We are all special, in the sense that we all have our own unique consciousness, our own perspective, our own dreams, ideas, desires.
The biggest part of you is the one that you probably never talk about and the one you couldn’t really explain. It’s the big you, the inner true you, your soul.
You have feelings and they are you guidance. They tell you whether or not your focus is upon things that are what you really want to be focusing on.
See, the big part of you knows what you’ve been experiencing, what you’ve been thinking, what you’ve been wanting in your life,what you need to do, where you need to go…
There is some traditions that encourage you to eradicate desire.
I say desire is the most essential part of our being.
We live through our experiences and out of every experience are born one or thousands of desires. We desire more or less of this and that, we desire that the next time we have an experience like this it’d be more like this or that…we arrive to new conclusions, new preferences. This mechanism is always working in your life, always determining your new preferences and desires.
You can always trust yourself to know what is good for you.
Only…no one tells you so.
The people that care about you: parents, teachers, partners, friends… are for the most part well-meaning people and want the best for you. But what they consider to be ‘the best for you’ has nothing to do with you, and everything to do with what they would be pleased to see you doing.
When most people tell you what to do and why, they’re more interested in your looking for ways to please them than in your looking for ways to please yourself.
That’s how in their trying to be social most people lose themselves and their true passions, they simply feel persuaded or obligated to ignore their own guidance.
These people usually end up basing their motivations on the attention that is directed at them by other people.
Sometimes it feels really difficult to follow your own guidance in this society, especially as a young person, everyone seems to think they know what is best for you, and you have no idea.
The thing to keep in mind is that most people are only talking from their own position of having shut down their own guidance system.
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Sometimes out of respect or the kind of relationship we have with certain people, we allow ourselves to consider and focus our attention on the things they tell us that oppose our goals, dreams and desires.This never helps you or brings you anywhere because it always makes you feel internal discord, which will actually make it more difficult for you to achieve what you want.
There will always be others that disagree with what you are doing or want to do, but when you pay attention to them then you are the one that is disagreeing with your own goals, dreams and desires.
The only way to really gauge the appropiateness or possibility of your desires, dreams or behaviors is to listen to your own guidance system: your emotions.
Pay attention to your feelings and follow what makes you feel good, alive, in tune, in alignment, happy and joyful, because that is who you really are.
There is no reason why your life should go any way but the way you dream it to go.
Sure there will be tons of things that happen to you along the way that will seem like you neither planned nor wanted, but the truth is that we all end up living what we think we’re going to anyway, so it’s just a matter of you really getting it, learning to use and live with this knowledge and doing it purposefully.
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See, when you don’t feel the callingto do something, then you look at it and consider it from a whole different perspective than the person that feels a passionate and compelling pull to do that same thing.
That’s why when you go up to your parents and tell them about your dreams to be a dog psychologist in Australia they can’t help but feel a bit queasy and tell you all the reasons why it wouldn’t be the right thing for you to do, because from their passionless perspective they just can’t see all the pros of the situation and how they would outweigh the cons for you.
In the end, a lot of times, people that really care about us end up taking a position of passionately opposing our desires, which makes it even more difficult for them to see how it would be a good option for you.
That’s why you ultimately shouldn’t listen to anybody but yourself when it comes to making decisions in your life.
Don’t get me wrong, it’s very important to do a lot of research, to inform yourself about your decisions, so you know what you are getting yourself into but it is a different matter to let yourself be advised about the actual outcome of the situation in a way that you are being told what is right or wrong for you to do.
No one knows what is like to be you, no one is in your head and no one has lived your experiences so no one knows what’s best for you but you.
Remember this applies to other people too. That means, take into consideration that you can easily become ‘the Others’ in this situation.
We’re all part of that big ‘They’ just someone else’s.
That’s why whenever someone asks me for advice on any given topic I always end up talking to them about bigger or more general things that their specific choice or decision, I talk to them about how they have guidance that can help them much better than me.
You are truly your best friend, in every way, if you just got to know yourself better, you’d realize it right away.
I had never done collages or much with mixed media before. My mom really loves it though, and she’s been making beautiful things that way for a while. Recently she found the fantabulous, sparkly + inspiring Suzi Blu and her fun/awesome/ridiculous and super inspirational youtube videos where she shows how she makes art and talks about her philosophy of life in between all other sorts of cutesy craziness. She urged me to check her out and when I did I was delighted and instantly in love!
Suzi has a blog and an online art academy where she teaches workshops with names like: Be. Divine. , Mystic Mamas or Be Brave, for art lovers who might have been afraid to make art in the past.
Suzi’s just great.
Watching her videos got me really excited and inspired to start making collages and experiment more with mixed media myself.
One of the things she talks a lot about in her videos are art journals which she fills with drawing, paintings,collages, poems & thoughts and all sorts of mixed media and she encourages you to do the same yourself.
So I went and bought a big black sketchbook and decorated the covers mixed media style, using ribbon, lace, sequins, rhynestones ect… I enjoyed it a lot.
It’s my Art + Dreams + Desires Journal that I mentioned in my last post. I started to actually fill it on my birthday and I want it to be kind of like a vision board but in art journal form. I will fill it with photos, collages and art that represents the things that I want in my life . It’s been making me very happy . It is a very magical book already.
And I glued little silver stars all over the back.
Most people make resolutions for the following year around New Year’s Eve, I usually end up doing it on my birthday. Maybe because since it is at the end of January, I’ve had some time for the year to set in and it feels appropriate enough.
I’m really excited about my 22nd year… I feel it’s going to be magical and a lot of my dreams are going to come true!
I don’t know if I want to do this every year but this time I’ve come up with 22 resolutions for my 22nd year on earth:
1.
Better my sleep.
I want to sleep good every night, I want to wake up refreshed. I want to go to bed relatively early and wake up relatively early as well… I want to enjoy and make the most out of my mornings.
2.
Post new content every other day.
When I started this blogazine I wasn’t sure how often I wanted or could update it with new content, but now that I’ve been blogging for a few months, I think my ideal goal would be to post quality content every other day. I think it’ll be the best blogging rhythm for me.
3.
Dance more.
Go out dancing. Dance at home. Go to dance classes. Dance. Dance. Dance.
4.
Master Hooping.
I got a Hoop from my good friend Jill over a year ago…she makes them out of acrylic thermo piping that her dad uses for his business and then she decorates them with colored duck tape and even yarn! I know how to hoop but I don’t do it nearly enough, even though I love it and I have plenty of space in my flat. I want to hoop a lot more , and learn to do cool tricks while hooping like this.
5.
Add something to my Art+Dreams+Desires journal every day!
Even if it’s just a tiny weeny bit. I started this journal inspired by my mother and the wonderful Suzi Blu, of whom I will talk a bit more in my next Art Friday post (*excitement*). I started it on my birthday and I want it to help me master manifesting what I want in my life through art & self expression. I will be talking about it more in the future. It’s been a really exciting & powerful project for me so far.
6.
Achieve a Beautiful Relationship with Food.
Some months back I read this interview with the inspiring and awesome Dhrumil Purohit. At the time, I really liked it but it wasn’t until a month ago or so when I started having some challenges staying raw in the winter that I really related to this article.
“… having a beautiful relationship with food is using food as a vehicle of nourishment instead of treating food as the destination. We all know people that are out there that get so caught up with being perfect when it comes to their diet that they spend more time thinking about food and stressing about food than they do enjoying life. Food is not the ultimate goal, it’s just a vehicle to take us somewhere, to enjoy life further, to live more in the present moment.”
Through the years I might have become obsessed with eating the “right way” and I want to realign myself with the joy of eating and feeling healthy for the sake of feeling good and nothing else.
7.
Sing more.
Maybe even take voice lessons. I love to sing. I sing every day. Specially when I’m alone, I sing a lot. I make up songs about everything that goes on all day long, and I even have theme songs to different situations & people in my life. I’ve been this way my whole life, but at some point during my conservatory music education I was told I didn’t have “a voice” and it stuck with me.
This year I say :Fuck That I’m going To Sing Out Loud and see what happens!
8.
Stay true to myself Under All Circumstances.
No exceptions. I am tired of making ‘mistakes’ when I knew it was a mistake all along because I want to go along with what people around me say or do, or because I want to somehow fit in. I want to stay true to myself and aim to please myself and stand by my values, not anybody else’s.
9.
Tattoos!!.
I want to get mine beautified. And also get some more. I’ve been dreaming up a half sleeve for years, but I’ve also have like 5 other dream tattoos that I want before that. First I need to meet my dream tattoo artist that I can work with though!
10.
California.
I need to move West. It feels vital to me. I’ve been living in Wisconsin for almost four years and I’ve learned so many things I never even had a concept of before. But something calls me west. I need sun, and dependable weather. I want the weather to be a non-issue, not a constant obstacle to my lifestyle. Basically, I don’t think I’ve ever gotten used to this extreme weather and temperature transitions. I want to still be surrounded by nature though, but I also want to be closer to a big exciting city full of inspiration and creativity.
11.
Kitty Sister for Betty.
I’ve been wanting to adopt a kitty sister for Betty for a while now. It won’t happen until we’ve moved to California, but I’m really excited!! I’ve been dreaming about another fuzzy little ball to play around with Betty for months.
12.
Travel More.
I want to travel more. Road Tripping across the United States it’s been on my mind for years. Also I’ve never been anywhere in South America and I’m really intrigued, my mother is from Brazil and I think it’s about time we all go there and check it out! . I know I will be going back to Spain in the spring or summer and I would love to travel around Europe too, go to London, Amsterdam, Berlin…all places I’ve been wanting to go to for so long!
13.
Get my Etsy Shop Up & Running + Sell lots & lots of Beautiful Treats.
I have so many dreams for my Etsy Shop, and even though it’s taking me a little while I’ve been working on it steadily and surely. I’ve been experimenting & learning a lot in order to create the products I dream of. I want to get in a flow and be able to update the shop once a month.
14.
Balance Out and Establish my Business.
This is my dream, my baby.I’m putting everything I’ve got into this project, with its many sides. I’ve never done anything that made me this excited, happy, motivated & inspired. I know this is my calling and this is what I’m supposed to be doing right now. I’m the type of person that schools herself on things before going at them, and that’s kind of what I’ve been doing. But I trust that I’m on the right path and things are getting better all the time! The thing I hadn’t predicted is that it would be so tricky to balance out the different sides of it and how long I spend dedicated to each. If I concentrate on getting the blog going and posting regularly the shop is left behind, and then when I try and focus all of my energy on the shop, I don’t update the blog as often as I’d like to…so I’m still balancing things out and feeling my way around things, but my goal is to figure things out and get a good rhythm going this year.
15.
Read all the Books in my List & Basket.
I have a list of books I’ve been wanting to buy and read for quite a while and I think they would really help me with my development in all areas of my life ( or at least the ones that matter to me at the moment) I really want to get around to reading them this year . But also, and most importantly, I have quite a few of these books from my list already in my house and a lot of them I have started to read and haven’t finished and a couple I haven’t even started! So that’s my first priority , book wise, to read the books in my basket.
16.
Create my ideal wardrobe + Master the Sewing Machine
I love to sew. But so far, I really only sew by hand. I’m really really good at it. But it takes so long! I want to learn to make all the clothes I dream of easily and quickly! It’s pretty silly because I’ve had a beautiful pink sewing machine for some time now. It’s lovely but I’ve only used it a handful of times because I guess it drives me a bit nuts. I’m so into sewing by hand, I like it so much and I get the results I want so easily that I just kept making things that way, even when I know it would have taken me a fraction of the time in the sewing machine, if I only knew how to use it. A lot of times I use really delicate threads that can’t be used in a sewing machine, they would break all the time. But now that I want to start selling my clothes on Etsy I think it’s time for me to master the art of the sewing machine and implement it in my creative process to speed things along.
17.
Find & Move into the Perfect House in the Perfect Community for Us.
As I’ve said we’ve been really wanting to move for a while. We want to live in a place big enough for us and all of our projects and experiments. I want a back yard, where we can plant vegetables and lay in the grass. I want my own washer + dryer. And N needs a garage to build things in! I want to find a neighborhood, a community as lovely as the one I live in now, but in a warmer, more me sort of place.I believe it’s possible and that life with take me there.
18.
Spend More Time in Nature.
I didn’t really grow up with much of a connection to nature. I did go to camp in the mountains in Madrid in the summer as a little girl but I really never truly connected to nature until I moved to Wisconsin and had different experiences and interacted with people that really are connected to the land they live in. A few times in the past year, when I’ve hit hard or desperate states of mind, I’ve suddenly felt a strong desire to go to a church or some place like that ( I don’t really know why, since I wasn’t raised or am religious) to achieve a sense of peace or something…but in all occasions I found the churches around me closed….and ended up in some peaceful corner by the lake surrounded by trees and bushes. I get it Universe, Nature is my Church. And I need to go more often.
19.
Take more and better photos.
I love photography, but I know very little about it. I spend hours browsing through Flickr and staring at beautiful photographs everywhere. I love taking photos and looking back on old photos…if they look good. I guess I also have a fear (or panic) of bad photos, so I want to work on that too. This year I want to learn more about photography, take lots of beautiful artsy photos and enjoy the experience, go all out trying to really make it look like I envisioned it in my mind!
20.
Learn to Drive & Get a Driver’s License.
Even though I’ve had many chances to get my drivers license ( I could have even cheated and gotten my license in the US when I was 16 even though in Spain you can’t until you’re 18 ) I never did . When I was 18 N even tried to teach me to drive in his old Toyota, but I just wasn’t very interested. I enjoy being in a car and being driven, but I never had ANY kind of DESIRE to drive, AT ALL. So I didn’t. Until we got our BMW. The first time N & I went for a drive alone in this car, I wanted to drive it, bad. I’ve never felt the speed and the excitement like I do in this car, even though I know I’ve been in better and faster cars before but I’ve never felt the desire to be in the wheel and feel the power and speed myself while I was in control. This year, I want to learn to drive in my bimmer.
21.
Go to more shows.
I’ve gone to fair share of shows in my life, but it’s always been an special occasion type thing. Every time I go see an awesome Musical, the Ballet or a really good concert I feel so inspired and electrified! I want to do it more often! I think moving closer to a big city would certainly help with this. Growing up in Madrid I always took all these things for granted, but living here far away from all that action has really made me miss it and want it more than ever!
22.
Go with the Flow Always.
Sometimes I have trouble going with the flow. I tend to get impatient and want things to happen in my time table, so I get antsy pants and try to MAKE things happen trying really hard. This never works for me. It’s pretty insane that I still find myself doing it, trying to go against the stream of life, but I do. So this is year this is the resolution I would most like to keep, I want to go with the flow, and trust the process of life to take me where it shall, and don’t fuss or worry so much. Let Things Flow.
The first step to freeing your mind is to STOP justifying who you’ve ended up becoming. To yourself, to your partner, to your friends & family, to the world.
You are who you are and you are where you are at and it is perfectly fine because regardless of the circumstances, it is ALWAYS temporary.
Circumstances are ALWAYS temporary and they are subjective to change as the way you feel and think about them changes. It is a subtle process that we are so used to being a part of that we barely realize it is going on at all.
Every time you have a new idea, or there’s a major change in your life or perspective. Do you spend a lot of time asking others what they think or how they feel about it? Do you question it yourself over and over again in your head?
I used to do that. I still catch myself doing it sometimes, but now I know how to recognize the feeling and disregard it, ignore it, distract myself with something that makes me feel better about who I have become. Who life, overtime, has caused me to be.
Allow yourself to be. Then the magic will start really happening. Stop second guessing yourself, demanding perfectly logical plans and explanations from yourself about your every ‘move’ in your life.
Let yourself flow and trust that you are capable of anything you set your mind to. Your thoughts create your limits.
Every skill that I’ve got, every ability has come as a surprise when I least expected it and most needed it, and it’s been like a gift I’ve had to explore, discover, develop.
While you’re explaining to someone, who is usually not listening, why you deserve that which you want but you don’t have and how unfair it is that you don’t have it, you are not allowing it to come into your life.
Measure your success by the joy levels you are regularly experiencing. The happier you are the more in track you are in life.
We tend to justify our successes with our struggles because we don’t really get that good things are good and they feel good and we deserve them because we are good.
We resist the evolution of our own character & life and we become critical and judgmental of ourselves in our attempt to be better, but it is that critical attitude that keeps us from getting what we want.
If you are to feel good and live the joyous life that you deserve, you have to allow yourself to keep up with the evolved version of you.
Life is constantly causing you to become new things, to become more, to expand. You experience all kinds of contrasts everyday in your life that cause you to desire new things, to define your preferences and intentions. But contrast doesn’t feel good to you unless you go in the direction of your expansion. When you resist the evolution of your life, you don’t feel fear & unwell.
It’s pretty simple : If you keep up with your own expansion you feel good. If you resist it or fight it, you feel bad.
Think about what you want and why you want it. And concentrate on that, dwell on it whenever you feel resistance or fear of who you are becoming.
Free your mind : Real freedom is knowing that you can feel good because you choose to regardless of the circumstances or situation.
The first step is to Allow Yourself To Be, To Evolve & Expand and Stop Justifying to Yourself and Others the validity of your existence, your actions, of yourself.
More outfits of the day because I’ve been drawing like a maniac for days!
This is what I wore when we went and indulged in our favorite warmy cooked food on Reyes Eve. I thought this outfit was really worth documenting because I very very rarely wear brown. As a matter of fact, I think these are the only three brown items I own!
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* Brown shirt from H&M.
* Black sweater from Blanco in Spain.
* Black & Pink plaid shorts from Old Navy.
* Black knit wool tights from Urban Outfitters.
* Black Mary Janes by Candies.
* Suspenders.
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And here’s the coat I wore with this outfit, which my mom gave to me years ago.
I’ve been meaning to dye it black forever, since it’s really a fabulous coat (and super cozy and warm!) but I rarely wear colors that would go with it.
Do you know how many hours do you spend every week watching news on T.V. or reading the paper?
A couple of years ago I decided that I was spending way too much of my energy & attention on getting “informed” about the happenings in the world.
During my teens I got in the habit to watch the news a couple times a day and read the paper, or at least scan it.
This seemed to be what grown ups did, and I was ready to be one.
After following events like September 11th, Afghanistan’s bombings, Tsunamis, March 11th, Katrina , etc. on TV news stations and papers I had finally realized that most of the time the overwhelming amount of information I was getting was driving me crazy, rather than making me feel more empowered or educated, which is what I thought being informed and being a grown up was about.
I wanted to know and care so much about every thing that was supposedly going on that I often overlooked the fact that, according to the news & the paper good things hardly ever happen, and when they do they tend to be dorky little things, which aren’t really news at all.
It’s not that I don’t want to be informed, I just don’t want to focus my attention on the bogus that they call ‘news’ these days.
Another thing I realized, as I started to pay more attention to my thoughts and my beliefs and the way they affect and shape my reality, is that most of the time, the news & the papers were manipulating my attention.
Watching & reading the news, most of the time makes you feel like you live in a tough cruel world, where things aren’t fair & there are very few good things happening. And if that’s what your predominant perspective you will see more and more evidence of how the world really is that way everywhere you go. It becomes your concept of “reality”.
The reason I decided to kick my old habit and start a new one that served me better is because I realized that even though there are horrible things happening in this world, in this country, in this state all the time, if I’m not affected by them or I can do something about them, it doesn’t really help for me to be feeling as awful as the people directly affected are feeling.
In my eyes, it is a bigger & more valuable contribution to this world, for me to be a happy, hopeful & positive member of society ready to get involved & help those around them, than being someone that knows in every sort of detail why this world isn’t working & yet feels completely disempowered to do anything about it.
My new & better habit: I subscribed to Time magazine. I thought a weekly news magazine would cover everything major that I would want to know about and would keep me informed without overwhelming me, plus it is delivered to my door every week! Also, I still check the news online once in a while & keep up with Current TV.
All in all, I feel so much more positive these days than I ever did back when I watched the news & read the paper obsessively. My conversations no longer revolve around current events, or the decay of our planet. You’d be amazed how many arguments you avoid. It’s been working out for me, I might be naive, or in some people’s eyes uninformed or ignorant, but it is by choice, and it keeps me happy, now it’s so much easier for me to see that things are getting better everyday!
We live in the most exciting and fabulous time in history! You wouldn’t want the news to let you overlook that, now would you?
So you’re feeling positive and you’re doing good with your life…but somehow you still get anxious sometimes. And you deal with bouts of depression that come out of nowhere.You want to not give importance to these feelings (or maybe you do, and so do your parents/partner) but the fact is that they are there, they come and go and you have to deal with them.
This is for sure what happened to me. I used to be very depressed in my teens, I was even on medication & therapy for a while. But now I am really quite happy with my life, with myself, with my choices…but I still had to deal with occasional, seemingly random bouts of depression & anxiety. Recently, during one of those, I thought it was enough. So I did, what I always do when I decide that enough is enough, I went and did a ton of research. I read something very interesting.
Depression and Anxiety are byproducts of supressed anger.
Oh, boy. I had heard that before, but this time I actually dealt with it…
I realized maybe…I was really fucking angry. I was angry about a ton of things, so many in fact that just thinking about it overwhelmed me a lot. It made me literally dizzy.
I did what I read is helpful. Start punching pillows, or something soft and easy to punch….until it comes out . At first I thought it was silly, but man, did it come out. In fact, it’s been coming out everyday ever since.
It’s been quite revolutionary in my life, actually. But it hasn’t been an easy ride.
So, why do we suppress our feelings in the first place?
We’re raised to. We all are, for the most part. Your parents most likely were and their parents even more likely were as well. When you are a kid, you are taught not to talk back, not to defend yourself when adults punish you (even if they do so physically), you’re even forced not to express your anger towards them after such treatment. When you are a kid and you are mad at another kid, instead of teaching you how to express you anger in a healthy way, they scold or ground you for expressing it at all.
Depending on how severely punished you were for expressing your anger it might be more or less difficult for you to express it.
But the fact that we are raised to be that way, means that most adults are acting this way between each other.
It doesn’t feel good to suppress our anger. When we do, we feel depressed and anxious.
Anger isn’t really bad in the first place. It is a coping mechanism. When something happens to you that threatens your life, your mental stability, your wellbeing. It is normal and healthy for you to feel angry and that you would stand up for yourself and do something about the situation. It’s helping you survive and protect yourself. We’ve just domesticated ourselves and each other to believe that, somehow, that’s not acceptable behavior.
What happens also is that when we suppress it, the anger becomes a whole new problem for you to cope with. It’s how we make problems complex and difficult to solve. We lose track of where they really started.
So once you’ve decided that you want to stop suppressing your anger, you want to express it when you feel it and then let it go, you might find that things get a little difficult.
You start flipping out on people. And then you feel really guilty afterwards. You start to feel lost.
This happens to so many people because, again, most of us have learned to only express our anger in very mean, destructive ways.We’ve watched plenty of people let their anger bottle up until they finally exploded.
It’s important for us to not get lost in the feelings and identify with them. You are feeling really fucking angry. Possibly even furious. Now might not be the best time to talk to that person you are so furious with. Now might be the best time for you to go somewhere where it’s safe for you to scream, or punch a pillow or something.
A lot of people use exercise as a coping mechanism for anger. It works MUCH better than depression & anxiety
The interesting thing about anger too is that it doesn’t even last that long. Once you allow yourself to fully feel your feelings, you feel better and they are gone. You don’t have to dwell on them. You just need to get things off your chest.
Another way in which people cope with anger is expressing it to someone else or by just complaining, instead of expressing it directly to the person they are having an issue with . For example, spouses often express their anger towards each other to other people, instead of each other. They’ll talk to their kids, friends, siblings, family members, co-workers…
but if you want to have a different kind of relationship with your partner, friends, family members…
If you want things to always be clear and good between you, whatever your relationship. If you want all the cards to be on the table. You need to find a way to express anger that works for you, and talk to them about it, tell them how you feel, do something about whatever it is that made you feel angry. Without getting mean or destructive, once you have gotten that original rage out of your chest.
It could eventually become something really helpful, if you learn to deal with it in a way that works for you. It could help you learn about yourself, about the people in your life that are important to you, and better your quality of life in general.
but it is a different matter to let yourself be advised about the actual outcome of the situation in a way that you are being told what is right or wrong for you to do.
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