Believe In Love Again

The other day I had a low point, but of course I came back from it even stronger. For starters, I have been so stressed out and overwhelmed with my schedule that I had to just cancel everything and take a day for myself. I needed a whole day where I didn’t have a To Do List dangling over my head; where I wasn’t looking at the clock; where I could just BE.

This, however, meant I got to work through a lot of emotions that had been dragging along behind me the past few weeks. I was happy to finally get some time to work through them. Honestly, I probably cried for a third of the day, but the feelings came and went, and I was able to guide myself through it to a better perspective. I just needed the TIME to do it, instead of letting it sit on my heart like an elephant, weighing me down and making everything else in my life that much more difficult, because keeping that elephant from crushing me was already taking so much energy.

Here’s the summary of the thoughts I had to work through. First of all, I just had to relax. My busy schedule was going to be okay. One thing at a time. One day at a time. It would be fine. Second, I’m still stuck in my negative view of relationships. I’m very depressed and bitter about how I perceive men to view women. I feel like men view women as sex objects and then as baby makers, care takers and home makers. I don’t feel like there is any mental and emotional equality in those views, and I feel like no guy raised in that way would ever be someone I wanted to attach my life to. I want an emotional and mental equal. I want someone who feels the same way about life, love, people, relationships, right and wrong, etc. I want someone who wants me in their life because we are SOUL mates, not because I fill a role in his life (i.e. wife, mother, cook).

This of course is a negative perception that will be manifested if I choose to believe it. I can’t generalize people like that. Sure, television preaches it and a lot of the guys I know are like that, but there are HOW MANY people in the world? A lot. It would be very presumptuous of me to declare that everyone is like that. There may not be someone out there who is what I currently want, but not everyone is horrible, either. I just don’t quite believe that yet. But I do know and BELIEVE that if you don’t think something exists, you WILL NOT FIND IT. And what you are looking for, YOU WILL FIND. So I’m trying to remind myself of that.

Talk about Divine Timing… I happened to turn on the tv that night and catch what I guess you’d call a “chick flick”. If you know anything about me, you know that I am NOT a girly-girl. I don’t watch chick flicks, for the most part. But I watched this one. It was Remember Sunday. I was curious because it sounded like the same concept as Memento, except a love story instead of a revenge story: A guy loses his ability to create new memories, so when his short term memory is ready to dump into his long term memory, everything just gets erased, so he wakes up every day not knowing where he is or what he did. He has to write notes and come up with a system to live life with any kind of continuity. In Memento, he is trying to solve a mystery and avenge his dead wife. In Remember Sunday, he meets a girl and has amazing date after amazing date with her and falls in love every single day (because every day he meets her for the “first” time).

Anyways, so the chick flick kind of made me remember that everything isn’t completely hopeless. I realize life isn’t like a movie as far as that, and really it shouldn’t be, but it just reminded me that people can love. I’ve had it before, I just like to forget, apparently. And when I have it, so much of my negativity either goes away or is tested for its importance and validity. I just have to remember to take my negative thoughts with a grain of salt. I have to make sure to not shut out Romantic Love, just because I now see it as a desperate attempt for people to fill voids in their lives, souls and confidence.

Believe in love again.

Didn’t Richard from Texas say that in Eat Pray Love? I feel like I’m at that point. That phrase puts me to tears, because right now I don’t. I truly believe I will end up alone, because no one is good enough for me. No one is what I want. What I want isn’t possible. I just have to remember that, at best, that is only true RIGHT NOW. I will change; what I want will change; other people will change. Everything is always changing, and even if that is true right now, it won’t always be true – but it WILL be true if I refuse to let Love and Light into my life. If I choose to stubbornly believe that love does not exist, then for me, it won’t.

Do Your Outsides Match Your Insides?

I don’t look the way I feel.

I feel like I’m just a little chubby, in a healthy way. I feel badass. I feel wise. I feel like a force to be reckoned with. I feel like I demand respect and attention. Then I see myself in the mirror, and I look fat and child-like. It frustrates me to no end. I want the two to match. I want what I feel on the inside to be reflected on the outside. You’d think how I feel on the inside would shine through.

Maybe I do look how I feel – until I see myself. Once I see myself, then I’m in my head. Then I start to judge myself and I manifest those judgments. Maybe I can’t ever witness myself in those ways, because then I start to influence reality. Negative feedback.

I always wished I had video footage of myself going through my day so I could analyze how I come off to others. You never know until you see it for yourself. I do a fairly good job without it, but I just go off of how people respond to me. If I could see myself, I’m sure I could fine-tune myself much better and uncover things about myself that I perhaps wasn’t aware of.

The other day I was working on my “plastic smile”. As a dancer, you’re expected to portray emotion, and generally I just look serious. Someone would say, “Smile! Look like you’re having fun!” Then comes the fake smile. It looks fake because it is. I’m having fun, but smiling isn’t my thing. Not like that. I decided this might be another area where I am sabotaging myself based on old beliefs and old experiences. So I tried to think about some of my memories involving smiling. In high school, someone told me my plastic smile looked creepy (the person had seen me perform in a fashion show). I didn’t like how I looked smiling, and the times I saw myself smiling, there wasn’t legit joy behind it. So that made me not want to smile in pictures and whatnot. Because it didn’t look good. And it didn’t feel right. So I’m thinking that’s continuing through adulthood.

I saw someone else dance and smile at the same time. I tried to mimic it, but it looked horrible. Then I got it. It’s because the smile is fake (duh). Don’t worry so much about “smiling”. Instead, work on letting out some of that joy. I could feel the difference. For the plastic smile, the cheeks go more up and out, whereas a true smile just goes up. At least for me. My teeth don’t show as much for a true smile. A laugh is different… but yeah, I don’t think I’ve ever really “truly” smiled. It’s definitely a new feeling for me. It feels weird. It makes me a little uncomfortable actually. Maybe smiling makes me feel vulnerable? I don’t know, it just doesn’t feel natural.

Now that I know this, I’m going to work on it…

In what ways do your insides and outsides match and mismatch?

Learn How You Can Speak with Authority

I am awesome!

So I’ve talked about how I need to speak with authority and interject into conversations even when I feel like what I have to say isn’t necessary. I’ve been MASTERING that. I’ve been projecting my voice; I’ve been proposing ideas and debating work strategies. And people have been noticing.

You’ve seen my progress through this experience. This is one of the reasons I wanted to have a blog. You can see me each step of the way and see the baby steps it takes to reach a final result. Well, not “final”, but you know what I mean.

Here’s the advice I have on that: BE SELF-AWARE, AND BE CONFIDENT. For me, both were so necessary.

You know what I was doing before? I was aware, but for a long time I thought, “That’s just how I talk,” or, “It must be them – for some reason people talk over me and don’t hear me.” I was in a mindset where I was defending myself and lowering my expectations. I think this is a survival technique to protect your ego.

I was also under the assumption that I was operating the “correct” way, as far as not interjecting and wasting time and breath. I figured if I was on the same page, nothing needed to be said. I figured that was the same standard everyone else was operating under. I felt like everyone was annoyed when someone used different words to say the exact same thing, and I thought it was inappropriate and egotistical for someone to declare their opinions when they are not experts with the same authority as if they were experts.

Boy, was I wrong. I mean, sometimes that does happen. But that isn’t a 100% rule across the board. And just like anything, there is a delicate balance. And people may think that of the really extroverted people, but at the same time, if you say nothing… you are making yourself irrelevant. If you are smart, speak up. Even if it seems somewhat pointless, say it. But don’t timidly say it!!!! Soooo important. You announce it. Project your voice. Declare it. Do not say it timidly or softly. That’s what I’ve been mastering lately. If you speak timidly sometimes, speak as if the person is 50 feet away from you. Project your voice. Don’t shout desperately, just… project. Make sense?

So let’s circle back around. Here’s the trick. You can’t be hard on yourself. You can’t think of it as, “I fail. I’m doing something wrong. Something needs to be fixed in me.” You have to realize how freaking smart you are for noticing what’s wrong. Think of it as a puzzle. Think, “Hm. I see that people are talking over me. I see how other people respond to these other people who are speaking with authority. I’m going to figure out that trick and use it myself!” And then do it! Think of it as a puzzle or a game. And if it doesn’t work, regroup. Figure out what you think happened, and then try again. Gather feedback and then keep going until you master it. You CAN’T be hard on yourself. Then everything will come off as desperate or frustrated instead of confident and authoritative.

BE SELF-AWARE. See how people are responding to you. See how others act that gets the reaction you want. Figure out how you can apply that. Then, BE CONFIDENT. You are amazing! If you don’t act like other people can bring you down…. Then no one will get that vibe! No one CAN bring you down! Even if you say something wrong, who cares! Ask question to clarify. Laugh it off if it is that bad. It’s fine. You’re involved in the conversation. That’s what’s important. Stay confident and you can get through any misspeaking that occurred. Other than that, there is absolutely nothing you can fear. You just have to time it well if you are trying to sneak in your words with people who talk a lot.

My next tips are along those lines. First of all, position yourself such that you won’t be outside the main group if you want to say something. If you are positioned on the outskirts, and everyone else is talking, yeah, they won’t notice you! You can’t blame them for that. Second, wait for a spare second to speak, but then JUMP. Don’t hesitate! If you hesitate, it is too late. It’s like merging into traffic. Third, don’t straight-up interrupt people. Try to make sure they’ve exhausted their topic before you jump in. This one is sometimes tricky for me. I’ll always wait for a pause and then jump in, but if you do it in the middle of a thought, you’ll get acknowledged for half a second and they will go right back into it, because honestly, you were rude and they weren’t finished yet. That timing is so important. Probably something you’ll have to screw up a couple times before you get it, if you are anything like me.

This doesn’t just go for speaking with authority, obviously. This goes for anything, really. Be self-aware and be confident. With those two tools in your tool belt, you really can’t go wrong.

How can you use self-awareness and confidence to improve your life?

Everything Will Be Okay

A few days ago I was in a Love drought. I was anxious and stressed out, and I knew that, for the most part, I was the only one to blame. No one was putting this stress on me – I was doing it to myself. I knew logically that everything was fine, but I just felt this intense pressure and stress that was causing my heart to pound rapidly, my temper to be short and my temperature to rise. I kept telling myself, “Be careful right now. Be careful right now.” For some reason it was really hard to focus on being present. I guess I was in my own little world a little too much. I concentrated really hard on being aware of how I was coming off and being giving and loving to those around me.

I tried to find some time during the day to break away and check in with myself. Instead of letting all my thoughts float around at the same time, I focused on specific words.

Everything is okay. Things that you’re stressing out about will work out fine.

Don’t feel stressed out and feel like you’re going to get attacked – that will change the experience you have. Instead of getting defensive, approach things calmly. Pose questions and opinions you have in an intriguing way. There’s no reason for it to be defensive. This is a chance to shine and spread love, not to be stressed out. It’s not necessary. It’s going to be fine. It’s going to make life better now and later if you can control that. Remain calm. No one is trying to attack you – you don’t have to defend yourself.

Don’t worry about things. They will work out.

I’m going to have a beautiful day, because I get to decide how to perceive things. I choose to perceive things in a positive way. I choose to be happy.

From then on, I was good. I just had to get centered. I had to get balanced. Somehow I’d gotten off balance. I think because I’ve been so busy, even though a lot of it has been enjoyable, like my big garden project I spent all weekend on, and of course all my activities and big events coming up. I probably just feel really overwhelmed. I just needed a moment to remind myself that everything is okay, and I needed to really hear, absorb and believe that statement.

How often do you need to remind yourself that everything will be okay?

What the World Needs Now...

I hope the community I'm witnessing now that's growing, for example The Daily Love, is able to make a difference and get people back to understanding love, life and their own worth so this stuff doesn't keep happening. Our society and others teach that our worth is conditional and our happiness is conditional, and that's exactly the problem. We have to BE something to be worthy or successful; we have to HAVE something to be happy. When people don't think they are worth anything and don't think they are happy, they lash out. They feel trapped, separate and miserable and they hate everyone else. That's what's causing this and that's what needs to be fixed, not gun control or anything like that. That's just the means they use. As we saw yesterday, criminals can find other ways to do damage. It's the hate and anger in their hearts that is the problem. You can't fix everyone, but you can fix the criminal-factory that this rat race, fast-pace, popularity contest, looks-obsessed, stab people in the back, unreasonably high expectations and stress in our world. It is DAMAGING. I would imagine it's the same deal in other cultures - if you don't worship that culture's god adamantly enough, you aren't worth anything. If you don't master that culture's skills or businesses, you aren't worth anything. Whatever the culture is, if you don't master what they find important, you are a waste of space. A waste of air. A waste of resources. That's how people feel. But just by being HUMAN, you are worthy of love and happiness. Just by EXISTING, you already have all of that. You are NEVER a waste. It takes special people to be able to handle that sort of pressure and put it in its place. It takes special people to understand that they are human, and therefore they deserve love and happiness, and they don't need to base their worth on external circumstances. People judge others how they judge themselves. If they can stop judging themselves, they will stop judging others. I'm learning this one myself right now in various ways. You don't fix crime by stripping all the good people of their ability to defend themselves, and then continue to have this kind of environment. Fix the people. Bring everyone back to humanity. I'm not saying it's easy, and I'm definitely not saying there are any laws you can pass that will do that. Is that what people want? A law that will fix it? Really?? The government has to tell you to be a good person and to love yourself? No. You can do that for yourself. WE can do that for OTHERS. Do it today. Compliment someone today. Do a nice deed for someone. Hold the elevator. Let that car in instead of speeding up so they can't get by. Hold the door for someone. SPREAD LOVE. The world is in desperate need of it.