Monday Mindfulness

Cultivating Strength, Joy, Calm & Resilience


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Branching Out

Today I want to be a tree,

providing steadiness and sturdiness in the world,

receiving assuredness and ease,

knowing precisely where I stand.

Anchored in the strength of the earth.

Expanding gently, respectfully and gratefully into the air and space of others.

I want to be a source of clearing of thoughts,

feelings,

worries,

suffering,

not absorbing it as my own,

simply removing the impurities and toxins.

I want to breathe in and receive

the light

the water

the nourishment of family and friends

the success of work

the richness of creation.

to feel my beautiful roots and my capacity to grow endlessly upward and outward.

I embrace the simultaneously simple and complex nature of me

Inviting gratitude and joy as my guides

Growing ever stronger and steadier in who I am

and how I show up in the world.


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Shape Shifting

For just a moment,

I breathe.

Stories begin to evaporate.

Expectations

Fear

Doubt

Dissipate

Ceasing to exist without the stories.

Spreading my fingers, I release the hold,

Unbridle the mind

Widen the heart

Let it all go.

Clearing spaces

I grow lighter

Longer

Looser

Expanding

Into lightness

I deepen my capacity

I feel into my power.

My power is

Joyful

Assured

Easy

Bright

Clear

Not taking on a particular form, shifting fluidly between states and forms as they serve me.

Diving into limitless potentiality

Alive with creativity

I can be

or do

anything

Or nothing.

Feeling into my greatness

There lies freedom to choose.

Growing

Into my capacity.

I am powerful

Whatever shape I choose.


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Self-Care Plan

Ease in movement

Confidence in heart

Peace in spirit

Clarity in thought

Patience in receiving

Kindness in expression

Assurance in being

Joy in doing

Stillness in action

Flourishing intuition

Thriving in grace

Abundant in gratitude

Living in love


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Bad Me

Jealousy points towards unmet desires.

Disappointment implies that joys and successes rely on others.

Anger signals the breaching of important boundaries.

Fear rises from insecurity and a false sense of incompleteness or inability.

These are not bad or broken parts surfacing to limit and constrict.

These are powerful markers built into me that arise over and over again not to point out my weakness, lack, or flaws but to strengthen my knowing and clarity.

My power lies in being not formed by them but informed by them.


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Free Will, Free Me

When I am afraid, I just need to pause.

When I am tired, I just need to soften.

When in doubt, I open my hands and stretch my fingers to let go of the burdens I am carrying.

It’s time to release the bags full of insecurity, judgment, and uncertainty,

to relieve that heavy weight off my shoulders,

unlock my hips, knees and feet

and walk confidently into the less than clear,

the less than perfect,

the unknown.

I will be patient with myself and with others.

In that patience I will grow confidence.

I will seek compassionate words that promote truth to foster ease, healing, and happiness in myself and others.

I will not need approval,

and in fact,

I will revel in my stumbling.

I will cultivate pauses to inquire,

and to see the unknown

not as daunting,

but as freeing.

The only thing I will hold onto

is the hand of the little child within me.

Seeking love and assurance from within,

I will open my hands, spread my fingers and let everything else go.

I will no longer grasp limitations that hinder my ability to see and be grateful,

that mask the abundance before me,

the joy within me,

my capacity for unconditional peace and love,

and my ability to know in the unknown.


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Divine Wisdom

I’m not waiting.

I’m allowing.

I’m unlimited creative genius,

Divine!

I am not waiting to be rescued or for my destiny to find me.

I am getting out of the way!

Waiting means I’ve got it all planned out and everything is going to be step by step as I envision.

I know that I don’t make it happen.

I allow it to happen.

So many other forces are at work. Why would I think it’s just me marking my path.

It’s me counting on you and everyone and everything around us.

In that way I cannot control the direction I go in.

All I can do is know that I am headed that way.

I know what it feels like to have the future I am destined for.

The how is irrelevant.


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Infinite Possibilities

There is not just one way to be happy.

one form of happiness.

We are limitless beings with infinite possibilities for happiness.

There is always the potential to find fulfillment, accomplishment, significance, and satisfaction in absolutely every experience.

When locked into one way of feeling or recognizing happiness, faith and trust are trampled.

Happiness is bypassed for the more familiar feeling of disappointment, failure, lack, and shortcomings.

When we step out of the familiar way of seeing things

and can imagine the potentiality for happiness in every moment,

we cannot help but to live happier.


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Compass Rose

To the north I find the earth and sky.

The east brings new beginnings.

The west lowers the veil of transition, the mark of endings.

It is in the south where I meet my soul.

We sit and watch the rising and setting sun cast against the earth and sky over and over again.

Humbly and joyfully admiring the ever changing landscape of transitions, the beauty in the unknown as it takes shape each dawn and dusk, and the vast expanse of opportunity in between.


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Bursting with Power

It doesn’t matter how much power you have if you don’t allow it to burst out and serve you.

So many times I have used my power to suppress my own needs, my voice, my self-advocacy…all for the sake of “preserving the peace.” But, how can peace be preserved when a battle rages within me to suppress my own feelings and needs simply to avoid the risk of imploring you to revel in my power to know myself. Ah, yes, there is a chance that you will be wounded in the wake of my power, but that wound I can hold with much greater compassion than the devastation that comes from turning my power against myself.

My power transforms from exploding within to bright and shining rays of love and truth when authentically attuned. I begin to recognize that honesty is a demonstration of true prowess and the recognition of woundedness an opportunity to be powerful in kindness, forgiveness, and grace.

My power magnifies when I allow it to burst out and serve me, so much so that it can hold all of the discomfort, all of the woundedness, all of the needs and feelings — yours and mine – and in that outburst peace is preserved.


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Living in the space of AND

White flowers

Dark textures

Straight lines

Soft edges

Living wholeness

Dried pieces

Flowing lines

Still emptiness

Warm touches

Cool feeling

Hope and breath

In the spaces

Photo courtesy of Susan Kerr.