Talking Points 5 Grantham meeting

The 49 people who came to the workshop on Saturday make it the largest workshop on Mood Mapping yet. Well done Grantham! many thanks for your hospitality. By the end, everyone had a Mood Map and we went through a couple of strategies for managing anxiety.

"Thought tagging" which is a technique where you get a single phrase answer for any problem that you are stewing over. For example, it may be something like, being worried about whether a relative is Ok or not.

Find a phrase such as "I have done everything I reasonably can to make sure he is fine and I have to wait" Make the phrase suit your own circumstances. Then everytime your brain comes up with worries about your relative, you repeat your phrase. Don't enter into discussion with the voice inside your head, just keep repeating your phrase. Because if you start arguing, the voice inside your head will win! its been arguing with you for years now and it knows every weakness in your argument. Just keep to your phrase. In marketing terms it is called "stone walling", Just stone wall the voice inside your head and sooner rather than later it will get bored and move on.

Mood Mapping, the book includes this and dozens of other strategies to help you manage your mood - from drinking a glass of water, to helping you decide who you are.

It was great to meet everyone in the Grantham workshop, and I felt like a proud parent when 49 people succeeded in drawing their first mood map. I am working on a short video with my friend Ashley Pollack so we can demonstrate Mood Mapping on the Internet.

Whilst in Grantham I couldn't resist this photograph. Grantham has two famous "sons" Newton and Margaret Thatcher. Newton stands with his back to the Town Hall, and this is Margaret Thatchers place of birth and original Grocers Shop!

Definitely worth a picture, even though Roger did worry that the middle of the road, was perhaps not the best place from which to take it. If you look carefully, you can see the plaque on the corner just to the right of the post besides the first floor window