November 29th, 2011, by Shelley Riutta
Hello-One of the things that will hold you back from feeling good about yourself is expectations of perfection. Do you put pressure on yourself to do things perfectly or to be perfect? See if you can watch yourself carefully to see if you are doing this because it puts unrealistic pressure on yourself—it also sets you up to self-judge if you fall short of your perfectionistic expectations. See if you can loosen things up for yourself and let yourself be imperfect and to do things imperfectly. You will find yourself relaxing more and just letting yourself be yourself–-and you are WONDERFUL just the way you are—you don’t need to prove it with being perfect.
Today—relax and just let yourself be you—letting go of expectations of perfection!
November 24th, 2011, by Shelley Riutta
Hello! When is the last time you reached out for support? I work with people on developing a Loving Adult on the inner level that is attending to their feelings and taking loving actions on their own behalf. We also need support from others. So it is the job of the Loving Adult to determine when it is time to reach out to others.
The wounded self—the conditioned part of us may think that reaching out is a bad thing–that others will think we are weak or will let us down etc.—so it is better to “just do it on our own.” If you follow the wounded self and don’t reach out you will feel alone and isolated–on top of struggling with whatever you are struggling with. Reaching out to others will help you open up to connection–to know that you are not alone and that someone cares about you and is supporting you. Many of our wounded states are related to feeling somehow different and set apart from everyone else in our suffering. So reaching out and connecting in of itself is very healing and will help you shift into a better place.
Spirit works through other people as well as coming from your own guidance. The information that would be helpful to you is always trying to get through to you. It can be our own negative states that lower our frequency and make it difficult to receive this information. So reaching out to others will allow helpful information to come through to you that you may be blocking because you are having a difficult time.
Give yourself the gift of reaching out to others for support when you need it.
November 22nd, 2011, by Shelley Riutta
How loving are you with those around you? How you treat others will affect how you feel about yourself as well as greatly impact the quality of your connections with people. Notice what you focus on in others—is it their faults–what they are doing wrong—or what you love and appreciate about them. A simple loving comment to someone in your life–can improve how you feel as well as positively affect their mood as well. Make it a practice to share appreciations with people throughout the day—everyone you meet share something you appreciate about them and watch the joy you feel as well as the joy you will spread to them.
You can be a beacon of light to those you connect with—so let your light shine and share your appreciation today.
November 17th, 2011, by Shelley Riutta
One of the exercises that you can practice to raise your self-esteem is to practice being gentle with yourself. Instead of putting pressure on yourself or having expectations of perfectionism–lighten up and be gentle. This energy of being gentle will make your inner world lighter and more loving. You will begin to relax and be more authentic–be more “you”. This inner shift will also help you to be more gentle with those around you—which will open the door for a closer connection.
Today practice being gentle with yourself.
November 15th, 2011, by Shelley Riutta
Hello! What happens inside of you when you get a reaction from someone that you perceive as negative? How you react will affect how you feel about yourself. Carmen was talking to a good friend of hers and she sensed that he was irritated by something—right away she went into self-judgement–she thought “He must be upset with me–he must think that I am being very demanding” she felt awful when she thought this–but it was an automatic reaction.
It reminded her of when she was little and her Mom would be mad and irritated and took it out on her. She learned to take responsibility for her Mom’s upset—Mom must be right—I am bad.
Now Carmen is an adult and developing a Loving adult voice inside of her–once she catches this self-judgement she can move into compassion with herself and say “Honey we don’t know what is going on with our friend—it probably has nothing to do with you–we are not responsible for his feelings–let’s just check in with him and see what is going on.” She did check in with him and the irritation she thought he was in was something else that he was feeling and was not related to her at all.
So next time you perceive a negative reaction from someone–first move into compassion with yourself —reassuring yourself that you are not the cause of these feelings in the other person. Then you can move into the intent to learn with the other person and find out what is going on for them. By doing this you will prevent yourself from going into needless self-judgement of yourself–causing yourself unnecessary pain and eroding your self-esteem.
November 10th, 2011, by Shelley Riutta
Hello! I was working with a client this week and I talked to her about remembering the immense strength and gifts of her Spirit. We talked about remembering that no matter what the situation is–she is capable from the perspective of her Spirit to handle it.
I had her envision her Spirit expanding and extending beyond the bounds of her body–becoming very large. I said “This is who you really are—this large, capable, talented, wise, compassionate, creative, smart Spirit—with accumulated knowledge and wisdom that is beyond what your earthly perspective might lead you to believe.” I said “We are much more than we have been conditioned to believe–and it is important to remember the truth of who we really are and act from that.” She had been able to have glimpses of experiencing who she really was and now it was time for her to claim it and live this more consistently. I suggested she use this visualization to help her connect with who she really was when she felt small and doubtful about her own capabilities.
By connecting with this she will respond to situations more creatively and authentically–feeling like she is an empowered leader of her life than a helpless victim of what is happening around her.
Claim who you really are and take action from your expanded Spirit— this is who you really are!
November 8th, 2011, by Shelley Riutta
I think the issue of low self-esteem is HUGE for people. Everyone I work with needs to do a lot of work around this issue. The good news is that when you really get how wonderful you truly are—your whole life improves— because self-esteem affects everything–it affects how much good you allow into your life. The phrase “How good do you allow your life to get?” is more of a function of a belief that you really deserve a wonderful life. The good that is wanting to come into your life can only flow to the extent you allow it to flow in. The better you feel about yourself–the more good you will allow into you life.
The interesting thing with Self-Esteem is that the wounded part of us—the part of us that absorbed negative messages and conditioning as a child is very devoted to the status quo. This means that we have gotten used to the negative messages and the low self-esteem–this can feel familiar to us. Moving into the truth—which is that we are an amazing, magnificent person with tremendous worth and potential—stretches us out of our comfort zone. Without even being aware of it–we can keep ourselves locked into low self-esteem by the choices we make that are in alignment with this low-self-esteem. An example of this I see over and over is when people go to make the decision to attend a Workshop. They have the initial excitement and they want to attend—then the old conditioning can take over and come up with a million and one reasons why they shouldn’t attend. It is the fear of the conditioned self—of moving out of what is familiar into the territory that is new—it is the unknown. This conditioned self is very compelling and many people listen to it—and they continue to stay stuck—not even knowing it was there own choice that is keeping them there.
The last “I am Fabulous ” Workshop there was a woman who said she wanted to attend—a day later she called and said she had a real busy week and would be too tired to attend. I saw that this was her conditioned self and encouraged her to attend anyway—stating that the Workshop would be energizing for her. She attended and had a huge breakthrough that completely changed her life—she has been the happiest and most peaceful she had ever been since the Workshop. She was so close to not coming. She would have missed out on the very thing she needed to grow to the next level. So if it is your time to attend the “I am Fabulous” Workshop–listen to the voice of your true self–not the voice of your conditioned self wanting to hold you back!
So watch yourself when you make decisions–make sure that you are making decisions that are what you really want—that are moving you forward—rather that decisions from your conditioned self that are going to keep you stuck in old patterns.
Make decisions that are in alignment with your true priorities. Back what you want with positive action.
November 3rd, 2011, by Shelley Riutta
Hello! What is your self-talk like today? If you are feeling happy and peaceful your self-talk is probably positive and supportive. If you are feeling stressed, anxious, depressed, guilty etc. etc. your self-talk is probably filled with self-judgement.
Many people routinely engage in self-judgement and aren’t really aware that they are doing it. It can be so automatic and regular that it is invisible. The best way to start to tune into your self-talk is to monitor your feelings. Your feelings will give you pretty accurate feedback if you are being loving or unloving with your self-talk. If your feeling good your self-talk is positive and on track– if you are feeling bad it is an indicator that there is some negative self-talk happening inside.
See if you can move into curiosity with your feelings—let’s say that you are feeling anxious—ask the anxious part of you–”Why are you so anxious?” —the anxious part of you may reply “I’m feeling so anxious because you are telling me that I made a stupid comment in the meeting today.” Now that you are conscious of what is happening you can move into dealing with this self-judgement. You can move into a Loving adult space with yourself and talk to the part of you that is self-judging and say “I’m sorry that I said that you made a stupid comment—you actually added a lot to the meeting—you did just fine with the comment you made—you have a lot of good ideas and I am glad we shared them.” This statement is more supportive on the inner level and will create a sense of peace and security—in turn opening you up to more creative ideas. The self-judgement stifles creativity and creates immobilization.
Love yourself today by using loving, supportive self-talk.
November 1st, 2011, by Shelley Riutta
Hello! I am back and hopefully back on track with my daily blogging. One of the exercises to build self-esteem and self-worth is to stay in tune moment by moment with what you need to do to be loving with yourself. Most people have their antenna turned to the outer world–scanning what other people are doing–how they are reacting and responding to what they are doing. They then make decisions based on this outer information–making choices to try to please the people around them rather than tuning into what they really want to do.
When I work with clients I suggest that they shift this antenna away from the outer world and inward to tune into their own feelings and needs. Once they tune into their own feelings and needs they can then ask themselves “What is the loving action I need to do for myself right now?” Asking this question brings in information about what what be most loving in that moment. Once the client gets this information the next step is to take action on it. For example if they asked what was most loving for themselves right now and what popped into their mind was to rest—then they would take some time and rest. If for some reason they couldn’t rest in that moment they would make arrangements to rest at some point during the day.
The consequence of doing this throughout the day is that you would be attending to yourself at a very deep level, moment by moment. This kind of attentiveness to yourself creates a sense of being loved by YOU. We love ourselves by being loving to ourselves. We show our love by our attentiveness and responsiveness to our own needs. We are the only one who can do this for ourselves—because we are living in our own bodies 24/7.
So for the rest of the day experiment with this–continue to keep your attention inside of you and ask “What is the loving action that I need to do for myself right now?” –then take action on what the answer is–and watch how great you will feel. You will feel very loved and valued because you will be loving YOU!
June 2nd, 2011, by Shelley Riutta
Carol was in her 40′s and struggled with her weight since she was a child. She binged on sweets and couldn’t seem to control herself. She called me for some phone sessions to address this issue. In the first session it became clear what the inner dynamic was that was fueling her desire for the sweets.
Carol was very hard on herself and put pressure on herself to be perfect all of the time. She felt if she was perfect she would then be loveable and acceptable to the people around her. This was a reflection of the way her Mom treated her. When she was young her Mom didn’t see her clearly–and put pressure on her to be perfect—the message was “If you are perfect, then I will love you and accept you.” Because of the pain of not being loved unconditionally for who she really was and the pressure from her Mom to be perfect– she began to use sweets as a child to comfort herself.
This pattern continued into adulthood and was confusing for Carol because her Mom was no longer in her life and she was surrounded by people who truly did love her unconditionally. Carol was able to realize that she had a wounded part of her that was just like her Mom–putting pressure on her to be perfect and not seeing her own intrinsic worth and loveability just as she was. This pressure was creating a lot of anxiety within her and to cope with it she overate the sweets to comfort herself.
Once she recognized this she was able to shift into being more loving and supportive with herself–much like she was able to be with her own children. She gave herself messages like “It’s OK to be you, you are loveable just the way you are.” “It’s OK not to be perfect–just relax and be yourself–you are enough just as you are.” As she gave herself these new messages she felt herself relax for the first time in years and stopped having the intense craving for sweets. She was able to understand this and heal this long-standing issue in only two sessions!
What I love about the Inner Bonding process is that it helps to gain insight and clarity into the inner dynamic that is fueling our feelings and behavior. This clarity is about 70% of the healing. This morning as I worked with a client and we developed clarity about a long-standing pattern of hers—the feeling or incredible relief in the room was palpable. Now with awareness of the inner dynamic she had a clear path for healing and shifting the dynamic that was causing her so much pain.
Notice a long standing patterns of yours. What do you think you are saying to yourself on the inner level that is fueling this pattern—can you track the sequence of it. Example: I say this to myself—my reaction is this (ex. anxiety)–to deal with this reaction I then do this.
We are talking to ourselves all of the time—having inner dialogues that are either loving and supportive—or critical and hurtful. Inner Bonding helps to bring these dialogues to conscious awareness so that you can make decisions to shift these dialogues to being more supportive to you.
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