Being able to name something gives power. I’m not talking about naming furniture. I’m talking about the hard stuff. It’s “the nameless dread” that gets to us. We can deal with “I hate asking women out and risking rejection.” (After you read this article, you’ll reframe that as “It’s unpleasant to risk rejection, but I’ll guts it out to get what I want.”

If you can name reactions, you can think and plan a strategy. When you realize there’s fear (of losing her) behind your anger (she’s going on a vacation alone), you can avoid doing something stupid. A pounding heart and blind anger are good for telling you what you want, not good for getting it.

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Don’t forget your body while you wrestle with a relationship or marital crisis.

It is easy to let yourself go. It is easy to postpone – I will start tomorrow – your walking, running or workout. Your preoccupation with the other person floods your life, leaving little room for anything else. Or, you find yourself so overwrought that it seems impossible to “talk yourself” into getting started.

But, exercise and nutrition are powerful tools to help yourself at this point. Here are 6 reasons why:

1. Exercise and attention to your nutrition shift your focus to you. Exclusive focus on the other person atrophies your spirit, your energy, productivity, your healthy emotions and your body. You fade. You diminish. You become less than you truly are. So much of my work with others is helping them begin to think about themselves and take action for themselves. This is a major move. And it can begin by focusing on your body. It is the best, most practical place to begin. Your body is basic. It is a huge part of you. Begin paying attention to it.

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Rapport building is one of mutual influence, a give and take within a relationship, includes having regard for the feelings of others, respecting and understanding them, and looking at life from someone else’s perspective other than your own. Walk a mile in someone else’s shoes and begin to understand where they’re coming from – it doesn’t take much, just your willingness to give it a try.

One of the great things about rapport is that it doesn’t matter whether you have agreement or not with the other party. Remember some conversations you’ve had in the past with your best friend, partner, or even children. Do you always agree with them? What happens when you disagree? Is it the end of the world or is there friendly banter? Sometimes we simply agree to disagree. I heard someone say once “You can either be right, or you can be happy.” I know I’d rather be happy.

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Life would be difficult without the blessing of significant relationships as an integral part of our lifestyle. However although relationships can be the source of much joy and happiness, they also can frequently be a source of pain, stress, conflict and anxiety. It is a sad factor that when we have a close relationship the openness and vulnerability that we share with that person has the ability to bring both happiness and also pain.

There is a natural response when we feel hurt to protect ourselves from being hurt again. Frequently this protection involves creating a wall around the heart, distancing the emotions to avoid pain. This very act may well protect a person from feeling more pain, and keep it at bay, but also means shutting out the potential of enjoyment in the relationship as well. A wall keeps out both good and bad!

Unfortunately it is a fact that too many people become detached from potentially meaningful relationships through misunderstanding and assumptions about the other person. The reality is we can never fully know a person and understand them, and often we see things from a totally different perspective, and even speak a different emotional language. A tone of voice, a look, or a comment can easily be misinterpreted, and our response is to feel hurt or offended. If this happens it is all too easy to into a pattern of assuming and responding to that assumption until the whole incident becomes a large issue.

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Marcus, another of my clients, was also commitment phobic. “When I’m not in a relationship, that’s all I can think about it. I really want someone to play with, to love and to grow with. But soon after getting into a relationship, I start to feel trapped. I feel like I can’t do what I want to do and I start to resent the person for limiting me. Most of the time, she has no idea what’s going on and is stunned by the break-up. She thought everything was fine. After leaving her, I’m back to square one – wanting to be in a relationship. This has happened over and over again.”

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“When did you start to feel depressed?” I asked.

“Well, I think it started last week right after we spent a wonderful weekend together.”

“What happened after the weekend?”

“It was Sunday evening. We had just come back from an early dinner, and Todd wanted to watch a movie with me on TV. I told him that I wanted to go to the gym because I hadn’t worked out in a few days. He sounded disappointed in not watching the movie with me, so I didn’t go to the gym. I stayed and watched the movie with him because I didn’t want him to feel hurt and rejected.”

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Love and death are the two life experiences which really compel us to look at life and the nature of reality. The loss of love, such as a divorce, the end of long term relationship or even an unrequited love can be as devastating as a death. We try to be rational and look for answers from an intellectual viewpoint, but we rarely, if ever, find satisfaction or resolution. At best, we may decide that, ‘It’s just the way things go, get over it and move on.’ Through some force of mental discipline we suck it down and convince ourselves that we have accepted and recovered from our loss.

There is nothing quite like a funeral to bring up the big questions, and we find ourselves processing our thoughts from a place outside the intellectual framework. A subtle and intangible sensing seems to come into play, and we may find ourselves wondering, ‘Could it be some kind of primal instinct, a spiritual communication or something along the lines of mystical or psychic phenomena?’

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Below, I’ve listed 12 simple steps to overcoming your shyness. These aren’t magic solutions, but practice these steps and over time, your shyness will fade away and you will be left wondering what all the fuss was about in the first place.

Step 1. Fake it until you make it!

This is an infamous saying in the sales world. In other words; mimic or act like someone whom you admire and has all the personality traits you wish to have. This is a great way to start teaching yourself new behavioral habits. Put yourself in their shoes and play out real life situations as though you were them. This may sound crazy, but it does work!

Step 2. Ask yourself why you are shy.

Be honest with yourself. What are your real fears? What do you think people see when they talk with you? Answering these questions will help guide you into separating reality with what you are mistakenly perceiving it to be.

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I couldn’t find the origin of this saying, but it ranks in my top ten instructions for successful living. It’s just another way of saying, “Think before you speak,” but it sounds much more important.

When your mouth gets moving before your brain is engaged, your inner brat is unfettered. There is no filter to prevent you from saying things you might later regret.

Here are some risks of speaking without thinking:

- You might hurt/alarm/offend others, intentionally or not

- You might regret betraying secrets and confidences

- You might lose the advantage while negotiating

- You might lose respect from others

- Your reputation might suffer long-term damage

- You might lose your chance for a date, for a job or for a promotion

- You might get into trouble with the law

- You can’t take back what you said

If speaking mindlessly is so potentially destructive, why do people do it? There are a number of reasons:

1. To get attention: Spreading gossip or saying something outrageous puts you in the limelight for 15 seconds. But you may pay a high price to pay for those 15 seconds – lost trust and hurt feelings.

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Or maybe I should ask a better question…

Do you believe in miracles? Give me the answer to either one of the questions, I can tell you your answer for the other.

Dr Wayne Dyer has a wonderful book “You will see it when you believe it”. It is a life changing reading. If you haven’t read it yet, you should get a copy.

I have seen lots of miracles in my own life, and I see miracles almost every day.

Wouldn’t that be a miracle if you are thinking of improving your health, an experienced Chinese Qi Qong master come into your life and become a very good friend and teacher?

Wouldn’t that be a miracle if you are thinking of improving your spiritual life, you suddenly find a book by a spiritual master in the early 20th century.

Wouldn’t that be a miracle if you want to improve your financial life, an retired multi-millionaire living on the other end of the world come to contact you and is willing to teach you his success secrets?

Wouldn’t that be a miracle when you want to do a joint venture, someone from nowhere come to contact you and turn out to make one of the best joint venture?

Wouldn’t that be a miracle when you think of a solution for a problem, and a brilliant idea suddenly hits you?

Miracle happens everywhere, it can happen to you as well.

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