Tag Archives: #selflove#knowyourvalue

Your words and thoughts create your reality

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I did a post this week on my social media after I had a big epiphany and I thought we should talk about it here because it was so incredibly powerful.

I have been doing alot of self reflection type of work and working on loosening my grip on trying to be in control of literally everything and for a bit, it had me upside down and sideways in my mindset.

The biggest self discovery happened this week:

I figured out that turning 50 messed with me more than I thought it did. 

When I was close to that magic number, my body was suddenly against me, or so I thought. I was gaining weight “for no reason” I “needed’ to move to lower impact workouts because well you know, “I’m getting older and I need to accept that’s where I’m at”. Looking back and reflecting on that, I mind fucked myself. I know that now. I believed that to be true, I said the words and that is the shit I manifested for myself. Wow. Mind blown. LIke seriously?

I found myself eating things that I KNEW my body hated, because what was the point? I’m getting older and you only live once so eat the cake. And yes, eat the cake is a thing that you should do, just not the WHOLE cake.

In the midst of all this shiz, I started doing the Unlimited workbook that I spoke about last week on the blog. Every morning, you read a few pages of information, then you say an affirmation, meditate and you write what you’re grateful for. You also write 3 things you want the universe to achieve for you and then you let that go. This workbook goes for a 40 day period.

Doing this every day really gets you digging in your heart of hearts. You start to see where you are working against yourself simply by thinking or saying things a certain way. 

This was the start of my epiphany. 

Then, I listened to an audio lesson on mindful eating. There are meditations you do to understand why you want to eat and helps you to determine if you really are hungry or if that’s just because you’re programmed that way. There is an exercise to write down how food makes you feel. By the way–mindful eating is really just that, it’s paying attention to your body and your food. It’s still ok to eat a certain way if it makes you feel good or you’re trying to achieve a specific goal. 

This got me thinking about life in general and what makes me happiest. Then, I made a list. I sat there at 5 am and wrote a giant list about what I practice when I am at my best. 

This simple task, showed me in black and white, what I needed to do in order to pick myself fully back up. It’s a few days later and I am back to eating the food that best fuels my body, working out pretty hard core, I’m organized and focused at work and in my personal life and I’m HAPPY! Like so happy. I encourage you to do this activity for yourself and let me know how you feel afterward. 

Patti

xo

Back at it! Sweating it out like a champ!
Yummy fuel!

Time off for self care

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Last week, I didn’t blog for the first time since I started this blog. I just wasn’t in the right headspace. I blog to share my story, the good, the bad and the ugly stuff, but I am not willing to write just for the sake of writing..and last week, that is what it would have been. 

I let the world get to me over the past few weeks. I struggled to remain positive. I got dragged down into a shitty spin. It all became too much work: the eating, the mindset, the workouts, the staying positive, the coaching. All of it. 

I think we are all really struggling again with the state of the world. The pandemic variants are creating havoc. In Ontario, we are once again under a state of emergency due to the insane amount of people getting sick. And looking around, it was the attitude of people that got to me. The complacency, the selfishness and the overall attitude. When a shutdown was announced, people were actually quoted on the news that they needed to get their nails and hair done “while they could”. For real. And I allowed that to really drag me down.

Thankfully, I mean really thankfully, I’ve done so much work on my mindset and created some super consistent habits that will always reign that nonsense in. I’m so grateful for meditation. If you do nothing else for yourself in your life, please at least meditate.

Even when I felt the shittiest, I still meditated. What that did was to help me step outside of my mental state and observe where I was at. Eventually, a plan came to me to get out of the funk. 

Here is what I did to pull myself back to, well, myself:

  • I gave something up that was no longer working for me: Beachbody Coaching
  • I kept working out and meditating
  • I meal prepped and planned
  • I booked a day off work and spent my day outside in nature with my camera

That was all it took. 

The first step, ending my coaching relationship with Beachbody was tough. I love coaching. I love their programs. I don’t love that you have to spend so much money to qualify as a coach. I don’t love their restrictions on promotion of other products. I don’t like their sales approach. It’s yucky to me. It felt like–not me. It was a hard decision but needed to be done. I’m still running an accountability group FOR FREE because I love it. It keeps me on track and I love seeing other people’s success. More to come on that group on my social media.

The working out, meditation and meal planning are already habits that are ingrained at this point. No matter what, it’s something that is always done. That doesn’t mean that when I’m struggling I didn’t go to Dairy Queen and I didn’t eat an entire chocolate bunny in a day. It just means that the structure is already there, making it easier to get back fully on track when I’m ready.

The day off work was probably the most valuable thing I did. I got outside. I found so much to love and appreciate in nature. The sun, the new spring flowers and all the little birds and critters. It did WONDERS for my soul. It allowed me to come back and be ME. Patient, positive, loving life ME. 

I feel like this little bird, just living my best life and singing its praises. I pray you all are living life like this bird.

Patti

xo

Someone out there loves you

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This week, I want to cover something that happened this week that was absolutely awful. 

Trigger warning: this post talks about suicide and mental health.

I’m part of many awesome online communities of strong women. Safe places where we can lift each other up in mental health, fitness, nutrition, all sorts of things. You end up meeting lots of individuals. Over the past week, in one of the smaller communities, we discovered that a very active participant had lost her battle with mental health, and took her own life. I don’t actually know her, never met her face to face but have seen her pictures and messages she posted. And when things like this happen, you look for past signs. Did we in the group miss something? You ask yourself, could I have been the one to have saved her? 

To me, the answer is a resounding no. And there’s a reason for this and you may agree and you may not. You see, I’ve been through so many losses like this and I’ve examined every single one under the strongest microscope you could possibly find, and the answer is always no. If I were the one to save that person, the one that made that difference that day, it would have happened. Those people would still be here today. It was not meant to be. 

I have mixed feelings about suicide. When it’s someone that is terminally ill, and in pain..I am on board for the most part. Now this is where the inner conflict gets me….what about mentally in pain? For these precious individuals they are in pain that is so unbearable, there is no other way out. No light at the end of their dark mental tunnel. And to me, that is tragic in itself. It’s almost mentally unbearable to me to think that someone would or could ever feel that way. It is also a scary feeling to understand that they would feel that way.  

The other side of the coin for me has happened since I lost Kayla. When it’s a young person and they take their life, part of me gets ANGRY. Like blood boiling, How dare they give up their life, when I know she would have done anything to stay here? It’s hard to let those bitter feelings go. That’s where I loop back to my empathy and compassion for the person and how dark a place they would need to be in. And those feelings win. I hate to think of how dark a storm must be for them to do this, because, with all the darkness I have seen and in the lowest moments of my life, never have I felt that level of despair that I even contemplated this. 

I am putting this out to all of you that read my blog: Please, I beg of you, if you are in that dark, black terrible hole and you’re even getting an inkling of feeling that suicide is your only option, talk to someone, ANYONE. It doesn’t have to be me. It doesn’t have to even be someone you know. It can be the person beside you in the grocery store, I don’t care who,..just talk to them. We want your magnificent light to continue to shine. There is always hope even in that dark tunnel. We got you. You are loved now more than ever, in your imperfection. 

You can click this link to access help and to understand warning signs of suicide.

Let’s all hold each other up in love and peace.

Patti

xo

Shifting Perspectives–Change your Mindset

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Why does everything always happen to me?

How does the above statement make you feel? It brings me down and makes me sad. It makes me feel or it implies that all bad things happen to this person and there is no escaping from it. It sounds dismal and negative. It sounds like a punishment that never ends. I immediately feel sorry for this person that is saying this.

Now, take that same statement but change one word: Why does everything always happen for me?

This sounds like revelation. It sounds like self discovery. Like nothing but good things happen for this person. It sounds like the universe, or God or Angels or whatever you believe in is doing this person a FAVOR.

See how easily you can shift things with a very simple shift in your perspective? That was a change of 2 very short 2 and 3 letter words. Crazy but true.

I have been practicing this mindset shift (at least doing my best at it anyway) and it is life altering to say the least. I am in a better mood, and my outlook on life is genuinely more positive and hopeful.

When something happens that we feel is a negative…rather than asking why it’s happening TO us, let’s start asking why it’s happening FOR us. Ask what doors will this open up for me? How does this event or thing change the path I am on? What lesson is this teaching me?

Life is so full of potential with this simple shift. It’s helped me see light in tragedy, and altered my overall view on life, and in turn, my beliefs.

I’d love to see you give this a try yourself. In the coming days/weeks or even months, when a challenging situation arises, or something “negative” happens to you, shift the view to why it’s happening FOR you and see where that takes you.

I bet it’s somewhere awesome.

Patti

xo

What a year!

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This week marks the one year anniversary that a global pandemic was announced. We were sent home from work “for a few weeks” and we really thought it would all be over then. Here we are..the world indelibly changed: How we shop, how we work, how we socialize and even celebrate. Looking back, I didn’t see even a twinkle of this coming. So what have I been able to learn and observe this past year personally? Turns out, alot. 

What I learned about myself during a global pandemic:

  1. I was in complete denial about where I was in my grief journey. I honestly thought I was doing well and functioning, which I was, however, life was crazy and we were always doing things so it was easy to bury what was really going on. Getting into a lockdown, with nowhere to go, forced me to deal with the emotions that were right there under the surface. With the use of my mindset tools I have to say I’m in a way better spot than I have been in my entire life.
  2. I am not quite as social as I thought I was. As much as I love people, I enjoyed not having to attend social functions and just being able to slow things down. 
  3. I am super attached to my family. I mean, I knew I was, but now I REALLY KNOW. Being away from them during the lockdowns has been absolute torture. I’m just happy and thankful that between lockdown periods we’ve been able to be together.
  4. I found some hobbies. I love birds and I love photography (and the combination of the two)and I really love writing. Both of these hobbies have been a fantastic creative outlet for me and have been incredibly therapeutic.
  5. I am more productive working from home and I love working from home.
  6. I love shopping online, even for groceries. I would have everything delivered if I could. (we are almost there).
  7. I’m a pet person.
  8. I have awesome cooking and baking skills which have served me well, especially when bread was scarce and everything was closed (no takeout)
  9. I don’t need a gym to get in shape
  10. I am very open to a power greater than myself.

Cool and Awesome byproducts of the pandemic for me:

  1. I started this blog!
  2. I got really dialled in with nutrition and exercise
  3. I got out way more in nature
  4. I got really consistent with meditation
  5. I took long breaks from drinking
  6. I started coaching for Beachbody
  7. I discovered Epicure
  8. I got to spend tons of time with Mike
  9. I appreciate my family WAY more
  10. I get to work from home 
  11. I can identify a lot more birds now
  12. I got a nice camera and I’m getting better at using it
  13. I did multiple puzzles
  14. We did a few road trips and had fun exploring
  15. I reconnected with old friends and found friendship with people that I didn’t realize I would.
  16. I got a new grandson!

The pandemic has been awful in so many ways. So many lives lost. So many businesses lost. So many people are struggling with mental health. Kids not being able to be normal kids. I am not making light. I know that I am so incredibly fortunate to be able to work and be safe and healthy here at home.

 I have been up and down mentally but I chose to write about the positives today because that is what I am choosing to do from a mindset perspective. Let’s focus on the positive so that is what we continue to attract to ourselves.

Is there anything you learned about yourself during the past year? Did you develop a new skill or hobby? Comment and let me know!!

Patti

xo

Knowing your worth

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I’ve been talking alot this week about knowing your value. Since going back to my Barre Blend workouts and doing the accompanying daily affirmations again, it’s really had me thinking about this topic.

There is such a misconception out in the world that if someone values themselves and therefore carries themselves differently that they’re either arrogant, selfish or greedy.

I’m going to start here: it’s not selfish to know what you’re worth and that translates not only to taking care of you and your mental and physical body but it also goes with monetary gains.

So speaking about monetary gains.

When I read You Can Heal Your Life by Louise Hay, she talks about not undervaluing yourself. For instance, you are an artist. And you undercharge for your work, and then you struggle to pay bills while doing what you love. That is a prime example of someone not knowing their worth. This person doesn’t see their value, so therefore they don’t think others will either.

Now, let’s talk about not taking care of yourself mentally or physically. When you don’t know your value, you don’t take the time to take care of these things. The rationale sounds so noble: I don’t have time because I’m always working..I don’t have time because I have kids..I don’t have time because I volunteer in my spare time.

People, not taking care of YOU, means that you are valuing everyone else above you. You are putting out to the world that every other person’s needs are more important than your own. It’s not noble. It’s sad.

When we value ourselves enough to take good care of ourselves first, we are happier, healthier and wealthier. It puts us in a better situation and headspace to help the people we so value in our lives.

I saw online this week something that hit this home in my heart: When you’re on a plane, listening to emergency instructions, you are told to put the oxygen mask on yourself first before assisting others. Why? Because you can’t help someone else if you’re dead.

I urge you to start prioritizing yourself and really know what you’re worth. It will open doors you never thought possible.

Patti
Xo