Feel, Trust and Act

When my daughter was still “cooking” in my belly, I would say to her, “one thing that I want to teach you, it is to FEEL, TRUST and ACT on your gut instinct.”  I am a firm believer that when we center ourselves, listen to and act on our own instinct, then we will be in alignment and on track to lead a happy, stress free life.  It took me years to actually practice my own advice because I was too preoccupied with keeping my, at the time, fragile inner ME together.

Fourteen years ago, at the age of 27, I came to recognize  that how I was living wasn't actually living.  I was the poster child for over achievers.  I was superb in keeping myself busy, distracted and constantly moving so that I never sat quietly with my thoughts.  It never dawned on me that this was an unhealthy way to live.  In fact I considered myself strong and others weak who couldn’t keep up with my professional achievements.  I never enjoyed ME.  I never took the time to learn about what I wanted or needed.  I just took “it” how it came and kept trucking along, not realizing that I was the one dishing accepting "it" out.  I knew life should be different from the rat race that I was living; different from the chronic mental poison that I sifted through each day.  I had brief conversations with myself about the matter, but I didn’t dare sit long enough for my feelings to surface.   I didn’t know that I was a person who didn’t feel.  I didn't know that I wasn't present.

I want to acknowledge and thank my husband at this point. If it weren’t for his unconditional love, strength and role modeling, my own development would have taken much longer.  I have told him on many occasions that I took myself as far as I could development wise.  It was through his love, ability to shed light on my negative, unhealthy, repetitive behaviors, in addition to, his strength and level of respect he has for himself as a man, that I was able to do the hard work.  I learned that living joyously, connected and present is not such hard work after all.  In fact, life became easier to live, once I stopped ignoring my gut instinct.  When I began to act on my intuition, and stopped dismissing it, is when I began to align with my core being.  It's is when I began truly living.