Reflect

Reflect

We judge people all of the time. We point fingers or espouse “words of wisdom” trying to help other people be better, do better, or even act better … all the while we are not correcting our own behavior. We tell people what they should eat in order to be healthy and yet we stopped at DD to get a glazed chocolate donut for breakfast. We tell people to control their kids meanwhile ours are off being the ring leader of bad behavior. We tell our friend to dump the loser they are dating and yet our own partner has left us in tears - again. We tell others to leave the job they despise, meanwhile another year has gone by of us hating our own career path. We run around with opinions about everything, except our own actions. Here’s a secret, no one is going to listen to you if your own house is messy. No one is going to take anything you say seriously unless you are walking the walk and talking the talk.

 

Before you point the finger of judgement, do yourself a favor and point it right back at yourself. Get honest. Ask yourself if you are taking your own advice. Then do just that. Take your OWN advice. Stop being the town crier for what everyone else needs to fix and start cleaning up your own backyard.

Remember

Remember
If you are not careful, somewhere along the way you can lose yourself.  The person looking back at you in the mirror has become a stranger. How did that happen? It's easy - life happened and you weren't a priority on your to-do-list.

• You stopped voicing your opinion
• You lost your sense of security
• You did everything for everyone else leaving you with nothing left to give yourself
• You doubted your abilities .... at work, as a mother, as a spouse, etc.
• You held yourself up to other people who seemed to "have it all" and "do it all"
• You let your values be chipped away
• You stopped doing the things that fed your soul

Whatever the reason (or reasons) you lost yourself along the way but that stops NOW.  That stops TODAY. You are unique and have a great purpose to fulfill in this lifetime and that requires you to show up as you. Look at the person in that mirror and this time don't stop starring until you see the person you know looking back. When you do, smile at them and said good to see you old friend... and start living your life for that person.  The one that's always been there. The one that never left. The one that has been patiently waiting to welcome you back with open arms. That's the person whose voice should mean the most to you.  Never allow yourself to abandon them again!

Failure

Failure
We all fail. Sometimes several times in one day. It can start to wear us down and make us feel defeated at times. Failure makes us question ourselves, our beliefs, and what we know so really failure (in all of its glory) is just our teacher. We try, we fail, and the we try again based on what we keep learning. We keep doing this until we succeed. Just like learning how to ride a bike - none of us jumped on a bike for the first time and rode it perfectly down the street. No, we stumbled, panicked, maybe we even fell over a few times before we took everything we learned from all of those failed attempts and finally  "got it".  What happened when we were successful? Well we were physically able to soar!  Well maybe it took us just down the block but the feeling was pure freedom. That's what all of our failures are - moments that teach us how to continuously rise. Embrace the fail every time so that you can fully embrace the win.

Advice

Advice
You know all that sound advice you give to other people and all the pearls of wisdom you have provided over the years? It's been pretty spot on. So the question is then, why haven't you taken your own advice? It's easy for us to tell someone else how to leave a bad relationship, how to handle their money, how to proceed through a divorce, or what to do about this situation and that situation.  We are all experts when it comes to telling other people how to navigate their life. The problem is though, we very rarely take our own advice!  We end up in situations where we are spinning our wheels, pulling out our hair, and sometimes we are even brought to our knees being crippled by what life has thrown in front of our paths. But if we listened to ourselves though, really listened, we always had the answer - we just didn't always want to hear it. Well not anymore. It's time to take own advice, you know the one you have been avoiding listening to. You know the steps you need to take to change your life for the better. You know what you need to do and you know what you would tell someone else in your situation. It's time to stop helping everyone else and this time help the one person who matters most - YOU!