Just wanted to publish a quick post about some upcoming changes. This domain name/title of my blog is going to be changing from Solutions Beyond the Mainstream to 1000Bridges.com. We are in the process of making this change this week and into next week. I am going to be phasing out my website and merging all of my information into this new blog. The content of the posts that you receive will be the same. The exciting news is that the blog will soon have video’s, e-book links and a tab for web based classes. The changes began last month with the development with the new landing page for www.SolutionsBeyondthemainstream.com.

I am also in the process of developing a facebook fan page in order to create a more interactive experience.

Yes, LOTS of exciting things happening!

I hope to have all of this completed by mid-May at the latest. Please excuse in advance any random “test-posts” that you may receive. We are hoping that this won’t happen but in case it does I wanted you to be aware of where they were coming from.

I plan to continue to post throughout this process just wanted you to be aware of what is happening on my end and didn’t want you to think you were getting spammed by some random site called 1000bridges.

I also wanted to add why I chose 1000bridges as a new name. For years I have been searching for a brief statement that sums up what I do for people. What I realized is that my purpose is to assist people through life’s transitions.  In life we cross 1000’s of bridges and many times we need assistance. With my blog posts, e-books, classes and through individual sessions I hope to accomplish this. It is a true honor to serve in any way I can.

Thank you and many blessings,

Michelle

My goal is to spend as much time living in balance as possible. Being that we are human and have ego’s that feed us fear based thoughts we all get thrown off from time to time.

What I have learned that helps is to have a “Default Thought” when we feel ourselves begin to slide emotionally. A default thought is a thought we can  immediately go to when something causes us to slide out of balance emotionally.

It can be a place in the past, present, future or even a made up place. We imagine that place when anything throws us emotionally. It will help us to disassociate from the situation causing us stress and bring us back to balance.

Buddism teaches us that when something happens in our experience, we need not let it “hook us,” to pull us in, to get lost in it feeling like we can’t get out.  When it “hooks us,” we begin to slide down the emotional scale, drowning with the emotion. We then reach for something to pull us out like food, alcohol, tv to numb our pain. We can accomplish the same relief in a positive way when we pull in our default thought.

Research has shown that a human emotion lasts only 1.5 minutes and it’s released. If we are feeling anything after 1.5 minutes, we are choosing to hold it unto ourselves.

Many people ask me how to let go of thoughts or emotions that are painful. This is one way to do this. It’s not as much about us letting them go or pushing them away it’s about changing our minds and focusing on something else. Then our distressing thought fades.

I have a friend who works as a teacher in a very rough inner city high school with gangs and lots of daily fighting. It is extremely difficult for my friend to pull herself out of bed and go to school everyday as every day is a challenge. I told her she only has 2 more months left but those 2 months feel like 10 years to her. I asked her if there was ever a time this year when she had a rewarding experience, one that made her smile and made her feel really great inside. She said yes, however there were just a few. I asked her to to focus on just one experience and how great it made her feel and when her thoughts guided her down a path of hating her job and couldn’t bare the thought of another day etc. I told her to force herself to think of that one experience that made her feel good (her new default thought). By doing this, the vibration of her being will shift into another emotional place, a new, balanced, peaceful and maybe even happy place.

Spend some time finding your default thought. It could be anything that evokes a feeling of peace, joy and/or happiness. It could be the day you met your true love, the birth of your child, a favorite place, a spot in nature, the ocean, a beautiful field of flowers, a tree where you used to sit under as a kid, laying in your bed. It could be anything.

After you find your default thought, practice “going there” even when you are not feeling emotionally out of balance. Then when you feel yourself slip and need to regain balance, quickly pull up your default thought. Close your eyes and be in your default thought. Spend as much time as you need in that thought. Tune into your body and notice if there is any tension left. If there is, sit longer, if not then continue on with your day. It will change your emotional state to that of more peace. Who doesn’t want to live with that?

When we speak in absolutes like these we limit ourselves, which creates anxiety because we feel stuck, like there is no way out. We all use them. Here are a few examples:

• I will NEVER lose this weight!
• I ALWAYS lose at this game.
• ABSOLUTELY not!
• I would NEVER take a chance on that, it’s too risky.
• If you EVER talk to me like that again…

There are many others that we use but you get the idea.

These words limit us, limit our potential. We must make every attempt to become aware of when we are speaking with absolutes. They are powerful words and very limiting to the creation of our future realities.

Re-read the statements from above or look at some of your own and question them.  This is how we must speak to ourselves (and others) when these words slip out.

For example:

• I will NEVER lose this weight!  Never??
• My husband is ALWAYS late, it make me so mad!   ALWAYS??

When we question the absolute, we find that it’s not true! This powerful act of simply questioning the statements that we make to ourselves and others can relieve created anxiety. Anxiety is born from the future feeling hopeless and having no control over it.

Becoming aware of our speech, listening to what we are saying and dropping or questioning the absolutes will help in shifting our emotional states. The ego/mind likes absolutes and chooses to use them often, it’s very limiting. Without absolutes we can be hopeful and even optimistic about our futures.

Feel this statement in the heart center,  “I will never lose this weight!” This is when we would question this statement, “Never?”  “Well, maybe just not right now, it just feels hard today.” “Maybe someday but not now.” “Maybe if I hired a trainer or joined a gym that would help.” “If I even walked 20 minutes for 3 days a week I am sure it would help me drop a few.” “Maybe never is the wrong word.”

Every statement we make creates our future. Don’t allow absolutes to limit your future. Release absolutes from your vocabulary and realize that sky is the limit for creation of our realities; we just have to pay attention to what we are saying and challenge the limiting words we are using.

Have you recently been tired or even exhausted lately? Have you not been able to wake up in the morning or felt like you needed a nap during the day? You are not alone!

I feel compelled to write about this as I have had almost every person I spoke with last week tell me how tired they were. I have had people ask me if they were depressed, had issues with thyroid or even mono. The common theme has been fatigue and/or shaky emotional states. Don’t rush to the doctor just yet, and don’t read into your symptoms.

This fatigue that people have been feeling is two-fold; it is partly due to the realignment of our energy since the earthquake. The Japan earthquake moved the coast of Japan 8 FEET and moved the earth 4 inches off its axis.  As our earth realigns itself everything on it must also realign itself to the earth’s energy. We must remember that everything is energy and everything finds its balance when out of balance. Our energetic bodies have been thrown out of balance and are now in a realignment process with the earth. This is very tiring on us and creates fatigue. Honor that your body is tired and get extra sleep during this time.

Another reason for fatigue is the tremendous fear in our atmosphere. Please read last week’s post for more on this. But the combination of fear and the realignment process both create fatigue and even exhaustion.

What do we do about it?

1. Honor it. Allow yourself extra sleep. Help your body to realign by not overdoing it when you feel tired.
2. Do grounding exercises and spend time outside on the earth. If possible, get your feet right on the earth if you can, make direct contact.
3. Take trace minerals. This will not only help ground but help balance our electrical systems and realign with the earth’s electrical system.

The fatigue will subside. It will just take a bit of time. Performing the above will help speed the process of realignment. Please also read last week’s post for more information on this. Above all, remember like everything this too is temporary.

With everything going on in the world I find it time to address some questions people are having on why they are experiencing so much fear and run away thoughts that lead them into anxiety, sadness or even mild depression.

There are a couple factors to consider as to why we are feeling so much fear.

The first is that of law of attraction. This law states that like attracts like, in other words, like thoughts attract more like thoughts.

The second is the amount of fear on our planet right now. This is happening for a few reasons. The first we can consider is Iraq and the war we have participated in for years. Secondly we have had numerous natural disasters over the last few years.  Lately these events have been one right after the next, major catastrophic events all over the US and even the world, from hurricanes and flooding to earthquakes. How does this affect us?  When one single person has a fearful thought, it literally launches out of us and finds other like thoughts and they collect or clump together. This is also known as the collective consciousness, a collection of thoughts that collect that are similar.

Think of the smog in San Francisco. It’s a thick layer that rests over the city. This is what happens to all of our thoughts only it’s two fold. All of our fearful thoughts get launched out into a collective consciousness “smog” in our atmosphere that sits there and continues to accumulate. Here’s the problem, we not only add to it but we have easy access to it when we have a fearful thought. Remember because of law of attraction, like thoughts attract like thoughts, so when we have one fearful thought, we have an entire planet wide collective consciousness of fear that we pull from that adds to our already negative feeling. It literally dumps into our own consciousness when we have one negative thought.

The third and final ingredient to this is something people are already talking about which is 2012. I plan to write a separate posting on this but for now I will say that with 2012, it is NOT the end of time, in fact it’s a very exciting time. But what is happening as we approach 2012 is that time is speeding up. What this means for us is that we are attracting in these fearful thoughts much faster than in the past. So we have one fearful thought and it attracts in the smog (collective consciousness) from our atmosphere of other heavy negative thoughts, one comes in and another one and another one. It happens incredibly fast these days. It’s a real slippery slope once it starts.

I have asked so many people lately if they are experiencing this and I get a unanimous, “YES!” “What is going on?”

So now we know what’s going on but how do we prevent these moments, hours or even days of anxiety, sadness or even depression?

First of all, know that it’s not really anxiety or depression, so don’t run out and grab anti-depressants. At least until you try a few things.

Here are some tips to help stay out of the fear consciousness:

1. WATCH YOUR THOUGHTS! We must stay on top of every thought. When we experience one little thought that comes from fear, we must turn it around immediately. Don’t let them build. This means we must live very aware, very present moment. Do not let them slide down the slippery slope creating anxiety/depression.
2. STAY GROUNDED Make sure to do exercises that keep your energy in your body. Do yoga, take a walk or go for a run, do some visualizations for grounding. Get your feet on the earth.
3. SALT WATER BATH Soak for 20 minutes in a sea salt bath to cleanse your auric field. The aura (the energy field that sits outside our physical body) is a collection station of all thoughts we have as well as other people’s thoughts that we are near. Put some quiet music on in the bath, do some deep breathing and/or meditate. Relax and release while soaking. Use 2 cups of sea salt in your warm bath.

If you have already slipped down the slippery slope, here’s what to do:

1. GROUND YOURSELF
2. REMIND YOURSELF WHATS REAL. Our negative thoughts tend to take us on a crazy roller coaster ride down very quickly. Just today my husband texted me while I was getting on an airplane to head home and he said we needed to cash out our investments and that the stock market was going down and had fallen 200 points today already. We have lost almost everything 2 years ago for various reasons and I was not about to lose our last and only investment. I texted my husband and told him to do it but realized it was in my name and his hands were tied. The flight attendant came on and told us to turn off our phones. My head began to race…”We are going to lose everything like our friends did in the market crash after 9/11.” “Why didn’t I sell last month like my sister told me to, blah, blah, blah” .” My thoughts continued and I felt the knots in my stomach arrive and then the tension in my neck and shoulder then I said to myself, “WAIT A MINUTE…STOP!” “Michelle, you are out of balance!” I promised myself not to let that happen and to be as conscious about these moments as I possibly could be. So I immediately stopped my thoughts, closed my eyes and began some slow deep breathing, ceasing all thoughts. I then reminded myself of what was real,” would we really lose everything in 1.5 hours during the flight home?” I decided to chose the thought “No.” I began to ask myself a list of questions that were real and in the moment like, “if we lose almost everything could it someday come back?” I decided yes. I asked myself if I knew for sure that the market was going to crash today. I decided, I did not know for sure but felt like maybe not totally crash.  I began to climb out of the dark hole I had fallen into. I forced myself to reach for the thoughts that made me feel better. This 10 minute process (at the most) turned me around from sliding into complete anxiety and panic to peaceful and calm. I then began to put in positive empowering thoughts about our finances (creating in a positive way and not negative). I felt great, got off the plane got home and called my planner and found that the stock market had begun to come back and now it was only down 90 points.

All that stress for nothing! BUT it was an amazing experience and was so happy to experience myself fall out of balance and then shift back into it in 10 minutes. It’s really that easy, it just takes desire and effort.

During this time of so much fear on our planet the greatest tool I have utilized for myself has been awareness. We MUST slow down and catch our negative thoughts and our negative feelings before they take us down. It’s imperative that we do this and we do it as soon as we experience the slightest negative thought or feeling, it will maintain balance within our emotional state and not allow the fear to creep in and take us down.

Every spoken word or statement is creating our next move, our future realities. Yet we limit ourselves and make ourselves feel stuck with how we speak.

It’s time we tune into our statements and conversations.

I hear people say statements all the time like…

“ I am so depressed…” “I am so fat…” “I am so upset with my husband, he frustrates me to no end!” “I hate my job.” “I can’t stop crying, this grief is consuming me.” “I can’t stand my in-laws, we will never get along.”

All of these types of statements make us feel stuck and disempowered with no solution. They create a certain level of anxiety within us, and if we don’t release it, it only builds and gets worse!

We state these types of statements to our friends or family and then they give us feedback and validation (that we are right to feel this way) and typically we walk away not feeling any better, still stuck with that bad feeling.

A very easy solution we can all do to open up our limiting speech is to add two simple words that can change our reality…”For Now.”

By adding “For Now” onto the end of a sentence it helps us to realize that our current agony is actually temporary. It empowers us, helps us to realize that it won’t be forever, in fact, it’s temporary.

Feel the difference between “I am so depressed…for now” “I am so fat…for now” “I can’t stand my in-laws…for now”   “I hate myself…for now,” try it on a few of your own statements. It feels so much better than our dead end way of speaking with no hope for change in the future. The “other way” of speaking creates drama and at times puts us in the victim status. No one likes how that feels.

Life changes like the wind, one day we are in love the next we are not, one day we are working for one company and all of a sudden we find ourselves in another position with another company, we may swear that yoga is not for us and then before we know it we are enjoying weekly classes, one day we find ourselves sad,  and another day we are happy.

We find our lives changing all of the time. Change and release limiting thoughts simply   by adding “for now” at the end of a sentence, and know that life for you too can change for the better, we simply need to be open to the possibility and allow it in.

A group of women in my son’s class wanted a “luncheon for the ladies,” so I volunteered and cancelled my entire day of work to offer this luncheon in my home.  I planned, prepared, cleaned and started shopping for my big event. The day before the luncheon, I sent out a reminder email and one by one, the regrets started coming in. When the final head count was a whopping 3 attendee’s I decided to cancel it.

Everyone said thank you and how sorry they were for saying they were coming and then cancelling at the last minute etc. I felt nothing after the first few regrets came in but then began feeling an angry monster inside of me start to awaken with every regret that came in thereafter. A few of my friends commented that it was awful to cancel so last minute etc. This was like throwing fuel on the fire. I could feel this anger rise up inside of me and I began to chime in with my friends on how terrible it was then I decided to stop. DECIDED is the key word here.

I was about to text one of my friends in the class (that was coming) and I stopped dead in my tracks and put my phone down. I said to myself, “why do I need to create drama around this?” “It’s not personal…” “In fact it’s actually a good thing…” “Now I have an entire day to myself to work on my blogs and ebook!” What a blessing in disguise! There is always a silver lining to every cloud, we have to choose to see it!

What I realized was how quickly we all create drama. When we buy in to disappointment  and make it about us and how sad “it” is that “this” happened to us we have created drama. Then we have friends and family feeling sorry for us, talking about how terrible “so and so treated us” blah blah blah. I decided I am NOT going there anymore! I sat and tried to find one positive quality to drama and realized, there is NOTHING good about it!

When I responded to a couple people with, “No big deal, I’ve moved on, going to make great use of my day off,” the drama stopped. The response I got was much different. It changed their response from, “I’m so sorry” to “Good for you!”

In every moment we create our realities. By me falling into the victim trap of making it about me and it’s so sad, etc. I’m only creating more of that for me.

None of us need drama in our lives. It doesn’t serve us! It’s distracting, a waste of time, throws us emotionally out of balance  into the victim place and is completely inauthentic. Yet, the temptation increases to go there when life hands us the short end of the stick. We must be strong and resist the minds trickery, to suck us into the victim/drama place. We feel much better when we rise above and stay in the empowered place…ALWAYS.

We all want something…more money, a better relationship with someone, our boss to like us, more friends, weight loss, to overcome a fear, something. Take your pick.

What we typically do is want and wait for “it” to happen. When “it” doesn’t happen we give up and go back to things the way they were. Many of us even say, “I tried but it didn’t happen for me.”

One way to make some serious changes in our lives is to “Act As If” we have already accomplished our goal. Let nothing get in our way, let no one sway us otherwise, just do it.

If we want that better relationship with our husband, it won’t happen automatically. First decide what you want:  More communication, more sex, intimacy, pick one. Think then for a moment how you would react or treat him differently when your desires are met. Imagine in your mind him treating you as you desire and how you will react to that. Then continue acting as if he is treating you this way and continue living this way. Acting as if…

Another example is money. If you want more money in your life, imagine for a moment how you will feel when more  money comes in. How will you emotionally live differently? How will you feel? How will you speak? Act this way, maintain that feeling and just watch as the income shifts.

The reason for this is that we are a (vibrational) match to everything in our lives. The Law of Attraction teaches us that like (vibrations) attract like (vibrations). If we don’t have enough money in our life experience it’s because we are holding beliefs that state we won’t have enough money.

If we have a relationship with our mate where we lack intimacy, there is something within us that states intimacy is unsafe or something our spouse should instigate, or some other belief. It’s something within US that is causing US to get exactly what is in our life, good or bad. If we don’t like what we have in our life experience WE must shift OUR thoughts/feelings about it, which shifts our inner vibration.

Here’s how we do it:

Ask yourself:
1. How will I emotionally feel when “X” happens? How will I act/react to things differently in my life experience after “X” happens?
2. Begin to live this way, as if “X” has already happened!
3. Watch your life begin to change as your desire becomes your reality.

What happens is we become a (vibrational) match for our desired outcome. This is true manifestation. Most of us want the outcome to happen first THEN our mood and attitude will change. We must change our attitude and reactions first and then watch our desires manifest.

To Act As If takes quieting our ego, it means we don’t listen to that inner voice when it says, “But he/she is wrong.” “He/She makes no effort, why should I?” “This is too hard, I’m not doing it.”

Try this empowering act  for a week and you will be surprised with the outcomes you can produce just by Acting As If. After a month, you too will wonder how things can change and manifest so quickly. Put yourself to the test, it will be well worth the effort. I guarantee it.

Owning our story can be hard but not nearly as difficult as spending our lives running from it. Embracing our vulnerabilities is risky but not nearly as dangerous as giving up on love and belonging and joy — the experiences that make us the most vulnerable. Only when we are brave enough to explore the darkness will we discover the infinite power of our light.

Brene Brown
From the book:
“The Gifts of Imperfection” Let Go of Who You Think You’re Supposed to Be and Embrace Who You Are – Your Guide To A Wholehearted Life

I love complimenting people on something that I admire: a new hair cut, new shoes, nice outfit, a decoration, a child’s behavior etc.

What I have noticed, is how uncomfortable we are with receiving compliments! When we receive a compliment we quickly rebut with downplaying the compliment, or even avoiding it, as if it’s somehow painful to acknowledge.  The typical response is: “Oh, these shoes, I got them at Target on sale.” OR “This outfit, I have had it for years!” OR “You are just seeing my son on a good day, usually he is not this well behaved.”

Why can’t we let people see that we may have a great kid?! Why can’t we proudly wear an outfit regardless of the age? Why must we make excuses and deflect when we receive a compliment?

The biggest question is why can’t we just say “THANK YOU” when we receive a compliment? Thank you can be a complete sentence! There is no explaining necessary, no excuses needed, just  “Thank You.”

I became aware that as I was teaching my children about apologizing to each other after a disagreement or if one of them hurt the other one, their exchange to each other was typically something like this, “Sorry for hitting you,” and the response was, “It’s ok.” When I was really listening to this response it dawned on me… WHEN IS IT EVER OK FOR SOMEONE TO HIT YOU?????  When I began to think deeper about this I realized that we adults say the same thing! Our typical response is, “It’s ok,” or “It’s fine,” or even worse,  “Don’t worry about it, it’s over.”

WHEN DID IT BECOME OK FOR SOMEONE TO HURT US AND THAT THEY SHOULDN’T WORRY ABOUT IT???

My realization is that whether it be compliments or apologies the response need be the same, “Thank you.” For some reason, this feels like a difficult response for both. The difficulty stems from the issue of worthiness and how we treat ourselves. Both a compliment and receiving a sincere apology are energies of the heart. This means that when we deflect them, we are not allowing ourselves to take in heart energy or love energy. Another way of saying this is that we don’t feel worthy of receiving the love coming in and can’t accept it.

Ask yourself, do you allow yourself to receive a compliment or an apology? How does it make you feel when someone compliments you or apologizes to you? Are you worthy of it? Why on earth wouldn’t you be?

When did we get so good at putting ourselves down? Whether it be a compliment or an apology, start using the response, “Thank you.” The simple exercise of saying “Thank You” can shift us emotionally, from  feelings of unworthiness to worthy, from deflecting love for self to accepting love for self.  Self love is the greatest gift we can give to ourselves and it all begins with a simple “Thank You.”