Blog Posts

Deep Awareness

1/7/2020

Buddhist Monk Thich Nhat Hanh says that, “Each thought, each action in the sunlight of awareness becomes sacred. If you touch one thing with deep awareness, you touch everything.” I absolutely love this, it brings forth wonderful imagery.

The word sacred means connected with God. Therefore, the quote becomes...each thought, each action in the sunlight of awareness becomes connected with God.

I like to envision holding out my thought, or my action, in the sunlight of awareness and then ask myself, "Is this a godly thought, or is this a godly action?" That deep awareness of being connected with God, being one with all, and shining a bright ray of light on that deep awareness with the knowledge that it touches everything.

This doesn't mean that we won't have challenging feelings like anger, frustration, sadness, etc. I'm not a proponent of sweeping these feelings under the rug and ignoring them. However, we can bring awareness to our feelings, to our thoughts, and reactions to those feelings. A lot of times our thoughts and reactions to the feeling is the piece that causes us to get stuck.

Yesterday I was reminded to "embrace the anger", to use it as fuel for positive change. This is a good example of how we can either choose to use our anger destructively and gear our thoughts and reactions toward things like vengeance, or we can use our anger productively toward something like steps to correct an injustice, etc. Anger can be a wonderful motivator, a change agent.

Pastor and entrepreneur, Russ Ewell, explains that, “'Deep Awareness' is a spiritual sensitivity to God and his Word that awakens our conscience, and stirs up the transformative power of the Holy Spirit for change. This awareness keeps us from slipping back into old patterns of life or attitudes of mind. Most importantly, 'Deep Awareness' keeps us confident of God’s grace, so we can navigate the difficult or even discouraging stages of our spiritual journey, and reach the destiny to which God has called us."

In this new year, this new decade, I'm setting my intention to live with a deeper awareness, to bring my thoughts and actions into the sunlight of awareness, to continuously remember my connection to God and to all.

Yoga instructor Lisa Mccormack sums it up beautifully, "When we walk united in deep awareness and stand undivided in our intention, our collective energy is exponentially magnified. Our brothers and sisters and the animals in Australia need this from us right now. The next person you meet needs this from us right now. You may need this from us right now. Join me in creating an energetic tapestry of compassion and hope to surround and comfort all living beings who are suffering in the world right now."

Amen

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Reflections & Intentions

12/15/2019

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As 2019 is quickly coming to a close, it's common for us to reflect on the past year and begin planning for the new year. Reflecting on how the year went, what we accomplished, setting our intentions and goals for things that we plan to do in the new year.

What reflections do you have about this past year? Did you accomplish what you desired? What positive experiences did you have? I invite you to make a list of all your accomplishments from the year, both big and small. What did you achieve? Consider putting your list someplace visible, so you can savor them and be reminded of your achievements.

What challenges did you experience? Consider going through each one looking at what effect they’ve had on your life. There might be lessons you learned through these challenges, setbacks, or disappointments. A great way to heal from negative experiences is to learn from them.

I think it's healthy to productively reflect, to productively look back for a bit before setting it aside and moving forward. Not getting stuck in the past, just looking at it to savor the positive and learn from the challenges.

What's your intention for 2020? Have you thought about it yet? Have you envisioned what the year ahead will look like for you? Have you set some goals for yourself?

How are you feeling about the new year? I know a lot of us have mixed feelings as we are looking out at our world. We want change, we desire change. How is that change going to happen for you? Are you willing to be the change that you want in the world? Are you willing to do your part to create the change in your own life, in order for that to ripple out into the world?

If you desire the world to be a healthier and happier place, than be healthier yourself, be happy yourself. If you desire the world to be a place of more love and peace, than be more love and peace yourself. If you desire more acceptance, more compassion, more tolerance, more forgiveness, than be more accepting, be more compassionate, be more tolerant, be more forgiving. Ripple them out to the rest of the world. Create big bold bright sparkly ripples!

Grow these qualities in yourself and they will create huge ripples out to the rest of the universe. Create habits within your daily life to support those things that you wish to see not only in your own life, but also in the world. It's time to be the change, to be a change agent. The world is hurting, people are hurting, it is time for each and everyone of us to do our part to be the change. How can you be the change? How can you create big bold bright sparkly ripples in your own life that will ripple out into the world?

What is causing you to be stuck? Stuck in your life? Stuck in your body? Stuck in your mind? Stuck spiritually? Make some movement, set your intentions, make some change. I invite you to BE the CHANGE you desire to see in the world. This year I want to focus on being the change. This year I want to focus on making big bold bright sparkly positive ripples of change, will you join me? We can do this! We can each make important ripples in our lives and in the lives of those around us. Let's do it!!!

I will leave you with the insightful words of Wayne Dyer.

You become what you think about. If you think about giving, as God does, the Universe will provide. If you think about things being taken away, then that’s what you’ll attract. If you want to manifest your dreams, you must become a master at monitoring the thoughts and feelings you are aligning yourself with. Your thoughts and feelings become your reality, so become adept at observing the thoughts and feelings you are creating for yourself.

Do not let your imagination be restricted to the current conditions of your life, or what I call “being obsessed with what is.” Keep reminding yourself that everything that you’ve believed has gotten you to precisely the point where you are now. This is a rather persistent theme in my work, so it bears repeating here: if you want to elevate your life and become a manifester, then you have to change what you’ve believed to be true about yourself that has landed you where you are. The sentiments of This is reality, This is just the way things are, There is nothing that I can do to change what is, and the like are pernicious thoughts that will taint and defile your great gift of I am that I am, which is your Divine inheritance from your creator.

The words of all the great spiritual teachers encourage us to see ourselves as unlimited and to know that even the least among us has the divine power of God available at every moment of our lives. I know that you, if you practice studiously, can begin to manifest for yourself virtually anything that you are capable of conceiving in your mind. You must unplug from your conditioning and know in that private space behind your eyes that you can and will take on the challenge of manifesting your destiny. It is my belief that you are never given the power to dream without the equivalent power to manifest that dream and make it your physical reality.

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The Magic Is In The Mess

12/9/2019

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The holidays can bring up lots of mixed emotions for people. For some, the holiday season is not a magical time of year at all. One of my favorite authors, Brene Brown, shared her thoughts on the holidays and I wanted to share them with you.

Every holiday season, as I think about my own life and reflect upon what my family and what many of the people around me are going through right now, I’m reminded that struggle doesn’t take off for the holidays. As a lover of Christmastime, my mantra has become “the magic is in the mess” and I always like to post a little love note to myself and our communities.

We need to be kind with ourselves and remember that the gremlins don’t go on vacation. Checks bounce, chemotherapy appointments are scheduled, interventions are planned, relationships keep unravelling, being alone feels even lonelier, parents negotiate who will have the kids on Christmas morning, and the “never enoughs” are in full swing.

As I prepare to spend the next few days with my family and friends, my goal is to practice love and gratitude with the special group of folks who keep showing up and loving me, not despite my vulnerabilities and imperfections, but because of them.

I'm grateful for our community. For your generosity and the respectful way that we move forward together!
Blessings, Brené

The Christmas lights, trees, decorations, cards, neatly wrapped gifts and carefully decorated cookies are beautiful and magical, but to me, the real beauty comes in finding the magic amongst the busyness, physical mess, emotional mess, relationship mess, through any and all of the imperfections. Looking through all of the mess and working to find the magic.

Remembering that beautiful and hard can coexist in the same breath, in the same moment. Finding the moment of connection with love, connection with gratitude, connection with compassion. Sitting with the messiness and looking past it to the magical spirit. Remembering that we are perfectly imperfect humans walking this earth and doing our best.

May we see the magic in the mess this holiday season, however that looks for each of us. May we savor the moments of connection. Wishing you and your loved ones a very joyous and loving holiday season!

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Together We Can Create A Happy World

12/3/2019

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You have probably been bombarded by shopping ads and sales for Black Friday and Cyber Monday, but today is all about helping others. Today is #GivingTuesday, a day dedicated to helping charities help people in need and that is something way more exciting to me!

The Tuesday after Thanksgiving has been tagged as the global day of giving. Bringing people together around the values of service and giving back and to encourage and amplify small acts of kindness. Giving Tuesday unites people and countries around the world by sharing our capacity to care for and empower one another.

Today people and countries are coming together to celebrate kindness and generosity. Practicing gratitude for what we have in our lives, as well as what we can do to help and be of service to others. I love the concept of a global day of giving for many reasons, two of which are proven to be key pillars of happiness...gratitude and generosity...service and kindness.

The Dalai Lama in his book, The Book of Joy, says, "As one of the seven billion human beings, I believe everyone has the responsibility to develop a happier world. We need, ultimately, to have a greater concern for others' well-being." He goes on to say, "Too much self-centered thinking is the source of suffering. A compassionate concern for others' well-being is the source of happiness. We have to take care of ourselves without selfishly taking care of ourselves. If we don't take care of ourselves, we cannot survive. We need to do that. We should have wise selfishness, rather than foolish selfishness. Foolish selfishness means you just think only of yourself, don't care about others, bully others, exploit others. In fact, taking care of others, helping others, ultimately is the way to discover your own joy and to have a happy life. So that is what I call wise selfishness."

The Dalai Lama starts each day by setting his intention for the day. His intention is for the day to be meaningful. For him, meaningful means, if possible, serve and help others. If not possible, then at least not to harm others. He believes that, "Everybody wants a happy life...and our individual happy life depends on a happy humanity. So we have to think about humanity, discover a sense of oneness of all seven billion human beings." The path of joy is connection and the path of sorrow is separation.

Bringing people and countries together to celebrate our oneness, our kindness, our gratitude, our generosity to care for, empower and lift each other up, creating a happy humanity and a happy world.

Science supports that when we see someone perform an act of kindness or of generosity it warms our heart. This warm and fuzzy feeling you get when you have witnessed human goodness is called moral elevation. Studies have found that the natural high of moral elevation makes people want to behave more altruistically toward others, causing kindness to be contagious. Elevation motivates those who experience it to open up to and assist others. Elevation makes an individual feel lifted up and optimistic about humanity...something I think we could all use a bit more of these days!

Let's finish out this year by intentionally practicing giving, being of service, acts of kindness and of generosity. Let's create moral elevation, so we can all feel lifted up and optimistic about humanity, the world, and our future together.

What can you do over this next month to create moral elevation? What small act of kindness, service or generosity can you perform? What act of compassion will make someone else's day brighter and lighter? Let's practice wise selfishness instead of foolish selfishness during this holiday season. I invite you to join me in creating ripples of moral elevation.

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Gratitude Is The Doorway

11/14/2019

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This time of year, gratitude and giving thanks get a lot of attention. Next week most of us will be celebrating Thanksgiving and we take time to pause, to reflect and give thanks for our blessings, the people and things that we feel truly grateful for in our lives.

Being grateful is a daily practice of mine. Formally in the morning and before bed each day, recounting and expressing gratitude for the many blessings throughout my day and in my life. And informally throughout the day as I'm aware of all of the things in my life that I am grateful for. This practice has significantly changed and enhanced my life. Gratitude changes the lens upon which we see everything in the world.

Gratitude has also changed the way that I pray. I start off all of my prayers with expressions of gratitude and thanks. I believe that gratitude is the key to leading a life of happiness, and also the doorway to the Divine. Starting out praying with expressions of gratitude acknowledges the many blessings we already have in our lives. You leave something in return when you pray with gratitude. I believe that my relationship to God, with the Divine, begins with a grateful heart, with gratitude.

I have spent a lot of time studying and researching positive psychology and happiness and the one thing that consistently comes up over and over again is the power of gratitude in leading a positive, happy, joyful life.

Our brains are programmed for a negatively bias. We are 3-5 times more sensitive to negative information. Our brains are trained to scan the world for the negative, for the threats, so that it can help us to survive. Our brain is like velcro for negativity and teflon for positivity.

Negative emotions put us into fight or flight mode and narrow our ability to think. Positive emotions broaden and build our brain's ability to think and see. Positive emotions flood the brain with dopamine and serotonin. Chemicals that not only make us feel good, but that dial up the learning centers of our brains. This helps us to organize new information, to keep the information longer and retrieve it faster.

There are many scientifically documented advantages to having a positive brain versus a negative brain. So how does this all relate to giving thanks? Gratitude is a system to offset the negativity. It amplifies the goodness. Gratitude is the gateway to happiness, the gateway to the advantages of having a positive mindset. The practice of gratitude invites joy into our lives, not the other way around.

When life is going well gratitude allows us to celebrate the success. When life feels like it is going poorly and we are challenged, gratitude gives us perspective. It is a beautiful perspective shift. 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. Gratitude helps you fall in love with the life you already have.

This week, in honor of Thanksgiving, I invite you to go deeper with your gratitude practice. Each day journal at least 3 new things that you are grateful for, be as specific as you can. Or, take a few minutes each day to write a thank you note to someone, thanking or praising them for something they have done to make your life lighter and brighter. Let's turn up the volume on gratitude and ramp up the vibration this week!

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The Heart Is A Portal

11/12/2019

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This past week I was watching the documentary, Time of the Sixth Sun, and the narrator said, "When you see the world, see it with the eyes of your heart. The heart is a portal." The heart is a portal to our soul, our higher self, to our intuition, and ultimately to the Divine.

Mark L. Collins, author of the book, The HeartSpace Portal, writes, "When we shift our consciousness, from the brain into the heart, we enter the sacred chamber that houses the soul, what I call the Heartspace Portal. In this place where the higher self resides, we can tap into a power that is magically transformative."

So often we defer to seeing the world with the eyes of our mind, our intellect, our social conditioning, our ego. It can be a challenge to pause and have the courage to take the 18 inch leap from our head down into our heart. What might the world look like if we saw it with the eyes of our heart versus our head? How would the world shift, change and soften?

Dropping down into our heart opens up the portal to a higher state of consciousness. Inviting our higher self to guide us instead of our ego. Seeing the world through the eyes of our heart we can make decisions based on love, empathy, compassion, forgiveness, gratitude, peace and joy. These are the igniting force of the heart.

I challenge myself to follow these guidelines:

Don't be quick to judge...be quick to listen, to empathize, to be compassionate, to apologize, to forgive, to love.

Don't be quick to be right...be quick to understand, to hear another perspective, to be open to a different way, a different thought, a new direction, to love.

Don't be quick to bully, to manipulate, to control, to compete...be quick to collaborate, to compromise, to respect, to partner, to love.

Judging, needing to be right, to control are indications that our ego is dominating our behavior. An acronym for ego is Edge God Out. I invite us all to take the time to pause, to connect to our higher wisdom, to the heart's portal to the Divine. Allowing ourselves to become heart gentle.

May we each open our heart wider today. May we see the world through the eyes of our heart, allowing it to be a portal to a more gentle way. May we pull down the walls and take a leap of faith from our head to our heart and live and love wholeheartedly. May we open our heart wider today to Divine Love. May we feel it, embrace it and be inspired by it today and always.

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Make Growing A Daily Priority

10/29/2019

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I vividly remember a time period in my life where all I could manage each day was to muddle through and survive. I was knee deep with diaper changing, feeding, entertaining, keeping safe, teaching, cleaning, bathing, reading, laundry and trying to manage a household of 5 plus a dog. I also remember the days before deciding to stay home with my kids, when I was juggling all of that plus managing a client base and a career. And before that I remember being a young adult and how exhausted I was working to build a career and find my way as an adult, as a friend, as a girlfriend/wife, as a daughter, sister, etc.. I have to admit I wasn't focused on growing each day, as much as I was on surviving each day.

I was indeed learning and growing, but I wasn't intentionally working at it, or focusing on growing, or determining where I wanted to focus my attention. I was focused on the tasks at hand. Yes, growth came a long with it and yes, I had goals, but as I reflect back my growth goals centered around my career and what was needed to grow and change in my career. I didn't spend much time focusing on my own personal growth. I reacted to what happened in life, and at times not in a way that I felt good about.

It was fairly easy to have years slip by without really stretching myself. Operating under the same status quo, having some of the same personal experiences happen over and over. Growing and stretching takes an openness, a willingness to put forth some extra effort. A willingness to own that you have some things that you can work on to grow and expand yourself.

Certainly, some stages in life are more demanding of your time and energy and it's hard to do more than just survive, but mostly our busyness and our priorities are dictated by us. We can always make room for something if we make it a priority. I think it's important that we make growing a priority. It doesn't have to be huge, but taking a step each day to focus on our personal growth. Even if it's just reading a short paragraph, or watching a short video clip, or reading a blog post, maybe picking up supplies for a new hobby. Whatever it is, no matter how small it may seem, focusing intent effort on how to grow a little bit each day.

I once heard a suggestion that ten cents from every dollar you earn should go to help someone else, and ten cents from every dollar you earn should go to help invest in yourself. Tithing for yourself, to help you grow and improve, what an awesome concept! Maybe to help you attend a personal growth seminar or a retreat that you've had your eye on, or to participate in a mission trip, or to take a class on painting, or to purchase tools for your new hobby, or even to take a vacation. Investing in yourself, I love it! We think about investing in our future all the time don't we? Investing to buy a house, investing for retirement, investing for college funds, is there an account in there for yourself? I love the idea of investing in our future selves.

I believe that we are students of life. We are here growing, learning lessons, experiencing, remembering. Let's work to not become personally stagnant. Let's not risk losing track of who we are and what our soul needs in the busyness of life. I invite each of us to carve out time for to grow and shift and change and expand and learn each day. Some days in big ways and some days in small ways. I love this saying and I don't know who said it, "Each day try to be better than you were yesterday and tomorrow be better than you were today."

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Deep Compassionate Listening And Loving Speech To Heal Conflict

10/22/2019

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What comes to mind when you think of deep listening or compassionate listening? I just love the phrase "deep listening", it conjures up a vision of listening that I desire to engage in more. It feels like wholehearted listening, listening without response, listening without judgment or expectation where we can truly feel seen and heard. Most of us typically practice negative listening habits (more on this later).

What comes to mind when you think of loving speech? For me it brings to mind open communication filled with compassion and love, lacking in judgment or advice giving.

In an interview with Oprah, Thich Nhat Hanh, a Buddhist monk and peace activist, discussed the concepts of deep compassionate listening and loving speech. He believes that deep listening, or compassionate listening, can help relieve the suffering of another person and that loving speech in-conjunction with deep compassionate listening allows for the type of communication that will resolve conflict and shift perceptions.

Thich Nhat Hanh describes deep compassionate listening like this:

"You listen with only one purpose, help him or her to empty his heart. And if you remember that you are helping him or her to suffer less, and then even if what he says is full of wrong perceptions, full of bitterness, you are still capable to continue to listen with compassion. Because you know that listening like that, with compassion, you give him or her a chance to suffer less. If you want to help him or her to correct his perception, then you wait for another time. But for the time being, you just listen with compassion and help him or her to suffer less. One hour like that can bring transformation and healing. The fear, the anger and the despair is born on the ground of wrong perception. We have wrong perceptions concerning ourselves and the other person, and that is the foundation for conflict, war and violence."

Thich Nhat Hanh describes loving speech like this:

"The only way we can begin to end conflict is communication between people. We should be able to say like this: 'dear friends, dear people, I know that you suffer a lot. I have not understood enough of your difficulties and suffering. It's not our intention to make you suffer more. It is opposite. So please tell us about your suffering, your difficulties. I'm eager to learn, to understand.' It has to start like that, loving speech. And if you are honest, if you are true, they will open their heart and tell us. And then we practice compassionate, deep listening. And during the process of deep listening, we can learn so much about our own perceptions and their perceptions."

Deep listening and loving speech to end conflict within our personal relationships, professional relationships and global relations.

Deep compassionate listening is to listen with your ears, eyes and heart. To pay attention to body language, to tone of voice, to the hidden emotions behind what is being said. To be fully present. Making someone feel that they are truly listened to, seen and heard.

Most of us typically practice what's considered to be negative listening habits. Here are six negative listening habits (taken from Priceless Professional Development). Do you see yourself in any of them?

1. The Faker: All the outward signs are there: nodding, making eye contact giving the occasional uh-huh. However, the faker isn’t concentrating on the speaker. His mind is elsewhere. He or she is pretending to listen.

2. The Interrupter: The interrupter doesn’t allow the speaker to finish and doesn’t ask clarifying questions or seek more information from the speaker. He’s too anxious to speak his words than to listen.

3. The Thief: The thief uses the speaker’s words only as a way to get to his message across. When the speaker says something, the thief steals the focus and then changes to his own point of view, opinion, story or facts. Favorite thief lines are, “Oh that’s nothing, here’s what happened to me...”, “ I remember when I was…”

4. The Advice Giver: Giving advice is sometimes helpful; however, at other times, this behavior interferes with good listening, because it does not allow the speaker to fully articulate his feelings or thoughts; it doesn’t help the speaker solve his own problems; it prohibits venting; it could also belittle the speaker by minimizing a concern with a quick solution. Well-placed advice is an important function in selling and leading. However, advice given too quickly, and at the wrong time, is a turnoff to the speaker.

5. The Rebuttal-Maker: This listener only listens long enough to form a rebuttal. His point is to use the speaker’s words against him. At his worst, he is argumentative and wants to prove you wrong. At the least, this person always wants to make the speaker see his point of view.

6. The Intellectual or Logical Listener: This person is always trying to interpret what the speaker is saying and why. He’s judging the speaker’s words and trying to fit them into his logic box. He rarely asks about the underlying feeling or emotion attached to a message.

When practicing deep compassionate listening we are practicing positive listening skills, not these type of negative listening habits. Deep compassionate listening says I'm here for you, I'm in it with you, I'm not here to fix you or to judge you, I'm here to feel with you and to let you know that you are not alone.

What might our relationships, and the world overall, look like if we each practiced deep compassionate listening and loving speech?

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Unhealthy Mental Habits

10/15/2019

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In previous posts, I've shared information on how to build positive, healthy mental habits into your life. Habits that have proven to promote resiliency, happiness, peace and joy. Habits like having a gratitude practice, mindfulness and meditation, practicing forgiveness and compassion.

This week I want to flip the table and focus on letting go of some unhealthy mental habits. By letting go of unhealthy mental habits we are better able to be resilient, to bounce back from adversity. This ability to be resilient, not getting stuck in the muck, is one of the keys to sustaining a happy and healthy life.

Amy Morin, a clinical social worker, psychotherapist and author of the bestselling book, 13 Things Mentally Strong People Don't Do, believes that everyone has the ability to build mental strength, but most people don't know how. Amy says, "We spend a lot of time talking about physical strength and physical health, but much less time on mental strength and mental health. We can choose to perform exercises that will help us learn to regulate our thoughts, manage our emotions, and behave productively despite our circumstances - the 3 basic factors of mental strength. No matter what your goals are, building mental strength is the key to reaching your greatest potential."

Amy covers the following 3 areas of destructive beliefs that rob us of our mental strength.

Unhealthy beliefs about ourselves
This includes feeling sorry for ourself, having a pity party. and replaying the story of negativity, the story of what's gone wrong over and over. Nursing it, cursing it and rehearsing it.

Getting stuck in the place of "why me?" Why is this happening to me? Why is that happening to me? What's wrong with me that I have these things happening to me? Why does this happen to me when wonderful things happen to other people? Playing the comparison game. Comparing ourselves to others and harboring resentment for our circumstance in life. This kind of thinking keeps you stuck, keeps you focused on the problem and keeps you from focusing on the solution.

This category also includes ignoring uncomfortable feelings and emotions. Sweeping them under the rug, avoiding and denying yourself from dealing with them, instead of feeling them and moving through them.

Unhealthy beliefs about others
It can be easy to get stuck in the belief that other people have the ability to control us. When we think that other people control us, we give away our power. There are very few things in life that we absolutely have to do. For instance, you don't have to work late tonight, that gives away your power. You have a choice. There may be a consequence for your choice, but you do have a choice.

Instead of saying, "I have to work late tonight", say " I choose to work late tonight" and then list the reasons why. I choose to work late tonight because it will make tomorrow an easier day. Or, I choose to work late tonight to demonstrate what a dedicated employee I am, to show that I will do what it takes to get the job done, etc. This subtle shift is impactful to our brains. It's telling our psyche that we are in charge and we are choosing to find the meaning behind what we decide in life. Otherwise, you should be saying no and not doing it.

Another example is saying, "My boss drives me crazy!" Maybe your boss is not the nicest person, but it's up to you how you react. You are in control. Instead, consider thoughts like...my boss is teaching me patience, my boss is teaching me diligence, my boss is teaching me compassion, or whatever it is that allows you to find meaning in the experience. Finding meaning in the experience shifts our thinking to something purposeful versus useless and annoying.

Unhealthy beliefs about the world
Unhealthy beliefs about the world include thoughts that the world owes us something. Thinking if we put in enough hard work that we deserve success. Amy says, "Feeling that success is going to fall into your lap like some cosmic reward is going to lead to disappointment." We want the world to be fair and the world is not fair. The world's not always going to feel fair. The world's not always going to feel just.

Understanding and coming to terms with the idea that the world is always going to feel fair and just helps to release this unhealthy belief.

Changing our mental habits requires diligence. It means paying attention to our thoughts, words and beliefs. Catching ourself, stopping and intentionally choosing a different thought pattern, a different speech pattern and ultimately a different set of beliefs. It doesn't happen overnight, it's a conscious decision, a way of life.

Small changes, small steps create impactful ripples in the direction of mental strength and resilience. What is one small step that you can take today to create a healthy habit and/or to let go of an unhealthy habit? It doesn't have to be grandiose, just one small step in the right direction.

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All We Need To Do Is Remember

10/8/2019

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All we need to do is remember, we don't need to have all of the answers, know all of the solutions, or know all of the reasons why this or that, all we need to do is remember.

All we need to do is remember who we are, where we came from, what our intentions are, what our values and priorities are. When we remember this, the decisions become clearer, the path illuminated.

I know, I know, easier said than done right? On the surface it may seem like this makes the path murky, obscure, even challenging because our ego, and our conditioning, leads us in the other direction of fear. We're conditioned to believe in the survival of the fittest, in scarcity, we make excuses...oh the myriad of excuses.

I propose that all we need to do is remember over and over again and the path will become clearer and unfold with more ease. So simple, and yet it's sometimes easy to forget. We get absorbed in our own stuff and the busyness of life. To trust and have faith that all will be well if we choose this path, if we choose to remember.

All we need to do is remember to be love. Even if we don't think the same, look the same, act the same, believe the same things, all we need to remember is to be love.

All we need to do is remember to be kind. Even if we don't think the same, look the same, act the same, believe the same things, all we need to remember is to be kind.

All we need to do is remember that we are all one, that we are all cut from the same cloth, come from the same Source. Even if we don't think the same, look the same, act the same, believe the same things, all we need to remember is that we are all one.

If we remember to be love and kindness and that we are all one, then everything else falls from them...forgiveness, compassion, gratitude, being of service, respect, etc. Have faith and remember to be love and kindness.

For those who believe in Christianity, remember Jesus and the example he set for us. He was clear on who he was, where he came from, his intentions, values and priorities. He lived them and demonstrated them for us. To follow the example of Jesus is to walk in wisdom. He displayed love, hope, compassion, kindness and servanthood. He did not make excuses to justify veering course from these values.

Just the word itself, Re-Member, implies becoming a part of a group again. Re is a prefix, meaning “again” or “again and again” to indicate repetition, or with the meaning “back” or “backward” to indicate withdrawal or backward motion. And member implies being part of a group. Re-Member.

All we need to do is remember to tap into our inner knowing, to our soul, our heart, and not be afraid to follow its wisdom and guidance. I pray we walk with wisdom, that we treat each other with more kindness, more love, more courtesy, more humility and patience and forgiveness. When enough of us do this consistently enough the world will change and problems will be solved.

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Deep Awareness

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The Magic Is In The Mess

Together We Can Create A Happy World

Gratitude Is The Doorway

The Heart Is A Portal

Make Growing A Daily Priority

Deep Compassionate Listening And Loving Speech To Heal Conflict

Unhealthy Mental Habits

All We Need To Do Is Remember

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