It’s not personal

Something I’ve learned this past year or so is that it’s not personal – ever.  I’m so glad I learned this.

When people throw unkind words, they are the thrower not me.  I don’t need to throw them back.  Their words coming from inside them.

And if I throw unkind words, I am the thrower.  My words, not theirs.  If I throw unkind words, I am the one that is unkind, not the person I am throwing them at.

We all seem to do it.  Throw our “shit” at other people and blame them for how we feel and think.

If someone makes an assumption that I am racist, for example, then they are racist themselves.  They are the one bringing that up, throwing that accusation, bringing that issue into the playground.

So what to do when other people throw their shit at you?  I guess the only thing you can do is smile inside and know that it is not your shit.  And hope that maybe one day they’ll realise this.

Life is a stream

It moves and it changes.  Go with what feels good.  Listen to your heart.  Listen to your voice inside.

Angelina Jolie has a funny face

I watched the film “The Tourist” the other day with my boyfriend, who basically drooled over Angelina for the entire movie and I had to admit that Angelina Jolie is a very attractive woman.  BUT she has a funny face, it’s sort of masculine and she’s sort of ugly too.  I couldn’t stop looking at her, wondering what it is about her that makes her so attractive to men and then it hit me, bang!  She has confidence.

She exudes confidence.  As if she has just decided to KNOW that she is attractive.  No doubts, no questions, no fears – she has just decided that she is attractive.  She emanates confidence.  And I got to wondering what she would look like if she had a different attitude; if she was insecure about her looks and rather that strutting, as she does, she shuffled along with her head held down, feeling uncomfortable about her face and her rather large lips.

I know she’s beautiful and I know she’s attractive but at the same time she has a funny face and she could so easily just look plain odd, if she had a different attitude.  But she doesn’t feel insecure about herself – that’s obvious.  She lives and breathes Angelina.  She is not afraid to be herself and be herself, and then some.  She’s stepped into her own shoes, she’s stepped into her power and she walks.

Can you imagine Angelina looking at other women and feeling insecure about herself, like so many of us women do? I can’t.  Can you imagine Angelina trying to look like or be like someone else?  I can’t.  She has just decided to be Angelina.  All Angelina and truly love herself and KNOW that she is beautiful.

I think she is great and just by being herself, she offers a valuable lesson to all women (and men) about the power of simply loving and accepting yourself for who YOU are and just being that.  Just radiating that – who YOU are.

How to be happy (backwards)

There are quite a lot of  ‘How to be Happy’ guides around.  So this is something a little bit different.

This is the complete guide to being utterly miserable:

1. Look for the worst in every situation.
2. Worry about things that haven’t happened – make sure that when you worry, you imagine the very worst case scenario.
3. Expect failure – have absolutely zero faith in your ability to succeed, make a difference or make changes.
4. Focus on your mistakes.
5. Recall in mind-numbing detail sad things that have happened in the past.
6. Believe that people do not like you.
7. Fail to notice the nice things that people around you say and do.
8. Spend the majority of your day complaining.
9. Never think about solutions – always think about problems.
10. Read bad news in newspapers and watch the news on television.
11. Look at yourself in the mirror and dislike the person staring back at you.
12. Criticise yourself all the time.
13. Never be yourself – always pretend to be something that you are not.
14. Eat lots of sugary sweet things – 10 cakes a day if possible.
15. Watch a lot of television.
16. Refuse to partake in any form of exercise.
17. Choose friends that you don’t get on with.
18. Find a job that you hate.
19. Never be honest about your own shortcomings – always blame everything on everyone else.
20. Eat McDonalds every day – preferably for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
21. Don’t wash or comb your hair.
22. Refuse to smile at anyone.
23. Wear the same clothes for a week.
24. Take life seriously – and avoid laughing as much as possible.
25. Eat cheese just before going to bed.
26. Dwell on every little upset, for at least a week, preferably longer.
27. Take the way other people act, personally, all the time.
28. Wear too tight shoes, or new ones that cut into your feet.
29. Eat foods like broccoli, sprouts and baked beans on a regular basis.
30. Don’t have any hobbies or interesting – be bored.

This list should help you on the way to being utterly miserable.  If I have left anything out, please let me know.  But if you would rather be happy, just don’t do anything on this list 🙂

Related articles by Zemanta

• Don’t Worry, Be…Healthy! (horsepigcow.com)

You are infinite possibilities

You are infinite

You are infinite possibilities. Right now in this moment you can choose to leave the past behind. Discard the stories of your past that you thought defined you and start anew right now. You are infinite possibilities.

You can re-write your story. You can re-define who you are. You can drop all the unkind labels you’ve placed on yourself. You can walk tall with your head held high. You are infinite possibilities.

You can choose to believe you can. You can put all the memories of the times when you couldn’t in the trash. You can start again right now, in this moment. You are infinite possibilities.

Are you living a life of hate-believe?

Not make believe, but hate-believe?  I liked the title.  It just popped into my head.  Don’t have any words to go with it.  Just a touch of randomness.

Just a change in perspective

It truly amazes me, what a difference a simple change in perspective can make.

If I walk round thinking, “My life is pants,” then all I seem to see are the things that back up this view.  What I believe, I see.

And if I walk round thinking, “Flippin’ eck, my life is amazing,”  then all I seem to see are the things that are amazing.  Like the little things people say and do, the wonder of this life and all the things in it.  I notice the details on things, maybe things I haven’t noticed before.  I notice the basic goodness of people.  I notice the funny side of life.  And life is amazing.  Really amazing.

It is as if, whatever I believe, my mind goes out in search of all the things that support that view.  What I believe I see.

I don’t even think it is a question of what is ‘true’.  What is truth anyway when we all have different perceptions?  Is even a history book true?  Supposed facts are only ever the writer’s version of events and writers are human, and they make mistakes and have their own viewpoint to sell.  Any real reality is only really consensus, like the world being flat.

I think it is more a question of how I choose to experience life.  I can experience it as pants if I want or I can see the adventure in it all.  The choice is down to me.  The choice is down to each and every one of us, every single day.

If you want to try it out for yourself, just try believing something like, “My life is great,” and then just notice all the things in your life that make that true.

It’s almost like the mind is a dog.  We throw out the ball and it goes out and brings it back.  If you really believe your life is great, it will bring back to you things that support your belief.  It’s kinda funky!

Don’t believe the hype!

So you have a thought, something like, “they don’t like me” and then you BELIEVE it.

Then, when you see that person and you are believing that thought and you UNQUESTIONINGLY think that it is true, then your experience will reflect that thought.

You will see what you believe is true.  And anything that argues with or differs with that belief will either be rejected by your mind, argued with or not even noticed at all.

Say for instance that I think “Susan” doesn’t like me.  If I see Susan, I’m going to be immediately reserved with her.  Why should I open up to someone that doesn’t like me?  And Susan will probably pick up on that and be somewhat reserved with me – thereby apparently proving the belief “Susan doesn’t like me.”

If Susan says, “You like nice today,” I might think I don’t believe her, she’s just being sarcastic and totally dismiss the comment.  (There is also the element of whether I think I look nice; if I think I look nice I’ll believe her, if I think I look a mess I won’t – again seeing only what I believe to be true).

If Susan asks to meet up with me, I might then think, if I’m still believing the thought “Susan doesn’t like me,” that she’s just being polite and doesn’t really want to, and then politely decline her offer.

Eventually, Susan will probably get the hint and stop bothering with me.  Boof bang!  Belief proved – “Susan doesn’t like me.”

Susan may have well really liked me but my belief wouldn’t allow it.

We all do it – our minds are very automatic and issue out heaps of thoughts all the time, every day in every moment.  Most of the time we are not even aware of the thoughts but they do affect us – mentally, emotionally and physically.

The thought, “Susan doesn’t like me,” can easily cause my heart to close and my shoulders to hunch up.  If I’m seeing someone as non-welcoming, reactions will come up in my body.  Everyone knows that stress can cause ulcers!  And stress is the result of un-helpful thinking.

Taking that belief, “Susan doesn’t like me,” and using Byron Katie’s work follows this route:

1) Is it true that Susan doesn’t like me? Yes.

2) Can you absolutely know that it’s true, that Susan doesn’t like me?  No.  How can I get into the head of someone else?  How can I possibly know what someone else is thinking or feeling (especially if I don’t even know what I’m thinking half the time).

So no, I cannot absolutely know that Susan doesn’t like me.  That’s a blow to my absolutely certainty in my belief.

3) How do I react when I believe that thought?  Well I pull back, I shrink back from Susan.  I think I am not in good company.  I don’t feel safe.  I feel protective of myself.  I am reserved with Susan.  I tend to think the worst of everything she says.

4)  Who would I be without that thought?  I’d be relaxed and open and just be myself.  I’d be nice to Susan.  I would feel happy in her company.

Ah!  So it’s not Susan’s fault then, that I am reserved with her.  It’s totally my responsibility.  It’s totally my belief.

Then there’s the turn arounds:

I don’t like Susan – well why should I like someone that doesn’t like me?  I don’t like being around someone that doesn’t like me.  Correction, someone that I THINK doesn’t like me which I now realise is not necessarily true.  Find a few examples, of ways in which I don’t like Susan.  Maybe I think she talks too much or doesn’t listen (but wait, maybe I talk too much and maybe I’m not that great at listening either).

I don’t like myself – ah!  so I don’t like myself and I’m blaming Susan for not liking the things I don’t like about myself.  ah! interesting.  In what ways do I not like myself?  Well I talk too much and I’m not that great at listening – that really annoys me about myself.

Susan likes me – oh yeah!  she’s often smiled at me, i’d never really noticed that before.  I just thought she had wind.  And she’s asked me to go out with her and I said no – maybe she’s lonely, maybe she needs a friend?  Oh!  I feel bad now.

After going through this process, and examing all the possible angles, the things that are true for you, the original belief is much much harder to automatically believe.  In fact, it often just falls away like a snowflake once it is looked at and questioned.

Another important thing to understand is where the belief, “Susan doesn’t like me,” resides and who ‘created’ it.  Well it exists in my head – it’s not written on a stone, or a pavement, I can’t buy it, no-one else can see it, it’s not physically real, the only place it exists is in my head.

And how did it get there?  Well I decided to think that.  The first time I met her she was very quiet and decided to interpret her quietness as meaning that she didn’t like me.  So I was the creator of that belief.  And so if I decided to make that belief up, then I’m equally capable of un-making that belief.

And so it lies with me… I am responsible for the thoughts I believe.  Just me.

And it’s not really a question of going into why I thought that and believed it but more looking at what I am believing and just taking some time to evaluate if I can really honestly support that it’s true.  Thoughts can come up willy nilly at all times and in all places and the fact that they come up is not the problem – it is whether you or I believe them, without questioning their validity that’s the question.

Questioning thoughts can really open your eyes and take away the blinkers.

Can you relate to this?  Do you have thoughts that you unquestioningly believe, that cause you stress and unhappiness?

Freeing your mind from negative beliefs

Until I became aware of my own thoughts and the automatic nature of my mind, I was a prisoner to my thoughts.  That sounds extreme but it is true.  The only reality I ever had, was the one my mind allowed me to think.

I had a series of dreams a while ago.  It seemed like every morning I’d wake up with a new understanding and awareness and then as my mind awoke the awareness I felt, slipped away.

One dream that I remember very clearly was being immersed in an understanding and knowing that everything just is.  It is all neutral.  It is only our minds that put meanings and judgements on things.  Calling this bad and that good.  In the dream, I just experienced the neutralness of all things.  It wasn’t something I understood in a mind, thinking sort of way.  It was what I felt and knew – that everything, everything is just is, is just neutral, is.  And then on that morning, as my mind woke up, I saw how it began to put labels on things and meanings on things until that awareness slipped away and I was back in the landscape of my mind.

Recently, I’ve been watching videos of Byron Katie and she definitely understands this.  Her teachings, we she calls ‘The Work’ are an amazingly simple and very effective way of breaking your mind free of all its set thinking, judgements and limiting beliefs.  For anyone that struggles with habitual negative thinking, I would highly recommend her technique as it provides an excellent to dissolve them, once and for all and open your mind to new ways of experiencing and seeing life.

It’s not a quick fix, as Katie says, “There are children in there,” and a lifetime of negative limiting thinking will take some time to address but it is well well worth doing.  It is a process.  First becoming aware of the automatic thoughts that are running your life and then becoming aware of how they effect you emotionally and physically and then, questioning them, exploring them and dissolving them.

If you are looking for a way to free your mind of negative thinking, visit Katie’s site on youtube here and try it out for yourself.  The Work of Byron Katie.

The Girl Who Fell to Earth

(Inspired by a painting by my friend David Bezzina, the artist.)  Visit him at:

http://www.davidbezzina.com
http://comicartcommissions.com/Bezzina.html
http://www.myspace.com/davidbezzina

And so it was time to go. To land on that planet they called Earth. It was a sad place and yet so full of beauty. It was a place of limitation and yet so full of possibility. It was a place of minds and yet so full of spirits. If they only knew.

And that was her mission – to help them remember. She looked down at the planet, so full of magnificent colours yet she knew they could not see, except for those special ones. The creative ones. The artists, the poets, the musicians…

It was a mission she had chosen voluntarily, as part of her soul’s learning. But she knew once she landed on Earth, she would have to forget her true nature and don her human suit. No longer free to shine like a star and create new worlds just by thought alone, she would have to play by the ‘rules’ of Earth. And she hesitated – she knew the trials and struggles that awaited her. The sadness and the loneliness she would experience.

But it was all an illusion, one that she would soon forget. Love never leaves anyone alone.

Her commander had arranged her life; she would work in a market in London town. One of the busiest places in the world. Full of dead eyes. And it was her job to remind them of their true nature. She would sell jewellery. The most exquisite and most beautiful kind. Not of silver or gold, but of transparent aluminium. And they would wonder how, the people that bought it. And as they wondered, it would begin to open their eyes to their true reality – the magical world of energy and vibration. For in each piece of jewellry, a vibration had been set to enchant its owner and bring about new dreams. So that each morning, the owner would awake with a new spiritual truth and understanding.

She donned her suit and prepared for her adventure. She would be gone awhile.

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=5673006&id=668491941