Nurturing our Relationships

Hello there gorgeous!  I hope your doing well this beautiful morning! I am currently in a hotel room in Canton OH visiting with my family. We have been hanging out, eating together, laughing together, singing, dancing and just being silly together. It has been so much fun! Seriously just to be around those you love and hold dear to your heart is enough to fill you back up energetically sometimes. Just to sit and hold space together, talk, listen and truly be heard from the ones you love fills your cup, rejuvenates you, and can heals you. 

This weeks’ post I wanted to take a second to touch upon this topic of relationships and how we could all probably nourish some of them in our life a bit more. I know I can without a doubt.

How easy is it to be somewhere else in our head when having a conversation with a friend or family member? 

How easy is it to people watch and not pay full attention to the person right next to you speaking? 

And the most obvious of all, how easy is it to have our heads in engrossed in our damn phones when our beloved is talking to us? 

This has become a normal occurrence for most of us and we see it and do it all the time. 

So this post today is very much so a reminder for me to step up my game and become fully present and engrossed in each moment I have with my family here. 

Give them my full undivided attention just like they’re worth and just like they deserve.

I believe the biggest gift we can give someone is our time, it’s priceless and we can never get it back. 

So although this was a quickie today I believe this message about nourishing the special relationships in our lives is so important and it’s something I know I want to really grow into more and work on.

So today beautiful one remember in your core that you are made of love and light! 

The world is ready and waiting for you to shine your brilliance onto the rest of us! 

Have a great day sweet friends!

 MUAH!!!!

Learning To Recognize What Motivates You

Hello there beautiful one! I am so grateful that you are here and going on this journey with me today!

You totally rock BTW!

So I have been feeling a bit overwhelmed and busy this past week and my body is telling me it is definitely time for a break soon. I am at the point where I’ve let my chores and the ever daunting “to do” list get bigger and bigger until I let myself get to a state of overwhelm. You know that feeling right?  That feeling of all work, no play.  I’ve put my chores and domestic tasks above my play time and wellness.  It’s time for a recharge. We are leaving for vacation to visit with family and do some camping in the breathtakingly beautiful blue ridge mountains this weekend and I am freaking counting down the hours!!!

This week has had me reflecting on the idea of what truly motivates us as we move through our day.  Am I making my choices based on my truth, my passions and my well being?  Or am I making my choices based on feelings of guilt, panic and fear?  I can say for me it changes constantly.  I’d love to tell you that all my decisions and choices in life are made out of pure love, light and passion and that I live on a cloud of bliss!  That shit is so so very far from the truth, in fact I’m just trying to hold it all together most of the time.  

I have found that I am a so much more happy, generous and grateful when I am making my daily choices and decisions from a space of love though.  My day goes by more smooth and light.  What that looks like in my life is saying no to something I don’t want to do or that doesn’t align with my beliefs even if it might hurt someone’s feelings.  Or even surprising a loved one with coffee and a hug randomly throughout the day just because I want them to know I love and appreciate them.

Making these day to day choices out of love and respect for yourself is how we are able to show way more love out into the world and onto those around us.  

It used to be my default setting to be a people pleaser as I’ve mentioned before and nine times out of ten I would make decisions based on how it would effect others, how it would be received and how it would make me “look.”  That’s lame and I don’t want to live like that anymore.  All that would be left of me is this bitter, unhappy and misunderstood version of myself.  

Once we open our hearts to the knowing that it is in no way ‘selfish’ to make our choices from a place of love for ourselves, in fact it is the opposite, we will find that life is so much smoother, happier and better all around! 

If you’re used to showing up and taking actions from feelings of guilt and fear remember to be gentle with yourself it won’t change over night. Hell I still can ‘relapse’ with my decision making process sometimes. Like I said I most definitely don’t live on a cloud of bliss!  I think the key is to simply notice and be honest with ourselves when we do it though.  We can acknowledge that we weren’t being true to ourself in that moment.  We made that choice because we didn’t want to hurt that persons feelings and now were pissed for committing to something that doesn’t align with our truth.  Acknowledge it, learn from it, then move on.  No dwelling on it and making it any bigger then it is.

This is a continual daily practice and it can be completely foreign to those of you that are used to making choices out of obligation.  Show yourself some grace, just keep moving forward. 

I wanted to write this post today to remind us all that we are worthy of making these daily choices and decisions that make us feel happy and whole.

The more you keep practicing and working out this decision making muscle the easier it will get in time and the happier you truly will be sweetness!  I still have a long way to go no doubt, although I can say with confidence that I have seen tremendous growth in myself in this area of my life.  I couldn’t be more grateful to have finally gotten my ass in gear and started looking out for my well being more!

I hope you are doing the same you beautiful thing you!  You are so crazy worth it!!!

So remember in your core that you are made of love and light!  The world is ready and waiting for you to shine your brightness onto the rest of us!  Have a great day friends!  MUAH!!! 

Don’t compromise your Boundaries

“If you continue to blame other people for ‘making’ you feel guilty, they still have power of you, and you are saying that you will only feel good when they stop doing that.  You are giving them control over your life.  Stop blaming other people.” -Henry Cloud, Boundaries
I freaking love this particular excerpt from the Boundaries book because its something I think we all struggle with, this concept of feeling ‘guilted’ into doing things for people even when we’d rather not. There were many years of my life where that was pretty much how I operated on a day to day basis.  Constantly making choices that I knew wouldn’t cause ripples with people or making decisions out of a feeling of obligation or guilt.
 I started to blur the lines of what I truly wanted and what I thought everyone else wanted for me.
When you prescribe to this way of thinking and operating inevitably what happens is you grow angry, bitter, resentful and truthfully not a very fun person to be around.
Total buzz kill.
It becomes this vicious cycle that you default to almost on auto pilot until one day you’ve had enough, you get jarred when your finally sick enough of living with the ‘guilt’ mentality.
There is no action that has space for love when you come from a place of a guilt mindset.  When you do something for someone out of a feeling of guilt your not doing them or yourself any favors.  You are not showing up with your full potential and more then likely you are also not showing up with any type of positive energy, in fact your probably pretty irritated and pissy.
Seriously who wants that?
I surely don’t and I think its safe to say neither you or the other person would honestly want you to show up in that manor.
It’s crazy because now that I have had a little more practice implementing boundaries not only have I learned what the things are that I find unacceptable for my well being but I’ve also found that I can take ownership of my feelings with more grace.
‘Letting’ someone ruin my day happens less and less frequently, I’m able to shrug it off a bit quicker when someone says something hateful or disrespectful to me.  And listen, lawd knows I am far from perfect and I still have SO much room for growth fo real, but seriously that excites me babes!
So today I wanted to give you this friendly reminder for you to choose to take ownership of your life.  Choose to respect yourself enough to start to figure out where in your life right now you may be lacking solid boundaries.  Boundaries really are so very important for us to have consistently in our lives.
Please remember its ok to say no sometimes, its ok to take time for yourself, is ok to show up differently then what people are used to seeing you like.  That’s what we humans are here to do in this life, grow, evolve, change and reinvent!
It’s pretty freaking cool if you ask me!
If you’d like to go more in depth and learn some super amazing tools on how to really create and implement solid boundaries in your life you should pick up the book Boundaries written by Henry Cloud and John Townsend.  It was a total game changer for me when I read this book a few years ago.  Lots of AHA and light bulb moments happened through the reading process.
So remember in your core that you are made of love and light!  The world is ready and waiting for you to shine your brightness onto the rest of us!  Have a great day friends! MUAH!!!

Did you fall back into your comfort zone?

Hey there cutie pie! How you doin? Today I want to talk about how powerful fear can be and how easy it is for us to just stay stuck in our comfort zones. Hell, our comfort zones are warm and cozy. Sure they’re boring and nothing new, fun or exciting happens there, but at least we’re safe right? It feels like an instinctual thing starts to happen whenever I’m operating out of my comfort zone for too long. I find that my brain kinda cathches up to the fact that I’m doing something new, exciting and a little scary and then all of a sudden it slips back into its cozy shell, its comfort zone. What the shit is that all about?

I would like for my default to be that I’m constantly putting myself out there and smacking fear in the face on the daily. But that’s not what happens.

I truly believe its another form of self sabotage that I’m still working through. I wrote a previous post on self sabotage and you should totally check it out if you are relating to what I’m talking bout’ here.

The thing is anytime we do something in life that is going to stretch us and make us a better human 

its probably going to be a little bit scary right? Like when you move out of state for college, or if you take your dream job that makes less money, or you decide to write your first book, or you move away and join the circus, the list goes on and on. You get the point. There will always be room for us to stretch and grow, we’ve just got to step into it, own our right to grow into our fullest potential and that is exactly where pure happiness and a sense of fulfillment lie. 

I’m not saying you can’t have happiness in your comfort zone, I lived in my comfort zone for along time and as you know I frequently go back and visit it, but I will admit that I can reach a higher level of contentment when I’m pushing myself outside of that. I’m going to bet you feel the same way.

So what do we do? How do we live outside of that comfort zone and rise into our greatness? 

In my humble opinion I believe the first step is to notice that your hanging out in it. Once we start to acknowledge the fact that we could be learning more, practicing more of the things that light us up and make our heart sing is how we jump back in.

For instance I noticed I was getting a bit complacent with my researching and reading I’ve been working on for my book. I started watching a little more TV and indulged in more of the mindless entertainment vs doing the things I know would benefit me and the goal I am reaching for. But its cool to take a break, we all need a breather, some down time. My point is we don’t want to lose focus on the things in life that light us up and make us do the happy dance! Especially when it might scare you, don’t fall prey to fear, remember your why and keep going, the fear will fade the more you do.

So as you go through your day today notice if your making choices out of comfort or if you are stretching yourself and growing. I can tell so far today I’ve decided to stretch again because I feel vulnerable when I’m writing this post, and that’s exciting! I want to be raw, real and open here with you. 

We’re all on this journey together and the beautiful part is, we’re not alone! I am here for you, we can do this together and support one another. 

I hope that you have an amazing week beautiful ones!

Remember in your core that you are made of love and light! The world is ready and waiting for you to shine your brightness onto the rest of us! Have a great day friends! MUAH!!!!!

Know Your Worth

Hello my beautiful friends! I have been experiencing some major shifts in the way I think, feel, love, and experience things in my life over the course of this past year. This shift has been such a beautiful and profound journey, but admittedly scary as hell too because a lot of things I am awakening to are very foreign to me. It’s a complete paradigm shift on the way that I see myself, treat myself and others around me. I credit this new perspective for giving me the unshakable courage to start writing my book and to start this blog as well. (Which I thoroughly enjoy doing!)

My goal with this blog and with my book is to be the vessel that sparks something inside of you to awaken and tap you into your greatness! 

One major element that I am learning about as I’m going along this wild ride of my journey is putting value in what I’m worth. 

Seems simple, ‘we’re all created equal, no one is worth more then anyone else.’Hell, I used to say these types of things out loud for years but I never really felt that way. I always felt inferior in one way or another. You know what? I didn’t even realize how low my self worth had gotten because I had literally gotten so good at presenting myself as having it all together and being just fine that I believed it. Kinda like that fake it til’ you make it concept. Oh ya I had that shit down! 

I was so used to feeling like I wasn’t worth what other people were, it became my normal. 

For instance when I would hear stories from people about their lavish trips and getaways, I would close down from feeling the excitement of one day experiencing that because I didn’t feel as if I would ever be worthy of such a vacation. Or when it came to me asking for help with something I would almost shrink into myself before asking because I truly didn’t want to burden people and their time was more valuable then mine anyway I thought. I would sacrifice my time, energy, emotions, and health time and time again because I didn’t believe deep down in my core that I was worth more then that. 

Where does this come from? For some people this comes from years of being emotionally or physically abused in a relationship and it sticks, weather you’re still in the relationship or not. For others it comes from events that occurred in their childhood. For me it came from living a secret second life for years and learning how to function normally like a pro and putting up a front that everything is fine, “Nothing to see here.” The problem was, everything was not fine at all and since I was living a life that I was no where near proud of it severely damaged my sense of self worth, and I’ve been repairing ever since. 

No matter what you have been through, or are still going through, you are a soul that was called to this earth for a reason. You have these special gifts and talents that no other human on this whole wide planet has. Only you. My dear, even if you still don’t know what they are yet, don’t give up. We need you to shine your brilliant light onto the rest of us. By doing so you give others around you permission to do the same thing. You will be the light, be the hope to make big changes around you. Think of someone in your life who has inspired you in a positive way, you can be that person for someone else.

Please let those words wash over you and soak into your skin beautiful. I can tell you that stepping into and owning your true worth has been a process, I’m still not there yet. I have to remind myself constantly that I am worth someone else’s time, or that I’m worth that new shirt, or even that I’m worth a compliment. It’s getting a little easier though with time. Give yourself the time and grace to get there, don’t give up. 

I promise you are 150% worth the effort babe! As you go along your journey of finding yourself and your worth again you will be inadvertently showing others your worth. They will start to treat you better because you will no longer tolerate the bull shit that kept you shrinking down and afraid. 

Nope. Done. Finito. 

So go Rise into your power and greatness now gorgeous! You are a force to be reckoned with don’t you forget that shit! 

I cannot wait to hear about your process of finding your worth again, please share with me your findings along the way either by FB messenger, IG direct message or leave a comment down below. 

Remember in your core that you are made of love and light!  

The world is ready and waiting for you to shine your brightness onto the rest of us!

Have a great day friends! MUAH!!!

Break the Judgement Cycle

Do you get relief when you cast a judgement on someone else? 

Does it make you feel good to know that someone else is worse off then you? 

Do you feel a sense of self righteous regal when you judge a person for how different they dress or act vs. how put together and normal you are? 

I can guess with a bit of certainty that since you are reading this right now your answer is the same as mine, HELL NO!

I feel crummy and yucky inside when I judge. I wish I never ever had a judegemental thought. 

I want to break the cycle and detox my judgement cycle and I hope you do to.

 You see we all judge. Each and every single one of us has judgements pop up from time to time. We’ve been hard wired since we were kids to judge.  Weather it came from religious beliefs systems, family beliefs, TV, the crowd you hung out with, the beliefs you learned along the way might still be holding you back from creating a better life. 

You must be brave and look deep within, be honest with yourself to see them, but they are there. 

I feel like I have always been super open and willing to do just about anything in life (maybe sometimes to open) and because of that I assumed that I was so not a judge mental person. Hell, to each his own, who am I to judge? Is what I always thought. 

Then I read this incredible book from Gabrielle Bernstein called Judgement Detox. 

Damn.  Unbeknown to me I guess I do judge after all. I picked up this book not because I felt I needed any judgements to be detoxed, I’ve just read other books by her and like her writing style, so this judgement thing was a character trait of mine I totally stumbled upon.

A lot of our judgements start from within. We are so hard on ourselves to be these perfect little humans and as you know it just doesn’t happen. So what do we do? We first judge ourselves and then since that doesn’t feel very good we move onto the next best thing, we pick out what we believe to be character flaws in other people to judge in order for our ego to feel better about itself. 

It truly is a vicious cycle my friends. 

So in order to kick this ugly ass judgement cycle to the curb for good, the gorgeous Ms 

Bernstein suggests that we must first become aware of the judgements. Notice if you judge someone at the grocery store for what they’re wearing, or if you judge someone’s FB post there are small judgements happening all day long, become aware of them. As you are becoming aware of them do not judge yourself and get mad that you are thinking these thoughts, simply notice them.

Once you get used to observing them you want to notice how they make you feel, do you feel gross and yucky or do you feel justified? Observe why you may have felt justified. 

This is the point where you take it a step further and you journal, purge it all out, why do you feel justified? Where did this justification come from? Is this something I learned to judge from my childhood? Is this judgment a mirror reflection of something I don’t want to face inside myself?

Get deep babe and get it all out on the paper, you’ll start to recognize your pattern. 

Knowing your pattern is literally half the battle. From there you can banish the cycle away in various different ways, but for me its a surrender prayer. 

“Dear spirit, I need help with my judgement toward myself. I’m ready to release this now. I welcome in the presence of love to take me back to my truth and grace. I’m ready to surrender this judgment and see through the eyes of love.”

I hope this post resonates with you today beautiful. Once you start to recognize these judgment patterns and offer them up I promise your life will be so much more light. So much happier, more full of love, peace and oneness. We’re all going through our own journeys, we all flow through life different and that is the most beautiful thing!

If you want more insight on this topic pick up Gabrielle Bernstein’s book, Judgement Detox, Yao won’t regret it! 

I hope you have a beautiful light and love filled day! MUAH!!!

Stay Present

Mahatma Gandhi said, “The future depends on what you do today.” 

How true is that? As I read it I thought about how simple that concept is, yet how often we tend to forget it. So many times we go about our days on airplane mode. Work, school, the kids soccer practice, dinner, bath, TV, bed. Our days go by in a blur and by the end of it we are left feeling empty and burnt out. There is an infinite amount of beauty, blessings and miracles around us at any given time and we don’t make the time to stop and appreciate it. We feel we’re to busy. Our phones pretty much hold the damn key to the universe, they do everything for us, why wouldn’t we be constantly distracted and detached from the present moment whilst holding our iPhones? 

 I don’t want to live a life where I don’t value the little things and since you are reading this, I know you don’t either. 

Listen beautiful friend I lived for many years of my life numb, in a fog, firmly detached and unplugged from the world around me and it was scary at first to feel the vulnerability of being open and fully present. For me I got so used to being numbly on autopilot in a drug induced haze going through my days.  I had zero capacity to be fully present with anyone.  I had to fight tooth and nail to climb out of my fog and re-learn what it’s even like to be present and fully engaged in my life. 

A lot of you don’t have to go through something so traumatic and life changing in order to wake you up to the miracle that is your life. We all have different journey’s we’re on and various lessons we must learn in this lifetime. (I just happen to be the one that has to learn the hard way, and that’s ok.)

My point I wanted to hit home with you this week is that you have a life you are living right now that you may (or may not) be only fully engaging with at 50%.  When you step into the present moment and become fully aware of the world around you miracles start to happen. You notice the beauty around you that has always been there, you simply hadn’t noticed. Your children are happier. Your friendships are deeper. Your love is stronger. You become a damn rockstar to those around you because you are there. You are not on your phone zoning out while someone is speaking to you. You are not day dreaming during a presentation. You are open, fully engaged, receiving everything the universe has to offer and wants to give to you right now!

Let this be the reminder you needed to hear right here right now gorgeous!  Wake up to all the beauty and priceless miracles you have all around you darling. Lord knows its not all rainbows and sunshine but we all have so much in our lives to show gratitude for.  The more we awaken to the beauty and the miracles the more we will have in our daily lives. 

Remember you are made of love and light and you deserve to fully be present, awake and aware of all of the beauty and the love that surrounds you my sweet. 

I hope you have a very loving and lighter filled Monday