Freedom

Yesterday I found freedom in the last place I would have thought to look ~ at a Candy factory taking phone orders for Christmas. I worked the entire day and as the day progressed the feelings of joy kept building inside. I couldn't believe it at first... could it be that an $8.50 an hour job could give me such pleasure?

I realized that it's all in the meaning I attach to the job (or any event in life for that matter). I see the job as an opportunity to practice serving others, connecting with an open heart and being fully present in each moment no matter where I am. It's a wonderful game that I'm choosing to play. The freedom comes from the choice. I'm not being forced into this job. It's something I'm choosing to do.

This "meaningful motivation" as my Vividly Woman sister and mentor Leela Francis says has made all the difference in the world. Ten years ago I served at a similar job as a cashier and hated it. Everyday was all about me, how tired, bored, sore I was and how cranky the customers were. It's so empowering to witness my own growth come full circle and to feel the feelings of love, peace and joy building within me more and more of the time.

Flight

Before I left for Wizard camp last July, I had a unique experience right in my own backyard. As I was looking up from my computer out my window I saw not one but two birds walk very deliberately across my back yard. The walked slow and steady, plodding purposefully along step by step until they got to the fence blocking the way to the neighbor’s yard. At this point it looked bleak for the fence was many times taller than the bird. The bird stopped for a second almost pondering the obstacle and then suddenly as if remembering that it was a bird spread its wings gracefully and flew magically to the top of the fence. The second bird then proceeded to follow the same deliberate walk of the first bird and flight up to the top of the fence to ensure that I understood.

I did understand somewhat than and more fully now… in my life I’d been putting my head down and plodding deliberately along creating my own business. At some point along the way the joy seeped out of the whole process and I found myself faced with a wall. For months I had been spinning my wheels trying to do more, to market more, make the website faster, meet more people and all I succeeded in doing was stressing myself out and giving myself more deadlines without any real reason to keep moving other than to not be still.

The birds made me realize that all there was to be done was remember who I am and spread my wings and fly. For the past three months I’ve been embracing the process of remembering. At first I’d been berating myself for not knowing myself deeper and not being able to help others. With sweet, sweet surrender came the clarity that I needed to dive deeper in order to be able to soar higher. What emerged from the stillness surprised me and now that I’m starting to live it out, I’m still surprised at the simplicity of it all. I have to keep reminding myself not to overcomplicate things. My mission right now (should I choose to accept it!) is to fully embody love, vulnerability, openness and intimacy in all that I do. In my relationship with myself, with my dog, with my husband, my neighbors, my co-workers and clients spiraling out to everyone I meet and on and on.

I am being called to truly embody compassion, love, humility and to allow myself to merge with others, connecting deeper and more profoundly than ever before. When I surrendered to this yearning I realized its perfection, its great timing and preparation for me to express more of my authentic self more of the time. With practice have come great fun, joy, success and other times of disappointment, breakdown, correcting and breakthroughs. Amidst it all I keep going, keep trying, improving, opening and surrendering. For love and connection is the basis of everything I am and everything I do whether it be as a writer, healer, teacher, coach, trainer, guide, lover, mother or woman. Underneath it all is love and the practice of love is transforming my life from the inside out – preparing me for flight.

Putting the Pieces Together

As I wrap up my year since leaving my engineering job, the message has consistently been “put the pieces together”. I finally realized a few months ago that I needed to start by putting the pieces together of my own soul, my path, talents, abilities, etc. and then to put together the pieces of my mission and the visions for living that mission out in the world. I can say that now I feel like I have most if not all of the pieces spread out before me and have put a few of them together.

All that remains is to keep at it, keep entering the stillness to discover what my heart yearns for, trying it out and discerning more and more keenly what my life is all about. This process of discovery is a game of wonder to me and when life gets rough and I feel like I’m just holding on trying not to get washed away, I cling to the wonder of the game and trust that in surrendering to this new storm, this new challenge in my life, I will ultimately discover a new piece of myself and that is worth all of the trial and tribulation I may go through at times.

Building the Foundation

I've been wondering for months now when they are going to build the house behind us. The plan for it has been in the works since even before we moved in eight months ago. Just when I'd given up hope that they were going to build it this year, all of a sudden work started a couple of weeks ago to prepare the ground and lay the foundation. Now as I look out my window and watch the frame go up, I can't help but reflect on my own life.

Sometimes as I go about my day and week I fall into thinking that it doesn't look like I've gotten anywhere lately in my life. The problem is it's hard to see the results of all of the ground work I've been laying - forgiveness, releasing old emotions, weeding out negative thoughts and energies, and programming new empowering beliefs. Seeing the frame for the house go up in a few short days, I remind myself that in my own life right now I've done the excavation process and am laying the foundation for future successes. I know that this planning and foundation building is not only an important part of the process but the key to building a stable future. So as I move forward, I'm reminded that patience and perserverence will see me through and soon enough I'll be erecting my own framework.

Everyday Beauty

I was at the beach the other day and it was a beautiful, sunny, picture-perfect day. When I was walking along I noticed someone with a metal detector. He had his head down and headphones on and was concentrating hard on his search for buried treasure. It struck me that sometimes this is how we go through life, with our heads down, searching so hard for a small trinket that we miss the beauty and abundance all around us.

As I continued walking I pushed the pause button on my life for a minute and made sure to be fully present - to pay attention to the sun warming my skin, the gentle breeze on my face, the soft crunch of sand beneath my toes and the lapping of waves at my ankles. I am reminded that everyday truly is amazing and all we have to do is be open to it and let it in.

Underneath It All - How a stinky onion can show the way to our core essence

A few weeks ago I was peeling an onion and immediately noticed a stench. When I looked at the end I saw the there were two bad layers buried within the onion. At first, I tried to get rid of the smelly layers by cutting more slices off of the end of the onion. It quickly became apparent that that wasn't going to work as each slice contained a piece of the smelly two layers. I thought of throwing the whole onion out, but then an idea came to me; if I cut through the good outside layers and then the two brown layers, I can get to the core inside. That's exactly what I did and in the end I was left with a much smaller onion core that was pure white and perfectly healthy.


Looking at the experience from a personal and spiritual growth perspective; if we are the onion, then at some level there are stinky layers within ourselves that need to be healed. A lot of the times we walk around thinking we are whole and that nothing is wrong. Often others can smell the stench of a bad layer before we do. When we do smell it, sometimes we want to cover it up, other times we believe there is nothing we can do about it and then there are those times of despair when we just want to throw the whole onion out and forget about it.

The secret is to go deeper. To be willing to peel back the layers of ourselves in order to get to our core essence. The true shining self that lies within was there all along and is waiting for us to discover and reveal it. It takes courage to be willing to peel back the layers and reveal more and more of our true self to others. Most of the layers have been added at some point for protection of some kind and we can feel naked and exposed without them.


In my life, I've noticed that as I continue to peel back the layers and reveal more and more of my true self, my life has become increasingly blessed, on purpose and peaceful. I encourage everyone to find the courage to peel back the layers of yourself to go deeper than ever before. The core of each and everyone of us is pure beauty and love and the world is waiting for the real you to show up.

Good Things Multiply

In looking over this blog and the posts I've made so far, I realized that I've posted a lot when I've gone through a truly transformational part of my life. So in hindsight it looks like I have a lot of trials and tribulations in my life - and I do, don't get me wrong. But what I've come to notice is I'm far less likely to post when I'm feeling great. I'll share with my friends what's going on, but somehow I thought in order for it to be worthy enough to post it had to be either dark or a huge insight.

I know in my head that the more I acknowledge the stream of good things, creativity and synchronicities in my life, the more they will grow. So starting right now I'm acknowledging some of the great questions I've asked that have been answered synchronistically in my life lately include...

How do I network online? I received an email from a artist friend to attend a social media university course as her guest - thanks Diana.

How do I network in person? A contractor who was doing some repairs on my house mentioned a new BNI (Business Networking International) group meeting 10 min from my house.

How do I become more focused and hit my deadline? This one gets a little convoluted... but I got an email with a free video from Joe Vitale, the only catch was that I had to register for a Simpleology account. Long story short, I never watched the video (sorry Joe), but started taking the Simpleology 101 lessons and am much more productive now than before. I even started to get scared because I had such a clear path to my target and was moving so fast! (see my Afraid of Success blog post).

So the great saying "ask and you shall receive" is so true, time and time again I've witnessed the power of asking questions in my life. I can not emphasize enough how powerful they have been for me. My aha moment and the part I'm really starting to pay more attention to is that the pace of the synchronicities increases in my life as I pay more attention to them and acknowledge them with a simple thank you. So thank you for this insight and what else is possible?

Be You (Everywhere)

I've been taking a social media university course with David Riklan (which is very good by the way), and at first I thought I don't really like this Twitter thing at all. Then Warren Whitlock one of the instructors shared how it's not about getting a huge following, it's about making real connections with other people. That totally flipped the lightswitch for me and I've been loving Twitter ever since. I went out and searched for people with similar interests to me and found some really cool people online. I'm so excited now and feel connected to the people who I'm following and who follow me.

I've also been having a hard time lately writing regular blog posts. I was not feeling the inspiration and couldn't quite put my finger on what was off. I finally realized that I was trying to be witty and wise instead of being me and sharing what I've learned. So the big takeaway for me was, whether I'm on Twitter or writing my blog, having lunch with a friend or holding the door for a stranger, all I have to do is show up as me (everywhere)! That's all any of us really wants anyway - a real connection with a real person. In the end, who really wants to be friends with the perfect person who never makes any mistakes, won't talk about anything real in his/her life and doesn't need our help? My posts from now on will be about me, what's going on in my life and what I've learned from it. Me, pure and simple :)

Afraid of Success

Last night I realized that I'm on a clear path to becoming a fully self-sufficient intuitive healer and it scared me half to death. I've been using Simpleology 101 and it's helped me to put together a clear marketing plan. I can now see the steps I need to take to get me from today to my online email launch in less than two weeks and I was stuck in place not moving at all. A whole wave of self-doubt came up - what if I don't provide enough value? what if I get stuck or don't know what to do?... I'll stop the pity train there for the sake of those of you reading this. Let's just say it spiraled downward from there.

Have you ever noticed how sometimes it's not that we're scared of failing, but that we're scared of success? Why is that? It's a totally irrational fear. I mean it must be someone with a crazy sense of humour that would spend months putting together a plan to be a successful intuitive healer (run a marathon, have a dream relationship... you fill in the blank) and then stop dead in her tracks less than 2 weeks from it actually coming to pass. I mean really! For me it all comes back to my own self-esteem and feelings of worthiness. I know in my head that I just have to keep taking the next step, but this morning I couldn't force myself to do it, my heart wasn't in it.

I finally gave myself permission to take a personal day and just do whatever I needed to do. I kept reminding myself that "this too shall pass" and that when obstacles appear it's a sign that we're taking action and moving forward. This is where I'm so thankful to have friends, intuitive guidance and the willingness to be emotionally present. I listened to some Abraham-Hicks tapes, wrote and allowed myself to flow with whatever emotion came up. I feel much more relaxed and focused again now. I know that I've cleared a major hurdle on my path to success and am moving forward again. I'm thankful that I was able to take this time to take care of myself. All I have left to say is thank you for this experience and what else is possible?

The World's Worst Boss

Well if you haven't guessed by now, the world's worst boss is me. I am harder on myself than anyone else. I'm so driven to succeed sometimes that I've got to stop and just breathe. I've been putting a lot of pressure on myself lately to get my website launched (which I did last month - yeah!) and now to launch my grand opening online. I've been making tremendous progress and learning so fast, but I don't always give myself credit.

So here's to me and all of the other over-achievers out there who are self-employed entrepreneurs and are stressing themselves out. "I'm proud of us, we're doing just fine. We're exactly where we need to be at this moment. And finally, take a deep breath and just breathe. Let all the tension, frustration, what ifs and I'm not doing it fast enoughs go... and breath and smile. Everything is okay." Thanks for walking through that with me, it felt great.

Give More

This week has been an up and down week for me or should I say down then up. I had a lot of things on my to do list that I wanted to get accomplished. I've got an accountability partner and a business coach that I meet with every week and I had a lot of tasks to do to stay on track. As I progressed through the week, I started to force things more and more. I was determined to get things done and quickly. Yet the more uptight I got about it, the slower things moved until finally Thursday afternoon things ground to a halt.

I took a break and did my workout and found some real anger there. As I did the martial arts portion I let out a really gutteral yell... I was pissed! The workout helped to reenergize me and give a creative outlet to my frustration but it did nothing to make my brain work faster or focus on the task at hand. Eventually, there was no other option left except to give up, to surrender and let go. I know sometimes giving up is given a bad rep but for me time and time again it has worked. I said "Okay, I get it, I can't do it on my own and I really don't want to. Please help." Then I laid on the floor and got all of my anger out, followed by my tears. It felt really good afterwards to lay there and be in the moment. To not have to worry about what to do next and to just be.

After a while I got up and put on some music. The first song that came on was "Give" by Third Day and it moved me. In that moment, I realized that all week long I'd been focusing more and more on what I had to do to get everything done and not on what I can give. That night I recommitted to asking powerful questions in my life like "How can I better serve?" and "What more can I give?". The shift has made all the difference. This morning I woke up inspired to write a blog posting and wouldn't you know it was one of the things on my to do list :)

Resurfacing

It's been a time of hibernation for me lately, a time to step back and re-evaluate who I am and where I'm going. I can't believe how time has flown since the summer. A big move from Canada to Georgia and leaving my engineering job all helped to speed up time, but that's a story for another time. This post is acknowledging the new 2009 year. I've been so lucky to be able to have the time to turn inwards and explore who I am. A key part of that has been releasing all of the old crap of been hanging onto through awareness, forgiveness and even screaming or crying at times. It sounds extreme I know, but it was (and still is at times) very cathartic.

One of the biggest realizations and processes I'm going through right now is trusting that everything I ever need will be provided for me. It is an age old spiritual principle from many different traditions that I now understand from personal experience. In leaving my job we now live on less than half of the income we did before, but somehow at the end of the month there is still money in the bank and everything is okay. I'm very grateful to have learned how to live simply and step outside of the crazed consumerism that has taken over most of North America.

When I finished my job on Dec. 1st, 2008, I thought a couple of months to create a website and start my own life coaching practice would be plenty. At the time I didn't realize how much personal housekeeping I had to do before starting the next chapter in my life. At last after Christmas I finally surrendered and just went with it, I stopped struggling and started becoming aware of my feelings, beliefs and thought patterns. The more aware I became and the more I released, the more I realized how much more depth there is to me and how much more there was to release.

A couple of weeks ago though I hit a bottom of sorts and started coming up again. I started to notice the sun shining and how warm it is here in Georgia. I also started to want to go out more and got a new haircut. Last weekend I had a yard sale and cleared out the old physical energy in the house. It feels so much clearer and lighter now too. I also I feel lighter now, like I'm carrying around a lot less baggage. Throughout the whole process (which some might call a "dark night of the soul") I've been able to watch what was happening and stay somewhat aware of what was going on. Yet I still felt the more extreme highs and lows. Now that I'm resurfacing the highs and lows are becoming less extreme and my outward appearance is radiating the peace and love I feel on the inside. It feels really good to be alive and I'm awed at how amazing life can be.

One sidenote before I go, I looked back at my first post from over 8 months and liked being able to track where I am and what I'm feeling. At times during the past 8 months I've thought of writing more posts but never got around to it. I can now see the value in it and am going to write when inspired. I really do love to write; it helps me get through the tough times and it helps me to see where I am and where I've been. Over the next few months I'll be attending business school, creating my website and giving the vision I have for "Push Pause" a lot of my attention. I'm really excited to write about my progress as I start out as a self-employed entrepreneur focused on helping people discover who they really are.