HOLISTIC WELLNESS BLOG
TRANSFORMING YOUR LIFE. LITTLE CHANGES MAKE A BIG DIFFERENCE
TRANSFORMING YOUR LIFE. LITTLE CHANGES MAKE A BIG DIFFERENCE
POST 10 - TAKING BACK YOUR POWER We’ve spoken in terms of what you’d have to give up by letting go of some of the modern conveniences rather than what you will gain. It’s time to flip that conversation. Those of us old enough to remember the time before computers and cell phones… and even a time before email and answering machines may have an easier time of this. The news was on in the evening. If you needed more you could read the paper but there wasn’t a constant assault of noise and information. If something really big happened, news wise, they’d break into programming to deliver it. Often someone would call to ask if you’d heard it. If you missed that, the news would get to you one way or another and not having instant knowledge didn’t change what happened. News has a way of traveling with or without an app notification. Speaking of notifications I have all of mine turned off. I check them they don’t check me. When I was younger we had a natural way of prioritizing and focusing on what was right in front of us. If you were out playing and the phone rang you simply missed the call never even knowing that it came. If it was important they’d call back. We did things without interruption. If we were out having a meal with a friend the words “sorry, I have to take this” never crossed our lips. We just did the one thing. What a concept! Believe it or not, we can return to this singleness of focus. The cell phone, tv, and radio all have off buttons. If we’re having a meal with a friend, going out for a walk, watching a movie or otherwise occupied, why not switch off your phone? If this thought makes you uneasy ask yourself one question; Who’s in charge around here? You or the phone. The answer is YOU. Turn the thing off. You decide when you’ll receive information and when you won’t. Take back your power! What you will gain by disconnecting: Time Money Peace Focus Calmness Stress reduction Happiness Self awareness Absorption in a person, pet, project, task, activity Increased attention span Groundedness What you’ll actually be giving up: Cortisol, the stress hormone Constant interruptions Addiction/dependence on an appliance The need for instant gratification Being at servitude of a device This is not deprivation it’s possession! Empowerment! Are YOU ready to take back you power? What negative things will you be letting go of by unplugging? Please let me know in the comments below!
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PART 6 - HOW FAR ARE YOU WILLING TO GO TO HEAL? You will get out of it what you put into it. The deeper your commitment to this process the more profound the change will be. Full Self-Retreat - The Minimalist Detox You will fully detach and unplug This is great for
Changing Your Subconscious. What is the subconscious mind? It’s the the mother board of the brain. In some ways it’s like the default settings on your phone or computer. It’s why we don’t have to think about breathing because it’s programmed into our brains. However, you can also breathe consciously like when you’re meditating. Your subconscious brain is your default program. The part of your brain that takes over and drives you home when you’re lost in thought or busy performing your favorite song. The very first time you drive someplace you need to focus, to concentrate, but the more often you go there the less you have to think about it. Soon you can get there on autopilot. Why? Because a conscious thought performed over and over became part of the subconscious. It’s your auto pilot. It’s also where we store all our beliefs. Think of it like this. If a wagon travels up and down the same dirt road over and over, eventually it’s wheels will create a rut in the road. However, once that rut is created the same wheels that created it will fall into it, unable to break free from that path without great effort. The wheel creates the rut, then the rut controls the wheel. The mind is like that with thoughts. For this purpose the thoughts you have are the wheel and the subconscious mind is the road. If you think the same thing over and over again it will become part of the subconscious brain and that thought process will take on a life of its own. The though becomes the default program, the auto pilot. That’s why it’s so hard to change. But you can change it. You just have to shift where the wheels of that wagon travel. Or drive it down a different road, altogether. By doing so, again and again, over time you can create a new healthy track for the wheels to travel. How do I know? Because I’ve done it. So that’s what we’re going to do. We’re going to break free of those ruts and drive your wagon down a different road. But it’s going to take thought, concentration, effort, commitment and time. And it will need to be repeated over and over again. For the Full Program: Turn off the internet and cable for one year. You can go to the library for anything you need. What you will do in your massive amounts of free time? Practice self-care. Exercise in the way that best suits you and makes you happiest. This time is all about getting to know yourself What you are trying to accomplish with this? Changing your levels of dopamine and what makes you happy! If this sounds impractical for you we'll do the next best thing. No More WiFi. You go where the computer is, it doesn’t go where you are. You will move your computer into a separate room and you must sit in front of it to be online. This time should be scheduled and limited. Just as if you had turned off your internet and had to go to the library. If you use your phone to go online you will also have to do this only in a designated area for a very limited amount of time. You are on retreat. Your days will no longer be frittered away online. Does this sound like something YOU are willing to do? Will you give it a try? Please let me know in the comments below the video! Thank you! xoAmie Order Amie's book! HOW TO GET TO KNOW YOURSELF AND REVEAL THE SOURCE OF YOUR ISSUES – Turning your life into a full-time retreat. This is part 5 in a series. Click here or "Healing Your Kintsukuroi Heart" in the categories menu to go to the full series If doing what you’ve been doing hasn’t been working, you’ll have to do something else. Once again simple but not easy. In order to find out who you really are – to really get to know yourself – you will have to create space in your life. A lot of it. The Wisdom of Minimalism (Where Terrifying Meets Extraordinary) Turn off the noise. It is a distraction and a huge time vampire. I went all the way with this one because, well, I was really ready. I was sick to death of living the way I was living and feeling the way I was feeling so I made a drastic change. It also dovetailed perfectly with one of my “symptoms” which was my financial problems. Even if you don’t have financial issues, there is still great beauty in living with less. I turned off my internet (breathe), my cable and my landline telephone. It was a terrifying step to take – and let me tell you, my internet/cable provider did not make it easy. They made offer upon offer to keep from losing me as a customer but I stood firm. Once I did it, it was like the scene from The Wizard of Oz when Dorothy’s house got spit out of the twister. She landed with a thud and everything went silent. Being left alone with yourself without TV or internet is terrifying and liberating in equal measure although the liberating part is a little harder to absorb. So there is was alone I my quiet little house. Now what? What the hell am I supposed to DO? What will you do? And the answer is… anything you want! Here’s the list of what I stopped doing: Watching the news. Watching tv or movies with no redeeming qualities. Socializing and/or having relationships with toxic people. Eating unhealthy food. Wasting time on things that don’t matter. Negative self-talk. Here’s a list of some the things I did with my new free time:
What I accomplished in doing all this was discovering who I was and what I most liked to do. I created a schedule that was all mine filled with things I never even knew I liked or never had the time to do. I became so much calmer and more relaxed and without the barrage of negativity from the news and social media I was happier, more centered and grounded. The better care I took of myself the better I felt about myself. The better I felt about myself the better choices I made. The better choices I made the more I earned self-respect. The more self-respect I had, the better care I took of myself, an so on… In doing this for an extended period of time, I found clarity. I found my identity. I found my strength and power. I began to feel really sure of myself and confident in who I am. I became far less mailable to the opinions of others. I rewrote my internal dialogue. I discovered I was passionate about going to bed and getting up early, going for a run at first light and then making myself a big healthy breakfast. I remember how much I adored hiking in the woods and loved my artwork. I even had my first real art show! I was an artist! Who the heck knew? I found that I couldn’t wait to make myself dinner and watch a dvd about an empowered woman or how someone overcame the odds and found true happiness. I enjoyed it so much that I’d actually get excited about it! I did these things daily – even on days I had to work I could still get up early and do what I wanted. The same at the end of the day. By doing exactly what I wanted – good healthy habits - for an extended period of time I found I very much preferred my own company doing what I enjoyed over many other things. I certainly wasn’t going to spend my time with people who weren’t positive and really enjoyable to be around or doing something that was unhealthy for myself. I got to the point where it simply was no longer an option. Here’s something else I found - The brain is the original search engine; it remembers what you’re looking for and seeks it out, putting it in your path over and over. When I stopped making unhealthy choices those choices, over time, fell away and no longer presented themselves in my life. It’s not that they no longer existed they just became so uninteresting to me, they fell of my radar. Remember the Jersey Barriers? (Click here to read my Jersey Barrier reference!) I learned that it becomes second nature to make healthy choices for yourself when you like yourself and know exactly who you are. And it becomes second nature to do so with a quiet grace. “Holding on is believing that there’s only a past; letting go is knowing that there’s a future.” – Daphne Rose Kingma Read Amie's Book: KINTSUKUROI HEART; More Beautiful for Having Been Broken Order on Kindle or in paperback on Amazon WHERE TO BEGIN This is part 3 in a series. Click here or "Healing Your Kintsukuroi Heart" in the categories menu to go to the full series Click here for Part 1 Click here for Part 2 Taking Inventory I started by looking at what wasn’t working in my life – aka – the symptoms – and working backward to find the underlying cause. Here’s what I mean. For me, the two biggest “problems” were my lack of money/resulting debt, and making poor relationship choices. Then I asked myself why it was happening? Why was I broke? Why did I invite chaos and negativity into my life in the form of unhealthy relationships? Because of the deep seated beliefs I held about myself. If I really, deep down, thought I deserved better I would have required it. This concept was easier to understand when it came to relationships but not so easy when it came to money. On the surface I thought it was the economy or just my crappy luck. Perhaps it was to a degree, but honestly, it was just more chaos and a manifestation – or symptom, if you prefer - of how I saw myself… as in “not enough”. If I doubted my own worth how could I claim it? Ok, so I discovered and named the source. I did that piece of the work for you and I’m happy to pass it along to give you the starting point. Now, your job is to accept this truth, fine tune it to fit your specific situation(s), and make the commitment to put the plan into action and heal yourself. It’s a large undertaking but entirely doable! It bears repeating - How or why we originally acquired these feelings of low self-worth is irrelevant for now. Because regardless of how they got there, here we are. And now it’s up to us to fix it. SO, IT REALLY IS ALL ABOUT US! And admitting that we are at the center of our issues. Doing this – acknowledging that how we view ourselves is the root of our issues - rather than blaming outward circumstances, or someone else – gives us the power to change. If someone or something else is the cause of our issues than there’s nothing we can do to change anything. Taking ownership means taking back our power. This part is crucial. You must own it. So now what? Now we fix it. THE FOUR-PRONGED PLAN OF INTENTION.
Moving forward, as the healing takes hold, good choices and positive movement will become more and more intuitive and a self-perpetuating upward spiral takes hold. Your thoughts, words and actions will be in service of your very best self and fulfilling your dreams. It will become second-nature. THE FOUR-PRONGED PLAN OF ACTION. Note: I strongly suggest writing this out with physical pen and paper. It connects you more deeply to the work. Make a list of what isn’t working in your life. Start with the big things. What are you doing that you need to stop doing? Write it down. Now, what aren’t you doing that you need to start? Write it down. You’ll apply these things to your personalized Four-Pronged Plan! They will become the promise you make to yourself. Your mission statement. You can use pen and paper or purchase the workbook here. Rule Number One: MINE: No relationships of any kind with men for one year. None. No dates, no flirting, no phone calls, not even hanging out platonically with male friends (because they also offered attention and externally fed my damaged ego). It was absolute. No relationships. No men. Period. They were part of the problem and also a distraction and I could afford neither, so they were the first thing to go. I was officially and completely off the market. YOURS: What will you let go of that isn’t serving your higher purpose? What needs to go? Are you over spending? Talking smack about yourself and/or others? People pleasing or tolerating unkindness? Smoking, overeating, or another self-destructive behavior? Get very specific. Break it down into segments. Use my example above as a template. If it’s more than one thing, fill this part in more than once. Your Rule Number One Template: No (fill in the blank) of any kind for one year. None. No (fill in the blank), no (fill in the blank), no (fill in the blank), not even (fill in the blank) because (state your deep truth). It is absolute. No (fill in the blank). No (fill in the blank). Period. This is part of the problem and also a distraction and I can afford neither, so they are/it is the first thing to go. I am officially and completely (fill in the blank). Rule Number Two: Focus inward and practice self-care. I’d never really developed a true sense of self or figured out who I was as an individual. You need to get to know yourself and to be autonomous. You will also be kind to yourself, practice self-respect, maintain a healthy lifestyle, and there will be no more negative self-talk. You will stop putting yourself down or calling yourself names. Not even in jest. Like the saying goes, if you don’t have anything nice to say, you will say nothing at all. If you are going to change the way you feel about yourself, you must to treat yourself like you are important and worthy, and you must rewrite your internal dialogue. We will have an upcoming, detailed posts specifically on self-care and discovering yourself as an individual! Note: If you let something slip out, if you refer to yourself in a derogatory fashion, stop as soon as you realize it. Look in the mirror if you can, but breathe and tell yourself this.: “I’m sorry. That was unkind. It’s simply not true. I deserve much better. Please forgive the mistake. I will do better next time. I am amazing.” Forgive yourself and breathe… Rule Number Three: MINE: Career. Many years ago, in 1998 to be exact, I’d chosen a career in holistic wellness. A field that I loved but, in practice, had never really enjoyed. I would now allow myself to be fully focused on developing and nurturing my career, to let go of the parts I didn’t love and pursue and expand the parts I was passionate about, to continue my education and become an expert in my field, to know my own worth and to claim it. Taking control of my debt also came under this heading. It’s up to you to decide if cleaning up any messes you’ve made becomes part of rule number 1 or rule number 2. We’ll address this further in upcoming posts/videos. YOURS; Here's your template: What will you begin to create? What steps will you take to live your dream, achieve your higher purpose. What will you do every day to live in service of making it happen? If it’s more than one thing, fill this part in more than once. I will now allow myself to be fully focused on developing and nurturing my (fill in the blank), to create time and space to (state you deep desire) to (state your commitment to the process and how you will go about it and your ultimate goal), to own my right to pursue my dreams, know my own worth and to claim it. RULE NUMBER FOUR: This will come a bit later. That's it, simple but not necessarily easy. If you are choosing to do the full program, the entire year will be devoted to helping yourself heal; mind, body, spirit and craft. Yes, one year! We are talking about very deep healing! You can also choose to try it for as little as a weekend - or one month - thee months or six. Or, you read the blog, watch the videos and put them into practice where, when and how you see fit. But again, very deep, long lasting, life changing healing takes a long time. I did it and it changed my life in ways I never dreamed of! Take some time with this part – the next two weeks if you need it. Get quiet, sit with yourself. Do some real soul-searching. These are true commitments you’re making to yourself. You owe it to yourself. It’s time. Quote of the Day "Acknowledging that how we view ourselves is the root of our issues - rather than blaming outward circumstances, or someone else – gives us the power to change. Taking ownership means taking back our power." Amie Gabriel If you can relate to any, or all of these statements to any degree, I’ll see you here in the next installment. Thursday, January 28th at 1 pm Pacific time. Can you relate? Are you considering participating in this program? Please let us know what you think! Comment below... I's love to hear your thoughts! xoAmie Read Amie's Book: KINTSUKUROI HEART; More Beautiful for Having Been Broken Order on Kindle or in paperback by clicking on the Amazon Affiliate Book Link below! Healing Your Kintsukuroi Heart; Part 2 LOW SELF ESTEEM IS A GATEWAY DRUG. Taking Responsibility This is part 2 in a series. Click "Healing Your Kintsukuroi Heart" in the categories menu to go to the full series. Click here for part 1 Last week we identified that low self-esteem is the original “gateway drug” even if your challenges have nothing whatsoever to do with substance abuse. Click here to read the post. I also said that, even if you don’t initially think it applies to you, I’d illustrate how it may - so stay with me. Today we’ll discuss how accepting this truth – that low self-esteem is source of our issues - can change this gateway drug into your gateway to healing. LET’S EXPLORE SOME SCENARIOS:
Do any of these statements – or a version of them – resonate with you? Now read them again, but this time tack on the words “Because I feel so good about myself.” at the end. For a clearer illustration you can watch the companion video by clicking here. Now you get it, right? It’s entirely contradictory. Any type of behavior that doesn’t honor yourself or who you want to be, isn’t in service of your dream, or in pursuit of being or becoming the very best version of yourself, comes from a place of feeling “less than.” People who truly feel good about themselves don’t think, speak, or behave in ways that are people pleasing, unhelpful, unkind, lack understanding or have a positive purpose – regardless of whether it’s directed inward or outward. There’s no shame in feeling less than. It just is. And the sooner you can embrace that the sooner you can get on with doing something about making it better. Note – don’t confuse an inflated ego with a healthy self-worth! Ego is the opposite side of the same low-self esteem coin. People who feel good about themselves don’t have to blow themselves up in an attempt to impress others. A healthy self-esteem isn’t greater than or less than; It’s equal to. SO, NOW WHAT? I’ll tell you everything – step by step - in this series. Again - It’s free. There’s nothing to buy to gain access to all of it. If you’d really like you can read my book, Kintsukuroi Heart; More Beautiful For Having Been Broken, or order the companion workbook to this series, Healing Your Kintsukuroi Heart, both on Amazon, but you certainly don’t have to. All you really need is occasional access to the internet and a pad and pen. Oh, and a deep commitment to change… if only you could order that on Amazon! HOW I AND WHY I CREATED THIS PROGRAM. I had issues. Big issues. As I mentioned before, the specifics of how those issues presented themselves aren’t important right now. I’ll talk more about them in a later video/blog. Initially, I worked through my issues by taking the traditional route of therapy, medication*, self-help groups and talking with friends, which all worked and I still recommend. But for me, they only worked for so long and only to a degree. They were either too costly, didn’t go deep enough or they addressed the symptoms and not the root cause; I needed to dig down and truly change the way I looked at things and, most importantly, change how I viewed myself. If I could do that, I knew my life would change. *Note - titrated off of my anti-depression medication with the permission and under the very close supervision of my doctor. Never EVER replace the experience of another over the advice of your trusted health care professional! Over the years I’d gathered inspiration through books and movies. Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert. Gift from the Sea by Anne Morrow Lindbergh. Under the Tuscan Sun (the movie). A Year by the Sea by Joan Anderson. Educated by Tara Westover. Wild by Cheryl Strayed. Love Warrior by Glennon Doyle Menton. The list goes on. (All linked below!) However, most of the books and films in this genre, wonderful stories that I have deeply loved (I recommend them all and have linked* all the titles above and below), came from a place so unique that, although fabulously inspirational were, for me, mostly unrelatable or unactionable – the experiences of the very fortunate or wealthy, or situations so extreme that very few people find themselves – offering remedies that were simply out of my reach. I wasn’t in a position to take time away at the beach or travel around the world to find myself, I had to work! I didn’t have extra money or a scholarship to an Ivy League school. I deeply admired those who did and longed to be in their shoes, but I simply wasn’t. There were times when I couldn’t even afford to buy those books or a ticket to the movies, I checked them out of the library. But I read them. I watched them. They inspired me and gave me something to shoot for! So, being a determined and resourceful little bugger and having the professional training, I devised a way to do these extraordinary things – to embark on a life-altering journey of healing – without leaving home and with rather ordinary resources. These “ordinary” circumstances are what often stops women from doing something extraordinary. You are my people and I am here to inspire you! I put myself on an intense minimalistic, at home self-retreat. Exactly what I would do if I paid thousands of dollars to go away on retreat or soul searching quest. I committed to addressing my issues via holistic wellness, intentional physical exercise, and the mind/body/spirit connection. I tried new things. I practiced yoga and meditation, and began living with defined intention. I unplugged and sought peace, quiet, and solitude. These things are easily accessible and available to all of us for free or at very little cost. In fact, once I went into this wholeheartedly – a time of concentrated self-discovery and minimalism - I actually saved a ton of money. This realistic vantage point is one way in which I feel this program is different; it's wholly accessible and meets you at a place where many of us find ourselves when starting over. I know it works because I created it, I’ve applied it, I’ve lived it, I’ve practiced it and afterwards, the really poor life choices I’d been allowing to enter my life on a daily basis became inconceivable to me. Not because I focused on changing those choices but because I changed how I felt on the inside. The positive choices I began making became a symptom of how I felt about myself just like the negative ones had been. I didn’t work on the symptoms –I addressed the root cause of the symptoms. I healed the person who was making them. To be clear, I had to clean up the mess of some of those choices and so will you. Not to worry, I’ll help. I’ll give you the tools and we’ll go over all of it, step by step. Now is your time to work on acceptance. To ready yourself to embark upon a journey of deep and lasting change and true transformation. Next week, we start the transformation. Quote of the Day: "The positive choices I began making became a symptom of how I felt about myself just like the negative ones had been. I didn’t work on the symptoms –I addressed the root cause of the symptoms. I healed the person who was making them." Amie Gabriel If you can relate to any, or all of these statements to any degree, I’ll see you here in the next installment. Thursday, January 21st at 1 pm Pacific time. Can you relate? Are you considering participating in this program? Please let us know what you think! Comment below... I's love to hear your thoughts! xoAmie Scroll down for the YouTube Companion Video! ORDER AMIE'S BOOK BY CLICKING HERE TAKING THE FIRST STEP. Is there something – or several things – that are preventing you from being the very best version of yourself and achieving your goals? What if I told you that all your counterproductive thoughts, words, actions, beliefs – whether they’re directed toward yourself, toward others, or both – all trace back to just one thing? One single source. And if you can embrace that idea, and heal that one thing, you won’t even have to try to do better in the future because directing your energy toward anything other than the most positive aspects of your life becomes unthinkable. In this blog post we will name that one thing and talk a bit about what it’s going to take to heal it. In a series of upcoming weekly blog posts and companion videos, I’ll be going in-depth and guiding you through the steps toward healing. Regardless of whether you decide to fully immerse yourself into this program or just glean insight and advice for self-improvement from the weekly posts, it will cost you no money and there’s nothing to buy or sign up for – just read the posts, watch the videos and, of course, take action. Sound interesting? Keep reading! But first... In case we haven’t met, I’m Amie Gabriel, holistic wellness expert, author, and former train wreck. This is my program and I originally developed it to heal my own life. It worked and now I’m sharing it with you. CUTTING TO THE CHASE Negativity, poor choices, an unproductive or unhealthy lifestyle. I’m talking about the things that prevent you from being the very best version of yourself and achieving your goals. Things within your control. These diversions and roadblocks can appear in your life in a multitude of ways, varying greatly from one person to the next so, for now, the specifics – how they present themselves in your life - don’t matter. They are the SYMPTOMS and we’ll get to them later. What matters right now is getting their root cause. Their source. The one thing that allows them to present themselves to begin with. Because when you heal the source, the symptoms take care of themselves. How do I know? Because I lived through it and this is exactly what I did to heal. COULD THIS BE FOR YOU? HERE ARE SOME QUESTIONS: Is there something in your life that isn’t working? Something you’d like to change? Are you lacking joy or just not feeling as happy and fulfilled as you’d like? Are you stuck in grief over the loss of a loved one, relationship or other life circumstance? Are you making poor choices or feeling unempowered? Are you depressed or maybe not in not in love with your job, your level of fitness or your reflection in the mirror? Is fear keeping you from moving forward? Is there a goal you’d like to achieve but just haven’t made it happen? Maybe things aren’t so bad – maybe you’ve already overcome some obstacles - but you just know things could be better and you want more. Maybe you’re like me when I began this journey – I didn’t particularly want to put forth the energy required to transform but nothing in my life was working and everything needed to change – or maybe you’re somewhere in the middle? If you answered yes to one or more of these questions, keep reading. WHAT’S IT GOING TO TAKE TO CHANGE? Regardless of where you find yourself on the spectrum of challenges, there are a few common denominators that foster change.
Are you ready to embark on a life-altering journey of healing – without a ton of money and without leaving home? Or maybe just find out more about it? I have done it and, in this series - all at no cost – I will show you how. WHAT I DID TO HEAL. I healed by putting myself on an in-depth, at home, self-retreat - while working full-time - and I’ll share with you how you can, too. Let me tell you up front, it isn’t quick or easy – a true commitment to lasting change on a very deep level rarely is - but it’s simple, entirely doable, costs little or no money, and is SO worth it. LET’S GET RIGHT TO THE SOURCE. And once we do, even if you don’t initially think it applies to you, stay with me – I’ll illustrate how it may. So, what is the one thing that became damaged in your past that spawned – and allowed – any and all the negative behavior that followed? Three words; Low Self Esteem. Low self-esteem is the original gateway drug. No matter what your drug of choice is… even if your drug or choice has nothing whatsoever to do with drugs, it’s a catch-all phrase. "Drug of choice" just means the manner in which negativity presents itself in your life. And if low self-esteem is the gateway drug for counterproductivity to take root, then a healthy self-esteem – true self-worth - is the immunity. In the next post/video Low Self Esteem is a Gateway Drug I will illustrate how low self-esteem is the original chink in the armor, regardless of how it presents itself or effects your life or to what degree; even if you think your self-esteem is just fine. In the meantime, here’s the short version. I promised myself I wouldn’t do that again… but I did. I promised that this time I’d get it done. But I didn’t I know better, but… If you can relate to any, or all of these statements to any degree, I’ll see you here in the next installment. Thursday, January 14th at 1 pm Pacific time. Can you relate? Are you considering participating in this program? Please let us know what you think! Comment below... I's love to hear your thoughts! xoAmie Quote of the Day "When you heal the source, the symptoms take care of themselves." Amie Gabriel Watch the Companion Video Below! Read Amie's Book: KINTSUKUROI HEART; More Beautiful for Having Been Broken Order on Amazon Kindle or in paperback by clicking HERE!! Check out the video for three big announcements for the New Year! Let me know what you think in the comments! xoAmie Order Amie's book. KINTSUKUROI HEART on Kindle or in paperback by clicking on the Amazon Affiliate Book Link below!
Thank you so much, xoAmie It was the darkest day of my life. Not the day you might think. Not the day my husband died. It happened before that.
It was early April, the day my husband was scheduled for surgery. That was the day the surgeon emerged from the operating room two hours late – two hours after the time the surgery was expected to end. He ushered us out of the main waiting area and into a private, adjoining room and he closed the door. That’s when he told us that he was terribly sorry but they had been wrong. What they were so sure was a blood clot against the portal vein in my husband’s liver was, in fact, a large tumor. The cancer was back. As the saying goes, a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, and in my pursuit of higher learning much time was spent on anatomy, physiology, and pathology. I’d found the classes fascinating and I’d paid close attention. I’d learned how the human body works, starting at the cellular level. I’d studied the circulatory system; how a cell in the blood stream is transported through the body like a leaf swept along with the current of a river. I understood what a tumor pressed against the permeable wall of a vein could do. I knew that once the mutated cells were loose in the bloodstream there would be no stopping them. I’d studied hard and I’d aced my tests. And so, I knew. The room started spinning and I couldn’t really hear much after that. I remember I had to find a bathroom because I became physically ill. When I returned to the little room, the doctor tried to explain what this all meant. However, my ability to hear and my level of comprehension were intermittent at best. I became intensely aware of the sound of my own heartbeat echoing inside my skull, as though I’d run full speed up ten flights of stairs then cupped my hands over my ears. Sandwiched between the deafening pulses of blood through my brain, I heard bits and pieces of the doctor’s attempt at optimism: “Start chemo… got it early… chances are good… still get a transplant…” But I knew. Only two other thoughts were running through my head. The first, oddly enough, was my deep concern for the people in the next room. In an out-of-body moment of self-observation, I suddenly realized that I was no longer sitting in stunned silence, tears running down my face; I was now doubled over and I was screaming. Reality was crashing in and because my body lacked the physical size to contain the enormity of it all, I had unknowingly morphed into a kind of human volcano, earsplitting wails erupting from my mouth. I thought how that must be scaring the hell out of the people in the next room – who were waiting, as I had been, for their loved one to come out of surgery. You see, what was coming out of my mouth was not a sound one would associate with humans. It was the sound of mournful horror. A primal manifestation of terror and disbelief. It is the sound that would come out if the Earth cracked open and all of hell spilled forth. Because, in that moment, I knew. The other thought was this. We had been so hopeful, so sure, that this surgery was the opening of the door to recovery. This surgery was the last hurdle to be cleared so my husband could get on the list for his liver transplant, and a long, happy, healthy life was ahead. We were so close and we were so excited. But it wasn’t the case. This, instead, was our worst nightmare. Still, I knew one more thing had to be done that was even worse than what was happening now. With this realization, I bellowed as I felt myself falling into the abyss. Somewhere within these hospital walls, the sweetest, kindest soul lay deeply sleeping, blissfully unaware. In a few hours, he would be awake. How, in God’s name, would I tell this to my husband? So, on the seventh of April, on a beguiling spring day, the lights went out, the walls closed in, the sky fell down and the rug got pulled out from under me, all at once. It was the beginning of the end of the world. And I knew. Next week's post, Chapter Two; Tipsy on Thursday, December 17th at 10 am Eastern, 1: pm Pacific time Want to read it all right now? Order on Kindle or in paperback by clicking HERE! Thank you so much, xoAmie Different ages. Different decades. Different circumstances. There are specific events in our lives that shift our paths, write our stories and break our hearts, adding layers, depth and complexity to the clean-slated girls we once were. Each chapter in Part I of Kintsukuroi Heart is a non-fiction stand-alone story. A collection of vignettes offering glimpses of the exact moment in a woman’s life when something happens, either by choice or circumstance, that changes her course. In Part II we see how these experiences, though deeply personal and unique, are the threads that intertwine and connect us all, fostering compassion and empathy for one another and, hopefully, for ourselves. In Part III we see how, as women, like all forces of nature and works of art, our beauty is formed through refraction, revealed in dimension and contrast, shadow and light, our benevolence becoming both the result and the salve, the subject and lens. The road may be beastly but the result, if allowed, can be spectacular. “Kintsukuroi: kin-tsU-kU-roi (noun) (v. phr.) ‘To repair with gold.’ The Japanese art of mending broken pottery with lacquer dusted or mixed with powdered gold, silver, or platinum. As a philosophy, it treats breakage and repair as part of the history of an object rather than something to disguise, understanding that the piece becomes more beautiful for having been broken.” “We delight in the beauty of the butterfly but rarely admit the changes it has gone through to achieve that beauty.” ~Maya Angelou~ Next week's post, Chapter One; Waiting Room on Thursday, December 10th at 10 am Eastern, 1: pm Pacific time Want to read more now? I can't wait to share this book with you! Order on Kindle or in paperback by clicking on the Amazon Link below! Thank you so much, xoAmie |
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