Are You Chasing Fulfillment?

Wellness has a different meaning for everyone. Searching for quotes and thoughts on the subject, the results usually point to health and fitness. In other words, the most popular perspective and understanding seems to be that wellness and physical fitness are synonymous.

My view differs from that. Yes, I have been known to say that I am allergic to exercise of a physical nature. As a child and well into my youth, the general assumption was that my future would lie in some athletic endeavour. I quickly disabused people of that notion and my daughter, who is a bit taller than I am, followed suit.

Together we have done our fair share contributing to the profits of gyms, athletic shoe stores and various media entities pushing fitness DVDs. Even recently, we began a squat challenge with one of her childhood friends in South Carolina. The goal was to get up to 200 squats a day. Each of us would record our routine and upload it via Glide for the rest of the group's comic relief.

Suffice it to say, that experiment ended at 100 squats a day. Abigail's knee gave out and my heart followed suit in sympathy. Any excuse not to physically exert myself is acceptable! I have long accepted that "wellness" will never equate to "fitness' in my life.

Yet, I consider myself extremely well.

Wellness in my experience began with an intentional internal journey. Up until my 45th birthday, happiness and a sense of fulfillment were not things that I could honestly say I knew.

Great education, home ownership, good cars - even new ones, nice furnishing and all the other trappings of a "good life," were mine. Yet that deep feeling of joy, a prevailing contentment eluded me.

There was always something to fear, something else to attain, another relationship to enter in or a promotion to get before I would be fulfilled.

When we bought the house and furnished it, I was still not feeling it. Then I got the job of a young lifetime, more money flowing in, travelling across the Caribbean region monthly and fulfilled was not what I felt.

I went to church - a different type of fellowship but while my mind opened to a new perspective on God, life and well being - fulfillment remained elusive.

We migrated in pursuit of fulfillment and it emigrated. My then partner and I searched for it as we charted new careers and educational courses. Both of us thought that once the culinary and theological studies were over, fulfillment will come bundled inside of the diploma and degrees.

Years later, single, distraught and chronically depressed, I gave up and accepted my failure to find happiness and fulfillment. I acknowledged that my search led me to all the wrong places.

Where they really though - the wrong places?

"That hunt for you is life!" Abraham Hicks

I have much to be thankful for in the work of Esther Hicks. Many discount her as a charlatan or a snake oil dealer when they are being kind. For the most part, naysayers ridicule her work as that of a delusional split-personality psychotic demon-ridden cult leader.

Well, it may be that and more but those words expressed through her - "That hunt for you is life" clarified my search for meaning.

Never to be found in the latest diet or exercise fad, certainly absent in intimate relationships, lost in the multitude of "stuff,' fulfillment is an inside job.

What came clearly home to me as I relaxed in the "littleness" of stuff in my life, the deliciousness of the single life, the enjoyment of employment for a cause and the love of real family and friends, is that wellness begins when the heart is fulfilled.

Yesterday, I went to see my doctor and his words to me would have some in utter panic. I am not.

My bank account does not have a seven-digit balance but what is there pleases me.

The stereotype of black women with big booty does not match me whatsoever. That matters not to me. I will not squat one day longer.

Fulfilled, however, is what I finally am.

"The key to ultimate happiness and fulfillment lies within our own transformation. The more we learn and grow and evolve as individuals, the more we will find happiness and satisfaction in relationships, work and life." Kristina Bowman

I have found that key and so can you. Write to me, join my list and let us deepen and widen this circle of wellness.

Namaste. 

Some photo source: pinterest,com
 

This Week: Expand Your Life

May Day! May Day and I for one could not be any happier - it would be illegal if I were.

My life is large!

Saw a post earlier this morning on Google+ that gave me another reason to be happy. This month is also observed - officially or not - as "Masturbation Month!" Happiness tun' up!!!

Wrapping up April, the most read essay was on the matter of living an expanded life. You can read it again or for the first time here. Please share with anyone who might need some suggestions.

I would love to be in touch with you over the weekend. As there is no blog posting until Monday, do visit my coaching page and/or join mailing list and let us connect.

Have a gorgeous first of May and weekend!!!

Thirty Days To Freedom

I changed my mind about March.

And about men and relationships.

Did the same with food and friendships.

Now working on changing my mind about money.

Mental slavery is a b'tch and so I changed my mind and am actively choosing "full free." That is what the main character in that classic movie - Amistad - demanded as he and his fellow kidnapped Africans stood in chains before a judge.

Full free is what this next 30 days are about.

Many of us spend a lifetime trying to be what we came into this life experience as - fully free humans becoming. Naked, unscheduled, unprogrammed and most certainly unshackled we entered. Along the way, well meaning people, starting with parents, changed and influenced our experience of who and what we truly are.

This too can and shall pass - whether it takes a lifetime or a few days. You can choose as I have. Change your mind, free yourself from the most insidious bondage there ever is - mental slavery.

Today is Day One. The first step is to test the strength of the chains that bind you.

What this requires is:

Take an hour or however long you need in a quiet place or simply close your office door if you have one. Do a mental inventory of your life right in this moment. Ask yourself the one and only relevant important question: "Am I happy from the sole of my feet to my fingertips?"

If your answer is yes, like mine is, then your step two is below. Should your answer be no, not really or completely, not sure then this is your step two. Get a bit of paper - nothing big - or on your smart phone app, make a note of the one thing, no more, that you would like to be different and what would make your heart sing.

However, this one thing CANNOT be a material item, such as a new house, car, shoes, etc. Neither can it be dependent on someone, such as your boss passing away or at least retire or finding someone who you feel can make you happy.

Once you have that happiness thread noted, put the paper or phone away and get back to your regularly scheduled activity with this mantra in your mind: "My happiness is dependent on me."

For those of us who feel the constant tingling of happiness, our exercise is to repeat the same mantra throughout the day, no matter what comes up. Colleague being difficult, boyfriend/girlfriend has not texted for hours, car repair shop called and you have to take public transit home - "My happiness is dependent on me."

This my friends is the first step in our deprogramming. It is called "taking responsibility for our lives, feelings and well being." Ever noticed a newborn how unaffected they are by the circumstances around them? Whether the parents bought Gucci baby clothes or their wardrobe came from Walmart they poop in it just the same.

That's our mission today. Find one thing that would tickle us pink and use the thought of it as our compass to inner happiness and peace. Drop a load on whatever else shows up!

Try that for today and tonight just before bed, make a note of three happy moments that surprised you today. Share them with me here or on my coaching page.

Be blessed and be happy as we #BreakLoose this March.

Claudette is the Founder of Daughter of Sheba Foundation. She is a communications specialist and lives in Edmonton, Alberta.

Hawk De Near!

"Chicken merry, hawk de near!"

My mother would use that Jamaican proverb and knock the merriment off my face for most of my young life. Little wonder that I did not end up with a permanently cricked neck due to my constant scanning of the skies, looking up for that darn hawk every time I was having fun.

Happiness was M.I.A in my childhood home. 

We were not destitute, although if you listened to my mother it was never far. To me, we were doing just fine. Certainly, we did not have some of the luxuries that I saw other children with but I was never hungry. Scared to eat the food sometimes though because it "was poor people food," and my neighbourhood friends might come over and see it. I was also guilty about eating supper on occasions since the stranger-to-me of a father "never provided it," as my mother would remind me.

On the surface, my childhood might have seemed idyllic to some being the only child and seemingly my mother's pride and joy but that was from the outside. The atmosphere in our house was tense and it felt as if the only time laughter was allowed was when my mother approved of it and was participating in the mirth.

That sense of dread became so much a part of my personality.

It still is but I have learned how to manage it. For years, happiness was a very fleeting experience, one whose presence went as fast as Usain Bolt at the sound of the Starter's gun. Forty years it took for me to finally embrace the concept that I was allowed to be happy - whenever, however and for whatever the heck I chose.

My now friendly ghost, Dread, pays a visit ever so often. Sometimes she manages to make herself a sandwich before I realize she came in. Singing, even with my off key tone, is my remedy for her. Whether she is midway through her meal or I notice her bony behind coming up the driveway, I just start singing.

Not sure if it it is my cracked voice or the volume that I sometimes have to reach for, Dread goes running. "This too shall pass" is another my favourite affirmations. It is my final statement to Dread and my welcome to the peace that passeth all understanding that ensues.

Nowadays, whether there is $10 or $10,000 in my purse, you can never tell. In a relationship, just broke up or in the throes of a budding one, unless you are pretty close to me to know the details, the smile will be the same. Why? Well, I made a conscious decision to look for reasons, examples, signs,  etc of things to be happy about. Every morning as I open my eyes, I chose to feel happy.

On my birthday this year, I accepted a new position. At this point, I am in probation but I think the job will be mine. It was not an advertised position but everyone was aware of the opening. My job title is "Love-are in Training," and my boss lady is The Universe.

You see, what I learned over these 40 years is this: "The happiness you feel is in direct proportion to the love you give." Want to feel and be happy, give love.

There are still quite a few openings at my workplace, so if you are interested, leave a comment here or hit me up on Facebook or Twitter. Oh, I forgot to mention, in this job, we redirect hawks back to their rightful place. :)

Until tomorrow, have a Happy Friday and love as wastefully as you can.