Ask and you shall...

Everything comes to us that belongs to us if we create the capacity to receive it."
-Rabindranath Tagore

re·ceive/riˈsēv/

Verb:

Be given, presented with, or paid (something): "most businesses will receive a tax cut". Take delivery of (something sent or communicated): "he received fifty inquiries".

I've worked a lot on acceptance, and forgiveness, happiness, making myself happy, looking out for me, moving forward.....something I am still stuck on in certain parts of my life is receiving. I have such a difficult time being the recipient of "niceness". I like to give. I read this quote and totally related to it:

 From then on, I realized this is what I want to do, what I'm supposed to do: Giving energy and receiving it back through applause. I love it. That's my world. I love it. I enjoy it. I live for it." -Erykah Badu

I know that is often what brings me the most happiness---giving. Whether it be cookies on my blissful block, a handshake and a smile as my wonderful boys enter the studio, or the cashier at the register that deserves a thank you--I love that external energy. 

However, it makes it a bit difficult when I sometimes also feel like this: 

There is a secret about human love that is commonly overlooked: Receiving it is much more scary and threatening than giving it. How many times in your life have you been unable to let in someone's love or even pushed it away? Much as we proclaim the wish to be truly loved, we are often afraid of that, and so find it difficult to open to love or let it all the way in. -John Welwood

For this Happy Tuesday, I'm working on the giving as well as the receiving. May you have a Tuesday filled with receiving all the beautiful things that life is offering to you....and take 'em darn it!

When you truly give up trying to be whole through others, you end up receiving what you always wanted from others. -Shakti Gawain

Generosity is giving more than you can, and pride is taking less than you need. -Kahlil Gibran

Just for a bit of fun:

Be Fearless

I'm not afraid of storms, for I'm learning how to sail my ship.

-Louisa May Alcott

Last weekend I went to a Haunted House. They had the attendees fill out a card before entering the event. The card asked what you were most afraid of. After hearing other people's answers of: the dark, spiders, bugs...I realized my answer of, "being unloved", was really not what they might have been looking for. There goes my honesty getting me into trouble again!

Fear is that little darkroom where negatives are developed. 

-Michael Pritchard

I've been terrified lately. I've been so filled with fear that I think I've been making myself sick! This week, after receiving my fortune cookie that said, "Don't Panic", I thought it was time to just face my fears head on. Here's to being fearless and embracing those things that terrify you. Happy Tuesday. Be fearless! I'm gonna keep my little ship sailing along as I greet those fears every day.

He who fears to suffer, suffers from fear.  ~French Proverb

Fear grows in darkness; if you think there's a bogeyman around, turn on the light. 
-Dorothy Thompson

Fear is a question: What are you afraid of, and why? Just as the seed of health is in illness, because illness contains information, your fears are a treasure house of self-knowledge if you explore them. -Marilyn Ferguson

Fear is my good friend, it shows me the way to nowhere; I choose another way. 
-Yossi Ghinsberg

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our Light, not our Darkness, that most frightens us.
-Marianne Williamson

Be good to you

I don't like myself, I'm crazy about myself -Mae West

Last week, I had the opportunity to go with one of my favorite neighbor peeps, Lisa, to her weekly yoga class at East Yoga. The class was great (not the same as my favorite Tglaz at Abhaya in Dumbo...) and she had us focus on a person we loved and something we wanted to give that person. I chose one of the most loved people in my life and chose love of self. We spent the hour and fifteen minutes devoting our practice to them, and fast forward, at the end of class the teacher says, "...and you chose this quality for your person because it's actually what you need for yourself". Bazaam! Totes.

You, yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection. -Budddha

I think I'm really good at loving other people. I'm good at taking care of them. Making their favorite treat to surprise them. Finding the perfect little thing to suit them. Listening when they need to talk. But, I'm not the best at taking care of myself. I hate cooking for myself. I'd rather listen than blabber on about my problems. I'll make a flour filled dessert before a mediocre gluten free treat that I could have myself....

So, this week's Happy Tuesday is about taking care of yourself and being good to yourself. Take some time today and do something for you that you would normally do for someone you love. Love who you are today and take care of that beautiful person.

To love oneself is the beginning of a life-long romance” -Oscar Wilde

If you aren't good at loving yourself, you will have a difficult time loving anyone, since you'll resent the time and energy you give another person that you aren't even giving to yourself. -Barbara De Angelis

People who do not love themselves can adore others, because adoration is making someone else big and ourselves small. They can desire others, because desire comes out of a sense of inner incompleteness, which demands to be filled. But they can not love others, because love is an affirmation of the living growing being in all of us. If you don't have it, you can't give it. 
-Andrew Matthews

It is of practical value to learn to like yourself. Since you must spend so much time with yourself you might as well get some satisfaction out of the relationship. -Norman Vincent Peale

Instinct

Let your heart guide you. It whispers, so listen carefully. -Littlefoot's mother


There can be as much value in the blink of an eye as in months of rational analysis.-Malcolm Gladwell

It's not easy to trust your own instincts. It's so easy to second guess ourselves and try to rely on logic. Something I learned about myself this summer was that I typically have really good instincts, the Tamstinct I like to call it. Here's to a Tuesday of following your heart, your own gut, your true instincts.

in·stinct  

n.

1. An inborn pattern of behavior that is characteristic of a species and is often a response to specific environmental stimuli: the spawning instinct in salmon; altruistic instincts in social animals.

2. A powerful motivation or impulse.

3. An innate capability or aptitude: an instinct for tact and diplomacy.

Art and works of art do not make an artist; sense and enthusiasm and instinct do.

-Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel

I would rather trust a woman's instinct than a man's reason. -Stanley Baldwin

In art as in love, instinct is enough. -Anatole France

If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more,

 do more and become more, you are a leader. 

-John Qunicy Adams

Inspire:
verb (used with object)

1.

to fill with an animating, quickening, or exalting influence:His courage inspired his followers.

2.

to produce or arouse (a feeling, thought, etc.): to inspireconfidence in others.

3.

to fill or affect with a specified feeling, thought, etc.: toinspire a person with distrust.

4.

to influence or impel: Competition inspired her to greaterefforts.

5.

to animate, as an influence, feeling, thought, or the like,does: They were inspired by a belief in a better future.

When I was in high school I was a huge dork (oh yes, believe it or not dear ones). I wore oversized t-shirts, Winnie-the-Pooh overalls, pigtails...oh dear. The pictures are scary. In my high school English class, we read Lord of the Flies. In the novel, there is one leader of the group: Ralph. We had a writing project in which we were broken up into 7 smaller groups. Each group had to choose one person out of our own class that would act as the Ralph character--the leader of the whole class.  Imagine my dork-a-rific self in total surprise when every group had chosen me. I couldn't understand why. I wasn't what I thought of as a leader of people.

"I always manage to inspire a strong reaction one way or another" -Nathan Lane

Recently, I was able to relate to this idea more. I had a very new friend as well as a very long time friend both tell me that I inspire them. Now brown cow, I don't think I'm all that and a bag of chips, but I suddenly understood my high school English class. My new-ish friend said to me, "You don't see it do you? People see the way you're living your life. The way you are being you. The way you manage to write personalized notes to everyone, gather a group, bake a ton of goodies and still be happy. They see you and they don't understand it, yet they are inspired themselves to do more and be better people" {and I'm paraphrasing here...I think I got most of it right :)}.

 Maybe when people see that it's possible to do what you love, be who you are and still have a sense of fulfillment it also seems possible for them?

                               "Our chief want is someone who will inspire us to

 be what we know we could be" -Ralph Waldo Emerson

It's affirming for me to have good friends tell me such things. Better that than they can't stand me, right? Since I've been traveling solo without many people to talk to or bake for or simply tell they are great people I've felt myself get a bit sad. I realize what a crucial part of my day to day life those sort of things are. I am so inspired by people in my life--from my own parents who married very young not knowing what the world had in store for them, to friends who take on totally new careers, unsure what will happen. People who bravely open themselves up to a new love, new life, new experiences. There are so many sources of inspiration out there. What inspires you? I'd love to know. We can all start sourcing our inspiration water from the same well.

"My purpose is to inspire people of all walks of life to discover the virtue inherent within them and to bring forth that virtue in their daily lives". -William Shirley

Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter, and those who matter don't mind.--Dr. Seuss

Today you are You,

                                        that is truer than true.

There is no one alive

who is Youer than You.--Dr. Seuss

I have been having the best summer of my life. This summer, I've just tried to be me. I've lived most of my life worried what people thought of me. I was worried that they didn't like me, possibly annoyed with how I acted, what I said, if they thought I was nice or smart or pretty. After getting my nice, smart, pretty butt dumped, I was worried that it was because they didn't like who I was. I started this year spending time with someone who thought I was too much. I have spent the summer just enjoying who I am and being that person every day. I surround myself with wonderful people who seem to like this person that is me. Maybe they still get annoyed, but I'm at a point where I think that is their issue and they don't have to spend time with me if they don't like me :). It's a great sense of freedom and I have so much more time to think about ways to make my little universe a better place, rather than consuming myself with what other people think of me. So, go out in to the amazing world just being you. Enjoy it. Embrace it. Love it.

By your own soul, learn to live

                               And if men thwart you take no heed.

If men hate you have no care.

Sing your song, dream your dream,

Hope your hope and pray your prayer.--Parkenham Beatty

I was once afraid of people saying, "Who does she think she is?" Now I have the courage to stand and say, "This is who I am."--Oprah Winfrey

If you are what you should be, then you will set the world on fire.--St. Catherine of Siena 

oh, that's right, I'll personalize your HT if you live near me and request it :)