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The World Needs More Love

1/31/2017

February is a time when we celebrate love with Valentine's Day. Last year, for the month of February, several of my blog posts focused on love. This year I would like to continue that tradition and again focus this next month's posts around the theme of LOVE.

Don't you all feel like the world could use a whole lot more love right now? A few days ago I came across a post on Facebook about a 30 Acts of Love Challenge. I was intrigued, I had it on my brain that I desired to focus the month of February on the theme of love and bringing more of it into the world. As the universe would have it, this challenge and it's related movement was not only aligned with what I was thinking, but was created by someone here in my hometown with a link to my family. Yep, super cool and amazing!

Taryn Nicole, the founder of Love Sum and the 30 Acts of Love Challenge, created her website and movement to, "be a source of positivity and inspiration to add more love to our daily lives. I believe that by adding a little bit of love to small choices throughout our day, we are able to live more engaged, fulfilling and happier lives. When we add up each of those moments of love, we add to our Love Sum and contribute to the Love Sum of the world. By choosing love, you are positively impacting the world and making it a little bit better one choice at a time." Oh yeah, I love that!!!

Taryn says, "One of my goals is to help people understand that we don't need to flip our lives upside down to be happier. We can be happier and more fulfilled by making little shifts in the way that we go about our days. Here is an example:
The scenario: You are checking out at the grocery story and as the attendant is scanning your items you are glued to your phone texting a friend.
Shift it with love: During the 5 minutes that you're checking out at the grocery store, put your phone in your pocket and be present to the person who is helping you with your groceries.
Why it matters: This shift shows the cashier that they matter and also provides an opportunity to connect with another person in the world. You never know what you might be able to learn from a stranger in 5 minutes. You also never know how those 5 minutes might affect that other person."

The link to access the free challenge hosted by Love Sum to complete the 30 Acts of Love in the month of February is at app.convertkit.com/landing_pages/159793?v=6. The official launch date is February 1, 2017, but no worries if you join on after that date....better late than never! When you sign up for the challenge you'll receive tons of fun suggestions on different acts of love. Some for yourself, some for your co-workers and some for your community,

The challenge website says, "Doing this challenge will help you become more mindful of the areas in your life where you can add more love. Positive thinking will lead to happier days, so more joy and fulfillment is also a goal of this challenge. Sharing the acts of love you are performing might also help inspire others to do the same. We can never have enough love in the world. Do your part to spread the love!"

What do acts of love look like? Gestures of appreciation are acts of love. Kindness is an act of love. Compassion is an act of love. Forgiveness is an act of love. Peace is an act of love. Self-care is an act of love. Being present is an act of love. Listening is an act of love. The list is truly endless!

Let's all intentionally increase the vibration through acts of love during the month of February. Love vibrates high. Love is the opposite of fear. Let's focus the month of February on acts of love. I've signed up for the challenge, will you join me?

I would love to hear your feedback on this post. Please drop me a comment or send me an email. I would love to hear about your acts of love!

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What Is Your Intent?

1/24/2017

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I've often said that happiness is not a pursuit, not a destination, but rather an intentional practice. Jonathan Fields, author of How to Live a Good Life and founder of The Good Life Community says, "Life is neither journey, nor destination. It is, instead, a daily practice."

I feel that our daily intentional practices are the key to leading a good life, a life of more sustained happiness, inner peace and well-being.

Marianne Williamson refers to her morning intentional practice of meditation and prayer as a necessary daily purifying process. She often discusses how we cleanse or purify our bodies each day by showering, brushing our teeth, etc. and how it's equally, if not more, important to cleanse and purify our mind. She poses these questions, "Do we purify the anger, the bitterness, the resentment, the grudges? Do we purify the thought of being inadequate and not enough? Do we purify the stress?"

She recommends that every morning you spend time in meditation and prayer. She suggests going through all of the people that you know you will interact with during your day and set your intention to interact with them with love, kindness and compassion. She also suggests that you set the intention to act with love, kindness and compassion toward everyone you interact with, even those who are unexpected. Pray that you can be of service and be used as a vessel for God by asking, "Where would you have me go? What would you have me do? What would you have me say and to whom?"

I would add that you start off your daily meditation and prayer with gratitude. This sets the tone, raises your vibration and helps to connect us to a higher source.

In his book, Jonathan Fields says to, "Think of your life as three buckets: Vitality, Connection and Contribution. These are your Good Life Buckets.

Your Connection Bucket is about cultivating deep and meaningful relationships.

Your Vitality Bucket is about optimizing your state of mind and body.

Your Contribution Bucket is about contributing to the world in a way that is deeply aligned with who you are and what matters to you.

Your quest is to keep all three as full as possible. When your Good Life Buckets are full, life is amazing. If any one runs dry, pain ensues. If two run dry, you are in a world of hurt. If all three are ever empty at the same time, you’re no longer alive—by any definition."

He goes on to say, "Your only job is to wake up and ask yourself, 'Which bucket needs a little love today?'. Then, go about doing a little something to fill it, while also remembering never to abandon the others."

The key goal of a daily intentional practice is to function from a place of being intentional versus operating from a place of reactivity. Reactionary versus intentional. You can imagine the difference in your day, and your life, if you are reactionary versus intentional.

In this new year, what do your daily intentional practices look like? How strong are they? Could they use being ramped up? I would love to hear your feedback on this post. Please drop me a comment or send me an email.

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Darkness Cannot Drive Out Darkness

1/17/2017

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Yesterday, as a nation, we celebrated the life and achievements of Martin Luther King Jr.. And this week, as a nation, we will also inaugurate a new President of our country. There has been a lot of on going debate and concern about this transition of power, with strong feelings and emotions on both sides of the fence.

Many times throughout this past year, I've been reminded of this powerful quote by Martin Luther King Jr., "Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that." A lot of what I've seen and heard from both sides has felt hateful and dark. It hasn't felt productive, solution-based or light-filled. I sense that a lot of it stems from a place of fear, and fear by it's very nature, breeds anger and hate.

Mindfulness teacher, Jack Kornfield explains it this way, "When our experience is one of pain, hurt, loss, or frustration, our usual habit is to draw back in aversion or strike out in anger, to blame or run away. Like pain, fear is the other common predecessor to anger and hate—fear of loss, of hurt, of embarrassment, of shame, of weakness, of not knowing. When fear arises, anger and aversion function as strategies to help us feel safe, to declare our strength and security. In fact, we actually feel insecure and vulnerable, but we cover this fear and vulnerability with anger and aggression."

Anger, aggression, blame, fear and hate, do not bring forth more light, or ultimately more love. Fear is the opposite of love. In situations like this, It's rare that it's productive or solution oriented. If it's broken, let's quit blaming, pointing fingers, throwing punches, calling names, but instead work toward fixing it. Coming from a place of love and light. Each and every one of us is powerful. Powerful within our own homes and communities and that carries a lot of weight and impact and light.

Many times this past year, I've also reminded myself of what the Dalai Lama said about prayer. He says that praying by itself is not okay, that we need prayer and effort. He said that we can bring our prayers to Jesus or to Buddha or to whomever asking them to solve the world's problems. He believes that they would say...you created them, you fix them. He feels that yes we should pray, but that prayer without action is not okay. We also need to make the effort ourselves to do what it takes to fix the problems that humankind has made. So yes, put it on the altar and then go take action to bring more light and love.

My Pastor put it this way, "When it is pitch dark and you have no bearing, it is just safe and prudent to sit down. But with Jesus that has changed. He brings light. And of course, it takes a while to ‘get used to the light.’ We all have practiced what is called 'learned helplessness.' We sit down in the dark and let someone else deal with it, pray, serve, feed another mouth, or write a Congressperson, for example. Let’s practice, 'learned light sharing' instead of 'learned helplessness.' It takes no effort, no imagination, no gritty boldness, no risk of time and dollar to sit in darkness. Anyone can do that. But the call to share light, move ahead, dream, collaborate, build bridges, share a word - that takes faith. That is an adventure into the light."

It takes faith, it takes practicing "learned light sharing". I invite you to have faith, to adventure more deeply into the light, to shine your light bright and bring with it more love. I invite you to be part of the solution, however that may look for you, to take action to fix the problems humankind has made.

I invite you to remember that you are powerful and that you are enough. I invite you to bring more empathy, compassion, forgiveness and gratitude to the table. To build bridges and not silos. To create unity, not divisiveness. To seek commonality and understand differences. To extend an olive branch.

I would love to hear your feedback on this post. Was this helpful to you this week? Please drop me a comment or send me an email.

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Put It On The Altar

1/10/2017

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There's a song that I like called, "Put It On The Altar", by Jessica Reedy. Here is an excerpt from the lyrics:

So everything that you've been worried about, put it on the altar
You need Him to work it out, He'll work it out yeah, put it on the altar
All of your burdens ... just bring 'em on down, hey, put it on the altar
You're gonna get an answer to your prayer,
If you put it on the altar
I know you need of healing, you sick of being sick, you need relief
You tired of the pressure, yeah
You got all this stress and you need some peace
Come on and get your break through, break through
Or haven't you been suffering long enough?
Make your way down to the altar, hand it over, leave it there

The altar is a place of worship, a place of sacrifice, a place of offering, a place of healing. Although it can be a particular location in a church, it is more than that, it is a spiritual place...a place of surrender, a place of personal sacrifice, a place of prayer.

Altars are a place where the divine and human world connect and interact. Altars are places of exchange, communication, and influence. God responds to activity on the altar. The altar is referenced during times in our lives when God calls us to offer ourselves to him.

Surrendering what we think we can control. Surrendering our ego to the Spirit and having faith that what will be, will be. Spiritual growth happens when we bring it to the altar, turn it over to God and surrender what we think we need to, and can control. I love how the lyrics say to "come on and get your break through" and "or haven't you been suffering long enough?"

What are you holding onto that you can bring to the altar? Are there things in this new year that you could benefit from surrendering? The hardest part, the scariest part, is to turn over control. Surrendering your will to God. We fight it and sometimes we need to hit rock bottom before we'll give in. We don't like to altar our experiences. Spiritual teacher Marianne Williamson says, "That which you put on the altar is altered."

Is it a matter of trust, of faith, of resistance against losing control? Whatever the reason, it seems we struggle with putting things on the altar. Turning it over to God means giving up control, giving up our wants and desires to God's desire for us and having trust and faith in that.

What in you needs healing? Go ahead and put it on the altar. Ask for atonement, ask for guidance, ask for relief, put it up on the altar. Have trust, have faith and let it go. This year turn it over, set your ego aside, and strengthen your faith and spirituality.

What do you think about bringing it to the altar? I would love to hear your feedback on this post. Please drop me a comment or send me an email.

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Indulged

1/3/2017

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I celebrated Thanksgiving and Christmas and New Years and birthdays and bowl games and ate and ate and drank and drank and indulged in this that and the other thing for days and days and weeks and weeks. There I said it, I lacked any self-control and simply INDULGED!!!

So much yummy food and drinks that I feel weighted down, bloated and yep I put on a few pounds too. There are a lot of good cooks in my family, my husband's family, my friend circle and at a variety of restuarants! :) I didn't meditate regularly, I didn't exercise regularly and my sleep schedule is off. Do any of you feel the same?

And now today it's no longer January 1st and it's not even a Monday, but I'm making the decision today to stop the madness! I fell off the wagon and now it's time to get back on. No excuses, no I'll start next week, nope it's happening today! That's the thing, we can choose again each day and every moment. Today I am choosing to listen to my body and to make choices that are good for my body, mind and spirit.

How am I going to go about doing this? I am starting by cleaning up my diet. There are many ways to clean up your diet. For me it works best if I simply shift to eating mostly whole foods and elimnating meat from a majority of my meals. You might be wondering what whole foods are...whole foods are food that has been processed or refined as little as possible and is free from additives or other artificial substances. Things like fruits, vegetables, nuts, meat, eggs, fish, seafood and grains.

Next, I'm going to meditate daily. I'm setting time aside each morning. Some days I'll devote more time and other days less, depending on the day and my schedule. Regularly meditating helps me maintain my other intentional practices. It also helps me stay connected to Spirit. There are so many benefits to regular meditation, it's a game changer!

Lastly, I need to get back to my regular schedule of exercising and I am ramping up my schedule to include more yoga. I've been allowing myself to slack and it's time to get back to being consistent. I always feel energized and positive when I get in some physical movement.

I invite and encourage you to join me in honoring your spirit, mind and body in this New Year. To step back and listen to your body, listen to your mind, listen to your spirit and recognize what it is in this New Year that you need to optimize your well-being.

Maybe for you too it's to clean up your diet, to meditate and regularly exercise. Maybe it's to work on the fine art of forgiveness or the practice of graitude. Maybe it's exploring your creativity or being adventursome. Whatever it is for you, use this opportunity to get clear on it and choose today to make it happen. If you fall off the wagon dust yourself off and get right back on!

I would love to hear from you. How are you honoring your mind, body and spirit in the New Year? Drop me a comment or send me an email.

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The World Needs More Love

What Is Your Intent?

Darkness Cannot Drive Out Darkness

Put It On The Altar

Indulged

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