Last Saturday I attended a Skilled Migrant Mentoring Program at the SGSCC, and I must say it was quite an interesting morning.

I was invited to talk a little about myhelper and how what we have learnt might help some of the attendees.

Most of the attendees came from a professional background such as Engineering, IT, Business, Business owners and so on, yet most are not doing what they used to do for a myriad of reasons. One common factor I observed however was the lack of confidence a lot of the people had when they introduced themselves using their new language-English.

Many people mentioned how hard it was to find work and how they ended up doing work which is below their actual skill levels. Some thought that their country of origin had something to do with their failure to secure work, and some figured it is just their lack of English.

I tend to look at things quite positively and would suggest that although English is very important, confidence, ambition, drive, creativity and energy are equally if not more important.

I also noticed that many were focusing on the presentation of their goods or skills;  like a brochure would attempt to sell you any given product. I think the problem is possibly a different one. I believe the issue often relates to trust; a potential employer doesn’t yet trust you and therefore asks for ‘local work experience’ or ‘local references’. So again, the issue is trust, not a lack of skill or lack of English, yet during my time with the group, no one even considered this aspect.

Food for thought? Indeed it is!

Thanks to Mikall Chong for inviting me, and to all the participants for being open and interactive!

Thomas

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We still have a few volunteering opportunities available.

Check them out!

It Tutors

Do you have exceptional communication skills and remember how hard it can be to learn a new task? We have vacancies for volunteer IT tutors to teach older people how to use a computer, send emails, look up information on the internet and even how to use a mouse! Bilingual speakers particularly welcome.

Southern Sydney Volunteer Expo 2010

Interested in volunteering for an exciting one-off Event? The Southern Sydney Volunteer Expo, being held in Sutherland on Thursday, 21st October, is a great opportunity to try out volunteering. Join the welcome team, stall holder team, workshop team or the entertainment team.

Bush Care

Love the outdoors? Then we have the opportunity for you to join a fabulous team of volunteers caring for our local bushland. Weekends and weekdays.

Information desk volunteer

Have you ever noticed the Community Information Desks at most big shopping centres? They are manned by volunteers to help direct you to find the most appropriate service for your need – it may be community transport, shopping assistants, meals on wheels and much more. If you are interested ion finding out more please contact us via myhelper by clicking the “apply” button. You will need to register on myhelper which only takes a minute and is very simple.

Shopping and home help volunteer

Volunteers are required to visit clients in their homes or help them with their shopping (heavy lifting is not required) or maybe just taking someone for a coffee or the movies. Can you picture yourself in this role? Yes? Then Please contact us via myhelper by clicking the “apply” button. You will need to register on myhelper which only takes a minute and is very simple.

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It has been a while since we blogged but here we are again with some new volunteering opportunities in Sydney’s south.

Information Desk – volunteer

Shopping and home help – volunteer

Museum Guide – volunteer

Gardening volunteers

Assistant for bus outings

All of the above opportunities are run by our friends at Volunteerlink, so make sure you do your bit and support them!

Your team at myhelper!

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We have experienced a technical issue with our email server which was undetected for some time now. This meant that the signup was not working for new customers.  You could also not contact us via the normal myhelper contact window

We apologise for this and have rectified the issue now.

Best Regards

your myhelper team!

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by Christian Nor-Arevian

“It’s all in your mind.” How often have we all heard those words spoken in a critical fashion? Yet those five little words hold one of the greatest truths in life.

Have you ever wanted to achieve something such as a new job or promotion, loosing weight, finding the right partner or even starting your own business – but no matter how hard you tried you couldn’t achieve your goal or maintain consistent results?

Informational resources abound – television, magazines, books, motivational seminars, and of course the internet – all offering ready made quick fix solutions or guides on how to lose weight, achieve financial freedom, improve relationships, be happy, reduce stress and so on, all which contain a myriad of ideals that we think will make our personal and professional lives more successful or fulfilling. Generally, we may get motivated for a short period yet, within six months, or even less in most cases, we are back to our old ways, in despair and again in search of the next quick fix, motivational mind-opening course or bestselling book. Factors such as genetics, IQ (intelligence) and EQ (emotional intelligence), education and socio-demographics (where you grew up) all have a relational influence on how ‘successful’ you’ll be in life. Yet, regardless of all these factors there is a single prevailing factor that is continually overlooked and which often provides the missing link in achieving your goals – your beliefs.

As You Believe, So You Achieve

One of the most important things when it comes to delivering self sustainable and lasting results, is understanding what is at the core of what motivates and drives us. This is where our beliefs and values become so critical, together with having a specific strategy and plan to implement. Beliefs and values, just like our bodily functions such as breathing, blinking and digestion, are relatively unconscious to us. They operate as an inner authority or computer program in a hard drive which determines what‘s important to you, what you spend your energy and time on and what you think about mostly. Although beliefs are continually formed throughout our life, many of our core beliefs were formed during our childhood, when we aren’t consciously aware of the complexities in our environment, and we relied heavily on our parents and other authority figures for guidance and understanding of what was right or wrong, as well as what’s important in life. Due to a combination of social conditioning, limited life experience, availability of skills and resources in dealing with certain events and the nature of the human brain, we may have misinterpreted information and events from our past or unquestioningly taken on other’s perspectives – which may not be appropriate or empowering to us in later life. As a result, we developed certain views and beliefs on core themes and relationships in life, such as career, politics, marriage, health, wealth and education, these were often typically based on what our parents and other authority figures did or didn’t demonstrate. Beliefs and values also act like self-fulfilling prophecies, in that if you believe something is true or not, you will perceive and act according to what you believe. This is where problems often arise, and where long held beliefs can begin to work against our highest aspirations. Every time you act on a previous belief, it creates deep neural connections within our brain which essentially acts like wiring, telling the brain how to respond if presented with a similar situation in the future. As these neural pathways become more engrained our thinking and behaviour also become entrenched to the point that they become automatically triggered when similar events in the future occur.

For example, when dealing with conflict, an individual formed a belief due to previous experiences that it’s better to avoid conflict and therefore will continually steer clear of it, because they believe that conflict can create problems and disrupt or destabilise their environment, leading to dissent and criticism. In the short term, this belief may avoid the symptoms of conflict, although in the long term one runs the risk of escalating it, creating further breakdowns in relationships through disunity and distrust, that could be easily resolved through effective communication and negotiation strategies.

I recently worked with a partner of a law firm who was experiencing significant amounts of stress, due to work life balance challenges and being disengaged with his career. This led to low levels of enthusiasm, motivation and frustration as well as conflict at work and home. Plagued by constant indecision and self doubt, my client experienced an ongoing internal tug-of-war between what to do and fear of what could go wrong if he made the ‘wrong decision’. This impacted his performance and he began to feel physically and emotionally drained. Insights in neuroscience have demonstrated the reasons why we react to stressful situations are due to the activation of the amygdala which resides within the limbic system in the brain. When we’re confronted with a potential threat or stressor, the amygdala highjack’s the logical thinking centre of the brain called the frontal cortex, and assesses the intensity of the threat and determines whether we should stand and fight or flee the situation. In my client’s situation, he initially felt overwhelmed and wanted to resign, however after some discussion he was able to turn his circumstances around by accessing the areas of his brain responsible for problem solving and higher thinking. Rather than leave his job, he was able to identify what he wanted to achieve and subsequently developed a strategy that was beneficial to both the organisation and his needs. In computing, we don’t keep kicking the computer to change the results – we upgrade or create a new program so the computer does what we want it to and that which it is designed to do. Likewise, by accessing the regions of the brain that are responsible for higher thinking we can create new possibilities and solutions to our problems. Combined with new skills and tools, the more we act on our new patterns of thinking the more we establish new neural pathways that further support and reinforce our desired thinking and behaviour. What was once a roadblock to your success can provide the hidden key that, will unlock your potential and continually drive performance towards achieving your desired outcome.

Creating Meaningful and Sustainable Change

To ensure long term results, the following steps provide a guide to drive us towards solution focused thinking, while identifying the actions and resources needed to achieve your specific outcomes:

1. Determine what you want to achieve and become: State

specifically what you want in positive terms – not what you don’t

want. If we give vague or conflicting directions to someone such

as telling them to turn right when we wanted them to go left

they will end up some place else. Your brain is somewhat like a

computer in that it needs specific orders of what to do.

2. What are you doing that is working? Identify your key strengths

and the parts of your strategy that are working and keep doing

it. This will give you both confidence and a foundation to build

your new plan.

3. What am I doing that is not working? Our greatest lessons

and opportunities are often shrouded within setbacks. Use this

information as feedback that part of your strategy isn’t working.

Determine what you need to change and commit to changing it.

4. Create a plan. List the specific actions that need to be

taken, including learning new skills, acquiring resources and

developing relationships that support your outcomes, together

with where and when you will do it, and how you will measure

the progress of your actions.

5. Take Action. Often we procrastinate and hesitate to create

change because we wait for the environment to change or

we wait to feel motivated prior to taking action. Feelings of

motivation and inspiration, happiness and fulfilment often arise

only after we act on the things we want to achieve.

6. Test and measure. Continue to assess the effectiveness of your

strategy and make the necessary adjustments and refinements

along the way.

Through advances in neuroscience we can now combine

effective and reliable strategies that enable us to overcome the

brain’s reactions to significant stress and begin to access greater

possibilities and solutions to both our personal and professional

challenges as, well as capitalising and creating new opportunities.

“The lesson here”, as Dr John Ratey clinical professor of

psychiatry at Harvard University states in his book ‘A Users Guide

to the Brain’, “is that we have the power to change our brains” -

and our lives.

Christian Nor-Arevian is a performance and executive coach who specialises in coaching executives on performance and leadership development, effective communication, stress management and work life balance. Using a researched base awareness of neurobiological basis of human behaviour, development and positive psychology, Christian has worked with clients such as PricewaterhouseCoopers, Telstra, Energy Australia and McGrath Real Estate to achieve lasting and sustainable results to create environments that enhance fulfilment and performance.

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Volunteering is done of your own free will, without monetary reward, for a not-for-profit organisation and is of benefit to the community. It is what makes our communities a harmonious place to live. 

Just look outside for a moment. 

See the car with Community Transport written on the outside? A volunteer is driving that car and more than likely is taking an elderly person to an important medical appointment. 

Do you enjoy our beautiful parks? The native bushland is maintained by volunteers through the local council. See the happy group of elderly people eating lunch together at picnic tables? There are volunteers amongst them making sure everyone enjoys themselves. 

Enjoy spending time at the local museum? The Tour Guide that helps you understand the story behind each item is more than likely a volunteer. 

When you last went shopping did you see a group of people helping others do their grocery shopping? You guessed it – they are volunteers! 

There are many more volunteers working away answering queries from the public, delivering meals, knitting trauma teddy bears and developing websites. 

The one thing that all of these roles have in common is that they are very rewarding to do! 

Volunteers gain new skills, meet people, add to their resume, practice existing skills and knowledge, feel healthy and go home at the end of the day feeling very satisfied. 

So if you are thinking about volunteering in your local community, why not look at the jobs available on the My Helper website – you will be surprised at what you can do!

Article  by Rosalind Kimber, St George Community Services Inc http://www.stgcs.com.au

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Starting as a volunteer is easy. There are just a few important steps involved! 

Firstly, think about why you would like to volunteer. Is it to meet new people? Learn new skills? Try out a new career? Practice what you are learning at TAFE or Uni? Give back to the community after you have been helped? Get outdoors and be healthy? There are endless reasons for volunteering. But each reason provides an important clue – what to do as a volunteer. 

For example, if you want to be outdoors and active, you may choose to volunteer with a bush care group, or walking dogs at the local dogs’ home. If you love being with people, you may volunteer with a social outing group. 

Secondly, seek out volunteer organisations that have positions available that match your ideal volunteer role. Volunteer Resource Centres such as Volunteer Link can help you do this or you can find roles on the My Helper website. 

It’s important to talk to the volunteer organisation to find out more about the role. Is it during the week? On weekends? Do you need certain skills? Does the organisation reimburse travel expenses and have a volunteer role description? 

Once you have decided on a role that is right for you, the volunteer coordinator will ask you to come and meet them. This is when you will complete a police check, fill out an application form and meet other volunteers and staff members. You may also be asked to complete a short orientation session so that you are fully equipped to carry out your new volunteer role. 

From that point on you can look forward to many happy hours as a volunteer, be a valuable part of your community and enjoy the rewards that come with it!

Article  by Rosalind Kimber, St George Community Services Inc http://www.stgcs.com.au

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