The Key to a Happy Holiday
My coaching clients often ask me some version of the same question. How can I be happier? Happier in my marriage, happier with my body, happier with my life in general?
This time of year, many are thinking about upcoming celebrations and wonder “how can I have a happier holiday this year?”
The answer is forgiveness.
Lesson 121 in the spiritual text A Course in Miracles states “Forgiveness is the key to happiness.”
I agree.
True forgiveness unchains us from the past and allows our full expression of life in the present. What does that mean?
Access to more love, compassion, and happiness for ourselves and all in our world.
Let me be clear. This isn’t the forgiveness of your youth when your mom made you forgive your little sister so you could get your Barbie doll back. (Maybe that was just me?) This forgiveness, authentic forgiveness, is life changing stuff.
How do you start? The Be Love Principles have been my process to shift from the constricted feelings...
Choosing to Live a Bigger Life
What does it mean to live a BIG life? What constitutes a small life?
The answer is entirely up to you…and the way you choose to think about it.
You don’t need to take lavish vacations, spend time in Vegas or pal around with international celebrities to enjoy a big life. You need only go within and get curious:
How could I be enjoying my life more right now?
What activities bring me pleasure and satisfaction?
Who do I love being around?
What sparks joy in my heart?
What do I love to learn about?
What do I love to share with others?
What makes me feel alive?
As the leaves shift from summer greens to the hues of autumn here in Virginia, it serves as a gentle reminder of the passing of time. As I embrace this season of my life, I recall a famous quote from American poet Mary Oliver:
“What is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”
Am I content to live a small, limited life? What’s tugging at my heart right now? How is my soul calling me to...
See All Things Anew
When is the last time you consciously looked at people, places, or situations in your daily life “anew?”
That’s the message I’ve been getting lately. “See all things anew.” Not from a different perspective, or with a different attitude. Look at everything anew.
I’ve been exploring this by asking questions.
How could I see my marriage anew? My business? My finances? My family? My body?
I’ve been asking these questions for a few weeks now and have been receiving amazing insights. By consciously looking at every aspect of my life with “new eyes” I’m seeing things I either haven’t seen or have taken for granted.
I looked at my husband anew and noticed the mischievous twinkle in his eyes. I am more aware of how kind and loving he is towards me. Had I really forgotten this? (I can easily remember every time he doesn’t act this way!) I recognize once something becomes expected, it can lose its sparkle. Time...
Do the Right Thing
I used to know exactly what the “right thing” was. In my younger years, and in most every situation, I had my opinion and felt strongly it was the “right” one.
Then I lived a few more decades and got a tad wiser. Not a Yoda by any means, but I gained the type of insight that comes from living life and through societal changes.
When I was a very young girl, the “right” thing was to send children to specific schools based on their race alone. As I grew into a teenager and young adult, I was led to believe the “right” thing was to pay women a lower wage than their male colleagues doing the same job. Well into my adulthood, the “right” thing was to only recognize legal marriage between heterosexual couples.
A lot has changed over the last sixty years and thankfully so. I’ve come to recognize that prevailing opinions shift based on societal norms, customs, spiritual practices and developments in science and technology.
So...
Love Lessons From My Surprise Hitchhiker
Life constantly provides beautiful lessons…you just need to pay attention. That’s what happened for me just a few days ago.
On the way to my weekly visit with my four-year-old grandson, Emory, I had noticed a slight tug as I sat down in the driver’s seat of my car. I realized I’d stepped through a spider web as I opened my door.
“Sorry, buddy!” I said out loud as I started the car and drove away.
Driving happily along a busy two-lane road at 55mph, out of the corner of my eye, I noticed something moving outside my left window. I glanced quickly to see a large brown spider with yellow striped legs clinging to what was left of his web, connected to my side mirror and vigorously flapping in the wind beside me.
I screamed.
And instantly felt ridiculous.
Here was this tiny spider, tiny compared to me, outside my closed window struggling to stay connected to a thread in what must have felt like hurricane winds. What was I afraid of?
And yet my first...
Chaos as an Invitation to Love
So I bet you’d rather NOT get an invitation from “chaos,” even if it is to remember love.
But it happens. And it’s happening now.
While 2021 feels different than the chaos of 2020, there’s no doubt we’re all still facing much uncertainty. At home. At work. And in the world.
We’ve seen the recent global upheaval challenge institutions, tear open social wounds and force businesses to rethink the way they do everything. And it’s done something else.
Chaos brings with it an invitation to remember that which never changes.
The spiritual truth of universal love, compassion, kindness and recognizing oneness can anchor us to feelings of peace within, even when the winds of change are howling. That truth is felt deep inside when we allow the Divine wisdom of our own heart to comfort and guide us to love.
How can we do that? By remembering universal spiritual principles that lead us back to the truth.
#1 Love unites, fear separates.
The outside...