Tag: wisdom
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What Happens When We Don’t Say What We Think and Feel
“The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.” ~George Bernard Shaw
Can we just talk?
Those words can be a buzzkill on dates, and yet talking is the most profound interaction we will ever have with another human being.
A while back, my husband walked into the kitchen where I was reading an article on my phone and asked me if I had a chance to get a Father’s Day card for his dad (who lives in Canada). I said no I didn’t, and, since it was eight in the evening, I’d get it tomorrow.
He put on his shoes, got the keys, and said, “I’m just going to get it,” then slammed the door.
Now, this seems like an appropriate conversation; however, what I can’t relate through the computer is the tone of it. You know, that tone where you know there’s more to it then what was just uttered. Plus, the door slam was like a slap in the face.
Immediately, my mind started accumulating thoughts about how I had messed up. How I place more emphasis on my own family, and he must feel I don’t do enough for his. I was spiraling into negativity and, within minutes, I was in that dark place of “I’m not good enough.”
Usually I sit with this for hours and days; however, tonight, I couldn’t take it, and what I needed to say was busting through. We talked as soon as I took a few breaths and re-centered myself.
I asked him if he was upset. He responded no, but he felt the need to go get the card that instant. I brought up slamming the door, and that it made me feel like there was more to the story.
He agreed that he was upset because I didn’t look up from my phone to answer the question. AHHH relief! He just wanted my full attention during a conversation. He doesn’t think I’m the daughter-in-law or wife from hell.
Me: Why didn’t you just ask me?
Him: I feel like you should’ve known.
Me: I’m not a mind reader and you aren’t a kid. Tell me what you need.
There are so many miscommunications like this between us, like the time when our outside bar fell over in the wind and the glass top broke. He came outside and I said, “Oh it’s broken,” and he said, “Tell me the truth. What happened? Did you break it?”
I was horrified. Where’s the innocent until proven guilty? I felt disrespected and like a liar. After talking about it I realized this happened because our past communication had been like this. Out of fear, I may have told a white lie or left out details.
I further re-centered to realize that I had allowed us to talk this way to each other most of the time. I would get upset and then let it go. I didn’t state what I really thought or felt; not only did this not allow us to grow, but this allowed him to think everything was okay.
I finally found the courage to state my boundary for communication in our marriage, starting with: can we talk.
I would need more openness in our conversations. More direct communication about what you really mean to say rather than expecting that I “should just know.”
I would need you to just say, “Hey, can your put down your phone so I can ask you a question?” Even simply saying, “I’m not sure what to say right now” is better than the silence, the hesitation, the pause, which gives my ego a meaning, a reason to put me down and spiral me into that dark corner.
If you are telling me exactly what you need from me, and I from you, there is no interference, no misinformation, no blame, shame, or guilt in either one of us.
This simple interaction of just talking completely transformed the communication in our marriage. It also gave me the power and strength to express what I will and won’t stand for in our marriage, or in any relationship in my life.
Simply by talking. The energy around us becomes light, and we are able to accept the love that is between us. In honoring our words and our voice, we stand for the greatest human characteristic we have.
Other animals mate, cuddle, and kiss, but talking, that’s only a human trait, and it’s the key to all human interaction, since it’s the only way anyone can know what we’re thinking and feeling.
So talk, be vulnerable, say exactly what’s on your mind. Truth is, the other person may be thinking the same thing, and you could be the link that reopens communication and makes them feel human again. So let’s just talk…
Couple talking image via Shutterstock
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7 Ways to Put Life Back into Your Relationship
“Eventually you will come to realize that love heals everything, and love is all there is.” ~Gary Zukav
I was always a hopeless romantic. Since I was a little girl, I craved love and the fairy tale romance.
Growing up in a two-parent home, I was very fortunate to see that it was, in fact, possible. In my teen years, I remember fantasizing about the cute boy with the dimples and how he would take me to prom and eventually carry me over the threshold after our wedding night.
I thought that all relationships were unicorns and rainbows, but after a series of failed relationships and two marriages by the tender age of thirty-two, I realized that relationships are hard work, and that in order for it to be successful, it has to be a two way street.
You can’t force someone to love you. You can’t force someone to change. And you can’t push your values, beliefs, goals, dreams, and visions on someone else. Unfortunately, I learned that the hard way.
The reality is that relationships are a series of ups and downs, and sometimes, they are downright confusing. Before you throw in the towel, remember why you started. If you’re going through a rough patch in your relationship, try these seven things to help bring it back to life.
1. Stay positive.
I know it’s hard to keep a positive spirit when you feel like your relationship is falling apart. Take the time to really focus on what’s right, the things you love, the stuff that’s going well, and the good times you’ve had together.
When you’re discussing your relationship, highlight the good stuff and minimize the bad. You’ll feel better, and so will your partner.
I used to tell all my girlfriends about all the wrong my partner was doing and found that the more I looked for the bad, the more it showed up. But when I focused on the good things about him and why I still loved him, it made me appreciate him that much more.
Now, this doesn’t mean that you don’t deal with pressing issues or forget the problems at hand; it just means that you change the conversation to one that’s empowering to the relationship.
Let go of your anger and annoyance about small things that irritate you. It won’t be easy, but every moment you hold on to poisonous feelings is another moment that will steal your chance to be happy with the person you love.
2. Remember that no one is perfect.
You must always remember that no one is perfect—not even you. As long as you and your partner are trying and open to growth, there is still hope.
Remind yourself why you fell in love with them in the first place. We all have our own quirks and bad habits, and we expect our partners to love us despite all of that. Give them that same respect and understanding.
The downfall of my failed relationships was always that I demanded control. I wanted to be right in every situation. I wanted to prove something, and I failed miserably every time. No one won, and the relationships turned sour as resentment built. It’s not about being right or wrong; it’s about opening up, listening and understanding where your partner is coming from.
3. Love yourself first.
Loving yourself and working on yourself is the beginning of all change, whether the change is in you or in someone else. Simply put, you can’t change someone else, but you can encourage change in those around you by the love, positivity, radiance, and growth you reflect.
Spending your energy on pushing others to become what you want them to be will only detract from your own growth. Instead, focus on yourself and progressing in your own way. Live as an example for what you want to see in those around you.
4. Make decisions from the heart.
Ask yourself what you’re really trying to achieve in your relationship; ask yourself why you are with this person. If you really love your partner, is that reflected in how you act toward them, speak to them, or treat them? If someone were to see how you act in your relationship, would they be able to see a couple that really loves each other?
If not, it may be time to start making decisions and actions based on the love and respect you have for your partner. Just like in the previous tip, you can’t just think you want something; you have to have action and feeling behind it.
If you love your partner and really want to make it work, then take the necessary steps and commit. But know that both of you have to be on the same page. A relationship can’t be one sided. If you do the best you can to make it work and it still doesn’t, at least you tried.
5. Lead by example.
Take responsibility for your wrongdoings in the relationship. We are all so quick to blame our partners for why things went wrong. Look at yourself first. Take a day (or two) to observe your own behavior. Be honest about whether you have a mean edge in your voice or a condescending tone when you talk to your partner.
Try to think before you speak to your partner, take a few deep breaths, and then say what you need to say coming from a place of love. Fully engage with your partner and really listen when he speaks. You really do get what you give.
6. Start doing things you love.
Find what makes you feel loved. Find what makes you feel alive and invite your partner to be a part of it. People that really love each other want to see their partner light up, have success, have fun, and live life.
Likewise, help your partner discover what lights them up and fills them with joy. Sharing these experiences together can spark up a dull flame, especially after years of just existing in the relationship.
This could be something simple, like doing starting a hobby or a club together, or something big, like starting a business with your partner.
I remember when my partner and I started our clothing business together. It brought us so much closer. We worked together and thrived in the business, and were able to bring that into the relationship. We had things to talk and strategize about and were able to bring those skills into our marriage.
7. Go on an adventure.
Take risks. Do something fun. Do something scary. Try something new together. Think outside the box and take the relationship to a whole new level.
Try skydiving, bungee jumping, or take trapeze or surfing lessons together. Infuse fun and adventure back into the relationship. These moments will be sacred and last forever. The thrill, the adrenaline, the rush of doing something out of the ordinary can bring more life into a relationship than you can imagine.
If you want to salvage your relationship, you have to be willing to do the hard work, self-reflect, and then take action to balance your partner’s needs with your own. When things start to slide back, always remember to bring out your best self and treat your partner respectfully.
Relationships are meant for growth, not comfort, and even if you try all of these tips, it still may not work. The beauty of it all is that you are preparing for the best relationship of your life, whether it be with your current partner or a future one.
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Every relationship happens for a reason. When you live and love with intention, awesome things start to happen.
Jumping couple image via Shutterstock
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3 Ways to Let Go Of Control and Relax Into The Flow
“You must learn to let go. Release the stress. You were never in control anyway.” ~Steve Maraboli
Sometimes I try really hard to control things.
I run two businesses so, in many ways, control gives me a sense of peace of mind.
When my team is doing what they are supposed to be doing, I can relax. When business is booming, I can relax. When I am getting what I want, I can relax.
This control freak-ness doesn’t just apply for me in just business. I used to be this way about my body, and I notice these tendencies even pop up in my relationships too.
When I feel like I am in control, I feel free. When I feel like I’m not in control, I feel frustrated, scared, and angry. It rocks my sense of security straight to my core.
It’s tough to admit, but it’s the truth.
I’m getting a lot better at relaxing without needing to be in control, and I’m realizing that the greatest control is in letting go of the need for it.
When I try to control, I get attached to how I think it should play out; I think I know the best way for things to happen. But many examples in my life have shown me that when I trust and let go of thinking I know best, the outcome is better than anything I could have imagined.
Letting go doesn’t mean giving up the desire, it means letting go of the struggle.
It’s exhausting needing to be in control all the time, isn’t it? And the truth really is that any sense of control that we think that we have is false anyway.
Our greatest power is in learning how to trust. When we focus on our desires with a sense of non-attachment to exactly how they unfold, it releases the blocks and opens us up to greater opportunity.
Here are three ways I’ve learned to trust and let go of trying so hard to control.
1. Step away.
Richard Branson has been one of my greatest mentors from afar. He amazes me with his ability to balance business, family, and fun in the perfect way for him. He doesn’t even own a desk, and never has!
I love watching the videos that Virgin posts on their blog about his life, because they remind me that creativity and great ideas come from stepping away from work and letting your mind open up. Richard says he gets some of his best ideas while in the bath, and he kite surfs every day, even if it’s just for fifteen minutes.
While we don’t all have the luxury of our own private island to jet away to (yet), we do have the ability to take a long walk outside in nature, start our morning with even just five minutes of meditation or yoga, or turn the computer off an hour earlier each night.
Taking time to enjoy life will only inspire and rejuvenate your energy for your work.
2. Stop looking around so much.
Compare and despair. Have you ever gone on Facebook to see what your friends are up to, and then twenty minutes later you are down in the dumps because somehow you ended up on a thread or a site comparing yourself to that person and where you think you should be?
The second we get caught up in comparison, it sucks the creativity and energy right out of us. One of the best things I’ve done for myself is cut back on looking around at what everyone else is doing.
I finally got to the point where I realized that, not only am I never going to measure up to them, I never want to!
I want what I want, not what they have. So now I just try to stay in my own little bubble, working on the creative projects that excite me.
Every now and then I do look around to see what others are up to, but I am super conscious to continuously check in with myself and ask, “Is this what I want to create for myself?” versus immediately judging how I measure up to their level of success.
I also remind myself that I am on the right path, because I am on my path.
3. Listen to your body.
The human body is an amazing machine, one that most of us take for granted. We get signals from our body all day long, signals I call inner wisdom or intuition. Oftentimes, we ignore those signals and choose to follow what everybody else is telling us to do instead.
Our body really has a vast amount of information that can help us with making decisions. When I am trying to control, I am totally ignoring my intuition. The more I relax into the flow, the more I rely on my intuition to guide me.
Sometimes my body tells me I need a fifteen-minute nap. Sometimes it tells me that it’s not time to write the blog post right now and instead I should focus on something else. Whatever it is, I really try to listen and override the ego part of me that tells me I must push or force things to happen in order to succeed.
It’s the difference between being solution-oriented versus problem-oriented, or in other words, inspiration-driven versus fear-driven.
As a society, I feel like we need to remind each other often that an unhappy journey does not lead to a happy ending. It’s like we believe that if an achievement doesn’t involve stress or hardship, we don’t deserve it.
We do deserve it, and we deserve a life built around a lot of ease and fun.
What’s one thing you do to let go and release stress?
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Managing Anxiety: 5 Steps to Open Your Mind and Calm Your Heart
“Don’t wait for your feelings to change to take action. Take action and your feelings will change.” ~Barbara Baron
I’ve struggled with anxiety for as long as I can remember. From the time I was very young, I would worry about things—my life, my parents, my house, the state of the world.
I would experience a tightness in my chest and an overall sense of fear that only got worse the more I worried. The more I worried, the more afraid I became of the unseen factors that plagued me.
Anxiety is distress, caused by fear of danger or misfortune, and over the years this worry has driven me. It’s helped me to be high-achieving and extremely productive, all the while depleting my nervous system and creating exhaustion throughout my entire being.
As an adult, I have recognized how this unnecessary fear has limited my ability to enjoy and be fully present within my life.
I’ve learned that taking action, or guiding my thoughts down a more positive path, can transform my feelings to a much more grounded and peaceful place. I’ve created my own road map to navigate stress, anxiety, and worry in five steps.
1. Slow your roll.
When anxiety hits, everything around us seems to speed up. Physically, we feel our heart rate quicken or breath become shorter; and mentally, we might start to head down a rabbit hole of worst-case scenarios.
When this happens, slow down. Shift activities, call a friend, watch a funny YouTube video, go for a run—anything that interrupts the cascade of worry and overwhelm that can create a mountain out of any molehill.
2. Ask yourself: “What is true or what is actually happening right now?”
Sometimes, just labeling exactly where you are in time and space (i.e. “I am driving to work.” “I am sitting at my desk.”), helps to refocus the brain and disrupt the physiological response that happens when stressors arise.
Focusing on what is actually happening instead of “what if” helps us to minimize our initial reaction of panic and fear to awareness.
3. What do I fear losing if this is true?
Because anxiety is driven by fear, it is both empowering and helpful to label where the fear actually stems from. Many times, this can be from a fear of losing something—security, money, friendship, or love.
By noting mentally what we are afraid might happen in a given situation, we can easier recognize the worry for what it is, most often, a fear of loss. The next time you feel anxiety coming on, it may be helpful to ask yourself which of these areas you fear losing?
4. Where might I be limiting myself within this belief?
As human beings, we have a tendency to focus on what is not going well, limiting our beliefs to those that focus on scarcity or lack. When anxiety is high, it can be much easier to focus on all that is wrong or bad instead of what is working or going well.
By simply pausing and recognizing where you might be holding on too tightly or limiting your possibilities, you may notice that the picture is, in fact, much bigger than you had originally thought.
5. Could there be a hidden gift or silver lining amidst this situation?
We often learn from problems, mistakes, or painful events. Reminding yourself in a moment of panic that you’ve always landed on your feet can help you to see the light at the end of the tunnel.
Envisioning yourself on the other side of this stress, lesson in hand, can be enormously helpful in actually getting you there. Sometimes simply reframing the situation to seek the lesson or hidden positive at the onset of a stressful situation can be useful in diffusing some of the anxiety.
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I have learned, through years of exploring and recognizing my own anxiety triggers, how to create a sense of peace and calm even when things seem dire.
As human beings, we are capable of creating our experience and have the power to choose whether we lead with fear and anxiety or an open heart and mind. Which do you choose? What experience will you create?
Woman in a field image via Shutterstock
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When Positive Thinking Doesn’t Help
“The best way out is always through.” ~Robert Frost
Earlier this year my partner, our son, and I all moved to Santa Barbara from Oregon. People move all the time, but for us it was a huge step.
My partner had a new exciting dream job, and we were eager to experience the sunshine of California. But our son was only six months old at the time, and we were leaving both our families and all of our friends. On top of that, I was leaving my successful private practice in Chinese Medicine to become a stay-at-home-mom.
I knew it was going to be hard, but I was determined to turn the move into a positive new opportunity for myself. It was a chance to renew my commitment to blogging, perhaps work on that book I’ve been talking about writing, maybe start a coaching practice?
We arrived in January, excited to find sunny skies and mild weather, while our friends and family were complaining about the rain. We both started a cleanse, determined to start the New Year off to a healthy start. We walked more, took our son out for strolls.
My partner went off to work, and I was determined to dive into re-inventing my business. All I needed was determination, the right attitude, and everything would just come flowing my way, right?
Friends would call and ask me how I was: “GREAT!” I would answer, determined to keep a smile on my face.But it wasn’t great. Nothing was working. In the few spare minutes I had between chasing a six-month-old, I would try and write. But I was stuck and I couldn’t figure out why.
I even hired a life coach, thinking all I needed was someone to point me in the right direction. The first thing she said was “You are back at square one, it’s not time to be making plans.” I burst into tears.
She explained how I had to take the time to grieve my old life. I had to grieve the loss of my career, my identity, friends, family, even the loss of my favorite grocery store if that is what it took.
No wonder nothing was working! I was so determined to think positively about my new transition I didn’t even take time to feel sad.
It was like I hadn’t even landed in my new home; I was just walking around about a foot off the ground in a bubble of “everything is fine,” when really, I wasn’t fine; I was sad.
I took her advice and it made all the difference. Here is what I learned about when positive thinking can actually slow you down:
Feel your feelings; just don’t attach meaning to them.
I was so afraid to feel sad because I thought I would be blocking myself from positive experiences. The trick was letting myself feel the sadness without attaching a story to it. Like, “I will never find friends” or “I will never get my practice started.” It was the negative stories that weren’t helpful, not my feelings.
Feelings are just like the weather; they can’t be controlled and they are always changing. I found that if I just let myself be in the sadness, it passed so much quicker.
Take the time you need for yourself.
Shortly after this realization I took some time just for myself. I quit blogging, quit planning, quit putting so much pressure on myself, and just let myself be sad. I cried. I napped when my son napped.
Planning and being busy were just another way for me to avoid how I was feeling. I needed time to turn inward, not expand outward.
Even in grief there is room for gratitude.
This was a hard one because I wanted to blame my unhappiness on our new home. But as hard as I tried, the beauty and charm of our new home won me over.
As I took time for myself, I made sure to be grateful that we had landed in such a beautiful spot. Having something to be grateful for really helped me keep my head above water.
The time for dreaming will come again.
At one point I thought it was never going to shift, but then it did. Little by little, I began being excited by life here. I stopped feeling like I was missing something so much. With that shift came new friendships, new business opportunities, even a renewed sense of fun and adventure in my relationship.
This was the magic I was looking for; it had to come from a place of true, grounded joy, not hollow optimism that I thought I had to fake.
There is nothing wrong with trying to keep a positive attitude, but it can’t come at the expense of your true feelings.
Only by allowing yourself to be present with more difficult emotions can you begin to move through them and create space for a new experience. Real happiness comes only when the positive thoughts in your head are aligned with the true joy in your heart.
Man under raincloud image via Shutterstock
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3 Essential Elements for Long-Term Happiness
“He has achieved success who has lived well, laughed often, and loved much.” ~Bessie Anderson Stanley
Love. Purpose. Selflessness.
That’s it. Everything I’ve learned about happiness lies in those three words.
Why those words?
Because in their absence it’s hard to be happy. Your mind wanders and sets upon trying to fill that void, leaving little room for joy and happiness elsewhere.
I’m willing to go as far as to say that these are the three most essential elements to your happiness.
I spent my formative years trying to understand why I wasn’t happy. And in the times I felt happy, what had fallen in to place to make that feeling possible.
Of course, happiness can be seen through different lights for different people. But I am not talking about in the moment happiness. The kind you feel from a lovely gesture or good news.
I’m referring to the long-term happiness that sits in the back of your mind, every day. The kind that makes you feel whole. The kind that makes Carpe Diem that much easier.
These words are like a Jenga tower. With all the blocks in place, happiness can flow. Remove one, and the tower can fall. Their importance relies only on what you are missing.
Recognize Love
It’s easy to feel lost, abandoned, and as if you’re walking through a dark forest all alone; unloved, and as if the world does not care about what if going on in your life.
Behind the tree, in the darkness that has been created, lies an army of people who truly care about you. But it’s up to you to reach out in to the darkness and feel the light.
Without love, and the subsequent support that comes from it, happiness is rarely ever possible.
That is not to say that single people are not happy, or those people who choose to go it alone are not truly happy.
But to feel unloved creates a gaping hole that runs deep.
Love goes beyond that of a partner and intimate relationships.
It stretches out in to the reaches of parents, cousins, siblings, friends, and those around you who care for you.
It’s the people in the world who offer complete and utter support, regardless of how bold, fragile, or doomed-to-fail the thing you’re working on is.
Around my neck I wear a necklace the reminds me that I’m always loved. It reads: “My dear Grandson, forge your own path, anything is possible.”
And with that love, I can achieve anything.
Find Your Purpose
“Try harder next time, son,” said the Recruitment Officer as he closed the door on the way out of the room.
Sitting alone in a tiny cabin on the Air Force base where I so desperately wanted to work, I broke down in tears. I cried until my face hurt and there was nothing but braille-like dark blue patches on the front of my shirt.
I was seventeen and my life was still ahead of me, but in that moment, it was over. My hopes, dreams, and aspirations for the last ten years all shattered by one sentence, from a man who had no idea how hard I’d tried.
For me there was no way out. It was two years until I could reapply, and for seventeen year old me, that was an eternity.
The subsequent months saw me fall in and out of depression. My long-term relationship fell apart, I dropped a tremendous amount of weight, and I no longer felt like James Johnson.
It was a downward spiral in to one of the deepest and darkest pits I would ever find myself in.
There was nothing for me to get out of bed for. I wasn’t walking the path towards my mountain.
My purpose was gone.
Until one day, reading the newspaper, I stumbled upon a personal training course and started down a path toward a new mountain.
Training people, researching how to make them better, faster, stronger, leaner and healthier. How to have a positive, lasting effect on their lives. That became my purpose.
And suddenly, I was well again. I was happy, and I was back to being James Johnson once more.
My purpose is different now, and I have cycled the same emotions time after time.
I’ve seen it not only in myself, but in the people I love.
When they have lost all direction. When they are walking aimlessly on a road to nowhere, they become despondent and their happiness slowly starts to fade away.
Truly happy people have a clear idea of where they’re going. They have something they want to live for. Something to strive for. Something to try and attain.
It doesn’t have to be career-based. It can be passion for fishing or gardening or designing tiny little paper houses from recycled newspapers. Anything you want.
But in order to focus on being happy, you should take the time to sit down and identify what it is you want to do. What you love to do. What gives you purpose.
What makes you, you again.
Be Selfless
In 2013 I moved to America for nine months to coach soccer.
The company I worked for had a pretty simple structure for your living arrangements: You coach their kids, and you live in their houses.
That was what we were thrown in to.
And we’d move from house to house, and from town to town. Sometimes I’d stay with a family for sixteen weeks, others it would be one.
They would feed me, let me do my laundry, and take me out with them to do some amazing things.
But there was one family in particular that gave me a lesson in selflessness that will stick with me forever.
In Burbank, California I had to coach a program for twelve weeks. And for the first two weeks, we had places to live; after that, our boss had decided to let me fend for myself.
And I scraped, and I scrounged, and I came up with the odd place to stay for a few nights, or a week or so, before moving on to somewhere else. It was a feeling of upper middle class homelessness.
But there came a point where I had no place to stay at all. No house to move on to from where I was staying. And I was going to spend the best part of the next six weeks living out of a motel 6, eating Panda Express.
The family I was staying with heard me talking to my colleague about this one day, and they offered to let me stay for the remainder of the time.
This was something they didn’t have to do. But they did.
And, they treated me like family the whole time. I was one of them. And I was a part of their daily life. I did everything from watch their kid’s soccer games, to going on their family trip to Disneyland.
They showed me I was loved. They let me fulfill my purpose. And they made me extremely happy.
That is what selflessness is.
It’s going above and beyond you, to let another’s happiness be facilitated.
It’s seeing the bigger picture. Making someone else smile. Showing them the same things that you wish to be shown in your life.
Without any return, because it is the right thing to do.
Truly happy people find themselves taking pleasure in making other people happy, because it is the most universal and sought after currency in the world.
Woman jumping image via Shutterstock
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When Nothing Feels Like Enough: Filling the Void of Spiritual Need
“When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive—to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love.” ~Marcus Aurelius
I recently met a woman at a friend’s dinner party. She was tall and attractive, yet had a glowing, inviting energy about her. I liked her nearly immediately even though I had no concrete reason to. In my myopic mind, attractive and genuinely inviting energy do not combine, and I was naturally drawn to her for this combination.
Just as the Universe would have it, the woman and I were seated next to each other for the duration of the evening. With a warm smile, she introduced herself and we engaged in courteous, commonplace “what do you do for work?” and “where did you grow up?” dialogue.
Quickly, because we are the unique kind of soul-breed that we are (and perhaps due to many glasses of wine), we began divulging stories about our pasts, laughing together, and identifying with similarities. She manifested the three S’s I strive to embody; she was smart, sassy, and successful.
The conversation eventually made its way to spirituality, as they always seem to do in my case. I sensed we had a deep knowing that we were both cut from the same cloth in terms of our spiritual energy.
She began sharing with me about her spiritual healer and the work that they do together. Since I am a spiritual person and curious to learn from others’ experiences, I inquired more about it and came to find that she works with the same spiritual healer as Madonna.
As in Madonna Madonna. Eighties. Multi-Grammy Award winner. Sold over 300 million records worldwide.
That one.
Instantaneously, I was struck with great surprise upon hearing that this prolific performer, the most successful woman in the music industry to date, has a spiritual healer, which indicates that she must need spiritual healing.
Why in the world would the woman who has everything need that? What could she possibly be lacking?!
I looked at my new friend and said, “Pardon if this question comes across as uncouth, but why would a woman who has everything have a healer?”
She smiled.
“When you have everything you could possibly want, and have accomplished everything you’ve ever dreamed, and it’s not enough to fulfill you, you realize you need something else developed deeper inside of yourself.”
I was caught in my judgment. It makes sense in my mind once I focus on it, but my automatic assumption, my internal belief, is that people with money and celebrity don’t suffer or experience true hardship. I don’t have significant wealth or fame; therefore, I am an appropriate candidate for spiritual work. I am the one who needs it because I have nothing else to hold onto. Woe is me.
This is a scapegoat for my ego. As long as I try to find wholeness and happiness outside of myself, I am off of the hook and don’t have the responsibility of working for it.
How often I get caught in the belief that fulfillment is out there instead of within me.
As real as my spiritual practice is, perspective proves to be a real challenge. My humanity is often at war with my divinity.
I wish I could say I am evolved or enlightened enough not to worry. Worry about what other people think, worry about wearing the right fashion for the present season of the year, worry about my level of attraction, appearance of financial income, and career importance. But I am not.
As quickly as one click on a photo on social media, with one passing of the magazine section at the grocery store, with a few minutes of window-shopping, or with one drive through a wealthy neighborhood, I find myself riddled with fantasy and victimization.
I separate myself from what I perceive to be the Good, Rich, and Beautiful Life, putting things out there on a pedestal.
Despite my “successes” in over three decades of life—traveling the globe, teaching in developing countries, earning two Masters degrees, being published, praised for beauty and brains—I still have to work on my spiritual landscape.
I have to address that chasm deep in my chest that cannot be filled and that ebbs with fear; that part of me that says it’s never enough. Just like Madonna, the need is there for me, too.
Moments after my new friend at the dinner party responded to me so graciously, I thought to myself, “Oh, Sarah. You still believe that there is a difference between people, that some have spiritual need and some do not. We all are in need. We are all the same at our core.”
We are just people, spirits with bodies as our casing, and we are all in need of something more, even Madonna. After all, money and fame cannot buy personal healing, happiness, or wholeness.
What I get to observe about myself in this situation is that I still all too easily fall prey to idolization of others and grandiose ideas of perfectionism. If only ___________, then I would be fulfilled and life would be good all the time.
However, when I am engaged in my daily spiritual practice, I am not as concerned about external matters.
When I am meditating, praying, sharing with others, being true to myself, and responding to life from a perspective of gratitude, I don’t take things personally. I enjoy the present moment. I notice the various ways laughter dances, the color of my barista’s eyes, and the flowers poking up from cracks in the sidewalk.
Those practices provide perspective for me and allow me to appreciate the art of living. I do not experience lack when I am aware that each moment is a gift along with everything that moment offers—that is truly my spiritual practice. When I am tuned in to that spiritual frequency, which requires effort and discipline, I experience life with abundance.
Often times we compare other people’s outsides to our insides, and it’s simply not fair to us or to them. When we compare at all we are robbing ourselves of the present moment, the most spiritual moment to be in, and we miss out on the beauty that is ours to cherish.
No one is better or worse than another person yet we cling to labels, social status, and mainstream media to tell us who we should be and how we should appear.
When we are connected to ourselves and we are actively engaging our spiritual work, we care little about out there. We learn how to define our own fulfillment and exist in a state of contentedness. We find we are enough for ourselves just as we are.
In the words of Madonna herself, “Poor is the man whose pleasures depend on the permission of another.”
Meditating man image via Shutterstock
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6 Effective Practices for a Peaceful, Positive Mind
“To ensure good health: eat lightly, breathe deeply, live moderately, cultivate cheerfulness, and maintain an interest in life.” ~William Londen
We often focus on nourishing our bodies, with fitness and nutritious food, and forget that to function at our optimal level and experience overall well-being, it is equally important to nourish our minds.
Years ago I wasn’t doing either, and eventually I got stuck, physically, mentally, and emotionally. Physically, I had low energy; mentally, I was not growing; and emotionally, I was bored, resentful, and lost passion for life.
Life became a monotonous routine. I got lost in playing “safe” and remained in my comfort zone, which started limiting my potential to live the life I wanted to experience.
Things became stagnant and I knew something had to change to feel alive again, so I looked for ways to change my mindset, to help me move past my negative self-talk, and to find the courage to take action.
Once I started choosing activities and thoughts that nourished my mind, it triggered me to turn up the love for myself.
I started seeing my habits shift to eating better, incorporating more physical activities into my life, and being more open to take risks. I was able to live from a more peaceful, fearless, and creative space.
What Is Nourishing Your Mind?
Nourishing your mind is feeding it with positive, compassionate thoughts that support you in taking action to create the life you want.
We often hear people say, you are what you see, you are what you eat, and you are what you think. Our life mirrors back the energy we put out.
Why Is It Important?
Your body and mind work as one.
Nourishing your mind is a critical component of living a healthy, empowering lifestyle. It impacts your body systems, your behaviors, and how successful you are at creating the experiences you want in life, because everything stems from your mind.
When you nourish your mind, the thoughts you create trigger chemical responses in your body that help increase your happiness, lower your stress, and allow your body to function in homeostasis.
By checking in routinely to ensure your mind is aligned with your core values and what it is you want to feel and create in your life, you are able to choose your thoughts from a place of deliberation and clarity. This generates more peace, health, and happiness.
Below you will find the practices I have continually applied to maintain a nourished mindset before the mental weeds start to grow out of control.
Practice #1: Breathe.
Many people underestimate the power of breathing. The act of breathing consciously allows us to inspire vitality and expire what no longer serves us in life. It’s the constant that represents our life force, and it influences all aspects of our body, mind, and spirit.
It is also a tool you can use to “check in” and recalibrate what’s going on in your body and what’s happening in your life. It refreshes your mind and brings you back to the present.
When you slow down and pay attention to your breath, it quiets your mental chatter and creates room for you to tune back into your essence, while your body benefits physiologically. As yogis often say, “Perfect breath equals perfect health.“
Practice #2: Follow what makes you happy.
Tune into what tugs at your heart and makes you happy. When you follow it and allow yourself to bask in the feelings of happiness and fulfillment that result, your mind will consequently feel lighter and more positive.
Stop searching for happiness and stop trying to conform and meet others’ expectations. You only get lost in the process of trying to please everyone else, when the only constant you can control is you.
Practice #3: Talk to yourself like you would to a friend.
Practice being kind to yourself. Give yourself a break. By instilling loving and non-judgmental thoughts in your mind, you allow yourself to experience more pleasure than pain.
I remember a time when I had to host and record a conference call for my coaching group, as it was part of the curriculum requirements. After the call, I realized I didn’t log in properly as a host and failed to record it.
Instead of getting angry with myself for being a careless, forgetful idiot and letting my group down, I asked myself what would I say if it happened to another group member.
I knew I’d say it’s okay, things happen. Look at it as a technical learning experience. We all enjoyed the call and came out with new ideas and perspectives and you did a great job leading it.
Now, doesn’t that sound nicer than if I was to beat myself up?
Practice #4: Ask powerful questions.
When we experience conflict in our lives, instead of making assumptions, take responsibility and ask powerful questions. Get the facts. See things from a different angle, and spin it into a positive perspective.
Instead of thinking why is this happening to me again? Ask what do I want to change? What can I learn from this? What has to happen for me to feel good about the outcome?
Our perception creates our reality. Reflect on what can be done and what you can control to influence and create the outcome you seek. When you are willing to take responsibility, you will be freed.
Practice #5: Challenge your thoughts about failure.
Oftentimes, failure is what stops us from taking action to better our lives, because it has a negative connotation attached to it, which fuels our mind with fearful thoughts.
When you change your beliefs about failure, it can nurture your mind and allow you to take steps to achieve what it is you seek.
Not trying is failure. Exercise your right to live a full and purposeful life.Give yourself the opportunity to create and experience the life you desire.
If you fail, similar to Thomas Edison, you’ve simply learned “10,000 ways that won’t work.” This takes courage and contributes to your learning and growth, which is what feeds our energy and vitality for life.
Practice #6: Embrace your imperfection.
We are not perfect, so stop trying to be. The sooner you are able to accept your imperfections, the sooner you’ll be able to get out of your head, and the sooner you’ll be able to rock your authentic self.
When I travel, I challenge myself to bust out what I know in the local language when meeting people or asking for help. Most people appreciate the effort, and are often more willing to help out and engage in conversation.
In the process, I am improving my language skills little by little, having a good laugh at times, and if I’m lucky, I may experience and meet some really interesting and fun people.
When we seek to be perfect, our mind tends to be on alert to ensure all the i’s are dotted and the t’s are crossed. Our body gets uptight and our mind gets lost in the worry. It gets exhausting and stops us from allowing lightness and joy to come into our lives.
So, if you are trying to be perfect somewhere in your life, ask yourself, am I already doing the best that I can? Am I trying to be someone else’s perfect vision? If you answer yes to the questions, I encourage you to let it go for your peace of mind.
Remember, when you feed your mind with nourishing thoughts, your body also benefits from it. So find and apply what works for you, and see your life shift in the direction you seek with greater clarity, courage, and confidence.
Woman in garden image via Shutterstock
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Can You Make Your Brain Fall Out of Love?
“Sometimes love means letting go when you want to hold on tighter.” ~Unknown
A long time ago now, but once I was in a relationship that was full of great passion and hot desire, but it was also addictive, distracting, and destructive.
When I noticed that it was ultimately bad for me, I knew I had to “get out.” So, I went cold turkey, as they say, and broke up, thinking I would be able to handle it.
Unfortunately, it was much harder than I thought it would be. Every morning I woke up and found myself in the midst of some sort of insanity; my mind and body were filled with thoughts about him.
My mind just wouldn’t stop racing about all that had happened, what I could have said differently, what I could have done differently, what could have happened differently. I lived with this for months and it was a daily dose of hell.
It was at this time, however, that I enrolled to study as a hypnotherapist. When you train to become a therapist, you learn to treat different conditions.
Usually, we had our teacher describing and explaining a therapeutic technique, and then he demonstrated the technique on one of us, which was followed by each of us practicing on each other.
(By the time we had finished the degree, we cured all of each other’s phobias and bad habits, until none was left. This was quite a journey of self-development!)
Soon the day came when the topic was “Suggested Amnesia,” a technique to “erase” unwanted memories. I volunteered immediately, ready to let go of all it all.
The experience was nothing like you would imagine as some cold-war brainwash type of hypnosis.
During the whole procedure, I didn’t lose any of my awareness. At the end, I didn’t lose any of my factual memories, either. But the memory of my tormenting relationship, previously so eminently on my mind, became a dim and vague residue memory as a result of the procedure.
The amnesia worked on the emotional level. The edge of my thinking, which made my life so hellish, was gone. Actually, it taught my brain to fall out of love!
The scientifically interesting background of this experience is about the nature of memory. Since the age of information technology, we tend to think of memory as a kind of data in our brain, which is either stored (remembered) or not (forgotten).
Information is stored in our brain like on a computer, which can be kept on file or erased. Interestingly enough, however, newest psychological experiments show that the analogy for memory as a data bank is not quite accurate.
Memory is not a piece of information from the past simply stored in our brain. Rather, all past events have created imprints on our mind, but those imprints are not static. Our mind constantly works with them and constantly changes memories as its current thinking changes.
Memory is formable. You can change past memories by changing your present state of mind.
How is this possible? Memories are formed as neurological connections in the brain: a certain sequence of connections is fired when the event is happening and later recalled.
The same happens during imagination. When you close your eyes and visualize whatever you want, you’re actually creating new neurological pathways. This means that memory and imagination are created on the same neurological level and therefore one can override the other.
You can try a little experiment. Close your eyes for a minute and think of a person you had a bad experience with.
With your eyes shut, recall the memory of that negative experience. Make it as real as you can: see it like a colorful movie on your mind. See what you saw, hear what you heard, feel what you felt at that time.
Don’t make it too long, just long enough that you can open your eyes and notice the negative feeling coming up with the memory.
After that, close your eyes again. Bring back the last scene of the same movie on your mind, but this time turn the colors black and white, play it backward, and start to shrink the size of the whole picture, until it’s nothing but a tiny dot that disappears into the vast blackness behind your eyelids. Gone.
After that, start to make a new movie, completely out of your imagination, in which the same situation with the same person has a positive outcome.
Maybe the person says something different, or you do, as long as at the end you can see the “enemy” person smiling at you, shaking hands, perhaps even giving you a hug (if that’s within your comfort zone).
After you have effectively created the movie, open your eyes and observe how you feel. You should feel less negative toward this person, neutral, or perhaps even positive.
The difference between your emotions following the first (memory) and the second movie (imagination) is due to new neurological pathways you have created in your mind.
After my experience at the hypnotherapy course, my whole obsession with being “in love” completely changed.
I no longer had those morning thoughts that had previously tormented me for hours after awakening. I no longer had those memories flushing into my life seemingly out of control.
It is sobering to think how much of what is happening to us is actually a product of our own mind. How often do we say, “Oh, I can’t help it … I’m like this … I’m like that,” while it is our own mind that is responsible for our emotional reactions—whether we are conscious of that or not.
I felt great relief. For a moment, I also felt disillusionment. My story was about a broken relationship, but what about good relationships?
“Programming” our minds to fall in and out of love, would that not deprive relationships of all poetry and beauty? Are those happy, loving, and promising relationships also nothing more than connections in our brain?
Of course not, I reminded myself. True love is not generated by our brain; it is a matter of our heart. Luckily, no amount of research, science, and therapy will ever change that.
Woman in pain image via Shutterstock
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Dealing with a Relationship Crisis: How a Little Distance Can Bring You Closer
“Getting over a painful experience is much like crossing monkey bars. You have to let go at some point in order to go forward.” ~C.S. Lewis
When you’re in the middle of any sort of relationship crisis, the very last thing you want to do is let go. Conflict with someone you love often makes you want to do the very opposite, especially when the other person is already doubting the future of the relationship.
When we’re feeling threated by the loss of someone we love, we act from a place of fear. Our stress hormones sky rocket as we react with our fight or flight instinct. Suddenly we hold tighter, talk more, do more, and think of nothing else.
However, with a little space and hindsight, it is easy to see this sort of intensity around a negative situation only works to amplify the anger and resentment that both parties being feel.
When you are mid-crisis and fighting though, it is very hard to see that the very thing you are doing to try and resolve the situation is actually making everything far worse.
When I packed my toddler in the car and drove away from my husband six months ago, I fully believed I would not be returning. I honestly thought that if it had become so bad that we had to separate, that we would not ever reconcile our problems.
To my surprise, it was the act of letting go that allowed us both some space to re-evaluate our relationship, and helped us to finally realize that none of our disagreements were worth losing our family for.
Don’t get me wrong; I’m not saying that any of it was easy. It was ugly and dark and messy. It took us both to rock bottom, and to a place we never thought we’d come back from.
But it was this very darkness that forced us to focus on our own thoughts and actions rather than our external conflict with each other. Looking at ourselves was exactly what we needed to start viewing our arguments from each other’s perspective so we could finally move past them.
For me, the process of grieving the loss of what we had in our relationship shone a light on all of the things I had done to contribute to us falling apart.
At first, this was in an angry and disparaging way, but as I realized I had to start looking after myself in order to move forward, I saw the need to own my own part in what had happened, without negative judgment.
Realizing what I had done wrong was empowering. It gave me the opportunity to approach my partner in a new way. And it was clear from his response that he had been doing some very similar soul searching in the time he spent on his own.
When we started to reconnect, we came from a place of understanding and love, rather than resentment and hurt. As you can imagine, this drastically changed our interactions. And rather than spiralling into our past negative cycle, we were able to create new positive experiences to share.
Even now, this mindset is one that requires conscious effort to maintain. It’s too easy to get caught up in the negative annoyances that pop up when you are so close to someone, so we have to work hard to make sure we don’t allow ourselves to get stuck in that cycle again.
Especially when we’ve both hurt each other badly in the past, it would be all too easy to keep dragging that up with each petty argument that arises.
But we’ve both been to that dark place, and the feeling of losing something that we value so much remains a reminder of why we work so hard to maintain what we have. Why it is important to always speak from a place of love, not a place of hurt, annoyance, anger, or, the amplifier of all, exhaustion.
While the drastic step of separation is exactly what helped us reconnect, it didn’t need to go that far.
If only we’d had the awareness to step back from each other and view our relationship from a place of love, rather than fear, we may have been able to save ourselves the incredibly painful experience of letting go.
Instead of grasping, fighting, and reacting (all fear based responses) and focusing on our own pain, we might have been able to use love to see and understand the hurt that the other person was feeling.
Rather than continuing on our negative spiral of conflict, focusing only the wrongs that had been done to us, we needed to step back and be honest with ourselves about our own roles in the relationship conflict.
We both needed to realize that our own behavior is the only thing we can control, and it was our own actions that needed to change to move us to a better place.
Hindsight is a beautiful thing, isn’t it?
So, if you have been fighting and reacting from a place of fear in your relationship, try stepping back and giving yourself some space to look at the real issues.
Give yourself the distance you need to view the conflict from a place of love and give yourselves the chance to find your way back to each other, without having to let go.
Divided couple image via Shutterstock
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Living for Yourself So You Won’t Die Full of Regrets
“One day your life will flash before your eyes. Make sure it’s worth watching.” ~Unknown
A mother was walking down the street with her two little sons. A man stopped to admire them and he asked, “You must be so proud of them! How old are they?” The mother answered, “Who? The doctor or the lawyer?”
A few days ago I heard this joke and, despite its purpose, it just made me feel sad. I was one of those children who, when turned into adults, never explored their passions and never went for their dreams.
I loved writing. I mean I could write for hours without feeling tired or hungry.
I was so happy to express myself through my poetry. Fast-forward fifteen years: I was working as a finance manager in a top multinational company. I woke up one day and I just couldn’t move. I mean literally, I couldn’t leave the bed, I was so unhappy.
Thinking about it, I was just like the upgraded version of my mother, who had been working all her life as an accountant in a small company.
Don’t get me wrong; I love my mother. I love her so much that I could do anything just to see her happy, including embracing a career that I do not love, just to make her feel that I will be safe. Because I will be, right? What’s not safe about a management job that pays so well?
But if this career is supposed to make me feel safe, why am I feeling like I am losing the most important battle of my life?
Been there, done that. Hopefully, I am one of those who, in the end, managed to find themselves again. Unfortunately, I had to watch my father dying full of regrets just to be able to finally do this.
So, what about you? If the joke above resonated with you in a not-so-funny way, you may want to consider this:
Understand your story.
Who were you as a child? What did you enjoy doing? Did you stop doing the things you enjoyed? When? Why? What have you learned about working from the people who had some authority in your life (parents, grandparents, brother, sister, teachers you admired)?
Own your story.
It is what it is and you can’t change the past. Allow yourself to be angry for a moment. Acknowledge your feelings. It’s okay; just don’t get stuck at being angry.
Negative emotions will not help you or anyone else. Turn them into forgiveness. And then be grateful. People are dying each day being full of regrets; they don’t have any time left to change anything about their lives, but you do. You still do.
Make a plan for yourself.
Make it a daily/weekly routine to get in touch with your true self. What is your definition of being happy? Are you happy? Spend ten minutes each day, whenever you have the time, thinking about the things you really enjoyed. Is there a way to bring them back into your current life? How? When? Schedule it.
In most cases, you don’t have to change your whole career, or even your current job. You just have to incorporate more things you love into your life.
Make it happen: stick to the plan like it’s your most important project right now.
It won’t be easy. Of course, you have your very limited free time and your responsibilities, kids to take care of, or you’re just traveling a lot. Still, you are your most important asset. And unless you are going to take responsibility for your happiness, no one else is going to. Furthermore, what do you want your kids to learn from you about life?
Finally, please get yourself out of the “when vehicle.”
When you’ll get that raise, when you’ll buy that bigger house, after you’re back from that wonderful trip, once your kids are going to leave for college… life happens to us while we are waiting for some distant event to take place.
Smell the roses that are now growing in your small garden. You’ll feel instantly better. And that’s a promise.
Happy man jumping image via Shutterstock
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You’re Not Bad; You’re Crying Out for Help
“A kind gesture can reach a wound that only compassion can heal.” ~Steve Maraboli
My fourth grade teacher was named Mrs. King, and she was a no-nonsense, fairly stern presence who enforced the rules and kept us kids in line. I was a timid kid who wouldn’t have dared to break rules anyway, and I assumed that Mrs. King didn’t like any of us, especially not me.
The only time we left Mrs. King’s classroom was to have our hour a week of “Music,” which meant trouping off to a downstairs room that contained a piano and a slightly manic woman who played us old folk songs to sing along with, like “Waltzing Matilda” and “Sixteen Tons.”
One day in music class I transformed into a bad kid. Instead of quietly following the rules, I made cat noises during the songs. I poked other girls in the ribs. I loudly whispered forbidden things, like “Linda is a peepee head.”
I don’t remember even wondering why this transformation had happened to me. It just happened.
As we trouped back upstairs I felt defiant, but when I heard several of my classmates telling Mrs. King about my behavior, I began to deflate. “Ann was bad in music class,” one of them said. “She was meowing in the songs,” added another.
“Ann,” said Mrs. King, “please come with me.”
I was struck dumb with terror. Now I was going to discover what happened to bad kids. I didn’t know what it would be, but I was sure I wasn’t going to like it. Shaking, I followed Mrs. King out into the hall, and into the tiny teacher’s lounge. We sat down.
“Ann,” she said. I didn’t dare look at her. My heart was pounding. What was she going to say about my misbehavior? What was my punishment going to be?
The silence stretched on, and I realized she was waiting for me to look at her. I dared to peek at Mrs. King’s face, and I was astonished. I had never seen such compassion.
She said, “I know your dog died…”
It was true. A few weeks before, out on a walk with my beloved dog Trixie, I had let her off the leash, and she had been hit by a car when running across a street to rejoin me. My parents had quickly bought me another pet.
There were no models in my family for allowing feelings to emerge. I remember being mystified when I saw my brother briefly weep for Trixie—and he hadn’t even been there when she was killed. I hadn’t been aware of feeling anything at all.
In the teacher’s lounge with Mrs. King, under her kind gaze, my eyes filled up with tears. I nodded. Yes, my dog had died.
“Maybe you would like to write a story about your dog. I know you like to write. Maybe you could give it a different ending if you want.”
I did write that story, but even before I began, the shift had already happened. I had my self back. It was okay to feel sadness and shock.
There was room in the world for my feelings, because someone with compassion had seen them.
Having feelings in response to events is normal. When we can share those feelings with caring family and friends, it allows the feelings to go through a natural cycle of change.
Understandings surface: “Oh, now I see what bothered me so much.” Our circle of support strengthens. After a while we feel refreshed, stronger, ready to go on.
Many people, though, grow up, as I did, in a family and a culture where feelings are not welcome. Feelings are embarrassing, or they show we are weak, or they are something we “just don’t do” and nobody talks about.
In some kinds of families, feelings are actually dangerous. “Stop crying or I’ll give you something to cry about.”
When we repress and deny our feelings, we cut off a natural process of healing and self-understanding. When that avenue is closed, what is left to us is “acting out”—being “bad,” being depressed, addictive behavior of all kinds.
Many of us deaden our feelings with unhealthy food, drugs and alcohol, video games, overwork. At some level we feel deeply out of balance, but we suppress that too.
This can lead to a feeling of being inwardly at war, trying to stop whatever it is, feeling ashamed, yet finding ourselves still doing what we don’t want to do.
What can change this is a process of bringing compassionate understanding to our warring parts, a process I call Inner Relationship Focusing.
First, slow down. Pause and make contact with your body.
Use this kind of language to describe the inner war: “Something in me wants to eat potato chips, and something in me says that that is disgusting.”
Then say hello to each of the parts you have identified. “Hello, I know you are there.” (Notice how that already shifts how all this feels.)
Next, assume, as Mrs. King did with me, that there is some life-serving reason why each part is behaving as it is.
Lastly, ask each one: “What might you be wanting to help me with?” Wait for the answer to come from inside. When an answer comes, let it know you hear it. Don’t try to make it change. Change comes when something you feel is deeply heard with compassion.
I am so grateful for all the ways that compassion shows up in my life. I have learned that every part of me is trying to save my life. And in bringing compassionate inner listening to my warring parts, I have healed from writer’s block, addictions, and social anxiety, to name just a few.
And I never cease being grateful to Mrs. King, who showed me that day long ago that someone can look past outer “bad” behavior to the worthwhile person inside. A deep bow to you, Mrs. King.
Helping hand image via Shutterstock
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The Key to Happiness: Accept Yourself & Stop Seeking Approval
“Acceptance is not submission; it is acknowledgment of the facts of a situation, then deciding what you’re going to do about it.” ~Kathleen Casey Thiesen
I think many of us get caught in a vicious cycle of thinking that leads us to believe we can only be happy if we gain acceptance from others. We think to ourselves, “The only way I can ever love myself is if others do.”
This leads us down a path of self-deprecation and hopelessness. We end up making decisions purely for the sake of gaining approval and acceptance, when really we should make decisions that reflect our authentic self and life goals and aspirations.
This was me just one short year ago. I was in school full time and I was working so hard that I was pushing myself to the brink of destruction.
I’m a cancer survivor, and since I got sick at fourteen, my health has never quite been the same.
I pushed and pushed through school because it made others happy. I ignored the important task of taking care of my mind, body, and spirit because I felt that there was no time in my life for any of these things.
Acceptance and love from others was paramount in my mind, and love and acceptance from myself took a back seat. However, this sort of thinking is a slippery slope. Eventually, I got the wake up call I needed.
When I was seventeen I developed a chronic and relentless case of insomnia and was prescribed Xanax. I was severely physically dependent on this medication until I was twenty-one. It distorted the way I perceived the world in ways I am only just now beginning to understand.
When I turned twenty-one in September, I finally could see the forest for the trees and saw that my life was falling apart.
I sought treatment for my substance abuse issues and suddenly I began to experience moments of clarity that helped me understand what I had been doing wrong for so many years.
Ever since my cancer treatments I have been chronically ill. It has made walking a traditional path in life very difficult. But I never really wanted to walk a traditional path; I only did so because I was caught in the trap of seeking approval from others.
I spent many years having a pity party for myself and wondering why I was such a good person who had to endure such a bad thing. I spent thousands of dollars on medical treatments hoping that I could one day be the person I was before I got sick.
This led to a deep depression when I was at the crux of much of my substance abuse issues. It wasn’t until I went to treatment that I realized that accepting my situation didn’t mean I was giving up; it meant I was granting myself the right to have some peace in my life.
I finally surrendered to the fact that there were aspects of my life I just couldn’t change, and trying would only further the insanity. I finally realized it was time to move on.
So, once again, I need to stress that accepting your situation does not have to mean you become complacent. In fact, for me, it was quite the opposite.
For the first time I met myself where I was and loved and nurtured myself in a way I never had known how to before.
Stemming from this self-love and acceptance something magical happened. For the first time I stopped looking at myself as a broken, sick person with no future, and I saw positivity, power, and abundance in my life.
I started focusing on what I would like to cultivate in my life and what sort of path I could walk given my circumstances. I started making lists of things that I had wanted to do but had put off because I believed I would never be well enough.
As my confidence grew, I started to envision a positive and wonderful future for myself. I had always wanted to move to Berkeley ever since I was sixteen, and so I set out to do that. I had always wanted to sell on eBay but was too fearful of failure to try it.
For the first time I decided to take a risk and so I started to do that too. I had wanted to take a break from school and so I granted myself permission to do that as well. The end result? I now have a successful eBay store and just moved into a cute little apartment in Berkeley.
I took some time off from school to gain clarity and will be returning next semester. However, I will only go at the pace that is reasonable for me, and I will no longer compare my path to the path of others or do things a certain way purely for approval and acceptance.
I will do what I can while still leaving plenty of time to care for myself in this deep and powerful way that has led me to my current situation. These are the kinds of changes that you can make in just a few short months, and all you need is a little self-love and self-acceptance.
So what have I learned this year that perhaps can be helpful to you? First and foremost, I have learned that we should never compare our path to the path of others. Our focus should be on walking the path that is the most reasonable for us while still having time to genuinely love and take care of ourselves.
Further, I learned that sometimes the biggest risks in life reap the greatest rewards.
Lastly, I have learned that cultivating a deep sense of happiness and well-being from within will ultimately provide us with the strength to manifest what we want in our lives.
When you focus on the internal, rather than trying to directly influence the external aspects of your life, inevitably the external aspects of your life also change for the better. It all starts with you.
Girl with dandelions image via Shutterstock
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Overcoming the Fear of Vulnerability and Unlocking Your Power
“To share your weakness is to make yourself vulnerable; to make yourself vulnerable is to show your strength.” ~Criss Jami
Wanting to avoid pain and shield ourselves from it is natural—and, by the way, completely not possible, because as we close up to protect ourselves against pain, we also block out the light that reflects from it.
Despite our best efforts, the boundaries that we’ve built around our hearts to protect us from feeling pain, discomfort, and hurt are the very chains that keep us tethered to it, disallowing us from feeling the opposites—joy, love and passion.
Only in embracing our true nature, at our deepest core level, as emotional, vulnerable, and feeling beings are we able to tap our resilient inner strength.
Have you ever tried to cross your arms in front of your heart while smiling or laughing at the same time? Try it. It feels weird. You may be aware that you’re smiling or laughing, but you sure don’t feel like it.
Or, try throwing your arms up wide with a big open heart like you just crossed the finish line of an amazing race, and see if you can wear a frown or angry face. It simply feels unnatural. This is because we are feeling beings and our heart center is our core feeling center.
When we block our heart, we block the feelings as well, and when we open our heart it feels unnatural to be anything but joyous.
Our feelings are indicators of our current alignment with our soul’s path and higher energy source.
I used to stuff feelings down deep, especially negative ones, not understanding that by doing so I was suppressing my unique intuitive guidance system.
Feelings are there to teach us something about ourselves and reveal to us our true desires. It is only in a state of vulnerability, when we drop the armor around our hearts, that we can truly access these feelings and lessons to become centered, strong, and wise.
My early childhood and adolescent years were largely dysfunctional. I grew up broke for the most part in an unstable household, where my father, who was an alcoholic, was also verbally or physically abusive.
This environment imprinted on my young developing mind a perception that the world was difficult. I viewed the world through a lens smudged of struggle, and this perception became my reality as I felt I had to muscle my way through life in in an effort to not end up like my past.
As a result, I spent the better part of three decades unconsciously building walls to protect myself from these fears and insecurities I knew as a child.
Vulnerability meant emotional pain, so I developed thick skin growing up. From the vantage point of others, I had a good front of just being strong-willed and determined; and my fear of being judged by my dysfunctional upbringing was somewhat minimalized.
As I made my way through life, I’ve always seemed happy enough, pretty enough, and smart enough, yet I grew acutely aware there was a happiness ceiling I was hitting my head on, fully conscious of the fact that it simply was not high enough.
While I experienced happiness regularly, when it came to feeling joyful, there seemed to be a disconnect. I was too guarded and allowed myself to become hardened, stiff, and in a state of resistance.
I thought that in order to be strong and powerful I had to be tough and put up a good fight, putting up protective layers of resistance. Ironically, in an effort to be strong, I was giving up my power.
My happiness was largely contingent on other things happening or not happening as if it was out of my control. I now can attribute this disconnect as a result of resisting my true authentic nature and not staying open and vulnerable to the calling of my inner Higher Self, due to the layers of walls and blockages I have built.
There came a point in my life after my father’s traumatic death to cancer when I decided I no longer would accept going through my days hardened, disconnected, or defensive. I had not fully forgiven him at the time of his passing, but I made a conscious choice then, and now it’s a daily evolution, where I choose to surrender to my vulnerability instead of hiding from it.
Through yoga, meditation, and a lot of conscious intention setting, I began to shed these walls one layer at a time, revealing each time the softer side that I’ve always known to be a core part of my being—the side that is moldable, connected and resides with a deep inner knowing; the part that changes, grows and allows.
These days I choose to take my power back and wear my heart on my sleeve, where it belongs. This doesn’t mean I’m overly emotional, but I do allow myself to be vulnerable, to drop my resistance and feel my way through my experiences, reflecting as needed in pursuit for higher meaning behind anything that would otherwise cause me pain.
I’m acutely aware that everything is fleeting or temporary, and because of this I try my best not to take things for granted. With this awareness I feel I have no choice but to completely absorb the moment by allowing myself to be vulnerable and truly deeply feel.
The challenge lies in discerning what beliefs no longer serve you and understanding that, while you have emotions and deep feelings, you are not these emotions or feelings, and rather they are there to help guide your life’s experiences.
If we move through life mistaking vulnerability for weakness, or build walls to hide from our vulnerability, we stifle the fruition of the very experiences we long for, and true love, joy, passion, and freedom will fall painfully at our feet, appearing out of reach.
To be vulnerable is to be in a state of trust and courage. From this state, all things are possible and our drive, willpower, and strength align with who we really are, not what we fear.
Any strength that lies outside of vulnerability is a façade built by fear. It must be shed to allow our completely raw and unrefined truth to shine through, so we can deeply experience all of life’s’ beautiful sharp edges.
Joyful woman image via Shutterstock
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How Meditation Can Help You Find the Perfect Friend
“When you love someone, the best thing you can offer is your presence. How can you love if you are not there?” ~Thich Nhat Hanh
I meet with a lot of people who say things like, “Oh, I’ve tried meditation before but I’m just not good at it.” When asked to explain, the most common answer is, “I just can’t make my mind get quiet.”
I’ve heard responses like this so often that I’ve come to realize that this is the single greatest misunderstanding about meditation. In truth, meditation is not about calming our mind or achieving a state free from mental noise and cognitive clutter. Far from it, actually.
I have many decades worth of experience practicing meditation. Still, when I sit cross-legged, my mind floats and roams through shifting states like a cloud-adorned sky filled with hundreds of colorful kites.
Thoughts of my wife and children mix with those of household chores, distant goals, past memories, judgments about a fly that lands on my ear, or the sound of a neighbor’s lawnmower I wish was not there.
And, sure, there are times when my consciousness—my sense of an individual self—dissolves into a state of vacuous bliss and timelessness, but this just happens sometimes, and that’s okay. Whenever it does happen, that’s successful meditation. Whenever it doesn’t, that’s successful meditation too.
During meditation, no matter how busied and chaotic the inner activity of your mind may be, you’re successfully meditating, because meditation isn’t about calming your mind. It’s about spending quality time with the most important person in your life: you!
This is the true method (and goal) of meditation. We sit, pausing to pay attention to what’s really going on inside ourselves.
We enter our home and witness what’s happening there, whatever this may be. In so doing, we discover ourselves, who and how we really are, something we only fully notice when we allow ourselves to take a brief hiatus from the daily hustle of life on planet Earth.
It’s like taking a moment to sit down with someone over a cup of coffee or tea, except that, in this case, this someone is you.
And once you’re face-to-face with this person, you can really start to build an extraordinary relationship with him or her.
You can genuinely connect with yourself in a way that is rarely possible while the “two of you” are preoccupied with picking up the dry cleaning, taking the kids to school, answering emails, or a thousands other activities that so quickly seem to crowd each day.
Really, this is such an important relationship! But how often do we set aside time to connect with ourselves in such a simple yet beautiful way, to truly meet and spend time with ourselves?
That’s all that meditation is. It’s an opportunity for us to build a peaceful, harmonious friendship with this essential person in our life, just like we would with anyone else.
Our favorite people in the world are those who we know judge us the least. These are the people who we know like us for who and how we are exactly. They don’t criticize or scold us or demand us to be different. Around such people, we know we can be most fully ourselves, without walking on eggshells or fearing reprimand. This is the very definition of true friendship.
Meditation provides us with a chance to build such a relationship with ourselves. I call this internal friendship and it’s cultivated just like any other friendship, by sparing this person from judgment about right or wrong, good or bad.
When you like this person that is yourself for who he or she is exactly, demanding nothing, then a true internal friendship develops from this (not that it’s always easy).
When I was living at one monastery, we’d meditate each morning and night for an hour and half each sitting.
I didn’t have a ton of experience at the time, so this was supremely tortuous for me. I remember often angrily glaring at the master—a docile, elderly Sri Lankan monk—psychically trying to get him to ring the bell that would conclude our session. I adamantly blamed my discomfort and anguish on him.
When my resentful stares failed, I’d have no choice but to turn inward again, facing all my thoughts about how “I can’t do this,” “This sucks,” “Why am I so much more pathetic than everyone else meditating around me?” “I’m not cut out for this.”
Then one day, it dawned on me. All I was doing was fighting with myself and, instead, I chose to let go, to embrace myself for being just as I was.
If I was in physical pain, I let myself just feel it. If I felt angry or frustrated, I gently reminded myself that this was okay. If my mind bounced around all over the place instead of resting in stillness, I allowed it. I stopped criticizing myself.
“This is me right now and there’s nothing wrong with that. This is me and that’s okay.” And, from this, I began to befriend myself, to genuinely like me for me.
Unexpectedly, as I did this, meditation suddenly became enjoyable for me. I’d sit, focus on my breathing, and just experience myself as is.
The internal chatter faded away and I’d become fully present, not only to myself, but to all around me, to each bird singing in the trees outside, each creak in the shifting walls of the temple, each whisper of breath from those around me.
By befriending myself in this way, a friendship to all existence developed. I finally experienced the calm I had chased for so long.
It is relatively easy for us to experience harmony, peacefulness, and calm within our relationships to our best and closest friends. As our internal friendship grows through meditation (just sitting with ourselves as we are without complaint), the calm that exists within our mental and emotional interior grows right along with it. See how this works?
Meditation builds friendship; friendship builds calm. This is so important that it bears repeating. Meditation builds friendship; friendship builds calm.
As we aim for greater calm in our lives, we cannot skip this important middle step of building friendship and still expect to reap great rewards.
The stillness that slowly emerges from a continued practice of meditation comes not from forcing ourselves to think less; it comes from allowing ourselves to be exactly as we are.
It comes from liking ourselves enough to spend some quality, unfettered time with ourselves, to just sit alone together for a bit, experiencing all that it means to be us in the moment amidst the limitless vastness of time and space.
As we sit with ourselves without judgment, friendship grows. We experience the joys of being liked and the joys of liking, both simultaneously. And when this all-important relationship blossoms as a result, a bounty of benefits emerge.
We begin to experience greater mental clarity, insight, awareness, and stillness. Meanwhile, we enjoy the emotional rewards of this internal harmony—more compassion, patience, calm, and feelings of loving-kindness.
As we cultivate friendship within ourselves, our overall ability to live in a spirit of friendship unfolds. Everything around us appears worthy of friendship. All of life, including its greatest difficulties and challenges, its ugliest scars and hardest woes, invites a graceful smile upon our hearts. We become capable of embracing everything with friendship.
This is what meditation is truly about, not creating an emptier mind, but building a true spirit of friendship, starting with the internal friendship we have with ourselves.
So, the next time this important person in your life asks you to sit down with him or her for a while, accept the invitation and see what happens.
Enjoy a little time together. It doesn’t have to be more complicated than this and, best of all, there’s nothing you can do to mess it up. Every moment of meditation is successful meditation.
Meditating image via Shutterstock
