Embarrassing or Empowering: Choice is Yours to Speak Out and Recover

Lately, I have been talking to a lot to people about my book Love on the Line, How to Recover from Romance Scams Gracefully and without Victimisation, It has been a huge learning curve for me about how to best advocate to my audience the importance of recovery as a surviving method from romance scams. My method has been writing through healing narrative. I have been surprised to find how hard the recovery really is because so many people feel embarrassed by their own experience. 

There are many reasons for embarrassment from loosing money to not really believing that such a thing could happen to me. Sometimes it is hard to face yourself and admit to the vulnerability that is within everyone of us. Sometimes it is hard to be confident to know that it was never your fault, even though the victims are often blamed for the crime, What is certain is that anyone can become a target of a scammer. Dr Cassandra Cross from the Queensland University of Technology, while talking at my book launch in January 2016, put it as it is:

   "The reality is that anyone could become a victim of scammers. We all have vulnerability. We have to respect that the offenders know exactly how to find that vulnerability and weakness. That is their profession."

She also said that people like me who come forward and speak out are rare. I was not really aware how rare, before I started to really engage with my readers and interested audience. I also found that many websites or groups that take on the issue of scamming have to work in secrecy or very privately to keep their members protected from treats. It was a schock to understand how many people are affected by scamming.

Wouldn't it be the ideal that our world would support the victims of scams. Instead, many feel isolated and afraid. Many feel devastated and disillusioned with the world. Luckily, there is hope, healing and recovery to consider. There are those who have spoken out about it, like Sharron Armstrong with her #standup2scams community. There are people like John with his Website and Facebook group who want to help. There are bloggers like Jas who write about inequality and how to engage yourself in making the world a better place, Last, but not least, there e people like Chris and Glenda who have made it their primary purpose to help others, in business and in person to get over it and act on it. I feel it my duty to spread the word of hope and positivity through writing.

So, join me in empowering yourself by using hashtags like #stanup2scams and my new one #speakoutandheal in your social media postings. Also tags like #empowerment #endviolence #positiveaction and #recoveryispossible would be good. And you can make up your own as you go. Blogging is also an effective and easy way to get your meaning accross to a wider audience. Sometimes, there might not be a huge readership, at first but we are working towards a long time result so every little action is a welcome addition to the movement. And if you have some good ones, please feel free to comment and and suggest down below, 

I am currently developing writing workshops and also a newsletter. My new Website for Love on the Line Book is alive and there is a blog that is all about those important question that has come fort during my book signing and event tours. Feel free to get involved. My main Website should get you everywhere. The book can be bought through Xlibris or any other main distributor like Amazon. Ah, and do like my Facebook Author page, too.

I wish you all a great Holiday Break from Australia.

Contemplation on Newly Learned Goal Setting Methods and Futuristic Thinking Processes

Recently I attended two very interesting small workshops about goal setting and futuristic thinking processes.

The first one was a lunch workshop at Jimboomba organised by the Logan Country Chamber of Commerce, the second was an inspirational breakfast talk organised by the Westside Business Women at Springfield Lakes. Both were concerned about the future, one with a personal focus and the other with a more of a global business focus. Both were about creating that little edge that makes us reach for more and allows us to dare to take a premeditated leap of faith towards the presently desired future possibilities.

From both seminars, I acquired a book. Paula McSporran gave me a link to her eBook The Smart Start; The Basics of Goal Setting and Craig Rispin let me download the eBook version of How to Think Like a Futurist; Know First, Be First & Profit First'.



My experience

For many, many years I have recorded goals for myself and my businesses. Every now and then I have picked up a new method on how to evaluate my existing situation and how to set new goals for the future. I have received lots of mentoring and advice on what would be the best way to take action.

Mostly, I have succeeded in determining what to do and how I wanted to go forward with my life. Mostly, I feel, it has been determination, positivity and good luck that has brought me there. I feel that I have gotten everything I ever really wanted and much more of what I never consciously knew I wanted. Does that sound familiar?

I have 30 years of records on my methods of personal goal setting and action taken from that. For the first 15 years, I followed a very simple advice from the collective of feminist mentors by traveling around the world in conferences, picking up trends and researching the accuracy of them in relation to the Scandinavian situation and taking social action for Human Rights, especially Women's Rights.

The last 15 years have been more structured. I have followed many leads and methods from doing all the exercises in the Experimental Guide to James Redfield's The Celestine Prophecy to experimenting with affirmations learned from Victor Boc's How to Solve All Your Money Problems Forever. I also have been inspired by many motivational speakers that have given advice on goal setting.

Paula's workshop

I was very intrigued by the simple and strait forward manner of the goal setting method Paula McSporran proposed in her workshop. It is to write a story of your 'best year yet' dated one year from the day you are writing it. The story will allow you to imagine what you really want to do in a short time-frame.

The next step is to write down what you need to start, maintain and finish in order to create your 'best year yet' in quarterly sequences. The most important step is to take action to realize your goals into reality.

This means that if you want to travel overseas for Christmas, you actually need to book your flights or if you are looking for a job, you have to write an application and send it. Wishful thinking is not productive for efficient and clear goal setting.

Re-program your brain

The most important reason why you need to be clear of your goals is that it will re-program your unconscious brain to work for the goal and attract situations that will aid in realizing your desired future.

One interesting recently released movie called 'Source Code' is based on the quantum hypotheses that there are many possible futures for us and that every decision we make will create a new pathway into the future. The goal setting processes rely on much the similar idea. Once you have programed your brain to focus on a goal, your unconsciousness starts drawing suitable circumstances your way to make it a reality.

What if you want conflicting things?

After the workshop, I went home and wrote a story about my best year yet based on what I felt and wanted on the day I wrote it. That was two weeks ago. I also took action on the most obvious things, the once I have control over. Now things have changed.

Since most of us look at life through our emotions rather than cold reasoning, it is about right that we would have conflicting feelings on a daily bases. So, now I need to write another story. The good thing is that, our brain is so plastic that it will re-program itself any time.

My conclusion from this experiment is to write a new story of the 'best year yet' every couple of months. That will enable me to determine what it is that I really want. After that exercise I probably will have some real goals for starting, maintaining and finishing.

A huge thanks goes to Paula for her practical advice. I think it is really important to start somewhere and keep on doing it.

What about the futuristic thinking?

Incidentally, a week from Paula's workshop I attended a breakfast talk by a professional futurist and a motivational speaker Craig Rispin. That allowed me to think of the future more in terms of the 'bigger picture'.

Craig is a very inspiring and enthusiastic speaker. It is impossible to get a still picture of him while he is talking. This probably is a good demonstration of the fact of how quickly the world is moving towards the future.

In 30 minutes, I learned a lot about how to think like a futurist. For example, we now have 468 million mobile net devices in the world. We are in the digital age and it has to be taken into consideration when determining business goals and strategic plans for the organisations we work for.

I also was reintroduced to many successful past futurist thinkers. According to Craig a futurist is a reverse historian. I can certainly relate to that. After reading his book, I am thoroughly convinced.

When applying what I learned to community capacity building and aged care, I can definitely see that there is lots to take in. Futuristic thinking applies to all areas from how and where to place your marketing strategy to how to strategize for finding opportunities in the growing new communities around us.

After these experiences I am re-ascertained that innovation is the key, both to personal growth and the business growth. Thinking outside the box is immensely important for the future of humanity in the global digital future with the aging population.

References:

Boc, Victor (1997) How to Solve Your Money Problems Forever, Perigee Trade

Redfield, James & Adrienne, Carol (1995) The Celestine Prophecy; an Experimental Guide, Bantam Books

Link to Paula McSporran

Link to Craig Rispin


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Notes from Partnering - Above and Below the Line – Workshop

Last week, I and 20 others were lucky to spend two fascinating days in a workshop about partnering fascilitated by Ian Dixon (Dixon Partnerships Solutions) and Max Hardy (Twyfords). They are specialists in engaging people in partnerships.

About a year ago they formed a successful trainer partnership and have since trained Primary Health Partnership Council members and their prospective partners around Queensland on how to set up partnerships and engage in meaningful and strategic conversations with each other. Through these conversations the eventual partners gain skills in creating, developing and sustaining productive initiatives that contribute to the health and wellbeing of their communities.

I was astounded that there is so much to learn about this. I found that there actually is a structure to building strong partnerships. The workshop proved to be a very enlightening experience. Until now I have just gone from the assumption that to form relationships and engage in conversations is human nature. But now I know that some are far better at it than others. Not only that but engaging skills can be sharpened and used constructively.



I have always been good at networking and have understood that building and maintaining relationships is a natural part of my work in the community. However, as a skilled engineer, Ian has dissected the process of building relationships. He has made it to a structured process that can be used to form and build strong and healthy partnerships that are productive until it is time to ‘move on’. Ian’s way of structuring the partnering course of action is very useful and practical. I am looking forward to applying the acquired learning to my daily work practices.

Ian and Max work very well together. They have combined their skills in workshop practice and can really engage participants. Max is the social worker of the duo.

In the workshop he facilitated the exercises around the partnership building by introducing us to such very useful relationship creating and building tools as ‘Appreciative Inquiry’ and ‘Strategic Questioning’. “Research shows”, he explained, “that the way surveys and enquiries are laid out affect the results.”

Well, we knew that, but it was a surprise to get to know that the very process of the enquiry affects ‘how we are’. It is better to enquire into positives of experiences than fix the problems with negatives.

We were introduced to David L. Cooperrider (2003) and Fran Peavey (1994) and their thought processes in enquiring about the positive in human experience and putting their questions in such a forward thinking way that it contributes to the desired outcomes. We then practiced our newly acquired skill in groups. It was a well-organised learning curve for us all. In just two days we came out with a highly useful practical skill set. We also met new people and formed new relationships.

For me, this is always the best part of the workshops I participate in, getting to know everybody, sharing experiences and stories. I am looking forward to receiving newsletters and connecting with my new prospective partners through work and through social media.


References:
COOPERRIDER, D. L. & WHITNEY, D. 2003. Appreciative Inquiry: A Positive Revolution in Change, San Francisco, Berrett-Koehler Publishers.

PEAVEY, F. 1994. By Life's Grace: Musings on the Essence of Social Change, USA: New Society Publishers.