So many of us believe that we are actually hearing and processing what is being said to us, however, for many of us that is just not the truth. 

We hear the persons voice and as they continue to talk we start to form answers in our brain, hence we are now missing out on what is actually being said. 

In relationships a high percentage of problems comes from the reason that we just don’t actively listen to what our partner is saying.  Hence if we are only hearing a small portion of what is being said, how much of it is our interpretation of what is being said. 

We cannot listen and form an answer at the same time, we believe truly that we do listen, but the simple truth is we do not know how to actually listen to what is being said, we catch onto little bits and then form our own interpretation.

We often reply to the feelings we receive by those said words. 

For example when your partner is late home for dinner we hear the first line, maybe it would be “I just can’t leave my work half way through…..” 

Now their work maybe that of a Doctor or Dentist, but during this first sentence we may form the answer, “no of course not, everyone else is far more important that I am” we have not heard what our partner has actually said, we have formed our own opinion on the fact that our partner is maybe grumpy that we should have felt anger at our being late. 

We may have by now thought of all the things that our partner should have done, whilst our partner is thinking of all the things we should have thought of.

If we had taken the time to listen a row could have been avoided, perhaps an apology given and accepted gracefully and an enjoyable meal is shared. 

Although I have heard many a beautiful meal has landed on the back of a door or worse!!!!

So how do we develop active listening skills? 

We learn to stay silent and listen, not asking questions or telling them what they should have done, but by simply reflecting back what they have said. 

When we have this verified as being correct, then we can answer allowing time for our partner to reflect what we have said.

I sometimes get my clients to hold a wooden spoon and the other is not allowed to speak when they hold the spoon, after they have finished, we are given the spoon and repeat back what we have been told to ensure we have it correct. 

By using this technique as a game can also be helpful and if it is not fact we are dealing with where feelings are involved then we can see the funny side of what is being interpreted. 

Active listening is basically asking no questions, merely repeating what we have heard and made sure we have heard it correctly or that they have conveyed the message they wanted to. 

Once you have mastered the art of active listening it allows each person to feel understood and even to go deeper into their reasoning.

Have a practice and you may be surprised just how much we miss out on what is being said to us.  When anger is at the wheel there is no room for reason!

Practice makes perfect.  Have a go.  It could save a partnership that was once a happy relationship, just by listening.

If you'd like to have a chat, contact Yvette or call on 0411 407149

Many relationships today don’t keep that spark of love alive, and then life just becomes a habit, and we all know that habits can be hard to break, even when we would like to. 

As we get older sometimes, we no longer make love, for many different reasons, but that is no reason why we cannot show our love in other ways. 

A soft stroke on the cheek, an arm around our shoulders. 

A hug, a kiss, and words of love. 

Every night no matter how rattled I may have been with my husband during the day, always end the day by saying, “Good night God Bless, I love you”. 

I could not go to sleep without hearing this.  We have been married 32 years and I love him dearly.

Cooking a special meal together can be quite romantic, and doing anything together, a jigsaw, or play a game of scrabble or even the dreaded Monopoly.

You need to know how your husband /wife knows that you love them. 

Some show their love by doing things for you and saying nothing, others express their love in words, or taking you out somewhere special and finally some need to be touched, kissed and caressed, but you need to know how your partner needs to receive love.

Sitting at the table to share meals is a big bonus, whilst sitting watching TV with dinner on a tray is not a great way to share your feelings.

We sometimes get to a point where our relationship teenager /parent relationships too.

If you need help call Yvette Allen today on 0411 407 149 or send me a contact message about what I do and book a free 15 minute talk.

Quite often a business seems to have a slow or in some cases sudden downward spiral, and in these times we have to ask ourselves what has changed. 

Often it is blamed on the economy, or during the current climate, I am loath to say Covid. 

However, when looking at a business whether it has 2 or 102 employees we also have to look at management, communication or whether we have a toxic employee in the mix. 

I can hear you asking well how would I know. 

The answer to this is firstly to look at how we communicate our instructions to staff, how do we make our wishes known and ensure they are understood. 

This can be quite easy to assess if you know the secrets of how to communicate and what to look for.  For example.  

You may have an employee who seems absolutely wonderful to you, they are always polite and willing and eager to please, but have you ever watched how they are with other employee’s?

Or indeed if it is indeed their own work, or has it just been pushed on to someone else and they have taken the praise and glory! 

This type of employee can be toxic, and you will find that you are losing all your good staff, the staff often cannot get past this employee to voice their concerns so it is easier to just move on that to try.

Other types of employees are managers who really don’t have any idea how to communicate with staff, and will only be able to communicate with 30-40% of the staff. 

This shows a need for education in how to communicate to the various type of staff we have and get our messages over in a clear and concise manner so that all understand. 

It may be that you have to take the time to occasionally sit in at meetings, or that you do staff appraisals so that each employee has an opportunity to voice what they feel it good and what they find does not work so well. 

These appraisals should be done periodically and not attached to wage increases. 

Getting to know your own management style and how to communicate with vocal, auditory and kinaesthetic people can be a great advantage here. 

There are many Neuro Linguistic Programming courses that you can undertake if you have the time, or you may just hire someone with these skills to assess your business. 

You can also read the Virginia Satir Styles of management which can also be helpful. 

No matter what you feel is right for you it is worth your time looking into. 

Education in this field not only helps with staff, but also with your customers. 

When you feel someone is like you and it much easier to like that person and a lot harder to say no to them!

In the long term you can save your business $$$ and let us face it we cannot afford to throw good money after bad.

If you'd like to know how you can communicate and engage with your staff in a more meaningful way, please contact me.

Sometimes things happen in your life, which seem quite trivial at the time, but they keep going through your head, particularly at bed time.  Perhaps it is an incident at work, and you go over and over what you should of said or could have said and there is no end to it. 

This starts as sometime quite unworthy of notice, but once you start to ruminate, each time you go over it as you want it to be the harder it is to deal with that person at work, which could lead to other disputes and end up in one of you leaving the workplace.

Other times perhaps a friend has said something hurtful, and you cannot understand why, what had you done to deserve this, why are you being put up as the bad guy, you have done nothing wrong, why is she bringing this up, had she spoken to the other person, what is going on, and once again come bedtime this will keep ruminating around and around to try and understand, and what can needs to be said or done to make it right. 

Something taken the wrong way, has lead to this, but rumination had blown it completely out of context.

Sometimes you may have reacted badly to a situation and just don’t know how to put it right, how can you take back what you said, it was true after all, they have no right to treat you this way, and you had to defend yourself afterall. 

So there it goes again, around and around and around in your head.

So why do we need help to stop this happening and what does this rumination do for you?

It can cause health problems, especially mental health problems, lack of sleep causing you not to function as well during the day, and exacerbation of the problem through rumination can lead to loss of job, it can rob you of your self esteem, cause you to doubt everything you do, or indeed it can cause you to become aggressive and attack. 

It can change your personality and lead to anxiety, stress and depression, all of which can be avoided if we know how to stop the rumination.

Another type of rumination is when someone has passed over and you have not had the chance to say goodbye, perhaps you had to finish something at work before rushing to the hospital, or perhaps you did not realise the severity of the situation, no matter what it is self blame is not healthy, we cannot turn the clock back so we have to find ways to overcome these feelings of guilt, which often we may have been in the room, left to visit the toilet and when you got back your loved one had passed.  It is very common that a loved one will wait to be alone before they take their last breath, it is not your choice it is theirs and we have to respect this.

For those of us who have family pets, when one passes it is equally upsetting, but when we have been at the vets and been given a choice whether to hang on for a few months, or euthanize we are going to end up ruminating. 

If we hang on and then the pet seems really unwell and we have to euthanize then, we blame ourselves for letting them suffer longer, and if we choose to euthanize straight away we beat ourselves up that it was us that did not want to have the pet there if it only had a year or so, reminding us every day that they may not be there in month or two. 

There is no right or wrong decisions, however when choices are given no matter what we choose, we need to know whether it was the right choice.  

The choice is made, it cannot be undone, so why do we ruminate, beating ourselves up.

We cannot turn the clock back, and Yvette has faced many of these examples, but fortunately she sought help and was able to come to terms with her decision, and also able to apologise if she had mistaken a comment made.  Being able to solve or come to terms with the truth is needed to allow us to move forward.

If we don’t seek help when needed, we can end up seriously depressed or have no self esteem, we may not find making decisions at work easy and it can change our life.  Anxiety is one of the top mental health problems, it can lead to panic attacks, and these can cause one to feel you are having a heart attack, and end up in hospital, to undergo a battery of tests. 

Not a pleasant feeling.

If you would like to ask a question or have a confidential talk then please contact me.

Counselling

A talk therapy, helping the client to map out their needs and how to achieve them. 

This means that you are able to talk freely and absolutely confidentially to your therapist about your feelings, what may have happened to you and how you feel about work, relationships, or any area of your life. 

The therapist will help you to understand what is going on and help you to understand and give you help and information on what you may be able to do to help yourself

EMDR

Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing. 

Associated with the positive effect of this component. 

It helps the brain to store the trauma to a different part of the brain.

During trauma the brain stores the memory in an active part of the brain which constantly brings the memory to the present. 

EMDR moves the memory to a part of the brain which stores the memory, but does not constantly bring it into function.

Hypnosis

Hypnosis is ruled by what the client wants, the hypnotist cannot make anyone do anything that is against their wishes or beliefs. 

During hypnosis the therapist can speak to the unconscious part of the brain and set goals or desires that the client wants to achieve.

NLP  

Neuro Linguistic Programming is a method of communication so that when talking to other you not only build rapport quickly, but generally are able to speak to people in the way they want to hear things.  It is a way of changing someone’s thoughts and behaviours to help them achieve their desired outcomes.  It is a way of changing the way we think, act or file information to our advantage.  This is done through communication and changing how we think, fell and act about certain problems which affect our everyday life.

Time Line Therapy

Involves treatment at an unconscious level and allows a client to surrender negative emotions linked to past experiences and transform their internal programming. 

In time line therapy we find which way our memories and future are stored. 

We are able to release negative memories or habits which are no longer useful to us. 

The therapy also offers a breakdown system which looks at the whole of you and corrects that which needs attention. 

The breakdown system usually takes about 4-6 hours.

Resource Therapy  

Is based on Ego State Therapy taught by Helen and John Watkins. 

They believe that the person is not one homogenous whole, but made up of different parts. 

In Resource therapy we speak to the part that is hurt or needs help and give that part what it needs to become healthy. 

It is an extremely kind therapy and many clients report that after just one session they feel so much lighter. 

It is a remarkable therapy and the client generally only needs a few sessions to complete their treatment.   

To explain it a little more imagine a Pirate Ship with one wheel at the helm where the ship is steered from. 

Now only one part of the person can steer the ship at any one time. 

On the top deck are all our parts which we use daily, which can go to the wheel at any time to help us do whatever it is that we need. 

These parts are what we call healthy parts and do not need any help. 

Right down the bottom on the ship are the parts of us that we either do no use any more, for example the skill used to ride a tricycle, and also the parts of us that may hold shame, or those parts which are not comfortable in going to the wheel and hold position on the top deck. 

These parts we class as unhealthy. 

In resource therapy the therapists can allow us to speak directly to these parts and give them what they need to become healthy again.

If you'd like to find out more, contact Yvette.