Healing through art & therapy! I used to be depressed and codependent with very low self worth and many unhealthy habits. But several years ago I started the healing process and am sharing what I learned with gratitude and hope for each of us. Peace & hugs, Leah
If you’re serious about being happy than you must commit to change. You can’t just win the lottery or wait for a hero to save you. Depression comes from inside of us and we are the only ones that can truly heal ourselves.
I just read an article “Ten Simple Things That Will Make You Happier Backed by Science”, from Higher Perspective. I totally agree with the advice they share because it’s all steps that I used and continue using to heal myself from a lifetime of depression. Below are their 10 steps and at the end a link to their article with more details.
The Self-Love Diet(SLD) is about accepting all of yourself as one whole imperfectly perfect person. I joined the January 31 Day Self-Love Challenge to reinforce what I already know, that I love and want only the best for myself. In order to do that I must choose to be conscious of my thoughts and actions. I must choose to be objective and use critical thinking to be my best self and therefore have a lifetime of wonder. This challenge is a wonderful opportunity to do just that.
“In the Self-Love Diet you are invited to look within when you notice something you don’t like in someone else. When pointing the finger at someone in your life, notice the three fingers pointing back at you and ask:
#1 “What am I feeling?”
#2 “Why am I feeling this emotion?”
#3 “What do I want?”
The most important relationship you will ever have is with yourself. The SLD tool of looking within and asking yourself these 3 questions helps you learn more about your emotional self. Once you understand what you are feeling, why you are feeling it, and what you want, you are equipped to have that important conversation without the wasteful blaming game…” ..continue reading at LoveWarriorCommunity.com
Below are the answers I thought up when reading this post:
#1 “What am I feeling?” Usually anxiety, fear and doubt from situations that seem out of my hands. I feel threatened or confused and am looking for outside reassurance.
#2 “Why am I feeling this emotion?” Because I’ve taught myself to be a victim. Because I’m used to blaming others. Because I’m a human and have a range of emotions.
#3 “What do I want?” I want to stay balanced and not stress out or overreact when I’m feeling down, unsure or threatened. I want to remember that I am capable, strong and wise. I want to be fair and kind to others. I want to react out of love, not stress. I know that at my core I can do this as long as I stay focused.
Be inspired and join the challenge on Facebook.com
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Available at Bookemon.com
Read and buy “Word Art and Affirmations” at Bookemon.com
“Quanology is about nature – our nature and our relationship to the nature that created us.”
This week I read an advance copy of an upcoming book “Quanology” by John Khoury. It offers an easy to understand way of explaining the scientific side of humanity and sociology from an evolutionary viewpoint. He mixes science with personal development to create a guiding book for those of us who want more from life than a winning lottery ticket. Our biological instincts and cultural history are often in conflict with our present technological and cultural situation causing problems worldwide. We’re not basically selfish, we’re “gene-ish” as the author says, that is to mean our genes are guiding us and we’re still following those basic instincts which evolved over thousands of years. The book explores how we use strategy and resources in everything from creating governments to dating just so our genes can proliferate. He does this with a sense of humor which always helps when thinking about BIG ideas that encompass all of humanity. The message is clear, nature forces us to compete and or cooperate because that’s how we survive and thrive. Evolution doesn’t stand still and I like how this book explains that process.
The science of why and how shows that we should make time to look at our lives objectively and use critical thinking, which if you’re a regular reader of this blog you know is a main message in my posts. At the beginning of each day while our genes may be guiding us the choices we make and actions we take are what ultimately drives evolution forward.
I recall learning about natural selection in school, but never in the context of how we can use the theory to improve our life. In school I learned how to memorize and repeat what was taught so I received good grades. Then I graduated HS, started working and living independently and realized that method only helped me learn the most basic of skills. At some schools(my family moved often so I attended many) we had classes like accounting, home-economics and sex-education to prepare us for grown up life, but that is not enough of what should be taught in the form of “life skills”. As the author notes in his section on education, “I didn’t understand that I could be good at life by studying and practicing life. It never occurred to me. It wasn’t a part of school, so I didn’t think it was a subject.” Does this ring true to you? Are you starting to understand that education is more than learning math and english? Then you should read this book.
Our species just about stopped evolving so long ago you may be asking, what has evolution done for me recently? Well not much, but it does have one function that I find to be very helpful. In order to stay sane when learning about terrible news I remind myself that we are a bunch of animals who have to evolve into higher beings and evolution like that takes a lot of time. As an example from this book, the author writes in regards to how slavery used to be legal, but is now illegal. “The writing is on the wall to have it wiped off the earth soon enough . . . “soon” for evolution, that is.” Doesn’t that make you feel optimistic? So the next time you hear bad news and all you feel capable of doing is signing a petition to stop such atrocities, remember that we are improving, but humans evolve SLOWLY. This isn’t an excuse to slack off, but instead should inspire you to keep being the change you want to see. Evolution follows revolutionary ideas.
As far as self-development books go this is one of the best. I recommend this book for anyone with a curiosity for why the human world works as it does, science and sociology teachers, curious students, those looking for a more sustainabe life and hopeless romantics so they can have some balance and not be so hopeless.
I didn’t want to stop reading this book. It has a great empowering message that fits in with this blogs theme of individual empowerment.
One telling trait of a great book is reaching the last page and craving more, which is what happened at the end of The Big Wide Calm. This alluring story is full of surprises making it difficult to put down. You may think you know how things will end, but the twists and turn are not predictable; you will be surprised at how each one plays out.
This is a story of Sex, Love and Rock n’ Roll, without the painful drug addictions and unsettling backstabbing associated with too many rock to riches stories. This writer handles drama well without exasperating the reader with unnecessary conflict. The main character Paige is strong and confident in her abilities with a humor and kindness that keeps you rooting for her. Following her revelation of who she can become as opposed to who she thought she would be is inspiring. She is as invested in her music and aspirations as she is in her romantic entanglements and friendships. The characters surrounding her are intriguing and really complement Paiges’ journey.
A plus that you don’t always find in stories about musicians on their road to fame are the enchanting lyrics to the songs that Paige creates throughout the story. The lyrical development is an integral part of her journey and one of my favorite parts. I recommend this book for anyone who loves to read about following dreams, lasting friendships, intimate romance and of course music. Even more this book offers a broader message of seeking our own paths in a world that is at best confounding.
If there’s one thing I want women to take away after they participate in one of my self-defense classes it’s how they deserve to be safe and therefore shouldn’t hesitate to fight back. Society may still teach and expect us to be “nice like sugar and spice” but that hasn’t helped so far. It is time to fight back.
I was taught to use THREE STRIKES if attacked. One strike might cause the attacker pain and two might cause them to stumble, but three will likely disable the predator.
1. Gouge the Eyes! Place your hands in front of you with palms out, make a W shape with your thumbs and fingers and use your thumbs to apply as much pressure as possible to the predators eyeballs. THis will cause pain and make it difficult to see which direction you are run.
2. Kick the Knee! The best strike is kicking the kneecap because knees are only supposed to bend one way and it’s my all time favorite move because of that fact. You can also knock down a predator with a kick to the side or back of the knee. This is a major joint for balance and if you can injure the knee so they are hobbling or on the ground than you will be able to put more distance between you and them.
3. Rip the Ear! Grip the predators ear, dig your nails in and yank that sucker down. This move not only causes intense pain, but it can give you DNA under your fingernails if you choose to report the crime.
4. Punch the Solar Plexus! This area above your naval and below your ribs is super sensitive, you can knock the air out of a person with a strong punch or knee strike.
5. Kick the Groin! This obviously works best with a male attacker, but it can also hurt females. Do a chorus line kick, straight up to the crotch. No need for a fancy karate kick. In fact you will cause more pain by kicking straight up with your toes and hitting the very sensitive testes.
When you’re being attacked you can attract attention by screaming “FIRE”! This word is sadly more effective than screaming “Rape” or “Help”. People hear FIRE and think their own stuff may be in danger as opposed to thinking somebody is jokingly yelling Rape or Help.
“Songs for 5 Year Olds” by Adora Levin and Hanan Levin, is so much fun. You’ll be holding your sides and laughing as you and your child sing together. It’s full of clever and humorous songs that children will love too sing along with, if they can stop laughing long enough. Parents will enjoy how the songs encourage a playful imagination. If you loved reading Dr. Seuss or Shel Silverstein, you should buy this book.
Children will love songs like “A Sofa Made of Choloate” that brings to life a world of sweets and “The Stinky Song”. Parents will love songs like “What Will You Do When You Grow Up Adora” which offers ideas on what she might be doing at various ages in her life. My favorite song is “EyeWax” because its silly and unexpected with a sweet ending.
I recommend it for parents, babysitters, and childcare professionals. While the book title says 5 year olds, those younger and older will also have fun with the songs.
These songs were written(mostly) by a 5 year old girl. It is part of the Adora Art Project, another “amazing” art project, wherein 1,000 artists from all over the world paint, draw & sculpt Adora. In addition to the book readers can visit AdoraLevin.com for even more fun, inspiration and art.
The Conversation began as series of lucid dreams I had while on the island of Itaca. They quickly became so much more. They welcomed me to a level of awareness and consciousness that was meant to be shared.
I completed this book several years after my experience while recovering from my eighth brain surgery; a 14-hour ordeal, which left me unable to see, speak or walk. It took months of recovery before I was able to edit my own story, but these dreams were why I wrote this book. They are why I was compelled to finish it, and why I created this post; so that you can take a step forward on your own journey to your inevitable transcendence.
Each dream was a transference with what I can only call a native intelligence. Together the conversations answered so many of the questions we all have about Life, Death and the meaning to the Human Experience we are all a part of. These dreams confirmed much of what we inherently know is probably true about Science and Spirituality, God and Evolution, Physics and Metaphysics, and the transcendence of the Human toward the Divine. To this day, they provide me a direction and a sense of growth, self-actualization and a level of awareness that continues to change my life for the better.
Just as they will change yours as well.
Here are the key lessons that I took away from my conversations with the divine that I wanted to share with you.
1. You are energy.
You are simply energy, floating in a sea of energy. That is all there is to existence. Your consciousness exists as a concentration of energy. It floats within the eternal sea, in an endless ebb and flow that is all around you and passes through you. It is a part of you, and you of it.
2. Everything you experience is an echo of existence.
Like the ripples formed when a pebble is dropped into the ocean, when there is an occurrence in the sea of existence, your consciousness witnesses through these ripples. It is in the waves that you experience all that is. Your perception is an echo of the event’s reality.
3. Your consciousness created your human experience.
Your consciousness created the Human Experience you are now a part of. It did so to gain a new perspective through which to experience existence. The filters your human form creates for you – your five senses, your emotions – distorts your view of reality based on your understanding of the world around you.
The experiences you are a part of are not good or bad, they simply are. How you perceive them is up to you. It is why it is so important to release yourself from the experiences you are a part of and move on.
When you transcend your human experience you will rejoin your consciousness and see beyond your five senses, you will transcend and see reality as it truly is.
4. When you change your thoughts, you see reality.
The human experience alters your perception of reality. How it does this is based on the vantage point from which you experience the echoes of reality. Learn to change your emotional viewpoint, and you change your perception of everything. Each viewpoint gives you a new look at existence, until you can see reality.
5. There are no flat lines in existence.
Nothing in existence moves in a flat line. Everything moves in circles. Galaxies spin, planets orbit, storms turn, tides ebb and flow. Even life moves in a never ending cycle. Birth, life, death and rebirth continue in an unbreakable cycle. You cannot stop it, but you can transcend it. Let go of the humanity you have grown comfortable in and you allow the divinity within you to soar.
6. There is no death, there is no judgment.
Your spirit is eternal. There is no death to your true self or to your consciousness. When the human body has done its job, your spirit is freed. It moves on. The moment it leaves you, there is only freedom. There is no judgment waiting. There is no book of deeds to be measured by. There is only your spirit leaving your body with the love it has gained from the human experience you have been a part of.
7. Your only task is to Love.
Your only task while in the human experience is to learn to stay open to the energy of Love that is all around. Every time you learn to overcome hate and anger, you grow one step closer to your own transcendence. It is the reason your spirit chose to experience existence through the Human Experience; so that your spirit could witness existence from a new vantage point and see the Love that is through a new perspective.
8. The energy of existence is the energy of Love.
The sea of energy that is all around us, is a vast sea of endless Love. Stop and open yourself. It is there around you every day. When you open yourself up to it, when you learn not to close down to it, you can feel the direct channel to the energy of Love that is all around you.
You have felt the energy of a room the moment you walked in. You have felt the energy of those around you, sensing whether they are inherently good or bad.
The energy of existence is real. It is there for you to tap into, you simply need to stop yourself from closing down and from following your very human emotions. When you do, you will find how easy and natural it is to be a part of all that is.
Only when you learn to stay open will you be able to bask in your own everlasting light. And that can happen right here, right now.
I hope as a reader of this blog you don’t tire of the Self-Love message that I constantly post. For some people it can be a little too much, I used to cringe at ideas like this myself so I understand. If it wasn’t so necessary and important in this glossy world obsessed with outward appearances I wouldn’t feel the need, but… So here is another blog post about the importance of loving yourself unconditionally. Read an excerpt below and then continue on to the Treasure Trove blog for the full story.
“I have come to learn, with the help of my Mama, my Aunt and Uncle, and many, many others that loving myself involves treasuring myself. That is, I should treat myself as a precious gem. Not just treat myself as I would treat others (or hope to treat the ones upon whom I would bestow my love!), but to carve out time to nourish my soul, body and mind. To be patient with myself; to infuse my mind with positive self-talk instead of bad-mouthing myself; to seek out time alone (not to be confused with loneliness) as well as with friends; to make the time to work on – or play around with – creative endeavors; to let loose of being productive ‘all’ the time and simply be.”…continue reading at the Treasure Trove blog
Confidence, success, happiness, and inner peace are all side effects of loving yourself unconditionally.
You Can Live Healthier by Adopting Whole-Person Approach to Your Diet.
The book starts out with an empowering message about nutrition based on a whole-person lifestyle. This isn’t just about what we physically consume, but how all parts of life connect to create or wreck our natural balance. Emotional health needs to be part of our healthcare. Based on my own health challenges I agree wholeheartedly with this and have found the information in this book beneficial to improving my diet.
Learn about how changing your diet can eliminate food allergies and sensitivities as well as lessen or cure diseases like diabetes, polycistic ovarian syndrome and urinary infections. Learn about nutrition labels, calories, sweeteners, good fat vs. bad fat., minerals, vitamins, Ayurvedic medicine and bio-diversity to support your unique body type.
The book also covers important environmental food issues, the benefits of eating local and organic and the risks of GMO’s, pesticides and preservatives. I like her example of how consuming local foods is good for optimal health as well as a lower carbon footprint which means we are all creating and consuming less pollution.
My favorite part of this book is the knowledge that we are each in much more control of our health than we think. If we want to reduce illnesses and create balance then we can pay attention to how our emotions can help us eat healthier; use visualization, cultivate an attitude of gratitude, become more mindful of our choices and stop making excuses.
The author, Lynne Dorner, a Certified Holistic Health Coach who studied at the Institute of Integrative Nutrition, and compares life to a salad bar. “How you choose from this salad bar shapes the course of your life and well-being and influences whether you feel vital and content, sad and depleted, or somewhere in between.” Of course changing food habits is not easy. Sticking with healthy living can be a struggle so I recommend following her advice to “Share your goals with those you trust. Or join a group of people who are motivated to make similar changes.”
I recommend this book if you’re tired of generic “diet” books. Inside you’ll find resources and advice that’s easy to understand and follow to a healthier you! Get our copy today atAmazon.com/101-Secrets-Nutrition-School
Learn more about healthy living from Lynn on the following sites:
We act how we are taught, whether it’s specific lessons taught from our guardians and role models or subconscious ideals from mass media. As a society we’re slowly recognizing that this is damaging. Will you take the pledge to “challenge the status quo and ultimately transform culture, so everyone, regardless of gender, race, class, age, or circumstance can fulfill their potential.”
“I PLEDGE TO USE MY VOICE TO CHALLENGE SOCIETY’S LIMITING REPRESENTATIONS OF GENDER.”
This week I read an advance copy of an upcoming book “Quanology” by John Khoury. It offers an easy to understand way of explaining the scientific side of humanity and sociology from an evolutionary viewpoint. He mixes science with personal development to create a guiding book for those of us who want more from life than a winning lottery ticket. Our biological instincts and cultural history are often in conflict with our present technological and cultural situation causing problems worldwide. We’re not basically selfish, we’re “gene-ish” as the author says, that is to mean our genes are guiding us and we’re still following those basic instincts which evolved over thousands of years. The book explores how we use strategy and resources in everything from creating governments to dating just so our genes can proliferate. He does this with a sense of humor which always helps when thinking about BIG ideas that encompass all of humanity. The message is clear, nature forces us to compete and or cooperate because that’s how we survive and thrive. Evolution doesn’t stand still and I like how this book explains that process.
Individual Empowerment 