coach

Anxiety & Stress Are They Stealing Your Joy

/ Robert Bruton / Leave a comment

Anxiety and stress can have debilitating results. For years I suffered through stress, work-related, home, you name it, I could find a way to stress myself out!

Over the past couple of years now, some fantastic results have passed through my life. Yes, I still stress, but boy can control it been enhanced. I will share with you my daily routine and habits that help.

prayer, faith, hope

First, let me say that if you’re struggling to get help from a licensed health care professional. What I am sharing with you is just daily habits that you can try to see if they help. By no means should you feel this is a cure-al?

Simple daily routine changes can help with stress & anxiety:

  1. Learn to quiet the mind. This is just a simple relaxation method that can help you with a clear mind. When the rhetoric in your head can slow down and quiet. Amazing results begin to appear.
  2. This can be a simple walk around your neighborhood. Or you can join a gym. Working out the tension in your body, getting stronger can help you not get so fatigued that your anxiety just increases.
  3. Take a moment often during the day to just breathe. Sixty seconds to breathe in through the nose and out through your mouth. Nice cleansing breaths.
  4. Regulate your soda, coffee, and high caffeine drinks. For most of us, we don’t need more help to get anxious.
  5. Take the time that’s just for you. Watch a sunrise by yourself. Sit by a creek. Do something that is just for you (retail therapy is a no-no. Credit card debt is a stressor). Go shoot baskets at the park, kick a ball, ride a bike.
  6. Stay connected with people that uplift you. Debbie-downer is not your friend. Choose wisely. Don’t hibernate.
  7. Set boundaries for people that bring stress into your experience. If someone can only talk about negative things. Cut them short (YES YOU CAN) politely excuse yourself from that situation “oh I totally forgot ______” hopefully that person gets a clue. You are not anyone’s sounding board for garbage.
  8. Home or office is a mess. Guess what? That is the state of your noodle. Clean up, organize, and enjoy the environment around you. People often tell me the disorganized desk in the office, “that’s just the way I am.” So, you’re a chaotic malfunctioning human, and we should all get over it? I regularly must organize myself, it’s a habit I highly recommend.
  9. Sit down and prioritize your life. I mean down to the last detail. If you tell me you’re a free spirit, you fly by the seat of your pants. Then I say super if you’re a well-adjusted, NORMAL functioning human being I will shut up. Otherwise, organize based on the importance of what you need to do every day. The reason being, if you have a real sense of accomplishment, wow, is that life-changing! Activity vs. Productivity learns the difference now!
  10. Patience and faith. If you can learn to allow life to unfold (yes you must do the work) knowing full well, you’ll be fine. Even when you can’t see a way, you believe with everything that is you, all will be well. Spiritual connectedness will indeed bring about peace in your life.
  11. Learn to be grateful right where you are. If you want more out of life, you must be thankful where you stand. If you want more from the Universe, why would that occur if you’re miserable where you are (NO, I am not suggesting you be grateful in a situation that is emotionally or physically harmful to you). However, if this is not the case and you’re simply aggravated at your lot in life. Be grateful you have a car that gets you to work, you have a job it may suck, but you have one, a roof over your head, food to eat, your health and clothes to wear.

You can find a million reasons to stay in the crap. I just gave you eleven reasons not too. What’s more, you can do each of these with just a little effort.

The real question now; “What are you prepared to do?” Until you make the decision to change your life, expect the same outcome.

No guarantee this will be easy. Nothing worth having is ever easy. I am going to let you in on a secret. For most of our lives, we’ve been taught to run away from pain. Sounds reasonable.

Ponder this:

When you first go to the gym and workout hard, what happens? Soreness from hell hits you. Can’t brush your teeth, can’t raise your arms high enough. You can quit or go back to the gym and work out a bit more until the soreness subsides.

Coaches will push you beyond your mental and physical breaking points. Why? Your head will quit far sooner than your body or mind can handle. Marathon runners are prime examples. “The wall” as marathon runners will tell you hits about the twenty-mile mark, and your brain says your body it’s time to stop. The physical pain that is causing damage to the point if you don’t stop, you could injure yourself or worse die.

Medical studies have proven this is all in your head. Runners are not hurt, injured, or dying. What is happening is our limiting beliefs take over, and it’s; fight-or-flight.

Before you give up, take one more step. If you took the step, then maybe we can go more. It’s all up to you. The ONLY PERSON ON THIS PLANET THAT CAN SAY YOU CAN OR CANNOT. IS YOU!

Don’t let anxiety and stress take your joy. If you need professional help go, get it. I am putting a resource to help you get started. This is not a paid endorsement, nor an endorsement by me. It’s just a great place to get started.

Buy me a coffeeBuy me a coffee

National Institute for Mental Health

God Is Your Coach

/ Robert Bruton / Leave a comment

My new book, God is Your Coach out in Paperback and available on Kindle.

Take a look at chapter one:

Chapter 1

The Title Fight

In this corner, wearing depression, despair, and no hope Me!

In the black corner wearing out my life, the enemy!

The enemy will work to keep you sufficiently depressed so that you won’t take steps towards a new life. The attack can come in many forms, depression, self-doubt, or just merely giving in that this won’t work. Hogwash!

Change comes at a price. We’ve all heard the adage; nothing in this life is free. Nothing worth having is free. A beautiful life is worth the price we will pay to enjoy. There is hope, and it will come. However, we do have to navigate some attacks on our life.

As change begins to take hold in our life, smiles on our face, a pep in our step and peace in our mind. Everything appears to be moving nicely. All the sudden the rug gets pulled out from under our feet and smash we go.

The first thing that comes to us is excellent “this doesn’t work.” I knew it, I knew it, I knew it! Precisely what the enemy wants you to believe. Loser, failure, and nothing you will try will work. All lies! Here is the rub, stay in faith. What??? I can hear you screaming. Will get to this further in the book, keep going.

Spiritual warfare for those of you new to a Christian life can disenchant most from staying with God. As humans, we tend to allow pain to numb our senses in a way that we accept a sort of mediocrity for our lives. Sad! How the enemy keeps us leashed — never allowing us to wander off too far.

You’re not too old, too weak, too young, or any other moniker you can place to defeat yourself. Are you not tired of kicking your ass? I know I was and that has prompted this book.

Beginning this process, you will come out swinging. Strong bold, and you feel that you can conquer the world. Then you take a shot to the gut that puts you right to the ground. Everything starts falling apart; all your work seems to be running down the drain.

Depression and self-doubt overtake your mind. Spiritual warfare has arrived. Keep in mind that trials and tribulations can take on any negative form. We’re using these analogies to set an expectation that whatever form attacks take they’re relentless.

Here are a couple of things you can do to help you with immediate changes in your state-of-mind:

  1. Take 60 seconds and breathe. Cleansing breaths in through the nose and out through the mouth. Breathing will relax tension.
  2. Get outside and walk to the end of the block. Walking will relieve tension. Focus on the beauty around you.
  3. If you can get to a quiet place to meditate, relax your mind. Good, contemplate music.
  4. You can almost immediately change your state of mind listening to music that moves you. Music is incredibly healing at the moment. Get your feet to move.

Changing your state-of-mind can bring peace. Everything is going to be okay; you have to get your head there. The preceding was temp solutions to get your head out of a dark place.

No matter the obstacles in your life, they’re all temporary. Think about some hard-times in your life. If you’re past them, something terrible that happened ten years ago, that at the time seemed devastating. You must see, you’re still here, everything is most likely calmer, settled and most importantly over. The monster is defeated.

This next part of the chapter is one of two articles I have written and included in this eBook that I think help bolster the message I want to get across in this eBook. Bits and pieces may be redundant, but I trust you will overlook that to receive the news.

When your feet hit the floor in the morning, let the Devil say, “Oh Shit He’s up!”

Our minds can exhaust us to the point we feel like we’ve been in a heavyweight title fight. Pardon the cliché, but you are sick and tired of being sick and tired. What I want to prepare you for is the title fight that is coming. The enemy will see a change in you for good. All the sudden, you went from being depressed to having hope.

Jesus paid for your sins on the cross. I am not going to pretend to be a theologian and quote scripture. What I did do is start attending a great Bible-based church. Began to study the word of God. You have protection from the enemy; you can yourself cast him out of your head (No you’re not Reagan McNeil from the Exorcist). God supplies all the tools you need. You must show up for work.

Part of your job will be to follow the path I am laying down. Find an excellent Bible-based Church. Not hard to find and you may need to attend a couple before you see one that you feel is home. You will need the tools, and foundation for Christ to win the fight to come.

The enemy will come at you hard. WHY, because he is afraid to lose you to the right side. He wants your soul; he wants you to fail! You have free will so that it will become a choice. I would cry so hard thinking God seems pissed at me for all the things I have done in my life and losing hope that God wanted nothing to do with me. NOT TRUE! Learning from the study, Church and the Bible God loves me. It is the enemy that has the hold on us, not God. Rest easy dear friends. It is good and evil in this world it took me a while to understand. Sharing this first thing will sound a bit scary. You will have a better understanding that the difficulties to come are manageable with the right tools. God says, “No weapon formed against me will prosper.” Remember you have all the promises the Bible says we have. You must start believing with unwavering faith. God wants you to think about it before you receive it. Try it; this is where I stumbled hard.

Friends would tell me that God will never give you more than you can handle. I hated hearing that. The problem is it’s true. You can’t fight for the heavyweight championship of the world without getting knocked on your backside a few times. You will find the strength just as I did. Even from the darkest depths of your mind, a path to peace is available for anyone who seeks order.

Women readers who are moms can relate to this. Labor pains are excruciating, but the result is the greatest joy of your life. Once you go through labor and deliver yourself from hell, you’ve created in your head. The sooner the greatest joy in your life will be at hand.

Remembering always that the enemy will fill your mind with doubt, fear, this will never work. What happens is when you believe you’ll quit. Then the enemy wins. The only loser in this fight is you. It may seem as though God is not listening to you. He is, I thought this so many times. I would scream at God in my vehicle “get in the game” why are you forsaking me. He is not; the devil is treacherous in your mind.

You will learn to live with your soul, not your head. The mind will never win over your destiny. What you can control is how quickly you see your future reveal itself. Frustration, hate, anger, despair will only cause you to delay your life moving forward. You must begin to see yourself happy, joyous, and free of pain. Don’t scream, “I can’t do it.” If you do, you’re right. None of this is easy to hear; I get that!

What I am telling you is if you get knocked down get up. Tell yourself NOT THIS TIME; I get to win this time. Get that loser mentality out of your head. It won’t come all at once. You must recondition your mind for good. If you have suffered for a long-time change won’t happen overnight.

The mind will fight you to the point of utter exhaustion during a marathon where you will hit the wall many times. Just like marathon runners, you convince yourself that it’s a mind trick; it’s not your reality. Reality is you already have, peace, love, and happiness. We as Christians must learn to accept it. You think acceptance would be easy, for most it’s not. Stay in faith even when you don’t seem to have confidence in anything. Tell God you don’t see a way, but you trust he will make a move!

One of the most important things I can tell you. Don’t help God, don’t impose your will on a situation that needs Gods hand not yours — for example, separated from your spouse. It’s a situation that you did not want, hit you out of the blue and you’re heartbroken. You call your spouse saying I promise I will change; I love you, please let’s work it out. That’s imposing your will. It’s not you are helping even though you think you’re fighting for your marriage. STOP!

If you want to trust God for a change in your life follow along in this book, I share what mistakes I made so you can have greater insight. You need to believe that God is handling the heart of both you and your spouse. You are jumping in does not help. Trust that if you give your marriage to God, asking him for his will be done. Someone asked me two questions:

Do you want a perfect, loving, happy marriage?

Do you want your spouse back with no change?

Relationships meant to be will be. Maybe, God is moving this person out of your life to make room for your deep down in your soul exact right person to appear when we let our destiny unfold naturally what a blessed life we will have.

It’s not always easy to see clearly during times of adversity. Remember we’re in a title fight for our life. The enemy will put horrible, terrible things in our head or before us. We can get betrayed; our life shattered into pieces.

How you get up and tell the enemy “that’s all you got” I have the power of God almighty who controls my life. A quote I love, “when your feet hit the floor in the morning, the Devil says oh shit he’s up. “Anything beats living a life of misery. It’s where I am at, and I pray you are too. Now is our time and “I ain’t going down no more”—Rocky Balboa

The fight will come hard, but if you keep reading, you will find the help you need to get up and fight even harder. The tools you will learn will make those fights fewer. Your spiritual armor will see you through.

Stay strong because God is getting ready to show out in your life in ways you could never have imagined. Your blessings are on the other side of this battle; what was meant for your harm God will bless your life in ways that only he can.

The stronger the attack, the bigger the blessing. Crazy, but when you get kicked right in the gut hard. When you walk trusting God, you know, he is getting you ready to show out in your life! The pain you may encounter along the way in strengthening your resolve. Helping you be able to face anything the enemy throws in your approach to disrupt your life.

Everything I am writing about what I have experienced. So, if you’re saying what does this guy know about my pain, he won’t understand what I’m going through in my life. It’s because I’ve lived it same as you.  I choose not to lose any more! Hope you come along!

Are you ready for some good news?

What if you could look at all this doom & gloom as coaching experience. That with a different perspective to life’s challenges you could get through with expectations of winning. You’re excited to face these challenges with a new open mind. You believe now that you will win no matter the obstacles.

Well, friends get ready for chapter two because you are about to learn how to WIN!

To purchase this book click the cover to visit Amazon:

book, ebook, God is your coach

A Man of True Faith, John Wooden

/ Robert Bruton / Leave a comment

“Many things are essential to arriving at true peace of mind, and one of the most important is faith, which cannot be acquired without prayer.”–John Wooden

Arguably the greatest basketball coach to have ever lived. John Wooden instilled in his players more than just fame. He taught them to be a gentleman, put their studies at UCLA above basketball. The dressed in a shirt and tie before games. Any profanity on the court put you on the bench.

Coach Wooden taught his players how to live the life of a true gentleman above all. A man of God that reminds us of their legacy to simply be good folks.

God, Prayer, Faith

With God first in his life, faith ever present. A man who lived with a wife he adored, educated kids was his real passion, created some of the best players to have ever played in the NBA, Kareem Abdul Jabar, and Bill Walton just to name a couple.

Have faith it’s that simple! Follow the examples of people like John Wooden, who lived life. Put God first in your life!

Is Adversity happening to you or FOR YOU

/ Robert Bruton / Leave a comment

“You’re going to go through tough times – that’s life. But I say, ‘Nothing happens to you, it happens for you.’ See the positive in adverse events.”–Joel Osteen

In our previous blog post, we talked about God being our coach. As you can see in this quote to paraphrase, “nothing happens to you, it happens for you.” That’s my point entirely.

What happens for you is coaching. We need to learn from adversity. Look at this as though you trained really hard one day, and now you’re so sore with pain it hurts. God, as your coach, is going to work you out to make you stronger. Good coaches push athletes to their limits. Same principal.

winning, happy, God

Why does God do this? If you’re going to run a Marathon and you cannot even make a mile, how can you expect to move forward with the race? You have to condition yourself, a coach will push you so that you can make the distance. It’s not God saying no, it’s God pushing you so he can say yes!

When I grasped this, my life truly changed. All the stress went away, and I was anxious to go to practice as it were.

If you have questions or comments:

How God Can Help You With the Future, He is the Coach

/ Robert Bruton / Leave a comment

The other day while recording a Podcast, I had a bit of an epiphany. We’ve been talking about New Years resolutions, goals and how to get going. Speaking also about change being difficult and working through that.

My own question and a question that is posed to me all the time, “Why is change hard?”. Why if we’re Christians does God allow us to have trials and tribulations. He is God, so why can’t he just miracle me through?

prayer, meditation, Training

That’s when it came to me. God is like a great coach. If you’ve played any sort of sports, you know that coaches work you hard to make you better. Get you in shape to handle the season of play. At the beginning of the athletic season, you may train, two-a-days, extended hours to prepare you for the season.

How I now see God, as my coach. What pain and struggle I have now is preparing me for the season. If you’re Christian, you understand you have seasons of life. How can God advance you to run a marathon if you can’t run a mile?

Training is hard, some days it takes us mentally to the breaking point. “I can’t do it” “It’s to difficult” yet the champion in you won’t quit. This too, can be the breaking point that your mind will try and convince you that this is too difficult. NO, NO, it’s not. That’s your brain telling you, the enemy putting that self-doubt garbage in your head.

Where people fail is getting into self-doubt or the feeling it’s too hard. Merely giving up at the first obstacle. Another fail is “this is taking to long.” It won’t work! Successful people will tell you they are because they’re willing to take one more step than you are.

God is preparing us to win. Training is hard, sometimes excruciating. Think about if you’re going to become a world-class athlete you can’t ski a downhill if the only slope you ski is the bunny-hill.

Being a competitive athlete takes training and preparation. So it stands to reason that if God is going to bless your life with more, you need to be prepared to handle it. He is not going to let you fail. Therefore training is a must. Don’t look at it that God is not answering your prayers, trials, and tribulations are God coaching you to win. Remember, you can’t play in the Superbowl if all you’ve played is flag football with your buddies.

Think about this for a moment. If the struggle is part of your current experience, look at it as coaching. Meditate on what lessons need to be learned. Are you stressed or calm? Calm allows change to occur for the better, stress stifles progress.

Look for learning in a tough situation. It may take some time, it’s not just going to stand up and say “hey, here is the lesson” you have to find the answer. It will come when you least expect it, and it will come on God’s timetable not your own.

When you learn to allow destiny to open up as it should, life will become incredible. You have to do the work nothing comes for free.

God is going to push you like a great coach will push to mold you into a world-class athlete. The same principle applies. Are you ready to be the world-class person you’ve always dreamed of being?

Allowing myself to realize wow God is my coach, he is coaching me to be a world-class player of life. That’s when I master each training objective, I move closer to God’s true blessings for me. This realization has indeed allowed me to breathe!

If you have questions or comments:

 

If this article has helped you, I will happily accept your cup-of-coffee! Thanks.
Buy Me A Coffee