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5 Steps to Move on with Your Life
Are you a person who holds tight to past ideals, always striving to reach impossible expectations? If so, there is a great chance that you are also engaging in self-sabotaging habits. You may be wondering how you can stop these harmful practices and live a more fulfilled life. One of the major milestones for moving forward with your life is by making peace with your past and accepting the things that you cannot change for what they are. This can be a difficult process, but these five tips can guide you to making some healthier decisions along the way to creating your best life. 1.Disregard the opinions of others. Everyone…
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Getting Back on Track When Things Aren’t Going So Well
Life is truly the greatest gift of all, but there are times where it will get tough. When it does, finding your way back to the right track as soon as possible is essential. Even if progress is slow, moving in the right direction is still progress and that is all that really matters. When things aren’t going as well as you’d like, it’s easy to assume that major life changes are required. In reality, though, the simplest concepts and minor changes can make all the difference. Focus on the five ideas below and you will start to find your way back to the right path. Invest in Healthy Living…
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Follow the Work Wherever It Leads You
I keep telling myself these seven words. Over and over again. Follow the work wherever it leads you. I started this blog over three years ago as an outlet to express myself creatively through my writing and through my personal style. I also wanted a forum where I could share my mental health journey in the hopes that it would help others on similar paths to the one I have traveled. Time and again, I am met with this deep urgency to find a larger forum to spread my message…a message of self-care, empowerment, strength and courage, kindness, love and light. And time and again, I find myself right back…
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Shelbee Says…”Forgive yourself.”
If you type in a simple Google search forgiveness quotes, you will find a plethora of profound and valuable statements from a vast array of wise individuals throughout the history of mankind. Forgiveness seems to be one of those virtues that allows us to let go of the wrongs that have been done to us or by us in order to move forward through the journey of our lives. Some wrongs may have been intentional with malicious purpose, some may merely be mistakes due to lack of insight, and some may be so incredibly minor as to have not much bearing at all on the grand scheme things, yet we…
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Shelbee Says… “Trust the process.”: 8 Steps for Managing Bipolar Mood Swings
On Friday, I wrote about the battlefield that is Bipolar Disorder and I discussed how I have developed a great capacity for managing the mood swings when they start. Often when I share my story, I am met with the question of how I manage my Bipolar Disorder so effectively without medication. Every time I am asked this question, I am left without an adequate answer. All I can ever come up with is, “I don’t know. I just do it.” However, I am fully aware that this answer helps absolutely no one. So I decided it was time to sit down and really think about how I navigate my…
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4 Ways to Deal with the Unstructured Days of Summer
*As I browse through the internet, blogs, and social media, I am reading how everywhere it is nearly back to school time. A week or two is all that is left of summer before school is back in session. However, in Northern New York, we still have a full four weeks of summer break remaining before the kids head back to their regular school schedules and this mother of two can finally return to my normal state of sanity. At this point in the summer, four weeks seems like an insurmountable time for me to survive to the end! So I thought it would be a good idea to revisit…
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The Art of Delayed Gratification
For my entire life until I had kids, I was a voracious reader. I found such solace and escape and inspiration and motivation in reading books on a variety of different topics. I have always loved books on philosophy, psychology, religion, and self-help. My favorite genre of fiction has forever been 17th through 19th century British literature but also any type of historical fiction from most cultures. I have also always been a fan of the classics, you know, the books we were “forced” to read in grade school. I loved them all. But then I had kids and it seemed that I never had time to read for my…
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Shelbee Says…”Do the Work”
“Dear Shelbee, I had been talking to a counselor about various issues in my life but I had to stop going because I was tired of the constant questioning of everything I do and feel. Everything wrong in my life is not all my fault. I get that I am responsible for my own behaviors, but there are other people to blame as well. What is the purpose of counseling if all it does it place blame on me? Nothing gets fixed that way. -Not to Blame” Dear Not to Blame, Life issues are not really a matter of blame at all. Life issues are just that…issues that we all…
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Shelbee Says…”A certain amount of selfishness is really just self-care.”
“Dear Shelbee, I want to go out with my friends more and laugh and have fun to get away from my young kids for a bit and unwind and relax. But I also know that my husband and I need more date nights. However, at this point I feel way more inclined to want to hang out with my girlfriends than with my husband. How do I find a balance between family time, me time, husband time, and girlfriend time without the guilt? -Feeling Selfish” Dear Feeling Selfish, Finding the perfect balance between all of life’s obligations and responsibilities is one of the greatest struggles we all face. So, first,…
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Shelbee Says… “Communication is the responsibility of both parties.”
“Dear Shelbee, my spouse and I seem to communicate better through text messaging than through face to face conversations. It seems that face to face conversations always end up in an argument, but when texting we can reveal our true thoughts and feelings more easily and express our frustrations without getting snippy with each other. How can we transition to smoother face to face conversations without arguing?” -I’d Rather Be Texting Dear Rather Be Texting, Communication is a rather tricky concept when you really think about it. The way we communicate with one another as humans is distinctly unique from the way communication happens among any other animal species on…