Moms, in general, deserve a HUGE shout out of thanks for all the selfless ways you give to your families. Add COVID-19 to the mix and you ladies have become saints! I’m in awe of the way you are helping your kids navigate the current changes and bringing your families closer with creative fun activities.

With Mother’s Day tomorrow, not only are you to be honored, but we are reminded to celebrate our own mothers and all the women in our lives who are mothers.

It’s also a great time to reflect on how you love you…whether you are a mother or not, ask yourself, “Do I honor, nurture, and nourish myself?” In other words, are you a good mom to you?

Let’s face it, we all give and nurture others at one time or another. Some of us do it continually, taking care of other people in our lives, being present for them and serving them on a daily basis.

Many of us set aside our own needs and desires in order to help someone else. Sometimes it’s absolutely necessary to care for someone, especially a sick friend or aging parent. At other times, we may be called upon to support a colleague who is going through an emotional upheaval.

Although there is nothing wrong with giving our time, energy, love and attention to others – and there are times when it is absolutely essential that we do so – the danger is that we can care for others to the point of being off-balance in our own lives, losing our sparkle and Self in the process.

How does it look when we become off-balanced when we aren’t tending to our own needs? How does it feel when we haven’t focused on self-renewal or taken steps to revitalize and replenish ourselves? Well, imagine that you are a big, beautiful crystal pitcher filled with lemonade.

Surrounding you is a circle of glasses that want to be filled up. These glasses represent the people in your life – your mate, your kids, your boss, siblings, parents, friends, colleagues, etc. As you focus on filling up everyone’s glasses – filling and refilling them because everyone continues to want more – what happens?

Eventually, the pitcher gets emptied. There’s no more lemonade to pour into the glasses. The pitcher is depleted. Everyone around you still wants more of your wonderful, yummy lemonade, but if the pitcher is not being refilled and replenished, eventually there is nothing more for you to give. That’s what happens when you do not take the time for self-renewal.

Like the pitcher, you eventually have nothing left to offer. You’ve squeezed yourself dry. Yet, you continue to try to give. However, now what you are able to “serve up” becomes flat – it doesn’t taste sweet anymore.

Even though you know you are running on empty you push yourself to pour your pitcher anyway. And those who you serve are aware – often unconsciously – that what you’re providing isn’t as good as it once was. Maybe what you now offer is laced with bitterness, resentment, frustration and even anger.

So, what can you do to refill your pitcher – to renew yourself? First, it’s vital that you understand a key concept: the most important relationship you will ever have in your life is the one you have with yourself! If that relationship is not rock solid, and full of love for yourself, you can lose your way-even lose your sense of Self-and feel isolated, separate, and disconnected from everyone and everything (even if you are living in the same house!).

Alternatively, the more you nurture your relationship with yourself, the more you are ready and able to have relationships with others and give to them – whether that’s a spouse, partner, friends, or family members.

How can you renew and nurture your relationship with you? At the core must be the belief that you are valuable, that you deserve to be cared for, and that you’re worth it. So, the first step is to love yourself. You must be able to see that you are worthy of love and that the most important love you’ll ever receive is the love and acceptance you give yourself. It starts with you.

Once you acknowledge that you are important and worthy of love and self-care, you can take time to appreciate who you are and spend time refilling your pitcher. There are many ways to do this. To begin with, plan to give yourself some undivided attention. Focus on what you can do to breathe new life into your body, mind, and spirit.

Here are just a few suggestions to get you started:

1. Soak in the tub. If you love taking baths, create a tranquil ambiance – including candles and music – and soak in scented bath salts that relax and refresh all of you.

2. Get moving. For your body, exercise is another important component to include. Be sure to choose an exercise you enjoy and put it in your planner. Keep your appointment with YOU.

3. Eat well. Make healthy food choices and say ‘no’ to white flour products and refined sugar.

4. Take supplements. Research a good supplement plan and put it in place … one you can stick with.

5. Listen to your body. Listen to your body and take care of your needs. Eat when you’re hungry, sleep when you’re tired, get a massage, indulge in a mani-pedi, and kick any destructive habits/addictions you may be using to cope, like alcohol, drugs, or food abuse. Don’t be afraid to reach out for support.

6. Appreciate yourself. Don’t forget about the little somethings that put smiles on faces and do those things for you. Write yourself a love letter, send a note of gratitude to yourself, or even have flowers delivered to you at home.

Give yourself permission to show yourself some special love, attention, and appreciation. Remember: it’s okay to admit that you need to be cared for as you care for others. That said, I encourage you to be a good mom to yourself. Take time this week to acknowledge and renew your relationship with yourself.

You matter greatly,

PS: As a gift to you, I’d love to offer you a complimentary session with me! Just CLICK HERE to access the calendar and pick a time that is best for you.

Now that most of us probably know every square inch of our home thanks to quarantine times, are you looking around and noticing things that you haven’t noticed before? Like…clutter? YIKES!

Piles of junk mail, old clothes, and other items from your past strewn everywhere as well as cluttered closets!

Or maybe you noticed it before but since life was so busy it was a fleeting thought of, “I’ll get to that later when I have more time”. But now that it’s in your face 24/7 and you have lots of time why not get organized?!! There’s never been a better time!!!

On top of it, spring is here! This season is all about throwing open the windows, clearing the past, and making space for new energy, people, and opportunities.

Research shows the health of your environment is a reflection of your overall health and well-being. A 2010 study from the University of California found that mothers who described their living environments as cluttered suffered from higher cortisol levels, greater feelings of depression, and lower marital satisfaction than those women who described their homes as “restorative” and relaxed.

So, if you’ve been finding it difficult to feel balanced or be able to drop down and focus on your dreams and aspirations, de-cluttering might be the first step to getting back on track.

Why Do We Let Clutter Take Over Our Lives?

We’re all busy with career, family, and social obligations so it makes sense that from time to time, we might get behind on sorting the mail, organizing those receipts or making the bed every morning. However, for some people, clutter can become a cover-up for more deeply rooted fears and subconscious beliefs.

In addition, if you’re struggling with clutter, it can feel overwhelming, right? And that can block you from seeing possible emotional components underlying your need to hold onto things. As an example, one of my clients, Sally, had a stack of family photos that she wanted to put into albums. Despite not working and having plenty of time to take on the project she couldn’t motivate herself to get started and kept procrastinating.

In my recent post, 4 Ways to Break Bad Habits, we looked at how many of us are unconsciously committed to beliefs that restrict our growth. In the case of Sally, we discovered that she was raised with the belief that she didn’t deserve love. Well, as you can imagine, that made putting family albums together with her loving children nearly impossible for her. It was in total conflict with her underlying belief about love.

In my years of working as a coach, I’ve found that one of the most common limiting beliefs women carry is that they don’t deserve love. But I’m here to tell you that you do! In the case with Sally, after making that discovery and then healing, reframing, and installing a new supportive belief that she did deserve love, she was able to put those albums together in less than a week.

So as much as you may desire to de-clutter your space, you may be spinning in overwhelm and have a subconscious belief that’s keeping you stuck and not knowing where to begin.

You may want to spend some time thinking/reflecting on what’s got you keeping things so cluttered up OR you can simply start a new habit by heeding the following tips.

Set Yourself Free with These Easy Decluttering Tips:

So here are a few tips on how to get started right now.  Set a timer for ten minutes. This is a very powerful tool psychologically. When you look at your piles and think it’s going to take you hours to make a dent you often do nothing. Day after day of that avoidance is deadly to your psyche and can propel you into feeling bad about yourself. On the other hand, most people have 10 minutes. Once you get started, you may discover that you want to go longer than ten minutes and that’s fine, but you don’t have to. Ten minutes a day adds up to more than an hour a week! Slowly but surely, you will make progress and that will make you feel good about you! Win-win!

Work one room at a time. Create a schedule for yourself. List all the rooms that need to be de-cluttered. Choose one room and commit to working on it till it’s done. Then move on to the next room and stay with it till that’s done and so on and so forth. You will see progress more easily when you stay with one space rather than try to do a little bit in several different areas. This will increase your sense of accomplishment and pride and emotional well-being.

Start with your car. Cars become receptacles for everything from loose change to receipts to travel mugs and more. Starting with your car can be great because it’s a relatively small space and you can easily see how you’re making progress as you go. Many of us spend a great deal of time in our car – especially if living in a metropolis. Having a clean car gives a spacious feeling and allows for more creative thoughts and peace of mind – especially important for those of us living in highly trafficked cities.

Keep it positive. To avoid overwhelm, create some positive beliefs, and repeat them to yourself as you work. Saying things like, “I love the freedom I feel when my space is clean and organized,” or “I love the harmony and balance I am creating with this new spaciousness”. Saying these types of statements will lift your spirits and give you renewed energy and vibrancy – not to mention keeping you motivated!!

Take advantage of this “pause” and gift of lots of extra time and make a commitment to get yourself and your home/office clean and organized. By taking small steps towards creating a clutter-free space, you will build confidence, feel less stress, and communicate to the world that you’re ready to be your most sparkling, expansive self.

Sparkling love,

It’s been a week since we’ve connected and I’m wondering how you are doing?

Although things change daily and effect each of us differently we are all experiencing the same global shift. I’ve spoken to many people who are slumping into a depression and others who are doing well….

How are YOU?

If you are feeling down I want to share an insight I recently had that I’m hoping will lift your spirits. The other day I woke up in a low energy funky mood and decided to take a walk in the neighborhood to shift my mindset. Even though I was having my usual morning chat with God, rather than letting Spirit flow through me, I was mentally trying to force a “shake-out” of this bad juju….with no luck.

Have you ever done that? Doesn’t work so great does it?? And that is even more frustrating!!

With angst I asked, “Ok God, help me see what I need to see, know what I need to know and feel what I need to feel” and literally within seconds I was given a great gift – a wonderful insight.

Nature has always brought me powerful messages and this day was no different.
My eyes were guided to the tree’s along the road. Suddenly I saw them in a whole new light. My attention was drawn to the trunk: solid, sturdy and vertical – reaching up to the heavens, fed by the Light.

Instantly I understood the trunk to be symbolic of our inner core strength – what I call your Diamond Power ladies. We too have vertical access to this Light and when we connect with this Source, man oh man do we become sturdy in our core!

Now think about a tree’s branches – they are like our thoughts – some are strong and supportive but others are twisted and gnarled like our monkey mind thoughts that make us crazy. All we have to do is prune some of those branches back and we can do this by turning our gaze upward and connecting with Infinite Love/God and we will come back to center, our trunk, becoming strong and sturdy again at our core.

It’s amazing how simple things can be when we give ourselves permission to make our lives easy and peaceful isn’t it?

As I walked the final stretch to my house I felt exhilarated – by letting go, opening, and allowing a power far greater than me have it’s way with me, I felt fantastic, full up and rock solid in seconds. Wow!

Here’s to getting out of our way, opening to Gods Love and Light, and anchoring into strong and sturdy!!

Sparkling love,

Now perhaps more than ever as our world is experiencing a pandemic health crisis and events, schools and places are being rescheduled, canceled or closed it’s an eye-opening opportunity to see what you are committed to. Take a minute and think about it, because everyone is committed to something.

Get honest and ask yourself a hugely important question, “What am I committed to – faith or fear?”

And hey, you may be thinking, times are scary and life is a struggle and that’s not negative, it’s simply the Truth. I get it – I used to think the same way. Until I stopped and made an honest assessment of ALL the results I was experiencing. That was a wake-up call because what I realized is how you do one thing is how you do everything! As I lived in fear and struggle, more things showed up to be fearful of, more struggles popped up and it was a continuous cycle.

It became clear I wasn’t living in faith…trusting that EVERYTHING is in Divine Order, and EVERYTHING is good, even if it doesn’t appear to be in the moment. Trusting that God is up there orchestrating it all for our highest good. The moment I really got this miraculous thing started showing up in my life.

The thing is even if you think you are committed to living a big happy life – if your dreams and goals are not becoming realities there is something – a belief, a fear, an assumption, a way of thinking that you are unknowingly committed to that is blocking you from feeling safe and peaceful and manifesting what you say you desire. Literally taking you in the opposite direction of your dreams.

That’s important because you know how it is to be committed – you’re ALL in, right?

And that’s GREAT when it’s a faith-based belief that serves you, but what about those fear-based beliefs that limit you? The truth is every belief, whether supportive or sabotaging wants to be right. As a matter of fact, they inspire behaviors that create results to prove they are right. That could show up as stuckness, unfairness, being broke, things not going your way, men leaving you, cheating on you, constant chronic illness – you name it- it’s a programming that keeps you in a vicious frustrating cycle.

The key is to find out what the commitments are that are wreaking havoc on your life and reframe them – so that they can become healthy, nourishing, positive commitments that will feed your soul and produce peace and happiness.

Here’s how you break those vicious cycles:

#1 Commit to filling your mind with faith-based beliefs

#2 Pay attention to your thoughts -if you notice you always think life is hard, you are committed to things being difficult. If you routinely worry about your abilities or competency you are committed to not being enough. If you stay on the sidelines and under the radar you might be committed to being invisible.

#3 Reframe your limiting thoughts – think a new empowering thought like “life is easy,” or “I am more than capable, who I am and what I say matters,” or “it’s safe to be seen,” or “with God all things are possible,” or “I trust God is guiding me to the best outcome or greatest opportunity even if I can’t see it now.”

#4 Take action – do the opposite of what you normally do. In meetings or group situations if you normally sit on the sidelines quietly, be the first to voice your opinion. If you normally back away feeling resistant to committing to something that would help you reach your goal – commit!

#5 Make a declaration right here, right now to commit to behavior that serves your desire! If it’s scary you know you’ve hit gold – jump in! Have Faith!

#6 Commit to being good to others, kind to everyone (even if they are unkind to you), give without remembering, take without forgetting.

This is so doable! All you have to do is make the decision to commit to Faith-based beliefs that will fulfill you and expand your life and ultimately bring you more happiness and love:)).

And the good news is, it’s easy! It’s just as easy to commit to a good thought/behavior as a bad thought/behavior.

What will you commit to now? The choice is yours!

Sparkling Love,

I just got back from an awesome two-day workshop with my mentor! The theme was miracles and love…we talked about the 12 components of a miracle (which I’ll be sharing in more detail in the weeks to come) and the incredible power of love (did you know it’s 5ooo times stronger than your thoughts? WOW! ).

Which is why it’s so important to be in coherence with your heart – that means telling your evil twin sister (inner critic) to take her toxic thoughts and hit the road! Because if you hang on tight to the things that drive you crazy you’ll never allow love into your mind. There’s no room for it. A mind full of trash gets more trash. And you want love, right?

Now you might be saying, wait a minute, isn’t love specific to the heart? True that’s where we FEEL love, but it starts with the thoughts we are focusing on in the mind. Our feelings are determined by what we put our attention on – we think something, then we feel.

Think about it– someone says or does something that is unkind, disrespectful or even crosses a boundary – and you think wait a minute, what did I do to deserve that? What happens next? Most of us put our attention on what was said or done, attach a meaning to it, take it personally and then feel upset. Totally taking it personally our body starts to fill up with anger and injustice and maybe some hurt or frustration. Maybe you say some unkind things in return and get even more riled up.

Can you think of a time that happened to you?

I know I sure can. The thing is while our mind is busy taking things personally our heart is shutting down and we are waaaay far away from the love we desire.

We all crave love and yet the #1 limiting belief for women is “I’m not loved or lovable”. How many times have you allowed your mind to spin out of control with thoughts that don’t support self-love? Ay yi yi and the vicious cycle that creates – rarely letting the love we desire flow into our hearts.

When we let our mind hold onto thoughts and beliefs that make us feel bad about ourselves we suffer. The key is to let go of taking things personally and open to the knowing that we are loved and lovable. But that requires a sacrifice and the sacrifice is letting go of feeling bad and unworthy, strengthening our love of Self, believing in our beauty and goodness.

How do you do that?

The key is greater awareness and making consistent healthy decisions. Here’s the deal there’s a part of you that wants to go forward and expand into love and there’s a part of you that’s arguing for why you can’t. God wants you to have a free full life of love because that’s what God/life wants for us but then the human side argues for the hurtful things that were said, resentment, blame, criticism, anger, and it’s arguing for contraction. One of those two sides wins with every decision we make.

The awareness is key because it helps you see with every decision you make which side is winning. Then you can see that part that argues you out of love. And it’s not just in taking things personally – ask yourself if you lean into that part of you that gets small and weak in other areas of your life? As we do one thing we do everything!

The fabulous truth is that ultimately you have way more opportunity for love in your life than you are currently allowing.

Are you up for a challenge?

I thought so – you rock!

So the challenge is to pay attention to what you are paying attention to for the next week – and let love win! By letting go of those idea’s/beliefs/thoughts that don’t serve you, and instead choosing empowering thoughts that nurture YOU :))

With Sparkling Love,