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Three tips to enjoy your life more  …

1: Have a daily ritual around enjoyment:  

Upon waking, ask yourself, “What do I look forward  

to most today.”

At the end of your day, ask yourself, 

“What was the most enjoyable part of my day and why? 

2: Whenever you eat try to focus on the

taste of your  food for just one minute.  

What does it taste like?

Try to identify the different 

sensations.

Salty? Sweet? Bitter? Sour?   

If you are eating with someone, comment to them 

about each observation. 

This tip comes out of the research which suggests  

that eating smaller portions of food with more  

mindfulness can increase your actual enjoyment  

of what you are eating.  

3:  Put a reminder in your calendar  

Decide what is a priority for you each day and then set reminders

in your calendar, phone, or computer to remind yourself regularly to

enjoy whatever is most important in your life.

Take Action: 

Try these three tips to enjoy your life more.

At Resilient Minds we help our clients to develop strong

resilience so they can perform at high levels in all facets of

their lives. 

www.resilientminds.co.nz 
Thought Leaders in Resilience, Productivity, and Wellbeing 

Jamie +64 21 772 079 

‘You have to enjoy life. Always be surrounded by  
people that you like, people who have a nice  
conversation. There are so many positive things  
to think about.’ Sophia Loren 
 

Certain colours make us think of certain things.  

Ever wonder why all sales signs are red, for example?  

It’s because people react faster and more 
forcefully when they see the colour.  

People tend to associate the colour red with a  
danger cue, and that attracts attention. 

Guess which colour provides the biggest boost in  
motivation and energy? 

The colour green. 

That’s why we should all ‘see some green’!

Researchers have found in two studies that  
surrounding yourself with a bit of green provides  
a boost in motivation; and also that a glimpse 
of the colour green sparks creativity. 

One study asked subjects to perform three cycling  
exercises while watching a video of a rural cycling course.  

The videos were randomly selected to have green, grey,  
or red filters. 

The green filter made the cyclists happier and less tired.  
 

Simply seeing lots of green made them more motivated. 

Take Action: 

How can you ‘see more green’ in your life? Go outside!  
 
Take a stroll in a garden, or anywhere with shrubs and  
greenery. Go out and walk in these places. In addition to  
seeing more green; you’ll be a lot more motivated after a brief  
physical exertion and some fresh air. 

At Resilient Minds we help our clients to develop strong resilience 
so they can perform at high levels in all facets of their lives. 

Warm regards 

Jamie Ford 

www.resilientminds.co.nz 
Thought Leaders in Resilience, Productivity, and Wellbeing 

Jamie +64 21 772 079 

‘Green is the prime colour of the world, and that from  
which its loveliness arises.’ Pedro Calderon de la Barca

One of the fastest ways to make yourself feel more  
positive is to read an inspirational positive story.   

Here is a great example about choice: 

Every day we have two choices 

Michael is the kind of guy you love to hate. He is  
always in a good mood, and always has something 
positive to say.  

When someone would ask him how he was doing,  
he would reply, “If I were any better, I would be twins!”  

He was a natural motivator. If an employee was having  
a bad day, Michael was there telling the employee how  
to look on the positive side of the situation. 

Seeing this style really made me curious, so one day I  
went up to Michael and asked him, “I don’t get it! You can’t  
be a positive person all of the time. How do you do it?”  

Michael replied, “Each morning I wake up and say to  
myself! You have two choices today. You can choose  
to be in a good mood or you can choose to be in a bad  
mood. I choose to be in a good mood.” 

I reflected on what Michael said. Soon thereafter, I left  
the Tower Industry to start my own business. We lost  
touch, but I often thought about him when I made a  
choice about life instead of reacting to it. 

Several years later, I heard that Michael was involved 
in a bad accident, falling some sixty feet from a  
communications tower.  

After eighteen hours of surgery and weeks of intensive  
care, Michael was released from the hospital with rods  
placed in his back. 

I saw Michael about six months after the accident.  

When I asked him how he was, he replied, “If I were  
any better, I’d be twins. Want to see my scars?”  

I declined to see his wounds, but I did ask him what 
had gone through his mind as the accident took place. 

“The first thing that went through my mind was the  
well-being of my soon to be born daughter, “Michael  
replied.  “Then, as I lay on the ground, I remembered  
that I had two choices: I could choose to live or I could  
choose to die. I chose to live!” 

“Weren’t you scared? Did you lose consciousness?” 
I asked.  

Michael continued, “… the paramedics were great.  

They kept telling me I was going to be fine, But when 
they wheeled me into the ER I saw the expressions on  
the faces of the doctors and nurses.” I got really scared.  
In their eyes, I read, “he’s a dead man.”  

I knew I needed to take action. 

“What did you do?” I asked.  

“Well, there was a big burly nurse shouting questions at me.  
She asked if I was allergic to anything.” 

“Yes,” I replied. The doctors and nurses stopped working  
as they waited for my reply.  

I took a deep breath and yelled, “Gravity!”. 

Over their laughter, I told them, “I am choosing to live.  
Operate on me as if I am alive, not dead.” 

Michael lived, thanks to the skill of his doctors, but also  
because of his amazing attitude.  

I learned from him that every day we have the choice to  
live fully.  Attitude, after all, is everything.  

What a great positive story to help us think about how we handle life’s challenges and to realise that we have choices every day.

Action Exercise: 

Go to your bookshop or library and get a copy of any of  
the books in the series ‘Chicken Soup for the Soul’.    

Each book has around 100 true inspirational positive stories.   

Reading even one of them can make you feel great.   

At Resilient Minds we help our clients grow their resilience 
so they can perform at high levels on the really important 
things in all aspects of their lives. 

www.resilientminds.co.nz 
Thought Leaders in Resilience, Productivity, and Wellbein

Are you Resilient?

If there was ever a need for resilience, it is the dumpster fire of 2020 – but although we pride ourselves on that good old Kiwi can-do attitude, it seems that New Zealanders – especially women – could use a bit of a top up.

Interview with Jamie Ford for capsulenz.com

There have been plenty of studies over the last 20 years has shown that Kiwis aren’t very resilient – that’s really surprising to us! Why do you think that is, and what areas especially are we struggling with?

This dates back to our ancestors leaving the United Kingdom for a better life here in New Zealand. They wanted to say goodbye to the uncertainty of life at the hands of landowners as well as no hope of ever owning their own plot of land.

But on arrival, dreams were dashed, hopes evaporated, uncertainty increased, and they had to settle for a hard life.

This caused negative thinking and has been accidentally passed on from generation to generation. We now find ourselves with a less than resilient mindset that has been normalised – and we do not notice it.

An examination of the diaries and letters of our forebears, along with the content of today’s social media, might well substantiate this.

As a nation, we tend to struggle with the accidentally learned habit of thinking that reasons for adversities and setbacks are:

• Permanent – ‘it will have a long-term downside’
• Global – ‘it will have a negative impact on many aspects of life’
• Personal – ‘it’s my fault’

To help combat this, I’m working with organisations like Southern Cross Health Insurance, to offer their employees science-based resilience development training – something that has never been as important as in this COVID-19 year.

This kind of support extends well beyond the immediate positive impact on staff and business – the benefits also have a lifelong increase on peoples’ wellbeing and happiness.

When it comes to Kiwi women, we’ve been disproportionally affected during the pandemic with redundancies – and that’s before dealing with families in lockdown and the stress of making ends meet. What are some of the best tips you can offer for those who are struggling through Covid-19’s consequences?

It’s important for women to stop personalising the impact and remind themselves that nothing about them is redundant. It’s only the job that was made redundant.

Start reminding yourself, and keep reminding yourself, that you yourself are not redundant. You still have all the skills and abilities, the capabilities and expertise that made you a valuable employee before the pandemic.

In your self-talk – your internal dialogue – make sure you remind yourself of all of the external reasons for the pandemic and its impact on your life and the lives of loved ones.

All of these things are out of your control.

And lastly make a list of the good things going on in your life to help you focus on the positives despite the struggles many people are finding themselves with.

Especially with working from home, the blur between home and work has been harder to separate – do you think people have actually worked longer hours than usual thanks to working from home pressures – e.g. making sure bosses know you’re working, no set home time, etc?

Thanks to the internet, it’s highly likely that many Kiwis are working longer hours than usual. It instils an ‘always on’ culture and an expectation of immediately responding – even outside traditional work hours, and now these lines have become even more blurred as people work from home more.

Some people are also fearful of losing their jobs, so they work longer hours so as not to be seen as dispensable.

If possible, set up a separate working space at home – use this space for work only, and ‘close the door’ at the end of your working day.

A 20-30 minute walk will also do wonders for ‘letting go’ of the working day.

Another tip that works well is to intensely focus during dedicated work time as there can be a lot of distractions at home. This will help you to deliver work on time and not have to work extra hours.

What do you think businesses and employers need to be doing better right now to support their workers?

Demonstrating kindness and empathy is definitely at the top of the list. We have seen how successful this has been in our Prime Minister’s approach.

It’s important that employers are willing to be flexible and adapt to the needs of employees, both in terms of getting to and from work but also the balancing act of working from home. It’s important to be mindful of the hours they’re working during this time and speak to them about it if need be.

Finally, changing your mindset is crucial.

I run resilience workshops with Kiwi organisations around the country like Southern Cross Health Insurance who value workplace wellbeing and supporting their people through personal and professional challenges.

These seminars help to demonstrate exactly how much of an impact your mindset can have on your mood and your emotions.

Using science-based concepts, such as a ‘temporary versus permanent’ mindset and not letting others control your emotions, will positively impact the way employees can manage adversities and setbacks.

Are there any other tools you’d recommend for Kiwis to help them become more resilient in the workplace?

• Steer clear of the people who have a negative attitude
• Find the people whose glass is always half full and spend time with them
• Get out at lunch time and exercise
• Be proactive in keeping your boss informed while you work from home. This will help to increase trust and enable you to work autonomously
• Invent ways to make work enjoyable

Original articles:
Capsulenz.com

Stuff.co.nz

To find out more or to enquire about Resilient Minds workshops, courses, or coaching, email [email protected] or call Jamie on 09 414 2942.

One of the best ways to create more happiness in your 
life is to get more pleasure and enjoyment out of each day.
A fun way to do this is to remember the 1000 marbles story.  

This was written by Jeff Davis many years ago and has  
now been reprinted thousands of times.  

Here’s how Jeff Davis’ 1000 Marbles story goes … 

I turned the dial up into the phone portion of the band  
on my ham radio in order to listen to a Saturday morning  
swap net.  

Along the way, I came across an older sounding chap, 
with a tremendous signal and a golden voice.  

He was telling whoever he was talking with something  
about “a thousand marbles”. 

I was intrigued and stopped to listen.  

“Well, Tom, it sure sounds like you’re busy with your job.  
I’m sure they pay you well but it’s a shame you have to  
be away from home and your family so much. Hard to  
believe a young fellow should have to work sixty or  
seventy hours a week to make ends meet. Too bad  
you missed your daughter’s dance recital.”  

He continued, “Let me tell you something that has helped  
me keep a good perspective on my own priorities.” 

And that’s when he began to explain his theory of  
‘1000 marbles.’ “You see, I sat down one day and  
did a little arithmetic. The average person lives about  
seventy-five years. I know, some live more and some  
live less, but on average, folks live about seventy-five years. 

Now then, I multiplied 75 times 52 and I came up with 3900  
which is the number of Saturdays that the average person  
has in their entire lifetime. It took me until I was fifty-five  
years old to think about all this in any detail”, he went on,  
“and by that time I had lived through over twenty-eight  
hundred Saturdays. I got to thinking that if I lived to be  
seventy-five, I only had about a thousand of them left  
to enjoy. 

So I went to a toy store and bought every single marble  
they had. I ended up having to visit three toy stores to  
round-up 1000 marbles. I took them home and put  
them inside of a large, clear plastic container right  
here in the shack next to my gear. 

Every Saturday since then, I have taken one marble  
out and thrown it away. I found that by watching the  
marbles diminish, I focused more on the really important  
things in life. There is nothing like watching your time  
here on this earth run out to help get your priorities straight. 

This morning, I took the very last marble out of the container.  
I figure if I make it until next Saturday then I have been given 
a little extra time. And the one thing we can all use is a little  
more time. 

It was nice to meet you Tom, I hope you spend more time  
with your family, and I hope to meet you again here on the  
band. This is K9NZQ, clear and going QRT, good morning!”   

I had planned to work on the antenna that morning, and then  
I was going to meet up with a few hams to work on the next  
club newsletter.  Instead, I went upstairs and woke my wife  
up with a kiss. “C’mon honey, I’m taking you and the kids  
to breakfast.”  

“What brought this on?” she asked with a smile. “Oh,  
nothing special, it’s just been a long time since we spent  
a Saturday together with the kids. Hey, can we stop at a  
toy store while we’re out? I need to buy some marbles.” 

Action Exercise:  
 
Work out the number of weekends you potentially have  
left to enjoy.  When you realise how limited this is, you  
tend to value each day a lot more.  

At Resilient Minds we help our clients grow their resilience 
so they can perform at high levels on the really important 
things in all aspects of their lives. 

Increase your Resilience: 
Our next open resilience development programme is on at the University of Auckland on November 26^th and 27^th. 

Warm regards 

Jamie Ford 
www.resilientminds.co.nz 
Thought Leaders in Resilience, Productivity, and Wellbeing

Here are two keys to help you regularly make good decisions to improve your life. 

Key 1:   Value Is In The Eye Of The Beholder 

How much is a litre of water worth? 

Well, if you’re reading this, you can probably get a 
litre of water for a few cents from your kitchen tap.  

Yet, if you were dying of thirst in a desert, you’d  
happily pay a hundred bucks for it, right?  

On the other hand, you’d pay a hundred bucks  
an hour for a plumber to  avoid the water  being  
there in the first place (in your flooded basement,  
that is). 

Many people believe value is intrinsic to an object.  

Sure, water is water is water, but its value varies  
enormously depending on what you need it for. 

Decision making is a very personal business  
— it’s about assessing what’s valuable  to you.  

There’s no  absolute  best job, best car or best life 
to be lived: value is in the eye of the decision maker. 

How to Apply This Insight 

Always decide on your own. 

Sure, factor in other people’s opinions, but bear in  
mind that they may value things (very) differently.  

Blindly following other people’s advice may  
lead to disastrous decisions — even if they  
are based on “sound” advice from people  
with the best intentions of helping you. 

Key 2:  Your Decision Outcome Can Be No  
Better Than Your Best Alternative 

Many people believe that if they just think  hard and long  
enough, great outcomes will result from their decisions. 

The truth is: no matter how much effort you put in,  no  
decision outcome can be better than the best alternative  
you considered.  

And no amount of analysis or systematic thinking will change  
that. 

Having a good amount of alternatives to explore and choose  
from, then, is essential for making great decisions. 

If you’re having a hard time deciding, it doesn’t mean you’re a  
poor decision maker: most likely you’re just out of decent  
alternatives. 

How to Apply This Insight 

Generate many alternatives.  Before jumping in and  
deciding among just two or three options that first  
come to mind, spend time generating  plenty of  new 
alternatives.  

Take Action:  

The next time you have to make a decision use  
one or both of these simple keys 

At Resilient Minds we help our clients grow their resilience 
so they can perform at high levels on the really important 
things in all aspects of their lives. 

Increase Your Resilience: 
Our next open resilience development programme is on at the University of Auckland on November 26^th and 27^th. 

Warm regards 

Jamie Ford 

 ‘A wise man makes his own decisions, an ignorant man  
follows the public opinion’ 

––Grantland Rice 

www.resilientminds.co.nz 
Thought Leaders in Resilience, Productivity, and Wellbeing

Is clutter weighing you down at home and the office? 

Not sure where to start when it comes to clearing things out? 

Here are 3 ideas to help you eliminate clutter to simplify and  
streamline your life. 

1. Tidy up your desk 

Do you find it difficult to work on your desk or find office  
supplies when you need them? Remove old sticky notes,  
out-dated papers and notes, junk mail, magazines, as well  
as any obvious trash and wrappers from your work space.  
Put office supplies such as pens, paper clips and pushpins  
in small decorative containers, or store items in flat storage  
bins or trays in your desk drawers. Don’t forget to chuck  
any broken office supplies or dead plants that are on your  
desk or sitting in your office. 

2. Clear out your closet 

Begin by purging any clothes that are obviously stained,  
damaged, ripped, torn, or no longer fit. Next, remove any  
clothing and accessories you no longer want or need.  
Finally, take a good look at items you haven’t worn or  
used in a year or two as well as items that are out-dated.  
Will you really use these items soon, say tomorrow or  
even in a months’ time? It might be time to bite the bullet  
and say goodbye to these items. 

3. Give your computer a cleanse 

Clutter can appear in many different forms on your computer.  
Consider clearing out files from your desktop screen (file items  
or delete them), cleaning out or emptying your computer’s trash  
or recycle bin, defragmenting your drive, or getting rid of  
applications and programs you no longer use. Finish things  
off by wiping down your computer’s screen and keyboard with  
an appropriate computer cleansing solution and cloth to clear  
off dirt and germs. 

Take Action 
Pick one of these tips to handle clutter in your life and use  
it in the next week. 

Go forth and eliminate clutter!

At Resilient Minds we help our clients grow their resilience 
so they can perform at high levels on the really important 
things in all aspects of their lives.  

Warm regards 

Jamie Ford 

 “Have nothing in your home that you do not know to  
be useful and believe to be beautiful.” 

––William Morris 

www.resilientminds.co.nz 
Thought Leaders in Resilience, Productivity, and Wellbeing 
 

Most of us admit to feeling stressed at least some of the time, and we know the importance of relaxing and slowing down, but how often do we actually take the time to do it? Here are 3 tips for you to try today to ensure you’re handling stress in your life. 

1. Breathe Deeply 

Take a 5-minute break and focus on your breathing.  
Sit up straight, eyes closed, with a hand on your belly.  
Slowly inhale through your nose, feeling the breath  
start in your abdomen and work its way to the top of  
your head. Reverse the process as you exhale through  
your mouth. 

2. Reach Out 

Your social network is one of your best tools for handling  
stress. Talk to others — preferably face to face, or at least  
on the phone. Share what’s going on. You can get a fresh  
perspective while keeping your connection strong. 

3. Laugh Out Loud 

A good belly laugh doesn’t just lighten the load mentally.  
It lowers cortisol, your body’s stress hormone, and boosts  
brain chemicals called endorphins, which help your mood.  
Lighten up by tuning in to your favourite sitcom or video,  
reading the comics, or chatting with someone who makes  
you smile. 

Take Action:  
 
If you’re not handling stress well, try any of these 3 stress buster tips the next time you find yourself needing to relax more. 

At Resilient Minds we help our clients grow their resilience 
so they can perform at high levels on the really important 
things in all aspects of their lives. 

Warm regards 

Jamie Ford

 “The greatest weapon against stress is our ability to  
choose one thought over another“

––William James 

www.resilientminds.co.nz 
Thought Leaders in Resilience, Productivity, and Wellbeing 

If you’re looking to improve your ability to find happiness, then  
check out these 5 things happy people do differently. 

1. Happy people find balance in their lives 

Folks who are happy have this in common: they’re  
content with what they have, and don’t waste a whole  
lot of time worrying and stressing over things they don’t.  

Unhappy people do the opposite: they spend too much  
time thinking about what they don’t have.  

Happy people lead balanced lives. This means they  
make time for all the things that are important to them,  
whether it’s family, friends, career, health, religion, etc. 

2. Happy people don’t sweat the small stuff 

One of the biggest things happy people do differently  
compared to unhappy people is they let stuff go. 

 Bad things happen to good people sometimes.  

Happy people realize this, are able to take things  
in stride, and move on.  

Unhappy people tend to dwell on minor inconveniences  
and issues, which can perpetuate feelings of sadness,  
guilt, resentment, greed, and anger. 

3. Happy people surround themselves with  
other happy people 

One defining characteristic of happy people is they  
tend to hang out with other happy people.  

If you’re struggling with a bout of sadness, depression,  
worry, or anger, spend more time with your happiest  
friends or family members.  

Chances are, you’ll find that their positive attitude rubs  
off on you. 

4.  Happy people are passionate 

Another thing happy people have in common is their  
ability to find their passions in life and pursue those  
passions to the fullest. Happy people have found  
what they’re looking for, and they spend their time  
doing what they love. 

5. Happy people see challenges as opportunities 

Folks who are happy accept challenges and use  
them as opportunities to learn and grow.  

They turn negatives into positives and make the  
best out of seemingly bad situations. They don’t  
dwell on things that are out of their control; rather,  
they seek solutions and creative ways of overcoming  
obstacles. 

Take Action
 
If you’d like to bring a little more happiness into your  
life, think about the 5 principles above and how you  
can use them to make yourself happier. 

At Resilient Minds we help our clients grow their resilience 
so they can perform at high levels on the really important 
things in all aspects of their lives. 

Warm regards, 

Jamie Ford 

‘People don’t notice whether it’s winter or summer  
when they’re happy.’ 

Anton Chekhov  

www.resilientminds.co.nz 
Thought Leaders in Resilience, Productivity, and Wellbeing 

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Thought Leaders in Resilience, Productivity, and Wellbeing
Jamie +64 21 772 079

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Thought Leaders in Resilience, Productivity, and Wellbeing
Jamie +64 21 772 079

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Thought Leaders in Resilience, Productivity, and Wellbeing
Jamie +64 21 772 079

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Thought Leaders in Resilience, Productivity, and Wellbeing
Jamie +64 21 772 079

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Thought Leaders in Resilience, Productivity, and Wellbeing
Jamie +64 21 772 079

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Thought Leaders in Resilience, Productivity, and Wellbeing
Jamie +64 21 772 079

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Jamie +64 21 772 079

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Jamie +64 21 772 079

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Jamie +64 21 772 079

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Jamie +64 21 772 079

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Jamie +64 21 772 079

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Jamie +64 21 772 079

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Jamie +64 21 772 079

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And a good night’s sleep is a proven way to eliminate stress,
improve your energy and make you feel positive. 

Here are four proven tips to sleeping well… 

1. Keep a regular sleep timetable

Keeping a regular sleep timetable by going to bed and waking
up at the same time every day will ultimately help you feel
energized and refreshed. 

So set yourself a fixed rest and wake up time that you follow
every day, even on weekends. 

2. Avoid late night television

Many of us will watch television as a way to wind down at night
or fall asleep. 

But what many people don’t realise is that television actually
stimulates the mind, rather than relaxing it. 

Late night television usually consists of content that either shows
disturbing material or requires us to think and use our brains. 

The light from the television can also confuse our body clock,
making it harder to fall asleep 

3. Exercise at the right time

While regular exercise positively impacts sleep quality, it is best
done in the earlier part of the day. 

Exercise stimulates the body by raising its temperature, so if you
exercise later in the evenings you may experience trouble getting
to sleep as the body requires a cooler temperature in order to
wind down and promote rest. 

4. Adopt a pre-bed ritual

Doing activities that help relax the body will make it easier for you
to drift off. Things like taking a warm bath, stretching, reading a
light book or listening to gentle music will help you wind down
after a long day and ultimately send cues to your body that it is
almost time to sleep. A calm pre-bed routine will help your body
prepare for sleep, allowing you to get to sleep more easily. 

Take Action: 

So if you are having difficulties sleeping try adopting some of
these tips to improve your sleep quality 

And get a great night’s sleep at the same time! 

Have a great week. 

Jamie Ford

“A good laugh and a long sleep are the best cures in the doctor’s book.”

Irish Proverb

At Resilient Minds we help our clients grow their resilience
so they can perform at high levels on the really important
things in all aspects of their lives.

www.resilientminds.co.nz
Thought Leaders in Resilience, Productivity, and Wellbeing
Jamie +64 21 772 079

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We can all talk better than we do, so it’s always inspiring to hear from one of our recipients who is putting it into practice.

Recently, we wrote about “Gratitude and Being Thankful”. And Neville Hill emailed us this in his own words:

‘I guess a single thanks is only one word but that one word can mean a lot if you are used to not getting it said at all …not that I am suggesting that either you or I are not . One little habit I have got into is to make, “THANKS”, the very 1st word that I say when I wake from sleep in the morning.

The reason I started doing this is that I noticed that when I woke I would say something like ‘oh crap’ or ‘oh s*&%’, (or worse), as my body dragged itself out of sleep to the sound of the alarm clock. It simply occurred to me one day that to awake every day with a swear word or a negative phrase escaping my lips had to be the worst possible way to start each day… I won’t bang on but it is part of a new approach to life that both my wife have adopted towards living our lives, and that is to be grateful every day.’

Thanks for sharing your insights and new habit with us Neville.

Words of Wisdom for all of us.

At Resilient Minds we help our clients grow their resilience
so they can perform at high levels on the really important
things in all aspects of their lives.

Have a great week.

Jamie.

“You have power over your mind -not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.”

––Marcus Aurelius

www.resilientminds.co.nz
Thought Leaders in Resilience, Productivity, and Wellbeing
Jamie +64 21 772 079

Here are 6 ways to have more fun in your life… 

1. Laugh to Your Heart’s Content 

If we wake up in a funk, it’s easy to find ourselves in a 
bummer of a mood that is hard to shake off. Start your 
day by reading funny comics in your newspaper or watching 
a quick video on YouTube that puts a smile on your face.  

2. Change Your Morning Routine

Add a nice splash of variety to your life by switching up 
your morning routine. Do you usually eat breakfast at the 
table? Take your breakfast out to the porch and listen to 
the birds sing. Do you typically start your day by working 
out at the gym? Take your training outdoors by running 
sprints on a nature trail or track. 

3. Sing in the Shower

Belt out a song from your favorite Broadway musical during 
your morning shower if you want to instantly feel better. 

4. Listen to Nature Sounds

Go outside and listen to the crickets chirping, birds singing 
and wind blowing. Focus really hard and be amazed by the 
beautiful nature sounds that you’ve been too busy to notice. 

5. Join a Club

Are you a new mom, a pet-lover, a gaming enthusiast, 
or an artist?  

If so, there is a club of people just like you  who would be 
so happy to have you in their life . 

6. Reconnect with an Old Friend

When life gets busy, it’s easy to lose touch with even the 
best of friends.  

Scan through your contacts until you see a name that 
makes you think, “I wonder what happened to them?” 
Call them to re-connect, and if they are local, make 
plans for next weekend. 

Take Action:  

Try any of these 6 strategies to add more fun to your life.  

At Resilient Minds we help our clients to develop high resilience
so they can perform at high levels on the really important
things in both their work and personal lives. 

Have a great week. 

Jamie Ford.

www.resilientminds.co.nz
Thought Leaders in Resilience, Productivity, and Wellbeing
Jamie +64 21 772 079

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Nothing is more important than your health. 

If, before you were born, you were given the following choice, 
which would you choose? 

To be born a millionaire but crippled 

To be healthy but penniless 

Would you trade in your consciousness for half a million dollars? 

Your ability to move for $250,000? 

Would you give up your sight for $350,000? 

Your sense of smell for $100,000? 

Of the important things in life, wealth is probably not in the 
top three. 

So today, just for the record, let’s remind ourselves that… 

Health is more important than wealth. Loving relationships are 
more important than wealth. And so is the sense that you are 
spending your time wisely. 

If you don’t have health, you cannot enjoy or sometimes even 
experience the other gifts life gives us. If you have wealth but 
have no friends to share it with — you have nothing. 

And even if you have health and wealth and friendship but 
lack purpose, you are going to spend the rest of your life 
feeling the lack of it. 

Here’s a simple way to appreciate your health and all the other 
blessings that you have: 

Write down a gratitude list. In other words; all the things in 
your life that you are grateful for. This might include your 
good health, your comfortable home, your interesting job, 
your great friends and anything else you can think of. 

Then take a few minutes and add a few items to your 
gratitude list every day. 

At Resilient Minds we help our clients to develop high resilience
so they can perform at high levels on the really important
things in both their work and personal lives. 

Have a great week. 

Jamie Ford

www.resilientminds.co.nz
Thought Leaders in Resilience, Productivity, and Wellbeing
Jamie +64 21 772 079

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The 90/10 rule for happiness says that we have no 
control over about 10% of what happens to us each day. 

We cannot stop the computer from breaking down. A driver 
may cut us off in traffic. Someone may be rude to us. 

We have no control over many things like these each day. 

The other 90% is different. 

We determine the other 90%! 

How? By our reaction to what happens. 

Imagine that are having breakfast with your family. As you walk 
to the table you trip over your dog and spill coffee all over your 
work clothes. You snap at your dog and tell it off for getting in 
your way. You get angry and upset because you will now be 
late for work. 

So you rush around and change your clothes. Breakfast is now 
very uncomfortable for the rest of your family because of your 
temper. You drive to work still angry, and have a generally 
miserable day where nothing seems to go well. 

Let’s rewind the clock and look at this experience again 
using the 90/10 rule. 

Here is what you might have done: 

Coffee splashes over you. You are about to get angry. Instead 
you say “Oops, I better watch where I walk and be more 
careful next time”. Grabbing a towel you rush upstairs. After 
grabbing a new shirt and your briefcase, you come back down 
to finish your breakfast. 

You make a quick phone call to work and let them know you 
will be a few minutes late today. You laugh and joke with your 
family at breakfast and leave for work. You arrive at work about 
ten minutes late and cheerfully greet your workmates. Your day 
seems to go well. 

Notice the difference. Both days started the same, but ended 
differently.  

Why?  

Because of how you reacted. 

Action Exercise: 

Remember the 90/10 rule. Keep in mind, that the 
one thing you and I do have control over is how we react 
to anything that happens to us. 

Choose how you will react today when things happen that are 
outside your control. 

At Resilient Minds we help our clients to develop high resilience
so they can perform at high levels on the really important
things in both their work and personal lives. 

Have a great week. 

Jamie Ford
Kim Tay
Thought Leaders in Productivity and Wellbeing

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A success list is a simple way to create more fun,
pleasure and enjoyment in your life.  

First get a small pocket notebook. Then get into the 
habit of writing down in this notebook five or more 
successes that you have each day. A success is 
anything that makes you feel good about yourself 
when it happens. These successes can be things 
you do or things that happen to you. The key is that
you felt good about yourself when each success 
happened. 

Examples: 

A success could be something as simple as getting 
to work on time despite the traffic. It could be someone 
smiling at you. A success might be getting positive 
feedback on something you’ve done. A success could 
be doing a task you’ve been putting off. A success could 
be meeting with an interesting person who inspires you. 
A success might be taking one small action step toward 
an important goal. 

A success does not have to be earth shattering; however 
it does have to be something that makes you feel good 
about yourself when it happened. 

When you’ve used a success list for three weeks or more; 
you will have written down over one hundred successes
you’ve had in this time. 

Imagine how good you would feel reading a list like this. 

Think of a success list as being a bit like a photograph 
album filled with photos of some of the happiest moments 
in your life. Every time you look at the photos, those happy 
moments and feelings come back. 

Action Exercise: 

Get yourself a pocket notebook today. Start writing at least 
five successes you have each day in this notebook. 

Notice how you feel after doing this for a week or two 

At Resilient Minds we help our clients to develop high resilience
so they can perform at high levels on the really important
things in both their work and personal lives. 

Have a great week. 

Jamie Ford
Kim Tay
Thought Leaders in Productivity and Wellbeing

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The happiest people of this world and the unhappiest 
people of this world often experience similar things in
their day:   

Challenges at the office, traffic filled motorways, the 
seemingly endless stream of negative news and 
constant levels of change.  

What separates the happy from the unhappy is that the
joyful ones give their mental focus to different things, because
true harmony is to be found within you, not outside of you.  

Here are two simple strategies to help you live fully each day: 

1: Count Your Blessings 

All too often, in the crush of daily life, we fail to notice all the 
good things in our lives. We focus on the less than ideal job 
or the endless time in traffic or on the mountain of bills. By 
taking a few minutes out of your busy day to count your 
blessings, you will bring a sense of perspective to your life 
that might be missing. Give silent thanks for the great 
country you live in, your good health and loving family, 
the fact that you have a roof over your head and food 
on the dinner table. Counting your blessings will remind 
you of the good in your life that most take for granted. 

2: Laugh More 

The average 4 year old laughs 300 times a day while the 
average adult laughs 15 times a day. Make the time to 
watch a funny movie or share a belly laugh with your child. 
Laughter relaxes you and ensures that you don’t take yourself 
too seriously. 

Action Exercise: 

Write down ten things that make you laugh. Then schedule at 
least one of these things into each day 

At Resilient Minds we help our clients to develop high resilience
so they can perform at high levels on the really important
things in both their work and personal lives. 

Have a great week. 

Jamie Ford
Kim Tay
Thought Leaders in Productivity and Wellbeing

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On any day you take positive action toward your most 
important goals you will feel great. 

You will have a feeling of success, achievement and 
accomplishment. 

The four keys to achieving goals: 

Grab a piece of paper and a pen. Or turn on your 
computer and open a new document. 

1: Take a few minutes and make a list of at least 10 things 
you would like to do, have or be over the next 12 months. 

These could be goals to do with health, job, career, money, 
travel, relationships and many others.  

Examples: 

I’d like to increase my income by 25%. 

I’d like to take a two week luxury vacation in Italy. 

I’d like to run a half marathon in under two hours. 

2: Next, look over your list and select one goal you would 
like to get started on.  

You might pick your trip to Italy. 

3: Now, write down 10 action steps you could take to 
get closer to achieving this goal. 

So you could write down things like ‘Read a travel guide 
on holidaying in Italy, get brochures from five travel agents 
on luxury holidays in Italy, speak with a friend or colleague 
who took a trip to Italy’ and so on. 

4: Now do one of these action steps today. So today you 
could go the local book shop and buy a travel guide on Italy. 

Now repeat steps 2, 3 and 4 on a regular basis and soon 
you will have achieved many of the goals on your list.  

And as you take action each day toward these goals you 
will feel wonderful at the same time. 

Action Exercise: 

Today, take one or more positive action steps that will 
get you closer to a goal that is important to you. 
(Notice how you feel when you take this action.) 

At Resilient Minds we help our clients to develop high resilience
so they can perform at high levels on the really important
things in both their work and personal lives. 

Have a great week. 

Jamie Ford
Kim Tay
Thought Leaders in Productivity and Wellbeing

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There is an interesting happiness concept that says 
“The person who experiences the most; wins”. 

In other words; make sure you have numerous experiences 
that add to the colour, richness, depth and wisdom of your life.  

There are dozens of adventures (big and small) waiting 
for all of us to try; if we just open our eyes and look for them. 

By engaging in “micro-adventures”- little adventures that 
you inject into your day – you can often restore the passion 
from childhood that you may have lost. 

For Instance: 

Taking an hour to go to your favourite bookstore and  

browse through your favourite section, might be a 
micro-adventure you can engage in today. 

Or trying Vietnamese food (if you have never tasted it before) 
could be another micro-adventure you try tonight.  

Or picking up the phone and having a conversation with
someone you admire could be another micro-adventure 
that you schedule into your day. 

So today, commit yourself from your heart, to experiencing 
more adventures in your life. 

Action Exercise: 

Write down at least 5-10 micro-adventures that you could 
experience. Plan to do at least one of them this week 

At Resilient Minds we help our clients to develop high resilience
so they can perform at high levels on the really important
things in both their work and personal lives. 

“The big question is whether you are going to be able to 
say a hearty yes to your adventure.” Joseph Campbell 

Have a great week. 

Jamie Ford
Kim Tay
Thought Leaders in Productivity and Wellbeing

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In his Book “High Energy Habits” author Bill Ford talks 
about “Getting rid of the little things that annoy you”. 

We can think of the little things that annoy you as being 
like mosquitoes. They are pesky, irritating and drain you of 
energy you could use far more productively on other things. 

Often these ‘mosquitoes’ are some minor annoyance or 
irritant that that you are tolerating, but are not happy about. 

Usually you know what to do to fix it, but you have just not 
yet got around to doing it. 

We are so busy that these little things do not seem to justify a 
high priority. 

But it takes energy to ignore the mosquitoes and it also reduces 
our enjoyment of whatever else we are doing at the same time. 

The wasted five star hotel room: 

Imagine you have just paid a large amount of money to stay 
in a luxury five star hotel room. The room is magnificent and 
has every luxury you could possible want. 

You lie down to sleep in the superbly comfortable bed and 
suddenly you hear a mosquito start to buzz. 

You turn on the light and because the hotel ceiling is so high 
you can’t get the mosquito. It buzzes in your ear all night and 
you just can’t sleep. 

The five star hotel room has been wasted and all because of 
one tiny mosquito. 

This experience is exactly what life is like when it is full of 
these little annoyances. 

Here’s the solution Bill gives: 

1: Take 10 minutes and make a list of all the little things in 
your life that annoy you. You can even make two lists if you 
want to. One list can be for work and one list can be for your 
personal life. Add to each list over time. You will start to 
notice more and more things that are not quite the way you 

would like them to be. 

2: Pick two easy ‘mosquitoes’ and deal with them today. By 
‘easy’ I mean items where you know all you need to know in 
order to fix them and also won’t take too long. 

These could be things like clean your car, sew on a button, 
replace a light bulb and so on. 

Then keep going and pick at least two more ‘mosquitoes’ for 
another day. The momentum will build. Even if you don’t get 
the thing that irritates you fixed make sure you at least write 
it down. 

Action Exercise: 

Make a list of at least 10-20 little things in your life that irritate 
you in some way. Then take action on two of these things today 
and notice how good you feel. 

At Resilient Minds we help our clients to develop high resilience
so they can perform at high levels on the really important
things in both their work and personal lives. 

Have a great week. 

Jamie Ford
Kim Tay
Thought Leaders in Productivity and Wellbeing
www.resilientminds.co.nz  

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One of the big barriers to achieving greater success in our 
lives is that most of us think it’s going to take a lot of hard 
work to get there.  

The good news is you can often get much better results 
in your life without having to work longer and harder hours.  

Here’s a real life example of the easy way to success.  

A lady called Cindy Cashman saw an interesting idea 
ago that took her fancy. The idea was for a book with
the title “Everything men know about women.” 

The book was over 100 pages long and inside there was 
nothing but blank pages.  

Cindy liked the fun nature of the book but she didn’t like the
he idea of having to work really hard to make a few sales. 

So she began looking for ways to sell huge amounts of her 
book with very little effort. 

Cindy approached businesses like women’s clothing 
shops and got them to display her book next to the cash 
register. Women shopping at these stores would pick up the 
book because of the catchy title, laugh when they saw it was 
totally blank inside and would then buy a whole bunch to give 
as gifts to people they knew. 

Cindy kept the price very affordable and sold over a million  
copies of her book over the next few years. 

In your own life always be on the lookout for things you can 
do that are low effort with high rewards. 

Saying thanks, showing appreciation, displaying affection, 
watching a sunrise or sunset, caring for a pet or a plant, 
smiling at a casual acquaintance or stranger, committing a 
random act of kindness, enjoying a walk in a beautiful place 
these are all ways of getting great results with very little effort. 

Action Exercise: 

Write down ten things you could do this week that would create 
more happiness in your life with very little effort. Then spend 
five minutes each day doing some of these things. 

At Resilient Minds we help our clients to develop high resilience
so they can perform at high levels on the really important
things in both their work and personal lives. 

Have a great week. 

Jamie Ford
Kim Tay
Thought Leaders in Productivity and Wellbeing

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A Professor stood before his philosophy class and 
had some items in front of him. 

When the class began, wordlessly, he picked up a 
very large empty glass jar and then proceeded to 
fill it with golf balls.  

He asked the students if the jar was full. 

They agreed that it was. 

The Professor next picked up a box of sand and poured 
it into the jar. Of course, the sand filled up everything else. 

He asked once more if the jar was full. 

The students responded with a unanimous “yes.” 

The Professor then produced two cups of coffee from 
under the table and poured the entire contents into the
jar, effectively filling the space between the grains of sand. 

“Now,” said the professor, as the laughter subsided,
“I want you to recognize that this jar represents your life.” 

‘The golf balls are the important things–your family, 
your children, your health, your friends, and your 
favourite passions – things that if everything else was 
lost and only they remained, your life would still be full.” 

“The pebbles are the other things that matter like 
your job, your house, and your car. The sand is 
everything else -the small stuff.” 

“If you put the sand into the jar first,” he continued, 
“there is no room for the pebbles or the golf balls.” 

“The same goes for life. If you spend all your time 
and energy on the small stuff, you will never have 
room for the things that are important to you. 

Pay attention to the things that are critical to your 
happiness. Play with your children.  

Take time to get medical checkups. 

Take your partner out to dinner.  

There will always be time to clean the house and 
fix the waste disposal.” 

“Take care of the golf balls first, the things that 
really matter. Set your priorities. The rest is just sand.” 

One of the students raised her hand and inquired what 
the coffee represented. The Professor smiled. “I’m glad 
you asked. It just goes to show you that no matter how 
full your life may seem, there’s always room for a couple 
of cups of coffee with a friend.” 

This story is a great reminder that taking time for the 
important things in your life is a vital part of being happy. 

Action Exercise: 

1: What are the most important things in your own life?  

Write them down. These are the golf balls in this story. 

2: Invest some time every day on the golf balls in your life. 

3: A great way to focus on the important things in your life
is to set up a bucket list. This is a great way to create more
fun, excitement and adventure in your life.  

There is a wonderful guide called Inspired for Life that shows
you how to set up and use a bucket list. You can download
a complimentary copy of this guide from this link on our website. 

Put in link to download booklet 

At Resilient Minds we help our clients to develop high resilience
so they can perform at high levels on the really important
things in both their work and personal lives. 

Have a great week. 

Jamie Ford
Kim Tay
Thought Leaders in Productivity and Wellbeing
www.resilientminds.co.nz  

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Power Questions that create more happiness: 

In his book “Awaken the giant within” motivational speaker 
Anthony Robbins notes that our life experience is based on 
what we focus on. 

And what we focus on is often determined by the questions 
we ask ourselves on a regular basis. 

The best questions to ask yourself are what he calls 
Power Questions. 

Power questions are designed to cause you to experience 
more happiness, excitement, pride, gratitude, joy, commitment, 
and love every day of your life. 

Anthony suggests you come up with at least two to three 
answers to all of these questions. 

If you have difficulty coming up with an answer, just add 
the word “Could”. For instance you might want to ask 
“What could I be most happy about in my life now?” 

Here are some Power Questions you can ask yourself 
first thing in the morning when you wake up. 

1: What am I happy about in my life now? 

What about that makes me happy? 

How does that make me feel? 

2: What am I excited about in my life now? 

What about that makes me feel excited? 

How does that make me feel? 

3: What am I proud about in my life right now? 

What about that makes me feel proud? 

How does that make me feel? 

4: What am I grateful about in my life right now? 

What about that makes me feel grateful? 

How does that make me feel? 

Action Exercise: 

Use some (or all) of these Morning Power Questions 
every morning for five days and notice how good you 
end up feeling. 

Have a great week. 

Jamie Ford
Kim Tay
Thought Leaders in Productivity and Wellbeing

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In the wonderful book “How to stop worrying and start 
living” by Dale Carnegie there is an excellent technique
to handle worry.  

It’s called the ‘Worry Buster’ and has four simple steps. 

1: Define in writing exactly what you are worried about.  

For example “I am worried about a key staff member as
I think they want to leave and work somewhere else.” 

Or “I am worried about a business client who is slow paying
their invoice.” 

2. Define in writing the Worst Possible Outcome (W.P.O.)
   of this worry.  

If you have concerns about your key staff member, the 
worst possible outcome is that they leave your business. 

If you have concerns about a business client being slow 
to pay their invoice the worst possible outcome is that you 
never get paid. 

3. Decide mentally to accept the worst possible outcome
   should it occur. Ask yourself will this outcome kill me?  

Will losing your staff member kill you? Will not getting paid 
kill you? In most cases the answer is no. (Asking this simple 
question allows you to put your worry in perspective.) 

4. Take action immediately to make sure the worst possible
   outcome doesn’t occur. Action is the antidote for worry. 

If you are worried about your staff member, talk to them and
ask if they are thinking about leaving. If they are ask if there 
is anything you can do to make their job more enjoyable. 

If you are worried about a client not paying you, perhaps
you could talk with them face to face and voice your 
concerns. You might offer them an instalment plan to 
pay their invoice if they are in financial difficulty. 

Action Exercise: 

Use the Worry Buster technique on any worry you have. 
It’s an excellent tool to eliminate worry quickly. 

 And the more worries you eliminate the happier you will feel. 

Here at Resilient Minds we offer in house programmes that 
give our clients the mental tools to handle any problems and 
challenges that they face. This quickly improves performance
and productivity for everyone involved. 

Contact us for more details on our in house programmes. 

Have a great week. 

Jamie Ford
Kim Tay
Thought Leaders in Productivity and Wellbeing

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One of the interesting things about humans is that we sometimes forget about the things we are really good at.

Here’s a good way to test this yourself…

Try reading these jumbled up sentences:

Acocdrnig to an elgnsih unviesitry sutdy the oredr of letetrs in
a wrod dosen’t mttaer, the olny thnig thta’s iopmrantt is that
the frsit and lsat ltteer of eevry word is in the crorcet ptoision.
The rset can be jmbueld and one is stlil able to raed the txet
wiohtut dclftfuiiy.

You should be able to read this very easily.

Which goes to show your brain is actually very clever and can do a lot of things you didn’t realise it can do.

Action Exercise:

Take a few minutes this week to write down 10 things that you are really good at that you sometimes forget about.

(When you focus on the things you are good at doing you tend to feel a lot more positive about yourself and life.)

Here at Resilient Minds we are big fans of using science-backed strategies to help our clients become more resilient.

And this exercise helps to develop a positive belief in yourself.

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Surprise, surprise, stress is good for us. Yes, that’s right, despite all we’ve been told stress is good for us. The right kind in the right amounts.

Think about it for a moment. How would our immune system develop and be able to deal with all kinds of nasties if it wasn’t subjected to lots of different stressors as we went through childhood and on into adult life?

How does a vaccine work? We get a little bit of the virus and this prompts our immune system to develop the antibodies that will resist the full virus when it attacks us.

Stress works in the same way – a moderate amount makes us tougher, and can help us learn more skills to take on the next challenge.

When your heart is pounding, your breathing is fast and your muscles feel tense – that’s the adrenalin and cortisol racing through your body giving you the ability react quickly – the ‘flight or flight’ response.

What you do next is the key to making stress work for you.

1. See stress as helpful

How you think about your stress response really matters.

If you see it as helpful – that you’re getting more oxygen to the brain and your body is getting you powered up, ready to take on the challenge – this belief does two important things. Firstly, it makes you feel less anxious and more confident. Secondly, it keeps your blood vessels relaxed (rather than constricted, which, over time, can lead to a heart attack).

2. Reach out for social support

Connecting with other people enhances the physical benefits of the other hormone that your stress response has triggered – oxytocin.

Just like adrenalin, oxytocin is also released when we’re stressed, and it’s designed to get us to seek social connection. Known as the ‘hug drug’, oxytocin helps heart cells regenerate and helps us recover faster from stress. So in addition to the ‘flight or flight’ response to stress, we also have this ‘tend and befriend’ response.

If there’s no one around, give yourself a hug. Put your right hand on your left shoulder and your left hand on your right shoulder. Let your chin relax down between your crossed arms and enjoy the feeling of good long hug.

3. Cut the stress short

Too much cortisol and adrenalin over a long period of time can lead to anxiety, depression, headaches, weight gain, and more health problems.

Stop imagining the worst possible outcomes. For example, imagining the customer who found a slug in their salad will write a terrible review, ruining your business (and you’ll die penniless and alone…).

Instead, think of the best possible or most likely outcome and put your focus on doing what you can to make that happen (e.g. helping the waiter get the customer to see this in perspective – even the Queen gets slugs in her salad – and make amends with a free dessert).

4. Breathe

Put your hand on your heart (to focus your attention there and not on your racing mind), breathe in for a count of four and out for a count of six to get a smooth and even heart rate. This helps your brain to think more clearly by calming and regulating the signals its getting from the heart.

5. Learn and practise meditation

There are even free courses and apps to help you get started. The benefits of ‘quietening the mind’ kick in surprisingly quickly and increase with time, making changes to the brain that help with focus, managing emotions and reducing cortisol.

6. Get moving

Exercise reduces cortisol and adrenaline, and increases endorphins making us feel more positive and helping us to master stress.

7. Smile and laugh more

In case you were in any doubt about how useful positive emotions are to us, science shows they help us master stress by un-doing the physiological effects of anxiety and anger, and making us more creative at solving problems. Add more childlike playfulness to your life; watch funny videos, tv shows and movies; ask people to tell you the funniest joke they can remember; and savour those times when you do smile and laugh – and do it for longer.

As a starter for 10, here’s the world’s funniest joke from the research scientist Richard Wiseman did in 2015 (read more about that fascinating study here):

Two hunters are out in the woods when one of them collapses. He doesn’t seem to be breathing and his eyes are glazed.  The other guy whips out his phone and calls the emergency services.  He gasps, “My friend is dead! What can I do?”.  The operator says “Calm down.  I can help.  First, let’s make sure he’s dead.”  There is a silence, then a shot is heard.  Back on the phone, the guy says “OK, now what?”

Five years after the research study, Wiseman found the original source of the joke: Spike Milligan! A lovely coda to the research.

(An earlier version of this article was first published in the December 2018 edition of the Restaurant Association’s magazine Savour)

Video created by Executive Education at the University of Auckland Business School for our public course. See here for details: what-does-it-take-to-improve-our-productivity

With figures showing the world is facing a tsunami of depression and tragically high rates of suicide here in New Zealand, there is good reason to be concerned about mental health and wellbeing. Particularly for people working in high stress, fast paced, pressure cooker environments like the restaurant industry.

The good news is science has uncovered a kind of ‘vaccine’ for depression. Not only can this ‘mental toughness vaccine’ help prevent depression, but it can also enhance our lives by increasing productivity, creativity, motivation and physical health.

The core ingredient of ‘mental toughness’ is having an optimistic mindset. Fortunately, this type of mindset is a learned skill – not just being lucky when the genes get handed out at birth. When we think of optimism, we tend to think of happy people who look on the bright side of life, ‘glass half full’ types. While there is some truth in that, what we’re talking about is deeper, more specific than simply seeing the world as full of all things good.

The recipe for an optimistic mindset is based on the ground breaking work of Dr Martin Seligman, one of the most influential psychologists of the 21st century. His work has led to hundreds of scientific studies exploring the benefits of learning to use an optimistic mindset.

Mindset Matters Most

Seligman examined the thinking styles of people who are able to bounce back from adversity, and who can easily get on a roll after brief success. It’s about keeping our internal ‘self-talk’ on the right track, and using more helpful thoughts to drive how we feel and act, rather than letting momentary emotions take charge.

When faced with a setback, unfortunately it’s human nature to catastrophise the event in our mind. It can often be one of three default settings we use to explain the cause of adversity (a fire in the kitchen, a rude diner, a mistake with an order). There is permanent (“customers are always ungrateful”), global, affecting all aspects of our life (“everything is so stressful”), and personal (“I’m hopeless at all this stuff”).

When something good happens, often we’re too quick to think of it as a temporary success, one specific only to this particular situation and mainly due to external forces, rather than our own skill or talent. (For instance “what a huge tip, I’ll probably never get another one like that again.”

The proven style of optimistic thinking is about seeing our setbacks as temporary or fleeting. That they are specific to that one event or situation and mainly due to circumstances or factors outside our control (“Tough day, last night’s big night out has made a few people cranky”.)

Just as importantly, when things go well, we need to capitalise on that success, big or small, by thinking of it as permanent – “I always…” – and applicable to other areas of life. We need to find aspects of that success that are due to ‘me’ – my efforts, skills or talent.

Data from thousands of New Zealanders who’ve had their thinking styles tested show that we are quite a pessimistic bunch when it comes to how we see the causes of our successes. We love to be humble and knock those tall poppies down, but we actually need to high-five ourselves more.

So there’s work to be done, but it can be learnt, and the pay-off can be huge. We hope to be sharing more with you on this in the future, but in the meantime:

1. When the proverbial hits the fan think PIP – “put it into perspective’. Treat it like a speed bump on the highway of life, not a landslide that has destroyed the whole transport network.
2. Don’t sweat the small stuff.
3. Put your energy into what you can control and let the other stuff slide away.
4. Think of bad events in terms of being temporary, specific and the ‘result of many factors’ alongside your part in it.
5. Think of the good stuff that happens in terms of permanent / always, everything / universal and ‘me’.

It’s your mindset that matters most.

First published in “Savour” – the  magazine of the Restaurant Association of New Zealand

BY KIM TAY & JAMIE FORD DIRECTORS, RESILIENT MINDS

Psychometric tests are useful tools for employers when the appropriate test is used for the right reasons. One of the most scientifically validated diagnostics, the SASQ, is highly useful for recruitment – to select the most resilient and productive talent, and for identifying learning and development needs. It provides an in-depth report on an individual’s levels of resilient and optimistic thinking patterns, which has been shown to be directly connected to performance at work, as well as in the areas of sport, academic achievement and health. Jamie Ford speaks with Liam Dann (NZ Herald Business Editor-at-Large)  about the value and use of psych. tests after the IRD found itself embroiled in unnecessary controversy by planning to use them in a redundancy and restructuring context. He suggests that a diagnostic like the SASQ would be useful to help prepare and equip people for the types of upheaval restructuring brings. https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business-video/news/video.cfm?c_id=1503079&gal_cid=1503079&gallery_id=183145

Marketing guru Graham McGregor interviews Jamie Ford on the vital mindset that underpins success – ‘Mental Toughness’ (MT).  The ideas underpinning ‘X Factor’ thinking are explained in ways that make it simple to understand and easy to use.  The improvements in performance and productivity are proven to work, backed up by 40 years of extensive research, and bring benefits across all aspects of life – work, sport, academic achievement and health and wellbeing. Learn why some people get remarkable results, while others fail miserably, given the same set of circumstances.

It takes more mental toughness to be a successful business owner than it does to be an All Black. Here we share insights on how mental toughness helps business owners perform better and succeed quicker, including a 5 step action plan.

Karl had been down in the dumps and getting demotivated for more than three months.

With the help of a business coach he had written a business plan with ambitious goals for his business two years ago, but it wasn’t happening. Now he often worried that the business would end up as ‘road kill’ like so many other owner operated businesses, rather than the success he had dreamed of.

Unfortunately Karl’s business coach was not familiar with one vital element necessary for turning ambition into success – the requirement for ‘mental toughness’.

Shortly after we met Karl completed a mental toughness assessment and that showed exactly where things were going wrong. He had a ‘pessimistic’ mindset and no business plan or goal-setting was going to overcome that.

With some expert coaching in mental toughness he soon had a complete change of attitude and found it much easier doing the ‘hard yards’ needed to achieve his business goals and make a success of his business.

Karl had fallen victim to the fallacy of assuming awesome goals automatically lead to awesome results. The facts are otherwise as many business owners will avow. A mentally tough and optimistic mindset is the absolutely vital ingredient in developing and maintaining high levels of drive, energy and motivation.

Business owners are under huge pressures every day of every week of every year, and even many times during the course of one day. The All Blacks are under nothing like that level of constant pressure.

Fortunately good science has now unpacked the ingredients of mental toughness and we know it is a learned skill, not a matter of being lucky when the genes get handed out at birth. Generally it doesn’t get much thought until a lack of it shows it’s face, as in Karl’s case. But anyone who applies themselves can learn to be much more mentally tough than the average Kiwi business owner.

Being mentally tough means you will:

• Worry less and use your energy for more constructive actions, taking your business forward.
• Be healthier with a positive attitude and be much less likely to get down-in-the-dumps when trouble comes over the horizon with your name written on it.
• Pick yourself up much faster from the knocks that are part and parcel of owning a business.
• Be much more motivated to use the pressures you experience as a way of gaining new insights on how to improve the performance of your business.
• Find you have levels of ‘drive’ to succeed that you only dreamed of previously.

Your 5-step mental toughness action plan 

1. Live above the line and take ownership of your thoughts, moods and emotions. Don’t pass the buck and whine about how other people have upset and demotivated you when that’s an outcome of your own thinking about what is going on.
2. Only concern yourself with what you can control and let the other stuff slide away. This will leverage your capabilities instead of exhausting them on wild goose chases.
3. Put yourself at risk of succeeding by seeing every failure as a stepping stone to success. Be like Thomas Edison and get comfortable with failure as a normal part of owning a business. Edison had a mentally tough mindset and it shows in this famous quote of his: “I failed my way to success”.
4. Focus on flourishing more than ‘coping’. Coping is a weak and ineffective outcome; you have your nose above the water but the next ripple of adversity will take you under. Being mentally tough is about having a mindset that enables you to flourish even in the most adverse circumstances.
5. Get the insights for building more mental toughness by taking an assessment, getting an action plan, and an expert mental toughness coach to work alongside you.

First published in NZ Business Magazine, March 2017

Jamie Ford discusses this contentious topic with Simon Pound from the SpinOff. How come the suicide rate of young Aussies is 50% less than here in NZ but not one person in the helping professions uses the Seligman Attributional Style Questionnaire to gain valuable insights into the root causes?

We bag Australians because we say they’re so arrogant; we bag Americans because they’re so brash. But in fact what we’re reflecting on there is the fact that they’re more resilient and they’re much more optimistic. Australians and Americans tell me that the negativity in New Zealand hits them like a wall when they get off the plane.

There is a huge amount of research that shows how learning the thinking skills of resilience can act as a ‘vaccination’ against depression.

Read more here:

https://thespinoff.co.nz/podcast/business-is-boring-callaghan/07-06-2017/why-australians-are-more-resilient-than-kiwis/

The Hibiscus Coast AFC are introducing sports psychology into the training, with mental toughness coach Jamie Ford, to ensure the players have the right mindset during games and training. Read the full article here in the Rodney Times 25 January 2017 https://www.stuff.co.nz/auckland/local-news/rodney-times/88726209/hibiscus-coast-afc-looking-for-strong-start-to-season

Resilience can be thought of as an “optimistic mindset” and involves paying attention to the language and words we use, because lots of us inadvertently use pessimistic language in the way we talk about our successes and failures.

The power of a resilient mindset is in enabling us to tackle tasks with energy and enthusiasm by thinking about the outcome.

The breakdown of any relationship is devastating. But, while shocking, confusing and catastrophic, surviving (and ultimately thriving) after a split is possible. Resilience is key.

Jamie Ford shared tips to the NZ Herald on how to use resilience to not only survive but grow from a break-up.

A resilient mindset is more than the ability to quickly bounce back from the adversities and setbacks that occur in life. It also plays an important part in keeping someone attracted to you when you’re in a relationship.

For example, “the positive person who is not easily derailed,” Jamie says, “is much more attractive than the person who gets down in the dumps and stays there for quite some time banging on about their misfortune”.

Aside from that, resilience can make you a better significant other by ensuring you:

• Don’t sweat the small stuff and put unnecessary pressure on your partner and your relationship.
•  Easily put issues behind you. You can bury the hatchet quickly and forget where you buried it.
• Don’t have a mind-reading licence so you always assume good intentions on the part of your partner. Even if you find out otherwise, you can be forgiving more easily than the person lacking resilience.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/lifestyle/news/article.cfm?c_id=6&objectid=11817919

Jamie Ford enjoys riding a motorcycle in his down-time. His choice of bike suits his personality – the Honda 1000 Africa Twin is an adventure bike, he tells the NZ Herald Driven: “I like adventures and exploring. It takes courage to get the best from it, and that suits me”. – NZ Herald Driven 22 April 2017 

https://www.driven.co.nz/news/lifestyle/me-my-bike-out-in-the-elements-and-loving-it/

Jamie Ford speaks with Hilary Barry on TVNZ’s Breakfast Show about the science of psychometric testing in the world of work.