Melanie Pritchard Success Coaching

"Jenny is at death’s door and is trying so hard to stay alive. It feels impossible that she can survive a few more days or weeks like this, let alone the months it might take to raise the money. She is deteriorating constantly. She is in screaming agony 24/7 but is unable to scream. She cannot support her head or neck since the operation and has been horizontal with her head supported by a pillow ever since. She hasn’t been able to move off that pillow since the operation" - Anne Rowbory (my brother in law's cousin).

It's hard to fathom what Jenny suffers daily with Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome (EDS) having been left in worse pain by negligent surgery her family finally somehow fundraised the money for. They need to raise another half a million pounds to get her to America to a specialist who can help her.

Jenny fell ill as a medical student some years' ago and has been barely able to move since. To top that all off, her father died suddenly last year, putting the family under even more financial pressure.

If you'd like to do a good deed for the day, please donate whatever you can. Or if you know any very wealthy people who feel compelled to donate a large chunk, please pass this on. It really could change her life from one of brave daily misery:

Jenny Can’t Be Left Like This, organized by Jenny Rowbory We never expected to be here again, asking for help. The craniocervical fusion surgery a… Jenny Rowbory needs your support for Jenny Can’t Be Left Like This

‘Being vulnerable is the only way to allow your heart to experience true pleasure’ - Bob Marley 🎶

The consistent high performance habit every incoming coaching client has is a willingness to be vulnerable, whether —

💎 Sharing their painpoints and frustrations in life
💎 Opening up about blocks and limiting beliefs that have been keeping them stuck
💎 Sharing their dreams for the future or being willing to unearth what those might be
💎 Being willing to challenge their old familiar patterns and practise mindset mastery tools to effect big shifts

I often joke that I should develop an online dating service because the combination of the willingness to be vulnerable and desire for change show my clients up as deeply courageous and sexy people. Unwilling to be victims to their monkey minds — allergic, even if just a seed of allergy mixed with fear, to sitting in the status quo — a defiance to move beyond something that feels mediocre in their lives. A determination to GROW 🌱

Sounds easy, doesn’t it? But courage is anything but. It isn’t the absence of fear - it’s the willingness to move through fear.

And it’s the difference between living a half life and feeling truly alive.

There’s simply no way around facing yourself in some way in life and exploring how you truly feel if you want to teach your hugest potential.

Who knew that vulnerability could be so scary and liberating all at once?

If you feel stuck in the safe duvet layers of cosy familiarity but have an inkling you’re misaligned with your true self somewhere, ask yourself this —

What would your 90 year old self advise you right now?

And if you were told your days were numbered today, what would you regret not having been, done or had?

Comforting questions perhaps, but as they say, there’s no confusion in truth 🪞

Beautiful words from on the sliding doors of life and the freedom we find in accepting ourselves where we are at 💎

🕊️

‘Fear is the most disabling emotion, keeping us stuck where we are, ruminating on the past, catastrophising about the future, labelling ourselves in harsh ways and approaching life with limiting black and white thinking which prevents the growth we seek’ - Me 🍎

This is probably my greatest observation from 7 years’ life and career coaching. Whether geneticists, doctors, lawyers, management consultants, creatives, barristers or entrepreneurs, it is the almighty monster that is FEAR that keeps us stuck.

Fears like:

🙄 why am I like this?
🙄 I don’t know who I am and what I want - I’m completely lost
🙄 I know something needs to change but my inner critic is rampant and I have no clue how to move forwards
🙄 is there something wrong with me? Does anyone else feel this way inside?
🙄 I’m not as great as people think - when will I be found out?

All these fears are v v common. Pretty much every person has felt them at some point in life. You can be sure of that cos our brains are programmed to keep us on high alert for danger and threat - which is v helpful when there’s genuine peril around us but it’s maladaptive when it’s disproportionate to reality - which is what fear really is. A deeply human but skewed perception of reality.

I’ve also learnt that Marie Curie’s words: ‘Nothing in life is to be feared, only understood’ are so true.

Once we start to understand why we think, feel and behave how we do, even the most complex of feelings can be understood - and changed.

It’s quite simple really l:

— knowledge = power
— tools = change

Don’t believe me?

Ask any client I’ve worked with whether highflying doctor with crippling imposter syndrome,
hot shot lawyer with zero confidence or stressed out client who believes career change success to be as likely as constant sunshine in the U.K.

So I say again, ‘nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood’.

Once you understand your fear and learn simple tools to deal with it, the world is your oyster 🦪

Want to learn how? Drop me a DM with the words ‘yes please’ and be prepared for change!

Get well soon, Ingrid - loveliest of ladies 💜

“Trusting your intuition often saves us from disaster.” — Anne Wilson Schae

What does intuition mean to you?

How does it show up?

Where are you when you’re most connected to it?

How has it helped you in life?

And what’s happened when you’ve ignored it?

I’ve had strong intuition in life I haven’t always listened to.

Once was a sense of mistrust in a boyfriend I shouldn’t have trusted - others told me I was being silly (even his sister), but turns out I was right. I learnt intuition trumps reason when I found out he’d cheated with the colleague I sensed he didn’t ‘see as a man’ as he put it (!) 😂

Another moment of clarity was the strong intuition I had to leave London a few days’ before lockdown was declared. It was a distinctive sense of clarity atop a double decker bus in London that was impossible to ignore - even if it didn’t make real sense. It felt like divine guidance just a few days’ later from the wilds of a peaceful loft in Suffolk!

Another was the nauseous feeling I had about following a legal career instead of the green lights I felt when I thought about studying journalism. I remember my inner voice saying: ‘law will be too intense for you and won’t bring you balance’ - I was right! My dad had suggested I leverage my degree result and shift path away from law later if I wanted to so I did what a lot of my career coaching clients do and listened to others.

Sure enough, I learnt my real interest lay in working more directly with people and doing something more linked to the human condition and helping people on a more fundamental level. I was also reminded of a truth I’d shared with ! ‘Just cos you’ve got a brain, doesn’t mean you have to use it’ 😂

I now remind coaching clients of the same - just because you have some leading strengths, it doesn’t mean you’ll want to use those in your work.

What are the moments your intuition has rung loud?

When have you trusted that and what happened?

How much are you listening to it right now?

If the answer is ‘not enough’, how can you make space to connect with your intuition more?

For me, it’s being in nature. What about you?

A little pre-weekend slow down reminder from .holistic.psychologist 🙌

“Trusting your intuition often saves us from disaster.” — Anne Wilson Schae

What does intuition mean to you?

How does it show up?

Where are you when you’re most connected to it?

How has it helped you in life?

And what’s happened when you’ve ignored it?

I’ve had strong intuition in life I haven’t always listened to.

Once was a sense of mistrust in a boyfriend I shouldn’t have trusted - others told me I was being silly (even his sister), but turns out I was right. I learnt intuition trumps reason when I found out he’d cheated with the colleague I sensed he didn’t ‘see as a man’ as he put it (!) and I learnt others’ intuition can be powerful, too, when they said he’d never change - he went o

Another intuitive moment was the strong intuition I had to leave London a few days’ before lockdown was declared. It was a distinctive sense of clarity atop a double decker bus in London that was impossible to ignore - even if it didn’t make real sense. It felt like divine guidance just a few days’ later from the wilds of a peaceful loft in Suffolk!

Another was the nauseous feeling I had about following a legal career instead of the green lights I felt when I thought about studying journalism. I remember my inner voice saying: ‘law will be too intense for you and won’t bring you balance’ - I was right! My dad suggested I leveraged my degree result and shifted path away from law later if I wanted to so I did what a lot of my career coaching clients do and listened to others. Sure enough, I learnt my real interest lay in working more directly with people and doing something that probed the human condition and helped people on a more human level. I was also reminded of a truth I’d shared with ! ‘Just cos you’ve got a brain, doesn’t mean you have to use it’ 😂 I now

What are the moments in your life your intuition has rung loud?

When have you trusted that and what happened?

How much are you listening to it right now?

If the answer is ‘not enough’, how can you make space to connect with your intuition right now?

What would be different if you viewed everything in life as a blessing or a lesson?

Our monkey minds tell us life is black or white, good or bad, but the truth is far more nuanced 😶‍🌫️

They say life doesn’t happen to us, it happens for us. In other words, every challenge is sent to teach us something so we can uplevel to greater happiness and success rather than swim around in the stasis of victim mindset.

It might not be easy but until you learn what you’re meant to from a challenge, you’ll be kept in the same block or cycle until you become more aware and make the necessary changes for growth.

It’s the difference between the passive fixed mindset - ‘it is what it is, nothing can change’ and the growth mindset which chooses ownership, self-responsibility and growth over passive acceptance of challenges.

What have your best learnings been in life at moments of challenge and how has embracing these served you?

What’s keeping you stuck in life right now and what could the learning be in that?

What one step could you take outside your comfort zone to shake things up?

And what might winning look like if you own that sh*t?

Still feel resistance? Then remember this —

Happiness is an inside job —

Nothing changes if nothing changes —

If you keep doing what you’ve always done, you’ll keep getting what you’ve always got —

So do that one brave thing that may help you level up - and remember fear is a barometer for growth.

The alternative is staying in the safe zone you’ve always known.

But you know what they say about that? A comfort zone is a lovely place but nothing grows there 🌸

‘People think a soul mate is your perfect fit, and that's what everyone wants. But a true soul mate is a mirror, the person who shows you everything that is holding you back, the person who brings you to your own attention so you can change your life’ - Elizabeth Gilbert 🧜‍♀️

What are your thoughts? Cinderella story A-B or something a little more zigzaggy?

Easy peasy lemon squeazy 🍋 or the Heathcliff and Catherine, soul-stirring stuff?

Or something in between?

.holistic.psychologist

‘Beautiful sunsets need cloudy skies’ - Paulo Coelho

“Change happens when the pain of staying the same is greater than the pain of change.”
— Tony Robbins

Wanna rise up or lie down and give in?