Creating kicks ass. I know this, because I had my first free three-day weekend in a while (meaning not only did I not have schedule work, but I also had no other plans made) and I chose to focus on Freedom Junkie and create. And you know what? It was awesome. Of course, it would have even more awesome if I were able to do what I did in the wilderness with a view of snow-capped rugged peaks (hmmmm…perhaps that magazine cover with me using an iPad while backpacking isn’t so far from reality as I had originally thought…). However, being able to look out my window and see the distant hills, the blue sky, these gorgeous tree blossoms, and know that I would have uninterrupted time to create was such an indulgence.
I have often thought about the time available to us in our youth. Sometimes seemingly wasted time, with us lacking the wisdom to “make the most of it.” I have often wistfully yearned for the freedom to have a thought, and ponder it for hours. The hours! What a luxury. And here I gave myself permission to geek out on Ziji for an entire weekend. No answering any calls except from my partner or my mother. No errands. No laundry. Just pure creation. And I couldn’t wait for it to start!
The result? No more jotting down notes while driving, no more dictating blog ideas into my iPhone. No wishing that I was able to completely focus on my genius work (not something I am good at, or even excellent at, but something that fills my cup, that nourishes my soul). I immersed myself in Ziji and it was phantastic;)
I created four new Free Training Calls (aka Jedi Juice). I named them Jedi Juice because of the total badass-ness of the power of creation they open you up to…and because Yoda es el señor). I decided I was going to offer them for free. I got super psyched to pick the topics most important to my Ziji peeps. I got uber invested in offering unbeatable value in everything I offered. I stayed up until 4am writing. I slept in. I did yoga. I went on runs in the hills. I had ideas and I thought about them. For a long time. Uninterrupted.
Revolutionary.
I was on a creative retreat, and I’d never really taken one before.
The first day of this stretch, I held a Ziji Up Mastery Program group coaching call. Then I sat in a steamroom for 30 min and afterwards I got a 90 minutes massage. Then I sat in the steamroom again. Then I created two new programs that night. Talk about return on investment! I stayed up awhile, but I was jazzed.
So…create! Go forth and freakin’ create! When you are doing something you love, all the work and what you create it is merely love manifested – not burdensome.
What fills your creative soul? Is it singing? Writing? Dressing up or doing your hair or makeup? Is it planing a backcountry expedition? Is it organizing a trip to a remote part of the world? WHAT IS IT?
You must find the answer if you don’t know it yet. If you do know it, DO it and BE it now.
We are creative beings, and to manifest our creative destiny is one of the greatest gifts we can leave this world. If you don’t think you’re “creative” because you don’t know how to draw or because your outfits are boring (“How did she EVER think of wearing socks on her ARMS?” you wonder), or because you’re a science geek, think again.
We are all creative, and we must find our own way of expressing it. Maybe for you it is dance, writing love letters, telling jokes, or cooking, mountain biking, or building a boat! Those are creative acts. Those acts are you expressing yourself in your own way, doing it in your style.
Bring it. The world will be a better place because of it.
Note: Ana Neff is a personal life coach, guide and FreedomJunkie™ She helps individuals awaken their lives of freedom and personal success with confidence, clarity, self-love, and passion. Her monthly Freedom Junkie ™ eZine goes out to hundreds of subscribers. Her Full-On 365 blog posts stem from her commitment to living full-on, every day, for 365 days in a row. If you are ready to take your life and your world to the next level, you can learn more about her coaching programs and download her FREE Getting Clear Guide by signing up at anaverzone.com! Sign up for her next FREE Jedi Juice Training call at anaverzone.com/jedi-juice
It has been a totally “normal” last few days for me. However, to most it seems quite abnormal. For example, in one day, I saw midwifery patients, had coaching clients, was the model for a magazine cover shot at sunset (I got to hike during it!), taught a super fun Ziji Up Mastery Program workshop in the evening, and then filmed a late-night video audition for an internet TV channel (no, not porn). Oh, and I also snuck in a yummy dinner and pinot noir wine flight at our local wine bar.
OK fine…that was kind of more busy than usual. But really, my days usually seem to be full of random things…and I LOVE IT! I also love how I love seemingly opposite things, and that I can have my cake and eat it too. I like that I can say, “I love this and that, even if it doesn’t make any sense to you.” Life is so much more fun that way.
Someone once asked me what kind of music I liked. I remember their amusement when I said, “Anything, as long as its good!” Made sense to me…
I love having days like the one I described above, where every moment is full-on. And I also love having days where the best and most full-on thing that happens to me is that when I am feeling overwhelmed and about to crumble a bit, I find a little love egg hidden by my partner (see a picture of the one I found two days ago above). And, despite my exhaustion, I can still feel his energy and passion and adoration fill me. And I cry a little but it feels good.
one of the LOVE eggs I found the other day
I had another day recently where I delivered 2 babies in 4 hours all before 5am – one a little teeny baby that was so tiny (duh…redundant), and she was miraculous and a little fighter and she did awesome – and I was so pooped but so happy! Then I designed a webpage for my audio and video files of my most recent Ziji workshop and had so much fun with everything I learned!
I do yoga and run, and also love sitting on my ass and watching movies. I drink wine and even take drags off my friends’ cigarettes when I am feeling particularly spunky and still do 3-week cleanses with no alcohol/sugar/processed foods/gluten etc. I love spending every moment of the day with my partner and also the stretches of days I have all to myself. I love my sweet home with a sauna and view on the hill, and yet I also love the simplicity of living out of my backpack and everything I own fitting into my car.
I love my fit body, and I also feel indebted to the lessons I learned from having cancer, and the person I have become as a result. I love getting stinky in the mountains and having battle scars of cuts and bruises from the climbs I’ve done, and I love shaving my legs and feeling them silky smooth. I love having bursts of energy (like when your puppy does sprinting laps around the house) that inspires me to dance naked in my kitchen (maybe with a wig on), and also I love surrendering to massages and long stretches of time staring off into space and watching the clouds or the stars so long that I see them move.
I love a lot of things, and sometimes that makes me a busy, whacky lady. But as long as I also take time to recover and rejuvenate and be present for the people in my life, it’s all good by me.
One day I caught one of my exes looking up symptoms on the computer trying to diagnose me. He concluded I had ADHD. I concluded it was high time for a divorce.
I am abnormal baby, and I freakin’ love it! In fact, I think I was born with an innate fear of being normal, or average, or (gasp!) bored.
I am meant to be extraordinary – and so are YOU!
So. Be. It.
Note: Ana Neff is a personal life coach, guide and FreedomJunkie™ She helps individuals awaken their lives of freedom and personal success with confidence, clarity, self-love, and passion. Her monthly Jedi Juice ™ eZine goes out to hundreds of subscribers. Her Full-On 365 blog posts stem from her commitment to living full-on, every day, for 365 days in a row. If you are ready to take your life and your world to the next level, you can learn more about her coaching programs and download her FREE Getting Clear Guide by signing up at anaverzone.com! Sign up for her next FREE Jedi Juice Training call at anaverzone.com/jedi-juice
This post will be in bullet points, because things are a bit full on to write a loquacious one. You see, today I’ve got to drive from San Francisco to Oregon, and tomorrow I’ve got several kick-ass Ziji client calls, then a photo shoot (for the cover or a local magazine! Yeehaw!) then a Ziji Up! Workshop in the eve, and finally, I’ll record a short video on confidence for a colleague’s uber popular website. Whew! So whaddya think…bullet points OK? One full-on event for each of the last few days
• Day 57 – created an awesome teleseminar for April on adapting to change. I can’t wait to get on the phone with more Ziji peeps and talk about skills for Jedi mind juju to get through times when it feels like you’re swimming rapids in life. PS: it’ll be free so can an eye out for details next month
• Day 58 – I honored my needs and didn’t go out late with friends, even though I really really wanted to. Instead, I went to an amazing workshop during the day, then had a lovely evening of tapas with my “lil’ sis” and fell asleep by 10pm after sending a mushy text to my man. It was a sahweet slumber;)
• Day 59 – drove to San Francisco and actually enjoyed the views of Mt. Shasta and the valleys and sunset along the way (instead of multi-tasking), and did a lot of catching up with people I hadn’t spoken to in awhile. And i also got more clear about the upcoming FullOn365.com logo (creating is so fun! Especially with people you dig;)
• Day 60 – had an amazing evening with two of my besties at Sol Food (amazing Puerto Rican cuisine) then hot tubbing under the stars, then champagne and chick flick. I slept sooooo well;)
Girlfriends kick ass.
Note: Ana Neff is a personal life coach, guide and FreedomJunkie™ She helps individuals awaken their lives of freedom and personal success with confidence, clarity, self-love, and passion. Her monthly Jedi Juice ™ eZine goes out to hundreds of subscribers. Her Full-On 365 blog posts stem from her commitment to living full-on, every day, for 365 days in a row. If you are ready to take your life and your world to the next level, you can learn more about her coaching programs and download her FREE Getting Clear Guide by signing up at anaverzone.com! Sign up for her next FREE Jedi Juice Training call at anaverzone.com/jedi-juice
“Rather than letting our negativity get the better of us, we could acknowledge that right now we feel like a piece of shit and not be squeamish about taking a good look.” ~ Pema Chodron
I had a very sad experience this past week. A family had lost their baby, in the hospital, within 24 hours of their birth, from an accident. The air was heavy with compassion, as well as the underlying fear that something just as horrible could happen to us – by accident. The intensity of the grief was palpable, and I was in awe of how humans can actually make it through an experience like that.
Many people do get through life’s formidable challenges and continue with their lives, albeit changed. I got to thinking about resiliency, and how some people seem to take life’s blows – big or small – with relative grace, and others get thrown and sucked down by relatively less stressful events. What was up with that?
What helps people bounce back (or stay steady to begin with)?
I’ll give two examples of different perspectives that I’ve seen recently (names changed, of course).
If life could be graded, Christina would give hers an F.U. Her new job is stressful, her teenage daughter is struggling with depression, she and her husband are fighting a lot lately, and she hates herself for the extra 30 pounds she’s carrying.
Christina feels hopeless and her life seems depressing and dark. Every setback reinforces her feelings of pessimism and grim certainty that nothing will ever get better.
Barbara’s struggles seem just as daunting. Her husband just lost his job, two months after the birth of their first child. She is responsible for her elderly mother, who is becoming increasingly frail. To make things worse, her best friend and main support is moving to another state (yikes!) and the landlord just raised the rent by $200. Despite all this, Barbara gives her life a strong B+ and knows there are some A+wesome days ahead.
I’ve done my share of studying and exploring mindset and it’s effect on resiliency and optimism. A lot of my interest started because I grew up in the ghetto, and I wondered why some of us “got out,” and others didn’t. Most people don’t believe me when I say that about the ghetto, but then I point out that the movie Dangerous Minds was based on my neighborhood, and then they believe me.
Growing up, I watched most of my friends join gangs, drop out of school, and have babies by the time they were 16. I had a gun pointed at my face, point blank, when I was 15. When he pulled the trigger he aimed it just left of my head to be funny. To top it off, I had a schizophrenic bipolar father, an (ahem) challenging and aggressive mother, and I walked around – literally – with holes in my shoes.
But dangit, if that paragraph had you wanting to buy me a Coke, let me tell you: I was somehow happier than my other friends were.
For a long while I thought I was messed up somehow. For realz! Like I didn’t understand some “mature” truth about life that somehow made it suck more.
Then I started to pick up on the fact that despite my father being schizo-affective, when he wasn’t having paranoid delusions, he was actually super funny and positive. And my mother, while needing a few courses on anger management back then, was utterly unfailing in the way she supported anything I wanted to accomplish, and bounced back from adversity pretty quickly. And it was REAL! For both of them!
Somehow, our life wasn’t “ideal,” but we were going to have enjoy it anyway. And my parents always said, “Obstacles can become opportunities.” (We heard a baptist preacher give a speech at a graduation once, and he went through each letter of the alphabet like that, e.g. challenges into consciousness, and they stuck.) My one other friend from my neighborhood who went to college? Also optimistic. Ever since we were kids it was obvious.
Snap! I started thinking that while optimism wasn’t the only reason, it was probably a big one.
Using the examples above, I’ll bet your bottom dollar that unlike Christina, Barbara sees her setbacks as temporary obstacles to be overcome. To her, crises are a part of life, opportunities for her to gain wisdom and courage.
Put simply, some people are optimists and others are pessimists. However, optimism isn’t an accident–it’s a skill that can be learned, one that can help us feel better, resist depression and greatly improve our lives. I learned it from my parents, for sure. Studies have also shown that some part of optimism (a SMALL part) is indeed a biological wiring of our brain but – HEY! If you have pessimistic tendencies, don’t go down the “permanent” path – it is malleable! You can teach yourself, and learn, how to be optimistic. And that means you can teach yourself to be healthier and happier.
I Can Learn to Be Optimistic? Prove it!
OK.
Psychologist, clinical researcher, and bestselling author Martin Seligman has spent 25 years studying optimism and pessimism, and is one of the founding leaders of the Positive Psychology field. In his book, Learned Optimism, he states that pessimistic thinking can undermine not just our behavior but our success in all areas of our lives.
“Pessimism is escapable,” he writes. “Pessimists can learn to be optimists.” Does this mean when you are optimistic that you walk around ignoring suffering and negativity? Hellz no! It means you learn to not spiral down into a place where you are doing yourself more harm than good. And it means you don’t spend all your energy trying to protect yourself from suffering because you get that it is a part of life, so you might as well get on the bouncing-back-quickly bandwagon and learn some skillz. It means that you give yourself and others the benefit of the doubt, and you have a more positive experience in life, and more happiness, even if nothing else in your life changed.
So why not, right?!
By altering our view of our lives, we can actually alter our lives, Seligman says. First, we must recognize our “explanatory style,” which is what we say to ourselves when we experience a setback (aka gremlin alert). By breaking the “I give up” pattern of thinking and changing our interior negative dialogue, we can encourage what he calls “flexible optimism.”
He believes that focusing on our innate character strengths (wisdom, courage, compassion), rather than our perceived failures boosts not just our moods, but our immune system. Research has shown that optimistic people tend to be healthier and experience more success in life; therefore, he encourages parents to develop the patterns of optimism in their children.
Practicing “spiritual optimism” is another way to improve the quality of our lives. Joan Borysenko, psychologist, speaker and author of several books, including Fire in the Soul, encourages people who experience feelings of despair and hopelessness in times of crises to remember it takes courage to live, and that we can find that courage by facing our fears, finding support and using meditationm or prayer.
Similar techniques outlined by Dr. David Burns in his book Feeling Good: “The New Mood Therapy,” have been effective in treating depression. He believes that changing our thinking has a profound effect on our moods, including cases of severe depression. It’s not our lives that depress us, he writes, but our thinking about our lives.
There are multiple theories out there, and a growing body of decades worth of research, supporting the idea that unless Christina begins to change her thinking, her life’s outlook may remain bleak and dismal. Barbara, however, is likely to experience more satisfying and fulfilling years ahead because she believes her life is filled with “challenges and opportunities,” rather than “struggles and obstacles” (same same, but different).
Where do you fall on the scale of optimism vs pessimism? Check out the UPenn site where they have all sorts of fun positive psychology tests (Optimism Test, Compassionate Love, Authentic Happiness Inventory to name a few) that might help you learn more about where you can grow, and where you’re already dropping into how awesome YOU and your life are.
Keep an eye out in April for my upcoming FREE teleseminar, “What the Hell Just Happened!? Adapting to Change.” I’ll probably change the title, but that sounded fun for now;) If you want to get on the wait list, let me know here and I’ll send you early registration (I will limit it to 20 people so we can interact during the call).
In the meantime, try a daily practice of waking up and practicing gratitude first thing in the morning (=before you even get out of bed, even before you open your eyes, or have sex). Its a great way to set the tone for your day’s mindset.
Note: Ana Neff is known as the Ziji™ Mentor. She helps individuals awaken their lives and personal success with confidence, clarity, and passion. Her monthly Ziji Up! eZine goes out to hundreds of subscribers. If you are ready to take your life and your world to the next level, you can learn more about her coaching programs and download her FREE Getting Clear Guide by visiting www.ZijiLife.com
Me and Maria, a nurse’s aid, in the DR after the birth of this beautiful baby
Warning: this post will be sad and possibly considered graphic for some. But living Full On isn’t about always being stoked and easy to read. I have had 4 hours sleep total in three days. Lately I’ve been helping out the midwife group even more, as one of the midwives is on an extended maternity leave and another tore her rotator cuff. This means I am often Full On pooped when on call. But despite the fatigue, I wanted to share briefly about living full on when you are tender inside.
The past few days have indeed had me living and experiencing fully. I had a deep appreciation of the fortune in my life and counted my innumerable blessings after being reminded of the deep suffering people can experience in this world – A family at the hospital had lost their child, only 24 hours old, from an accident. I can’t even imagine the heartache and the places their souls and minds must go after that.
Then I remembered my friend and fellow midwife, Joanne Jorissen Chiwaula. She founded the African Mothers Health Initiative in Malawi, and I had the utter joy and honor of going to graduate school with her. She described how they had shelves where they would put the babies that had died that day, which happened every day, and they wrapped them in bright African cloths. I had an image of those shelves with bright bundles representing social injustice and the human condition.
I remembered volunteering in the Dominican Republic and going in to catch a woman’s baby and next to the labor bed, on the cold cement floor in a cardboard box, was a stillborn baby just tossed in there. I cringed in horror, first thinking of this mother I was helping and that she might have to see that right before giving birth. I took my foot and gently pushed the box out of the way as she struggled onto the table, apologizing to the baby in there with my heart. I silently cried inside as I tried to stay present for my laboring mother and her baby.
Later, some friends in the chocolate industry in the D.R. sent a driver with a Mercedes to pick me up in the “bad” neighborhood I was in. That was awkward.
After making sure I didn’t feel scared where I was staying (I loved it! Salsa club just around the corner!), they asked about my day. When I told them my experience in the state hospital, they were in disbelief, even going so far as to say my observation of there being no running water in the hospital – at least on labor and delivery – was a “mistake.” One woman there was even a pediatrician, but she trained in the US and worked in a private hospital. They weren’t bad people. Just sheltered – and passively not facing – the realities of their country,
I told them gloves were a luxury, and I brought mine from the US (on advice) while he local staff washed the ones they had in bleach and hung them in the sun, where they broke down quickly and would tear as you put them on. I had to carry my gloves on my person in a hipsack, as they’d get stolen by the staff wanting to protect themselves from HIV and the other predominating communicable diseases there.
I had flashes of the stillborns I had delivered here in the US, because birth is a “miracle” for a reason – and there are lots of things can can go wrong simply because it can, and can’t be prevented. I remembered delicately handing the swaddled silent babies to their mothers and the thick silence and holiness of the air.
After knowing about this family’s loss recently, I was reminded of all these events in a montage of memory flashes. I became heavy when I thought about how so many people experience this so much more frequently in other countries. I remembered my mother casually telling me that in the Philippines (she’s a Filipina herself), they often say pregnancy is “one foot in the grave.” Dang!
This suffering happens all over the world. And people still get up, and make breakfast for their family, go to work, play with their other kids and laugh with them, and they watch the sunset…the resiliency of humans – and here I particularly bow down to the women of the world – is awe-inspiring.
I let my heart fill with compassion,felt the sadness fully, and let it move through me. I was filled with a conviction to not turn away from the suffering of others. I also vowed to not get pulled under by the suffering of others, because that doesn’t serve anyone either.
The human condition is so fragile, yet resilient and bold. Tonight I go to bed grateful for my life, my blessings, and my ability to change the world and make it a better place.
PS: One book that really opened my eyes further to the huge role of poverty in social injustice is Paul Farmer’s Pathologies of Power. Check it.
Note: Ana Neff is known as the Ziji™ Mentor. She helps individuals awaken their lives and personal success with confidence, clarity, and passion. Her monthly Ziji Up! eZine goes out to hundreds of subscribers. If you are ready to take your life and your world to the next level, you can learn more about her coaching programs and download her FREE Getting Clear Guide by visiting www.ZijiLife.com
Wow…so sometimes when you live full on, the Universe reminds you of exactly how happy this makes her, and how much more beautiful the world is because of it.
When I was facing a serious cancer and going through my inventory of possible regrets, I had but one major one. I was pretty happy about that. I had learned enough to attempt to appreciate life regularly, and had spent all of my 20s adventuring all over the world. I had begun deep healing in my relationships with my parents. I was a whacky but fiercely loyal friend and partner. And I had learned to be compassionate with myself about using the word “regret.”
I had a general rule that if I learned from the experience and made amends for it, I could call it a mistake or a lesson, rather than a regret. But let me tell you this: when looking at not being able to do anything about a regret cuz you may die, even one regret SUCKS.
So…I am guessing you’re wondering: What was my ONE major regret? It had to do with LOVE, of course! I had one great love that I had not fully appreciated or done everything I could for. We met in Kathmandu in our 20s, and all sorts of social “rights” and “wrongs” (too soon after a breakup so maybe I wasn’t clear…having to do the responsible thing…yada yada) kept me from saying “yes” when he asked, “Will you come ride a motorcycle with me through Cambodia and Laos?” Or months later when he came to visit me en route to Antarctica.
Us in our 20s, stuck in Baja during to 9/11(after sea kayaking Isla Espiritu Santo)
We kept in touch, regularly. We had 2-3 hour phone conversations (even until recently!). We tried to date but were always on different continents. Not different continents like North vs South America. Like Antarctica vs North America. That made it challenging.
Then I pushed him away by doing some hurtful things that I didn’t know were hurtful at the time…probably because my heart was closed off after hearing he was dating a woman in Antarctica, or dating a woman in Alaska. Sheesh. How embarrassing. Apparently those things kind of kept him from opening his heart to me anymore then. Fair enough. You can’t expect someone to open their heart to you if yours is squeezing shut.
We talked about “us” and resigned ourselves to the fact that while we both wanted to be together and give it a go, perhaps it just wasn’t meant to be in this lifetime. It was too difficult to make it happen. So we became “just” friends. REALLY good friends. Like he called me from the South Pole, or sent me little trinkets from Egypt or Bolivia when he would barely email anyone else, and called me when he was having a really hard decision to make. Or like I would call him when something awesome happened in my life…like, oh, say…when I got engaged.
We had promised each other we’d tell the other person – not matter how distanced we may ever become – if either of us got engaged. I can safely say we both assumed this was to give the other person a last chance to go for it.
So I called him. And he sounded surprised, then…he congratulated me.
Sigh.
I hate to admit it now, but I was indeed disappointed. It might have been wise to listen to that. It could have spared me my later divorce (albeit an amicable one, for my ex was indeed a super awesome man). However, I was young on my path to understanding my intuition then. I had chalked it up to “grass is greener” syndrome. Plus, he had a girlfriend he met in Antarctica that swam to islands in Fiji with him with a plastic bag tied around their ankle full of their belongings. WTF. How can you top that when you’re stuck doing 12 hour shifts at a hospital while in graduate school in San Francisco (albeit also squeezing in Yosemite walls and climbing trips to Australia, alone)? You don’t. You just are happy for him, that’s what. Sheesh.
In any event, as I was preparing for my cancer excision and renal auto-transplant in 2004, wondering how sick I was (or how sick I was going to be), I thought of HIM. That relationship was my one “What if.” HE was the one thing I had wished I had gone for fully. Not pushing him away. Not making up stupid excuses. Not waiting until it was convenient or easy. And now I was married, and he was about to be engaged (although I didn’t know that at the time), and both our partners were totally amazing. Fuck.
So I let it go.
I KNOW, right?! But I wanted to do what seemed like the “right thing” then… and a big part of me still feels good about that.
In any event, I tell you all this because the Universe is supposed to have come in and given me props for all my full-on living thus far. And she did.
The past few days when I wasn’t writing here, I was fully experiencing love with HIM. I am 38, and I am finally with him. I know now that the decade+ delay was all for good reasons. We appreciate each other even more now, that’s for sure. We learned to love one another as friends. We REALLY know each others’ crap, and knowing that the other person still wants to be with us after all that is rather lovely. And we learned many things in our other relationships that we didn’t have to learn with each other, which surely spared some heartache. And there are many other things to celebrate about having surrendered to the Universe back then. But no matter what, all I know is I am absolutely receiving love from him, fully and completely. And dishing it out.
Yes yes, we are building our lives together, and making all those plans and talking about kids etc. But for me, the point is that I AM FINALLY ABLE TO LOVE HIM FULLY, LIKE I ALWAYS WANTED TO. And I am receiving his love fully, like I never let myself do before. To be honest, even if we don’t stay together “forever,” I can die knowing I experienced my great love. And that is so much better than a “What if.”
Many of you could call my bluff…if you’ve truly been dealing with dying before you were ready before. I have to admit, there’s nothing like that to get you to realize exactly HOW SHITTY it feels to have “What ifs” when you are possibly going to die much sooner than you ever thought possible.
And now I got a second chance. How often does that happen? Probably not often, because actually we also have a huge part in CREATING those second chances ourselves, and we often give up too soon. But having said that, THANK YOU for this second chance (to all involved)!
It wasn’t an easy peasy “I’ll call you and let’s meet up for coffee” kind of thing. We were still almost a continent apart. When we both first opened up to this possibility again, he was heading off to China, and after that trip he returned to his home-base in Alaska (I was currently in Oregon). Getting to be with him took some balls this time around too. I really had to take some risks, and so did he. But it was so worth it. So very, very worth it.
I was talking to a client the other day about wanting to protect our hearts, and I was reminded of my new willingness for it to get hurt again as long as I am honoring my truth all the while. It is NOT worth protecting it at the price of possibly not loving fully again (there are wise ways to do this, but that’s another post;) The risks, while scary, are part of the dealio.
So the past few days have been me receiving fully and loving fully. And I find little notes from him in my stuff, and I watch him sleep and I’m like, “HOLY SHIT! I am with him! Like I always felt I should be! This is SO WEIRD! And so incredibly cool.” Talk about patience and faith and trust. And risk-taking. And … who knows what else.
Us in Mali, West Africa – on a different adventure in our late 30s;)
But what I DO know is that had I not been committed to living Full On, to not making excuses, to not wasting any more of my precious life energy doing anything I do not want to be doing, to being willing to take the risks…I could have missed out on this. All of it.
If you’ve vomited after this, I completely understand. For me, it is The Notebook in real life, after all. Well, The Notebook minus the horse races and white picket fence and white people and one of us being an aristocrat part. Well, minus lots of things from that…but PLUS many more of our own flavahs.
I’ll admit that I own The Notebook, and everyone told me it was Hollywood bullshit, by the way. And yes, I know many of you are devastatingly disappointed by my admitting that, but oh well;) It is the only love story movie I own. The rest are Kung Fu flicks and the Star Wars series. However, I bought it because when I watched it, it reminded me not that my true love was still out there “somewhere,” but that life was too short to make up excuses for not living fully.
I liked being reminded of that, because for me it did so not in a woo woo way, or in a bullshit “Hollywood is trying to make you feel bad about your life” kind of way, but in a “Cut the BS and get off yer ass and go get it, even if you end up disappointing others by staying true to yourself. Life is too short!” type of way. I think it was because I KNEW that was true for me, and I needed to be reminded not to make up excuses anymore. I wasn’t waiting for my prince charming. I just had to have the balls to stop getting in my own way about it.
I still really do believe that it is not about if we stay “together forever” that defines true love, but rather this expansive wholeness that I feel in my heart. To feel this, even only for a brief while, is kissing God. So although I have every reason to believe this is a continuation of another lifetime and will continue to be so, this really, truly, for realz, is enough.
So have you not told someone you care for about your heart? Have you not forgiven someone who desperately wants you to? Have you not apologized for hurting someone, even if you didn’t mean to? Today, PLEASE do something about one thing that you would regret if you put it off. You never know what second chances might open up for you.
PS: I also skied up Near Point and watched cool sunsets;)
At the top of Near Point, Anchorage, AK
Note: Ana Neff is a personal life coach, guide and FreedomJunkie™ She helps individuals awaken their lives of freedom and personal success with confidence, clarity, self-love, and passion. Her monthly Jedi Juice ™ eZine goes out to hundreds of subscribers. Her Full-On 365 blog posts stem from her commitment to living full-on, every day, for 365 days in a row. If you are ready to take your life and your world to the next level, you can learn more about her coaching programs and download her FREE Getting Clear Guide by signing up at anaverzone.com! Sign up for her next FREE Jedi Juice Training call at anaverzone.com/jedi-juice
Yesterday was a mellow day of sleeping, fixing up the yurt, then eating pizza with friends as we watched footage from our epic weekend (see below). There was such an awesome sense of community all weekend, and it was nice to fade into the rest of the week with a nice eve with amigos. It would have been even better had I not had my little uber-sensitive gremlin come up again. It had been awhile, so I was taken off guard. Can I pretty please blame it on my new birth control pills? Arrrgh.
I got all sensitive about how hard I was having to work the past few months and as a result, how I wasn’t as fit as I normally am (because of so many various reasons that we have all made up in our heads about that one before) and not being as, well, fun because I didn’t have as much energy as usual. I did that whole “I’m going to compare myself to other people” crap and that is never a good idea. Then I blamed my partner for comparing me, which he totally wasn’t (You should have seen me try to pull off that one! Good thing he’s on my gremlin’s* ass). Then I felt shitty about all that. Then I felt shitty about feeling shitty because deep down I know my life is sahweet and life is too short for feeling shitty!
Then I did the full on thing and said to my partner, gulp, “I’m sorry for freaking out,” and totally owned my crap. Then today I did my mental Jedi juju stuff and told my gremlin to get the fuck out of my head and heart and let me live the bad ass life I am destined to be living. Yes, sometimes you need to be that harsh with The Gremlin. Sometimes it is good to say something sweet, like “Thank you for trying to protect me, but I don’t need that anymore.” And sometimes you just need to tell it to shut the f#*k up (I am trying to minimize my swearing for my mother…at least for this paragraph).
*What’s a gremlin? A fancy coaching term for it is also The Saboteur. The gremlins/saboteurs are the voices that tell you you are not capable or deserving enough to be happy and fulfilled. Like when one of my Freedom Junkie coaching clients says she wants to write a book, her gremlin says it is too expensive, or that she has nothing original to say. Another client’s gremlin tells her she can’t possibly have a career with her art because that is not “realistic.” One of mine (and apparently of many friends and clients) is that we aren’t worthy of love because if someone really knew who we were, they’d realize we aren’t perfect.
WTF! How crazy negative is that??!!! Very. And we ALL have them. Watch. Just for a day. Or an hour, even. You’ll notice them a lot. But don’t get down on yourself about it. It’s the way our brain works, and it is re-wireable. And you’re not broken because you have them. You are human!
It is best to learn about and acknowledge your gremlins, maybe even personify them (like have them look like the mean schoolteacher or a troll) and then come up with a system to shut them up. Where saboteurs speak from is fear, NOT TRUTH. You MUST remember this. NOT TRUTH.
When you hear a voice of TRUTH, it is very different. It speaks in a compassionate and clear voice. It is not one of fear or anger or belittling.
And know that saboteurs come up right when you are about to do some seriously bad-ass living, like right when you are about to be totally content in your relationship, or right when you are about to feel confident enough to quit your job, or right when you are about to come completely out of debt. Or right when you just had an epically fun weekend with your boyfriend and awesome friends skiing in the Alaskan backcountry, for example. They often cause us to (duh) sabotage our own happiness at these crucial moments.
So get out of your own way, and tell your gremlins to shut up so you can get on living you awesome life. It can be tricky. Trust me: this morning, when I decided not to drop into my saboteur’s story, I had to dig deep to believe that I was not hearing truth in those words, and I had to dig deep to come up with what I knew to be true. It was more difficult than usual because I have been so tired. But thankfully, I’ve had years of practice, which makes it much easier over time (I promise!). If you need some help with your own gremlins, let me know! A team often helps;)
For now, I am going to resume my bad ass life and head out for another ski. Did I mention the sun sets at 8:15 in Anchorage these days. Supah sahweet!
PS: As promised, here is more footage from the past few days:
http://youtu.be/tHlzDWSaCtU
Above is a video of one of our earlier runs
Below is a video of Tony and his dog, Pup Pup, on the first run off the summit of HaleBop (after you’ve admired Tony’s moves, rewind and watch Pup Pup run in his fresh tracks…awesome!)
http://youtu.be/mU_B1wiBo80
Note: Ana Neff is known as the Freedom Mentor™. She helps individuals awaken their lives, their businesses, and their success with radiant inner confidence. Her monthly Ziji Up! eZine goes out to hundreds of subscribers. If you are ready to take your life and your world to the next level, you can learn more about her coaching programs and download her FREE Getting Clear Guide by visiting www.FreedomJunkie.com
Yeehaw! When you need to rest, rest. It’s so much easier living full on when your have the energy to do it. I did NOTHING Days 44 and 45 except sleep in, get a massage, read, and drive to a sweet backcountry Alaskan powder hut. I went to bed those nights and slept HARD.
The day after driving to the hut, we all slept in because the shutters were still on the hut windows blocking out the light. Once up (at 10??!!!) the 8 of us (plus two dogs) made an epic breakfast of eggs, coffee with Bailey’s Irish cream (for breakfast?! Yes! St. Patrick’s Day!). We then donned our wigs to eat breakfast and head out to ski. But before that we had a morning work party and chopped wood, brought it back to the cabin with sleds, and put in a new door on the hut.
After all that we hiked up epic backcountry terrain (BTW if you’re ever cold put a freakin’ wig on your head. They are WAY warmer than hats!) and skied down amazing fresh powder. And I mean AMAZING. Plus the views were epic, the weather was spectacular, and the company was hilarious. Not to mention it was awesome to have two other women along the trip to balance out all that testosterone.
I am not a big skier. When I was younger it was too expensive and when I was older it seemed scary to fall going so fast. But I’ve slowly grown into it after I picked up a pair of tele skis, and am digging spending a lot more time on snow this season;) Plus, Alaskan powder makes in much less scary to fall!
I have a cool videos of us skiing (with me singing really bad operatic soundtrack on one), and will post here in an update. In the meantime, all I’ve got are the wig pictures above.
When I speak of resting, I can’t describe how key it was for me to take time for myself and listen to my body. Rather than forcing myself to go go go
the first day of skiing, I decided to sit atop a ridge as everyone did a lap up and down. I sat there and took in the views, the utterly beautiful silence, the glistening sparks of snow in the sky that looked like fairy dust, and felt the sun warming my face. Granted I was wearing five jackets but it was surprisingly warm on that Alaskan ridge in winter. It felt so good to REST. Plus at the end of the day I wasn’t too tired to don the wigs again and laugh for a few hours. I really was tired at the start. I could feel it intensely. Hiking was so hard. It was barely fun that day…but that all changes soon!
By the end of the day there were 9 of us and 4 dogs in the little hut. That wasn’t quick breeding – we just had more visitors. It felt so cozy falling asleep with every inch of the hut – including the kitchen floor – strewn with my friends and their pups. Even though there was no running water, we cooked on a wood-stove, and heated the place only with wood, it was relatively light work with so many friends.
The next morning was an earlier rise. But I felt fantastic after having a relatively restful day. So fantastic that I boot-packed (aka hiked) up to the summit of Hail Bob peak with everyone even though there was NO WAY I was going to ski down the steep corniced chute from the top (at this point in my skiing life, at least). I instead climbed back down, which many of the skiers said would be scarier for them than skiing down. Just goes to show its all relative!
We got back and there was an Alaskan moose meat chili ready for us after slow cooking on the wood stovetop all day. We all packed up (at this point there were 12 of us and 5 dogs) and I managed to have kept track of all my wigs (thank you, Ashland friends, for lending me wigs for this event;).
We toasted my 8 years of being cancer-free from renal cell carcinoma, gave group hugs, and headed back to Anchorage. That was after falling flat on my back and ass on ice as we packed up the truck. THAT was the most painful part of the whole trip! I always seem to injure myself in the front country.
Pretty full on for a weekend. But that’s kind of how it goes in Alaska;)
Note: Ana Neff is known as the Ziji™ Mentor. She helps individuals awaken their lives, their businesses and their success with radiant inner confidence. Her monthly Ziji Up! eZine goes out to hundreds of subscribers. If you are ready to take your life and your world to the next level, you can learn more about her coaching programs and download her FREE Getting Clear Guide by visiting www.ZijiLife.com
A part of me was secretly excited that my site was down for over 24 hours (all was good – it was maintenance). That’s because I was way too busy to write a post. And that’s the way it has been for the past 3 days, actually. I’ve been so busy, in fact, that I have only slept 10 hours since Monday (and I write this Thursday morning).
Not all of this is due to something “stressful.” I had many amazing Freedom Junkie client calls, helped dozens of women with their lives and their health, and feng shui’d my house so that it looks like a freakin’ model home (it’s on the market, otherwise it would look like its usual bohemian madness self). I also brought multiple babies into this world in the wee hours, and that, albeit not ideal timing for sleep – is always a miraculous time of day. All this was not without the help of other amazing kick-ass women in my life, like my personal assistant Jenna, my medical assistant Claudia, and my organizers Kristin and Cathy (thank you!). But while those events fed my soul, the sum of the whole left me with my ass whooped. I was so whooped, I was brought to tears – yet I was too tired to cry. So I just thought about how good it would feel like if I did. Dang!
So what to do? I am guessing my future post about today – and perhaps even tomorrow – is going to be about Full On Rest. Amen.
from my morning snow run
I’m writing this as I head to Anchorage. Normally I would be super excited to get there. But being as tired as I am, I am not looking forward to having to build a fire when I get to the yurt, or shovel snow. So instead of focusing on that, I am going to book a massage (maybe even massages!), promise myself that if I don’t get to sleep in an hour after arriving I am also booking a hotel room with a jacuzzi tub for the night, and then I am going to plan a spa day with my Alaskan girls. They could use some pampering after all that backcountry skiing we’re going to do;)
It is funny how I have to give myself permission to rest. After ALL that stuff I accomplished, there’s still a little voice telling me I can do a bit more. But who cares if I could!? Just because we can do more, doesn’t mean we should do more. Yes, I am talking to YOU, fellow super-woman extraordinaire. YOU don’t have to either.
Well then, it is settled: today I am choosing to do nothing. I can be gentle with myself and do absolutely nothing. Let me rephrase – I need to be gentle with myself and do nothing. After all, on top of that sleep deprivation, I also passed through the anniversary of my first encounter with The Big C (8 years yesterday!). Yeehaw! C free baby! A cause to celebrate, but also an emotional experience to be reckoned with.
Which reminds me that I had another mole removed from my right shoulder Monday (Day 41), reminding me of my second run-in with the Big C. It was my four-leaf clover mole. I’ve had it forever. I even have a picture of it. But I wasn’t 100% sure if it was changing or not, and I would prefer not to dance with a melanoma again, so I had them shave it off. And to boot, this was at 7am. Ouch.
So yeah, I deserve every bit of rest I can muster.
Was it worth this degree of fatigue? I’ve already mentioned some Full On moments from the past 3 days. Thinking back on others, I also went for a morning run in the snow (while it was snowing!), and that woke me up big time and had me appreciate beauty first thing in the morning, which is always a blessing. I dipped back into my yoga practice, which escaped me for a bit these past few hectic months. I scored some sweet party wigs for a fiesta I am having this weekend, celebrating that 8th year of being free of my renal cell carcinoma, and visited with some girlfriends I hadn’t connected with for a long time (albeit on the phone!). Plus I spoke to my mom, every day, even though I was utterly exhausted.
So when I choose to focus on those moments, yes, it was all worth it. I’d rather have had some of those moments than been asleep. I’d have done it a little differently in hindsight, perhaps. But sometimes we just have these bursts of time where we barely make it over the finish line. And that’s just life. Sometimes you just need to do what you need to do, and try to do it with as much grace as possible.
I am designing my life to have fewer of those stressful bursts, though. I know I can have both adequate sleep and kick-ass moments. “Sleep when you die” is not a funny phrase to someone who has had cancer twice;) And in reality, this was just one of those times in life where all those things HAD to be done – and I did them! So I am celebrating the fact that I kicked some busy ass. And I am SO not doing that craziness again for awhile. Promise. We need to remember to fill our cup!
When we find ourselves in those moments of being stretched to our max, this is where Ziji comes in: knowing – no mater what – that you can do it. Because you have time and time again. And you’re still here, having everything you need inside you to move through this, with grace and courage and a kick-ass attitude.
Add a spoonful of self-love and compassion for this gal. I am heading to bed…after booking that massage!
Note: Ana Neff is a personal life coach, guide and FreedomJunkie™ She helps individuals awaken their lives of freedom and personal success with confidence, clarity, self-love, and passion. Her monthly Jedi Juice ™ eZine goes out to hundreds of subscribers. Her Full-On 365 blog posts stem from her commitment to living full-on, every day, for 365 days in a row. If you are ready to take your life and your world to the next level, you can learn more about her coaching programs and download her FREE Getting Clear Guide by signing up at FreedomJunkie.com! Sign up for her next FREE Jedi Juice Training at FreedomJunkie.com/jedi-juice
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Creating kicks ass. I know this, because I had my first free three-day weekend in a while (meaning not only did I not have schedule work, but I also had no other plans made) and I chose to focus on Freedom Junkie and create. And you know what? It was awesome. Of course, it would have even more awesome if I were able to do what I did in the wilderness with a view of snow-capped rugged peaks (hmmmm…perhaps that magazine cover with me using an iPad while backpacking isn’t so far from reality as I had originally thought…). However, being able to look out my window and see the distant hills, the blue sky, these gorgeous tree blossoms, and know that I would have uninterrupted time to create was such an indulgence.
