The Children’s Society today (27/1/10) published a 2 year study on children’s well being. 7000 children aged between 10-15 years old were asked what made them happy and give them life satisfaction.

The report makes for some interesting reading. Although the focus is on children a lot of the findings could be attributed to the mass population.

The report found that stress, worry and anxiety were regularly mentioned as things that prevented young people having a good life, sound familiar! The findings of what made children unhappy were

• Family conflict
• The way they are treated by adults, in their own community and media
• Least happy with their appearance and confidence

Appearance and confidence is one of the major areas, that the report found to be  a source of unhappiness. 17.5% unhappy with their looks, 16% unhappy with their confidence. 115 unhappy with the amount of choice they have and 10.5% unhappy with the amount of freedom they have.

How much would this be applicable to the adult population? Would the figures be so different? You could envisage that these percentages would be much higher.

This new world of taking control of our lives and the amount of resources available now through the internet, demonstrates that to get what you want in life, is more about your confidence and how you are perceived, as well as what you know.

Schools have started to recognise the importance of developing children’s emotional awareness, through the PSHE( Personal, Social Health & Economic Education) and the SEAL (Social and Emotional Aspects of Learning) programs, however they don’t go far enough.

We all ‘know’ that if a child is happy, feeling good and confident they are more likely to perform better, the same as adults. The number of seminars, workshops and course that are available for us all to develop our confidence and improve our performance is huge. The question to ask, is why is this type of education an after thought in mainstream education?

The report also highlighted some really interesting good points, 66% of young people felt that their life had a sense of purpose, wonder if this would be so high for the mass population? Previous research has shown that having a sense of purpose is linked with well being. Having a life with purpose gives you direction and clarity.The report also showed that 63% of young people felt that their parents/carers understood them.

The feeling I get reading the report is that communication is the key. The report shows that on average families that “get along well together” were around 20% happier than those who do not, irrespective of if you were in a single parent family, living with step parents or living with both partners.

Working in both business and schools, with the teachers, I would say this is also true. When communication is flowing people are much more happier and confident. This is not saying that all things are agreed upon, however knowing there are clear lines of communication and everybody feels valued, means for a more productive working environment. The default position within the UK population is often around avoiding conflict or confrontation, this results in a communication breakdown, where people don’t express what they truly feel.

There is a common saying that 99% of the problems we think of never come true! Think about this, we may stop saying something because of fear of conflict, and we become noddy dogs within board meetings to avoid confrontation, however express what we think after the meeting nearer the water cooler. By having a bit more confidence and courage by individually taking responsibility to communicate more effectively we will all be more happier.

Communicate, with your children, with your friends,  and with your colleagues, it WILL make all the difference.

Summary of Executive Report from the Children’s Society

Related articles

• Innocense of Children’s Thinking (performancecoachingandtraining.co.uk)

Last weekend I went to a seminar run by my friend Deepak Lodhia and he remined me of the famous saying that Bruce Lee Coined – Be Like Water.

This puts what we strive for, in perspective. A great metaphor, if we adapt to situations and events and be our true to our self we will get more of what we want

Image via Wikipedia

Getting more clients is what we all strive for. We go networking, make cold calls, and go to workshops to learn the secrets from the ‘experts’, however if we apply the Yoda principal to getting more clients we will get more than we need.

The word ‘try’ is often heard when in our language, when we look to attempt something, ‘I want to work with that blue chip company, I will try and call the CEO’

TRY!!! This allows for failure. By trying we give ourselves a get out clause.’ Well I did try and call him, but he was busy, he is already working with XYZ‘

Next time you say you will try to do something, just change it to do. Even saying this will change the energy around your intention and make it more likely to happen.

When you are committed to something it is amazing how often opportunities occur. When I coach, whether in schools or in business, if I had a penny for the number of times I hear people say the word try, well, let’s just say, it would be easy money. Yoda’s response to Luke when his ship immersed in the lake was, all about intention.

Is your intention to fail or succeed. Is it an option that you fail? No, so why allow it to happen. By doing, your intention is all around succeeding, and history tells us as soon as we decide on something our intention changes and we get closer to what we want.

Go on try it, sorry DO IT, you never know it might just be true!

So what has undiluted orange squash got to do with anything.

In life we are forever told we must do that, do this, use these words, do this action, don’t eat this, do more exercise, buy this product. However, how many times do you actually listen to your inner self. Some call this intuition, awareness, gut instinct, any numerous definitions.

Does listening to your inner self make a difference, well if you listen only once or twice, maybe not, however if you trust it and listen the results may surprise you.

What would a glass of undiluted orange squash taste like? Bitter, strong, not very nice. Now the easiest thing to do is put water in it and drink it. Wouldn’t it be good if life was like that, i.e. when we come up against something that is bitter and not very nice we can just add something to it to make it better.

Just imagine if you put just one drop of water in the undiluted orange squash, would it taste any different, would it look any different, would it smell any different, no it wouldn’t. Now if you gave it to a scientist to see if it was different, what would they say? Yes there is, however only you and the scientist can know there is a difference.

That drop of water represents the small change we could all make to get the things we want in life. That small step that takes us nearer to our goal, that one small change of thought that makes us see those seemingly impossible things, now just really difficult.

What would be the implication if you allowed yourself to add one drop of water each month, each week, each day, or even each hour? For the first few drops only you (and the scientist) know you have made some changes, however the outside world will not know until, much, much later.

As humans one of our “want’s” is that we look for approval so when we make some changes we like it acknowledged, and when we don’t get that outside validation we lose self-belief  and give-up. The outside world will notice the great glass of orange juice only until several drops have been added and then the outside world can see the differnece.

This is the same when we do something different. It may take days, weeks, or even months before others see the different. But does this matter. If you knew that by adding a drop of water each day, you would achieve your goals, tackle near impossible tasks and increase your self-belief, would it really matter, if others notice the differenece?

By making sure you add one drop of water each day and being consistent you will start to get the results you want, and if you’re lucky others may see the difference as well!

Image by epicnom via Flickr

We often hear marketing professionals asking us about our USP (unique selling point) is, and many misinterpret this as  how are you better than the competition, when actually what they are is how are you DIFFERENT than the rest.

What is it that stands you out from the rest of the crowd? Think about it, you tend to remember the things that are different from the norm. Does your marketing and sales pitch lend itself to this? What is the impression that people are left with when they have either met you at an event, or experienced your services? What do they remember?

Ask yourself this, are you constantly trying to show how much better you are than the others or how you are different? Whatever profession you are in, people will choose you because you relate to them and because you have something different that they like.

Don’t kid yourself, whatever your profession, (unless you are the leader of a country!!!) there are thousands of people doing what you do. The following video perfectly demonstrates this. Getting over 38 million hits, it’s all about being different not necessarily better.

How can you be different? Please leave a comment and let others know what is different about you.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Train Yourself To Be In The Mood You Want (stacyknows.blogspot.com)
• 9 Ways To Stand Out In A Crowded Blogging Niche (davidrisley.com)
• A Few Guidelines To Help You With Effective Article Marketing (ronmedlin.com)
• 6 tips for treating your customers like friends (smartblogs.com)