Category Archives: divorce

How to move forward gracefully after a divorce

Divorce, and break-ups in general are very difficult to process and move on from.  For many reasons, separating from someone we love leaves us feeling lost and desperate for answers.  Many times we blame ourselves in hopes that if we take ownership of the breakup we can then fix it and not have to suffer with this pain any longer.

The pain can be so deep that it triggers other emotional issues inside us, ones that we thought we buried and would never see again.  Sometimes break-ups are the Universes’ way of getting us to deal with our issues instead of filling voids and living the day to day as if these issues do not exist.  That’s called denial.

Being divorced twice and losing both husbands in a similar and pretty traumatic way I realized the Universe was sending me a message…it was the same message both times and this time I listened.

Below are my simple tips of letting go and moving on after a divorce (or breakup):

  • Let yourself go through the stages of grief/loss – A divorce or breakup of a significant relationship is quite similar to a death.  In order to move forward you must go through the stages of grief.  The five stages are  denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance and they are a critical part of the framework that makes up our learning to live without the one we lost. They help us to gain the tools we need to help us identify what we may be feeling, however there is no exact timeline when it comes to the healing process and you may bounce around from grief to anger and back to denial before you hit acceptance.   Healing is not linear.
  • Accept that healing takes time – As I stated, there is no time table and healing is not linear.  Just  know, you are where you are meant to be, healing.  The more difficult the relationship and break up the harder the hit is to your body, mind and soul.  You need to be compassionate with yourself and accept that it can take years to recover and that is OK!  Honor yourself and where you are at, at every moment.
  • Allow yourself time to heal – solo – Fix yourself and heal first before bringing someone else into your world otherwise you risk repeating the same patterns until you have learned the lesson you were meant to learn – the Universe is speaking to you so listen.  The only way over it, is through it.
  • Do not fill voids by immediately trying to replace your ex – Believe it or not, you are not ready for a new relationship!  By jumping in to a new relationship, you are trying to fill a void to escape from hurt, that never works, it delays the healing process and puts other people at risk for heartbreak.
  • Allow yourself to feel anger, fear and sorrow – These feelings are normal and are part of the healing process.  Feel every feeling until you are numb to it.  Stuffing your feelings does not work, facing them head on speeds up the healing process.
  • Fill your life with interests and activities – Now is the time to try something new (new hobby, take a class, start an exercise routine), make new friends, and start some Keystone Habits (see my blog on Improve your life with these simple Keystone Habits).  This creates a full and satisfying life.  Become a better version of yourself!
  • Make peace with your loss and try to forgive – If you focus too much on the loss and don’t let go of the story you will not get to acceptance and you will prolong the healing process.  There is a lesson in all this, take the time to learn what it is.
  • Let go of the story – Yes it was traumatic – yes you are in pain – yes you miss him or her – but if you do not let go of the story and make peace with what happened and why it happened you will delay creating a new and better story, one that doesn’t involve a traumatic breakup.  Learn the lesson and move forward.
  • Make time for yourself and figure out who you are as a person – I imagine you have spent a majority of time focused on your relationship and your significant other.  Now it is time to focus on yourself and figure out who you are and what makes you tick.  Fall in love with yourself!
  • If you want to find a happy, nurturing, compassionate relationship, look for those qualities inside yourself – Do you have those same qualities you are looking for in another person?   Remember … you are holding up your mirror so be who you wish to meet!  Its that simple.

Once you change your mindset from loss to opportunity, the healing process will be a much easier Journey to the next story of your new and wonderful life.

Namaste’

Please share this with others who you think will benefit from this article.

Anxiety

– The only way over it, is through it! –

Anxiety is a fear based emotion and/or feeling.  It is the feeling of a lack of control.  However, it can exist only if we feed it.

We feed anxiety by either by living in the past and wishing for a different outcome or by trying to predict or control the events of our future.

On a very basic level anxiety is a lack of trust in ourselves and the Universe.  A worry of what is to come.  An inability to process and accept the past.  It is the action of trying to prevent a certain outcome by driving it a certain way (not trusting the Universe).    It is a lack of forgiveness of others and Self.

Anxiety = fear

The anecdote for fear is to trust Self and the Universe.  We need to stop trying to control the outcome and allow the magic of the Universe to unfold.  We spend so much time trying to steer the events of our lives and dictate where we think they should go, that we end up missing the magic of where it could lead us.  We need to trust.

Anxiety will not subside on its own.  We must resolve the underlying fear or trauma before the anxiety can start to dissipate.

  1. We must dig deep and explore our past and present Self;
  2. We must let go of what we are trying to forget (but can’t);
  3. We must let go of what we fear to lose;
  4. We must not try to run from it, hide from it, nor should we feed it or mask it and expect it to go away.

We must look at anxiety/fear as if we are holding on to a very short rope.  Holding on to this rope is exhausting, draining and it is emotionally killing us.  However, this fear of letting go of the rope has become our lifeline and a way to avoid the unknown.

Letting go of that rope IS scary, however, letting goes frees you and allows you to BE!

  • Be you
  • Be happy
  • Be free
  • Be strong
  • Be loved
  • Be content
  • Be empowered
  • Be still
  • Be safe

JUST BE!!!

How do you get rid of the anxiety?

Let go of the rope!

  1. have faith – find your spirituality
  2. create a blank slate/fresh start – the life of your dreams
  3. live a clean life
  4. exercise
  5. do the right thing
  6. don’t keep secrets
  7. listen to and trust you intuition
  8. surround yourself with happy people
  9. do not run from your problems
  10. stop self medicating
  11. ask for help
  12. see a counselor/coach/therapist
  13. talk through your fears and issues
  14. feel your feelings
  15. confront childhood trauma
  16. feel – cry – repeat
  17. learn to trust yourself
  18. figure out who YOU are
  19. give up all vices (drugs, alcohol, food)
  20. enjoy the moment for what it is
  21. be in nature
  22. journal your thoughts and feelings
  23. express gratitude
  24. fall in love (with yourself and others)
  25. surround yourself with peace
  26. remove physical and emotional clutter
  27. remove those that are toxic from your life
  28. create a self care routine

Sadly I spent most of my life (starting at a very young age) living in an anxious state.  This is a horrible way to exist.  It wasn’t until I worked through my childhood trauma, abandonment and fears that I started to notice the anxiety lessen until it eventually disappeared.

I also learned coping skills to help me work through those horribly anxious moments (triggers can cause deep anxiety).  Gratefully I am able to reach into my tool belt to find the best tool to ward off the anxiety before it takes over.

Once we accept the concept that we, ourselves, actually feed the anxiety with our very own thoughts (and worry), we are able to work to change our mindset and start focusing on the positive.  Another way to ward of anxiety is to get involved in something you enjoy so you are able to change your mindset before your mind starts taking over with negative thoughts (read Grounding exercises to ease anxiety and the stress of daily life).

If you would like more information on how to work through anxiety or would like to schedule a coaching appointment, please contact us Coaching

Love, light, laughter and peace

Avesha

 

 

 

 

How to practice self love daily

How do you start your day?

~Life is an endless process of self discovery~

Self-love is not a trend, it is not something you do when you feel like it.  You don’t just “do self-love” after a break up or after you experience trauma.  Self-love is a life long practice that needs to be added to your every day life. With self-love comes the releasing of negative thoughts and self-criticism by embracing more of a loving and positive acceptance of yourself through forgiveness of yourself and others.

The Universal concept is that our thoughts create our actions and therefore those thoughts dictate the outcome in our lives.  Self-love is a very powerful and necessary practice and critical if you want to have healthy relationships with others.

Self-love is not selfish!

Taking care of and loving ourselves and being a whole, sound and emotionally healthy person allows us to take care of others without it feeling like a burden. If you aren’t taking care of yourself, if you don’t rest and relax your soul, then you will be of no help to others— especially yourself.  You will eventually feel drained and eventually there will be nothing left to give.  You must give to yourself as well as give to others.

Below is a a simple self-love checklist that may seem overwhelming to you at first, however, I promise that if you commit to adding a majority of them into your daily routine or practice as I like to call it, every single day, you’ll see the benefits immediately.

45 Ways to Practice Self-Love

  1. Create a quiet and safe zone in your home (may it be a corner, a closet, or a spare rom and deem it your “space”)
  2. Buy yourself fresh flowers (or cut them from your garden and display them)
  3. Grow a garden of fresh vegetables
  4. Start an exercise routine (yoga, pilates, the gym, take a walk) – increase those endorphins (see Creating a workout routine you can and will stick to)
  5. Read, take a nap, listen to music, sit quietly – please just rest your soul
  6. Buy yourself some new makeup and play with it
  7. Create a daily bucket list and post it
  8. Repeat the following mantra “I love and accept myself”
  9. Make a list of all the things you like about yourself
  10. Create a gratitude journal (see How to start Journaling – Keystone Habit)
  11. Start your day with meditation and yoga
  12. Implement a “treat yourself day” (mine is Friday)
  13. Dress nice, even if you don’t have to, put on those earrings, scarf and lipstick and show the world how beautiful you are
  14. Take a breath between your bites of food and savor the taste
  15. Make yourself a hot cup of coffee or tea and savor each sip
  16. Have a protein or collagen smoothie every morning
  17. Sleep at least 7 hours a day
  18. Say no and be ok with it
  19. Pay it forward, always
  20. Make someone feel good whenever you can
  21. Smile often, even if no one is smiling at you (they may think you are weird but that is ok)
  22. Eat food that is nourishing (put down the boxed food – unless its treat day)
  23. Get a massage and have them use essential oils
  24. Go for a hike or long walk in nature
  25. Be confident (walk and talk with confidence)
  26. Learn something new – dance classes, yoga, tennis lessons, start or join a MeetUp group
  27. Host a ladies night
  28. Call a friend and laugh for hours about nothing (no complaining)
  29. Spend time with your kids before they grow up and move away 😦
  30. Get a new haircut and/or buy some new makeup
  31. Eat chocolate guilt free (maybe on treat day)
  32. When someone offers your a compliment, simply say, “Thank you”
  33. Travel solo
  34. Set a no screen time in your house (dinner, after 9, etc)
  35. Set goals (see Improve your life with these simple Keystone Habits)
  36. Take a day off and do something nice for yourself (go to the gym, coffee shop, shop, meet a friend for lunch, take a walk, sleep)
  37. Self-love mantra: “I am enough. I have enough. I do enough”
  38. Let go of what no longer serves you
  39. Buy a diffuser and infuse essential oils like lavender
  40. Write a letter to yourself and put it away for a year
  41. Host a dinner party
  42. Hire a coach or a counselor (see The real benefits of working with a Life Coach)
  43. Take a hot bath with Epsom salt and lavender (or whatever your favorite oil is)
  44. Make new friends (and remove those toxic ones)
  45. Clean out your closet and donate clothes you no longer wear

The biggest message I have is, be gentle with yourself and always honor where you are at every stage of your Journey.

The best advice I have been given – ever is to ~feel your feelings~

Namaste’

Contact Us if you would like to work with a coach to help you kick start your self-love and self care routine!

The journey begins….

And so it begins….the transformation of my once broken soul to a strong, confident, happy and balanced person.

I was once a very anxious, scared little girl living inside a grown woman’s body.  I cared so much about what others thought of me, I was terrified of making decisions and although I appeared extremely confident on the outside, my insides would scream at me that I was not good enough.

I still feel that way at times.  Insecure and sad, abandoned and scared.  The difference now is that I honor those feelings instead of trying to push them away.

Navigating through childhood “stuff”, loss of significant people in your life, loss of what you perceived as love, recognizing and dealing with bad choices and their consequences are all very heavy burdens to handle.  Not all of us are equipped with the tools to deal with most of these things.  These are the things that can destroy us internally.

However, through my own Phoenix Process – I have learned that if you feel your feelings and don’t try to push them away you will work through them much faster and most of the time they will pass (if you let them).  Holding on to them can feel like you are protecting yourself, like a shield, but the reality is you are only hurting yourself and prolonging your healing.

If you do everything in your power to avoid feeling your feelings…by drinking, over planning your time, drugs, sex, pornography, clinging to relationships..you are prolonging the entire process of healing and actually making things worse.

It takes time to process feelings and avoiding them doesn’t make them go away, unfortunately they get stored in our subconscious and eventually those thoughts and feelings you are trying to avoid come seeping out….through anxiety, depression, nightmares, anger, however your body wants to process them.  There is NO escaping these thoughts and feelings no matter how much you drink, eat, have sex, etc.  They will always be there.

So my advice is to truly feel your feelings….cry until there are no more tears left…and please know that at some point this period of sadness/anxiety will pass and you will feel so much better as you catapult to the next stage of healing.

It is also important to create new good memories which will ultimately replace the older ones that are stuck in your mind.  We tend to cling to what feels good and forget what hurt us in the past.  I assume this is for survival.  However it is not healthy to hang on to the past and focus only on what felt good, just as its not healthy to ruminate about what hurt you.  There comes a point in time, once we have let our feelings seep in, that we have to let go and move on from the past (good and bad) and focus on what is in front of us.

We truly are the director of our own lives and we do have the ability to construct our lives exactly how we want them to be.  With a little time and effort and some real belief in yourself and the Universe, you can live the life you want…within reason.  Set your expectations to a realistic measure and start making better choices that involve self care and self love.  Remove toxic people from your life, think before you act, do not engage in self fulfilling prophecy’s and focus on how you would like to feel.  Everything is about feelings and how things make us feel.  Love is a feeling, sadness is a feeling, happiness is a feeling.  Construct your life in a way that makes you feel good.

But also understand that you will not be happy every single day of your life.  There will be days you question yourself, your friends, your lover and your choices.  That is ok.  How in the world would we be able to recognize things are good if there was no “bad”.  We wouldn’t.  The bad times are what help us appreciate all the good we have.

Write down (right now) about 10 things in your life that you are grateful for and smile as you write them.  Say each thing out loud and say thank you like 2 or 3 times with true gratitude.

I am personally grateful for so many things…my beautiful children, my peaceful and zen home, yoga, Luke (my beautiful and smart Golden), my friendships, peace, food and water, my career and financial stability, my gardens, the earth/nature, travel, amazing coffee.  The list really and truly is endless.

Everyone can list their lack, the things they don’t have, the things they want, the things they miss, but that just creates more lack.  Focusing on what you do have will help you attract more and more wonderful things, even if they aren’t exactly what you want.  The Universe has an incredible way of providing us what we need.

As a survivor of abandonment and trauma I can tell you that the mind is a very powerful thing and it is actually what gets us into trouble 99% of the time.

We literally create most of our own issues by:

  1. focusing on the past and not whats happening in front of us
  2. ruminating – allowing thoughts to run rapid in our minds
  3. not appreciating the things we have and always creating a feeling of lack
  4. not letting go of anger
  5. not dealing with our issues and letting them fester inside us
  6. loving people that are wrong for us and treat us poorly
  7. not valuing ourselves and putting ourselves first
  8. not practicing self love and care
  9. allowing others to define our worth
  10. giving away our power

We do not have to do this, we can gain control of our thoughts (if not fully, partially) and re-direct them back to a positive and happy thought process.  It takes practice and consistency but through yoga, meditation, mindfulness, earthing and grounding and many other wonderful techniques it can be done.

I am finally at a place where I can fully let go of my negative thoughts just by using my tools that I have learned the past two years.

Being able to do this has totally changed my life and it can change yours.

Feel your feelings, let them in and let them go…

Namaste

 

 

Learning to live in the calm

I read a fantastic article the other day that really resonated with me.  The writer was referencing how a lot of us have a difficult time living in the calm, therefore we [subconsciously] create our own drama just so we feel something.

Sometimes, life can be too calm and in that calmness, for those of who have been living on high alert for many many years, waiting for other shoe to drop, walking on egg shells, waiting for someone to hurt us, walk out on us or cheat on us, that calm can feel very empty.  This is because the internal fight or flight response has been our only source of fuel.

Calm….feels…scary!  It represents the unknown, it feels weird and unsettling.  We sit…waiting for something to happen and when it doesn’t….we get confused and feel emptiness inside us, which is very confusing to our psyche.

It’s a sad realization when that feeling of empty washes over us.  We tell ourselves that we shouldn’t feel empty, we should feel at peace, but we don’t, not yet.  We will, but it takes time and lots of work on ourselves to allow ourselves to be at peace, to fill that emptiness with things that make us happy, to learn to soothe ourselves in that moment of peace that is so foreign to us.

We have spent too much time living in a chaotic and toxic environment under a big black cloud, and that became our norm.  We knew what to expect, we lived it daily….our norm was their anger, cycling of moods, cheating, discontentment, histrionics, alcohol abuse, temper tantrums, lies, secrecy and depression. Our sole job has been to try to manage this person and their moods while trying to succeed at our own lives….job, parenting, keeping the house, paying the bills and trying to keep everyone…happy.

Exhausting and fucking IMPOSSIBLE!

When we finally decided to leave and save ourselves from the madness that we thought we could handle, over time things finally became calm.  Our space becomes peaceful, there is no black cloud there to invade our space, no one rolling their eyes at us and cutting us down, no one angry at our kids just for existing, no one lying to our face while cheating on us behind your back, no one to take you down a notch..just for fun.  No one to blame us for their poor choices.  Its now just…calm.

Although this is amazing, it is also a complete mind fuck.  The peace and space leaves us  feeling empty.  We have no one to manage but ourselves and it is then that we realize how much energy that person stole from us.  Now we have to figure out what to do with all this free time we have now that this emotional vampire has finally moved on to someone else that they can suck the life out of.

So what should we do with this time?  Well….after the initial shock of realizing we have this time, after the confusion subsides, after the haze disappears….we should ENJOY THIS TIME!

Take a class, do yoga, read, rebuild your relationship with your friends, get a pet, start a blog, get involved in your community, join a meet up group, see a therapist, work with a life coach, but whatever we do….we need to enjoy this time of peace.

What we should NOT DO IS FIND ANOTHER SOUL SUCKING TICK.  That would be the easiest thing to do to fill this time we are not used to having, but its the most devastating thing we could do.

It is time to spend some time with ourselves, create a happy place in our homes, start a garden, go hiking, do whatever it takes to find ourselves!

In time, when we feel we know who we are and what we want, and when we are no longer in danger of finding another emotional vampire….only then can we go back out into the world of dating.

We will know when we are ready….and when we are not.

Until then, find you, love you, honor you and complete you…above all else.

Love, peace, light