Blissalicious Blog

 

It’s been a while since I’ve written about the burnout beastie, apparently today is the day! 

In this moment far too many people that I care about are fighting the burnout beastie… and something needs to change!  

I’ve have fought the burnout beastie a few too many times and I’ve come out the other side every single time – knowing more, being more and having greater awareness than I believed possible. If, today,  you are sitting on the edge, going ‘wtf?’, I have written this for you.  Sense it as a big energetic hug that can change everything in an instant!

The burnout beastie sneaks up on you, stealthily turning a once joyful life into a shattering string of ‘Who am I and is this all there is?’ moments of overwhelm and despair.

In the worst of those times, I remember hanging on by a thread, waking up every morning, wondering if the thread would hold another day.  Wondering if it would be easier to just quietly, gently let go and allow the sad little burnout shell that was pretending to be me to just disappear into the nothingness…

I remember not being able to keep myself upright for more than about 3 hours at a time and continually going back to bed and crying for no reason except total exhaustion. I remember not being able to remember the beginning of the sentence or what I was talking about, being so incoherent that I could barely answer basic ‘yes or no’ questions… Questions like ‘would you like some chocolate?’ were pretty much beyond my cognitive capacity to deal with (difficult to believe now I know!)  It's a scary thing being 40 and seriously wondering if you have Alzheimers...

And I remember being extremely unhappy... (actually, let's not mention unhappy...it reminds me of being unhappy.)

It's been almost 5 years now since that was me. Most of all I remember wondering how the hell I had created such a mess and being terrified that it was never going to change. The burnout beastie had me so fried that I couldn’t decide if I should check-in to a psychiatric hospital or check-out… permanently.  I am so grateful that my decision-making capacities were non-existent at that time. So grateful that I had disabled myself to such a degree that I literally had no capacity to choose anything except to just BE!

Despite my total incapacity, somewhere inside I knew that neither of those choices could create the different possibility I was truly desiring, that had got me into this mess in the first place! And I knew that something had to change – massively.

What’s funny about burnout is that we always want the world outside to change.  We want the world to conform to our awareness of what could be possible… and we want to take everyone we know with us… the burnout beastie shows up when we are doing so much to create change that we can no longer just BE.

It’s our addiction to creating change and generating greater possibilities in other people that wears us out and takes us from being a catalyst for change, into a 'human doing' that desperately requires change.  People who get burnout are never happy with the status quo.  We know we have the potency to create a different reality and we want it now!  It’s how we go about it that sends us into the arms of the burnout beastie.

We tell ourselves a grand story about how much we care and how much we need to do to enable those around us to have different choices, mostly because they can’t see what we can (that bit could be true … they often can’t… or maybe they just don’t choose to?)

I bought this big fat burnout beastie lie for a long time.   How could things change if I wasn’t there? Always being the catalyst, always being there for other people, always making it easy for everyone… except the one person who needed it most… ME!

Well, when the burnout beastie comes to visit, you can’t be that for other people anymore… you don’t have it in you! There is no steam left to power the train!!  It’s over baby… you are officially on the intensive care ‘do not disturb’ list… until you change you… until you start caring for you… until you start feeding and nurturing the amazing being that is you. There is nothing for you to do except be.

It’s a hard pill to swallow.  You don’t want to know that all of the people you have been the catalyst for will finally have to make their own choices and create their own possibilities.  Some of them will, some of them won’t.  And it’s not your job to change that.  You are the catalyst – you got the steam train running in some new directions… what they do with that energy is their choice – not yours.

So is now the time to put down all of the beasts of burden you are carrying around…  is now the time to look at what would truly work for YOU… and to actually just BE the possibilities you are aware of, rather than dragging the unwilling along for a bumpy ride down a dead-end track?

Yes, I know… you have a whole lot of “shoulds, have to’s and must do’s” and 'oh but's'  running around in your head right now.  You can’t possibly stop this now… there are people relying on you, you need the money… life won’t be worth living if you give up the thing you most want to create…

Every excuse you can come up with I have tried… and tried… and tried… and what you need to know is that the burnout beastie is now driving the train… and he doesn’t do train tracks… there are no refueling stops… so you are on a collision course to nowhere – unless you change something fast.

So this is what you are going to change.  You are going to start sensing what you truly desire and you are going to start nurturing you first, before anything… or anyone else.   That’s it.  Turn off the phone. Cancel stuff.  Change stuff… do whatever it takes to boot out the burnout beastie – it’s time to refuel. 

If you're not sure what refueling looks like... here are three of my favourites:

• Snuggle up with someone or something you adore...(even if it is a teddy bear or your dog!) ...stop thinking... allow peace to infuse your universe and just BE.
• Laugh.  Words cannot express how grateful I am for the friends who made me laugh and laugh and laugh until I cried during the darkest of those burnout beastie days... they literally saved my life.
• Play.  Oops... you've forgotten what that is like haven't you!  Find a small child who has total delight in their universe and rediscover a whole new universe of just being...
  

If you were choosing for you today, what would you choose?

This is not the end.  It is just the beginning.

Love you! xox Lisa

P.S.  When I removed the burnout beastie from my life I lost the person I thought I had to be... and I became the person I could BE - the one that truly could change anything... just by BEING... what if that could be possible for you?

 

Over the last few days I’ve had some really interesting experiences of how people perceive the energy of ease.  It seems a lot of people just aren’t willing to choose it!  Every time I see this it spins my head, turns my brain into fairy floss and creates a density in my body that allows me to know it is a lie for me. 

Last week I was talking to someone about a personal situation that has been rather interesting this year and I was quite excited to note that in two weeks I will have removed it from my life totally and that will allow all of the little bits of stuck energy still hanging about to be cleared with ease.  

This person proceeded to impel me with a whole lot of points of view about how I should delve deep into it so I could clear it.  They refused to hear that I could clear it with ease and that once it was done, I would be totally free of that situation… they refused to hear anything except their own limited (from my perspective!) point of view about how I should fix this, not to mention the big blast of judgments they shot at me.  They literally could not hear that ease is possible for me in this situation.  

I almost bought it but the density of the conversation showed me that while this may be true for this person, it is not a choice I would make for myself.  What if immersing ourselves in heavy energy does nothing but intensify it? That’s how it felt to me in the moment… and once I removed myself from that person’s space and points of view, I quickly regained the lightness and joy that I started the conversation with.

WOW!!   What else is possible here?  It was a gift to see how different I have become – by choosing awareness and consciousness rather than all the density of ‘feeling the feelings’ that many spiritual people like to immerse themselves in.  

What if we didn’t have to feel the intensity of things to clear them?  What if change could be feather light and come through like a cool spring breeze, bringing new possibilities and choices in an instant??  

Which brings me to the next fascinating situation… I wrote some copy for a client and included the words ‘with ease’ in a headline.  They asked me to remove it because no-one in their industry believes leadership can be done with ease!  When I look at the energy of that, there is a lot of fixed points of view and value vested in the idea of it being complex and complicated – and this is exactly what creates the exclusion and the limitations that stops the ease from showing up!  

Kinda funny really… what if we give up ‘struggling against’ and creating by force?  What if we could just ‘choose ease’? Could that create a different reality?

So how often do we give up our awareness and our capacity for letting go in an instant to make other people feel comfortable?  What can I say… it’s boring for me to hold onto stuff and wallow through it, hoping that if I stay there long enough I might come out the other side… in my universe it is way easier and way more joyful just to choose a new reality and create new possibilities!  Who said we have to suffer??

And what if we could change the ‘tough’ bits in an instant? The situation may still be there, but your response to it could be completely different… With the insight and love of my totally awesome friends, I have chosen to create ease in this personal situation about a thousand times this year…

So it wasn’t always easy – but in each situation I have been able to create greater ease than I would have if I wallowed in the distress of the situation for the entire time and made it all really significant and meaningful.  Sometimes you just gotta go – "that person is mean, nasty and insane, and nothing I do or be will change that – it’s simply their choice.  Cool… and what else is possible??"

Can you imagine how excited I be that finally the situation will be resolved??? Woohoo!!  Look out world!!!   Would you be willing to have that much ease even under the most challenging of circumstances?  It’s just a choice… (and a little know-how!)

Yeah – I choose for my world to overflow with ease!  I reclaim my space of joy and ease... and I be the awesomeness of me...

And if you choose to - enjoy the 'with ease' conversation on Facebook too -  lots of great perspectives!

xox    Lisa

Image: Pinterest :)

Within this beautiful spiral shell there is darkness and light.  I had a wonderful conversation with a friend this week about how often we keep the darkness hidden away and squashed inside and only allow the light to be seen because that's what we have been told is 'acceptable'. 

Whether we admit it or not, somewhere in our depths, most of us have more issues than Vogue. And we keep them well hidden until such time as they burst to the surface, dripping unresolved emotions everywhere.  As the energy on our planet is in upheaval, so it is within us at this time.  Much is surfacing to be harmonised and resolved.

What could change if we were to start questioning what is 'acceptable' and to start to follow our own knowing?  It seems pretty clear that the traditional ways of dealing with the darkness hasn't exactly created peace and light in the world!!  From that space of clarity and inner knowing we can generate the peace and harmony that comes from resolving or espressing the dark and hidden places that have held us captive until now. 

When we get over the idea that the darkness is 'wrong' and the light is 'right' it opens a door for us to look at both aspects and how they can offer new possibilities.  As the divine feminine energy moves into place and we start to operate from a place of flow instead of force, all of us have the possibility of experiencing how much capacity the darkness has to create a potency in our life that allows greater possibilities to show up. 

This potency is created within us when we make peace with the darkness.  When we know that we have what it takes to move beyond the darkness.  When we have gratitude for the contributions the darkness has made in our life and we are willing to step into a lighter place without a backward glance.

Resolving the darkness is not an invitation to splatter your darkness everywhere all over people through fear, anger, abuse or any other emotion of force... It is an invitation to look at the darkness with awareness,  to remove its power to inflict harm, and allow the insights gained from that process to contribute to a different possibility for the rest of your life.  So what does this mean in practical terms?

Would you have more peace and harmony if you...

• stopped creating friction as a way of proving you are alive and looked for the possibilities of ease and joy?
• focused on what the lightness can contribute instead of what the darkness is not contributing?
• asked the darkness what it could contribute to you if you saw it differently?
• celebrated the darkness and turned on the party lights?
• reviewed everything in your life that is no longer serving you and simply let it go, without having to be 'right' or to explain and justify your choices?
• stopped creating your dreams from a fantasy based on the past, and simply looked at what you desire right now?
• allowed relationships and beliefs that are based in lack, fear and anger to slip quietly away?

I am definitely not suggesting you become a doormat, quite the opposite!  When we allow the darkness to have no power over us, and to contribute the potency it has created within us, we become very clear about what we are choosing.  We set boundaries, we speak up for ourselves and we follow the path that offers peace and harmony, even if we have to climb a couple of boulders along the way.  It is okay to roar!  It is important to be heard.  When you can do this from a space of darkness resolved, rather than the underlying unresolved issue, your potency will not be mistaken as anger! 

Peace and harmony can be created from darkness.  So wherever we see these energies playing out around us, it is up to us to ask 'What energies could I be, do or contribute here that could change this in an instant?'   When we stop contributing to disharmony, much can change... more space and lightness shows up on the inside and the outside!!

As I have followed this process in my own life over the past few weeks and months I have come to see the value in recognising both sides.  All of a sudden we see the 'thing' that keeps us in the spiral pattern of repeating an issue, rather than being able to graciously move into a lighter, more blissful, more joyful reality.  Once we have shone a light onto the 'thing' it can no longer trigger the darkness in us... instead we can wallow in the bliss and sparkle! Simply beautiful!

As we go, so goes the earth.  Every time we shift the darkness we allow more lightness into our beautiful planet.  That lightness both heals and allows for greater transparency in places where there is still unresolved darkness - for us personally and on a global scale... all change truly starts with us!

Have a beautiful Sunday... take a few moments to find some peace within :)
xx
Lisa

I had a great giggle at this... it made me ask a lot of questions :)



I loooooooove how this girl gave each of these people the opportunity to see the world differently!!

• How much do we have fixed points of view about how things 'should be'?
• How much do we love to control the outcomes rather than go with the flow?
• How much do our expectations dictate our responses?
• How much judgment are we willing to receive for doing things 'my way'?
• How much joy is there in having no point of view about something being 'right or wrong'?
• How much freedom could we have if we found the humour in everything we experience?
• How much fun can we have NOT meeting everyone else's expectations?

Just a few of the ideas that came to mind as I giggled my way through this playful video... enjoy your Friday!!
xox
Lisa

As those of you who know me will attest, I tend to be impatient.  My mother once said to me 'the problem with you is you want to live your whole life at once.'  And yes... that has always been my point of view... if I've thought of it then I'd like it NOW please!!  What do you mean I have to wait??

The last few months have been a journey of exploring 'right timing'.  I have found that I couldn't force anything, that I have had to be patient way beyond my normal capacity (or desire ;-) lol)... and once I got over the frustration of things moving so slowly I discovered yet another great adventure!

In playing with the concept of flow, I have seen that all I need to do is get the energy of what I desire and then do whatever feels most like that energy each day.  It's like BEing water... follow the path of ease and you'll end up exactly where you need to be in exactly the perfect timing!  There are no mistakes.  There are  no wrong turns...  Always there is the question of what can I create from the space I am in right now?

I have seen this occur over and over and over in the past few months.  Much to my surprise!  And even more fascinating has been to see how, when I stop trying to force anything but simply make the demand for what I require, without having a point of view about whether I get it or not, that the most phenomenal possibilities are showing up effortlessly.

I have come to see this process as a moving meditation of creating flow with ease.  (And for someone who isn't big on sitting still and chanting OM, that is a beautiful thing! Meditative states are found in all sorts of surprising ways!)

So today is a great time to start moving in your own flow.  Unhurriedly, serenely, and with total awareness of what would gift you the most serenity in this moment...  What if time really doesn't matter?  What would you choose today? Could total bliss be on the menu?

xox
Lisa

(P.S.  If you would like some more tips on flow, I have a free e-course and two free chapters from The Mojo of Flow on offer)

Love love love this interview with Tim Bothams, phenomenal sustainable farming expert and nurturer of our beautiful earth... (and conscious man who follows his bliss!) please listen in honour of Earth Day!  What if you could gift to the earth just by being happy?

And what if we could be more aware of our food choices... love my local farmers market too!
Would you be willing to be more conscious in your choices for you and the earth?  We can all contribute, wherever and whenever we choose!

Choose bliss...
xx
Lisa

(Image Credit - much gratitude to Pinterest)

If you want your life to be different, then ignoring how it is in this reality is essential!  Sounds a little unconventional, but stay with me here…

If you have no money but you desire to have more, what will allow that to generate fastest for you – thinking obsessively about having no money, or getting the energy of what having more money than you can imagine is like and then being THAT energy?

I have proven for myself that when I BE the energy of that which I desire, it arrives so much faster!  In the midst of relationship challenges, I took the time to look at what I truly desired in a relationship.  When I described how that would look without considering the current ‘reality’, it allowed me to see so much more of what was possible for me!  It also allowed me to see that I wasn’t really choosing what I most desired for my life.

The second part of ignoring reality that really made a difference was I stopped trying to fix what wasn’t working, and asked the universe to show me different possibilities.  In a short space of time I saw all sorts of potentials and at that point I started to choose for me.

When we make what we truly desire the priority, instead of focusing on what we definitely don’t want, it opens up a space within us for everything to change.  

Contrary to what you may have thought, ignoring reality is not about putting your head in the sand.  There are some situations in this reality that do need our immediate attention – if we are always willing to have that in our awareness, but not to live in the trauma and drama or depressing energies that are not expansive for us, we place ourselves in a space where we can have so much more bliss in our living.  

If you’d like to explore this creatively, here’s some fun questions to play with…

• What would my life look like if I had peace with money, business, relationships and me?
• What complexity am I choosing that is destroying me, my life, business, finances or relationships?
• What simplicity am I avoiding that would generate more of me, business, money or relationships?
• What are the true priorities that would allow me to live blissfully and with ease right now?
• If money wasn’t the issue and time was plentiful, what would I choose for my life?

When you play with ignoring reality, you get to choose more of what brings you joy, bliss, ease and lightness.  Would you be willing to brush your life with a feather and let massive change be created that sweetly and lightly?

Last week I moved house from the Gold Coast to the Sunshine Coast on very short notice, amidst the chaos of the Brisbane floods. I am so grateful for the support of friends and family who made the move not only possible but joyful and ease-filled too!  This move followed six months of not so blissful living and choosing this change has already delivered so many more possibilities!  How does it get better than that?

So often we hesitate to make big changes or we resist until the universe finally thrusts them upon us! Ff course, I've never done that lol!! Once it happens, a whole lot more bliss is created in the most surprising ways.  I hope you enjoy these insights from my recent experiences… I’m seeing it as a few more ways to remember to choose bliss everyday!!

1. Never tolerate what is disempowering you or limiting you – choose to be ALL of you.
2. Remove obstacles and anything that is creating overwhelm. You can always choose again another day.
3. Set clear boundaries and stick to them.  Empty threats never create change!
4. If you can’t fix it with ease, do something completely different.  No point in suffering.
5. Perceive the situation for what it actually is and focus on what you desire for your life. Don’t allow it to become trauma and drama – it uses too much energy ;-)
6. Don’t be vested in a specific outcome.  Get the energy of what you desire and be willing for it to show up in unexpected, unimagined ways…
7. Wake up each day willing to make new choices. There are no failures or mistakes, just new possibilities!
8. Reach out to those who love you – there is so much more support there for you than you realize!
9. Be gentle, kind and nurturing to yourself – don’t beat yourself up for the choices already made… simply choose again!
10. Listen to your intuition. Ask questions.  Generate more than you think is possible!

In less than one week I have had so much joy and possibility open up in my life.  It has made me wonder what took me so long to make the choice to move!  

What is it that you are delaying or resisting that if you chose it would allow so much more bliss and ease in your life?  

Would you like some support with choosing to change or choosing more bliss?  The new weekly Bliss Essence Teleconversations are designed to do just that!

"Dissent will not be tolerated."   On the weekend I was totally enthralled by ‘Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix’… watching the forces of good versus evil and magic versus ‘the rules’ at play got me thinking about how often we meet our challenges with rules when a little magic would go so much further and faster!! 

There was so much joy for me in the scene where the hundreds of rules put up by the miserable headmistress Dolores Umbridge (perfect name!!) crash to the ground.  I could have danced (if I wasn't so comfortable lying on the bed)!!

The world will not change for the better if we do not choose dissent when it most matters.  I have spent much of my business life in trouble for not following the rules set by those I reported to (mostly because they made no sense and felt like an unnecessary limitation!). And in doing so have often created many more possibilities for myself and the organization just by being me!

That commitment to being authentically me has been worth it on so many levels and has created immeasurable amounts of magic, often when least expected! 

What magic would you be willing to create in your world today just by being the magic of you?  Love your work!!

Bliss is about living an ease-filled life that we truly love.  If the life we are living is not 100% blissful right now, then something needs to change.  The funny thing is most of us resist change like it’s an incurable disease, rather than the source of everything that we desire!!

Have you ever thought about how many ways you have of resisting change?  Have you ever asked yourself what you are actually creating (or not allowing to be created!!) by resisting that change?

One of the most surprising discoveries I have made as a control freak of magnitude is that change can be good.  Actually, change can be phenomenal.  Change creates and generates more in my life than I ever thought possible!!!

Here are a couple of ways I move past resistance… feel free to share your tips below!!

• Feel the resistance and choose it anyway… if you see resistance as your inner saboteur then pop that balloon and just keep moving… choose for the real you!

• Ask a lot of questions about what you are actually resisting… what would you ‘lose’ if you actually received what you desire… and what is the benefit in keeping that rather than having what you truly require in your life??

• What would it be like to trust you so intensely that you resist nothing? (... maybe its time to stir your potency pot??)

Looking forward to hearing what you are resisting and how you are moving past it into a new reality!!