My imagination plays so many games with me. Literally! It’s one slippery slope after another. What is odd is that most of the time I am a calm wise cucumber. I have wise transmissions flowing from my pores.

But then, anything that has been obscured but weighing on my mind, such as, worries, insecurities, doubts, well they make it to the surface and my Saturday afternoon is spent being with all those ‘scaries’ and processing.

Imagination and the mind are such wonderful tools if used with humility and not with controlled intent. Every manifestation is a creation. One must leave room for the creation to create you too. It’s a wonderful tool for manifestation if used correctly.

However, when under focused, aka scattered, it can wreck havoc on me emotionally and mentally. It can play some serious head games. It stimulates my mind to push me and push me, but not in good ways. Rather than focusing on the basics, it attempts to propel me forward with ideas that appear to be better than the last one… and it just keeps going, and then nothing gets done. It’s always trying to tell me the best angle or approach to take. The best approach, however, is always the one in the moment.

It’s all a bunch of mental blah, blah, blah. It’s a distraction from doing what you actual need to do. It’s an avoidance movie. It’ll tell you that this idea you thought was great, isn’t good at all.  And perhaps try to convince you that that you should wait or something better will come along. So, you shouldn’t even bother. Nothing is good enough as it attempts to create perfection (like as if) before you’ve even done any action.

And then you don’t get anything done or what you get done isn’t good enough and maybe even ‘boring’.  In archetypal terms this is the addict and the inner critic tag teaming against you… pay attention. Pay attention and be aware but don’t get caught up in the ring match. Just let it move through you.

These moments don’t happen as often as they used to. But when they do, I am getting ready to shift; getting ready to be ready for the ‘new’ that is wanting to manifest through me. This is my surrendering and sometimes it gets dark. And I’m okay with that. We all came from a womb. It was dark there too.

When the tag-team starts, I don’t always catch it in the moment. Sometimes, it has such a hold on me, it spirals me downward to an emotional sobbing afternoon. And then it shifts. The inspiration, direction and focus have broken through and I am on my way without judgements or criticism. It’s quite a remarkable process.

I get back to basics when things don’t appear to be working for me or life feels hard or complicated, or when I simply don’t know what to do about a particular situation.

Here are my go to’s until my intuitive response and inspiration start flowing through my body:

• I sleep when my body wants to sleep.
• I exercise. I do yoga stretches and QiGong but I don’t force it. I also love going for daily walks as the sun goes down.
• I go through a list of real appreciations to remind myself that Life is good.
• I go to the park, lie on the grass, sit next to a tree, hug a tree, or walk bare foot to feel the grass under my feet.
• I usually do a fast or restrict my food intake in healthy ways.

The affirmation I use is, ‘What would it feel like if everything was okay, right now?” Because that’s really what all of this is about; a perception that things aren’t okay in the moment, when in fact they really are. They may not be fluidly ok next week. But for right now, in this very moment, everything is ok. I have my health, I have a cute apartment, I am in no physical danger, I have great jazz music playing in the background… see where I am going with this? Right now, in this moment (which is only what we really have), everything is ok. They I start to expand that feeling, making it large.

Charles Eisenstein is one of my favorite, loving wise souls whom I listen to regularly.  He had said that, ‘we are here to serve Life and Beauty.”  It’s a wonderful phrase to contemplate and to focus our energy. It contains a lot of authentic hope and inspiration. It makes me feel good in contemplating it without the need for specific answers or outcomes or results or successes. It helps me come back to my alignment as to why I am here. It’s uncomplicated, simply yet very powerful.