Aligning Your Thoughts for Career & Relationship Success
Posted on December 07, 2022 by Nicole Trincia, One of Thousands of Career Coaches on Noomii.
It's not what happens to us or our circumstances in life, as it is our thoughts and resulting feelings. How may you shift perspective?
Do you ever feel out of sorts, off, or just not right? Perhaps you are out of alignment. “Out of physical alignment?” you may ask. That is quite possible as a resulting manifestation, but more importantly- out of alignment in your thinking. When our inner world, specifically our thoughts, does not match our outer world, conflict arises. When our thoughts about ourselves portray us as in conflict with the outer world, our experienced reality is unpleasant.
If you were to slow yourself way down, get quiet, and be still, what do you find is out of alignment? What is it that you are trying to achieve or become that is not quite lining up? What are your expectations- of something to happen, of someone else, or just of yourself? How might you look at the situation or yourself and truly see it as it currently exists- withholding your expectations, and any judgment, and simply accepting it as it is- even for just a few moments? You may not wish for it or approve it, but you may accept it. How might you even become playful and curious about this situation, flip it around, and consider the opportunities it might present, the information or message it might offer, and the clarity it might reveal?
In Dragon Slaying: Dragons Into Princes (2000) cognitive behavioral psychologist L. Michael Hall, Ph.D. thoroughly describes how it is not so much what happens to us or our circumstances in life, as it is our thoughts and resulting feelings about it. This phenomena of NLP (neuro-linguistic processing) and resulting meta-states (feelings layered upon thoughts) can create nightmarish loops of existence, or as Hall calls it, dragons. However, NLP and meta-states can be tamed and transform our worst nightmares into our wildest and most wonderful dreams- and lives. So, how may we get ourselves right or in alignment with our lives? How may we become an ally to our presumed conflicts? More often than not, we are called to adjust our expectations or perspective of how we see something, someone else, or ourselves in relation to our life.
Coaching leverages this transformative use of NLP and restructuring of meta-states. It offers a courageous and honest opportunity to explore and gain awareness of how we are perhaps out of alignment. Many other consulting-like approaches or apps tell us what we “should be” doing or “how to be,” checking off boxes or a To-Do list. Partnering with a live, sentient professional coach is the only modality that empowers its brave adventurers to discover their own unique, limiting framework, identifying the misalignment with their world. From this place of self-awareness, one may proactively choose how they want to redirect their focus- into alignment, freedom, and peace.
Next time you feel a bit off, hit pause, take a breath, and take inventory of your surroundings, situation, and inner landscape. What are you thinking, and how do you feel about it? What assumptions and expectations are you perhaps rigidly holding as your basis of operation? Now, what if you were to remove those guidelines? Are there other ways to look at the situation or possibilities to consider? How might things or YOU be exactly how they are meant to be? How would you need to shift your interpretation of your situation to move you out of being at odds with your reality to one with which you are in alignment- a reality worth living? How could you shift your motivations to prioritizing alignment and peace? The possibility and choice to be an ally of alignment are always yours.
Nicole Trinica is a Certified MBI Wayfinder Life Coach and active San Francisco Chapter ICF Member in progress to obtaining ICF Certification by year-end 2022. She shares a background in psychology, education, and coaching, with a Master’s in Education and a Bachelor’s in Psychology. She has over 20 years of combined teaching, wellness, and coaching experience, specializing in career and relationship coaching. She partners with curious and courageous individuals in the workplace and independently to empower them to live authentically and fully.
