Where Can I Find Great Training Courses By Experts?

August 19, 2017 by Gill Thackray Leave a Comment

Where can I find great training courses?

You won’t ever pay extra for bespoke, tailored training with us. It comes as standard with our training courses (and we’ll guarantee that our standard is less than our competitors).

We’ll also give you UNLIMITED support after we’ve worked with you and delivered your training courses.

You’ll get FREE access to a huge range of resources including psychometrics, self assessments, blogs, e-books, podcasts and videos. Our suite of resources complements all of our training courses.

You and your team will get FREE access to our virtual Q&A surgeries to trouble shoot any challenges that you come up against after your bespoke training course.

We’re here for you. We want you to succeed and we’d like to be part of that by doing everything we can to help you get there. It means everything to us.

No fuss. No gimmicks. No spin.

Just very well qualified, highly experienced trainers who want your performance to soar. We’re different because, well, you are.

Find out more about what we do by visiting the rest of this site or our events page www.planetpositivechange.com or contact us as admin@planetpositivechange.com

Don’t forget we can create a course for you, bespoke, tailored to your exact needs at no extra cost.

You can ask us to create bitesize espresso, half day, 1 day or 2 day training options for you all at no extra cost. We also deliver conference keynotes based upon our latest research. Just ask! Contact us at admin@planetpositivechange.com

The Hamburger Model

December 16, 2016 by Gill Thackray Leave a Comment

We’ll begin with a disclaimer: The Hamburger Model doesn’t sanction a hamburger fest. Nope, it’s way more nuanced than that. So what does Harvard’s Dr Ben-Shahar have to say about hamburgers and happiness?

Ben-Shar’s happiness model rests upon his assertion that “When you learn how to live for today and for tomorrow at the same time, you learn how to balance your immediate personal needs with long term goals and enjoy life as you never have before.”

Using a hamburger analogy, the happiness model emphasises how some of our choices will bring immediate satisfaction. Cue the image of a big, juicy, cheesy hamburger. Yum. Ben-Shaham equates that with tasty, short term pleasure. But long term? Not so great. Sure there’s a short term gain but it comes with a long term price. Health, wellbeing and physical fitness are all impacted. Ben-Shaham then offers us the alternative example of a veggie burger. Initially, to some, less appealing. It’s the healthy option, we may have negative feelings about consuming the healthy option over the hamburger but long term, it provides us with multiple benefits. The hamburger model illustrates how we oscillate between healthy-unhealthy options, choices and attitudes in every area of our lives. The happiness model encourages us to refine our choices, identifying options that are both healthy and tasty.

In addition to the hamburger analogy, Ben-Shaham identifies four archetypes;

Nihilism: Nihilists feel that all of the joy has been sucked out of life. They don’t see the point. Present and future benefits don’t exist for the nihilist.
Hedonism: Hedonists are all about the present moment. Whatever brings them pleasure is ok by them. There’s little future thought when they make their decisions and choices.
Rat Racing: This archetype focuses upon future reward at the expense of present pleasure. Deferred gratification is the mantra for the rat racer.
Happiness: This archetype represents balance between the present moment and the future.

Do you recognise your own individual archetype?

By developing our awareness and identifying choices that will increase our happiness, Ben-Shahar argues that we can increase our level of happiness. This model is all about incremental steps, small choices or tweaks that we can make each day to contribute to our overall wellbeing.

Ask yourself: What incremental steps or choices am I able to make today that will provide balance and happiness tomorrow?

Want to know more about the Hamburger Model or building your happiness, resilience and wellbeing? We offer consultancy, training, bitesize, half day or one day training courses along with conference sessions on how to build effective organisations. Contact us at admin@planetpositivechange.com to find out more. We’d love to talk with you.

Ageing and resilience – how attitudes help manage stress

August 11, 2016 by Vivienne Dutton Leave a Comment

How our attitudes towards ageing influence resilience

Your attitude to ageing – more than a passing thought?

We’re almost continuously bombarded with tips and advice about the secrets of remaining young but have you ever considered how your attitude towards ageing could impact you in other ways?

Ageing and resilience

New research from North Carolina State University (NCSU) examines the link between attitudes towards ageing and resilience. The team at NCSU were curious to know why previous research examining older adults attitudes towards ageing and resilience had shown mixed results. Lead researcher, Jennifer Bellingtier explains,

“… some studies have found that older adults are less resilient than younger adults at responding to stress; some have found that they’re more resilient; and some have found no difference … we wanted to see whether attitudes toward aging could account for this disparity in research findings. In other words, are older adults with positive attitudes about aging more resilient than older adults with negative attitudes?”

The study

Forty three participants, aged between 60 and 96 were asked to complete a daily questionnaire regarding stress and negative emotions they’d experienced over a period of eight days. Researchers factored for how optimistic and upbeat participants generally were in order to establish whether attitudes specifically towards ageing influenced resilience. Participants were asked a series of questions at the beginning of the research to establish their attitudes towards ageing. For example, researchers asked if participants felt they were as useful now as they were when they were younger, or whether they were as happy now as when they were younger.

Bellingtier and her team found that older people with a more positive attitude towards ageing were more resilient in the face of stressful events. The older people with a more positive attitude did not show a significant increase in negative emotions on more stressful days. Participants with a more negative attitude towards ageing showed significantly increased negative emotions in relation to stressful events.

Implications of the research

The way we think about ageing has a very real impact on our ability to manage stress as we get older. Stress has been linked to an increased risk of cardiovascular disease. The research illustrates the importance of managing our emotions and cultivating the skills that allow us to effectively deal with stress. We’re are all able to practice and develop the techniques that enable us to enhance a feeling of calm and quickly move away from negative emotions rather than dwelling on whatever has caused us to feel that way. Why not try Positive Change Guru’s ‘how mindful are you? assessment to get started on managing your negative emotions.

We love to talk about all things positive psychology at Positive Change Guru. Check out our forthcoming events or get in touch to find out more about our suite of courses. We’ll be excited to talk to you about bespoke positive psychology training for your organisation.