Three Magazines I'm in this Month (and some comments about Rodney Hide and confidence and the psychology of personal change)

This month I’m in 3 magazines.

For the current edition of Mindfood, I wrote an article about expressing thanks. My editor at the Mindfood requested the topic because its their end of year/holidays edition.

Back in August I was one of the judges at a New Zealand fitness industry awards event called the Fitness Life Awards. Along with Hon Rodney Hide and Dr Nigel Harris, senior lecturer in fitness and exercise at Auckland University of Technology. A write up about the event is in the current issue of Fitness Life, as well as lots of photos. For readers outside NZ, Rodney Hide is a leader of a political party in New Zealand and current cabinet minister/member of parliament. Rodney lost a LOT of weight in the last few years through working with a personal trainer and being a contestant on NZ Dancing with the Stars. Rodney has had some negative press attention lately (as a result of his partner accompanying him on some overseas trips at tax payer expense). However, I wanted to make a positive comment about the speech Rodney gave at the awards event. Rodney’s speech at the awards was both insightful and heartfelt. The point he highlighted was that prior to working with a trainer he had been resigned to being unhealthy, overweight and unfit. He did not have confidence in himself that it was within his capacity to make changes in this area of his life. (Psychologist’s call this low self efficacy. Self-efficacy refers to your belief in your ability to achieve your goals i.e. Your beliefs about what’s possible for you). Rodney said in his speech that a big change for him was that his trainer helped him see himself differently. She helped him develop a new belief that it was possible for him to make changes. It was obvious from how Rodney spoke that he is profoundly grateful to the trainer for helping him see himself and his capacities for change in a fundamentally different way. It was a personal and touching speech and I liked it very much. I love that finding someone who has confidence in you can be a dramatically life changing experience.

An interesting question that comes up a lot in therapy is – How confident are you that you can achieve whatever it is that you want to achieve (e.g., feeling happier, feeling less anxious, or overcoming an unwanted behaviour)? Lets say scale of 0 to 10, 0 = not at all confident, 10 = completely confident. If you’re less than a 10, what would help you be more confident? Say, to move up a few numbers on the scale. If you’re not at least an 8, this is probably something to work on. Sometimes becoming more confident is an issue of correcting faulty beliefs and sometimes its about other types of problem solving (if your lack of confidence has basis in reality).

The third magazine I’m in the University of Canterbury Alumni Magazine. It’s a feature about my weight and relationships study and also about my practice and this blog! It’s a really cool article. A pdf of the magazine is available free online but the latest edition isn’t up on their website yet. Will do another blog post with the link when its available.

I have quite a few blog posts in unfinished, draft states so expect more psychology/self help posts later in the week. :-)