Thursday, June 13, 2013

all happiness is inside of you

i've written a bit about this before, but a conversation with a new friend last night reminded me of the importance for inner happiness and peace.

i have gone through quite a bit of growth over the last couple of years, and have experienced a tremendous change.  over two years ago i was couch hopping while waiting for my apartment to be ready, living paycheck to paycheck, and so broke i was worried that i wouldn't be able to afford living on my own.  i was stressed out, up and down all the time emotionally, confused in other aspects of my life, weak, and i just didn't see the light at the end of the tunnel or that i would ever get out of this funk.  i would complain all the time - bitch and whine, bitch and moan.  i would just sit and stew in a pot of crap.

then one day, when my aunt was tired of me hearing the same record over and over again, she gave me some great advice that i have now given others around me.  she said to write down the same affirmation everyday until i felt a change within me. 

i am grateful for all the universe has provided me in the past,
that which i am receiving now,
and all i will receive in the future.
i have a grateful heart.

when i started this, i thought it was a bunch of crap.  grateful for what i am receiving now?  please - i wasn't receiving shit!  but then i began to feel this gradual shift.  i started thinking of all that i did have, instead of what i did not have.  i kept saying the affirmation over and over again, and eventually i found that i genuinely meant it.  i started to wake up with a grateful heart - i started to feel happy.  and not just happy - the happiest i have ever been.

i had read 'the secret' years before.  amazing book.  it talks about the law of attraction, and what you put out into the universe sling shots right back to you.  if you're angry, depressed, and negative all the time that is what you will attract.  if you are positive and happy, the universe will bring the same to you.  and that is what happened for me.  once i started feeling happy and grateful and started smiling again, the most amazing things started to happen.  i got this amazing job offer from dell - i felt even more grateful for the opportunity.  and you know one of the reasons they hired me?  it was my contagious, bright energy! 


and then everything just seemed to fall into place after that.  i moved into this amazing apartment in this amazing neighborhood that i love so much.  i started being able to cook again (one of my favorite things in the world) after couch hopping for a few months.  i bought all new stuff for my apartment - furniture, dishes, clothes, a bed, everything.  it was like i was starting over, just me, picking up the pieces.  i started to do things i had always wanted to do but didn't for one reason or another.  i bought myself a guitar, and began teaching myself to play.  i went through yoga teacher certification, and delved deeper and deeper into my practice.  i began to travel.  i fell in love with my new nephew over and over again.  our family went through a traumatic experience the last couple years, but our already close family grew even closer.  i even took ballet lessons. 

the last couple years, i discovered that all the happiness i had was inside of me all along - i just wasn't channeling it.  before i would tell myself, 'when i get this i'll be happy, when i have that i'll be happy'.  but once i stopped placing this contingency on my happiness, i started to feel so happy and so whole just being zoe.  i felt so much lighter, as if a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders.  me was not only enough, it was more than enough.

and now, i truly wake up with a big morning stretch and a smile on my face.  i wake up grateful that i have another day on earth.  sometimes i feel so sublimely happy that i can't imagine being happier than i am now.  sure, there are life stressors around us everyday - and i, too, am guilty at losing myself in them from time to time.  but you are as stressed out as you choose to be, and as happy as you choose to be.  life's 'stressors' will always be there - kids, relationship woes, work, death, etc. but you choose how you confront them - you either choose to approach them light and without stress or anger, or you choose the latter.


i've been through a lot of crap, i dare say more than most.  but i wouldn't change anything, take back one thing, because all of it brought me to where i am today.  i wouldn't give up how i feel today for anything.  the last couple years i have felt so full of life, so whole just being me.  my confidence has grown.  i look at the world around me so differently. i relish in the little things - the feeling of grass between my toes, the smell of rain, watching my dog dream, the innocence of my nephew, a new pair of flip flops, the lake early in the morning when the water is glass, a glass of wine with my mom, sunrises and sunsets, the taste of a dr pepper after a long run, barton springs, the sound of the trees, the smell of the wind, and the feeling of the sun on my skin.  this may sound very hippie cheeseball, but dude - it's the god's honest truth.

energy is so contagious, whether it be positive or negative.  i feel like that red, hot angry energy is unfortunately more contagious than light, bright warm energy and so much easier to fall into and not get out of.  i continue to make conscious decisions to not surround myself by negative people - if i do, then i start to feel icky and pissed.  but, if i surround myself with beautiful positive people, i feed off their energy and they feed off mine.  these are the people i surround myself with.

i just hope that anyone who begins to experience this happy wholeness with themselves, stays with and holds onto it.  i believe you truly need to have this before you invite someone else into your life to experience it with, and i believe that both people need to have it.  this is how the whole conversation got started last night.  my new little friend has started to feel this again, and that makes me so happy for him.  unless you are truly happy and feel whole just being you, i don't think you have shit to offer anyone, especially in a relationship.  i have seen what happens over and over again when people enter into a relationship when they don't have this - they continue to feel unhappy, then the unhappiness spreads like a disease in the relationship, you stay in broken relationships too long because you're scared of being on your own... i could go on.  to halves don't make a whole, two wholes make a bigger stronger whole.

and i guess that's it for today, at least for right now.  be happy, love each other, smile, feel warm.  and from an old mayan prayer, honey in the heart.

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