by Kacey Mya Bradley | Aug 21, 2016 | Meditation, Simple Living, Spirituality
Once upon a time, my daily life was filled with mind-numbing tasks that I completed like a zombie.
I’d wake up to go to the office and barely have the energy to get out of the door. When my day was going well, one thing after another would happen: I’d bang my knee getting dressed and my car wouldn’t start. The stress added up and weighed me down every day.
Hours would pass before I could sleep, and then I’d wake up with a racing mind. Even when I tried to slow down or take a daycation, the stress would creep its way back into my life. The day I started to practice mindfulness, my entire life shifted—what really mattered in my life was given my full attention, and my worries began to dissipate as I dealt with them from a more aware perspective.
What Mindfulness Is Not
Mindfulness isn’t a reset button as much as I wished I could hit that button. The snooze button worked for a little while, but everyone wanted something from me when I wanted to be left alone.
No matter how hard I worked, I always worried about my success on projects. I despised faking smiles and telling lies when people asked how I was doing. All this stress does is distract you from being aware of what’s going on within yourself right now.
Mindfulness isn’t some watered down version of meditation where you chant mantras and take a certain number of breaths. It’s about taking notice and being here, in the now.
What Mindfulness Really Means
I’d heard all about how I needed to “be in the now,” and it does sound like a pitch to sign up for twenty classes of yoga on a special deal. Go ahead and take a second to roll your eyes, and I’ll tell you what mindfulness is really about for me.
Mindfulness is about waking up refreshed and open. Instead of mentally checking over my to-do list, I feel how comfortable my bed is and how energized my body feels after actually getting a decent night’s sleep. I listen to my heart, my breathing and even the sounds of construction outside my bedroom—the sounds of a new day starting. I frown at the banging of a hammer and stretch with a smile, open to receiving each moment to follow from a clear-headed space.
Instead of feeling behind, my sense of ease continues with me into the rest of the day. Mindfulness allows me to be responsive and observant of a moment as it happens, rather than making a stressful idea into a reality. Being mindful is a way of living.
How Being Mindful Affects My Everyday Life
Being mindful doesn’t take this huge effort, and it won’t take up your time. You don’t force yourself to think positively and criticize yourself when you don’t. You will worry, but as mindfulness becomes a part of your daily life, you’ll find that old stresses affect you less.
Most of the time, I don’t even notice when I am being mindful. I started bringing mindfulness into my daily rituals used to unwind and connect to myself. I began with Wednesdays, that “Yay! I’m halfway through!” day.
I’d go to a coffee shop with a big window and look out to the street.
Being somewhere else and allowing myself get lost was helpful, but stress would still find me.
That’s because I wasn’t experiencing the flow of what I was feeling in the moment.
I decided to sit down with my coffee, and for five minutes, focus on the birds outside eating the bread crumbs that a man was dropping.
The birds fought over the crumbs, but each bird had a piece before he left.
I found myself laughing and almost crying, because that felt like the day I had.
That day at work, I was so worried over having certain needs met and meeting the needs of others, that I scurried when everything was going to turn out okay, anyway.
Those silly birds, that fought over bread crumbs, flocked together no matter what.
From there on, I decided to choose one thing to observe within that weekly coffee break: from the people in cars driving home to my breathing.
Mindfulness was brought intentionally into other daily rituals. For example, when getting dressed in the morning, I take in everything possible: the cool air on my wet skin after a shower or the feel of fabric soft on my skin.
Mindfulness sneaked its way into my morning drive to work and in evenings when I walk the dog. Instead of cursing at stopped traffic, I notice my breathing, and calmly call in late if that’s going to be the case.
Instead of rushing the dog along on his walk, we take in the evening air.
I’ve noticed the seasons changing in more detail. I have let go of stress and recognize what is outside of my control.
Stress can be addictive. Maybe you work in a stressful environment like I did and want to shift your perspective by being more mindful. Maybe life feels too mundane or routine. All of that was true for me, but bringing mindfulness into my daily life became the day I started living.
Kacey Mya Bradley is a lifestyle blogger for The Drifter Collective. Her love for the world around her is portrayed through her visually pleasing, culturally embracing and inspiring posts. She writes an eclectic lifestyle blog that expresses various forms of style through the influence of culture and the world around us. You can also find her on Twitter, Pinterest and Instagram.
*Photo credit
by Monica Espinoza | Aug 5, 2016 | Self Love, Uncategorized
“To love oneself is the beginning of a lifelong romance.” Oscar Wilde
In my twenties, I had control issues that prevented me from truly falling in love.
I had a boyfriend who genuinely loved me and we were together for over 8 years. Only, I never truly fell in love. That truth didn’t set me free as much as it scared me.
The root of that fear is what my journey of self-love has been about.
I believe it is the root and source of all emotional pain.
I mustered courage to end that long term relationship and later had a few short term romances that ended abruptly and hurt tremendously.
So, I avoided men which reduced my chances of falling in love and ultimately getting hurt. I was ambivalent about romance because of my upbringing.
Given my parent’s violent quarrels and painful exchanges, you could understand my ambivalence.
I rationalized that I needed to love myself first before I could be in a relationship.
My wise therapist suggested working on loving myself while dating.
I was reluctant, but realized that I had unsuccessfully tried loving myself even when I hadn’t been in a relationship.
I worked through some of my many issues and became adept at processing feelings but not at feeling the extent of my wounding.
Still, I inched closer to a love-affair with myself by putting effort into my relationship with a new boyfriend.
So how do you love yourself when you are in a relationship?
Self -love requires your willingness to be very intimate, vulnerable, honest and courageous to admit the truth about what you think and how you feel.
It requires surrender and making time to be with ourselves to listen to our whole being.
Here are 6 ways to fall in love with yourself:
1. Intimacy is energy circulating within you in love and trust.
You become an explorer of your inner domain. Intimacy is letting your guard down and welcoming every experience. Intimacy creates sensitivity to self and others. You become aware of everything you are feeling.
It means trusting that the Universe is providing everything you need.
To be intimate, you must be vulnerable.
2. Vulnerability is willingness to experience your insecurities.
It isn’t so much about disclosing your insecurities to others as it is about being with your insecurities.
Vulnerability requires honesty and courage to yourself.
3. Honesty means you tell the truth to yourself.
It requires trust and conscious emotional awareness.
Your emotions offer important messages.
Avoiding these messages is not growth promoting nor very loving.
Honesty takes courage.
4. Courage means you are willing to experience your pain including any bodily sensations.
It requires attention to what you are feeling in your body and what you are thinking moment by moment.
It doesn’t mean examining or studying your experience or thoughts.
Self-love requires courage to surrender.
5. Surrender is letting go of controlling what is or what may or may not happen.
Embrace rather than resist your pain.
Experience your pain. Feel your pain.
Love whether of self or others becomes more graceful when you simply surrender to what is, including what you feel.
You must feel the depth of your pain which is at the root your fear that you lack value.
To feel deeply you have to make time.
6. Time with yourself is valuing yourself enough to listen to yourself.
Being aware of what you are experiencing allows you to introspect which means coming to an understanding of your experience.
The key is not getting lost in the mental aspect of introspection without first feeling your pain.
It is being emotionally aware while not being absorbed by your emotions. Your conscious awareness empowers you so you are not swept away by your emotions.
Self-love is a journey and practice of being intimate, vulnerable, honest, and courageous. These form the foundation of self-love. Other elements help you to actively love yourself like patience, good self-care, kindness, self-validation, setting boundaries, forgiveness, etc.
The beauty of your journey is that opportunities for growth and greater self-love arise continuously. What is vital to loving yourself is a firm decision and willingness to venture to live life as well as a commitment to expand your own love.
You don’t live life by thinking about it.
You live by experiencing.
If you struggle to love yourself, it is likely you don’t fall in love easily.
It points to a tendency to be caught in your mind.
Being absorbed in your thoughts means you are not fully present to live your life. If you think too much then you need to remind yourself to feel with your body.
“Like lovemaking it is a whole body experience not just a mental exercise.”
You don’t hold back but give in to the knowing of your whole being.
The universal human experience of falling in love is referred to as a ‘fall’ as it happens unexpectedly.
You don’t struggle or plan the fall, it just happens.
You don’t attempt to control your feelings for doing so compromises our freedom and happiness.
When you value yourself, you do things that fulfill you and makes you happy.
Self- love as well as love for others is real when it makes you feel open, free, and happy.
When you love, you are free.
When you are free, you love no matter what.
Being free to love is true happiness.
True happiness is priceless.
Living is about being present to each moment.
You’ll know you have started to fall in love with yourself when you feel free to be yourself anywhere and with anyone.
You know you are loving yourself more when you value yourself in situations where you had not before.
Others will be drawn to you because you invite them to be themselves.
Monica Espinoza is an artistic writer, blogger and self-love alchemist. To receive her regular posts by email, sign up for her blog here.
* Photo credit Oakley F
