I Tivo Oprah everyday. Once or twice a week, I’ll buzz through a show or two and unwind with the queen of television. I only watch the shows that have titles that really interest me.

This week, I sat down to watch the interview with Queen Rania of Jordan (She’s pretty cool, by the way!).

Then Melissa Etheridge came on for an interview.

I’ve never been a raving fan of her music, but I figured I might as well continue to be comfy on my couch and see what she’s bringin’ to the table.

And bring it she did.

She’s been through a lot and offered some good little truth nuggets about life. One in particular struck a chord with me:

“You have to make a choice to perceive life as: ‘Is this the most horrible thing that ever happened to me? Or is this the greatest opportunity for me?’”

I love the way she put this.

I teach this all the time to my clients (and myself). And there are infinite ways to make this same point. But for some reason, the simplicity of this really resonated with me.

This is what it all boils down to.

THE ONLY WAY TO CHANGE YOUR LIFE IS TO START LOOKING AT IT DIFFERENTLY.

And yes, I’m even talking to those of you that are in what feels like the very bottom pits of hell.

It is your choice. Always.

And that is a beautiful thing.

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Owner of Brilliant Life Design and twenty/thirty-something life coach, Melissa Foster, works with clients to take their life OFF of auto-pilot and get ON purpose. If you want to start living a life that delivers lasting success, sign up for a fre*e subscription to Melissa’s weekly eZine, Fully Alive at www.BrilliantLifeDesign.com.

Listed below are sure-fire tips that promote a clear and sharp mind…

1 – Become Aware of Your Thoughts

It doesn’t always feel like there is a separation between our mind and soul. There are three parts to each of us: body (our fascinating and very advanced HOUSE), mind (our thinking; the ENGINE) and soul (the LIFE that resides in the HOUSE).

Thoughts are powerful. In fact, they are literally our point of power. They guide us.

The funny thing is, we usually just think away without ever really thinking what we’re thinking about!

Being aware of your thoughts just means that you NOTICE, without judgment, the thoughts that you think. Our thoughts are like the running ticker at the bottom of a CNN screen. So, just as you would watch the ticker at the bottom of the screen – watch your own thinking. And again, WITHOUT JUDGMENT. Don’t try to analyze, just notice.

Practice this as much as possible. And like with anything else, the more you practice – the better you get.

2 – Spend Time in Silence

There is so much going on in our lives. Our minds are constantly distracted by sights and sounds. Especially in today’s society because we have technology around us at all times.

Technology is fabulous, but being inundated with it creates overstimulation. And we wonder why ADD is so prevalent these days! It is so easy to disconnect from ourselves and constantly be taken up with our environment.

Sitting in silence/meditating is like hitting the reset button. We need time to reconnect with ourselves and reset so that we can live from the inside out. So that we can live from a centered place.

When we go through life out of touch with ourselves and uncentered, we are constantly REACTING to our environment.

Schedule at least 5 minutes/day for silence. Close your eyes, breathe, and just be. Reconnect your body, mind and soul. Reconnect with yourself.

3 – Take Brain Breaks

Research shows that short breaks from your work or activity will create more efficient and laser focused attention during the work periods.

For every 60-90 minutes of work, take a 5-10 minute break.

Schedule your work periods and schedule your breaks. AND STICK TO IT.

The brain performs better when it has plenty of oxygenated blood. During a break, get your blood flowing a bit. For example, breathe deeply for a minute or two to get some good oxygen into your blood. After the deep breaths, stretch out and move around. Stretch up tall and definitely stretch your legs. Walk around some if you can.

It’s important to give your brain breaks. Stop treating it like a workhorse! Start incorporating this into your day and watch yourself get sharper and more productive!

4 – Avoid over-eating

FOOD COMAS. We’ve all had them. That lethargic feeling after eating too much.

Talk about brain fog! There is no way that you can be sharp and clear after over-eating.

The best way to avoid over-eating is to eat for FUEL 90% of the time. (The other 10% is for joy eating…birthday cake and other times of celebration!)

LISTEN to your body. It will tell you when you’re hungry and when you’re not. We just aren’t used to tuning in to listen to the sensations that our body gives.

Think of hunger as a scale of -10 to +10. -10 is FAMISHED. +10 is STUFFED. And right, smack dab in the middle is Zero. Zero is neutral. Try to constantly stay between -2 and +2.

Staying in this range will keep your eating from jeopardizing your mental clarity.

5 – Eliminate consistent, excessive alcohol intake

With this kind of brain fog – you just feel plain stupid.

Consistent moderate alcohol intake results in consistent mild to moderate brain fog.

Getting hammered will result in severe brain fog for 1-2 days and mild brain fog for days after that.

There are a couple of reasons for these lasting effects…

Alcohol strips vitamin B1 (thiamine) from your brain. Thiamine is essential for brain function. This deficiency that is inevitable from getting a buzz (or plastered) results in depression, irritability and brain fog.

Also, alcohol consumption suppresses REM sleep. REM sleep lasts for 70-90 minutes each night and is when you actively dream. Emotions and stress are dealt with during REM sleep. Lack of REM sleep can make you feel more stressed, emotional and can result in a decline of mental activity (as well as hormone and immune system problems).

Start incorporating these tips into your life and notice how much better you regularly begin to feel!

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WANT TO USE THIS ARTICLE IN YOUR E-ZINE OR WEB SITE?
Please do! Just be sure to include this complete blurb with it:

Owner of Brilliant Life Design and twenty/thirty-something life coach, Melissa Foster, works with clients to take their life OFF of auto-pilot and get ON purpose. If you want to start living a life that delivers lasting success, sign up for a fre*e subscription to Melissa’s weekly eZine, Fully Alive at www.BrilliantLifeDesign.com.

Our lives are constantly in motion. And there are different speeds at different times in our life. Sometimes the speed of life is like an idling car and other times it’s more like riding in Tony Stewart’s car during a NASCAR race. Hold on tight!

Regardless, life is ALWAYS in motion.

Sometimes we feel stuck. When you feel that, remind yourself that stuck is a state of mind – not a physical problem.

We need BOTH, the times of slower, more calm movement AND those times where there is momentum and velocity.

One reason that we tend to keep ourselves “stuck” in either the idle mode OR in the adrenaline pumping, race mode of life is because we are afraid to say goodbye to what we know is no longer serving us. Good bye to someone or something.

Afraid of letting go.

We place a lot of drama around letting go. When you keep your focus on the goodbye of one thing and NOT the HELLO of the new –drama is created, fear is perpetuated, and there is less-than-turtle-paced forward movement with your life.

Focusing on what you are moving away from (or what is moving away from you) creates that illusionary stuckness that you feel.

Drama does not have to be a part of letting go. Your thoughts and actions around a goodbye create the drama.

You can look at it in a sad, dramatic way OR you can look at it as shedding old skin. A fresh place that allows for forward movement and growth.

Letting go is about release.

It’s about allowing change.

We all have those moments when we just KNOW that it’s time to move on.

You know what I’m talking about. It’s like a tiny voice inside that whispers. And sometimes when we hear it, it’s tempting to cover our ears and sing loudly. Because we know that the voice is calling for change.

You have two options when you feel this instinct for change:

1) Ignore Your Inner Knowing

Ignoring your inner knowing is a very convenient way to go. You can stay inside your comfort zone. You will likely grow more miserable with time, but you’ll get to stay in that comfortable place of yours.

“Comfortable and miserable” is easy because it is familiar. And familiarity rules, unless you are willing to break that pattern.

EXAMPLE: If you have a deep inner knowing that you are in the wrong relationship, you can ignore it by flat out lying to yourself about it. It’s easy to ignore the truth, to keep making excuses and giving reasons why it is the right relationship for you and slap on a fake smile.

Fast forward 2 years…everything around you has changed or shifted in some way or another. And you have grown more unhappy and miserable somehow. That inner knowing that you sensed and decided to stuff down and ignore is still there…you are just not living in alignment with it.

And that, my friend, is a recipe for UNhappiness.

So you can ignore that inner knowing OR YOU CAN…

2) Acknowledge Your Truth
When an instinct for change arises, we tend to not even acknowledge our truth. There is usually fear around what that would mean. Acknowledging our truth means that change and movement HAVE to happen, right?!

Nope. Not at all.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT takes place on the inside. ACTION takes place on the outside.
You get to choose what action to take, if any at all.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ≠ ACTION.

Instead of lying to yourself, just acknowledge what you intuitively know is true.
If there’s one person that needs to hear your pure honesty, it’s YOU.

And now, using the previous relationship example, whether you choose to continue the relationship or leave it, you are clear. Clarity is oh-so-important when it comes to making decisions.

Change is rarely easy, which is why there is a tendency to avoid it. Growth cannot happen without some change. And change cannot happen without an occasional “see ya later” to something or someone.

People that are truly living life allow the instinct for change to be heard. They are honest with themselves. They acknowledge their truth.

As you acknowledge your truth and trust your instincts, you may decide it’s worth it to step out of your comfort zone and actually honor your truth.

True happiness and success comes from spending time at the intersection of self-honesty and self-honoring. And that intersection is rarely inside of our small bubbles of comfort.

“Goodbye to one thing is hello to another. And hello is full of opportunity and a fresh place to be.”

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WANT TO USE THIS ARTICLE IN YOUR E-ZINE OR WEB SITE?
Please do! Just be sure to include this complete blurb with it:

Owner of Brilliant Life Design and twenty/thirty-something life coach, Melissa Foster, works with clients to take their life OFF of auto-pilot and get ON purpose. If you want to start living a life that delivers lasting success, sign up for a fre*e subscription to Melissa’s weekly eZine, Fully Alive at www.BrilliantLifeDesign.com.

Now that we are officially on the top of our holiday weekend, here are four things to help you have a fourth of july that will serve you for the rest of the year:)

1) Be Grateful

We live in an awesome country. It’s a big world out there and the freedom we have here is not the world-wide norm. Take a moment today and sit with that and allow yourself to feel grateful.

2) Be Careful

Lots of fireworks being set off this weekend! Pretty and fun until someone gets a finger blown off. Be careful!

3) Be Reflective

Okay this could the the biggie – if you do it. July 4th is just over 1/2 of our current year, which makes it a perfect time for reflection on your progress with any goals you may have set for 2009. Whether it was a New Year’s resolution or a goal set a little later than that – CHECK IN.  Re-examine the ’09 goals previously set OR set ’09 goals now. July 4th is a perfect marker for either of the above.

Where are you with the goal/goals? What’s working? What’s not? If you’ve gotten nowhere, break down your goal into an even smaller goal. Turtle steps, people, turtle steps. That’s what gets things done. Why? Because it’s MOVEMENT.

There are just under 6 full months left in this year and that is plenty of time for some real movement to occur in whatever you set out to do.

WHO and/or WHAT would you like to be when January 2010 rolls around? Set or modify goals accordingly.

4) Be FUN

Whatever that means for you. Enjoy yourself and this long weekend. Our founding fathers would love that you are taking time to celebrate the monumental change they created!

I had some pictures taken yesterday and today for my website and some coaching things I have coming up. It has always been a challenge for me to look natural in front of the camera. I’ve heard advice before about how to appear natural in photos, but nothing of value for me…”RELAX” or Think happy thoughts”…stuff  like that.

Today, at the very beginning of being photographed, it dawned on me…no wonder I was nervous and uptight and unnatural! The internal dialogue going through my head sounded something like: “First of all, you are smiling at a piece of machinery (camera). Look natural. Your smile is fake. RELAX! You’re too stiff.  Stand up straight. Don’t half-smile. Tone that cheezball smile down!”

So, I took a moment to just stop. To take a breath and clear my head. I know that those are crap thoughts. And crap thoughts DON’T DO ANY GOOD – EVER.  Also, thoughts lay the foundation for how we feel. Those thoughts were making me feel insecure, unsure, and shy.

These pictures are going to be used in some way, shape or form to help communicate with people. To help people get a better sense of who I am. Many people will be “meeting” me first by a picture. Soooo, I came up with some better feeling internal dialogue: “Treat the camera like it is a person.” “Smile like it’s the first time you are meeting someone”. I kept going over those two things in my head and WOW, there is a noticeable difference between the pictures taken before that clear-my-head session and after. Every time the photographer started shooting again, I just smiled at the camera like I was meeting someone for the first time. I immediately became more relaxed and easy going. More ME, which is the whole point of these pictures! At some point, I realized that I was actually having fun.

SELF TALK IS HUGE in determining your outcome in whatever it is that you’re doing. Start paying attention to those things (a situation, a project, a task, a goal, a dream, etc.) in your life where you feel powerless, shy, insecure or weak. What is the internal dialogue going on? Once you nail it down – change it. Take a moment and start thinking thoughts that are congruent with the outcome you want. If you are having trouble thinking positive, at least think neutral. It’s a step away from negative and towards positive.

Examples of the feeling states that result from positive, neutral and negative self talk/thoughts:

Positive thoughts result in empowered, strong, confident, and excited feeling states.

Neutral thoughts result in indifferent, calm, at peace, and relaxed feeling states.

Negative thoughts results in weak, insecure, and powerless feeling states.

Once again, if you can’t come up with inner dialogue or thoughts that get you to that place of empowerment and confidence, then just come up with what can give you a calm, relaxed feeling. It’s MUCH better than weak and powerless.

“CRAPPY THOUGHTS PRODUCE CRAPPY RESULTS.” -Susan Hyatt

To think big or small?

To move forward or sideways?

To be confident or cocky?

To be humble or insecure?

To live from the inside-out or the outside-in?

To focus forward or rubber-neck at your past?

To take time to be bored or be bored most of the time? 

To connect with like-minded people or like-actioned people? 

To seek or to meander?

To have a still mind or a stagnant mind?

To stay in your business or meddle in other’s?

To be curious or skeptical?

To live or merely exist?

To be clear or confused?

To be transparent or vague?

To be deliberate or aimless?

To be productive or chaotic?

To make requests or complain?

I choose to think big, move forward, be confident AND humble. I want to BE from the inside-out. I focus forward (although, I had to wear a neck brace for a while from a history of severe rubber-necking at my past). I cherish my scheduled down time and LOVE my like-minded peeps; like-actioned only goes so far. I seek out my truth, practice my still mind, and stay in my business. I am VERY curious and love exploring for answers. I LIVE, baby! In my experience, clarity comes from living inside-out and I strive for that on most days:) I live TAO (transparent, authentic, open). My actions are deliberate for my greater goals. I’ve been working on the last one…NO COMPLAINING:)

With all that being said…the above paragraph will always be a progressive concious process. That’s what it’s all about – living conciously, not unconciously. I choose to grow. There was a  time that I breathed, ate, and existed unconciously. Life is so much better now:) 

What do you choose?

If you haven’t read Tribes (Seth Godin’s latest book)…DO. Pretty quick and GREAT read. The concepts in this book are already in practice for some and new to many. Here is Seth giving a talk about the main idea behind his book. It’s 17 minutes, but AWESOME.

We are way too quick to underestimate the influence that each one of us has.

I used to dance. I used to dance a lot. From the age of three, dance was my thing. When the question was asked, whether on paper or verbally, “What are your hobbies/interests?” – I ALWAYS answered “Dance”.  I graduated college and moved to Atlanta with every intention of picking it up down there (HELLO, hip hop capital of the world!) and never did. And now I have lived in L.A. for almost two years and still no dance. My desire for dance had been buried by excuses followed by lack of attention to it. I could give you ninety-seven reasons why I haven’t danced in years…EXCUSES.

So, why did the excuses initially exist? Well, it’s easy to be “too busy” to get it going. But come on, what is “too busy” covering up. If I really wanted to do it, I would have… right? I mean think about it. We make time for the things we truly want to do. Hell, we probably make even more time for things that we don’t want to do in life, but feel like we have to (that subject needs it’s own post, but seriously take a look at your to-do list). So, why didn’t I make it happen? After some attention and questioning to this matter, this is what I came up with: FALSE FEAR.

There is an awesome explanation of fear in ”Finding Your Own Northstar” by Martha Beck, but let me break it down for you here:

Fear’s purpose is to protect from danger. If you are walking to your car at night and you see a man ahead of you just hanging out and you get an instinctive jolt of fear – you are scared of this guy. Your fear tells you to turn and run. That is true fear.

False fear shows up as generalized anxiety or worry and doesn’t lead to clear action. It usually shows up when the ego is involved. My “fear” was anxiety that I wouldn’t be good enough to keep up with hip hop in Atlanta. I was a good dancer in Indiana. In my mind, Atlanta was going to be another level. And now in L.A., I was recently asked why I don’t still dance. I didn’t know how to answer that. Good question. Why don’t I still dance? “I’m going to get back into it”, I thought to myself. And then the excuses started pouring. And that is when I did the above investigating to finally get to the bottom of this. Once I figured out that false fear was keeping me from getting back into dance – I knew I had to do it.

Healthy reactions to fear:

True fear–> Run from danger.

False fear–> Face it head on.

So, I did some research and chose a studio. Before I went to class, I gave myself permission to be willing to suck at dance. It had been a long time. What if I was rusty and could not keep up with the choreography? What’s the worst thing that could happen? I am there for ME. My opinion is the only one that counts here. Totally fine if I suck at this, I’m there to have fun.

And it was the most fun thing I have done in a long time. I didn’t realize how much I missed dance. I was in heaven. I was surrounded by people that love it just as much as I do. The music was incredible. The choreography was incredible. The instructors were awesome. The other students were nice. I kept up just fine. And most importantly, I had a blast! If I would have let that false fear stand in my way, I would have continued to miss out on my passion.

So here’s to kicking false fear’s ass and living life to it’s fullest! Cheers!

What if, for a day, you were not capable of experiencing any of the five physical senses? Not sight, sound, taste, smell or touch. But your were still able to think and feel emotions.

What would be the driving force behind decision making?

The sense of feeling emotion is what would guide you through your day. You would naturally follow what feels good for you. If you were so in tune with this sense, you would undoubtedly be more in tune with intuition (gut feeling). You would realize that your thoughts truly are the trigger for emotion, not what happens around you.

What if we let go of the addiction to data collection and analyzation? What would happen if you felt your way through a day? What would happen if you stopped trying to think your way through and made decisions based on what feels right for you? 

We live in a world that requires us to make decisions using that left brain of ours. But what if we toned it down a bit and checked in to see where we could slow down our busy mind? The second you begin analyzing, you create a cloud around your options. Start practicing with small decisions and items on your to-do list.

For a day, focus on leaning towards what feels good and right for you. Steer away from over-analyzation. Your decisions with be made quicker and you will feel better. 

“Many people try to think their way through the block when it’s their thinking that IS the block.”-Martha Beck