**Hi everyone. Quick note before the show starts. This is a special extended episode because we have a guest, Professor Jenn Cumming, and she is taking me through a review of my year using a strengthbased approach, and you'll hear all about what that means in the show and why it's so useful. So you are gonna get to hear quite a lot about me and my life, and in doing so, learn how you can take a strength based approach to reviewing your year two. She'll explain why that's so important and exactly how you can do it. It's. Gonna be an amazing episode. So grab a pen and paper so that you can take notes. I know you're going to want to. Jenn's microphone was a little bit dodge. We thought it was okay, but it hasn't turned out that great. You'll be able to hear her absolutely no problems whatsoever, but it's not quite up to the usual quality. I know it won't affect how inspiring and useful you find this episode, though, so enjoy the show.**
You can find out more about my guest, Professor Jenn Cumming, in all these places:
@drjenncumming
https://www.sprintproject.org/
and the two tools she mentioned are here:
https://www.viacharacter.org/account/register
https://www.gallup.com/cliftonstrengths/en/254033/strengthsfinder.aspx (there is a charge for this product, but it may be available through your workplace too)
Transcript
Vikki: Hello and welcome to episode 12 of the PhD Life Coach. And I am really excited because we have a special guest today. She is a leading psychologist and one of my best friends, so welcome Professor Jenn Cumming. Do you want to tell us a little bit about who you are and then we'll get on the show.
Jenn: Thanks Vikki, it's so exciting to be part of your podcast, so thanks so much for inviting me to be a part of it. I've known Vikki for over 20 years now, so she is slightly biased when she says I'm a leading psychologist, but I've worked at the University of Birmingham for over 20 years. And I'm a sport and exercise psychologist and currently a professor there as well as a chartered psychologist. So I've been working for a long time in terms of helping people to be able to really recognize and enhance their potential and, through this podcast, hopefully we can talk about how we can view this in a really positive strength-based way.
Vikki: Fantastic. And Jennn says, I'm biased. I am biased, but I am also right as usual. And one of the things I love most about Jenn's work is she has been involved in sports psychology with elite athletes, enhancing performance, but then has taken loads of the work that she did there and applied it into really, really vulnerable populations as well. And I know she'll tell you more about that work at the end of the show, but it means she's bringing this huge wealth of experience, of helping a whole variety of different types of people identify their strengths and use that to achieve their goals, enhance their wellbeing, and generally live good lives. And Jenn touched on this slightly in her intro, but the purpose of today is really thinking about reviewing our year.
So one of the things that can be really useful to do at the end of the year is to think back over the year, what have I done, what helped me succeed, all those sorts of questions so that we can really reflect on how the year has gone and then use that information looking forwards. And we have got a podcast coming with another special guest thinking about New Year's resolutions.
But this episode is really thinking back across the past year. So I'm going to hand over to Jenn because we are not just going to talk about this. We're not just going to tell you how to review your year. Jenn is actually going to support me to review my year so that you can see how it's done. You can hear me kind of reflecting in action so you really see how it goes and you can then take the questions that Jenn asks me and think about them in your own lives too. So Jenn, you are in charge, which is exactly the way I like it.
Jenn: Thanks Vikki. I love being in charge, as you know. So what's exciting about this today is that normally this is something that I do for myself, usually around this time of year, December. And I guess just to say that December is a bit of an artificial time point to reflect back in our year. I think everybody has a different sense of what the year is for them. So I know lots of people who work in education, academics, for them it could be the academic year, so you might be looking back on your year, maybe it's in the summertime for you because September is when you kick off your next academic year. So it just so happens we're talking about it now and it ties really well into what people like to do in terms of New Year's resolution. So, Vikki, we had a bit of a chat about this and you know, I've been doing this for the last couple years and you've been kind of wanting to know sort of how I go about doing this.
So I think this is a great opportunity to share that. But I guess to say for me, this is an evolving thing. So each year I have some questions that I think back on and I like to look back on my responses from previous years. But each year I do it slightly different. So we're going to give it a go and see, see how, how we get on today.
But maybe the first thing in terms of thinking about looking back on your year is that we want to think about it in terms of what has gone well. So I think often at this time of year and when we're thinking about New Year's resolutions, we're often thinking about maybe what we're lacking in our life or bad habits we have that we want to break and essentially trying to look ahead in terms of what we want fix about ourselves. And that's quite a deficit, negative way of, of thinking about our year. And so I think we're already pretty skilled at doing that sort of thing, but actually, what's sort of missing, maybe a more balanced way of doing it, is to focus on what's going well, what's going, what's going right.
So when we take stock of things and think about what we want to do more of, then we can come at it from a more strength based perspective. So that's how we're going to do it today, if that's okay with you.
Vikki: That sounds, yeah, that sounds perfect. And thinking about all the populations you've worked with and stuff, why is a strengths based approach a good way of doing this?
Jenn: Yeah. one of the reasons why I really like that, especially for taking a kind of a backward glance in our year, is that if we just focus on what's going wrong, then it can be wrapped up in a lot of sort of negative emotions. So feelings of guilt or maybe shame, wanting to fix that bad habit, whatever it is, like spending too much time scrolling on our news feeds and our social media, or, you know, maybe we haven't got as organized as we want it to, whatever it is. Then it comes from a place of shame or guilt, and that's never a good place for motivation for change.
So we're starting to think about how we might want to move forward and do things differently. If we're already starting from a negative place, then often the way that we cope is more starting down, blocking, avoiding, and so it's really, really hard to make successful changes to what we do in our lives if we're coming from that perspective to start with. So if we flip the script and look at it in a more positive strength based way, then I think you're going to find yourself being more motivated and excited to make those changes and to move forward. And so you get to test this out today and be your own kind of personal test case, but certainly there's lots of research evidence to also support the fact that when we get better at reflecting on, recognizing, and using our strengths, that can have a whole lot of benefit, including helping us to feel more motivated. But then we also get the win-win of also having better wellbeing at the same time.
Vikki: Love it. I'm already feeling motivated. I'm so excited. I love listening to listening to you speak. and I guess the other thing to say is, you know, as we said at the beginning, we've known each other a really, really long time. And you know that I am a recovering highly self-critical person, I'm an awful better than I was about that, but yeah, it's certainly always been my tendency to look at what I did wrong. I was always the kid who got 98% on her science test and got very stressed about what the 2% was that I missed. That was the first thing I used to look for in the test. So I think this is also is something that we both know will be really, will be really useful for for me.
And I'm sure a lot of people listening, it's really common in academia to have that kind of self-critical perfectionistic approach. So I think it'll be really useful for other people too. So, cool. What do I need to answer?
Jenn: Brilliant. So, um, how are you going to record this down? Do you have a piece of paper?
Vikki: I have a piece of paper, yes, I have a piece of paper. For people listening, Jenn hasn't told me any questions in advance, so everything I do today is going to be completely off the cuff. The only thing I did do is I like to remind myself of the year and what I've historically done is have a little look back at my diary to see what I did. Because I left university and lost access to my email and calendar, I couldn't do that this time. So I went back through the photos on my phone, which has been very lovely.
So the only thing that I've got pre-prepared here is a little bit of a stuff I've done in each month according to my rather overloaded iPhone photos folder. Other than that, I'm going to find out these questions at the same time our listeners do . So yes, I have paper and pen.
Jenn: And there's that nothing, I think any, anything kind of magical or special about the questions, but the idea is just to kind of prompt yourself to look back,. And I would say too, that it isn't just about work. This is an opportunity to look at things in a more holistic way. So think about it in terms of work, family. Think about it in terms of, you know, maybe your physical, your mental health.
In other words, everything's on the table. There's no rules saying that you only have to focus on one of your life in fact it’s better if you try to look at all of at the same time.
Vikki: Cool, I can do that.
Jenn: And I guess the other, the other thing to maybe keep in mind too is we could make endless lists but actually focus on what's most meaningful and important to you.
So we're gonna start on what's worked well in the last 12 months. And so let's start with something a bit fun, which is what are the things that right away pop into your mind with your favorite memories?
Vikki: Well, Jenn knows this, some of my listeners will know this. 2022 has been quite the year, I think it's fair to say. So my favorite memories of 2020 have to start with my wonderful then boyfriend Andy asking me to marry him, um, in springtime. So that is absolutely a top highlight of the year. I also moved house, so moving back closer to my family and being back here has been a huge highlight.
I had my inaugural lecture, so in the UK as Jenn knows, but for listeners, when you get made professor you get to do your inaugural lecture, which is kind of about your life and all those sorts of things. Jenn and I both got my professor in 2020 in the midst of the pandemic, so I finally only just got round to doing mine and that was a real highlight. It ironically ended up being my first lecture as a professor and my last lecture before I left. So that was a real moment. Starting my business was another big thing, having my first paying clients and all that sort of stuff. So yeah, I would say those are the… they feel like quite big life things, don't they?
Jenn: Yeah. And those are fantastic memories and I bet Andy when he listens to this, will be really relieved that the proposal is number one.
Vikki: Of course!
Jenn: But I think also maybe to say too is that when we think back on our memories, they don't always have to be the big stuff. It can be some small stuff, but it's the things when you think, you know what, sometimes you look back on those pictures on your phone or those moments that pop on your social media feed where you're just like, these were the small things that they were, they were special and important. And actually, with this question, I love to start off with because right away I could see, as soon as I asked it, you smiled and I can almost see lift in terms of like, Ooh, this is gonna be fun. And so just getting down those memories, maybe like trips that you've taken or, you know, activities that you've done. Just, just those things.
Vikki: So I have a couple of examples I think of small things. So my dog, Marley, that you know, is highly reactive to other dogs. He's a super good boy, but he is somewhere between scared and excited with other dogs and we knew moving back here, my mom has a dog and we were going to need them to be able to be in the same house and this was a massive source of stress. We did tons of work, slowly introducing them and things like that. And, this year, the early part of this year was the first time that they were able to walk around my mum's house both off the lead and just ignoring each other and I nearly cried. Um, so that is a real memory for me.
Also, Andy, my fiance has teenage daughters, my stepdaughters and I'm officially allowed to call them that now because he checked and I'm very excited. So I have lots of happy memories of us absorbing into being a family of four. So there's, there's a lot of small things there of us just playing stupid computer games together and things like that, that are definitely very dear to my heart too, even though they're just small things.
Jenn: Yeah. And taking stock of that, pulling it all together starts to paint a really lovely picture of a year and focusing on the happy memories. Sometimes, the way our brains are wired is that it's easier to recall the negative stuff that happened than the positive. We have to work a little bit harder at it.
And so starting with that question puts us on a really good front moving forward because it now helps us to move straight into the next one, which is what are the things that you achieved in the last 12 months? So in what ways do you feel like the years been a success?
Vikki: Okay. So that, that automatically gears my brain towards more work things. And you'll probably advise me in a minute that there's probably other ways that I could define success too. But from a work perspective, I finished two coaching qualifications this year. I'm super proud of that because I did it alongside what, you know, is a very busy, full-time job as an academic. So that was, that really took enormous amount of my time and effort and things.
And I was going to say, sticking to things isn't always my strong point. I do finish things. I'm trying to remove the belief that I don't stick to things because I do, I'm trying to sort of reduce that in my head, but to have committed to those and com and completed them, I'm really, really proud of that, so I'd say that is a success. Um, I'm also, I'm also mostly pleased with where my businesses at, at the moment. Inevitably with a brain like mine. I want to be going faster, but, I've had amazing clients who've said really nice things about what they've, what they've achieved and the changes they've experienced through my coaching.
Some of that's in my free group coaching. Some of that is in my individual paying clients. And so that feels like a massive success when I have clients who renew their packages with me because they want to carry on, where they can see the progress they're making and they want to carry on working with me, that feels like, like huge success as well.
Jenn: Yeah. And you know, our brains often go to the work things and so those are the big things. I'm also thinking of the stuff that you did to get that going. So the fact that you developed some skills around building a website, getting a podcast going, there's lot, lots of things that you, that you achieved this year that helped you to get to those big moments, where you pass that course or you got that business going. So maybe just take a few moments to, to think about not just the outcomes that you got, but some of the things that you had to develop to help you get to get there.
Vikki: Yeah, I think that's really important because I think we often only measure it in terms of the end goal being achieved, but as soon as you said that, you're absolutely right. There's been a whole lot of structural stuff. You know, you move away from a university and suddenly you're like, hang on, I don't have Zoom, I don't have anywhere to put courses.
I don't have any transcription software. I need to figure out all this stuff. And I have had to do all of that to, to get the business to where it is at the moment. And yeah, I think in terms of the preparing and completing the coaching courses, I had to fit it in the gaps and I had to put time aside for it.
And I had to prioritize doing practice coaching and going to the sessions and listening to all the bug hours, hundreds thousand of hours of other people coaching that I've listened to. And that does mean that there's other things that I haven't done this year and I'm quite proud of that. I'm quite proud that I sort of focused in this year much more than I, I have done in previous years.
Jenn: And that is so excellent that you can look back and pick out those things because sometimes when we think back, you think, oh, what did I actually achieve, but you forget all the things that you had to put in place to get to those, those outcomes. You're thinking, where did all my time go? That that's where your time went. And so taking stock on not just the outcomes, but the things that you did to get there, the, the processes is, that's how I refer to them, can be super, super helpful. And I'm so glad that you're talking about what you're most proud of, because that's also a really good way to kind of help you work out what is the most meaningful things to you.
And when you start to run out of ideas, another way to help unlock more things is to kind of look at it from a different perspective. So I'm going to ask you to think about how the people who are closest to you would look at your year and say, what did you achieve? So what, what do you think they would answer? And how would that be different from one ones you just gave.
Vikki: You're gonna make me cry now. I know Andy would say that I have created our home here. So one of the things I do do is sort of go, oh my God, I didn't make enough progress in my business in September. It was my first month being full time and Andy always reminds me, you literally did everything because he works an hour away from here.
He's deputy head. He has a really busy job. And so I was the one who was coordinating the people putting in the carpets and putting up the utility room cupboards. And we moved from an old house to a modern house and lots of our furniture was really old. And so there was quite a lot of buying of furniture and those sorts of things.
And these were all luxury problems. I don't want to present this as stressful. We've been super lucky, but it was a lot of decisions and a lot of coordinating. We’re in a new-build, so it’s making the snagging list and making sure they actually do the snagging list and all of those things. I know Andy would say that a really big success is that home feels like home and that's, that's really important to all of us.
I know my family would say, so my, my sort of family of origin would say that, my decision to move back here was a big success. So for those of you who don't know, I moved to Birmingham as a undergraduate student when I was 18 and never left.
So I went from undergraduate to professor in the same department and have lived in Birmingham that whole time. So like 26 years. No one ever thought I would move back to my village and whilst I was working in universities, that just wouldn't have ever been possible. And, I moved back partly because I wanted that change of lifestyle.
but I also moved back because my family are really, really important and they're here and some of their health isn't as good as it could be. And then I've got nieces and nephews growing up all around this area and I wanted to prioritize that. And I know that came, not that I wanted to prioritize. It came as a shock, but the fact that I was actually going to do it and move back was a really good shock for the family.
And so I think there's some success there around being able or willing to make that really big life change to, to come back here.
Jenn: Yeah. And, and these are huge, huge things. Being able to make big life decisions, to be essentially a project manager of a massive project moving house, setting up a new home that involved lots of skills and lots of achievements.
And, uh, you know, I'm so glad that you, you picked up on those things by just thinking about it from someone else's perspective, because right away it shifted you off of work and onto home, family and other things. So, so sometimes actually looking at from different perspectives can help us to unlock things that we haven't quite seen for ourself, but also to get maybe more balanced view on it as well.
**Strange squeaking in the background**
Vikki: Can you hear that? Marley is dreaming
Jenn: He wants to be on the podcast?
Vikki: Well, I mean, Marley is always a success in my life. . In fact, I'd say 80% of the photos on my phone are me and Marley, so he is a clear success too.
Jenn: So the, the next question for us to think about is, and, and some of it you've answered already, but I'm going to ask it anyways. Sometimes a little repetition is useful because it might help us to uncover things we hadn't quite got around thinking about on the previous one. So, this one, it's around what were important projects completed.
Vikki: Important projects completed. So definitely the coaching qualifications, definitely the, you know, you referred to the house move as a project, so, um, and bold definitions of projects. I guess it was, say that for sure. Um, setting up this podcast was a massive project.
Um, so it now is something that sort of ticks over as part of my standard work week. Um, but the whole, how am I gonna do it? How am I gonna record it? How long is it gonna last? What's it gonna be? All of those things. Making the little artwork for the icon and all that stuff. I hope you like it, I'm super proud of it.
So those are big projects. We're starting to plan the wedding. That's going to be a project. I have a venue and a dress and a photographer, so that project is underway. The other thing I think I have, because it feels so long ago, because I think they, you can tell me if other people experience this.
I sometimes find when I'm reviewing my year, I struggle with the first half of the year cuz it just feels so long ago that I think in my head I neglected a little bit. I had 25 dissertation students this year all doing their own projects, and I love them all dearly. If any of you are listening, I miss you.
But that was huge. So I think finishing out last academic year and wrapping up a 20 year career and sort of finishing things off, handing things over was actually more of a project than I probably recognized looking back. Because it feels like ancient history now.
Jenn: Yeah. And, well done because, Sometimes the things that happen more recently are the easiest things to remember, but by gathering up the photos, prompts can be really useful tools for this type of looking looking and so, people do it differently. Some have paper diaries, online diaries, you know, social media feeds, but essentially you probably have this record of your year without even realizing it. So just pulling that all together as you work through this type of reflection can be useful.
But also say it doesn't have to be exhausted either. Because already I think you've picked up on some of the most important things for you and that's, really, that point because already I get the sense it's filling you with this like, wow, actually there's so much more to this year than I really am giving myself credit for, because my immediate thoughts were like these two or three things, but actually you've come up with 7, 8, 9, 10 things just through those first three questions and that's really the point.
Vikki: And I love that idea of almost triangulating different sources because I can imagine, PhD students listening to this, academics listening to this might go to monthly reviews with your supervisor, things like that, members of staff do annual performance reviews. So I can imagine going to those sorts of documents for what projects you've done and things. But actually we all know that just keeping that particular piece of kit functioning in the laboratory because it breaks down every 10 minutes and you worked out why and got it sorted.
Those things don't necessarily go on progress forms, but were huge projects, you know, getting your ethics applications sorted or whatever it might be. So I love that idea and just wanted to highlight for people listening, that, that idea of looking in several different places where you might have a record of what you've done this year.
Jenn: I think that's a good point because everyone will have their own kind of repository. When I started doing this type of review a couple years ago, I think I realized that what I was writing down was mostly work stuff and so actually this has really helped me to start to think about actually I need to record the good stuff that's happened in my life as well. And so when I take stock, I'm thinking about those things and not just the work stuff, so that that's another way to also maybe able to move it, move it forward, but, and it helps us to maybe take the next step into our questions.
So we've really focused the first bit on, on more of the outcomes. I've started to prompt you around the processes, but now we're going to dive more into processes. Okay. So, so let's start by asking you about the good habits that you have developed or maintained over this year. So, I'm not interested in the bad ones,
Vikki: Because you know my bad habits already.
Jenn: I I do, yes, I do.
Vikki: You've seen them firsthand.
Jenn: But we're taking a strength based approach and so I don't think we often take stock of the good habits because maybe they're so automatic we’re taking them for granted. When actually you have to work to get them there. And good habits are just as easy to lose as bad habits, so let's name them, let's identify them so that you can feel really proud that you have these good habits.
Vikki: Okay. One thing that jumped out as you were talking is I think I've been really brave this year. I don’t know whether being brave is a habit, but I'm going with it. I jumped into both of the coaching qualifications and was like, yeah, going to do it. It's alongside my work, it's huge, but I'm going to do it.
Obviously the decision to move, the decision to leave work, to go full time on the business, let's frame it as a habit of taking big steps, quite boldly. Um, I sometimes overthink them beforehand, but when I do it, I'm quite happy to, to do it. So I think that's one, and that's now helping me too, in that I'm feeling quite comfortable now being bold about approaching people, about the PhD training courses that I'm going to be offering at universities and things like that.
I feel quite happy to just message people and be like, hello, this is amazing. Your students should have it. Let's talk. So I think, does that count as a habit? Is that the sort of thing?
Jenn: You know what? I think we can, because you know, a habit is something, I think a behavior that you develop and then when you can start to use it easily without having to think about it too much, then it's become a habit.
It's also one of your strengths, so we'll come onto strengths in a minute. So, you know, being brave is an important quality that, that you have and you are able to use that quality to help move forward on big, big goals. So it really is part of the important processes that you've had this year, but let’s think too about even the small things, the things that you, that you do maybe on a daily basis without even thinking about it, but sort of support you in being healthier, being happier, being more productive.
Vikki: This is gonna sound like a funny one, but it absolutely is a habit I stand by, I am really good at resting. So resting is probably not the right word. I am really good at boundaries around work and fun stuff. So one of the things that I saw is that academia can become all consuming.
It can become everything you do. There's no time to do anything else. There's no time to have any hobbies. You just can't do it. And I have always had the habit of doing other things. And so I've always had that habit that if I don't have things booked for an evening I've done circus, I've done comedy, I've done all sorts of random things.
And I think that was really important in academia. I know I've talked on the podcast before about how that was part of what helped me to be able to leave because my whole identity wasn't wrapped up in academia, but it's also helping me now, you know, anyone who's set up their own business knows that it's really easy for it to become all consuming.
But I think a habit I do have is that mostly when I shut down in the evening, I've shut down and I'm not going back and doing work things. I'm not eating into family time with work. I need to get better at the starting in the morning bit of it, but I'm really good at stopping in the evening bit.
Jenn: But as, as a good habit. It's something that brings you all kinds of benefits from what you've just described. And, one of them is that it's given you the opportunity to try out different activities and it doesn't almost matter what the activities were. It's not, not having done the activities, the habit, the habit is actually being able to separate work from life and then creating the time to be able to enjoy different things.
And I know from, I, obviously knowing you well, but they've given you new people in your life. They've given you new skills. They've given you, you know, I think also strengths that you hadn't realized in terms of like performing with CircusMash.
Vikki: Maybe I'll post that video online.
Jenn: Yeah, that'd be great. That also leads us straight into talking about your strengths and your qualities. So, you already mentioned a couple of them, but what are the ones that pop into your mind in terms of what do you think are your greatest strengths?
Vikki: So on top of the ones I've said enthusiasm. Enthusiasm is always a strength. Um, it's something that, I don't know, just make, keeps things feeling positive. I know it's something that people around me generally enjoy. Sometimes it's a bit much. My dad used to talk about getting Vikkied when I was too over enthusiastic. But mostly I think people feel like it's a bit infectious and they, they leave feeling more enthused than they started.
So definitely enthusiasm. What other strengths? Another strength, and again, might not sound like a strength at first, is, I do overthink, but I also don't care too much. So one of the things with, for example, making this podcast is I could be super perfectionist about it. I could script it all out. I could record it five times to make sure it's perfect.
I could spend hours and hours and hours researching all the most up to date research to make sure that absolutely everything's evidenced all the way through I could do all of those things, but actually I think it would then be a really struggle, real struggle to produce a weekly podcast, and you'd probably lose some of the humanness of it.
So I think a strength of mine is that I'm quite good at going put it out there, that I will do, happy days. People like it. Without sort of going. did I say Um too many times? Was it too personal? Was it too impersonal? Was it boring? It's like, okay, it's done, people will find it valuable. It's useful. Let's get it out. So I think that's probably a quality that's proving quite useful at the moment as well.
Jenn: Yeah. And knowing you as I do, I absolutely, totally agree and, and one of the, one of the things we talked about, having different perspectives be really valuable. So thinking about it from, one of your best friends, maybe that's where I can help you out with be more strengths as well. So I think it's also okay to ask the people around you to say, well, what, what would you say are my greatest strengths? And for me, I would say that some of your greatest strengths is your creativity.
So you've got incredibly creative mind and you are such a good problem solver. So if anybody's got a problem, you can come up with a solution and usually your brain's jumped five steps ahead to work out exactly how it should be done. I mean, not too many people have that, that ability. So there's so many strengths, but one of the things that I've found in, in my own work is that helping people to reflect on strengths can be a skill in and of itself.
And, there's lots of things out there that can help. So there is, uh, for example, the Values in Action website where you can fill out a very long survey to work out your signature strengths. And there's also the Gallup Strength Finder. So some people use, use that to work out. Um, what are your strengths?
They're very different strengths on these two different tools. But, one of the things that we've done on our own website, so it's Sports Psychology Reaching New Territories, the SPRINT project. And on there we've got a tool for helping you to reflect on your strengths in a way that makes it really meaningful to you because you come up with the labels for your strengths.
It's not predetermined things that you get on these other websites, which can, can be very useful if that's something that you struggle with. But, on this strengths tool, it helps you to create a profile of your strengths with the idea being that once you have an idea what those strengths are, you are in a better position to use them.
And so the more we use our strengths, then the stronger the strengths get, then we start to also be able to use them to offset maybe areas that we wanna develop too. And that's, that's really quite a lovely way. So in other words, we do know that when we use our strengths, some of our weaknesses take care of themselves without actually having to pay attention to them.
Where we put our energy and attention is often where we see our success, but sometimes the weaknesses just take care of themselves then.
Vikki: I love that because I think before I got more involved in the kind of coaching and that side of things, I did still focus, despite your advice over the years, I did still focus on the things that I needed to get better at doing. I was a little bit obsessed that I didn't have enough of a routine, that I wasn't good at sticking to habits. I wasn't consistent. I needed to be organized and capable and on it and those things. Um, And there was a period of my life where in the attempt to fix those things, I was squishing some of the things that were best about me.
And I loved the idea. I can really see how creativity, problem solving, enthusiasm, it’s very kind of you to say I have those strengths, but those sorts of strengths, how they could really make it not that necessary for me to have really consistent, organized, highly structured practice.
And that actually, if I keep being creative and problem solving and being enthusiastic about it, I'm going to get loads of things done that are important and valuable. So yeah, it feels different, you know, I can, I can feel in myself a like, “yeah, I can do more of that. That would be great” kind of thing.
And I hope our listeners are starting to, you know, we're going to give you the questions afterwards, you’ll be able to get them from Jenn. But even as you listen, I hope you are starting to think, okay, what would be my strengths?
Jenn: So, moving on then, we talked about your strengths. We talked about how you've used some of those strengths. So let's move on to a different kind of question. I'm gonna ask now, when you think back on your year, what was time well spent and what was money well spent.
Vikki: Oooh I love this. Time well spent was Andy. Um, I, it would. So I was single for a really long time, as you know. And so I had a really rich life outside of work.
Tons of different friends, tons of different activities that I was doing and things. And when I met Andy and things I thought could get serious and amazing, um, I did have to make some decisions about how I was going to do my time and it would've been quite easy to see him once or twice a week, try and keep up all my previous hobbies, all my previous everythings.
And it's not that I ditched everything by any stretch, but I thought it could go somewhere and I put time into it and I'm obviously super, super glad that I did because everything is wonderful. So I think that's probably the biggest thing. That's probably the thing where there was the real decision about how I was spending. Time. Um, and now I'm just in this last few months, I'm just so able to see my family for like 15 minutes just because I'm bored and not getting any work done. So I'll walk over with the dog and say hello and have a cup of tea and come back.
And being able to put time in like that is, is really, really meaningful for me. I think I'm pretty good at keeping up. Old friends as well. So obviously I've moved away from Birmingham, so lots of people there, like you are becoming further away and things like that.
And I always wish I'd put more time in, but any time I spend connecting with people like you and other old friends that are around the country that I don't necessarily get to see face to face as much as I would like. any time I spend on that always feels like good time. Um, my wedding is going to be filled well with you and with, um, several people that I've known for 30 years, 40 years, and that's really lovely.
Jenn: Putting time into relationships as a is a really big one. So money well spent then
Vikki: Whew. We spent a whole ton of money putting stuff into the house. We've been pretty sensible with that though, so I, I feel like that's money well spent because we've, we've not been excessive on it. So that is good money spent. I've spent money on coaching. I have individual coaching and in my opinion, that is always money well spent. An enormous amount of what I've not just achieved, but the kind of the way I've lived for the last few years has been because of those individual and group coaching programs that I've been part of. So I will shout out Kristin Carder, Focused and the I have ADHD podcast is amazing. Paula Englebretson, I've also had individual coaching from. I am now joining Karin Nordine’s program, and so I'm spending money on that too.
So definitely check out all of those if you're listening. So that money spent on personal development has been great.
The other thing that was money well spent, and Andy will not forgive me if I don't mention it. Andy has always claimed to be a minimalist. He moved in here with very little stuff other than tools.
He is now, partly thanks to me, the proud owner of an absolutely obscene amount of Lego, like obscene amount of Lego. And so he would want me to say that all the money I have spent on Lego was definitely money well spent because it made him very happy.
Jenn: Yeah. And I'm definitely sensing a pattern in terms of, um, you know, really this year being a lot about relationships for you and how, how actually so much of what we talked about in terms of time, money, achievements has come down to that.
And I think one of the nice things about doing this kind of reflection is that you do start to see those patterns in terms of what has been the focus of your year. And it often all starts to make sense to you, like, yeah, that that's, that's why. But rather than getting into the cycle of like, where has it gone and what have I done no, actually, I hope that by talking this through, you can start to see how full and busy and exciting, but also very meaningful and important are the things that you've done and why you've done them and how you've done them.
And it gives yourself more credit than you probably realized.
Vikki: Definitely. Because one of the things I did realize as I went through my photos was that I haven't done as many cool and fun things as I usually do. So I volunteerws for the Commonwealth Games, which is one thing that I have completely forgotten to mention so far, which was a really big and amazing thing.
But usually I volunteer on adventure races, I do paddleboard polo tournaments. I do all sorts of random bits of pieces. And when I was looking at the photos, my initial reaction was a bit like loads of really, really good stuff. Don't get me wrong, 2022 is gonna be a year that goes down in my memory, like a proper milestone year.
But there was part of me that was a bit like, but you haven't done those things. But when you say it like that, the theme around relationships and stuff and that you can't focus on everything, all the year because then it's not a focus, but actually I'm like, you know what?
That's cool. There hasn't been as many stupid, ridiculous adventure things, partly, pandemic driven, it has to be said, but there hasn't been as many of those things. But that's okay because if you'd told me… I mean, mate, the conversations we've had, if we'd been told 18 months ago that I would be engaged, running my own business, not working academia, both of us would think that we're absolutely, you know, that was just not on the agenda.
And so, so yeah, I think it's really, interesting to try and pull out what's your theme of the year like that and really recognize how big that's been
Jenn: And if you had just only focused on what hadn't gone well, then actually probably would've come away with very different feelings about the year.
Than by taking a look at it in this way. Already, you're starting to go. Oh yeah, that bit’s okay. I've done it in previous years, but this year it's been about other things. It's been about other things and actually it's been about wonderful, exciting things that have helped my life feel fuller and different and yeah.
Which is so exciting and leads me straight into the next question, which is, and I think you're gonna enjoy this one. Who has supported you, nurtured you, and who have you enjoyed supporting and nurturing?
Vikki: Oh, okay. This is, I'm pulling overwhelmed faces for those listening on the podcast. So many people which is really lovely to look back and think.
So obviously Andy and the girls and my family here. People like you, people like, I'm not going to list off all my friends, because then if I forget somebody, then I'm going to offend them, but the list would be too long. I've been supported by old friends. I've been supported by colleagues in the department where we used to, where you work, where I used to work. So yeah, I particularly value, I think the, the support that my parents have given me, because I think it would've been very, very easy for them to tell me leaving a secure professorship at a prestigious university to set up your own business, because you want to is a ridiculous idea. It would've been very easy for them to be like, oh, what are you doing? And they have been all in on all of it and that has been, that has been huge.
And then who have I enjoyed supporting? I mean, hopefully all of those people back, hopefully my family, you, my other friends. I feel like they're all really reciprocal relationships and I hope other people feel like that too.
I've loved supporting my clients, whether they're the freebies that come on to my group coaching on Wednesdays or whether they're, um, my paid clients. Um, I loved supporting my students while I still had them and I miss them. And I love this podcast. I hope that the people who listen to this podcast feel like it's support too, because that's how it's intended to feel.
So I hope that people would agree that I'm, I'm supporting the people listening to this podcast too.
Jenn: Yeah. And, and of course we won't forget Marley in all this.
Vikki: Oh yes. He supports me. Oh my goodness. I can't forget the four-legged one. He’s sat down there as we speak. He is within two meters of me at all times. And even though there are occasions where I want to leave him on the doorstep for somebody else to take away when he's just barked at another dog again, um, he's, yeah, he's absolutely a support for me all the time.
Jenn: And I think that's one of the nice things about focusing on this question, it brings a whole new dimension to our year as well. It just gives a kind of warm, buzzy feeling of all the support going both ways you receiving and you giving. And just that recognizing of that is, is just a lovely moment when we reflect back
Vikki: So I feel super positive, but just to play devil's advocate here. There may be people listening who don't feel they've been well supported this year. So for me that question is wonderful because it brings me warm fuzzies and I genuinely can't think of anybody that I wish I had support from that I don't. So for me that's an entirely positive question.
And I guess with any of these questions, how would you advise somebody who looks at those and goes “I don't feel like I have been supported or I don't feel like I have had any good habits. So I don't feel like I have had any successes.”
Jenn: Yeah. And that's where some of the coaching, self-coaching can come into play. So, what I would then ask the person is just to give a sense of that on a scale like one to 10?
So let's say one is the worst it could possibly be in terms of how you spent your time and ten is the best it could be. So of course those are arbitrary, but it's what's meaningful to you. And I'd ask the person where, on that, on that scale would they be, and it could be that they tell me, one, they could say, actually I minus one, they could say, actually maybe it's about a five, but whatever the number is, we, we can then work from that. It might need some creativity to work it out. So for example, on the, the relationship question who supports and who do you support?
It may take a bit of creativity, but there will be something there. And it's a starting point to work from. And the reason why I believe in it's because, having worked for a long time on a project with young people experiencing homelessness, you would think this is a group where social support is an issue.
And for some it would be really difficult for them to come up with answer to those questions. And we do an activity called a dream team, where we get them thinking about different people in their lives and who supports them and using the analogy of the football team. So for example, who's their team manager?
Who's their coach, you know. But for some they couldn't always name a person. So sometimes it was a pet or sometimes it was an object. So I guess we don't have to have a very fixed definition of these things too. There's no hard and fast rules.
We can come at it in very creative, very broad ways to make it meaningful, important to the person. Because remember I said at the beginning, that's actually kind of the key rule that we're following here. And so we can also, we can also, you know, park the question too. We don't need to have to answer it right now too.
We can come back to it another time that, that, that's okay as well. So in other words, we don't have to just automatically assume who that just because our first instinct is that we can’t answer it, doesn’t mean that with a little bit of more digging reflection, you might be able to get there.
It's just that our answers may not be what we were expecting at the beginning.
Vikki: I love that and I love the idea of being creative with it. Things that ping into my head, I could imagine people feeling that they're supported by the person who sells them their Starbucks in the morning or even, you know, if you're someone who's really into mu, you know, you feel supported by Taylor Swift because her songs make you really think that people understand you or whatever it is. I could imagine people feeling supported by people they don't even know. Perhaps people feel supported by people they follow on Twitter because they just see that somebody else is struggling with the same things that they are.
Jenn: And you don't need to have a fixed notion about what that means, but actually being flexible and really trying to embrace it in, in that sort of way.
And I think you can unlock all kinds of answers for yourself. So it could be something as small as I'm commuting and the nice person who works at the train station looks like when I'm strugglingwith my bags opens the gate for me that kind of small thing can make such a big difference.
So let's, let's move on to another one and in this one again, thinking back on our year and thinking back to times maybe when we experienced obstacles, setbacks, and what I want us to focus on is what are the things you did to overcome them?
So it doesn't really matter what the obstacle setbacks were, but what were the things that helped you overcome them?
Vikki: Ooh, okay. I mean, all that support, so all the people around me definitely. Constraint. And I know for, you’ve know me long enough will know that that has been a long time coming and something I'm working on, but one thing that has definitely helped is really learning to believe, and I now think I'm at a stage where I can say, I do believe, that I don't have to do everything. That I can generate the life I want with fewer things than I thought I did. And I, when I say things, I don't mean stuff.
I don't mean I've never been someone who needed to buy lots of things, but I mean, I always have thought I had to have 50 different hobbies and 50 different friends and 500 projects going on at work. So constraint has really helped. I don't think I would've got through spring and summer the way I did if I hadn't accepted that because I was doing those coaching qualifications, I had ridiculously busy academic term, and I had the wonderful Andy, that other things were going to have to give and that that was okay. So I think constraint helped enormously.
I think a healthy dose of blind optimism has helped. A sort of just belief that this will all work out, that the world needs the service that I want to provide through my business, and therefore that one way or another I'm gonna make this work so that I can support PhD students and academics.
Jenn: Excellent. And you know, through these different questions, but ask them in different ways, I think what we've done is hopefully revealed to yourself a long list of strengths. So we start off with bravery, we end up with optimism, but there's a whole long list in between. Actually thinking back on our year in very positive strength-based ways, but using different perspectives, using different kind of questions, sometimes we have some overlapping answers, but actually we come up with all kinds of really good interesting stuff.
So how, how are you feeling now about your year having, having done this reflection?
Vikki: More emotional than I thought I would be. Really positive. It's interesting how much it's making me spin forwards and think about exactly what you intend. Thinking about how I can use those and maximize going forwards and what do I want, and not even more of necessarily, but how can I just keep doing those things and, and recognizing those things.
Because I think it's really easy, and I'm sure listeners will resonate with this, it's really easy to take for granted the things that you find easy and the things that come somewhat naturally to you. So some of those qualities I've talked about, things like constraint are things that I've really worked on and so those are things that I feel super proud of. No one will tell me that's easy because that's something I've struggled with my whole life and I feel like I'm really making progress with. Whereas being brave enough to just jump in is something that my parents will tell you I did a lot as a child usually into something muddy or off something I shouldn't be jumping off and so some of those things I think it's easy to take those for granted. And so I think this sort of process that you've taken me through of identifying what those are and kind of going “actually there's a lot of people that those would be the things they consider their weakness that they would like to change about themselves”, I think it's really nice to sort of, to recognize that.
So it's make you feel very satisfied and motivated, which is good.
Jenn: That is exactly the aim of it. And because you're absolutely right. The next step, which is beyond this kind of podcast, is start to think about what is it that you want to continue doing? What is it that you want to maybe start doing more of?
Because maybe there strengths still to be uncovered, strengths still to be developed. Maybe there's strengths that you could use in different ways for different things. Like a strength you might just use for work, maybe you could be using over here for your family or relationship or vice versa. So the next step would be to start thinking about it.
And one of the ones I like using is this just a basic Stop Start Continue. We don't need to be complicated here. just have a way to build on this reflection because right away our brains start to move forward and think, okay, so what's next? What's going to happen next year? Where do I want to move towards?
What is it I want to achieve? And so before you even do that, use this reflection to help you create the vision of what 2023 is going to be for you. And that's when you start to think about how is it that you're going to use these strengths to achieve what's coming up next for you? You know, you got a wedding in the future, you’ve got a business you're continuing to plan build, but there'll be other things up ahead and how, how can these strengths be to really help you get the most out of your year?
Vikki: I love that. And I know our listeners will be feeling just as motivated and energized by that as well. And I really hope all of you listening take the time to really sort of ponder some of these questions for your own lives so that you can identify your own strengths and the things that you've got through this year and the things that you've achieved and enjoyed, so that you can go into 2023 feeling as excited and motivated as I do right now. Thank you so much, Jenn.
Jenn: You're very welcome. And I would just say as one final step before you sign off, which is when you finish the reflection, you need to celebrate having done this review because this it’s been mentally and emotionally, something to go through.
I brought you around from, um, the start going, this is interesting, this is different to, ooh, this is quite emotional, to wow, I learned something about myself. So how are you going to celebrate? Doesn't have to be a big thing, but how are you going to celebrate having done this review?
Vikki: I'm going to celebrate the way I always do, which is by telling Andy and telling my Mum. And you've already made me think I have, you know, I have my two teenage stepdaughters now, you've already made me think that these would be really interesting questions to ask them too. So I think I will be celebrating myself. I've always been jealous, you know, I have always been jealous of your amazing reviews and bullet journals and your ability to stick to all of those things and have this incredible, like, catalogue of the things you've done over the last 10 years and stuff.
And so I don't underestimate how much doing a review like this is, is important and something to celebrate. So I think that's, that's really important and I will. So what I was going to say though is thank you so much. As usual, you're amazing and I hope you'll come back on the podcast at some point in the future, cuz I know you have a million things that you could contribute and that our listeners would love to hear from.
If they want to hear more from you in the meantime or find out more about this, how would they go about that?
Jenn: You just need to come along to visit our website, which is sprint project org. We've got blogs, we've got tools, everything's free, and people find it really, really useful.
So anything you hear today will, you'll find the tools to help support you through it.
Vikki: Amazing. And on Twitter, you are @drjenncumming Is that right?
Jenn: @DrJennCumming on Twitter.
Vikki: Perfect because Jenn also in another life gives amazing advice about writing and writing routines and structuring your writing and all those sorts of things. So if you want to know more about that, make sure you're following her on Twitter too. I will put her Twitter handle and the links in the show notes on my website. So thank you so much, Jenn. I really appreciate it. And thank you everyone for listening.
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