The Therapy Edit - One Thing with Simon Ong on harnessing the power of your positive energy

Episode Date: November 24, 2023

In this guest episode of The Therapy Edit, Anna chats to Simon Ong about his one thing; the power of your positive energy and how you can harness it to attract great things into your life.Simon Ong is a Life Coach and Business Strategist, an author and a Dad!Simon runs an online community, Energize where he introduces you to the art and science of energy management. In a world where we are always 'on', Simon coaches you to work with your natural energy resources to recognize your most energized state - when to push and when to recoup - so that you can work sustainably towards your biggest goals.He's also the author of Energize; Make the most of every momentYou can also follow Simon on Instagram here

Hello and welcome to The Therapy Edit with me, psychotherapist, mum of three and author Anna Martha. Every Friday, I invite one guest to tell me the one thing they would most like to share with mums everywhere. So join with me as we hear this dose of wisdom. I hope you enjoy it. Hi, everyone. Welcome to today's guest episode of The Therapy Edit. Today I have with me, Simon Ong. Now, Simon is an award-winning personal development entrepreneur and coach. His work has seen him invited on to Sky News and BBC Radio and he's also regularly featured in press sharing his wisdom. He has an amazing book which I really encourage you to explore. It is called Energize. Make the most of every moment. His book answers this question. Your energy is the fuel that drives your success and it gives you the power to achieve. your potential. So how can you be your best self if you are always tired, stressed and burnt

out? I mean, that resonates very deeply. I think it is often the burnout and the juggle that just holds us back from just being who we could, the best that we can be. So yeah, how great to have a book that dives into that. Simon coaches you to work with your natural energy resources to recognize your most energized state when to push. And most importantly, to go with that when to recoup so that you can work sustainably towards your biggest goals without the fizzling out that I often experience the go, go, go, then the fizzle. So Simon will help you be a little bit more sustainable as you seek to approach your goals. So Simon, it's great to have you.

Anna, fantastic to connect. And thank you so much for having me on your show. It's an absolute pleasure. We've already bonded, haven't we, over, or we met at Car Fest in the summer. And that was great. and we were both talking at different points on the spa fest stage, which I love the name of. So who knows when we might end up bumping into each other again.

We've also bonded over daughters. So you've got three and a half year old Sienna. Three and a half year old, Florence, yeah. And she's cheeky. They've both got a cheeky streak. Oh, we're going to have to get them acquainted, aren't we? Oh, my gosh. I know, you've already said about the snack request.

Florence is pretty cagey around her food. Oh, that's going to be interesting. It could be a bun fight, quite literally a bun fight. But anyway, how are you? How are you? As we record on this kind of slightly rainy, where the weather's really turned, hasn't it? How are you today? Yeah, the weather's turned. Despite that, I am excited. I think the magic of life is that at every turn, there's a potential for life being a lot better than we can ever imagine. And that keeps me excited. You know, I have no idea what the next day is going to bring, what the next week is going to bring. and for me that's the beauty the beauty of life that is an amazing perspective to have is to look ahead

at this next season and I think for so many people and I catch myself feeling this you know is the evenings get darker and the night's drawing there are only so many pumpkin spice lattes that are kind of like with a spring in my step you know and it's that kind of like it can feel like quite an oppressive time in some ways but I love the fact you're like actually this is we're stepping into the unknown possibility. Good things can happen. The excitement of the unknown, you know, one of the things I said to a friend recently was that when everything is unknown, anything is possible. And that feeling that we can shape and shift our future by the decisions and choices we make today means that we are responsible for what we manifest in our reality.

This is amazing. I absolutely love this. You're turning because anxiety is. You're, is fear of the unknown, isn't it? It's that often trying to brace ourselves for things that haven't and may never happen. But actually, you're saying that you look ahead and feel excitement at the unknown because you don't know what's going to happen. It could be good and great things. Totally, because when you don't know what's going to happen, then you're not limited. You're not limited by your perception of this has to happen or it can only happen this way.

when there are no barriers, then you can sculpt a future really through your own perception of reality. You know, that's why I often say to people, a lot of us live through this lens of paranoia that somebody or someone is trying to sabotage my career progression or my future or my opportunities. And that tends to keep us in a very negative mindset. Why is the world always working against me? Why aren't I getting those opportunities?

But if we were to live through the lens of pro-noia, which means the opposite to paranoia, that the universe is conspiring in your favour, that life is working for you and not against you, just imagine the possibilities that begin to open up. Oh, I love these just these little encouragements just to turn the ways that we often don't even realize maybe that we're in the rut of thinking on their head. And I saw that pro-noia, that little reframe, I saw that on your Instagram. your Instagram is so good for this, just kind of dropping in these little like,

wait a minute, why don't you think about it like this? What about if you thought about your future through the lens of excitement rather than fear? And it just questions the mindset, I think, that we can so often just feel entrenched in and like there isn't another way. When actually, you know, even listening to you just talk in the last few minutes,

my levels of excitement of this next season of life, this, you know, the literal kind of autumn season, it's just shifted from like, oh, gosh, it's going to get dark. What am I going to do with the kids? You can't go to the park. You know, everyone's going to be tired to, oh, what might happen? And I think that is because we forget that we live in the feeling of our thinking moment to moment to moment. So whatever we bring into our thinking, we bring into our reality. And so that gives us a very special power, which is the fact that at any moment, we can choose one fall over another, and that completely transforms our reality.

That transforms our experience of the day we are going through or the event we're experiencing, just by choosing a different thought. Yeah, and that there is that choice there for us as soon as we start to recognize that that choice is there. I guess we can't control the things that come into our heads and the first thoughts that we have, but there is a choice to culture,

debate a second thought and a second way of seeing things. Definitely. And it's why life is never about what happens to you. It is about how you choose to respond to what happens to you. Yeah. And I guess that's all what your work really is, is about offering people awareness of that choice and maybe how to choose differently

and how to feel empowered to make different choices around how you feel and how you see things. So I'm excited to hear then on that basis. I feel like you've already given us like a million golden nuggets of things to think about and go away with. But, Simon, what is that one thing that you would love to share with everyone listening today? The one thing that I would love to share with everyone today, Anna, is this. People do not buy your ideas, your products, your services, as much as they buy your energy.

People buy your energy. And this is because energy is infectious. When you show up in a certain way with the work you do and who you are as a person, you begin to attract opportunities and people into your lives. And that is because positive energy has this incredible influence on impacting other people. It's the way you show up, it creates a vibration. People might call this charisma or magnetism, but it's the fact that energy is powerful because it creates an emotional connection with people.

Maya Angelou quoted it beautifully when she said people may forget who you are. They may forget what you said, but they will never forget the way you made them feel. And that is energy in motion. So our energy is what attracts people to us. So what we say, what we do, those things are almost secondary to how we make people feel in our presence. So I think as a mum who's been through a summer where I've just been totally and utterly frazzled, you know, and historically at tough times, I've wondered about burdening people and wondered about kind of bringing their energy down. So what would you say then to those moms listening who are like, I am just worried that I, my energy is just, you know, frazzled central and that, you know, I'm not bringing my best self to people. And yeah, so how can we, how can we, how can we? we adapt that energy or how can we, even in hard times, how can we find that energy that is a little bit more magnetic when we're feeling a little bit heavy? Sure. So I think there's

two parts to this Anna. The first part is the things you can control and the second part is the things you can't. So if I start with the first part, there was always something you can control. So as a parent myself, if I know that my child is going to be attending school between this hour and that hour, then I know that that gives me my window of opportunity to get rest, do the work I need to do, and prepare for the evening. So if there's things in your diary that are repetitive events, then with that awareness, what is within your control is how to prepare and plan for those things. so when they do occur, you can be present and show up with the energy that you would want to show it with. Now, on the flip side, of course, there will be curveballs. There'll be things that you can't control, which mean the best laid plans don't always go to where you want. And so when that occurs, the thing to do is to have compassion and kindness to yourself. To simply say, given

what has happened today, given the events I've just experienced, I'm just going to give my best. and that's all we can do. And giving your best is different when you're a single parent, when you have family around you, when you have no child care or support, whether you just experienced a personal tragedy, giving your best will be different for each of us. But that's all you can do sometimes when you're faced with the unexpected.

I love this. Just give your best whatever that looks like. And I remember seeing an Instagram post, which I shared, slightly mathematically, but I, you know, to me, it spoke to me. But someone was saying, if you, if you wake up with 40% of who you are, you know, 40% of energy and resources, and you, you give 100% of that 40%. You've given 100%. There's some mathematical question around this. So I'll show you for it. Okay. Because I think it's just, it's saying exactly what you're saying,

if you're coming and you're showing up and you're being authentic, then, and you're just kind of being, you're allowing yourself to be with people and allowing people to be with you as and who you are and you're open to stuff and you're open to whatever that, whatever that may bring. Then actually you're being your best. You're bringing your best, aren't you? You're doing your best. And the thing is, well, never perfect. There's no such thing as perfection. And the way I see it is that we are a constant work in progress. So you're going to have good days. You're going to have bad days. There's going to be everything in between. But the fact is you're always learning. So whenever I go through certain experiences, I always ask myself, well, what went well

and what could be better next time? And it's the focus on these two questions that keep me focused on the learning. If I start dwelling on, well, why didn't I do this? Why didn't I do that? Why couldn't I have chosen this decision? Then I'm living in the past. And once something has occurred, I can't go back and change it. But I can change tomorrow.

And so I'm really focused on the things that are in my. control. It's just an openness, isn't it? It's a kind of, it's a working with what's working with what you've actually got rather than trying to change something that you can't. And at an openness to learning, learning from it and through it. Definitely. I love that. So when we talk about kind of the vibrations and like good vibrations and high energy, tell me a little bit more about that and how does is authenticity high energy is that good vibrations even if you're having a hard time but you're being authentic within it well i'd love to know a little bit more about that definitely so when i i'll give a bit of context first so when i talk about energy i see it through four

dimensions so we have physical energy mental energy emotional energy and spiritual energy so when we talk about authenticity that's touching into the emotional energy side of it so if you are not authentic, you might hide your true feelings or you might keep what is going on in your head just to yourself. And as we know, that doesn't really help anyone because that can brew and brew and brew and it would be coming out in ways that you would not like it to come out. But if you have a good support group around you, if you have somebody that you can share what is on your mind with, your challenges, your feelings, your emotions, then what happens is that you have a space that can help you understand what is going through in your head.

And this is why a lot of people advise those who haven't really shared with others to take up journaling or writing. Because if you're not comfortable sharing yet to other people, journaling is like therapy for free. It allows you to download what is on your head onto paper and to make sense of all of those thoughts. And even if you don't find the best way forward, at the minimum, what's happened is that you have a much clearer head because all of those thoughts are now onto paper and you can visit them

to understand why were you think in a certain way, what would be a more productive way, how else could you see it? You start to understand yourself and awareness, this level of self-awareness is the beginning of change. And so this has a lot to do with emotional energy. It may also be called emotional fitness or emotional intelligence, but this emotional energy is really important for us to thrive in the long term. Yeah, so journaling and just learning a little bit more of yourself so that you're aware maybe of some of these patterns and habits of thinking that do just feel like habits and are just a bit entrenched and actually being able to think

or maybe there are other ways of seeing this. And sometimes we can only go through that process when we actually externalise it. One thing I'd love to ask you about, whilst you here, because I'm finding this so interesting, is I went, I drove up to see a friend the other day and I was only there for an hour and a half and her baby was really unsettled. So he was kind of crying quite a lot. And we were having a catch up. So I was telling her about the things that we've been through as a family and the things like the grief and all of these different things. And then I felt I was just being really authentic with her. She's a good, she's a good long time friend. And then I went away and she

texted me and she said it was so uplifting being with you. And I thought, how on earth is that uplifting. I let you quiet at your kitchen table. But maybe, I think what you're saying here is giving me a different perspective on this, because maybe, and for so long I feared that if I was just my authentic self and if I took my vulnerabilities to people, that it would be heavy and it would be burdensome and it would push people away. But actually, maybe in her message, what she was saying was that me just bringing my authentic self and her being able to speak into that and maybe feel useful and being able to comfort me or just give some wisdom and insight,

that that could potentially have been uplifting as an experience because we were there together as two authentic people, where we were in our journey. And yeah, what you're saying is just giving me a little bit of a different insight

because I just thought, how on earth could that have been uplifting? Absolutely, Anna. And I think if I were to summarize your experience with your friend, I would summarize it with these, words, vulnerability is the path to connection. When we can be vulnerable with each other, when we can be open to express it, it is how we connect with other people. If I go and tell

everybody, hey, I'm super successful and you just have to do this, this and this, that's great to some extent, but it doesn't allow me to relate to them. They can't relate to where I am. But if I start sharing the realities of the work that I do. You know, sometimes I have to make sacrifices. I fail a lot. You may not always see it, but I have failed a lot. I didn't think I was going to get far in this career because I didn't have to support of my family at the beginning. And so I had to learn all of this in real time. I still face challenges now. You know, I feel scared and I have self-doubts about myself from time to time. So when I start to share this stuff, I want them to know that it's not always about the happy, smiley, Simon on social media.

Of course, we know that we only tend to share the good bits on social media, but there is also human side to every journey. And every journey is unique. Every journey is different for obvious reasons, but also we all share the same struggles. You know, we all share the same struggles as everyone would when they embark on a path that they've never been on before, where they have to learn everything as they go along. And that brings itself challenges, obstacles and setbacks that we all have to deal with. And it's that that builds our resilience, our insight, and the wisdom that we accumulate.

So helpful. This is so wonderful. So thank you so much. And I really encourage people to go and find your book and immerse themselves in it. I'm going to do it exactly the same. It's called energize, make the most of every moment and thinking about how can you be your best self if you're always tired, stressed and burnt out, how can you tend to these different parts of you so that you're being fed and you can give out from a more authentic, less frazzled space. So Simon, to finish off, I have got a quick fire question for you. I would love to ask you, what's one thing that makes you feel good? That's a very easy question actually. One thing that makes me feel good is quality time with my daughter. Oh, lovely. Every time I'm away from home, whether it is

travel, whether it is for work, just the experience of coming back home and seeing my daughter and sharing with her what daddy got up to, daddy's beautiful. Yeah. Oh, wonderful. Well, thank you. Well, thank you for your wisdom. Thank you for answering all of my questions. I feel, yeah, I feel informed and empowered. And I'm going to look at this. autumnal time a little bit differently. I'm going to welcome excitement for the unknown for this season. So thank you. Thank you for sharing your wisdom with us and your warmth.

Thank you so much for having me. Thank you so much for listening to today's episode of The Therapy Edit. If you have enjoyed it, don't forget to subscribe and review for me. Also, if you need any resources at all, I have lots of videos and courses on everything from health anxiety to driving anxiety and people pleasing nail. all on my website anamatha.com and also don't forget my brand new book raising a happier mother is out now for you to enjoy and benefit from it's all about how to find balance feel good and see your children flourish as a result speak to you soon