Walking is a natural, easy and very effective way to keep body and mind fit, relaxed and aligned.
Imagine not only to motivate for healthy habits, butenjoypractising them! Sounds like a shift from activating your success machinery to enjoying your life experience as a sentient being, doesn’t it?
Uplift yourself and learn to appreciate your active existence using such a simple activity as walking with consistency and moderation! It is important to shift from a low or mediocre mindset to a positive mindset in order to attract more positive thoughts, feelings, actions. Awareness is the key to open that door. Then, you just need to keep on walking through, day by day.
The Key is Awareness
It is your capacity of being aware that enables you to choose freely what truly feels good. If we don’t use this ability, we easily get trapped in habits, we don’t really want and it doesn’t really matter, where the origins of these habits come from, conditioning, genetics, former life or global warming. What matters is, how to deal with what is.
Imagine you could switch from a state of resistance or fight or flight to a state of alignment and freedom to choose. From feeling torn apart between thought and emotion to a state of aligment.
Stop complaining. Start walking.
Walking in nature with the intention to train your awareness is an easy way to find inner peace and reconnect to the heart. And it is free!!!
The Walking Guru is YOU
Sounds good? Don’t think about it, get started and keep walking! You got the gift with you, go unwrap it 😀
How to change habits and beliefs with Walking Meditation, Life Coaching and other Techniques
Did you ever have a bad conscience without knowing why? A bad conscience for no reason is one indicator, that some old program is running in the system. Just not being able to totally relax. Wanting to fix everything, before allowing to take a break. Never feeling “good” or “prepared” enough…
How do you detect such a program, delete or overwrite it?
Can it be easy?
Technically, it seems to work that way: a certain belief has created a neuronal chain reaction in the brain over years and years – the program – and now it is about creating a new neuronal pathway.
There is a great book by Dr. Joe Dispenza called “Leaving the Habit of Being Yourself” on this topic.
But is it enough to just talk yourself into something “positive”? “I can do that. I am good enough. I am brave. I am fearless.” etc.?
Louise Hay has become very famous with her positive affirmations and created a huge publishing enterprise publishing this kind of self-help books: How to change your mind and your life.
Align mind and heart
To me, it all sounds great. There is no risk in experimenting with positive affirmations. For me, it actually does work, when I also feel a feeling that resonates with what I am affirming. In other words, if my verbal declaration and the feeling are aligned and not controversy, then, some shift is happening in my perception of the world.
In the way I accompany people during times of challenges and change, life coaching is not just about defining the status quo, where you find yourself right now, defining a goal where you want to be in timeframe x and defining the timetable in steps how to get there. Working with Walking Meditation as main tool to change your way of thinking and reacting to situations, it is all about training your awareness and becoming response – able. Training your capacity to be conscious about what is going on in your inner world in terms of thoughts, feelings and physical body responses as a base to then act upon in.
The next step is about accepting what is. This is absolutely necessary because otherwise you just feed all your precious energy into resisting what is, focussing on judging into good and bad, obsessively trying to defeat what you don’t want, not noticing that you put even more focus on what you actually wanted to change!
Awareness is also the master tool for meditation. In recent years Mindfulness meditation have become very popular and many people who just don’t seem to be able to meditate can better deal with practicing mindfulness meditations.
So if you do realize that it is up to you to first of all be responsible for your mindset and secondly are willing to change it responsibly, you are half way there.
Acceptance of what is plus loving yourself the way you are here and now is the key to the new pathway. How to do that is described in many self-help books and yet, knowing how everything works simply doesn’t work, because the knowledge is useless unless applied!
It is about lovingly introducing and practicing a ritual or a loving and kind routine for yourself, where you step out of your mouse wheel consciously and -instead of repeating yesterday’s thoughts and feelings like an automatized robot- train and use this awareness of yours to realize what is really going on here and now. It means freeing yourself from the prison in the mind. It means being present here and now. It means opening the door to actually change something versus fighting something old.
Yaduma Walking Meditation is a system, that is easily applicable and takes only 10 minutes a day to start out with. It can be divided into 5 minutes in the morning and 5 minutes in the evening. It is all about walking slowly and consciously and bringing your awareness again and again back to walking and breathing. It doesn’t matter how many times the mind wanders away. You just bring it back. This form of Walking Meditation for many people is much easier to practice than sitting in a meditation pose over a long time. And starting with only 5 or 10 minutes daily is a trick to overcome the resistance of the thinking mind to let go of controlling the very moment obsessively and allowing to relax. If you must not do more than 10 minutes, it is easier, to allow those 10 minutes for the “experiment”. Once you do this for a few days, you have practiced your meditation muscle and resistance will decrease. Automatically you will be willing and allowing to spend more time to your mind-clearing meditation and slowly slowly reach deep states of relaxation.
If you are unable to meditate, try Walking Meditation
If you suffer from thinking fast and never getting a break, you can always practice Walking Meditation. You may find it much easier. Keep it down to little time at the beginning to start training your “muscle” smoothly.
And remember:
It’s all about being loving and kind to yourself
That’s how your vibe will change and you impact the world around you in a loving and kind way, without need of control or manipulation.
If you have problems to concentrate, Walking Meditation is a great little tool you can always do. Even on your way to work or on the way home.
If you can’t focus, Walking Meditation starting with only minutes can sharpen you mind, if you practice regularly in a kind way.
Walking Meditation is a great tool for people who believe they can’t meditate.
Experimenting with such tools will also have an impact on your quality of sleep. Sleeping problems can be solved with regular practice and introducing a couple more eating, drinking, exercise and digital/information detox.
If you suffer from thought patterns, habits or an inability to relax and be present, Walking Meditation is one of the easiest tools with very quick results. Sometimes it makes sense to hire a Life Coach teaching you those tools. He or she can give you tools, feedback and coaching and guide you along until you get on your own feet! Sometimes it makes sense to get on a coaching or monitoring program to help you stick to your kindness-exercise until you install that new neuronal pathway/ habit.
Some of my clients only used one or two sessions to train their kindness and relaxation muscle. It down’t work with working hard on it. It is the opposite. It is about letting go and allowing which will help you find the strength to make up your mind day by day and invest those 10 minutes daily for yourself without support.
Let’s go!
Enjoy the experiment and remember: nothing to lose, everything to gain.
October 8 is my birthday and I have a wish. I am not wishing for money to donate to a good case. You do that anyway, if you feel it! Children, sick, old, animals, the oceans, nature, fighting drug abuse, mental health, peace work, doctors without boundaries, there are so many great “cases” out there, where people collect money to do something good and we can make a change by donating.
For my birthday, I wish that everyone who reads this, can FEEL a sweet moment of gratitude, love and compassion in the HEART. That’s what life is about to me and that’s what I wish for all the wonderful people I met so far.
I am blessed with many sweet moments where people meet and connect with the hearts. Sometimes it’s just a look, sometimes it’s just a smile, sometimes it is a profound communication or a hug or singing a song together. That is what makes me happy, strong and rich.
Every day is a new birthday. The moment you wake up. That’s my motto. Go out, explore, live and share your gift.
During my birthday, I will be traveling ALL DAY from Costa Rica to Sedona, AZ.
Costa Rica is a big school for me. I am in Puertoviejo on the Caribbean. It is like Paradise, and yet conflictive. Contrasts are stronger here. Everything is stronger, so you can’t miss it: Lush nature, organic food, many cultures, Pura Vida. I meet beautiful people everyday and learn new things all the time: slack-lining, how to make roses from Palm Trees, how to produce coconut oil (that one I will have to study more and especially practice …), local food, local culture, the difference in communication, not just language but manners, gesture, mimics, social habits.
During my travel I will celebrate every moment and have you guys in my heart.
Live moments consciously with the heart open, so you can feel. And a peaceful mind, so you can still feel.
I feel blessed with the greatest gift on earth: two children, that I was able to accompany during some time, the first one, a “birthday child” was born 3 weeks early exactly on my birthday. The second one a gift of God to the Universe, was almost born in a car during Tornado Gordon in Florida. Both have been my biggest teachers and amazing human beings. What they taught me most, is what my own mother gave me all the time: Unconditional Love.
Unconditional Love – being loved for who you are, as you are
For many unconditional love is just an idea, a concept a word with a construct as meaning to it. It is difficult to feel compassion, when this “love” has been placed in the basement of all feelings, hoping that would protect from being hurt.
So here is my birthday wish for October 8:
Give yourself a smile and do take a sweet moment to FEEL the Love in the heart!
Unconditional Love for yourself and others
If I had a wish, I’d wish for all of us being aware enough to remember to first of all give some love to ourselves, appreciate all parts of ourselves, stop being so hard on ourselves and others, take a break from knowing and doing for the sake of being, loving and living.
A break from Knowing and Doing for the sake of Being, Loving and Living
Give yourself a smile and feel it in the heart. Focus! Allow this vibe expand all over the body, feel the vibration, feel alive! And allow this vibe to expand to the world around you. Do your share to world peace. Be kind and forgiving to yourself and others.
I feel healthy, happy and rich not only because of all the people in my life and the experiences I have lived. But because I realized that when I take away the judgment of “good” and “bad” I can appreciate all creations as they are and free myself to choose, who I want to mingle with, what kind of experiences I want to nourish and how I want to share my gift. A clear Yes and a clear No to certain things instead of blaming, judging and fighting.
Abundant, joyful, loved and connected. It is all within. From there, it can be shared.
…at least that’s how I perceive it…
Hundreds of people taught me so many things: family, friends, clients, business partners, strangers, “bad guys”, Masters, Gurus, Swamis, Shamans, children of the world. I feel rich and blessed. Thank you!!!
Let’s celebrate those sweet moments consciously, together, where ever you are. Many sweet moments, every day.
Detoxification – cleansing is usually referred the body. In Coaching Detox refers also to information. Letting go of old information that has no use in your experience of life today.
When it comes to Stress-Management “Mental and Digital Detoxification” is a great tool to get into your Power. In Workshops, Talks and Seminars, you can find out how to change your mindset, discover how you think – your expectations, attitude, fears, concepts, believes etc. and start to change, by letting go of limiting beliefs. But at the end, the knowledge doesn’t lead anywhere. It is about practicing new habits on a daily level. Not just digging in the mud to find whatever might be “wrong” from the past. But installing loving, kind habits, that make you feel at ease, peaceful, ok with all there is, right here, right now.
Introducing daily rituals, training awareness, taking care of the way you “vibrate” on every level: thoughts, feelings, physical habits such as exercise, eating, drinking and especially, the way you do the things you do makes a huge difference.
The Way you Do the Things you Do
If you eat and actually taste every bite, or if you eat quickly without even noticing the taste properly. If you eat while reading the paper or watching TV, you obviously won’t focus on the taste and eating is more of a refueling the motor than an enjoyment. That’s OK, as long as you are consciously choosing it. If you don’t even notice what you are doing, some kind of physical response will probably “wake you up” at some point: Stomach ache, sleeping disorder, digestive problems, heart disease.
Pain can be useful: it wakes you up!
It doesn’t have to be so complicated to change habits. Nor does it have to be hard. It is simply a question of willpower to decide to do yourself some good. It is about loving kindness, not just looking good or getting your ideal weight, job or partner.
It doesn’t have to be hard
Cleansing some old rubbish out of the mind that is no longer useful is another dimension of detoxing, leading to inner peace. Meditation is THE remedy all cultures talk about, even in the first world. You don’t have to be religious or believe in a cult or sect. The benefits of meditation are countless: better health, concentration, longevity, resilience, etc..
For some people meditation seems impossible. They feel resistance just by imagining sitting still without doing anything.
There are many ways to meditate without having to sit still. Walking Meditation or guided meditation to name a few. Hypnotic writing is a simple tool to get into a state of allowing yourself to express what you feel and think without editing or judging it. A great little technique to open up to our inner world and become conscious, response-able (instead of reactive) and get on the driver’s seat of your life instead of sitting on the back seat.
Stress is a natural phenomenon and as human beings we have the ability to be conscious and observe. We must not react like an automaton. Push the button or trigger and spit out a standard reaction as if we had no choice. And still, it happens. If we are unaware and follow yesterdays daily grind, we keep thinking, feeling and doing the same over and over again and then even complain about the world out there not working well for us, while we miss to be in charge, wake up and respond consciously.
The way we vibrate is the way we radiate. Stress coping starts with becoming aware and responsible for yourself. Nobody else can change you!
The Way we Vibrate is the Way we Radiate
It is a lot about being kind to yourself. Sounds logical and yet most people I got to work with in Coaching have a problem to be really kind to themselves. Even though the intension seems to be there, they don’t know how!
Rewarding with goodies or withholding goodies is not necessarily healthy and kind. It is about accepting all there is within in the very moment. Feeling good in your skin despite all the “defects” you have declared you might have. It is about learning to be non-judgmental and learning to remember to be grateful every day. This is what creates a different vibe in your system.
What if you just can’t love that trait of yours – whatever it is?
If you just can’t love some traits, then, you create a constant situation of stress, acting against your own system, creating a kind of acidic and hostile environment which makes it very difficult to cultivate new living seeds of change. You bring yourself into a constant state of resisting what is. That is creating useless stress!
For those who have investigated, researched, read self-help books, possibly contemplated about who or what they really are, what is really important for you and still don’t seem to be able to quit the mouse-wheel of unconscious mental and emotional habits, there is good news: Finding inner peace and deep states of relaxation and contentment is possible. Taking a break from the habitual experience of daily life in a very conscious, possibly guided way makes it easier.
Digital Detox is helpful to no longer flood yourself with information constantly which not only loads your storage capacity with all kinds of stuff you don’t really need or want. It prevents you from experiencing the moment here and now, prevents you from being at your center and at peace. Prevents you from experiencing silence, relaxing, recharging the batteries and enjoying the moment. It also prevents you from feeling and appreciating what is going on here and now…
Humans are habit animals. This is both helpful and hindering. But the great advantage we have, is our ability of being conscious and making new choices to quit useless and unconscious habits.
Humans are habit animals with the ability to change
If your self-talk is rather limiting, it is time to get back on the wheel and change the declarations you tell yourself on a daily level!
If you feel kind of low and depressed it is time to allow yourself to feeling what is instead of distracting or numbing yourself with all kinds of “unconscious” strategies.
If you notice that your daily habits, the way you spend your day is other than nourishing, it is time to change! Get exited!!!
To get more free inspiration and Stress-Management Coaching or Tools towards Emotional Intelligence and to Change Habits check out https://thewalkingguru.org/
It all about you getting into your creative power in a loving and kind way, so you can enjoy being the way you are and share your gift with the world.
Do you experience stress to an unsupportable extend? Do you have a hard time to exist in a “stressful” environment, a stressful job, a stressful partner?
Stress is not a good nor a bad thing! – It is about how you decide and manage to deal with it. First of all “stress” releases hormones that give you extra energy… Stress is not an opponent. It is just energy moving.
Stress is not good nor bad
Stress hormones are a quick an effective device to get instant body reactions. When adrenalin and cortisone stream in the blood, your reaction is faster than thinking. You probably know how adrenalin gushes feel, e.g. when you get scared or highly surprised.
Stress becomes a problem when this extra energy provided to the body by these hormones is not being used. Nowadays, we do not run away from the bear or attack the same. High levels of these hormones are not being used and stay in the body. They become a risk factor contributing to weight problems, burnout syndromes, heart disease, relationship problems, psychosomatic diseases etc..
What can we do to “cope with stress”?
It is about dealing with stress mechanisms mindfully. Dealing with this amazingly sophisticated mechanism by nature consciously instead of creating the idea of being the victim. That doesn’t mean that you stay in an environment that is harming your health forever. It means to be able to make up your mind in a calm way to decide consciously how to deal with a situation, instead of suffering from auto-reactions that seem to disable you.
Become awareof your body reactions to external stressful situations: tense shoulders, shorter breath, eyes wider, tension in the muscles…. Become aware of how your thoughts, fears, memories or negative expectations effect have the same effect as external influences
Learn to release the tension consciously: take a deep breath, breath out and drop your shoulders. Learn relaxation techniques from a specialist instead of using legal or illegal drugs. Aerobic exercise like brisk walking 3 times a week balances hormones and use of the extra energy and tension in your body. As a nice side effect it is good for your lungs, heart and relaxes state of mind. Consult a physician: Don’t wait until the first heart attack, divorce or drug addiction! Get proper consultation and support to start your personal wellbeing program!
Talk! Talking about problems helps to release the tension – if you have a trustworthy friend. Just complaining about circumstances and people will not help. Depending on the extend of stress you experience a specialist might be a good option to get you out of a destructive circle.
Exchange with others! Use the Internet to exchange your thoughts. The fact that so many people out there have similar problems releases some of the tension or you might get new ideas on how to be able to change the mindset and the habits.
You can’t change the outside world
Changing the outside world is the not a smart idea nor does it work!
By changing the job, the partner, the city you don’t change your mindset and your ability to cope with stress, so better start with the latter. Then, you can still decide to go for other possibilities. Then, you did the job: you consciously chose and don’t just run away.
Get into your Power!
If you prefer to get live support on the path to changing the way you use your mind and to updating habits, you may check out Walking & Coaching and Walking Meditation at
You know that feeling: Something just doesn’t feel right. You can’t really figure out why. Or you have dozens of ideas why. All you know is, something gotta change here…
How to Relax more deeply?
One thing most of us found out so far: to find the joy, we don’t need to go anywhere or do anything special. Joy is something that happens within us, just like any other feeling. For me, as soon as I care for my inner state, a whole world of energy opens up. Caring means, not to run away from feelings, especially not suppress by trying to control, but feel all there is: joy, fear, anger or sadness. Addressing what is, daring to feel what is within you, is showing loving kindness towards oneself. As if you had given loving attention to something inside that is there to be seen and heard. If ignored, suppressed or “talked out of it”, inner conflict arises: you resist a part of yourself. Just like you hear oeople say to a child: don’t be saf or don’t be angry. It’s stupid, because sadness is sadness, anger is anger, fear is fear. And: joy is joy.
Imagine getting used to numbing most feelings most of the time. Joy also gets numbed at some point. Sometimes we try to manipulate the situation with legal or illegal drugs and risk to mess up the whole precious being in the body…
Start with no longer Distracting yourself and Daring to Feel what is!
Once the feeling is being detected, felt and acknowledged, it has done its job and you can make smart decisions afterwards.
What if a feeling doesn’t seem to disappear ever? It’s quite possible that the situation you are facing has triggered and unresolved emotion, something from way before. Emotions last longer. Feelings that refer to a current situation appear and disappear faster.
If you notice that something “old” within you has been triggered and you seem like stuck in this emotion, it’s the ultimate opportunity to look beyond the trigger all the way to the original issue and release the the stuck energy. To connect with the original unresolved painful situation can happen automatically, once you really dare to feel the pain bravely. No thinking needed. It’s about daring to feel.
Some people directly run away, when exposed to the idea to feel old emotional pain. Then they wonder why life is not flowing despite business success etc.. Why they can’t feel the joy.
Once all feelings are ok and allowed, unresolved emotions can be healed with time. It happens naturally, once you allow it. As if there was a natural devine timetable running in the background offering you healing opportunities, once you are ready for them. Then, you may find that joy is a natural state.
Emotional Intelligence Frees Loads of Energy
It certainly helps to stop labelling feelings and situations into “good” and “bad” and stay curious and brave about the next learning opportunity.
Feeling what is, including rage or fear doesn’t mean that you must project your low vibration on others. Again, there is a distinction necessary: for instance anger is as healthy as a feeling as joy: it helps you to set boundaries. Say “stop, don’t go any further” to others. Or a clear “No, I am not ok with that”. Expressing how you feel now, relating to the current situaion is healthy and important. Dwelling on things, holding back or endless screaming is possibly related to old unresolved emotions. So if you suffer from such reactions, it’s a good moment to dare to find new ways to release the old.
Meditation, therapy, alternative therapy, coaching or going on a retreat can be such ways. Just accumulating knowledge by reading doesn’t necessarily change anything, but your knowing. This is about daring to feel. You can’t “do” it by knowing!
Trust that your gut feeling will bring up the right choice for you and when it does, don’t think twice and take advantadge of the hint.
Sounds ridiculously obvious and still, we seem to forget at time: Feeling can’t be done by thinking
Feeling easily triggered by something occurring around you?
A trigger is a small device that releases a spring or catch and so set off a mechanism. You feel like someone “pushed your button” and you shoot. You either implode inside or you explode with an over the top reaction.
It happens all the time: the boss of your new company looks at you in a “strange” way like x-raying you and you feel super uncomfortable. The people in the shop disrespect standing in line. Your colleague doesn’t give you any feedback and leaves you “in the air”. Or they say something that you take as a clear offense while other people don’t feel that way. Or you say something and get an way over the top reaction… The interesting part is, that some people have a problem with some situations while others don’t… You create those stories in your mind that run your life. Those stories determine how you feel.
How to unwind
It’s like a system of a ball balancing on another ball. You are the one system balancing on top, and the other system triggers something, that kicks you off balance. It’s unstable and annoying, because it feels as if your whole being depended on others not purposely or unconsciously triggering you.
There is no ease in such a situation. You might even declare that it is the other person who has power over you. With this statement, you are giving your own power away and state that your well-being is dependent on others doing what you would like. Obviously, a difficult enterprise, not only because we can’t control others, also because it is ridiculous. And yet, we all know those situations when we totally believe, “they did this to me”, not realizing, that the others often have no clue, what they have triggered within you. It is YOUR story that has been triggered. The pre-installed button that has been pushed is your story. Some old stored information with a mental and emotional auto-reaction.
How to stop over-thinking and thinking too much
Don’t follow every thought! It’s normal for the thinking mind to think. But you must not follow every thought as if it was the Truth.
So how do you release the trigger of that pre-installed button of yours, so nobody can push your button anymore?
3 SIMPLE STEPS TO STOP ALLOWING OLD STORIES RUN YOUR LIFE
Acknowledge
Accept
Agree
Easy, it is definitely simple and it requires self-love and patience.
Before asking what can keep you from experimenting with those 3 steps, let me explain them:
Acknowledgement
If is necessary to first be aware of what is going on. With awareness you start to become clear. You identify the situation as it is: You experience a strong or exaggerated reaction within you to something happening in your life. Your reaction is not by conscious choice. It happens like pre-programmed. Automatic. Undeniably. That is acknowledgement. No hiding, no denying, no neglecting, no sweet-talking. “Aha!” “Interesting!” are statements that help you gain that clarity. You are not the victim, but the observer.
Acceptance
You decide consciously to no longer resist what you are experiencing. You say “yes” to the program that has been running your life up to now. First you realized and acknowledged it, now you even accept it. You make it yours. It’s not some funky thing going on out there. It happens within you and you not only realize, you are owning it.
It is a bit as if you were willing to experience the intensity of what is happening or the exaggeration of reaction within you with full acceptance.
Agreement
That’s when you get into your power!
It is about saying “yes” to what is being triggered, no matter if you might not like it. It takes a sense of non-judgement, no blaming, no shame. As if you were watching a movie without sympathizing with any of the actors and still fully feeling the intensity of the story or drama.
Sounds easy. And it is. It can be a lifelong process, so you better make it a game that you practice with some sense of humor. A game that you get more fluent in, the longer you practice. Don’t take it so serious. Make it fun. That could be your number one rule of the game.
What could it be, that might keep you from allowing these simple 3 steps to free you from being bound to old stories?
Think about it!
Who is ready to say yes to something they don’t like about themselves? Here is the trap which is also the way to freedom. Accepting EVERYTHING!
You might identify with the old story that is stored in your memory. “This is me. I am my past. My past is who I am. I am not willing to let go of my past stories, because then, I lose the idea I have of myself”. Maybe this is what your inner dialogue may look like.
How motivated are you to free yourself from old triggers?
It’s ok to keep going the very same way you have always been “functioning”. It’s your freedom to chose. No good, no bad. What matters is that you realize that you do have the choice.
What I want to express with this blogpost is that you DO HAVE A CHOICE. And that makes a huge difference. If you kind of have fun with the triggering game, wonderful. Enjoy the ride!
If you suffer from those triggers, intense reactions and stories your mind makes up in certain situations, welcome to the club. It is most natural for humans of our culture to have this mechanism happening. And now, that you know, you can change it, please take it easy with experimenting.
The most important part in this change-game is being compassionate with yourself and others all the time.
Remember, that you are not some old story and that you are free to stick to it or free yourself and create a brand new one, every day.
Please comment in the box below, if you would like to share some of your experiences during the process of finding out who you really are, freeing yourself from identifications that are simply old stories.
Words have a frequency. Frequency is vibration. Vibration influences the whole being. Take music: Did you ever experiment with the influence of classical music on you? Or binaural beats? Or techno? Are you aware of the effect of music on your system?
As soon as you are aware of what is, you can change it. The danger is, when you don’t realize what is going on and keep doing, perceiving, experiencing the same situations without acting upon it. It takes being aware, that it is up to you, how you create your reality.
The space beyond knowing is where change happens
As soon as you read this, you might hear yourself saying or thinking: I know, I know. I know about the power of words. And still, you might not be using this information that you “know” adequately quite yet. You probably know, that not only the spoken word is powerful, but also the thought and the emotional frequency that comes with the thought. A quick film happens in the mind as if a box would open up and you take out or stick the information in it unconsciously. Bang. An unconscious habit determining your experience of life.
Thought, emotion or vice versa: that’s what determines our state and experience in the very moment. The spoken word even more. Words are like a declaration! You probably also know that these kinds of declarations have an impact on your energy, your motivation, how you feel about things, how confident you are, how prone to act upon what you really need, want, envision or not. Every bit of information has an energetic input that works on your system. “I know” is not helpful. It is about acting upon it.
Napoleon Hill’s book Think and Grow Rich was among the 10 best selling self-help books of all time. People like Donald Trump and Adolf Hitler have used this knowledge to the excess and influenced millions of unconscious, blind, fearful or numb “followers”.
Today, it’s all about getting into your own power and creating your own life consciously instead of creating unconsciously by repeating yesterday’s stories. Being driven by old emotions or habitual patterns or following blindly some big words. What matters is, being aware in every moment. It’s ok to feel shitty. It’s ok to fail. It’s ok to keep following some big talkers. It just sucks and is also dangerous, as we know from history, to stay unaware of what is really going on. You disable yourself from all impact.
In business or private life, coaching has become very popular. Get a coach, change your life. Great people like Tony Robbins are influencing millions to get interested in self-empowerment, curious about how to change your own thinking, feeling, habits, belief-system, actions. People who visited those amazing events – which seem bit like amazing shows for a European like me – are deeply impacted and seem to gain benefits from those mostly high priced events in such a way, that they actually do change something about their lives.
Do you really need to spend 5000 Dollars to enable yourself to change? I consider it well-invested money! And still: the homework is what counts, how you apply the input in your daily life. In order to change anything, you first must be aware of it.
Coming back to the power and danger of words: How aware are you of your inner dialogue? When something unpleasant happens, what is your inner reaction? How is your outlook on things and how do you communicate this? Are you super-cautious, maybe rather protective-closed for new ideas or are you an optimist, able to talk shit into gold vice versa? Both is not quite helpful. What is helpful is to become real. Realize what really is and what impact a situation has on you. What does it trigger in terms of thoughts and emotions. Accept this. Watch it. Observe. Feel. Don’t judge. Ignoring, neglecting, acting as if you would not be impacted by something unpleasant is NOT helpful. It just brings conflict in your inner world: what you feel and what you tell yourself and others is not aligned. That’s the main problem when it comes to change: lack of awareness. How can you act upon a new situation or learn from it, if you ignore or resist what is?
I am a believer of non-judgement. How do you make decisions, if you don’t judge? You first accept what is, without sticking it in the good or bad box. Then, you feel and use your mind, both together. Sounds like I was trying to teach how to walk, but honestly, don’t most of us live on auto-pilot and unconscious habits most of the time?
Accepting what is is the first step. It’s ok you don’t like it. It’s ok to feel however you feel. Just feel it, go for it! Dare! No good feeling, no bad feeling. Feeling what is. That’s where the power is, that’s how energy gets moved, by feeling it! That’s how blockages can be detected, faced and removed. That’s what it takes to empower yourself, get into your power by stoping to resist, suppress or ignore. That’s how you get your energy back.
Awareness is key to change. Words are an easy way, to get into your power. It’s a great start to observe what you say to yourself and others most of the time. People like Tony Robbins use affirmations, Louise Hay is probably the most respected author who promoted the power of affirmations. Words have a frequency and depending on what kind of emotional frequency they carry, words impact your very state here and now. Listening to people in an unaware state and allowing all words enter your system unfiltered, unaware is dangerous. Just as dangerous as your own habitual self-talk may be.
We create our reality. You know that. Do it consciously! Make it fun! Make it a hobby or a sport, like training a muscle. Smile!
Especially parents have this power of words over their children. Whatever a parent says to their child, that’s what they believe is true, that’s how they build their reality of the world around them. You are smart, you are talented, you are this and you are that. Or you are just not this and that. Whatever parents say, kids believe it and create their world according to those words. And some kids never grow up, never realize that it is up to them now, how they create their world. Those grown-up unaware kids sometimes need another type to wake-up call. Sometimes it is a life crisis, financial crisis, serious health issues or anything that shocks them in such a way, that they realize: I gotta change something here immediately and I can’t wait for the world to change for me. It is my respons-ability.
Self-confidence is not necessarily built on successes. Athletes know that: now matter how many prizes they won, a series of unexpected fall-backs can kick self-confidence into the ether.
Words are a real simple approach to start that 5000-Dollar-Experience and change your life today and from now on every day. Consciousness is the key. Words are a great first step to practice self-empowerment.
No need to lie or ignore what is. By acknowledging and accepting e.g. when you feel nervous, anxious or sad, you allow this energy to be as it is. It is not “bad” to say “I feel sad”. There is energy in those feelings. And once you gave them the space that they require, it’s ok, and the message of the feeling has been heard. The fear or sadness is felt and acknowledged.
What if you have this habitual state of standard low vibration?
Then, it is still important to acknowledge. Is there a real reason here and now for how you feel? Is some old fear or sadness or anger coming up? Acknowledge, accept and agree with it. Then, you can move on and choose consciously how you want to act upon it. Some old pains want to be acknowledged. That’s what most healing therapies are about.
For now, you can just watch your words and choose them consciously. That’s a great start to stop repeating old unconscious patterns.
On an exploration trip to the Caribbean Coast of Costa Rica, the first thing I find is a Slackline right on an amazing Surf Beach. I love to watch Surfers and slackliners for hours. It’s about going with the flow. Enjoying life. Being here now. It’s about my “business” as a coach.
Soon, I check out slack-lining to find out that it is not just about physical fitness and balance but especially about mental and emotional stability and focus.
How to gain stability, balance and focus
One of those sports, where the consequence of every single thought manifests immediately. Slacklining is the perfect little exercise for experiencing this phenomenon: one single thought might create a disturb signal and hit you off balance.
Every single thought manifests immediately in your reality
Soon, the surfer dudes come to give me advice how to practice slacklining. Sweet!
“You have to believe in yourself!”
“Focus on the other end of the line”.
“Don’t think!”
“Keep your strength in your center!”
I am amazed! That’s all the techniques that I teach during coaching sessions. I don’t use those words but changing one’s own mindset and habits takes essentially that: Confidence, owning your power, mental focus, clarity and direction.
So if you have no slackline to practice confidence, focus and mental clarity, what do you do?
Practice confidence
There is no pill for confidence, even though some people still totally believe that alcohol and drugs make them more confident. All it does is numbing the feeling of lack. It is not really satisfying. Not lasting.
Believing in oneself and having confidence that things will work out is something we all have inside by nature, but it is covered by the hangovers from past experiences. By hangover I specifically mean the way we perceived, remember and store something that happened in the past. Many of those experiences turn out to be illusions and sooner or later we find out, that what we believed was true, was just our personal perception and interpretation of the old story.
Feelings of incompleteness, lack, shame or guild can be devastating. Obviously, numbing those emotions with drugs or distracting otherwise won’t enable us to bring the illusion to the light, so it can dissolve like a cloud.
How to heal old wounds
Healing means bringing Light into the Shadows. Daring to feel. Daring to stop distracting. Daring to feel some pain. Daring to let go of mental control and allowing to experience feelings. Out of the comfort zone into the Healing zone.
Emotions can feel devastating. Healing means bringing light into the shadows. Daring to feel what is to the very depth of the emotion seems scary and yet, it’s a practice that is healing. Often, what it takes to overcome old unconscious and unreal emotions of shame and guilt resulting in obsessive behavior is daring to face them first. Otherwise we just spend all that wonderful life energy in suppressing them.
Facing What Is
Self-Confidence can arise, once we dare to explore, experiment and really face that feeling of total discomfort. The more we dare and practice this way of facing what IS, the more the fatal guilt, shame or fear monsters in our minds dissolve like a cloud on a stormy day.
That’s what I practiced on the slackline and after that on a surfboard. Before even stepping one foot on the line I felt a nervousness, a slight fear. What was that fear about, I mean this is not life-threatening nor is it important if any stranger on the beach watches me falling of the line.
What is that unreal fear about?
The more you face it, the more you become aware that this is a habit, an automatism. It happened later on with the surfing as well. I booked a class with an instructor. Waves were small. No real risk and yet, my heart was pumping as if I was about to compete and risk to fail.
Fear of failure is ok, as long as you keep going
Fear is a natural feeling, designed by nature to protect us from not getting hurt. Better don’t step out of the door, you might be killed by a bear or something…
Dare to face the fear and free yourself
Knowing that this fear is a kind of “factory setting”, you can play with this mechanism and change the setting. Now, that you are an intelligent being, equipped with awareness, it is more about distinguishing between a real threat and an automatic reaction with no real threat. And the next step is about acting upon that awareness. Step on that slackline. Dare to give a speech. Strengthen that muscle. Free yourself from mental monsters.
Trapped in uneasy emotions is THE possibility for transformation, growth and stepping into your real power.
It is all about that shift of thinking:
Know and acknowledge, that you are trapped. Be proud!!!! You dare to feel and stand up for yourself as you are right here and right now.
No neglecting, ignoring or numbing. Total responsibility. Total power. This is what enables you to become confident. Feel the habitual emotion, face it , feel it go deep inside, explore it! There is a lot of trapped energy in this. Then, you can transform it with practice again and again. Just like slacklining. Again and again, day by day, that’s how you become a master. By practicing.
Confidence is more than believing in yourself
Confidence is more than believing in yourself. It is about believing in the process of life that you are part of. It’s about feeling connected and part of all there is. It’s about feeling worthy for being, being the very individual that you are, with your specific “features”. Confidence allows us to get into the flow of life and bring our gifts to the world naturally without suffering or forcing anything. Confidence is what makes the spark in the eyes. It is the connection between your center and the world. It is knowing, that you are here now, exactly how you are meant to be. It is about a deep knowing, that it is your job to polish that diamond that you are; polish away what is not yours, transform old programs and belief systems and enjoy your light and bring your light into the world. No reputation needed. No proof needed for true confidence. Confidence grows with practice. Practicing being authentic.
In my coaching practice, changing habits is simple: face it, bring it to the surface and act upon it with awareness. Over and over again. Reprogram unconscious patterns means in other words: own your power and choose consciously, instead of being driven.
Choose instead of being driven
Changing habits is not simple at all if you are not aware. That lack of awareness keeps us blocked and trapped in unwanted habits of distracting, running away or even drug abuse. That’s why people ask for support when it comes to changing something that we were so convinced of, that it was “us”. What a blessing it is, once you realize that what you thought you were was just an imprint of other’s resulting in a habit. Freedom lightens up, when you no longer shame, blame or make yourself small, but realize that you do have the power.
For all those, who still believe they are what they think they are, I wrote my last book called Head♥️less Chicken. It makes clear, how it happens that we are totally convinced about certain stories in ours lives that we believe shaped our being and why it is not true. Head♥️less Chicken is available on Amazon of your country or any bookstore.
I know, I know
If you hear yourself saying “I know, I know” it is time for shifting from knowing to practicing! Self-confidence is not depending on reaching goals and showing successes. However, self-confidence does show results.
If you want to learn slacklining or live a more abundant, joyful life, you got it all inside and all it takes to bringing it to the surface.
A great way to strengthen the confidence muscle is facing fears and going for those “unreal” traps in order to break through old bondages and programs that seem to run your life without you being on the wheel. Make it fun!
Here are some examples:
Anything you feel too shy for, go for it: singing, dancing, improv classes
Anything you say “I can’t because….” Do it anyway!
Anything you would like to do but are afraid you might be expelled from your loved once. Do it and give them a chance to love you for who you really are!
What are your experiences and ideas on how to strengthen that confidence muscle, please SHARE below!
If you severely suffer from sleeping disorder you must consult a doctor. If you always have been a light sleeper and your sleep is easily disturbed by noise, light, digestion issues, dreams or anything else, please continue reading my 7 super simple, practical and easy to follow Life-Coaching tools for better sleep.
Simple Steps for Better Sleep
Your Sleeping Schedule Start a daily sleeping routine by going to bed at the same time and waking up at the same time. If you can’t sleep, then tell yourself it is ok to just relax the body and allow your mind to wander or dream. Focus on relaxing your muscles and observe your breath going in and out without you having to control anything. Ideally, you experiment for some time to get up at 6AM and go to bed around 10PM. On the weekend you vary only by a maximum one hour, to get you on track. 7AM to 11PM is a beneficial schedule as well, however, the 6AM wake-up time has some special benefit to it. Best is, to just experiment for a few weeks!
2. Your Eating Habits Eating your last meal before 6PM helps you to relax easier, having digested meals at the time you go to bed. It can make you sleep easier and deeper. Just experiment. When eating, make sure to eat consciously, tasting every bite. Don’t watch TV or read while eating. It is you treating your body.
3. Your Drinking Habits Obviously, coffee, tea and any kind of stimulating drinks such as alcohol can disturb a good night sleep. If you really want to sleep, stay away for some time and then just ad one cup of coffee a day, or only once in a while. If you like a glass of wine or a beer sometimes, drink it not just before going to bed.
4. Your Information Intake Habits Find out what happens if you don’t watch TV, no news, no videos, maybe just reading a bit. Find out the difference if you engage in discussions before bedtime versus being all quiet, just feeling inside or observing the body, mind, feelings or breath. If you really want to sleep, do the experiment: quiet time one to two hours before bedtime. Enjoy that quiet time. Nothing to lose, everything to gain in those times of silence.
5. Your Exercise Habits If you don’t use your body adequately, it is hard for the body to relax and sleep. Give yourself the benefits of at least a brisk 20Minute Walk outdoors every day or any other form of sport that you ENJOY. If you go to the Gym, make sure you don’t do there with resistance. Do it, if you like. Find out how it is more fun, e.g. by going with a buddy. Practice dancing or rollerblading or jogging outdoors. Anything that might feel good. At least a brisk walk in nature. If you feel resistance, try listen to some relaxing or uplifting music while exercising. Let it be a loving experience. “I must” transformed into “I choose to”. Try new activities. Slack-lining! Climbing! Horseback-Riding. Golf. Found a Walking Group. Take your chorus for a walk. Anything you choose, SMILE!
6. Your Relaxation Habits How do you relax? Many people have a coffee break or smoke a cigarette or have a beer. It gives them the illusion of relaxing. Really relaxing physically and mentally may take your conscious loving, kind choice though. It is like deciding to train your relaxation muscle. You have it and it needs to be used regularly in order to work properly. If you don’t have any healthy Relaxation Habits yet, try different ones. Check out Meditation! If sitting still seems difficult for you, try Walking Meditation, Qi Gong, Yoga, Tai Chi or Muscle Relaxation. Listen to meditation music or guided meditation. Download a meditation app and practice. (e.g. Headspace, programs from MINDVALLEY or Daily OM). Make it your new exiting hobby to try out different techniques. Socializing with conscious people e.g. during your newly founded walking group can be relaxing and nourishing as long as you don’t engage in gossiping and don’t do it right before bedtime.
7. Practice Non-Judgement When it comes to habits, especially when it comes to Thinking Habits: Accept what is, e.g. that your thinking mind is thinking. That’s what it does. You might engage in worries and doubts. Realize this habit and instead of judging it, focus on choosing something else:
You have the power to focus on the thoughts or decide to let them go and come back to e.g. breathing or observing and feeling the air entering the belly and flowing out again, with your placed hands on it.
Do not judge into good and bad. BE OK with what is, if you like it or not. Letting go of judgement is fostering relief and helps letting go of attachment. Experiment and see what happens!
If you are in bed at night and think, you can’t sleep because you think, take a step back: don’t judge, don’t take it so serious, don’t engage in it. Just allow it. You may also choose to think about a dream you would like to dream. Or imagine your breath nourishing your body and visualize how fresh breath enters the system while used air is exhaled automatically without you forcing anything. Just observe and enjoy.
It takes time to change thought patterns and habits. That’s why reglar meditation is so powerful and important. Instead of judging the fact that the thinking mind seems to want to engage in thinking, start being loving towards yourself. Observe, let go, without engaging more deeply. Come back from thinking to focusing on the feeling of love or gratitude. Switch from engaging in thinking into engaging into feeling gratitude. Make it an experiment. Be curious. Don’t judge. There is no good and bad here. Just experiences and you observing and letting go.
Looking for a break from daily routines, the Groundhog Day Symptom and an inherent curiosity in what else is there, out there created a huge industry: Tourism.
Wether for health or business, recreation or cultural trips, travel certainly impacts your state of being and awareness.
Where else is it that easy to be really present with all senses? That’s how we live life fully, here and now.
What is it, that makes the difference of having a coffee in Rome and having exactly the same kind of coffee at lunch break at work? It is not the coffee, but the state of awareness and the overall experience. It is extremely difficult for many human minds in our fast-living culture to stay as present in everyday life. During travel it is easy. The mind tends to wander and carry us away. Travelling you are mostly exposed to new experiences, that makes it easier to be in the very moment, feel and enjoy.
How to be present in there and now?
Travel exposes you to new situations. That helps being present and not replay yesterday’s film in the mind.
Meditation is one art to master the mind and take the reins of that part of ours. A way to be owner of the mind and not vice versa.
Travel makes you alert, wakes you up from the daily, sleepy state of repeatitive routines.
I love to experiment and stay at one place for a longer period of time to explore what it takes to stay present. I realize, it takes some kind of regular meditation ritual, to not fall unto the same trap: the sleepy state if repeating yesterday’s experiences as if we were rewinding a movie.
Master the Mind
That state of awareness can be also be reached or maintained during any activity, such as walking, cooking, cleaning or driving. It depends on HOW I do the things I do. It depends on me declaring an intention instead of allowing an unconscious mind to take over my life. That’s the difference between opening my eyes everyday like looking for the first time, using my senses consciously, feeling what IS present versus being unconscious as if I was elsewhere. The difference is my free will, intention, choice and willpower. For me, this distinction of mental state makes the difference between being in my power or feeling like victim of circumstances. HOW I face what is. Aware and non-judgemental.
Funny enough big part of the tourist industry is about partying as much as you can, drinking hard or getting drugged in search of a special feeling. Unfortunately, a feeling to be experienced takes some kind of awareness as well and getting drugged may create a desired mental and emotional state, but it’s manipulated. In search of that desired state, we do everything: shop till you drop, consume anything to have the illusion to FEEL GOOD NOW: more coffee, more drugs, more food, more sex…
How to feel good now?
As soon as the hype is over, the illusion is gone and we are thrown back into that other state. This phenomenon also exists after traveling. Back to unconscious normal resistance.
It takes making peace inside with all there is, an art that is worthwhile to practice. How else can you free the energy it takes to become responsible, in charge of your life and empowered to make smart decisions, take it, CHANGE it or leave it?
Stopping to fight what is, frees energy for constructive change. Non-resistance takes learning to let go of judgement all the time, accepting first of all what is, including or especially including yourself as you are right now with all feelings. Also that what we used to consider as “bad”, “ugly” or “negative”. To stay in your power it helps to see and declare situations, states and experiences as opportunity for Growth and Personal Development, instead of denying what is.
Travel can be great to reset your mind and get your power back.
Get you into your Power
That’s why retreats are offered either in remote or secluded places: to wake you up from the habitual to arrive here and now.
Many people experience what they call a healing crisis during “detoxing’ from excess. Maybe that is what leads to the drinking symptom for many tourists. Healing old unresolved “ugly” emotions by allowing to feel them and becoming clear and aware of monkey mind taking over, brings along a great chance for deep transformation, maybe even the end of resisting life and start living fully. Imagine the state of inner peace, once you were ok with accepting what is and even appreciating the fact of being alive!
Travel or Retreat, if your intention is to run away and search for something that feels better than what you experience, chances are that there is not much possibility for real transformation. You are taking your old mindset along, looking outside for relief.
Transformational Retreats
However, if your intention is to grow, expand and develop your capacity to enjoy, create and maybe even be more compassionate with yourself and others, chances are, that you switch your focus on what you want from what you are running away from.
I am currently on a long exploration trip in Costa Rica, a place far away from the habitual. Lush nature, fresh food, sun and sea. A great place to learn to be here now, to be present and dare to keep evolving and creating consciously.
Apart from Mallorca I provide Exclusive Transformational Retreats for Individuals who suffer from too much thinking, stress and are at risk to burn out. For those who desire to change their current “setup”, feel more joy and respond differently to life, I created the opportunity to spend 1-2 weeks on an Transformational One-on-One Life-Coaching Retreat in beautiful Costa Rica, where the jungle meets the Caribbean:
There are people who hire a life-coach to help them feel more joyful. Obviously, nobody can change the way you feel. You are the one and only who feels what you feel. Don’t fool yourself. Don’t lie to yourself! Face the feelings of fear or sadness or anger, if you have them!!! Others may try to fool you, distract, sweet talk or twist ideas around feelings, thoughts and situations. But that’s not the way it works. At least fake “solutions” don’t last. Joy is always there, when there is no current problem here and now. If you can’t feel joy, it is quite possible that you are numb or “put up your numbness bar” too high as Clinton Callahan calls it in Possibility Management.
Why would you have a variety of feelings, if not to feel what is, notices the signal, deal with it and move on?
Fear of Depression or the desire to not feel sad, angry or afraid is stupid and childish. Yes, there are more feelings than just joy and yes, fear, anger and sadness are not as much fun as joy. Yet, the mere desire to not feel those feelings must lead to dilemma, since you spent too much energy in trying to hide, suppress or re-interpret what is. You are an adult, responsible for you and your life. And there is also your power, choice, freedom. Trying to cut down basic feelings to joy is like cutting of 3 limbs or 3 cardinal points. You can continue heading West (or South or whatever) and go for joy, just don’t fool yourself. It’s like in Navigation: winds and currents are part of the deal when navigating. You can navigate your feelings too. Use the energy in each feeling constructively instead of limiting your energy by repressing feelings.
It is childish, because you are an adult today and you now know for sure, what you have been told as a kid was partly quite stupid: don’t be sad. Don’t be angry. Don’t be afraid… Everybody was told that. It doesn’t make it less stupid to forbid feelings when those feelings are adequate feelings, that help express and deal with certain situations.
It makes sense to distinguish between a feeling that is due to a current situation and an emotion that is an unresolved old feeling, being triggered by a current situation. A feeling is related to here and now and doesn’t last that long. An emotion is related to the past and tends to last long. At least this is how some experts (e.g. Possibility Managers) differentiate.
Personal Development is a path towards peeling off layers that have been building up through conditioning. Unresolved emotions from childhood covered under layers of walls stay unresolved and keep you trapped. People want a quick fix, anything, to just not having to feel. Drugs is the most common remedy, legal or illegal. It doesn’t work like that.
Start loving everything you feel. Even Fear of Depression or Fear of Failure. Or deep sadness. Or rage. That’s part of loving yourself.
Self-Discovery means daring to go deeper within with or without support. There are many ways to get to Rome. Meditation, Workshops, Books, Therapies, Coaching to name a few. Yet, without daring to feel what is, you won’t access to the core and free yourself from the baggage that is not needed anymore, now that you are an adult. If you use exercise, work, sex, food, party or anything else in excess to make you feel good, you got a problem and you know it. You can’t really relax without it.
No, you can’t solve this with logic or thinking. It does take feeling. Logic is for solving a different kind of issues only.
Face the truth and stop fooling yourself looking for quick-fix remedies from outside! It gets easier, lighter and brighter, once to start peeling off old layers courageously. And there is a lot of energy being set free that you can use for what you really want. Get curious and exited, it’s worth it!
Thinking can’t replace Feeling!
To facilitate this process it helps to get into healthy lifestyle habits, such as a good sleeping routine, good quality, quantity and variety of food, moderate regular exercise and healthy drinking habits. It’s not that hard. There are online programs and people like me who assist you with a doable motivating program.
Make friend with the idea to love all feelings!
All that will become easier and easier, once you start feeling the difference between feeling numb and the release of energy when really feeling what is.
Life-Coaching, Therapy or Self-help Groups
The first step to get out of a circuit of suppressing and numbing feelings is to acknowledge it! Once you realize, that’s what you do, you can stop denying and start acting responsibly, e.g. by getting help.
We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.
Albert Einstein
Do you have experience or tips on how to DARE to feel what is? Please SHARE!
