Mindful Pause Podcast

Last week, I shared that I was feeling low, stuck and uninspired. Our #ittybittyshittycommittee brainwashes us with repetitive dialogue that is often negative and vague. Listening to it just perpetuates fear.

Although it’s healthy to feel heavy feelings, it’s unhealthy to dwell in those feelings, looping you into a story that shapes your beliefs and actions (or in my case my inaction).

I was paralized with debilitating comparison, doubt and anxiety. I’m talking jealousy, bitterness, self-sabotage - low level stuff! 

I’m completely stretching out of my comfort zone to create my SOUL SCHOOL online course. I’m pouring my heart and soul into this program and, honestly, I’m fearful no one will want it and I’ll be a failure.

By getting quiet,  I realized the ONE thing I could do to pull myself out of the dark hole of feeling the overwhelming anxiety was to take ACTION. 

...any action.

If we don’t take some form of action, we stay stuck in victimhood. The Fear beats us down, until we believe it. The inner critic wins. 

Digging deeper into my heart, I know with every bone and cell in my body that this program will change lives, guide people to create their legacy and help shape them into the person they are meant to me. This is what I’m meant to do is to serve and be that messenger to guide people their answers within them. 

THAT! That’s a way better motivator than being afraid to look stupid.

So, I took action. 

Fear loses.

Through action, we create momentum to move away from our doubts, fears, and judgement. 

Action propels you into positive energy that carries you to the next step … and the next step … far, far away from fear.

How do you move through FEAR? 

What were you doing when you were 14 years-old? At 14, Mimi Ausland was already living her purpose of making an impact on homeless animals with her company freekibble.com which helped feed over 14 Million homeless animals.

Now at 23, she had the courage to leave college her sophomore year, move to Santa Monica to follow her passion of helping save our oceans and environment by founding FreeTheOcean.com, a click-to-give website to create a free, fun and easy way to make a daily and tangible difference in in our oceans with the 19 billion pounds of plastic pollution.

“The greatest threat to our planet is someone else will save it.”

Mimi believes that small actions lead to a big impact

Combining her childhood love of trivia with her value of giving back, every time you play their daily trivia question on FreeTheOcean.com, you’re helping fund the removal of a piece of plastic from the ocean and coastlines and you’ll learn something new and have fun while doing it!

In just one month of starting her company, FreeTheOcean.com has removed 580,000 pieces of plastic!

I hope today’s conversation inspires you to tap into your childhood passions and have the tenacity to know you can do anything you desire – one small action leads to a big impact.

https://www.freetheocean.com

Perfection is boring. . . not to mention EXHAUSTING!

Embrace your flaws. 

We may have failures, but we ARE NOT failures.

You are FLAWesome!

With divine timing it’s the Autumn Equinox, where there is equal light and dark hours and the  new moon creating a potent time to go inward and look at both light and dark areas of life, shed layers of habits and limited beliefs that aren’t serving you and cultivate new beliefs and visions that do.

This exercise is a dynamic time to hold your dark and light aspects equally in one hand so you can learn from both. 

Normally, we do our goal setting in January, but with the change of seasons, it’s a good time to check in and see what you’re currently delighting in and what you’re struggling with.

Please listen to the previous episode before starting this meditation EP 66 to clear away any mind chatter so you can tune into the whisper of your heart and soul, the internal GPS that guides you to your truth. Let yourself free flow write without any commentary.

You have all of the answers within you.

Download the FREE Manifestation Journal Exercise PDF HERE

With divine timing it’s the Autumn Equinox, where there is equal light and dark hours and the  new moon creating a potent time to go inward and look at both light and dark areas of life, shed layers of habits and limited beliefs that aren’t serving you and cultivate new beliefs and visions that do.

This exercise is a dynamic time to hold your dark and light aspects equally in one hand so you can learn from both. 

Normally, we do our goal setting in January, but with the change of seasons, it’s a good time to check in and see what you’re currently delighting in and what you’re struggling with.

Please listen to the guided meditation EP 67 to clear away any mind chatter so you can tune into the whisper of your heart and soul, the internal GPS that guides you to your truth. Let yourself free flow write without any commentary.

You have all of the answers within you.

Download the FREE Manifestation Journal Exercise PDF at www.YourBlissfulSoul.com

How often have you said something that blurted out of your mouth that you didn’t mean to say, or said something hurtful as a knee jerk reaction because you were hurt, or gossiped when you’re not a gossiper, or said something judgmental only to feel shameful that you said it.

With so many outlets to voice yourself these days, and sometimes anonymously voice your opinions, we can say and do things from an unconscious place.

I talk a lot about mindfulness on this podcast, but isn’t everything that we’re striving for deeper connection to others and to ourselves, honest conversations, meaningful relationships, and more purpose in our lives all require mindfulness?

This week’s Mantra Monday is an easy acronym to help bring more mindfulness into every you say and do. The acronym is to THINK before you say or act. Ask yourself these questions:

T is it thoughtful?

H is it helpful?

I is it inspiring?

N is it necessary?

K is it kind?

T is it thoughtful? Is it truthful? Are you coming from an honest and loving place?

H is it helpful? What is the intention behind your words and actions? Is it for the other person’s benefit or just for you?

I is it inspiring? Not everything you say or do will be inspiring, but you lead by example. Are you living your values of who you want to be?

N is it necessary? I’ve caught myself saying things that really are extra, unnecessary, and can convolute the conversation. I do this a lot with my husband. Sometimes I include way too many details that are unnecessary, and then I see his eyes glaze over and I know I’ve lost him. I’m working on being more clear and concise so that people will listen and know exactly what I’m talking about. Sometimes we say things that just aren’t very necessary.

K is it kind? When I was pregnant, my husband, Jake and I had the conversation of how we wanted to raise our daughter and the values we wanted to instill in our family life. Being kind was top on our list. Above anything else. Kindness will take you a long way in life. authentic kindness makes people feel seen and heard. 

When practicing the acronym THINK this week, you may not get to all 5 of the questions each time you say or do something, but even being more mindful of one of them will help guide your conversations and your actions to be more in line with your conscious and higher self.

I’d love to hear from you. Please share with me how do you bring more mindfulness into your daily life?

EP 64: Be The Light 

My friend, Cameasha is one of the people who always exude a positive light. Her light is real, not just a mask of positivity or affirmations. It’s in her DNA, her beliefs and values to always be the light. It’s her mantra that she lives every day.

So, I’m adopting it this week and I invite you to too.

We live in a world that’s so divided. We’re busy and stressed. We’re unconsciously reacting. You can’t depend on other people to be the light. YOU HAVE to be the light.

What does being the light look like? Gandhi said “Be the Change you wish to see in the world.” It all starts with you.

What if you worked on improving yourself without expectations of others? Often times, we change ourselves, but don’t let go of expectations of others and get frustrated that nothing is changing. Like “we changed, now you change too. I’m positive, but it didn’t work on this person. I’m doing the work, now you be conscious too.”

That’s not being the light. That’s being manipulative. 

You don’t know what other people are going through. They may not have the conscious tools like you do to be more mindful and kind. What you say and do may make all the difference in another person’s day, without you even knowing it.

You’re going to put effort in your day, so why not put effort in being the light, especially in those dark circumstances. Also, Life becomes really nice when you don’t let others affect you. it’s nicer to be in an abundant state and know you have control of yourself, and not others. You don’t take on their shit.

Being the light is subtle. When you work on your own awakening, without needing to control external things like the result or a person, your perspective expands and your heart softens. You can see that really being the light is being in a pure state of love without putting your crap onto someone else or taking on their crap. You can be compassionate, encouraging, forgiving, kind without the blame, shame or keeping score.

There is something magical that just works when you let go of your expectations of changing yourself to change others. You’re in the flow. You are the change you wish to see in the world. You are the light.

Falesha A. Johnson is a woman of many hats. She was a 2x all American at the University of Washington, and has used her track and field collegiate and professional experience to create Felite Performance, a fitness company, that focuses on training youth and adult athletes.

When she’s not training, she’s a full-time fundraiser for UW and a public speaker striving to build confidence and leadership skills.

It was so great to talk to her because we both had a revelation – the same advice we would give to our younger self is the same advice we give to ourselves today: I can. I will. I am deserving. 

You deserve to be here too.

So, how do you find your purpose, get over fear and lead with authenticity? Find out on today's episode!

Some words of wisdom from Falesha:

• You can only build your confidence when you allow yourself to be exactly who you are
• You belong here and are deserving
• Say YES to opportunities to grow.
• There’s something to learn from failure.
• Pay it forward and make a difference.
• Find your purpose by aligning with your values
• Slow things down, spend more energy on what brings you joy & run towards fear
• Find the good in things
• You can only build your confidence when you allow yourself to be exactly who you are

If it’s not gonna matter in 5 years, don’t spend more than 5 minutes upset by it

We have 50,000-70,000 thoughts a day. Typically, they’re somewhere else other than in the present moment.

How often do you ruminate and turn over a story?

How much time and energy and your spending holding onto a story, a grudge, resentment, anger, guilt, shame, or worrying about something, turning over an outcome that already happened or may not even happen, or recycling that story about that person who wronged you, or didn’t love you or didn’t do what you would’ve done.

Instead where could you redirect that energy that would more useful to you? even if it’s just creating some space to allow for creativity or peace. Or maybe some positive thoughts to build more self-love and create balance in your life?

I know, this mindfulness stuff is hard work. It’s effort. You’re already spending your effort somewhere, so is that effort beneficial to you?

This week’s mantra Monday is: If it’s not gonna matter in 5 years, don’t spend more than 5 minutes upset by it.

Let me know how this has changed your perspective. I know this has totally shifted mine!

Our mind’s job is to stay busy. To protect. To analyze. To make sense of things

But when our mind runs wild, it can take us into places that aren’t good for us.

Byron Katie says, there's “Your Business, Other People’s Business and God’s Business.”

Our Ego loves to be right, so it compares us to others. We judge others, we worry about others – their opinions, their actions. How they wronged us, how this person should do something different than what we want, worrying over someone and their choices. We have no control over other people. These stories of others play over and over in our head exhausting our energy. It’s Wasted time of energy. Makes us small.

When I tell someone “I just want you to be happy, you should do this, I wish He was like this, I care about you that why I tell you should do X,” this is me getting into someone else’s business.

Gossiping about someone is an obvious way we are getting into someone else’s business. It’s low level energy and does absolutely nothing for our soul. In fact, it depletes it with judgement, negativity and smallness. But even sharing information about someone else’s life is a way, our minds keep us busy. I used to talk about other people because I didn’t think I had much to share about myself and it made me feel important that I knew what was going on with other people’s lives. It’s not productive or important. I have no control over it.

We worry about things that are in God’s hands – call it source, the universe – things like the weather, catastrophes, life and death. Things we have no control over. We spend our energy on these things and they actually can sway our feelings and moods. Think about it: the weather is rainy, so it ruins your day. YOUR day? Or you get angry over a catastrophe and let your mind ruminate over it for days. Or the injustice of something that is completely out of your control.

While it’s good to feel your feelings, worrying about anything that you don’t have direct control over is futile. It causes conflict in your mind. It keeps you stuck in business that is exhausting.

The only thing we have control over is ourselves. Our thoughts, actions, words. When you focus your energy on what YOU do have control over, life shifts and your perspective changes.

You no longer need to feel in resistance to what’s going on in life. you can feel, accept and let go. You no longer need to feel like a victim, because you know you have the power of your thoughts, choice and actions. You no longer need to hold on to resentments and judgement. You can be free to let people be who they are, and you focus on you.

I don’t know about you, but that sounds pretty liberating! I’ve let other people, my grudges, opinions, the weather, outside circumstances control me, because I’ve been trying to control it.

The Invitation this week is to notice when your mind drifts to putting in energy somewhere that you don’t have any control. Check in with yourself and see if this is a good place for your energy. Is it the most productive and healthy place to spend your thought?

Redirect it to only things you have control over. This will help refocus your mind from mindless chatter, what ifs, worry, fear and comparison. It will help you step into your authentic power of what you DO have control over. This is ultimate power, this is ultimate love, this ultimate living in the present moment.