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The Secret Key

8/25/2015

Did you sign up for Oprah and Deepak's 21-day meditation experience Manifesting Grace Through Gratitude, this past month? If you did, I'm guessing you enjoyed an awesome treat! If not, I want to share with you some of the pearls of wisdom that I took away from a few of the meditations. What they shared with the world was such a gift, so magical, so inspiring and life altering. As I mentioned in my very first blog post, I believe that gratitude and grace are foundational to any spiritual practice and that gratitude is truly the key to not only grace, but to leading a happy and satisfied life. I love that Oprah and Deepak combined the two together in their latest meditation series.

Gratitude

I have touched on the topic of gratitude throughout several of my posts. It is truly a game changer. Life rapidly changes when your heart, mind and spirit are focused on gratitude. Gratitude changes the lens by which you see the world. It's been proven as one of the key factors to leading a contented and happy life and it's one of the quickest and easiest ways to increase your vibration.

Deepak describes gratitude as the secret key that shifts your awareness. He believes that gratitude changes your relationship with life from an attitude of rejecting and defending to one of acceptance and appreciation. Gratitude is an engine for holistic change. When you are grateful for what you have, you make energetic space for more abundance to flow into your life.

When feeling grateful you feel more open, generous, connected, aware and alive. As Oprah so eloquently states, "A closed heart cannot feel gratitude. Your heart should only hold two things...love and gratitude. If you have anger you need to forgive. Gratitude changes something within you and changes everything around you and that is what is called grace."

Grace

Deepak defines grace as an expression of divine love. He states that, "Grace can be how you carry yourself with inner dignity and inner beauty. Gratitude helps to change grace from a noun into a verb." A verb describes an action or occurrence or indicates a state of being. I love that Deepak shared with us how gratitude helps to change grace from a noun to a state of being. Through gratitude we activate grace and grow our presence within it. Through gratitude we actually become grace personified.

Oprah discussed how gratitude awakens the grace within us. That gratitude opens up the light, the space, the path for grace within us. Her words conjure up such a nice visual image for me. It helps me to really grasp how through gratitude, grace is manifested. Pope Francis says that, "Grace is the amount of light in our souls." If gratitude opens us up to the light and then to grace, it makes sense that grace is the amount of light in our souls.

They also shared that when you give gratitude you in turn receive from source. They then suggested an exercise that I love. They said to imagine three things you are grateful for right now. Then focus on the first one and feel the gratitude, express your thanks for it. Now imagine it receiving your gratitude and it shimmering as it receives your thanks. You have opened the flow to grace. Repeat the exercise with the two remaining things you are grateful for. I've used a similar exercise many times before in my meditation practice and have taught it in meditation class. I love the visual of it shimmering as it receives your thanks, such a great visual!

Happiness

Through my research and studying of happiness, I've learned that our brains are programmed for negativity bias. It's called "caveman brain". It's part of what helped our ancestors survive in more primitive times. Research has proven that positive thoughts need to remain in our short-term memory for several seconds, several times, in order to move into our long-term memory, whereas negative thoughts go straight to long-term memory. The brain is like velcro for negative experiences and like teflon for positive ones. We need to savor the good facts and experiences for 10 seconds or more and to make it as intense as possible, in order for it to reach our long-term memory. This exercise is a great way to help us to identify, savor and ultimately move a good experience/memory that we are grateful for to our long-term memory. It is one of the tools that we can use to help us to lead a happier life.

The most powerful way to achieve grace is through gratitude because gratitude makes a deep connection with the source of grace inside you. I recommend starting and ending each day with gratitude. I like to express my gratitude either out loud or in my gratitude journal. Oprah and Deepak recommend expressing gratitude at the end of your interactions. I love this suggestion, what an awesome why to increase your vibration and the vibration of the person you are interacting with. It creates a positive ripple and I'm all about creating positive, magical ripples!

Gratitude is a powerful, easy, magical tool. Through it grace is manifested. Happiness is the experience of living each moment with gratitude and grace. I would love to hear your feedback on this post. Leave me a comment or send me an email.

Oprah and Deepak's 21-day meditation experience, Manifesting Grace Through Gratitude, can be purchased at https://chopracentermeditation.com.

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Just breathe

8/19/2015

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Have you ever stopped during the day to notice how you are breathing? At times I find that I am breathing really shallow, sometimes quick and shallow, or sometimes I'm even kind of holding my breath. I also notice that when I'm in this mode of shallow breathing that I feel sluggish, tired, anxious and less alive. What the heck, why do I do that?

We all know how to breathe. It's something that we don't even have to think about, it just happens naturally and automatically. Yet we often develop unhealthy habits with our breathing without even being aware of it. We modify and often restrict our breathing habitually. Stress, increased responsibilities, life style pace, and environmental factors have all played a role in changing our breathing habits.

Studies have also shown that when we focus or concentrate on something that our breathing becomes very slow or even gets suspended. As we concentrate our muscles become tense. The muscles in our arms, neck and chest contract. The muscles that control inhalation clamp down and restrict both inhalation and exhalation. Our breaths become shorter and shorter. Over time our system becomes frozen into a certain posture, position and rhythm. We become fatigued from the decreased circulation of oxygen within our blood because we have almost stopped breathing.

Breathing is the only means of supplying our bodies with oxygen which is crucial for our health and vitality. Oxygen is the most vital nutrient in our bodies. It is essential for the proper functioning of the brain, nerves, glands, organs and cells. Most of our energy requirements come, not from food, but from the air we breathe. We can survive for weeks without food, for days without water, but without oxygen we will die within a few minutes.

If the brain does not get an adequate supply of oxygen, vital organs in the body will start to degrade. The brain itself requires more oxygen than any other organ, if it doesn't receive enough the result is mental sluggishness, negative thoughts, depression, disease and illness.

Breathing is also one of the ways to get rid of waste products and toxins from our body. One of the major secrets of energy and rejuvenation is a purified blood stream. The quickest and most effective way to purify the blood stream is by taking in extra supplies of oxygen from the air that we breathe. By purifying the blood stream, every part of the body benefits, as well as the mind.

We typically are not taking in enough oxygen and we are not eliminating sufficient carbon dioxide. As a result, our bodies are oxygen starved, and a toxic build-up occurs. Every cell in the body requires oxygen. Our level of overall vitality is a byproduct of the health of all the cells. The importance of maintaining health is directly related to the quality of our breathing.

So, what are some ways that we can make sure that our bodies are not oxygen starved? I think plain old awareness is half the battle. Once I started being more aware of my breath, being present and paying attention to how I am breathing, I started to shift my habit of shallow breathing to taking slower, deeper, fuller breaths. Yoga and meditation are great tools to help cope with stress and improve constricted breathing patterns. Laughing and exercise are other awesome ways to improve your breathing. When you are under stress, feeling angry or frustrated, or in deep concentration, make sure you take regular breaks. get up walk around, stretch, bring awareness to your breathing.

I know that I feel better when I am breathing more fully. I feel more alive, more alert, happier and relaxed when I am getting adequate supplies of oxygen into my body. Do you pay attention to your breathing? Have you noticed times when you are breathing shallow? How does it make you feel? do you regularly practice breathing techniques? I would love to hear your feedback. Leave me a comment or send me an email.

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Celebrating Life

8/13/2015

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So, today is my birthday. Yep, I'm another year older and wiser! What an amazing year it has been, full of new discoveries, new opportunities, brave new steps, wild new adventures, crazy fun dreams, and an abundance of love, support, health and joy!!!

Last year on my birthday, I made a commitment to myself to make this year one of being brave and authentic. I wanted to live more fully. Live out what I know to be my purpose, my path, my passion, my dream and to do it authentically. I desired to set my fears aside and to lead with love and passion. To tap more fully into that spark within myself.

I told myself to take small steps forward and not worry about having all of the pieces to the puzzle figured out, to trust, to surrender, to look for the opportunities, to live in the flow and know that there are infinite possibilities. What an awesome year it has been, and I know that this next year will be filled with even more fabulous experiences!

This past year I also spent a lot of time pondering the meaning of life and marveled at the miracle of life and the journey of life. I've had some cool discoveries and yet there is still so much more to discover, so much remaining mystery.

This next year I commit to celebrate more. I'm going to celebrate life, to celebrate the everyday little things, to celebrate in big ways too. I plan for more adventure, more playfulness, more joy, more laughter. Celebrate, celebrate, celebrate this is my mission for this next year of life.

I will still live more fully with passion and purpose and authenticity, but I will also celebrate more along the way. I plan to have more fun, be more playful, lighten up on life, to belly laugh more, to dance more, to talk in silly voices more with my kids.

In order to feel like celebrating more I plan to ramp up my self-care routine too. Good healthy food, regular meditation, regular exercise, regular rest...you guys are all back up to the plate!

I believe that God made each and every one of us with intention. I want to honor and celebrate that intention. One thing that has been very clear to me throughout our communications with Spirit is that there is a playfulness, a definite lightness, kind of a child-like feeling to our interactions. We are not meant to be so serious, so celebrate I will do!

Each and every one of you has played an important role in my experience this past year. Whether you know it or not, you have made a difference in my life and my journey. I am very grateful for you. Thank you for being on this journey with me! I look forward to celebrating for many more years!!!

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Our vibe speaks louder than our words

8/4/2015

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Have you ever been around someone, maybe where you're meeting them for the first time, and the message they are speaking, the words that are coming out of their mouth just doesn't feel in sync with the feeling, the energy, the vibe you are getting off the person? Where your gut check just tells you that something is off and doesn't make sense? Kids learn in school that they should pay attention to their gut and that uh oh feeling that something isn't right.

I'm pretty sure we've all been around those individuals that radiate fun and joy. We can be across the room and have no idea what they are saying, but just know that they are an upbeat person. These are people that we naturally want to gravitate toward they seem happy and full of life. We've also been around those people who seem unapproachable, maybe even angry or just not at peace with life. These are typically people that we tend to want to avoid, right?

This feeling that we are sensing is the person's vibe or vibration, their energy, their frequency. Our vibes speak louder than our words, they have a frequency. We are all made up of energy and vibration and it carries a frequency with it, as do our words.

Quantum physics has determined that everything in the universe has energy. Your electromagnetic vibrations resonate at varying frequencies that correspond to your thoughts, feelings, and beliefs, about everything.

If you haven't read my post on my rice experiment I would highly recommend that you give it a read. It demonstrates the power of our intentions, our thoughts and our words. Words actually carry a measurable vibration. Scientists have been able to measure the frequency of our bodies and of words.

It is estimated that the average person has approximately 70,000 thoughts per day. Every thought, every word has a vibration and is conscious energy. Every belief begins with a thought. Unhealthy thought patterns and limiting beliefs have a negative affect on our emotional, mental, and physical health. Being mindful of our thoughts and the words we choose to use, we can consciously change the way we think, what we believe and therefore what we create.

All energy has conscious intent. Thoughts, words, and emotion are an expression of energy. Words can evoke emotions and these emotions magnify the energy of the thought or word either positively (high vibration) or negatively (low vibration). Words and thoughts such as happiness, gratitude, forgiveness all our high vibrational words. Words and thoughts like hate, anger, frustration, disappointment are low vibrational words.

Many of our thoughts are played over and over again in our head, these are the stories that we tell ourselves. Just like old records, these thoughts create grooves that establish and reinforce thought patterns creating limiting core beliefs. When we stay in lower energy vibrations our perspective in life becomes distorted and our energy constricts, we become a low vibrating person.

Understanding how we shape our world can enable us to make the decision to live in healthier vibrations. We can change our thought patterns and our limiting beliefs, and feel healthy and happy. We attract the positive things we want and are able to see the beauty and the joy in life.

Dr. Wayne Dyer says, "You can't expect to draw people into your life who are kind, confident, and generous if you're thinking and acting in cruel, weak, and selfish ways. You must be what it is that you're seeking - that is, you need to put forth what you want to attract. You attract what you are, not what you want."

Living a life with gratitude at the core is the single and best way to change/raise our vibration. I highly recommend starting off and ending each day with expressions of gratitude. If you don't already do this, what you will find is that it engulfs your life and pretty soon you are expressing gratitude throughout your entire day. Gratitude has been proven to be a key to leading a happy life.

Since what you focus on increases (law of attraction), be aware of incidents in your day that result in feelings of happiness, peace or connection with others. Focus on really feeling those feelings, with gratitude that they occurred. You will attract more and more situations that result in these higher vibration feelings and thoughts.

I will devote a future post to another method that I've learned to help us reprogram that broken record of stories that we repeatedly tell ourselves. I've found it to be a very useful tool to help bring separation between who we really are, and the thoughts that have created stories that we believe to be true about ourselves and the world around us.

We don't have to change the world, we just need to change ourselves because that has a huge impact on the world, a huge ripple of change will be created. Raising just your vibration offsets the low vibration of hundreds of others. So, be mindful of the energy that you take in and the energy that you put out.

Are you consciously aware of your vibration? Can you feel yourself shift vibrations? What tips and tricks do you use to help you vibrate high? As always, I would love to hear your feedback. Please leave me a comment below or send me a message.

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The Secret Key

Just breathe

Celebrating Life

Our vibe speaks louder than our words

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