Happiness & Wellbeing with Dr Charmaine Saunders

Newsletter JULY, 2011 As predicted last month, June did prove to be much pleasanter though the last few days have been a bit of a strain. We've just been through an eclipse season which can bring tension plus I think I've been going through SAD - seasonal adjustment disorder. It normally happens earlier in the year but as we had such a late summer and only now getting autumnal/winter weather, it's been delayed. I get it every autumn and spring but only realise it when it's already upon me. It's like a heaviness, weariness and flatness all rolled into one. As this is so unlike my usual mood, it's very noticeable once it starts. Luckily, it doesn't last very long. On a happier note, the vertigo was confirmed to be caused by a virus and has now abated. At my last specialist appointment, I got the all-clear and don't have to have another check-up till October. Yay! That's the best part. Thank you so much to all of you who responded to my request for info on vertigo. It helped a lot to know what others have experienced, especially when I still wasn't sure what had caused it. Like many people, I've had a very challenging year but it's only strengthened my faith in myself and the goodness of life even during the dark times. CONFERENCE I'm speaking at the WIN global women's summit on July 30 here in Perth. It was supposed to be in Sydney and when I had the vertigo, I was worried I wouldn't be able to go but as the organiser operates from Perth, it's been relocated. It's a whole-day seminar with a range of speakers covering topics that affect women today. I urge you to attend if you are in Perth at that time. It will be a very special event. My talk is at 1.30 and it's going to be on living without limitations. Of all the topics I could've chosen, I felt this was the most important. I'd love to see many of you there. Please contact Lesley for full details and bookings on gwsperth2011@gmail.com and this is the link for the web page - http://globalwomenssummits.com/perth-australia Speaking of WIN, I have started my regular recordings as a radio host for them so check it out at www.winonline.com BIRTHDAY A close friend turned 50 yesterday and I organised a birthday surprise lunch for her. I've been planning it for many weeks and it's been surprisingly complicated and stressful because it had to be so tightly planned. I tend to put myself under a lot of pressure with these events so that they run perfectly. Anyway, it did go very well. I booked a private room in a restaurant and told her I was just taking her out for lunch. The guests were all waiting in the room and she got a real surprise! She's been superb during my recent health problems and I wanted to give her a special day. The food was lovely, especially the cake, she got some great gifts and a good time was had by all, most importantly, the birthday girl. Many, many warm wishes, Chrissie! LIVE EXPORTS I've always been against live animal exports because I think it's unbelievably cruel but a few weeks ago, Australia's `4 corners' programme filmed a shock doco inside one of Indonesia's abattoirs and it was so horrendous that 200,000 signatures were gathered in 3 days and delivered to Parliament house. To my great amazement and joy, the Australian government banned the export of live cattle to Indonesia effective immediately! I was so happy when I heard about it, you'd think I'd won the lottery. It was a red-letter day, a victory of humanity over money for a change. I hope this is just the first step to stopping the live trade altogether. JOKE I promised to share some jokes with you in the newsletter. This is one of my favorites that came through online from a friend - Ten Dollar Dog. A guy is driving around the back woods of Montana and he sees a sign in front of a broken down shanty-style house: 'Talking Dog For Sale ' He rings the bell and the owner appears and tells him the dog is in the backyard.. The guy goes into the backyard and sees a nice looking Labrador retriever sitting there. 'You talk?' he asks. 'Yep,' the Lab replies. After the guy recovers from the shock of hearing a dog talk, he says 'So, what's your story?' The Lab looks up and says, 'Well, I discovered that I could talk when I was pretty young. I wanted to help the government, so I told the CIA. In no time at all they had me jetting from country to country, sitting in rooms with spies and world leaders, because no one figured a dog would be eavesdropping.' 'I was one of their most valuable spies for eight years running. But the jetting around really tired me out, and I knew I wasn't getting any younger so I decided to settle down.. I signed up for a job at the airport to do some undercover security, wandering near suspicious characters and listening in. I uncovered some incredible dealings and was awarded a batch of medals.' 'I got married, had a mess of puppies, and now I'm just retired..' The guy is amazed. He goes back in and asks the owner what he wants for the dog. 'Ten dollars,' the guy says. 'Ten dollars? This dog is amazing! Why on earth are you selling him so cheap?' 'Because he's a liar. He never did any of that stuff!' BELIEF Here's an extract from my Nova article on Belief: SELF-DOUBT This is the greatest enemy and hindrance to any kind of belief in life. It is much easier to practise because you will be supported by all the negativity around you. To stand firm in the light and believe when all the evidence proves you wrong - that takes real courage. We doubt ourselves because we don't value our own judgement. We flounder when life throws challenges our way, as it always will. We lurch from one bad decision to another, caught in a vortex of emotion and confusion. We hand over our power to others, too afraid to think for ourselves in case we're wrong. Some caution in decision-making is prudent but if we allow ourselves to be immobilised by doubt, we'd never do anything at all. The best way to overcome self-doubt is to practise working with inner wisdom, listening in the silence to the voice within which can never lead us wrong. The mind is full of faulty information and the heart will lead us only to our fleeting desires but intuition is linked to the God-force and thus, contains only truth. Self-doubt, like fear, is crippling, and leads to an empty, unfulfilled existence. Indecision, too, is very stressful. Once you've thought a matter through, trust yourself enough to act. Dithering and procrastinating will only add to the doubt. It's all connected to self-esteem. Arrogance is not to be recommended but simple self-value and calm resolve most definitely is. CORE BELIEFS These are the deep-seated beliefs garnered in childhood. We can gain them in a number of ways - what we hear, see, receive, don't get, pick up from what is implied. By the time we go to school, we have literally thousands of beliefs tucked away in our subconscious, and they range from the basics of life like home, family, love, marriage, work, money to minor issues such as types of food. Some therapists liken the storage of these beliefs to carrying them around in an invisible suitcase; I like to say we carry them inside us as a series of images like flash cards, which we use as terms of reference on our journey through life. If something occurs that doesn't match the picture, it takes us out of our comfort zone, and we either reject it at the start or wreck it later. To illustrate, here's an example in the area of relationships - let's say a girl grew up in a family where she saw continual fighting. Her belief about marriage will be that it involves continual fighting! If she meets a guy from a similar background and they date then marry, they will probably have a long, lasting marriage full of --- continual fighting. However, if she meets someone calm and placid who doesn't want to argue and fight, she might be attracted to him at first and even love the peacefulness but, after a while, it will cause an itch she just has to scratch. She will gradually become so uncomfortable within the relationship, she will have to either leave or stay and sabotage it by provoking what she believes is inevitable - fighting. You see, it's a vicious circle which can only be broken by understanding how core beliefs work and identifying one's own. This is not simple, unfortunately. By the very nature of core beliefs, they are buried deep. They were learned subconsciously so they have to be released subconsciously. However, there is hope! Core beliefs can be unearthed by looking at the physical reality of your world - what does it look like? Taking the five key areas of life - home, relationships, money, health and work - do you have a home that is a comfortable haven? are your relationships positive and healthy? do you suffer from financial woes? are you in good health? Do you do work you love? Usually, there will be one negative area that stands out. Mine this as a rich source of information about your belief structure. For example, if you are always ill, what is your belief about health? Did you have a constantly sick parent? Did you get sick as a child to get attention? What negative ideas might you be holding about health/illness? Trace it back and, like an unbroken thread from the past, it will lead you straight to the answer. So, belief is the foundation of everything we do. When our lives are not working well, we need to look to the cause from within ourselves. Ask yourself - what belief led me to this place, this relationship, this decision, this mess, etc? If I asked you for a definition of love, you'd probably say it's a warm feeling towards another, caring, contributing towards the happiness of others and so on. But your core belief about love might be quite different. Perhaps you learned in childhood that love hurts, love traps, love disappoints, love fails, love leaves. How then might you choose relationships? How then could you be happy? It's powerful stuff and most of us are walking around totally unaware of how we're being driven by this belief system which, in turn, creates the patterns we live by. That's why we keep repeating the same mistakes, the same self-defeating habits, the same harmful behaviours. The desire to learn more about core beliefs is a good start but it will take patience and effort to uncover them bit by bit. It's probably impossible to ever reach down into the deeper recesses of the mind and know everything about ourselves but it's worth getting as much as we can. Knowledge is power and awareness is crucial to mental wellbeing. The most important core belief of all is the one we hold about ourselves. If you have a negative self-belief, it will permeate into every facet of your daily life whether you know it or not. You can't be successful if your internal image is of yourself as a loser. As with relationships, you might be all right for a while but somehow, you'll spoil things and be left wondering why, like people who break up from a lovely relationship out of fear. Risk is easy when you have nothing but terrifying when you get something you really want and there's a chance you might lose it. So people jump ship prematurely to avoid the risk of loss or rejection. I find all this terribly sad because it is completely avoidable. DETACHMENT What has this got to do with belief? It goes back to trust. Trust must be 100% or it really isn't trust. As I said at the start of this article, I live by an extreme form of trust and it has never failed me. Fear is the antithesis of trust. When you truly trust, there can be no fear. One cancels the other out. That's why I'm not afraid about my health. That's not to say bad things can't happen to me but even if they do, there's a good reason for it. It has something to teach me, a lesson, a gift so how can I not be accepting and grateful? Detachment is part of this process because trust requires that we step out of emotion and observe our own experiences almost as a stranger would. I learnt about trust and detachment from Florence Scovel-Shinn who wrote `The Game of life,' a life-changing book for me. These are not attributes that came easily to me, but in embracing them, I have found a peace and acceptance I never knew I was capable of. People often ask me if I'm a Buddhist and I have to say, in fact, I'm not religious at all but many of the Buddhist tenets are life-affirming, the practice of which brings inner peace and spiritual love for all, the importance of which we saw in last month's Compassion theme. My message in departing this theme is - always be brave. We are powerful beyond measure and happiness is available to us as a constant. It's nothing we have to earn or manufacture. We attract what we believe so believe good things. QUOTE Life will throw you some curve balls. You have 2 choices. Bitch about curve balls or learn how to hit a home run off one. Tweet Till next month, Charmaine To receive my weekly newsletter by email, subscribe here.