I love how stretching your beliefs is similar to stretching your body. In both instances, you move in the direction you want to go and when you feel discomfort, you stop pushing, relax, and breathe. In stretching your body, you move until you feel physical discomfort, and then you stop and breathe into it. As you relax and breathe, the muscles begin to release. As you repeat this over time, your muscles become more flexible and you can reach further until you have a new physical limit. From this new place, you stop pushing, relax, and breathe. When shifting beliefs, you stretch your thoughts and mind towards Who you want to be or the life you want to create until you feel emotional discomfort. This may start out as reaching for a thought of gratitude. That for this instant, you can relax and breathe, and be grateful for being right where you are. As you practice that, you may then be able to reach for the belief that you are forgiven. That all the hurts you imposed and horrible things you have said and done are absolved. And as you practice the belief that you are forgiven, you may then stretch your thoughts to see situations in the past differently so that you can forgive others. You may then reach for compassion—for others and yourself. You may reach for the belief that not only are you forgiven, but you are accepted. And as you get comfortable with your acceptance you may reach for the belief that you are loved and adored exactly as you are. That you are worthy of good things happening in your life, not because of what you do, but because of […]
Go from Grumbling to Gratitude
Do you ever catch yourself grumbling or complaining about what someone else did or didn’t do? By comparison, how much time do you spend thinking about all the wonderful qualities that person has, and how much they add to your life? What focus do you have more consistently? What would happen if you spent more time looking at them through a positive lens? How would it make you feel to spend as little as a minute every day feeling grateful for that person? That might look like appreciating their wonderful qualities, or the things they did that were helpful, or why they are in your life, or their general and inherent value as a person on this planet. (And they have inherent value, I promise.) Just one minute a day. How might even that small shift in focus alter how you feel? How might it impact how you show up in the relationship? How might that shift change the dynamics of the relationship for the better? No one else is with you in your mind. No one is forcing you to think or feel anything. If you are holding on to frustrations and irritations it is because you have your mental fist grasped tightly around thoughts of their infractions, weakness, or imperfections. And it is because you are judging them as weak, imperfect, and full of fault. Who made you creator of the rules? Why is it that everyone else must cater to your expectations? How do you like trying to fulfill other people’s expectations and beliefs about the “right” way to do anything? The solution is to begin to allow those things that frustrate and irritate you to run through your mind like water […]
Sharing A Prosperity Blessing
One of the first things I do every morning is read inspirational emails from a number of my favorite teachers. Today, before I headed upstairs for my workout, I read Veronica Hay’s Prosperity Blessing, which was shared by Bob Proctor in his Insight of the Day. Abundance and prosperity–which are indeed a part of optimal wellness–have been on my mind a lot lately, and this blessing captured how I woke up feeling. Since these are the wishes I have for you, I am sharing her wonderful words. May you be blessed with an amazingly abundant day today! May the clouds break and the heavens pour down upon you more joy, more love, more laughter and more money than you could have ever dreamed of. May the sun shine its golden light of prosperity through every cell of your extraordinary body. May you be cleansed today of any resistance or feelings of unworthiness that you may still be holding onto. May your false illusions of doubt, fear and scarcity gently fall away like soft white feathers on a gentle breeze. May you be willing, simply willing, to allow the Universe to shower you with miracles today. May the Angels wrap you in their shining wings of opulence. May the fairies deliver you to their pot of gold at the end of a majestic rainbow. May your eyes shine with the glorious truth of who you really are and may that truth uplift others in your presence to their own inner knowing. May your ears hear the sound of perfection ringing in your soul. May you taste the deliciousness of every precious bite of life as your day unfolds moment by moment with amazing grace, heartfelt love […]
How Did Your Dream Come True?
There’s a fine line between knowing what the obstacles, pitfalls, and dangers are and using them as an excuse not to go after what you want, or to enjoy the blessings that you have right now. Most people are doing way more excuse-making and fear-focusing than they are careful strategizing and navigation, or appreciation. They just look for the worst possible outcome and use that as the reason not to do something, or not to be in the moment. Here’s a quick way to check how fear-focused you are. You are driving and narrowly miss having a collision with another car. After the hit of adrenalin has passed, do you tell your family, friends, coworkers–and maybe even strangers–all about the crazy driver that almost hit you, how scary it was, or how close you were to disaster? Or do you think, talk, and focus more on how blessed you are that you’re safe, how often you move through life unscathed, and how grateful you are for your healthy body and fully functioning car? Can you feel the difference? This doesn’t mean that you don’t pay attention to where you are and where you are going, but it does mean putting problems and obstacles into perspective (how likely is the worst possible outcome, anyway?) and then figuring out how you would navigate around it should you encounter it. Often, we just take the word or experience of others to keep us from moving forward. For instance, I have a friend who won’t let her husband get on the roof to clean out the gutters because she knew someone who fell off their roof and was severely injured. That was a tragedy for sure, but how often […]
What Did You Expect?
Whatever you’re thinking about is literally like planning a future event. When you’re worrying, you are planning. When you’re appreciating you are planning…What are you planning? Abraham as interpreted by Esther Hicks “Miracles are happening, seen and unseen.” This is the mantra that has been going through my head all weekend. And I absolutely believe it to the tips of my toes. Every time I was critical of my body or discouraged that my physical progress in my 18-week Transformation Challenge isn’t further along, I said it. Every time I thought about the future and doubted, I said it. Every time I caught myself concerned or worried, I said it. Because this is my life I’m creating. If I want things to be different, then my thoughts, feelings, and beliefs have to be different first. When you think about the Foundation Principle that “Like Energy Attracts Like Energy,” also known as the Law of Attraction, it makes sense that if you’re doubting, worrying, or being critical of yourself or others you’re attracting more of that same energy back to you. In other words, you’re creating more things about which to doubt, worry, or be critical. A quick way to check what you’re thinking, and therefore creating, is to examine what you expect. Do you expect things to work out—or not? Do you expect life to go your way—or not? Do you expect things to be easy—or not? You’re getting more of what you expect. All-That-Is (God, the Universe, Source Energy, Higher Coach—whatever works for you) absolutely wants you to have every good thing you desire, but you have to open the vibrational-door wide enough to receive it. You’re opening that door when you’re experiencing positive […]
Thank You! More Please!
I don’t believe in coincidence. To me, those moments of synchronicity, happenstance, miracle, chance, and luck are gifts from All-That-Is (God, the Universe, Source Energy, Higher Coach—whatever works for you) that we open the vibrational-door wide enough to receive. One of those moments fell into my lap as I sat down to write today’s blog and was wondering what I would focus on in a short amount of time as we have family coming in today and there is lots on my to-do list. Having just finished my workout and eaten my breakfast, I made my way into my office with my steaming cup of lemon-green tea and fired up my computer. As always, I checked my emails first, and there was one from Abraham-Hicks, one of my favorite spiritual teachers, offering a free preview of the first 10 minutes of a workshop, so I clicked on the link. Not having read the fine print, what I didn’t realize was that the offer was to see the first minutes of a live workshop and once those 10 minutes were over the channel would be taken down. I just “happened” to click on the link just as Abraham welcomed the workshop participants—live and in real time. My timing could not have been more perfect! And the words that I heard in those 10 minutes were a direct answer to a question I’d been rolling around my mind for the past couple of days. What a beautiful gift that I appreciate to my core! Those types of gifts are coming to us frequently, but often we are so distracted, overwhelmed, and disconnected that we don’t recognize them for what they are and we literally do not receive […]
Look How Far You’ve Come
You’ve come a long way. This is true regardless of who you are or where you are in your life. Think about the things you’ve overcome, what you’ve learned, how you’ve changed. Even the experiences you had yesterday have added to Who you are. Too often people compare themselves to others or where they think they ought to be. This leads to self-doubts, self-criticism, and frustration that they’re not further along. What happens if you stop for a moment and really look at how far you’ve come and let yourself appreciate where you are right now? How different does that feel? How much more empowering is that new feeling? That feeling is the difference between negative catabolic energy that holds you back and positive anabolic energy that enables you to move towards achieving your goals. Comparing yourself to you versus someone else or where you think you should be gives you a much more accurate progress assessment. For instance, if you’re dieting, what you learned yesterday helps you know more about how your body responds to food, what thoughts and emotions may trip you up, and what helps you succeed. And where you are today will be a measurement to assess your progress tomorrow, or a week, month, year or lifetime from now. Even if you are 20 pounds (or more) heavier than you want and you feel like you’ve lost ground, you haven’t. You’ve gathered information that will help you move forward towards your goals and Who you want to be. That time and experience was not lost or wasted. Even if all you have is a clearer picture of what you don’t want, that is valuable. Sometimes you have to know that before […]
Diet is a Four-Letter Word
I’m not on a diet. What I am doing is choosing to eat for optimal wellness most of the time. From the outside, I know it doesn’t look much different. I’m still choosing to eat some foods and not others. I’m choosing to eat at some times and not at others. And I have a plan that keeps me in a certain calorie range. But there are some primary differences. One of the main ones is that I am in control and am taking responsibility for everything I put in my mouth. There is no victimization going on here that is making me feel deprived. I am eating food that I love, that feels good when I eat it and in the amounts that I am eating it. What and how I am eating is in alignment with my core values, and I am eating consciously with the intent of achieving optimal wellness, as I define it. This is not a goal that you can achieve and then allow yourself to slip back into old eating patterns. Unlike dieting to lose weight, optimal wellness is something you never finish and can move on from. It is always something you are striving to attain. That doesn’t mean that I’m never going to eat birthday cake again. (This is on my mind because today it’s my Mom’s birthday. Happy Birthday, Mom!) It doesn’t mean I will never have a relaxed evening with friends eating pizza. Life is meant to be lived and enjoyed. But what it does mean are those choices will be the exception rather than the rule. For me, this will look like 90/10—ninety percent of the time I will eat clean and ten percent […]
More Tips for Practicing Appreciation
In Saturday’s blog, I presented information on how appreciation is similar too, but different from gratitude and pointed out five tips for practicing appreciation. But how do you know when you are raising your positive anabolic energy? Pay attention to your emotions. Abraham advises looking for any feeling of relief as an indicator that you are shifting your energy. For me this means starting to feel more at ease, being more present and peaceful, and having those feelings build to contentment, satisfaction, love, and ultimately joy. It is the pinnacle to get to the point where you are absolutely and completely in love with life and are eager for more Any improvement in your emotions is letting you know you are shifting to a more anabolic state. Here are some more tips for practicing appreciation. Make it a game. One of the keys to practicing appreciation is to lighten up and let go of taking life so seriously. In a less serious state, you are more willing to play and let anabolic energy flow. Ways to make appreciation a game are to: Think of things you appreciate that start with every letter of the alphabet. For instance, I appreciate Apricots, Bananas, Cashews, etc.” (Humm, must be time for breakfast!) Or pick one letter and see how long you can make the list. I’ll give an example with the letter O. I appreciate oranges, orangutans, ostriches, oscillating fans, openers, onions, olives, organs (both those in my body and those that play music), ovens—you get the idea. Or pick a taste you a like and think of everything you appreciate with that flavor. For instance, salty. “Popcorn, pretzels, pistachios, nuts of all sorts, roasted vegetables, etc.” Or […]
How’s Your Body Working for You?
Have you ever stopped to marvel at all the physical processes that are going on in your body? Without even thinking about it, your heart is beating, your lungs are taking in air, your stomach is digesting and processing food, your immune system is fighting off who knows what, blood is flowing, your brain is registering all your sensory input and is instantly putting that data to use—the list goes on and on. Each cell in your body is working hard to provide you with optimal wellness. And what is the reward we typically give our bodies? Too often it’s an unending stream of criticism, low-nutrition food, soda instead of water, and lots of time being sedentary. Still, our bodies do amazing things with the low-quality physical and mental resources that we provide it. The majority of people are well most of the time and are able to get through their days doing what they need to do. Yet, if something in our bodies does start to breakdown, we often feel betrayed, self-critical, or judgmental about the inferior quality of the body we got “stuck” with. Thoughts can run along the lines of, “Out of all the bodies on the planet, mine turned out to be a lemon.” What would happen if you showed up in the relationship with your spouse or partner the same way you show up with your body? How long do you think your partner would stick around if you spoke nothing but harsh criticism, ignored them, and didn’t do anything to take care of their needs, and in fact often sabotaged their efforts to take care of themselves? Our bodies are often much more willing to take that kind of […]
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