For some of us, it takes time to learn how to receive the good into our life. Opening to abundance and JOY may feel challenging.

When you've learned to settle into lack, negativity, doubt, old habits and patterns... happiness feels elusive and abundance just out of reach.

These unproductive mindsets impacted EVERY area of my life. I settled for less in relationships. I played too small in my work, pulled back from my biggest dreams, and blocked abundance, money and love from flowing in.

Allowing myself to "receive" anything, including simple offers of help or even compliments, was a block I had to remove.
I healed old stories, shifted old mindsets and reframed my beliefs. I have been learning what *really* makes me happy and have spent more time doing those things. I have learned to receive with gratitude. I welcomed grace and joy and love into my life.

In what ways have you experienced similar blocks? Do you know what truly makes you happy?

Do you find it hard to receive from others? This manifests in many ways... from simple compliments to offers of help to expressions of love.

You deserve the good!
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Life is short. Allow yourself to welcome more joy, love, abundance, and fun into your life.

I used to feel so self conscious about my body that I stopped wearing my bikinis. Over the years, I had internalized so many messages about my own body and messages about what women's bodies are "supposed" to look like.

It was my daughter who made the biggest impact and helped me shift my thinking. She was 7 at the time.
We were getting ready to go to the pool.

I was standing in my closet looking at myself in a bikini, replaying a phrase someone had said to me several years prior ("I don't think you're quite bikini ready").

I was just getting ready to change out of my bikini into my one-piece and my daughter came bursting in and said, "mommy you look so pretty in your swimsuit!"

How could I change my suit after that?

That moment touched my heart in so many ways and was instrumental in helping me heal years of body image issues.
I want to model body confidence for her. She'll get enough messaging from other people about her body in the coming years and I want to support her in feeling good about her body, no matter its shape or size.

My goal is to teach her some basic principles... *Take care of your body... nourish it with healthy foods, exercise, rest.
*Love yourself. Love your body. Don't let other people tell you what beauty is or what you have to do to be "beautiful." We don't need to "fix" ourselves to meet other people's beauty standards.
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*Radiate your inner beauty, your uniqueness, and your gifts. That's what really makes us all beautiful humans anyway.

When your body is begging for rest, do you listen? I have had days with a whole list of things that needed my attention, but my body was screaming for rest and replenishment.

On those days, if I try to plow through the tasks without giving my body what it needs first, I get very little done. And the things that do get done don't get done well.

Rest and relaxation is a different kind of productivity. Giving time and space for a physical, mental, and emotional reset allows me to begin again feeling refreshed and ready to focus on my important tasks.

We are all allowed to REST. You are, too.
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When was the last time you allowed yourself a day of rest...? What are your favorite ways to rest and reset?

Why is it so difficult to extend compassion and forgiveness to ourselves? My journey with self-compassion has been challenging for a variety of reasons...mostly, because I expected myself to be PERFECT .... All. The. Time!

I used to have zero tolerance for mistakes or failure. When I did mess up, I was incredibly hard on myself.... mentally (and sometimes verbally) judging, criticizing, and berating myself.

It took me a long time to understand that mistakes and "failures" are actually a good thing. Because if we are messing up, it means we are trying. We are choosing. We are taking action. We are taking risks. We're learning and growing.
We actually do most of our learning during the challenging parts of life. In our mistakes and failures we learn what works and what doesn't. We learn what's important and what's not. Through our actions, choices, mistakes and failures, we learn about ourselves.

There is no perfection in the change process. No matter how badly we want to change our behaviors and make better choices, it easy to fall back into old patterns. It takes a lot of inertia to implement new habits because it's *easier* to keep doing what we are doing rather than changing our behavior.

I like to approach change from the mindset of "practice." I will keep practicing the new behaviors until they become my new natural choice. Sometimes this takes days, weeks, or months. Sometimes it takes a year. It depends on what the change is and what else is going on in my life.

As I experience setbacks, challenges, mistakes and failures, I've learned to extend myself patience, compassion, and love. Because I deserve it.
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If this sounds like anything you have been struggling with, reach out and let's schedule a discovery session to see what kind of support may be beneficial to you.