Energy Coaching

The state where I live in Brazil, Santa Catarina, has been affected by a major flood.  For months it rained non-stop and entire families found themselves homeless or with loved ones missing or dead.  The outpouring of compassion and help from Brazilians has been immense and touching.  The area has been rebuilding and its people are encouraged to start again with the help of its fellow Brazilians. 

Everyone naturally wants to give, everyone wants to serve.  It is a natural law of the universe and of many spiritual traditions that receiving is inherent in giving.  We don’t need to wait to major catastrophic events to be compassionate and giving.  All we need to do is to be aware of situations that would allow for us to give, serve and be compassionate.

Compassion can be practiced anywhere: At airports, on beaches or in shops, and most importantly, in our own homes toward the ones we love the most.  Basically, whenever we are together with other people we can bring compassion to action.  Try this five-step exercise around friends and strangers.  Do it discreetly and try to do all the steps with the same person.

With your attention geared to the other person, tell yourself:

• Step 1 - “Just like me, this person is seeking happiness in his/her life”
• Step 2 - “Just like me, this person is trying to avoid suffering in his/her life”
• Step 3 - “Just like me, this person has known sadness, loneliness and despair”
• Step 4 - “Just like me, this person is seeking to fill his/her needs”
• Step 5 - “Just like me, this person is learning about life”

(Source for this exercise: Resurfacing:  Techiniques for Exploring Consciousness by Harry Palmer.)

The idea is to make compassion a habit.  The other idea behind this is that the more you become compassionate toward others, the more you will also become compassionate toward yourself.  You can also begin by having compassion toward yourself and that will extend toward others as well. 

Make it a compassion driven year!

With energy,

Ana

As I light the Chanukah candles every night, I think of a world where The Light finds no obstacle to shine and reveal its beauty.  I see our future with hope, beauty and joy.  I see all of us coming together and rebuilding the world as it is our collective mission. 

However you celebrate the holidays, I wish that you add to it a sense of joy and hope.  I invite you to welcome and enjoy The Light that comes from above. 

May the Light that shines brighter at this time of the year be a constant companion to all of you in the coming year!

Make it happen in 2009!

Lots of Energy (and Light),

Ana

I must confess that when my web guru told me to add a blog to my website I was a bit taken by the challenge. There was all this new technology that I had to master and all of this writing that I wasn’t sure people would want to read… The same old self-doubt that creeps in when we are about to start something new.  I said yes nonetheless.  I told him to go ahead and add the blog to my website.  He patiently coached me on the how-to of the blog world and I was hooked.

My intention has always been to offer clients and non-clients alike a little bit of coaching through a weekly message. Paying attention to clues that life gives me, I add my experience as a coach and offer a message that I hope people will benefit from reading.  Blogging teaches us to share and to encourage more people to blog as well. It’s totally abundance based!  The more people blog, the more the tool becomes recognized and legitimized. It’s a win-win situation for every blogger to have another person doing the same! I  personally learned a lot from this dynamic. So, I encourage all of you to read my blog, pass it on and start a blog yourselves! We all have wisdom that others can benefit from.  Go for it!

Another bit I want to share with you is an interview that I gave last week in a Brazilian television about my blog. Together with three more bloggers, we shared our experiences and had a lot of fun while doing it. It was great to hear what they had to say, how they find inspiration for their posts and how they got started into blogging.  The interview is in Portuguese with no sub-titles, so I apologize for those who don’t speak Portuguese and will not understand it.  However, my intention is to share with you a big moment of mine and to encourage all of you to either read a blog or to start one. It’s great fun, a good way to spread your wisdom and you never know when a TV will invite you to give an interview!  The link for the interview is posted below. Enjoy it!

With energy,

Ana

Check out the others blocks: second, third and fourth.

This year has been a major roller-coaster to all of us.  Many times we were caught shifting our thinking and focusing on what we are lacking instead of what we have; a.k.a. our blessings. 

In trying times, we hear our brain complaining about a certain situation in our lives and we forget that all that happens is ultimately for the best.  When we activate this believe in our heart, also known as faith, we rejoice rather than succumb to despair and depression.  When we are happy, our brains operate much more efficiently.  Therefore, faith actually enhances our brain power and our ability to cope under any situation.

It is our choice to be happy or to let depression take over.  It is our choice to be happy with our lot in life at this very moment (our blessings) and to have clarity of mind and thought.  Sadness and depression destroy clarity of thought and rob us of our free choice.  When we are happy with our lot in life at the present moment, we are living in the present, we are living our blessings and opening the way for new blessings to come into our lives. 

If a person is dissatisfied with life, then he or she is liable to constantly make wrong choices.  Proper choices are the result of a clear mind, and a clear mind is a consequence of happiness.  Therefore, the prerequisite to living a purposeful life free of unfortunate mistakes is the choice of being happy with your present moment and with your current blessings.  Once this choice is made, we enhance our chances of success both in the spiritual and material realms. 

Choose happiness today!

With energy,

Ana

Life doesn’t have to be hard.  We were hard wired to live in joy and experience bliss.  In case of finding an obstacle or something we need to work on, we would simply face it knowing that it is for our betterment.  Imagine if we did that on a regular basis…  How much more enjoyable would our life be?  The word stress would probably have never been invented!  Most people spend way too much time convincing themselves that life has to be hard and that, occasionally, they would experience a nice ten day vacation a year and start it all over again.

A lot of us refuse to dream and still believe the myth that life has to be hard and that money is a huge obstacle to our happiness.  A lot of us believe that without a certain amount of money, we have no freedom to chose.  The illusion is that money would give you the freedom to choose.  I say the word ILLUSION because that’s what it really is.  A fisherman in a remote island in the South Pacific fishes during the morning and sleeps on a hammock in the afternoon after a nice lunch.  Is he a millionaire?  Far from it!  He simply does what he loves and lives accordingly.  Was Mother Teresa a millionaire?  No, and yet she lived the life of her dreams helping people in her native India and setting an example of service to the world.  She was probably one of the happiest human beings to ever walk the face of the earth.  Why?  Because she was doing exactly what she loved.

The question is:  Why spend the best years of your life waiting to be happy at the end?  Believing life is one set of hard encounters after another?  Life is what happens now, not 20 years from now.  Let’s face it:  You might not even have the next 20 years.  It is true, isn’t it?  We can slip in the bathtub, hit our head and die – God forbid!  The end.  All we have is NOW. 

Sooooooooooooooooooo, how can you make the best of now?  Hint: 

Always choose what you love!

With energy,

Ana