Being Yourself- Soul Musings

Hello Beautiful Souls!

The above quote is on a lovely calendar I have and I love it. Though I think like a lot of quotes and things we say it’s just sort of in passing. We think oh that’s true and move on. But have you ever stopped to think about this quote, I mean really think about it?

To be totally honest I am not sure I had until just recently. I posted a photo a while back on facebook of a tea tag that said “Be Yourself” and someone commented “Who else would I be?” well that’s just it, we often don’t take the time to really explore or define who we really are. We are so often on autopilot going along, reacting to life and demands (self-imposed, family, friends or society) that we have lost sight of what we really want of who we really are.

We are led by the Shoulds and Fear so often, not even aware of it until we get so far out of where we want to be (if we have even admitted it to ourselves) that it sometimes can feel like there is no getting back to who we really are.. In this case I encourage you to start from where you are (rhyme not intentional!) How many times a day, a week a lifetime do we compromise our real desires, our silly or sensitive selves to fit in?

We have held on to the “old” things (likes, style, dislikes, dreams etc) so long that we are not even allowing room for what really feels right, what fits in our lives now. A small example is that I love the color red, I do but it’s not my favorite color anymore but I was hanging on to that for a while until I let myself “admit” that a dark pink and Teal sorts of colors were the ones I am constantly drawn to. Like oh yeah i am allowed to change what my favorite color (for now) is even when I am grown (as opposed to when we are younger and our tastes change every 5 minutes it seems!)

Look really truly being yourself is not always easy for us or for others in our lives but constantly hiding your authentic self is even harder (on all mind -body-soul) on us- on you. There are bound to be some growing pains. Give yourself and those around you  the gift of showing up as you, truly you.

I offer a few tools in this journey my Visual Journal Workshop, Journey to Authentic You Worksop and Coaching

Here is to living Inspired, Creative and Empowered

Heather

Excited to share my guest post-Finding Your Voice…

Hey Beautiful Souls!

I am SUPER Excited about my guest post on Kind Over Matter. It’s about finding your voice! Check it out!

Here is to living Inspired, Creative and Empowered

Heather

Creativity- Coaching Q and A

Hey Inspiring Souls! It’s Coaching Q & A time again!!

Q: I really feel the pull to do something creative, but I just think I may be one of those people who is just not creative. The things I have tried are just not as good as they should be. It’s discouraging, how do I start to find my creative voice, or am I just better off giving up that idea and moving on?

A: Let me start with this: You are creative, you were born that way. We just lose sight of what that looks like as we get older. Most times when we are young we don’t struggle to make sure our forts and imaginary friends are as good as other people’s, but as we grow up we get so stuck in comparing and looking at how things “should” be that we lose sight of own creative voices. Some ideas to start exploring and defining your  creative voice are:

1-First take a deep breath, you can do this, allow yourself to be as open as possible

2-Willingness to explore, when in the process of finding your creative voice (and when redefining etc.) we need to be willing to explore. There are so many ways creativity can show up and a willingness to explore some of them is essential!

4-Exploration, try lots of different things. There are a zillion things to try! Some ideas are: Visual Journaling, Writing (by hand or on the computer, it doesn’t matter just allow yourself to play with words), knitting, cooking, jewelry making, painting and photography. Those are some ways to express yourself creatively. Experiment with some of those or something else. You will know when you have hit on the one(s) that really speak to your soul!

5-Don’t compare! This can be a real creativity killer.. Take inspiration from others not that the way they do it is the only way. Allow yourself to “mess up” as it’s all part of the process. I remember when I first started visual journaling I had times where I wrote “this is supposed to be fun” I was frustrated because my pages didn’t look like they should (getting the should from how other people did their pages”) Then I learned there is no “Should” when it comes to expressing myself. I pushed through it and am so happy I did.

6-Learn to push through and learn to be gentle. There are times where you are just hitting a bump of self-doubt and it needs to be worked through. Other times we need to allow ourselves to step away (and perspective is often so helpful!) be compassionate with yourself when it’s called for!

7-Look for (and even write down) the ways that you are creative now. The way you problem solve, decorate, dress, cook and so on. There are so many instances in everyday life we are creative and looking at those can also be great clues into finding our creative voices.

These are just some ideas, I have a lot to say about this subject (clearly!) and in my Clarity Coaching or Authentic Living Coaching we dig a bit deeper in this subject! You can check it out here if you are interested!

Have a coaching question of your own? Contact me hstoliveinspired @ gmail.com

Here is to living Inspired, Creative and Empowered

Heather