Marie forleo

“I don’t have to settle. I don’t have to tolerate the life I have, even if it’s good. I want great, magnificent, and outstanding.”

Take the time to watch this.
SO good.
It’s summer. You have time.
I’m not kidding!

PS. There’s naughty language used, wear your headphones if kids are around.

Carry on,
xox

So, you guys, in the past 36 hours, three of my squad, my spiritual tribunal — Liz Gilbert, Danielle LaPorte, and Marie Forleo, the ladies who I look to to give it to me straight — they ALL wrote or talked about looking fear in the eye, saying “fuck it” — and then moving forward.

Carry on through the fear you guys, (Like Lizzie into the fire, *wink).
xox

Take it away Liz!

Question of the day: DO YOU ALREADY KNOW WHAT YOU NEED TO DO?

Dear Ones –
Here I was yesterday in the South Island of New Zealand, where I am visiting my beautiful cousin Melissa. You can’t really see Melissa in this photo (she is the tiny figure on the right) but trust me: She’s here.

Why is Melissa here?

Because four years ago, my cousin quit her good steady job (during a recession, no less!) and left behind her safe and familiar life in her small Midwestern hometown, and moved HERE, to begin a new life, starting from nothing, at the wild ends of the earth.

My cousin didn’t know anyone in this entire hemisphere. She had never before traveled. She feared she was “too old” to change her life. She had always been risk-averse, and the thought of moving across the world was terrifying. But she had been stuck for too long. She was suffocating in her day-to-day existence. She couldn’t take it anymore. She was tired of faking happiness.

Then she realized: “If I don’t face my fears, I will never grow.”

So she did it. She followed some deep, irrational, inner instinct that led her right to this place. She planned to stay in New Zealand for only four months…but she has now stayed for four years. And holy shit, has she grown. She sees this wild ocean every day. She has bungee’d off cliffs, and climbed glaciers, and repelled down mountains, and bought a house, and started a business, and — most amazingly of all — she has conquered her fear of public speaking!
(And oh yeah…she also met and married the love of her life here.)

As Melissa told me today: “I wish I had changed my life earlier, but I didn’t have the courage. I always knew what I needed to do, but for years it made me sick with fear to imagine actually doing it.”
This observation made me think of all the times in my life when I was stuck, and also knew exactly what I needed to do — but I might have put it off for years, because I, too, was sick with fear about actually doing it.

In fact, it made me wonder if maybe we all have some deep inner instinct about our true destiny — about what we need to do next, at every turn — but our fear and insecurity and self-doubt sometimes makes us put it off for years. Or forever.

I do believe that every single time in my life I have ever said in desperation, “I don’t know what I should do!” — in fact, I DID know what I needed to do. I was just too afraid to do it.

And then one day, you’ve had enough.
And then one day — you just freaking go do it.
And that’s the day when the best part of your life actually begins.
ONWARD,
LG

If you need more convincing, take a look at this!

Today I heard the most beautiful Buddhist meditation/prayer for fear.

It is recited by Colleen Saidman Yee at the end of her yoga classes.
I just love it and I thought you would too.

Here are her words.

“It goes something like this: Sit down and notice where you hold your fear in your body.
Notice where it feels hard, and sit with it. In the middle of hardness is anger.

Go to the center of anger and you’ll usually come to sadness.
Stay with sadness until it turns to vulnerability.

Keep sitting with what comes up; the deeper you dig, the more tender you become.
Raw fear can open into the wide expanse of genuineness, compassion, gratitude, and expectancy in the present moment.

A tender heart appears naturally when you are able to stay present.

From your heart you can see the true pigment of the sky. You can see the vibrant yellow of a sunflower and the deep blue of your daughter’s eyes.

A tender heart doesn’t block out rain clouds, or tears, or dying sunflowers.
Allow beauty and sadness to touch you.
This is love, not fear.”

Isn’t that beautiful you guys?
Happy weekend,
xox

You can catch Colleen’s entire interview with Marie Forleo and hear her say the prayer on my Facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/Theobserversvoice

Colleen’s new book:
Yoga for Life
A Journey to Inner Peace and Freedom

http://books.simonandschuster.com/Yoga-for-Life/Colleen-Saidman-Yee/9781476776781

Hi you guys,
This is a subject I struggle with A LOT.

I’m tenacious to a fault, and some of my greasy (I wrote greatest but auto correct changed it to greasy and who am I to challenge auto correct? Truth be told — they were greasy!) Mistakes happened when I didn’t know when to throw in the towel — cut my losses.

Other people fold the minute things get tough. Wait, what am I sayin’ I’ve wanted to do that too!

I love me some Marie Forleo. I want to be her when I grow up and I love this graphic by Deborah LeFrank, cause I’m visual, I love seeing Marie’s insights all written out.

The ten-year test is genius.

Asking for guidance…learning curve.
..listening when it’s offered…pricless.

Quitters DO win…game changer!

So, is this something you battle with as well?

Which one are you? Do you get dragged or do you let go too soon?

Or both – like me?

Do you have any stories, what did you learn?

Carry on,
Xox

I participated in an interesting exercise last spring.
It was suggested as a kind of fact-gathering, first step.
Part of an online, open hearted, business school that I took.

marieforleo.com/BSchool

What I did was to ask about thirty five people I respected, in the humblest way I could think of, to list my best qualities.
You know – for school.

I assured them it would be over quick, it was for my education – and we would never need to speak of it again!

At first you feel like a real assbite crafting such an email.
It could resemble an ego driven fishing expedition; but really, it wasn’t, and if you could get past the initial “yuck factor” and just write it from a place of heart-filled curiosity, it made it much easier to hit SEND…and I know people could sense that.

The idea behind this, in business speak, is that you can track the responses, and the ones that repeat enough to become your top three are your “greatest hits” so to speak – and those are the ones you could conceivably charge money for.

But what I garnered from this exercise went waaaaay beyond monetizing my personality.

1) If you have the balls to ask people you respect (and that’s an important distinction, don’t just ask every troll you find under a bridge) the emotional payoff is extraordinary.

My people, were honest, to the point, and didn’t pander or sugar coat their response. Come to think of it, that’s probably why they’re my friends.

2). You get HUGE insight into YOU. In a really good way. Stuff you didn’t ever think about yourself.
For me, good listener was in my top three. Who knew? I would NEVER have guessed that.
Big talker, interrupter, chatty, conversation hog – yes.
Good listener? Not so much. That was a truly unexpected surprise.

3) It felt so damn good to be seen. And complimented.
I want to send that letter every year, just to bask in the feedback kind of good.
I felt everyone’s two minutes of attention all the way down to my big toe.

Why on earth don’t we tell people how we feel about them?

The aspects we admire. The things they do better than anyone else.

Without them having to write a dumb-ass email?

Why don’t we compliment those around us, letting them know what they’re doing right in the world?

So much rage comes from feeling unseen and unheard. It kills some people from the inside out.

We’ve become a society that is quick with the snarky review. Some of the stuff I see on Yelp or on blog feeds makes me cringe.

I like to write letters, emails or comments when someone does something right. Positive reinforcement I guess.
I just know how good it feels.

I’ll leave you with two things before I get off my soapbox.

Last Friday my husband made a bank deposit and it never showed up online. So therefore it never happened. You can imagine his anxiety level last weekend. First thing Monday morning he went into the bank with his hair on fire. Not really, he’s bald. But three days of wondering had left him “Where the fuck is my money?” curious.

Seems he had attached a deposit slip from another bank account at a completely different bank to the check…so the manager WALKED it two blocks over and deposited it into that bank.

He did WHAT?! Are you kidding me?

Above and beyond the call of duty – so hubby is writing a letter full of admiration to this guy’s superiors.

You gotta tell people when they’re awesome.

Number two is this: Take a minute and think of someone who would be the most surprised, who feels the most invisible, unseen and unheard – and send them a text or an email with a compliment. Doesn’t have to be elaborate. Just a short “I really appreciate what a good listener you are. Thank you.”

Trust me, it’s going to make their day. Maybe even their month.

Love you guys, I really do! You are loyal and insightful and obviously have very good taste in blogs.

Have a great weekend!
Xox

Be careful of your thoughts, for your thoughts become your words.
Be careful of your words, for your words become your actions.
Be careful of your actions, for your actions become your habits.
Be careful of your habits, for your habits become your character.
Be careful of your character, for your character becomes your destiny.
—Chinese Proverb
Excerpt From: Dr. Habib Sadeghi. “Within.” 

Nope, I don’t have time.
How may times have we all said that? We’re stressed out, trying to eek out fifteen minutes here, an hour there, to get things done.
But, if you’re REALLY honest with yourself, it’s not the truth.
Even worse yet, it can be a self sabotaging belief. A bullshit tape that runs on an endless loop. 24/7.

When I say I don’t have the time for something, what I’m really saying is:
It’s not interesting enough.
It doesn’t sound fun.
It won’t be productive.
What’s in it for me?
I have something better to do.
And the Hall of Famer: It’s just not a priority right now.
Because truth be told, we WILL find the time for the things we want to do.

I seem to find time for Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. I can loose hours to those three punks. I spend maybe ten minutes promoting the blog, and then I get sucked into their devious vortex for an hour of mindless trolling. Kim Kardashian did what!?
You know you do too.
What did we do before social media? It didn’t even exist in its present, obsessive form five years ago. And I still felt a time crunch.

We are all very discerning about what takes us away from the things we love to do.
Like spending time with family.
I was in a cafe the other day and observed a family of four. Sitting around the table, looking down at their phones. ALL of them. No conversation. No interaction. No connection. Not a good use of their time together.

I can lie and convince myself that I don’t have time for a workout and then talk to my sister for an hour or get lost in emails. When I tell that lie, my pants should catch on fire. At least running from the flames would burn some calories.
Pun intended.

I know, it seems like our 24 hour days are really about 18 hours. Unless you’re waiting to leave for a vacation. That day is 100 hours long…….So it’s all perception.

If you feel like you don’t have enough time, that is “lack” mentality. Lack mentality can permeate other areas of your life if you feel it and say it enough.
Case in point.
My husband is a designer/contractor. He is also an amazing manifestor. There’s just one catch. 
The first quarter of this year started slow. He had little stuff going, but nothing big lined up. So he asked the Universe, the Big Boss, for more jobs. Lo and behold, people started calling and emailing like crazy. He had ten proposals to do in two weeks. He started to feel the time crunch. He started to worry about having enough hours to meet with the clients, bid the jobs and write the proposals. All of those things are very time consuming. What if he got them all, then what? How was he going to be able to effectively run all those jobs at the same time? A bit of panic set in. It was very interesting to watch.
He no longer felt the lack of work, but he did feel the lack of time to get things done.
And you know what happened? Nothing. Everything stalled.

Partly from the freaking crazy energy lately, but mostly because:
You can’t ask the Universe for more, and then tell it you don’t have the time.
She hates mixed messages. They piss her off. So, she just stands in the corner, arms crossed, taping her foot impatiently and muttering under her breath: “Ya wanna be busy or ya wanna be a cry baby? Don’t over target, be realistic about what ya can accomplish in one day. I’m here, let me know when you’re ready.”

We have to be vigilant and clean up our energy, our perception and the things we say about time.
He’s working on that now. It’ll all work out. It always does.

To quote the brilliant Marie Forleo: It’s all figuraoutable.
So instead of saying we don’t have the time, let’s say instead: Let me take a look at my schedule, and see what I can figure out. The Universe likes to hear that. She may even take notice, unfold her arms and start to send great things your way.

I want to know, do you struggle with a “lack” mentality? If you’re honest, are there things that waste the precious little time you DO have? Do you agree that it’s all perception? I’d love to hear what YOU think.

Xox

“The only currency in this bankrupt world is what you share with someone else when you’re uncool.”
~from the movie Almost Famous~

I love that line. It’s delivered by the disheveled, “uncool” underground DJ played by the late, great Phillip Seymour Hoffman. He drops that little truth bomb on William, the 15 year old who is touring with an up and coming band, trying to capture their story for Rolling Stone magazine.

I can relate to that…now more than ever.
I am the un-coolest blogger in the blogosphere, THAT I know for sure.
I’m not really sure why I got the “hit” to blog, I’d never even read a blog before I 
started my own a year and a half ago. I just got the urge to go public.

Confession: When I look at the other blogger’s sites, I just want-to-die…of un-coolness.

When a blogger “likes” something you write, it is only polite to go check out their site. Even more so if they start to “follow” you. 

Some of these people are kids! But they have got it more together than I EVER will!
15 year old girls have blogs that link to their websites. These websites have so much content, it looks like they cost $30,000! They have paid advertising and products for sale, some have books.
WTF? At 15, I had pimples…end of story.

There are incredible 20 something fashion bloggers with tens of thousands of followers, one Italian street fashionista has over 10 million!
There are all these badass photographers who take amazing photos from exotic locals all over the world.
There are ridiculously talented writers and poets. I mean seriously good.

Then there’s me.
Almost 56 year old me, who lives in the burbs, sings musical theater (gleek), rides on the back of a motorcycle and writes about spirituality, life, and and
occasionally I throw in a poem.
I send these musings out into the world every morning. I post them, I tweet them and Facebook them, ( which I’m sure is SO last Tuesday) wondering if anyone reads them.

But every now and then, something will resonate with one of the “cool kids”
and they’ll email me, (They never leave a comment; too un-cool) to tell me it touched them or made them laugh.
They encourage and push me. They tell me I should vlog (video blog) and suggest I self publish.

Whoa, cool kids, let’s take it slow here, I’m just getting the hang of this stuff.

I do have to say, the spiritual blogosphere in general, has such a generosity of spirit. They are a community that embraces everyone. It’s where the cool kids dane to talk to the uncool, and give great advice. They are big hearted smarty pants’ who talk the talk and walk the walk.
I’m starting B-school with Marie Forleo in March. It’s an online business school that all the cool kids suggested, and which I’ve been stalking for a couple months.

I can’t even imagine it now, but I’m cautiously optimistic that I will be just a smidgen cooler come May.

By then I’ll be privy to what all the cool kids know. 

Note to self: stop using words like “smidgen”. 

I’m afraid I’m just terminally un-cool.

XoxJanet