unknown

Leave Room For Possibility

My brain tends to straddle between the practical and the magical. But when I get overwhelmed, tired, or stressed out, it typically defaults to the practical, which, can be helpful in walking through things, but it can also close my peripheral vision and the place where the magic happens. I consciously work every day to keep the channels of possibility open in my mind, to leave room for the unknown and channel my positive energy to that place, because the truth is, I don’t know everything, no one does, or can, but believing I do, or that I know what the outcome will be, closes the door of possibility of anything different than what I’ve already predetermined will be. I’ve learned, from the many years of living in the dark, that, not only I am grateful that I left the door of possibility open just a crack on a day when it mattered most, but that me thinking I know everything can lead me to a place of utter despair and a state of emergency. So, every day, I keep that door open, even when it feels safer to slam it shut, for possibility to come in.

When I was struggling to find the light in my life if felt safer to close off the world around me. I tend to, when I feel like things are out of control in my life, try to tighten the reigns and control things more, at least what is within my control, but in doing that I only see what I want to see, and I’m only thinking of safety, or what I perceive as safety, instead of really seeing all of the possibilities of what’s out there. During those times of fear, the “what’s out there” is what scares me, but, what’s out there isn’t always something I should be fearful of, because it can bring many beautiful gifts. In my journey today it is important to keep my heart open, that is the place where possibility is born, which is why, at times, it can be scary to leave room for it, because I feel vulnerable. But it is within that vulnerability that I have received so many incredible gifts, and why I work, each day, to live within it.

I do believe we are meant to share ourselves with others, to share those vulnerabilities, be mindful of what we do, but allow people to see who we are and where we’ve been, to feel compassion for those around us, and to be open to new things, thoughts, people and challenges. I have found that my vulnerabilities, those things I used to work so hard to hide, are what connects me to those people I cherish most, it allows me to share my light with others who may need it, just as someone else’s vulnerability lit my path almost 14 years ago. Our vulnerability is a powerful thing, which is probably why it can be so scary to show it to the world, but it is our soft gooey center that is our sweetest part.

As I am thinking about the year ahead, I remind myself to leave room for possibility, and that may be easy as we look forward to a fresh start, but it’s important to leave that room every day, especially when things gets tough or we get bruised by disappointment, it’s during those times that we need to push that door open a little more. We don’t know everything, and even though things may look like all is lost, there may be a reason for it all happening the way it has, and by leaving room for possibility we allow ourselves to be open to a positive result. For me, I had to trudge through a lot of difficult roads to find myself on the road I am now, and I can see how all of the roads I traveled on, even the most treacherous, had to be traveled on to bring me to this road where the possibilities are endless. Open your heart and let the possibilities in. SLAY on!

SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you leave room for possibility, or close yourself off thinking you already know the outcome? Does living closed-minded leave any room for the unexpected, or possibility of a different outcome? When have you been surprised in my life when something turned out differently than you expected. Write down an example. What did you do differently then that you may not do ever day? What stops you from doing that every day? Look at possibility like leaving room for dessert, I know I never have a problem doing that, so do what needs to be done each day, make sound, clear choices, but leave a little extra room for something sweet, you may be surprised what comes your way.

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

Slay Say

Good morning SLAYER! It’s not the unknown that we fear, it’s what we think we know about the unknown that we fear.

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

State Of Slay What We Know

Don’t Borrow From Tomorrow

Before walking this path I was rarely present. There were a few reasons for that. One, I hated my present circumstances and hated who I was, so I would often think about tomorrow because that seemed less dim and dark because it hadn’t happened yet. Two, I wasn’t ready to take action to change the circumstances I was in, blaming others for my misfortune or believing I was a bad person who didn’t deserve better, so my head would live in the future with the hope that things would just magically get better on their own. They never did. When I set out to find a better way of life I was told to live in the present, to only look so far as what was in front of my hands, that, at first, frightened me, because it was hard to escape my situation when you could only look that far, but I realized that much of my anxiety came from fear of the unknown, fear of what might come next, and fear that I would also stay stuck right where I was. When I could focus on what was in front of my hands life became easier, because I only needed to focus on what was right in front of me each day, every day. My thoughts still wanted to jump ahead to tomorrow so I had to train it to stay with me right where I was, but the more I practiced it the more I found comfort in only focusing on each moment as it came, each task, each step I needed to take to get through the day. I realized why I had not been living that way as I started out on this new approach, there’s no hiding from the truth when all you have is the truth in each moment.

Jumping ahead was a way to escape, a way to fantasize and hope that things would get better. I would keep borrowing from tomorrow, and the tomorrows after those thinking somehow I could just wish things better, but as the years went on and the darkness got bigger and thicker, that hope was harder to find and I would reach farther and farther into the future while I was dying in the present. It was like a smokescreen, so I wouldn’t notice how bad things had gotten, and how bad they still could get, my thinking would propel me forward hoping a magical solution would present itself somewhere out there in the days that had not yet happened. They never did. The solution that appeared came to me in the present, in the form of a person, who in the present, could see how much I was suffering, and how sick I truly was, and in that present moment shared his story with me, which, in that moment, I did not fully absorb, but on a night when it really mattered, on a night when it mattered most, that story became as present as anything could be. I saw myself in that story and I was suddenly pulled back into the present, lost, scared, and wondering what to do next, but the thinking of what comes next, held me in the present.

When we find ourselves in those moments things get really simple. It becomes about survival, and when you’re fighting for your life there’s no time for complications. For me, I took the only action I could in that moment, I picked up the phone and asked for help, that action set off a chain of events that are still happening today, 13 years later, and today, 13 years later, I still focus on what’s in front of my hands, especially when life gets busy and can seem overwhelming.

It’s OK to plan for the future, to have goals and things you are working toward, but don’t cheat today by living in the future, you never know what you might have missed while you were looking ahead, and what you missed may have been the key to attaining everything you ever wanted in a future, and more, maybe even beyond your wildest dreams. SLAY on!

SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you have trouble staying present? Where does your mind typically go? Why do you think it doesn’t want to stay right where you are? What frightens you there? What makes you uncomfortable? What do you think living in the future offers you? What if you tried to live in the here and now? What if you only did what was in front of your hands? Do you see how simple your life would be? How much more grounded it would be? When you think about doing that how does it make you feel? Try it SLAYER, focus on what’s in front of your hands, don’t allow yourself to get ahead and go to places you have not yet been when there is work to do right here, trust that where you are is where you are meant to be, and that there is valuable information there that will help to get you to where you are supposed to go. Follow your hands and listen for the direction of where they should go next.

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

Knowledge Is Power

I used to be a “I don’t wanna know” kind of gal. I would put off going to the Doctor or looking into something I didn’t really want to know the answer to, or was afraid of. Consequently, by the time I would find out the answers is was generally too late to do anything about it because that opportunity had passed. I write a lot about finding out the facts, or focusing on the facts, and that, when we have the facts, we are safe. But we can take that one step further with, when we have knowledge, we have power. For instance, I was a passenger in a car accident this past summer, I got injured, not horribly, nothing was broken, but just your average car accident stuff, stiff neck, sore back, even though I was in pain I powered on, thinking it would right itself eventually. Well, it didn’t, so I started treatment, and it has improved over the past few months, but having just moved I had to switch doctors, and he ordered X-Rays, that sounded kind of scary, like, what if he finds out things are really bad in there, or, even worse, finds something else wrong? The old me would have avoided those X-Rays like the plague, coming up with excuses to not getting them, but now, even though I was nervous about the results, I went and got them done, because if there is something wrong, now is the time to correct it, not later when the body cannot be adjusted and has locked itself in to being a certain way. Looking at the X-Rays I learned a lot about my body, and why it does certain things, I gained knowledge, and, in the end, what I learned was that things weren’t nearly as bad as I had worried they might be, what is there is fixable, for the most part, and will help me live an active and healthy life, so, with that knowledge I know that everything will get better, and my Doctor now knows what plan of attack to start to get things back on track. I feel better having the knowledge about what is really going on and what it looks like, instead of just blindly going to treatment and trusting what’s being done is the right thing and helping. Now it’s not the unknown.

Why are we so afraid of the unknown? Why do we let it paralyze us? Why do we let it get in our way of taking care of ourselves and seeking out the best care? I know, for me, that even though I can have some fear around something, finding out the truth and learning about something I may not know about, far exceeds that fear, in fact, a lot of time it stomps all over it. Sometimes, gaining that knowledge takes some work, so we don’t do it, but if we’re not willing to work for ourselves, to help ourselves, then who are we willing to do the work for? If it’s for our well-being we should always be willing to do the work, no matter what it is, no one is certainly going to do it for us, nor can they most of the time, so invest in you, put in the work, put in the time, put in the energy to learn more about you and those things that affect you. I know, each of us carries around the baggage of our past of certain things having gone badly, but think about those times and ask yourself if you sought out the knowledge around those circumstances, did you get the facts? Sometimes no matter what we do there’s nothing we can do to change or better the outcome, but at least in those situations we can prepare ourselves for what’s coming, and possibly find a way to lessen the blow. Knowledge is always better than ignorance, or diversion, or not doing what’s best for you. Get the knowledge. Seek out the knowledge that helps you make the best decisions for you, that allows you to be our best you, and that gives you the tools to so you can help yourself.

Knowledge is power, don’t you want to arm yourself with as much power as you can?

SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you always seek out the answers to a problem, or do you avoid them hoping they’ll fix themselves? Name 5 instances when a situation got worse because you didn’t take action. What could you have done differently? What can you do in the future to avoid this same result? Name some times when you did take action and found out the truth and got some answers. How did that make you feel? How was this better than ignoring it? Make a pledge to yourself SLAYER, to get as much knowledge as you can, to find the answers in any given situation, and to give yourself the power to make the right decisions for you, and perhaps, find a better path. SLAY on.

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