Thinking Archives - Page 2 of 5 - Chantal Breytenbach Coaching

Are you taking in the room or simply rushing for the door?

The other day my daughter asked me why I set timers for myself throughout the day. I set alarms that remind me when it’s time to leave for an appointment, or when it’s almost time for a client call. I do this so that I don’t have to keep watching the clock. I find constantly watching the clock takes me out of the moment and that is not helpful for my intention to be fully present IN the moment. So, I have alarms that remind me of the time. That lessens my mental load, and allows me to simply BE in the moment and enjoy the moment, because I don’t have to worry about missing a call.

And of course, with the wisdom and brilliance of a 6-year-old, my daughter shared her insights from what she understood about why I have alarms that go off throughout the day… […]

On the other side of fear…

Posted on August 14, 2023By ChantalPosted in Bias for action / Commitment / Courage / Decision-Making / Dreaming / Failure / Fear / Future Self / Grit / Happiness / In the muck / Inspiration / Leadership / Life / Mindset / Perspective / Resilience / Thinking / Transformation

The other day on my morning walk, I came across three deer. They wanted to get past me to the other side of a set of stairs. Their fear prevented them from doing so. And this got me thinking. Isn’t this just how we are as humans? We reach a fork in the road of life. We are faced with a transition or a challenge in our lives. We tell ourselves we want to change, and yet we stay frozen right there in the middle of the road, too afraid to take the next step. We consider what might be on the other side. We take a few small steps forward; only to take three big steps back again, when things start shifting… […]

Life lessons I learnt from watching the Barbie movie

Posted on July 25, 2023By ChantalPosted in Authenticity / Courage / Failure / Future Self / Happiness / In the muck / Inspiration / Leadership / Life / Listening / Meaning / Mindset / Perspective / Thinking / Transformation / Values

This past weekend we went to the cinema and watched the new Barbie movie. I was initially very resistant to watching it. I had my own story about Barbie and that it would be a complete waste of my time to watch the movie. I was not a big fan of Barbie growing up. I had some Barbie dolls at one point. And I loved dressing the dolls. And at the same time, I felt a lot of resentment towards the stereotypes that the doll’s existence perpetuates. Barbie perpetuates an unrealistic and unattainable ideal that is very hard for most women to be confronted with. My husband was very keen though. He thought it would be funny. So, we went to see it. Here is what I learnt about life from watching the Barbie movie… […]

What’s your Gremlin?

Posted on July 11, 2023By ChantalPosted in Failure / Future Self / Happiness / In the muck / Leadership / Life / Mindset / Perspective / Thinking / Transformation

We all have Gremlins – also know as Saboteurs or Inner Critics. Our Gremlins are what we consider the worst parts of ourselves – the monsters that come out when we overfeed them. They come out when we feel most insecure, most inadequate, most incompetent, and when we feel most like we lack confidence in ourselves and our abilities. It’s the judgements we have of ourselves. It’s what we most dislike and want to hide about ourselves, because we believe that they get in the way of us showing up fully as our best or highest selves… […]

The Last of the Human Freedoms: The Freedom to Choose

Posted on June 26, 2023By ChantalPosted in Bias for action / Courage / Decision-Making / Emotional Agility / In the muck / Leadership / Life / Mindfulness / Mindset / Perspective / Thinking / Transformation

To live a full, rich life, requires taking ownership of our responses and our experiences. It requires that we co-create WITH life, instead of fighting against life. And secondly, it requires that we take full responsibility for our own healing and the integration of our different parts. Life is asking us to choose to be Creators instead of Reactors… […]

Striving, yet not thriving

Posted on May 2, 2023By ChantalPosted in Bias for action / Coaching / Commitment / Failure / Future Self / Goals / Grit / In the muck / Leadership / Life / Mindset / Passion / Perspective / Purpose / Resilience / Self-care / Slow down / Thinking / Thriving

Recently, I posed the question, can you handle the effort shock? And there was quite a reaction to that article. So, today, I want to speak to those of us (myself included) who tend to overdo it and who tend to not know where the line is between effort and burnout. […]

Your Future Self wants you to love yourself NOW

Posted on March 13, 2023By ChantalPosted in Commitment / Decision-Making / Dreaming / Failure / Future Self / Goals / Inspiration / Life / Meaning / Mindset / Perspective / Planning / Purpose / Thinking / Thriving / Transformation / Values

We have always lived in a world that is characterised by change and uncertainty. We have never lived in a world that wasn’t changing…

No-one has it all figured out, because what would be the fun in being alive if there is nothing to learn? Until the day you release your last breath, you will continue to evolve. You will continue to change. When we remember our past selves, they seem quite different to who we are now. In some instances, your past self might seem like a completely different person to you, and it may even be hard to relate to who you used to be.

We know how much our personalities and tastes have changed over the years. However, for some reason, when we look ahead to the future, somehow, we expect that we will stay the same as we are NOW. We assume that we will not change as much in the future as we have changed to get to this present moment… […]

What’s your relationship to wanting and dreaming?

Posted on January 30, 2023By ChantalPosted in Bias for action / Decision-Making / Dreaming / Goals / Happiness / Inspiration / Leadership / Life / Meaning / Mindset / Planning / Purpose / Thinking / Thriving

Whenever I’m in conversation with a new person, I invite them to dream. I invite them to consider what they want. For some peole, it’s easy to know what they want. They find it easy to dream. And for others, knowing what they want, knowing the longing of their own heart, feels unreachable or impossible. The experiences of their past are so painful, or they have fallen into pleasing others and morphing themselves into whatever they think others want them to be, so much so, that they lose their sense of who they are and what they want.

I remember a time in my life when I was so busy adapting who I was being to try and be more loveable or acceptable to others, that I had no sense of who I was. During those times, I found it hard to dream. I found it hard to even begin to know what I wanted outside of asking others’ opinions about what they thought I should want.

Recently, my coach Amber Krzys, shared an email with the title What’s your relationship to wanting? And that got me thinking… […]

Heart and Mind Goals

Posted on January 17, 2023By ChantalPosted in Bias for action / Commitment / Completions / Goals / Inspiration / Leadership / Life / Mindset / Planning / Purpose / Slow down / Thinking / Thriving / Time management

Today, I want to say a little more about setting goals. As I’ve shared before, I’m not a big fan of traditional New Year’s resolutions. I believe that when we are setting goals, these goals should come from our highest most authentic self, our Inner Wisdom or Inner Leader. When our goals come from this place, they are aligned with who we want to be in the world and what we feel called to create and bring into the world. When our goals come from our Ego, or from our sense of how we see ourselves falling short when we compare ourselves with others, then our goals are essentially SHOULDS and not WANTS. […]

Slow down and turn around: Honouring Completions

Posted on December 28, 2022By ChantalPosted in Celebrations / Completions / Decision-Making / Failure / Goals / Life / Meaning / Planning / Purpose / Slow down / Thinking1 Comment

The New Year often evokes within most of us the need to set new year’s resolutions. It’s an invitation to start anew with a clean slate. And it’s been my experience that so often people are so eager to move forward, that they don’t take the time to slow down, turn around, and look back to where they had come from.

At the end of last year, I wrote about the value of celebrations and why I think it’s important to choose to celebrate our successes and milestones. My thoughts here are an extension of the discussion on celebrations because I also believe there is value in truly honouring completions… […]