HOW DID SHE CHANGE FROM A CRITICAL VOICE TO AN EMPOWERED VOICE?

“Once you replace negative thoughts with positive ones, you’ll start having positive results.” Willie Nelson

It is seven fifteen am, early enough that the town is still quiet. She puts on a beanie and puffy jacket as the fog holds in the morning chill. She listens to the silence and takes in the smells of jasmine, wood-burning fireplaces, and briny air. Allowing her body to move slowly on the eight-block walk to the beach. Gratitude swells with every familiar step.

This beach has always held her; this is no different. She sees a couple with their dog at the far end of the beach. Sometimes when she is lucky, she has this enchanting beach all to herself. The quiet offered is filled with the noise of crashing surf.  A rhythmic crescendo orchestrates the perfection of the sea. Stepping onto the sand, it squeaks, assuring her it would as it had the last time. She looks for seals or whales as seagulls blaze through the sky with their morning call freckling their poop.

Trying to push her to-do list out of her thoughts and stay in the moment, stay in gratitude, write her mind script as shiny.

Her body is limber now as she walks to the shoreline. This is the place that puts her heart at the correct rhythm. She can express herself with no judgment.

Her greatest critic has been that voice that has kept her from the freedom of self-expression; it led her to the wrong choices, no more. That demanding mutter told her that her body was not right, her hair was unruly, and that she wasn’t pretty enough or smart enough. Those thoughts of scarcity and lack kept her in fear, self-doubt, foggy, scared, and shamed.

All the while, she smiled and could help others on the outside, but her inner voice was in shambles.

It seemed impossible when her Healer friend guided her to this practice. Her first step was to write on paper gratitude and the beauty that brought her the most joy. When her thoughts spiraled into empty glass and self-loathing, she could recall those notes she had written.

It took determination, and healing, to learn positive self-talk. She practiced the moment her tape began with the negative voice. As she recognized this pattern, she would stop, take a minute breath, and rewrite the words until they were calm, supportive, and uplifting. This brought her time to make it a habit.

Now she can come up with absolute thoughts first thing in the morning as she heads to her favorite beach.

She now puts into her body healthy foods that support her immune system and give her energy. She eats organic and clean. Her days of sugar, white flour, packaged food, fried foods, and alcohol abuse are happily over. It is simply her life, and she is blessed to be sharing it with her partner.

Bad things and challenging moments happen. She acknowledges her pain and allows herself to know that when things are better, they will be better. She has learned to put herself first and then has the freedom and light heart to give what she decides to share. She has learned choices, learned boundaries, and learned to change her thoughts to ones with hope.

Part of her new regime is prayer; she is not alone. There is a higher loving source. She embraces this before she falls asleep. She dreams of her vision board and goals and sees them already happening. It is then that sleep comes to her.

My Mantra: “The most powerful things you can change are your thoughts; they affect your health and hold you captive. Change your thoughts, change your life.”