Practice Your Way to Well-Being

I’m looking for practices that support my well-being and my staying connected to who I am, besides meditation (which I’ve tried and I just can’t seem to get the hang of!).  Any good ones you know of that really work?

Ken, Ohio

Why yes, Ken, I do!  This is one of my favorite topics to speak to, as I have found in my own experience as well as the experiences of my clients that engaging in a daily practice is the single most important thing you can do for yourself, and happens to be the key to sustaining your connection and well-being.  When you show up for yourself in this way with such consistency, commitment and discipline, you are becoming aligned and present in life in such a way that positively and powerfully impacts every aspect of it.  The reason for this is because engaging consistently in practices such as meditation allows you to stay in a high-vibrating, good-feeling place, and you are able to access more clarity, truth, intuition, wisdom, inspiration, motivation, etc. than when you are feeling disconnected, negative, and vibrating low.  So I always encourage my clients (and myself) to make their daily practices as important and as high of a priority as eating, sleeping and breathing are, and I’m not exaggerating.

So I’ll get off my soapbox now and give you 3 of my favorites:

~ Daily Gratitudes: Each day spend a few quiet moments writing down at least 10 things that you are truly grateful for, and consciously choose to make your first and last thoughts of the day thoughts of gratitude.  I have no doubt in my mind that if each and every one of us did this the world would be a much better place.

~ Incantations: Very similar to affirmations, yet waaaaayyyyyy more powerful because we are engaging your energy and physiology with the words to produce the “feeling” of what you are saying.  Let me explain.  You know how sometimes repeating an affirmation or a mantra can sometimes get frustrating because while you are saying it you are very aware that you are not feeling it?  With an incantation, we choose our statement, and repeat it with feeling, much like an actor delivering a line.  We also repeat it while engaging in a “power move” or stance, a movement or position that makes you feel powerful.  The results are quite magical.  For example, if you were to use the incantation, “I am confident and happy”, repeating it several times with emotion while moving your body powerfully (or even just standing in a yoga pose or something), you would find yourself feeling confident within minutes, sometimes seconds.  You see, incantations help us immediately manifest the emotion, which is what we’re looking for anyway.  It’s not the house, the car, the job, the relationship, etc. that we want, it’s how we think it’s going to make us feel.  Imagine being able to feel however we wanted to without the things we think we need in order to feel it first – that would mean we literally do not need anything outside of ourselves in order to feel good (see: illusion of need from “Communion with God”)!  And a lovely added benefit to this is that our very “feeling” or “being” draws those things to us (see: process of creation from “Happier Than God”)!

~ Meditation:  Yeah, yeah, I get it – you’re not good at it.  But I’m going to include it anyway because the benefits are endless, and I’d like to offer you a new approach/perspective on it: there is no wrong way to meditate.  Whether it’s sitting in silence with your eyes closed focusing on your breath, doing a guided meditation, or just daydreaming, you are benefiting.  Try a few different things on, without judging them, just notice which method you like best.  And start small – even 3 minutes a day every day can work wonders.

Try these out, Ken, and see how they feel.  But give it a good two weeks of committing to practice these every day no matter what so that you can really feel the impact.  Because it doesn’t really matter what you do, it’s the fact that you take time to go within consistently that creates the experience of well-being and connection.  Enjoy!

(Nova Wightman is a CWG Life Coach, as well as the owner and operator of Go Within Life Coaching, www.gowithincoaching.com, specializing in helping individuals blend their spirituality with their humanity in a way that makes life more enjoyable, easy, and fulfilling.  She can be reached at Nova@theglobalconversation.com. )

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