David and Annie at the Bubbly Pool
When I realized that what matters most is saying yes to love, I invited love into my life, saw that it’s an inside job, that it’s always been there, and that love does make the world go round.
Louise Hay, the inspiring author of You Can Heal Your Life says:
“We have so much love in this world, and we have so much love in our hearts, and sometimes we forget. Sometimes we think there isn’t enough, or there is just a small amount. So we hoard what we have or we are afraid to let it go. We are afraid to let it out.
But those of us who are willing to learn, realize that the more love we allow to flow out from us, the more there is within us and the more we receive. It is endless and timeless.
Love is really the most powerful healing force that there is. Without love we could not survive at all. If tiny babies are not given love and affection, they wither and die. Most of us think we can survive without love, but we cannot. Love for ourselves is the power that heals us. Practice as much as you can.”
Jeannette Maw, (an amazing Law of Attraction Coach) agreed that lack of self-love was at the bottom of my being stuck in the areas of love and money and sent me her e-book: The Art of Self-Love: Your Essential Key to Successful Manifesting. It’s full of tips on how to fall hopelessly in love with yourself. I see that my relationship with myself is a mirror of all my relationships and that practicing true self-love has a powerful ripple effect.
The roads will be lined with stuffed animals, chocolates and flower arrangements and I’m already thinking about what to get my new love while keeping the focus on what its really about, LOVE.
I’ve been growing my ‘say yes to love” muscle by practicing a meditation shared by Baba Ram Dass in Be Love Now. Say to yourself, “I am loving awareness”. Focus your attention in the middle of your chest on the heart-mind. Breathe in love and breathe out love. Watch all of the thoughts that create the stuff of your mind and love everything you can be aware of. Just love.
I’m not limiting myself to romance this valentine’s season. I’m including everything and everyone in my loving awareness, opening up my heart and saying yes to love.
xxxooo
“Learn to wish that everything should come to pass exactly as it does.” – Epictetus
I went to register my car this morning. Armed with duck tape to secure my Mylar replacement mirror, the ever present computer and bags of books to leave at the Frenchtown Deli book exchange, I set off for the Department of Motor Vehicles making sure to ‘ prepave” the experience. I was picturing it not too long and easy.
I was the first person in the inspection lane so imagine my resentment when an SVU pulled up next to me and zoomed into the lane before me. I hesitated, decided to let it go and returned to reading my book, 7 Spiritual Principles. Then I started worrying that ‘my’ inspector looked like a “…a tough cookie”. I almost went there, but chose to withhold judgment and all she asked was for lights, papers, have a nice day … no problem.
The lessons were coming really clear, concrete and in my face. There were a few more at the DMV, including the benefit of having a great book, patience, a sense of humor and gratitude. On my way back to my car I heard someone call my name. Joe pointed out that there was some kind of marathon and the streets were blocked so I avoided sitting in traffic, took a detour and breezed on through to find myself stuck behind a big WAPA linesman truck lumbering up the winding hills of the north side. The road was too curvy to pass so I chose a deep breath, slowing down and enjoying the scenery. to chomping at the bit, hyperventilating or trying to pass.
I played with the channels in my mind. It’s so easy to switch to a happier, more downstream channel when we notice where we are. With an intention to be fully present, to take the higher road, open my heart and stay focused on the light and where I’m going – I get to enjoy the ride. I glide past the brambles, the velcro, the zippers and tangled webs – for the most part- and when I don’t, I push off from the banks like I did when I was tubing in the Russian River – breaking free and laughing.
When the WAPA truck finally turned off, I got to see the driver – a handsome West Indian hunk with a beaming smile. He waved. I waved back and drove down the steep hill home, drinking in the breathtaking views out to sea. Walking into my house I spotted Ganesh, the Indian elephant God, remover of obstacles, sitting on my shelf. I couldn’t help thinking of the inner obstacle course I’d just been on and how I’d rounded each pole, enjoyed the ride, and had fun doing it.
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Since my own mini version of Eat, Pray, Love and its transformational effect on my life (see previous blogs), I have been considering what it means to ‘resume’ my life and if, in fact, I even want to.
Heraclites (Greek philosopher) pointed out that ‘ time is like a moving river” and ‘you can never step into the same river twice.” To pick up where you left off would be impossible. The only real constant is change- from the cellular level on up. Getting stuck and wallowing in the ‘same old, same old” is a disorder of perception and has a perceptual remedy. Once we start seeing things as perpetually new and resist laying our templates, beliefs, judgments and fears on ‘life’, we can sprinkle the dust usually reserved for vacations on our paths each day (including freeways, subways, elevators) and open ourselves up to experiencing things as though we’ve never seen them before. Think 50 first dates and then back up a lot.
If we really tuned into the nature of things, we’d be motion sick from the dizzying rate at which one-thing morphs into another, we move from place to place, and from the endless parade of thoughts that marches through our minds constantly.
Perhaps because change is the underlying constant we human being create structures and comfort zones and prisons that keep us ‘safe’. There is nothing like stepping out of our usual routines (think vacations) to provide ‘contrast’ – i.e. to help us get clearer about what makes us happy. I’ve been on plenty of vacations that were but distant memory a week or two after homecoming.
The definition of insanity is to do the same thing over and over and expect different results. Since I’m aiming for sanity this time around I am very aware of not wanting to pick up where I left off and of wanting to keep the sense of adventure, openness and excitement alive. I came back clearer about what I want in terms of life-style, relationships and my business.
I’m creating new space and cutting lose what is dragging me down and holding me back. I’m cleaning out my closets and taking inventory. Just as I am about to blame her, him, it… I realize that it’s me! I am the one who is holding me back and I am gifted with chances to clear and release and enjoy my new lighter/freer reflection in the world.
For quite a while now I have been carving my “real” life out of what looks like vacation material. Living in the tropics helps as does having a postcard worthy view. It’s a work in progress, and I’ve taken ‘do-overs’ many times. Slowly and surely, by leaps and bounds, I’m getting to the point where the boundaries are blurring and my “real” life is taking on a more and more free wheeling vacation-like appearance and feeling.
Imagine that you have just returned from a month long cruise. It was long enough for you to truly step out of your day-to- day habits and notice how great you can feel. You are now ‘returning’ to the prospect of a whole new year. There’s no ‘going back’. How will you make it different? What seeds do you want to plant and nurture? And most importantly, what would you like to be celebrating on December 31st 2011?
Whether you go it one step at a time or by LEAPING, I’m offering a limited number of NO COST 15-minute INTENSIVE LIFE COACHING ASSESSMENTS to help you end 2010 on a high note and get excited about your life in 2011. Send me a message with your email (as a comment) and I’ll get in touch asap to schedule your Intensive.
Get ready to WOW yourself in 2011. There are going to be lots of BEFORE and AFTER’s and I hope that you’ll be one of them.
“Before anything manifests in the world, it first appears as a thought or an image in someone’s mind. …. Every positive thought is like a prayer and all prayers are answered.” (Millman)
This is cutting edge, bottom line stuff. The more I ‘get’ the message that what I think and how I feel about it is what I’m inviting into my life, the more I pay attention to my thoughts and the better I get at creating what I love.
I’ve been manifesting some pretty spectacular stuff lately. (See my October blogs to read about my amazing month long, sailing adventure). I manifested an adventure worthy of coverage on the lives of the rich and famous. It was as though I had an event planner for dreams-come-true in my employ – (and we all actually do!).
I’d been thinking about sailing and boats, being on the water and adventure and I manifested a gorgeous boat and long trip in postcard territory. I manifested great weather, beautiful, peaceful anchorages replete with rainbows along the way. I manifested an amazing traveling companion and romantic leading man and I manifested an excitement about my life that had been missing. Not bad, if I do say so myself. And, of course, thank you universe.
There were, however, some glitches and these bubble to the surface. They are the golden nuggets that I am mining. The trip ended. The romance floundered on dry land and the flame of excitement about my life is alive but not always steady.
Its as though I forgot to add some essential ingredients to the recipe like ongoing adventure/life style change and a romance that is amphibious, monogamous and long term.
But now I have. That’s what’s so cool about this manifesting game – we get do overs. We can clean out the closets of our minds, discard limiting beliefs about what is possible and start thinking and imagining anew. I’ve already added the missing ingredients in my imagination and am enjoying what is popping up in the world, even on such short notice I might add.
In the past week alone, I have manifested crewing on my friend CB Jensen’s boat Absolut in the Coral Bay Thanksgiving Day Regatta (we came in second) and falling even more in love with sailing. I’m wishing fair weather for my friends Alan, Susie and T who are sailing Joyous down here with an invitation to join them for adventures as they meander down island. Sailing is proving faster and easier to manifest than love but I think that may be a limiting belief and I’ve manifested a date for drinks and dinner this week. This morning – once again at my office at Magen’s Bay under the sea grape tree – I am thinking and imagining thoughts that I’d love to see manifested in the world… mine and yours – and feeling pretty excited about my life and how I can help you get excited about yours.
What thoughts and images are on the front page of your mind when you drink your morning coffee and set out to greet the day?
I have my G-list in hand – (see last blog post) and I swear by the regular practice of gratitude to keep my life afloat if not aloft. This is the season when in-boxes are full of thanksgiving promotions and messages about gratitude, appreciation, abundance, family, giving.
They are lovely messages and the practice of gratitude works miracles but today I realize that we can’t be picky about what we are grateful for.
It’s easy to be grateful for a pomagranate or a kiss, a rainbow, an act of tenderness or generosity. But what about when you don’t get what you want and are mad, hurt and disappointed? What if your family and friends are nowhere near over the holiday season? Maybe you’ve just experienced a loss of some kind, big or small. What’s to be grateful for there, thank you very much!?
What if we purposely focused on what hurts, is distasteful or difficult – people, places, situations – and made a point of being grateful even if we’re not sure yet for what: for the chance to come face to face with something important, learn what we don’t want, get clearer about what we do want, release old baggage, heal. It’s kind of a psycho-naturopathic approach to healing . You take a dose of what hurts and it makes you better. You love, cradle and comfort what is injured or upset. You examine it dispassionately and accept it completely.
I believe that I have invited the people and experiences that I need to learn from into my life and that they are the perfect experiences and the best teachers custom made just for me. Some lessons are harder than others, some bear repeating and some etch themselves deeply and form beds where water flows. Some lessons are no-brainers and of-course’s and some are subtle and nuanced like astrophysics or zen koans.
When I suspend judgment (“this is good” “that is bad”) and have faith that everything always happens for my benefit, I can feel my G-list swell with the things I’d rather not think about. I can get down and dirty and embrace it all. It’s the Loving What Is of Byron Katie, The Power of Now of Eckhart Tolle.
This morning, I’m standing in my kitchen, looking out to sea. I can hear the waves crashing below. I also hear the silence of the ebb. The rhythm and sounds are soothing. Emotions swell and crash and ebb. There are surfers down at Caret Bay riding the ocean waves. I am up here riding my own and grateful for it all.
Happy Thanksgiving.