A Licensed Therapist's 5 Truths to a Life Worth Living

1. If you don’t use it, you lose it.

Isn’t that the freaking truth? Body, mind, heart & soul. They all need your attention friends. Your body needs movement. Your mind needs stimulation. Your heart needs love and connection and your soul needs to feel fulfilled.

2. When something hurts, stop and listen.

I mean this on various levels; physically, mentally and emotionally. Our pain is speaking to us. Our job is to pay attention and to decode what it's trying to tell us. If something is hurting, whether it be your physical body or heart; stop, listen and give yourself some space to work it out. Take time to ground and allow the message that wants your attention to come through. 

3. Learn to Sit With Silence.

Sometimes there’s nothing to say. Learning to sit in silence and not fill the space, both verbally and externally will help you stay more clear and centered. When you're not trying to fill the space, it’s always interesting to witness what comes up to fill it besides you.

4. Practice Trusting That Life is Happening as IT Should.

Things have an interesting way of working out if you can genuinely remove yourself from the drivers seat of your life. Like anything in life, when you let go of holding on so tight, things have a way of falling into their own natural rhythm.

5. When Someone Shows You Who They Are, Believe Them The First Time.

This is an Oprah statement that really resonated with me. It’s so easy to validate and create a story that excuses negative behavior of the people around us. On the flip side, when someone who you don’t know well or at all, really shows up for you in a positive way, that’s important to pay attention to as well. People are constantly showing us who they are via the way they treat us and others and through their actions. Who you let into your life is a big deal. Pay attention to the character of others.

Cheers.

* Image taken by Amy Lynn Bjornson.

Go Toward What Scares You (Tips to Work Through Fear)

Oh, fear, that thing that keeps us from what we really want. With the topic of fear coming up so often this week in the sessions with my clients, I feel moved to write about it today, so here it goes………

Fear is something we all have to face at one point or another. Some of us face it and conquer it more frequently than others. Like many things in life, the more you’re exposed to something and prove to yourself that you can “handle it,” the less “scary” it becomes. 

Fear is no different. 

If you live your life facing your fears, generally, you’re living a life full of taking more risks and chances without knowing how things are going to work out. The more you face fear and realize that it’s not as “scary” as your clever mind tricks you to think, the more momentum and strength you have to stand up to "fear" and do what feels true for you. When you feel and face your fears on the regular, the benefit is that more opportunities and options will come your way.

On the contrary, if you have a habit of turning away from what’s scary, that action breeds the natural consequence of having less options to pick from in the game of life. Fear can be super paralyzing. It can keep you frozen in a stagnant zone of your life. Fear keeps us bored. It leads us to feel stuck because when we're not facing something scary, we’re not going to live up to our full potential. Needless to say, this leaves us feeling unfulfilled.

You get what you give in life. Therefore, when you learn how to face scary and uncertain situations, you will be rewarded for doing so. The energy that you “put out there” will attract the result that you get back.  

There seems to be a misperception that some of us are immune to fear. You may have heard someone be described as “fearless,” although, there is no such thing. The reality is that fear is a natural human emotion that we all feel and have the option to face at one point or another. When we learn to tolerate feeling fear and mindfully push it aside, while carrying on with what we want to do, we can conquer our fears. On the other hand, when fear overcomes us and swallows us up, it leaves us stuck, avoidant and leads us to live “smaller” than we’re meant to live. 

I’m a HUGE believer that in order to get anywhere cool and rewarding in life, you have to do things that freak you out, scare you and make you uncomfortable. Straight up; discomfort equals growth. This concept can be counter intuitive because we’re taught early on that when something hurts or causes us pain, we should avoid it. (Sometimes, yes, this is true.) Although, with that said, I’m referring to pain that leads to growth and discomfort that leads to positive change.

This blog post is a reminder for, both me and you, to go straight toward things that are scary. There’s such big rewards in facing things that bring discomfort. 

Keep me posted on what’s waiting for you on the other side of your fear. This is what I know for sure: It’s gonna be good.

* The above image was taken by San Diego based Lifestyle & Wedding photographer, Amy Lynn Bjornson.

*Jewelry on model by Curated Collectibles. Instagram: @handmeetssky