Define Your Needs vs Your Wants

Here we are. Most of us find ourselves staying home for our own safety and for the safety of the world. For many this is a new experience, not being able to go where we want to go whenever we want to go. With any new experience comes new insights, new opportunities to see things not seen before. Without the constant movement, distraction and demands of life pulling you in all directions, you are most certainly going to uncover some valuable truths that have been waiting patiently for you to discover.

A truth you are probably seeing for yourself what you actually need in this life. This is somewhat the same for all of us – the need for safety, food and connection. But the underlying items that create these can vary greatly from person to person. Now that you are in a situation that is forcing these realities to surface do yourself a huge favor for your future: write down what you need versus what you want (those nice to have but not going to break without).

Here is what I came up with for myself. I need sunlight to not only feel a sense of connection but also a sense of safety. For me, opening my blinds to let the sun rush in gives me a reminder that life is still out there, still going strong and provides hope. This has been a must have in my life I discovered many years ago when I was battling depression. Sunlight makes me feel safe and gives me a feeling of connection to all of life itself.

Another great focus area is on food. Food is a source of life. There are so many choices out there today, but which foods are an absolute must for your continued health and sense of well-being? Personally, I love popcorn. But popcorn is not a need, it’s a nice to have want on my list, a luxury item if you will. A need for me is vegetables: spinach, onions, tomatoes and bell peppers are a must have in my pantry.

What about connection with others. Now that we are “social distancing” and sheltering in place what do you feel like you need more of when it comes to connecting with others. Do you need a daily phone conversation with someone, watch a live stream, have a video call with a loved one? What does that look like for you?

You have this opportunity to uncover what your needs are at a very real level. Do your future self a favor, identify these for yourself so you can bring these into your life moving forward. This can be a real game changer.

If there is any support you need from me, please do not hesitate to reach out and ask.
With much love,
Elizabeth Roberts

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Now is the Time

Now is the time.  The time to be the person you have always wanted to be.  That kind, compassionate, loving creature you know you are that you have been hiding deep down.  The world needs you to step into yourself completely now more than ever.

You may have heard a trend in many of my writings encouraging you to be yourself.  Now more than ever we need you.  We need everyone to be themselves.  If you look deep within, you will find how beautiful and lovely you are and how much you have to offer.  That offering will be different for each of us, but that is exactly the point.  Each of us offers a piece of the whole.  When we finally embody our piece others can begin to move into their piece that will then nudge another to move into their piece.

We have been living in a world where we thought it was better to be like everyone else.  In times like these it becomes apparent that is not the case, nor was it ever the case.  We were only locked into a way of being that got us by.  We may have gotten by but the overall feeling from the individual level all the way to the collective whole has been that feeling of just getting by.  We aren’t here to just get by, to simply survive, we are here to live.

So, now is the time. Now is the time to live your life.  Now is the time to be who you are without having to look around you to see what everyone else is doing or who they are being.  We have moved into a moment of time where we are being asked to take a deeper look, remove the distractions, and finally get real.

We have all been invited into a new way of looking at life and a new way of being in this world. I hope you will join me in this adventure.

What To Do When You Let Yourself Down

If you prefere to listen, click here for the audio recording

We all know the feelings of guilt and shame when we let ourselves down.  Sometimes these feelings can be overwhelming and can feel like we are carrying a boulder with us everywhere we go.  While many may be holding on to old events in our life that gave us a feeling of guilt or shame, it doesn’t mean we have to keep carrying this around moving forward.

One of the quickest ways to eliminate guilt and shame from our minds is to begin by keeping our promises.  Especially the promises we have made to ourselves.  Think about it.  We all make promises to ourselves, usually promises that give us hope for a better life. Things like our famous New Year’s resolutions, the promise to do better this year than last, the promise to take better care of ourselves and to do better with others.

Whenever we break these promises to ourselves, we tend to spiral down into guilt and shame.  That hopeful, flying high feeling the promise gave us is quickly replaced with crippling doubts about who we are and what we are capable of doing.  Don’t let those crippling feelings take away the hope that had you feeling so high on the possibilities of life.  Those possibilities are still there, it’s only your thoughts that would have you believe otherwise.  You can still get back to that hopeful feeling and keep that promise to yourself.

Whenever you get that feeling you are carrying around a guilt or shame boulder, stop and ask if it’s keeping you from your promises.  If it is, then you have an awesome opportunity to bring that promise and hope back to life.  It means you still want it. We all take steps back on our way to what we want, but this is no reason to stop.

Children make mistakes all the time on their way to learning anything.  We don’t tell our kids to stop when they come up against an obstacle or allow them to wallow in misery about an innocent mistake.  We help them understand what happened and encourage them to keep going because it’s worth it.  You can do this for yourself too.

Once you have noticed that your feelings of guilt or shame are keeping you from what you want, take a moment to identify what prompted the feelings in the first place.  This will help you find where you are making yourself feel like you did something wrong.  Now that you know what it is, ask yourself what you can do to either make it right or what you can do to move forward.  Maybe you just need to slow down, give yourself permission to learn along the way, adjust the timeline or even make adjustments to the original promise.  It is in our mistakes where we learn what it is we really want and can then make the necessary course corrections to get back to it.

You can do anything you put your mind to when you allow your mind to work for you, instead of you working for whatever your mind says.

If you find this helpful or know someone who needs to hear topics like these, please be sure to share.  Be a life changer. You never know what may change the course of someone’s life.

Break The Cycle

Your past will never dictate your future.  Your past is done, finished and over never to be repeated again unless you decide to hold on to it.  Just like the dinner you had last night, your first kiss or the time you stubbed your toe so hard you cried it’s all in the past.  Your past only provides memories and wisdom as you move forward.  The only reason your past replays in your mind is because you believe it is you.

Memories are not you.  You are always the present moment.  You get to chose who you are moment to moment.

Every moment, every second is another opportunity to do something different.  A chance to see and experience life differently.  You chose what you are right now, not your past.  Break the cycle, break the pattern, break out of your depression and anxiety by choosing to see the present moment.  See it with clear eyes and a clear mind so you can fully take in what is in front of you.

Your past is merely a distraction.  Choose to see this life with fresh eyes and start to live in the moment. Be the author of your life today, tomorrow and for many years to come.

If you find this helpful or know someone who needs to hear topics like these, please be sure to share.  Be a life changer. You never know what may change the course of someone’s life.

You See What You Are

Do you ever wonder why some people react to a comment, a situation or even a commercial and you do not?  Or what about the times you get upset or excited about something, yet the people around you don’t?  The truth is, you see what you are.  You can only relate to those things in the world that represent a piece of you, whether that piece of you is known to you or repressed by you.

Take for example a social encounter where you walk away offended by another person’s apparent lack of social queues.  They interrupt conversations, burp openly without an excuse me or you just don’t like the way they dress.  There is a reason these behaviors rub you the wrong way.  Yet, there were other people in the room experiencing the same offensive person, but they walk way with a completely different impression.  Perhaps they even walk away holding that person in high regard.  Funny how different people can experience the same thing and walk away with different opinions.  Neither more right or wrong than the other.  Each experiencing their own truth.

You can only see what you know.  We can only see what we are even if what we see we do not like. Notice that you are around millions of pieces of information every single day and not every one of those will trigger a reaction in you and many of those pieces of information will not even register consciously with you.  This is because you do not relate or hold that information important to who you are.

Let me put this into slightly different terms that we see and feel to some degree every day:

JUDGEMENT

When you feel judgement well up inside of you it is because you are afraid that part of you may come to the surface.  You are facing what you fear is a capability you have within yourself.  This is something you have shoved down and spent a great deal of energy keeping hidden from yourself and from the world.  You think if that part of you comes out you may be ridiculed, seen as worthless or worse case scenario become an outcast in today’s world.

Our inclination to judge others is only a judgement of ourselves.  We would not feel a need to vilify a behavior, attitude or appearance if we did not recognize this potential within ourselves.  This explains why we find ourselves fighting so fiercely against those things we judge as wrong.  We have been fighting to keep this part of ourselves from surfacing.  Once you can see that what you judge in others is only a fear you have for yourself, you can begin to move forward with an open mind.  Remember what you see as a horrifying trait, someone else sees completely opposite.  Begin to see that your judgement of others is an invitation to take a closer look at what you are hiding from yourself.

ADMIRATION

When you find yourself drawn to someone or something sparks a positive surge of energy through you, know this is something you recognize with yourself too.  We admire what we desire.  We desire what we are deep inside.  We want nothing more than to fully step into the person we were born to be and to be that every day.  When we are presented with an experience of admiration this is life’s invitation to show you what you are that you are keeping from expressing on a regular basis.

Notice the next time you feel that surge of admiration.  It makes you feel good.  You will find yourself saying oh I wish I could do that or I can totally do that.  You would not have the vision to see it, feel it or even speak about it if you didn’t already have that piece inside yourself already.  Take a deeper look at what specifically you admire about a person or a thing and look for all the ways you have shown up in the world with those same traits. Once you know what those underlying traits are, make a conscious effort to be more of that in your day to day.

If you find this helpful or know someone who needs to hear topics like these, please be sure to share.  Be a life changer. You never know what may change the course of someone’s life.

What is Your Dissatisfaction Trying to Tell You?

Spring is officially here!  This is my favorite season because it brings so many reminders of how everything can come back to life and it is even more beautiful than I remember.  As I look around at the sudden vibrant life in the trees and amazing colors of the flowers it reminds me about the purpose of seasons and the cycles of life.  Spring is the season of renewal and rebirth.  What once seemed dead and is now renewed and filled with life.  The seeds buried deep within the Earth were merely lying there preparing for the new season.

I see this as a metaphor for our dreams and desires.  When I was a young girl, I had dreams and desired to make an impact on people.  I wanted to infuse people with hope and to encourage them to follow their heart.  I saw and heard the potential in people and wanted nothing more than for them to follow their heart so they could to bring that dormant potential to life.  There was a time in my life when I thought that dream was dead, as life had taken a much different turn.  The season turned to survival then into a wonder into wilderness where I ended up buried under all of life’s demands.

Years passed by, as my dreams and desires lay dormant, or so I thought.

One day I noticed this nagging in the back of my mind that kept hinting that I was supposed to be doing something else with my life.  No matter what I did – work more, acquire more stuff, stay busy, numb it away, even just trying to flat out ignore it as crazy – it didn’t go away.  It was as if something was starting to wake up inside of me and there was absolutely nothing I could do to stop it.

All those dreams and desires never really go away.  They are always somewhere inside.  If you take a look around you will see little hints of them trying to come out.  Perhaps they show up as that voice in your head gently reminding you that you are not doing what you have been called to do, you find yourself questioning, is this really all there is to life.  Maybe it shows up as a consistent and very persistent annoyance in the world around you that only you seem to notice.  Or you find yourself in certain situations over and over again.

I was blessed with the trifecta.  All of the above were screaming at me loudly right before I finally admitted I couldn’t take it anymore and started seriously exploring what was going on. I felt misplaced, disconnected and my overall mood was one of anxiety sprinkled with sadness that I just could not shake.  I knew there was so much more to life.  I was so annoyed by the lack of listening that was taking place everywhere I went – from seeing friends completely ignore their friends, parents cutting off their children to leaders and co-workers too busy to pay attention to each other.  It really ate me up inside.  In addition, I was placed in situations over and over again that put me in position to be an example of the very thing that annoyed me.

If you are fed up with the way your life is, not fired up or just not excited about anything anymore you probably have dreams and desires inside of you trying to get out.  All of us have desires that were planted deep inside that are meant to grow.  You don’t have to keep them buried and you don’t have to wait until you hit the trifecta of clues to do something.  Please don’t wait like I did or you run the risk of that dull sadness turning into depression or the worry taking over into anxiety.  You can bring your dreams and desires back to life.

One of the easiest ways to do this is by dreaming on purpose.  Spend time allowing yourself to think about things that get you excited, things that make you feel connected again.  Get a journal and just write out all the things you loved as a child, these are great pointers to the desires planted inside of you.  It is springtime, the season of revival and new beginnings.  Let’s get into the spirit and start growing into your life.

 

Stop and Ask

You would like to change your life, but you have no clue where to even start. All you know for sure is that this is not the life you had in mind for yourself and something has to change.

You are not clueless about what you want or even who you are and who you want to be in this world. You already know things about yourself. You know the roles you play in life: a child, an employee, parent, and spouse. You know what excites you and what weighs you down. Where most of us struggle is trying to identify our passions and purpose. The clues are there, you know somewhere deep inside what is calling out to you. Over time, you just let your truth slip into the back seat as the worldly “shoulds” took up the space in the front seat. You know the “shoulds” that play in your head: you should do this not that, you should want that over there not this, you should feel this way… You let the “should” take the wheel. No wonder we look around one day and wonder where we are and how we got here.

If this is where you find yourself, it’s time to stop and ask yourself some questions.  Ask questions that will reconnect you to your truth so you can get yourself back into the front seat of your life.

1.What do I like?

This sounds so basic and simple, but when was the last time you took inventory of what really excites you?  Keep a piece of paper close by and write down everything you like and everything you don’t like. Yes, everything: people, situations, food, weather, anything and everything.   After 1 week look over your list and ask yourself how you can reduce the dislikes and bring more of your likes into your life.

1. What do I value?

Your values guide how you think and ultimately how you behave.   Values define what is most important to you and provide you with a framework on how to make decisions in life. Uncovering your values will show you who you are at your core before the world told you who you should be. Once you identify your core 3-5 values you can start living into them on purpose by choosing to do things that align with your values.

Sometimes all we need to do is to stop and ask the right questions.  You already have the answers somewhere inside of you.  Now, it’s just a matter of tapping in to hear your truth.

 

 

Where are the Answers?

What if you already have the answer in you?  What if you are just looking in the wrong places? What if there was a way to find the answers that are tailor made for you?

We all have the answers we need somewhere inside of us.  We each have an internal guidance system, we just don’t use it. This system is just buried underneath stress, the expectations of others and society, pressures we put on ourselves, not to mention the feelings of guilt and shame we hang onto.  All of those things interfere with our internal system and cloud our vision, muffle our hearing and ultimately take us off our path.

So, how do we go beyond the chatter and stories of the mind?  Pause and ask questions.  Questions act to disrupt the chatter and pull you out of states of worry, frustration and confusion. They shift you into a place of pure curiosity, honesty and discovery.  This shift places us beyond the mind and into a space where we find all of the answers that line up with who we are and inspire us into action.

Next time you find yourself stuck, stressed or just a little frustrated, just pause for a moment.  Take yourself away from the situation by taking a short walk, go to the bathroom or turn on some music.  A change in environment helps to accelerate the shift and creates space for the honest answers to come through.  Once you feel calmer, you can begin to ask questions. You will find your answers coming from a different place.  If the situation has been going on for a long time a brief walk or pause may not give enough space.  You may need a day or two before the space is there for you to uncover the answers.  It is important that you not force the answer.  Trust the answer is there and it will reveal itself.

As you practice pausing then asking, you will find it easier and easier to access your internal guidance system.  You will find your life in flow and see life is truly beyond the thoughts and stories of your mind.