LOVE is a choice.

Each of us has our own experience and meaning when it comes to love. And rightly so, because there are so many different ways to experience, express and channel it. Love is limitless.

What I've discovered along my journey is that we all have love within us. It is the most powerful energy we have and are, and when manifested in our relationships and work, has the power to move mountains.

While there are many experiences and expressions, what I know for sure about love and connection, is that we cultivate it when we allow our most vulnerable selves to be seen. Mustering the courage to express our deepest feelings is a risk. And so is speaking up and asking for what we need. But these are the essentials of self love. Simply being ourselves is a risk, but we will always be free to be ourselves in our relationships.

The right people will love us for who we are. I've realized its not worth holding back who we are. Ever.

We must choose to open up to love. And this begins with opening up to the love within ourselves.

Brene Brown sums it all up powerfully in these lines..

“We cultivate love when we allow our most vulnerable and powerful selves to be deeply seen and known, and when we honor the spiritual connection that grows from that offering with trust, respect, kindness and affection.

Love is not something we give or get; it is something that we nurture and grow, a connection that can only be cultivated between two people when it exists within each one of them – we can only love others as much as we love ourselves.

Shame, blame, disrespect, betrayal, and the withholding of affection damage the roots from which love grows. Love can only survive these injuries if they are acknowledged, healed and rare.” 

We make the choice to open up to the love within ourselves each day. When we learn to love ourselves first, honor our needs and boundaries, embrace our vulnerability and see that regardless of where we are and who we are with, we are worthy.

From this place, we know how to love another. Our love is free because we don't look for it from someone else, we simply share what we already have within us. Without the attachment and dependency, we love without expectation.

 And in the space and freedom, our love will grow in ways beyond what we can sometimes conceive until we experience it. It will extend into every area of our life and to everyone around us.

And its when we give ourselves the permission to rise up and shine, regardless of our circumstances or what other people tell us, that we also give others the permission to express their own limitless source of love.

When Not Giving A Fuck is Actually a Good Thing

Usually when I'm running, clarity comes to me. I think of great ideas and the most urgent calls for action become apparent. I know whats important, and also the shit I need to let go.

I'm sure many of you can relate. I've come to believe that it's the practice of moving our bodies and becoming present with our breath and the moment that we are able to move past the story of our minds and hear the whispers of our soul.

And bam, it hit me. Next blog. I'm going to talk about how we need to care less about what other people think. It's so important for our souls and the pursuit of living our dreams.

There will be many times when others don't agree or believe in the way we see things. This is none of our business and a great time to not waste any energy convincing.

Anything is true if we believe in it. Essentially, we become what we think about most of the time. If we think somethings possible, then it is. And vice versa. We have a choice on the thoughts we think, content we absorb, things we do and people we surround ourselves with.

It doesn't matter if everyone agrees, what matters is finding what makes us feel good. "Our joy is our greatest service to the world."

Everyone is entitled to their own truth and beliefs. And if someone is trying to put you down with their limiting belief system, it is a reflection of who they are and what they think they are able to accomplish, not you.

Most of the time, this would be the best time to walk away. We cannot change others, only ourselves. We can choose to be around people who lift us up. And the opinions that don't support or inspire our growth, expansion and love are not worth spending energy on. At all.

At the end of the day, the right people will stay in our lives effortlessly.

“Don't chase people. Be yourself, do your own thing and work hard. The right people - the ones who really belong in your life - will come to you. And stay.”

- Will Smith

We owe it to ourselves to not give a fuck what the naysayers tell us. Really, the only voice we need to listen to is the one deep within. It is also from within that our power lies and the best place to start if we want to follow our bliss.

When we stop caring so much about what other people think or needing external approval or permission to follow our dreams, we set ourselves free.

We get to define ourselves. Every day. From the moment we wake up in the morning. We get to choose.

The effect of making empowering choices is that we attract the right people and circumstances. Yes, we may not get the approval from everyone, but we follow our heart and find ourselves connecting with higher quality relationships and opportunities to grow and thrive.

Marianne Williamson wisely quotes, "Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do." If we depend on the opinions of others, we serve up our power. Unconditional self love is to, regardless of what other people think, give ourselves the permission to live out our greatness and shine our light. From this point, we've found our true power from within.

And sometimes, this mean's not giving a fuck about what some people think.

Why We Need to Take Fun More Seriously

We all sometimes fall into the trap that in order to get things done, to move forward in life and attract the situations and people we want, we need to only work hard and take things seriously.

Now while I'm all for doing the work to create the reality we want to live in, I've also come to realize that fun and play are not opposite to work, they are the ideal compliments.

 "The opposite of play is not work—the opposite of play is depression."
- Brené Brown

Fun, laughter, play and silliness open our eyes up to spontaneity, creativity, new solutions and deeper connection with ourselves and the people around us.

Fun brings us to the present moment.

And fun is a choice. It's a choice in how we want to see things.

My current phone wallpaper is "Happiness is not a state to arrive at, but a manner of traveling." The other day this really clicked. If I'm setting goals, I want to have fun along the journey. This is also where the growth happens.

And the external results we attract (money, people, recognition) as a result of our work will naturally happen. We need not worry so much about the result, the result will happen. We need to focus on how we feel along the journey.

This doesn't mean we lose sight of the forest through the trees. Having a destination in mind demands focus and the vision of what we will create is a source of excitement and motivation, but it's on the journey that we find fulfillment.

I've played with the idea that fun is literally a mindset, an awareness, a state of being that raises our vibration. And science proves that laughter and mischief literally opens our mind as it raises levels of happy hormones such as serotonin and acts to rewire the neural connections in our brain.We naturally allow more positive ways of thinking into our mind.

This is serious biz guys!

Laughter is the best medicine, the best drug. It's interesting because the first blog entry I wrote in this blog was about the "Power of Laughter" and how many benefits we receive when we laugh. And now it's hit me once again. Full force.

I mentioned to my Life Coach recently that I want to be a fool. She asked me what I meant and I referred to the idea that we have this idea that we need to be serious and try really hard to get anything done, that it's supposed to always be hard. And it will be this way if this is what we believe. But since we choose our beliefs, I emphasized that it was time to bring more foolishness into my life.

You know how they say, "Set goals that scare you"? This intention literally scared me.
So I'm going to "be fun" and see what that attracts? She agreed and it clicked with me.

Now I want to clarify that having fun doesn't mean we don't acknowledge, hold space and honor our pain, anger and struggles. Of course we do. What I'm saying is that somewhere along the journey, we open up our minds to different ways of seeing things, and leave an open seat for fun.

Are You Giving Yourself Permission to Dream Big?

I'd like to start off this post with a dare. Are you willing to dream big? Are you willing to let your guard down, stare down fear, let go of limits and picture what excites you? Sounds easy, right?

Well this is the thing. Sometimes when we are hurt, when we've experienced failure or rejection, we stay small to avoid feeling that pain again. We take the circumstance personally, even though shitty things happen to all of us. Job losses, breakups, divorce, you name it. We stay small and safe because dreaming is scary, it sets us outside of our routines and the walls we built around our mind and hearts to stay comfortable.

The trouble is that we think we're protecting ourselves from pain, but really we are causing ourselves more pain by not allowing ourselves to grow.

But despite how obvious this may seem, we are all humans and need time to heal, even if the shitty things that happened had nothing to do with us. They still hurt and this is legitimate.

Sometimes we just need to trust that we will come back to our heart and the freedom that we are born to live in.

When I lost my job half a year ago- a company that was just starting out and clearly unstable- the rejection really hurt. I questioned if I had done something wrong or there was something wrong with me, even though this was far from the case. The company had an unhealthy rate of turnover and lacked feedback and communication between managers and employees.

So yes, the change was shocking both emotionally and financially, but looking back I see that it's made me stronger. The process of healing, adapting, re-claiming my self-worth and letting myself dream again is how we learn and grow.

The challenge is to, no matter what happens externally, hold the most expansive perspective and belief that we can within us.

Dreaming big means allowing ourselves to let go of fear, rules and conditions. It means visualizing what you really want to do if money were not a factor. Because when we uncover what we really desire, that's where the motivation lies and finding the resources and means to make it happen becomes a whole lot easier. Instead of starting from our limits, let's start from our dreams, shall we?

How to Awaken Your Ecstacy

During winter months, we need nourishment more than ever and to find our flow and light from within. There are so many awesome ways to awaken our inner energies of love, power and light, but the one that really sticks out these days is movement. The power of movement can be found in running, sex, yoga and dance to name a few. These practices open us up to greater love within ourselves and in sharing our love with others. On my own journey of finding more flow with movement, dance has recently really stuck out.

Dance brings together so many beautiful elements. We are given space to express, have fun and connect with our own body and intitution while also connecting with others.

How magical.

It is in the body that we come alive.

I attended an ecstatic dance event recently where a community of like-minded people connect over the power of expression through dance. Ecstatic dance is an intuitive-based practice where we dance barefoot to the music in whatever way feels right. There is no right or wrong, just what we feel and our truth.

Dance, in this form, is like life when we let go of the "shoulds" and rules and allow ourselves to live our  truth, vision and values. We walk the path that feels most right to us, act according to our heart and express our truth every step of the way. In doing this we free ourselves and open up to greater love.

We give ourselves the permission to be free, because it is in freedom that love grows. And the more love we have within us, the more love we have to share.

I attended a dance event and realized that movement moves us into greater ecstasy, but I also realized that we have the ability to take freedom and love further than the dance floor. It is not just on a dimly lit dance floor that we express our truth. We find the courage to shine our light in all other areas. This is really Wholehearted living (Brene Brown) because we realize that in any situation, we can lean into our intuition, free ourselves and find love.

We can find our presence and love in even the most chaotic situations and challenges we are faced with. And even in the midst of winter, we find within us lies an invincible summer.

But Do You Feel Alive?

If you asked me a few years ago what it means to feel alive, I don't know if I would have known what to say.

It's because life experience has knocked me down, made me stronger, opened my perception and heart, and basically given me an abundance of different situations to practice insane courage and embrace vulnerability. I'm different now, and boy I've grown.

There's this whole world to experience and we can choose to either stand on the sidelines and judge people who follow their hearts or we can step into the arena ourselves and take the leap of faith.

In the past few years, I've really come to value growth as such a necessary ingredient in our lives. If we're not growing, if we're not pushing ourselves past our comfort zone, we don't feel alive.

Being alive means we take risks, we are willing to embrace failure and imperfection and we choose the adventure. 

Being alive means we choose to do the things that both scare and excite us. It's embracing spontaneity, taking to strangers and the willingness to start all over again. It's saying I love you when we feel it, embracing vulnerability and asking for help. It's getting up in the morning and saying, "I may feel scared, it may be uncertain, but this feels so right that I'm going to give it a try. I'll take the chance."

Because life is all about taking these risks.

I remember the first time I traveled on my own to Montreal from Toronto. It was a train ride to another province in my country, but it was the first time I would travel on my own after breaking down three years back. I had grown from the pain and struggle of feeling isolated in private school and watching my family fall apart. Fully embracing the wholehearted journey, feeling so supported and blessed, I was ready for an adventure. Montreal was one of the best experiences in my life that both scared and excited me.

And I loved it.

When I saw that the fear was good, I moved with it to find myself meeting some pretty incredible people, experiencing insane synchronicity and personal growth.

And this is what I realized: Fear doesn't go away. But we can choose to feel it, and follow our desire anyway. Because it is through facing fear that we become fearless, grow, connect and find the source of limitless love and light that is within all of us.

So book that trip, say I love you, be yourself, change course, choose to focus on the thoughts that serve you, identify your desires and go out there and make them real, live in the here and now, open your mind, open your heart, and be open to experience and live in the mindset that if you can dream it, you can be it.

Yes, it might be scary and uncertain at times, but I promise you that you will never regret the decision to Dare Greatly.

Because its what being alive is all about.

Catching the Breath: How Running Changed My Life

The truth is that running has dramatically changed my life. I don't know where I would be without my running practice. This doesn't mean I wouldn't be happy or healthy, but it does mean that the habit has played a very powerful role in my personal growth and well-being. Running has supported me through many rough points in my life and acted as a simple way to gain a lot of ground, calm, clarity and focus during times where I struggled to find those feelings.

My experience is proof that one habit can play a huge part in how happy, alive and connected we feel. Yes, I have other habits, practices and ways of thinking that support me, but being physically active definitely tops the list.

Running is my thing, but it doesn't have to be yours. What matters more than what you do, is the effect that the activity has on the body and that you do that thing consistently. Any physical exercise where we move our body to sweat, get our heart rate up and blood pumping is going to get the same result. 

There's no need to workout every day.  In fact, we need the rest days in between, they are important to our sense of balance and ironically to our desire to be active. When we don't push ourselves too hard and listen to our body, giving it time to rest, we find that we want to be active. We want to do it because it feels good. Its not a chore. Its a desire.

And psychology is there to back us up with time-tested facts. Feel good, pleasure-inducing chemicals such as dopamine and serotonin are released during physical activity.

"They improve mood and protect against mental health disorders. Serotonin, which is produced by long-term cardio exercise, decreases depression and dopamine improves your mood and long-term memory. It stimulates highly pleasurable feelings in the brain and could contribute to what is called runners high." (www.livestrong.com)

The emotional, mental, physical and even spiritual benefits are endless. I'm sure I will write more about this topic, but in the meantime let me leave you with this- let's come from a place of self worth and practice self care because it feels soo good. 

What is your physical practice?