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Faith, Flow, Knowingness

8/30/2016

Ever had a really busy day? Oh yeah, I know that you have! Especially in today's world where the status quo seems to be to jam pack the calendar full. Run, run, run on the hamster wheel of life.

Today was especially full for me. I had appointments lined up back-to-back, errands that needed to somehow be completed in between, a family member I wanted to help out, phone calls that needed to be made, a class I wanted to take, kids and a dog that needed to be fed, tended to and transported, and a blog to write :) If any one thing didn't go as planned it could have all come crumbling down. The doctor could have been running late (well that did happen), the hair stylist could have been behind, traffic could have held me up, whew it could have been a stressful day full of anxiety, but guess what? It wasn't.

I've learned some things that have helped me keep a day like today from wigging me out. I wanted to share them with you in this post and hope they will help you too. Here is what I intentionally practice:

1) I look at the day as being full, not busy. Busy for me implies running on the hamster wheel completing tasks. Full helps me to frame the day with intention. I choose it to be full of things that I wanted. Full to me means I made an intentional choice to put each and every one of those things on my calendar because I wanted them there. Full is a positive thing, not a negative thing, it helps keep my brain from veering into fight or flight mode. Next time someone asks you how your day was and your inclination is to say "busy", switch it to "full" and feel how it shifts you internally. Next time you look at your day and think "whoa", say to yourself, "It's just full of the things I want to have on there."

2) I recognize the fact that I've done this before and it all turned out okay and I will handle it today and it will all turn out okay too. I exercise knowingness and faith. I know it'll be okay and I have faith that all will be well. I have faith that I am enough and that I bring creative solutions everywhere I go. At times I actually repeat this to myself..."I am enough and I bring creative solutions wherever I go." Thank you Haywood Simmons for that one :) Try it out and see what you think!

3) I understand that worrying and stressing doesn't serve me or anyone else. In fact, it can actually harm my well-being and cause my brain to shut down, to narrow, to not see opportunities and solutions that may be present. A positive, non-stressed brain stays in the broaden and build mode operation which has been scientifically proven to allow for more creativity and productivity. Your visual field actually expands and your mind is able to see and develop more creative solutions.

4) I practice the S.T.O.P. technique that I discussed in my post on June 7, 2016. The "S" stands for stop. The "T" stands for take 3 deep belly breaths. The "O" stands for observe what you are thinking, feeling, seeing, smelling, tasting, experiencing. The "P" stands for practice gratitude. This is my reset button. If I ever start to feel a little overwhelmed, frustrated or impatient I practice this technique. You can read more about it by going back to the June 7th post if you would like.

5) I'm sure you've had someone say to you, "Just go with the flow." I plan to get more into the idea of flow in a future blog post. I work to go with the flow, especially on days that are full. It'll all work out...let it roll off your back like water off a duck's back. My friend Haywood Simmons says to envision that you are the water and watch how it just flows over everything...the rocks, the sand, the fish, shells, whatever is in it's presence it just flows over and around. It glides through without difficulty, just like me shifting and changing as necessary to maneuver my way through the full day.

Holding space for faith, flow and knowingness on full days works for me. And you know what? At the end of the day it typically all works out anyway right? It's how you choose to move through it and how you choose to look at it that makes the difference between a stressful day and a joyful day. The day is a lot easier, more graceful, happy and peaceful when I practice faith, flow and knowingness.

I would love to hear you thoughts. What helps you get through days that are full? Please leave me a comment or send me an email.

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Our Thought Systems

8/23/2016

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In my post two weeks ago, I mentioned the importance of managing our minds in order to maintain a healthy mental state and to sustain a happy life. The post also talked about how thought is an ability and that feeling is preceded by thought. This week I want to follow up with some additional ideas on this concept of managing our minds.

All of our thoughts from the past come together to build our thought system. This thought system becomes our reality, our lens through which we see the world. It is the filter upon which we make decisions, form reactions, and interpret what we experience and give it significance. It forms our beliefs, expectations and opinions.

Our thought system can be stubborn and self-validating. As Richard Carlson states in his book, You Can Be Happy No Matter What, "Our thought systems lead us to believe that we are realists and that the way we see life is the way life really is. The fact that one person can view a situation as an opportunity and another equally intelligent person sees the same thing as a major problem doesn't bother a thought system. Our thought system dismisses the other point of view as off track, well intended but wrong, or not quite right."

Our thought systems prompt us to continue to see things in the same way as we have in the past. We react negatively or positively to similar situations or circumstances over and over again, interpreting things the same as we have in the past. We tend to accept familiar ideas and disregard the rest.

Carlson gives this example, "A person who believes that people are inherently critical will become defensive whenever anyone offers a suggestion, regardless of whether the person meant to be critical. This will become a theme in his life unless and until he understands the nature of thought systems, particularly his own. Understanding this concept will help him see that he is not seeing reality, or truth, but an interpretation of reality through his own thinking."

Understanding thought systems allows us to let go of the need to be right. It allows us to recognize that our beliefs, our thoughts, and our opinions are a function of past conditioning and experiences. If our past was different, our ideas and beliefs on life would also be different. Before this understanding we tend to discount information that we don't agree with. New information is usually unwelcome in our existing thought system. Once we understand thought systems, it's easier and less frustrating to hear, and be curious about, other points of view.

Awareness is a huge first step. Once we are aware of our thought system and the concept that thinking is an ability which precedes feelings, we can begin managing our thoughts, our feelings and our thought systems. We can open ourselves up to other possibilities, interpretations, opinions and beliefs without becoming frustrated or wounded. This opens the door to a healthy mental state and to sustained happiness.

What do you think about the concept of our thought system? Does this idea make sense to you? Can you see how it would be easy for us to repeat the same thought patterns over and over again? I would love to hear your feedback on this post. Drop me a comment or send me an email.

As I was writing this post I received an email with a link to a video by Gabrielle Bernstein titled, How to be More Mindful Everyday. Gabby does a great job of discussing in this video how in each moment we can choose to be mindful and happy. I invite you to check out her awesome 12 minute video at:

gabbybernstein.com/how-to-be-more-mindful-every-day/?inf_contact_key=6637541c19ec8a36d3c2d01fbbba05c54c93c1de87674cb66d09686980f8f363

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August 16th, 2016

8/16/2016

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This past week I celebrated a milestone birthday, my 50th. In my head I feel like I'm still in my 30's, goodness gracious how did I get to 50 already? Another milestone is my oldest child, my son, just turned 18 and will be heading off to college in less than two weeks. How is that even possible? Wow, these past 20 years just flew by!

A milestone in life is considered a significant event in your life, often marking a new chapter in life. It designates the distance we have come. It's often used as a time to reflect, a time to plan, to check the bucket list and a time to celebrate.

So, what does this milestone mean to me? As I reflect back and look forward it's telling me that I need to give more to life. I need to play a little harder and I need to work a little harder. Not that I'm worried that my time is limited, just that I really want to enjoy and experience life. I want to enjoy the restful times even a little bit more and I have things I want to accomplish and experience and I need to get busy doing them. It's not a time for me to sit back and pretend that I'm on the downhill side of life.

There was a time in the past when I thought this milestone meant I was on the other side, the side where I would kick back more, the side where I would slow down and take it easy. Although I plan to enjoy some restful moments, what I've come to realize is that slowing down too much really isn't all that much fun. Now I desire to keep my passion for life, my zest for having fun, for celebrating, for being engaged and connected and doing things that are fulfilling.

Age is just a silly number anyway. Why do we even keep track of it? I feel like sometimes it just serves to box us in and cause us to change our expectation based on our own or someone else's age. When you think of a particular age it summons up images of what that age looks like and feels like and then guess what? We tend to become that which is our expectation. I'd rather ignore my age and focus on feeling and acting youthful. So, part of my plan is to ignore my age, because I'm working on being more youthful and wise, not older :)

We aren't guaranteed that we will be here another day, let alone another 20 or 50 years, so why be on the downhill side taking it easy when we can be roller coasting it up and down the hills of life?

Milestones are great, but we really don't need them in order to reflect back, to look forward, or to celebrate. As we are entering the last 4 months of this calendar year, how are you doing on your goals for this year, your intentions that you set out for yourself in 2016? How are you doing in your life? What changes do you want to make? Go ahead and use my milestone to reestablish your commitment to your life!

As always, I would love to hear from you. What are your thoughts on this post. Please drop me a comment or send me an email.

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A Softer Focus

8/9/2016

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Last week's post discussed living in a beautiful state or in a suffering state. It mentioned the need to manage our minds in order to keep ourselves from getting stuck in a suffering state. This week I want to share with you some ideas on managing our minds, because our minds can work for us or against us at any given moment.

First, let's examine the concept of thought. We are thinking beings, every moment of every day, our minds are trying to make sense of what we see, hear and experience. Understanding the nature of thought is the basis for leading a happy life, allowing us to remain in the beautiful state of being.

Thinking is an ability and it goes on whether we want it to or not. Personally, it would be nice to sometimes be able to turn the thought faucet off! We tend to believe that "thinking" requires time and effort, but thinking about something can occur over several days or within a single second. We tend to put weight in the "thinking" that happens with time and effort, but dismiss the importance of a more fleeting thought. Feelings however, follow and respond to thought, regardless of how much time that thought takes. Every feeling (whether negative or positive) is a direct result of thought. For example, it is impossible to have sad feelings without first having sad thoughts.

Richard Carlson in his book, You Can Be Happy No Matter What, explains it this way, "If you have the thought, 'My boss doesn't appreciate me...I never get the recognition I deserve,' the fact that you now feel bad about your job came about as soon as that thought came to mind. It all takes place in an instant. The time it takes to feel the effects of your thinking is the same amount of time it takes to see the light after turning on the switch."

He goes on to say, "The ill effects of thought come about when we forget that 'thought' is a function of our consciousness...an ability that we as human beings have. We are the producers of our own thinking. Thought is not something that happens to us, but something that we do. It comes from inside of us, not from the outside. What we think determines what we see...even though it often seems the other way around."

Sometimes it's easy to forget that we are in charge of our thinking and that it's our thinking, not our circumstances, that determines how we feel. We tend to blame our unhappiness on our circumstances, which makes us feel powerless over our lives. I hear you...you might be thinking right now that some of the circumstances make our reality suck which in turn makes our thoughts suck.

As Carlson states, "We have innocently learned to interpret our thoughts as if they were 'reality,' but thought is merely an ability that we have...we are the ones who produce those thoughts. It's easy to believe that because we think something, the object of our thinking (the content) represents reality. When we realize that thinking is an ability rather than a reality, we can dismiss any negative thoughts that pass through. Only thought brings meaning to a circumstance."

When we think about something, we can choose whether we take the thoughts to heart and react in a negative way, or choose to let them pass through. We can pick and choose which thoughts we wish to react to. We don't have to take everything so seriously, we can lighten up. We can choose to practice some of the other tools in our toolbox like empathy, forgiveness, looking for the lesson and the silver lining, etc. We can choose to have that childlike quality of soft focus which brings back curiosity, wonder and adventure into our lives.

This softer focus will allow us to listen to people and to our thoughts in a more loving way without letting every negative thought bother us. Because ultimately, the relationship that we have with our own thinking determines our mental health and happiness. Not every thought needs to be taken seriously, analyzed and construed as reality. We can choose a softer focus of thought, we can choose which thoughts to act on and which to let pass through, we can choose to not be victimized by our own thinking.

This concept of thought is pretty intense. What do you think about thinking being an ability from which our feelings are derived? Or, about the idea that thinking is an ability rather than reality? How do you like the idea of using a softer focus? I would love to hear your thoughts :) on this post. Please drop me a comment or send me an email. In two weeks, I'll follow up with more ideas on how to better manage our minds, our thoughts, our feelings, and ultimately our mental health and happiness.

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Living In A Beautiful State Or A Suffering State

8/2/2016

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I recently watched an interview where Marie Forleo was interviewing Tony Robbins about his new documentary titled, Tony Robbins: I Am Not Your Guru. It was an awesome interview and the documentary is pretty amazing too (you can view it on Netflix). The documentary is a behind the scenes look at one of his famous 6 day retreats.

I really appreciated what he had to say about what he calls living in a beautiful state or a suffering state, so I want to share some of his message with you in this post.

Tony's overriding message is that you don't have to tolerate the life that you have, even if it's good, that you don't have to settle. He says to strive for having a great, magnificent and outstanding life.

He believes that there are two states of being that we live in, either a beautiful state of being or a suffering state of being. The beautiful state of being represents happiness, love and peace. In the beautiful state of being you do the right thing and no one has to tell you, it's automatic. You also treat yourself and others well. The suffering state of being represents stress, worry, depression, frustration and anger. He believes that we have the ability to move back and forth between these two states of being and that it's our choice whether we allow ourselves to remain in a suffering state of being.

I've discussed this concept in many of my previous posts. It's called your resilience or your "stickiness", however I appreciate how he describes the two states and what he has to say about them. Tony says, "If you don't manage your mind you can have everything and still be in pain, still be suffering. The mind is not designed to make you happy, it's designed to make you survive and it does that by fear. The brain looks for what's wrong through flight or fight mode. We need to shake ourselves out of that. Our minds can take us over unless our heart is what's running us." Our minds can work for us or against us at any given moment. In next week's post I'll share some information on managing our minds, in particular our thoughts. I love this James Allen quote, "All that you achieve and all that you fail to achieve is the direct result of your own thoughts."

Tony believes that, "Life is too short to suffer, we can raise the bar on what we call suffering, so we can see it for what it is and realize that we can free ourselves from it. Problems need energy to live and some things you just don't give them energy and they are much easier to solve. It's easier to solve things in a beautiful state." I've mentioned in previous posts that our brains are more creative and able to problem solve in a positive, broaden and build state versus when in a negative, or flight or fight state (more on this next week).

Tony goes on to say that, "Expectations for yourself or others get us in trouble. They put us in a box and they bring on a suffering state. You can free yourself when you trade your expectations for appreciation. Breathe into your heart, be curious about your thoughts, be appreciative for this moment, and something in it. Consider making the most important decision of your life… I will not suffer anymore. It's not fake, it's not funny, it's not placated, it's not sweep it under the rug, it's saying life is short and knowing that life is beautiful and rich and I want to be joyful."

So how do we maximize our beautiful state of being and minimize our suffering state of being? I believe that this requires having an intentional practice and a variety of tools in your toolbox. If you would like to learn more about maximizing your beautiful state of being, I invite you to join me for our next Happiness Workshop 3-part series September 14, 21 and 28 from 6-8 pm. You can register at http://bit.ly/HappinessClinic. In the workshop you will learn about the science behind happiness, the advantages to living a happy life (some of these will surprise you), quick and easy habits and tools to incorporate into your everyday life, as well as long-term strategies for well-being.

I would love to hear your feedback on this post. What do you think about the beautiful state of being and suffering state of being? Do you currently live in a beautiful state of being or a suffering state of being? Do you have the tools in your toolbox to help you navigate life's challenges and maximize your happiness, love and peaceful state? Please leave me a comment or send me an email.

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Faith, Flow, Knowingness

Our Thought Systems

August 16th, 2016

A Softer Focus

Living In A Beautiful State Or A Suffering State

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