Seoul Life Coach Archives - Page 7 of 16

Friday Focus – 2/23/18 {There’s Nothing To Worry About}

“Your conflicts, all the difficult things, the problematic situations in your life, are not chance or haphazard. They’re actually yours. Their specifically yours, designed specifically for you by a part of you that loves you more than anything else.

The part of you that loves you more than anything else has created roadblocks to lead you to yourself. You’re not going to go in the right direction unless there’s something pricking you on the side telling you, “Look here! This way!”. That part of you loves you so much that it doesn’t want you to lose the chance.

It will go to extreme measures to wake you up; it will make you suffer greatly if you don’t listen. What else can it do? That’s it’s purpose.”

~A.H. Almass

Every little thing that you worry about has a purpose. Look deep inside the worry and you will realize it is all for your own growth and expansion of your very own heart.

Love is the answer.

In wellness,

Susan

Photo by Schicka on Unsplash

What Is It You Desire?

So often we focus on what is going wrong in our lives or our day… but how often do we spend time thinking of what we already have or would rather have?

I see way too many people focus on what is lacking, versus the abundance that already is, or the possibility of what is to come!

Take a moment to answer this question and don’t skip ahead 😉

What are the 3 words that pop into your mind with this word: Job

Pause a moment

Pause….

Ok, do you have your 3 words? How easy was it to come up with the words? What were the FIRST words that popped into your head before you started analyzing for the perfect 3 words?

You see, there are categories of words that reflect your own resonance with the word “Job”. For example:

Words that are similar to: Sucks, 9-5, Ok, Annoying, Not Fulfilling, etc. tend to reflect all the things that are going wrong.
Words that are similar to: Love, Thankful, Creative, Friends, Mentors, etc. reflect all the things that are enabling you to feel gratitude and the things that are going well.

This exercise is a great way to see in which areas of your life you focus on the lack rather than the abundance/desire.

You can apply this exercise to any word and you might be surprised to see what words pop into your head. And of course, try not to analyze or change the words right away. The point here is to allow yourself to be honest with what comes up so you can pinpoint what’s truly going on.

Do you see how changing your focus can make you see and feel things differently? How one word can change your enter feeling state toward something much more positive and healthy?

Give it a shot today, focus on what’s working or what you’re sure is coming into your life and see just how different the world looks.

In Abundance,

Susan

Photo by Jazmin Quaynor on Unsplash

Patterns That Run Our Self

“Breaking the chains of your self involves learning how you imprison yourself through your thoughts, beliefs, and feelings and discovering had to change them and set yourself free.”

~Owen Fitzpatrick

In wellness,

Susan

Photo by Raw Pixel

Why Everyone Will Have A Coach In The Future

Yesterday, I wrote on how exercising the mind is just as important as exercising the body, and today, I wanted to share why I believe everyone will have a coach of some kind in the future.

To be honest, informally we already have them! Whether you know it or not, you receive some form of therapeutic benefit from your local yoga instructor, your boss, a dear friend, or heck, someone you may randomly meet at a dog park. In certain ways over a period of our lives, we’ll run into people that help relieve some part of our psyche, whether it was through their words, the safe space they provided, or their presence alone.

For example, have you ever left a Soul Cycle or a Yoga class in a completely zen state? Perhaps there was something about the instructor’s words that spoke to your heart and reached into a part of your brain that sensed relief, peace even. Or how about standing in line at the DMV and somehow you meet someone who was able to give you a hit of inspiration.

You see with the way technology is integrating every aspect of our inner and outer lives, and therefore making it hard to “turn off” and “slow down”, it’s no wonder more and more people are searching for ways to feel a sense of ease!

The rise of meditation, spirituality, psychedelic use, and personal development are on the rise and it’s not hard to guess why. We need relief. And it’s a good thing we’re recognizing it!

Our world is a lot more complicated than it used to be. Prior to the kind of technology that crept into our personal lives we were left to perceive the world through the tangible interactions and experiences we had; and now with the introduction of social media and text (to name a few) we are left for a lot more room for perception and interpretation in ways that are driving our minds crazy.

So where does that leave us? For one, it’s important to invest in your own personal practice of inner stillness. Working on meditation, being out in nature, journaling, taking hot baths, whatever it is that works for YOU, finding a personal practice that will build your inner stillness will be more important than ever.

And just like how there are coaches and trainers for just about anything, looking to a coach, therapist, whomever it is that you need, will be a growing trend. No longer will there be a stigma around having a personal relationship with a coach or therapist just as there is no stigma around having a personal trainer or chef! As we continue to appreciate and understand the importance of our minds (as we currently do our bodies) we will come to realize having someone to guide your mental life is just as important of an investment to yourself.

So, in what ways can you see having a third party perspective be helpful for you? In what ways, whether you realize it or not, do you find mental relief currently? What are the easiest ways of releasing stress for you and can you incorporate this into your life daily?

With that said, here’s to more stillness and building our own personal power so that we can dance with this beautiful life with more ease and grace.

In wellness,

Susan

Photo by Anna Demianenko on Unsplash

Why Exercising Your Brain Is A Must

Have you noticed the latest and hottest trend for the past few years has been how we can take care of our bodies? From the trendiest diet, lifestyle hacks, to exotic supplements that are guaranteed to have you performing like you’re 25 years old again, there’s an expert in every field promising a solution for any ailment you’ve ever experienced.

We’ve heard over and over again how important it is to exercise our body. To start lifting weights in order to prevent osteoperosis as we age, or to take tumeric so that we can decrease inflammation in the body, the list is endless!

But how about our minds? Our minds are the driving force behind how we function and why we’d want to function at all. It’s the one thing we rely on and most often, we rely on it without questioning – it’s on autopilot.

If we really understood the implications of autopilot, we’d want to recognize the importance of exercising our brain, our mind.

For reasons that are far better explained on the internet, we’ve survived millions of years due to one thing – looking out for danger. And unfortunately, while our basic needs are met, our brains have become so adapted to protecting us it’s the first thing that enters our mind. And in so doing we’ve allowed other, not so positive ways, to also enter our mind – comparing, judging, labeling, etc.

Our brains are wired to think and analyze because it wants to protect us. However, we live in different times! It’s time to recognize our thoughts as thoughts and most all of the time our brains have been habituated into thinking the same thoughts every day, all day – autopilot at work in its finest form.

If you’ve meditated for a while you know exactly what this means. You’re able to notice “Thought A” at it’s 50th time and not follow the story down another rabbit hole. You’re able to notice “Thought D” and see its very beginning stages of cycling up to “Thought A” status.

Which is why we must exercise our brains. Meditation is the most powerful tool out there. Coaching is another powerful tool in order to physically hear yourself talk and have that gentle reminder and support, verbally talking to yourself as if you’re a best friend is another powerful way in which you can get out of your head, automatic writing and burning the paper is another physical and visual way of getting it “out of your system”.

Little emphasis is spent on actually doing the work. Our minds cannot be controlled by a pill or a one-stop shop magical experience on psychedelics, and while this might help, our minds, just like our bodies, NEED TO DO THE WORK. It needs the daily exercise so that it doesn’t go off forming neural pathways in your brain that doesn’t serve your highest good.

So, what tools and techniques work best for you? What thoughts have run through your mind already this morning? Can you notice repetitive thoughts? And how do these repetitive thoughts make you feel? Do you see the causal effects?

We already know our brains, our minds, are powerful. In recognizing this we should treat our brains just as well as our bodies.

And don’t forget, this is a life long practice. Let’s do the exercise together in loving compassion for ourselves and others.

In wellness,

Susan

Photo by Avrielle Suleiman on Unsplash

Friday Focus – 2/15/18 {What Truly Matters?)

Happy Lunar New Year! For those of you following the lunar calendar you know this is a special time. It’s the turn of a new year following the phases/cycles of the moon and many countries in the East has followed this tradition for years, and still do!

It’s a time, just like our traditional New Year on January 1st, of re-birth and moving forward.

Identifying with both American and Asian culture I loved celebrating this special holiday. It was a time to shed anything still lingering from January 1st, and it was an opportunity to take a second, hard look at what truly mattered.

And while this isn’t a practice that should only be done during the beginning of a new year, the Lunar New Year is another great opportunity (whether you celebrate it or not) to ask yourself – what is it that speaks to your heart? What truly matters to you at the end of the day?

These are the type of questions that really zing at your heart aren’t they? They allow for such clarity to arise so that what occupies the mind 90% of the day immediately falls away,…or at least begins to crumble.

So,what speaks to your heart? What truly matters to you? In this moment?

You may find it’s the simple things. The small moments of stillness, the moments of laughter being shared with someone you love, spending time with your furry friend.

Whatever it may be for you, take a moment to honor the Lunar New Year and do a little more of what it is that brings you closer to your own heart. As I’ve always said on the blog, the more we focus on what we want, the more it expands.

Happy Lunar New Year!

In wellness,

Susan

Photo by Jakob Owens on Unsplash

You Hold The Key To Every Situation

“As a being of power, intelligence, and love, you hold the key to every situation, and contain within yourself that transforming and regenerative agency by which you may make yourself what you will.”

~James Allen

In wellness,

Susan

Photo by Jeremy Bishop on Unsplash

May We Love More

May we trust our heart more than our head.

May we smile more than we frown.

May we see the good more than the bad.

May we detach from outcomes and trust in the unfolding.

May we lean in to discomfort, only to find our own true capacity to love.

May we love…more.

In wellness,

Susan

Photo by Helena Lopes on Unsplash

There Is Only Love

Love.

I was having a heartfelt conversation yesterday and we were saying how the pain and joy in life all stems from one thing – people and our capacity to love.

Some of the hardest parts of our lives stems from our interactions with one another, strangers even! And yet, some of the greatest joys in our lives come from the very same source. Ironic isn’t it?

When we feel pain, oftentimes at the root of our suffering is the perception of non-acceptance, feeling unloved or even judged.

I say perception because the deep truth of it is that we all stem from the same Source, the Universe, whatever you like to call it. We are ONE, and yet we see each other as separate.

You see, all we want is to be loved at our core.

And here’s the bottom line – no matter what seems to be happening on the outside, recognize you are already love. Instead of looking out and the effects, look inside and recognize the truth of who you already are.

No one can take that away from you.

No one can say or do anything to make you less than what you already are.

All that needs to happen is to lift the veil so that you may recognize your own truth. Your own self.

When things do get tough I like to share a thought process Matt Khan speaks of called, “Thank you for teaching me”.

You see, when we turn the focus around from analyzing a false thought pattern of “what’s wrong with me” to “thank you for teaching me”, it allows us to realize there is nothing wrong with you, but it is an error in our way of perception of the person or situation. Thus, “thank you for teaching me” allows us to truly give gratitude to the person or situation and allow us to learn and build our very own capacity to give love.

Beautiful isn’t it?

So here’s to truly understanding our very own essence and capacity to love.

In wellness,

Susan

Photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash

The Courage Of The Seed

This past weekend I, along with 31 beautiful souls, completed our 200 yoga teacher training. 10 weekends, 108 asanas, mudras, mantras, and an expansion of soul, body, and mind.

To think that we all met in this time and space “randomly” would be far from the truth.

I am in gratitude and humbled by everyone’s strength, courage, vulnerability, heart, and of course wise teachings from our Rasa tribe leader Greta Hill and a multitude of other teachers who graced us with their wisdom.

Yoga has been a practice and place where I have been able to return to for strength and vitality, and I am honored to have learned the art and soul of this practice at a more in-depth level.

And how beautiful it is to wrap up Winter and step into Spring?

We all planted a seed, a rooted intention to begin this 200 hour journey, and to watch this seed continue to blossom is this sweet, magical unfolding will be truly a mystical experience.

Mark Nepo said it best in this poem below:

All the buried seeds crack open in the dark, the instant they surrender to a process they can’t see.

What a powerful lesson is the beginning of spring.

All around us, everything small and buried surrenders to a process that none of the buried parts can see.

And this innate surrender allows everything edible and fragrant to break ground into a life we call spring.

In nature, we are quietly given countless models of how to give ourselves over to what appears dark and hopeless, but which is ultimately an awakening beyond all imagining.

As a seed buried in the earth cannot imagine itself as an orchid or hyacinth, neither can a heart packed with hurt imagine itself loved or at peace.

The courage of the seed is that once cracking, it cracks all the way.

~Mark Nepo

Whatever journey you yourself have been on this past Winter – trust the process, have faith in the unfolding, watch the magic.

Here’s to planted seeds and watching them bloom.

In wellness,

Susan

Photo by Kristopher Allison on Unsplash