Know ThySelf

Perfect: {pur'fikt} adj.

Lacking nothing essential to the whole; giving your best. Flawless; admirable. Just right.

And yet...

I am just landing from a turbulent inner flight. As I visited various states of numb and pondered the hypocrisy of me, "the coach"out of her game, when she is benched.

How hilarious this ego of mine is. As if the expectation of being a life coach were that I would never falter, fall flat on my face, call up my coach for a private crisis session (thank you Patti!).

Here is the victory of temporary "defeat":

I GET TO USE THE TOOLS! All these amazing tools I have accumulated over the years. I forget that they aren't only for sharing with others, duh- they work for ME as well! This is when it gets rich, where my foundations get checked!

Each trip down to Hades is new and old at the same time. First off, I now realize I'm down there a lot sooner! There are signs that allow me to know mySelf and my inner whereabouts.

Here are some of my tell tale signs:

1) I notice mySelf drifting off into fantasy land. Instead of using my imagination to create my future, to enrich my latest projects, to hone my life vision, I check out completely. In fact I pretend I am someone else entirely. I call it "Quantum Leaping" remember the show? Each week he'd leap into someone else's life and become them? It's sort of like that. Someone walks by and before I know it, I have designed and furnished their life, complete with car, lover(s), career, you name it. There was a time when I would literally be lost in this daze (mind maze) for up to a week at a time. Only interacting on the surface with my actual reality, then slipping back into the cozy death trap of what will never be. The life energy wasted here is tragic. Now I notice it immediately, but it's got a drug like seduction to it, and whether or not I choose to dip my toes into it or not....

2) I no longer taste my food. The flavors dull and I notice a craving for very spicy food spikes.

3) I feel NUMB in my physical body. I notice some pain, but pleasure hardly registers.

4) I do not feel love for my peeps. My conversation is light and flaky, distracted, and hollow.

5) I FORGET to meditate. I will go for months having been devoted to my daily practice and then suddenly, I just forget it even exists. Like amnesia.

6) I lose compassion. This translates into intolerance, impatience, and taking things personal which leads me to the next clue...

7) My feelings get hurt easily.

Knowing these tell tale signs is incredibly helpful. When I wake up to the trance I've fallen into I can take immediate action. Noticing is action. Being is action. Upgrading my internal conversation is action....

My mind tells a story that goes something like this:

I have fallen from glory, it's too late, don't bother. Peace is light years away. How many times do we have to go thru this same BS? am I really worthy? blahblahblah

I am now familiar with this lie. I can nod at it, and remember:

1) to grab my journal, curl up get cozy (on the couch with my favorite down comforter) and write my heart out, be furious, ridiculous, pathetic, nonsensical, whatever let it flow.

2) Light a candle, just sit and be.

3) CRY! Cry hard and loud, soft and muffled, get snotty and ugly, dramatic is ok too.

4) Take a bath

5) Move my body! Run, walk, dance, jump, stretch, SENSE my body.

Any and all of these things work. Some better than others depending on the day. I have several starting points, recovery touch stones!

When I've journeyed back home and feel safe secure, connected again. I am always grateful for the underworld, my shadow, and it's teachings, the empathy carved out, the fresh raw gratitude for an intentional life.

I am renewed, empowered, enlivened, delivered, in LOVE, present...I am!

What's your story Morning Glory?

If it's all a story, why not make up something phenomenal?

History, Herstory....

It was Brooke Medicine Eagle who first challenged my story.

"Tell me about your childhood."

What follows that invitation is usually a neatly compiled memoir of one dysfunctional event, followed by many more. We groom our victim stories, fondling and cradling them until they have grown so large in our minds they overshadow and drown out the happy times in between.

It's so handy to have all those excuses for playing small, for not forgiving.

Brooke's challenge blew my story wide open. It washed away the excuses, and made my grudges seem as ridiculous as they actually were.

I was instructed to find and record my earliest happy memory. To see that memory as a bead and begin to string a necklace of happy child moments one after the other as they came back to me. At first it was rusty awkward work. I was accustomed to those well lubricated larger than life poor me dramas. They bubbled up to the surface several times a day.

What we give attention to grows. Keeping at it, more and more of these other memories showed up. Creased and faded they poked their heads through the crust of my old victim story. I found myself grinning fondly, chuckling, even blinking back tears of gratitude.

In just a few months my entire life story had been retold. I was brimming with gifts and lessons from my unique childhood. As I traveled from then to now I had been recreated.

Thank you Brooke!

Last night on my Women's Circle call we stopped to notice the stories we are currently telling ourselves. It was a great reminder. Today I did some editing and made my story about a beautiful, talented, intelligent, funny me who loves my life!

What's your story?

This Is Not My Beautiful Life!

It was in the space between waking and dream, tangled and tripping on the thin veils that define the two realities, when I stubbed my toe on an old rotting stump of a memory.

It was cold tile slick with my snot and tears, I was gagging on the mediocrity of my life. "How did this happen to me?" Even more disturbing was the lack any real proof or permission to feel this way.

I had a successful and thriving business, a healthy child, a relationship free of infidelity, physical abuse, etc. I chose to work 3 days a week. I had a loving supportive family to watch my son. My Yoga practice was consistent and strong. I had plenty of time to cook, paint, write, hike...

Why had this life become too small, so intolerable? What was this growing resistance inside of me? Why was I insistent on more?

That day I screamed it out loud to my shower curtain, to the gods of plenty, (and apparently to a neighbor who came over later to check on me) "THIS IS NOT MY BEAUTIFUL LIFE! I WANT AN EXTRAORDINARY LIFE! NO MORE MEDIOCRITY, ENOUGH!!! I WILL DO WHATEVER IT TAKES TO REALLY LIVE MY LIFE!" over and over and over again.

(The next day in Yoga class my left hip was magically opened. The hip that I had all but given up on. That's another story for another time.)

8 years later, this morning, I leapt out of bed... The awareness of that declaration made manifest. I was thrust into this truth: I am doing it. I have been slowly but surely creating, cultivating, growing, nurturing my beautiful life. It is extraordinary. I have released what no longer served me, upgraded from mediocrity, I surrendered and birthed a whole other me, that was asking to be born.

My days are rich with deep connection. I am in meaningful service and PLAY! I have amazing communities of sisters, dancers, coaches, artists, and mentors! I get to dance almost everyday! I love my body, finally! I am surrounded by family and friends who love me, and I love them!

How did I get to be this lucky?

Wait I'm not done...there's more!

This Thursday I am leaving to spend more than a week in Troncones, Mexico. I will be in Circle with my Vividly Woman Community! Dancing, playing, swimming and soaking in Sacred Sensual Splendor. www.vividlywoman.com

This isn't luck. It is intention, it is saying Yes to my heart's desires. I am powerful in my life.

We are powerful in our lives. I choose to be extraordinary! Did you hear that? We can choose the extraordinary!

Tell me, are you living YOUR beautiful life?

Come as you Are

Come to us however you are.
Come whole.
Come broken.
Come and gather your pieces here.

Bring your heart and mind and soul, and know that we hold space for you.

If you are stuck, sit in the center of us, and we will buoy you forward, like a lifeboat on the tide. Even if four of us are stuck, we are strong enough. Even if half of us are stuck or hurt, we are strong enough. Even if ALL but one are unable to move, that one is strong enough.

And if we were all unable to move, every one of us broken or scared or stuck, we would join arms, look upward to the Great One, and scream. We would reclaim our power, as one, and then each take it with us, back to our lives. Our ferocity.

So come if you are RADIANT. So radiant you're afraid to blind us!
And come if you are in shadows, so shadowed you're afraid to mar us.
Come. However you are, BE WITH US. Be here, in our circle.

Because we are a circle that meets and holds one another -
with golden shimmering ties of love -
that neither time nor distance can efface.

May LOVE hold us and buoy us forward, beating hearts of sisterhood. RIGHT at this moment, beating. Living. Hands held for our lifetimes.

guest blogger Mary Agnes Antonopoulos

Mary Agnes Antonopoulos, Vividly Woman Leader Sister, is a writer and social media expert and coach.

RockAwayWriter.com

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New Year's Wish

The collective sigh is reverberating across the country... The Holiday season is almost through. The stressful ones are over (unless you are hosting a New Year's Eve party, which I am not!) . I love this gelatinous week in between the 26th and the 2nd. There are still sugar and fat to be found in most homes. The work schedule is lax, or at least most of us pretend it is. Throw another log on the fire, put the kettle on for another cup of tea, or better yet how about some of that homemade Baileys? Lounging and general slothfulness is accepted. (In my house it is encouraged, unless you're a teenager, and that is the only gear you ever move in).

Then what? The mania begins for most of us. Lofty expectations of oneself begin to hail down. The clean fresh start of a New Year is already polluted with pressure. Week one's dogma is week three's apathy or despair.

I know, I do it too. Already my mind is poking my relaxing week in the ribs whispering curse words like, "cellulite - mucking out the house - paperwork" etc. "This year is going to be...blahblahblah"

I am going to remind myself again and again (It's like brushing my teeth, once isn't enough.)

Destruction happens in seconds. Creation takes time. When we decide to implement change, we want it NOW and we want lasting results. Think of any time in your life when there has been lasting change that happened immediately. I can think of the sudden death of loved ones, loss of a job, and cutting my hair off (no really, I mean ALL of it OFF!) that felt like it lasted forever.

Then I think of building businesses, relationships, or growing my hair back out. The headway that was made bit by bit day after day. Small, consistent, and less than spectacular. This is the kind of change that is actually sustainable. There is name or a method to this approach, "Kaizen".

Earlier this holiday season I noticed myself feeling lousy because I was eating more junk than my body is accustomed to. My intellect donned it's dictator mustache and declared, "That's it! Enough with the garbage gut! You are allowed nothing but water and kale, before you poison yourself and rot out your teeth."

My inner child FREAKED out, immediately seeking fudge and revenge. Thankfully a shower of sanity fell from the heavens, resulting in Kaizen: "If I eat a piece of fruit each day and 1 raw veggie, go ahead have the cookies!" whew. Amazing. The charge around the junk food was gone. I didn't even want the fudge anymore. (Yes I did have some the other day) My point being, this is manageable. I like fruit, especially with breakfast. I also enjoy snacking on carrots, celery, and peppers. For me this was so easy, I could not fail. Did I lose weight? nope. Did I gain weight? nope. Did I enjoy myself, food, drink, friends and family? YES!

As I move into the new year I will continue this practice, even when the cookies are gone. I like the habit I am creating, It feels good in my mind and body. I have not yet decided what my next Kaizen step will be this January, but I do know it's going to be easy, and I'm going to succeed!

This year I propose trying this approach. Experience a way of being softer, gentler, steady, gradual, thoughtful, and probably successful.

Pick one thing, and start there. Make it so easy you can not possibly fail.

Happy New Year!

What does Sacred mean to you?

What happened to Sacred Ceremony?

There are still remnants of the rich tapestry of Ritual and Ceremony lingering...

The wedding ceremony, baptism, bar/bat-mitzvah, graduation are some of the remaining threads of culture marking our passage through life's doorways.

Many of us have left the religions of our heritage and in doing so, we have thrown out Ceremony and Ritual.

Can it still exist without religion? What if it could be larger, inclusive, modern, ancient, serious, fun, or anything you desired it to be?

Inside the details, lives the cause to be witnessed, celebrated, and supported.

Ritual is an act of consciously opening ourselves to the presence of our own Spirit. Pressing pause on the rushed routine of life to say, "Hey wait a minute. Check this out, something is happening and this matters!"

We design rituals to bring ourSelves to a deeper place of reverence. Creating physical metaphors to signify, acknowledge, and honor the change that is underway.

Ceremony holds ourSelf, loved ones, and our Ritual, in celebration.

Western Culture is starving for the PAUSE. We are begging to be witnessed, upheld, and supported as we embark on our conscious journey of Life!

In this melting pot we are privileged by the influence of so many cultures. If we have no link to the ways of our ancestors, we can still can learn, divine, and collage our own rituals, lush with all that speaks directly to our own soul.

More Than A One Story House

I recently fell in love with the left handed no looking technique.

I drew, painted, laughed and wept. (Special Thanks to Barbara Krauss creativity Coach and artist! www.barbarakrauss.com)

As I prepare to move out of my home that I love, and open up to my next, this came out of me and I am grateful for the medium.

Here is the story, spotted inside the house:

"I have held children growing, tea kettle whistles, and turkey's roasting. I heard the snoring, sobbing, as well as the muffled moans of so much lovemaking. I have worn your bright colors, been caressed by laughter. I could not help but to fall deeply in love with all of you. You have been my family.

I will move with you, hidden in the photo albums, and forever the back drop to your child's memories. Just as you will be kept safe here. Your dance deeply impressed upon my floorboards. Your dreams and your gratitude, the sweetest residue, tucked neatly into my nooks and crannies.

I am well seasoned with love and celebration, prepared to wrap myself around the arriving hearts, dreams, and the next story.

I am more than a one story house."

Thank you for witnessing