Want to feel strong and confident in your decisions?
We can put on our Wonder Woman suit and protect ourselves from the part of us that plays the villainess in our mind – the part who tries to take us down when we aren’t looking. Too often, the lack of deep love in our lives comes from a lack of self-love and self-compassion. We can be incredibly hard on ourselves.
And when we start going into the underworld those meanies in our mind get really loud: “I’m not good enough, I’m worthless.” “I’m not interesting enough.” “I’m too old – who would want me?” And, we may set ourselves up with goalposts almost impossible to achieve. Millions of people suffer from insecurity, anxiety, and depression, and much of this is due to self-judgment, to beating ourselves up when we feel we aren’t measuring up.
To me, a heroine is a woman who is brave enough to love herself completely. Because, the truth is, only you hold the power to transform your life—to drive out the pockets of darkness, moments of insecurities, doubts, or fears that may be holding you back from living joyfully and authentically. And, everyone deserves to live a life filled with love and loving connections.
How can we intentionally create and experience more love?
Although many of us look for love on the outside, the path to love really begins inside. This quote by Lucille Ball is a longtime favorite of mine: “Love yourself first and everything else falls into line. You really have to love yourself to get anything done in this world.”
So what’s the answer?
When you feel safe with yourself—knowing you can set protective boundaries that honor you – you’ll start to show up like Wonder Woman – full of strength and confidence and a loving heart. Others will be drawn to you with an open heart. The darkness in your life will have been replaced by the light of Truth—old patterns of thinking, beliefs, or habits that may be distracting you from a sparkling life will be gone – poof!
At the end of the movie, Wonder Woman talks about how it’s not what you deserve—good or bad—but it’s about what you believe in, and she believes in love. In that moment, the light of love—her faith—literally obliterates the darkness.
Stop judging and evaluating ourselves altogether. Stop trying to label ourselves as “good” or “bad” and simply accept ourselves with an open heart. Treat ourselves with the same kindness, caring, love and compassion we would show to a good friend. Love yourself to overcome those dark spots, fears, doubts, worries, so that you can have a strength like Wonder Woman. When you believe in love anything is possible.
Likewise, you will attract people who will treat you with love and respect because you will not stand for anything less.
Love is one of those things that it’s so expansive and infinite in nature; we will never have “too much” of it. We can only acquire more. Which is kind of the whole point, isn’t it? Here’s to healing and receiving all of life’s blessings and love!
Self-love assessment
Listen to the video above and answer the 4 questions asked to assess how well you are loving yourself:))
Here’s a bonus action step to create more self-love – MIRROR WORK–this is very powerful and a great way to build self-love from the inside out.
Look in the mirror and say:
I love you.
I’m proud of you.
You are special to me.
I am here for you.
Do this in the morning and at night PLUS the action steps from the video and you will soon increase your confidence, self-love and become your sparkling best Self! All essential for creating love in every aspect of your life.
Do these sabotaging emotions steal your love?
How often do you do something for or with others because it just doesn’t feel right to focus on yourself? Do you ever feel ashamed because there are times you just don’t want to do one more thing for anybody else? Are you trapped in a cycle of doing, doing, doing for everyone but yourself?
In the spirit of Independence Day, let’s take a look at three emotional thieves that steal our mental freedom and block our love of Self. They wreak havoc with our serenity, self-worth, and keep us from living full, authentic, and sparkling lives:
- Guilt
- Selfishness
- Shame
Many women wrestle with these three feelings and their associated limiting beliefs.
How would you like to be liberated from the behavior you’ve been trained in to always put others’ needs before your own?
Guilt –
Do you feel a wave of guilt when you decide to take time for you or set limits around your availability or what you’re willing to do for others?
If you are like most women, you might feel guilty for taking time to replenish your own reservoir of life-giving energy.
As counter intuitive as it may seem, the most loving thing you can do for the people you care about is to take care of yourself first. If you intend to continue giving your time and attention to loved ones, then you must be kind and loving to yourself first.
Ask yourself, “Who would I be without guilt?” Dig deep to see if you can get to the root of what holds you to these feelings of guilt because without guilt you can be a new woman—sparkling, replenished, refreshed, and ready to cheerfully give fully to others.
So right now, right here, write down at least 1-3 things you can do to nurture you – and then do one of them!
Selfishness –
Do you label yourself as “selfish” when you want to do something for yourself or even by yourself?
Sometimes others take advantage of your desire to serve. They can call at all hours of the day and night and expect you to be available at a moment’s notice, especially when they’re experiencing a crisis. When you get courageous enough, you may set boundaries around your availability. As soon as you do, an alarming voice might resound in your head, screaming at you about how selfish you are being. That distorted belief of what it means to be selfish kicks in and challenges you to wonder how you could ever think you were so special to deserve to put yourself first. Along with beliefs of selfishness come other judgmental and critical thoughts that take you down that bottomless rabbit hole.
To overcome these toxic thoughts ask yourself what you get for buying into the belief that you are selfish. Then set a healthy boundary and stand strong. Decide to reframe the time you spend on yourself as being centered in self so that you can be of greater service to others. The truth is we need self-care to really glitter and glow. Just like a diamond, our beautiful, brilliant, multi-faceted radiance cannot shine if we don’t take some time to polish and buffJ)
Shame –
The dance of blame and shame holds you back. You feel ashamed for thinking you were so special or significant as to put yourself above another. Shame keeps you from taking care of yourself adequately.
Instead of feeling shame, honor your own value.
For instance, if you decide to nurture yourself by going for a run and a friend calls to vent, either let the call go to voicemail or answer the call and let her know you’ll call her back. When you permit others’ needs to take precedence over your own, you are not valuing yourself. It’s imperative that you make yourself the priority.
Feel the weight lifting off your shoulders as you permit yourself to nurture your own needs. Imagine yourself floating as light as a feather and take a deep breath. If all else fails, regardless your religious affiliation, perhaps you can find comfort in the Serenity Prayer:
God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, Courage to change the things I can, And wisdom to know the difference.
Recently, I spoke with leadership expert, John Boggs, about reclaiming control of your life. If you missed the interview I encourage you to click here in order to discover the most common culprits that block self-leadership and how to overcome them.
When you are out of balance, the quality of your giving will be less than adequate. So take a break and take care of you. It will help reduce your own stress, keep you in good health, and allow you to be even more nurturing to others. Then, what others will get is the best version of you: the sparkling diamond that is YOU.
(Interview) How to take control of your life
Do you ever feel like your life is spinning out of control with relationship challenges, career demands and the pressure of being a “good” parent/wife/daughter/sister/friend? Does it seem like you are always behind the 8 ball without enough time to take care of everything on your plate?
If you have a burning desire for things to change in your life you’re going to love this interview with my award-winning brilliant business mentor, John Boggs. In this conversation he gives us his wise life-changing success tips for leading yourself to a calm, balanced, empowered and happy life. Oh, and this isn’t only about being a leader in business it’s about being the leader of YOU.
Because he has helped me sift through “life” many a time – teaching me how to focus and prioritize with simple solutions I wanted to share him with you. He is a true master of self-leadership!
In this interview you will learn:
- A daily practice to build self-confidence and set yourself up for success.
- A step-by-step process to get out of toxic emotional states
- The most common culprits that block self-leadership and how to overcome them
- #1 secret to moving in the direction of creating a life you love
- How to measure if you’re leading yourself well
Take the time to listen to this interview – not only is John warm and authentic, he will inspire you to believe in a possibility of a better way of life PLUS give you the success tips and strategies to do it!
Happy listening!
Are you ready to rock a bikini?
It’s summer and you know what that means – bikini time! Whether it’s a poolside bbq, beach party with the kids and friends or water vacation you’re probably going to be slipping into some sort of swim suit even if you’re not into baring your belly.
So how are you feeling about that? Comfortable? Or are you body bashful?
If you’re anything like most of the women out there, the thought of parading around with less coverage can bring up some anxious thoughts.
Staying body-positive throughout the summer months can sometimes prove challenging for even the most confident woman. Women of all shapes and sizes have struggled with insecurities. Whether you choose to wear a bikini or not, feeling body-positive at every age and shape is beautiful. For example my client Peggy, aged 59, recently announced: “I wore a bikini on my vacation and rocked it!” She would never have said this a year ago – but with all the inner self-love work we’ve been doing she’s now fully confident and in love with her body. The same is possible for you!
3 tips to stay connected to Love
* When I have a man in my life that loves and adores me and makes me feel special (whether you’re in a relationship or single) …THEN I’ll be happy.
* When I have enough money saved to make me feel secure…THEN I’ll be happy.
* When I drop that 10 extra pounds I’ve been carrying for the past 5 years…THEN I’ll be happy.
And sometimes “when” arrives and sometimes it doesn’t. In the meantime our lives are slipping thru our fingers like the sands of time. Yikes!
What “when’s” do you have in your life? Think about it for a minute and write them down.
Are you tying your happiness to a condition?
Don’t feel bad if the answer is yes, most of us do! Myself included.
When I was younger, from the time I was 15-28, my weight was a huge struggle. I was forever trying to say sayonara to an extra 25-40 pounds (and trust me on a 5’3” small boned frame, that was significant!). I dreamed of stepping on a scale, peering down and seeing the dial stop at 110 lbs.…ahhh THEN I would be happy, thrilled…ecstatic!!!
Suffice it to say I went on countless diets to get me there including a week of eating nothing but German chocolate cake (did I mention they were mostly unhealthy? Geeeez!). Every morning when I woke up I would run to the bathroom, step on the scale and if that reflecting number wasn’t inching it’s way down toward my goal weight I would instantly slump into a bad mood. In a split second I would go from anticipation to anger and frustration letting the number on the scale affect my whole day.
I was totally postponing my happiness; making it conditional. I wanted out of that vortex but I didn’t know what to do to end the mindset that was creating the disconnect to happiness.
Until one day I discovered the secret. I understood how to bypass the condition and stay in that joyful, happy state no matter what!
There are 3 ways you can step out of condition-based happiness:
- Let go of any attachment to the outcome. This applies to every area of your life. Do your best without any strings attached. When we allow things to flow we stay in a higher more expansive energy – we are able to stay in a state of joy. So in my case, adapting a way of eating that took the focus off weight loss and put it on feeling nourished and healthy brought great happiness. Ironically the weight came off because I stopped obsessing about food and ate only when I was hungry.
- Let go of trying to change someone or a situation. We can never change someone else – in fact the more we try the more likely we are to run up against walls and feel frustrated. However, we do have the ability to change who we are being. This comes from within – it’s a choice, a decision. You can declare – “I can change how I’m going to be today. This day I will be the BEST version of me.” Step into this and watch your happiness level soar!
- Stay connected to God/Universe/The Divine. When things don’t go the way we want or expect we can feel defeated, deflated and discouraged. You will know this is happening because you will feel contracted or shrunken inside. From this state happiness is far, far away. Instead all you have to do is connect with God, feel His Love and you will instantly feel a beautiful peace sweep thru your body. Do this and you will stay in a higher vibration.
Next time you start to entertain the belief that you can only be happy when __________ (fill in that blank) happens whip out your 3 secret weapons: no attachment to the outcome, know you can change who you’re being, stay connected to God. Embrace these success tips and you will live with greater happiness and joy! You can do it!!
Is this missing in your relationship?
When was the last time you experienced romance in your relationship? If you and your man are like the majority of couples, you’re experiencing a romantic rut. Let’s face it, doing the same things over and over again can become a bit boring. The same old routine can leave you feeling like there’s something missing. And truth be told, there is something missing—your creative passionate expression!
There are so many different facets to who you are as a sensual woman, once you discover and unleash them into your life and relationship you will feel energized, empowered, ultra- feminine and happier.
How do I bring back the spark? Click here to find out how…
How to protect yourself from bad juju
Would you like to learn how to protect yourself from the negative people in your world?
Because let’s face it, we all know someone who’s gloom and doom, or thrives on drama, is a chronic complainer or gossips behind your back and if we’re not careful we can get sucked into the undertow.
This can be especially challenging if it’s a loved one, parent, sibling, good friend or co-worker.
I have a client who shared she is struggling with this right now. Every conversation she has with her soon to be ex is laced with venom. After each interaction she feels herself falling down into the rabbit hole and has a hard time getting out. She gets stuck in all the nasty negativity letting it affect her work, happiness, parenting abilities and overall quality of life.
Wouldn’t you like to be Teflon to whatever is going on in your surrounding circumstances? To stay centered and happy – letting others have their experience and not letting their experience have you?
It is possible.
Eleanor Roosevelt said, “All the water in the world can’t drown you unless it gets inside.”
That’s where the bubble comes in.
My best friend and I have been using this technique for 20 years and we love it! Not only is it a fun way to deflect bad juju, it turns it into love AND it works!!!
How to create the bubble:
It’s a very simple process. All you have to do is imagine a bubble forming around you, encasing your entire body. Assign a color and thickness to it – I like to use blue with a thickness of 4”. Many people use white and I invite you to choose a color and thickness that makes you feel safe.
Once you have it in place say, “This bubble is permeable ONLY to that which is in my highest good. Everything else bounces off and goes back to love.”
That said there are times not so great things slip in so that we can grow and evolve. Be confident in the knowing that whatever gets in is for our highest good.
Our true nature is LOVE so it’s possible if something negative comes into your bubble it’s stirring up something that’s unlike love – something that needs healing so that you can be more in alignment with love.
If you would like to set yourself up for protection all day you can put this on in the morning, or if it’s situational, it only takes a moment to create.
Voila – now, if you find yourself in the presence of someone who is spewing some ugly energy you can let them be in that space and you don’t have to be in it with them – you can stay in your bubble of safety and love :)!
6 Ways to Honor YOU
Mother’s Day is still a little rough, even though my mom’s been gone for five years now I still think of her every day. But this is an extra special time to cherish and honor her memory. So I picked out some flowers I thought she would like – red being her favorite color I chose a beautiful ruby orchid plant…and a single red rose. As I laid them on the grave-site I was flooded with beautiful warm memories of all the loving things she did for me.
How to release the past
Are you blaming yourself and feeling like a failure for relationships that have gone awry? Here is the answer you have been looking for.
If your Ex or partner behaved badly, or broke your heart you may not want to let go of the “he did me wrong” song and hey I know it hurts to be deceived and rejected but it hurts more to hang onto it. I bet you anything that you got so involved with him and his life that you have taken all the focus off your wonderful self. You are beautiful and amazing and deserve a love-filled life!
It is time for YOU!
Here is a short Self-Respect quiz to check it out:
- When is the last time you congratulated yourself for something you did or do you always see what you didn’t get done?
- Do you notice when you are tired and stop to nurture yourself or are you driven to manic activity with no rest?
- Are you an over achiever pushing yourself constantly and never feeling good enough?
- Do you compare yourself to others and see yourself as less than they are?
- Are you stuck blaming him for your low self-esteem?
In other words, do you respect, love and totally accept yourself?
If you don’t treat yourself well, no one else will either. You teach others how to respect you by how you respect yourself.
You will find clues in life patterns that started in childhood.
How did your parents treat each other – were they respectful? If judging and blaming was the norm, chances are you suffered from emotional and verbal abuse, not because your parents meant to harm you but because they were blind to how their actions were impacting you.
If the only time you got positive attention was when you accomplished something, you can bet you confused those accolades for LOVE.
Women who battle performance addiction and are insatiable people pleasers are my favorite clients! Once you know how to unleash your God-given spark…what you were put here to express, there is no holding you back!
Even though as a child, you didn’t have the ability to sort out fact from fiction and believed everything your parents and authority figures told you, once you find your sparkle, your truth, you will finally see that their beliefs were based on THEIR experiences and had nothing to do with you at all.
The truth is, they meant no harm—they were just repeating the patterns they grew up with. The big difference is that you are reading articles like this. You WANT to change your patterns. You WANT to find LOVE and SELF RESPECT.
What you must get is that your current view of yourself is not who you are. The reality is you were born perfect. A shimmering diamond of light vibrates at the core of your being. This is your true identity – your Diamond Power.
This unique essence, your truth, is so incredibly SPECIAL and VALUABLE that when you start to claim it, you feel the Real Love you were born to experience. And that is the ultimate freedom.
Here is a short exercise to help you take steps right now to find that Inner Sparkle that will set you free to find the Love you deserve:
Sit in a comfortable chair and take in several deep breaths. Allow your body to relax and sink into the chair. Imagine a beam of pure, sparkling Divine white light coming down from the heavens and shining on you like a spotlight on a dark stage.
See the darkness around you and feel the warmth and comfort of this pure light. Now let the light enter in to the top of your head illuminating you from within. Imagine this light dropping to the core of your Being, see your heart light up just like a Tiffany diamond showcased under the brightest of lights.
Like a lotus flower of light, notice how the facets of this gem open into new waves of sparkling electricity with every breath. Repeat this simple phrase 7 times. “I am open to the magnificence that is me.” Each time you connect to this energy, you will feel a deeper connection. Once you turn your attention inward and seek your Divine Diamond Spark, the past will be the farthest thing from your mind and heart 🙂
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