I woke begrudgingly with the sun shining in through the curtains, as I moved my feet to the floor I looked down to see the floor scattered with empty medicine packets. Lots of them. Then I remembered, last night I’d taken all my medicine. The medicines that made me get up, the ones that made me go to sleep and anything and everything else I could find around the house too. I was so angry.
Looking back to that dark day 13 years ago, I can remember the anger felt so engulfing I didn’t think I’d be able to speak to anyone without losing it. “How could I take that lot and not die!” I thought. It should have been a fore gone conclusion. I was so mad that I remember picking up the medicine guideline leaflet that can be like war and peace and looking for the pharmaceutical company’s telephone number so that I could phone them and complain, “This was false advertising, it clearly states that “in the event of an overdose, go straight to hospital. Risk of death.”
This may sound mad, but I was a poorly woman. I really hadn’t got a grasp on my mental health illness and I can remember that feeling that I just wanted it to end, life, me, just stop and let it go black for good. Thankfully I didn’t get my wish that day.
Looking back and remembering that moment, it’s like I was a different Mandie Holgate. I’ve learned so much about me, life, mindset and how to live a powerful happy life. And as awful as those 18 months of severe mental health illness were, without them I would not be changing lives around the world and have a book that’s sold around the world.
I wish we could learn the lesson easier that to be successful in everything we do, it has to start with self love. I often remind people that I can help them create the greatest marketing strategy or the best goal plan of action. However, if you don’t believe in yourself, you will find a way to damage your results and ultimately your success.
Self love also enables us to keep our confidence and self esteem high. Without this, it too will damage our success. We will suffer far more when experiencing failure, which is an ingredient to the recipe to success.
However, the pre-depression Mandie never really grasped what she had been was not what she could truly be. And if this resonates with you, if you feel like you are struggling with mental well being, it’s not something to be ashamed about; it’s not a weakness (as I saw it to be). As scary as it may be, know that when you take that massive leap to tell someone and talk about it, you will be putting your foot on the road to making it easier and a better for you. The right people do care, if you give them chance to let them.
Here I’d like to share the tough life lessons I learned and how they could change your life without nearly losing yours.
Telling people you are struggling is not a sign of weakness.
The hardest lesson I learned from my own adversity and obstacles to happiness is that, I don’t have to do it all on my own. I’m terrible at asking for help. When I was ill, it was because I felt weak if I asked for help — useless and pathetic. “Poor Mandie, can’t deal with life” I thought.
However, I’ve learned that we all need someone to lean on sometimes. It’s a sign of strength to be able to say “I need help”. Strong and confident people trust that they are liked and respected. They know that if they ask for help, they will get it so as to get the results they want.
The voices in your head will always aim to revert to negativity.
When I was ill, the talking therapies I accessed not only changed my life, but are changing my clients’ lives too since I also use the talking therapies with my clients now every day.
Of all the things I could share with you, I think being aware of the inner voice is a very powerful one. Learn to hear what your voices say to you. That internal dialogue can be a power for good or bad, but only if you become aware of what it is saying. I often point out to clients that at the start you don’t need to work out how to change that negative voice, just by being aware of it you could change it. It likes to go untested and unchecked, so note what you are saying in your own head.
Saying no is not selfish, it’s selfless.
We think we are being epic when we do everything everyone asks us to. When we constantly say yes, it does wonders for other people’s success. However, it can greatly impact on our own well being and success. A feeling of guilt and frustration can creep in, and you can feel like no one respects you or what you want to achieve. Learning when to say no and how to say it in the right way for you is a powerful way to achieve greater levels of success.
Getting it wrong is good for you.
For me, it was hard to accept that failure was going to be good for me. I felt like Mandie Holgate had to perform to perfection every time. The problem with this is that we are less likely to open ourselves up to mistakes and getting it wrong. We don’t want to lose face so we don’t risk failure.
However, failure is such a valuable lesson to success. It’s a chance to learn, appreciate your tenacity, determination and dedication. Without failure, you can’t hone your skills or even appreciate the depths to which they go. As long as you keep working towards your success, people don’t have a habit of concentrating on your failures. You, on the other hand, have an inherent ability to hang on to failure as a distinction of your success. Accept your failures as much as you do your successes to really achieve more.
Changing your mind is allowed.
Becoming an entrepreneur, I had clear goals from the start on what I wanted to achieve and what success looked like to me. I rarely shied away from sharing what that definition of success looked like either. You are after all, far more likely to achieve success if you tell people what you are looking to do. However, sometimes I would find myself doing things that I didn’t really want to.
Learning to be honest about what matters to you in life and going for true passions can mean that you change your mind and there is no law against that. How much do you want this? Is this really for you? Having the strength to follow a clear path is powerful, and knowing when that path is just taking you further away from what you really want is just as important. It feels easier to change course than change your mind and skill set. Be aware with this top tip that you aren’t changing direction because you aren’t getting results.
Stop assuming that you will fail.
I don’t think I’ve ever had a coaching client that has said to me how awesome it’s going to be. They always start from a place of “What if we can’t cope with demand?” “What if I can’t do it?” “What if it doesn’t work?” or “What if they don’t like me?” The reason relates to top tip number 2 in that we tend to revert to a negative train of thought. And thus we assume we will fail. We never assume it will be awesome, that they will love us, that we will be a sell out success. (On the occasions where someone has assumed they would sell out, they’ve only thought like that because they’ve assumed that they wouldn’t be able to cope with demand, and so would still fail by damaging their brand and reputation!)
The “What if game” is a great way to challenge the assumptions you are making and find out if they are true, or only an unhelpful perception that is distorting your view of the results you can expect. What could you assume that could be positive and how do you ensure that this happens?
Doing more does not always compute to more success.
I love how the standard reply to “How are you?” is usually “really busy thanks” It used to be “fine thanks, you?” Being busy has become the curse of the 21st century. Woe be tide the person that admits to finishing work early or not hustling, toiling, pushing, working hard or giving it your all. As a society, we’ve learned to look over our shoulder and assume what the next person is doing is what we will need to do to be successful—wrong.
We need to learn to think and work smarter. This summer, I turned my phone off and had 24 days holiday. The list of what I achieved in that time included a free holiday in a German Castle and opportunities I’d not even considered! No one need to know how many hours you work. The person you need to impress most, is you. If your way of working is delivering what you want out of your personal and professional life, stick with it. If it’s not work smarter, don’t just work harder. It will damage your long term health and happiness.
And lastly this may sound fake or salesy, however 2017 has personally thrown my family some very challenging times that have had me looking to the heavens and thinking “Really? More stuff dumped on us?” I’ve used my own book that is packed with the tools and techniques that I started learning all those years ago when I nearly died to keep my mind positive and still achieve despite life throwing obstacles and adversity at me. I truly believe that we can achieve anything with the right mindset. I was rather proud to re-read my own book and think, “wow, there’re some seriously good ideas in here!”
I don’t tell you this to sell my book, I tell you this because we are so fearful of being proud of ourselves and risking looking arrogant that we risk losing our self confidence and damaging our self esteem. Thirteen years on I’m very proud to be Mandie Holgate, and to be changing lives around the world for the price of a book. I wish that every reader of this article can learn the power of being able to say “This is me, and I’m damn good at it!” What could that do for your personal and professional success?
Buy Mandie’s book Fight the Fear – How to beat your negative mindset and win in life on Amazon
