2 fun strategies that help to leave old problems behind - check it out!

I love synchronicity, meaning that when you think, speak or deal with something more in-depth, you suddenly realize that this topic, person, group, community appears more often on your radar.
Has that ever happened to you? I'm sure it has.
The truth is that once we get interested or engaged in something (or someone^^) our brain gets wired to notice the topic of interest more and more consciously - and consciousness is the key word here!

I love these moments, when I think about something - as I had it yesterday with the topic of change and the new approach to dealing with problems or failure - everything I read and listened to afterwards, has dealt with the exact same topic!!! Coincidence... I don't think so!

Well, so much about my love-relationship to these small miracles (which always make me smile^^). The fact that the issue came up repeatedly after I wrote the last post, I decided that there is more that I have to say about this, and here it is ;-)

What do all problems have in common?

In one way or the other they have their sneaky roots in the past. Some are stronger and louder and we repeat them over and over again in our mind, with the effect that they (those sneaky problems) influence our being in the present; in fact, we cannot be fully present when we still dwell in our old problems or the failure that we did years ago...

We feel blocked to move on. We feel stuck with that problem FOREVER. We feel powerless to change. We think that we have tried everything and change simply does not work. We are terrified to get out of our 'comfort-zone'. (ironically we call it comfort zone, but it is really that comfortable??) One more... We might even feel embarrassed of having that problem, which leads us to hiding and concealing ourselves in fear of judgment from others.

Yuck - that sounds a terrible place to live from, doesn't it?

What is another thing that all those problems from the past have in common? They are IN the past, not the present - and that is the best thing about all this! THE PAST HAS PAST!!! That is the awesome and naked truth, because now all that is left for the problem to be there is YOU, and only YOU holding on to it!!!

I offer you some cures from NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming) here, that have helped me in the past:

Oh, before I reveal some really juicy, fun and good stuff, I want to make sure that you are aware of the one single and most important prerequisite to be effective with those exercises: YOU'VE GOT TO WANT IT! You have to say with conviction: Thank you fear, problem, (fill in your blank), you've been around for long enough, I have learned my lesson - enough is enough!!!

OK, ready!? :-)

#1: Enough is Enough Pattern:

1. Think of five times where you felt having or even embarrassed by having that fear or problem.
2. Make a movie of all five scenes.
3. Put all 5 movie scenes together - one after the other looking ridiculous of having this fear!
4. Now, it gets really fun... make the pictures bigger and brighter, play circus music to it (my favorite and sooo effective :D) as you run the movie of all five times in a row looking ridiculous until you get more and more embarrassed!
5. Keep on doing it until you start to say to yourself 'OK, this is insane! Enough is enough!'

#2: Laugh away your Fears (very effective if you're like me - love to laugh ;))

1. Think of a time you laughed your a$$ off. A time you couldn't stop laughing. A time when you had to love so hard that milk came out of your nose (or whatever it was that you were drinking :D) Remember how that felt, what you were thinking and feeling vividly!
2. Keep going :D
3. Keep on laughing and dwell in the experience :D :D
   Still, keep on doing it -feel what you felt, think what you thought, see what you saw, and feel feel feel gooood!
4. As you keep having those giggles, begin to think about what you used to fear and notice that as you laugh at it how it begins to change in your mind - the shift in perception!

The best outcome will of course be accomplished if you follow both scenarios one after the other - the first is to really ensure that you are fed up with keeping that fear or problem around and #2 is a great tool to really begin to laugh about your problems.

What is it that we do about problems, addictions, fears that we have 'overcome' or 'left behind' (= they do not have an effect on your present, and YOU have put them into the past!)? Yesss, we laugh about them!!!

Why wait? Start now!

You deserve it :)

Can you think of one person in your life who could also benefit from these tips? 
Remember sharing is caring ;-)

I would love to hear from you, how it works and your unique experience!

Happy Easter =)

xoxo

About ChAnGe!

Wow, it's been a while...

Arriving back in Austria after spending 7 transformational months in NYC has been a process in itself.

'Gut Ding braucht Weil' is a saying in German that means that all good things take time to flourish/come out/reveal! And that's how it has been and felt for me for the past 4 weeks.

I am very blessed to have a family and friends, who welcomed me wholeheartedly and remained patient for my fully integrated arrival (sure, I was physically present, but I also had to let the busy NYC gal and conscious Sati-warrior arrive back in cosy Austria^^)

What I could actually say is that 'daily life' has me back - but what does that really mean?

Thanks to many amazing experiences my perception, awareness and consciousness of many areas in life have changed. Be it body-, relationship with myself and others-, conflict- and goal perception have transformed... to be very specific they are all ever changing.

 

 

With every decision we make, we change in a way. We let go of something old to experience something new. 

Now, this does mean that we dare to try new things, which in turn has us come out of our comfort zone and yes, we might 'fail' (important note: this is only a matter of perception!!!)

I listened to one of Tony Robbins' tapes yesterday where he brought this right to the point:

If I would ask you if you like to fail - sure, you would intuitively say NO (and think 'crazy gal' to yourself - and that's ok^^) Let me re-frame my question: DO YOU LIKE TO LEARN?

Hm, so as many things in life - a matter of definition! What does learning mean to you?

Tony's approach offers us a tool of handling situations that surprise us negatively, which he calls PROBLEMS ;)

I encourage you to rethink your model of approaching failure and problems - when we come from the place of being the curious student of life, failures all of a sudden turn into lessons and problems become the playground of experiences to learn from!

When you are courageous enough to take this new approach (and I know you are), you'll soon start to realize that you dock onto the same stations (aka problems), but your docking tools have changed!

So go for it and enjoy the worry-free student life :)

xoxo

p.s. good to be back *yay* missed the writing!

Time to get real...

My last post was on change and has been hugely inspired by my current situation - another big change in my life is coming up! For the past 7 months I have been given the gift to live and experience mind-blowing NYC - and in about one week I will fly back to Austria. 

Those of you who have been following me on my journey know that I have changed a lot and immersed in personal growth through my intenSati practice, meditation, reading and Robbins-Madanes coaching training. 

These tools and practices have heightened my awareness to how I actually want to live my live - being a happy and free soul that is embodied in a healthy and fit body!

Discipline, self-control AND appreciation are key to living in integrity with who you want to be.

NYC offers so many crazy-great things, like green juice bars, raw food shops, fast food salad bars, vegetarian and dairy free food choices everywhere, hardcore workout routines (guess which one is my fav :D) and so much more ;)

After I posted The change formula a few days ago, I began to question myself if I'm really walking my talk here... What is this uncomfortable feeling when I think of my soon-to-come departure? It was FEAR (of judgment, sadness, powerlessness, being dissatisfied)!

Hm, what did I do with that fear... 'Coincidently' (haha) I read in an inspiring blog post by Mastin Kipp that said: in order to grow and learn, we have to do what we fear most!

Bye bye Fear... that went really fast - I am the co-creator of my reality!

Learning something new, exploring places and cultures, studying, reading, meditation, working out - intenSati ... fill in your blank ... means that we are GROWING and this equals CHANGE!

Every new experience and possibility to change is an opportunity to grow and expand.

What I want to say with this is that, only when we face our fears and the things we are most resisting, and then decide to take aligned action, we can actually break through old and limiting beliefs that prevent us from being happy and free!

Always ask yourself: what can I learn from this? 

Thank you all for reading and supporting! 

Love & miracles.

xoxo

p.s. to be completely real... I actually do not have to give up any of the things that I love so much now. their frame will simply change *new challenge* - I bought a juicer and I will teach intenSati classes in Austria *yaaay* AND happiness is an inside job!

pp.s. I was really terrified to publish this post, but I decided to do it anyways - facing my fears ;)

Impressions from my trip to D.C.

This weekend I visited the United Stated capital city - Washington D.C.

Beautiful and calm (probably I'm saying this because I have lived in busy Manhattan for the past 6 months) city with amazing buildings and friendly people.

This weekend was also a special one: Today, on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, the 44th president of the United States was inaugurated and I witnessed the preparations for this big national event.

Enjoy the captions of some moments of this weekend :-)

Darkness cannot drive out darkness, only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can. ~ Martin Luther King Jr.

The Smithsonian

George Washington Memorial

CNN reporting on inauguration day!

View on the GW Memorial from Lincoln Memorial!

Lincoln memorial

Happy ME :)

Huge and clean subway stations - getting spoiled here & not missing NYC that much to be honest ;)

When you wish upon a star *love*

Can't touch this ;)

Thomas Jefferson memorial

apparently girls like to take pics like that... this time I followed the trend ;D

Franklin D. Roosevelt memorial *beautiful* *mindful*

The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today!

Let us move forward with strong and active faith!

Martin Luther King Jr. memorial

freakin' cute squirrels

 

Ice-skating in Georgetown!

I hope you enjoyed some pics instead of writing for a change ;-)
Sending you lots of love from NYC (again) and watch out for miracles!
Xoxo

Reflections & outlook :-) week 1!

Wow, amazing - week 1 of my May Cause Miracles journey is completed!

The past week has been about becoming miracle minded - that meant for me/my translation: Breaking free from limiting and fearful beliefs... letting go of self-doubt, fear, the 'I can'ts...' and the negative self talk that kept holding me back. In intenSati classes I called this voice the inner mean girl ;-)

This week I have (continued) built the muscle to consciously decide NOT to listen to my inner mean girl (= fear) and choose LOVE instead! This is also what intenSati is about and once I understood that personal development/growth is like building a muscle, committing to a daily practice has become effortless, even more it has become necessary and an integral part in my life!

The upcoming week is going to be about creating a new perception of YOURSELF!

Gabby is guiding the reader through the nitty-gritty of self-love (in the self-empowering way)! 

For me personally, self-acceptance and self-love are essential in order to have the strength to bust through your blocks and to pursue your inner-most desired dreams! Sometimes we are not even aware of the way we play small and that we let our inner mean girl/boy run the show.

Take a minute and ask yourself:

What would happen if you would operate from a self-accepting and -loving place? What would you be capable of achieving and believing?

I love asking these questions - psst... inner mean girls tend to be speechless this way, which allows you to listen to your authentic self!

Have a great week and I will be back with a reflection next Sunday!

Love & Miracles!

xoxo

MayCauseMiracles - FORGIVENESS is running the show!

The F - Word!

Learning to forgive on Day 5 (Friday, in my case!)

Forgiveness is the bedrock of a life filled with love and miracles. Practicing forgiveness allows us to let go of our old fear-based past and center into the present moment.

~ May Cause Miracles

In past posts I have already begun to emphasize the importance of living and appreciating the present moment. One thing, I would like to point out is that most of my posts have always related to what is going on for me and what I'm currently working on. Sooo, I definitely practice on being more present rather than thinking about the future, which is usually very faithful, positive and exciting (sometimes a little stressful too, being totally honest) or thinking/obsessing about the past and my past experiences. As much as we can get energized and fired-up from lovely experiences from the past, we can detour into a fearful reality if we put our attention to negative memories. When we go into our past and unpleasant experiences it often has to do with things we have done or have been done to us, where we hold a lot of resentment, pain and anger within ourselves.

How shall we be present and live in the NOW, when we obsess about past resentment???

It is our task to forgive in order to become happy and present in the current moment! Forgive ourselves, forgive others, forgive the circumstances! Own your part, forgive and forgive the other!

This sounds like a huge task and it is challenging at the beginning - personal growth is like learning to play an instrument, play a sport, create a skill! Personal growth is like growing a muscle... you are training your soul, your brain and your mental abilities *yay* so, you are doing something great for yourself and others :-)

The moment you are able to say 'I forgive ...' is the best start! Even if it is hard to feel forgiveness at first, it gets easier over time! In Gabrielle Bernstein's 'May Cause Miracles' one day is dedicated to the F-word every week *aaawesome*

So stay in the F-game and be patient and the miracles will show up naturally :-)

Lots of Love&Miracles!

yours,

Alexandra

MayCauseMiracles - Only LOVE is real!

Hello my dear readers,

for the next couple of days I will be back in writing with you (instead of video-blogging) - I caught the flu and therefore I'm covered in sheets with tea and tissues! Enough of the whining - I'm the sneezing warrior^^

It is Day 3 of the May Cause Miracles transformation journey and I have taken or prepared you well for this piece (as I said I'm reading one chapter one day at a time!)...

Today it is important to acknowledge and really get that fear is only false evidence appearing real and that ONLY LOVE IS REAL!

There is always a choice to make - ask yourself, will I see this (situation, problem, feeling, ...) with love or fear? 

Let me assure you that there is always a loving perspective - even if you simply keep saying to yourself 'Love did not create this!' or 'I consciously choose love instead of this!'

If you go through your day and you manage to remind yourself about these few words a.k.a miracle mantras, you are in a great place to move towards your desires and goals! Because you cannot create from a fearful, doubtful and resentful place!

This passage of the chapter really got me:

Our fear-based minds believe that change is tough and self-reflective work is difficult. But let's face it: being consumed by fear is far more difficult than showing up for love - we're just tricked into thinking fear is "easier" because it's more familiar! ~ May Cause Miracles

So get your love-mind ON & expect miracles :-)

Love, health and light!
xoxo

MayCauseMiracles - Choose LOVE instead of this!

We always have this choice...

... I choose LOVE instead of this ... <3 ...

Lots of love,
xoxo

Searching, letting go and MIRACLES...

Visualizing, 

manifesting, 

vision-boards,

praying, 

meditating, 

affirmations, 

feeling, 

searching,

goal setting,

what do you do to get what you want in life?

I do pretty much all of the above and sometimes more than one at a time ;-) 

All of those are great tools to get clear on what it is that you want in your life. However, there is a chance that this is not enough! 

Hm... I used to be manic in searching for what I want, until I understood this:

Sure, it is very important and great to have a plan and direction for where you want to go and how you want to live your life. There is nothing wrong about thriving for a great career, the relationship of your dreams, the 'perfect' body, etc. 

By applying one of the techniques above, you want to achieve your goal the way you imagine it. You might think: 'What is wrong about that??' The answer is: NOTHING! 

But since it is a great goal that you want to achieve, as human beings we tend to obsess about our desire and become very impatient for it to come true. If you tell yourself: 'When is it going to happen...When, when, when?' that is when you are in the manic-search-spiral!!! 

We get hooked onto a certain outcome or goal that we block ourselves to the infinite opportunities around us! Through this ever-searching neediness, we will become desperate for the things to happen our way and we risk losing the faith in our power, if they don't!

What we need to do is free our mind from pre-set outcomes and let the universe do her thing - once we start to relax, miracles will occur naturally!

Have you ever 'given up' on a dream or a goal, by accepting your current state and suddenly your dream materialized?!? 

Again, it all comes down to being present and putting your full attention on the present moment. Seeing the opportunities right in front of you will be easy, because you are not busy looking to and obsessing about the future anymore. By letting go of your expected-future-reality, you open up to far greater experiences than you could imagine.

For attracting what you want, all you need to do is to set the intention - YOUR INTENTION CREATES YOUR REALITY! ~ Wayne Dyer

I set the intention to live a life beyond my wildest dreams - I'm committed to live in the present moment with curiosity, gratitude and openness!

What is your intention?

Hope you are enjoying your holidays :-)

Love & Joy

Reflections on expectations!

One could say expectations have been a loyal companion throughout my life. Where ever I could find something pleasant (!) to expect I did and I became really good at creating fantastic illusions around these expectations, be it in relationships, career, you-name-it... Of course, I was on a super-high when everything worked out, happy, strong, faithful, etc. 

But guess what happened when it didn't - crazy-town was the next destination. My ego/inner-mean girl would be supported in her strong belief 'You are not good enough' or 'If you would have done it this way, you would be happy now!' 

But what if you could be on that super-happy party of feelings all the effin' time!!! Note: if you CHOOSE to do so! Release your expectations - and here is why:

I personally had a hard time understanding why having expectations is bad; and then I found the answer by experiencing being expected to be or work a certain way myself. 

The truth is that the person, we put expectations on energetically feels that they do not act the way we want them to. But who are to tell the other person how to BE!?

Usually when we do that we come from a place of lack ourselves - we are unhappy with a certain situation or we want more than we currently have. The important thing we have to realize is that we are making the other person feel that they are not good enough, if they cannot meet our expectations.

Have you ever heard: 'You deserve better!' - Yes, you had some high expectations there!!!

 

Essentially we should be grateful for the presents the person gives us in the present (I love this beautiful word game^^). Of course, we appreciate the great feeling that we have of meeting someone or finding a new job or co-worker, but we crave for more, it's like sugar. We crave more and more and more and develop this story/illusion in our head, until we realize we have put our health (relationship, job, -self) at risk, because our ego's expectations might not correspond with the other person's plan or personality. And then we feel hurt, angry, not loved or resentful against the other person for not making us happy, while we know that HAPPINESS IS AN INSIDE JOB :-) read on...

Another thought why having expectations will not lead to the super-happy feelings is, there are things in this world that we have no power of controlling them. It is simply impossible to have full control about WHAT happens in our life - and here comes the biiig BUT, we can choose HOW we see and think about the things happening to us and what we will focus on. 

Rather than focusing on the future (projecting new expectations), focus on the NOW!!! 

I have to tell you this is a great challenge for me too because I have to say good-bye to my year long companion and invite the faithful dreamer in, who is able to handle situations and people from a place of gratitude and power over negative emotions.

The very good news is, life has become very light - my new companion is a really freeing and uplifting fellow :-)

I hope you all have a reflective pre-Christmas time, without having expectations - BE happy and grateful & watch miracles occur!

Lots of love,

xoxo