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Today is Friday and we’re heading into the weekend. I was thinking about some of the most common problems that I see people having when it comes to finding joy and happiness. I’d like to share the top three issues that seem to stop all of us from feeling the natural joy we could be experiencing otherwise.

There’s a funny thing about changing your life. While on the one hand, it’s hard at times and takes dogged determination to stick with it, it’s also as simple and instantaneous and easy as pausing to take a deep breath and smiling in the moment of difficulty. Change can actually be fun, rather easy and enjoyable once you know how to change.

One: Making Mountains Out of a Mole Hills

I once had a poster that said, “When you are up to your ass in alligators it is hard to remember your initial objective was to drain the swamp.” It was a wonderful reminder when I was down and looking at the shadows in life instead of feeling the love. Sometimes it’s hard to remember that things aren’t what they seem.
Mole hills aren’t mountains. There’s always another option and another way to see what you’re seeing and shrink mountains into small challenges.

Two: Change is Not as Hard As We Often Make It

It’s easy to look at what can seem like a huge project of changing your life around and feel utterly demoralized by it. This is a common mistake we make in so many areas of life. The truth is, life and change and goals and everything is only as hard as you decide it has to be.
The secret? It’s fine to look at the big picture once in a while, but don’t get stuck staring at it. Identify the next small steps you can to take and just take them. Suddenly you’ll find you’re making more progress than you ever dreamed possible.
Small, manageable steps will get you where you want to go. While staring at that unmoving mountain will only fill you up on despair. I found using the mantra, “easy and effortless” instead of, “this is hard” to be amazingly powerful.

Three: Focus on the Future is Undermining Everything

This is the tricky one and it gets all of us when we’re not present. When you spend all your energy focused on where you want to go, you can’t live in the present moment. The only time we can change anything is now, in the present moment.
In the present moment you can see how far you’ve come and appreciate your journey. Staying present can be challenging though and that’s why we need to practice it daily. Take a deep breath, relax completely as you exhale and feel the presence; let joy bubble to the surface and take that with you into your next step. If you’re staying present, you don’t need to worry about the future; it will take care of itself.

Why I Opened The Mentoring Program So Briefly This Time

I know that I haven’t given you much notice for the current Mentoring Program application opportunity process. I had actually not planned to open it up again for another couple months, but a few spots were available and I thought, what if NOW is the moment that someone really needed or wanted to get started changing their lives?

And so I thought that even if it was just a short notice I’d go ahead and let you know about it in case this was the best time for you.

Here’s what to do next…

So here’s your reminder. The application process is open until Sunday evening and I’ll be reviewing applications between now and then. Every person whose application qualifies will receive a free, 1-hour phone session with me and if you DO qualify, you’ll receive an email with instructions sometime after your application is sent.

Click here to apply for the mentoring Program and qualify for a free 1-hour phone session…

And of course, if you have any questions at all about it, please just reply to this email, or post a comment on the latest blog post and I’ll be sure to reply and answer all questions.

I look forward to hearing your thoughts and helping you on your journey in any way I can.

With much love and aloha,
Susan

What is the key to a happy, successful life?

Love. Not the romantic here today gone tomorrow love but the profound love that allows you to connect with your spirit and know who and what you really are.

A lot of us spend our entire life searching for love when we actually swim in a sea of love. You live in a universe that is more than willing to grant all of your wishes yet so often we yearn for more. We can have anything we want yet we are experts at snatching failure from the jaws of success.

How is it we do that?

How do we disconnect from the essence of who and what we are?

How do we block the flow of love?

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Aloha and Happy Thanksgiving,

Here in the United States we celebrate Thanksgiving Day today. It is my favorite holiday. A day dedicated to gratitude and thanksgiving. What could be better than gratitude and love? Lots of people use it as an opportunity to overeat but I love having people over, cooking, celebrating and truly giving thanks for everything. I am so grateful I have a wonderful home, a great family, friends and each of you. Thanks for allowing me to be part of your life.

As the holiday approached thought about what I wanted to give you. I finally decided I wanted to share a story from my book, The Toltec Way. It is about a village of people who learned the power of gratitude and love. At first I was just going to record it as an audio but then decided to make a video instead. I hope you enjoy it.

Here is the transcript of the story if you want to read along.

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I was recently asked what one thing changed my life the most. I had a hard time coming up with just one. I know I started my journey in earnest shortly after spending five days in an intensive care unit, on ever machine imaginable and in excruciating pain after a failed suicide attempt. I became very willing at that moment to do whatever it took to change the way I felt about my life. Believe me you don’t have to wait for that kind of a wake up call.

Here are some of things I learned to do that made a huge difference and the one most important thing I did everyday (and still do frequently).

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How many miles have your thoughts traveled?

I once read an article about how far out in space human beings original radio signals travel each day. I saw a science fiction movie in which ET’s were attracted to earth because of TV shows from the 50’s (what a scary thought!)

Imagine each and every thought or word you have ever had or spoken. Think of them traveling into space, forever held, forever spoken, forever reverberating through space, for all time, eternally. Are there any words or thoughts you wish you could take back? (more…)

That inner voice

Our inner dialog isn’t really the problem. The problem is we listen to that dialog, think it is our true nature and then we believe what we are telling ourselves. We forget that all of our perceptions about reality are based on an illusion. Until we change our perspective generally our assumptions about reality are based on the belief that we are separate and limited. We experience life as if we are our body and our thoughts are real. The world is a vast energy system and we forget that as soon as we start describing it, as soon as we start thinking we have broken our connection with who and what we really are.

You are a limitless, infinite, eternal energy presently inhabiting a body. The voice of your inner critic is an indication you have aligned yourself with your mind and not your spirit.  Many years ago I was told that I couldn’t think myself into shifting my awareness but I could take actions that would help me experience and in the process remember who and what I really was. (more…)

This morning I was doing some stretches in my hot tub. It is located under a tin roof and it was raining very hard. The gutters were gurgling with water destined for my water tank. I use rain water for all my water needs.

Suddenly I began to think of rain and what a miracle it is, water falling from the sky. Sometimes clouds are fluffy and white, at other time they share their water with the earth. This morning they were gray and dark yet I knew that the sun was shinning just on the other side of them. Rain gives life to the earth and many people are in need of that life giving water. (more…)

What a powerful phrase. Emotional poison …. we can poison our lives, we can poison our relationships, we can poison our passion, we can poison … we can poison. That is the point: we can poison anything with our thinking. Don Miguel Ruiz uses that phrase a lot in his teachings.

On the other hand we can also create anything we want with our thinking. It all depends on how we focus our attention. Life is and then we tell ourselves a story. What is our intent in telling that story? Does it allow us to be happy? Does it facilitate a deeper connection with our filter system or with our spirit? Fear or love? Does our habitual way of thinking take us in a direction we want to go? Are we getting the results we want in our life?

If we aren’t experiencing the emotions, events and outcomes we want in our life we can explore changing our perspective. It will have a very powerful result if we are willing to be honest with ourselves and make the necessary changes in our thinking. Life really isn’t about ‘out there.’ Our experiences in life are a reflection of our internal perspective.

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Our past can define us in a limiting way or set us free. The choice is ours.

Many times when I work with individuals the story of their childhood or past experiences have trapped them in an endless loop of creating the same thing over and over again. The key players may be different and the details of the story but ultimately the person winds up feeling the same way. They get to hold onto an old, limiting perspective – a belief they have successfully reaffirmed for years. After all they have the proof that the belief is true. They can point to their life and say ‘see’ I never get what I want or they never will understand, I’m not good enough or hundreds of other stories.

Life is and then we tell ourselves a story about what is and thus create our experience. What if we decide to tell ourselves a different story about the past? What if we decide our stories based on what they will create rather than based on what we believe about the past?

There is a big difference between knowing and feeling

Okay, so you begin to change your thinking. You know you are perfect. You know you can create what you want and very little changes. You know it but you don’t feel it in your gut. Until you feel it very little will change.

The world is a vast energy system so change is really about shifting our energy. A wonderful tool to help you do that is practicing what I call taking an inner journey. When we go inside to experience what is going on there are three levels of awareness: thoughts, emotions and feelings. Thoughts are thoughts, emotions are things like mad, sad, happy, glad, angry and love. Feelings are the sensations we feel in our body. Emotions can create feelings and often we mistakenly label feelings as emotions.

Beginning to decipher the language of feelings, understanding the language of energy makes an incredible difference in our life. You can begin to hear the language of your spirit, your heart, love or energy by focusing your attention on your five senses. Feeling through your five senses will help you feel rather than thinking about life.

Here is a short meditation that will help you focus on your five senses, relax and begin to feel the energy that always surrounds us and is the essence of who and what we really are.

Click here to listen…

Once you can feel the real you letting go is easy

People can struggle for years letting go of the past. Thinking they have to forgive people, process, write, scream, yell and then finally let go. I know I did but then I connected with my essence, with my spirit and I was able to be in the moment and see the past from a totally new perspective. Try it and see what happens. Set your intent to see life through the eyes of your spirit and watch your perspective change in amazing ways!

With love and aloha,
Susan

PS. If you have any questions feel free to post them in the comments. I welcome them and send you my love.

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I just finished leading a retreat here on the Big Island. A group of wonderful people from Lithuania and Latvia came here to experience Hawaii and get a crash course in transforming their lives. We had weeks of rain before they came and I was grateful the skies cleared and the weather was perfect, rain at night, sun during the day and showers only while we were driving. Magic at its best.

As is often the case I was teaching class Sunday night while they were here and had a profound ah ha that was in a sense always self evident yet not at all obvious until after the fact. I have found that is the nature of most of my profound ah ahs.

Horse are good at pulling wagons, but not so good at pushing them (more…)