Control your controllables

I have had a very busy summer training new NLP Kids Practitioners and helping children who for various reasons finished the summer term with very low self-esteem and feeling worried about returning to school in September. Parents decided to tackle this by enrolling them on my confidence and resilience programmes of four one hour sessions. Mostly these were face to face here in Burnham but I also did a great many on Skype which work so well as kids can sit in their bedroom and talk to me which makes it easier for mums who have other children and also for the child because they feel safe and relaxed. 

Let me share with you the one thing they all found really helpful. 

Control your controllables!

When they talked through things that had happened at school; teachers telling them off for things they hadn't done, other children being mean to them, friends dumping them for another person in their class, not being invited to a party 'everyone else' was going to, being bullied etc when I asked them to cross out everything they couldn't control, there was nothing left. None of this was in their control. 

We talked about the things that were in their control such as

• their body language
• their beliefs about themselves
• their ability to make other choices
• what they could say back
• who they could go to for help
• what skills they could use to respond differently
• choosing to be with other children
• acting 'as if' - fake it until you make it - pretending not to care

It was remarkable how once they realised and accepted that 

If you always do what you've always done, you will always get what you've always got

they could actually take responsibility for responding differently and get a different outcome.