Showing posts with label love. Show all posts
Showing posts with label love. Show all posts

Sunday, May 12, 2019

Wednesday, August 15, 2018

Loving Yourself Can Heal Fear


"I believe that anyone can conquer fear by doing the things he fears to do, provided he keeps doing them until he gets a record of successful experiences behind him." ~Eleanor Roosevelt
I know from my own experiences that what Eleanor Roosevelt said in the above quote is very true.
  • I used to be scared to speak up for myself or speak my truth, and now I do it easily.
  • I used to be afraid of public speaking or doing radio or TV shows, and now I do these easily.
  • I used to be scared to be in my power, and now it's natural for me.
  • I used to be afraid of confrontation and conflict, and now I welcome these experiences in order to learn from them.
  • I used to be scared that if I opened to learning with my higher guidance, there would be nothing there, and now I know that I'm never alone and am always being guided.
  • I used to be afraid of my deeper painful feelings, and now I embrace them with love and compassion and allow them to move through me. I now know that I can lovingly manage them and that they won't overwhelm me.
  • I used to be afraid to write, and now writing flows easily.
We can't talk ourselves out of fear, which is what our ego wounded-self tries to do. When we choose to operate as a loving adult with a strong motivation to love ourselves, then we don't put our inner child out there alone to do something we are afraid of doing.
For example, when I first started public speaking and teaching - before Spirit brought us inner work - I was very scared of not knowing what to say or of forgetting what I wanted to say. I was scared that I would get so nervous that I wouldn't be able to talk. After I started to practice inner work, I realized that I had been putting my inner child out there to do the teaching. Of course she was scared! It was not a job for my inner child!
Now, before I speak or teach or do a radio or TV show, I make sure to tell my inner child that this isn't her job - that it's the job of my loving adult allowing my higher self to speak through me. Instead of trying to control what I say, I surrender to my higher guidance and allow her to be the speaker and teacher.
After doing this many times, the fear went away.
Healing Fear Through Loving Yourself
The more my inner child knows that I am here loving myself through fear, the safer she feels with things that used to feel very scary. Healing fear through loving myself means:
  • Consistently showing up as a loving adult so that my inner child doesn't feel alone with scary things.
  • Being willing to do the scary things over and over until the positive experiences become part of my neural pathways.
  • Letting my inner child know that it's okay to make mistakes and to fail, and that my worth and lovability are not attached to outcomes.
  • Valuing my willingness to try new and scary things so that my inner child feels valued for the effort rather than for the outcome.
  • Being compassionate rather than critical with my feelings when things don't turn out the way I want.
  • Letting go of having to know ahead of time whether or not something is best for me and being willing to trust what I want and the information I receive from my guidance regarding what is in my highest good - willing to go with the flow of life rather than trying to control it.
I encourage you to start doing what you want to do rather than allowing fear to stop you, and see what happens!
Source

Sunday, July 22, 2018

Be Authentic - Love Who You Are, Flaws and All



You are one of a kind! No two people in the entire world are the same. Both good and bad past life experiences have made you who you are today. The good times have helped you learn happiness, compassion and love. Even the difficult and gruelling times in life have taught you strength and perseverance. Be authentic to you and honour your self as the unique being that you are, flaws and all.
So often, we tend to compare ourselves to others and this is so unfair. By comparing yourself to others, you do yourself a huge injustice because again, no two people are the same. Only you know the life you've lived and the lessons in life that you've learned. No other person on this earth has lived and learned, or are still learning to follow their path exactly the way you are today.
As an example, in the car dealership world, you can pick up a new car for the same price as everyone else. There's not much wiggle room when there are about a hundred of them on the lot with only one or two tiny differences. But if you're looking for a used car, you can be certain that your going to pay top dollar because there are no two used cars that are the same and the dealership know this. They play on that so that you love this car and when there are no others like it here or down the road, you'll pay more for it. You as a person are no different. Treasure yourself, your uniqueness and even your flaws, because they too, are what make you who you are.
Be authentic and accepting of yourself, flaws and all. If there's something you truly want to change, then do it, but love and accept yourself in the process. No one has lived what you lived, so you've earned it! Truly, each of us is our own worst critic and it certainly takes courage and self-respect to accept ourselves completely. See your value, take responsibility for who you are, the way you live, and your own happiness!
Source

Wednesday, May 30, 2018

Who is in charge of your emotions?

Everyone wants to enhance their quality of life. Everyone wants to be more fulfilled. But almost all of us get stuck at times in our limiting beliefs and emotional patterns. We make habits out of feeling frustrated, worried, sad or overwhelmed. But it is these disempowering habits that prevent us from doing what we are really capable of – even if that something is just being happy. 


While we cannot control the events that happen in our lives, we can master how we experience these events. People are always going to encounter stressful times. It could be losing a job, losing your health or even losing a loved one. Something happens that is outside our control, and it knocks us down. But stress, anger, sadness – these feelings don’t come from the facts, they come from the meaning that we give the facts. Of course, the terrible things that happen are real. But the question is, how are you going to allow that to shape your life? Are you going to let it tear you down, or are you going to use it to empower and enlighten the way you go through life?


It’s all about the meaning that you give the events and experiences of your life. Because when you come up with a new meaning, you can get a new perspective, and, ultimately, a new life.


THE STORIES WE TELL OURSELVES

We unconsciously decide what events and experiences in our life mean; we do it all the time, but may not be aware of it.
Take a downturn in the economy, for example. One person could interpret that as, “I’m going to be broke.” Another person, though, might say, “This means I’m going to work harder and I’m going to be more creative about saving.”
What do you think the outcome of this thought pattern will be for each of these individuals? Pretty different, right? Is it apparent why each will have very different approaches to life, and why each will experience very different emotions? That all comes from the meaning each person assigned to the event.
Now, let’s move to something a little more personal. Consider a woman who had been adopted as a baby. One path she could take is to devalue herself, to believe that because she was adopted, that she wasn’t good enough to be loved. She could also take the opposite approach, and consider the fact that someone chose her and chose to love her. What’s the significance of her decisions over what story to choose? How will this impact her decisions in her daily life? How will it affect her bigger decisions?
The former story creates a sense of loss, while the latter celebrates her life and her worth. And the story she chooses will impact her whole life – because the decisions that control us are the decisions about meaning, and meaning equals emotion.

TRADE YOUR EXPECTATIONS FOR APPRECIATION

If choosing the disempowering story sounds familiar, you aren’t alone. We all tell ourselves stories that make us miserable when we could be feeling joy. We make ourselves feel sad, worried, anxious, shameful, guilty, fearful and enraged on a consistent basis. Why? Because we are wired that way.
The human mind is always looking for what you could lose, what you could have less of or what you could never have. It might seem counterintuitive, but it’s a matter of survival and of protection. You are biologically wired to prepare yourself for the worst at all times. That is why it is up to you to take conscious control over the stories you tell yourself and the resulting emotions you experience.
The secret to doing this is to trade your expectations for appreciation. If you do this, your whole life will change in that moment. And if you keep doing it, your life will change forever.
Go back to the woman who was adopted. She had an expectation that her biological mother and father should have kept her. And that expectation could have tainted her entire life. But if she shifted her expectations to appreciation that somebody picked her consciously and loved her, without the obligation or the biological imperative to do so, her entire life would change. This is the power of trading expectations for appreciation.

TAKING BACK CONTROL

The choice is yours. What are you going to focus on? What story are you going to let guide your life? You get to choose what meaning to assign. This is the one power that you have right now in this moment that can change everything.
The only thing keeping you from getting what you want is yourself. The only thing keeping you from the joy you deserve is the disempowering story you keep telling yourself. But what if you decided right now to offer yourself a new core of belief? What if everything in your life, including the most painful and traumatic events, was happening for you, not to you? What if everything was designed for you to actually have a greater life and have more to give and more to enjoy?
If you want real freedom in your life, you must make a decision to stop allowing external events to shape your happiness. And that is only done by becoming the master of meaning and finding the empowering meaning in anything and everything that comes your way.
Source

Tuesday, May 15, 2018

Learn to Be Kind - To You

When I first realized I was putting immense and constant pressure on myself, and that the pressure was causing my body to revolt, it was like putting on glasses for the first time. I could see clearly how much I was beating myself up, trying to be perfect, judging myself, and otherwise rejecting who I really am. No wonder my muscles were tense, my body hurt, and I felt terrible about myself.

The next step was to somehow learn to be kinder to myself. This was a tricky thing, seeing as I could easily beat myself up for not being good at being kind to myself. You see the catch-22 here. Being in my mind was a little like being in an M.C. Escher painting. Just when I thought I was catching on, I'd realize I had somehow slipped back into self-judgment.
Last year, I gave my dad an M.C. Escher puzzle for Christmas. (Yeah, it's a doozy!) When I saw it in the store, it made me laugh. It's the perfect way to approach the mind-game of learning to be kind to yourself - see it as a giant puzzle. How can I slide out of self-pressure or self-flagellation in this moment and ease my way into self-kindness? What is the trick that will work in this moment? How can I extricate myself from this unkindness without causing more of it?
If you've ever studied martial arts or learned about the basic concepts behind them, you know that when force meets force, not much happens. If I force myself to stop being so forceful, I just get force-squared. Resistance increases. Everything gets harder. The power of love lies in its gentleness. Take away the resistance and you get freedom.
Stop trying to force yourself to change or be "better," and you make way for change to evolve on its own.
I had to stop trying to be kind to myself and start applying gentleness and love. What does that look like? It means that in the moment when I am beating myself up over something, instead of adding another layer of beating myself up (for being such a jerk to myself), I recognize the futility of doing so. Instead, I say, "Wow, I notice I'm really beating myself up here." Then, I allow myself to be exactly as I am in that moment.

The ultimate kindness is to say, "It's okay to be exactly as I am right now." Whatever you're doing, whatever you're feeling, whatever results you're getting - none of it matters. Remember, you won't create change with force. You'll create change with love. And unconditional love for yourself means loving yourself where you are right now. And THAT means being kind to yourself about where you are right now.
If you're overeating right now, it's okay.
If you're struggling in your business right now, it's okay.
If you're not achieving top quality in your efforts right now, it's okay.
If you're beating yourself up right now, it's okay.
If you're ignoring your body's wisdom right now, it's okay.
If you're behind in your to-do's right now, it's okay.
Whatever it is, it's okay.
Your mind might say, "Aaagh! Oh no! If I say it's okay, I'll turn into a blimp/never accomplish anything/never get my list done/never be pain free... etc." I'm here to gently, kindly, remind your mind that's not true. In fact, it's the ONLY way that you'll lose weight, become pain free, or accomplish what you want. Self-kindness is THE ticket. The wonderful thing is, you can be kind to yourself even when you're not being kind to yourself. You can say, "Wow, I'm really beating myself up over eating that chocolate cake. And that's okay."
That's the first step to truly being kind to you. It's what makes the next step possible. The next step is actually saying something kind to yourself. For example:
"Of course I overate this week. It's one of my coping skills, and I'm bound to return to it sometimes even though I know lots of great new coping skills."
"It's natural that I don't feel like doing anything this week. I've been pushing myself pretty hard lately, and I probably need some rest."
"Sometimes I ignore my body's wisdom and struggle with trusting it. That's all a part of the learning process when it comes to creating a new mind-body relationship. It doesn't mean I'm a failure - it just means I'm learning."
It may take some practice to learn how to say kind things to yourself. If you're like me, you've had years of practice saying not-so-nice things to yourself. But the good news is, with practice, you will learn how to do it. You'll find that the more you practice, the more unbidden kind thoughts appear in your mind. You become gentler with yourself, more compassionate, and more loving. And whatever it is you want to do in the world, I guarantee that being kind to yourself will make it easier and make you more effective.
Want to start practicing now? It's simple. Three times today, stop and ask yourself these questions:
What is the kindest thing I could say to myself right now?
What is the kindest thing I could do for myself right now?

Repeat that process for a couple weeks and you'll see that it becomes easier and easier to think of kind words and acts, toward you.
Today just so happens to be my birthday. My gift to me is threefold. 1) Saying kind things to myself today. 2) Doing things that feel kind and enjoyable today. 3) Sharing with you about self-kindness. I know that the kinder you are to you, the more you'll spread love and kindness in the world. And that's a gift for all of us.