self destruction to self love… where it all began

After the death of my mum at age 14, I spent most of late teens and early 20’s partying in self destruction mode. I sought attention and did things to please others. I ran with the wolves and my worthiness was pretty punching a bit fat zero.

I looked externally for pleasure and blamed the world. I had a massive chip on my shoulder and felt I was owed something for my bad hand. I had no idea what self love was but my own large heart and gentle nature certainly got a few bumps and bruises along the way. I judged my worthiness based on what others said and I probably spent 80% of my time judging others and gossiping.

If only I knew the statement ‘you are the sum of the top 5 people you spend your time with’…

After a nasty breakup followed by an abortion I threw myself into work with a side of vodka. Then after the next breakup (and some ‘finding yourself’ time in Bali) an opportunity presented itself for me to take a job in Sydney. I had nothing keeping me and nothing to lose.

I went for two months and stayed for seven years …

In the first year I enjoyed the bright lights and city life. I danced til the wee hours in Kings Cross and spent my wage pretty much in booze and taxi fares.

Before long I realised I wasn’t getting any younger, I was the heaviest I had ever been and probably the most unfulfilled. I was in no state to meet a partner, let alone call in my soul mate. I had no money, didn’t enjoy looking in the mirror and busied myself up so much that I was rarely alone.

Then I did something crazy. I signed up for Dry July…

I had NO idea that this one simple single decision was about to be the catalyst for changing the direction of my entire life.

My colleagues thought I was mad, my mates didn’t believe I could do it and many thought it was a joke. I however was deadset on making it through the ENTIRE month without a drink. It sounds simple right?

That month felt like the hardest month of my life. What happened after that month though was a flow on effect for when you put something out to the universe and say “I am ready”. 

I ate healthier, I moved more, I partied less and had almost no hangovers… All those hours spent running, boxing or walking from Bondi-Bronte did something magical to soothe my soul. I lost 20kgs, made incredible friends, started to feel confident in my own skin, and for the first time life started to make sense. The more I said yes the more life started to flow.

Did I have a fucking rad time doing it all? Absolutely! I wouldn’t trade all those nights dancing under the stars for the world but thats because I know it was all part of the journey… the journey that led me to exactly where I am and who I am today.

A few years after this I started going to Melissa Ambrosini’s weekly Goddess Group and surrounded myself around women who also were saying ‘yes’. Yes to living a life from your heart and not your head. Yes to their soul’s work, and yes to going inwards. Every single week I would go & immerse myself amongst this incredible feminine energy. I would write pages of notes and go home so full yet with so many questions. Questions about where I was, who I wanted to be, where I wanted to go and more importantly a drive to go deeper – to go inwards. To that place I had been avoiding for so many years.

You see I was ready, ready to start healing old wounds and saying goodbye to the stories. Ready to start tapping into that feeling that I felt and knew all too well. Ready to start living and stepping into my true souls journey. Now I had no idea what it was at this point, and some days I feel I still don’t know.

But what followed was, and still is, a deep commitment to learning.

Learning…

To being a better person.
To listen more.
To follow my heart and not my head.
To fulfil me first, always.
To only ever seek comfort internally.
To remove the stories.
To expand and contract.
To be uncomfortable.
To continually helping others.
To have no expectations.
To love myself.
To feel I am worthy of my desires.
To trust.

The rest is pretty much history.

Are you ready? Just repeat after me “I am ready”…

My top 3 tips for kicking stress and preventing burn out

Once every few years (sometimes more) things feel really unmanageable. Cortisol runs through my veins and there’s a pit of never ending tummy complaints, headaches, uncontrollable weeping and often days where the desire is to not get out of bed.

I‘m an A type personality who tends to go-go-go until I fall into a heap.

I hear the niggles but ignore the warning signs. Why?

In my 10 year career in human services I have come close to burn out at least twice and I reckon I am on the verge again if I don’t shift things up. Things like self care start to skip, sleep decreases, exercise is minimal, diet goes south and working hours increase. That can only go on for so long before your body says ‘ahoy there’!

1. Know the signs

It’s so important that you know your signs. Each of us have different smoke signals that our body sends out when things are getting a little cray cray.

For me, it generally starts with my mood. I’m tired and irritated and not so pleasant to be around. But let’s face it usually other people are the first to notice rather than ourselves. Then it usually goes to my body in physical signs or symptoms. Often it’s heightened emotions and uncontrollable crying, brittle nails and dull skin… and when things are bad I start to get little cuts in the corners of my mouth.

2. Shift things up

Now we can’t all quit our jobs or spend days in bed but we can make some subtle changes to start bringing some equilibrium back. We need to make sustained changes over time and as much as I love a 3 hour pamper session at the local day spa it’s not sustainable nor does it yield long lasting benefits.

Things like sleep, meditation and self care are proven to be good for our mental health and these are what we should focus on. What’s even better is this is all totally free and you can do half of them from anywhere!

Now I am not perfect… no one is. I occasionally let my self care slip but if it goes on too long our physical and mental health pay the price.

My go-to self care tools are:

• intuitive daily perfumes from my essential oil collection
• yoga
• guided meditations (abraham hicks is the bomb!)
• epsom salt baths with essential oils
• dancing (to really loud tunes)
• journalling
• session with my foam roller
• ice blue or aroma touch massages
• visualizations
• take a mental health day
• connecting with nature
• moving my tooshie
• cuddles with my son
• soul chat with my hubby
• therapy
• a good sweat session (sauna, run, boxing etc)
• waking chat with a bestie
• nourishing warming meals
• hot cup of cacao / herbal tea
• reading

3. Ask for help

Often when we are stressed out and nearing burn out we try so hard to look like we are holding it all together. This is partly due to the stories we tell ourselves that we ‘should’ be able to cope and the way society seems to knock down the people who are already down.

With a turning of the tides it is so important we spread the word around things like anxiety, stress and mental to help others to put their hands up. It’s ok to not be ok!

‘This too shall pass’ is a mantra I often repeat and remind friends of when times get tough. Sometimes it helps just knowing that these periods do pass and is critical to being able to move through them.

But sometimes in order to move through them we need help.

Asking for help isn’t a sign of weakness and can come in many forms.

It might be a friend coming to help with the kids, cutting back your hours at work temporarily, asking your partner to do some extra things around the house – it might even be paying someone to help prepare meals or a house cleaner.

Asking for help might also involve seeking professional support from a counselor or psychologist. I’ve seen many over the years and as a social worker myself I see a lot of value in talking therapy. Often when things get to the point of feeling like burn out there’s usually more than one cause and it’s important to know what each contributing factor is so you can see the signs in advance in case there’s a ‘next time’.
Let me know below your go-to strategies to help when things get tough 👇🏻

Need help starting your essential oil journey? Head here!

So Month of Mondays kinda went a little mad…

So today I sent our the first Month of Mondays newsletter to my tribe and things went a little, well, kinda cray cray! It started out with…

“you are probably wondering what the flip ‘Month of Mondays’ is … but this is something I have created with you in mind. This idea has been birthed from a recent call out where I asked what YOU want MORE of… how I can serve YOU better (oh and if you want to have your say its never too late, i’d so love for you to reply to this email and let me know).

Every Monday for the month of August I will be popping into peoples mailboxes with a stack of heart felt love… My aim is for us to get to know one another intimately (kind of like old friends). For me to share with them (you) a little more about me, my challenges, my passions and obviously a little bit about essential oils because, well, I just cant help it. It will be a space I can share with you things I am learning, recipes I am testing and DIY tips to save you $$”. 

 

Then this happened…

“I’m also going to be sharing with you (which makes me kinda nervous) a little about my steps to freedom”.

Eeeeeep!

So – to fill you in… I recently committed (this is a HUGE deal for me) to a 12 month coaching program with my mindset coach. This is not just about my business but about my entire life… we work on mindset around money, relationships, career – you name it!

Now i’ve never been one for ‘goals’, probably because I find it hard to stick to them (hello ego) and in fact the word ‘goal’ itself evokes all kinds of fear based emotions not to mention a tightness in my throat and butterflies in my belly. SO because I am all about getting a little uncomfortable I am going to take you along for the journey. Coaching alone brings me to the edge but sharing it with you scares the shit outta me so why not right? 

In gearing up for this 12 month program I had to sit down and write a VISION (which I did with the husbo) so that every month I can set goals that will itch me closer to my vision.

Now once I had decided to share this and had written it in my mailchimp template I was actually really excited to share this (it certainly wasn’t my plan at the time of drafting the newsletter but I am going with it).

MY VISION – planning for my families future

So the reason I committed to this 12 month program was because 1) I have gained a lot of clarity from past coaching, 2) I have some serious goals I was to kick and 3) I know up levelling and working on my mindset will be an ongoing battle.

To kick off my program I was asked to think about my “vision” for how I want my life to look – how I want to feel, where I want to be, how I am spending my time, who I am surrounded by … this then forms a bit of a picture so that I can have a crystal clear idea of where I want to head and map the path to get there. I will caveat this by saying I am yet to ‘firm’ up my vision so its still a little loose but ill share a snippet with you anyway.

Just a few of my visions:

+ have a thriving business that provides us the financial freedom to work from home and spend more time with our children

+ to move my body lovingly each day and nourish my body with food that makes me feel good (this is a biggie but always seems to fall off the list as not being high enough on the priority but it incredibly important)

+ being surrounded by women who support one another to rise and attracting like minded business partners to work with so that we can empower as many homes as we can to make the switch to no-tox natural solutions

Now you might think ‘ah aren’t these simple visions/goals’ but for me they are ones that will continue to challenge me to grow.

When I was copying over some of my goals to my newsletter I even contemplated only sharing the ‘easier’ ones but there is NO fun in that – plus sharing these visions creates more accountability and feels scarier so best to do that!

The challenges and learnings along the way. The blocks I uncover and the roadmaps I take. I will share all with you – in hope that you too might learn something along the way.

Now if you aren’t already receiving my newsletter grab it here http://eepurl.com/cKIsSf