To spread the Christmas message and promote our wellbeing coaching in County Durham we decided to put together a ‘12 days of Christmas self-nurturing challenge,’ aimed to encourage people take care of themselves in a period where personal wellbeing can be overlooked.

Although Christmas for most people is a fun time of year, filled with parties, celebrations, and social gatherings with family and friends. For many people however, it is a time filled with sadness, self-reflection, loneliness, and anxiety. This is especially true for teachers who have a lot of festive activities to plan in school and people who work in a business where Christmas is the busiest time of year.

Our ‘12 days of Christmas challenge’ had a range of different tasks, such as ‘Ring a friend that you haven’t spoken to in a while’ and ‘go on a digital detox.’ The digital detox was the hardest for me!

The Challenge was sent around many schools in County Durham to promote our wellbeing coaching and was published on our Facebook page.

Many people came back to us and said the challenge helped them have the most stress free Christmas they have ever had and this challenge is something people can still do.

Jilly Hilditch form St Bedes Sacriston said; “The challenge helped me a lot and reminded me to stay calm.”

Happy New year, have a lovely and stress-free 2017.

Love Rainbows End x

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Today is the United Nations International Day of Happiness and in countries all over the world people are being asked to help create more happiness in the world around them by focusing on their connections with other people.

It is true that there is lots of scientific evidence to support the idea that having good solid relationships in your life will help with your own personal happiness rating, however that is only part of the story. Shawn Anchor, psychologist at Harvard and author of ‘The Happiness Advantage’ says,

“What’s going on in your life — from health, to money, to relationships, to prestige — predicts only about 10% of your happiness”

His fundamental principal is that you don’t get happy by achieving success. You achieve success by getting happy.

So that’s an easy enough principle to get your head around, but what do we actually need to do about it? The internet is jam packed with array of commentaries, handy tips and pearls of wisdom on the subject of achieving happiness and loads of practical advice on how to go about it.

Included in many of these will be things such as ‘expressing more gratitude for the good things in life’, ‘taking more exercise’ and ‘setting positive goals’. All of these things are hugely valuable in the journey towards greater happiness but none of them on their own necessitates a change in mindset. In fact, if they are merely added to the great ‘to do’ list could even end having the opposite effect and making you feel less happy.

A change in perspective can often work wonders and when you need to see things from a different angle it’s often helpful to think about how children respond to the world around them.

When a child looks out of the window and see’s it is raining they think “brilliant, it’s raining, I can put my wellies on, go and jump in puddles and get drenched”. An adult on the other hand, will more like think “well that’s put a downer on things. I was looking forward to going out but now I will have to stay in and no doubt the kids will be climbing the walls”. In other words, children find the joy in things. It’s their default response.

Secondly, think about what a child would say if asked “what would you like to do today?” For a child, that question opens up a blank canvas that they can fill entirely with fun. Endless possibilities present themselves of creating things, playing games and sport, visiting the park or the beach, riding a bike, the list is endless. Not so in the adult mind. We are far more likely to fill our blank canvas with obligations and duties, “I must do the supermarket shop, go to the gym (to get fit and not to have fun), sort out the spare room, weed the front lawn and so it goes on.

Not that there is anything wrong with getting through our ‘to do’ list, in fact the satisfaction of ticking things off can bring enormous rewards. However what we need remember is that fun doesn’t just happen, we need to plan for it. It’s up to us to make it happen.

So in your quest to get happy, I urge you to see the world through the eyes of a child. Work hard on finding the joy in everyday things and make it your mission to plan for fun!

For more invaluable insights in How to Get Happy, download our free ‘Seven Steps to Happiness – your ultimate guide” right here.

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Hello World!

Say hello to our new website!

Please take a look around and let us know what you think.

Whilst your here why not download our FREE ebook by clicking here

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In 2008 Jenny and I embarked on the big adventure that is Rainbows End Coaching. We had six children between us, three of them just tiny babies and the credit crunch that led the UK into recession had just hit. There couldn’t be a better time to start a business we thought!

Now, several years on we are still here, armed with much knowledge and many lessons that we have learned along the way. We have lots to share and plan on making this blog a regular feature of our communication so that others can see the journey that we are on and how we overcome the ongoing challenges of life.

One of the things that we have struggled with in our business is how to make Life Coaching an accessible and affordable option to the many thousands of people that could benefit from it. Life coaching has always been a small, yet vital part of what we do here at Rainbows End but we now feel that the time has come to share our knowledge and expertise with a much wider audience.

We are extremely excited to be doing this as we know that it is the right thing at the right time. Over the coming months we will be launching a packed programme of Life Coaching offerings, from blog posts through to free webinars through to a fantastic free new e-book. We will guide you through a programme of personal growth covering topics such as ‘getting the best out of your personal relationships’, ‘feeling great in mind, body and spirit’, ‘how to get the right work life balance’ and much, much more.

If you feel ready to start your journey with us today then download our free exercise ‘how to feel great about yourself’ and get started straight away. Please comment below with any topics that you would like to see covered in our blogs and webinars in the coming weeks and months. We look forward to hearing from you!

Yours

Elizabeth

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