We reach for relationships because we long for many things. We long for acceptance, affection, companionship andappreciation. We want to be seen. We need to be heard. And so, we reach. We reach to form relationships so that these beautiful needs, our beautiful needs can flourish. We reach so that we can know love.

How do we achieve this? How do we create the kinds of relationships that fuel our lives? How do we cultivate deep connections? It begins with us. It begins with our willingness and our ability to create a deeply connected relationship with our self.

Acceptance experienced from another is born out of our acceptance for our self. Appreciation from the ones we choose to love has it’s genesis in our appreciation for ourselves.

In fact, the more we are able to meet our own beautiful needs, the more the people in our lives have to build upon. When we refuse to meet ourselves within our own heart, when we starve ourselves of our own love and attention and companionship, our loved ones – no matter their commitment to us – are rendered powerless.

In order for us to feel their love, it has to have fertile ground upon which to fall. That fertile ground is tended by us. That fertile ground is our responsibility.

When we take beautiful responsibility for our own beautiful needs, when we become stewards of our own inner relationship, a space gets created for the relationships in our lives to actually begin to move in powerful new ways.

So how do we get from here to there? Read more…

Recently at a lecture I attended, the speaker relayed the following story from her life: A six year old girl was asked, “Pretend you were in a room full of scary tigers. What would you do?” The little girl paused for a long moment and then responded, “Well … I’d just stop pretending.” 

Ah, the power of the mind. Just as it can conjure the scariest of scenarios, so too can it release them. Hold that thought for just a minute or two while you read on. What I want to chat with you about are the three wicked step sisters, Fear, Doubt and Worry (well, that’s a little dramatic but I think you get the point) and how to change the way you relate to them. 

To set the stage, a little gift from the poet Rumi entitled, “The Guest House:” This being human is a guest house. Every morning a new arrival. A joy, a depression, a meanness, some momentary awareness comes as an unexpected visitor. Welcome and entertain them all! Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows, who violently sweep your house empty of its furniture, still, treat each guest honorably. He may be clearing you out for some new delight. The dark thought, the shame, the malice - meet them at the door laughing, and invite them in. Be grateful for whoever comes, because each has been sent as a guide from beyond.

The premise: We all deal with fears of one kind or another but most of us haven’t a clue what to do with them or how to be with them. Mostly we employ the strategy of fight or flight. When we feel a worry, a concern, a doubt or a fear, we either go to battle with it or run for the hills (how’s that working out for you?).  BUT alas, there is another way. There is a way to be with the heavier side of our emotional selves; a relationship that redefines what it means to be the glorious feeling being that you are.  Read more…

What do you want more of in your life? How ‘bout more happiness or good God, how about greater ease in relationships? What about clarity and confidence in your choices? Belief in yourself and in the world? The answer to all of this is kind of simple. Just tweak what you’re feeding yourself on a daily basis. Eliminate some things and add others. Mix it up.

• You have a creative self. What are you feeding it?
• You have a spiritual self. What are you feeding it?
• You have an emotionally intelligent self. What are you feeding it?
• Many people believe that God, Spirit, the Higher Self dwells within. Do you connect to it?

We’re all used to the concept of how what we eat impacts our physical and mental health, right? In this diet loving culture we live in, you can’t hardly go 22 seconds without a new study or perspective on the relationship between our diet and our wellbeing. On the one hand all this focus and attention can be maddening. On the other, maybe all this attention speaks to something much deeper. Maybe, it’s not really just about food and drink and exercise. Maybe the conversation takes center stage because as a culture, we’re waking up to the bigger conversation which is about how we’re feeding ourselves in all areas of our life. Maybe as each of us grapples with the undeniable facts regarding our food diet we will make the leap to consider how we feed ourselves mentally, emotionally and spiritually. If we can accept that a diet based solely on processed food leads to all sorts of yucky things, can’t we then see that a life lived in front of the television or on a steady diet of newspapers and entertainment magazines might result in some equally nasty things (actually, do an internet search on the connection between TV and depression – yikes)?

Can we become emotionally and spiritually anemic? Read more…