Follow Your Inner Compass

“If you follow the inner path using truth and clarity as your compass points, the outer world cannot help but respond to your intention”  – Deepak Chopra

Years ago I used to travel with work three weeks of almost every month. I flew into or drove through almost every state except Alaska, Maine and Hawaii. The rental cars were charging extra for the GPS and my employer seldom got a rental car with one. It was printed directions from google maps or a similar program. My favorite saying was no trip was complete without at least one U-turn.

My husband swears that I have no sense of direction, and at some point in almost every trip I would get lost. Sometimes I thought I must have driven too far and would turn around, only to find the destination had been just a little further down the road. Other times I would drive around in circles. Did you know that in some places in New Jersey they don’t allow left hand turns? You have to do this weird three right turns so that you are on the street which crosses the intersection to the address you are looking for. It once took me 20 minutes to figure out what the directions were telling me to do.

“You inner voice always knows what to do, but it is a quiet voice.  You can only  hear the whisperings of your inner voice, your inner compass – when you turn down the volume of your fears, your regrets, your resentments, and the fear based advice your neighbors are so willing to give you” – Jonathon Lockwood Huie

So I have experience both literally and metaphysically with turning around because I am going in the wrong direction. The most interesting thing about it though, is how do you know when you are going in the wrong direction? How do you tell that it is time to turn around, because you will not be able to get to your destination on the road that you are traveling on? How do you know that you don’t just need to drive a little further down the road?

“You must find the place inside yourself where nothing is impossible: – Deepak Chopra

The first thing that I had to do on my actual road trips was quit stressing about being late; about being lost; and just stop and get my bearings. When I stopped stressing and looked at the directions calmly I would usually see where I went the wrong way or what I misunderstood. Sometimes I had to humble myself and call the place I was trying to get to and ask for directions. Sometimes there was a nearby gas station to give me directions. The same is true on the metaphysical level.

“The beauty is that through disappointment you can gain clarity, and with clarity comes conviction and true originality” – Conan O’Brian

When you get grounded, release the stress, and get into that calm place – you can get your bearings. You just need to breathe, trust and let go. This gives your inner compass a chance to get your bearings and stop spinning wildly in circles. Your true north will always draw you to it.

“You have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition.  What you’ll discover will be wonderful.  What you’ll discover is yourself” – Alan Alda

Sometimes the issue isn’t that your lost. It is that you are living a life of holding your potential in check. You need to be brave and unleash the potential to start moving. You feel like if you claim that you are lost, you won’t run the risk of failure. By quitting you are playing it safe.

The truth is that whether you stay put or move forward, there is a price that is being paid. Since you are already paying for being stuck in place, why not go ahead and pay the price of moving forward – why not “RELEASE THE KRAKEN” and move forward?

“You gut is your inner compass.  Whenever you have to consult with other people for an answer, you’re headed in the wrong direction” – Oprah

Being lost is just a nuisance. There is no new discovery until you release the potential.  Your potential is revealed by your values, your purpose.  It is part of the souls journey.  So put on the backpack, grab the walking stick, partner with a trustworthy friend and get going. Risk curiosity, wonder, spontaneous delight and discover what your human spirit is all about.

“The purpose of life is to live it, to taste experience to the utmost, to reach out eagerly and without fear for newer and richer experiences” – Eleanor Roosevelt

Live An Extraordinary, Creative, Inventive Life

Life Is A Journey Of Discovering New Possibilities

Whatever happens,

Wherever you go,

Whatever you do,

Remember this;

No one can take the Fire out of your soul,

the Stars from your eyes,

the Passion in your heart.

Those are yours forever.

 – S.L.

Do you remember that famous line from “The Wizard of Oz”?  Almost at the end, Glinda the Good Witch says, “You’ve always had the power to go back to Kansas”, then the Scarecrow asked why she didn’t say anything at the beginning of the journey?  And Glinda replies, “She had to learn it for herself.”  The same thing is true for each of us.

“Have faith in your journey.  Everything had to happen exactly as it did to get you where you’re going next” – Mandy Hale

I love the thought of curiosity in our travels.  Around the next corner, you never know what might be waiting for you.  Your focus will reflect what pops out at you.  You will notice the sun shining brightly, or the clouds coming to cover it up.  You will see rainbows or the coming thunder storm.  It is all a matter of the filters that you are viewing your life from.  Each experience adds up to who we are at this very moment.  And each moment, presents change and a new you.  Who are you becoming, as you journey down the road of life?

“The journey between what you once were and who are you now becoming is where the dance of life really takes place” – Barbara DeAngelis

When you have some specific goals in mind, time seems to be so slow.  You feel like you’re wading through the mud, with each step taking so much effort.  Stepping down into the mud, feeling the cold water flooding inside your boots.  Even your toes are struggling to get a grip on the sole of the boot, as you’re trying to lift your foot out of the mud to take the next step.  Fighting against the boot as it remains stuck in the mud. You tug at your boot.  Finally getting it loose you struggle with the weight of the mud that is still attached to the boot.  You keep trying not to lose your balance and do a face plant into the mud.  It takes forever just to take a few steps in the right direction.

Have you ever felt that way?  Your have to remind yourself that each experience in your life, has been right on time.  Your are never late according the divine destiny.  Each step, and each situation that showed up at your door step right on time.  Right now you may be experiencing sickness, a job loss, work furlough, stress around your financial future, worried about putting food on the table.  That would be you stuck in the mud.  It’s hard to tell where to take the next step.

“I am learning to trust the journey even when I do not understand it” – Mile Bron

Each obstacle that you encounter, every mountain that you climb and then hike back down again, strengthens your muscles.  Some of the muscles are physical, some mental, and some are spiritual.  Learning to pace yourself so that you don’t get injured or tired and quit.  Learning about the importance of not getting caught in the mind whirlpool of indecision.  Learning that even when you think that you’re abandoned by God, you are in fact always being supported.  The breakdown teaches you so much about yourself.  You are stronger than you will ever know.  No matter what is falling apart in your life this minute, you can conquer anything and anyone.

“Maybe the journey isn’t so much about becoming anything.  Maybe it’s about unbecoming everything that isn’t really you, so you can be who you were meant to be in the first place” – Summer Saldana

It is also important to take the time to give thanks to every single person that has been a part of your life’s journey so far.  The wisdom of the mentors in your life.  The love of family.  The blessing of friends, who are only a text, IM or phone call away.  You can Skype girlfriends from around the world, and see their faces and feel in your soul how much they care and support you.  Remind yourself to stop feeling that world is passing you by.  Enjoy the journey.  If you have a habit of getting so involved in planning, in working, in taking action, that you spend all your time “doing” – push the pause button and take time to just “be”.  To remember that joy and happiness are found within the journey itself, not as a reward for reaching a new destination.

“I am deeply reminded that our life’s journey is a gift, not a given, and that we can never truly know how long the journey will last.  All we can do is decide how it unfolds” – Sonia Choquette

The best part of the journey to self discovery, is that it really never ends.  Because each time you reach a destination, the new you that it took to get there, looks around and says, “Where are we going to go now?”  The journey has way-stops or check points along the way, but each destination opens doors.  Doors to new places to go to, new ways you grow into.  Sometimes going around the corner to a new destination, is simply learning to look at familiar things with new eyes.  The thing that I know for certain, is that the journey is never over.  Even when you leave this life, you will still be on a journey.

 “You are not on a journey to God; you are on a journey with God” – Dr. Steve Maraboli

Divine Timing – Trust, Let Go And See What Happens

When you truly “let go and let God” you stop trying to make something happen by a certain time.

You stop pushing the stopwatch.

You stop pushing those goals which are like large boulders up the hill, only to have them roll back down to the bottom when you get distracted.

What will then happen, is that divine timing is allowed to work in its own way, its own time, and its own mysterious plans and ways.

Paths open up before you that take you places that you would never have chosen to go.  Places that open you up to something new and so delightful that you never want to leave.

“Patience is quieting the ego and trusting divine timing” – Dean Jackson

Divine timing has amazing short cuts.  Let’s say that you have on your bucket list to go to Mt. Kilimanjaro.  You have no money to finance this kind of trip.

In your hometown is a non-profit that you volunteer to work for.  One day this non-profit, along with other agencies get a call to provide relief supplies for some villages near the summit of Mt. Kilimanjaro.  You volunteer to go and help to deliver the supplies.  The helicopter drops you off at the village.  You are now within immediate climbing distance of your goal.

Now they ask for some of you to go up towards the summit to deliver the supplies.  Divine timing has just express delivered a bucket list goal and all you had to do is say yes.

Now that story was totally made up, and you are probably saying, but that doesn’t really happen.  So, I want to share my own personal favorite story of divine timing happening in my own life, when I had no other choice but to let go and let God.

My middle son called me to tell me that he and his girlfriend were getting married.  I was so happy for them.  This was in January, and they had set the date for August.  I sat down and planned out what I could do to get enough money together to pay for their honeymoon.

If I was extremely budget conscious and could earn some extra commissions at work, I could just pay for the honeymoon that they wanted In Mexico.  The end of February they called with a new surprise; they had moved up the date to May.  I looked at my now destroyed plan and no matter how I moved the numbers, there was no way to pay for the honeymoon by the end of April.

So, I sat down and pulled out some paper and wrote a letter to myself in that moment in time, from myself in June.  I wrote how happy they were to go on their honeymoon.  They had a terrific time, and I poured every emotion and feeling of gratitude and happiness into this letter.  I wrote how amazed I was how unseen forces seemed to move my financial mountains to make it happen.  I wrote how I never could have foreseen the ability to make my dream of paying for their honeymoon happen, and how grateful I was to God for providing me with the funds.

Then I put the paper away, with no attachment to the outcome in a drawer and placed all of my faith in divine timing.  Two weeks later, I got a phone call from a neighbor who lived across the street from our second home in Upstate New York.  They wanted to know if I was interested in selling them 10 acres of our property. They would pay cash and we could close in two weeks.

Now when we had bought this house, it was on 20 acres.  I didn’t know why at that time, but I negotiated to cut the parcel in half and have 10 acres of land and 10 acres with the house.  We paid full price for the 10 acres with the house and $1.00 for the 10 acres of bare land.  So, I was able to say yes to the neighbor and we negotiated a fair price.  We closed the end of March and the first week of April I was able to fully pay for my son and daughter in-law’s honeymoon.

Even if I had thought of selling the land to pay for the honeymoon, it is highly unlikely that we could have sold and closed on it in 30 days.  That time of year the area is still covered in snow.  But I believe that divine timing knew that when I bought that house five years previously, I was going to need to liquidate that land to pay for my son’s honeymoon.

Because I had listened to intuition and split the property, divine timing was able to maneuver into place a quick sale and funds to pay for that honeymoon.

An analogy of “letting go and letting God” is water.  Water always finds a way.  It might take a year, it might take a day, but what is meant to be will always find its own way to completion.

I always think of the Grand Canyon.  Water carved that canyon out of solid stone.  In one place within the canyon is a small island of stone in a perfect circle of water that wound around it.  I don’t know how that perfect circle of stone is still standing.   But the story my imagination tells me is that the stone was especially strong in that one spot and that it took water a lot of time and persistence, but it was able to carve away all of the parts that didn’t belong, until what was left, was what was supposed to be there.  A tall stone island in a perfect circle of water.

So, know that in your journey, you are always on perfect time, divine time.  You are not early; you are not late.  You are right now where you are supposed to be.

That goal, off in the distance that you are busy running to, will happen right on time.  It may be that like me, you don’t see any way that you can make it happen.  But if you are willing to listen to intuition; If you are willing to do things that may not make sense at the time you are doing them; like splitting up 20 acres into two 10-acre parcels, divine timing will place what you need into your hands, right on time.

• What are your dreams, visions, your life purpose?
• Are you on track to bring them into reality and complete them?
• Have you allowed distractions to sidetrack you?
• Are you unclear on what your life purpose is or how to bring it into reality?

We here at LemonadeMakers not only write about waking up to the reality of who you are and your life purpose and living up to your full potential.   We also are here to help you ask yourself the right questions to open up your mind to the possibilities of living the life you have always dreamed of.  Contact us anytime and we are happy to have that conversation.

Live Your Truth, And Don’t Let Any Obstacle Get In Your Way

Years ago I was a loan processor for a company in Seattle.  I worked for a branch in an area called South Center, which was next to a shopping mall.  Most of the people there smoked and they would be out front every hour smoking a cigarette.  It worked out that they spent 10-15 minutes of every hour, out front smoking.  I didn’t smoke, and I didn’t feel right about spending “working” hours I got paid for, standing out front while everyone else smoked.

They gave me a bad time for the first few months I worked there and then gave up trying to convince me to be part of the crowd.  You have a moral code, you may have a very strict code, or not so strict.  To be other than average, you need to work hard to excel and be a master of your craft.  Spending 15 minutes of every hour for 8 hours means that you are working  only 6 hours.  A lot of work can be accomplished in those two hours.  Or you could just sit back and be average standing out front with the smokers – the choice is always yours to make.

“The only way to discover our true potential, is to clear out the clutter and focus on what matters”  – Unknown

Thinking back to that rock climber, each hand hold and each foot hold gets her closer to the top.  Her focus is solely on getting her to the top.  She isn’t thinking about the climb down, or the ride home, or going to work on Monday.  Every decision you make should be all about moving you one step closer to just today’s goals.  You don’t focus on the past or the future, just the next move for today.

“Each day, focus your attention on what you want.  Each day, take one step that will bring your closer to it.  All things are possible!  The key is to identify it, claim it for yourself, and believe that you are worthy to have it” – Iyanla Vanzant

The Best Things In Life Are The Moments When We See The Little Things Clearly

 Such a profound question – what is life?

I wanted a perfect ending. Now I’ve learned, that hard way, that some poems don’t rhyme, and some stories don’t have a clear beginning, middle, and end.  Life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what’s going to happen next.  Delicious Ambiguity.  

  – Gilda Radner

When you look around at your friends and family, how many people do you know that “just exist”? They are here. They wake up each day. They take in the breath of life, they eat, they go to work or school, they come home and watch a movie, TV, play video games. They are here, but what else is there in life, besides just being here?

The voyage of discovery is not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes. 

   – Marcel Proust

There is something about asking questions that opens life up.  About being curious.  Asking yourself the questions that you are afraid to ask, afraid of how the answers might change your life.  Questions like, “Why am I not happy with who I am”?

Be not afraid of life.  Believe that life is worth living, and your belief will help create the fact.

  – William James 

I think that there is more to life, than just existing. I think of some of the stories that I love best. They are made up of characters that progress down a timeline, the hero’s journey. They are walking along a path and something happens. Things go wrong, they change to meet the challenges and come out the other end a different person than the one we met in the beginning of the story.

Time is like a river, you cannot touch the same water twice, because the flow that has passed will never pass again.  Enjoy every moment of life . . . ,

  – Unknown

They discover things about themselves during the journey. They discover the “fire in the belly”, passion. They learn to speak up and speak out. They learn that they have courage to fight for truth, justice, life and liberty. We root for them to beat the odds and win. Take the first “Rocky” movie.  He is employed in a sketchy business as a collector for a loan shark..  He boxes and  is made fun of, nothing but a loser and a bum.  He dreams of a better life and thinks that fighting in the ring, could be his ticket to be somebody. He gets a one in a million shot at it, wins against the heavyweight champion, falls in love.

Difficult roads often lead to beautiful destinations. 

  – Unknown

Boxing was his passion.  He learned to have self confidence in his talent.  He learned that we can all be somebody if we are willing to pay the price of hard work to make it happen.  If we are willing to not give up when it looks hopeless.  As the rest of the series of movies show, transformation is an ongoing process.  We will learn valuable and painful lessons when we don’t remain conscious of who we are and where we are going in life.

Most of us have been through some sort of personal hero’s journey in our life.

Someday everything will make perfect sense. So, for now, laugh at the confusion, smile through the tears and keep reminding yourself that EVERYTHING happens for a reason. 

  – Unknown 

What did we discover about ourselves? Brendon Buchard tells a story about his own personal journey when he was in college. He had a bad breakup with his girlfriend.  She was the one he was going to spend the rest of his life with.  So to try and get out of his depression he went on a trip with a college friend to South America.  They were driving in a rural mountainous area on a narrow road.  The road turned out to be a hairpin curve.  His friend lost control of the car, and they went tumbling off the mountain.  When he came to he was bleeding.  They had fallen down a ravine.  He thought that he was dying.  In despair he asked himself three questions – Did I live? Did I love? Did I matter?

Thankfully they didn’t die.  They both got medical attention, and when he returned to the United States he was a different person.  He is an international bestseller with multiple  books; he is the founder of Experts Academy and High Performance Academy and is a sought after motivational speaker.  How was his life impacted from getting a broken heart?  From an auto accident that could have ended his life?  We never know how the painful experiences of our life, will be positively used for the rest of our lives.

Life has many ways of testing a person’s will, either by having nothing happen at all or by having everything happen at once. 

  – Paulo Coelho

I think that we all want to live a life that results in great friends and family that love us.  That results in us being happy and passionate about what we do with our days and nights.  That results in knowing that we had a positive impact in the world. But sometimes we fall asleep to those dreams.  Sometimes we get so beaten down by our hero’s journey, that we give the dream up as being impossible.  What I have discovered in life is that we tend to do one of two things.  We act without thinking our decision all of the way through and so we end up paying the bill of “unintended  consequences”.  Or we think about it, and think about it, and do nothing about it.  Why?  Because we can’t face our fears about “what if?”.

Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes.  Don’t resist them – that only creates sorrow.  Let reality be reality.  Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they life. 

  – Lao Tzo

So each morning, what if the first question we ask ourselves is:

If my life is a story, what can I do today to make it a New York Times Bestseller?

What could I do today, that a movie producer would want to make my life into an inspirational movie?

What can I do today that uses up all the best parts of me (my talents), to inspire the world around me to be a better place?

What can I do today that makes people laugh, smile and be more joyful?

Death is not the greatest loss in life.  The greatest loss is what dies inside of us while we live. 

  – Norman Cousins

They have a saying, that the best stories are in the graveyard.  There are books that never got written; apologies and forgiveness that were said in their heart, but never left their lips.  Millions of secret recipes that never got passed on.  Don’t wait for the end to ask, “Did I live, love and matter”, but instead ask it each night.  Ask if you showed love, and gave love to others each night. Ask if you were able to do one small thing today that mattered to someone. If you can say yes, to these questions each night, you have a wonderful life. You inspire me to try harder, to be better, to live fully in the present. To lose myself in the sunset.

Never, ever underestimate the importance of having fun. 

  – Randy Pausch

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Your Struggle Today, Gives You Strength For Tomorrow

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It is human to be scared of taking risks.  If I was on this rock wall, I would be terrified.  Being scared is recognition of a choice.  A choice to stay safe on the safe ground called your “Comfort Zone”, or to do something really, really brave.  Comfort Zone’s create boundaries . . . , essentially prison walls where you feel enclosed and safe.  But here is the thing about the boundaries and walls – they don’t let the fresh air in.  They stifle life and smother you. 

The thing about being BRAVE is it doesn’t come with the absence of fear and hurt.  Bravery is the ability to look fear and hurt in the face and say move aside, you are in the way. 

  – Melissa Tumine

Inspiration is the breath of God.  Being inspired, is life giving . . . , breathing Gods spirit deep into your soul.  When we cross those boundaries of the comfort zone we soar . . . , flying we chase the wind, and touch the sky.  This happens because our soul feels the prison bars bend and break when we courageously break out of the comfort zone.  Can you remember the “first” times in your life?  Your first step?  Your first graded “A+” paper?  When you road your bike without training wheels for the first time?  Your first kiss?  The first day at your first job?  Your first child being born?  Your first grandchild?  Think about how your heart swells and bursts wide open.  How you want to shout out to the world “Look at me!  I did it!”.  You don’t walk on the floor, you float.  That is the feeling of inspiration, the breath of God.  When was the last time you felt that?  If it has been awhile, what could you do now, today, this week – what could you do for the first time that would make your heart beat fearlessly? 

Sometimes all you need is 20 seconds of insane courage and something good will come of it. 

  – Benjamin Mee

To put that into perspective, Bull Riding Championships are called an “8 second ride”.  So 20 seconds can seem like forever, where you are doing something like that, it makes your heart pound.  Have you ever did something and then said, “Oh my God what did I just say yes to?”  Your destiny is deep within you.  You have hidden it.  You have to be brave enough to set it free.  You hid it because it scared you. It meant that you were different.  That you would be judged.  That some people would walk away from you.  Most of us don’t even see the full extent of our destiny.  We got scared just by seeing the outline of it.  You put limitations around it to cage it so that it didn’t escape.  Don’t do that to yourself.  Take the risk of letting it expand to its full glory. 

Have the courage to follow your heart and intuition.  They somehow already know what you truly want to become. 

 – Steve Jobs

Another kind of courage is not allowing anyone else to control who you are . . . , what you believe . . . , and what actions you choose to take in your life. 

Each time a person stands for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, they send a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and résistance.

  – Robert Kennedy

Taking a stand for yourself, for someone else is always scary.  But what is so interesting is that if you were to see into the minds of a crowd watching a bully, most of the crowd will not agree with what is happening.  They are all waiting for someone to take a stand.  And once someone does take a stand, others in the crowd will join with them.  They are just not brave enough to be the first person. 

A totally different kind of courage is standing up to your own friends, your family, your tribe. 

It takes a great deal of bravery to stand up to your enemies, but a great deal more to stand up to your friends. 

  – Dumbledore, Harry Potter

These are people who you want to accept you, to love you.  When you take a risk, that they are all telling you not to take, it feels like they are no longer your friends.  You counted on their support and they withdrew it.  As you travel down the path from who you are now, to who you think you can be, what you discover is that some friends will be left behind.  Some friends may not understand, but they will still love and support you.  You will also make some new friends who will join you on your journey.  When you accept the responsibility for what is in your life currently, you are granted the power to change your life.  Courage is letting go of what can’t be changed . . . , and the waking up to what can be.

The brave men did not kill the dragons.  The brave men rode them. 

  – Game of Thrones

I love this!  First of all I have always had an affinity with dragons.  My personal dragons were imprisoned when I was young, because when I would get mad, my words would flame out of my mouth and burn people up.  So I pushed the dragon deep down, so that no one would get hurt.  When I finally released the dragon, I realized it was just protecting me from harm.  So we learned together what was really harmful, and what wasn’t.  We tamed the dragon flames.  My dragon gives me both the freedom to be me, and the bravery to fight when I need to . 

Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgment that something else is more important than fear. 

  – Ambrose Redmoon

I always hated how fairy tales painted dragons as the bad thing that must be destroyed.  Fear most of the time is a story that we tell ourselves.  So to have courage, to be brave, we just have to tell ourselves a different story. That crossing the boundaries doesn’t have to be scary.  That the feeling we get in our stomach doesn’t have to be fear, it can be anticipation.

At the edges of ancient maps they had “Beyond this place there be dragons” as a warning to not cross out of the boundary of the known world.  The best part of any journey is all of the wild stuff that happens along our path, as we strike out past the boundaries.  Be brave and go past the edge of the map, find the dragons and ride them.. 

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Talent Can Happen, Genius (Vocation) Must Happen

Doing what others find difficult is talent; doing what is impossible with talent is genius.

  – Henri Frederic Amiel

What is the difference between your talents and your vocation?  Your talent is the thing that you spend the 10,000 hours training for to become a master.  In the old days, you were apprenticed to a master craftman and you learned at the masters feet to grow your talent, your skills.  You have worked hard to become the best in your field of endeavor – you may have gone to school to learn to be a doctor, an accountant, a teacher.  Or you may have learned on the job how to be a plumber, an electrician etc…Your vocation is what you were made to do, it is a divine calling, a divine purpose. 

A Man knows when he has found his vocation when he stops thinking about how to live and begins to live.

  –  Thomas Merton

Your vocation in life comes from where your greatest joy meets the world’s greatest need.

   –  Frederick Buechner 

I firmly believe that all of us have a vocation, a calling.  That we are an individual puzzle piece that completes Gods plan for what is happening in our lifetime.  If we walk away from that, then that piece of the puzzle is missing, it is incomplete.  We might still be able to see what the puzzle is supposed to look like, but the hole is still there.  It is sometimes really scary and daunting to realize what our talents and vocation truly are meant to be.  We look at that and we get scared of failing to complete the picture.  We get scared of getting called up on stage to sing in front of an audience.  We get scared that if we truly shine, people will judge us as imperfect.  They will throw judgment or hatred for where we demonstrate that we are not perfect.  Of being called a fraud.  Of being laughed at. 

If you’re not the hero of your talent story, you simply become a player in one you didn’t choose.”

  –  Jermainne Perry

Sometimes walking away has nothing to do with weakness, and everything to do with strength.  We walk away not because we want others to realize our worth and value, but because we finally realize our own. 

  – Robert Tew

What we don’t realize is that true failure happens when we walk away.  When we plug our ears and ignore the calling.  When we deny who we are.  When we walk past that door of opportunity and say, “Oh no, I am not talented enough, capable enough, you have the wrong person”.  When we do that we end up living an unsatisfying life.  We drag ourselves to work everyday at a job we hate, doing boring work.  We numb ourselves at home with liquor, drugs, or being a couch potato, watching movies and T.V. and doing nothing with our life.

Everyone has talent, what is rare is the courage to follow it to the dark places where it leads.

  –   Erica Jong

Everyone has a purpose in life . . , a unique gift or special talent to give to others.  And when we blend this unique talent with service to others we experience the ecstasy and exultation of our own spirit, which is the ultimate goal of all goals.

  –  Deepak Chopra

Part of the journey of the intersection of talent and vocation, is that we have to go back in our lives and pull the vocation out of the deep hole that we buried it in.  How many times have you watched one of the many shows on T.V. for talent contests – whether singing, dancing, or being a comedian.  You hear person after person say that at some point in their life, people discouraged them.  Told them they weren’t good enough.  Not enough talent.  Rejected for auditions. 

Every man has his vocation.  The talent is the call.  There is one  direction in which all space is open to him.

  –  Ralph Waldo Emerson

Walt Disney was fired from the Kansas City Star because the editor said, “he lacked imagination and had no good ideas”.  It wasn’t true, he was just in the wrong job, not his vocation.  Oprah same thing.  She was fired because she couldn’t sever her emotions from her stories.  That is exactly what made her so good at her T.V. Show.  It was part of her vocation to follow the emotions of the stories being told.  Elvis after performing at “The Grand Ole Opry was told that he should return to being a truck driver.  It wasn’t that Elvis couldn’t perform, sing, or play his guitar.  It was that Country Western music wasn’t his vocation.    So don’t let rejections around your vocation stop you.  It may just be that you  haven’t yet found how your talent and vocation intersect. 

Start by doing what is necessary, then do what is possible, and suddenly you are doing the impossible.

  –   St. Francis of Assisi

Vocations usually start out as something small.  Maybe as a child you would draw pictures in crayon.  Your mom thought you were a genius.  As you grew older, you started drawing fashion designs for your dolls.  Then when you got into Junior High or High School you started taking art classes.  Your talents were nurtured and they grew.  Then one day, you discovered sculpture.  It took over your life.  You felt incomplete when you were not working with metal, stone, or marble.  

Entrusted with the task of crafting, to create a work of art, a masterpiece, your vocation sheds light on the path, so that you will know which way to go.  The vocation is built into you.  You literally have no choice. It is the air you breathe. 

If you are what you should be, then you will set the world on fire.

 –  St. Catherine of Seina

David was Michelangelo’s masterpiece.  He saw him in the marble and released him, a symbol of beauty and strength.  Look at what the world would have missed had his talent and vocation not intersected.  If he had walked away from his vocation, saying it was too much pressure.   

We must realize our own talents and, having realized, accept them; and play on them like a symphony in which all other instruments are harmonized to make a better universe.

  –  Jeane Dixon

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It Is A Magical World, Be True To You

“Life is meaningless only if we allow it to be.  Each of us has the power to give life meaning, to make our bodies and our words into instruments of love and hope.”  – Tom Head

When you approach each moment with fresh eyes and an open heart, you are no longer defined by your past pain or your fears for the future.  This is because you are not using that past pain or fear, as a filter to color every future experience.

Just because someone broke your heart doesn’t mean that everyone else will do so.  It doesn’t mean that you can’t trust yourself with anyone ever again.  Everything you experience is always a different experience.  You are not the same person you were prior to that experience.  The person you are currently having an experience with is not that person who hurt you.

Sometimes you just need to realize that just because you have had a bad day, doesn’t mean you have a bad life.  Just breathe, let it go.  Begin again.

“Magic is believing in yourself.  If you can do that, you can make anything happen” – Johann Wolfgang Van Goethe

Everything in life is temporary.  Both the good things and the bad things.  Nothing lasts forever, as moment by moment life changes you.  Most of what you term a bad experience, was simply judged as being bad by you.

You got a “D” or an “F” on an assignment.  You could judge that as being a bad experience.  Or it could be judged as a good experience because it served as a wakeup call, to pay attention to your studies.  Now you can graduate with honors and be successful in your chosen career.

Or it could even be the “stop” what you are doing call.  The call that says this isn’t what you want to do with your life.  That you need to stop going through the motions of making someone else happy.

If you find yourself in the wrong fairy tale,

either rewrite the story or leave it.

It could be the moment that you go after our dreams.

At a Hay House Event I attended; I enjoyed a seminar with Sonia Choquette.  I have been a fan of her books for years.  She is an intuitive spiritual teacher.  She told the story of how her marriage ended a couple of years ago, a total surprise to her.  She spoke about the falling apart, the recovery.  Then he came back and wanted to make it work, and then he left her again.  The second falling apart was not as bad.  She spoke about what all she learned about herself.   How much her daily practices saved her so much in recovery time.

It is funny about the good things being around the corner – you can look down the street, and you don’t see them.  It is physically impossible to know what is around a corner.  It is not until you walk around the corner that you see it.  So, the good thing surprises you just as much as the devastation does, because it catches you unaware.

“She believed in dreams all right, but she also believed in doing something about them…, When Prince Charming didn’t come along, she went over to the palace and got him. ” – Walt Disney

Even in the fairy tales you had to fight to get what you wanted.  It wasn’t all stardust and lollipops.  Bad things happened and had to be overcome.

Many times, just as you thought everything was going to end up perfect, another bad thing happened.  You somehow think that life will just roll everything perfectly to your door, without any effort on your part.  Or you think that if you just follow all the rules, life will repay you with what you want – that was me.  I believed if I followed all of the rule’s life would be perfect.

Life brings you lessons to build character.  It opens many doors, but most of them you pass by because you are not conscious and paying attention.  Then you complain that your dreams are not happening, and they must not be true.

• You need to work to make your dream come true.
• You need to realize that when you hit roadblocks it doesn’t mean you are on the wrong path.
• You need to fight for the fairytale, because it does exist…,
• Just remember that you are the Queen of your kingdom and only you know how to rule it.

There are far better things ahead than any we leave behind”   – C.S. Lewis

• It means that you believe in six impossible things before breakfast.
• That you dream improbable dreams and then create them.
• That you are a little crazy, because all of the best people are.
• That your dreams are entrenched in your soul, and the only way to release them is to make them come true.

Nothing is safe and everything changes.

So, reach out and touch the dragonflies and butterfly’s as you take flight.

Reach for the stars.

Dance with the fairies.

Howl at the moon.

Be a shapeshifter.

Life is a treasure hunt with a shifting map.  Find the chocolate.

Be happy, have fun, and enjoy the beauty of life.

 

Something To Get Us To The Weekend

Laugh out loud.  Smile just a little.  Share with a friend.

 

Seasons Change, People Change; A Year Changes You A Lot

The distance between your dreams and reality is called action.  Desire to transform is what gets us started.  The secret to action is doing just one small thing each day to further the dream into reality.  The secret to success in found in having a daily routine in which you insert those small steps.  Determination is what helps us build momentum, to keep going as the path takes us up a steep hill.  Sometimes that means we let go of less important things. 

The secret to change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the old, but on building the new.

  –  Socrates

Remember the wagon train days.  They loaded their wagons with all of the belongings they couldn’t bear to let go of.  Along the trail to Oregon, you found the landscape littered with such items that became too heavy of a load to continue to carry.  Sometimes it means we learn to do something differently.  We all have good intentions.  We set intentions to accomplish our dreams.  But many times hoping and setting those intentions isn’t enough.  You need to be committed to bringing those dreams into reality.  You need to be faithful with your actions to back up that commitment.  Dedication is how we continue.  

To give anything less than your best is to sacrifice the gift. 

  –  Steve Prefontaine

What is currently happening in our life, is a reflection of our past choices.  Releasing and letting go of what no longer serves us, is like cleaning up the gutters on our roof.  If we want the water to drain correctly, then the gutters need to be cleaned of all of the debris that has been deposited into them.  If we don’t, they won’t work correctly, and the water collected from the rain will drip all over, instead of being channeled down the drain spout.  Everything in your life currently is a result of choices.  The people in our lives, our career, the home we live in, the car we drive.., they were once a choice of something that we wanted, needed, or desired to have. 

Seeing things from a higher perspective causes you to experience sudden bouts of stunning clarity – you understand that everything that’s ever happened in your life played out exactly as it was supposed to.

  –  Stephen J. Hopson

The most useful piece of learning for the uses of life is to unlearn what is untrue.

  –  Anthisthenes

For years I told myself that I would write when the kids were in school; then it was when the kids were out of the house; then it was when I would retire – then I would have the time to write.  I kept putting off my dreams, not because there wasn’t time.  That was the lie that I told myself.  It was because I was afraid that what I wrote wouldn’t be worth reading.  Who was I to think that I had some kind of talent?  Publishers would reject my stories.  No one would want to read what I put on paper.  I had to realize for myself that at some point, later would never happen. 

 Nothing can dim the light that shines from within.

  –  Maya Angelou

I had to realize for myself that the words in my head telling me I would be a failure, were not true.  That the voice in my heart telling me I could do this, was the one that I should listen to.  That my personal transformation started with a transformation of my inner voice.  I would no longer allow it, to make me feel small and unworthy.   I might have a learning curve, it might take time to go from a beginner to a master, but if I kept putting myself into action, I could do this. 

Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing.

  –  Helen Keller

There are no limits.  There are only plateaus and you must not stay there, you must go beyond them.

  –  Bruce Lee

It is our fears that create limitations in our lives.  My fear of failure and being laughed at, created the limitation of not enough time.  Everything that happens for us, can be transformed into something of value.  Now my fear of success has me dragging my heels, because I know if I am as successful with writing as I think that I can be, that once again everything in my life will shift and change.  Some of those changes I may not like, and I can’t see how all of the moving parts of my life will continue to fit in that new space.  What will it require me to give up? 

The cave you fear to enter holds the treasure that you seek.

  –  Joseph Campbell

There just comes a time when those thoughts of holding on tightly to everything in your life, are just too heavy.  When there is no other choice but to let go, and let God.  When the compass points in only one direction, the cave you are afraid to enter, because you know what you will find in there.  You will be laid bare with no more excuses; and you will have to own who you are. and do something about it.  That time is now.  If not now, then when?  When the time is all spent, and there is none left? 

Let today be the day you love yourself enough to no longer just dream of a better life; let it be the day you act upon it.

  –  Steve Maraboli

It is not the mountain we conquer, but ourselves.

  –  Sir Edmund Hillary

Focus on the good that will be gained. Be around the light bringers, the magic makers, the world shifters, the game shakers.  They challenge you, break you open, uplift and expand you.  They don’t let you play small with your life.  These heartbeats are your people.  These people are your tribe.  This is the tribe of LemonadeMakers. 

There is more in us than we know.  If we can be made to believe it, perhaps for the rest of our lives we will be unwilling to settle for less.

  –  Kurt Hahn

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Life’s Journey Is A Gift, You Decide How It Unfolds

 

“In life, finding a voice is speaking and living the truth.  Each of you is an original.  Each of you has a distinctive voice.  When you find it, your story will be told.  You will be heard” – John Grisham

I found the truth of this when I started writing these blog posts.  Each post dug deeper into who I really was.  Who I truly wanted to be in the world.  It demanded that I become visible, even though I was terrified to be seen.

• If you don’t go after what you want, you’ll never have it.
• If you don’t ask, the answer is always no.
• If you don’t step forward, you’re always in the same place.

“We are either in the process of resisting God’s truth, or in the process of being shaped and molded by his truth”  –  Dr. Charles F Stanley

Sometimes the smallest step in the right direction ends up being the biggest step of your life.  Tip toe if you must, but take the step. Each foot forward is a reflection of the respect you have for yourself.

The journey to living my life on purpose has sometimes seemed very slow.  I was moving forward, but at times it felt like I was walking through mud with each step being a hard process.  Other times it was like riding the rapids downstream and a furious pace.

“Your journey has molded you for the greater good.  It was exactly what it needed to be.  Don’t think you’ve lost time.  It took each and every situation you have encountered to bring you to the now, and now is right on time”–  Asha Tyson

“When life takes me on a new journey, I simply remember the smile my first ballet recital put on my face and I move forward” – Andrea Thompson

Life brings you so many experiences to enjoy, but you can’t do that if you are always putting lenses of fear in front of your eyes.  Then you are not letting the experience reveal itself.  Instead, you’re trying to make it fit into a preconceived box.

What I discovered on my journey to be visible again, is that this voice of fear had been in control my whole life.  It colored every expectation and looked for ways to twist the story of what had happened to keep me captive in my invisibility.

Maybe the journey isn’t so much about becoming anything.  Maybe it’s about unbecoming everything that isn’t really you, so you can be who you were meant to be in the first place.

As I worked on becoming visible, I met so many new friends, who were on their own journeys of discovery.  I became aware of how you attract those in your life that can help you in your journey.  Some lessons were painful, as the parting of the friendship reflected the places I still needed to work on.  Some of the friends were “soul friends” and as Rumi says, they were a pure joy in my life.

“When you do things from your soul, you feel a river moving in you, a joy” –  Rumi

Be grateful for all the obstacles in your life.  They have strengthened you as you continue with your journey.  No one knows what changes, big or small, lie ahead.  One thing is certain, your journey’s not over.  Be prepared to be amazed at how incredibly, breathtakingly beautiful your life can become.

“Faith is not a light which scatters all our darkness, but a lamp which guides our steps in the night and suffices for the journey” –  Pope Francis

I know that I wasn’t born to follow others blindly.  I am still trying to figure out what I am meant to lead.  What I know for sure, is that I am capable of whatever is required to live my life purpose.  I am still on the hunt, for who I am becoming and I know that the only way out is through.  I see that I need to find more joy in my journey, instead of being single focused on manifesting it.

“You will get there when you are meant to get there and not one moment sooner…, so relax, breathe, and be patient” –  Mandy Hale

And the journey continues…, ever onward.

• A journey of finding your true self.
• Of finding your power to live a fully lived life, without self-imposed limitations and fears.
• Of finding that delicate balance of living for yourself because sometimes you need to walk alone in this amazing journey.
• Of changing yourself, and thereby changing the world into something better than you started with.
• Of enjoying all of life’s experiences, even those you judged, and wish hadn’t happened.

Recognizing the truth that life happens for us, not to us.  And the journey continues…, never ending.