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Why we should encourage young people to feel more and think less

Why we should encourage young people to feel more and think less

“Why do you feel that is happening?” I ask my client.

“I think it’s because…” Her voice trails off as I watch her mind pick up then discard possible answers.  I ask her to pause, redirect her to what she “feels” and the answer comes clearly and promptly.

It’s another reminder of how connecting to the feeling of something will always get you to someone’s truth far more quickly than any reasoning activity.

Our minds are powerful tools that can construct a hundred well-reasoned arguments, positions, interpretations and case scenarios about any event – this is why psychology and psychiatry flourish as necessary professions. But, relying on the mind and reason alone is doing the human race at best a disservice and at worst, for our young people in particular, making people feel more disconnected than ever before.

Those who know me well will say I loathe the word “mindfulness” because for me it misses the point. I am far more interested in helping people connect to their truth than reason their way through a mind-constructed quagmire. Focusing solely on the mind, watching the mind, being mindful is quite frankly a waste of time if what you really want is to connect to the truth of who you are and what is right for you.

I feel the same sense of irritation when I hear people say they need to control themselves better when it comes to their emotions. Let’s be clear, control is a construct that isn’t serving you because you’re not a machine with an on/off switch. You are a human being and if, like me and my clients, you are a sensitive person, trying to ‘control yourself’ in a way that suits others will put you on a winning streak to nowhere.

On the other hand, learning how to manage how you feel, how you connect with others and how you connect to yourself will benefit you far more than any solely mindful or control constructed approach.

I sometimes strike resistance when I suggest to parents that we should teach children to check in with themselves about what feels right when it comes to decision-making. Some feel very uncomfortable and respond with comments like, “But they’re not mature enough to make their own decisions. I need to help them with that because I am their parent and that’s my job.”

To a point, they are right. However, they are also not right. If we show young people how to connect into what is right for them from an early age and to trust that instinctive knowledge we all hold inside us, they are likely to make better decisions when the parent is not around later for guidance.

The ability to connect to your truth can also help young people hugely when it comes to managing anxiety.

For example, choosing subjects for school or deciding on a university degree is a big anxiety-inducing activity for a lot of young people. Their minds over-think with questions like, “Will I get a job out of this? What do my parents think I should do? Will I know anyone else in the course? Will I be any good at it? Will I get in?”

The pressure of their choices feels overwhelming and can result in incredible amounts of stress, anxiety, tears, anger, frustration, despair and other roller-coaster emotions.

What if it didn’t have to be that way?

What if by the time your child is 16, you have already provided them with solid foundational skills to help them check in with themselves about what feels right? And then you have empowered them to trust and act on the intuitive knowledge they access within themselves?

Would this help young people to avoid scenarios where they say, after the fact, “I knew I shouldn’t go with them or do that thing but…”?

If they had trusted that “knowing”, even if on the surface everyone else said a situation was perfectly fine, would they achieve a different outcome?

I believe they would.

Many sensitive young people struggle with decision-making, anxiety and over-thinking because they have never been shown how to connect to themselves. Instead they are told to reason things through, do a pros and cons list, ask for advice and so on. There are numerous examples of how this approach is not working well for sensitive young people.

Our reasoning mind does not have all the answers. It never did.

As Einstein said, “The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift.”

Lucretia helps people to understand, manage and channel their sensitivity as a super power in their lives. She has a particular interest in helping young people and women to trust themselves and live their purpose on the planet. Please get in touch if you would like to chat about Lucretia’s services by emailing lucretia@lucretiaswords.com

If you’d like to learn more about sensitivity and its impacts for young people, you might also like my recent post We need to stop telling young people sensitivity is a bad thing.

Where is your integrity line?

Where is your integrity line?

I’ve been thinking about integrity – the line we each have within us that we don’t want to cross. It’s a line that marks who we are; our honourability in a world that often feels increasingly dishonourable.

There will be times for all of us when we will be tempted to breach our line of integrity. Some of us will do so – we will cross the line, feel the discord within ourselves and quickly reverse our path. Others will cross the line and keep going because they feel it is too difficult to turn back.

It is your ability to understand where your integrity line is, and adhere to it, that is a sign of your courage and fortitude. Sticking to this line is difficult in a world where you’re told you must conform, you must keep the peace and you must keep other people happy.

When you cross your integrity line to appease others, you are compromising yourself and often the well-being of others. We only have to scan the global horizon right now to see how a lack of integrity by some, is compromising the health of many and leading to the death of others. Terrible things happen while good people do nothing.

Integrity doesn’t mean taking the easy or most expedient path. It doesn’t mean acting from a place of fear or anger. It means having character, being honest about your own actions and motivations, and then acting in accordance with what you know in your gut is right.

Integrity. I can’t help but think we need more of it. What do you think?

When the restrictions lift, who will you choose to be?

When the restrictions lift, who will you choose to be?

I have a fear that gnaws away at me sometimes. It’s the fear that once everything opens up again, nothing will really have changed. Or more specifically, people will choose to go back to the way things were and not make any fundamental changes at all.

I understand that many of us are saying, “I just want my life back. I just want my freedom back.” Lord knows, as a single extrovert who lives alone, I’d love the chance to date, have sex, go out with friends and physically touch another human being. I get it.

But I also understand this moment in time, with all its attending death, trauma and upheaval, is a chance for individuals to choose something different when the world opens again. It is not a call to simply return to the way things were – it is the opposite. It is a call to choose differently when you have the chance.

But will you choose differently?

I help people connect to their Soul’s Purpose and live a life that embodies their calling. I love what I do and when I see the transformation that is possible, I am honoured to do this work.

But even now, when the Universe has sent us a very clear message that life is short and you need to choose wisely, I can see people are still choosing to stay stuck and will no doubt, make the same choices when lockdown is over.

Many are chafing under the current restrictions yet refusing to use this time to reassess what is really important to them. I see others still hesitating to back themselves and continuing to turn their backs on a life that would provide them with more personal joy and satisfaction. I watch others continue to stay in relationships that are unhealthy and stifling.

This period had been incredibly difficult but if you don’t choose differently when it’s over, then you’re missing the opportunity of a lifetime. You will pass over the chance to step into something greater and far more fulfilling than you’ve had before. Now is not the time to chicken out and continue accepting that you can’t have what you really want. Now is the time to do the work on yourself, face your shadows, call on your personal courage and step forward.

The uncomfortable understandings that are bubbling up within you aren’t supposed to be shoved back into a box when all this is over. Instead they are here to show you where you are out of alignment with your purpose. They are showing you there is another way if only you will choose it.

Now is the time to leave behind those patterns and situations that no longer fit you and choose to reset your life – leave that relationship, do that course, apply for the job you really want, start your business on the side, invest in yourself, change your career, write that book and create the art you love.

Make a clear and definite decision right now to not go back to the old normal. Instead consciously choose to move into alignment with who you truly are and what will make you happy. Make the tough choices, back yourself and if you need support to traverse the road ahead, find someone like me to walk beside you and help you find your way.

Because the very worst thing you could do, is go back to a normal that was never what you wanted anyway.

Should you be more realistic about your future?

Should you be more realistic about your future?

If you’ve found this post then you’re someone who wants to create change in the world. You want to live differently to the way your parents and other people you know have lived. You have a vision or maybe just an inkling of doing things differently.

Have you ever shared your desire, your dream, your vision with someone you thought would have your back? Maybe you opened up just a little and trusted them.

You wanted their support and understanding but instead, all you heard was something like:

  • “Oh look that sounds a bit like a dream to me and not very realistic”
  • “I really think you need to be a bit more practical”
  • “I think that’s something you can do on the side. But for now you should finish your degree and get a really good job”
  • “We never had these opportunities when we were young and we wanted to make sure that you have them. So don’t waste them. Get a good job and get paid well. Forget all that other stuff because it’s not very realistic. Just go out and achieve, achieve, achieve.” (This may come from your parents if they didn’t have a lot of opportunities.)

When you get this type of negative or “realistic” feedback about what you want to create, it can be really hard to keep your focus and maintain your faith in your ability to make your dreams real.

But there are things you can do to make sure their stories and negative feedback doesn’t take you off track and stop you from living your purpose.  

Understand their response is about THEIR STORY NOT YOURS.

We all tell ourselves stories about what is possible and what is not. These are based on our experiences, beliefs and interactions with others.

But if you share your desire or dream with someone and their story negatively influences their response, you potentially enter a danger zone. If you are not feeling really grounded and centred in yourself, you will take their story on as your truth. This is dangerous for you because it’s not the truth. It is just a story they believe and they are projecting it onto you.

It’s possible their dreams were squashed when they were young and they lost hope that they could do anything different. This led them to conform and do what their parents, community and friends wanted them to do. So your idea to do something that bucks the system will confront their beliefs and the story they’ve been telling themselves about what their life can, could or should be.

I’m not trying to invalidate their perspectives because those experiences will be real for them. But that’s their story, NOT YOURS. You’re here to create your own story.

Yes, you need to be able to support yourself financially, look after and be responsible for yourself. But that doesn’t mean you have to live the same kind of life that other people think you should live.

ALL OR NOTHING THINKING can stop you before you start

Sometimes we also have all or nothing thinking and this stops us from moving forward. You will be worrying that if you make the wrong decision now, you might screw everything up. This leaves you feeling indecisive and sometimes you avoid making any decisions at all.

But whatever you’re doing when you’re aged 20, 22, 25, 27, etcetera, YOU WON’T BE DOING THOSE THINGS IN ANOTHER 10 YEARS. Nothing stays the same for that long so you’re better off taking a chance in this moment, doing what feels right for you and moving forward. Otherwise you will be waiting for the perfect time and a guaranteed outcome (neither of these exist!!).

One particular decision is rarely going to make or break your entire life. Waiting for other people to “get it”, and understand and support your decisions is also wasting time.

If other people don’t agree with your life choices, that is not your problem.

Yes, we all want people to like us. But you cannot put yourself into a box to help other people feel more comfortable with their life choices. That’s not your job.

What other people think of you is none of your business. You need to focus on what you think of you!

Focus on what you feel is the next right step for you and trust yourself. When you do that, you are moving forward with your life purpose and life path. You will meet other people along the way who will get what you are trying to do. They will understand what you’re trying to create and will support you. But there will be others who will test your faith in yourself.

You need to make the best decision for you right now and understand that not everyone is going to agree with you, and that’s okay. Sure, sit back and question yourself a little but then ask yourself “Okay, what feels like the right thing for me?” then follow that and know it’s all going to work out. It probably won’t look like you think it will – life never works out the way we think it should. But it’s going to work out beautifully and in the best possible way for you.

If you’re ready to follow your dreams and create the life your Soul is calling out for, check out the Dream Creators Collective – an intensive six-week transformational process for intuitives, empaths and energetically-sensitive people who are ready to create change and serve humanity.

 If you are sick of feeling like you’re not enough…if you’re tired of the BS…if you’re done with that annoying voice in your head that keeps making excuses and says you can’t or you shouldn’t, then the Dream Creators Collective is for you. 

It’s for people who are ready to get serious, develop epic self-trust and harness their intuition so they can get out there and create change in the world.

The Dream Creators Collective is about learning practical skills to help you manage overwhelm and move you forward, managing and using your intuitive gifts, exploring your passions, living your purpose and connecting with yourself and others.

The six-week transformational process starts in early December 2019. Limited spaces.

Why the things we run from will keep following us

Why the things we run from will keep following us

Have you ever noticed how the things you want to get away from, will keep following you? No matter how many times you swear, “I’m never going to be in this situation again!” you will somehow find yourself back there for another round. It could be your new partner sucks you into a dysfunctional relationship (just like the last one!) or you get a new job and the work never really feels fulfilling (just like the last one!).

Often these patterns will jump across various parts of our lives. You have a boss who bullies you and a family member and a boyfriend who does the same? What a coincidence.

But the truth is, it’s not a coincidence. Unfortunately. And when you realise that you are  the common denominator in all these repeating situations, you also have to face another crushing truth – you need to change something in you to break the repeating patterns in your life.

In my case, does that mean I deserved to be disrespected by men repeatedly in the past? Um, no.

Does that mean I deserved to have bosses who bullied me overtly and covertly? No.

But it sure as heck meant that I needed to do something differently to stop it from happening again.

As you become more self-aware and self-accountable, these types of realisations are difficult to avoid along with the understanding that, despite all the red flags, we still rush headlong into the very situations we want to avoid – until we change something in us.

In my case, I dealt with a repeating pattern by learning how to set healthy boundaries and then maintain them. I won’t say it was easy (actually it was kind of scary for me) but once I did it a few times the pattern stopped.

I still have other patterns to deal with (we all do) but once you can identify them, develop an effective strategy to do something differently, then implement it consistently, the pattern stops being an issue.

I confess this all sounds fine and very practical but it is also incredibly annoying because I can’t play the victim for long periods of time anymore. After all, you can’t be a victim if you played a role in putting yourself there in the first place.

Drat!

As you grow in self-awareness you have to deal with your ‘stuff’ and it’s not always fun or comfortable. But it’s the trade-off we make if we want to evolve and, in my case, break a pattern of bullies and dysfunctional relationships.

If you’re ready to break free from the patterns that have been holding you back for too long, check out my Nights for Spiritual Beginners – six powerful nights over six weeks to help you kick your indecision and self-doubt to the kerb, connect to your intuitive power and insight, and step forward confidently so you can live your Soul’s Mission. Email me to find out more>>

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Photo by Seth Macey on Unsplash

Loss, change and golden starlight

Loss, change and golden starlight

There is a dim glow of golden starlight at my desk tonight. I know I can write anywhere but to have stars surrounding me is a special treat and it makes my office feel a little magical.

I can see a faint pale smudge through the curtains and when I pull them back, the moon sneaks through; a pale half crescent sideways.

I’ve been thinking about discomfort and new beginnings today, and when I bought the strings of stars from this morning, my goal was to help create a new beginning for myself and a new environment to work in.

Over the past couple of months, I’ve definitely had my share of discomfort and happenings that I did not seek and were quite frankly, unwanted. More than once I’ve felt like I’ve entered the swinging doors of a saloon, got caught in a gunfight and then been ejected unceremoniously out the doors on the other side of the bar where I’ve fallen face first into the muddy street.

My ego has been bruised, my self-confidence tested, and the Universe has called on me to let go of places where I felt comfortable, people I cared about and a pet I adored. And all this within a matter of weeks with losses and disappointments sometimes occurring within days of each other.

It’s been a trying time, to say the least.

I’ve wondered if there has been an energetic clearing happening as I’ve watched friends go through their own rather dramatic challenges and changes. It’s almost like the Universe has decided, “Nope you’re in the wrong place and if you’re not going to move then I will force you to shift.” Other people have jumped first when they’ve seen the Universal writing on the wall or faced harsh truths they have been avoiding before finally taken some action.

Whatever the Universe’s method, many now find themselves in places they didn’t plan to be in 2018.

Of course, it is our mind’s often obsessive need to control our journey and then pick the destination that makes these changes to our planned trajectory even more difficult. And when you add in your thwarted heart’s desires, the discomfort level increases and sometimes makes things almost unbearable.

I believe that human beings are genetically programmed to resist change, even when the outcome will be beneficial for us. I have no scientific evidence to back this up. However, when I look around, it seems that so many of us would rather stay in terribly uncomfortable, unsatisfying and sometimes downright unhappy situations and relationships simply because the alternative of disrupting the status quo and leaving our known ‘comfort zone’ is just too disturbing.

We humans are a little crazy that way.

However, when we resist for too long, the Universe will inevitably step in and kick our backsides until we have no choice but to move, let go or to step forward. She ultimately will make our comfort zone simply too uncomfortable, or take the decisions completely out of our hands.

And that is when the magic begins, whether we like it or not, because when these dramatic changes occur, they’re designed to get us back on track, to shake us up and remind us about what’s really important. If we’re wise, we’ll be honest with ourselves and recognise the changes for what they are – our chance to expand, grow and be more in alignment.

I’ve found myself changing roles twice in a short period of time in a way I never expected (or particularly enjoyed). But the place I’ve ended up is perfect for me and I have the time and space to write more – which is one of the most important things to me right now. I’ve also been reminded of a valuable lesson – that some people will never accept your help, even if they need it desperately. So it is better to help those who welcome it and leave others to do as they will – even if you know their journey is going to be more difficult as a result.

I’ve also been reminded that kindness and giving without expectation is a divine part of being human. When I my darling cat Mirabel took a rapid turn for the worse a few weeks ago, I sat with her in the surgery on a Sunday night, holding her in my arms as tears streamed down my cheeks. I knew it was her time to pass over and, although the kind vet (her own eyes filling with tears on my behalf) came to check on me occasionally, I was alone and emotionally torn apart.

Later, as I finally left with an empty cat carrier, I saw a woman sitting on the concrete near my car. I’d heard her desperate cries through the walls earlier when she’d brought in her Mum’s dog.

I put the lonely carrier into the front seat  then walked back, dropped to my knees on the beside the woman and took her into my arms. We then cried together for a while, two strangers, on the ground, in the cold late night air. I cried many more tears when I got home (and since then too) but offering her that comfort, and receiving it in return, helped me to feel a little less alone in my grief.

I must confess that Mirabel’s passing seemed an unnecessarily cruel blow coming just days after the very careful and deliberate withdrawal of someone important from my life. Although I understood rationally why things had happened, the Universe’s timing didn’t really seem to be in my best interests. But I guess it’s a sign of my resilience that I was able to get up for work then hold it together all day before sobbing my way home in the car as I thought of the cat-free zone that waited for me at the end of the trip.

You might wonder how I could feel that any of this was being done ‘for me’ by the Universe. I mean really, I have to say nothing felt particularly great at the time. Instead I felt like I was taking one blow after another.

But now the worst has past, I can see that although there has been pain and sadness, there have also been positive changes and shifts that occurred without me even realising it. Things are moving in the right direction and I know I’m on the right track.

Jobs will come and go, people will leave and return, and sometimes we will be asked to let go of the people, pets and hopes we hold close to our hearts.

But life is a fluid process and we always end up where we’re supposed to be, even if we would prefer a different outcome. My current place is under the stars with the haunting cry of a curlew in the distance, and in this moment, I feel peace.

I wish the same for you.

Lucretia is an author, psychic channel and transformational teacher. Her first book The Men I’ve Almost Dated is available through all good online bookstores. Lucretia also delivers mentoring programs to help intuitives, empaths and psychics learn how to manage their gifts and connect to their Soul’s Purpose.