The Girl Guides organisation has warned that female role models from TV programmes like The Only Way is Essex (TOWIE) and Made in Chelsea are limiting girls’ ambitions and potentially damaging a whole generation of women. 

Girlguiding UK recently questioned a selection of seven to 21 year old girls and found that those who had a narrow selection of role models also had limited future aspirations.

Around 55% of the girls questioned wished there were more aspirational female role models in the public limelight.

Many of the girls identified people like Amy Childs from TOWIE, and characters from C4 drama Skins as role models, prompting claims that these shows glamorise and normalise drugs, alcohol and promiscuous sex.

Tracey Murray, head of guiding development, said: “The type of role models that [the girls] were talking to us about tended to come from the world of TV and rich and famous celebrities, rather than the broader range of role models, like women who work in business, sport and other walks of life. We want to hear that girls are exposed to a broad range of women, so that they can have aspirations and interests, and are encouraged to make the right choices for them in future.”

The study also found that one in six girls would be put off from studying science or engineering because these are ‘careers for boys’. Girls tended to aim for conventionally female-selective careers such as teaching (12%), hairdressing (10%), nursing and veterinary work (7%).

Despite the upcoming London Olympics, many girls struggled to name even one female athlete. Many expressed an interest in starting a business but most said they would be put off by the pressure and responsibility entrepreneurship involves.

In light of the worrying results, Girlguiding UK has teamed up with Everywoman (a nationwide membership organisation for women in business) to create a series of ‘day in the life’ videos of business women enjoying the daily flow of their successful careers. The campaign hopes to open young women’s minds to different careers, show them the diversity of choice available and provide them with inspirational women they can look up to.

Despite huge developments in equal rights over the past few decades, many young women are still being deprived of the chances to reach their full potentials. Whether this is due to a lack of inspiring female role models, or a lack of encouragement from teachers and parents, it’s clear to see more needs to be done to show girls that there is more to life than partying, shopping and looking good.

To discover how a life coach could help you or your child achieve dreams and aspirations, please visit our pages on Parent Coaching and Career Coaching. 

View and comment on the original BBC News article, or leave your thought in the comment box below. 

The survey, commissioned by the Children’s Food Trust, questioned 1,000 parents to identify the areas in life they believed made it difficult for them to feed their children well.

A massive 69% of those asked thought they could do more to make their child’s diet healthier.

It seems a mixture of persuasive advertising and equally persuasive children makes it very difficult for parents to say no to buying crisps, chocolate and sweets for their children while out, even when they hadn’t intended to.

University of Newcastle researchers found that children are exposed to more junk food adverts than any other demographic.

Rob Rees, chairman of the Children’s Food Trust, said: “Parents have such a tough job to encourage their children to eat healthily – and what’s clear is that they think there are lots of ways we could make their lives easier. This isn’t about a ‘nanny state’ – it’s about what will help rather than hinder parents in feeding their children well. If we’re serious about reducing the crippling costs to the NHS of poor diet, we need to get behind parents on this.”

Health and nutrition is an incredibly important part of parenting. Unfortunately, the fatty, salty, sugary foods that we all love are also incredibly bad for us. It can be difficult to control our own diets- let alone our children’s! As they grow older, it can become increasingly difficult to encourage children to eat healthily – especially when they have their own pocket money to spend.

Parent coaching can help you to develop the skills and techniques needed to educate and help your child to become healthier. To find out more, please visit our page on Parent Coaching.

View and comment on the original Yahoo News article.

New research shows that regular jogging can increase life expectancy by up to six years.

It looks like the elixir of life isn’t hidden in organic food, acai acai berries or expensive pots of wrinkle cream after all – it’s a simple case of donning the trainers and going for a quick, gentle jog around the block a couple of times a week.

The research, conducted as part of the 36-year ‘Copenhagen City Heart Study’, involved 1,116 male and 762 female joggers whose lifestyles have been closely monitored since 1976.

Results showed that regular, moderate exercise increased lifespan by an incredible six years. However, once an optimum point was reached, life expectancy began to drop again, suggesting that intense exercise actually has a negative impact on the health of the body.

Natasha Stewart, senior cardiac nurse at the British Heart Foundation, said: “Physical activity has long been associated with improved health and so it’s no surprise to see just how beneficial jogging could be. Staying active can help prevent and manage a wide variety of health conditions and keep your heart in great shape. It can help the way you look and feel today but could also help to protect your heart health in the future too.”

Another study reported last year that regular cycling can increase lifespan by up to five years. However, in this situation it was the ‘fast pedallers’ who benefited most from the exercise.

There are many forms of exercise to choose from – not all of us are blessed with healthy legs and joints. Swimming is an excellent form of exercise for people who experience chronic pain or other physical problems. Swimming puts next to no pressure on the limbs and offers a fantastic cardiovascular work out.

To find out how a life coach could help you kick-start a health regime, please visit our Life Coaching Areas section, or alternatively search for a life coach today by using our search tool.

View and comment on the original Independent article to find out more about the Danish heart study. 

Teenage girls worry about getting sweaty, getting undressed and not being ‘sporty’ enough for P.E class, says the Women’s Sports and Fitness Foundation (WSFF).

Research conducted by Loughborough University found that 14-year-old boys exercised far more often than 14-year-old girls, and that girls’ activity levels halved as they got older.

Only 31% of the girls interviewed for the study claimed to exercise regularly, compared with 50% of boys. However, 60% of eight-year-old boys and girls claimed to exercise regularly for at least an hour, five days a week.

Most of the girls questioned said they would like to do more physical exercise but that they felt uncomfortable running in front of boys and lacked confidence in their sporting abilities. Some girls said teachers tended to favour girls who showed talent at sport.

The results have prompted the WSFF to write to schools offering advice on how to make P.E more attractive to girls.

“It’s simply unacceptable that the overwhelming majority of our young women are leaving school with dangerously low levels of physical activity,” said chief executive of WSFF Sue Tibbals.

Suggestions have included holding Zumba classes and introducing rollerblading to appeal to girls who dislike the traditional approach to P.E in school. These new measures could help to prevent a generation of obesity and ill health by reshaping young people’s attitudes towards physical activity.

If you feel like kick-starting a new health regime or want to help your children become more active, a life coach can help. To discover how, please visit our Health page.

View and comment on the original BBC News article.  

The Prime Minister’s national happiness survey is the hot topic of discussion this week, and it’s already providing some interesting (if unhelpful) insights into the general wellbeing of the UK population.

Results announced yesterday revealed that although parents feel a stronger sense of purpose and meaning in life, they were not as happy as people without children.

The survey, conducted by the Office for National Statistics upon David Cameron’s orders, is designed to go beyond the usual economic statistics to find out what really matters to voters. The £2 million survey has been slammed by critics for being a phenomenal waste of money and time.

Patricia Morgan, an author on family issues, said: “Mr Cameron wanted to know what is really important for voters, and now he knows. It is the same as has been shown by all the evidence piling up for decades. But the Coalition is doing nothing. There seems to be the same embedded hostility to marriage and to couples with children that has dominated governments for years.”

The report also revealed that couples who were married were significantly more satisfied with life than couples who lived together.

If you feel unsatisfied with your living arrangements, a life coach might be able to help. To find out more, please visit our Life Coaching Topics.

Read and comment on the original Daily Mail article here. 

Dr Costas Karageorghis is an expert on the effects of music on exercise at Brunel University, and has recently published a book surrounding the topic entitled ‘Inside Sport Psychology’.

According to the author, music acts as a legal drug for athletes, and  can actually boost sporting performance by up to 15%.

Listening to music whilst we work out is of course nothing new; nowadays it is unusual to see a fellow gym attendee or a jogger without headphones. But who is listening to music simply to stave of the boredom of working out and who is listening for motivation?

Karageorghis has said that there are many advantages to running with music, as it provides you with a constant stimulus that can be tailored to your personal music taste. In addition, the tune of the track you are listening to could provide a beat to which you could match your stride.

Recent years have seen an influx in the number of marathons and events involving music. Run To The Beat for example is a London based half marathon that features a course passing multiple stages on which popular artists perform.

According to some of the runners who have been involved in these kinds of live music events, hearing a song that you like can be extremely uplifting, with many runners appearing to speed up during specific songs and beats.

However, whilst for amateurs music does appear to act as a stimulant, for elite athletes it could have the opposite effect.

According to Karageorghis, the benefits of listening to music seem to drop off the faster we run.

“Elite athletes are usually associators”, said Karageorghis, “meaning that they have a tendency to focus inwardly when they are running”.

The majority of other runners however, are “dissociators”, meaning that they seek out stimuli and distractions to take them away mentally from what is occurring around them.

In today’s society we are constantly being reminded about the importance of staying fit and healthy, but often it can be extremely challenging to muster up the motivation needed to do just that. In addition, with gym memberships rocketing, not all of us can afford to pay the price.

Running is free, and as we know very well is great for coaxing out those happy hormones as it involves time spent in the great outdoors. However, taking those first steps and swapping your slippers for trainers can be difficult, so why not start by creating yourself an exercise playlist?

Spend some time thinking about a number of your favourite motivational tracks, the ones that lift your spirits when they come on, and pop these onto your MP3 player or iPod to listen to whilst you are exercising.

If you are still struggling in the motivation stakes then you may find that a life coach specialising in health could help you to establish how you would like to move forward, before assisting you in the setting of attainable goals to help you get there.

View and comment on the original Guardian article. 

Nine out of 10 women over the age of 30 have low self-esteem and poor body-image, according to mental health charity Mind.

The study, which involved 1,450 British women, showed that a huge number of women care so much about what they look like that they are willing to compromise their own physical health to avoid being seen.

Poor body-image means many women miss out on the physical and psychological benefits of outdoor exercise by opting to stay indoors. Others choose to exercise only early in the morning or late at night to avoid bumping into other people.

The idea of wearing tight Lycra shorts for a jog around the block is undoubtedly terrifying for any woman who doesn’t sport a six-pack or legs like Naomi Campbell’s, so it’s no surprise that around two thirds said they preferred to wear baggy clothing in order to hide their ‘wobbly bits’.

It seems the pavement is not the only no-go area for insecure females, as two out of three women admitted they were afraid of joining a gym class in case they weren’t able to keep up with the aerobic routine, or that other women there would be cliquey and unwelcoming.

As well as being ashamed of their bodies, 60% of women were nervous about sweating, passing wind and blushing while exercising in public. Only 6% believed they would make friends while working out.

Mind found that most women preferred to stay in instead of going out to exercise. 71% of women preferred to comfort eat food, 32% preferred to listen to sad music, 57% would rather login to a social networking site and 71% would rather find some other way to be alone.

The benefits of exercise (whether indoors or outdoors) are huge. Not only will it help you to burn fat, become fitter and improve the health of your heart and other vital organs, exercise will also make you feel better.

So, we advise you to lock up those Celine Dione CDs, deactivate your Facebook account, buy yourself some nice, comfortable work-out clothes and head out to the park for a brisk walk, a jog or a cycle. After all, everyone else is too preoccupied with what they look like to worry about what you look like.

If you feel ready to start making changes to your life, why not enlist the help of a life coach? A life coach will encourage you to feel good about yourself and your body. You will soon come to accept who you are, which is the first step towards making the changes you want to make.

To find out more about how life coaches can help, please visit the Personal Development section of our website.

View and comment on the original Independent article.

According to experts from a Harvard School of Public Health, a cheery disposition could protect you against heart problems.

The report, published in Psychological Bulletin, involved a review of over 200 studies that had recorded psychological well-being and cardiovascular health.

Interestingly, what the analysis revealed was that factors such as satisfaction with life, optimism levels and overall happiness were linked to a lower risk of heart disease, despite the age, weight and smoking status of the participants.

Those involved in the study assessed as being more ‘optimistic’ tended to engage in healthier behaviour, for example exercising frequently and eating a healthy and well balanced diet. However, whilst these factors are certainly influential, even when the researchers controlled for these factors the link between a healthy heart and happiness still remained.

Although this research is extremely positive, Dr Julie Boehm has warned that it only suggests a link, and is by no means concrete proof that emotional well-being is directly linked to a heart disease.

However, Maureen Talbot, senior cardiac nurse at the British Heart Foundation said of the study: “It also highlights the need for healthcare professionals to provide a holistic approach to care, taking into account the state of someone’s mental health and monitoring its effect on their physical health.”

As research such as this continues to emerge, it is becoming clearer and clearer that our emotional health does indeed have an impact upon our physical health. Previous research has already shown that there is a link between stress and depression – and with this in mind we should be doing what we can to optimise our emotional well-being.

If you are feeling particularly low and unmotivated this may be linked to certain areas of your life in which you feel unfulfilled. Life coaching is a form of therapy which offers effective and positive techniques that could enable you to address areas which are causing you unhappiness – helping you to move forward in the desired direction.

For information about the various areas in which Life Coaching could help you, please visit our Life Coaching Areas page.

View and comment on the original BBC News article.

‘Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking’ is a new book by American writer Susan Cain, and it’s set to take the personal development industry by storm. 

Have you ever found yourself at a party and wished you were at home reading a book? Do you find social situations emotionally and physically exhausting? Do you feel happiest and most centred when alone in your favourite place, or with some of your closest friends and family? If so, you may be an introvert.

Introverts are not necessarily shy, or unconfident. They do not all struggle with low self-esteem or crippling self-consciousness. In fact, many introverts are thought to have a higher level of self-confidence than extraverts due to the time spent alone enjoying their own company and exploring their own capacity for thought and understanding. Extraverts on the other hand, need to surround themselves with other people in order to feel happy and fulfilled. This need for the reassurance and affirmation of others can lead to unease and unhappiness when an extravert finds him or herself alone.

There seems to be a world-wide corporate quest for ‘leaders’: confident, outgoing, assertive people with great communication skills and risk-taking personalities. Our world is run by these people – smooth-talking politicians, super-salesmen company directors and ruthless bank managers. The route to ‘success’ seems to value good talkers over good thinkers, confidence over reserve and pushiness over passiveness. Even schools encourage a ‘loudest voice gets heard’ philosophy, with classrooms set out for group-work and discussion rather than silent contemplation and individual work. In fact, introverted children are often punished for their desire to work independently – how many times are quiet children told to ‘speak up’ and ‘participate more’?

Schools are designed to cultivate extraverts, as are open-plan office spaces and the ‘brain-storm’ mentality of so many companies today.

Susan Cain asks: are we inadvertently suppressing a great undiscovered wealth of wisdom, knowledge and ideas purportedly hidden in the secret world of the introvert?

In the new book that has already taken the world by storm, Cain argues that it’s finally time to make room for introverts in a world built predominantly for extraverts. These ideas could potentially change the face of education, business and success, and ultimately give introverts their turn in the spotlight (the spotlight being, of course, a nice quiet nook in the corner).

It is now time to give introverts the space they need to be alone without having to feel guilty or inferior for their reclusive tendencies. Cain argues that many introverts become ill from trying so hard to be outgoing and confident because they’ve been taught that this is how you succeed. Really, these people are forcing themselves to be something they simply are not, which can only lead to feelings of worthlessness and unhappiness.

The introvert-extravert scale is rich and diverse. No one is ever one or the other. As much as deep-thinking and contemplation should be revered and encouraged in business, so should the enthusiasm and liveliness of the extravert.

To find out more about Susan Cain’s new book and to watch an inspiring video of this exceptional woman speaking at a conference, simply head over to the official website.

For life advice, contact a life coach here.

Click to read the original Guardian book review.

David Cameron to introduce 18 certificates to ‘raunchy’ music videos to protect children.

‘Your not going out dressed like that’ is commonly used phrase from the parenting guidebook, with the vast majority of mums and dads sure to have been met with an angry faced teen on at least one occasion after telling them to change.

However, as children take increasing inspiration from the celebrities, hemlines are continuing to get higher and necklines are continuing to get lower – so what can be done to tackle the intensifying sexulisation of children at an early age?

Whether they picture a famous celebrity engaged in illegal activity or a female role model wearing raunchy outfits – music videos are currently not subject to the same rules and regulations when it comes to feature length films and age ratings.

However, Prime Minster David Cameron has revealed that he intends to stamp 18 certificates across raunchy music videos and explicit images in a bid to protect young children.

As it stands, parents have very little control over what their children are watching throughout the day, with many music videos from the likes of Rhianna, Lady GaGa and Katy Perry featuring scantily clad females engaging in raunchy activity or performing questionable dance moves before the watershed.

Behavioural expert Dr Pam Spur has said that adolescence is a time when young people can be extremely influenced by popular culture, so we have a duty to protect them from this negative way of behaving.

Often, low self-confidence and self-worth in young children and teenagers means that they really feel the pressure to look and act a certain way. If you are concerned that your teenager may be suffering from low self-esteem or low self-confidence, life coaching could help them to find positive ways of moving forward. Please visit our fact-sheets to find out more, or alternatively visit the homepage and use the search tool to locate a qualified life coach in your local area.

The original article ‘Kinky Katy Perry is no role model for our little girls’ was originally published in the 10/04/12 issue of The Sun.