One Small Change Daily, Can Improve Your Life….

Hello Wednesday –  yep, well it’s actually Thursday now in Australia but due to such a tiring set of  NeuroPhysio and physical rehab sessions yesterday my #WellnessWednesday was put on hold! But, that’s okay because building wellness sometimes means taking time out ! I am on the long walk of life, which means I  concentrate on putting processes into action that will help allow me to find total body wellness freeing me from FND and so many other chronic health conditions.
So, today let me share a few tips that I’ve aligned to my physical, mental, spiritual & emotional wellness regime daily that usually take less than 10 minutes.  The most effective way to meet goals is through a series of small changes. Here are 10 that work for me;
1 – Nutritionally wise, getting sugar smart is one small process that is one massive action step.  Since removing sugar and preservatives my inflammations have reduced in big numbers and this makes recovery a forward progressing journey much more achievable.
2 – Every morning do some yoga particularly a “sun salutation” pose. It’s posture releases such a vibrancy of energy through the bidy when practiced 6 times for 10 minutes.  An even clearer energy transforms when done outdoors when able. It kets you start the day with important stretching and strengthening and seriously it just plain feels good!

3 – Easing anxiety with a Tibetan style sky gazing meditation also begins the day right but when you feel anxiousness creeping higher within you, its great to stop and simply look out the window (or look upward), relax your whole body, and let your gaze expand into the spaciousness of the sky. Again if you can do this outdoors you can achieve an even more profound healing experience. With this process,  its good to repeat the “ahhh” sound silently—it’s the most open sound you can make, and it amplifies the feeling. Let your attention go, and sit for a few minutes. Do it as many times as you need!

4 – Pkay some music that is calming to you. The body’s inner rhythms activate to the external rhythms of music, similar to when you go to the seaside and you start breathing slower and your heart rate slows down and starts moving closer to the rhythm and pace of the ocean waves. It’s the same with music, especially reggae or jazz, however I have other music genres that uplift the mind , body & soul. If you need to listen to the song on repeat – do it! 
5 – Just put down the phone and step into a quiet space and breathe. When everything is overwhelming you, the impulse to whip out the phone and scroll strikes in high levels!  It’s a impulse decision, but don’t panic—that wave is supposed to happen.  Instead of scrolling and for a faster and more focused calming of the mind – take yourself  to a quiet comfortable place, breathe naturally, and settle your attention using your powerful breath. It is a sort of meditation and with each inhale and exhale, mentally repeat the words “in” and “out.” If your mind wanders, just let go without judgment, and bring your attention back to it. Once it rolls through, you’ll see that there’s something good in its wake: silence is freedom.

6 – Do you have inspirational mentors – focus on them! To feel a deeper connection to those around you, take time each day to sit quietly and think of someone who has unconditionally supported or inspired you. Close your eyes and visualise that person behind and slightly above you. Imagine them radiating love in the form of beautiful, golden light. Then visualise someone in front of you who you want to share the light with. Let it pour down through you and bathe the person in front of you. Once practiced, this action is profoundly powerful and you will be even more grateful for there presence on your life journey.
7 – Create yourself a selflove/self kindness mindfulness intention, affirmation meditation  –  Sit quietly, breathe normally, and repeat a phrase that suits you! Things like “May I be happy, may I be peaceful, “may I be healthy” are affirmations that I may use. Whenever your attention wanders, gently let those thoughts go and come back to the  particular phrase. After repeating that phrase for yourself, offer it up to include all beings and things everywhere, saying “May all things be happy, may all things be peaceful.”

8 – Remember what you want. Sometimes we’re so distracted by illnesses and stresses, we never take time to settle down and listen to what our body, mind, and soul are telling us – I am so very guilty!  Try this: Sit ir lay in a comfortable position, settle your breath, close your eyes, and, as you breathe, mentally repeat the words “I am” for 5 minutes. Next, ask yourself “What do I want?” 2 to 4 times—don’t feel like you have to answer it, let your mind settle down and see what bubbles up. 
9 – Posture  practice starts with even just sitting up straight.  When you move from poor posture to good posture, you increase levels of energising hormones, as well as feel-good serotonin, plus you decrease the stress hormone cortisol. Stop slouching and simply sit up straight.

10 – My afternoon slump crusher yoga pose is savasana to add to your regular wellness regime; 

So there a few of my most fave tips to bringing about a better total inner and outer wellness .Have you tried any of these things and did they or have they helped you? 

Perhaps you have created your own special little tips – please share because you never know when it may help someone else.

Whatever works for you, I hope we all can find a journey that works for our individual steps.
Please connect with me on my social media channels;

http://www.facebook.com/IAmFNDAware

http://www.instagram.com/fnd_goddess

http://www.twitter.com/FND_Goddess
Much love ❤️ 
“Wandering Towards Wellness, Globally”

Rehabilitation- The Path That Opens Up Wounds, That I Wanted Kept Buried.

Rehabilitation takes many paths to heal and recover from chronic illness and then as you begin doing the internal work, you find that the catalyst for the physical breakdown began long ago, in moments that I would rather forget.

Let me explain – 

I grew up in a narcissistic environment where I was conditioned to believe that only the voice of one person mattered. I learnt that only that person was allowed to have and express opinions. My voice was shut off in order to meet the needs of the house and instead at age eleven, I began the path of pleasing – I would cook and clean and look after younger siblings as well as get the best marks so that i could get acknowledged and celebrated but of course I didn’t. It was important for me to be perfect – that perfect child and student, because I thought if I was perfect I would eventually be celebrated- but again – NO, I never was!!! Across the journey from childhood to teens I fell in love with dancing (as a lot of little girls did) – this was my space to be free, to shine and star on stage and I did receiving medals and distinctions in my exams. But alas , that could not even continue because it was frowned upon and soon I lost what was my passionate purpose. 
As an adult now – I can see growing up in in a childhood like that , how awfully difficult it was and just perhaps keeping the emotional and physical abuse choked down inside could of impacted on the health challenges, both physically and mentally that I am facing in middle adulthood. I am tonight looking back and am even questioning my own value, as a wife a mother and a woman in the workplace because in all of those individual pathways I needed the perfection status – I needed to be celebrated but of course I wasn’t . Well I wasn’t in the mindset of how I grew up. Sitting here crying now as I write this, I can hear my husband telling me so many times, you are here now, you don’t need to live like that anymore. WHY , did I not listen way back when or across the thirty-two year journey that we have been together. I guess that’s what abuse does – it messes with you deep to the core  and then holding it all in, thinking you have life in control and everything balanced and settled, it all comes crashing down. 

In order to heal, it is time to start focusing on self love, self value and self worth and then as I have blogged about before a contented life will begin. Rehabilitation is now allowing me to move forward to “rewire” my brain and body to become one again – if you like , be born again to a life that I know i will love in every breath and step.

I must start at the beginning. I know already opening up and releasing some of these challenging moments of my life are going to trigger emotional flashbacks. It is going to be difficult because of having to remember being brought up in an emotionally neglected household where I would rarely or never receive compassion. I now realise that compassion is so essential for demonstrating empathy within childhood. This important skill was not properly taught to me as I was growing up  and perhaps this is why I pushed the kindness and compassion handle extraordinarily to my children. 

I keep stopping as I write this, telling myself to be patient – it’s something that my health challenges have taught me, but this time it seems even more important! There is a lot of shit, to release , so internal kindheartedness toward myself needs to start NOW. As I am writing this, I am thinking how I would react to someone else in similar circumstances, or what a close friend perhaps would say to me to give comfort to this unsettled self. What are the words I need to say to myself as I release the long suffered pain and rebirth my health and life.
I think I need to eliminate my inner most harshest critic and I need to learn to love myself. My “inner child” – little Lisa-Raie holds on to this hope that if i was only smarter , more helpful, more talented, and without any flaws perhaps I would of been loved. But perhaps my “inner child” was actually defective and unlovable and maybe that’s why the physical symptoms of today are a result of the failure of not finding perfection! These steps are a  self reflection process that I need to take, I am not meaning to self criticise it’s the stepping right back into the dark, to grasp the past so it can be exhaled and removed so healing can take place. I keep hearing my little voice, that inner critic continuing the past experiences and it is screaming toxic shame. I know why, I squashed all of this down – not wanting to remember! I just want to put my fingers in my ears and sing lalalala!!!  

But WAIT, what if I have been beginning to eliminate my past shame by learning the steps through showing my vulnerable side with safe people. Over, the last few months, I’ve begun connecting with safe people, I’ve started telling my story.

Yes, that’s exactly what I’ve been doing. I’ve started building self trust, by visualising my traumatic childhood as a way to start developing a stronger and more comforting, accepting, secure, and safer adult self.  The best way to learn self trust is to start treating yourself well.

Sitting here surrounded by my husband, one daughter and one son who love me dearly I can see how growing up in a narcissistic environment how much I missed out on healthy role modeling. As I recover these memories, I am feeling failed as a mother and a wife. Sorry, for swearing, BUT fuck this healing is hard! Keep going though, get it out – repair and rewire!!!  I can do this, it’s now that the self rejecting self STOPS and the self repairing  BEGINS. YES, I CAN DO THIS!!! Embrace younger self with the warmth and acceptance and let’s step into exercising the truest form of self love.

Growing up I learnt to focus only on the voice, reactions and power of one person. I think NOW looking at the adult self (ME), I really had no idea how to look internally at my own needs. As a child and teen, I was always striving to please, as a wife, mother and woman in the workplace the same. Always striving to be perfect when in fact there is no such thing as perfect. I think across my life journey particularly as a mother of five children, I developed an internal nurturer but I never really let it have a strong presence for the world to see, in case I was punished somehow. How stupid, tonight as I write I have so much self criticism – oh to release these pits of past perils! Oh self love, oh self love – where are you! Oh crickey, it’s 1.13AM, let me begin a process that can enable this healing journey to resurrect my physical and mental health. 

Step One, tomorrow or may I say later today this list is going to be the intentions I will set myself each and everyday to do for me, to be happy and healthy and live the life that is in all my visions and dreams and to which my purpose and passion pushes me towards.

1. Meditate
2. Rehab exercises to rebuild my body 
3. Say daily that “I am worthy, loved and enough”
4. If I am tired – that is ok, let myself rest
5. If I need to cry, let myself cry
6. Fill my body with good nutrition
7. Crochet, because creating heals

Okay, so this is just the truest and real start line for where healing illness and recovery from abuse begins. It is a process, that may take a lifetime to release and unravel but with the gracious guidance of my husband who has never strayed and now the solid BUT nurturing rehabilitation team of Erin, Ann and Peter to guide me , I know I will allow myself the gifts of  grace, and small steps to enjoy each day as it comes and be mindful of what I will be experiencing, finding and learning along the way. Ultimately, this recovery process will involve eliminating my little ME, my inner harshest critic and toxic shame that resides in my head so that the physical harm and pain can heal and my body be strengthened without too much harm being done. 
Let me begin, but first let me sleep. 🙏🏻

This has been very confronting writing this blog but also very cathartic. As I press publish, I have such strong anxieties and vulnerabilities flooding pain through every part of my body….and I hope there is something that my words have helped you with.

This moment marks my truest sense of gratitude that life is beginning NOW.
Lisa-Raie 💋
Please connect with me on my social media channels;

http://www.facebook.com/IAmFNDAware

http://www.twitter.com/FND_Goddess

http://www.instagram.com/fnd_goddess
” I Am Wandering Towards Wellness Globally”

Living A Life Of Contentment 🙏🏻

A lot of people search for ways to find happiness, but I personally think the idea of contentment is more important than happiness.

So why contentment over happiness? 
SIMPLY- 

1. Happiness can go up or down each day or by the moment, BUT contentment is something more stable.
2. We seek happiness by adding things like food, a warm bath, time with a loved one but contentment is a skill that allows you to not need those things and still be contented and balanced.
3. Contentment can actually be a good place to start as we make changes to health, life and simply ourselves.

So what is contentment? For me, it’s about being happy with who we  are as individuals. This is something I wasn’t for many years, and I think is one of the reasons I am slowly becoming more and more my truest self.

As I am journeying life and healing myself , I’m learning to be better with the skill of contentment.  I am happy with my life. I am happy with myself. I’m happy with where I sit myself each and everyday because I now see me for who I am and I love the woman that I’ve grown to be.  I’ve grown and I am still growing in ways that I would never have imagined and part of the reasoning is that I am content with knowing that I am enough in everything that I try and do on any given day. Of course, I still strive for many things but I know that for when one day ends and the next begins, I’ve been and done all that I can do – that is true and total contentment and that is enough!

So let’s take a look at the path of contentment and how it’s a good place for letting change to begin and how to get started down that path. The question is how to get there. How to go from being unhappy with yourself to being content with yourself!

• The path is learning a few important skills at a time.

• Build self-trust. The only way to fix a lack of trust is in small steps. You can’t  trust your unreliable self right a way,  instead, it’s about starting to build trust in small steps. Do little things, each day, where you start seeing things showing up. As this begins to happen, you open yourself up more and more to being able to want , think and feel more expansive options in health and life.

• What I usually do to build trust is to start with small things that I’m totally certain I can do, for instance  drinking a glass of water every day is an easy to do task. If you want to drink more water, like I do set yourself a bunch of reminders in your phone or with notes scattered around your home to remind you to drink more water. Keep that up for a week or more and it will help you to trust yourself. If we try to change hard stuff, we will fail, every time and then your self trust is gone. So start with the small stuff.

•  The other problem is with finding contentment is the reality of ourselves does not meet some of the ideals we hold in ourselves . That ideal comes from the media, particularly social media in this modern day world. Or are maybe our thoughts, are just coming from some idea about how perfect we think we should be – that was my idea and it’s still a process I am working on releasing.

• The truth is, the reality of ourselves is only bad in relation to the ideal that we have about ourselves. When we let go of that ideal, we’re left with the reality that can be judged as perfectly great and then we are able being someone who is beautiful in its own special way. It’s a most beautiful feeling to step into the thought when you suddenly realise , “oh I am really worthy and enough”. Life changes so dramatically when these thoughts appear.

• So ask if you’re feeling bad about who you are and how you are doing. When you can  recognise those traits that is awareness that you are noticing and those traits are your ideals.

Once we notice the ideals, we need to stop comparing ourselves to them. The only way to let go of the ideals is to see the pain that it’s causing in yourself. Letting go of an ideal that’s hurting us, is self-compassion. Being self-compassionate about causing pain within ourselves begins the process of comparing ourselves with these ideals. So are you ready to live a life of true contentment? Are you ready to commit to being really connected to yourself and living a life of contentment.
Let’s connect and wander together within life everyday using social media;

http://www.facebook.com/IAmFNDAware

http://www.twitter.com/FND_Goddess

http://www.instagram.com/fnd_goddess
Lisa-Raie 💋
“Wandering Towards Wellness, Globally”