Boldly Follow Your Way in Life

Never worry whether you can boldly follow your way in life. Each of us finds our level of boldness.

Boldly Follow Your Way in Life

Does this headline scare you or expand your heart space? These two reactions are right next to each other. One step forward brings you closer to expansion.

Sometimes, the unknown future keeps us rooted in a spot of fear.

How to Overcome Fear

Fear lives in our thoughts about the future. We feed our fear by choosing to question our power.

What if I don’t know the answers to the test? How will I perform in the new job? I don’t know anyone in my unique situation. How will I make new friends?

Instead, use your thoughts to review a personal triumph or known success of others.

I’ve done well on tests before. Every new job has a learning curve, and my new manager knows that. Once I’m in a unique situation, the unknown becomes the known. I’ve made new friends before by following my interests.

One Simple Tool Helps

Since fear lives in our thoughts of the future, we use a tool to live in the present. This tool helps you boldly follow your way in life.

Taking one deep breath brings you to the present.
Lower your gaze to the floor, and take another deep breath.
Continue to breathe normally, noticing how your body reacts.
Bring your focus to your breath, whether you can feel the breath at your nostrils, the rise and fall of your belly or your lungs filling with air.

Of course, you must be in a safe place when you use this simple tool. So safety is your first concern.

Practice This Tool Often

How many times have you practiced something before you needed it? For example, did you play with dolls as a child, practicing how to be a parent? Or perhaps you made mud pies and practiced cooking.

By spending time each day practicing mindful deep breathing, you can more easily live in the moment.

Some people call this meditation. You can call it whatever you want. It’s your life and your choice to follow your way in life boldly.

Give yourself credit each time you make forward progress, and forgive yourself when you stumble. We all have ups and downs. Take time to celebrate every improvement. You are worth it.

Letting Go of the Past Brings Joy

Do you want to experience a new, more accurate you? Letting go of the past brings joy by filling the void with possibilities for the future. As a result, you experience less emotional baggage and open up the room to develop into your true self.

Letting Go of the Past Brings Joy

I clearly remember when my friend said, “Let it go. Just let it go.” The subject of my rant was the judgment I felt from my mother. My internal response was anger. Since I grew up with the illusion that anger is an unacceptable emotion, I pushed the anger down. I felt it was impossible to let it go.

What is a better response?

Lower your gaze and take a deep breath into your energy center, just below your belly button.
With compassion for yourself and your friend, respond,

“That feels like a kick in my gut. Can you help me decipher where that discomfort is coming from?”

At this point, your friend might be angry, have hurt feelings, or they might welcome the opportunity to help. It’s okay.

The most important result of this scenario is that you made a giant leap toward letting go of the past.

What is Anger?

Anger is an illusion. It lives in your past. When my friend responded to my outpouring of frustration, my anger response was in the past. Specifically, it lived in the seconds before I acknowledged my anger. Furthermore, my lifetime of hurt and disappointment fueled the flames of emotion.

This concept that anger is an illusion because it lives in the past can be life-changing.

You can feel anger, acknowledge it, and immediately let it go by purposefully living in the present with a deep breath. That deep breath is in the now. It is the only thing that is now.

How to Change Living in Past Anger

Practice is key.

Imagine a situation in your past when you became angry.
Notice how you feel about that now.
Take a deep breath.
Notice how you feel.

Next, you can practice in your everyday life.
When someone pushes your emotional button, take a pause.
Take a deep breath.
Acknowledge your feelings.
Share how you feel.
Ask for help.

You can do this after the moment has passed, such as later in the conversation.

“Hey, I just realized your comment hurt my feelings. Can we talk about that?”

It’s never too late to start letting go of the past.

What’s With the Plates?

In the past, I worked for the Department of Public and Environmental Health in the City of Denver. I was the smiling face that appeared at an employee’s desk to fix their computer problem. I loved my work. It satisfied my curiosity and need to connect with people and gave me a deep sense of accomplishment in troubleshooting their problems and finding a solution. One high-level manager was eating her lunch on a beautiful plate. It made such an impression that I bought two small Fitz and Floyd plates for my lunches at work.

While Mom lived with Wayne and me in Florida, she helped me by setting the table for meals. Mom always chose one of the Fitz and Floyd plates for herself. I resented it but didn’t let her know my feelings. After we moved to NC, these plates fell out of favor for me. I moved them around in the cabinet, and yesterday I took them out.

I said, “Enough! It’s time for these plates to go.”

I’ve cried three separate times over this. First, forgiveness for Mom came during the release of tears. Then I forgave myself.

Letting go of the past brings joy into our lives in unexpected ways.

Stand Tall in Your Light

Be brave. Stand tall in your light. Pull yourself toward the sun and blossom like a yellow flower in a field of white flowers.

Stand Tall in Your Light

Everyone sends out and receives energy. Choose to find what lights you up and let it shine.

It takes effort to recognize your talent. In addition, you may need to overcome some realities of life.

Deep hurts from childhood
Understanding yourself
Physical limitations
Energy blockages

You can follow many paths to help you stand tall in your light. Some people try traditional routes. However, they may also find non-traditional ways for deep healing more successful. For example, I successfully used acupuncture and reiki to overcome physical limitations. Western medicine is excellent for responding to emergencies and some diseases. Yet, only reiki could soothe the pain of my husband’s cancer until the experienced hand of a surgeon removed the tumor.

Deep Hurts from Childhood

I have experienced healing by seeking traditional counseling. However, it was interesting how often I heard the suggestion of journaling to open my internal channel to find the root cause of mental anguish.

Listening to my intuition, the knowing I felt in my body, brought me to personal coaches, astrologers, the System of Reiki, writing retreats, shamanic healers, and many more.

The most important thought here is to keep trying until you find the necessary process to heal the deep scars. Perhaps it is as simple as knowing how to search for your helpers. Download my free guide to get you started.

Understand Yourself

Another realization for me is to take it slow. My default is to juggle multiple projects at one time. So I pulled back my days volunteering from two days to one. Soaring gas prices gave me another reason to reconsider the necessity for multiple trips into town. And I’m following suit on this blog, taking three times as long to finish it.

This understanding of myself has been a deeply personal process. Yet, we all need to understand ourselves better. My article about using ‘tried and true’ methods includes links to online personality tests that cracked open the window into my way of being. But recently, I found a unique questionnaire that helps me understand my conative self (how I do things). It’s from Kolbe Corp. When you know how you get things done, it’s much easier to set and accomplish goals in your work and personal life.

Physical Limitations

There are many ways we may feel physically limited. For example, perhaps you live in the desert Southwest but long to live near a beach. Can you change your location? Perhaps not. But you can make small changes that bring you closer to the beach you dream of through posters of a beach. By meditating on this scene, your energy can change, opening up an opportunity to move nearer to the beach.

Although we may feel physically challenged by our bodies, our minds are unfettered, free to imagine a world of limitless possibility. Moreover, it costs nothing and is always available.

Energy Blockages

Energy is in everything. It is limitless, at least to our capacity to understand.

The energy in a hug from a loved one is easy to feel. Notice changes in your body when you receive a hug. Since this feeling doesn’t have a linear component, it is possible to feel the energy in a memory. Try it right now. Close your eyes and imagine the person to whom you feel closest. Are you experiencing their loving care in this memory?

Making real change is a slow process. Many layers of hurt may absorb the earth’s and sky’s beautiful energy. Find a practice that resonates with you; walking barefoot on the earth, performing gentle yoga stretches, or simply taking deep breaths down into your belly. Daily returning to our natural grounding practice can result in a positive change. Soon, you will stand tall in your light effortlessly.