Category: Balance

Are You Ready to Find Meaning in Your Life. Cultivate this Skill to Find Your Happy.

I have spent countless hours with people who are looking to find meaning in their lives.

For some, life has thrown a curve ball. Something they did not expect or want. For others they’ve reached the goal they’ve been after and suddenly realize they have nothing to focus on now.

Many think they’ll be happy when they finally reach their goal. Others when they have enough money, or maybe it’s when people say I’m good enough.

But these aren’t it.

Photo by Simon Berger from Pexels

Clients show up in my office feeling lost and lackluster even thought they have many things to be happy and grateful about. If you follow the prescribed path laid out by your guru leader, culture, society you will eventually fall flat. 

You cannot find meaning following someone else’s formula. The only way to find that effervescent joy you see others achieving is to open to the truth inside you. 

This is hard and many feel overwhelmed focusing on what brings them meaning in their lives. So many of us were shamed for our deepest essence of who we are. We were told, “your a girl” “you want too much” “your different from us” “you can’t do those things” “boy’s aren’t sensitive”. We were told our value was getting a good job, into that school, getting married to the right person, having children, which meant the meaning of our life was what our community saw as valuable and available to “people like us”.

We learned early to turn off our internal barometer in favor of other people’s opinions. We found accolades and acceptance, when we did as we were told. 

In my experience when we follow our personal truth toward meaning, we create, deeply from that violet light inside ourselves, a sense of belonging, being lovable, and enough. We will never have these if we aren’t looking internal for our sense of true north. 

Each of our true north coordinates are different. Each of us has value, each of us has worth. Your first task is to learn to recognize your experience of openness and expansion. 

These are your signals to finding your own inner peace, and establishing a sense of what is good for you. Flexibility, openness and expansion are signs of health and wellbeing. We are looking for these when we want to create lives full of meaning. 

To get started think of a time you were doing something you truly loved, just because you love doing it. It could be cooking, hiking, watching TV, anything you truly love doing. 

Just make sure it is not something you love because you are “supposed to do it, like it, or want it”. Make sure it is not something you love just for secondary rewards, like compliments or having someone else approve of you. Make sure it’s not something that just feels good because you are numbing out. 

When you have memory of those things you did because you loved them and they created a sense of openness and expansion within you, notice how it feels in your body. Take a moment right now to feel the lightness, the ease, the fun. This activity is about noticing how you experience these feelings. 

I know learning to pay attention to your somatic experience can be difficult. If this is hard for you check out some of the other articles or guided videos on my YouTube channel to learn more about how to experience embodiment.

This embodied experience of openness and expansion, is the experience of purpose and meaning. Following these feelings when you are participating in your life will bring you a life full of purpose and meaning. 

This is your road map to living a life you want with intention. It is about what is good and wanted in your life. And doing things that bring your unique gifts into the world. These feelings of openness and expansion are your marker for following your own path. It is the lantern that shows you your way. Following this light is how you build the life you want. And live your life on purpose. …

If you are interested in learning more about finding purpose and meaning in your life, bookmark this page or click the social media links to stay connected and learn more about mind over matter and how our physiology and psychology are inextricably linked. 

If you are ready to get started making changes in your life. Then visit our clinic website to check out our amazing professionals and book your 1st appointment. www.studiob.life – we have a variety of programs to help you create your best life using psychology, physiology, and food. 

How to Create a Life in Balance Just for You

ahhhh … Balance

Balance, such an elusive idea. One many crave and few say they’ve found in their lives. What would your life look like if you had life balance? Can you describe it in detail?

 Photo Credit via Pexels

ahhhh … Balance

Balance, such an elusive idea. One many crave and few say they’ve found in their lives. What would your life look like if you had life balance?

People often describe being in balance as being able to have both the light & the dark, the joy & the sadness, the drive & the rest. Many describe how living “in balance” (think 50/50 between doing & being) would be so wonderful, yet continue to live and behave with most of their eggs on one end of the continuum. This often leads to overcompensating and losing sight of one’s healthy living goals. Now you are just swinging from one end of the pendulum to the other, and neither end, no matter how righteous, is living balanced.
dictionary.com gives two definitions of balance I think fit well into the concept of life balance. One is: mental steadiness or emotional stability; habit of calm behavior, judgment, etc. and the other: the power or ability to decide an outcome by throwing one’s strength, influence, support, or the like, to one side or the other. Let’s apply those to your life. If you looked at the last few days, would your life meet that definition? Where are you in balance? Not in balance? Where could you decrease or add items to create more balance? From here planning comes in.
Planning includes getting really focused. Ask yourself what’s one thing you could do today to increase your ability to experience life balance? Now get really focused on this item. See yourself engaged in it, completing it, how you will feel after you’ve accomplished it, how others are impacted by your behavior. Write it down, draw a picture, find a word, create a sounds or movement to represent it. Move, say, or carry your symbol of this change with you and use it often. Keep your mind singularly focused on your goal, not the problems. According to Feng, Schwemmer, Gershman, and Cohen (2014) “people are famously poor at multitasking control-demanding behaviors; they are often able to execute only a few, and sometimes no more than one at a time” (p.129) due to engaging multiple process pathways that reduce flexibility and efficiency completing tasks. Basically, where we put our focus drives what we focus on. Focusing on the problem then leads to focusing more on the problem. If you want positive change focus on the solution. Based on this model of focus you are more likely to stick to, complete your goal, and find more opportunities to support your positive change.
References
Feng, S. f., Schwemmer, M., Gershman, S. J., & Cohen, J. d. (2014). Multitasking versus multiplexing: Toward a normative account of limitations in the simultaneous execution
of control-demanding behaviors. Cognitive Affective & Behavioral Neuroscience, 14, 129-146. DOI 10.3758/s13415-013-0236-9
Here’s a worksheet to get you started:
Where are you not in balance? 
Home? Work? Intimate relationships? Friendships? Role as a parent, adult child, sibling, wife, mother, father, husband, etc? Spiritual? 
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Where could decrease or add items to create more balance?
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How will you engaged in this new behavior?
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How will you know when you are doing it or have completed it?
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Imagine yourself completing your goal, how will you feel?
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How will your loved ones, friends, co-workers, dog, etc be impacted by your positive change?
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What symbol will you use to help you remember you are practicing this new behavior, thought, emotional response? Find your symbol, carry it with you, and use it often.
A picture, word, sound, movement? Describe it, paste it, or draw it here.
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