better

Slay Say

Good morning SLAYERS! You either make yourself accountable our you will be made accountable to your circumstances.

SLAY on!

State Of Slay Accountability

Accountability

A huge part of my recovery has been my ability to be accountable. That is something I had to learn, as I certainly wasn’t practicing it while living in the dark. Back then I often would say and do things and then blame them on others, pretend it hadn’t been me who had said or done something, or denied my involvement in something that I alone had orchestrated. Being accountable was not something I looked at as an attribute, I wanted what I wanted, and I was going to do whatever it took to get it. When I sat down to look at my life, I had failed myself and others by not being accountable, and if I had any hope of getting better that had to stop.

At first it felt like protective curtain had been lifted from me, that I had nowhere to hide, and I didn’t, but that was the point, I shouldn’t have to hide anything if I’m living an honest life and being forthright with my intentions and expectations. I was told to suit up and show up when I made a commitment, and if there was a reason I could not, I needed to let that be known and why. I found it difficult at first, as I had operated under this smokescreen of mystery for most of my adult life, never really committing to things, being vague and manipulating those around me to produce a desired outcome for myself, but all of that really got me was continued suffering in my disease, my head would tell me that I had won, but each time I wasn’t accountable and honest I was actually loosing, and that was happening daily as I slipped deeper and deeper into darkness and despair. I knew if I was going to save my life I had to get honest, so no matter how uncomfortable it felt a the start I walked through it and trusted it was better on the other side. And, being uncomfortable was the worst of it, it didn’t kill me to be honest and accountable, in fact, it was a big part of building my self-esteem and self-respect, both of which I was lacking. Being accountable was my ticket to better health, better relationships and a better life, so I trudged forward, even when it made me nervous to do so, and I have to say, that never once did it produce a negative effect. Being accountable did exactly what was promised, I began feeling better about myself, I started to make better choices and engaging in healthy activities I was actually excited to be a part of and participate in, I was no longer finding the need to hide from people because I had promised too much, or something I had no intention of following through with. Being accountable forced me to make better choices for myself and telling on myself when I didn’t, which eventually got me in the habit of making those better choices the first time. It was the filter I used before I said or did anything, and it kept me on the path I am now. When we are being honest and accountable for our actions there is no need to hide or feel nervous about any situation, we are being true to ourselves, our motivations and our journey. When we are accountable miracles happen, people and situations can change that we would have never seen otherwise, it’s what keeps us in the light and doing what’s right.

You may have lived your life believing that you have to hide your true intentions or your truth from those around you, but when you do you keep yourself sick, being accountable gives you the tool to live your life with far less complications, to have open and honest relationships with others and to be your best self. Accountability is the key to unlocking a life of better decisions and an anchor to keep you grounded as you walk onto a path of a fulfilling life, one where you are taking care of yourself while achieving the things that you could only hope for in the past and that never seemed to materialize while you were hiding in the shadows. Being accountable puts the spotlight on you and in that light you can learn to shine bright. SLAY on!

SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you think of yourself as accountable? If yes, how are you accountable in your life? In what areas do you struggle to be accountable? How can you improve those areas? What stops you from being accountable? How can you overcome what stops you? In what areas have you improved your accountability? How has this changed your life? Your life will continue to improve the more accountable you are. Accountability means being more reliable to yourself and your needs and to those you choose to have in your life. When you are accountable you can’t go wrong, and even if your plan does go wrong, being accountable provides you with the tools to admit that and move on. In a way it’s a type of superpower, and when you master it, you’ll have the power of good in your life.

S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you

Slay Say

Good morning SLAYER! You did what you knew how to do at the time, when you know better, you do better.

New blog goes up Sunday, until then… SLAY on!

State Of Slay Green Better Not Bitter

When Things Seem To Be Falling Apart, They May Be Falling Together

I was reminded yesterday, thanks to Facebook memories, which aren’t always a good thing, but yesterday was a good one, that one year ago yesterday my life changed, a change for the better, and a change that has brought me to this place I am today, gratefully so. Personally, a year go, I was not in a good place, a place that did not serve me, make me happy, or, was good for my spirit, I knew I needed to make a change, and had known for a while, but wasn’t sure what the next step was. An opportunity came, out of the blue, and I jumped at it, not knowing what was waiting for me on the other side. The reasons I thought the opportunity was going to be a good one turned out not to be what I received from it at all, what I received was something better, and unexpected. But it got me thinking today about this topic, when things seem like they’re falling apart, they may be falling together. We only know what we know, which, in the big picture, is very little, but we work with the knowledge we have each day to make the best choices we can. That’s all we can do. Many times we get caught up trying to future surf, trying to imagine or wish for what we would like happen when we should be focusing on what we can change in our present lives to possibly get to that place, or a better place for us. When things don’t go as we would like, or had expected, we can fall into depression, anxiety or fear and let the disappointment of what we had thought our lives, relationship or situation was going to be consume us allowing the negative self-talk to creep in telling us we’re stuck, alone or don’t deserve better, but what we should really be doing is accepting what is not meant to be and being open to what is next.

In my experience, life, very often, doesn’t go as planned, but, it always goes as it is meant to. The highs and especially the lows have all been designed for a reason, and each experience has gotten me right here where I am today. Many times those things I thought I needed or wanted, when I look back, likely saved me from heartache or a situation that may have ultimately lead me down some dark roads. But, I’ve found, when I’ve opened my heart, and asked for direction, told the universe that I am ready for change, ready for new things and ready to take action, it appears. Now, that’s not to say the sky is going to open up revealing the secrets to life, but, when we are open, the signs, the people, the opportunities do come, but we have to make sure that we don’t grab for the same ones we have before and take a chance on something new, something different if we want to see change in our lives. A wise friend used to say to me, “the universe will give us the same present over and over, but in different wrappings, just to see if we’ve learned our lesson or, really mean we’re ready for change,” and that was true for me, probably for you too. How many times have we found ourselves in a place and said, “how did I get here again,” the wrapping may have fooled us and we got the same present we had already unwrapped many times. I try to look for those signs, things that I recognize from past situations that didn’t work or got to me a place I didn’t like, but sometimes we get fooled and tricked into believing that something, or someone, are different. So, when things start to fall apart, start to look at things as they are, not how we think they may be, or want them to be, for what the facts are, and see if there may be a reason for them falling apart.

When I look back over the past year, I had no idea what this weekend was going to mean to me a year later, I just took the opportunity that was in front of me and trusted I was being directed to where I needed to be, and I trusted that it was a place where I could let my heart be open and that it was safe, as a result, something beautiful happened that weekend, something unexpected and my life shifted.

When things don’t seem to be going your way, when relationships are ending or when you just don’t seem to be getting anywhere in your pursuit of things, instead of focusing on what may not be working, ask yourself why it may not working and what it may be showing you, what you perceive as the biggest disaster may just bring you to your greatest achievement, if you let go of what you think things should be and trust where you are being lead. SLAY on!

SLAY OF THE DAY: When things appear to be falling apart do you fall into despair or trust that you are being led to something new? Have there been examples in your life when things looked to be falling apart but were actually falling together? What’s an example. When you look back on your life do see examples of this happening that you may not have thought were examples of this? Do you look for new opportunities when something ends or falls apart, or do you tend to follow the same patterns and find yourself in the same places over and over? What patterns do you see in your life that you could break for a different or better result? Look for those places SLAYER, to make changes, trust that you are being given what you need to make those changes, and also look for places that may look different, but may be places you’ve already been that didn’t work. Life is a journey, we are here to learn, but ultimately we are given the direction to get to where we are meant to be.

S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you

Slay Say

Good morning SLAYERS! To be human is to feel broken sometimes, but loving all those broken pieces is it’s own kind of beautiful.

New blog goes up Sunday, until then…SLAY on!

State Of Slay Kill Your Sadness

I See It When I Believe It

Before getting well, I was often heard saying the opposite, “I’ll believe that when I see it,” which was almost always followed by an eye roll. I had a very skeptical mind that always went to the negative. I looked for the negative so that’s what I saw. I believed that’s what I deserved because I believed I was a bad person and I was ashamed of how I was living my life. Even when good things did come, I thought something negative would follow it to balance things out, robbing me of the enjoyment of that good. It never occurred to me to look for the good, or even that it was there before I stepped on this path.

When I made a commitment to get better I was encouraged to look for the good. I was in the darkest place I had ever been, so the thought that there was anything in my life that could be labeled good seemed far-fetched, but I was reminded that I was standing in a place of willingness, willingness to find a solution and get better, that alone was something good, and, that was something I could hang onto to start. Looking back, that was a lot of good, it took a lot of courage to come forward and share my true self, true pain and true thoughts and feelings, but I knew my life depended on it, so I gathered up all the courage I could to step forward. As I continued my journey I was constantly challenged to find the good, and to believe in it. Some days it was difficult to find it and I had to hold on to the simple facts that I had made it on this journey so far and that was positive, that I had love and support in my life and I was still alive. I had to break it down to those simple facts some days just to get by. But with most things, the more we do them the easier they become, and the more I started to look for the good and positive things in my life the more I found. I wrote them down at first, and some days still do, to remind myself so that if I came up against negative thinking I could pull that list out of my pocket and read them to myself. Just the act of reading or saying those things out loud could sometimes change my thinking. I also was encouraged to reach out to others when I was having a negative day, and not to talk about how bad I felt, but to ask them how their day was. That act also, many times, turned my thinking around, and most of all, got my thinking outside of myself. For me, the root of my troubles centered in my mind, my thinking, my thoughts wanted to keep me in the dark and isolated from everyone, so by doing things that took me out of my own thoughts or the negative thinking I had become accustomed to, my thinking started to change and so did my perception of the world around me.

I know today that I have the power to see what I want to see. I can take any day, any situation, and make it positive or negative, it’s all in how I look at it, or what I choose to take away. When I believe I deserve the good, when I believe I have good in my life, I see it, and not only do I see it, I feel it and share it with others. It becomes like a magnet, and that energy I give out brings back the same energy. But it starts with me believing. As a recovered “victim of life” that makes me feel pretty powerful.

If you believe it, you’ll see it. SLAY on!

SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you tend to see things from a negative perspective? Why do you think that is? Have you always been that way? If not, what changed? If you have, why do you think that is? Have you tried to find the positive in your life? How has that gone? Have you found it? Have you lost it? How? What if you made a commitment to look for the good, the positive, in your day today? Write down all of the things you find, and put it in your pocket for a rainy day. Practice doing this every day until you start to notice the positive on your own. Life is really what we make it, and when we believe it, we can see it.

S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you

Be Stronger Than Your Strongest Excuses

I never considered myself a weak person. I had overcome a lot and had always considered myself strong. But in certain areas my excuses were stronger. Even though I knew what I should be doing, and sometimes set out to do those things, sometimes my excuses would be stronger and I would stop, or I wouldn’t even start, convincing myself there was no point, it didn’t really matter, or it wasn’t worth the work anyway. It’s amazing what we can convince ourselves of, even when doing the work is the clear cut answer. A lot of the time, before I got well, those excuses usually got in the way of my health. It never failed, when I needed to take action for my own well-being that the excuses would take steroids and bulk up. And truthfully, the stronger they got, the weaker my resolve would be and in the end I did feel weak. When I got on the road to recovery I needed to pump my strength back up. I knew that it wasn’t going to be easy, but I needed to be stronger than the excuses my head was going to throw at me. I had to also learn that that struggle was the key to getting better.

We all have struggles and have certain areas where our excuses have been lifting weights and have the strength of a million men. But, that strength is only based on the power we give them. They have no strength alone. It is us that gives our excuses their power, which means that we also have the power to take it away. Now, that can be challenging, especially when we’ve allowed yourselves to be bullied by our excuses for a long time, or, have convinced yourselves we’re not worthy of anything better. We are. We just have to show those excuses who’s boss.

For me the key to getting my strength back came as I started to practice self-love and self-care, I practiced these things by practicing loving acts toward myself, by making a conscious effort to change my thinking to positive thoughts and choosing esteemable acts. As I started to change gears into a daily routine of what was best for me and my ongoing physical and mental health, my excuses started to lose their strength. They became weaker. My strength got stronger as I got better and started to leave behind my old destructive ways, and those excuses that I used to let stand in my way, no longer made sense to me. I was not only feeling stronger, but feeling better, and no excuse was going to take that away from me.

We don’t have to let excuses get in the way of what is best for us. We are the ones who can kick those excuses to the curb and get ourselves on track to our best selves. When we live in the now, when we think in terms of just doing next right thing and make a commitment to ourselves love ourselves enough to do what’s best for us, our strength beats out the strength of our excuses. Time to start showing those excuses who’s boss! SLAY on!

SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you let excuses bully you into not taking action? What do your excuses get in the way of most? Why do you think that is? How can you change that? What’s an example of something your excuses have taken from you, or prevented you from doing? How can you overcome those excuses the next time that same opportunity comes up? How do you think overcoming that excuse will benefit you? Why do you think those excuses come up for you? Well, it’s time they stop running the show. We get to decide what is best for us, and we can also tell, whatever might be standing in our way, to stand back, we’re running this show.

S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you

Slay Say

Good morning SLAYER!  The mind is like a parachute, it only works when it’s open.

New blog goes up Tuesday, until then…SLAY on!

State Of Slay Negative Actions

Avoid Slippery Places

As we walk our own path, working to be our best selves, giving back to others, and challenging ourselves to grow and move forward, we can sometimes hit a slippery patch if we’re not paying attention to where we’re going. Those slippery patches can be different for all of us, depending on what we’re not wanting to slip back to. For an alcoholic it could be a bar or social situation that we used to drink at, for a gambler it could be a casino, for a overeater it can be passing by our favorite bakery, and it can be as simple as engaging with family and friends. Anyone, or anything, that triggers us to our old way of thinking can cause us to slide back to our old ways, if we’re not careful.

For me, those emotional places are the trickiest, as specific situations or actions can cause me to recoil, reminding me of someone or something from my past. They can, at times, seemingly, come out of nowhere, and then BAM, they’re right in my face, and it’s in those moments when I have to make a choice, to do what I’ve always done, or to make a different and better choice than I used to. Those slippery places are much more difficult for me than any physical place, or object, that may remind me of my past. And, I also have to ask myself honestly, if I sought out a specific situation because it’s one I know, even if it wasn’t done consciously. I would have to say no, today, but the universe has a way to testing us, and disguising otherwise different looking situations and then we realize they are not. For me, it’s important to acknowledge what my part may be in finding myself there, and if there were no warning signs or self-sabotage, asking why the universe has chosen to place me there and what am I there to learn. You see, just because we find ourselves in a similar situation as we have before, doesn’t mean it’s necessarily bad for us, it may be just another opportunity to do things better than we have before and to move past that issue or pain from our past and finally let it go. It takes some sleuth work to look at it for what it is, and a lot of honesty, but if we walk our new path with awareness of who we are today, and where we don’t want to go again, most things should be easy to navigate through, some are a little more difficult to identify, which is why it always helps to have some good sounding boards in our lives, those people who are like us, and can help us walk through those murky waters.

It is up to us to stay away from the slippery places in our lives, and when we find ourselves there, to recognize them and safely walk ourselves through them. Life is full of slippery places, but it’s important to stay firmly on our path and continue to make decisions and choices that honor who we are today and the way of life we are currently living. There is nothing waiting for us in the past, it has already happened, and hopefully, taught us what we need to know today and in the future, nothing can be gained by sliding back. Watch your steps today and make sure you’re not unnecessarily tempting yourself by walking too close to your old way of life. SLAY on!

SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you tempt yourself by putting yourself in old situations or with triggers from your past? Why do you do this? If not, why do you think you’ve stopped? Do you sometimes find yourself in situations that are the same or remind you of your past? How do you think you get there? Do you think you seek out those situations? Or, do you think that sometimes those situations look different to start and the universe has disguised them as something they are not to see if you’ve moved past who you were before? What situations today do you avoid to live a healthier and happier life? How did you overcome them? What can you still work on to avoid slipping back? We naturally do tend to look for situations we are familiar with, but it is up to us to not engage in those activities, or those people, who pull us back to who we used to be, we must be diligent about our path today and protecting it from the those slippery places that can cause us to fall.

S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you

We Do What We Know

We are only as good as the information that have been passed down to us. The information we’ve observed. And the information we’ve sought out. But many of us don’t seek out other ways of doing things because we usually think we have all the information we need. Many times we don’t. What may have worked for our parents, or theirs, or the people around us, may not work for us, yet we continue to try the ways of those other people and wonder why things are so difficult. Or, we know something isn’t working and we continue to do it anyway, trying to will it into working when it never will work. I can personally attest to that. My life before wasn’t working. I wasn’t happy and until things got to a place where I had to make some changes, some major changes, to save my life, I wasn’t willing to seek out a new way of doing things.

Up until that point I never even questioned how or why I would do the things I would. I was living with undiagnosed mental illness and trying to do things the way other people around me where doing them, or, how it appeared they were, through my warped sense of perspective. I also didn’t realize then that what we see on the outside, very often, does not reflect what’s going on on the inside for someone. I know it didn’t for me, and it didn’t occur to me that many of the people I came into contact with every day may also be showing the world one thing, but may be secretly struggling with something internally. Yet, I would continue to judge myself based on what was being presented. Using that as my guidelines, I wasn’t ever going to get any better.

When I made the decision to get well, I had to throw out most of what I knew. None of that was working and I had to find a new way of life if I wanted to be my best self. It was hard to break those patterns I had established over a lifetime, and to look at the behavior that contributed to me landing on my knees asking for help. Making different choices, new choices, better choices, wasn’t always easy to start, it felt strange and foreign a lot of the time, but I was encouraged to keep making them and if I did, I would see results. I helped to have a strong group of people in my life I could run things by when I wasn’t sure what the next right thing was to do, and sometimes even knowing what the right thing to do was, I would fall back into destructive behaviors from my past. And all of that, was OK. Even when we fall back, we have an awareness of what the better choices was, and, we can make that choice next time. For me, the more I was making better choices, those old choices from my past no longer felt good, I didn’t want to jeopardize the progress I was making, so I was making them less and less.

Until we question if what we’re doing is really best for us, we will do what we know, and what we know may be just the thing that’s standing in our way of happiness and good health. Today is a good time to ask yourself, am I doing what works for me, or am I just doing what I know? The answer may unlock the door to where you are supposed to be. SLAY on!

SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you look at the way you do things and question it, or just do what you know? When things go wrong, or don’t feel good, do you take that opportunity to look at how you got yourself there? What, in your life, have you changed to suit you that isn’t the way you used to do it, or what you knew? What prompted that change? Are there things in your life that you should also change? What are they? We should always be taking inventory, looking at our lives and asking ourselves what’s working and not working, what would we like to see change and how can we make that change happen? Even when we’ve made changes in the past, those changes might not be current with what we need today. Our lives are always changing and growing, or they should be, so we need to stay on top of what we need today, and what we need to do today to get to where we want to go, and should go.

S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you