn from someone who is experienced and willing to give you all of her knowledge for the minimal price of the cost of the workshop. If you are not a poet then after Indigo's Artisan workshops you will become one. Any human being will benefit greatly from her life lessons. You will leave feeling awe-inspired and either not want to leave the building when she is still in there to share her passion of poetry or be scrambling for the nearest pen and paper to start writing for your next class.

Find all about Indigo from her website: http://indigowilliams.co.uk
She post a lot of insightful posts on her Tumbler: http://thestufflifeismadeof.tumblr.com
She is very opinionated on her Twitter: https://twitter.com/Indigowilliams
...and check out her videos on YouTube for some more good stuff. 

Self-development: How Much Do You Want It?

Self development is the key the success, fulfilment and worth. 

As a person you are either developing yourself in a direction that is moving you forward or you are being stagnant and moving backwards, losing the muscle memory to the skill or talent to which you were potentially gifted. 

"The difference between a successful person and others is not a lack of strength, not a lack of knowledge, but rather a lack of will."

Vince Lombardi 

"Action is the foundational key to all success."

Pablo Picasso 

The question so often is how badly do you want it and what are you willing to sacrifice in order for you to get what you desire? Focus is extremely important as it is where your thinking and physical energy is being directed at any moment. To achieve goals and ambitions you will need a lot of it focused in that direction. In my own life I recently had to acknowledge that focus takes a lot of discipline and sacrifice as it is not giving into temporary pleasures that do not benefit you or reach you closer to your goal in the long run. This very hard and sometimes it hurts. Whether it be in weight-loss, exercise, education or self-development in any other form. Once you have an actual choice, it's hard to make the right one over the more self-indulgent one. The following video is helpful in illustrating this point as well as being very motivational.

I personally find that one way to keep your self on track regarding focus is to submerse yourself into the activity by visualising the expected outcome every morning, reading inspirational books and quotes regarding the subject matter and allowing your brain to be so filled of that thing that it is unconsciously thinking about the subject matter even when your brain in a relaxed state, coming up with further solutions or motivations on it's own. That helps you to move closer to your desired goal and the expected outcome of success.

This works well for me but of course it is good to get healthy breaks from any action that is your complete focus. You do not want stress to creep in and then for you to become unproductive. I find the best way to overcome this is to build in structured breaks around whatever you are doing. Something that completely takes you away from the task at hand, so away from your computer, the running machine, your books etc. Let it be something that you look forward to that helps you to relax and something that you can consider a treat. A word of warning though, is if you have just come from exercising the best "treat" might not be a tub of ice-cream, so still consider your overall life goals when choosing your treats. For me I much look forward to my green tea breaks which takes me away from my desk and allows me a "treat" which will enhance my mood and focus when I return to my desk again.

When you start to fulfil the goals you have set for yourself then you start to experience fulfilment in that area of your life. You will start to attract people into your life who are on a similar journey and who will appreciate the focus you have towards your goals as they have similar ones towards theirs. Someone who is working towards their goals becomes a very interesting person regardless of the actual goal, be it having an elaborate stamp collection or a becoming a stunt double. Working towards your passions speaks very loudly and is appreciated by the person you are in conversation with as people love to learn about new subjects from a passionate person. There are many people not living according to their passions, as they have accepted what life has given them as opposed to moulding life around their passions. So those who take a risk in life to follow their passions with action and heart, maybe criticised and frowned upon sometimes but in the end they can say that they lived, not just existed.

"When you fully focus your mind, you make others attracted to you."

Toba Beta 

Please leave a comment telling me if you liked this article and if there are any other factors you feel contribute to success from your experience..... I would love to hear from you to be able to enhance myself as well as others who are reading this that are on this same journey. Thanks.

One Child Under Five Dies Every Four Seconds.... The Invisible Children

Click Here To Play Spoken Word Piece "Children Of The Light"

This spoken word piece was written in the early hours of this morning for the 150 million or more children all over the world who do not have a warm bed to wake up to and are so often ignored by the media and are so often forgotten by us. I think it would do everyone in the Western world good to wake up every morning and remember that there are innocent, beautiful children in the world that are fending for themselves and hence end up dying alone. This number does not include the children with families, who die due to poverty because they were born on the wrong side of the world. 

A poem is not enough for this cause