Case Study: Nora, Age: 59 years old

Background: Nora wanted to begin a new career, but old behaviors and limiting beliefs were preventing her from moving forward. She struggled with self esteem and personal confidence.

The client approached me for advice on how to handle stressful situations. Whenever the stress became too much, the client would have outbursts of temper that would be directed at the person she thought was causing it. She advised me that she did not know what happiness meant and that this inappropriate behavior was costing her new opportunities and friendships at work.

I asked the client to journal for approximately one month. The specifics were to record happenings at work, negative feelings / self talk and to record at least three things each day that went well or that she felt grateful for.

In reviewing her entries for the past month, the journaling indicated that her Meta Program was:

1. 1. Away from: Nora’s belief was “I’ll get you before you’ll get me” and was always the first to notice potential problems, who should be gotten rid of or fixed. Everyone was perceived as a threat to her work. The client was absolutely brilliant at troubleshooting a computer problem, as she naturally looked for what was wrong.
   
   However, this trait would be a problem when it came to goal setting. Instead of focusing on what was positive that could help her, she would become distracted and her attention would be redirected to what could be wrong, go wrong or who would have it in for her. This distraction distorted her perception of what was actually going on, and she felt that the world was working against her.
   
   She had a strong victim perspective and believed that “life was really difficult and nothing ever went her way.” As a result, she challenged and doubted opportunities that could bring her fulfillment and happiness.
   
   
2. 2. Internal: Her inclination was to look for what was wrong or assume that she had done something wrong. If she was not able to do something, or made a mistake, she would automatically assume that she was incompetent and couldn’t do the job. She set impossibly high standards that she could never meet. When people complimented her, she had trouble accepting their feedback. Her feelings acted as a filter to validate that she couldn’t do anything; and therefore, created her reality in life.
   
   
3. 3. Self: The client fostered a victim mentality, so the focus was always on how things affected her. She had a tendency to personalize everything, as if everything pertained to herself. Her personal perspective was from a lack of abundance.
   
   Nora had trouble saying no and would over commit to projects. By doing this, she limited herself to focusing on what she could do very well. Therefore, never becoming an expert at anything, increasing the amount of stress in her life, validating her feelings of not doing anything well, feeling taken advantage of and having stressful outbursts at work.
   
   This situation warranted a quick intervention, as this was affecting her chances of finding fulfillment on the job and life’s purpose. The Visual Swish Pattern method was recommended to provide her with the skills to introduce new behavior. Her language pattern was visual and auditory.
   
   I asked Nora to think of a time when she was particularly hard on herself, where she lacked self-esteem. A situation that made her feel unpleasant or helpless. I then asked her to place herself in that situation and experience those feelings, to see it happening and to listen to what was happening, let those negative feelings become more intense and to become aware of where this feeling resided internally in her body, I asked her to describe this feeling by color, shape and sound (if applicable). She explained that this feeling was dark and shriveled. It lacked warmth and would look back at her with accusatory eyes. It spoke to her in a low, raspy voice. She would hear criticism and feel sadness in the pit of her stomach. I asked her to set this temporarily aside by asking her to think of something else, such as what she had for dinner last night and to say it out loud.
   
   I asked Nora to create the perfect image of who she would become. Expand and picture it, feel and see it. This future was just three feet in front of her. This new Nora already knew what she needed to know. She was competent, confident and got along well with people. I asked her to let herself be powerfully drawn to this new person and to see herself being drawn to her. I then guided her to remember this new image as being brighter, larger, more colorful, that moves gracefully and easily. If this image of her was wonderfully compelling, what would this powerful her look like? What does she sound like? She is speaking in a complimentary way, in a softer, confident voice. Hear her say “I feel good about myself” and let her come toward you. “I feel good about myself” and let the words echo in her head. I asked Nora to let the good feelings wash over and through her.
   
   I asked Nora to take this feeling and the words “wonderful you” and place them into a tiny sparkling bubble, letting it float in front of her. Then let the sparkling bubble, become larger, shinier and brighter. Listen to the positive compliments and feel the warmth wash over her. I then asked her to picture a blank screen in her mind and then repeat the expanding process all over again.
   
   Then I asked her to think of the negative self again and to place the sparkling bubble in front of it. Seeing it expand, glow and become warm and clear. I asked Nora to exchange the negative image with the positive one and see the negative image disintegrate into tiny pieces. The new Nora’s positive image was taking over. It was becoming larger, brighter, with Nora hearing “wonderful you”. This wonderful image was overwhelming her mind and overflowing with color and brightness. Nora hears “I feel good about myself” echoing through her head, letting the good feelings envelope her body.
   
   I asked Nora to picture a blank screen in her mind, as though she were looking at a blank movie screen.
   
   In order to assist Nora with practicing this on her own, I made a recording (including positive affirmations) of the session to step her through the process and to repeat it as many times as necessary, ending with a blank movie screen between each session. I asked her to continue practicing the visualization until she could no longer feel those unpleasant feelings.
   
   Once Nora was able to do this comfortably, I asked her to take the sparkling bubble and multiply it many times over and to place these bubbles in her hands. Then throw them up in the air to see these sparkling bubbles float and expand into many wonderful images of Nora, so that she could see herself everywhere, no matter where she looked. Then seeing them settle all around her past, present and future. She would hear the words “wonderful you” and “I feel good about myself”.
   
   I tested the method by asking Nora to remember her negative image. She was not able to access that past image of herself. I asked her to use this technique whenever she felt stressed or doubted herself.