Tag: #knowyourpurpose

Spirituality

Shedding my skin, answering the call

MariaTeresa

We have officially entered this last month of 2019 my dear readers. I awoke this morning with lots of words swirling around my head which for this creative soul means a poem is about to come through. I have always relied upon writing to express my feelings and emotions. In this past year I have relied heavily upon creating poems to articulate my own life’s observations and experiences. Today one word kept popping up over and over again, bones.

In the past six months, as you my dear readers know, I have had an accelerated growth period within the spiritual awakening I now find myself in. This process has allowed me to shed so many old coping habits, mindsets and behaviors that no longer serve my highest self. That’s what I’m very focused on in life, what works and what doesn’t.

I’m an empath that has incredibly fast moving energy. I absorb it like a sponge through my pores. I liken my thoughts to a spinning rolodex. When a poem is forming in my mind, I see the words written across a kind of white board as a vision. They come together quickly and don’t take much effort on my part at all. The phrase that kept repeating in my mind this morning was, make no bones about it. As usual, I googled it for the exact definition:
To Make No Bones About Something. Meaning: To say clearly what you think or feel about something, however unpleasant or awkward it may be. To make no bones about something means to say something in a way that leaves no doubt, or to have no objection to it.

This makes perfect sense to me. First of all, I am honest to a fault. Being both an empath and a Sagittarius, at times my words spill out bluntly with little or no tact to my delivery. I speak my mind and my truth as I always have. I know this is one of the traits my fiance adores the most in me. He knows when he asks me my opinion on something, he always gets the truth! I can further relate to this phrase very much while I make this shift, shedding outdated ways to deal with life like a repitle sheds it’s old skin to make way for a new one. Snakes and lizards do this to allow for growth and to remove parasites that have attached themselves to their old skin. Again, this too I can relate to. I’m always growing and evolving, getting rid of aspects within my life that have become a drain upon me. A parasite sucks the nutrients it needs to live and feeds off of its host.

Before I started this deep inner work, I can admit to allowing others to feed off of my energy. Family, friends even co-workers would become very draining for me to handle and that was detrimental to my own well being. I have always had a very high tolerance and patience for drama therefore in my past I made decisions within my relationships that were in hindsight not the best for my life long term. That was then, this is now.

Like that animal who sheds its skin in order to allow for growth and a cleansing of the blood sucking, leech like organisms, I too am ridding myself of the pests in my life by letting go. Getting down to my bare bones. Building a newer and more solid foundation for my authentic self to blossom within. My spirit deserves to breathe free and fly to where the winds of change may take me. An emotional and mental cleansing that is happening at a rapid pace to keep up with my intentions and manifestations.

Recently I had a video chat with a fellow female empath that was so inspiring and validating to my soul! She was so open and kind by complimenting me on my inner strength and powerfully realized spirit. It made me blush at first honestly because I’m new to fully accepting compliments, allowing myself to receive love. She told me to shine like the queen’s essence I embody. After we said our goodbyes, her words were still in my mind. I looked at myself in the mirror and I told myself, “Maria, this is your time to shine and if others can’t handle it or find fault in your new found confidence, tell them to put on sunglasses!”

I’m at the stage in my life where I can see the big picture clearly. Speaking of glasses, I feel like I just got a new pair! All the questions and curiosities about life that I have had up to this point are all being answered revealing my path’s purpose. I am here to listen, share, heal and inspire others who feel lost, marginalized or forgotten. I know that feeling all too well and I won’t allow anybody I come across to feel that kind of severe hopelessness and worthlessness. I have walked in those ratty, torn up shoes of despair too and I will do whatever I can to lend a hand or a smile to those in need. A disrupter in life that fights against hate and evil to shine the light of empathy and compassion for those that need it. It’s in my bones. It’s my calling and I am answering it wholeheartedly! I’m determined to make a difference and I believe love will heal this world!

Mental health

Celebrating the small steps

MariaTeresa

In the last few days an undeniable and solid peace has washed over and is comforting me. My analytical mind wants to call out all of the reasons why I think this is so. Again, even while writing this and essentially downloading my thoughts on the subject of furthering this self healing journey I am on, I can’t help but see how both parts of my brain are working together. Not just the logic seeking, results driven analytical part but also the communicative, creative and empathetic part too working in a kind of see saw effect. I once dwelled so intensely in just the analytical part of my mind. So much so that I would get lost in the whys and feel terribly stuck. Sound familiar to anyone?

In the past as I just mentioned, I felt cut off and deprived at times from my creativeness. I believe that to be the lighter, more carefree and fearless part of me, I need show myself compassion and grace. These two sides are no longer at war with each other. They have founded a new partnership and by doing so I am feeling a real sense of freedom.

I spend a lot of time these days reading about and exploring levels of consciousness. I believe that I am in the process of teasing out two concepts. One being observing how my ego mediates between superego and the identity aspects of my personality. The stories each can spin in order to protect myself and impede the incredible shift that I’m undergoing are challenging my entire thought process while I expand my consciousness. Uncovering my true self, rewriting old and unfounded beliefs, lies really that don’t match my reality is for me just a higher level of awareness.

The second concept is integration of my shadow self and how much awareness I now have whenever I feel myself getting uncomfortable with parts of myself that feel at first shameful and threatening to my sanity. By digging a bit deeper and unconconditionally loving those parts of myself, I have created space for more acceptance of myself.

For example, the beliefs I have surrounding my own sexuality used to feel dirty and wrong. Instinctively I have been both dissoactive and dialectical when it comes to sex in general seeing it as both beautifully pleasurable, necessary as a bodily function while also feeling negatively full of shame. Yes, that is due to the sexual abuse and trauma I have experienced but it’s amazing how many other stories my ego would silently scream at me surrounding other aspects of my personality that aren’t part of my sexual identity as a woman.

I am continuing to tap into my self care rituals and reestablishing my yoga practice, breathwork and meditation has been hugely effective in gaining more mindfulness of both my thoughts and my physical awareness. How my feelings feel in my body. The most recent being a redefined focus of how anger feels. I know anger is born out of fear and while most of my life has been run by fear and anxiety, it makes sense to me that I am now paying closer attention to how anger feels.

I had blocked, stuffed and dissociated myself from these two most uncomfortable and troubling feelings. It sounds silly now to me but fear played a role in my drive that in the past I felt necessary to propel me on in life. Anger was something I completely denied and wouldn’t allow myself to truly feel. When I’m angry I have felt ugly, wrong and unworthy. These were the mixed messages my brain was being sent that only drove me further down sufferings path.

Now integrating these different yet vital pieces of my psyche I can clearly see how each one serves me and allows my resilience to grow. I’m having to have patience with myself which is extremely hard for me. I’m great at holding this space for others but when the focus is on me I immediately become impatient with myself. Meditation allows for and creates space between these conflicting thoughts. Once messages are challenged and the universe sends me signs that tell me to accept, love and care for myself in spite of my shortcomings, peace and contentment can grow and take root in my soul.

It’s so richly rewarding to be taking care of myself in these ways. Reparenting my wounded inner child, loving and accepting the small accomplishments will lead me to succeed. I have always held space for others, putting them before myself being and being the ultimate people pleaser. These days I am reevaluating how I feel in each of my relationships and establishing stronger boundaries. I’m deciding what is and isn’t my responsibility and what I will or won’t allow from others. It’s the ultimate in self love dear readers.

I’m really seeing how much these last 6 months of deep diving into integration of my shadow and reexamining my self acceptance, holding space for grace towards myself has given to my entire outlook on life. I know success is in my near future now. Doing this work has allowed me to open up my ability to tap into my flow state more. Operating from a much more conscious place. Focusing on really learning to love me.

Untangling shame is so empowering and is helping me alter my perceptions which give my creative mind even more to explore. Dwelling in the sticky uncomforbility of it all, challenging difficult emotions and moods is becoming a new superpower. I have accepted that only Maria can take the best care for Maria. This conversation I’m having with myself represents true inner beauty and acceptance because both light and dark must meet in order to be completely authentic ❤️

Spirituality

Living my life as an empath

MariaTeresa

I’ve written some previous posts about being an intuitive, emotional and physical empath. Some of my very first memories in life are of being so curious about others. I would stare at people, drinking their feelings and thoughts in. It’s always been distracting and often times overwhelming to have others most inner concerns, heartaches, joys and life’s problems swirling around my mind as I tried to focus in class. It has taken me many years to accept and cope with my life as an empath. Learning how to protect myself, my individuality and my emotions was key to my own inner peace.

I can admit that it’s always easiest for me to help others than to help myself and I for years did just that. I wasn’t even on my list of priorities. It felt like my heart was open and bleeding all the time. Like a bandage being pulled from a scab that is never going to heal. I was always exhausted, confused and looking for an escape route mentally and emotionally that would release my mind so I could rest. Heck, I had no idea of what was going on inside of me and I didn’t talk about it to anyone. It wasn’t until I was well into my 30s that I even learned there were others like me! I remember talking about it with my therapist and thinking, this is a thing?

Empaths, energy healers, light warriors and mystics are all people who can feel others feelings instinctively. I am someone who intuitively understands what others are feeling emotionally, I can read thoughts and even sometimes feel their physical pain. The feeling pain aspect is an interesting one because it can be really upsetting for me to endure something I know isn’t actually happening to me.

Right now my fiance, who is a former professional football player, is going through an immense amount of pain in his entire body. Most specifically, his knees and his head. He sustained numerous concussions during his career and coupled with severe mental illness causes him daily debilitating headaches. We have spent almost six years together as a couple and for most of them he has complained of daily headaches.

Almost three weeks ago he started a new program that is a study on brain supplements and a new light device called a BrainPro. It looks like a halo or a pharaoh’s helmet. He wears it three times a day for twenty minutes a session and it’s ultraviolet light penetrates his skull rejuvenating his blood vessels. More blood flow creates healthier cells and has actually relieved his headaches finally!! It’s a bonafide miracle if you ask me.

On Thursday he was able to receive stem cell injections in both knees in hopes that his bone on bone knee pain can be eliminated and he won’t require knee replacement surgery. This man has seen so many doctors, has had hundreds of tests run, x-rays and MRIs. The last one he had was in September of 2017. When the doctor who injected the stem cells looked over his scans from that time he gave him news that we hadn’t known. He has a broken knee cap, broken bone spurs, a broken bone in his ankle and tons of arthritis throughout.

When I got his call while I was at work giving me this news, I broke down in tears. To hear that the man that I adore has been walking around with broken bones and suffering in pain proved too much for me to bear. The guilt and sorrow I feel not knowing what the cause was is completely encompassing my thoughts and feelings.

I’ve always admired his talent, his personality and who he is as a person but now I’m calling him a warrior. To witness him enduring such an excruciating level of pain on a daily basis is awe inspiring. He also suffers from auditory hallucinations, voices in his head. Yet still he gets up, puts a smile on his face and makes everyone around him feel special.

While we go through these next eight weeks together for this study, I have been asked to document it. My goal and the goal of this program’s director is to not only relieve the pain these players have but bring awareness to the powerful organization that owns the game of football in this country. I’m referring to the NFL. I would like to share with you an excerpt from my notes so far to give you my dear readers a peek inside….

My heart breaks as my emotions run high but I try to get what needs to be done intelligently accomplished. Lincoln is in even more excruciating pain, he can’t settle down and sleep is out of the question.Therefore, I’m not settled and my sleep is hugely interrupted. I am working 8 hr shifts back to back on little to no sleep. My patience is worn thin as I try to make it through each moment without screaming at the top of my lungs WHY US???? The blessings are still abundantly clear now which makes for an interesting paradoxical situation. We now FINALLY know why he has been in so much pain. His headaches are FINALLY being relieved by the brain supplements and Brain pro device he is wearing 3x a day religiously. That is a miracle in my mind and I can’t deny that. Since I have known and I’m sure for much longer than that, Lincoln has suffered from daily severe headaches. I keep telling him that he is my warrior. I can’t imagine or even attempt to wrap my brain around the amount of pain and suffering that he must endure on a daily basis. It absolutely blows my mind. He has sacrificed his entire body for the game of football. The NFL as of 4/19 hasn’t compensated him a dime. Sure they and their many umbrella programs have covered certain medical procedures, bills etc. Those were only granted after my begging, pleading, emails, written applications, phone calls and so on demanding they help him out. He was a big running back that the 93-95 Cowboys teams used as a battering ram in practice mostly and to back up Emmett when he couldn’t play or to save him from injury. The NFL has no humanity, people are walking $ signs and are definitely expendable in their eyes. For a nonprofit billion dollar industry it is beyond incomprehensible. Blood, death and suffering is on their hands and they are still fighting to not claim responsibility for it. It makes me sick to my stomach yet when I ask Lincoln and some other former teammates that he is close to now if they knew what they knew now, would they do it all over again? There answer is always the same, a resounding HELL YES!!! That is the power, glory and prestige we as a society have put upon these football warriors. For me this brings up the question of whether we have really created a positive outlet for those who want to pursue professional football. Where are our morals, ethics and values? Does the quality of life AFTER football mean so little to the powers that be that allow this machine to continue to grind forward season after season???

You see my dear readers, life as an empath isn’t always easy. I understand that God’s purpose for me here is to help and heal others. I’m thrilled and overjoyed when I can be an outlet for others. I’m blessed to walk this path and be on this journey. I believe the people we meet and everything that happens is for a deeper reason. I hold onto this belief and nurture it when I need to. No regrets, nothing but ❤

Mental health, Spirituality

Choosing love while I remain true to myself

MariaTeresa

It’s been an amazing six months of personal growth and accomplishments dear readers. I recently posted a poem of mine on my IG profile under the handle @emotionalmusings (I have reposted it here) that revealed a personal truth. I have purposely held myself back from success for the past 40 years. Why you may be wondering? For fear of failure, for fear of not being good enough and finally because I didn’t believe in myself. It has been a long and winding road for me. One that required lots of twists, turns and quiet self reflection. Ultimately it took losing everything, my sanity, my personal safety and my home for me to discover that in the end love for myself is the only superpower that I needed. Something that was inside me all along, I just wasn’t accessing it!

If someone had told me that being involved in an extremely difficult domestic violence relationship eight years ago would be one of the catalysts for my evolution, I would of never believed them. Getting punched in the face is quite jarring yet it showed me over time that I wasn’t as worthless as I believed myself to be. There are no magic pills, absolute directives or a master plan to figure out one’s purpose here on the journey. I’m among one of the people in life who had to learn these important things the hard way. Perhaps you can relate. Please put your own story in the comments below!

Perhaps it’s my hard headed Calabrese roots, my fierce independent nature or my insatiable curiosity for why things are the way they are that has led me down a more difficult path than most. A dear friend of mine recently stated to me that I always seem to have so much on my plate. That is definitely true. Juggling lots of “life balls” is all that I know and something I have had loads of practice with since I was quite young.

I follow my heart always and air on my emotional side most often over my intellectual understanding of any given situation. One may say I through caution to the wind. I pride myself on leading with my human foot when faced with adversity or confrontation. I love that about myself and the more I choose to follow my heart, the more confident and content I become. It has taken years to gain this inner peace and now that I have discovered it I desire more of it!

The self loathing, self doubt, feelings of inferiority, and uselessness seem light years away now. I have survived some dark years. I firmly believe that without those years I wouldn’t have found my path of enlightenment. I give thanks for that time, I don’t regret it. Important life lessons and poor life choices resulted in some truly brighter days.

I write and post a lot about the need for more of us to show empathy to one another. In my opinion we must become love warriors against hate and evil doers. It’s those people among us that are crying out, in a more negative way, for love and acceptance. Humanity’s fate is under attack. It’s ugly and it evokes fear. I feel it is the root cause for people to in turn act in an ugly way towards each other. Bottom line…..ugliness, fear and hate needs to be challenged. The only recipe for change is love. Love is the only answer my friends.

Love hard, whole heartedly and often. Hate is easy. It takes more courage and faith to choose love over hate. In a real and genuine way, I challenge you to try a little more love in your life. Especially with complete strangers. A bit more empathy will open your heart to more understanding of not only that stranger but for yourself.

Trust me. I am living proof. I have survived, now I am striving. This is what winning looks like😁

current events, Spirituality

Planting seeds of empathy and love

MariaTeresa

I’m not a “green thumb” by any definition despite the fact that my mother is a wonderful gardner. She and my father loved spending weekends in our lush backyard pruning, planting and cleaning our grounds at the house I grew up in. In this post I want to focus on a different kind of planting and that is in cultivating a more loving society.

In light of the extreme terrorist attack recently at Christchurch in New Zealand, I myself am searching for an answer as to why such violence exists in the world. For centuries we humans have fought over, waged wars even over the concept of beliefs. I recently read an article in The Washington Post, “In the United States, right-wing violence is on the rise” published on November 25, 2018 that discussed the rise of violence from right-wing white supremacists.

“Over the past decade, attackers motivated by right-wing political ideologies have committed dozens of shootings, bombings and other acts of violence, far more than any other category of domestic extremist, according to a Washington Post analysis of data on global terrorism.”

This violence has been on a steady rise since President Obama but has surged while Trump has been in office. I don’t want this post to become too politically charged however the facts are the facts. People in power do have a lot of influence over our society.

Intellectually I understand that I can only control and manifest change within myself. As an energy reader, healer and communicator, I firmly believe in the laws of attraction. What you put out into this world always comes back to you. Therefore, I choose to love no matter what. Good, bad or indifferent….the one answer is always rooted in love.

I believe our God, however one may choose to define it, intended our purpose here on Earth is to show and practice love with our fellow man. This involves active tolerance and acceptance in the face of adversity and misunderstanding. We don’t have to agree with everybody but we should allow for the differences that exist among each other. I believe if somebody believes in God and then acts in a completely contradictory way, that person has some reckoning to do. God is love. Period.

When my boys were little I used to tell them that they didn’t have to like or be friends with everybody but they must love everybody. It requires courage to love, a vulnerability to allow ourselves to feel for another. Discovering and nurturing our connections is what life is all about. Celebrating what we can relate to and have in common with one another is far more beneficial than what divides us and makes us different. Differences should be celebrated and accepted because uniqueness is what makes each of us an individual. We are a stronger force together than when we are divided into smaller groups.

Today and everyday, I choose to plant the seeds of love, tolerance and acceptance. I choose to stand up and chastise wrongdoings and hate filled violence. Each one of us has to search our souls and decide what we believe is right and what is wrong.

Inclusivity and acceptance must be in the forefront for the future of our society to survive. It is not us vs. them. There is no “invasion ” of any country by immigrants. Rising violence is driving huge numbers of people from their homes to seek asylum in a different place. What if that was your relative or friend? Would you be so quick to chastise that person?

I encourage you dear reader to be a seed planter of love and empathy. Strike up a conversation with a stranger. We must keep the lines of communication open in order to learn from one another. Evolve or die. Learn and grow or wither away. Let’s destroy ignorance by growing more love. The urgency is now and can’t be put off until tomorrow.