But that changed a while ago. For most of us, somewhere around our 30′s. Then weight loss becomes a bit harder but still manageable. But during our late 30′s and most of our 40′s, that belly paunch (or beer gut or however else you want to refer to it) grows. And it seems to stay there.

Even if your mind thinks you’re a reasonably thin 20-something, the mirror reminds you otherwise. Always assuming you look in the mirror on a regular basis given that it also reminds you that you’re getting older in other ways as well.

Not to mention getting books about pregnant men for your birthday.

Grr!

If you’re like most men, the thought of a diet is an instant turn-off. Especially if it means missing out on the normal things in life like beer, good food and generally having a good time. Albeit maybe at a slower pace than a few years ago.

You know the score: less calories eaten or drunk means your body goes into fat burning mode.

You’ve tried Atkins. Which is probably the most man-friendly diet – who could resist bacon and eggs for breakfasts, steaks and all those other things that freak out the veggies in your life.

But then the craving for carbs comes back. You have a nice, crusty, piece of white bread. Or a pizza. Or some southern fried chicken (convincing yourself that it’s “almost” Atkins, ignoring the breadcrumbs and fries and upgrade options).

And because you’ve lapsed once, it’s all over. That’s the problem with any diet. We think that if we lapse once, we’re never going to succeed.

But actually that’s not the case.

Let’s face it, we’re only human.

And there’s only so many times you can turn down going out for a meal or a few drinks before you’re classed as being totally anti-social.

So, especially once we’re over 50, we need a weight loss plan that caters for that.

One of the best ones I’ve found is the Fast Diet. Although it sounds like a crash weight loss course, it isn’t.

And it’s nicely man-friendly.

You pick two days a week to “fast”. Or, actually, only eat around 600 calories a day. Which doesn’t sound a lot but is actually plenty. In a nutshell, skip breakfast or eat an apple if your stomach is rumbling. For lunch, have about 100 grams (3.5 ounces) of lean protein and as much salad (no oily dressing!) or non-starchy vegetables as you care to eat, followed by an apple or half a grapefruit or a bunch or grapes or similar. Do the same for evening meal.

Do that twice a week and eat normally the rest of the week.

It really is that simple.

And it works a treat for men over 50 because it’s rule based and they’re not complicated rules.

One other thing it pays to do with any weight loss plan – especially at our age when we think we know better – is to re-train our minds.

All those nagging voices that rattle around your head.

Not to mention that red tailed, horned, creature that sits on your shoulder and says that just this once will be fine. Even though you know that for things like cookies once is never enough.

That’s where weight loss hypnosis can come to the rescue.

Whether you snack late at night, eat the “wrong” type of food, eat when you’re bored, wolf down your food or near enough any other specific problem to do with weight loss, there’s an easy to listen to hypnosis track that can help.

Check out this range of self hypnosis weight loss MP3s that you can download instantly.

So there’s a fine line to be trodden and it could easily be argued that if you’re thick skinned enough, 999 rejections to get 1 very committed person is acceptable.

But most people would prefer a higher success rate than that, especially when they’re trying to be more persuasive over the phone where it seems it’s easier to set aside normal human values and just be plain rude and offensive. And there’s only so much rejection most people can take.

So how can you be more persuasive over the phone?

If you’re using a script – which is where a lot of people start – then you’ll need to rehearse. Ideally before you speak to a real prospect.

Think about it – if you’ve ever been called up cold by someone who’s reading from a script, you probably know it straight away.

They’re pretending to be your best long lost friend when you’ve never even heard of their company or their name.

They’re just plain liars.

And if you’re going to be more persuasive, you’ve got to set yourself aside from people like that.

What this means is designing your own script – if you’re not allowed to do that (for instance, if you’re in a call centre), strongly consider your exit plan from that job!

You need to be as comfortable with your phone technique as you are in your favourite clothes. The more natural you are on the phone, the more persuasive you’ll be because it will be congruent with your personality.

Another thing you can do – and this will work near enough every time – is stand up.

Standing up changes how your voice sounds. It automatically becomes more authoritative which in turn makes you more persuasive.

You can also try clenching your fists if there’s something you really want to get across to someone but use that technique carefully as it can make you sound too aggressive.

Another option is to use hypnosis to help change you to being more persuasive.

Hypnosis works at a deep level and will work with your subconscious mind to change you so that you become naturally more persuasive.

Just listen to this short hypnosis track a few times to help you become more persuasive over the phone and elsewhere.

But actually it’s built into us…

If you’ve ever almost fallen down a cliff or steep slope, you learned near enough instantly not to do that action again.

It’s hard wired into us.

But most of us have forgotten how to learn fast…

Speed learning is our normal way of learning. Not sitting down studying books for year after year and becoming a perpetual student.

Sure, there are times when we have to sit down and digest academic works. But they’re nowhere near as often as your teachers or professors would like you to believe.

And learning even academic works can be helped by using a technique such as photoreading, which is like doing speed reading on fast foward. Give it a go – you’ll be amazed at just how much better you comprehend a book after you speed read it first and then dip into just those chapters or sections you need.

But reading isn’t the only place that we can speed up our understanding of things.

You actually can learn fast and use accelerated learning techniques to help you learn anything faster.

Generally the more you make your learning experience multimedia, the quicker you’ll learn.

At the very least, take notes on what you’re learning. Ideally handwritten notes.

I know, you’ll probably never go back to them or ever re-read them (but you’ll probably keep them, “just in case”).

But actually that doesn’t matter.

The process of writing notes does a couple of things to reinforce the learning process.

Firstly it causes you to think about what you’re learning.

You know how you’ve maybe watched a television show but can’t really remember much of it even an hour or two later?

Well, if you’d taken notes, you’d have forced your brain to think about what was happening.

The same goes for the things you want to learn.

The seemingly simple process of taking notes changes your attention from passive to active. Which, in turn, tells your brain that you’re serious about this topic. And, in turn, that causes your brain to remember more about it – because it must be important!

There are lots of other techniques to help you learn faster. Most of them are simple – partly because we learn fast and we tend to learn simple things better!

One of them is hypnosis.

It works by conditioning your brain to learn better. And it reinforces the other techniques you’re using.

It’s easy to use – just listen to a short (19 minute) MP3 a few times and let your brain do the hard work with no real effort from you.

You can try out hypnosis to learn fast here.

You’ll find that people avoid you less and start to enjoy your company more.

And you won’t get your head bitten off quite as often in the process, so it’s pretty much win-win.

Take a breath

Often the second or two that this gives us makes all the difference between interrupting someone mid-sentence or not. This is especially true if you’re talking to someone who’s relatively slow speaking and you never quite know whether they’ve finished or have just taken a longer than normal pause (again).

Spot the signals

There are more clues when you’re speaking with someone face to face but you can spot signals even if you’re just on a phone call with the other person.

Pauses in a sentence aren’t a signal that it’s always your turn to speak. So, over time, train yourself to pick up the subtle and not so subtle signals that mean the other person has completed their part of the conversation, at least for now.

Develop your active listening skills

Active listening is just that – actively listening to what the other person is saying rather than drifting off into your own world where you’re busy working out what you’re going to say next.

Being a good listener is actually an excellent step towards stopping interrupting other people.

Not only will you find yourself interrupting them less often, you’ll also find that you contribute more to the conversation and help it to move forward.

Chill out

Sometimes our urge to interrupt or finish sentences is born from haste.

Sure, there are times when you just wish the other person would “spit it out” and say something in real time rather than a vocal version of slow motion.

But a lot of the time, it’s just our own impatience and you can control that!

Learn to relax – that’s something many adults have forgotten – and just chill out a bit more.

And if the other person’s slow conversation speeds really do bug you, maybe it’s time to find someone else to speak to or, if they’re your boss at work, find ways to minimise your time around them.

Use hypnosis

Hypnosis can help to re-train your mind to stop interrupting other people as much.

It often works behind the scenes, so you may not notice the changes happening the first time or two you listen to a self hypnosis download but the change will be happening and you’ll find yourself finishing less sentences and not interrupting others anywhere near as often.

Click here for a self hypnosis track to help you stop interrupting other people.

Everyone is different and everyone experiences pain differently.

But regardless of your pain threshold, it’s definitely worth considering using self hypnosis to help reduce the pain you’re likely to experience during natural childbirth.

Whilst it is possible to see a hypnotist to help you deal with the anticipated pain – and the anticipated joy – of your new son or daughter, it’s not always feasible to mix in visits to a hypnotist alongside all the other things that need to happen such as checkups, visits to the midwife and umpteen other things that all have to be done before childbirth. Let alone book them to sit beside you on the big day itself.

A self hypnosis MP3 is one of the best ways around that conundrum. You can listen to it at leisure and the half hour or so that the track lasts will give you a peaceful oasis at this often high pressure time.

Hypnosis is a good way to relax your mind. And – as you’ll know from all those expectant mother classes and talks – relaxation is a “must have” skill during the last few weeks of your pregnancy when it can seem as though the whole world is conspiring against you, not just the unborn child you’re carrying who’s more and more eager to make their presence (literally) felt.

It’s also a very easy way to help you prepare for your childbirth.

Top athletes rehearse their games before they take part in them and a good hypnosis track can help you do the same.

Because some of the pain associated with childbirth is pain we generate ourselves. Sure, a lot of it will happen anyway, but the more we can do to reduce its effect, the better.

And rehearsing your new child’s birth in your mind can help a lot with that.

Using self hypnosis to prepare for natural childbirth is a choice that more and more enlightened women are taking and you can try out the ideas for yourself by downloading a self hypnosis track and listening to it.

Click here to download a natural childbirth self hypnosis track.

These strategies for overcoming procrastination can help you stop procrastinating as much…

1. Just do it

Personally, I find this the best method by far. If I start something now, this instant, it doesn’t give me a chance to procrastinate on it. And then once I’ve started, it’s not usually as bad as I feared.

So the next time you hear all those voices in your head, urging you to do something (anything!) else other than what you know deep down you’re supposed to be doing, ignore them and start the project.

2. Divide and conquer

Sometimes we procrastinate because the task seems too large to ever be able to complete.

If that’s the case for the task you’re putting off, split it into bite size chunks. Tasks you can complete in maybe 15 or 30 or 60 minutes. You’ll start overcoming your procrastination this way because it’s less easy to put off something that will “only” take a few minutes. Plus it’s kind-of built into human nature to complete things once we’ve started because the nagging voice that was in our head saying “no, not now” turns into one that’s asking why we haven’t finished it yet. A kind of internal “are we there yet” that actually pushes us to completing that previously impossible task.

3. Employ the Pomodoro technique

This is a time management technique that recognises that most humans have a short attention span.

Set a timer for 25 minutes and work on the task for that time. Nothing else. No Facebook. No Twitter. No texting or checking emails or other messages.

Which may sound almost impossible at first but the 25 minute time length is good because it’s not too long – it’s about the length of a short television show after the adverts.

And at the end of the 25 minutes, you award yourself a 5 minute break. So there’s an end in sight and a reward when you reach the end.

Repeat that cycle 4 times then reward yourself with a longer break – maybe 15 to 30 minutes.

Do that with whatever it was you’ve been procrastinating forever about and you’ll be whizzing through things in next to no time.

4. Hypnotise yourself

This will help get your mind “on board” with the idea that procrastination isn’t necessarily the best option.

It’s easy to do – you could easily fit in listening to the short, 17 minute, audio I suggest below in almost any time schedule.

And – you’ll like this bit – there’s no real effort involved. All you have to do is play the MP3 to yourself and let the hypnosis do all the seemingly hard work of retraining your mind to stop procrastinating.

Click here to instantly download a hypnosis track for overcoming procrastination.

Children can be difficult at times. That’s pretty much a given as they find out new things and test boundaries. And once the teenage years strike, things can get worse: they mix with a “bad” bunch, experiment with how much they can challenge authority and generally rebel. Same as we did when we were younger – except that it’s different now we’re on the receiving end of things.

So how can you stop feeling like a failure as a parent?

A lot depends on what the issue is.

Exam grades can be down to a lot of different factors. Sometimes your child just doesn’t get on with a subject or there could be a personality clash between them and the teacher.

Think back – did you get on with every single teacher at school? I know I didn’t and I can’t remember anyone else who was every single teacher’s pet.

The same goes for subjects. Some seem almost mutually exclusive, so it’s not unheard of for the occasional bad grade to happen. Even if we’re increasingly being conditioned that every child should be a Grade A student rather than a part or full time member of what they can jokingly call “thick club”.

Bad behaviour is another area where you can end up feeling like a failure if your child misbehaves at school or in public.

Again, we’re talking about degrees of misbehaviour here. There’s a big difference between an argument and a fight. And both of those look different versus using or dealing drugs. Or using things like cigarettes or alcohol (because we never did when we were younger, did we?!)

There are several challenges with any of these situations where we put ourselves into the state of feeling like a failure.

Sometimes blaming ourselves is the easiest option.

Rather than talking to our child or trying to reason with them. Which could actually be the best way of dealing with the various issues that are bound to crop up as your children grow up.

Sometimes we feel as though we should have done something differently. But hindsight often gives us a rose tinted view of things and there’s a world of difference between what we would have done in a perfect world and what we actually do in reality.

If at all possible, take a step back from the situation and/or talk it through with a trusted friend.

Or sleep on it overnight (always assuming you can get to sleep with the blame that’s running through your mind). Often what seemed an impossible or irreconcilable situation turns out to be anything but that in the cold light of day.

Another option is to use hypnosis to help calm your mind and help you reconcile the conflicting feelings that are leading to feeling like a failure in life.

Click here for a hypnosis download to help you stop feeling like a failure.

1. Study openings

There are a number of common openings to chess games and even if you don’t use one in your next game, there’s a good chance your opponent will.

Study common openings and how they can affect the way the rest of the game develops.

2. Study tactics

Much like chess openings, there are some tactics that are more common than others.

If your opponent is trying to force you in a certain direction, you need to know how to react to that. Studying tactics will help with this.

3. Play online

The days of having to wait for a live opponent or unpacking the chess machine are long gone.

You can now play chess online at any time of the day or night. And, like everything else, practice helps a lot.

4. Review other people’s games

Reviewing classic games is an excellent way of improving your chess. There are lots of sites online that will allow you to re-enact games and allow you to analyse what happened and why.

5. Review your games

This can be painful!

But if the analysis helps you spot common patterns or traps that you fall into, it’s well worth doing.

6. Diagnose your defeats

You’re not going to win every chess game you take part in. That’s not possible.

So go back over your defeats and take the review process one step further by diagnosing what happened and where you could do better next time.

7. Study endgames

Once you’ve passed the novice chess level, endgames come into play a lot more.

Early on in your chess playing career, the game will likely be over almost as soon as you start. But as you get more proficient, how you play your endgames begins to make all the difference to the final result.

8. Learn to think ahead

Humans learned to play chess a lot longer ago than computers like Deep Blue. We have the ability to think ahead and compute the possible outcomes of different moves, several moves ahead. Without having extra “memory” or programmers.

So, even if you don’t think you have the capability to think ahead, start working on it because you really do!

9. Have fun

No matter how seriously you take it, chess is still a game.

If you take it too seriously, you’ll actually be hindering your chance of improving your chess game. So lighten up a bit and enjoy your games – you’ll almost certainly find the more relaxed you are, the better your game.

10. Use hypnosis

Hypnosis can help your mind with all the intricacies of improving your game.

It can help you to think ahead, stay more focused yet relaxed and generally help you to improve your chess with not much more effort than listening to an MP3.

Click here to use hypnosis to improve your chess.

Which often means you’re cutting winning trades short and letting losing trades run until they pip you out. Which then further dents your confidence and starts to become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

What can you do to reduce your fear of losing money when trading?

I’m assuming you keep a record of your trades – in a spreadsheet or specially designed program. If not, you really need to get serious with your trading and start doing that. You can then go back and analyse your trades to work out where they need fine tuning.

One thing to remember is that there’s often a very fine line between losing money trading and making a very healthy living. Your stop loss protects your bank and means that the ratio of losing trades to winning trades doesn’t have to be split 50/50 in order for your bank to grow nicely.

But, if you’ve just had a long run of losing trades that can be difficult to get your subconscious mind to believe. All it’s seeing is your trading bank going in the wrong direction, hearing the heavy sighs when you record another loss and generally picking up on the negative vibes that you’re sending out.

You need to make sure that you’re in the right state to trade.

That means getting a good night’s sleep (even if you’re up at the crack of dawn with the markets) and approaching each trade as an independent event.

The market doesn’t care whether you’ve had a batch of winning trades, heaps of losing trades or any point in between those two extremes.

It just cares about the trade you’ve just placed. And, unless your bank is measured in billions, truth be told it probably doesn’t care very much because the volume of trade you’re placing isn’t going to sway the market one way or the other.

So each trade you make is completely independent of the next one.

You may be going long or short. But that’s because those are the only two directions you can choose.

The previous trade may have been in the same direction or your indicators may have suggested that there’s been a change in direction. And, depending on the timescale you’re trading, that could be true or not.

Whilst it’s unlikely that you can get yourself to the state of being completely robotic in your trading, that’s actually the ideal: your signals tell you to take a trade, you take it as an automatic response.

And it’s easier to do that when you reduce your fear of losing money.

This takes time but it’s well worth doing. Accept that money is everywhere – it’s actually in abundance (even in less than happy economic times) – and start to visualise more money flowing towards you. Because money actually seems to sense our fear, much like dogs and other animals do. That sounds weird but the world’s millionaires and billionaires would be nodding their head in agreement if they read that sentence.

The other thing that can help is hypnosis. It helps turn your mind around without much effort from you.

I’m going to recommend a couple of inexpensive tracks that I think will turn round the way your mind currently thinks about losing money and also tweak your trading performance for the better:

Hypnosis to improve your trader’s mindset.

Hypnosis for fear of losing money.

But when you start to become almost perpetually in fear of loud noises then it’s time to do something about it, otherwise your phobia could severely limit you.

For some people, confronting their fear head on is the way to go. If you’re brave enough to even contemplate that course of action, talk a trusted friend into joining you. Just in case you have second thoughts when you get to the loud place. Sometimes what seemed like a good idea at the time turns out to be anything but that. And at least if you have someone with you, you won’t be left to turn into a quivering wreck on your own.

But if that’s too much to even think about, consider gradually improving your tolerance for loud noises.

That doesn’t mean getting people to randomly pop balloons or set off fireworks around you. But it could mean going to somewhere that is normally noisy – a subway station maybe – but at an off-peak time so that the hustle, bustle and noise is bearable.

Laughter is another good form of therapy for fears. Our fears and phobias are actually quite irrational things when you begin to examine them.

So – in much the same way as animals don’t like to be laughed at – the same goes for our fears. If you can find a way to turn your fear of loud noises into something funny – maybe by watching one of those (almost certainly staged) television shows or YouTube clips – then you could be well on your way to banishing your fear of loud noises or, at the very least, reducing it to a manageable level.

Some level of phobia about loud noises is perfectly natural. Thunderstorms are capable of unleashing tremendous amounts of energy and they’re not the kind of thing most people relish. So if you know in advance that there are going to be some loud, scary, noises near you then it could be time to put on a set of headphones and play some calming music through them.

Another option is to gradually change the way your mind thinks about loud noises and that’s very easily done with the help of hypnosis.

Listening to a short hypnosis track a few times will help your subconscious mind to come to terms with the loud noises you encounter and deal with them more rationally.

It’s easy to do and involves near enough no effort on your part. And it’s worked very well for lots of people so there’s an exceptionally good chance it will work for you as well.

Click here to download a hypnosis track to help get over a fear of loud noises.