Moxie Living: Courage and Confidence

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Thinking Makes It So

June 25 Dawn

Here’s a few things that aren’t real and don’t exist,

Horrible weather
Bad days
Hump Day
Monday Blues
Bad hair days (I type reluctantly)
Weird dress sense
Good news
Bad news

I know, how dare I suggest there is no such thing as bad news, or good news? Shakespeare wrote, “Nothing is good or bad, but thinking makes it so.” Spot on Mr S.

While you and I have probably said, ‘Feck, what a bad day I’ve had’, I’d bet my bra, that the 7 billion or so that lived the same date as us, there will be a few where the reality was different.

While we have interpreted a day as awful, some folks may have had very different experience: joyful, happy, amazing … one of utter wonderfulness.

So, that can’t make our perception the truth, can it?

And weird dress sense, it were the truth then everyone would have to agree it were weird. But what’s the likelihood there? And who decides what is weird and what isn’t? Maybe someone else would interpret it as fashionable, quirky and beautiful.

If the weather were horrible, then we would all have to agree on what we define, and what would be classed as horrible. When you are upset it’s raining, someone depending on the rain for their crops, may be doing back flips at the wet stuff falls.

The people who love what they do and get paid for probably don’t even think about Monday being a colour. What one person defines as a good day, another will perceive it as a waste of a day.

Even two people who have a similar experiences on the same day, one can say that was nightmare and the other could say what a great learning experience.

It’s all perception and interpretation.

These generalisations don’t exist.

You may or may not buy into them. You may agree with some (that fit your map of the world and the scripts we live by) and shun others.

And there you go,

There is always, always, other ways to look at things – a single way for each mind that wanders this planet. That’s a lot of ways.

Why would you choose to look at life as a hard, cold, negative, devaluing, and willingly agreeing with a way of thinking that diminishes, hurts, and puts down who you are? Why would you accept for example phrases such as ‘this is the way life is’ and ‘things aren’t ever going to change’ for your life. Why would you do that?

What would it take for you to ask, ‘Is there another way of looking at this?’ And to actually look.

You are always in control of your own thinking. Always. You can choose what you want to feel, how you look at things, and what state of mind you want.

Alas, many don’t believe that.

Or they think that they need trained to do it. That they need to learn a set of skills, how-to’s and techniques to get them to the point where they have passed some test, stamped by someone else that say they are, and always were, in control of their own thinking.

The first step is not just believing in the power thought, it’s believing that you have the power of your own thoughts. Believing that you not only can think what is possible, but it is possible for you. Can you see the difference?

When you start to believe, you then start to feel. When you start to feel, you then can create and try. And when you try, you become more skilled and confident. Eventually, all this negative talk and thought diminishes, your generalisations and limitations you placed on you and your life cease to exist.

There is always another way to look at things, you have the power to make that so. Trust it. Believe it.

You Get What You Think About

June 25 Dawn

When you think about your future, what picture do you see? Do you have hope, faith and belief that no matter what you have to face, go through, experience you will always be able to handle it?

Or do you see it as hopeless, with dread, and that things will never change for you?

How do you cope with adversity? How well do you go through the ups and downs of the human experience? How do you handle life challenges and pitfalls? Because it’s all determined by how you answer those questions, fuelled by your beliefs.

You move toward (and become) what you think about, and your present thoughts are determining your future.

As humans, you and I are goal orientated by nature, and we think in pictures. If I were to say to you pink elephant – you wouldn’t see the text pink or elephant – you would picture an image of a pink elephant.

Silly picture?

Is it though? Only because you have already made and have an association, understanding and interpretation of the colour pink. You have given it the meaning it has for you, based on what you were taught, you know ‘pink’ because someone said to ‘this is the colour pink’.

You don’t see with your eyes, in order to see, there must be light.

Light reflects off an object (and if you’re looking at it) — the light enters the eye. Eventually the light is focused, converted into electrical chemical signals and then delivered to the brain where what you’ve seen is decoded and interpreted.

That decoding and interpretation and the image you see will all depend on how you have been conditioned to translate the light, and give what you have seen a meaning for you.

Words create vivid pictures, and you are always drawn towards the pictures in your mind.

Have you ever heard the saying, ‘I am giving everything I see all the meaning that it has for me’?

Another way of saying that – you are interpreting, placing value and meaning on what you are looking at.

If you see the world (and your future) as hopeless, cruel, non compassionate, unloving, and you keep telling yourself, ‘It’s just the way it is and nothing is ever going to change’ … your brain will search and find for you all the evidence and proof you need to back up those beliefs you have, based on your past conditioning and experience.

You will be drawn and bring towards you a hopeless, cruel, non compassionate, unloving experience … you are creating it because that’s your interpretation of the world you see.

Eventually, you will have sought out so much so called truth that you can’t do anything but believe it.

This is called self-fulfilling prophecy,

‘I knew it was going to be a bad day as soon as I woke up this morning’. Guess what? A bad day. You move towards what you think about. Your thoughts are creating your reality. You’re getting the picture you asked for.

‘There is no way that I will be ever able to change career’. Guess what? Nope. No way. Not until you change the picture. And it sometimes doesn’t take much to shift it, in fact sometimes we aren’t even aware of the moments of change.

‘I hate cold calling so much, it’s never successful’. Guess what? It never is. Unless it’s a day when you actually don’t hate too much. Funny that.

You get what you think about, you get your interpretation

You can create more positive, inspiring, self-fulfilling prophesies. If you see the world as hopeful, loving, compassionate, empowering – and you are contributing to it – you will start to see more of it happening all around you.

What do you believe though? Do you think it’s just as easy to see the opportunities and possibilities around you as it is the horror?

Whatever you think about, your brain will start to find proof, that you will begin to observe it all around you. Most of us want the proof first.

You are drawn to what you are thinking about. How do you switch from one belief system to another? How do you set positive intentions for yourself instead of negative? How? Set the intention of the world you want to see and the pictures you want to be dominant. Declare it.

When you see (interpretation) pictures that are destroying your confidence, esteem, growth, potential and efficacy, question the picture. What you see can only ever be interpreted by you.

Take a look around your life, when someone pays you a compliment, what do you see? A genuine word, or someone wanting something? When success happens for you, what do you see? Congratulating yourself, or telling yourself it’ll never last?

Take Away/To Do

Words create vivid pictures, and you are always drawn towards the pictures in your mind. What words are you using to create positive, inspiring, confident and fearless pictures?

It’s Never Too Late (But One Day It Will Be)

May 22 Dawn

You’ve heard that saying ‘it’s never too late to be what you might have been’, yes?

(I like to add at the end, ‘but don’t leave it a moment longer’).

It’s a goody.

But it’s not the truth.

It’s one of those quotes that give us the illusion that we shall have enough physical time to get all the stuff (stuff = everything) we want to do actually done: to allow ourselves to get focused and paying attention to all those dreams, goals, desires that we have for our life.

It’s one of those quotes that we get squeeee-inspired with and the next minute we find ourselves planking on the coach with a bowl of Frosties watching repeats of Friends and Greys Anatomy.

We exist in time.

Your physical body (which allows you to experience this life thing) has an expiry date.

Your experience of you will end.

Oh, grim, grimmy-grimmy.

Hear me out.

Most of us are eating cereal waiting for life to start

Waiting until we become the other idea we have of ourselves before we can really live, ‘When I get that job, that relationship, that career, that client, that qualification, that home, that car, into that size of jeans, that reading on the weight scales, when I sort out my confidence, when I have more money, more time (eh???), when I’m ready, when I [insert your own reason here]…then my life will really start’.

Many people who swing by Living Moxie say, ‘I’m worried that this is it’.

(I’m worried that this is it means: feck, I’ve really screwed up this life thing, I’ve been playing at, doing stuff that I really didn’t want to, I’ve wasted so much of my time, listened to folk I shouldn’t have, and now I’m so far in it, I have no idea how to get out!. Happiness? Peace? Joy? Where’s mine?)

News: This. Is. It.

Did you just glance past that last sentence?

And one day it will be too late.

You are everything that your life is waiting for. Everything. Change that to I am everything my life is waiting for and you have a great affirmation (click that link and you can download hundreds of them).

You have the wheel. (Permission is yours: not your parents, carers, grandparents, aunts, uncles, siblings, partners, high school teachers, friends from the playground, bosses, ex-workmates. dog or cat…well, maybe the cat has a little of you, but hey that’s cats for you.)

You’re driving.

Optimism bias would suggest that you think you are going to live forever-ever-ever. That exits happen to other people, not you.

Nope. You don’t escape that door. There isn’t enough time for you to try ALL options. Take one.

Don’t wait for life wake up calls. What if it never rings? Then what are you going to do?

You don’t get a new life. You have one.

Quit living in the past, stop projecting into the future. You want a loving life? BE love. You want a happy life. BE happy. You want a peaceful life? BE peace. And on it goes. Be = live it now, not when you’re finished your cereal.

Stick a stake in the ground and claim your life. Own it. Give yourself full permission, it’s the only permission you are waiting on.

Carry on.

Live In the Questions

April 28 Dawn

We identify with our cherished beliefs – we may not like to admit it but – the world we see creates our point of view.

Moment by moment you’re constantly seeing and taking in proof and validation that your world view is the correct (or you’ll fill in what you want to see) way of looking.

What we see depends mainly on what we look for. ― John Lubbock

But I’m open-minded!

I say that too, until someone or something comes along and challenges my truths on how I see the world, then I can/may/possibly catch myself defending my beliefs – especially when they don’t agree with me and my script of how things should be.

“I mean, how can what they are saying be true? It just can’t be, not when I know what I am saying is the truth. We both can’t be correct. I have it all figured out, so they must be the ones in the wrong, right? They must have it screwed up. I don’t need to change my belief, they do.”

This way of thinking doesn’t half close us down to the endless possibilities and opportunities surrounding us, plus ideas, suggestions and other ways of looking at and living life.

As soon as you identify who you think you are with a belief you will search (and always find) all the evidence you need to confirm that what you believe is true. You won’t see another way because you don’t think you need to see it (until you decide to change the belief).

Live Life In the Questions

One of the ways to identify if a belief is really true for you is to live your life in the questions.

What questions?

You could try:

Am I seeing this correctly?
Is there another way to look at this?
What ways can I think differently about this right now?
What would it take to see this another way?
Am I giving this the correct meaning?

There’s five for starters.

And then?

Don’t go seeking for an answer. The habit many of us have is asking a question (especially when we are stuck) and then go on searching through our current belief system for an answer, you are going to come up with the one you started with. You can’t help it because you haven’t created a new belief yet, or another way to look at the world.

We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them. – Albert Einstein

You are the leader in charge. If the world you are seeing (living) is not what you want to look at (experience) you could try living in the questions until you start to collate other evidence that your current belief system isn’t 100% accurate.

“This always happens to me!”

Try: Am I seeing that correctly? Ask: Always? Does this always happen to me?

My life is just a mess!

Try: What would it take for me to see this another way?

I’ll never find the career of my dreams!

Try: What would it take for me to see the career of my dreams?

I’ll never make it!

Try: What ways can I think differently right now?

I will never have the courage or confidence to do that!

Try: Is there another way of looking at this?

Play with it. Practice. Have meaningful conversations with yourself. You may stumble upon a great insight and discovery.

Goodbye, Friend.

April 9 Dawn

“A goodbye is never painful unless you’re never going to say hello again”

March the 14th, I kissed my friend, thanked her, said goodbye and walked out of intensive care for the last time. Her death has been described as tragic, a terrible accident, an irreplaceable loss and my least favourite, ‘just one of those things’.

I do know,

Writing this post doesn’t change anything. The outcome remains the same.

I do know,

Her story has been told, and it certainly can’t be re-written.

Hey you,

I’ve been away from here for a while.

I’ve attempted this update many times over the past couple of weeks, I write a few scribbles, judge them, then put them aside. Today, I realise I’ve just been putting it off. Perhaps because to share it here with you means I have to accept the story as the truth.

I don’t actually know what to write to be honest. A tribute? Tell you about her life? What?! Also, I don’t want to get attached to the pictures and thoughts in daylight that go though my head at night.

I would love it, if today were the day that the grief had turned into wisdom, a fuller understanding and acceptance of what happened. But I would be lying to you.

This is a challenging experience, no doubt. My response to her passing has been a mix of my conditioned reaction to death and dying, and my belief that we are not our body (which does brings more peace).

Today, I am grateful that I can catch my breath.

See, I could have skipped this event and chosen to not write about it, you wouldn’t be any the wiser, but that would be a mammoth cop-out on my part.

Living with Moxie is about embracing all life: death and dying is part of the human experience, to leave them out rejects them.

Living with Moxie is about confidence, courage, bravery, fearlessness…in the face of adversity.

When you lose something you love, when unwelcome and unexpected grief comes slamming into your life, when your days are spent simply avoiding the opening to slipping in the downward spiral, when events out with your control are being acted out around you and you have no choice but to take part, it requires (now more than any other) digging really deep to find your inner courage, confidence and resilience to feel fully what you feel (whatever form that takes) so that you can move from grief into mourning, and then into healing.

I am practicing that last paragraph.

Loss is adversity, no doubt.

Unwelcome and uncontrollable change is adversity.

Circumstance out with your control is adversity.

Grief (and mourning) is adversity.

Adversity can be cold, ruthless and cruel, bringing with it a period of total chaos, uncertainty, fear and perhaps anger. Or it can teach you and I about life, living and love.

And yes, for some adversity that appears the road back can be a heck of a long one, with no signposts, instructions or a map to get you home, and it can demand so much from you, even qualities you didn’t know you had before it appeared.

Love waits on welcome

As you can imagine, because I am sure we share the common experience of losing love, even though the passing of my friend is at present connected with pain, anger, fear and utter disbelief – not just from me, but all those who knew her – there is no doubt that love has been ever present (as it is always, if you allow it) these past few weeks.

Truth: it’s love that has been the blanket to all of this, shrouding us, tucking us in, keeping us – friends, family, strangers – close and safe, allowing us to share stories, even laugh at times.

And this is where this story gives me such hope, faith and clarity for us all.

Even though we are all so different, complain and moan about the craziest, insane, and stupidest things at times. Even when we let our egos take over, or when we pay attention to parts of life that really don’t matter. When it comes down to it, we can put all that aside, all that nonsense that keeps us separate from one another and come together as fellow humans beings, sharing this human experience in all it’s form.

The majority of us do know that fear keeps us apart and love brings us together. That love is the first, last and always – gosh, that chokes me up. That we can in the hardest times actually get what’s important, that we can appreciate what we do have, that we genuinely have nothing to fear, and that we need not worry needlessly.

I’ll hold on to that.

Sheila Hyslop 1964 - 2014 — Sheila Hyslop (1964 – 2014)

I wish you had known her.

She was pretty darned special.

She was, with no doubt in my mind, the most compassionate, non-judgemental, loving and giving person I have had the pleasure to know and have in my life for over 20 years.

I won’t go into the details of her story, let’s just say she was one of the brave ones. Against the opinions of others, she didn’t sit down when her values and ethics required her to stand up, she did make a difference in thousands of lives – animal and human.

I am missing her. I will miss her.

You know, she was probably much like your closest friend.

Maybe give them a call today huh?

It will take you two mins. Or someone else that matters. Don’t hang up without saying Goodbye.

Goodbye, friend.

I Forgot to Tell You About My Queue Buddy (& How You Always Have a Choice)

January 15 Dawn

It’s 1 pm, the day before Christmas Eve and I’m standing a queue in my local supermarket.

To get to the end of it I’ve had to trail up the freezer aisles, wind round the bread and pitch up beside the chicken being roasted, the smell alone is enough to make me want to throw up, it’s a vegetarian thing.

30 trolleys are in front me with their temporary owners caring for their precision load, and they are complaining, huffing, tutting at how badly organised this place is and 2 days before Christmas as well!

They try to make eye contact so I can join them in their complaints.

I’m in a moment of choice.

Do I add myself to the queue and join in the choir of complaint?

Do I abandon my load and call it a day?

Or.

Do I decide to take a deep breath, accept that long lines, today of all days, are unavoidable?

Do I decide to stop getting pissed off at things I cannot control. Get off the thrown. And make my decision to choose how I want to feel?

I breathe. Accept. Get in line without the drama.

No sooner had I made my choice my ankles get rammed by the trolley belonging to the lady behind me in the queue.

Immediately,

I’m in another moment of choice.

Let the pain rise to anger and frustration and stay without the drama. Or choose again.

I take a breath, smile, tell her not to worry, it’s fine and start a conversation.

80 minutes later and I’m paying for my shopping. My queue buddy is helping me pack, and I’m loading her wares onto the belt.

We are chattering away, laughing and by the time we’ve reached the end of our journey together we’ve even had take-away coffee from the shop in the store.

I’m away first, so I turn to my queue buddy, and to the weird glances from the man on the till, we give each other a big hug and we both agree that was the quickest 80 minutes and best queue conversation ever.

I wish her a merry one at her friends house where she’s heading to next, and that all her family make it safe home for Boxing Day, that she does start that qualification she’s been hankering after,

…you know how friends say goodbye, a summary of well wishes for the conversation just had. And she does the same.

We agree that if we see each other again, we will team up.

You’re always in a moment of choice.

You always get to decide how you feel about any situation.

Yes, things will appear at your ankles to suck you out of the state that gives you peace.

But, you are always in a moment of choice.

If you find you have made the wrong one, decide again.

It’s. That. Simple.

No?

You’re always in a moment of choice.