Connecting With Your Self-Worth

Take Back Your Self-Worth

Photo-Marisha Fox via Flikr

Too many people struggle with self-worth these days. Whether it’s parental mis-guidance, peer pressure, or the evil and insidious ad business, someone is always ready to tell you you’re unworthy in some way. For women, the worst of them all concerns body image. I’m here to tell you, no matter what your size and shape, you’re perfect as you are. If women were meant to look like carbon copies of each other, they wouldn’t be born unique in the first place.

Still, too many grew up believing they needed to be thinner, blonder, taller, have straighter hair…the list goes on, and frankly, it’s all crap! Your individuality is your super power. You stand out from the crowd for a reason. Your unique talents, skills, and gifts weren’t meant to hide under a blanket waiting for the “right man” to notice you. If people call you weird, it’s both a reflection on them, and a compliment to you.

Whaaaaat? How can being called “weird” be a compliment? I’ll tell you why. If someone calls you weird it means you’re not conforming to rules that never made sense in the first place. You have the courage to stand up for what you believe in, to show off your special talents and abilities, and most of all, to question what others deem normal. I fully agree with the statement: “Normal is a setting on the washing machine.”

Embrace Your Uniqueness

You were never meant to conform to a set of arbitrary rules, or look like everyone around you. Your beauty isn’t determined by someone else’s opinion. In fact, your true beauty isn’t the pretty packaging you’ve been given this time around at all. It’s what’s in your heart, your mind, and your spirit. It’s in the way you treat others with compassion, refraining from judging them. It’s in the way you know everyone has hidden parts, past traumas, and insecurities you may never see. Everyone has days when they’re doing their best to get through it when all they want to do is hide themselves away until their personal storm has passed.

I look at it this way. When you’re judged unfairly, and seen wanting overtly how does it make you feel? Pretty rotten, right? So why would you do that to yourself, or allow other people to make you feel unworthy? They can’t possibly know your true value, especially if they never bothered to get to know you on more than a superficial level with their unrealistic, and myopic world view and guidelines as a measuring stick. Your outsides are not a reflection of your insides. You’re so much more than what most people take the time to see.

The trouble is, too many buy into the lies they’re told, believing they need to be thinner, have less wrinkles or bulges, or a different shade or texture of hair in order to be accepted. In truth, those who are unaccepting need to be ditched for a better group of friends. And yes, that includes family members who set impossible standards, and keep changing the rules to set you up for failure.

Halt the Abuse

I take issue with ad campaigns who coin cutesy little words like “muffin tops”, “camel toe” and the like. Such terms are not only cruel and insulting, but demeaning to women in general. They put too much focus on the body, and too little on the essence of the person. Sadly, enough women buy into the bullshit to create a billion-dollar industry, not only for beauty aids and treatments, but for psychiatrists and pharmaceutical companies, life coaches, and gurus seeking to ease the pain and trauma of never being enough.

If everyone was taught from birth they’re enough, none of this would be necessary, and maybe bullying would die on the vine too. People don’t bully others because they love themselves as they are. They do it to take attention away from themselves, and take their anger and pain at feeling unworthy out on someone else in the mistaken belief making someone else feel unworthy will improve their own self-image. If it worked, would they keep bullying other people?

Abusive behavior is a reflection on the abuser’s own misery at being unable to live up to impossible standards. Those who lash out have yet to realize they, themselves can get off the merry-go-round by choosing to stop trying to be a cookie cutter version of a person. Wave that freak flag around, and flaunt those differences. Getting comfortable in their own skin will free them once and for all; from the need to abuse, from the endless string of useless beauty products, and worst of all, from the need to self-medicate to mask the pain of constant failure.

Change the Story You Tell Yourself

One of the best exercises I ever learned was to look myself in the mirror every morning before I brushed my hair or teeth, or otherwise made myself presentable, and say an uplifting mantra. Mine is:

I’m beautiful, sexy, sassy, and delicious!

Sure, it’s corny, and I felt foolish the first few times I said it, but the silliness makes me smile, and who doesn’t look beautiful when they smile? After awhile, I started noticing positive aspects of my appearance rather than the ones I thought needed improvement. Pretty soon, I saw lots of things I loved, and became oblivious to the ones I didn’t. It’s not because the flaws had disappeared, but they no longer ran my life.

When I do see myself wanting, it’s rarely, if ever because of my physical appearance. Instead, it has more to do with the way I present myself. I know those are things I could change, but if I consider doing so, I weigh the cost of behaving in an unauthentic manner vs. achieving whatever attention it is I think I want. Most of the time, authentic wins over short-term satisfaction because I know whatever I achieve will be short-lived unless I commit to continuing the performance indefinitely. (Think Katherine Hegl in “The Ugly Truth”)

Love Your Perfectly Imperfect Self

Photo-Per Se via Flikr

Realizing I’m not everyone’s cup of tea was probably the most freeing revelation I ever had. It was further magnified when I saw how true I could be to myself by accepting I was never meant to appeal to everyone. The years I tried were fraught with failure, frustration, and self-loathing. In retrospect, it’s not a life I recommend to anyone.

Let me reiterate. You deserve to love yourself for who you are, not some idealized, impossible version of perfection. You were not meant to be a carbon copy of anyone. You are perfect the way you are. If the people around you don’t believe it, you need to find other people, not change yourself to please them.

Allow Gratitude for Individuality and Uniqueness

My gratitudes today are:

1. I’m grateful I learned to stop trying to live by anyone’s standards but my own.
2. I’m grateful I raised the standards for my friendships and found an outpouring of love, compassion, and acceptance.
3. I’m grateful for choices, including the one to ignore what “they” think others should look, act, or live like.
4. I’m grateful for inspiration which flows freely from my fingers when I let passion lead the way.
5. I’m grateful for abundance; love, self-worth, joy, compassion, acceptance, honesty, vulnerability, peace, health, harmony, balance, philanthropy, and prosperity.

Namaste

 

 

About the Author

Sheri Conaway is a Holistic Ghostwriter, and an advocate for cats and mental health. Sheri believes in the Laws of Attraction, but only if you are a participant rather than just an observer. Her mission is to Make Vulnerable Beautiful and help entrepreneurs touch the souls of their readers and clients so they can increase their impact and their income.

If you’d like to have her write for you, please visit her Hire Me page for more information. You can also find her on Facebook as Sheri Levenstein-Conaway Author

Reading Between the Herd of Turtles’ Lines

Messages from Turtles

I’m one of those who, I learned as a teenager, are the rare few who dream in color, and remember their dreams, often in vivid, kaleidoscopic detail. I’ve learned when a vivid dream fails to politely remove itself from my memory like most dreams do shortly after I’ve woken, there’s a message I need to take away from it. Sometimes, it also means I need to take some kind of action. On rare occasions, it’s a warning as well.

My latest sticky dream involved having a whole bunch of tiny turtles in my house. The first one came strolling in my front door when I opened it for a visitor who’d come over to talk about a recent break in where nothing was taken. Although I tried to politely escort it back outside, it thwarted all my efforts and made its way into the kitchen. Another came in through the garage door, and before I knew it, there was a small herd in front of my stove, and the cats were going nuts. What were these tiny armored creatures who’d invaded their home? Some tried to bat at a turtle, then scurried away when the turtle moved.

I wasn’t sure what to do with the small pile of baby turtles milling around in front of my stove, though doing them harm was definitely not an option. The dream ended before I figured out how to make them comfortable until I could find a place with the appropriate habitat for them to thrive.

Searching for the Symbolism

Hours later, I looked up the meaning of turtles in dreams, and specifically, lots of the little soldiers. I learned it means a couple of things, but mostly good fortune, prosperity, fertility, and that I’m loved and protected by my friends and family in all my endeavors. Also patience. Slow and steady wins the race, as it were. An alternate meaning is something is going to happen that will cause me great pleasure. My material situation will improve and I’ll have great success with my work.

It all does make sense at this stage of the game. I’ve been concerned about increasing my clientele, especially in light of the new law in California, and a pending one at the Federal level which seriously curtail efforts of Independent Contractors and freelancers in a wide range of careers, including mine. To get a sign like this that the eventual outcome of it all will be positive goes a long way to bring my stress level down, and keep me focused on meeting or beating my production schedules.

As I browsed through images I’d collected during my 10 years of blog writing, I noticed there were a lot of turtles. In reflecting on the times I’d used those images, I realized it was typically when I’d felt the need to shut down and retreat into my turtle shell for awhile. Somehow, none of those images portrayed the feeling I got from a pile of tiny turtles in the middle of my kitchen. Isolating and shutting down didn’t even enter the equation this time.

Seeing Signs is a Personal Preference

I realize some see dreams, signs, and the like as a bunch of garbage, so this post isn’t meant for those self-proclaimed realists. I’m not here to convince anyone to change their views on anything, except maybe mental health and suicide. But that’s an entirely different conversation.

At any rate, I’ve had far too many instances when a dream alerted me to unexpected events; a tragedy in someone’s life with whom I’d lost contact, or changes in my own life, to ignore one like this that nagged at me until I followed the dots and looked up the various meanings for the most insistent part of my dream; the herd of turtles.

Not Necessarily a Herd Mentality

I find it interesting there was an interpretation for a large number of the creatures as opposed to just individuals of various breeds. Frankly, I couldn’t tell the difference between a box, snapping, or red eared slider turtle when a bunch of tiny ones were playing tag around my feet. In hindsight, they also moved more quickly than I’d imagine a tiny turtle could move, but no one ever said dreams had to be completely accurate. The turtles came to me to make a point, not to exhibit perfect turtle behavior.

The fact that the interpretations fit quite well into my life at the moment only underscores the likelihood the message was intended. I’ve also learned how painful it can be to ignore those messages that come to me clearly and vividly. This time, it came gently, and left me with a feeling of calm and hope. I always have the option to ignore or dismiss the message, but the Universal head slap I know will follow makes paying attention the first time my wiser choice.

Embracing My Uniqueness

What I’ll do with this information remains to be seen. For now, I’ll spend less time worrying about attracting clients and “doing the do”, and more time showing up, writing, posting, commenting, reading, and re-sharing. Although I’ve been told by several professional copywriters that what I’m sharing, where I’m sharing it, and how I’m sharing it is ineffective, I believe it’s a matter of interpretation.

They are, for the most part, people who write sales copy. They’re good at what they do, and have built successful, lucrative careers. I’m more of a “let’s get to know each other” kind of writer. I talk about the more touchy-feely, or woo topics not everyone is comfortable touching. I reach deep inside people and find their heart; the one that’s been beaten up, broken, and put back together with spit and bailing wire over and over. I get cozy with their vulnerability, and help them use it to find their own tribe; the people who will love working with someone who gets them.

Calls to action have to be introduced more subtly (at least in my opinion). I don’t think opening your soul should be followed by a big red button proclaiming “schedule a call. I can help you do XYZ”. I’m more of a “if you like what you see, maybe we should connect and get to know each other better” kind of gal. I suspect many see that as naive, but for me, helping people is certainly what I want to do for a living, but it isn’t the entire reason I do what I do, or connect with people on a deeper, more personal level. In all honesty, I’m relatively new to that particular level, and am enjoying the process too much to want to rush through it.

Taking the Long Road

I meet too many people, especially from my generation who spent decades closed up and afraid to show any sign of imperfection because that’s the way we were raised. I truly believed there wasn’t another human alive who cared about my feelings, or who wouldn’t take advantage of me if I stumbled. For years, my experiences supported this belief, not because that’s how everyone was, but because I attracted what and who I expected to see.

I’ve learned it’s not only OK, but preferable to show my soft, mushy side. In doing so, I’m allowed to see the softer, more vulnerable side in others, and I cherish the experience as one of life’s greatest gifts. I won’t say I didn’t get clobbered a few times when I started admitting I wasn’t perfect. I had to shed a lot of people I’d acquired while I still believed in shielding myself from everyone. Not all those relationships died peacefully.

But as my personal landscape changed, it became less dangerous to be me, and in time, I learned to see the red flags early enough to dodge the worst of the fallout. It’s dreams like the herd of turtles which remind me I’m still on the right track even when things look like they’re falling apart, or are already in complete disarray. There are times all I need is a gentle reminder to proceed cautiously, but hold my course. It may be a dream, or an unexpected delay, but I’ve learned to read the subtler signs.

While my life will never be a smooth, straight road (and frankly, that would be insufferably boring), it will always be interesting, and I get to learn new things all the time. I’ve learned my job is to show up no matter what, instead of letting my frustration over a perceived lack of progress lead me to give up on my dreams. That would be the true tragedy.

Finding Infinite Gratitude

My gratitudes today are:

1. I’m grateful I’ve learned to take my dreams seriously when the memory stays with me long after I’ve started my day.
2. I’m grateful I see life as a bit of a jigsaw puzzle, and a bit of an evolving road map.
3. I’m grateful for a mind that doesn’t always require solid evidences in order to believe.
4. I’m grateful for my imagination.
5. I’m grateful for abundance; signs, symbolism, dreams, imagination, joy, love, persistence, friendship, community, connections, inspiration, peace, harmony, health, philanthropy, and prosperity.

Love and Light

About the Author

Sheri Conaway is a Holistic Ghostwriter, and an advocate for cats and mental health. Sheri believes in the Laws of Attraction, but only if you are a participant rather than just an observer. Her mission is to Make Vulnerable Beautiful and help entrepreneurs touch the souls of their readers and clients so they can increase their impact and their income. If you’d like to have her write for you, please visit her Hire Me page for more information. You can also find her on Facebook Sheri Levenstein-Conaway Author or in her new group, Putting Your Whole Heart Forward

Embracing My Flaws

My Flaws Hold My Uniqueness

I get inspiration from many things. Today, it’s a post from a friend who shared a picture of a gorgeous heart-shaped necklace she got in Greece. Like me, she sees the beauty in a flawed stone.

It reminded me I am drawn more to imperfect or “flawed” stones when I choose my crystals, just as I’ve learned, albeit late in life to appreciate imperfections not only in myself, but in the people with whom I surround myself. Putting on a perfect face isn’t a sign of strength at all, and in the long run, it isn’t sustainable.

No one is without flaws, and in fact, they make each person unique, interesting, and approachable. The masks people affect to hide those flaws in the mistaken belief they’re ugly and offensive are worn at a cost no one would willingly assume, were that cost clearly marked on the masks and walls.

Releasing Outdated Beliefs

For decades, I believed what I was “supposed to”; flaws were ugly, and showing my flaws or struggles, much less a tear or honest emotion meant I was weak. It meant I was often fair game as a target for others who were also trying to hide flaws and weaknesses from the world.

Like a well-trained monkey, I hid my own fears and kept my tears deep inside, little realizing each time I did, a small piece of myself broke off and crumbled into the dust which formed my foundation; a dust even a light tremor stirred up by the time I was 40. By then, my entire foundation was unstable layers; the dust of broken and unfulfilled dreams, friendships based on false faces hiding massive insecurities, and a disappointing life where only the love of my children was certain. Even that was, in one case, only temporary. Once she reached the edge of adulthood and began making her own mistakes and choices, that love, too was conditional, until I was no longer willing to meet the conditions.

It took a few more years, but when I began sweeping away all the accumulated dust, I discovered there was still a firm base to build on. For awhile, I narrowed my focus; self-love, smaller successes, and returning to my first love, writing. Hundreds of thousands of words later, I learned my flawed self wasn’t ugly at all. But I had a lot of fears to exhume and revisit before sharing those flaws finally led to real friendships with others who’d learned to find their true beauty in flaws instead of an unachievable perfection.

A Beautiful Mosaic Created from the Rubble

I see life now as a mosaic. I’ve built my life on false beliefs only to see the entire structure crumble before my eyes. I thought when things crumbled I had nothing left; no solid ground to stand on, and no more strength to rebuild. I was wrong.

Having everything crumble around me turned out to be the best experience of my life (once I got past the excruciating pain, of course!). Not everything dissolved into tiny motes of dust. Some simply broke into pieces. In their previous configurations, they’d already proven unstable, but what if I put them back together in a different order, using the love, connection, and compassion I’d gained as the grout which held those pieces together? What if some of the pieces I stuck together came from outside of me? In other words, what if I finally learned to ask for help?

I learned when I stand alone, depending only on myself to manage whatever life throws me, I do without a lot of things because I have no idea how to make them work. Just as I don’t know how to re-wire my house and need to depend on others, there are important aspects of my growth for which I have no experience, or even knowledge they exist, much less how important they might be to my overall construction. Until I interact with others, sharing both strengths and perceived weaknesses, I don’t know what I’m missing, or why my structure remains unstable.

One Woman’s Junk…

Many of my own broken pieces are of no further use to me, but to someone else, they might be the piece they’ve been needing to give their own structure and foundation the stability they need to withstand life’s 7.5 earthquakes. In the process of sorting through my own rubble as well as that of others, I’ve not only cleared away what no longer serves me, but found everyone gets to find what’s needed to be strong, stable, and connected.

While I’ve learned we’re already connected energetically to everyone and everything on the planet (and perhaps beyond), the bond is further strengthened when I’ve incorporated pieces of others into my own foundation. My own strength and resilience may be lacking in some areas, whether it’s confidence, flexibility, or something else. My experiences make me stronger in some areas and weaker in others, as do those of every person I encounter.

Creating a mosaic with features from different people allows those missing strengths and resiliencies to permeate both structures; both foundations. What might have felled either person before might still put us under stress, but will no longer bring us down like a stack of cards. We reinforce each other more than emotionally.

Finding the Support I Need

Even when I need to fall back a few steps, I only go far enough to reach the support of those I’ve not only learned to trust with my naked, unadorned face but who know where my wings aren’t yet ready for a solo flight. Sometimes, I fall back with others who are being buffeted by their own storm. Together, we create a shelter where we’ll wait out the current storm and regain our individual strengths before setting out again, together, or apart, as needs dictate.

I know now, each time I fall back a few steps, I’m not losing ground. Instead, I’m gaining experience I’ll need in order to conquer the next challenge on my path. Sometimes I gain it by letting someone guide me, sometimes, when they allow me to do the guiding; proving to myself I’m stronger and wiser than I believe. 

My greatest weakness throughout my entire life was, and may always be my inability to entirely trust my own skills, talents, and abilities. I know where it began, but assess no blame. I needed to see where I gave myself too little credit before I could learn to trust. When the time has been right, a teacher always appeared.

The Teacher Appears When the Student I Ready

Whether it was learning to trust the visualizations I received concerning peoples’ auras, or what I was seeing when my healing talents began to emerge, people came into my life who could confirm what I was seeing or feeling. Ultimately, the gifts they gave me of trusting myself opened up my mind when meditating, getting a massage, and most of all, writing.

I stopped writing for years because I didn’t trust the stories in my head. I didn’t think I had the talent to make them interesting or even cohesive. I’d spent so much time telling myself what was coming out of my fingers was garbage, I didn’t allow what was inside begging for release to reach my fingers. Like so many creatives, I mistakenly believed it had to come out perfect the first time and tried to control every word.

What comes out of my fingers initially these days isn’t perfect, or anywhere close, nor is it as flawed as I once believed. bit it’s always from my heart. The real epiphany came when I realized that’s true of every one of us. No one is perfect. Perfection might be something to aspire to, but it is not the real destination. The real destination is learning to embrace what I perceive as flaws in myself and others, and to share pieces of myself to create a unique, powerful, radiant mosaic of people, experiences, compassion, and love.

Gratitude is my Strongest Feature

My gratitudes are:

1. I’m grateful for the teachers who have come into my life when I needed them, and continue to arrive at the exact moment I need help learning a new lesson.
2. I’m grateful for all the lessons I’ve learned, and those still to come.
3. I’m grateful for the flaws which I’ve learned are not flaws at all, but beauty marks.
4. I’m grateful for the friendships I’ve formed since I learned to remove the masks of perfection and be my real self.
5. I’m grateful for abundance; creativity, love, inspiration, motivation, friendship, joy, beautiful mosaics, community, peace, harmony, philanthropy, and prosperity.

Love and Light

About the Author

Sheri Conaway is a Holistic Ghostwriter, and an advocate for cats and mental health. Sheri believes in the Laws of Attraction, but only if you are a participant rather than just an observer. Her mission is to Make Vulnerable Beautiful and help entrepreneurs touch the souls of their readers and clients so they can increase their impact and their income. If you’d like to have her write for you, please visit her Hire Me page for more information. You can also find her on Facebook Sheri Levenstein-Conaway Author or in her new group, Putting Your Whole Heart Forward

“As Within, So Without”

Where Did “As Within, So Without” Come From?

The phrase “as within, so without” is found in the Emerald Tablet of Hermes Trismegistus which put forth the concept “as above, so below” as well. “As above, so below” theorizes that everything from the simplest cell, to man and animals, to God, to the Universe is all the same. We are part of the same body, the same reality, the same truth. Above, God is man’s counterpart while below, man is God’s counterpart, and we are equally important, indelibly connected.

“As within, so without” takes the theory a step further, hypothesizing that a person (or as in the tablet, a Magician) can effect a change simply by willing it to happen and believing it has happened, much like healing techniques being used in China and India. In other words, whatever we believe to the core of our being will ultimately manifest itself in the physical world.

We often see this happen in the form of unpleasant or even disastrous self-fulfilling prophecies as it works whether we believe in the worst that can happen or the best. These days, the theory is being mass-marketed by everyone from Gay and Jerry Hendricks (“Laws of Attraction”), to Rhonda Byrne (“The Secret”), to Eckhart Tolle (“The Power of Now”) and others too numerous to name. Yet they all say pretty much the same thing. The reality you believe with passion will be the reality you see.

Thought Trains

The inspiration for this train of thought came from a seemingly unlikely source. Someone asked a question about the messy bun hairstyle many writers and others who work from home embrace to remove at least one distraction, low hanging hair. I commented that mine is especially messy since I’m trying to cram curls with a mind of their own into a confined space against their will.

It occurred to me that their wild unwieldiness is a reflection of the way my mind works. I can no more tame the monkey mind which insists on rushing in a dozen directions at once than I can, at least without extreme effort, tame the curls which do the same on top of my head. It’s not for lack of trying, both on my part, and in my early years, my mother’s. I think she bought stock in Dippity Doo in hopes she’d get my recalcitrant curls to lay flat the way hers and my sister’s did. But as my curly locks came from my dad’s genes, she was spitting in the wind.

At any rate, I’ve learned to accept and even embrace those curls, giving them permission and even encouragement to twist, turn, and even somersault if they’re so inclined. In so doing, I’ve let my mind know its gymnastics are also accepted and embraced.

What to Keep and What to Toss

In the last few years, I’ve done a lot of decluttering; my house, my life, my wardrobe…you name it, I’ve decluttered it. I realize what people say is true. When you organize your environment, you give your mental and emotional self some breathing room too. But in my case at least, that doesn’t mean compartmentalizing everything. Instead, it allows my creativity room to spread its wings and fly, unencumbered by all of the “coulda, woulda, shouldas” I’d allowed to camp in my head rent-free.

The physical act of cleaning has always been a great way to both burn off angry energy and do something mindless so my mind can come out and play. In the process, I get the added bonus of a cleaner and more organized environment.

That’s not to say my home will ever make it onto an episode of “House Beautiful” or what issues from my mind will inspire billions (I’ll be happy with thousands). I’m OK with that. My aspirations, at least while I’m the housekeeper, go as far as livable and reasonably clutter free. And if I only touch a few souls in the time I’m given, I consider my life a success.

Accepting Ourselves and What Makes Us Unique

We can spend our lives fighting with things we can’t control like our hair, the set of our cheekbones, our height, and even our weight. In the end, we accomplish more by accepting ourselves as we are. What people see on the outside is a perfect reflection of who we are on the inside, if they only took the time to look at us without judging or assessing our flaws. That, too starts with us.

As long as we make disparaging comments about one feature or another, we call attention to it, creating a flaw where, in all likelihood, there’s merely a reflection of our character. For heaven’s sake! There was a time when excess weight was a symbol of affluence. We can thank people like Twiggy for changing public perception of the perfect woman into an emaciated creature with all the feminine mystique of a teenage boy with twice the awkwardness.

It All Comes Down to Self-Love

What it all comes down to is this: when we learn to love ourselves on the inside, deeply, completely, and without reservation, that self-love is reflected, not only in how we look, but in everything we do. The simplest tasks are performed with as much love and care as we’d give to our first child or grandchild. We cherish each day and all it promises. We cherish the people we encounter and the experiences we have. We find beauty in the simplest things, and in their very simplicity, we rejoice.

None of us is perfect, and never will be, no matter how hard we try, or how much we stuff those perfectly natural imperfections into a box. Not only is perfection highly overrated, but “imperfect” and “flawed” are used to try to stifle our uniqueness and make it a bad thing. In the immortal words of Dr. Seuss, “Why fit in when you were meant to stand out?”

There’s nothing wrong with casting out what no longer serves you, be it clothing, personal items, a car, or even a relationship. But while you’re clearing things out of your life, it’s important to hold onto those things, those qualities that make you special, make you unique. If you lose those crazy, funky, different things from your outsides, they’ll wither and die on the inside too. Everything we do has consequences. Some are good, some, not so much. Change is inevitable, and keeps us from moldering in a rut of our own making, but we are in charge of deciding what changes to make, and whether or not they’re for the better. Choose wisely or you’ll lose something within because you did away with it’s counterpart without.

May We Always Find Something To Be Grateful For

My gratitudes today are:

1. I am grateful for the ability to recognize my differences aren’t flaws, but reflections of my uniqueness.
2. I am grateful for people who read and take my messages to heart.
3. I am grateful for encouragement from so many unexpected directions.
4. I am grateful to be living this human existence and connecting with so many wonderful, unique, amazing people.
5. I am grateful for abundance; love, friendship, innovation, inspiration, support, lessons, challenges, frustrations, motivation, dancing, energy, health, harmony, peace, prosperity, and philanthropy.

Love and Light

About the Author

Sheri Conaway is a writer, blogger, Virtual Assistant and advocate for cats. Sheri believes in the Laws of Attraction, but only if you are a participant rather than just an observer. She is available for ghostwriting to help your business grow and thrive. Her specialties are finding and expressing your authentic self. If you’d like to have her write your expert book with you, please visit her Hire Me page for more information. You can also find her on Facebook Sheri Levenstein-Conaway Author