The Zen Art of Christmas Shopping

Up until a few years ago, Christmas used to be a very stressful time.  I would put so much pressure on myself to get everything so perfect that it would not be that enjoyable. 

True, I don't shop as much on Oxford Street  as much as I used to, but by learning to relax and let go of getting it 'right,' it's become so much easier. 

As you learn to relax, and by letting go of getting all the right presents for people, you'll find that you'll tune into your intuition naturally and life flows much more easily.  

Racking your brain for the right presents for people becomes a thing of the past and you'll end up been drawn into the right shops at the right time, and hey presto - gifts from the heart! 

These can be testing times, but we must remember how we have been brainwashed into a more 'commercial' mindset about Christmas.  And even though giving and receiving gifts is fun..... try and remind yourself of the word 'fun' when you are out shopping - I'm sure it's not the first word that springs to mind! 

Yesterday, whilst rushing down Oxford Street with the millions of others pushing past me and bumping into me, I just stopped and said to myself, 'This is ridiculous!' 

It was in that moment that I laughed to myself and realised the insanity of it all.

When we try and control every detail of our life, we can become frustrated and create stress for ourself.  Life can go our way, but at a cost.  What you can control is what this cost is to you. 

A certain amount of urgency can be useful when we have to think on our toes, but more constant worry and stress is not as useful. 

Trying to work everything out with our left brain can remove any moments of inspiration and creativity that our right brain provides.  If you are experiencing stress, fatigue or anxiety, chances are you are going against the natural flow of life. 

The amount of pressure you feel equals the amount of pressure you put on yourself or the amount of pressure you allow yourself to feel from others.

Aim to reduced this as much as you can by making a decision to look after yourself this Christmas.  Slow down, and listen to your body and your intuition. 


Ask yourself, 'what will happen if I don't do x, z or z?' Remember to be realistic with your answers! 

A good exercise to do is to notice how quiet it is inside of your body compared to the busyness going on around you.

Have a MERRY Christmas!

Lisa x

How to Survive November's Rebirth!

 

I have felt like I have been in the final stages of labour recently! Has anyone else felt the same? 

 

And just to clarify - not in the way of giving birth, but feeling as though I am the one coming through the birth canal and being born, or reborn as the case may be - very difficult and very painful!

Every so often this happens, and, like women who have actually given birth, I forget what this process is like - the being reborn that is. It makes me think that this process of rebirth, like birth itself, is essential to life. 

Why else would women continue giving birth when it's so damned painful? 

 

The process of rebirth must bring growth and transformation and all the other positive stuff associated with this from a deep, primal and instinctual place within us. The very human, physical self screams 'no,' whilst our soul screams 'yes.'

Rebirth in our day-to-day adult life is exactly how I imagine a baby to feel as it is being born; we come from this place inside the womb of relative safety, serenity and warmth - or in other words our 'normal' adult living environment and situation that we have gotten used to, and all of a sudden, our bubble bursts, we don't know where we are, who we are and what the hell is happening! 

 

We find ourselves in a foreign environment, where contraction after contraction we are being forced towards the unknown. 

We try and grasp on for dear life, but it's as though the momentum of life and the 'divine plan' is taking us somewhere regardless of our objections.

The more we resist what's happening, the worse it gets. Our fear of the unknown gets in the way and stops us in our tracks. Our deepest and darkest fears resurface as we feel as if we are dying and in a way this is true; we are leaving the old behind us to face a new life. 

As we cling to the walls for dear life, our mother, the universe pushes us forwards. 

 

And it's just when we see that there's no point in resisting, when we believe we might die anyway, 'so what's the point of all this anyway,' when we let go of the past and the future, that we are catapulted out into this new life and we can breathe again.

These periods of rebirth are such times of releasing and surrendering to the unknown on a huge scale. They are times of death of the old, outdated ways of being, thinking and behaving in our comfortable environments and being born into a new life.

When you feel like your old fears are resurfacing, when everything you do is being met with resistance, try and remember what's going on and how the whole birthing process works. 

Look at it as if you are the baby in the birth canal, surrendering, letting go, allowing the universe to guide you through it and catch you at the other side. 

 

Remember to breathe, knowing it is easier the more relaxed you are, and the sooner you stop resisting. Get yourself a good support network around you, support yourself and then when you are reborn....

Remember that you can't run before you can walk, so take some time to adjust. Get curious again; about life and about learning. 

There's a whole new world for you to explore, so open your eyes as if they are those of a new born baby again.

Welcome!

 

Lisa x

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The Truth About Love

How come we often find it easier to withhold love? If you knew the other person involved loved you unconditionally, would that change things?

Love really does seem to be of a very high vibration.  Sitting up there with light, it might explain why many people use 'love and light' in their well wishes to others. 

It's true that love can melt hearts - just think of how a newborn baby can affect the hearts of those around them or how being in love can override the differences between people. 

We must all admit to enjoying the early stages of falling in love in a new relationship - doesn't the world seem a wonderful place?  How effortlessly do we move through life in those first few months?  Everything seems to just fall into place so perfectly!

But what happens after the honeymoon period is over?  Feeling how we do in those first few months is not completely sustainable, but it does give us an experience of how it would feel if we loved and were loved unconditionally all the time. 

What makes it so hard for us to give and receive love so freely?

Love has been with us fleetingly throughout our lives, with our first caregivers or parents influencing our experience of love from how they were with us and each other. 

Just by bringing us up, we learned that certain behaviours made us feel loved, and others didn't.  We formed beliefs from the way we were brought up such as:

'I must please people and then I will be loved,' or

'I am a bad girl or boy and don't deserve to be loved.' 

Love seemed conditional and so we grew up believing something had to be done to 'get it.'  As young children, we relied on our primary caregivers to look after us and with our basic survival instincts kicking in, we tried to please them, as losing their love would have been detrimental to our future. 

As we got older, we started to search for love amongst friends and partners too, with that search taking us outside of ourselves and ultimately away from the source of love - US.

Our fear of not being loved is so great that we spend most of our lives trying to protect ourselves from ever feeling unloved.  Our fear is so great that we withold love from others from fear of not receiving it back.  Our fear is so great that we don't allow ourselves to feel love as fully as we could, just in case it is taken away from us.

It is so sad when fear gets in the way of us living the life we dream of. 

As a therapist I have worked with many people who are unable to let themselves love others or be loved them self.  The key thing to remember here is that our past experiences often dictate how we behave now. 

Our subconscious mind stores all our past experiences from which we form learnings and beliefs such as 'I am not loveable,' or 'I don't deserve love,' and it is our subconscious beliefs that drive most of our behaviours and patterns of behaviours.  

Until we are aware of our own patterns that are affecting our lives, we continue repeating those patterns.  When we become aware of those patterns, we can then begin to start changing them.  

In the meantime, try and remember that  love is actually a core state of being, which means that it is not dependent on DOING anything to 'get it.'  We have just LEARNED to search for it, rather than realising we ARE IT! 

Today - Try and recognise that YOU ARE LOVE regardless of what you do or say.  Notice what comes up for you as you acknowledge this. 

With much Love and Light!

Lisa x


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Finding the gem in the face of adversity

The challenges that we face in our lives are not something that we cannot really avoid as human beings. And i guess the majority of you are human beings who are reading this! Challenges live up to their name by 'challenging' us with what they represent. They come in various shapes, sizes and duration with some lurking in the background and others coming right up to us and slapping us unashamedly in the face.

I've certainly had my fair share of challenges and I also know they're not over yet, so I've made a pact to embrace them. I made this decision quite a long time ago when I had no other option but to make friends with them. They had been there for some time, first whispering, then speaking, until finally they were screaming and shouting at me. I had to surrender and see what they wanted and they did talk to me, or I finally decided to talk to them - you know the way you would talk to someone who’s holding a gun to your head. I just wanted the challenges to go away, but they were here, they were real and like that person holding the gun to my head there was a certain amount of bargaining that came with this situation.

When faced with a challenge now, I still react to them and often do, especially in that instant that they happen. It can be automatic. I don't expect anyone to say 'that's great, our house sale has just fallen through,' or 'great, I've lost my job,' as it's simply not human. What is more realistic is finding a fleeting moment during the challenge to ask yourself 'what is this trying to show me' or 'how can I turn this situation around and find the hidden gem in this.' And often it's not until afterwards that look back and go ‘oh, that’s why such and such happened.’

So perhaps that house that you had your heart set on wasn’t as good as the larger, cheaper home you found closer to work. Perhaps in the meantime you met the person of your dreams or you learnt to have faith in what life brought. Or by losing your job, it gave you the opportunity to find your passion and become closer to your family or friends somehow.

Now you may never think that you will find that proverbial 'needle in the haystack,' but it is there... somewhere. If that needle was a precious jewel would your motivation increase in order to find it? If so then go on and make that needle the brightest, sparkliest shining gem you could possibly imagine. This is yours for the taking if you're prepared to look for it. The hay might still be there in the meantime, but it'll probably not bother you as much now you know what it is concealing.