Can you recreate a feeling of being on the sunny beach?

If you are dreaming about next vacation on the beach, but for some reason, you can’t go there now,  there is a great option to do it virtually!  Of course, a virtual vacation is not exactly the same as the real one, but it is very helpful for stress relief, mood improvement and simply energy boost. Plus, no money spent and no need to take days off. Devote to yourself only 10-15 minutes of your time and you are on the beach.

Find a quiet place or simply use headphones with soothing music, sit or lie down. If you are familiar with walking meditation, you can as well do it when you walk or even run!

If you are sitting or lying down, I would suggest to close your eyes fully. If you are walking or running, you can simply look down, so your eyelids are half-closed and you can concentrate on your imagery. For a moment, focus on your breathing. Breath steadily and calmly. You can use any approach to reach calm meditative state. I find, that one of the most effective and fastest is to imagine yourself going down the stairs. You need to imagine it in this way that you really start feeling that you are walking down. You can imagine as many stairs as you need to, until you reach hypnotic trance. If stairs don’t work for you for some reason, imagine a fast elevator, that goes all the way down to the last floor. You can count yourself down from 10 to 1.

Let yourself float down either on the stairs or an elevator or just by focusing on your breath. As you reach calmness and peace, bring up in your memory or just imagine a bright sunny day and you are on the beach. Start, by recreating how the sun feels on your skin, what smells you can smell around, what sounds you could hear?

Continue your imaginary journey by walking down, closer to water, where you stop, take a deep breath and just watch the waves. Fresh breeze plays with your hair and warm sunrays re-energize you… Spend few moments there, without thinking about anything. You are on vacation, on the beach. Notice the sand, it’s temperature and texture, the sky, the trees.

Notice how good it feels to be outside, in nature. Take few more moments, observing the beach…The sea shells, the waves, blue sky… You can simply “float” in this state, without focusing on anything specific but rather just enjoying the moment, being re-energized by the sun-rays…

If you would like to, imagine going for a dip or a swim, visualizing how waves are washing off any negative stress from your body, your mind…

If you have a moment, you can “stay” on the beach, perhaps seeing yourself doing yoga or just walking along the shore, otherwise, slowly bring yourself back to reality, feeling refreshed and energized!

Open your eyes, stretch or shake your arms, smile, voilà!

Welcome back from your virtual beach vacation! Make it a habit, take yourself to virtual vacation every day or at least once a week, absolutely free, satisfaction guaranteed!

Why do we get anxious or stressed?

If you observe your reactions carefully you might notice that some of the days you feel stressed and anxious, while others you are completely calm and peaceful. Sometimes, it is not easy to find out what exactly affect us.

We have so many inputs – people, environment, weather, food and of course, our past experiences.

I believe, that knowing the root cause of an issue is important, as it can help to either eliminate the trigger or to correct our reaction to it.

There are few different options to do find the root cause. One of them is close monitoring on your emotions and feelings. It is much easier to manage and stop your reaction, if you catch it at the trigger moment. However, even if you missed this very moment, a retrospective observation can help you to find it.

Either you are deep in your emotion or it is just starting, I suggest to take a break and find a quiet place where you can concentrate for few minutes. It doesn’t have to be long, even 5 mins will help you to set yourself back to balance.

Once you are in a quiet place (it can be even a restroom, if you are at the office or if children don’t give you a minute to breathe), sit or lie down and close your eyes. You might find the your thoughts are racing and you can’t find why do you feel so, because you are kind of stuck in the circle of your emotion itself.

If required, do self-hypnosis to feel calmer and then start going back in time observing what happened and when did you start getting off the balance. What was the trigger? It can be a thought or somebody told you something or it could be a situation that reminded you about some unpleasant experience from the past.

Once you are able to see where did you start feeling down, stressed or anxious continue your inner investigation further. Ask yourself if it reminds you any situation from the past. If so, remember the previous situation and change the picture in your mind. If you think this is nothing to do with past focus on the trigger and change your reaction and what happened as well.

You can change it in any way, the important outcome of this exercise is to alter the way you react. Your subconscious mind doesn’t really differentiate between a simulation and reality.

Once you changed the picture in your mind, observe your emotions, do you feel better? If you are not there yet add more changes to your picture – change colours, make positive things brighter, make negative things disappear from the image.

Practice your new reaction in similar situations. Still being triggered? Repeat the exercise or find hypnotherapist to help you to correct it, as many issues are coming from the past and it might be challenging for untrained mind to find this connection.

In either way, I wish you success and please don’t be shy to ask questions or more tips how to handle particular situations and reactions.

Do we have a set destiny?

I think everyone thinks about their destiny in life at least once. Some of us have found it, others did not.

For years, when I was looking for my destiny, I noticed different subjects coming to my head, but the picture was not clear.

I knew my interests, I knew what I would like to do, but destiny as the target of my life never appeared.

I believe, that everything in this world happens for a reason and if so, should not our life have pre-set destiny?

Some New Age theories suggest  that we are born, knowing what we shall bring to this world and we forget it as we grow older.

That would be easy to test, knowing hypnotherapy. I have decided to regress to my childhood to find the answer.

During hypnotherapy session, I had been regressed to my early years.  I was about 5 years old, holding my dad’s hand, walking down the street from the music school.

Focusing on the reason for regression I tried to discover my destiny, but the answer I got was there was no destiny. There is nothing, that I had to follow to. My future was unlimited and I could choose whatever I wanted to. My destiny has to be born from my choice.

When I was 5 year old, I did not have any worry, I was not thinking about the past or the future. I was fully experiencing only that moment in which I was walking with my dad. This feeling is indescribable.

I felt so light and joyful. I felt as if it was real.

Everyone once knew how to live in the present moment; we just forgot it as we grew older… We forgot that our future is unlimited and we can achieve anything!

We are the ones, who choose the destiny and we are the ones who either follow it or not.

I would like to encourage you to allow yourself to remember how you felt when you were a child. Notice, how light and positive your thoughts were and how much you believed in yourself.

Once you remember it, please keep these feelings. Life is simple when you are present to it!

What is possible today?

Often we think that challenges and obstacles are coming to our life from outside. Does not this way of thinking leave us as powerless, passive viewers of our own life?

What if we actually create our reality and our future? What if everything around us is a reflection of our own beliefs? If you consider yourself fully responsible for your own life, would not it put you in a position of power?

Even if today you are not right where you want to be, I invite you to shift your perception about life and your involvement in it:

– Become an active and responsible participant in your life. Take action and create new possibilities for yourself!

– Base your goals on your dreams, stop limiting yourself by fear and doubts.

– Remember yourself being a child, when you were sure that you CAN DO ANYTHING, if you wish so. What happened to it? Why today do you think in a different way? “Past experience, life…” – you are saying…

Look closer – these are the limits that are set by no one but by YOU.

– Stretch and exercise your mind, don’t let it be lazy watching TV. Train it! Tame it to listen to you.  Stop following negative thoughts and start creating new, positive ones.

– Every time you feel out of control with your own emotions – look deeper. What is there that got you out of balance? Why did you react like that? When was the first time that you felt the same? Can you see a similar pattern?

It is probably hard to believe to some of us that we are locked in the cage of our own mind. NOTHING ELSE! Is reading these words causing you to shake your head and say “NO”? Is this not a definition of your own mind? If so, then this is YOUR REALITY and until you realize that what shapes your experience is your own beliefs you will continue to feel trapped in obstacles that “somebody else created in your life”.

Do you still find it hard to believe? Ok. Then I will ask you another question:

Do you like the idea about being able to create the life you want to?

THEN WHAT IS STOPPING YOU FROM TRYING THIS ON?

This is your FEAR. Fear that it might not work.  And this is why, in advance, you choose to believe in the theory that you are powerless!  Notice, it is not even logical!  Can you now see that your mind really limits you?

You can live your life in fear, suffering and anger, blaming and complaining about your surroundings or you can MAKE A CONSCIOUS CHOICE TO STEP IN AND DIRECT YOUR LIFE!

I encourage you to give yourself a chance to become THE ARCHITECT OF YOUR LIFE!

TRUST YOURSELF!  If you don’t why and how can others trust you?

LOVE YOURSELF, YOU DESERVE HAPPINESS AND FREEDOM!

BREAKTHROUGH AND MASTER YOUR LIFE!

Do you live your life to the fullest?

I invite you to take a close look at your life.

Do you really enjoy it or you are just pretending, convincing yourself that everything is ok and you life is fine?

Look deep inside. If you are excited about your life – congratulations! You live it to the fullest, not wasting a single moment! Your life is amazing!

If in answering those questions you felt some heaviness in your chest or disappointment  or felt any other sign that made you realize there is something in your life that you don’t really enjoy then this now is the time to wake up and to start creating the life you want!

Some of you may believe that you cannot live your dream life. This is the first and only limitation that you have. The reason that you do not see this limitation is because you are just used to viewing life through this “filter”. You see your life through this filter believing that “life is just like that” and ignoring the fact you have a blindfold on.

Recently there was an experiment where people were asked to wear eyeglasses, one half of the glasses were blue and another half was red. Looking through the glasses one would see everything in blue if they looked left and everything in red if they looked right. The requirement was to wear the glasses all the time. After a week participants were interviewed and asked what colors do they see when they look left and right. The answer was is that they did not see any particular color anymore! Their brain adjusted to those glasses and could not differentiate the color of the glass. The filter became invisible!

The same happens with us in our daily life. Once, we are used to a particular belief or filter – it becomes transparent and we can not separate it from the reality!

The exciting part of this is that we can learn to distinguish our limiting beliefs and eliminate them!

Follow the exercise below:

– Take a particular area of life where you experience some struggle (health, money, relations, anything else?)

– Imagine that somebody asked you what you think about this area

– Write down the answers. Be honest with yourself.

– Look at your answers. These are yours limiting beliefs.

Once you know these beliefs you are already half-way to a breakthrough: once you know the problem you can fix it!

Next step is realizing where those beliefs originate from. Is it a childhood experience, trauma or just your parent’s words that created them? How old were you then? Are these childhood beliefs that you have just held onto?

DO YOU THINK THAT AFTER THIS MANY YEARS IT STILL MAKES SENSE TO KEEP THESE BELIEFS???
Why?
Do they benefit you?
Do you see the limits created by yourself from having this belief?
Write all this information down and absorb it.

What is YOUR CHOICE-to keep this belief and continue suffering or you are ready to give it up?

If you are ready to give it up, just make the conscious decision to rewrite this belief into a beneficial and empowering one.

Do you still hold onto the old belief? Re-work the previous steps, show YOUR MIND all the benefits of giving up this belief, convince yourself TO GIVE IT UP!

YOU CAN DO IT! YOU ARE THE ONE WHO CAN AND WILL CONTROL YOUR MIND!

Love is in the air!

Would not it be great to base our every relationship on love?

How is it possible, you might ask: “I just cant stand some people and now I should give them love, what else?”

You will be surprised but if you come from love, the first person who will be full of joy is YOU! You don’t need to love everyone in a way that we used to think about love. Feeling that I would like to discuss today is sharing Universal love with every creation. How?

Well, the first of all start with yourself:

Do you love and accept yourself or you constantly listening to your inner criticism ?

Even if you make a mistake (we all do them:) ), this is not a reason to stop loving yourself!

It is great to do some self-reflection on what had happened but don’t punish yourself by cutting love or to belittle yourself. This will only make you feel worse. Since we all interact and affect each other, when you feel down it is not only about you.

Consider following concept: when you are happy you share happiness, when you are upset you spread a bad mood, just like a virus.

Your happiness is yours responsibility towards the world.

It might be challenging to be in full integrity all the time, but…
we are strong creatures and can do it!

We are fully capable to empower and inspire ourselves and others!

The road to heaven…

I believe that the road to heaven is paved with good intentions.
I don’t know if there is a heaven after life but I believe that there is one here, in this lifetime and there is no need to wait in line to get there.

All you need are good intentions towards everyone in the world, including yourself.

If you always act from a base of love and integrity you already live in heaven – you enjoy your life and feel happy!

However, we all still have those moments, when we lose balance and get angry, irritated or upset.

Avoiding lows and getting back to where you feel great, find the state when your mental dialogue is quiet.

Each of us has a unique way to tune into absolute calmness be it by meditating, painting, hiking in the forest or resting on the beach. Whenever you reach this state you are actually in a state of hypnosis.

If you find it challenging to fully relax, please read my self-hypnosis post.

Once you reach this state take mental notes on how it feels, so once it feels different you recognize it right away.

Consider this state as your moment of truth.
Make this your core state.  This is the “Real You”, pure with no worries and negative emotions.

Monitor yourself. Now, when you know how the “Real You” feels, notice every small change and when something brings you lower stop those thoughts right away. The earlier you notice unwanted feelings, thoughts or emotions the easier it is to stop them and the faster you can get back to the “Real You.”

By acknowledging all of your emotions, you will not let them control you, but in opposite – you will be the one who is in control , the master of you life.

Are you a tree-hugger?

TreeYogaPoseMany of us often notice how good it feels to be in the nature. Sitting on the beach or strolling in the forest re-energizes us. Can it be that fresh air, trees and water simply calm us down?

If we think about it a little bit deeper, it is absolutely logical that in the nature we feel better than in high raises, malls or offices. Our evolutionary environment for thousands of years has not been composed out of concrete, fibreglass insulation, wire, synthetic carpets and multiple electrical gadgets of our century.

Today’s technical progress touches every aspect of our life and we have developed strong dependencies on using it’s products daily. However, we are still human beings and our roots belong to nature.

Our heart’s beat, brain waves, breathing pattern, our mind and body are lacking to be synchronized with natural resonance of Earth.

As any other living organism, Earth has it’s own pulsation, which is called Schumann Resonance. The fundamental frequency of Earth resonance is found to be 7.83Hz, though it may vary up to 11Hz, influenced by day-night changes, seasons, moon phases and sun activity. Interestingly, our Alpha brain waves happen to be in the similar diapason, from 8 to 12Hz.

This would explain why in nature, where interference of electro-magnetic waves is weaker and concrete box does not block it, we feel calmer.

There are many articles written today in regards to electro-magnetic and overall pollution on Earth. While it is important to have an awareness about it, an obsessive focus on such subjects might actually increase the feelings of anxiety and stress.

Instead of, let’s focus on how we can reconnect with the balancing vibe of our nurturing planet.

One of my favourite and easiest ways to do it is… to hug a tree!

A friend of mine once gave me this advice. At first, it sounded a bit awkward, but I did like the idea.

Hugging trees brings to our life a deeper connection with nature, balance and mindfulness.

When in the forest or in a park, choose the tree that appeals to you. The tree, that will give you the balance and energy. Some people like hugging big and tall trees, while others choose young and thin ones. It can be a different tree every day – depending on your mood and the environment around. Just listen to your heart.

It might be challenging to get into a calm meditative state as you are hugging the tree, if you are to concerned with what people might think about you. Either drop the fear to be judged or, if a fact of being seen hugging a tree still overwhelms you, find a peaceful and quiet location, where you can be by yourself, surrounded by trees.

At first, I like to touch the trunk with my fingers or place my palm on it. Then, I start contemplating the details of the bark. I learn all the small curves and cracks, visualizing the strong, vibrant energy, flowing behind it. I hug a tree, as if I was hugging a real person: with my arms open wide, I look up, to see all the branches and leaves. Then, I press my chest against the trunk and put my ear close to it, imagining I can hear the powerful stream of the energy inside.

I like to visualize the energy as light, flowing from the crown of the tree all way down, to the roots. I observe how my energy shifts and blends into the flow, slowly becoming one with the tree.

I attend to each sense, that I experience, observing it with calmness. What do I see around? What do I smell? What do I hear? What do I taste? What are my thoughts and emotions?

I become present to my breathing. Breathing in and out, steadily and peacefully. Sometimes, I close my eyes, other times I like to keep them open.

I imagine how the beams of sun or rain drops are purifying and energizing me as if I was a tree, that always stands there…I visualize how stress and any other negative emotions or pain leave my mind and body through the mighty roots of the tree to the core of Earth, where it is going to be cleansed and recycled.

Usually, I spend like that at least few minutes, feeling so serene, breathing in the freshness of nature.

If I have some extra time I like to turn to the tree with my back, leaning on it trustfully. I imagine how the time changes from morning to night and then next morning. What is the regular day for a tree? How do days pass for the trees? What would I see if I stood there for the whole day? A week? A month?

Changing the perspective from our busy world to the surrounding and life of the tree is helpful for achieving balance, clarity and mindfulness. The whole experience allows me to feel as strong and rooted as a tree and it feels wonderful!

Do you hug the trees?

If you do – share your way of doing it! What do you feel when you hug a tree and how does it impact your day?

If you don’t – would you consider it?

In Light,

Olga Blushtein

 

 

Walking meditation.

Many of us probably went into meditative state during walks in nature without even thinking about it. One of the ways to go into this state is by starting focusing on your breathing. You can either choose a particular spot of your body to observe the changes as you inhale and exhale or visualize how air travels through your airways, coming into the nose, going into the nostril, your throat, filling your lungs, opening your chest and abdominal. As you exhale, again, do it with awareness. Continue focusing on your breath and at the same time start listening to all the sounds around, and continue walking.

You can walk as fast as you want to. You can even jog or run. Just keep focusing on your breathing and sounds around. Then see if you can add in an awareness of the temperature outside. Notice how does it feel on your skin. So far, your mind is occupied with at least 4 different activities: walking, breathing, listening to the sounds, sensing the temperature. Bring an awareness about how your arms feel and how your legs feel and it is already 6 things that your mind does at the same time: walking, breathing, listening to the sounds, sensing the temperature and how your arms feel and how your legs feel.

Visualize your walk a run. Imagine that you become lighter and you are just slightly touching the ground. Notice how good, relaxing and at the same time energizing it feels. Continue focusing on your breath, the sounds around, the temperature outside and how your arms and legs feel and how relaxing you feel already. Thinking of all these 7 things allow yourself to think about nothing except of only one thing – how good and relaxing you feel.

Let all other thoughts, worries, doubts or issue to simply fade from your mind. Like as if it was gone with the breeze. No need to do anything, no one is expecting anything from you at this particular moment, simply disconnect from any chores, upsets, previous conflicts or unfinished business. Breath in the fresh air and enjoy your walk or a run or as I call it a “flight”, as it often feels that you are not running but floating above the ground.

When you are reaching completely calm state, you can always install some positive suggestions for yourself as this is the moment when you are highly suggestible and your subconscious mind is open for re-programming.

There is no need to do anything special at the end of your meditation. You can just slowly bring yourself back and continue your day with a big smile! Share your smile with others, make their day brighter to!

Positive stories for children.

If you are a parent, perhaps you caught yourself, while reading an another book to your child, that this is not how you would want your child see the world. ‘Cinderella’, “Princess and the pea”, “Sleeping beauty” – these stories are well-known around the world and repeated by parents, teachers and children. These stories were written many years ago and survived till our days. We see these stories as “classic” literature. Though, looking at these stories a bit closer, did you ever analyse what these stories actually teach? Cinderella is indeed a sweetheart hard-working girl, slaved by her sister and stepmother, getting zero attention or help from her own father. Why is that? Why should we consider it as a normal situation and base our children understanding of the world on a story like that? Why a girl should feel embarrassed and ashamed because he was not comfortable sleeping on the pea and what is so bad about being sensitive?

Why an ugly witch from “Sleeping beauty” ruined a young adult life, who fell asleep and woke up, subconsciously awaiting  for a prince on the white horse to kiss her?

Why should we install these endless fears in our dear children? Don’t we have enough fears generated around?

At some point I have decided that I want to read different books to my little ones and share with others my concern about what we are feeding young brains.

At the beginning, I was changing the stories, as we were going through the book, making the story brighter and helping my children to create positive beliefs. Then I decided to translate and adapt a “Seven petals flower” story, by V. Katayev and publish it in Canada, so not only my children, but others can enjoy the story as well. This is how the series of positive stories has started. Some of the stories I have written by being inspired from daily observation of nature and life. Other stories came to me as a “make over” from old stories. I call them as “old stories in a new light”.

There is nothing bad about old stories and I am very grateful and thankful we have kept them for history. Reviewing such stories we can see how society was developing, what was important and how life was back then. The way I see it is that now we live in a different point of time. Our views changed and some of the stories become outdated or not applicable under new conditions. Evolution of our mind pushes us to move forward, to become more self-aware society that is constantly developing towards being more humanistic, loving and caring.