Welcome

Posted on | November 6, 2009 | No Comments

Hi and welcome to my blog

I’m Carla, the founder of Space To Be and a life coach who focuses on helping people avoid burnout and get more balance and energy in their everyday life.

This blog is a mixture of stories from my journey towards a more relaxed life and a guide to life, love and relaxation. I’ll be talking about books, films and people that have inspired me and bringing you the latest news about health, happiness and relaxation. Space To Be provides life support for women and I hope this blog will be a useful resource if you’re looking for a great book to get you through a bad week, a holiday to inspire you or some words of wisdom from some experts on personal development.

Happy reading and please do join in and share your thoughts. ideas and recommendations too.

Love

Carla x

Top chat up lines

Posted on | February 18, 2010 | No Comments

Believe it or not research has actually been done on what works in terms of chat up lines.  In her book ‘Love by Numbers’ Dr Luisa Dillner quotes the following research…

Questions work better than statements and a smile makes all the difference, no matter what you say, as many people will have made up their mind before you open your mouth.  And the top 2 most successful lines form speed dating?  Turns out that they are:

• What is your favourite pizza topping?
• Who would you be if you were going on Stars in their Eyes?

I suspect whoever was participating in that survey needs to get out a bit more often!

For instant dating confidence try the Single & Fabulous hypnotherapy track.

Going with the flow

Posted on | February 15, 2010 | No Comments

Another great post from Leo Babauta at Zen Habits – this time something I really want to do but fund very challenging as I’m a real planner…

The prevailing way of living in our Western societies is to plan out our lives, both for the long term and on a day-to-day basis.

We have planners and digital calendars that map out our lives, sometimes to the minute. We feel we’re in control, with plans like this.

But it’s an illusion, as I’ve said before.

We cannot control our lives to this degree, no matter how we try. Things will always come up to spoil the best-laid plans, and the more detailed our plans the more of a guarantee that something will go wrong.

And what happens when the plans go wrong? We are stressed out, because things get out of our control and don’t live up to our expectations. This is one of the greatest sources of stress for most people, actually.

Think about how often your days actually go according to plan, exactly — it’s pretty rare, because we have no way of predicting the future. No matter how hard we try. There’s always an email that will disrupt things, a last-minute meeting, cancellations and postponements, emergencies and fires to put out.

So if plans will almost always go wrong, and when they do we get stressed out, isn’t all the time we spend creating the plans a bit of a waste?

But what’s the alternative? Giving yourself to the moment. This will not work for everyone, I’ll admit: there are those who will have a hard time giving up the illusion of control, and others who are controlled by their bosses or peers and cannot work or live this way.

Still, it’s something worth considering. Here’s how to do it — starting with the don’ts:

1. Don’t plan. Planning is an attempt to control the world around us, but it’s a futile attempt. Throw out your plans, for now at least until you’ve decided this method isn’t for you. What do you do instead? More on this below. For now, just stop planning.
2. Don’t worry about the future. Will something bad happen? Are there things coming up that we must anticipate and prepare for? Of course, if there’s a massive hurricane headed your way, you should probably get ready. But otherwise, just realize that the future is unpredictable, and worrying about it is a waste of time. Focus on right now, and you’ll always be able to handle what comes.
3. Don’t have expectations. If you expect people to act a certain way, or hope that things will turn out a certain way, you’ll always run into problems. Forget about outcomes for now. Go into things without expectations, and they will always turn out perfectly (if a bit messy).
4. Don’t get annoyed when others act a certain way. Don’t expect people to act any way other than how they actually act. They are exactly the way they should be — even if that’s selfish or weird or aggressive. Those are their problems. Your problem is figuring out how you should act. I’d also advise you to try to understand others — why do they act the way they do?
5. Don’t overreact. This is a major problem when people plan and things go wrong — they overreact, and get upset and emotional and blow things out of proportion. Stay calm, because if things “go wrong”, they didn’t actually go wrong — they just happened. More on how to react below.
6. Don’t try to be proactive. This is a common prescription (being proactive) in management and business literature. And while I think the general idea is fine — do something to prevent problems from recurring rather than just fixing them after they happen — one of the problems this creates is always worrying about what might happen. And creating solutions before there are problems — if there never is a problem, you’ve wasted a lot of time creating the solution, and a lot of energy worrying about the future.

And now for the dos:

1. Do be open. What would it be like to go into each day without a plan, but just to see what happens? A bit scary, because of the lack of security and control, a bit chaotic perhaps, a bit like we’re a piece of driftwood floating in the middle of a churning sea. But in truth, this is what it’s like to go into each day *with* a plan — it’s just that we normally fool ourselves about the amount of control we have. So start the day with no plan, and be open to what emerges in each moment.
2. Do what you love. So what should you do, now that you have no plan? Do what you’re passionate about, do what excites you right now. Create something amazing. Pour yourself energetically into a project. Build something new. And what you think you’re creating might turn out to be completely different from what emerges, but you’ll have fun doing it and something even better might be revealed.
3. Do act, in the moment. Giving yourself to the moment doesn’t mean being passive and just letting life happen. It means acting, but doing what is best at this moment, what you are excited about right now, what needs to be done, in the present.
4. Do respond appropriately. Life happens, and we must respond. But instead of overreacting, we can respond calmly and appropriately. We can take the action that’s required, fix the problem, do what’s necessary to prevent it from happening again, and move on without it ruining our day.
5. Do accept. Accept what happens. It might not be what you considered ideal, but it’s what life has given you, what has resulted from your actions in an unpredicatable world. Accept it, respond, act, move on. Don’t get caught up in things not going your way, but accept that’s what has happened.

Again, this way of living won’t be for everybody. Some don’t have the freedom to live this way, and others just won’t give up control. Some will think this is a passive way of living, but it really isn’t: it’s just a way of living in the moment without being caught up in the future (or the past) so much.

And when we live in the moment, we’re really living life to the fullest. This is the gift of the present.

Great blog post on all things love related

Posted on | February 13, 2010 | No Comments

We love www.thesassyminx.com on a Friday for a collection of all things love related.  This week includes the best bit from Moulin Rouge and a lovely review of Single & Fabulous just in time for Valentine’s Day.  Thanks Lisa!

How successful is on-line dating?

Posted on | February 13, 2010 | No Comments

We all know someone who has met their partner on-line but what are the chances of success?  ’Love by Numbers’ by Dr Luisa Dillner fills us in…

A Neilsen/Netratings survey on meeting people put on-line dating third, after ‘through friends’ and ‘in pubs and clubs’ and about 11% of us visit a dating site each month.  6% of internet dating site users have married someone they met online.  Match.com says that 200,000 people a month find someone on their site.  Other research shows that most on-line relationships last an average of 7 months, with a quarter lasting a year.

So how do you maximise your chances of success?

1. Avoid men who just wink at you (time wasters apparently) and those who declare undying love in week one (potential stalkers)

2. Post a photo where you look friendly and approachable rather than seductive or cross

3.  Most importantly – use a spell-checker – poor spelling is one of the biggest turn-offs!

Wellbeing holidays

Posted on | February 11, 2010 | No Comments

I’m a big fan of holidays and am always looking for interesting breaks or weeks away where I can meet new people.  I’m not a big skier, I don’t want to stay in hostels and I like to eat indulgently whilst on holiday so holidays that centre around skiing, backpacking or yoga are out.

A couple of years ago I discovered The Hill That Breathes – run by a fun and inspiring couple, John and Gaia.  It’s set in the stunning hills of Umbria, in a beautifully renovated farmhouse and has delicious food, a pool with a view to die for and a dome set the forest for yoga and other activities.

I went on a F*ck It week which was all about relaxing , letting go and not caring so much.  It was challenging, enlightening and most of all deeply relaxing.  I came back without the furrowed brow I left with and felt rejuvenated and happy.  The other guests were generally busy, successful people who wanted to relax and enjoy a different experience.

It was quite a spiritual week, so you need to go with an open mind but you’re free to take what works for you and ignore what doesn’t and are actively encouraged to do your own thing rather than what you feel you should do.  If you want to eat dinner alone and look at the stars that’s fine.  If you want to stay up all night with a group of people and a few bottles of wine (yes there’s wine, and chocolate) then that’s fine too.

This is the place I learnt how to truly relax, to breathe deeply and to tune into my inner voice.  two years later I am still grateful for all I learnt and experienced on that holiday.

Check out their website for the range of weeks that they offer and say hi to John and Gaia for me if you go.

If you’re looking for other wellbeing breaks check out this excellent guide from travel and wellbeing journalist Caroline Sylgar-Jones

Zen to slim: A simple five step weight loss plan

Posted on | February 7, 2010 | No Comments

I love the Zen habits blog by Leo Babauta and he generously lets bloggers share his blog posts with their readers.  Our Hey Gorgeous hypnotherapy CD featured on MSN on 2nd January as one of 8 simple ways to lose weight.  It led to loads of sales so I know this is a topic that many of you care about.  Here are Leo’s simple tips on a Zen approach to weight loss…

When I started running last year, and eating healthier (eventually becoming a near-vegan), I lost more than 20 pounds and kept them off. This year, my workout plan has been disrupted a couple of times by illness and then a back injury, but in July I’ve gotten back on track and can already feel the changes. I am confident that I’ll have a fairly flat stomach by the end of the year, barring any future injuries or severe illnesses.

Anyway, I recently had a few readers ask me about my weight loss plan. Well, I don’t diet, and I don’t do anything too intense. I’ve just made some simple lifestyle changes, one at a time, and I feel much healthier as a result. The weight loss is slower than with some of the more drastic plans, but I feel that they’re more permanent, because I’m in this for life, not for short-term weight loss.

If this sounds right for you, check out the following plan. Of course, you all know that I’m not a doctor, a dietician, a certified personal trainer, or in any way qualified to give advice. You know that you should see a doctor before starting a plan like this, to prevent any serious health consequences.However, this plan is based on the advice of experts much more knowledgeable than me, and I can testify that it works — for me, and for others I know who’ve done similar things.

There is nothing revolutionary in this plan. It’s common-sense, and simple:

Zen To Slim Weight Loss Plan

Step 1: Begin gradual exercise. Instead of trying to change your entire life with an intense weight loss plan, we’re going to start small. All you want to do is make a commitment to get yourself moving for at least 10 or 15 minutes each day for 30 days straight.

Some key points:

• Type of exercise. If you’re already a runner or a cyclist or something similar, then begin a very, very modest program of resuming that exercise. Otherwise, walking, a treadmill, hiking, a cycling machine, rowing, or something similar would work. Mixing it up is a great idea, alternating different exercises on different days. The actual exercise you do doesn’t matter, as long as you get moving.
• Most important here: start out really easy. People tend to start out with a lot of enthusiasm, and then burn out, skip a workout or two, and then the plan has failed. In this plan, you want to go short and slow. If you normally run 3-4 miles, for example, just run 1-2 miles. Go for about half of what you think you can do. You can always add more later.
• It’s important that you try to do it every day. Mark your successes on your calendar — gold stars always work well — and try to keep the marks going every day. If you can do short, easy workouts, and mix up the exercises a little, you can do it every day.
• Set aside some time to do this every day. If you’ve had success working out in the morning before, use that time. Otherwise, do it right after work.
• Strength. Another point is that you can do strength workouts, but don’t do anything too hard in the first couple of weeks. Just some pushups, crunches, lunges, squats, with no weights. That might sound easy to some of you, but the key, again, is to start out slow.
• Just start. Last key point: if you are feeling resistance to exercising, just tell yourself that you have to lace up your shoes and get out the door. How long you do it doesn’t matter — even 5 minutes is good. I bet, though, that once you start, you’ll want to keep going for at least 15 minutes.

Step 2: Replace fatty and greasy foods with healthier foods. You’re not going to go on a diet. But take a look at what you eat, and try to slowly replace the greasier and fattier foods you eat (think: fast food, or fried food) with healthier alternatives.

Some key points for this step:

• Examples: if you cook fried chicken, try baked instead. If you eat burgers, try a veggie burger or a low-fat turkey sandwich. If you eat pizza, try making your own pizza, with a store-bought crust, pizza sauce, veggies, and olive oil, with no cheese. You get the idea.
• Gradual change: Now, you don’t need to change all these foods overnight. But after you do the 30-day exercise challenge in Step 1, do a second 30-day challenge where you replace one fatty food a day with a healthier alternative. Slowly, replace more and more fatty foods with healthier ones. You’ll get used to it over the course of a month.
• Exercise: Also continue the daily exercise in the second month, increasing the duration of your workouts a little at a time if you can.

Step 3: Eat smaller meals, more frequently. Once you start getting used to less fatty foods, try eating smaller portions, and eating 5-6 times per day instead of just 3 big meals.

Some key points:

• The 5-6 meals: A good schedule is to eat breakfast, then a mid-morning snack, then a small early lunch, then a second small lunch a couple of hours later, then a small late-afternoon snack, then a small, light dinner. If that’s too much, just try adding a mid-morning and mid-afternoon snack, and make the main three meals smaller.
• Snacks: Make sure that your snacks are healthy ones. Good ones include fruits, nuts, low-fat pretzels, low-fat cheese, low-fat yogurt, cut up veggies.
• Wait: For your meals, try eating just one moderate-size serving. If you feel like a second serving, wait 20 minutes, then see if you’re full. It’s important that you gradually reduce your portions, and learn to eat only until you’re satiated, not until you’re bursting.

Step 4: Intensify exercise slowly. Once you’ve gone a month or so doing very short and easy workouts each day, and your body is used to daily exercise, you can gradually intensify the exercise.

Some points:

• Duration: The first thing you should increase is the duration of your workouts. Without working out any harder, keeping the low intensity of your previous workouts, just add 5 minutes to your workout. Stick to this new duration for 2-3 workouts, then add another 5 minutes. Your goal is to get to about 40-45 minutes (although eventually doing an hour once a week is good too).
• Intensity: After your body gets used to going for longer, once a week or so, try a slightly more intense workout. First, make the duration of the workout much shorter for this intense workout. For example, instead of running or walking for 40 minutes, do 20 minutes. Second, go harder in intervals. For example, do 3-4 minutes at a faster pace, then go at an easy pace, then a faster pace, and so on. Be sure to warm up first, and cool down at the end. When you first start doing the intervals, do them only at a slightly higher intensity, gradually increasing that intensity as the weeks go by.
• Hard-easy: If you do longer or more intense workouts, be sure to follow them with an easy workout. For example, if you do a longer workout of 45 minutes, just do 20-25 minutes the next day. Or if you do interval workouts one day, do a short easy one the next day. Consider the longer or more intense workouts your “hard” days, and never have two hard days in a row — otherwise, you may get injured or burn out.

Step 5: Replace sugary foods with healthier treats. The next target food area is sugary foods. Just as you did with fatty foods, try to replace them with healthier alternatives one at a time. With the combination of lower fat and less sugar in your diet, and your exercise, you should start losing weight much faster by this step.

Some points to make:

• Challenge: Just like with the fatty foods, try another 30-day challenge with the sweets. See if you can go the whole month without sweets! Or try a more gradual approach, and have less each day.
• Cheat day: If you try a month without sweets, I suggest a cheat day. For me, it’s Saturday, when I can eat whatever desserts I want. Interestingly, I don’t eat as many desserts on my cheat days as I used to. It’s not like I pig out, although I don’t restrict myself either.
• Alternatives: Come up with a list of alternatives to sweets, stock up on them, and get rid of the sweets in your house. For example, if you usually have a candy bar for a snack, have fruits or veggies instead. Often we just want something to munch on.
• Drinks: If you drink sodas or juices, cut out those calories by drinking water, exclusively (except perhaps for a single cup of coffee in the morning).
• Whole grains: If you haven’t yet, look for whole grain alternatives to things you might be eating, including cereal, bread, brown rice, etc.

Are you really ready for love?

Posted on | February 6, 2010 | No Comments

I’ve been reading Soulmate by Lauren Mackler which is a really useful book to read if you’re struggling with being single.  If you’ve been single for a while or are simply unhappy about being single this book can help you to make the most out of single life.  It’s full of useful and thought-provoking exercises that help you to value what you’ve got and to start reshaping your life to make it full of activities and thoughts that will make you happier.

Over Christmas I made my family watch ‘The Wedding Date’ starring Debra Messing  (from Will and Grace) and Dermot Mulroney.  I liked it – it was sweet and funny which is what I’m after from a rom com but my family were less impressed.

Anyway there is a line in the film that says single people are single because that’s what they really want.  Now the first time I heard that I disputed it.  I’d been single for ages and was ready to meet someone so it was clearly a load of rubbish.  But looking back, whilst I might have THOUGHT that I was ready to meet someone, my subconscious was holding me back as I didn’t want to get hurt.  I had to consciously choose to be more open and risk rejection before I was really available and open to a relationship.

Someone once described that to me as being like a taxi.  Do you go around with your light on, showing that you are available, and see what opportunities come up or do you only put your light on when someone meets your criteria?  I’m a bit of a control freak so at the time my light was very rarely on and probably flickered a lot when it was!

It was only when I decided to take a deep breath, switch the light on and see what happened that I met someone – about a week later! We sat next to each other at an event,  he started talking to me and I just enjoyed talking to him even though he wasn’t my type.  In the past I would have decided within seconds if I was interested and if not I’d have removed myself from the situation to avoid awkwardness.  This time I just chatted and forgot about criteria and one date later I was head over heels.

So why not consider putting your light on?  It’s not about being obvious or flirting with every man you meet.  It’s about being genuinely open to what life might have to offer you in the way of love and not prescribing how it should happen.  Good luck!

PS If you fancy seeing The Wedding Date here are the details…

Has Jennifer Aniston signed up for a personal introduction agency?

Posted on | February 3, 2010 | No Comments

So the rumour mill has it that Jennifer Aniston, the world’s most famous single woman (well now Kylie is getting hitched anyway) has signed up to a personal introduction agency to meet the man of her dreams. Read the full story here

Shocking as it sounds that someone as famously gorgeous as Jen needs an agency to help her meet guys, is it that unusual?  Internet dating is now totally socially acceptable with 3.5m people per month in the UK using dating websites regularly.  I’ve got friends who met their partners online and are now happily married.

Would you consider a personal introduction agency?  Are they the next big thing for successful attractive women?  I think 2010 is going to see it becoming increasingly acceptable to search for a partner and to hire someone to do that for you.  The old adage ‘it happens when you’re not looking’ does ring true but lots of people looking do seem to be finding someone.  When you know that there will be a steady stream of options coming your way, it’s easier to relax and enjoy the process.  It doesn’t matter if this date isn’t prefect as they’ll be another one next week.

If you’re single and want to feel more confident and positive about dating try our new Single & Fabulous hypnotherapy track.

Ready to move on from a break up?

Posted on | February 1, 2010 | No Comments

You’ve done the weeks of crying yourself to sleep, asking ‘why?’ and looking at the photos of happier days.  He’s no longer getting in touch and when he replies he doesn’t seem to be missing you.  In fact, he seems happier without you whilst you’re still sobbing into your pillow at night.  Sound familiar?

That was me a month ago.  I was trying my best to move on but still found myself missing someone who didn’t appear to be missing me.  Eventually I got tired of the crying and just wanted to erase him and all my feelings about him from my life.  Now sadly there is no magic delete button, and no way to rewind to the early dates or fast forward to when you can’t remember his name.

In fact I’ve been discovering that the way to get over a break up is to let yourself feel whatever emotion comes up without judging it or yourself.  It’s easy to beat yourself up for crying over someone you now know to be a loser but actually you’re honouring something that was once very special to you and has now been lost.

When you’re ready to really move on though I totally recommend ‘It’s Called A Break Up Because it’s Broken’.  It’s a funny, insightful and tough love approach to recovering from heartbreak.  I say tough love because the core message is that he doesn’t want you back (if he did he’d be at your door with all his stuff not sending you occasional text messages) and that if he doesn’t think you are the best thing that ever happened to him then he doesn’t deserve you.

The book’s break up recovery plan involves not getting in touch with your ex for 2 months.  They say that getting in touch says ‘I can’t live without you’ whilst keeping silent says ‘ my life is so fabulous I don’t have time to waste thinking about or contacting you.’

According to the authors, if your ex ended your relationship and seems to be moving on quickly it’s not because they didn’t care.  It’s because they had been preparing themselves and emotionally distancing themselves from you for a while whilst they considered breaking up with you.  So they are just way ahead of you on the path to recovery.  That made a lot of sense to me.

So if you’re feeling down I recommend curling up on the sofa with this book for a few hours and you’ll be smiling (albeit wryly) within 10 minutes.  Good luck – one day you’ll wake up and won’t think about him all day and that will feel great.

John Mayer gets pre-date nerves!

Posted on | January 31, 2010 | No Comments

I read today that John Mayer, famous for being something of a serial dater, gets pre-dates nerves and often feels so anxious before a date that he gets nauseous.  Read the details here.

I get pre-date nerves too, which is why I created Single & Fabulous to help build your confidence about dating and calm you down before a date.  If you haven’t got it you could try creating a soundtrack for your journey that gives you a bounce in your step.  Or arrive early and call a friend who will tell you how amazing you are.

keep looking »

Search for:

Pages

• About Carla

Categories

• Blogs & sites I like
• Books
• Family
• Health & happiness
• Love
• Relaxation
• Uncategorized
• Women
• Work

Space to be products…

• Career coaching package
  Change career, get a new job or get promoted by working with career coach Joanna Clarke
• Life coaching package
  Make changes in your life by working with life coach Carla Miller
• Hey Gorgeous
  Total body confidence from this 25 minute hypnotherapy recording
• Ultimate Unwind
  25 minutes of pure relaxation after a hard day - available as a CD or download
• Single & Fabulous
  25 minute hypnotherapy CD or download to help you feel truly fabulous when you're single

Archives

• February 2010
• January 2010
• December 2009
• November 2009
• October 2009
• September 2009
• August 2009