Number Two: We all know how clutter makes us feel, mess and disorganisation, it clutters our minds and distracts us from what we really want to achieve in our day. My son came yelling out of his room last night asking Mom when is the tiler going to be finished, I cant study with all this chaos around me!! I just need it all clean so I can focus on my study!!!

It doesn’t matter how old your child, or you are, you need a clean lined, organised SPACE to work in to really be effective in your working/studying day.

Children as young as babies are learning all the time, as soon as they can sit up and see their surroundings they have all that input coming at them. Teenagers who must sit exams, will use anything to distract them before they settle to study. Anyone who has had to take an exam will know this feeling.

So firstly you must de clutter your space. Look around your room and work out what you NEED to file away, your piles of papers or toys. Do you need shelving? Do you need folders? Take the time to clean up your area and make some empty space. You will work vastly more effectively. STOP and take the time to LOOK at what is cluttering your desk and how you can put it away somewhere. Look for clean lined simple furniture, that is not cluttered either. Look for shelving with doors so you cant see your mountains of mess. Organise it. It will be easier to find, and children will play better, learning more from organised toys. TEACH your children to do this too…..it will become a habit.

I am the WORST person for this so I know you have to STOP and really look at your space and figure out what you need to make a change. When my son was young I took away half of his toys and put them in a box up high. I would change out the toys sometimes but he didnt need them all at once, and as soon as I removed half of them clean up was so much easier and he could find and organise his toys with ease. This habit has now followed him into teen life and he is a very uncluttered child.

Look at how you can utilise your space. Can you have underbed drawers? Can you put shelving up against the end of the bed so it’s not right in your view? Are there attractive ways to house all your papers? Can you put all the lego in wheel out boxes and store them under the bed? Train sets? matchbox cars? barbie dolls?

Can you mount things on the wall, like the TV to take up less space. Are your shelves easy to dust? if not can you have perspex or glass doors put on the front so that you can still see your ornaments but they are less dusty?

Check out how REM Design takes care of space with their streamlined bunks with built in shelves and underbed drawers: http://www.remdesign.co.nz/862/002

So SORT out how you can make your space better, FIND what you need to make it work, and go do it NOW!!! you will feel so refreshed and focussed and you and your child will work more effectively, and efficiently, and LEARN to the best of their capacity!!!!

Compact, Space saving, Unclutterfying

The Pygmalion effect

The Pygmalion effect is a well documented and very powerful effect we have on others. The basic concept is the performance of the people you interact with is significantly affected by your expectations of them.

Expect the worst from people…and you are more likely to get it. Conversely if you expect the best from people….and you are more likely to get the best from them.

Can your expectations of others really affect their performance? Could it be that you are unconsciously helping (or hurting) others simply by your expectations of them?
A 1962 report by Rosenthal and Jacobson discussed the Pygmalion effect at length. In their study, they showed that if teachers were led to expect enhanced performance from some children, then the children did indeed show that enhancement.
It also showed that if teachers were led to expect poor performance from some children, then the children did indeed perform poorly.
The purpose of the experiment was to support the hypothesis that reality can be influenced by the expectations of others. Rosenthal’s position was that biased expectancies can essentially affect reality and create self-fulfilling prophecies as a result.
While the Rosenthal/Jacobson report focused on teacher’s expectation of students, what if this effect works on the people we interact with on a regular basis? I’m talking about family members, co-workers and others. What if we could influence these people simply by our expectations of them?
What if we could sell more of whatever it is we are selling, simply by expecting others to buy? What if we could help our kids get better grades in school, just by expecting them to perform at this higher level?
What if we could get more of the love we want and/or need simply by expecting others to be more loving? What if you could have more opportunity in any area of your life simply by expecting others to offer you more opportunity?
Expect the best from people….and you are much more likely to get it!
Try it for the next 30 days and see if it doesn’t make a difference. Let me know what you think.
Send emails to: chris@ultraresultscoach.com
or
visit: www.ultraresultscoach.com

Eriksons Stages of Development

Erikson’s stages of psychosocial development as articulated by Erik Erikson explain eight stages through which a healthily developing human should pass from infancy to late adulthood. In each stage the person confronts, and hopefully masters, new challenges. Each stage builds on the successful completion of earlier stages. The challenges of stages not successfully completed may be expected to reappear as problems in the future.

The stages

• 1.1 Hope: Trust vs. Mistrust (Infants, 0 to 1 year)
• 1.2 Will: Autonomy vs. Shame & Doubt (Toddlers, 2 to 4 years)
• 1.3 Purpose: Initiative vs. Guilt (Preschool, 4 to 6 years)
• 1.4 Competence: Industry vs. Inferiority (Childhood, 7 to 12 years)
• 1.5 Fidelity: Identity vs. Role Confusion (Adolescents, 13 to 19 years)
• 1.6 Love: Intimacy vs. Isolation (Young Adults, 20 to 40 years)
• 1.7 Care: Generativity vs. Stagnation (Middle Adulthood, 45 to 65 years)
  • 1.7.1 Central tasks of Middle Adulthood
• 1.8 Wisdom: Ego Integrity vs. Despair (Seniors, 65 years onwards)

Freud and Erikson Compared

Comparing Theories of Development

Sigmund Freud’s psychosexual theory and Erik Erikson’s psychosocial theory are two well-known theories of development. While he was influenced by Freud’s ideas, Erikson’s theory differed in a number of important ways. Like Freud, Erikson believed that personality develops in a series of predetermined stages. Unlike Freud

Kim from Desire to Inspire has done this….and I cant wait to do it to mine!!!

“I wanted to share a quick project with you that I worked on yesterday. Several weeks ago I spotted a batch of embroidered doilies on Etsy (Cheeky Vintage Closet) on sale for $18 which made me think of a doily table runner I had seen on a blog a little while ago. I bought them and realized how colourful they were and not really going to work in my home as-is. So I bought some dark grey fabric dye and dyed them yesterday (my first attempt at ever dying any type of fabric). They turned out perhaps a bit darker than I hoped but they’ll do. Now I just need someone to stitch them all together for me (and they reeeeally need ironing). ”

Mixed Pickles is Sharon Hoyle, Roger Williams and a big pile of really great vintage stuff. Sharon opened the first location in North Berkeley in 1998. Roger wandered into the shop in 2002. They struck up a conversation about 1920′s Jazz musicians, and have been talking ever since. The opportunity for a great new location in their hometown of Oakland presented itself. The new bigger & brighter shop opened as a partnership in December 2010 when the contents of their two homes reached maximum capacity. Favorite things: Salvaged and architectural antiques, advertising signs, furniture with clean lines, and finding new uses for vintage items. We dislike things made of brass, and the color lavender.
(Check out their blog and website for info, particularly their latest finds)

If you’d like to send us photos to include in next month’s “pets on furniture” post, please ensure your photos follow our basic rules: First, the pet must be on a piece of furniture. And said piece of furniture must be clearly visible in the photo, so it takes center stage rather than your pet. (Think of it more of a photo of a great piece of furniture that you want to show off…and your pet happens to be sitting on it). And second, the photo must be of decent quality. If it’s dark or fuzzy (from a camera phone) then it may not make the cut. Thanks! (Photos, your name, location and a brief description can be sent to stacey@remdesign.co.nz and PLEASE don’t send me closeups of your pet!)?

Verpan Desk Light

Flower Power by David Wiseman

Flower Power by David Wiseman

David Wiseman pairs porcelain with metal and aspires to bring nature inside. Hows that for unusual. http://www.dwiseman.com/index2.html#

Aren’t these lights gorgeous!! You can buy them at the above email address. If you are importing into New Zealand be careful anything over NZ$400 will incur an importing duty and GST which I have been burned with a couple of times.

Sharma De Silva, 276a Kohimarama Road in Kohi……..she is so lovely and an amazing seamstress for dresses, duvets, anything you need sewn this is the lady to see. you can call her to arrange an appointment on: 521 5785

If you want fabric, go into Jenny at Warwick in Parnell and have her show you great quality fabrics at decent prices and email me from the REM Design website to arrange getting it for you.

Cheers everyone, hope this is useful to some of you.

Stacey