Happiness – Page 3

Start your Day Right with a Morning Practice

Wouldn’t it be great to start the day feeling peaceful, focused, and inspired? Every day I start my morning feeling centered and at peace. My secret is having a morning practice. Having a daily set of rituals helps you feel grounded in your body, mind, and soul. Taking time to renew helps you be more creative, productive and energized throughout the day.

I have a meditation tray with all my favorite things that make me feel centered. It has photographs of people I love, a statue of Buddha, a rosary, and other treasured items. I am diligent of meditating every day. I created a special meditation room in my home. Sometimes I light a candle before I begin. There I can pray, meditate, and find my focus for the day.

Here’s some ideas for things to include in your morning practice.

1) Start the day with coffee, tea, or water

2) Exercise – This can be some stretches, yoga, or a morning walk with the dog.

3) Journal – Writing a few notes in your journal is a way to capture what’s on your mind. You can start with a journal prompt, writing about the day to come, what you discovered in prayer, meditation, a daily focus… whatever comes to mind. There are no rules.

4) Prayer/Meditation – Slow down and breath. Take time to reconnect to the Divine within you. Listen to the quiet whispers of your soul. Ask for guidance. You will be surprised how centered and focused you can be with just a few minutes of morning prayer to ground you.

5) Personal Development – Dedicate yourself to be a lifelong learner. Read a chapter from your favorite book. Listen to a podcast. Do a daily devotional. Read a newsletter from industry experts. I have a Library of Love I look to for daily growth. In it are titles like “Simple Abundance” abd “Finding your Own North Star”.

6) Get inspired – Uplift your soul. This can be reading an affirmation like “I am happy, healthy, and free”. It may be a word like “courage” that you want to embrace for the day. Perhaps you found an inspirational quote that sparked your interest. I like to spend 10 minutes internalizing my daily affirmation.

7) Be Grateful – The more your count your blessings, the more blessings you have to count. Take time to recognize what’s wonderful in your world. When you appreciate and take joy in what you have, the universe sends you more.

8) Dream and Visualize your Day – What would you like to have, be do? Take a few moments to close your eyes. Imagine what you’d like to see happen. Feel it in your heart. When you feel excited and focus on what you want, it will attract it. What you think about, you bring about. Create a dream map on the wall. Have a dream chest with items and pictures that inspire you. Start a dream folder with pictures about what you’d like to attract into your life.

9) Make a plan – What three things if you did them would make the biggest impact for you? Tackle the biggest task first while you are sharp and full of energy.

So instead of turning on the computer, hopping into your email, and letting the day control you, setup a morning practice. It gives you a beautiful, centered time just for yourself. By easing into your day, you’ll find more joy and stamina to tackle the day.

The Happiness Secret

Probably more than anything else in life, we all strive to be happy. Sadly, for various reasons, happiness eludes many of us. Some reasons are self-imposed and others we attribute to other people. The trouble is, when we feel other people are responsible for our happiness we are giving away control over our own lives.

Wake up call: Your happiness is your responsibility

Until I learned this lesson personally, I never really experienced authentic happiness. I lived my life thinking that the right dress, man, car or job would bring me happiness.

Over the 4th of July holiday, I was watching my grandchildren playing when it really hit me:

We are the creators of our own happiness.

Their endless imagination, to my amazement, kept them engaged all weekend in blissful recreation. There wasn’t a moment of boredom or any sense of lacking something. Each one of them had significant roles in the games they created.

My two granddaughters went from being ballerinas to princesses and my grandson, Remy, was dancing with them and had a cardboard tube as a sword. Their shrieks of pure joy touched my heart.

The only time there were tears was if one of them fell down or took the others toy. Their happiness sparked something in me. I remembered how happy I was when I was five years old. I would sail in my boat with my dog all day, or go into the woods and collect things that I thought were treasures. What if we kept that sense of wonderment throughout our lives?

The truth is, it never really leaves us, it just gets clouded over with crap. What if we freed ourselves from the fear of what other people think and just lived with the intent of being happy!

Happiness is not about having more but is about being more. Being the real you, the one that felt she was a princess and could dance like a ballerina. The girl that didn’t see any limitations but only possibilities in the simplest of things. She is still there, hiding within, just waiting to break out and reclaim her royalty in her kingdom.

The lesson here is to reconnect with the mindset of full appreciation of what is. To experience a joyful heart that is not covered over with grievances. To play, and not care who is watching. And if they are, then give them one hell of a performance!

Here is a great playlist from Anna Luther that will absolutely increase your happiness.

Gotta go – Grandma is on her way out to play in her kingdom.

Live Faithfully, Mal

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Mal Duane is a Best Selling Author and Personal Life and Recovery Coach who has overcome life challenges using the steps in the Alpha Chick Process. Her personal mission is to help women excel in all areas of their lives from business to personal relationships. Mal has been featured with Fox 25 Boston Morning Show, CBS Radio, Aspire Magazine, Healthy Living and Metrowest Daily News. She has also been a featured guest on over one hundred Blogtalk Radio shows discussing recovery and personal transformation.

Mal’s book, Alpha Chick, Five Steps for Moving from Pain to Power, is a best selling book and is available on Amazon.com.

Faith + Courage = Freedom to Exercise our Profound Personal Power

Throughout our lives as women, we have found ourselves paralyzed by our fears: fear of failure, fear of success, rejection, loss, loneliness, pain, loss of safety, security, and affection, estrangement, separation – the list goes on. We find ourselves willing to endure our pain because we are afraid, our instinct is to protect ourselves from the risks of change.

But we can come to realize that we are not powerless, worthless individuals at the mercy of the judgment of others. Our happiness is not dependent on the actions or perceptions of anyone else. We must accept responsibility for the unhealthy conditions that surround us and restore our personal power.

Giving away our power to the whims of others weakens our spirit. Many times, pain is the beginning of awareness. And that pain may awaken our consciousness.

We are who we are because of what we have been through. We cannot forget the meaning or nature of our journey. We must use the past and what it can teach us without being controlled by it, and take possession of the cruelties in our past to free ourselves of the bondage to these past events.

We can direct our energies and recognize our personal gains. Nothing and no one can take them away from us. We can gain strength from our experiences. We learn through our pain, we accept or reject our burdens, and grow beyond our fears. We can be unafraid in a world where there is much work to do, truth to seek and love to give and enjoy. We are free to be who we want to be.

So what is FAITH? Faith is a strong and steadfast belief in a power greater than ourselves. It is devotion, loyalty, hope, resolution, trust, acceptance, and confidence. Faith is belief without proof, leaping before you are positive you will make it to the other side, making a decision before you have ALL the facts or have solved ALL the problems, committing before you are CERTAIN. We can decide that we have faith in our ability to grow and change.

What is COURAGE? Courage is taking just one baby step, and then we will find that every time we take a risk, we strengthen our willingness to take another. Conscious risk taking can be very empowering which leads to greater self-esteem. Baby steps become leaps. So take a leap! What do we really have to lose? What do we have to gain?

And what is FREEDOM? Freedom is the ability to make a CHOICE! Freedom means we are not subject to the control or domination of another; we are not bound, confined or detained by force from other people’s perceptions

Here are 4 tips for your journey:

Tap into faith, courage, and the strength of your inner spirit.
Strive for the state of being nearly fearless.
Don’t be afraid to be yourself, be authentic.
Participate in life, don’t just let it happen.

The bottom line is: Risk It!!!

“To laugh is to risk appearing the fool. To weep is to risk appearing sentimental. To reach for another is to risk involvement. To expose your feelings is to risk exposing your true self. To place your ideas, your dreams before a crowd is to risk their loss. To love is to risk not being loved in return. To live is to risk dying. To believe is to risk despair. To try is to risk failure. But risks must be taken, because the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing. The person who risks nothing does nothing, has nothing, is nothing. They may avoid suffering and sorrow, but they cannot learn, feel, change, grow, love, live. Chained by their attitudes they are slaves; they have forfeited their freedom. Only a person who risks is free.”

– William A. Ward

If you would like to learn more about the Life Recovery Process and creating what you desire, check out my web page about the symptoms of not living with passion and purpose by clicking here.

I am passionate about helping women to recover their lives and to clearly identify the behaviors that are keeping them chained to the past. Life Recovery Coaching is a process for helping all women become the best expression of their divine selves.

Live Faithfully,
Mal

If you like our content sign up here for updates and a free gift!

Mal’s book, Alpha Chick, Five Steps for Moving from Pain to Power, is a best selling book and is available on Amazon.com.

Self worth + Self care = Joy

The deepest and most painful wounds come from self-condemnation. Yet, we keep doing it over and over to ourselves until the flesh is almost gone from our bones.

Some of us use a form of addiction as a band-aid to those wounds. But nothing ever really suffices; they just get deeper and more painful. All the alcohol or drugs that you can take only numb the pain temporarily. What is really needed is a shift in how you think about yourself.

Funny thing is, as simple as it seems, why do you struggle so much with thinking good things about yourself?

It all starts with childhood and the perceptions other people have. You‘re born with a clean slate, as a perfect little being and then you meet your parents. I am not saying that they are not loving or good but just that they have their own ideas which start to become your ideas.

How about little Johnny from next door that calls you a name or pushes you down in the yard? Holy crap, that one can last a lifetime and turn into some huge melodrama in your emotional development.

If you could look at this “stuff” that you collect along the way as not an accurate representation to who you are but just other’s perceptions, your life could change dramatically.

Very early in life we realize we are separate beings from our mothers and we can choose what we want. Follow a three year old around for an hour, you will hear “mine, mine, mine”. We just need to do the same thing with our thoughts.

No one can love you better than you. You know yourself and your deepest desires. You know the truth about you. You know the good and the bad. The relationship you have with yourself will be the most important one in your life. Make it a loving, respectful and nurturing one.

Self love starts with good self care. Eating healthy and honoring your body. Think of it as a temple for the magnificent soul within you. If you think of yourself this way, it is easier to stop many of your bad habits.

Look in the mirror daily and embrace your magnificence. Don’t compare yourself to false images from magazines or TV. Those models are not real representations of women today. They are touched up replicas or altered images.

Treat yourself to something nice every week. Maybe a movie or a manicure? If you don’t treat yourself nicely do you think anyone else will?

Please feel free to share some of the ways you love yourself. The best reply will win a personally autographed copy of Alpha Chick and a free Discovery Session.

Live Faithfully,
Mal

If you like our content sign up here for updates and a free gift!

Mal’s book, Alpha Chick, Five Steps for Moving from Pain to Power, is a best selling book and is available on Amazon.com.

Creative Imagination + Strong Faith = Deliberate Creation

Why do we get so beaten down and hopeless that we can’t create what we want in our lives? I am here to tell you, maybe even while standing on a roof top shouting that we most certainly can. Like everything else in life, there is a formula. Once you have that the rest is easy.

You wouldn’t try to whip up a fabulous chili dinner without the ingredients or the recipe would you?Your life is no different. Once you have the ingredients and the recipe, it is time to go to work.

Creative Imagination is simply fueling that vision of yours with powerful, real images. Want a new house, start cutting out all the pictures in magazines of the ones you like. But don’t stop there. Make sure you grab kitchens and bathrooms, draperies and anything else you want to add. The more images you have the clearer the vision that is imprinted on your brain. How much fun is that?

You can even build one online on Pinterest. You can create as many boards as you like, your dream house, inspirational quotes on Faith, your dream guy, places you’d like to travel. Then you can visit it everyday and add new pins and reflect and pray for what you desire.

Everything I ever wanted in life I started with a picture, a very detailed, thought out picture. After I had my colorful detailed vision in place, I started to pour on the faith. Tons and tons of belief that I could get this, I deserved this and was going to wait for the Universe to deliver. Want to know what happened?

I got exactly what I ordered every time. Usually a little better than what I initially imagined.

Faith is one of the strongest energies you can surround yourself with. This means on the worst of days-when you feel alone and face setbacks and mean people and think, Why even bother hoping for what I want in life? I’ll never get it-that you dig deep and encourage yourself to stay in belief. It will mean taking a deep breath and saying, the Universe/God is looking after me and I deserve to be happy. I’m going to stay in Faith, despite my feelings, and know that my dreams are on their way.

Three important keys to this whole process.

Letting go of guilt. You might say to me Mal, who am I to want these nice things? After all, I have it better than most. No, you deserve what you want, not what you could or should be content with. The happier and more fulfilled you are, the more you will be able to help others achieve their dreams. Often times this guilt comes from society or an unsupportive family that has sought to keep us inside a box. No! Your dreams and desires come from something much larger and fulfilling them is a key to a much bigger vision. For example, wanting a nice home isn’t to ‘show off’, it can mean a deep desire for security and comfort. Wanting a nice car can mean you long for freedom and adventure.
Vision boards aren’t all about “stuff.” You can create a board for Animals and put up pictures of rescue animals, if you want to start a Family you could put up pictures of nurseries. You can create a board called Peace and fill it with symbols and images that reflect this state of mind.
Celebrate your victories!!! When something on your vision board comes true check it off, cross it out, and say thank you to the universe!! Maybe a health problem cleared up or you found an online course to get you closer to your dreams! Whatever “appears” show your gratitude.

Do you have a burning desire for something? Want some help creating the vision? Just let me know. And check out my Pinterest page at pinterest.com/malduane/

Live Faithfully,
Mal

If you like our content sign up here for updates and a free gift!

Mal’s book, Alpha Chick, Five Steps for Moving from Pain to Power, is a best selling book and is available on Amazon.com.