Modern life can be challenging to navigate.
We all want a way to make it a bit easier, more graceful, and love-filled.
We need a manual on earth teaching us how to smoothly navigate what it is to be human.
I’ve learned this as a human, too. And then as a health & wellness professional, I get excited to share with you what I’ve learned as a human, that I’ve personally tested and actually works. In my line of work as a spiritual guide, intuitive, and meditation teacher for 15 years, helping people find their authentic selves, I have had to find a handful of trusted tools that assist in coming home to harmony within.
Here are a couple of my go to’s that are efficient, doable, and practical. I’m sharing them separately, but you’ll actually see as you read along with me that they magically go together.
- Learning and mastering the art of self-honoring
- Listening to sleep meditations
Why is learning and mastering the art of self-honoring (self-love’s cousin) important to navigating life’s challenges? (Write this one on a sticky. It’s good.)
Immerse yourself in the full meditation, Dreaming A New Reality, by Jamie Wozny here.
Read more: Transform Your Day & Boost Productivity with the 6-Step Miracle Morning Routine
When you honor you, it’s a win-win for everyone involved.
Some of us learn in our society that when we honor our own needs, wants, boundaries, joys that somehow makes us selfish. Or there isn’t room for that in our life. It’s not crucial. Or we won’t be loved asking for that. Or that we are full of ourselves.
That couldn’t be farther from the truth.
When we have the courage to live in alignment with our joys, wants, needs, desires, boundaries, passions, and express them from a place of love, well then we become an example, a permission giver for every burnt out beautiful soul wishing to do the same. You need these qualities honored to be full, whole, and overflowing so that you can show up for others from a place of aliveness.
One of the reasons I teach so much about self-honoring is because I have had to learn this path too.
What’s the opposite? Innocently dishonoring self, over-giving, people pleasing, not listening to yourself, disconnection from yourself, self-sabotage, self-abandonment to name a few.
I want to be clear. When we act in self-dishonoring ways, we aren’t doing it on purpose. It’s unconscious. It’s a pattern in our brain and nervous system that was once helpful for our survival that we’ve outgrown. We needed to be that way on some level to help us stay safe, loved, and belong in a less than ideal environment. So if you see these patterns, perhaps you can hold them with grace, compassion, and understanding.
Saying a little, internal acknowledgment to little you will start to get the ball rolling on healing this.
“I’m so sorry you had to dishonor yourself to stay safe, loved, and belong. I know how hard that was, and I’m sorry. You shouldn’t have had to go through that. You didn’t deserve that. I’m here now. Take as long as you need. Thank you for these patterns that once served us well. I forgive you and see your innocence. Let’s try to gently and slowly find a better way for us both now. I’m going to learn with you.”
Check in and see how that moment of acknowledging made you feel. Once we do this, we can begin to learn a new way.
What is the new way? There are many facets to self-honoring, but today I want to focus on needs and boundaries.
Boundaries.
What are your innate, inner yes’s and no’s? We might not have an easy connection to part of us currently, but as children, we are equipped with an internal system that helps us gravitate toward things that are life giving and joyful for us and moves us away from things that are depleting and life draining.
You’ll see this in animals who haven’t been taught that gentle, soft, flexible, healthy boundaries aren’t ok. They will move their head if they don’t want a pet, or they will walk toward you if they do. We have this too! But, boy do we have so many belief systems on top of this innate mechanism that tells us how we should be. Getting to know these inner nudges/impulses of what feels like a yes or a no in the body is a life-changing tool to have in the tool kit. Getting to know these and then honoring them will change your life.
Examples of an inner yes feeling: Feelings of expansion in the body, joy, lightness, tingling, a pull or gravitation towards something, an interest, a curiosity, a knowing. Our bodies are so different. These are just a few examples.
Examples of an inner no feeling: Contraction, pulling away from, pulling in, heavy emotions, weight, not wanting to be bothered with it. Again, our bodies are so different. These are just a few examples.
Yes’s and no’s can simply be as simple as, I’m thinking an unloving thought about myself, and it feels contractive. A self boundary that says, hey this thought is hurting me. Let’s find a kinder one.
This can take a while to decipher. But knowing they are even there inside our psyche is huge. And that no matter what you’ve been through, they live in you waiting for you to learn their language and get curious.
You can start to experiment, journal, or test out these. Go slow, steady, and a little bit at a time because it hasn’t felt safe for a very good reason. No need to rush. Healing happens slowly and steadily.
The second element of our tool kit of life success when it comes to self-honoring is,
Needs.
Experience the full meditation, Resting in a Positive Feeling Before Bed, by Jamie Wozny here.
Read more: Optimize Your Sleep: Choosing the Right Pillow for Comfort and Support
There are a ton of human needs that are natural and normal. Some examples are food, water, shelter, love, being heard, seen, connection, dignity, physical movement, and personal space.
I invite you to take a moment with me and check in with yourself, take a deep breath, and put your hand on your heart. Slow down and ask. What do I need? Sometimes we are so far detached from needs because, remember our protector learned to keep us safe. But just getting curious, even if we don’t take action on the need yet, is helpful. Starting an inner dialogue with kind curiosity is enough.
This is where the second tool to navigate life’s challenges comes in.
Sleep meditations.
When we begin to honor ourselves and listen to our needs, we begin to see we live in a society that doesn’t necessarily praise or respect certain things that bring us back to aliveness, harmony, and balance. Many are praised for going, going, going, over-giving, not resting, self-sacrifice, and the like so it can be challenging to shift this pattern. To stay well and flourishing, we must take time for ourselves.
How do we do this?
We tend to our needs and boundaries lovingly.
One of the ways this can show up as a deep need to refill our cup with “me time.”
I am a huge fan of practical rituals or ceremonies.
Benefits of sleep mediation:
- These sacred moments can fill us with much needed soul level nourishment.
- You can gift yourself the time for yourself before you go to sleep at night to offer yourself deep, loving rest.
- Sleep meditations can give you a feeling of being held, loved, nourished, and more.
- Sleep meditations are simply meditations that you listen to before bedtime to help you find deeper rest, peace, and healing while you sleep.
- You set yourself up for sleep success. Clear the mental clutter and sleep internally clean and light- hearted.
- An intentional space to tell yourself that you matter. We all know how important sleep is, and this assists us in making the quality of our sleep ever better.
- Science shows us that when we connect to others, we heighten our oxytocin levels. Listening to a sleep meditation before bed, with a trusted guide, can assist you in feeling connected to another, retraining your brain to feel supported by yourself and someone else, and by the others in the community listening to the same meditations too.
- Showing yourself an act of love. That you matter, you are important. That resting is important, and you’re here to help yourself rest easy. This becomes the new inner loving dialogue.
- I know when I am traveling, I love meditations like these to offer me a sense of “home”, comfort, and grounding.
- There was a study years ago that said the average meditator can take about 11 minutes to transition from work to realizing they are attempting to enter a space for harmony or healing. This eases your transition.
- After our work day is done and we enter into a sacred sleep space, it’s always important to show the body, hey, we are done for the day. Here is that gentle transition in the form of a sleep meditation to assist you.
- When we were young, we weren’t all given the proper care innocently. But sleep meditations can help you retrain yourself that you are here as your own loving adult for yourself. Giving yourself ease, comfort, transition, calm, peace, and healing.
- Studies show that when we are in higher states of self-love, self-honoring, and self-care, our bodies enter a healing state, our brains lower cortisol levels, and our overall quality of life improves. What more proof do we need?
I’m hoping the tools of self-honoring in the form of needs and boundaries, and the benefits of falling asleep being guided by sleep meditations, will assist you in your own healing and expansion too. I know they have helped me greatly.
It is my honor and pleasure to create safe spaces for people to feel seen, to settle gently into their true selves, and rest easy in the safety of their own beautiful truth.
Rest sweetly tonight.
Explore the full meditation, Finding Enoughness, by Jamie Wozny here.
Read more: Unwind With These Bedtime Yoga Stretches For Better Sleep
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