“To surrender certainty in favor of openness, to accept the smallness of your everyday life whilst admitting to the magnificence of your being, to open up to the… light that pours through you into a myriad of forms, endlessly creating, destroying, creating again — this is your sacred task.”
– Journey of Love guidebook by Alana Fairchild
“The rule is you have to dance a little bit in the morning before you leave the house because it changes the way you walk out into the world.” – Sandra Bullock
It doesn’t matter what’s happening this week, if you can find a song you like and let yourself enjoy it, there can be a cluster of minutes that lift you up. Try out Sandra Bullocks advice, if you haven’t already.
When this photo was taken, I was in the beginning of a separation and there was a wedding for people that both my former spouse and I were friends with. The event was bittersweet to attend, but it was good practice in being present for others and taking part in celebrating two people coming together. I appreciate that someone captured this because it’s joy in sadness – it’s a smile in discord – it’s a bit of bliss. However life may challenge you, whatever you’re feeling is not all you’re capable of feeling in any given day or hour or even within a minute. The way you start (or restart 😉) your day can domino into how the rest unfolds.
Let yourself be moved by good feeling. ☀️✨ You have an incredible capacity to smile in this very moment or the next if you will.
What is the next best thing you can do for yourself? As you go through this day and choose your activities (or if don’t feel you have a choice in your exact activity, then your focus could instead be on choosing your thoughts about the activities) would it be possible to take a pause with each transition to be aware of what exactly you’re doing and thinking?
A simple, short pause can be a doorway to change. In the moment of the pause, you can become present with your thoughts and choices. That’s the moment when you can choose the next best thing for yourself.
How can your day be altered by your intention or basis in approach? How does your everyday look if you approach things with dullness, imposed duty or even exasperation as opposed to a gentle compassion, with a sense of newness for this particular day. What would be part of an ideal daily vision if you took a moment to look inward? How would you feel and behave in an ideal day with no limits imposed on your imagination?
As an example in practical application, let’s say you have an exercise plan and you do it because you know it’s good for you, you want to have a certain number on the scale, and you’ll feel better after. How does this look differently if you do it because you like showing up for yourself, you notice the way your body has the capacity to move, using that as an opportunity to take joy in movement (even if it’s not quite where or how you’d like). How does that approach change anything, if at all? Are the first reasons made subsequent instead of primary? How does exercising change with approach?
You can shift the approach to anything in your day: the way you feel about desk work, meetings, cleaning, yard work, or even standing in line — anything that has previously been viewed as a “have to” can be a “get to”.
Let positive intention and approach help you to feel your best as often as possible!
What’s good in your life this weekend? Go small and go grateful for anything that brings you joy! See how long you can stay with that joy. The better you feel, the better you’ll be capable of helping someone else to feel!
The gratitude list here so far this weekend:
1. cheerful tableware
2. scrumptious summer peaches
3. neighbors who share their farmers market finds with us!
4. sharing our gratitude with others
In recent weeks I’ve been thinking of the fondness I feel for southern magnolia trees with their large, sometimes ground skimming limbs, thick shiny leaves, and elegant yet substantial blossoms. This was a solo exploration in fondness and I thought too how lovely it would be to have sight of a magnolia from one of my regular windows. About two weeks after thinking this, a neighbor of mine asked about sharing one or two trees with me. What kind of trees were these? Magnolia! How fortunate.
What may happen in your experience if you don’t rush to answer yourself and instead allow room to be answered?
The more we are able to hold a space for ourselves, the more we become a presence in which others can also flourish. — Alana Fairchild
How can you hold space with loving kindness for yourself today? What’s one shift or release that would allow you to be absolutely present with the glorious being that is you, even if only for a few moments – what does that look and feel like?
An activity for presence-ing:
If you have an apple to work with physically, that is fantastic, but this can also be done with your knowingness of an apple through past experiences and visualizing.
Hold an apple in your hands. Rotate the fruit in your palms and feel the flesh on your fingertips. Notice the weight of the apple. Notice the color of the apple. Notice the stem and leaf or absence of those.
How does the apple smell? Notice the space between your nose and the apple as you smell. Take a few breaths in, with the apple at your nose and mouth. Notice the breath at the tip of the nostril. Notice the breath as it moves into the nasal passage. Notice the breath in your body.
Take a bite of the apple. Let the apple stay in your mouth as you notice the shape and the touch on your tongue. Slowly chew and notice the sound, the taste, and the texture. What do you notice about the sound as you continue to chew this first bite? What do you notice about the taste and texture as the fruit is made smaller and ready to swallow?
When you swallow, notice the sensation of the food moving along the esophagus and toward the stomach if that sensation is available to you and notice if it isn’t. There is no should be, only what you experience.
Breathe in with the apple at your nose and mouth again before the next bite. Continue on with slow consumption and deep noticing, taking time to fully presence with the fruit.
Guided Apple Script
While this week unfolds for you, remember to move through or process life with perfectionism and a false sense of omniscience at bay. Allow yourself room to be imperfect so that your original self can come forward in genuine expression. Keep curiosity about you, a little clumsiness even, and some room for error. You may find that room provides the opportunity to grow into a way of being that is far beyond what you thought possible.
Be with what is available to you now and let movement stem from there. Move as best you can and deem that as perfect instead of some malevolent practice of perfectionism suggested by an overculture that would bend you from your natural expression.
What if as you go through whatever happens today or tomorrow or maybe the next, you see it all as only an experience? Let every moment be seen as an experience.
In previous posts it’s been suggested to see it all as lessons, but that can tie in negative or positive energies and it seems to be more often negative when we call something a lesson. What if instead, everything today and for longer if you like, is just an experience; it’s not good or bad; it’s not right or wrong. Your only aim would be to let yourself have experience without judgement. (It could be helpful to apply this idea to past experience too if there’s heaviness involved.)
How will it look if you are able to let poise be your power and nonresistance your grace in what you experience?
Presence and Positivity 