Author: valeriecameronmerritt

Man is made by his belief. As he believes, so he is.  —The Bhagavad Gita

Take time to quiet your mind so that you may bring awareness into your daily living.  Even 10 minutes of sitting every day to watch your thoughts and practice seeing them come and go will shift the frequency and speed of thoughts running in the mind.  Once you have practiced watching the mind, you will be able to detach from your thoughts and decide which ones you want to host and which ones don’t belong in your life any longer.  You can choose what fits you and what you will believe and allow in your experience.

This is practice, so please be kind to yourself and gentle when the process feels stuck or your mind unyielding.  Let yourself be imperfect and greet every thought with curiosity.  You don’t have to be serious, but you do need to be focused. The focus can be playful and curious while choosing what thoughts and beliefs are worthy of you.

Do you find yourself attached to the actions, responses, or opinions of others?  If you ask a question, do you expect a certain response?  In social settings, do you have ideas about how and why people should behave? This kind of attachement can lead you into judgements about others, keeping you from letting yourself act, or a combination of the two.

A few weeks ago, Jessica, told me she’s been saying to herself, “let you be you and let them be them”.  It’s elemental and effective!  I’ve been trying this phrase too and it sets up a space for allowance of whatever occurs or doesn’t occur, while filtering out those pesky expectations that are so easy to… expect.

If you catch yourself in a downward spiral with stress, disappointment, or whatever may be the case you can stop that feeling by recognizing it and knowing you don’t want to participate.  The moment you become separate from the emotion(s) you are feeling is the moment when you can neutralize any situation.  Once it’s in neutral, you may want to jump into a super feel good affirmation like “my every wish will be answered” but…. unless your feeling and belief matches those words, it won’t happen.  ☺️  When you’re looking for an affirmation that can meet you in neutral try on this one:

Things are always working out.

Say that a few times and if it feels good, try adding a little something extra:

Things are always working out in ways that are better than what I could have imagined!

When you need a lift, these words can do that pretty quickly!!

An affirmation for surrender:

I let go.

I let love.

This affirmation is worth revisiting again and again.  It can be helpful in many scenarios. Letting go is not about giving up, it’s about trusting in a plan that’s larger than you.  Letting love is about softening your heart to all that is and offering compassion to the world around you.  Let life unfold before you.  Let love move through you.  Feel the ease and contendedness in this affirmation as the words settle into your being.

My kiddos make jokes about the length of time it sometimes takes me to respond to them, which can feel very delayed.  They are accustomed to fast returns in every avenue of their experience.  With parenting, I’ve learned to slow it down and know there’s value in applying this elsewhere.  Often the first words that come to me are not an accurate representation of how I want to  navigate a situation.  Sometimes the first words, thoughts, and response to something are pieces of an old story we don’t want to tell anymore.

To make room for change and growth, the first active step is giving some space between stimulus and response.  We don’t expect to gather a harvest the same day we plant!  The areas of life you spy for improvement are like little seedlings.  If we look at making changes in those areas  with this understanding, the entire process can become one of self nurture.  After you begin recognizing the parts of your story you want to change, you can start the process of allowing room to think about yourself differently and then to respond differently.   That requires absolute presence.  The only moment you can change a response is in the moment you’re responding.

Give yourself room to notice old storylines and acknowledge your progress in identifying them.  Once you’re aware of what you’re saying or doing you can notice if that’s a match with what you want to say or do.  If everything isn’t quite lining up, give yourself some room to grow.

“Life will give you whatever experience is the most helpful for the evolution of your consciousness. How do you know this is the experience you need? Because this is the experience you are having at this moment.” — Eckhart Tolle

Sometimes the start to a week can meet you with some resistance, depending on life stressors and the components that make up your reality.  My family started Monday off with a few bumps that we need to address, and I’ve been reminded in another conversation of how important it is to just breathe.

In for 5

Hold for 5

Out for 5

It’s so easy and so very helpful!!

For the weekend, think about something that lights you up.  Go and do whatever that is.  Be with it.  Lift off the layers that this week has laid on you, and if you have more layers to lift than from this week alone, take the time to shed it all for at least a little while.  Underneath those layers of life stresses, there is a luminous body of bliss that is your true self.  Do something to honor the glowing, glorious core of you.  Take time to light up.  See how long you can leave that light on and find someone to share it with.  Perhaps your beautiful light will show through in such an infectious way that you’ll see others lighting up too!

Being a person that used to persist in getting to the bottom of things when it came to the motivation of others, I used to believe that every action had an angle.  I’m very glad to now be in place to tell you that it doesn’t have to be true. Also, I’m glad to know and say to you that you don’t have to spend one minute of your time figuring out another person’s angle – it’s not much fun!  If you have a gut response to steer clear of something or someone, trust that, but using your own time to hash out another person’s thinking is not your work.  The inner workings of someone else’s mind is their concern, not yours!

Ta-da! You. Are. Free.

The only person you need to be concerned with is yourself and your intention.

If you set your intentions with purity of heart, and you do not seek fruit from your actions, it is my belief that you will create a network of good flowing energy around yourself.  Love to love.  Give to give.  Share to share.  Speak to speak.  Listen to listen.  Smile to smile.  And so forth and so on.  Expect nothing in return.  You will be free of angles and you will attract others who understand the heart centeredness you engage.  If you encounter those who are not yet there with you in understanding, you may find yourself in a temporarily isolating demonstration, but this is sometimes the path of a teacher (and we are all teachers intentionally or unintentionally at some point or another).  In time it will be understood that you expect nothing in return and that there are no strings attached… or it won’t and that’s okay!  Let it all go as it will.

It is so good to love, give, share, speak, listen, and smile for action alone.  You will be free and you may be able to set someone else free from karma (which translates from Sanskrit as “deeds” or “action”).  Give yourself the gift of release from angles and the bonds of expectation.

Love and Happiness to you all!