Feeling Good!

I am always amazed at how serenity works. So much of the time it is easy to fall into the mindset that, "when life gets better, I will feel better". And in reality, that is not always so. Certainly there are situations in life that can be more draining than others, however, real serenity is truly about how we feel in the moment no matter what is going on.
I have noticed with myself that I am increasingly feeling better and my life situations have not changed at all. It is my perception that has changed and that has made all the difference in the world. I know for me personally getting further away from the recent split with my husband has also made things feel more smooth and "back to normal, although it is a new normal that I am creating at this time.
I really recognize how the best way to deal with life, for me, is to catch the curve balls as best as I can and run with them. Sometimes, when I run with them you would think my head was on fire. And other times it's more a of a sprint or a jog and I hang onto my connection with my higher self and Spirit as my GPS system. Most of the time, I do not know exactly where I am going. I just know that I am going and as long as I keep my contact, I am just creating a new and temporary "normal".
I have come to realize on a new and deeper level that the only thing that is permanent is change. That is the one thing that we can always count on happening in this human experience. I find that it is best to deal with that realization first and everything else seems to fall into place much easier. It takes my need to control out of the equation. I reminds me to release and surrender and to know that change is always happening and always with good reason, and usually reasons I don't understand until a long time after the fact, if at all.
It's not about knowing or understanding. It is about living in the moment, saying yes, being open to giving and receiving love and taking direct guidance from the only real support I have- Source.
I feel that this is how I am feeling serenity at this moment in time. God knows this will pass too and I will then relearn on an even deeper level how to move with the changes that continue to evolve me into who I am here to be.

Making Time

I find myself in a place that so many of my clients come to me in- EXHAUSTED! Here I am, a single mother, with a part time job and a company of my own that I started barely a year ago. I feel some days that I am so tired, less on a physical level and more on the mental level, and I can see how challenging it feels for some people to make time to care for themselves. Did I mention that I am newly separated and going through the motions of that as well? Yes, I am tired, exhausted really. I have also needed the energy to process, digest and feel my way through some very uncomfortable things. I have been uncovering a lot about myself. Things I love and strengths that I have. I am also finding more that I would like to change about myself. I am happy about that because I am here to grow and evolve more than anything else. Evolving and self reflection- yet another thing that takes time!
With all that I have going on in my life right now it would be easy to make excuses if I wanted to. Excuses as to why I do not have the time or energy to care for myself, to stop and spend time doing what feels good. However, I find that with a little more effort than usual, I am able to create time for yoga, meditation, journaling and time to be playful. These are activities that are all too often seen as practices. Sure, that is what they are, but that is only a partial truth. I feel that they go beyond a practice and become an integral part of who we are and are really life savers.
It is through fully immersing and integrating these activities in my life and really being a part of who I am rather than what I do, I am afforded the luxury of enjoying my life no matter what is going on around me. Sometimes are easier than others, but I have found that when I am right with myself, I am right with the world. In this time of heightened stress and exhaustion, I am laughing, playing, enjoying life and most of all, so in touch with how wonderful life is. How everything is really as it should be. I am hopeful, there is no impending doom in my life as there was for me years before. Before I was able to make time for myself I wondered through life with the sense that "it" was not going to get better. I know now that the truth is, "it" always gets better. Then, there is another "it" that seems worse and that too gets better. It is me that is okay as long as I chose to be. And I only seem to be really open to this CHOICE when I have made the time for myself. To stop whatever I am doing a couple of times each day to do a little something that reminds me to be alive and in the moment. Take time to make time. That is the biggest gift that we could ever give ourselves. And like I always say, when we heal ourselves, the world heals too.

Living From Your Heart

Eleven years ago, when my lights came on, I started therapy. I loved therapy and I loved my therapist. I spent a lot of time with my therapist, looking, inspecting and dissecting. I listened to my story and then I listened to her interpretations. I looked at how my situations at the time and how they mirrored the old. I could see the patterns that I created. I began to understand that I was not a victim, I was volunteer. I began to understand that when I reacted to so many situations in my life, they were from a very old place.
What a gift it was when my therapist taught me that when I react to something with a very high volume and the situation was not calling for that, it meant that I was reacting from a old place. It was more easily identifiable and that felt comforting to me. I now had a better idea of how to integrate all that I was learning because I had a "cue".
She then explained something I think she got from a book that was also very useful. An equation that went; I over E. This meant that when I was reacting emotionally that my "E" was over my "I" or my intellect was overriding my emotions. I needed to then find a solution to flip it the other way around. I used this practice for a long time and it served me well. I started understanding that I could feel all that I need to feel and still behave in a way that was not toxic to me or those around me.
Years later, however, I realized that I was spending a lot of time in my "I". I so enjoyed the benefits of not blowing up over stupid things, I enjoyed the more placid life experience this gave me and I also enjoyed control that processing gave. And where was my heart in all of this?
While I believe therapy gave me a solid foundation because of the way it allowed me to look at, as an adult, things that were still running my life. It created a safe space for those wounds to heal and a road map for me to integrate what I was learning and really practice here in Earth school. I also believe that I was not taught to distinguish the difference between my emotions and my heart. I had no idea that my heart was yearning to have a stronger voice as it continuously got covered up by my processing and compartmentalizing. Through this practice, I did not learn how to trust my heart, which for me is the center of my truth. Source speaks to me through my heart. Much of my intuition about my own life speaks to me through my heart and I had shut it down. I have learned that emotions are feelings and reactions due to experiences and perceptions we have. And the intellect processes the data like a computer. The heart however is where the purest piece of who we are resides. It is not reactionary. It is strong, trustworthy, it is pure and not swayed by all of our "shoulds".
It has been some time since I first understood this about myself. I have since been on the path of going to my heart when I am going through something. I do not always have to call a friend right away to "process". That does not mean that I do not call for support. What it does mean is that I count on my heart first. My heart does not have opinions. My heart honors me even if something does not seem logical. My world began to open up as soon as I realized and then leaned on the power of my heart for support. I sit with my heart and cry, write, meditate and THEN I call a friend!!