#7daysforme Challenge Day 2

I just completed my 5 minute meditation for Day 2 of my #7daysforme Challenge :).

5 minutes may feel like nothing at first thought, as though there’s no benefit that can be had from just 5 minutes. However, I believe that any amount of focused, quiet time listening for your answers can benefit you. 5 minutes is a good place to start.

So our task today was to focus on our word for the year for just 5 minutes of quiet reflection. Since my word is Courage, I spent my time with that word. Out of my reflection, I received beautiful insight. The phrase that kept coming to mind throughout the time was “I have the Courage to be the vision I see of myself.”

In reflecting on this, I believe I know what it means for me. It means that I want to have the Courage to move *into* the visions I see of myself living the life I want to live, doing things I’ve wanted to do, and having the impact on others that I want to have. It’s me believing that the vision of myself that I see is me seeing the future, not just me seeing something intangible and improbable. The reason why Courage is so important here is because it’s so easy to become afraid when I begin to think of all the steps towards the vision of myself that I see. It’s easy to let the nagging naysayer in my mind chide in and say things like 'oh that’s too much to do and will never work anyway. It’s just going to take too much energy to even try.'

And I'm done with letting the naysayer win. I’m done with letting it throw molasses in my path and slow me down with doubt and indecisiveness.

It’s my time to step fully into myself even more.

With Courage, I will.

:).

And how about you? What has your meditation brought you by way of insight?

Heading into the New Year

And so we are a few hours away from the New Year and I’m sitting down to write you all. I’ve been trying to write this newsletter for 3 days now :-). However everytime I sat down to write, no ‘right’ words would come out. Every beginning felt contrived, not the right thing to say, lacking of soething. And since I’m a believer in divine timing and wisdom, I decided to let the shoulds go and just write what comes through when it comes through. And now, I’m sitting in my favorite spot, in a lull of the day and the time feels right. So be forewarned, this is a bit stream of conscious and I’m just going for it :-).  

I think it’s because it’s ‘this’ time of year. Our minds are tuned to the frequency of reflection, shedding, and renewal. We are winded down with the expectant energy of a new start, ready to jump forward into the newness, the rebirth, the doover of a new year.

I always am excited about this time. Particularly the feeling that I get to doover what I didn’t get to do exactly how I wanted to this year. What I mean is that I get to try again. Everybody wants a rockin’ year. Everybody wants to look back on it and say, man, I really rocked it out this year. I blazed through all of my goals. I was the me I wanted to be and I embraced happiness 99% of the time. I am 100% rockstar!

But the truth is that often times, we may make it to only 85% rockstar, maybe 75%, sometimes barely 30%. And all I’m saying is that it’s ok, because you know what, a new year gives you a new chance (actually a bunch of new chances) to do it over again – to get just a little bit closer to rockstar status :-).

New Tradition

I want to encourage you to take on a new tradition this new year. You may have already heard of this and if so, I hope you are doing it. If not, go for it, this is a great time to start. For the next 365, create a memories jar. Every time something awesome happens, big or small, write it out on a small piece of paper and drop it in your memories jar. You can get fancy and buy a cute little tin from the dollar store or you can go straight utilitarian and rinse out an old glass food jar for your memory keeper. I suggest keeping it somewhere that you can easily see, 1. to remind yourself to keep up the habit and 2. To remind yourself that good things happen :-).

#7daysforme Challenge 

So remember in last week’s newsletter, I said that I wanted to invite you all to do a very easy, very impactful ritual/challenge with me to set off our new year right? Well over the next 7 days I will be posting my challenge over on Instagram and sending you a quick daily email reminder about it. Don’t worry, I won’t make a habit of sending you daily emails :-D .I just really want our new year to start with a good burst of rah rah energy. And intentional focus is a good way to do that ;-).

Simply, we’ll be answer 1 question a day to help us reflect on what we want for this new year. I encourage you to share your answers on Instagram with a picture and the tag #7daysforme or leave a comment here. Participating makes the mental work that much more powerful ;-). You can find me on Instagram at www.instagram.com/leahrpatterson. Look out for my posts :)!

Best blessings lovely people!