SiX Inexpensive Tips to a Happier YOU

It all starts with YOU. It is your movie and you are the ACTION star. You have the power to take action in your life. You deserve to be happy and stress-free. I want you to be happy and stress-free. I want you to be well.

Here are the gifts that I want to share with you:

1. Get Organized. It makes life so much easier when you know where to find what. Invest on jars, boxes, and BPA-free plastic organizers (no more toxins!). Label them with stickers. Clean your closet and donate stuff you no longer want to keep (or designate a box for all the stuff that you no longer want to keep but still somehow have an attachment to and let it sit until you are ready and you feel good about it). Donating is the ultimate recycling! Being organized helps so much with time management and being punctual. Use your smartphone or computer calendar for your appointments. Set an alarm. A notebook is very handy for quick lists and thoughts that you do not want to forget (you’ll never know when creativity oozes out of you!). Create a journal. I use this app called Day One on my iPad to write down all the things that I accomplished and did not accomplish for the day and many more. It is fabulous!

2. Self-love and Self-care. These two are partners–meaning you can only show yourself true love when you start caring for yourself. Screw all the things you have to do for other people. You first. Always. I know we can be selfless at times because we want to be helpful and show our love and dedication to our work and the people we care about, but we can’t give our best if our own basic needs are not taken care of (the people who depend on you also want to see you happy). YOU FIRST before your employer. Eat good and never settle for less (I mean get rid of junk food and all that processed shit that they sell at the grocery store and fast food). Learn to listen to your body. Care for yourself and love yourself. Set aside a special time for you everyday whether it’s meditating for 15 minutes under the sunshine or taking a long walk, or screaming in your car to let out some anger and frustration…whatever YOU like to do for yourself. You deserve it. Take it. I love long baths, snuggling, and good food.

This image courtesy of Foodmatterssays it.

3. Surround yourself with people who are good and inspiring to YOU. When you are surrounded by inspiring people, you will be reminded of your own potential. Notice how this reignites your own power and the power of your own imagination which will allow you to be more creative and bring creation in your own life. It makes you want to show up as a better version of yourself everyday and “say bring it on!”. Take notes of the things that will come up for you once you decide to enter a transition. Be aware of your self and what you want in your life. If you are not feeling that great or that good about what you are doing, fake it till you are it. Think about reinvention and not being ashamed to reinvent yourself. Instead of being jealous and insecure every time you see someone you admire, be that person. Be the person you want to admire. Remember that you will be accepted by the people who truly loves you no matter what you are, who you are, or what you do. (And minimize seeing or talking to people who create stress & drama in your life but you still want to be friends with. Seriously.)

4. Be honest. Stop lying. Stop talking shit about yourself. Stop talking shit about other people. YES YOU CAN. When you are living an honest life, you are taking care of your soul. Because LYING IS EXHAUSTING to the self and the soul. When you are being honest and truthful in your ways, you become clearer on who you are to yourself, who you are to others, and who you are in this world. It feels good to carry the truth. YOUR truth (and not someone else’s).

5. Show up and be productive. Whether you are self-employed or have an employer or you are a homemaker, KICK ASS in your work. Be mindful of your work–even if you hate your work. Doing shitty at your work and the work itself won’t make you feel good. Show up and use your skills and talents. Show up for YOU. Feel good with your accomplishments. Our work is a playground where we are given an opportunity to shine and inspire other people.

6. Share your smile and goodness. You are here and this is an opportunity to share YOUR being. Share yourself to your loved ones. Share yourself to the world! Believe that you have the power to influence and inspire the lives of those around you. Share. It feels amazing.

The Flowers are Blooming

My husband and I just entered a new period in our lives, we are trying to have a baby. You have no idea what goes on in my head everyday since we started the process. Of course I feel excited. I’ve wanted a baby for the longest time and now that we are finally trying, I can’t help but feel anxious. I am nervous, almost terrified. What if I can’t have a baby for health reasons? I know that I should get tested for this to clear out my fears and issues around it. But living in America–the supposedly land of the free,being in middle class, and a housewife (by choice) without a health insurance, seeing a health care practitioner is expensive. Such a bullshit system to have to go through for wanting to have the proper care. When I shared this dilemma to my girl friends, they had asked me not to give my bad thoughts the energy and to think positive and believe in my capacity in creating and carrying a baby inside me.

So what I am telling myself is this is me inviting the unknown. This is me “playing with the universe and co-creating with the divine”–these are actually the words that I often hear from our spiritual guide and now that it has value to me, I am holding on to it as my daily mantra. My anti-crazy mantra. I’d like to trust. Trust myself, trust my body, trust my husband, and trust the process. Writing about this in this moment is actually helping alleviate the heaviness that I’ve been feeling lately.

I read a lot of articles online that the number 1 cause of miscarriage is stress. Stress comes in many forms, and it kills if you do not learn how to become resilient. Now my work is to find things to do that would help me from overanalyzing and overthinking my day to day experience…actually, this has always been my work as a housewife, finding things to do during the day while my husband is working to keep me from going totally nuts and jumping in both feet with my hormone driven mood swings.

So yes..exploring new/old things and not being afraid to be bored with myself sometimes is my ongoing work as I actualize my dreams.

I keep getting this question, what do I do these days?

I prepare raw food. I recently met some really good, amazing and talented people who have inspired me to reignite my love of preparing raw food. So this is one of the hobbies that I have incorporated in my life now, preparing and eating raw food. I surf the Internet for easy raw food recipes and then I spend the rest of the time playing in the kitchen while listening to my favorite playlists. One of my favorite go-to site is Rawmazing. This website offers so many simple recipes that you can easily do by yourself if you are a beginner in the world of preparing raw food.

I am taking classes. I began taking classes in Child Development at UCLA last winter. I want to operate a daycare someday and I think that it is a great class for parents-to-be to take because it goes into details on what happens from germination (creation process) till after birth. I recommend this class to all women who want to become a mother and don’t have enough support or background to being a mom. I walk out of class feeling more confident than when I entered. There’s a lot of reading involved and 100% showing up prepared. Somehow I know that things are going to be okay if I keep doing my best. I believe in conscious parenting…I believe that we should give our children the chance to become successful. I am excited to see how this unfolds in the near future. I am excited to meet parents and learn to co-facilitate children!

I am embracing fitness. For the longest time, I’ve avoided exercise because treadmills and other equipments bore me. But thanks to my husband’s countless encouragement, I am now enjoying the oohs and the aahs of sprinting and deep stretching. Also, I’ve decided to check out the intenSati class (taught by a friend), and I find that it is fun and fabulous for the overall mind+body+heart+spirit health. It does help that Holly is an amazing intructor!

I am keeping in touch with my loved ones. I realized that keeping to myself is not a good idea especially if I am going through some crazy times in my head. So I make sure to reach out to the people I love and care about. I feel like for the first time since I moved to the United States, I am supported and I am loved by the people I choose to play with in my day to day. It helps that I acknowledge the fact that I was never excluded to begin with…that it was my own insecurities and projection all along. Pheww! Feeling secured helps me become more open to meeting and having new people in my life.

Recognizing Feelings and Self-expression

“Look.”

The problem with growing up in a culture where feelings are rarely ever recognized and expressed is that a child can grow up and see themselves as a mind walking around in a body. Expressions are pacified through “intellectualizing”: getting out of the feelings and into the head. Many adults who model this type of treatment towards feelings learn techniques (like I did) of denying their own emotions from surfacing their external in fear of receiving judgement from the people around them or in fear that they might crumble if they choose to expose who they are and how they feel.

I attended a school for a long period of my life where bullies and bullying is not recognized by the teachers and the institution itself. So when problems and conflict between students arise, even the smartest teacher in the school didn’t know how to address the situation where a young student can gain social and emotional learning. It’s tough being a small kid and be bullied by boys and girls alike. When I’d speak to my teachers about it, they’d tell me to be a good Catholic and practice forgiveness. In other words, stuff it down, apologize to the other child even if you didn’t do anything wrong, and pretend like it never happened. I guess it’s better than telling a child to get lost. It was a cycle of experiencing my ego and confidence getting crushed by others for twelve years of attending the same school from kinder till senior high school. I didn’t say anything at home because I saw how my parents were already having a hard time with my elder sister (she was in high school then and I was in grade school). I was scared that I’d get in trouble for saying something and both mom and dad will give me a silent treatment. I was scared to be ignored and that I would feel worse than I already do. I learned to mask myself well both at home and school. I’d just tell my parents about the good things (academic stuff) and leave out all the rest.

By the time I’m in high school, I was a bonafide rebel. I’d skip school whenever I can and when that became obvious to my parents, I got into a lot of trouble. My parents thought there’s something wrong with me. Of course they did. They’d have a one way communication (talking-back-is-disrespectful) “blow out” sessions with me. For what it’s worth, I liked the ‘attention’ they were giving me but at the same time it makes me want to isolate myself even more and go far far away. I still didn’t have the nerve to tell them what’s going on with me. In my head, it would be like betraying myself and my hard work of masking. I was scared to lose the toughness that I needed to survive that God awful school environment.

In 2002, I graduated from high school and moved on to college. It’s such a relief to be in an environment where you are either admired or not seen. I had my first long term relationship (lasted for 5 years) with a guy whom I loved from my head. Everybody I knew were dating, so should I, I thought. Not recognizing and honoring my feelings back then has taught me a great deal of control: control on myself and control on the other person. I mastered stewing my feelings until it builds up and eventually boils over to a point of explosion. It felt good to explode and release the tension but at the same time, I felt the guilt that came along with it. That relationship did not last long because we weren’t real with each other.

I hated myself for being so horrible with myself and not really knowing how to create the change that I wanted to create in my life.

When I moved to the US and started working, I met a lot of cool people. I began to feel appreciated and valued. Thank you. You know who you are. One of the most remarkable events that happened to me during that phase of my life was when I recognized my own feelings of love, grief, and jealousy through the relationship that I have with one of my best friends (who is now my husband).

It’s pretty awesome being married to a man who has the same initiative as I do of working together to keep the practice of conscious partnering alive in the relationship. I can be angry without feeling judged. I can express my anger without exploding. I can say I love you from my heart and not be ashamed about it–or think of it as weakness. I can be happy and not associate it with shame. I can say ‘no’ without feeling guilty that I did not satisfy the need of the other person. I’m learning to let go of whatever control I think I have over something or someone. My relationship with my family has gotten so much better and secured.

Over the weekend, I attended a heart-opening ceremony where I saw my guide for the first time in 6 months. I wouldn’t lie, I get nervous every time I see him, thinking to myself, ‘oh boy, what is he going to see in me and reveal this time?’ He’s always spot on and doesn’t miss a thing. He saw how I disappear inside of myself and lose my expression when I interact with someone (in the most unobvious way to me). I am not aware that I do it. With his help I was able to dive in and navigate past the surface of my own darkness and sadness. I was able to get to a place of recognition and face the emotion that was laying underneath the surface of sadness, which was none other than emptiness. I got clarity. Why I fear emptiness is what I am exploring for the next months by practicing awareness of my own disappearances inside–it always starts with recognizing your own patterns and catching yourself in the act. I have to remind myself to handle it carefully and with respect because I know that I can be harsh with myself sometimes.

If you are like me who wants to break the habit of intellectualizing your emotions, see if you can find a person whom you trust and feel safe with (he or she can be a family member, a friend, or your partner) whom you can practice talking to about the things that bother you and notice the emotions that comes a long with it. Most of the time, the reason why we feel that we can’t express ourselves is that we don’t feel safe to express. Instead of ignoring the feelings, stay with it, recognize it. Stuffing seems like an easier route than facing who we are but it doesn’t do us any good, it can be damaging both physically and psychologically (ex. I know people who look 10 years older than their real age caused by stuffing so much of who they really are and how they really feel–it’s hard to pretend and mask the real self all the time). It can be destructive. Felt feelings bring emotional energy. How can we use this energy in a constructive way? We can use it to improve our relationships with the people outside ourselves, our friends for example. It is only when we are being ourselves, expressing, that we can truly deepen our relationship with another human being.

The Calling

I’ve been so quiet.

What’s quiet is that voice inside my head that tells me I am not serving my purpose on this planet…the voice that every now and then nags a little bit and says, “wakee wakeeee….what on Earth are you doing with your life?!”

I hated that voice for a while just because I would think that it’s some sort of a reminder that I am not good enough or that I am not doing a good enough job as a housewife. I decided that if it’s not trying to show me what I want to see, or tell me what I want to hear, I should ignore it in whatever disguise it comes as.

Ignoring it was my resistance to seeing what my spirit is trying to show me and I go back to cocooning myself in my little piece of Neverland.

In Neverland, I am a wanderer. I am with my love and we are running together in the wilderness as wildlings, chasing the sun…we dive in to the deepest rivers of the forest…we eat the freshest fruits from the most ancient trees…we lay side by side as man and wife…and our children are running around free and happy in the shelter that we created for our family…we can all fly…we play with the stars at night…when we are tired, the moon watches over us as we gently let out our snores…with the air that fills our lungs as life’s greatest gift.

Perhaps this will happen in another lifetime or perhaps in this lifetime if the opportunity presents itself.

In Realityland, I am content to embracing what I have now. I live in a nice apartment with my love, my worries seem to revolve around creativity in the kitchen and chores, does he like my cooking? do I like my cooking? do I need to do laundry now or can I put it off for another day or two? why is there too much traffic when it’s not even rush hour? there’s a long line in front of my favorite restaurant! and of course, I worry about not having things to say on my private writings, why am I so empty? You know, self-entitlement stuff and other concerns. I realize that these are good problems to have. My love has given me the gift of time. And with that I am very grateful.

In between my Neverland fantasies and my reality, I couldn’t ask for a better life.

The desire to have things differently, to have more, or to do more, all seem to be constants, and it will always be floating in the horizon of our imagination. Like every other living being, my greatest desire is to thrive with you, to partake, to contribute, to help end our differences.

When I am at peace, there is no nagging or battling inside my head. Everything is an opportunity. From this place I can focus on paying attention to where my heart and soul is guiding me…from this relaxed place, taking action is much easier than when I am trying to reason and resist every step of the way. When my inner child is pacified, my adult self feels free to grow into the direction I am being pointed to so that I can open up an opportunity for myself.

And so my path has led me to applying for this coming winter semester at a university here in Los Angeles. I am going back to school to take up some units that I need in order to be a step closer to my calling…along with other tests and requirements that I need to pass.

To thrive, I will have to be healthy. To get to where I want to be, the tasks will be easier with a clear head. Relaxation, proper nurturing of the self, and lots and lots of loving! So for the next chapter of my life until the very end, I plan on taking good care of my body, mind, heart, & soul (…just like everything else, they need to be fed accordingly to survive and flourish…LISTEN)

Cheers to the next phase!

PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS [my broken dreams, getting things done, & starting over]

I won’t give up

It’s been a roller coaster ride of figuring out what I want to do with my life while I am here.

Yeah.

Here.

With you.
In this very confusing wonderful, crazy beautiful planet.

In the beginning I thought what I wanted to do for expression is play music. I remember coming home to my piano everyday after school and I would play until I’m entranced by the melody. We had that relationship for years–of being each other’s refuge.
Strange how that faded fast.
I can’t recall ever breaking up with it because that’s how I feel about it now.
Like we’re broken up, the piano and I.
Being a musician is my broken dream.
I desire to be able to get back to how I used to play, even get better at it.
These days I play, but only when no one else is listening.

Shortly after getting married, I explored in the kitchen. I had so much fun! (and I still do!) It was the first time that I realized I can create something. I fell in love with the art of making food.
Cooking helped build my self-confidence.
I learned so many things about fresh organic ingredients that were once foreign to me.
Most importantly I became aware of the fact that what I eat has an effect on how I function. I dreamed of opening up a vegan restaurant. I started thinking about creating a business plan. I had already practiced a pitch to my potential financier (a.k.a, father). Hah. But when the diet changes started taking place (we went from eating raw food, to caveman diet, to starch diet, to vegan, etcetera—in just a period of 1 year!), it got a little shaky. Perhaps too shaky.
I couldn’t hold it together. But I held it for as long as I could.
I knew I had to let it go.

After the restaurant idea faded, I allowed myself to get lost for a while, meaning I didn’t care about how I’d spend my time and day.

I got lost in my head. I swam in my sea of broken dreams while the moon and the sun slow danced at dusk and dawn. I isolated myself. I learned that it’s exhausting to do nothing. I emptied my cup. Then Scott’s voice (a form of my conscience) would enter my head with this question, If you were to drop all your excuses, what are the things that you can do now? With this I am able to define the structure of what is doable in the present and separate it from the ideals.

In my journal (I use this amazing journaling app called, Day One), I made a list of the things that I want to create in my life…this exercise helped me feel my imagination running again. I also made a list of reasons why I fear to take the risks and what will happen if my fears shall come to pass. I read what I wrote and it made me smile because I see how much I block myself. This is good news. No one else is blocking me but me. Hah!
These journal exercises helped me see that I can get over myself if I want to. That whatever it is that makes me think that I am trapped, it is not real. It is just an illusion that I created.

No wonder I keep getting off on the wrong foot with the universe.

So I am starting over.

I know now that the catalyst for my growth is how I show up to my life, my community and my work everyday. Through the eyes of my partner and the exchange that I have with my community, I am able to continue to identify the tools that I need to grow, as well as the thoughts and loops that hinder the process of growth (e.g. I am so lazy; I don’t have the patience for this; I don’t want to be judged or criticized; I am doubting my work).

My mother always tells me, “You’re good at starting something but you never finish it.” It coincide’s with my teacher’s words that he shared with the community this past weekend during a group session, “Finish it. You do. You will. Finish it.”

I’ve been doing some writing lately, which I love. Nothing publish worthy–yet.

To me, writing is the art of connecting with the imagination and translating it in words. Connecting with the imagination makes me feel alive. It makes me feel the power of our mystery. To be able to share the writing that comes from an authentic place is a gift and a challenge to those of us who want to write.

Everyday I set aside a time to practice creative writing. I visit the Writer’s Digest website to check for new writing prompts. Sometimes it’s cheesy but it gives me such a good workout (and I actually have fun spinning the stories). Here is an example:

A mad scientist approaches you with an offer: He has a secret potion that will help you get the thing you want most in this world—be it a person, a thing, an ability, etc. What you don’t know (and won’t reveal until the end of your story) is that there is one dire consequence (not death) from drinking the potion.

It doesn’t take a lot of discipline to sit and live my dream of becoming a writer but it takes a while to be inspired to write something. There are days when I am not inspired. When I’m in this mood, I pick up a book and read. I am learning to convert my lazy days into doing something productive for my vocabulary. Because English is my second language (Filipino is my first) and I want to write in English, reading a lot of novels that are written in English is essential (particularly from authors whom I admire the writing style). I didn’t get a formal education in writing, so I am letting these authors guide me as I tread this path.

If I were to draw a diagram of the relationship I have with my pursuit of happiness, it would look like a series of never ending cycles.

And the formula that makes it all worthwhile? not giving up.

I won’t give up.

What would yours look like?
What are the things that you do that makes you feel ALIVE?

xo