365 Inspirations—330: Setting Intentions

Leading a Workshop at Kalani on the Big Island, Hawaii on Intuitive Writing

"I had let go of WAITING for anything. I had moved on to the next creation and while I was in the act of creating, this good news came through. And that is how it has happened again and again...."—Katherine Jenkins

Yoon and I are offering a very special retreat for the New Year. It's called Setting Intentions: An Intuitive Writing, Collaging and Yoga Retreat. You can find out more about it on the side bar of this blog or on my Yoga and Writing Retreats page HERE.

I am a BIG believer in setting intentions. All the best things in my life came to me by doing this. I have notebooks/journals full of pages which state my intentions and an art presentation book full of collages (like vision boards) that I've created on retreat and in my own free time.

I can tell you one thing I've learned for sure: These methods, which activate a different part of the brain, WORK.

But they don't work in the way you'd like them to. The intentions you set for your life come when they are ready to come. Sometimes they slip through the back door or sneak up on you when you've completely forgotten about them.

If you are waiting for something to happen, you may be waiting for a lifetime. The best things in life come when you least expect them to. Of course you have to do the groundwork, but let go of the outcome. It's that simple.

Lots of people quit before they even start. The road may seem long or difficult, but I truly believe that the FIRST STEP is just as important as any other step towards living a life that is uniquely yours.

Intuitive writing, which I'll talk more about in my retreat, has helped me in uncovering my subconscious mind. That's where the juice of life lies. If you've ever had a hunch, a vivid dream, an inner calling or a gut feeling, you are tapping into that authentic part of yourself that wants to be front and center in your life but has somehow taken a back seat to the 'rational,' 'practical,' or 'realistic'. Not that these aren't important in life, but they've somehow taken over the wheel completely.

They took over the wheel in my life and still sit on my shoulder and tell me to 'get real' from time to time.

But what is 'real'?

Intuitive writing and collaging are playful ways of bringing back that childlike innocence and purity to our lives. Somehow, in our need to be mature or grown up, we've lost touch with that purity. Instinctively, we all know what makes us happy and what fills us with joy, but it's easy to lose touch with that as we get older.

Do you feel happiness and joy in your life? Do you like the way your are living? Are you completely satisfied with your life?

If you can say "yes" to all these questions, I congratulate you!

I wasn't able to say "yes" to all those questions. I didn't know what I really wanted until I started to creatively explore this area of my life through writing and collaging. Meditation and yoga also helped shed light on that inner part of myself that had been buried beneath a pile of 'have tos' and 'shoulds'.

Many years ago, while in a long course of meditation, I saw an image of my very first book. I saw the title Lessons form the Monk I Married. I saw the entire book, with all its pages and chapters, as if someone had flipped it right in front of my face.

At first, I was irritated by this. After all, I was there to meditate. I was in a serious, long course of meditation. I wasn't supposed to be daydreaming about a book.

But it kept coming back again and again and again...

In 2012, that book was traditionally published exactly how I saw it in my mind's eye.

A few days ago I was lamenting that I hadn't heard much about my book lately from my agent. I was worried and thought I needed to do something more.

Today, while I was working on material for my upcoming retreat in January, my agent contacted me to let me know that I had received an offer for the simplified Chinese rights of my book. That meant that my book would be available in Mainland China! The complex Chinese rights had already sold, which covered Taiwan, Macau and Hong Kong, but this was the cherry on the cake and I did NOT know it was coming.

I had let go of WAITING for anything. I had moved on to the next creation (my upcoming retreat) and while I was in the act of creating, this news came through. And that is how it has happened again and again....

Only through my own experience can I say for sure that this works.

I invite you to attend my upcoming retreat to experience how you might put these tools to use in your own life. If you can't attend, perhaps you know a loved one, family member or friend who might find this retreat useful. I'm also available for personalized Skype sessions on this topic.

And now a few questions for you...

Do you feel you are living the life you were meant to live? If not, what would it take you to get there?

365 Inspirations—274: Writers and Readers

Photo of my cousin reading my book!

"One must be an inventor to read well. There is then creative reading as well as creative writing."—Ralph Waldo Emerson

If you've written anything in your life, you are a writer. If you've read anything in your life, you are a reader.

You may not like to call yourself a writer or a reader and that's just fine.

I think it all depends on how you want to be identified. You can call yourself whatever you want to call yourself. Just because you work in an office doesn't mean you have to call yourself an office worker. If you don't have a job, you don't have to call yourself unemployed.

You decide.

I'm teaching a small business ownership class to ESL students this quarter. When I volunteered to teach the class, I questioned how much I actually knew about the subject. Turns out I know a lot more about business ownership than I thought I did. My husband owns a small business and I guess I sort of own my own business too—I write on this blog and I'm the author of a book.

I identify myself as an author/blogger and I appreciate and am inspired by all writers big and small. The same goes for readers.

I try and tell my students at the college that they can be whatever they want to be and open up any kind of business they want to open up, BUT it should be something they are interested in.

This blog here is a creation of mine I started in 2009 when I had absolutely no idea about how to start a blog, just like so many of my students aren't exactly sure how to start their own businesses. That's not so important at this point. The important thing is that they are taking steps in the direction of one day becoming business owners.

The steps I took in creating and nurturing this blog were such important steps for me and they changed the course of my life.

I appreciate you taking time to read this blog and to write thoughtful comments. You are both a reader and a writer just by doing that :).

I'm on blog post 274 today and it's a new month! It's October...happy October to you all.

I've been writing every single day here for 9 months! I can't promise every post will be life changing or earth-shattering. I'm writing about the small things that inspire me. I've written about everything from doorknobs and socks to the sun and the moon. You name it, it's probably here. In fact, I could use a few inspiring post ideas from you all and I'm open to guest posts on inspiration.

Today all the writers and readers out there are my inspirations. Without one, there wouldn't be the other, so my hat is off to you.

Do you consider yourself a reader or a writer? Neither or both?