Bring your focus to the 2nd Chakra – the Sacral Chakra – based in the middle of the belly beneath the belly button. Colour: orange / Element: water
Through this chakra you connect to your creativity, passion and inspiration, but if you hold onto emotions from situations that are draining you, this flow could be blocked, leaving you feeling empty, exhausted and even stuck. The aim is to get everything flowing again.
Tune into the orange colour flowing through the belly like water as you notice whether there is anything here blocking your flow, any stagnant energy or emotions you can let go of and let the water cleanse away. The beauty of letting go is that you create space for new energy to flow through you. Nurture and give back to yourself through this area and allow for new ideas to be born through here. As you fully balance this chakra, you ignite and connect to the passion, inspiration and creativity within you. Repeat the words, “Everything in my life flows with ease”, slowly three times and then move up along to the 3rd chakra.
Bring your focus to the 3rd Chakra – the Solar Plexus Chakra – based in the solar plexus, in the abdomen above your belly button. Colour: yellow / Element: fire
As you tune in here to the colour yellow or the fire in your solar plexus, notice whether there is any tightness or discomfort in this area. This chakra represents the upper digestive system so ask yourself, “How am I digesting life and situations through here?”, or “Is there anything here that is repeating on me?” ie an issue, emotion, relationships, and then just notice what comes to mind. As the element is fire it can feel very powerful to imagine a yellow light shining right through the body here cleansing away any stale energy. Sometimes emotions and feelings of anger, resentment or controlling behaviour can appear to be released. And as you balance this chakra you connect to your confidence and self-belief, turning up your own light allowing you to feel empowered as you let your shoulders fall back and the solar plexus open up for your light to shine brightly. It feels empowering when you visualize yourself standing fully in your own light! Repeat the words, “I am shining my light brightly and I am enough”, three times slowly.
Bring your focus to the 4th Chakra – the Heart Chakra, based in the middle of the body next to the heart. Colour: green / Element: air
Tune into the green colour now. This chakra represents all matters of the heart. From this space you can tune into the guidance you are feeling here and also notice if there is anything weighing on your chest making it difficult to breathe easily, and then literally asking yourself, “What am I feeling here?” or if there is a specific situation on your mind you can ask, “How do I feel about it?” The key is to drop into what you’re feeling rather than thinking. This chakra is all about feeling everything and allowing all feelings that are no longer serving you to come to the surface to clear. From here you can choose to forgive and let go of issues and emotions like hurt, sadness and grief as you allow for the infinite loving energy to flow through you. Remember, if you are withholding love from a situation, resisting letting it go, you are also withholding love from yourself as love and energy can’t flow through a blocked chakra. You forgive to set yourself free, to open yourself up to give love and be loved again. Forgiving someone does not necessarily mean agreeing with their behaviour – it just means you stop it from poisoning you over and over again, carrying it with you into the now. Repeat the words, “I am love”, three times slowly (see the exercise Heart Breath on pages 145–6 to work further with the energy field of the heart).
Bring your focus to the 5th Chakra – the Throat Chakra – based in the middle of the throat. Colour: blue / Element: ether (space)
This chakra represents the centre of communication and our immune system is also connected though this centre. Notice as you focus on this calming blue colour flowing through the neck and the throat whether you are aware of any tightness. It’s helpful to notice if you are holding onto something that has gone unsaid. If so, you can say whatever you didn’t get to say to that person in your mind now and let it go, rebalancing this chakra. This area is very much an area from where we tune into speaking our truth. So it’s helpful to check in with yourself and ask, “What am I communicating through here?”, “What am I not communicating here?” This chakra is also about finding balance between speaking and listening and resting and doing so you don’t run yourself and your immune system down. Listening to the guidance is key here. Repeat the words, “I communicate with clarity and I speak my truth”, three times slowly
Bring your focus to the 6th Chakra – the Third Eye Chakra – based between the eyebrows. Colour: indigo / Element: all elements combined and light
This chakra represents your intuition and is also referred to as the eye of the soul. As you tune into the indigo colour, notice if there are feelings of being overwhelmed, confused, stressed and anxious. As you keep focusing on that area between the eyebrows, opening the eye of the soul and tuning into your intuition, let it show you what guidance is here for you, allowing you to see with more clarity and focus, calming the mind in the process and letting the thoughts settle. Imagine you have laser vision seeing straight through the confusion and everything is as clear as looking through a piece of pure ice. Surrender to the guidance of your intuition. Repeat the words, “I see the guidance clearly”, three times slowly.
Bring your focus to the 7th Chakra – the Crown Chakra – based at the top of your head. Colour: purple / Element: no element or thought
This chakra represents your higher self, whatever that means to you, that feeling when you connect to the oneness and unity in the world or spiritual connection. Here you tap into the sense of being guided and knowing, exploring the sentence “I have all that I need right here within me.” Sometimes when you are busy working everything out in your mind, especially speculating about how things will work out in the future, it’s helpful to return to the present moment and allow yourself to focus only on the guidance here and the one thing you can do now. Bringing it back to now allows you to let go of anxiety about the situation or relationship so that you stop putting your mind into a spin about what may or may not happen in the future. As you start to trust and believe that you are guided and that everything is playing out just the way it’s meant to for you, you will notice your thoughts settling. Repeat the words, “I am guided”, three times slowly
To complete the Chakra Balancing exercise, start to imagine all of the chakras aligned and spinning in the same direction at the same speed. Imagine your breath and energy flowing through the body with ease. To conclude the meditation, imagine a big bright light shining from above your head and down through your body, letting the light flow down through each chakra, sealing them and keeping these aligned and cleansed energy fields protected.
May this wonderful chakra practice become a steady tool in your toolbox and one you return to again and again like a trusted friend.
“We don’t see things as they are, we see them as we are.”
Anais Nin
REJECTION
There are certain times in our lives when self-care becomes even more important and one of those is when we’ve been rejected. We definitely need self-care to regain our strength and positivity. Rejection is something most of us experience early on in our lives – it might be wanting to be friends with someone at school who doesn’t feel the same. We’re left hurt and wondering if it is because we are not good enough or pretty enough. The feeling of rejection never goes away, whatever age. When I first read the words, “You were not rejected you were protected”, probably inspired by the words “Rejection is God’s protection”, it summed up in one sentence what I had taught my clients for years – that when something doesn’t work out, open yourself up to the possibility that something even more suitable and better for you will arrive instead, and that it will all make sense one day. In the moment of rejection it’s hard to think that you were literally protected in that moment but, wow, when you truly choose to believe that, your mind switches immediately from a place of “poor
me” to “yay me, something better is on its way”.
It may take a few meditations and conversations with your friends or coach to come to that conclusion, but I can tell you it is definitely a much more compassionate way to look at it. If you are feeling rejected, repeat this affirmation, “I am protected, I am guided and I am loved”, a few times. It will help you to refocus on your healing rather than on the person who has rejected you.
Looking at rejection from the other side: let’s say you are letting go of someone who you have been trying to fix or save. Remember when we save others we actually prevent them from learning valuable lessons they need to evolve on their path.
“When we truly care for ourselves, it becomes possible to care far more profoundly about other people. The more alert and sensitive we are to our own needs, the more loving and generous we can be toward others.”
Eda Leshan
DAY 6: ULTIMATE SELF-CARE
We are almost at the end of the 7-day self-care plan. I hope you are starting to enjoy taking this time for yourself and feeling the benefits of doing the exercises, valuing taking care of yourself and letting it become a steady practice in your life. When I work with clients who are feeling unloved, hopeless or lonely, they know they need to take care of themselves, but they don’t know how to get started. The feelings that have made them feel low may have been triggered by a relationship difficulty, but as we have explored in the previous chapters, it is often an old pattern that has popped up from the past, a part of them, their inner child, that needs some love and care. By doing this self-care visualization you will learn how to be there for yourself at any time in your life.
Let’s visualize…
• Go ahead and close your eyes.
• Bring to mind how you are feeling in this moment.
• Try to remember a time as a child, or another time in your life, that you felt this way too, or if nothing comes to mind work with the situation present now.
• That’s the part of you that is longing for love and support. I want you to imagine you as you are now going to comfort that part of yourself and give that part of yourself what you need. Ask yourself what do I need? Then tell this version of yourself you are here to help and provide what you need and that you are enough, you are safe, heard, loved, supported, whichever words come to mind for you that feel right and comforting to you. Feel how healing this moment is as you tell yourself “You are safe with me.”
Doing this is such a healing experience and it can give you a real sense of having come home within. You can talk to your younger self and tell yourself you will grow up to become confident and awesome. And when you feel at peace and you are ready, you can go ahead and open your eyes. This exercise can take as little or as long as it needs for you to feel the healing and make the peace you need to make. (Go to www.zenme.tv/mindtools for the audio version of this visualization.)
INTENTION BEHIND THE INTENTION
Have you ever found yourself saying things like, “I should really catch up with xyz so they don’t get annoyed” or “I have to go to a friend’s dinner tonight”? Consider the words “I should” and “I have to” – the intention behind those words is very different from “I want to”. The intention is a need to please or not rock the boat – you are doing it for the other person, not for yourself. Saying no to a friend or leaving a friendship group brings the same feelings as leaving a love relationship, where you want to move on but are worried about hurting the other person.
Hanging out with the right friends can be such an uplifting experience and a real act of self-care – you can leave a conversation with a good friend feeling so elated, heard and free, but when you start filling your schedule with things you “should” do or “have to” do it will drag you down and steal your energy, leaving you exhausted. Would you want your friends to hang out with you because they feel they have to or because they truly want to? To attract that into your life you have to walk the walk yourself by making choices that are in alignment with your wishes and true intentions in relationships.
To get to the bottom of your intentions in a relationship, ask yourself: What’s my intention behind hanging out with this person? And then check in and ask what’s the intention behind the intention. For example, you might choose to hang out with a friend because you don’t really want to be sat at home alone or because you quite fancy watching the same movie rather than because you actually want to hang out with them specifically. Then when you actually meet up you find being with them draining and realize that a night in alone, or seeing the movie alone or at a later date, would have nurtured your soul more. The clearer you become about your intentions being aligned with what you truly want in any relationship, the more you will start to attract more harmonious relationships.
The same goes for business, too: if you are going to work events because you need to and not because you want to, consider a different way of networking, perhaps online instead. The key is to choose the way you want to network – the way that’s right for you, that allows your energy to flow – because if you’re in a space of “I have to” it will create a heavy, blocking energy instead.
DAY 7: NURTURED FROM INSIDE OUT
The final exercise is one I suggest to many of my clients and, although it’s a pretty straightforward one, it has a multitude of benefits. I’m so grateful I came across it as it is self-care on a deeper level – an exercise that can really nurture you from the inside out.
We are going to work with the vagus nerve, which is the longest nerve running through the body from your head down through the heart and into the stomach. The vagus nerve plays a vital part as it represents the parasympathetic nervous system, which controls your heart rate, mood and digestion amongst many other important bodily functions. When you stimulate your vagus nerve through breathing, you can help lower inflammation in the body and reduce stress and anxiety. And, guess what, as well as breathing, singing at the top of your lungs is another brilliant exercise you can do to stimulate and keep the vagus nerve working for you. So next time you are singing in the shower or in your car (or is that just me?!), know that you are exercising your vagus nerve and that it has benefits way beyond lifting your mood in that moment. Yoga and laughter are also great ways to stimulate this nerve.
You can do this exercise standing or sitting with your back straight.
1. Take a deep breath in through your nose for 4 counts.
2. Exhale through the mouth for 6 counts as you purse your lips together and the air makes the sound similar to the ocean, making it audible.
3. Let the belly expand with the in-breath and drop with the out-breath.
Repeat this exercise for 3 minutes.
The goal is to slow down the breath so there are fewer breaths per minute as you breathe deeper here and allow the out-breath to be 2 counts longer than the in-breath.
YOU DID IT!
You committed and you get to reap the benefits! You can carry on using the 7-day plan or choose to use one or more of the exercises from this chapter daily, or create your own plan made up of your favourite exercises from the book. See page 168 for a checklist.
One thing I have come to believe is that creating positive habits and having a routine works! I see it time and time again with my clients, when they make space for self-care in their schedules, whether that’s taking time to cook healthy meals, exercise and or meditate, their days flow with more ease, they feel less stressed and overwhelmed and, more importantly, they deal with challenges in their life more comfortably. And with everyone being “plugged in” most of the day and feeling under pressure, creating balance in our lives may mean scheduling small pockets of self-care over the day or week rather than being able to switch off each night at 6pm like in generations before us. I know that’s wishful thinking to many now and that’s why I help my clients schedule in self-care rituals at different times during their week to give them moments to breathe.
I hope that doing these exercises throughout the week has encour
aged you to set aside at least a little time for yourself daily. Once you start making a self-care practice part of your day it soon becomes a positive habit you will never want to be without and one you can rely on to support you every day.
Mindfulness every day is an act of self-care
If you have been reading the exercises in the 7-day plan and thinking, “I wish I had more time for self-care but I don’t”, then I would like to remind you that you can easily introduce mindful moments into your day. You can reap the rewards by simply becoming more mindful through your daily actions: when you are sitting on a bus or train, having a cuppa, eating your lunch – these can all be mindful moments. Give yourself that time to allow for you to be doing just that one thing and for thoughts to flow in and out of your mind without needing to do anything more than acknowledge them – there is no need to judge or work anything out. Each time you notice a thought, just come back and refocus on the task at hand. One of the most beautiful things about practising mindfulness is that it allows you to just be with whatever you are feeling – accepting, for example, that you are just going to sit or be with anger allows it to actually pass through you more quickly.
It's Not You, It's Me Page 13
