Day 2 of 40 Day Love Feast~Without Brushing My Hair.

Can you imagine a personal relationship that is filled only with love and understanding. One that whispers to you how great and lovely you are. One that says I love and accept you. This is the kind of love Hafiz wrote about in this lovely poem. Imagine answering the knock at the door and opening it to find the God of your understanding waiting to embrace you just as you are. This kind of love ishere and it is possible. Let's walk in it!

"Without Brushing My Hair"

The
Closer
I get to you, Beloved,
The more I can see
It is just You and I all alone
In this World.
I hear A knock at my door,
Who else could it be,
So I rush without brushing
My hair.

For too
Many nights
I have begged for Your
Return

And what
Is the use of vanity
At this late hour, at this divine season,
That has now come to my folded
Knees?

If your love letters are true dear God
I will surrender myself to
Who you keep saying
I
Am.


Here is a lovely song about meeting your friend :-D

Day 1~I AM surrounded by love and encouragement.

I am surrounded by love and encouragement.


Everywhere I go, I feel love radiating toward me. I make choices that I am proud of. And if I ever feel uncertain about myself or my decisions, I remember that all the love I need is there for me. I am surrounded by love and encouragement.


If I ever feel down, I remind myself that I am a valuable person and that my actions have positive effects. I call to mind all of my past successes. And I make sure to extend to myself the same love and encouragement that I endeavor to give to others. After all, love is a verb - an action. 


To really care for others, I have to first love myself.


Today, I know that I am surrounded by love and encouragement. Everywhere I turn, I see signs that I am valued. These signs inspire me each day to rededicate myself to acting lovingly toward myself.

40 Day Love Feast Challenge

Greetings Friends!  Today marks the first day of the 40 Day Love Feast for Lent.  During this period of time, I am asking people to join me as we fast from negative attitudes, behaviors, and limiting ideas and beliefs.  During this time we will feast on love messages.

Each day there will be an uplifting story, an affirmation or meditation that will give us the opportunity to see how love increases in our lives and share with one another the ripple effect it has created in our community.  To join in please visit http://www.facebook.com/lovefeast40.
I hope to see you there!

The "I DID IT!' List

This is a time for slowing down and contemplation for me.  To that end, there have been no newsletters mailings, blogposts or even status updates.  I just need this time to reflect and renew and most of all rest. 

I did have the pleasure of reading from one of my favorite bloggers and fellow goddess Jo Crawford.  She has a wonderful blog and in it she shared her I did it list for 2011 and that inspired me to do one of my own.  I encourage you to reflect on what worked for you in the past year and bring the joy of accomplishment into the present to create more of that for 2012.

I created the Wise Woman's Guide to Soulful Success.  It started out as a free 7 day ecourse and evolved into a workbook and planner.

 I rebuilt my website to reflect a lighter more inspiring tone.  You can check it out here.

 I joined the gym and started going consistently.

 I completed 13 days of a 21 day community juice feast. I met some wonderful encouraging women through that process that I still communicate with today and there are still a great source of inspiration.  One in particular is Roni who helps me get my local fresh food on.

 I met a wonderful soul sister and fellow coach Naila at the Girls Rock Columbus program.  Although we became facebook friends first, when we met in person I felt instantly drawn to her beautiful energy.

 I met one of my favorite authors, Iyanla Vanzant and had my picture taken with her! Teehee!(Pic coming soon)

 I began making jewelry again, this time with the focus on bracelets of intention.  Which happen to be beautiful in my humble opinion.(pic coming soon)

 In my quest to become a true Warrior of the Light, I started a pilot program and asked women to join me on a 12 week quest to conquer our adversarial thoughts and move ahead to play a bigger game in life.

 I joined the Goddess Guidebook Circle and met some wonderful women.  Oh my gosh! That is one inspiring place to be. Oh, and I created my first ebook for that Circle entitled,Permission Granted.  A mini course in saying yes to your greatness.

 I helped one client end limited thinking which kept her from playing a bigger game in her relationships and her business.  She is now married and poised to take her business to the next level.

 I was able to help another client remove some of her fears related to job loss and creating a sustainable income.

 I kareoke'd, I Zumba'd.

 I laughed alot, I cried some, I practiced radical appreciation daily, even to the dismay of some.

 I loved more openly, I reconnected with my creativity.  I was more truthful about my feelings and practiced forgiveness on a deeper, more soulful level.

 I also learned to connect with Source through writing with a wonderful author by the name of Janet Conner and soul writing.

 I took the leap and worked with a wonderful business consultant.  She helped me create products, she listened to me whine when I was too afraid to move foward and after all of that, she is still my friend! Thank you Jo for inspiring to reflect on what was good. 

Now that was momentum that I didn't realize that I had! It kicks me in the pants and gets me going into the next year strong and confident that my path is filled with passion.

 Happy New Year!!!!!

A Divine Truth Telling:The Art of the Enlightened NO!

I realized as I was going through my calender, there were some engagements and appointments that just left me feeling "yucky".  Now the occasional pap smear or dental appointment doesn't really apply here because although there are things that I would rather be doing, those are must do's in my opinion for maintaining health.
But those are not the kind of appointments I am speaking of here.  I am talking about the engagements and people that I just don't feel good being around.
Example, I belong to a start-up group and I had done a lot of work helping with the promotion, creating blogs, and websites at the expense of my own entrepreneurial pursuits.  That was a choice I made, I totally get that. However, I became resentful because I felt the work I'd done wasn't even being utilized.  I decided that I needed to take a step back and really figure out what really, and I mean really resonated with me.
I remembered reading in Gay Hendricks book, "The Big Leap",  where he talked about staying in your zone of genius. He describes the zone of genius as a place where you have transcended time and space and you are totally connected to Source and you are doing the work you love.  There is a spirit of synchronicity where things just flow and that is where most of us creatives want to be right?
Gay recommends that if you want to stay in your zone of genius, then you have to say no to the things that are not congruent with your values.  In comes the Enlightened No.  It basically means you are saying no to people and appointments that leave you feeling yucky but you are doing it from a place of love. For example, he gave this response for declining a request asked of you very lovingly.
"No, I cant at this time AND thank you for asking me."
He says by using the word AND, you are continuing to include(which is what love does) rather than using the word "but" which is used to exclude. Interesting huh?
I do believe it is important to offer selfless service to the world and I also believe that you can do it in a way that serves you as well.  You can give of yourself without giving up yourself.  Just use the Enlightened NO!

Taking A Soul Rest

Life has been a whirl-wind of activity lately always.  After moving into a new home, closing-not closing-closing on the previous home, project deadlines, working a full time job, writing, taking care of family, and everything else that we do, I need to sit down!

I wanted to rest.  I wanted to just sit and revel in the nothingness of the moment when I was reminded by Daniel Laporte with a wonderful post she wrote.  She reminded me of sivasana or corpse pose.

In yoga, after you have finished with your session of deep stretches and breathing and sweating, you complete with sivasana or corpse pose.(Which is greatly needed I might add.)

This is the position I was in "off the mat".  Yoga is a practice where the lessons are taken "off the mat" and into life such as balance, strength, awareness of the moment etc. I was taking the practice of sivasana off the mat and into life.  I was in a neutral position and completely relaxed and my spirit was soothed. My stress was reduced and my body's healing process was supported.  I was non-doing.  That is what the essence of sivasana is.

I will not rush to the next project, I will not force myself into positions that my body is not yet ready to maintain.  Instead, I will ease myself into the next agenda and gently notice how I feel while I am there but until then, I will remain in corpse pose for as long as my soul requires it.

If You're Happy and You Know It...

Are you still waiting for your circumstances to change before you’ll allow yourself to be happy?  Most of us have preconceived ideas of what would make us happy, and we refuse to be satisfied until those things happen.
The problem is that even once specific things happen in our lives, we’re rarely satisfied with them!  Instead, we shift our focus to something even bigger and better, believing “it” will make us happy (or happier).  We never allow ourselves to reach a point of contentment.  Have you done the same thing to yourself?

The good news is that you can decide to be happy NOW – even if not everything in your life is perfect.  Below you’ll find 3 easy ways to do so:

1) Be grateful. (This just happens to be my favorite.  You can often find me in a Rampage of Gratitude!)  Gratitude is one of the most powerful states of mind that you can adopt.  Not only does it make you feel good, it shifts your focus from what you don’t have to what you DO have, and keeps it there!  As you focus more on what you are grateful to have in your life (even the really small blessings!), you worry less      about anything that may be lacking.  The result? 

A more pervasive sense of happiness!

2) Take time to smell the roses.  If you spend most of your days feeling rushed and scattered, it’s hard to feel happy and content.  In order to be truly happy, you need to make time for yourself to relax, dream, and take pleasure in life’s simpler moments.  Beginning today, make sure to spend time doing things you love on a regular basis.  Read books that stimulate your imagination; listen to great music like this song here; take long walks, and generally make an effort to enjoy your life as it is right now.

3) Love the journey.  Many of us make the mistake of pinning all of our expectations on some vague, far-off result, like the completion of goals.  We believe that once we “get there” everything will be perfect and we’ll finally be happy.  However, there is much to be gained from enjoying the journey TO your destination!  Make it your mission to revel in every moment that you’re working toward higher goals.  Enjoy the sense of self-mastery and accomplishment you gain with every goal you achieve.  Make it a worthwhile journey and you’ll savor the end result that much more!
The most important thing to understand about happiness is that it is largely a CHOICE you make from moment to moment.  Though certain serious situations make it difficult to feel happy at times, most often we allow the little things to bother us and block any happiness we would otherwise feel.  Embrace happiness, and it will grow to monstrous proportions in your life!

Ready to work one on one with me to increase your happiness factor?  I have a few spots available for one on one coaching.
To find out more, please visit The Light of Inspiration Company or schedule your 20 minute Inspiration Appointment today!

Just finished an inspiration mini-coaching session with the talented @HeySharonda - she had me laughing, facing fears & dreaming big!less than a minute ago via web Favorite Retweet ReplyJo Crawford
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