Mirror Mirror on the Wall

“Our environment, the world in which we live and work, is a mirror of our
attitudes and expectations.”-- Earl Nightingale

It's been said before. The people around us are our mirrors.

The qualities in your friends that you love are qualities in you.

The qualities in those who frustrate, anger or upset you are mirroring you as well.

Yes. They are your mirrors as well.

A friend of mine reminded me of a wonderful exercise. (Thanks, M.)

I began thinking about how this little exercise could be used quite effortlessly in a "Dump and Flip" type of exercise.

I guess what I'll call it is the "Mirror and Flip". ;-)

Take a piece of paper, and fold it down the middle. On the left side of the paper, you will write (in pencil) those things people are "doing to you" or "not doing to/for you".

An example would be "my clients don't respect my time".

Now erase "my clients" and put "I". You end up with "I don't respect my time."

You may be thinking right now, "I do respect my time. That's why it frustrates me when my clients don't."

Let's take some time to think about this. If you truly respected your time, would you not put rules and boundaries in place? If your clients are calling you on Sunday, and Sunday is your family time, would you not set your phone up to automatically go to voicemail so you will not be tempted to answer?

Another example. "My spouse doesn't treat my business like a business." Are there ways that you don't treat your business like a business?

I have found that 99.9% of these things which frustrate me about others are truly a mirror for me and how I treat myself or those things that are important to me.

The next portion of the exercise is to take the Mirrors from the Left side of the page, and Flip them.

So "I don't respect my time" would become "I respect my time". "I don't treat my business like a business" would become "I treat my business like a business".

There is one more step to this exercise. It's a self-coaching step that you can incorporate to begin to make shifts on these "mirror moments".

For each of the Flips, ask yourself "What would it take to have me ..." and finish it off with your Flip.

For example, "What would it take to have me respect my time?" You may decide that it's turning the ringer off on your phone during your off-hours.

This little exercise should take no more than 5 minutes of your time, the possibilities of growth and change are incredible.

The next time someone does something truly frustrating, get out a piece of paper and play with the "Mirror and Flip" exercise.

You'll find some really great awarenesses, and through self-coaching will make wonderful shifts in your expectations and experience.

~*~*~*~

Velma Gallant is an Author, Speaker, Trainer and Abundance Coach. She's a co-author in a best-selling book series with Mark Victor Hansen, Deepak Chopra, Wayne Dyer called "Wake Up Live the Life you Love: Finding Personal Freedom". Velma is the creator of Living Abundant Joy where she interviewed 19 outrageously successful speakers, marketers and coaches on Abundance. She publishes a weekly e-newsletter called "Welcome Changes", which reaches over 45 countries around the world. Velma coaches entrepreneurs and business people to be abundantly successful in both business and life. You can visit Velma's website at http://www.WelcomeChanges.com, or reach her by email at velma@welcomechanges.com.