Learning to Pause

I don’t know about you, but during the day I often run helter-skelter from one task to another without a breath in between. Often, lunch happens well after noon, when I’m either famished or need a break, and then I am catching up on the news or Facebook or something else, slurping down my soup or sandwich without much gratitude or attention.

The result of running from person to thing to thing to person every day is mental exhaustion in which you can never really catch up until maybe, just maybe, the weekend hits. But there is a helpful remedy.

Take a moment to pause and breathe in between your tasks. Walk away from your desk if you can; hit the restroom, the water cooler or just take a step back, close your eyes and breathe. Clear your mind of the past and don’t think about what’s next; just enjoy a moment for yourself. Don’t take this moment for anything else like getting a cup of coffee and chatting with co-workers. This is a moment for you, your body and your mind.

My energy practitioner mentioned this one day when I was having a particularly busy week and felt so rundown I wanted to bury myself in a pile of blankets and not come out until hibernation season was over. Those lucky bears!

I saw the wisdom right away in taking time to close out one project – or even one phase of a project - and begin another by breathing and pausing; that even the most miniscule one minute of this practice can begin to unloop the overlapping, frenzied wiring to which I’ve gotten my brain accustomed.

This is also a great exercise when you feel overwhelmed and have too much to do; when you have trouble focusing on one thing because the shadows of so many other tasks await you. Clear your mind, take a few deep breaths. The focus will come. The clarity will come.

Done with Naysayers

I’ve always had a good-girl mentality. I want to be liked, I want to please, I want others to be happy with me, but there is always an undercurrent of want or need behind it. That for me is the mark of an inner child aspect who has not grown up.

Recently, my book club girlfriends have been talking about the book “The Life-Changing Magic of Not Giving a F*ck.” My inner good girl wants to care, but the older I get, and the more divisive and painful the conversations are in this country, the less I want to give an eff.

Recently, an advertiser told us her ad wasn’t working in out magazine, but that wasn’t enough. She went off on a tangent of painful spewing, not just slapping our baby; practically burying it after torture.

I am so done with that crap.

We didn’t lash out in anger and pain, even though we wanted to. Man, the things she said hurt. We had many, many things we could tell her about her business, what we know, what we’ve heard. But frankly, all we saw was a woman in pain herself, scared and obviously over her head, worried about money, life, and living the illusion of a business she expects will last forever.

And I decided right then that I am no longer giving an eff about mean-spirited, fearful people who only want to blame, criticize and judge everyone else but themselves.

I feel a little self-righteous about not giving a crap, my head held firmly high and a flush in my cheeks. I don’t think that’s the way I want to go about letting go; after all they say when you have no emotion about it then you are really there. But right now, I’m glad I feel that buzz because it means I am defending something of which I am proud, of which I have worked SO VERY hard, something for which I have spent long hours, sleepless nights and received not as much reward as I would have hoped.  It means I give a crap about my livelihood and my baby, when I really didn’t think I did care so much.

We don’t deserve the kind of harsh “reality” this woman decided to impose on us, thinking only of herself. That’s the joke – metaphysical “mal”-practitioners claiming to do good and be good and contribute to the well-being of the planet. HA. I know who the do-gooders are on this planet; I have scores of friends in the metaphysical biz who really are that kind of person, and whom I try to emulate on days I’m not feeling all that loving.  I know the real deal when I see it.

If I were in a financial position where I could have fired her as an advertiser, I would have done it on the spot. It would have felt so good. But it was also good to take time to process it and get to a different place mentally and emotionally about it, so that I know now I will no longer tolerate naysayers.

You naysayers, complainers, criticizers, judgers and blamers can go spread your ill-will somewhere else. I’m not putting up with it anymore. I will cut you off, I will walk away. I don’t need more negativity in my life, and I certainly don’t need to be spending my time processing your rants so that I feel better. And hopefully, soon, when someone else decides to beat my baby, I won’t need time to process it; I really just won’t care, except to decide what I am going to say that won’t hurt your feelings the way you might have hurt mine, and where I am going to go to get away from you.

Think about it the next time you come across someone who needs to put you or someone or something you love down. It's really about them, but they want you to feel as bad as they do. Decide it's not going to work, that they can stay with their pain, while you go off and live a freer, happier life not giving a rat's behind.

What’s Your Vision?

I stole that headline from the most recent Toastmaster’s magazine, in which new International President Balraj Arunasalam shares his personal vision statement.

I was captivated by his article, not because of his vision statement - that is compelling to him alone. Rather, here’s what he said the vision statement does for him:

“This will help me gain clarity when I am confused, determine if my progress is in line with my vision and encourage me to make choices that propel me in that direction.”

Can my personal vision statement be “pizza?”

I have a vision board which is not the same thing as a statement in pictures. There’s a boatload of difference between a mature statement that propels you to make decisions where “the fruits of your future success depend on a clear view of where you want to go” versus a stick figure of a dog, colored in brown pencil, similar to what you probably have from your kid on your refrigerator plastered in place with a magnet.

“History is replete with examples of highly successful individuals: Walt Disney, Steve Jobs, Mahatma Gandhi, Mother Teresa and Albert Einstein, to name a few. All had grand visions – often scoffed at and ridiculed – and all had a massive influence on the world. They each made the world a better place because they had a personal vision and dared to pursue it. Why not you? Maybe your vision won’t change the world, but it can change your world,” writes Arunasalam.

The reason I love the idea of a personal vision statement is that I often lose my way. Sometimes I am gung-ho about moving myself forward, working my business like a pro, writing my book like it’s the next Bible and being grateful for all that I am and have. Other times, by 1pm I have closed my bedroom curtains, donned my pajamas and watched Kung Fu Panda for the 30^th time, trying to forget there is a whole world outside spinning without me.  If I can let go of the guilt (of not doing or being enough that day) I am grateful for flannel (pajamas and sheets), delivery pizza and of course the creators of Kung Fu Panda, who have given me more joy than any delivery pizza.

Here’s what I think I need to include in my personal vision statement:

1.      That constant acts of kindness are a necessity (especially now);

2.      That I am the creator of my life and I can be or do anything I choose;

3.      That moving toward happy is not just a goal but a lifestyle;

4.      That I am intricately tied to the Universe whether I can see it or not;

5.      That consciousness shifts are necessary for me to heal myself, and help heal others.

So I think this is it for the first go-round:

“To seek continual shifts in consciousness so that I may always be an example of happiness and kindness, creating my life to be one of joy, reward, meaning, expansion and purpose to the best of my ability, allowing the unconditionally-loving Universe to work in its mysterious ways with full allowance on my behalf.”

I am going to continue working with this and honing it to be the very statement that helps me gain clarity when I am confused, determines if my progress is in line with my vision and encourages me to make choices that propel me in that direction.

Feels promising and hopeful.

PS: You might be curious about Arunasalam’s vision statement as the new International President of Toastmasters: “to lead by example, in both my personal and professional life, while continuing to invest in my own development to become an effective leader.”

Two Tips for Peace and Prosperity

If I could guarantee you will be happier, more prosperous and peaceful if you put into practice 2 simple tips, would you be willing to give it a try?

Then let me tell you a true story.

A few weeks ago, I was struck by a moment of inspiration, and “thought” to write myself a note saying that the Universe will provide me with unexpected abundance, within a week, and for exactly $900. I don’t know why that figure came to me; it just did. I wrote it all on a pink post it note and stuck it to the kitchen wall calendar to wait it out.

Five days later, a prospect called out of the blue, and asked if a full page ad at $900 would work for me. “Why yes it will!” I replied, without hesitation. Covered in goosebumps, I wondered how on Earth she could have just offered that. It’s nowhere on my advertising rate card, nor had she even mentioned anything about a full page ad, for that month, in the weeks we had been conversing.

Upon concluding my business with her, I ran for the note, threw open the front door where Doug was chatting with his brother on the phone, and yelled, “What does this note say??” and topped it off with my happy dance. The rest of that day, I was on a high from what I took to be a confirmation that I was in alignment with, and supported by, Source.

That in of itself is the story, but the reason I tell you this is because I didn’t get to that alignment by accident. It was because this was a radical departure from a prior month, where so much went wrong, I just wanted to jump in my car and escape. That month:

·         A full page advertiser halfway through her contract called to tell me she’s pulling out and there goes $1000 a month.

·         I got sick with a cold, and got Doug sick.

·         My car was totaled at a busy intersection.

·         My 75 year old Mother was having surgery in Florida and I was so afraid it would be the last time I’d ever hear her voice again.

Everything seemed to be falling apart, and I did everything wrong, MEANING, me, authoring a book on happiness, just jumped off the life raft of my own advice. I was letting the outside create my inside by perceiving all these events as bad, really bad, and kept letting those waves of fear hit me, over and over again until I felt myself go under, and had a scary panic attack, awake all night, heart thumping, gasping for air like a fish out of water.

Not only was I perceiving these events as bad, I was focusing on it all, ignoring all the good stuff around me, because the bad stuff is so damn hard to ignore, right? They are the squeaky wheels and the pesky flies, the poop in our punchbowls.  

They say that we teach what we most need to learn, and boy did I need to go back to my book in progress Moving Toward Happy. There, I found my abandoned life raft and jumped back on, reminding myself how important it is to create my inner world first.

And how I came to unexpectedly receive $900 is because I actively put into practice the two tips I share with you now, which can easily change your current state into a happier one:

1)      look at events you perceive as negative instead as a blessing and a gift even if you can’t understand it right now; and

2) focus on the positive – not just positive thinking, but focusing on the many positive people and circumstances you have in your life.

But don’t take my word for it.  Let’s take the word of a man considered to be one of the spiritual thought leaders in the world, shall we? Eckhart Tolle said “The primary cause of unhappiness is never the situation, but thought about it. Be aware of the thoughts you are thinking. Separate them from the situation, which is always neutral. It is as it is.”

Now you might have noticed Eckhart said everything is neutral and that has its appeal. But that’s hard for us to grasp because we are so used to labeling everything as positive and negative. And that word “neutral” has a neutral feel doesn’t it?

Words count in helping you increase your happiness, just as thoughts and emotions do. Doesn’t it feel lighter and happier to label everything as a blessing and gift? “Thank you Xcel; I will pay this bill gladly in exchange for providing me with the air conditioning and heat needed this month.” I’d rather believe that life is working for me, and give thanks for it, and that’s just another way to focus on the positive. It feels uplifting, doesn’t it?

So, in the months following, I focused on the positive stuff, and believed that yes, truly, everything is a gift, even if don’t know it until later. For instance:

1.      That $1000 that dropped out? The truth is, if I look to my history, there is proof that I’ve always had enough money, and there is always more money flowing in. I made up that $1000 and much more;

2.      That car accident? Cost me $1400 to repair and the insurance company gave me $2500. It might not look pretty, but it works just fine.

3.      That cold? I got pampered for a few days and then I pampered him. I realized in resisting the cold – just like Mother Nature or videos of dogs who talk - resistance is futile.

4.      Lastly, my mom’s surgery. I only hurt myself by worrying. She’s still the tough old bird I know and love.

Keep in mind there is nothing worth holding onto that keeps your happiness and peace at arms’ length. Don’t let the bad become the biggest thing in your mind and heart. For the sake of your happiness, peace and prosperity, I ask you to try these two tips: look at everything as a blessing and gift, and focus on the good stuff. And I guarantee it works, or your money back.