I crashed after the wedding

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Jun
23

I have to admit I am a recovering “RUSHAHOLIC, BUSYAHOLIC AND DOAHOLIC.” I have to be honest and admit I had a RELAPSE. I felt irritable, restless, tired and nothing seemed to satisfy me. I had lost my peace and didn’t know how, why or what to do about it, at first.

These are old behaviors that no longer serve me or make me feel good about myself. For much of my life, when I was doing, achieving, pleasing others and trying to make things happen in my life, I felt a sense of control and power. Today, I know these behaviors will make me sick. When I had a to-do list and crossed things off, I felt worthy of love. I enjoyed being busy because I felt like I was valuable when I was achieving and accomplishing so much. Have you ever felt like this?

Some of the signs of a DOAHOLIC are that you fill your calendar with things to do and tasks to complete. Your “free time” must be used effectively or you feel guilty or selfish. You are unable to RELAX and do nothing. With any addiction, it is because we try to avoid our feelings rather than go within and deal with them. I stayed busy because I didn’t want to feel the pain inside of me such as unworthiness, inadequacy, fear, shame and not being good enough.

I know today that these behaviors are ego-generated and fear based and not the truth of who I am or what God wants for me in my life. You may not be a DOAHOLIC, BUSYAHOLIC OR RUSHAHOLIC. You may suffer from being a FOODAHOLIC, WORKAHOLIC, ALCOHOLIC, GAMBLAHOLIC, or SHOPAHOLIC. The list is endless.

Unfortunately, this “pattern of energy” of always having to do more, look good and be more left me exhausted and unfulfilled because I never felt like I was doing enough. Can you relate?

My life is different today. Instead of pushing, achieving and making things happen, I am learning to allow and surrender to the Love within me to guide me. I am practicing “living in the moment” and letting go of worry and fear. I know that Love is all there is and everything else is just a dream. Today I proclaim to be a “PEACEAHOLIC.”

Peace is very important to me and my daily prayer and intention is to be peaceful, to love and to serve. I don’t like it when I lose my peace and I am restless or irritable, especially with Larry. I want to fix it and change it and I have a difficult time “accepting what is.”

As I said, I had a relapse to old behaviors of BUSYNESS AND DOING. I prayed and asked God for help. Here is what happened this week:

I felt tired, restless and irritable and couldn’t figure out why. I felt some guilt and shame because I thought I SHOULD be blissful and happy because we were just married and my dream had come true. At first, I felt embarrassed and didn’t want to admit it or talk about it.

I decided to Google “after wedding crash.” Sure enough, there were many articles to read and this was very REAL After the high and excitement of the wedding, all of the energy put out with planning, decision making and the attention I received, of course, there would be a crash and a feeling of “Now what.” I missed the DOING and excitement of the high! It felt just like the addict who puts the needle in his arm to get a high. I then realized I was in withdrawal.

The first step for me was asking for help from Spirit. The second step was admitting that I had relapsed to old behaviors and that I had these feelings. The third step was to be honest and share them with Larry. Of course, Larry was so loving, understanding and compassionate. He encouraged me to rest and relax and not do anything to push myself. I listened and spent the day resting, relaxing and loving myself. It is amazing how quickly I moved through it and am back to the truth of who I am as a Divine being. I am valuable and lovable and don’t need to prove myself or achieve anything to be loved.

It is easy to relapse to old behaviors or addictions, whether it be to food, doing, alcohol or shopping. The important thing is to not beat up on ourselves and stay there. We need to be loving, compassionate and forgiving toward ourselves.

I had lost my peace and recognized something was off and I didn’t feel in my center. I want balance and peace in my life. Because I am vigilant and “go within” for my answers in daily prayer and meditation, this only lasted for a couple of days. I am grateful to Spirit for the love in my life and the vessel of love I am being called to be in the world.

I needed Divine Intervention because I was very angry

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Oct
17

When Larry came to my door tonight he said, “I think you have a problem with your water pipe.” I came out and followed him down the long driveway to the road. I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw the water gushing out of the pipe into the air and running down the road. I had no idea how long it had been going on or what to do about it. Larry ran to his car to get a tool and tried to stop it, but to no avail.

Then I remembered! I had the plumber’s telephone number in my phone because he had just called me a couple of hours earlier concerning my kitchen faucet that was leaking.

I immediately called the plumber and was so happy that I didn’t get his answering machine. I desperately explained the problem to him. He said, “I will be there in 5 minutes.” I had no idea that he lived one street away and I don’t think it was 5 minutes before his truck pulled up. He took one look at the water gushing out of the pipe and said, “We have a big problem here.” I could have told him that. He called the owner on the mainland to inform him of the problem and to get his permission to fix it.

He was then able to shut off the main water valve and the gushing water stopped. Luckily he had a replacement fitting to replace the one that had cracked. The next thing I knew it was fixed and we thanked him for coming over so quickly.

Larry and I just looked at each other stunned how easily and effortlessly it was fixed. We kept thanking God for the synchronicity and timing of everything. If Larry hadn’t come over at that time, I wouldn’t have known that the pipe was gushing out hundreds of gallons of water. If I hadn’t called the landlord a couple of days ago, the plumber would not have come over today to look at the kitchen faucet. If he hadn’t called me today, I wouldn’t have had his telephone number in my phone.

God is interested in the details of our lives. I experience miracles all the time which makes me know that I am not alone and am taken care of. It was ironic because this gushing water in the pipe had nothing to do with my faucet in the sink. God knew that I would need a plumber for this emergency.

On a more personal note, I’d like to share my spiritual lesson for the week. I am learning to take myself lightly and laugh at myself. Many years ago I learned the importance of saying no, especially to my children. Of course, they didn’t like it because they liked me being a people pleaser and getting what they wanted. I know that was the best thing I could have done for myself and for them because I taught them how important it was to love themselves and say no-without feeling guilty.

Over the last few years I’ve been sharing with Larry the importance of loving himself first and not being a people pleaser. He has also witnessed how I love myself. Wow, it came back to bite me in the butt. I didn’t like it when he actually put himself first when it had to do with me. I was surprised, shocked, hurt and angry when he clearly and kindly said what he was going to do, which was not what I wanted him to do. I shared my feelings with him and really saw my “childish behavior” in action. I sulked and was quiet for a while. I then prayed because I knew I needed divine intervention because of how angry I felt. He said to me, “This is our first disagreement.” I barked at him and said, “No, this is a fight.” Then backed down and said, “Ok it’s a disagreement.”

We had lunch and I was able to explain to him how I perceived his actions and why it felt so hurtful. He listened and explained his reasons for doing what he needed to do for himself. By then, I was starting to soften and was able to smile. Even though I was beginning to calm down, I found myself dropping some snide remarks as we walked around Costco.

I am so grateful for the power of prayer that helped me move forward so quickly. I was then inspired with a plan that both of our needs were met. We both agreed to the new plan and I was able to laugh at myself for my childish behavior. I didn’t realize what a good teacher I had become and how well Larry learned the lesson of loving himself first.

The next day Larry shared with me that whenever he thought about our little disagreement , he burst out laughing because he saw the humor in my “little girl” behavior. I am grateful that he was so patient and didn’t escalate the situation.

I am grateful for the opportunities to grow and change and laugh at myself. It would have been so easy to beat up on myself and obsess about it, but instead I was able to love and forgive myself.

There was a hole in my soul that was insatiable

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Dec
12

As the captain of the cheerleading squad in high school, I knew how to “cheer on” my team and I loved it. I also learned how to “cheer on” all of my friends. Many of my friends sought me out to talk to me about their problems because they knew I cared and would listen to them.  I seemed to naturally have the answers and counseled them (without formal training) with their problems.  To be honest, I liked how it felt to be “sought out” and have the answers for others. It was a boost to my self-esteem and made me feel good about myself.  But, if I had a problem, I felt ashamed and embarrassed to ask for help because that seemed to be a sign of weakness. So I learned to “pretend” that everything was fine.

As I think about this today, I ask myself some questions, “But what about me?  Who had the answers for my life? How did I give my power away?” I didn’t learn to “cheer myself on” but looked to others to define me, to tell me what to do, how to be and how to feel. I looked to others to tell me that I was good enough, smart enough and deserving of love. Sound familiar to anyone?

Unfortunately, I didn’t have the slightest idea about how to “cheer myself on” or love myself.  In looking back, I realize I was my worst enemy.  On the outside, I looked good and together, (whatever that looked like), but on the inside, I felt very different. I never felt “good enough” and compared myself to others. I beat up on myself constantly and was always pushing and striving to do more, to be more and to please others. That was my addiction.  I looked outside myself for love and validation. There was a hole in my soul that was insatiable and I thought others could fill it by being nice.

I didn’t know that I was “supposed” to love myself. Nobody ever taught me how to do that. I didn’t know about self-care and self-love. I thought it was selfish to think about myself and felt guilty if I dared to put my needs first. I had no idea what boundaries meant.  I was told I was “conceited” at an early age. I am sure that I didn’t know what that even meant, other than – don’t feel good about yourself, don’t talk about yourself or your gifts.”  So being a good little girl, that is exactly what I did.

Yikes, it is hard to believe how far I have come and how I have been transformed. The truth shall set you free and I have been set free.  I am so grateful to God and to all the people who have loved me and helped me along the way – to learn to love myself, honor, validate and celebrate who I am. Learning to love myself has been a life-long process and will continue until I leave this earth.

What I have learned on my spiritual journey is that there is nothing wrong with you or me, we are God’s perfect expression in this world and we are made in Gods’ image and likeness.  The process is about remembering who we are. That doesn’t mean that we don’t need to change because life is about change,  and we are constantly evolving and growing into the person God intended us to be.

Spiritual progress is like going through a detox.  Things have to come up in order to be released. Once we have asked to be healed, then our unhealed places are forced to the surface.  Our blocks to love are not suppressed or denied, but rather brought into our conscious awareness. Our fearful places have to be revealed before they can be healed. Our ego is merely our fears. We all have egos and that doesn’t make us bad people. Our egos are not where we are bad, but where we are wounded.

We are all afraid at some level that if people saw who we really are, they would recoil in horror. That is why we invent the mask, to hide our true selves. But the true self, the Christ within us, is that which is most beautiful. We must reveal ourselves at the deepest level in order to find how loveable we really are. When we dig deep enough into our real nature, we don’t find darkness. We find endless light. Isn’t that good news? I have come to a place where it is safe to be myself, knowing that my darkness will not be judged, but forgiven. I am healed and freed to move into the light of my true being.

This process of no longer being anesthetized by unconsciousness can be painful and we may be tempted to go backwards. It takes courage to endure the sharp pains of self-discovery rather than to choose to take the dull pain of unconsciousness that could last the rest of our lives. When we feel jealous, it is because of the need to hold on to whatever we’ve got. It is because we think another person’s good takes away from my own. The ego is a belief in finite resources, but love is infinite. When we are in touch with our negative feelings and are able to release them, we feel the love that is beneath the feelings.

My journey is your journey because we are all ONE. That cheerleader that once cheered for others is now cheering for herself and she is doing an awesome job. I have learned to be my own best friend and it feels so good. I have learned to love myself and give myself what I need because IT IS MY OWN LOVE THAT I WANT. How many of us have spent years looking outside of ourselves for love?

Today, I cherish, honor and celebrate me and my successes.  I strive to have my insides match my outsides. I have learned to be authentic and true to myself.  I ask for help when I need to and am learning to receive all the Universe wants to give me.

Like many of you, I learned that giving is more valuable than receiving. That is a belief that I have let go of because it is not true for me anymore.  It has been my personal experience and the experience of those I have coached over the years that receiving is what we need to learn. The Universe wants to give to us, but we often block our good because we feel undeserving. I invite you to ask yourself some important questions.

Do I want to experience abundance in all areas of my life?

Do I want to let go of beliefs (conscious and unconscious) that no longer are true for me?

Do I want to learn how I am blocking my good so I can receive all that God wants to give me?

Do I want to learn how to be my own cheerleader and love myself?

If you have answered yes to these questions and you want to change and learn how to love yourself more fully, I invite all of my “East Coast Goddesses” to the retreat on January 4, 2014 called “Falling in love with the Goddess Within.” There are a few seats left, so if you are interested, please email ASAP.

“You can have it all. The Universe is capable of answering your every prayer. To receive your blessings, you must be willing to invest in them. Your most powerful investment is yourself. You have access to infinite resources, and many gifts are being laid at your doorstep. Bring your dreams to life by being true to them.” Alan Cohen, Wisdom of the Heart, 2002