Wonder Woman – Pam Grout

Wonder Woman’s true superpower

January 6, 2018 22 Comments

“If you need to stop an asteroid, you call Superman. If you need to solve a mystery, you call Batman. But if you need to end a war, you call Wonder Woman.”–Gail Simone
wonder woman timothy watters
Anyone who has ever attended one of my workshops knows I LOVE Wonder Woman. I have t-shirts, action figures, even underwear.

On New Year’s Day, a group of us were talking about last year’s movie. Most of us gushed praise, raved about Gal Gadot’s unquestionable badassery. Except for one naysayer: “I thought it was too violent.”

That got me to thinking. A true changemaker would never perpetuate the “old way.” A true changemaker would see that slaying bad guys just keeps the crazy going.

We will never be truly free until we move beyond the mistaken belief that bad guys exist.

Which is sorta what Lesson Six says: I am upset because I see something that is not there.

So sure, I can work to overcome all the “evils,” the “bad guys,” the “problems.”

Or I can retrain my mind to see a different reality.

Don’t get me wrong. I still LOVE Wonder Woman. I will still take her action figure to my workshops. I will continue to stand in Wonder Woman pose.

And I will remind myself (three times today, according to my Workbook lesson) that just like movies aren’t real, all those upsets I think I see are nothing but holograms that will radically change, not by fighting them, not by poking spears into their guts, but when I train my mind to see them differently.

Pam Grout is the author of 19 books including E-Squared: 9 Do-it-Yourself Energy Experiments that Prove Your Thoughts Create Your Reality and the just-released, Art & Soul,Reloaded: A Year-Long Apprenticeship to Summon the Muses and Ignite Your Daring, Audacious, Creative Side.

Shazam or Suffering Succotash–it’s up to you

May 30, 2017 25 Comments

“Words are like eggs dropped from great heights; you can no more call them back than ignore the mess they leave when they fall.”
― Jodi Picoult

weareall

Last I checked, the Yellow Pages doesn’t have an entry for “Prophets” like they probably would have back in Biblical days. But if you want a glimpse into your future, listen to the words you use to describe yourself and your life.

When you say things like “This is going to be a great day,” or “Things always work out for me,” you are using your words to predict and foretell a positive future.

When you talk smack about your life, even little things like, “Oh, I wish I’d gotten up earlier and wasn’t running so late. I wish that idiot in traffic hadn’t cut me off,” you create a resonant field of problems.

Instead of playing beautiful symphonies with our words, instead of utilizing them to come to our aid, we too often waste them moaning about problems.

Like a fingerprint, each word is unique. It has its own frequency and creative power. Each word has a vibration, same as hitting a particular piano key produces say, a Middle C.

At this point, most of us have little control over the ticker tape of thoughts that run through our minds, but we can monitor the commentary that proceeds out of our mouths.

Since I believe in taking my attention off problems and animating a different possibility from the infinite field, I decided to rerun a blog post about two important words.

The first is “Shazam!” I’d heard this word before. Captain Marvel uses it when transforming into his superself.

Jessica Ortner (from the Tapping Solution) told me that she and her friends always “shazam” each other as a way of sending positive energy. So whatever great goals you have for today, I send you “Shazam!”

The other word I love (and need to remind myself of) was invented by Phil Parker. He’s a brilliant London osteopath who is able to transform we humans’ “issues” seemingly overnight.

And it starts with the word du with a ^ over the “u.” Instead of saying “I am angry” or “I am poor” or “I am…. (whatever you don’t want to be) say, I am du^ing anger or I am du^ing poor which makes it a temporary state. It reduces the charge.

The reason he chose not to use the word “do” is because that reeks of blame. Last thing any of us want to do is point finger at ourselves. That’s what started the “issues” in the first place.

Two tiny words—huge possible change.

Pam Grout is the author of 18 books including E-Squared: 9 Do-it-Yourself Energy Experiments that Prove Your Thoughts Create Your Reality and the recently released, Thank and Grow Rich: a 30-day Experiment in Shameless Gratitude and Unabashed Joy.

Even Shonda Rhimes uses the Wonder Woman pose

January 8, 2016 10 Comments

“Instead of wallowing in the problem, I figure out what its yes would be.”—Shonda Rhimes

I just finished Shonda Rhimes’ inspiring book, My Year of Saying Yes. It’s a memoir that takes up after she’d already won countless Emmys and Writers Guild and Directors Guild awards for creating Grey’s Anatomy, Scandal and all the other shows on ABC’s prime time Thursday. You’d assume that, by that point, she’d be 100 percent happy, confident and living the dream.

Except, she wasn’t. She was scared to speak in public, unhappy in her own body and well, experiencing the same wacked out crazy head space as the rest of us.

In fact, she mentions some big banquet honoring the top women in television, the women who are at the very pinnacle of success. She noticed, one by one, as each was introduced how they downplayed their success, how they pooh-poohed all they’d accomplished. She noted (even though she did it, too) that they should have been jumping to their feet, giving each other fist bumps and saying, “Hell yeah! Thank you for noticing.”

After Shonda’s sister pointed out her tendency to avoid scary things, Shonda decided to embark on an experiment in saying “yes!” Especially to all the things she avoided at all costs. Like speaking in public. Like accepting invitations to be on late-night talk shows. Like looking at how she treated herself.

I especially loved, loved, loved that her remedy for stepping out of her comfort zone was my old favorite: the Wonder Woman pose.

If you’ve been to any of my talks over the past year or two, you know I use the Wonder Woman pose to stave off my own nervousness. I often get my audience to join with me and even took a Wonder Woman action figure to a workshop I gave at the Omega Institute.

Scientists have proven that when you stand like Wonder Woman (fists on waist and legs spread in what Harvard Business School professor Amy Cuddy calls a power pose) you lower your cortisol levels and boost your testosterone.

“So what?” you might be thinking. WHAT is that when your cortisol levels go down, you drastically lower your stress and when testosterone goes up, you feel more confident.

Cuddy discovered that standing in this pose for a mere two minutes helps folks ace job interviews, tests and other potentially stress-provoking events.

The point is…our physiology can help us get our mind out of the gutter of wack-a-doodle thoughts and back on the joy frequency.

The last little tip I’d like to share is to sing. Shonda didn’t mention if she used this little life-changer.

But Jay Pryor, a life coach who I’ve written about before (check out his new book Lean Inside or this article I wrote about him for People magazine), and his wife Jessica sure do. Instead of demanding that their two young kids come to dinner NOW or stop drawing on the Lazy-Boy, they simply break into an aria that much better gets the point across.

Have the best weekend of your life, my friends.

Pam Grout is the author of 17 books including E-Squared: 9 Do-it-Yourself Energy Experiments that Prove Your Thoughts Create Your Reality and its equally-scintillating sequel, E-Cubed, 9 More Experiments that Prove Mirth, Magic and Merriment is your Full-time Gig.

How Wonder Woman can help you fly through the holidays with ease and joy

November 26, 2014 18 Comments

“I had to stop watching the news. It was making my own problems seem insignificant.” –Cartoon I just saw in the New Yorker

It’s a long story, but many years ago I met Lynda Carter at Chris Evert’s wedding. So when Warner Bros. announced yesterday that Michelle MacLaren will be directing the new Wonder Woman movie, the first big budget superhero movie about a woman, I thought about Lynda (who will probably not be cast in the movie) and decided I would practice her superpowers this week. Here’s why:

“So what?” you might be thinking. WHAT is that when your cortisol levels go down, you drastically lower your stress and when testosterone goes up, you feel more confident.

Cuddy discovered that standing in this pose for a mere two minutes helps folks ace job interviews, tests and other potentially stress-provoking events.

Which is why I plan to strike this pose throughout the holidays, whenever I’m tempted to get testy with relatives or to feel time pressure about the 14 dishes I’m attempting to maneuver into the oven at the same time.

I plan to slip into the bathroom (Superman used a phone booth, but, thanks to cell phones, they’re practically obsolete), strike my Wonder Woman pose and come out, if not in cape, a whole lot calmer and happier.

I’d like to thank Dirk Stroda for introducing me to Amy Cuddy’s fabulous TED talk. I just met Dirk and his beautiful wife Verena in the Okanagan Valley of Canada. Dirk, who is a coach to executives and Olympic athletes, also taught me how to procure free drugs—well, oxytocin which is the love drug and the only one I’m interested in stockpiling. It can be manufactured IN THE BODY without Walter White’s goggles and messy law enforcement problem.

The point is…our physiology (like I point out in the Boggie Woogie Experiment in E-Cubed) can help us get our mind back on the joy frequency.

Dirk and I gave a workshop together at Sparkling Hill Resort, an unbelievably cool health resort with eight different saunas and steam rooms (one of them even had the same ceiling as the Sistine Chapel) and more than 3 million Swarovski crystals. Do I have a cool job or what?

The last little tip I’d like to share for sailing through the holidays is to sing. Jay Pryor, another cool friend of mine, from one of my power posses, and his wife Jessica have started singing to their two young kids. Instead of demanding that they come to dinner or stop drawing on the Lazy-Boy, they simply break into an operatic aria that more effectively gets the point across.

And lastly, because I was tempted to join a protest after last night’s Grand Jury decision in Ferguson, I’d like to present yet another headline in the world I’m envisioning:

Police officers all over the world give up their guns and realize the best way to do their job is to shoot love, not fear

Pam Grout is the author of 17 books including E-Squared: 9 Do-it-Yourself Energy Experiments that Prove Your Thoughts Create Your Reality and the just-released sequel, E-Cubed, 9 More Experiments that Prove Mirth, Magic and Merriment is your Full-time Gig.