I flew to Moscow in 2016 partly to meet an extraordinary man.
A man for whom work, life, and purpose have become one.
Albert Shiryaev, 86—a renowned mathematician and professor at Moscow State University.
He did his PhD next to the father of Probability Theory, Andrey Kolmogorov.
As a mathematician, I always admired the famous Russian mathematicians—and this was a reason I learned Russian.
It was a snowy Friday afternoon when I met Albert.
I had to convince a student to let me in as their guest otherwise it would have been impossible to enter the building.
I didn’t know if he was there but I was determined to find him.
While I was wandering in the long corridors, old photos on the walls caught my attention.
It was scholars who had passed away.
What struck me was that most of them got to live until their late 80’s or 90’s.
A coincidence?
How was that possible in a country where the life expectancy was only in the 105th position?
When I met him, I understood it wasn’t a coincidence.
This man’s aura was something else…
It was Friday afternoon and as you see in the picture I look exhausted, whereas his face is full of energy!
We had a short chat and then he said, “Angelos, I apologise but we are too busy today and I’ll have to go back to work”—and he left accompanied by his research students.
Later, I realised that this man doesn’t simply “work”.
I’ll never forget the respect and love he received from everyone around him.
The same love Andrey Kolmogorov gave and received from his students on those long walks in the forest talking about mathematics and life.
Andrey Kolmogorov giving and receiving love.
I understood why life is given to these people.
The ones who never retire.
The ones for whom work, life and purpose have become one.
I’ll finish with my favourite quote by James A. Michener:
“The master in the art of living makes little distinction between his work and his play, his labour and his leisure, his mind and his body, his information and his recreation, his love and his religion. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence at whatever he does, leaving others to decide whether he is working or playing. To him, he’s always doing both.”
It’s part of human nature to want to believe that something is absolutely true or absolutely false.
Human beings don’t like uncertainty.
An absolute true or false means we can take action in the right direction with absolute confidence.
And if we’re stuck because we’re uncertain about something, we often find a way to trick ourselves to certainty in order to go ahead and take some action.
That’s not necessarily bad. Belief promotes action which then proves or disproves the initial belief.
You may suffer some losses as a result of your actions, but in the end, there is definitely learning, and learning is always good, no?
Do you believe what I’ve just said?
If you read again, you will see I have my own beliefs. I’ve chosen to believe that learning is good because it promotes experimentation in my life.
I am open to suffering some losses because I believe this is how I’ll ultimately achieve success. But it’s just me and what I’ve chosen to believe.
I’m saying all this because, as you’ll see below, research showed that the efficacy of our affirmations depends on the degree to which we believe them.
For example, no matter how many times and how loud you shout, “I’m a superman”, it will make no difference if you don’t believe this statement deep inside.
I’m talking about positive affirmations— positive statements that you say to yourself to counteract limiting thoughts and uplift yourself.
Before you continue, you may wish to watch a couple of videos first.
In these videos, my friends and experts psychologists, Dr Sophie Henshaw and Bill O’Hanlon share their opinions on positive affirmations with me.
This is my complete guide with a whole new and effective approach on how to deal with anxiety.
In this guide, I will NOT ask you to:
meditate
do yoga
go for a walk
visit the gym
eat more veggies
delete your FB account
sniff jasmine essential oil
touch crystals
These are all great things we can do to manage our anxiety—but only manage.
None of these things goes deep into the root of anxiety. It’s the same as taking a pain killer. It certainly makes you feel better, but it doesn’t treat the cause of the problem.
I’m not saying “stop meditation” or “eat junk food”. If you’ve found a way to deal with the anxiety symptoms, that’s a good start.
But, if you only eat broccoli and pumpkin seeds to calm your anxiety, and you’re still struggling, please keep reading!
I’ve been there.
There was a time I ran away from work like a kid who runs away from school.
There was a time I didn’t sleep for two weeks.
There was a time I almost had back surgery to alleviate the physical pain created by my anxiety.
A London’s Royal Ballet teacher—we’ll call her Olivia—called me the other day complaining about her severe back pain, “I can’t get off my bed in the morning”.
Olivia’s story matched my own story (which I’ll share with you later) and the story of my other coaching clients I’ve helped with anxiety—all high-performing, successful, hard-working, military-disciplined individuals with a bag of dreams.
Olivia convinced herself that years of training and dancing left her with permanent damage in her back.
She felt frustration, anger, and fear, “Why is this happening to me? I hate this pain! It’s ruined my life”.
Although I’m not a doctor, I suspected that Olivia’s back was fine.
The physical pain she experienced was a manifestation of anxiety, fear, worry, and emotional pain.
My work was to teach Olivia how to dance with her emotions—acknowledge, embrace and learn from her emotions.
When Olivia learned how to work with her emotions, the physical pain went away.
This guide is about dancing—dancing with anxiety.
Because all anxiety wants is to dance with you.
When you relax and enjoy this dance, anxiety stops becoming a problem.
In this guide:
You’ll learn why all you’ve tried hasn’t worked or hasn’t been as effective.
You’ll understand anxiety on a deeper level.
You’ll discover how to transform your relationship with anxiety and see it from a more empowering perspective.
You’ll find how to get relief from the physical pain you may be experiencing as part of your anxiety.
You’ll feel confident to go back to living a normal life, dream again, and do the things you’ve always wanted to do.
People get surprised by my reaction when they reach out to me and ask for mindset coaching.
What makes you think you need mindset coaching? Maybe you don’t, I say to them.
And although you’d expect a well-rehearsed answer to a question like that, their answers are always spontaneous, fresh, and truth-revealing.
Magic happens when you tell your story to someone who is genuinely curious and believes that everyone has all the answers within.
The process of giving structure to your thoughts and formulating the problem often reveals the answers to the problem itself.
But first of all, the role of a mindset coach or any coach is to remind his clients that there is no problem in the first place! The coach is there to help his client turn his attention to something positive that — once accomplished — eliminates the problem the client intended to solve (assuming the client ever had a problem).
Because I’ve found that when you focus on the problem, you always see the problem and you’ll never be content until the problem is solved, whereas when you focus on creating something new and beautiful in your life, you feel enthusiastic, motivated and engaged.
The role of a coach is to:
Help you to become crystal clear on your vision
Rewrite self-limiting beliefs and thoughts (install a new mindset that is aligned with your vision)
Point you to that vision and make sure you’re on track
Continue to do all this until you learn to do that yourself without his help
As Stanford Professor Carol Dweck explains in her book Mindset: The Growth Mindset is based on the belief that your basic qualities are thing you can cultivate through your efforts, your strategies, and help from others.
👉🏻 For more on mindset and how one can change their mindset, read here.
