When the worst thing happen and it feels like relief

We generally spend a lot of time in our heads, thinking about life rather than living our life. And our minds are so creative. Whether we’re daydreaming about what vacation will feel like or we’re worrying about the future, it’s the same thing; fantasies. Not reality.

I talked to a friend the other day and she told me about this guy she’d been dating for a couple of months. At the beginning it was awesome but quite soon she felt as if he was drifting away and she started feeling a lot of fear for it to end. It was a grueling couple of months of worrying for it to end. And then it did and all she felt was relief. Because when what she feared would happen actually did it turned out to be so much easier than she had expected. Her conclusion was that the fear of them breaking up was worse than them breaking up. She felt relief because she didn’t need to be afraid anymore.

Here’s the thing: In the now we always deal. Moment by moment by moment. In especially grueling experiences we are forced to be completely present which usually is a huge relief no matter what it is, because we don’t have to deal with anything else at that moment than the present one. We can always deal one moment at a time.

When we’re living in our mind we can’t deal because it’s not in the present moment where we have the power. So, we feel powerless and full of despair, fearing a possible future moment that we would, in fact, deal with perfectly fine if that moment would come. Because, again, in the now we always deal. We’re always okay.

You’ve survived every day so far. All is well. Come back to now, where your power lives, and realize that you have nothing to worry about.

With all my love,

Helena

This too shall pass

This might be the most helpful thing to remember in times of distress. I really love this quote from James Baraz:

Mindfulness is simply being aware of what is happening right now without wishing it were different; enjoying the pleasant without holding on when it changes (which it will); being with the unpleasant without fearing it will always be this way (which it won’t).

We’re so afraid that the good day is gonna be gone too soon and that the bad day will last forever. Nothing is gone too soon and nothing lasts forever. Everything changes. All the time. That is the only constant. We know this.

Living life with an open palm means being with what is and witnessing it come and go, without grasping on or trying to push things away. We know that most unhappiness lives in the gap between reality and our expectations of what reality should be. How can we practice being with what is instead and spare ourselves from unnecessary suffering?

I don’t have a definite answer, because I definitely do both grasp and push, on the daily. But I do notice my daily awareness practice through meditation helps. Talking about it with other woke people helps. Showing compassion with myself as I fail is instrumental.

Some say awareness is 50% of change. Well, let’s celebrate every second of awareness then, shall we?

What are your best tips for letting go and letting be as life moves through you?

With all my love,

Helena

My course is launched again (and anything is possible!)

Alright, I know, I know, this is a course in Swedish and I’m writing to you in English (when will I ever figure out this language thing?!) but I still want you to know a few things:

1. The cart is open for my four week online course on Personal Power until May 15th. Early birds (signing up latest May 11th) get a signed book in the mail. For my lovely Swedish speaking readers, find all you need to know here: www.helenaonneby.com/kurs

2. You can change the world. You are changing the world. You being here. Doing your thing. Your energy is affecting everyone around you, what energy do you want to send out?

3. I was so sick I didn’t really have a future. Yet, here I am, 7 years later, creating online courses from what I learned on my journey. When I don’t really know what to do practically I google it. When I don’t really know what to do spiritually, I ask my intuition. Anything is possible.

4. There’s so much more great stuff happening in the world than the bad stuff. Turn your head towards the light, fill yourself up, then be of service to whoever needs you. (The opposite; feeding on the negative and then being too drained to even help yourself is not how we’ll “save the world”.)

5. There are no rights or wrongs. Only consequences. I recently finished Marie Forleos B-school. It was a great training but it also triggered my inner critic big time because I’m not writing, marketing or doing much of anything in my business the way you “should”. I figured flow is the way to go and any possible consequences of choosing flow over “businesslike” I’m more than willing to take because my alignment means everything.

If you’ve been reading my stuff lately I’d love to know: Have you noticed a difference? What do you like in my writing? What don’t you particularly like?

Thanks for reading all the way to here and most of all, thanks for being invested in being you.

With all my love,

Helena

It is okay to leave. It is okay to say no.

Stay with yourself. Say yes to you.

You don’t have to stay at your job, or in the relationship, or in your hometown or anywhere you no longer feel at home.

You don’t have to say yes to the family dinner, or the extra project, to your friends or the worlds expectations.

It is okay to leave situations that no longer serves you. It is okay to say no to things that no longer fulfills you and that makes you say no to yourself.

“Well, that’s just selfish!” some might say. But the thing is: You were given this life. You are here and you are here for a reason. The only way you can honor and live that reason is by being true to you. To your inner voice. To your calling. That’s how you serve. By being you. By taking responsibility for your needs and your desires.

You were not only given this life, you were given a life with so much privilege. You have a free will. Most of you reading this have all the opportunities in the world to live and love and create. I don’t think that’s coincidence. But with all this privilege comes responsibility.

Playing small or making excuses is not how you honor this precious gift of life at this place in this time. You honor it by being true to you first and foremost. And when you tune out the noises of the world and tune in to yourself you will be given the guidande to the next step, one step at a time.

It doesn’t have to be big or extravagant, it only needs to be true. And only you know what is true to you.

You can do this. I believe in you. Stay in yourself. Stay in your power. And trust that all that you need on your path forward will be given to you when you need it.

With all my love,

Helena

ps. if you feel you need guidance on this journey, I’m here to serve you.

Busy is a choice

Oh, I know, that’s a hard truth, and for many people, really provocative. But let’s be honest. You’re leaving early from one thing to be late to the next. Always rushing, hurrying, feeling inadequate and not enough. Why?

Most people answer: Because I have to! You don’t understand, I have so much to do!

Your life is a consequence of a lot of choices you’ve made so far. And you constantly striving for more is a choice you might still be making. A choice.

We don’t have to live in big beautiful homes. We don’t have to work full-time. We don’t have to have lots of hobbies and activities and friends that we need to fit in. All of this is a choice we make.

We choose when enough is enough. What’s enough for you? How much money, stuff, activities or medals do you really need? Really?

Honestly, guys, think about it. If you feel really busy in your life and you don’t like it, then change it. Choose again. It’s up to you. If you don’t want to make a change well, then, that’s also a choice you make. Sure, if your life is really crammed right now it might not go overnight, but if you’re committed to changing how things are you will change how things are.

Some people sell everything to travel the world. Some people choose not to have kids to be able to live more freely. Some people pay others to do what they don’t have time to do. Some people live a really minimalistic life to give room for more space and less work. Some people are really good at saying no to lots of things so that they can say yes to free time. Some people become monks, or nuns or move out into the woods.

Whatever choice you make, remember this, if you choose to be busy, it’s totally up to you.

Does this provoke or inspire you? I’d love to hear from you!

With all my love,

Helena

What Pure Personal Power is to me

We live in a society that is somewhat obsessed with external power. External power is obtained through resources, information or physical force. External power is unevenly spread across the human species. There are only a few people that hold a huge amount of the external power and can use this power to control others. But external power can also easily be taken away from those who possess it. This is not personal power. 

Personal power is authentic power. It exists inside each of us, but is not always fully tapped. Personal power is the internal source of strength that lives inside all of us. When I talk about Pure Personal Power it’s with reference to this internal power that has helped me tremendously on my healing journey. 

It is pure in its form since it derives from the Source. The Source from where we all come and to where we all shall return. Personal power is not depending on external power. Most often people with less external power have found ways to tap their personal power, but not exclusively. There are plenty of people with both external and internal power, and those are the people that use their external power for good. People who work to empower others to find their personal power, and often, as a natural consequence, also their external power. But people that possess personal power don’t necessarily need the external power. External power often works as external validation to those who haven’t connected to their inner strength. External power can easily be taken away from you by someone else or fluctuate over the course of your life. 

The Pure Personal Power that I refer to is the only thing that can give true and lasting satisfaction and freedom. It is the kind of power that you get when you take responsibility for everything in your life. And it provides a strength you might not previously have thought was even in you. 

Pure Personal Power is the true essence of who you are, if you learn to tap into it. If you haven’t yet found it in yourself, I will give the tools to start the exploration. 

Source: Pure Personal Power - tools to collect on a healing journey

With all my love,
Helena

Never stop learning, always be kind

As we’re on the home stretch of my online course the theme and common challenge for my participants is getting clear: Kindness as we learn. Change can be uncomfortable although it’s happening all the time.

The course participants are on a journey of discovering and re-discovering some of the most powerful practices of staying in the driver seat of their own life. Avoiding victim mentality, where powerlessness resides, and finding joy in the moment and gratitude for it all.

Our inner critic easily awake as we learn something new. She’s often resting as we go about our day, doing things as we use to, following the routine, staying in our comfort zone. But as soon as we get out there, stretch, live fully or try something we’ve never done before or something we might have “failed” at before, she becomes wide awake.

What do you think you’re doing?

You’ll never make it!

Who do you think you are?

What if you fail?

But truth is, these are your options: Either you succeed or you learn. Because everything is progress. Success can be sweet but truth be told, we usually learn more when we don’t. So why do we fear failure if we’re here to learn in the first place?

It probably has evolutionary explanations, as do all of our fearful thoughts. But remember this sweetheart, you’re all grown up now and you can take care of yourself. So the dreaded exclusion for the group that your inner child is fearing, that will probably never happen in the first place, is not the end of the world. It might actually be a blessing in disguise. Because that too, is an opportunity for growth.

What’s most important in life class is self-compassion as we practice. Self-compassion as we grow. Self-compassion as we “fail”. You can have your own back. And if you need some extra support, I got you too.

With all my love,

Helena

How choosing your beliefs changes everything

This is really important to me. This is truth. To me. It didn’t use to be but I made a conscious choice to make it so and now it feels like it’s ingrained in my DNA. Because is nothing but a thought you keep thinking, So choose your thoughts wisely.

Everything that isn’t love is fear. Or as A Course in Miracles puts it:

Every loving thought is true. Everything else is but an appeal for healing and help, regardless of the form it takes.

To me this means that all Trump ever really needed was feeling truly loved for who he is. Or that a violent person could change by a warm hug. Or that the mean boss is just feeling really insecure. Because only hurt people, hurt people. And healed people, heal people.

This does not excuse any kind of evil acts. But it does explain a lot. Another way I love to think about it it:

I will never ever really know if people are doing the best they can, but believing so sure does make my life better.

This has been my experience. When I believe the best about others, my life improves. I realize that they treating me bad has very little to do with me and a lot to do with their own pain. Glennon Doyle always knows how to express things:

When I feel someone's been unkind, I know that all that just happened is they felt the hot loneliness. But they don't know how to be still with it. So they just treat it like a hot potato and pass it on to the next person.

But pain is not a hot potato. Pain is a traveling professor. And it just goes and nocks on everyone's door, and the smartest people I know are the people that say come in, and don't leave until you've taught me what I need to know.

This doesn’t mean you stay and take shit. This doesn’t mean you don’t have boundaries. This doesn’t mean that bad behavior is okay. It just means that right now, there’s a lot of fear in the world. And that the best way we can support each other, the world and ourselves is by spreading light. Martin Luther King Jr sure knew what he was talking about:

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

I know this perspective is provocative to some. But it’s my absolute experience that my life quality increases exponentially the more I remember this. What does this bring up in you?

With all my love,

Helena