Let’s talk about it. What experiences in your life have become emotionally toxic? What are you holding on to that hinders growth? What are you not saying or doing to avoid conflict, or for fear of being misunderstood?
This I Thrive Self-Care Meetup is all about identifying energy zappers – those things, places (and yes, unfortunately, sometimes people) that consistently keep us tapped out and stressed out.
Whether you’re able to pinpoint your “zappers” right away or have to give it more thought, we all have had (at some point or another) experiences that left us feeling depleted. Why? There are a multitude of reasons – some of them only you know. However, at the top of the list for most women is people-pleasing, more specifically, not saying no to things we don’t want to do.
We’ll learn and discuss eight mindfulness practices that will support (1) letting go of what no longer affirms and honors you, (2) setting healthy boundaries, (3) creating experiences that align with what you genuinely want.
Please join us October 28 for Change What Drains. Get your ticket, spread the word, and of course, bring a friend. Let’s finish the year strong – refreshed and with clarity for 2019.
What you’ll need + other things to know:
Bring a journal. (All other materials/resources will be provided).
Dress is casual + comfortable.
Refreshments will be served.
There will be a self-care gift box giveaway at the end of the meetup, too! Some lucky participant will be the winner of a box chock-full of good stuff.
About I Thrive Self-Care Meetups:
I Thrive is an affirmation, a commitment to apply practical self-care regimens that motivate women to make themselves a priority. I Thrive is sisterhood, a chance to hold space for one another as we let go of what no longer serves us, and to make room for new experiences and clearer, healthier perspectives.
Meet & bond with other women who are just as committed to self-care breakthroughs and transformations.
Receive encouragement and guidance that help your daily practice.
Know you’re not alone on this path. We’re all figuring this self-love thing out together!
Be in a space that honors vulnerability, and also provides preparation for the week ahead.
Dig in and give yourself the love you deserve, the necessary and invaluable me-time that feeds the mind, body and soul.
Love Yourself First! Friday invites women to tell their LYFF stories to inspire and empower others to also fiercely demonstrate self-love in action. The questions are meant to shed light on various ways our featured Phoenixes are making self-care and intentional living a priority.
This week’s Phoenix is Kadijah:
How do you love yourself first? What does that mean to you?
I love myself first by being organized in my day-to-day activities. Once I am organized, I can consciously take into account setting aside some quiet time. It does not mean I need to leave the house, but it does mean up to two hours (at minimum) each week I will self-reflect. Getting up fifteen minutes earlier in the morning just so I can have a cup of coffee in silence. I reflect on my accomplishments thus far and what I would still like to achieve in my life.
As a single mother of two girls, finding those few moments for myself is not always easy, but it is necessary for my well-being. At times, when I need a bit of a boost I’ve placed notes on the bathroom mirror reminding myself I am just as worthy of receiving the love that I exude to my children and others on a daily basis. I build in time at least once a month to have fun with friends.
Loving myself means knowing my worth, understanding my limitations and pushing myself to move past them. Loving myself is having the confidence to keep fighting even when others doubt my abilities, proving to myself that I am a strong body, strong minded, and strong willed individual.
What actions demonstrate the self-care you provide to your mind, body and soul? (Exercise, healthy eating, spiritual practice, etc)
Self-reflection is key for my self-care, taking time to look at my life as it stands and having confidence that further greatness is to come. When feeling frustrated, I leave the house to jog for a while; I also like to find a good book that will allow me to escape from reality and find solitude in someone else’s story. Finally, I pray and have faith that God will only put in front of me the challenges that He knows I can get through.
Is there an obstacle or challenge that you’ve overcome that led to a deeper love for who you are?
I am currently 41 years old. Twenty-four of those years were spent with my now ex-husband dealing with various levels of mental, physical, and sexual abuse. For many of those years I lived on hope, the hope that our relationship would reach the level of love and respect that I craved. Not only did we never achieve that, it became more and more toxic over the years. Finally, I had to face the reality that I was not living, but just “surviving.” I put his needs and wants above mine. I forgot to love myself. Instead, I tried unsuccessfully to be the person that he wanted me to be in hopes that my life with him would improve. Two children and 24 years later, nothing was better. I did in fact, learn how to hide my unhappiness and bruising from everyone – including my family and friends.
I had a feeling of hopelessness, and I gave up thinking I could be anything other than the abused wife and mother of our children. When faced with so much violence, I became numb and emotionless. I ended up losing myself. I no longer knew my likes and dislikes. I went into survival mode just to save myself and my children from harm. I wanted out but didn’t know how to go about doing it. Finally, I gave up on the hope that things would improve with my husband and started the journey toward divorce. He knew he was no longer in control, so things exacerbated to a level that gave me no choice but to remove my children and I from his hold. It has been a long process, but one with many tears of joy instead of sadness. My husband is incarcerated for the abuse and we are now divorced.
My children and I have finally reached a point of happiness; happiness and freedom are feelings that I never thought I would obtain.
What have you learned from self-love?
Self-love has taught me to consistently evaluate what makes me happy, making sure the goals I have set for my life are truly my goals and not what is expected of me by others. Self-love is having a free body and mind to do whatever I want. No longer will I allow others to control my feelings and desires. Self-love is when I see the smiles on my children’s faces, confirming that I am finally loving myself and doing what is right for my family. When people ask me how I am doing, my response is “Living and loving life.”
Inspired by Kadijah’s powerful LYFF story? Well, let her know in the comments.
Do you want to share your self-love story? Send an email HERE. Just put “My LYFF Story” in the subject line of your email, and you’ll be contacted by the Phoenix Team with details on how to participate. Be sure to read some of our other inspiring stories.
This is the first self-love story of 2016, and it’s exciting to bring it your way.
Love Yourself First! Friday (LYFF) is part of The PRC’s Shed Lightseries collection. We invite women to tell their LYFF stories to inspire and empower others to also fiercely demonstrate self-love in action. The questions are meant to “shed light” on various ways our featured Phoenixes are making self-care and intentional living a priority.
This week’s brave Phoenix to kick off the new year is Candi:
How do you love yourself first? What does that mean to you?
Loving myself means giving myself exactly what I need. I do this by acknowledging how I feel in every moment and staying conscious of my inner dialogue. I pamper myself and also take myself out on self-love dates.
What actions demonstrate the self-care you provide to your mind, body, and soul? (Exercise, healthy eating, spiritual practice, etc).
I practice a vegan diet, exercise, meditate, journal, spend time in nature and create art.
Is there an obstacle or challenge that you’ve overcome that led you to a deeper love for who you are?
The most recent obstacle I’ve faced was starting my business; I had no idea how to, and I have little to no support. But my persistence and authenticity kept me going, so along the way I’ve been adopted by many soul sisters. Overcoming this fear made me appreciate my creativity, and I proved to myself that I can be in business and be myself: kind. It made me trust myself more and my intuition.
What have you learned from self-love?
That it’s not how others treat me that matters; it’s how I treat myself that counts.
Candi is Founder/Creator of Lioness Healing Arts. Be sure to check her out and also follow her inspiration and newest jewelry creations on Instagram.
Share your self-love story! Send an email HERE. Put “My LYFF Story” in the subject line, and you’ll be contacted by the Phoenix Team with details on how to participate.
Love Yourself First! Friday is a self-love series created by The Phoenix Rising Collective. Phenomenal women who fiercely demonstrate self-love in action in order to build and sustain healthy, positive self esteem share their stories. Be sure to read some of our other inspiring stories.
Your fitness journey is your journey and looks completely different than your sister/mother/best friend/neighbor.
In my professional life I am in the middle of an executive leadership training. With the help of my mentor, we have decided I need to work on patience. Not just how to have it, but the awareness of when it is necessary. So many times in life we want something and we want it now, but in reality that rarely happens. In contrast, there are times when patience is not necessary; we can work hard to get where we want and quickly get there.
I am sharing this lesson this month because it is relevant to health and fitness: There are times when we need to be patient with ourselves but there are also times when we should push ourselves to get to the next level more quickly.
When you start a new fitness program you must have patience; you may have been in the best shape of your life at 20 years old but today is a different journey, a different and new you. It will take a few weeks to build endurance to get back to your higher level, but know that you can get there. Your fitness journey is your journey and looks completely different than your sister/mother/best friend/neighbor.
However, when you’re in the middle of your training, push yourself, do that extra push up or hold that plank for an extra five seconds. This would be a place in fitness where no patience is required. Go for it! Fitness isn’t always comfortable, but it is effective.
I’ve added a video that shows a few exercises to strengthen your arms and legs. Remember to keep your abs engaged in all exercises (in towards your belly button like you are bracing yourself for a punch). When you do the leg workout, stay low with your knees bent. See how many of each exercise you can complete in twenty seconds; recount every other week and watch your progress!
One more quick fitness analogy about goals and patience: In my super-hot and super-awesome yoga class, the instructor had the class doing a very long balance sequence. My leg was burning by the end and my balance looked like I had just taken three shots of tequila. I wasn’t the only person in class struggling during this very hot and very hard sequence. She reminded the class that we needed to focus on something in front of us – not too far in the distance – that was still. Hmm, yes! Was this particular yogi in my executive leadership training call? This is life: Stay focused on a fixed target in your near future that is attainable, but not too far that you lose balance. When your goal seems too difficult and your life is a little wobbly, recommit your gaze to that fixed target. Find your inner strength and keep going. As the instructor also pointed out, if you lose balance and fall a little, readjust. That is OK. That is life. Most people know that adding physical exercise to their daily routine is good for the heart and body, but it is also a mental exercise. When you’re out for a jog, getting down on some Zumba, or listening to the hardest music set you have while completing your bench press set for the day, you are exercising your body AND mind.
I hope each and every one of you finds patience and the awareness of when to have it. Stay strong and on your fixed target. Make the new season about your health and personal fitness goals. Exercise your body and your mind.
In fitness, health and happiness,
Megan
About the Contributing Writer:
Megan Weidner is a fitness coach and environmentalist in the Akron/Canton, Ohio area. She manages a global sustainability and corporate responsibility program for a large multinational company; her areas include environmental compliance, social equity, community engagement and health and wellness. Megan is also devoted to Rock. It. Fitness., her fitness and natural skincare business. She is committed to making the world a better, more environmentally friendly and healthier place through motivation and education. She is certified through AFAA and Tabata Bootcamp. She has a B.S. in Soil, Environmental, and Atmospheric Science (University of Missouri), a Graduate Certificate in Environmental Management and Policy (University of Denver) and an M.P.A (University of Missouri). She lives in Green, Ohio with her husband and three kids. Read her latest posts.
Yes, time flies, right?! There are only six more days before The Fullness of Me workshop. Join us Saturday, August 22, 1pm – 4pm at Gather in Columbus, OH. This is your chance to retreat before the busyness of the fall season!
The Fullness of Me: Spirit-Affirming Self-Care Practices for Women Ready to be Self-Love in Action is an activity-driven workshop that provides simple, soulful daily self-care practices and resources that support you in loving the life you lead. Resources include The Phoenix Rising Collective’s The Fullness of Me: Intentional Living Guide.
Love Yourself First! Friday (LYFF) is part of ourShed Light series collection. We invite women to tell their LYFF stories to inspire and empower others to also fiercely demonstrate self-love in action. The questions are meant to “shed light” on various ways our featured Phoenixes are making self-care and intentional living a priority.
This week’s wholehearted Phoenix is Tathina:
I am learning to love, accept, and allow everyone freedom to simply be…however they are in the moment.
“I am in peace with being alone. I would not have thought this could be possible for me years ago though! Aloneness is different than loneliness. Aloneness is innate to each of us. We are connected through this Love-space.”
How do you love yourself first? What does that mean to you?
I was taught, like many of us were taught: to put others before Self, to put myself last after everything and everyone else. Taking care of myself was seen as selfish and wrong. With this social conditioning, I felt like I needed to be punished or perfected because I wasn’t okay or good enough as I was. I wasn’t allowed to simply rest in the moment. Some goal always needed to get done first and I had to postpone this deep rest I was yearning for. For years I tried to do this. I tried to put myself into a box of “doing it right.” I tried being what I thought others wanted. I sought to please others and to also help others through studying psychology in college. But during my senior year, I realized that I was not fulfilled. I had a lovely mask on. I may have tricked others into thinking I was happy, but I was far from it. I realized I was not giving myself love and seeking it outside of me. I truly didn’t know how to love anyone else because this love was not discovered within me yet. I sought to find true fulfillment through relationships, spiritual paths and texts, careers, material things – everything that came across my path – but none of it lasted.
Loving myself first means putting myself first. This means not taking care of other people, but really taking care of myself, as only I know what I need and only others know what they need. This means allowing myself to be however I am in the moment, and allowing myself to feel however I feel. It means not fighting with fear, but using it as an invitation to really discover what cannot die in the moment. Self-love is stopping when I know I need to stop. It is allowing mistakes and not trying to be perfect. This means ignoring the idea that I am not good enough.
What I have discovered is that when I love myself first, put myself first, cherish the Life that is expressing itself through and as me, this is inspiration for others to do the same.
What actions demonstrate the self-care you provide to your mind, body, and soul? (Exercise, healthy, eating, spiritual practice, etc.)
I am always learning how to take care of myself more in all areas as Life guides me. Meditation has been a blessed key – not just sitting for a few minutes and then going back to giving attention to the thoughts and stories in the mind for all the other hours in the day (though it definitely started this way). This is also not meditation where I am striving for something to happen or appear. It is very simple. Along the way, I discovered Satsang, which means coming together in truth or meeting in truth in Sanskrit: Sat means Truth and sangha is being in company. I see my whole Life as Satsang now. I see every experience as an invitation to simply be in the moment, to discover the truth of myself. So, meditation for me is simply being in the moment. We do this by ignoring the thoughts, and using the feelings or the breath to bring our attention back to the moment. To really be in the body grounds us in the present, in presence. This is good for all parts of us. The body gets to relax and simply be. The thoughts are allowed to be (not being fought or clung to). The feelings are allowed to be. Everyone is given this permission to simply live in freedom. Also, being present encourages me to listen more to my body and what it wants or doesn’t want. I listen as to where there is a ‘no’ or a ‘yes’ coming from the truth of the moment. I give myself full permission to simply be a human being, this particular human being, and this particular flavor. Self-care can reveal this peace to us again and again.
Is there an obstacle or challenge that you’ve overcome that led you to a deeper love for who you are?
As I mentioned, after college I was searching for truth, fulfillment, and a way to take off the mask I was hiding behind. I was ready for healing, and I discovered that healing came from letting go of my story of suffering, a narrative I would tell others and myself over and over again. I had hidden behind painful childhood experiences (and experiences passed down through generations); this story of not being good enough, needing to fix myself until I was perfect enough to love. So, I adamantly searched, and Life crushed all my lifelong dreams of going to graduate school to be a psychologist. Life had something else in store and brought me to a point of retreat. Life stopped me, gave me a break, and brought me face-to-face with my true Self as if It was saying, “You wanted freedom and healing so here is this spiritual detox.” I was also being invited to make peace with aloneness. I had been trying to help others through my professional career choice, but the truth was I wanted to really help myself. I can’t help others to discover the tools to nourish themselves if I am not nourishing myself.
I was brought to a challenging point. A lot of resistance and all types of feelings like depression, anger, fear, and everything we feel as humans came for me to finally make peace with them. This was self-love even though it did not feel like it in the moment. Because through feeling my feelings, I took power out of this story of being a victim. The feelings brought me into the moment.They brought me into the space that is unshaken by any storm, by any emotion. I asked for real help at the end of 2012 in a moment of total surrender and was mysteriously led to my true teacher. He pointed me back to this moment where there was no one seeking; there was just infinite peace and love. This love is unconditional and it can be ruthless when it wants to free you from the limitations and chains of the conditioned mind. All the challenges of my Life always bring me to a deeper recognition of the love that is here, the love that I am, you are, and we all are right now.
Through loving ourselves as we are, unconditionally accepting the cards we were (are) dealt, something powerful and mysterious begins to happen that I cannot write about. It cannot be spoken. Only you can experience it for yourself in this moment.
What have you learned from self-love?
Through self-love, I have learned how to love. Period. Loving myself when I was in a personal hell or when I was considered wrong or when I was stripped of everything I once used as a distraction taught me how to love all of existence. Compassion started to grow. I have discovered that when I’m taking care of myself, everything else is taken care of (even when my mind judges it to be wrong). Yes, some who are not in peace with this change may not be happy with my self-love/self-care and will get their feathers ruffled and think I’m selfish. This is their issue to make peace with.
Selfishness is expecting others to do for you what you should be doing for yourself. Self-love is our sole responsibility and freedom. It is empowering for all! I allow those that don’t accept me for who I am to leave my Life; this is their freedom and mine to be ourselves. Namasté.
About Tathina’s LYFF Collage:
“These three photos are when I am in nature, meditating, enjoying, simply being and/or playing/exploring – bowing to the mirror of Life’s vastness and Love everywhere (Namasté meaning).”
Thank you for sharing your self-love story with the Collective, Tathina. You are definitely a Phoenix rising!
Learn more about Tathina’s journey; she is the author of The Invitation (to Live) (the Truth). Want more? You can also get info about Satsang and how Tathina gives herself permission to just “let go of all the defenses and BE” by following her blog, HERE, for self-love/meditation challenges that mirror some of the practices in her LYFF story.
Join the Collective. Share your self-love story with us. Send an email HERE. Put “My LYFF Story” in the subject line, and we’ll send you follow-up info. Sweet. Short. Simple!
Love Yourself First! Friday is a bi-weekly self-love series created by The Phoenix Rising Collective. Phenomenal women who fiercely demonstrate self-love in action in order to build and sustain healthy, positive self esteem share their stories. Be sure to read some of our other inspiring stories.
Hey, Phoenixes! If you’re in Columbus, OH or surrounding areas join us Saturday, August 22, 2015, 1pm – 4pm at Gather. Before the busyness of the fall season begins, we are retreating in a sacred space with fellow Phoenixes who have also made a commitment to practicing healthy self-care regimens. This is your chance to connect with yourself and create authentic connections with others.
The Fullness of Me: Spirit-Affirming Self-Care Practices for Women Ready to be Self-Love in Action is an activity-driven workshop that provides simple, soulful daily self-care practices and resources that support you in loving the life you lead. Resources include The Phoenix Rising Collective’s The Fullness of Me: Intentional Living Guide.
Get more details HERE, and register now! Make yourself a priority. And by all means, invite a friend!
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Megan Weidner is a fitness coach and environmentalist in the Akron/Canton, Ohio area. She manages a global sustainability and corporate responsibility program for a large multinational company; her areas include environmental compliance, social equity, community engagement and health and wellness. Megan is also devoted to Rock. It. Fitness., her fitness and natural skincare business. She is committed to making the world a better, more environmentally friendly and healthier place through motivation and education. She is certified through AFAA and Tabata Bootcamp. She has a B.S. in Soil, Environmental, and Atmospheric Science (University of Missouri), a Graduate Certificate in Environmental Management and Policy (University of Denver) and an M.P.A (University of Missouri). She lives in Green, Ohio with her husband and three kids. 
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The Phoenix Rising Collective 