smiling young woman in summer field show heart shape hands sign

Do you deny yourself love?

by Nicole's Blog

Do you deny yourself love?
 
I always ask my clients what their self-care practices are.
 
Often I get a nervous laugh. And then a ton of excuses.
 
Why do we deny ourselves love?
 
Recently, I had to look at some of the ways that I deny myself love.
 
I criticize myself. Sometimes I’m afraid to charge a decent price for my services. I don’t schedule myself a lunch. I procrastinate about things. I opt out of yoga because I let client sessions run over.
 
These are the ways I take myself out of self-love. How about you?
 
When I recently talked to a client of mine about love, she said, “I never wanted to love myself because I was told it was arrogant.”
 
Arrogance is not love. It’s fear – imposing your ideas of superiority because you have to prove your worth. Love is knowing everyone is equal under the eyes of God.
 
What I’ve learned from the Shamanic indigenous ways and Yoga, is that everything is connected and it’s imperative that we respect all, including the Earth. In loving and having incredible respect for all of God’s creations, we must love this body-mind system to its fullest.
Love is appreciation, value and self-worth.  Love is what you are offering the world in service to the whole of humanity, the Earth and ultimately the Universe.

How could your life be different if you really loved all of you?
Can you imagine into what it would be like if that’s the way we all lived?
 
The more I value and love myself, the happier I am. I don’t need to do anything to prove myself, I have so much less pressure to perform, I feel in flow with life, the less I need, and I can offer so much more to the world.
 
If you want to learn more about self-care, self-love practices — sign up for your FREE Shamanic Priestess session. We can talk about ways you can love yourself more.  Ping me.
 
P.S. Join my free, private Facebook group Shamanic Healing Arts Academy #ShamanicPriestess to connect with other women who are empowering each other to evolve and thrive by sharing their deep healing processes!

Infinite blessings on the path to awaken to the Divinity in all,
Nicole

Http://nicoledoherty.com
“Our power to manifest is equal to our power to generate our own evolution.”
– Claire Zammit

lovechrissaunders

Dear Love, You Win!

by Nicole's Blog

Dear Love,

OK. You win! I’ve been fighting you for a while.  I realize I’ve been making up stories about You. I was focused on who wasn’t in Love with me, why I was not loveable, and why I was not worthy of You.  I’m not sure why anyone would take these steps to block You. I think I was in fear of Your power. I think I was fearful that Your power was in me.  That I could be You and You could be me! Love, guess what?

You totally win!

My vows to you Love:

I promise to bring You into my heart more fully in all moments.

I promise to bathe in your warm light.

I promise to pray for your guidance in all my relationships.

I promise to forgive myself swiftly when I forget You.

I promise to remember You more and more each day.

I promise to live my life with You in it, even when I’m challenged.

I promise to remember that you are always giving to me even if I don’t understand the ‘why’ of the moment.

I promise to guide my students from You and with You.

I promise to see myself as You.

I promise to embrace You whenever I share my gifts and talents.

I promise to sing with You and for You.

I am You and You are me and together we are One.

How do you practice Self-Love?

Self-Love is the most important game in town. There is no other game. This human experience is a “Cosmic Joke” —  a game to recognize Who We Truly Are. Please stop blaming, victimizing and telling yourself that you are not Worthy of Love. It’s simply not true.  These stories are obstacles created by the Mind and the Ego to keep you in the Game. We are all playing roles as mirrors to one another to reflect and remind each other that we are Love.  You can keep playing the game over lifetimes, or you can triumph over your perceived limitations and be and act in Love now. Dedicate your heart to Love.  Once you understand how to love yourself and you understand how to fill your cup, then you can share it!

What are some activities that you practice to fill your cup?

Here are some my favorite self-love practices:

  • Meditation/Prayer – Whenever I can. 5 min – 45 min. Sit. Be still and charge up with God’s love!
  • Yoga – I am practicing Kundalini Yoga these days, a highly Spiritual practice that involves meditation, breathwork and movement.
  • Bhakti Yoga Shala Monday Night Kirtan. I go weekly to chant to God for 2 hours and be in the “Bhav”.  Bhakti is the practice and art of Devotion to God.
  • Walking the Beach – I connect to the Earth and pray with gratitude to God for the beauty that we have the privilege of seeing.

What are some activities you do to share your love?

Here are some of my favorite “love-sharing” practices:

  • Creating – Creating is allowing the flow of the Creator to come through you and create Love.  Writing, singing, drawing and dancing are my forms of creation that I love to share with others!  (Thank you Artist’s Way for this profound teaching!)
  • Being of Service – I give love every day in some way through the acts that I do daily whether it be teaching, healing or giving smiles when I walk down the street.
  • Hugging – I love to hug people ‘heart to heart’ and give them a good dose of Love daily.
  • Facebook Wall Postings – My goal is to offer some sort of Love to You, my community, that inspires and enriches Your life.

Please feel free to comment and share what it is that inspires you, what you are doing to create more self-love and how you love to share your love!

How can you practice loving yourself?

by Nicole's BlogVideos

In the months of Aug & Sept during #empowertoevolve we were excavating some of the deeper layers of the Self…pulling up some of the weeds and examining our subconscious. The path to transformation is not easy, it takes work and practice, but with a great community of support, like the one we share, we are able to find the extra nudge to keep going and the power to hold true to our center. Give yourself a huge hug, right now! Deep gratitude. 😉

I am so rejuvenated and alive, just back from Burning Man. It was an epic celebration. It was my best year yet. I’ve heard this from so many, mainly because as a whole we are raising our consciousness and vibration in profound and beautiful ways.

What Burning Man is to me — Radical Self-Acceptance, Self-Reliance and Self-Love and a great place to share our heart connections! What a powerful experience.

After practicing deep forgiveness and release over the past year, personally, I’m gearing up on all levels (and it seems many of my soul sisters are doing the same #selflovetour #smartselflove), to really empower myself to practice these concepts of the Self. As we enter the more introspective season of Fall/Winter, I am practicing sense withdrawal, Pratyahara. It’s time to hunker down, own my shit and freakin’ LOVE MYSELF!

How can you practice loving yourself?

1. Establish firm grounding that is rooted in YOUR truth. What feels right in your gut, your third chakra? This is your place of empowerment. Don’t worry about what anyone else thinks right now. We are all operating from different levels of awareness and experience. (want to know more about this chakra, you can download my free lower chakra meditation on my website under “meditations”.)

2. Create healthy habits. If you are anything like me, you may find that you have habits that continually pull you off your center. For me, it can be Facebook postings, comparison and competition. Can you give up these habits that pull you out of your center and keep you in a perpetual loop of restlessness about who you are? Or what you are offering? Can you just sit with yourself?

3. Create a friendly relationship with your ego, so that you can maintain your power, have good self-esteem, and ask for your needs to be met while honor others’ needs. This is a great place of balance. If you lack self-confidence (deficiency in 3rd chakra) you probably are seeking outside yourself for validation, acceptance and Facebook likes. If you are overactive in your third chakra, you may have a need to prove yourself or “puff ” your ego and act more forcefully usually to be right!

3. Practice balance. Meditation, yoga and breath work are great practices that can bring us back to center. Watch your path of action daily. If you find yourself caught up in negative emotions, know that this comes from the thought process. It is a story you are telling yourself from the past, or a perceived lack in the future. Get present, that’s where Spirit lives.

4. When it comes to setting healthy boundaries, ask for what you need with clarity and alignment to higher wisdom/Spirit. When you come from a place of real love and ownership of your stuff (vs. victim/blame), then the majority of times your needs will be heard, honored and you will feel good about your decisions because you know its guided by your highest wisdom and Spirit.

5. Practice affirmations. I talk about this all the time. You need to BELIEVE how amazing you are! You are beautiful; you are loved and completely loveable. If you can’t say this in the mirror, then who will reflect it back to you? Remember Stuart Smalley? “I’m good enough. I’m smart enough. And doggone it, people like me!”

6. Gratitude – Find ways to create gratitude rituals in your life. Go to the mountains and hug a tree. Attend a Kirtan to sing God’s praises. Call people and leave them love messages. Write a letter of appreciation and mail it. Pray. Honor the great things in your life!

Bowing humbly to the Goddess Mother Earth and all her beautiful beings!