Finding your bliss

Finding Your Bliss

- Haidee 1 Comment

MAKE YOUR BED AND LIE IN IT

Part 5

You may always have known what “floats your boat” or you may have spent much of your life in vague or outright discontent because your existence so far has been some other director’s movie when you should have been directing it yourself. Whatever the case, you need to grab the director’s chair ready to re-invent yourself and your life, and start making the movie your way, from the heart. If you need some help to dig out your authentic desires so you can turn them into a stunning script, there are many wonderful books available to show you how to do this, including one called ‘Simple Abundance’ by Sarah Ban Breathnach, from which the following excerpt has been taken:

The key to loving how you live is in knowing what it is you truly love. ‘To know what you prefer instead of humbly saying Amen to what the world tells you that you ought to prefer, is to keep your soul alive,” 

Robert Louis Stevenson reminds us. Keeping our soul alive and nurturing our creativity is paramount in our quest for fulfilment , and it is only after we acknowledge our inner needs that we can harness the energy necessary to manifest them in our lives.

“It is inevitable that when one has a great need of something, one finds it,” Gertrude Stein reminds us. ‘What you need you attract like a lover.”

                                                                      Refined from  ‘Simple Abundance’

To discover your ‘bliss’ you must first discover what pleases you, that place where your heart leaps for joy.  Follow your instincts – they are the signposts to an exciting and fulfilling life. Choose paths that feel appropriate to you and follow them wherever they lead. There is a journey and adventure ahead, no matter what your age or circumstance. You are being called, and opportunities will always make themselves available to you when you follow this call.

Each of us is called to be courageous and trust the voice within. When you do so, every cell in your body is alive. There is an amplification of life and consciousness. You may not know what your next step is, but the adventure has begun.

Your experiences in life are unique. No-one has lived a life like yours before. Nor will anyone have your particular opportunities and talents. It is the uniqueness of your life’s journey that gives you the potential to contribute so much.

                                                                                             From ‘Happiness

Whatever the components of your “big, fat dreams” the same principles apply when it comes to living them.

Bliss-Low

Tell your  children…

No-one knows how long their time on earth is going to be, so when we are of an age to understand that this is our one chance to get it right, we should find the things that sing to our soul and make them our driving force.

Having a fulfilled soul will bring us joy when all is going well, and solace when life is difficult.

The songs will change with different phases and decades, but you must always follow your bliss.

Your Attitude

- Haidee Leave a comment

MAKE YOUR BED AND LIE IN IT

Part 4

Knowing how to achieve inner equilibrium is important, but your attitude towards life makes or breaks the quality of your life’s journey.

—- The way you touch life is the way it touches you back. Touch it with love, and love will flow to you. Love life and it will love you back.

—- You see in your life essentially what you believe. If, for example, you were to believe strongly in scarcity, think about it regularly, and make it the focus of your conversations, you would probably see a great deal of it in your life. On the other hand, if you believe in happiness and abundance, think only about them, talk about them to others, and act on your belief in them, it is a very good bet you will see what you believe.
From ‘You’ll See It When You Believe It’

—- Practice being positive . A positive mental attitude (whether it sounds old hat or not) is what you have to integrate into your life until it becomes a part of you. Initially it may not be easy, but the more little successes and joys and good outcomes you clock up and take note of, the more you will trust in the concept, and the easier the climb will become. Soon, you’ll be adept at it.

A positive attitude means looking on the bright side, finding the best in things, believing that what you want to achieve can be done. You harbour no negative feelings towards yourself, your capabilities, your destiny. As we noted before, everyone has lows in their life, but they shouldn’t be invited in because you’ve been standing at the gates of life shouting “Hey! Over here!”. Your life can be better and happier because that’s what you expect.

—– Day to day contentment is something you can make for yourself by trying to keep your mind constantly on the pleasant aspects of life and the things that can improve your situation. Try to forget (and avoid) everything that is irrevocably ugly, irredeemingly depressing or totally mundane. This is perhaps the most efficient way of minimising the factors that can induce stress, while at the same time filling your life with a soft shine that will show itself to others, too.

Cultivate agreeable thoughts; be friendly and smile a lot; focus on things that will enhance the quality of your days. And keep a healthy sense of humour – learn to laugh with life.

Resolve to see the world on the sunny side, and you have almost won the battle of life at the outset.

Sir Roger L’Estrange

Finding My Bliss

- Haidee 3 Comments

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My mum was a big believer in having a passion. A love. A bliss.

Before she died she wrote a book called ‘Make Your Bed and Lie In It’. She had written many books in her lifetime but this was written in the years after her breast cancer was discovered and she lovingly had it printed and bound for the all the women in her life. My strongest memory of this book was having just started working at the printing company that 13 years on I still work at. Part of my job is to bind and when she came home with this book that she was so proud of, I proceeded to tell her that the coil on it was too small. I was 19 and thought I knew it all and for some reason, I just couldn’t let it go. It really upset her and to this day I still feel absolutely terrible for making a big deal over something so minor when it was something so important to her and something that she had put her heart and soul into. Isn’t it funny the things that we remember? I get teary just thinking about it now and how naive I was to only be worried about something as silly as a binding coil that made it hard to turn pages when she had spent months pouring her heart into writing it.

The reason I share this story with you is that I want to do her proud and I want to share with the world her wisdom and writings. I truly believe that in doing so it will be a healing and learning experience for me and it will be a tribute to the beautiful talented woman she was. And because I have yet to find my own bliss.

Once upon a time I was a writer. I guess you could say I still am in some respects but after her death I stopped many of the things I loved to do. I once was a painter. A poet. An aspiring novelist. Then she died. I lost myself in other distractions. First came my new boyfriend. Then came a proposal. A trip to Europe. Wedding planning. A wedding. A first home. The prospect and excitement of starting a family. Infertility. IVF. A long awaited pregnancy. A baby boy. A surprise pregnancy. Another baby boy.

But who am I now? Other than mother and wife. A year and a half on and I feel the strongest desire to find my own bliss.

She wrote:

Too many people feel they need to ask, 

What has the world given me?

But they should be asking,

What have I given the world;

And if you have given generously of yourself,

If you have contributed things of value and beauty,

You shouldn’t need to question how fulfilling your life has been.

You will be blessed with riches.

Since the birth of the idea to start writing a new blog I have evolved in my original plan of writing a more ‘traditional’ mummy blog to writing from the heart, whatever that may be about. To collaborating with my mum to create and write something a little different. I will of course write about motherhood and my boys but it will also be a blog about discovering who I am after all this time and finding my ‘bliss’. Perhaps a chance to pour out my own heart and soul the way that she did in writing her book. To grieve. To remember.

Maybe it will also help you to find yours.