Who are you?

by Rebecca Jane Mindfulness

Who are you to make me feel small and humiliated?

Who are you to tell me how to live my life?

Who are you to know better?

I don’t understand, how you know how, and I don’t?

Why do I believe you in the first place?

Allowing you to make me feel small when I am unsure if you actually know.

Stepping back, with reddened eyes, drained from the shame.

Who are you?

Are you wiser than me?

If so how?

Why do I take your words as gold, and mine as muddy brown?

Who are you?

My mouth frozen, the gaze of my eyes lowered towards my knees.

Shoulders drooping with humiliation.

While you stand tall and broad, voice booming with confidence.

You must know, as I creep into myself.

Looking for a hiding place, a place to crawl into to get away.

Who do you think you are?

Take a Pause: Blowing out Shame

We have all faced a situation when someone makes you feel like this.

This is when our little child comes alive.

Carrying the burden of shame.

Whether it was a teacher, parent, a peer or a stranger, shame sticks to us like glue.

These memories are more vivid than any others.

The time you stood up in front of a class frozen like a statue or when laughed at for giving the wrong answer.

At those moments your voice shut down, and the urge to run was paramount.

Years later, you continue to carry this shame.

Triggered out of nowhere.

Try something different next time

Notice the feeling and where in your body you feel it. Are you sickened, flushed, sweaty, tired?

Take deep breaths and blow the shame out, just as if you are blowing out candles on your birthday cake.

Blow out the shame.

Sit tall, eyes gazing forward, and feet planted firmly on the ground.

Ask the question,

Who are you?

More like this, try reading Without Guilt
or Without Fear

That Voice

by Rebecca Jane Mindfulness

That voice

A voice that hijacked my self-worth and happiness.

Somewhere back in time a little voice whispered in my ear;

You are not good enough, pretty or handsome enough, a loser, and not lovable.

This whisper left an indelible mark hidden away, seemingly real, but so far from the truth.

As a baby none of those phrases could possibly be true, a baby is beautiful, lovable and enough.

Where did that voice come from? Mom, dad, brother or sister? Possibly grandma, grandpa or aunty?

A voice that spoke with conviction that your perfection does not exist and your lovability and beauty wither away with age.

You take those words on board as if they are your own.

The media confirms your lack; lack of physical perfection and lack of success.

Of course, I am none of these, my legs are too big, my belly is soft, and I am not wealthy or excessively talented.

That voice that spoke so long ago was indeed correct, look around at everyone else, look at those photos on Instagram or the Facebook posts.

According to them, my world is lonely and forlorn.

My legs, my face is dusted with lines and mottled with spots.

It is true I am no beauty, I am not lovable and am just alright.

Yet, who dropped those words into my tiny body, I would like to know?

Because of that elusive voice, I became those words.

I believed those words as truth.

Now, I am unsure, as I look at a tiny baby, with perfect feet and hands, skin soft and flawless and a coo that melts the heart, those words are farthest from the truth.

The truth is that you are good enough, you are beautiful, and you are lovable.

Take a pause: Speak the truth

Our truth is that we are enough, we are lovable, and we are perfect as we are.

Take a pause and take a deep breath.

Breathe in – say “I am”

Breathe out – say “enough”, “beautiful”, “perfect”, and “lovable”

Create new words; the truth.

discover more about mindfulness last chance to book on my acclaimed mindfulness course starting this week – more

Trapped by Guilt

by Rebecca Jane Mindfulness

Are you trappped by guilt?

Feeling the need to please people?

If you don’t you feel guilty?

Your conscience shouts “it is all about you?”.

What if you give in and please them?

Choosing to please seems like the right thing, it diminishes guilt, or so it seems.

However, guilt persists because deep within you, you wish you hadn’t agreed.

You can’t win.

How many times a day do you experience guilt?

I have to admit guilt is my nemesis, is it yours?

Guilt that you are not doing enough?

Or should be more kind?

Possibly having negative thoughts about the person?

Guilt is essentially a toxin, akin to inhaling smoke or eating McDonalds.

Though guilt, as all emotions, is invisible, which makes it more dangerous.

Whereas food and smoke eventually are eliminated from your system, guilt remains tucked inside you, waiting to pounce.

Guilt is one of the most destructive emotions in our bodies.

Triggering inflammation, disease, mental disorders, and addictions.

You may be apprehensive to let it go, convinced it keeps you on the straight and narrow, or that it motivates you.

Though trust me, it does neither of these things.

Guilt is all about beating yourself up it is not concerned with motivation or compassion.

It is the dagger that haunts you and inflicts endless hours of pain.

Whether you accept the invitation or not, notice how you feel.

Do not make choices based on guilt.

Take a pause: Observe guilt

Notice where in your body you feel it.

Is your body resisting?

Are you getting angry, anxious, or nauseous?

Acknowledge it’s there.

Take a deep breath in and out.

Let it go

Let guilt float out of your body.

Make decisions without guilt’s intrusion.

Find out how to deal with guilt with my Mindfulness course starting 16th April – last few places – book here now !

Got a problem?

by Rebecca Jane Mindfulness

Got a problem that needs solving?

Have you been racking your brain for answers and nothing seems right?

Problems are the constant in our lives.

A young man, Tom (not his real name) a very talented, struggling artist, lives in one of the most expensive cities in the world.

His dilemma is whether to stick it out as an artist or get a secure job.

Ideas flood in from people, some innovative and some typical.

What if Tom approached the problem from a different angle, rather than look for the answers outside of himself?

Instead look inside, at the feelings behind the problem.

Asking, “how do I feel about not being financially secure?” or “not having a consistent pay check?”

Chances are he is “scared” of being poor, homeless, and hungry?

Or angry that the very thing he loves and is talented at he can’t make a reasonable living.

Or “prideful” and “resentful”, I am really good at art, it isn’t fair!

Apathetic, losing drive and stamina.

Full of “shame” for not “making it” or guilty “for letting people’s perception of him down” if he were to throw in the towel.

These emotions are survival-based emotions (low level) wired in all animals, particularly primates.

Low level emotions are what keep us on our toes, afraid and hyper alert.

Ideal when we are living in the forests, or in poverty, or in a war-torn country.

Not so helpful for most of us, in fact these emotions drain our energy for thriving, retaining us in survival mode.

“Take a pause”

Don’t look for a solution to the problem, don’t move beyond the feeling.

If scared, acknowledge I am scared to death, sit with the fear and let it go.

If angry, guilty, shameful, apathetic recognise them, see them for what they are, feelings that are trying to keep you safe and secure.

Once you hold them up, notice how these very emotions that are supposed to safeguard you are sabotaging your life’s dreams, whispering potential failures in your ears, and are the actual problem.

The outcome is more energy, a new perspective and confidence.

Tom is the captain of his ship, if he avoids the feelings behind the emotions they don’t go away, stuck in repeat mode.

Surrendering to the feelings underlying the problem diminishes the negative spiral, and eventually removes the blocks that keep you from thriving.

Take a pause

What are the feelings behind the problem?

Don’t analyse, rationalise, deny, repress, simply attend to the emotions

Acknowledge and let them go.

Repeat, Repeat, until you are free

Learn about mindfulness – join me on my next Mindfulness Course in London starting 16th April more details

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