Life Loves You | 2 Of 2

Feeling stuck or limited by life circumstances? Light a candle, grab your journal, and press play.

In this recording, Rachael shares some tips and tools to help you shift your mindset and remember that you are in control.

You'll consider the gifts in your struggles, the desires of your soul, and steps to regaining positive momentum in your life.

You'll also be given a moment to feel into your power with some uplifting affirmations at the end.

Transcript

So in part two of our shift in our mindset around life and what is possible for us, I have four tips and then we'll end with some affirmations. So the main sort of overarching thing that I want to say now is that what is really helpful is to notice when we are resistant to how things are and to decide to let go, To let go of the resistance because it's the resistance to circumstances, To events, To how we feel, To a challenge that comes up. It's the resistance that A makes it more painful and actually keeps us locked in that reality. And when we feel stuck it's so easy to just get stuck in that loop of doom, So stating how bad it is over and over and over, Creating internal stress for ourselves. Or maybe we are avoiding altogether, So using social media, Food, Alcohol, TV, Picking arguments, Whatever, You know, As in an attempt to kind of distract ourselves from the pain of what it is. So a few things in order to kind of help us to let go of the resistance. So number one is bringing a mindfulness and a compassion to our experience. So this isn't about just kind of jumping over negativity and just going everything's okay because we do need to process how we feel, We need to acknowledge to ourselves how we feel and let the emotion pass through us rather than kind of burying it. So things that can be helpful in regards to mindfulness and compassion are labelling, So labelling the emotion that you're feeling, Labelling the thought, Basically expressing your thoughts, Your emotional state or the difficulty that's occurring in as plain terms as possible. So without kind of getting into this long winding story of meaning, Just stating what it is in this moment. So thinking about X, Worried thoughts around blah, Frustration, Anger, So just labelling, Putting a label on things that will help you to create distance from the thing so that you realise that you are not the thing, You are not the difficulty, You are not the frustration, That is an element of your experience. Another thing is to feel your body sensations, So just kind of investigating what does it feel like to be frustrated right now or what does it feel like to have this physical pain. So when we allow ourselves to feel our emotions and feel pains and struggles, We release tension, So there's a sort of relaxation that occurs in our bodies and in our minds, So that tension gets released and guess what, The thing isn't as painful when we actually allow it to be here. So there's two steps, It's allowing, So you can even just say that word, Allow or accept, And then focusing on sensations, How does it feel, How does this emotion feel, How does it feel when I allow, How does it feel to notice that tension is being released. So if you kind of pay attention to it, To the emotion, To the tension that you are feeling and then allow it to be there, It kind of disintegrates under a watchful eye, So as we look at it, As we allow it to be, As we investigate it, It gets less and less and less, It kind of evaporates. So those are some easy ways to just kind of be mindful in the moment, So allowing it, Labelling it and just watching like sensations, How does it feel. And lastly we want to be sending love to it, So sending love to ourselves, Sending love to the emotion, To the part of us that feels hurt or feels like they're stuck. And we can send love via words, So may I be free of suffering or this is hard, I'm sending love to myself, So any word that feels comforting, So thinking of how you might comfort a friend perhaps. Touch is another good way of kind of igniting that self-compassion within us, So putting a hand on your heart, Giving yourself a hug, Stroking your face, Your arms, Your hands, Like rubbing your hands together. So just kind of touching yourself to activate the kind of nurturer system within you, So getting that oxytocin which is that love hormone going and just kind of giving yourself, Your body, The message like that you are safe and that you are here for you. Or you might like to use imagery, So some people like to imagine sort of like a bright nourishing white light, Bathing them with love. So just kind of play around with ways that you can ignite a sense of self-compassion and love within you to help you process the difficulty so that then you can shift. So my second suggestion is to ask questions, This is my favourite one because it's just so, It works every time you know, I just find that so helpful because we can keep things stuck on a loop by just stating how things are or you know as I mentioned the avoidance. But when we ask questions we create movement, There's this sense of flowing forward rather than just going around in a circle. So the types of questions you can ask, So if you're looking for guidance for example, You could say like what would be a perfect way that I could create more balance in my life? So instead of just being like my life is completely unbalanced and my job is so stressful and I have no time to take care of myself, You want to then ask a question, Well actually if this is how things are, Okay this may be how things are now but like how, What do I want and how can I get there? And on the point of asking questions it's important to note that this isn't about like grasping for an answer, This isn't about overthinking, This is about putting a question out into the universe and like being open to the answer coming which may be immediately, It may be tomorrow, It may be as you're brushing your teeth, You know it will come in its own time but the point is really just to shift your attention to what you want towards a solution and trusting that actually the answer is going to come from intuition, It's going to come from your right brain rather than your left brain logical thinking because actually it's the logical thinking often that you know when we are kind of overthinking, Trying to find a solution that just kind of keeps us stuck so we actually really want to go into more into our intuitive self. So ask the question and just release the need to know now, Just trusting that it is going to come, The answer will come. So you can also ask for help so it could be like please help me find the strength to x, Y and z, Maybe there is something you're really just finding so hard but you know there's something in you that can deal with it, That can overcome, That can turn this into you know a lesson or whatever but maybe you just don't know how in this moment you just you know that there's a but you want to be that person but you just can't, You just don't know what to do and the moment you can just give that you know to the universe, To your higher self or whatever you believe in. Please help me to find the answer or to show me how to do x, Y and z. So just that releasing because you know otherwise we just got all this pressure on ourselves to change and to do everything in the moment and it's hard but if we can trust that actually the answers will come you know put out those questions and answers and questions, Questions and answers are like hot and cold you know they're like yin and yang like a question can't exist without an answer existing so you ask the question you're going to get the answer you don't know when but in my experience it's very rapidly. Meaning, So meaning is another one that you could sort of put a question around so as I mentioned the sort of Viktor Frankl take on like finding meaning and suffering, Finding some purpose in it is so valuable and you becoming powerful even in the most harrowing situations. So one you could ask yourself is what is life helping me to achieve, What is this helping me to know, What is this helping me to understand or what point is my soul trying to get me to by having me have this experience. So those are some ways that I would suggest just kind of using questioning as a way to help you to a just kind of like ease the pressure like it's not all on you to find all the answers in this moment right now but also just like getting you in touch with your intuition and your higher self and just trusting that they're out there once you put those questions out those answers are going to come your way you're kind of just you're calling them in. So my tip is never state a negative without asking a question or placing a but on the end of it so for example don't just say if you have no money don't just say I have no money say I have no money but I'm open to finding opportunities for it to flow in or I have no money universe please help me to get creative and find a way that's gonna allow me to create an income while doing something I love something like that but you see what I mean so it's like keeping things flowing essentially not stating how things are just letting that be the you know that broken record going round and round and round. So number three of my tips in helping you to shift your mindset and feel go from feeling stuck to feeling hopeful feeling expansive and feeling free is to remember what you want so you know we did at the beginning kind of consider our desires and this is just really a reminder that if you know in the future when you are kind of hitting up against a situation or an event circumstance it just feels like god this is still not changed like it sucks let these moments so let these moments where you're unhappy with your circumstances or Abraham hick say contrast moments of contrast be prompts to remind you what you want so don't just think about what you don't want in the moment don't just feel rubbish about x y and zed but use that link that displeasure with the desire so you're kind of making a habit in your mind if you link those two together so that every time you think of what's not great you then also think about what do I actually oh yeah I want this this is what I want to change in my life this is what I'm looking forward to experiencing you want to state what you want and especially those soul desires that we talked about and see it so allow yourself to to want it and allow yourself to see it in your mind's eye and just like see how that would feel so just like you're trying on a coat try on how that would feel for things to be the way that you want them to be and and importantly just being open to nudges to guidance around your next step being open to signs being open to receiving new opportunities being open also to changing your mind about things because we like to kind of I think it's just a facet of our personality where we we make statements of how things are or what we like or what we don't like and that also can just keep us locked in in in a certain reality whereas if we are open to changing our minds about things then again it's we're just opening doors for ourselves so number four which is our last point is remembering what's good so we've we've thought about remembering what we want when we have a moment of contrast but we also want to remember what's good and good enough now so it's not just thinking about what we want in the future but also looking at our current situation and surroundings with a more balanced view so contrary to what we may think in a particular moment there's no shortage of things to feel good about it's just that our brains have a tendency to focus on what's not good what's negative that's our negativity bias which is helpful from a survival perspective but not helpful for you know happiness so in order to balance out the brain's negativity bias we need to proactively shift our attention to the elements of our life and our circumstances and our experience that actually do feel good that actually are kind of amazing and we're lucky to have or to experience so just taking a balanced look just thinking okay what in my life okay there's this that i don't like but actually what else exists for me that feels good that allows me to know i'm safe that i feel actually satisfied about that made me smile the other day or whatever just just considering what is good so importantly when something does feel good when you do notice something that feels pleasurable and it could be anything like a cup of coffee a nice dinner a friendly cashier at the supermarket um you know a cute dog in the park a funny text whatever it is let your attention linger on it for a few seconds longer so what we tend to do is flip our attention around and we may notice something nice but you know in a millisecond we're back to what's wrong or we're back to daydreaming or problem solving or planning or whatever it is so we want to just kind of be um almost be like a dog trainer but like a an attention trainer so training our attention to go no just stay here for a little bit longer sit and and enjoy it enjoy this moment let yourselves bathe in it enjoy it it's for you this moment is for you so savor it and for me what savoring means is noticing all the sensory aspects of it so the physical sensations how does it feel in my body when you know someone sent me one of my best friends ever has sent me this funny text and it's just brightened up my whole day how does it feel physically in my body also considering why is this so important to me oh yeah because we've been friends for 20 years and like you know we still get on like a house on fire and that means a lot to me having connections and people around me who understand me and who i understand means a hell of a lot for me so just considering like what the personal meaning is of this this nice thing um it could even just be simple things like um i don't know you're you've got your favorite favorite socks on or something you know they're fluffy and they're pink and your toes just feel like in heaven so whatever it is just allowing yourself to enjoy it so the physical characteristics the sensations the smells the sights and the personal meaning why is it so great why why do i want to take this in because the more we do that we create a habit of balancing things out of feeling good in our day of not just this endless like focus on what's wrong what's wrong what's wrong oh how many pieces of evidence do i have that life is rubbish um we start to create a new habit of actually how many pieces of evidence do i have that life loves me so that was a lot of stuff i hope it was useful um i will just do a quick summary now and then we will finish with some affirmations so to summarize difficult life circumstances can make us slip into limited thinking of feeling stuck or feeling like life is against us or feeling like there's something wrong with us or feeling like what we want is not possible but the truth is life is not against us life is for us and even hardships help us to grow give us wisdom they can even be seen as steps along our life path towards what our soul desires and the stories that we tell ourselves about us and about our lives are actually more powerful than any situation or any circumstance and so we have to be proactive in the things that we things that we let our attention linger on so wanting to shift from focusing on problems to what do we actually desire what's within us what are the strengths that we have within us to bring this about what's already amazing in my life so really taking control of of our minds and creating new habits new ways of seeing things so the the story we play in our mind about our life is actually helping us to create the life that we want so obviously it takes practice it's not something we do overnight but that's fine like we're all in this for the long haul so with that said i have a few affirmations so to end with so get into a comfy posture close your eyes and repeat after me life loves me life loves me i'm learning so much i'm becoming so strong so and i'm open to the flow so i'm open to the flow so my path is the perfect path and every obstacle will be overcome so my path is the perfect path and every obstacle will be overcome so life loves me life is happening for me so when i flow with life life flows with me when i flow with life life flows with me thank you so much for listening take care

Reviews

I love the way you present things. Thank you for putting yourself and your teachings out there. Much gratitude, Valerie.