“Improving the quality of people’s lives”

Dr Michael C Paterson

BSc PhD DClinPsych CClinPsychol CSci AFBPsS

Consultant Clinical Psychologist

Performance Enhancement

for business, sport or creative arts

“Life and business are like the changing seasons. You cannot

change the seasons, but you can change yourself.”

Jim Rohn

DO YOU NEED TO ENHANCE YOUR PERFORMANCE?

Few people actually achieve everything they are capable of, even though everyone has incredible potential. There are notable exceptions of course. Richard Branson continues to build his business empire; Steve Redgrave, the Olympic oarsman, achieved gold at an age long after other athletes had retired; James Galway, the flautist and conductor, has filled concert halls while in his seventies. What has held you back?

When you were an infant, you were an intrepid explorer: neither fear nor negative thinking held you back. But as you grew older, your survival depended on learning about the danger of threatening situations. Your behaviour and thinking changed accordingly. Even though you learnt good lessons from life’s negative experiences, you may have developed irrational fears and now hold irrational beliefs about yourself. These will prevent you from doing the things in life that you might otherwise have done.

Below are fictional case examples of how fear and/or self-limiting thoughts prevented some people from achieving their true potential.

Business

John, a bright, industrious man in his early thirties, is in middle management in a manufacturing company that has a number of export contracts. Two of John’s contemporaries had generated new overseas business and received promotion. John had the skills and structures he needed but was afraid of failure, therefore he did not follow through. As a result, John’s core belief of ‘I’m a failure’ has been reinforced.

Sport

Rose, a 22 year old athlete performing at the highest level in middle-distance running, is at the peak of fitness. Despite this, she has been beaten consistently into second place in important competitions by several of her competitors. Rose feels she doesn’t deserve to win: this relates to guilt she is carrying for an experience during her adolescence when her mother died the day after having had a row with her.

Jim is an 18 year old professional footballer who had shown great promise playing for the Reserve’s team. Last season, when he got an opportunity to play in the English Second Division, he showed his talents to the full during the first half. Shortly after the interval, Jim missed an open goal and was booed by his team’s fans and castigated by his captain. His game went to pieces thereafter and he left the pitch a dejected man. Despite this, Jim was selected as a substitute for the First team’s next game. When he went onto the pitch, late in the second half, he felt so anxious about making a mistake his performance was poor. Jim was then relegated to the Reserve’s team where he still puts in a good performance: he remains anxious when thinking about playing at the higher level.

Creative Arts

Joanne is a concert pianist whose dream is to play a solo concert at the Royal Albert Hall. Although she has immense talent and practices several hours a day, she believes she isn’t good enough. She has played solo concerts in cultural festivals and small auditoria, and was applauded warmly. To achieve her dream Joanne has to firstly believe in her ability.

WHAT I HAVE TO OFFER

While individuals can, and do, overcome fears and/or irrational limiting beliefs to perform on a particular occasion, the underlying negative beliefs remain unresolved and can resurface with even the smallest setback. We see this so often among sports people at the highest level.

I can help you overcome irrational fears and beliefs and free you to fulfill your true potential. I will achieve this by:

helping you identify the earlier life experiences that led to your current difficulty,

assisting you to address your issues, leading to a positive shift in your core beliefs about yourself,

preparing a template for your behaviour, thinking and emotion in future situations.

I am able to help with your problem, or difficulty, using different forms of therapy. An approach will be selected that best suits your needs.

REFERRALS

These can be accepted by phone or email. You can self-refer or be referred by another agency

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