Well – I outlined in the previous post how unfairly we can treat ourselves, even when we are paragons of generosity to everyone else. Now clearly that’s not a healthy way of being. In my experience, people who harbour only harsh thoughts about themselves can live lives full of spectacular inner anguish.

The most positive people beat-up on themselves on occasion; most of us fall somewhere between the two.

So the second part of Small Gifts to Yourself focuses on the gifts of mental attitude that can bring confidence, self esteem, self belief, self acceptance, recognition of abilities, and finally – a more generous attitude to your perceived flaws, weaknesses and eccentricities.

I’m not going to detail all the different types of gift you might offer yourself here. I’ll leave links at the end of the post. What I will focus on yet again, is the way the small-gift mentality acts as a motivator and catalyst in helping you act generously towards yourself.

Cultures of Negativity
This can be very difficult for some people to do. In many cultures praise is as elusive as pots of gold at the end of rainbows.� My own Yorkshire, English culture certainly falls into this bracket. Excellence was (and still is) acknowledged with grudging phrases like not bad or you did alright (I’ve not attempted to convey Yorkshire dialect). The idea of a person openly acknowledging their own abilities and talents was virtually taboo.

For any potential high achiever, the fine line between proper modesty and being regarded as an arrogant, big-headed plonker is all too easily crossed. They clearly needed knocking down a peg or two to stop them getting above themselves.

It’s no wonder that so many people feel inhibited in giving themselves credit where credit is due – even in the privacy of their own heads.

When Will My Luck Run Out?
When the censorious voice of society becomes internalised it limits our whole imagination and skews our perceptions. A world full of options and choices becomes tragically narrowed. Even when we achieve some success we are likely to offer the credit to Lady Luck or good timing. At its worse, outwardly successful people can feel criminally fraudulent. Unable to appreciate their own skill and endeavour they are continually dogged by the expectation that their luck will run out and their success will be ripped away. No fun there then.

Of course, this is just one example of how we limit ourselves. Rest assured there’s a whole bagful of other ways we can deny our potential and talk down our success.

Without doubt then, one of the biggest (small) gifts we can give ourselves is positive acknowledgement. I’m not talking about self congratulation to the point of self deception, or talking ourselves up to talk others down, or the kind of boring boastfulness that sees friend and foe alike diving for cover.

Accepting Our Talents
I mean the simple, powerful gift of acceptance of our talents, our abilities and our achievements. And that goes for our modest achievements too. So if you are starting out on a creative journey, be it dancing, art, photography, writing, music or whatever, you judge yourself from the context of where you are now. You give yourself credit for your achievements founded on what you’d expect from anyone else beginning from the same place.

Small gifts such as these accumulate into a growing sense of wellbeing, motivation and courage.

This should not mean you are blind to the differences between your own current abilities and those of a master in your art. Neither does it mean you cannot also acknowledge your own areas for improvement.

‘Weaknesses’, Courage and Kindness
In fact recognising your own weaknesses in a spirit of courage and kindness is another small but profoundly constructive gift. The courageous part will help you address and improve on your weakness. The kindness part is about much more than not beating yourself up. No blame, no self recrimination.

Faulty Assumptions
When people have developed negative thinking habits about themselves they are often at the prey of faulty negative assumptions. In art and elsewhere it’s easy to interpret a particular ‘weakness’ as broad evidence of general uselessness! When I first began writing I looked with envy at the beautifully fashioned metaphors decorating the writing of my peers. While they were finding diamonds and honing them to perfection I was stuck with bits of rock that I could never get into shape.

When you’re in a negative frame of mind such evidence morphs into proof that you are no good at the whole endeavour. No good at metaphors? Well, let’s face it I’m just useless at writing. Might as well pack it in now and save myself the trouble. Let those negative thoughts fester a while longer and before you know it you’re scraping together every failure you can remember and hey – it’s not only writing you’re no good at – you are simply no good. Period.

Does that seem crazy? Then I guess we must all be a little crazy occasionally.

Refusing to apply such a damaging train of thought is one heck of a small gift that you should never stop giving. The more positive gifts of kindness to yourself, celebration of your real abilities and a positive attitude towards improvement are even better.

The benefits in confidence and self acceptance alone will help transform your self image and boost your ability to produce better and better creative work.

A Gift for Today
So what small gift would you really thank yourself for today? It might be quite different from the examples above – maybe even some small token that you have to buy. It may be about the focus of this post – small gifts of positive mental attitude, or it may be more tangible, more practical. We’ll look further at practical small gifts in the final post of this series.

Here are a few specific areas that you could think about (not all to do with your creativity but often of indirect benefit)

• Creative skills
• Artistic materials
• Selling your work or raising your profile
• Visit a gallery or research another artist/writer, etc

• Fitness and weight loss
• Your appearance – dress better or differently, take extra care, project a different image
• Food and drink
• Learning
• Relaxation
• Travel and journeys

Give yourself just one small gift of positive mental attitude in any of these areas and you will have improved your day just a little. Of course it doesn’t have to be only one small gift. Be a devil and give yourself lots. And do it again tomorrow. Then you’ll really begin to make a difference.

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Below are some small inner gifts for yourself:
Visualise Your Creative Block or Writers� Block
Increase your sense of wellbeing in three simple steps
Stop Worrying About Talent And Be Your Best Creative Self
Falling off the Horse

There’s lots to write about on this topic. Small gifts to yourself can be mundane (boring?) yet profound – those every-day details that offer your future-self practical help. This has been a big benefit for me and I’ll say more about it soon.

But one of the more deeply beneficial ways of offering small gifts to yourself is simply to treat yourself in the same kind and generous way that you can treat everyone else. Sadly creative people can be particularly prone to doing exactly the opposite.

As I was working on explaining the consequences of this it came out in verse – don’t know why. I hope it gets the point across nicely – though if you judge it as poetry that’s a different matter entirely.

No Friend to Yourself

If you stand by your friends
But crucify yourself

If you are kind to others
Yet cruel to your soul

Do you cut them some slack
And tighten your chains?

Are they lovably odd
To your hatefully flawed?

You help them to shine
but smother your flame

See things go wrong
Know you’re always to blame.

Then, there can be no ease in your world
No balance, no love without fear
No laughter unstained

Then, you are no solace to your friends
No friend to yourself

***

Hmm… a bit gloomy that – and after several re-writes I still don’t feel happy with it. The creative process of writing a peom is so, so tough. Hats off to all you poets.

I’ll write more on this soon, in prose, and I promise I’ll focus on the brightness and the cheer. In the meantime, if you aren’t already giving yourself regular small gifts of kindness and generosity, think about how you can do so today.

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Please also read:
The Power of Small Gifts – Gifts from the Universe
The Power of Small Gifts to Create a Better World

I’m starting this post with a very, very big statement. Here it is: when the giving and receiving of small gifts becomes habitual, your world will be a better place. That’s big – but it’s not big enough. Make the small-gift mentality global and the whole world would be happier and healthier. Okay, I hear you saying, Andrew’s finally lost it. Well, maybe I am getting carried away with myself just a little – or maybe not. Nothing wrong with large-scale thinking from time to time.

Not About Shopping

You might guess here that I’m not primarily talking about material, bought-from-the-shops style gifts. Although small and thoughtfully bought gifts do carry tremendous power they are only one element of the bigger picture. That bigger picture is all about the cultivation of a generous frame of mind. And having a generous frame of mind is not just about giving. True generosity encompasses receiving too.

I believe it’s impossible to by truly generous of spirit if you cannot receive the generosity of others with grace and appreciation.

So generosity of spirit is at the core of the power of small gifts. What the idea of ‘the gift’ gives us is a way of recognising opportunities for generosity – opportunities to give – and actually doing so. It’s a handy label that we all understand, and it gives us a concrete way of thinking about generous giving that might be as fleeting as a smile or as subtle as allowing someone else to shine.

The Ultimate Creativity?

Now, I started with that huge claim about making a better world. My initial meaning here was that when you practise the giving and receiving of small gifts your experience of the world becomes more benign and caring. You feel connected with people; you feel the warmth of their humanity; you become more tolerant and appreciative of the differences and quirks that might otherwise annoy you.

Because of this, shifting to a gift-oriented mentality is itself a creative act – even an artistically creative act if you wish it to be – see the hugging video I posted previously and tell me that’s not a wonderful piece of performance art.

So the gift-shifted attitude creates a happier way of perceiving your world – but that’s only the beginning of the story. Every small gift makes its own small impact on the real world. Each small act of giving by yourself doesn’t only change your own world for the better, it changes someone else’s. Now that really is creative.

Likewise when you accept a small gift with grace and appreciation (as opposed to not recognising the gift, or worse, not appreciating it) then again you have positively impacted on the giver’s world.

Different Kinds of Gifts

Here are just a few of the gifts that can help make your world a better place to be.

• Actual, material small gifts (though not necessarily bought)
• Compliments & positive feedback
• Appreciation & acknowledgement
• Courtesy
• Respect
• Tolerance & understanding
• Space & silence
• Sensitivity
• Taking a hint!
• A smile

Isn’t This All a Little Rose-Tinted?

You could argue here that we live in a hard and often cruel world, a world where people and societies commit the most appalling acts against their fellows. That’s undeniably true. You might also argue that the small-gift frame of mind becomes somewhat unimportant and feeble in the face of such horrific crimes.

Having a gift-oriented attitude does not mean we pretend these things don’t exist, and it doesn’t mean we don’t fight against them.

It does mean that we refuse to let the badness blind us to the goodness.

Wellbeing and Creative Productivity

There’s now plenty of scientific evidence showing that offering gifts of generosity and kindness bring positive health benefits – both mental and physical. In other words, your gifts to others are also gifts to yourself (which, incidentally, is the topic for the final article in this series).

In terms of practising your own creativity, whether that’s writing, art, performance or the myriad other creative artistic fields – the effect is indirect but nonetheless powerful.

Much of the thrust of The Creative Instinct is to do with getting your head right so you can be the artist you wish to be. The great power of small gifts to and from others is in moving you towards that place, and doing so in a beautifully pleasant manner.

Small Giving Changes the ‘Mirror’

One way we judge ourselves is through the responses and actions of people in our company. Our self image is substantially shaped by the smiles and scowls we receive daily. Our perception of self is therefore pieced together from our continually glimpsed ‘reflections’ when interacting with others. It stands to reason then, that much of this reflection is in our own hands.

If other people’s reactions are the mirror by which we judge ourselves, then it’s easy to see how, quite apart from the beneficial act of giving, we also have the bonus of people showing their positive feelings towards us because of our own small generosity.

The Butterfly Effect

A butterfly flaps its wings and causes a chain of increasing weather events that affects a whole continent. Every now and then a small gift of yours can similarly produce a massive effect on the life of the recipients. A word of encouragement when times are tough, a token to say you care, a moment to listen – all and any can have profound effects that can positively change a persons life forever.

I can certainly think of a few of these precious gifts that made a difference for me: the vicar who took time to talk with the long-haired, bearded proto-hippie (yes, I do mean me) when I was getting married to my partner, Lynda. He sensed that any talk of ‘God’s glory’ would send me running for cover. Instead he offered me a sentence of thoughtful secular advice that has guided me ever since. I never saw that man again, and don’t even know his name.

And then there’s John Murray, my English teacher when I returned to study in my thirties. At that stage all I wanted was to write good English, having left school without even the basic qualification. I wrote an incredibly long book review – pages and pages of it. His heart must have sunk at the thought of ploughing through it, but he took the time to encourage me, to pick out the positives and only ever-so-gently point out better ways of working. This blog, such as it is, would not be here without that small, thoughtful gift.

Take a moment now to think back to some small gift you received that has made a difference. Appreciate it again.

A Frame of Mind that’s a Gift in Itself

For me personally, the Small Gift mentality makes a massive difference. I won’t pretend there aren’t times when it’s not there – times of anger, of mean spiritedness or times when my focus on my own needs overwhelms it – and times of forgetfulness too. But as a guiding symbol of what I can do, it helps me find more happiness and self-satisfaction than I ever could without it.

When I’m practising small giving it helps me experience the world differently – genuinely creating a different perception and a different reality.

And for creative people who sometimes feel blocked by the stresses and the tensions of their world and their dreams – it can offer the mental space and balance that can open the doors to your best work.

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See also:
The Power of Small Gifts – Gifts from the Universe
Increase your sense of wellbeing in three simple steps

It’s 7:50 am on a Tuesday morning and I’ve just received a tiny, unexpected gift from nature involving a couple of spiders and an intricate dance of life and death.

I’ve been mulling over a post about the power of small gifts for a few days now, without it quite coming together. How wonderful then, that a gift from out of the blue helped it gel.

It helped me see 3 clear categories of small gift that – providing you are open to them can inspire your creativity, sprinkle joy and awe around your daily life, enhance your personal effectiveness – and finally, think more positively of yourself and others.

Now that’s not a bad haul.

Let me stress again though – you have to be open to it. You have to be ready to recognise the gifts and gratefully receive their benefits.

Here are the ‘gift categories’ that those two spiders have helped me to see.

• Gifts from the universe
• Gifts from, or to, others
• Gifts to yourself

I’ll cover the final pair in later posts.

Gifts from the Universe

One way or another, these are gifts for your soul.

They give the same kind of jaw dropping hit you might get from a close encounter with a blue whale, or from time in the Himalayas, or from a solar eclipse. But the difference is that where you generally have to seek out such events – these smaller gifts from the universe seem instead to seek out you.

These fleeting moments may literally be from the universe – a star twinkling in a way that takes your attention, an unusual halo around the moon or the briefest, silent streak of a shooting star. They can be common-place events like sunsets, birdsongs and rainbows (even in England, where rainbows are common, can anyone ever take their stunning beauty for granted?)

And you can also find them very close to home – very much in your own back yard.

Spiders and Wasps

Take care not to miss them. Take the time you need to enjoy them. Whatever else you are doing can usually wait for a couple of minutes, can’t it?

Here in Britain it’s been a very poor summer. August was wet and depressing. In fact August 2008 had the least sunshine since records began. Because my wife, Lynda, is still recovering from her recent health challenges we’ve rarely journeyed far from home.

Luckily gifts from the universe happen everywhere – and wherever you happen to be right now is no exception.

It’s the less obvious gifts that can bring light to your life most powerfully. This dark summer has been peppered with such gifts for me, and by far the most memorable have been within metres of my home. Hey – two of these gifts came while I was putting out the rubbish!

Bizarrely, spiders and wasps have been to the fore. I should mention that British spiders are entirely harmless and not to be feared.

The first of these gifts came on hearing the urgent buzzing of a fly being subdued by a spider half its size. As I watched, a passing wasp also noticed the commotion. It landed on the fly, fought off the spider, stung its new possession to death and then flew off with it, dragging bits of web in its wake. Now that’s drama.

The second was observing a wasp hunting for hoverflies on the flower heads of a fennel plant.

Then there was the spotting and capturing of a mother wolf spider, complete with dozens of her babies on her back. I was able to share that with my young grandson before returning mother and family unharmed.

And just now, as I was about to wheel out our recycling bin for collection I was gifted with the sight of two garden spiders hanging from the bin in a dance of love and death. I watched from only a few centimetres away as the tiny male carefully tickled and coaxed the female into subdued readiness for their briefest of encounters. But when he made his move she pounced. Instead of being her lover he became her breakfast.

Gifts for All Tastes

Now I concede that this particular kind of gift might not be your cup of tea. Fair enough – but do remember that I wasn’t looking for these gifts – they found me. I was simply open to recognising and receiving them.

Luckily for anyone not so enthralled by creepy-crawlies, the world is full of variety. The universe offers gifts to suit all tastes. They are all around you if only you are open to receiving them.

I can’t fully explain the power of these small events. They are life affirming. If you have a faith then they are faith affirming. If like me you are not religious they still offer moments of deep spiritual connection – along with the chance to lose yourself for a short while in the intricate beauty of nature.

And when they happen and you accept them as the wonderful gifts they are then even non-religious types like me feel – dare I say it – blessed – or at least very, very lucky.

The Power of Gratitude

It’s not just the gift, it’s how you receive it. Recognising your luck is crucial. Feeling grateful is essential. These are powerful positive feelings to bring into your life. They make you feel better about your world and about yourself. They help you maintain or introduce beneficial good emotions. And they can spur you to inspiration and creativity.

If your thoughts are dark they give you a chink of light. If you’re already bathed in sunshine they make you feel even better.

So there it is.

1. Have your senses open and your awareness at the ready. Don’t let these gifts slip by unnoticed.
2. Be willing to accept the gift for what it is. There are no strings, no catches, just a fleeting offering from a generous universe.
3. Take time out. Lose yourself to the moment. Appreciate. Connect.
4. Be generous yourself in your gratitude to the universe. Share the gift if you can. And be fully aware of your positive emotions.

Gifts from the universe are there for every single one of us. Accept them as often as you can.

Please add a comment and share your own favourite gifts from the universe. I’d appreciate it very much.

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Related posts:

The Power of Small Gifts to Create a Better World
Delayed Gratification and the Creative Soul � Part 1: Delayed Gratification is Good For You

For most of us our self limiting beliefs inhabit the shadows, exerting their stifling influence on our thoughts and actions without us ever knowing they are there. At their most powerful self limiting beliefs can stop a person achieving anything worthwhile, and even wreck the good things they’ve already gained. That’s why identifying them is so important.

Teri’s Story

Teri (I’ve changed her name and a couple of minor details to protect her identity) was fascinated by the medium of film and was particularly drawn to the idea of film script writing. It was very clear she had a lot to offer. But Teri found it impossible to contact the groups, classes and people that would have helped her develop. She simply wasn’t up to being in the company of (as she saw it) more talented and able people. And her belief was that anyone at these groups would be more talented and able than her.

The really sad thing was that you only had to talk with Teri for half an hour to see her talent and her brightness shining through. Everyone who knew her also knew her potential. I wish I could tell you that Teri’s story had a happy ending, but it didn’t. Her self limiting beliefs condemned her. They were her unchangeable truths.

Finally she gave up the struggle and began to fritter away her hours in computer chat rooms. She became increasingly bitter and resentful towards anyone who was achieving beyond her own perceived limitations – including her partner and some close friends. The results for both her creativity and her relationships were inevitable.

Now that’s an extreme but real story, which brings me to the first valuable resource for pinpointing our self limiting beliefs – our friends and loved ones.

Self Limiting Belief Identification Method 1 – Ask Someone You Respect‘

Your friends will know where you are holding yourself back. Some of them may have already told you. If so pause now to write down the good things they say about you that you yourself have a hard time believing. But if you don’t have a clear idea, then ask them.

When you do ask, make sure you feel relaxed about it. Going about the task in a formal and stiff way can make it seem a big step. Wait for a time that seems natural and casual. How do you bring stuff like this into a conversation? Well, you could do worse than saying you’ve been reading some blog posts about self limiting beliefs and you were wondering about your own.

You can ask your friends questions like:

• Where do you think I hold myself back?
• Which of my abilities should I be making the most of?
• What could I achieve if I really believed in myself?

Large and Vague – or Smaller and Specific

Self limiting beliefs can be large, overarching beliefs such as Teri’s story above, but they can also be small and very specific.

For example, Sunil (name changed to protect identity) is a highly creative, able and ambitious young man who was working hard to achieve his goals. He enjoyed each Friday night with the same long-standing group of friends. Sunil actually loved those Friday nights and didn’t want to give them up. But the established tradition was that each person bought a round of drinks, and that everyone had to have a drink every round. It was a big group of friends, but Sunil’s next-day hangover was getting even bigger.

The creative and business time Sunil lost to his hangover each Saturday (and sometimes Sunday) was eating away at him. He felt trapped and expressed his self limiting belief about the situation like this: ‘I have to drink the same as everyone else on Fridays.’ There were all sorts of justification he could give for this statement but the bottom line was this ‘truth’: that this was one situation that was impossible to change.

Only when he challenged the ‘truth’ and recognised it as a self limiting belief did he begin to explore the possibilities for change. Having considered many options he decided on a tactful and it’s fair to say, tentative, approach to cutting back on the sheer quantity of alcohol he drank. To his surprise several of his friends immediately followed suit. The ‘truth’ of the situation as Sunil had believed it to be, turned out to be anything but.

Self Limiting Belief Identification Method 2 – Self Perception Statements

You can do this exercise on your own – though completing the statements with a partner who’s doing it too can certainly make things easier. Just complete the sentences below with your own perceived truths. When you’ve done that you can begin to confront your limiting perceptions with the ‘challenge’ questions which you’ll find towards the end of the article.

Self Perception Statements

Complete the statements below. You can complete each statement in as many different ways as you wish. Don’t move on to the next statement until you’ve exhausted the possibilities for the current one.’

• I am…
• I am not…
• I am good with…
• I am not good with…
• I will never be able to…
• I don’t deserve…
• I am held back by…
• Other people…
• Other artists/musicians/creatives…
• I always…
• I never…
• I should…
• I have to…

The next step is to identify which of your self statements limit you in some way. These are the ones we’re interested in. Pick out these statements even if you believe them to be absolutely true.

You will then have a list of your self limiting beliefs. Now at this point you might be thinking something along the lines of: ‘What if I have a really solid, unarguable set of circumstances that limit me?’ Well, there’s no doubt that some situations are genuinely limiting – but in that case it’s often your own attitude and assumptions that are the deciding factor.’

For instance, I’ve lost count of the number of successful dyslexic writers I’ve met or have heard about. And The Association of Mouth and Foot Painting Artists of the World has around 650 highly accomplished members. These creative people certainly had a genuine obstacle in there way (ie. no hands), but the positive and empowering self belief of each individual member transformed obstacle into inspiration. Let me repeat that – positive and empowering self belief transforms obstacle into inspiration.

So pick out a statement and ask yourself the challenge questions below. Take your time answering them and please don’t be afraid to inject some healthy humour into your answers. Be as creative as you like and see how many scenarios for change you can come up with, no matter how crazy and surreal.

What you are doing here is beginning to change your perceptions about your self perceptions. You are changing the way you think about yourself and your abilities.

Challenge Questions

• How true is this statement?
• Do I have to accept this?
• How can I change? Attitude? Actions?
• What can I begin to do differently?
• What’s the ‘positive opposite’ statement that I’d like to work towards?

Don’t Just Read This – Do It!

There’s a fair amount of work involved in identifying limiting beliefs, but the effort can be profoundly rewarding.

It’s now a well accepted that we can choose to change our self limiting beliefs for more life enhancing and positive ones. It’s the truth, and you’d better believe it.

t’s also worth checking out the first two parts of this series:
Changing Your Creative Destiny – Understanding Personal Self Belief
Changing Your Creative Destiny, part 2 – Self Limiting Beliefs and Me