Why Being Humble is Actually Toxic:

Aloha everyone,

I know its been a while since I’ve written on this format (almost five months!!). I’ve been using my voice in other avenues like my new podcast which has taken up a lot of my time and energy. But I felt called to write about a particular subject that has been on my mind the last few days: what it actually means to be humble.

This topic came up this past weekend when I was talking with my partner about where we wanted to live in Hawaii (we are thinking of buying property here on the east side of the island). I currently live near sea-level, about a mile or two from the ocean in an area that is deemed more jungly and a bit more expensive than other parts of the area. I love it here and it feels like home to me.

Many others that know this area also agree that it is generally a nice place to live: it is a mutually agreed-upon notion that the road I live on is worth more money than other areas and is great for having food forests and living off the land. While my partner and I were talking about where I wanted to build a property I told him on the road I currently live on. I had my sights set on a property a half-mile or so from me that I had walked by almost everyday. I imagined myself living there, working with the land, and building a circular home made out of ohia trees and lounging about with my two future german shepherd puppies.

He told me he thought one of the reasons I wanted to build a property on the current road I live on was because I enjoy telling other people where I live and because it is a nice area to live in. It gives me “status” so to say and a sense of pride and accomplishment. I could tell the way he posed this idea to me that it was meant to be a “bad” thing to think; to get satisfaction in telling people where I live. I thought about it before answering. Normally I would have felt shame upon this reflection and wanted to change the way I felt and how I expressed myself to others.

Luckily for me I’ve done some serious work on my beliefs, my emotional-world, self-love, and the way I talk to and think about myself. Because I accept and have come to love myself for who I am, I accepted this part of me. I no longer felt bad for feeling good, accomplished, prideful about where I lived and where I wanted to build my dream house. Then I did something a lot of us have a difficult time doing: I was honest about myself and how I was truly feeling.

“You’re right”, I said. “That is exactly how I feel. But I don’t believe there is anything wrong with that.” As I said this I felt a big release of any tension I had been holding within me. I did it. I stood my ground and planted my feet firmly into the roots of my authenticity. I claimed who I was and what I thought in the moment; and I didn’t feel one lick of shame for it.

My partner had little words to say to me after my response. What could he really say when I agreed with him? We talked a bit about our egos and the word humble came up into our topic of conversation. I thought about humbleness on our drive home (we were coming back from camping) and how this term is actually toxic to us. I had always thought that being humble was a good thing and something I was trying to achieve so I could be enlightened and everyone would love me, but now I realize that trying to be humble was only taking my power away.

According to dictionary.com (2022) to be humble is to be, “not proud or arrogant” as well as “having a feeling of insignificance, inferiority, subservience, etc.”. They also go on to say, “low in rank, importance, status, and quality.” You get the picture.

Humbleness is something we have been told since we were little to be. “Don’t brag about yourself. Don’t talk about your achievements. Just be humble”. My partner’s background on his phone is even “stay humble”. The message runs deep and thick people.

To me, to be humble is to not take up space and show up authentically. It is to be quiet, “a nice girl”, putting others needs before your own, never striving for more or better, and giving your authority and independence to someone or something else.

This keeps us small. This keeps us from thinking that we are inferior to others. So many of us are trained to not want better for ourselves, to not celebrate and acknowledge ourselves because we will be deemed “narcissists”. This fear of coming off as “full of ourselves” keeps us quiet and gives our power away to those that will claim it. And then we all get angry at those people for taking up space, showing off their wealth and achievements, and call them narcissists; and so the cycle continues.

There is nothing wrong with being content with your life and having gratitude for what you have now. In fact, I believe that this is just as important as wanting more. We need both. We CAN have both. You can feel gratitude for what you have now yet at the same time also be working towards more and better for yourself. Because YOU deserve it!

We are not meant to be small. We are not meant to stay stagnant and to never grow. Life is a party and its time we started to act like it! Celebrate yourself for all that you are doing for you everyday. I promise it is more than you think you are doing. Write a list of what you have done and when you cross something off give yourself a hug, dance to your favorite song, and congratulate yourself because you’ve done it.

Sometimes I look in the mirror and think “damn I look hot”. Yes, thats right. I think that and I believe that to be true. There is nothing wrong with this. I celebrate myself for taking care of myself. Do I feel this way every single day? No! Which is why its so important to celebrate and acknowledge yourself when you are feeling good and not so good.

Talk about your achievements. Talk yourself up. Show the world what a great artist, financial consultant, influencer, coach, app-designer, tax-driver, father that you are!! You are important and you have something special to give to the world. When you try to be humble, you hide this gift from yourself and from all of us. It really is a lose-lose for everybody. You tell yourself that who you are and what you do doesn’t matter and isn’t worth sharing. When you do this you are giving your power away. You are telling the world “hey, don’t look at me. I have nothing to offer you.” And so you hide in your corner and pretend that you are not a badass, liberated, and successful person. This leads to resentments within yourself that ultimately get projected onto every other area of your life: your friends, family, partners, job, hobbies, etc. You start to resent the very life you are living. You feel trapped and suppressed, yet you don’t know how to get out because you thought you were doing the right thing by being humble.

The time is now to break free of the chains that bind you. By this I mean words and the rulership they have on your life. Humbleness is just a word. Let it mean whatever you want it to mean. Narcissism is just a word. Let this mean whatever you want it to mean. But don’t let them have power over you that makes you feel like you can’t be your true self. This is the most important piece. We are all just telling each other stories and believing them. But you don’t have to. You can write your own story, change your perspective, and express yourself in ways that are aligned with the real you.

Get out there, turn the next page and keep going! Get out of your corner, feel the sun on your face, and claim to the world who you are and what you’re here to do. You got this!

Thanks so much everyone for your time and energy spent reading this:). Writing has always been something I’ve been passionate about and it truly brings me joy to express my life-experiences with you all. Please let me know what came up for you from this idea. Feel free to comment or email me.

With love and gratitude,

Rylee

Works Cited: https://www.dictionary.com/browse/humble

To listen to my podcast, click the link here: https://wildwomanhealing.life/wwh-podcast

What You Judge Others For is What You Judge Yourself For:

Aloha beautiful humans,

I hope that you all have been having a great month of February and are showing yourselves and one-another some love: we definitely need this during these times.

Today I want to talk about judgments and our feelings towards others in regards to ourselves. This has been a hard lesson for me to learn and honestly I am still learning it as I go. The beauty of life right?! The cycles are always continuing.

I once heard a woman say, “you cannot see something in someone else unless it is within you first.” This was quite hard for me to hear and even alarming. She went on to say that the racism you see, the hate you experience, as well as the love you feel for others, can only be experienced if it is within you first. If it does not exist within you, then you will not experience it in your outer world and relationships.

This is all well and good if these things within us are considered “positive” by our society. However, things like hate and racism are shadows within us that no one wants to accept let alone shine a light on.

I am here to say that in order for us to grow and evolve as a collective species, we humans MUST turn inwards and heal ourselves. We can no longer look outside of ourselves, point fingers, and place the blame on others. This leads to nowhere and is simply a waste of time and energy, not only for you but for the other person or persons involved.

I see all of us as mirrors for another. Life is a school of sorts and we are all here too teach one another certain lessons that will help to transform us into more aligned and loving versions of ourselves. This is not to say that there is anything wrong with you. We are all exactly how we are supposed to be in this moment. In fact, if you want to stay the same, by all means. But if you are sick of consistently being triggered by others and the outside world, then changing your inner world may be just what you need.

So many of us do not want to look at the “dark” or shadowy aspects of ourselves. Our shadows are the parts of us that we cast to the side, or the parts of us that we do not like and so we pretend they don’t exist. We bury them deep within us, locking the door in hopes that they will never escape out the window. But, eventually they do, in more ways than one. When this happens, it can feel as though you are fighting with a sort of “demon” (as I like to call it). You may think to yourself, “what just happened?” or “I didn’t mean for that to occur like it did.” This demon is not an actual demon, but a part of you that has been locked away for far too long. It has built up its energy and when it is finally released, it explodes like a volcano rather than trickling out like a peaceful stream.

This release may be triggered by something outside of you. Most of the time this happens when you are confronted by someone else who may be expressing certain parts of your shadow-self. You do not want to experience this and so you may become angry, annoyed, and hateful towards them, You may judge them harshly, when in reality they are just being themselves.

For example, I used to make fun and judge women on Instagram that were in the spiritual community. I would judge them for their posts about their journeys, the work they were doing, creative projects, etc. I would think to myself, “who do they think they are posting that?” or “they must be so full of themselves”. I actually thought that I despised these women only to find out that this was actually a deep wish inside of me that I chose to ignore and push to the deepest crevices of my being! I so desperately wanted to post about my journey, my offerings, as well as my creativity but was too afraid to do so.

When I saw these other women living out my wish, a part of me that did not want to acknowledge my dream for fear of humiliation, decided to make an enemy out of them. It was difficult to deal with. I always found myself coming back to their profiles and spending my energy on them.

It was only when I decided to finally live out my wish of expressing my true self and my creativity that I was able to accept these women. I realized that I was these women and I admired them rather than despised them. I only thought I disliked them because I was projecting the part of myself that I did not like onto them. This was easier for me to do at the time rather than accept my shadow-self.

I believe that this is something we all experience. We each have shame, guilt, and fear for certain parts of who we are. Whether this be our desires, our feelings, and our wishes. But the more we turn away from our true selves, the more we detach from the love that we have for ourselves. When we don’t love ourselves we cannot love others. We may think that we love others but this is not true and unconditional love. This is usually a love that is attached with conditions and this is not actually love.

The time has come for us all to take responsitiblty for ourselves and our inner worlds. In order to change the world we must first change ourselves. This can be a scary notion for most of us. It is much easier to focus on others and what “we think they should be doing” or “who they should be”. I promise you that if you keep going down this road it will lead you to nowhere.

If you want to live with more spaciousness, alignment, and love you must create these within. Love yourself and love the world.

Thank you all for taking the time to read this longer than expected post haha (sometimes I get passionate). Thank you for showing up for yourself and for loving yourself everyday.

Feel free to comment your thoughts about this post and ways that you love yourself (I’d love to hear them). Also feel free to reach out to me as well with any insights.

If you’d like some guidance on your journey within and/or with cultivating self-love check out one of my many offerings like my Re-Wild Yourself Course as well as my 3-month 1:1 coaching program where we dive in sooooooo deep into what holds you back from your truth and highest self! Click the button below to learn more.

With love and gratitude,

Rylee

Taking Time To Reflect:

Hey beautiful humans!!

Today I am taking about the importance of taking time to reflect. Reflection is a key component in being able to not only see how far we have come, but what it took for us to get to the place we are now. From there, we can reflect on what worked and what did not work. Reflection is a great tool to use when deciding where it is you want to go and how you will get there using lessons that you have learned and wisdom you have gained in the past.

Sometimes it is not useful nor healthy to dwell in the past. This is normally unhealthy if we are focusing on things we regret, holding onto resentments, blame, and/or shame that keeps us from harnessing our full potential in the present. However, when we are using our past as a way to springboard us forward into a life that is aligned with our true selves, it can be used in a healthy way.

How cool is it that we humans have the ability of reflection to learn lessons, decipher what worked and what did not, and use this to help build our future selves in a way that best serves us?! I think this is amazing!

But so many of us do not use this tool. We cross one thing off of our never-ending to-do list only to move on to the next thing without contemplation of what it took for us to achieve that goal, accomplish the dream, or release what no longer serves us.

I am guilty of this and still am to this day. I have a million things that I am wanting to “accomplish” in this life and when I do, I do not hesitate to move onto the next thing. This is associated with the idea that I have created within myself that “there is not enough time”. I believe that many of us feel this way and to even think about the idea of allotting a few minutes let alone an hour to reflection would be a waste.

But it is actually more of a waste NOT to reflect.

When we do not take the time to reflect and really understand what occurred during our experiences we are unable to see what we learned.

When we are unable to be aware of what we learned from the experience, we are unable to integrate this experience into our reality. So the next time we are doing something new on our list we are left without the skills, know-how, and wisdom from our past. We forget what it took to become the humans we are now. We forget to celebrate ourselves and acknowledge how far we have come.

So many of us believe that we are never getting anywhere because we never stop to realize that we have come from somewhere else and what it took to get to where we are now. We think that we do not have the courage, skills, and mindset of what it takes to climb the mountain that is in front of us.

If we could just pause, take a beat, and look behind us we could see that we are at the top of a mountain that we once believed we could not climb.

But you did climb that goddamn mountain and along the trek you learned the unique lessons and skills of what it took to reach the top. You have evidence that you CAN do what you once thought you could not do.

This gives you the ability and the new mindset to realize that this mountain in front of you that you once thought you could not climb, is more in reach than once believed. You can take these lessons with you on this mountain trek and on every mountain that you will climb. Because life is never flat for long!

Reflection is just as important as coming up with the idea and taking action on it. Without reflection we are left thinking that we don’t have what it takes to chase our dreams, start something new, or simply do the hard things. It is like going into battle without your armor, or rather it is like trying to write without a pencil. It could still be done but it is a lot more difficult and painful!

I encourage you all (and myself!) to take some time to really reflect on your life. Where you are now, what got you to this specific point in your life, and what lessons and wisdom you have learned that you want to take with you as you continue to move on this wild wheel of life. The answers might surprise you!

We are more wise and capable of great things then we believe ourselves to be.

Feel free to share your wisdom and lessons with me in the comments below or message me. I love to hear from all of you:).

I am so grateful for this community and all of the light, wisdom, and reflection from all of us.

With love and gratitude,

Rylee

The More You Resist, You More You Suffer:

Greetings lovely people and happy Monday!

I was on one of my daily morning runs to let off some extra energy when I realized something about myself. I have been trying to listen to my body and her messages more because my body has so much wisdom to offer me. When I tuned my awarenss into what was going on below my neck, I felt how much I was holding on to.

It didn’t feel heavy per say, but it felt like a great weight of energy. Almost like a knot inside of me. Then I began to move my awareness upward and discovered that my jaw also felt this same way. Tense and like there was a knot.

I was holding something, but what was it and what would it be like to release this energy?

Then a bigger question came to the forefront of my mind: “how long have I been holding onto this?”

So many of us go about our daily activities unaware of all of the extra “baggage” that we are carrying around. By baggage I mean energy that has been caught inside our bodies. This energy could come from many places: experiences, emotions, other humans, trauma, etc. This baggage weighs us down and keeps us from experiencing life as we are meant to: moment to moment.

This is energy is not stored by mere coincidence. This energy comes from different parts of ourselves that we don’t want to see or deem as “bad”.

As we are growing up, the people around us (perhaps our caregivers) as well as society are constantly telling us how to act, how to be, what to feel and what not to feel. Depending on how we were raised, we may have been shown that certain emotions or states were things that we need to hide in order to be accepted, such as anger or sadness.

We were taught that the only acceptable states to be were happiness, joy, or contentment and everything else was something to feel shameful about. I recall this happening to me when I was younger. My family was not one that knew how to regulate our emotions let alone talk about them.

Growing up, I was taught that crying was a sign of weakness and that experiencing emotion meant that I was not in my “right mind” or rather my logical mind. The same was true for anger; and I was an angry child. However, because this emotion was not accepted by those closest to me, I was forced to hide these feelings I was experiencing. I would pretend that everything was ok and that I was an agreeable person.

It felt as though I was a teapot full of boiling water and at any moment I was going to be set off an explode in a fiery rage, which I ended up doing many times. After experiencing these volcanic eruptions of anger, I would feel immense shame and wonder, “what just happened to me?” I would say things that I did not mean and do things I could never imagine myself doing when I felt contentment. It felt as though there was a demon inside me.

In a way there was (at least from my viewpoint). I demonized my anger because I thought that it only led me to more pain and sadness. I didn’t understand myself and because of this I felt that no one would understand me. I feel that most of us feel this way (especially when we are young). We are taught to keep things surface level and never talk about the pain and anguish that we might be going through because it might make others uncomfortable.

But what is so wrong with feeling uncomfortable? This is how we grow people! This is why I believe that we suffer more than we need to.

We resist the pain or the “negative” feelings such as anger, shame, and grief and push them down to the deepest parts of ourselves. But we fool ourselves when thinking that these feelings do not continue to affect us and linger within our thoughts, actions, and reality.

In order for us to really move through the suffering and find contentment, we must first be ok with suffering! We must be ok with moving through the hard feelings and coming to terms with the notion that life will not always be sunshine and rainbows. The more we become ok with feeling this way, the more that we will be open to these experiences. The more open we are, the more we will be able to let them go instead of holding onto them.

When we hold onto them they fester within us. They create pain and blockages that keep us from living in alignment with our true selves.

It’s time to stop fighting yourself. Its time to stop swimming upstream and instead open yourself up to the river called life. This river is full of different states, experiences, and emotions that might be hard to process and go through, but I promise you that you have the strength and the ability to go through these feelings and more. They will not only bring you into alignment, but will teach you the importance of letting go and letting it flow! For the more that we try to hold on and control ourselves and our lives, the more we will suffer.

I have been here before and believe me, it is not a joyful place to be!

Ask yourself the questions, “what would happen if I just let go?” and “What would happen if I no longer resisted?”

Remember this: what you resist, persists! Until you can do the hard thing and move into the fire and the uncomfortable moments, you will always be weighted down by some sort of baggage that you carry.

And I promise you, WE can do hard things!! I know that you already have done hard things to get you to where you are now. You can do hard things and you will continue to do hard things because you are a warrior of truth, peace, and light.

This is your reminder today to let go. Breath and just let go and I promise you that the world will open up so much more when you do.

I am so grateful for all of you and this community that we share together! Feel free to comment below your thoughts, feedback, and insights.

Rylee

How to set goals that will actually stick!

With the start of the new year, many of us are looking to change our habits that keep us stuck in loops of disempowerment and negativity.

As the champagne is poured and the countdown ensues, we find ourselves thinking “this will be my year. This is it. Im finally going to make these changes and transform my life!”

Or you may be someone that finds yourself thinking, “why even bother? I have tried to make changes so many times before and they no longer stick. I don’t understand what I’m doing wrong, I must be lazy and incapable.” We see others changing their lives for the better. Seemingly without struggle and much effort. What is their secret to success?

Well I am going to fill you in. Sit back or go get your resolutions from the trash can because I am going to tell you how to set goals and achieve them!

I believe that EVERYONE has the capability to set goals and achieve them, it is simply a matter of starting small, your why, having passion, and being realistic.

When you start with a goal or a dream, usually you are thinking BIG. I am going to use the example of a half-marathon because to me it seems big and I have actually ran them before.

Lets say you have a goal of running a half marathon that is occurring in your town in less than a week. You are not a runner and have never run in your life (this is an extreme example used for effect). Race day comes and you go out there, hit the pavement and give it your all, only to drop out of the race a few miles in.

You’re laying on the side of the road, panting and sweating as everyone else runs by you, seemingly with ease. You think to yourself, “I’ve failed again! This is why I never try anything. I’m such a loser. Everyone else can do it but me.”

You play this sad song in your head over and over again. You feel angry, disappointed, and shameful. You don’t want to feel this pain again so you decide never to set any more goals for yourself. It is more comfortable to feel safe yet stuck.

This is just an example (an extreme one at that) that happens to all of us at some point. We have BIG changes that we want to make RIGHT now and we think that they will magically happen over-night.

We bite off more than we can chew and then we find ourselves quitting before we even started. This leads to pain and frustration and it tells our sub-conscious mind that setting goals and chasing our dreams leads to painful experiences. So we don’t do them. We throw our resolutions in the trash!

One way that we can keep ourselves from flying too close to the sun and burning out is to start small. Start even smaller than you think. (Trust me on this). We are re-wiring your mind and beliefs about goals here.

Lets go back to the example of the runner. You want to run a half-marathon that is occurring in your town in six months (notice the different time-frame here. This is way more realistic than a week). This is your BIG goal or rather the over-arching umbrella that covers all of your smaller goals.

In order to achieve this BIG goal we must go back all the way to the present moment. The NOW. All we have is now so you must commit to your goal and taking action NOW.

Because you are not a runner and have never run in your life, you have to start very small and work your way up. For three days a week you commit to running for one minute. Yes I am aware that this seems crazy. But here me out.

You run for one minute for three days a week and now guess what? You are a runner!! You are proving to yourself that you can do this and that you are committed to this goal of running. Slowly you start to run even more, maybe its for five minutes for four days a week. Then you build up even more to six days a week for twenty minutes a day.

Each time you lace up your shoes and get out there and run, you are saying “yes” to yourself and your goals. You are giving yourself evidence that you are capable of achieving this goal and that you can run this half-marathon. The more success you have with this goal, the more you will associate goal-setting with pleasure instead of pain.

So eventually, when you cross that finish-line six-months down the road, you think to yourself “wow! I did it!” You feel admiration for yourself. You feel GOOD. This is what makes you want to set even more goals for yourself.

Another important factor in goal-setting is your WHY. Why are your doing this? Why are you setting this goal? What will you get out of it? What will your life be like when you accomplish this goal? This is your why. What feeling is it giving you? Most of us do not set goals and buy things because of the (tangible) thing itself but for the (intangible) feeling that it gives us.

This will help you in staying motivated. Knowing your why is so important as well as if it is coming from YOU. If your supposed goal is coming from an outside source (such as a parent or a boss) than you can almost bet that this goal will lead to failure. You will have little to no motivation by the end of the goal because it isn’t really aligned with what you truly want. You will either abandon the goal all together or keep going but associate goals with pain which will make you not want to set them in the future.

Getting clear on what you want and when you want it by is also another important variant in goal-setting. You really need to be specific. For example, “I want to lose weight by August” isn’t specific enough. How will you know when you lose the weight? Whenever we use the term “lose” as well, our mind associates this with scarcity. We don’t really want to “lose” anything. We always want to be gaining, cultivating, bringing in, etc.

A better example would be, “I will get to my ideal of weight of 145lbs. by March 2,2022 because I appreciate and love my body and treat her with respect.”

Notice how much more specific this goal is and how it is associated with more positive wording than negative wording.

The more specific our goals are the more “tangible” the goal is in our mind. The more tangible the goal is, the more we can picture ourselves grabbing it, crossing it, and even tasting it! If we are not specific enough, our minds have nothing to hold onto and nothing to work towards. We are not even sure where we are going and how we will know when we get there.

I firmly believe that anyone can achieve their goals and make their dreams a reality. It all starts with your WHY, “why do you want to achieve this goal?” Then implementing the steps that it will take you to get there (aka the small things lead to the big changes). Make sure that your goal is specific and is worded in a way where you are gaining something rather than losing it. The more we train our minds to associate goal-setting with pleasure rather than pain, the more we will want to keep implementing them into our lives. The will lead us to believing that we are capable, successful, and we have what it takes to make our dreams come true!

The Importance of Investing in Ourselves:

Happy Monday beautiful people! I hope that you all had a lovely, aligned, and restful weekend:).

Now, getting to today’s topic!

I want to touch on the importance of investing in ourselves. This is something that is so important in our growth and especially in getting us to where we want to go. But this is also something that is so HARD for us to do.

I have been there so many times. It feels as though I am have two mini me’s on each of my shoulders that whisper in my ear, “do it” and “don’t do it”. I chalk one up to being my logical and rational mind and the other to being my emotion-centered heart. They both mean well and they both have good points for me to consider. So which to choose?

Most of the time I find myself giving in to whichever voice is louder and whichever voice invokes more fear into my bones. Most of the time I am answering to my “logical and rational me” instead of my “heart me”. I give into the fear of investing in myself because this “little me” shouts “who do you think you are spending money, time, and and energy on yourself? You’re wasting it all! You’re selfish and you should be spending it on someone or something else”.

Notice the SHOULD here.

The more conscious I have become of my internal world, my beliefs, and my habitual thoughts, the more I realize that whenever a part of me is saying “should” then that means it is not truly coming from “me”.

I understand that this may be confusing, but the way I see it is that there is a “fake me” or a “me” that was molded by the hands and opinions of society, culture, and other humans in my life. This could be more of a persona or rather the mask that I wear in the world. However, sometimes I forget to take the mask off and it is as if it becomes glued to me. The longer I wear it, the more it becomes attached to who I believe myself to be.

Unfortunately, what this persona has learned is that investing in ourselves and doing anything for ourselves (especially us women) is considered selfish and bad.

We are taught that we must give and give ourselves to others in service of the greater whole or the “machine” (we have to keep progress going after all). We do this by over-working, letting others cross our boundaries, and saying no to ourselves when we really want to say yes or yes when we want to say no.

We think that by doing this others will love us more and we will be happier, because this is what society tells us. If you follow the rules and do what others expect of you then you will be successful and life will be swell. But the more we say no to ourselves, the more alienated we become from the life that we are meant to live.

When we do not invest in ourselves (whether this be time, energy, knowledge, workshops, coaches, etc.) we are telling ourselves that we are not worthy of success and living the life that we really want to. We are telling ourselves that what we want does not matter and what matters is making sure everyone else is happy with our decisions.

This is self-sabotage people. We may not be conscious of it, but it is happening within us, and when it does it keeps us small and in cycles of disempowerment.

I was in this cycle for a while. Starting my business was exciting and I thought I was saying yes to myself. In a way I was, but I was also saying no to myself so much more. I wanted to market myself, hire a coach, and take a few workshops, but the voice inside my head kept shouting “no!”. I felt as though there was a tug-of-war going on inside of me. I felt anxious, confused and could not make a decision to save my life. It took some time and uncovering my unconscious beliefs about “who I thought I was” until I could shine the light on the “fake me” that was keeping me from saying yes and moving forward.

Once I realized what was going on and how I was letting my fears, doubts, and disempowered persona drive the wheel, I decided it was time that I truly commit to myself, my growth, and my business.

The most important thing you can do in this life is help yourself.

So many of us are running around trying to change the world, but the world is in us. Whatever we feel inside of ourselves will reflect out into the world: in our relationships, actions, jobs, etc.

The more you invest in yourself, your dreams, and your abilities, the more aligned you will be in your truth.

The more aligned you are in your truth that more compassionate, empathetic, and passionate you will be. You will share your amazing gifts (whatever they may be) with yourself and the world around you. You will show up and live life as you’re supposed to, not from the blueprint of others.

When we invest in ourselves, we invest in making the world a more authentic and beautiful place. You are not selfish for investing in your heart’s desires. You are meant to be here, take up space, and live in alignment with yourself.

The only person you actually have to answer to at the end of your life is you, so start answering to yourself now, because I promise you you will be and feel so much more fulfilled.

Thanks so much for reading and being open to receiving this from me today. Feel free to comment, share, and reach out to me!

Rylee

The Beauty of Failure:

Recently I’ve been grappling with the idea that failure is not actually something to run and hide from. It is actually the opposite. Failure is something that we should be running towards with open arms and inviting in for a hug.

Failure is like an old friend to us all. One that we are all familiar with, yet one that we normally hide and duck from in the aisles of the grocery store.

Why is this?

Why are we so afraid of failing?

Now really stop and think about this.

What will truly happen if you fail?

I mean really really fail. What is the worst that could happen?

Most of us are not really afraid of failure itself, but more of what it feels like to fail and what it means to fail.

Society teaches us to not only run away from failure, but also our feelings about failure.

When we were in school we were taught that failing or receiving an F on something was the worst possible thing that could happen to us.

I remember failing quite often. In my first semester of my undergraduate degree, I failed not one, but TWO classes.

I remember feeling mortified. I hid this dirty little secret in my back pocket. I felt so much shame about this and did not want anyone finding out that I was a capitol L Loser.

Yes I will admit that it wasn't my finest moment and it sucked having to repeat two classes later on. But I also gained something important from that failure: lessons.

Lessons are so important for us to be cultivating, especially in our adult years. So many of us think that once we graduate from academic institutions that we are done with our learning.

Learning has actually just begun and failure is the pathway to this learning.

I like to think about our lives like a school of sorts, but ones with less rules and rigidity. (If we want them to be that is). We are constantly testing and experimenting to see what works and what doesn’t work within our day-to-day existence.

From here we can decide for ourselves what lessons we want to take with us and what information we need to leave behind. This is the beauty of life-long learning and failure. Without it, we would not learn a damn thing! Without learning, there is no room for growth.

If we could simply get over our fears around failure then I believe that we would be limitless. Come back to your thinking self for a minute here. If you were ok with failing, what would you do?

If you knew that you would be successful in your endeavors, what action would you take?

The path to success is always one paved in failure. If you’re not failing, then you’re most likely not putting yourself into the ring of what it means to truly be living, creating, and dismantling.

One way to get over this fear of failure is to practice failing. This might be scary at first, and honestly who wants to do anything they know they will fail at?

However, with practice you will be able to move through whatever arises when you “fail”. You will be able to take the judgments, opinions, and criticisms of others (and yourself) that will come with failure and know that you are anything but a failure. You are someone that is truly engaging in a co-creative process with life and with each failure you gain the ability to be able to bounce back and keep going.

I challenge you all to go out there and fail and keep failing! Notice what comes up for you. Be open and curious as well as withhold any judgments that may arise. Be compassionate with yourself as failing is tough for all of us (myself included). As you keep failing and remaining open to this process of failing, you will begin to notice the differences (perhaps subtle at first) between when you first embarked on your failure journey to becoming life-long besties with failure. It may now seem that failure is not the enemy, but your greatest ally.

It is through failure that we discover how resilient we are. When we become ok with our failures we also become ok with the failures of others. We become more compassionate and authentic about what we really want for our lives and what actions we want to take to get there.

Failure is not something to run from, it is a natural part of the cycle of what it means to exist as a human. When we can shift our perspective on failure, we can see that it is not something to be ashamed of, but something to be celebrated. For failure means we are on the path to something even greater.

Feel free to reach out to me with any comments, feedback, and questions that you might be having. Feel free to comment below as well.

If you have trouble with failure or are feeling stuck with creating more success in your life then check out my 3-month coaching program in my offerings page of my website. Together we will “fail” to discover what needs to be shed from your life in order for you to create the life of your wildest dreams.

The Importance of Trusting Yourself and Your Life:

Aloha everybody,

I am here today to talk about the importance of trusting ourselves and our lives. This can be so difficult for some of us to do and it has us feeling frazzled, unable to make decisions, and relying on other’s opinions and viewpoints.

However, when we rely on others to make our decisions for us, we begin answering OUR life questions with the answers from SOMEONE ELSE’S life. It is like trying to fit a piece into a puzzle that doesn’t fit. We try and try to no avail. The piece simply was not made to fit into that puzzle.

This is what so many of us do in our lives. We are trying to fit pieces of ourselves into someone else’s puzzle. Or vice versa, someone else’s pieces (aka advice) into our puzzle. When we do this, it is like hitting a brick wall and we feel even more dizzy and confused then when we first started trying to put the puzzle together!

I have been there. And I am still in this state of mind even now. This sense of not trusting ourselves and our intuition is so deeply programmed in us, that it is hard to shake off the idea that we truly do know what is best for us.

It really is so simple when we think about it in this way. We have all of the answers to life’s great test within us. It is only a matter of being able to slow down, shut up, and listen to the whispering of our true selves.

I believe that this concept is so difficult for us to shake because it serves those that make a profit on supposedly having the answers to our life’s questions, or so they say they do.

When we look at advertisements on TV, the latest self-help books, or even your college professor; we see that they are trying to sell us something that will answer our deepest and most vulnerable questions to our lives. So we buy all their books, attend their seminars, and buy the latest products all in hopes of somehow figuring out how to put the pieces of our puzzle together.

But it never really works, does it?

They always seem to promise that it will, but somehow you still end up with pieces of your puzzle scattered all across the floor.

We are taught from a young age that there is always someone out there that knows more than we do. As kids we are taught that logic is king and following your heart is meant only for a princess in a book.

We (especially us women) are taught that what we feel deep within the centers of being cannot be trusted. That it comes from a place of emotion and feeling, and in our patriarchal society, these are not things to be relied on.

i have always had a difficult time trusting myself and my life. From an early age I was taught to listen to “adult figures” more than myself; because they knew more than I did. I was not taught to make decisions for myself or listen to the messages in between the beats of my heart.

If I was to make a decision it was best that it could be backed up by logic, reason, or because everyone else was doing it. Aka “that’s just the way it was done.”

This of course, did not sit well with my little rebel heart. Something inside me felt amiss. The longer I refused to listen to myself, the more chaotic my life seemed to get and the more unhappy I became.

It finally took me hitting my rock bottom and breaking open, for my true self to slip through the cracks of my conditioned being, for me to hear her voice again.

So I began to listen to myself more. It was difficult at first, and I faced a great deal of backlash from people. (Know that this will probably start happening to you when you decide to finally live your life on your terms. People seem not to like it). I recall my parents thinking that the decisions I was making were “crazy” and “selfish”. I felt a lot of shame upon hearing these words, but I also felt a deep knowing within me that I was on the right path. Slowly, the puzzle was forming, piece by piece.

The more I began to listen to myself, the more my world opened up for me in ways that I could not imagine! Looking back now, I can see that when I listened to myself and agreed to pledge my loyalty to myself and my intuition; my life became so much easier.

I wasn’t constantly running about on the hamster wheel thinking, “what if?” I did not experience as much confusion when making a decision, and instead focused my awareness on my heart center instead of my head.

I am not saying here that we should throw logic to the wind. I feel that finding a healthy balance between the head and the heart can be very transformative. It’s just that a great deal of us spend most of our time and decision-making in our head.

So the next time that you are having difficulty with a decision or trusting that it will all work out, I call you to drop out of your head space for the time being. Take a walk and LISTEN instead of trying to take action right away.

Your mind may be screaming alarm bells at you yelling “WE DONT HAVE TIME FOR A STUPID WALK! WE HAVE TO SOLVE IT RIGHT NOW!!”

Being a sufferer of this mindset I can confidently say, “there is always enough time.” Period. There is always enough time for you drop into your heart center and listen to the simple whispers of your soul. I promise you that it makes all the difference.

Listening to yourself and your intuition is one of the greatest gifts you can give yourself. Letting go, trusting, and knowing that everything you need to solve this grand, mysterious puzzle of life is already within you, just waiting to be discovered.

You have all of the tools that you need within you. You have all of the answers to your life’s questions. All you have to do is listen.

Level-Up Your Life:

Hey everyone!

Happy Sunday. I wasn’t originally going to write a post today, but I had a spark of inspiration when listening to an episode from the podcast Manifestation Babe. If you haven’t given her a listen or checked out her content, I highly recommend her. (I’ll put a link at the bottom of this post to her webpage and social media).

So today I wanted to talk about leveling-up your life. As always, I resonate with writing about topics that are prevalent to my life currently and that I have first-hand experience with. Recently, I have felt my life asking me to level-up. It is not really that I hear a voice or anything whispering in my ear, it is more of a strong feeling in my gut. This is how I know my life REALLY means business. If the message is coming from my gut, then it is coming from my intuition or my highest self. If I don’t listen, the consequences could be dire.

Even though I I did not want to listen to this gut-feeling or gut-message rather, I knew in my bones that I had to listen or else I would risk letting my life-force energy be boxed-in and stagnant. The message my life was giving me was that it was time for me to level-up my life. In order to do this, I had to change many external circumstances in my life so that I would be in alignment with my truest and wildest self.

What did I have to change you ask?

I had been looking for a new place to live for around two months and I FINALLY after months of searching and feeling defeated, found my perfect place. It was exactly what I was looking for. My own place deep in the jungle, close to the ocean, with a loft and circular in shape. I knew before I saw it that THIS was the place. Do you ever have this feeling? It is so strong that you just know; you don’t have to think about it and there is certainly no time for doubt to creep in because this all-knowing energy propels you to take action then and there.

This is what happened to me. A week later, I was moved into my new place and was feeling anything but peace and serenity. I thought to myself, “WTF did I just do? This place is about three times as expensive as my old place, I am trying to get my business going, I’m a full-time graduate student, how will I be able to make this work?”

I lay in bed at night letting these thoughts play on repeat in the tape-recorder of my mind. Theses old and stale beliefs had their hold on me again. I was learning a lesson here, but didn’t know it yet. I have always been someone that likes change, yet is resistant to it. Ah humanness.

All of the feelings of comfort that I had inside the four walls of my old place were suddenly gone. It felt as though I was moving through a wind-storm in the middle of the desert with sand flying everywhere and blocking my view from my highest and true self.

I couldn’t hear her anymore.

I could only hear my negative mind-set screaming at my through the megaphone inside my skull.

It wasn’t until a few days later that I began to see the lesson that my life was giving me. It was asking me to level-up. In order to grow, I had to let go of my comforts, the four-walls that I shared with my boyfriend, and cheap rent.

I had to try to make this new life work because this new life IS my life. This life is the one that I am truly meant to live. It is the one that is aligned with my being. Once I realized this, I knew that I could move through anything.

I became aware of the fact that the tape-recorder in my mind would no longer fit with my new life. In order to really level-up like my life was asking me to do, I had to erase this belief system and begin recording another system more suited to who I am in this moment.

I had to move through the fears, doubts, and frustrations. I am still doing this now, but I am doing this in a way that is more curious and open, rather than one that is sinking into these feelings of scarcity.

This is important to remember. If we truly want to level-up our lives, we have to act like person that we want to be in the future. Think of it as a game of sorts.

For example, if you’re at a level two and you dream of being a level four, then you have to act like a level four while your still at a level two! If you continue to act like a level two, you will surely never be able to reach level four let alone level three.

This may seem confusing or like a far-off dream, but I promise you that the level four you so desperately want to be is inside of you NOW. Let that sink in. The person that you want to become is already within you.

It is simply a matter of believing that you already are this person and then acting like that person.

Ask yourself, “what would level four me do in this situation as opposed to my level two self?” This will get you to where you want to go. Slowly, what made up your level-two self will start to fall away and before you know it you will suddenly be the level-four person you always wanted to be.

Leveling up can be scary. But you know what is even scarier? Choosing to stay at the same level of you life for your whole life! Where is the fun in that? Where is this challenge?

So the next time that you feel the calling of your life within you, asking you to make the big changes in order to reach that new level of yourself, know that this self is already within you. Know that you are always supported by your life, yourself, and that you have the ability to level up in each moment.

Manifestation Babe website: https://manifestationbabe.com/

Manifestation Babe Instagram: @manifestationbabe

How Gratitude Affects Our Attitude:

I’ve recently been thinking a lot about what I don’t have and how if only “I had this much money” or “this many clients” than my life would be so much better and I would be so much happier.

This is a limiting mindset to be in. When I find myself perceiving my world in this way, it sets the stage for a chain-link affect of scarcity and fear. Whether this be in my business, relationships, hobbies, etc.

I tune into the frequency of victim-hood and think “poor me” and “if I had this in Y in my life, I could achieve X” and” because I lack Y, I can never get X”.

When we think in this way, we see our lives in this way. We believe that we do not have enough stuff, money, love, beauty whatever it may be. We look outside of ourselves and consume more and more until we are left feeling emptier than when we first began.

This only feeds the cycle of believing that we are not enough and that we don’t have what it takes to live the life of our dreams.

So we continue on the wheel that we perceive as “our life”; going round and round in circles of despair and grief.

But I am here to tell you that there is another way.

There is always another way to look at your life and yourself.

Only YOU have the power and ability to change your life and your circumstances. How cool is that (though I admit it is sometimes a daunting thought, but mainly cool).

I’ve been cultivating a gratitude practice in the last few months. I do this especially when I find myself descending into old patterns of “not having enough” or “not being enough”.

Every morning I take time to either think, write, and speak aloud things in my life I am grateful for.

It could be as simple as having a roof over my head or a delicious cup of coffee to drink in the morning. Or it could be as big as finding my dream Jungalow to live in or getting a few new clients a week.

The point it, how we view our reality is what shapes our life. We create our life and our attitudes and shifting our attitude from one of frustration and anger to one of gratitude for all that we already have will change your life tremendously.

If we are constantly putting out the vibe that we don’t have enough or are lacking something, then that is how we will see ourselves and every aspect of our life. This is what will come back to us and this view will haunt us in our relationships with others and ourselves.

Why choose to live in misery when you can live in gratitude?

I am not saying that this shift is easy either.

Like anything worthwhile, it is going to take some time and awareness to consciously change your beliefs about feeling grateful for yourself and your life.

Our society has unfortunately given us the idea that we are always lacking something and if only we would buy this product, then our lives would be magically changed right there and then.

I am going to tell you right now, that gratitude is something that you cannot buy. It is not something that can be sold either.

It is already within you, waiting to burst free from it’s shackles of grief and shine through your whole being like a luminous star!

We all have this ability to shine bright, harness our power, and live the life that is aligned with our true selves.

Cultivating an attitude of gratitude can get us to this place of wholeness and inner peace.

What do you have to lose besides your debilitating mindset?

To cultivate a gratitude practice:

1. Pick a time of day where you can reflect on all you are grateful for (you will not need more than five minutes if you’re in a pinch! This can be done anywhere at anytime).

2. Reflect on a few things you are grateful for. Write them down, speak them out loud, or simply think about them. You can even tell someone you are grateful for them as well. Bonus points!

3. Notice how you feel before, during, and after this practice. What arises within you?

4. Come back to this feeling of gratitude anytime you feel yourself shifting back into old ways of being such as scarcity and fear-based mindsets.

The way that we perceive our reality is what our reality will be. Remember this. You have the power to design your life and shift your attitude whenever you desire.

I am so grateful to you for reading this and for this platform to share my ideas on:).

True Growth comes from Diving into the Depths of the Unknown.

Recently, I have been going through a period of many unknowns in my life.

It feels as though everything I knew about myself and my life has been flipped upside down into something completely opposite of what I knew to be “true.” My life is something that I no longer recognize. It feels scary and, in a way, exhilarating at the same time.

There are many parts of me that desperately want to cling to old ways of being and the “comforts” that I had come to know and love.

If I’m being completely honest, almost all of me wants to cling to what I know. Because in these walls of knowing and predictability, I feel safe—or I think I feel safe. I believe that I have control over my life and what happens to me on a daily basis.

Yet at the same time, I find that I am slowly being suffocated by these comforts that make me feel “safe.” It feels as though my life force and vitality are slowly being drained from my rainbow essence into something lacking any of its signature color. Instead, it feels as though my life is simply streaked in grey.

I believe that so many of us feel this way. We desperately want to change our lives and grow into the humans we dream about, but we are afraid of the unknown. We are afraid of throwing ourselves into the river of life—for there are many unknowns contained in this river.

Sometimes, she is a raging force of power that calls us to be thrown into new ways of being and seeing our reality. At other times, she is a calm body that allows us to float on her surface.

The point is when we decide to “take the jump” or “leap” into this river, we have no idea what will happen or where we will end up. So many of us (myself included) want to know our future before taking any action. We want to know if we will succeed, be happy, or end up in a better place than we started.

But this is not the way of the world, nor should it be.

If we knew what our futures had in store—if we could see what the pot contained at the end of the rainbow—then where would the magic lie?

To me, it is not so much about reaching the pot. It is about the journey of finding the courage to leap into the river and knowing that I have the creativity, strength, and resources to survive whatever she brings into my path.

This is where true growth occurs. It is in the unknown times where we can choose how we want to react and what we want to do. There are many paths to take and each path will mold us into something different than we are now. We always have this choice to plunge straight into the vital waters of life.

But so many of us let our fear take the wheel and we find ourselves spending our life waiting on the river banks while watching others dive in headfirst.

Diving in means that you will sometimes flail and splash about wildly, swim with ease, or drown in the depths of the unknown in order to be reborn into something new. But the most important thing is that you took the leap in the first place!

When we sit back and wait because we are afraid of life, we can almost guarantee that we will stay the same as we were and always have been. We will stay the same and be immersed in our comforts. And guess what? Fear will still be present in our lives.

Fear will be in our lives—no matter what. But when we dive headfirst into it, we come out the other side knowing that we not only survived but we came out stronger and as a different version of ourselves that is more aligned with our truth.

Fear is not something to conquer; the unknown is not something to conquer. They are tools we can use to move through and to become more familiar with.

I believe that we all have the ability to create the life that we want. Becoming more comfortable in the uncomfortable times (and feelings) is how we can shed layers of who we thought ourselves to be in order to be left with our wild and true selves. In my upcoming online course, I offer my clients the chance to take the leap and tune into their wild and true selves.

So, what are you waiting for? You can choose to take the leap and see where the river will flow or you can sit back and watch others sink, swim, and everything in-between.

The point is not that they are “succeeding” in their swim, but that they are swimming in the first place.

As always, feel free to message me with any insights, questions, or comments!

Happy Swimming:)

Why We Need To Go Through Change:

Today, I am going to talk about change as it relates to our growth and evolution as souls in human form.

We are always changing and growing.

We can take a lesson from the natural world that nothing ever stays the same. the seasons change, yet they are all necessary in the grand scheme of things.

Why do we change? Why can’t we just stay the same? Yes, this would be easier.

It would definitely be a lot more comfortable, but it would also be a lot less fun and fulfilling. Of course, if we really wanted to stubbornly stay the same person for our whole lives, cultivating the same habits and personality, we could. But that is not why we are here.

We are here to grow and evolve into the people that we are meant to be. Every waking moment is a chance for us to grow and become more aligned with our values and our calling.

How cool is that?

We all have experiences that shape us. We have families, relationships, and systems we engage in, art that provokes us and makes us break open into new realizations. We take all of these in, and this assembles how we view our reality.

We are always moving and learning and taking in new world-views, thoughts, and ideas that make up how we see our world. Each moment we can choose to view these new ideas and perceptions through our old lenses or ways of being.

Or we can choose to view them in a whole new way.

Life is all about how we see things. We can have the same situation, and we can choose to see this situation in many different ways. This will shape our lives. It will shape our present moment, how we react to experiences, how we treat others, and how we treat ourselves. This is extremely important to consider. We truly have the power to make our life what we want it to be.

Yes, a lot of the time we have no control over external events. But we do have the choice with how we choose to view this event.

We can say, “Why is this happening to me?” or “What is this showing me? What can I learn from this?”

Perhaps, we can think about a situation in our lives and try asking these questions in relation to our situation. Notice how we feel when asking these questions. Notice how this changes from question to question and how we look at the situation from the various perspectives of the questions being asked.

When we choose to engage with the same situations in new ways, we will begin to slowly unfold into a new being.

I think this is all the point of existence.

We are all in the great school of life, and we are here to have fun and also to learn from ourselves and from others. If I am not constantly challenging my world-views and ideas, then what am I doing? I cannot possibly know everything, and besides, everything there is to know is always changing.

Just look at science. At one point, we believed in a Newtonian Universe, and now we are experiencing a shift into a quantum one! Amazing.

What will happen next for us? We cannot possibly know.

Yes, change is scary and difficult.

We attach ourselves fully to our identity, career, jobs, and relationships. Now, stop and think.

“Who am I without all of these things?”

Who are we without all of the external labels that we associate ourselves with? All of these things will leave us eventually. In death, we cannot bring any of these things with us. All we can bring is who we are, underneath all of the things that we think make up who we are.

I painted a sign recently that reads, “Who am I?” I plan to post it above my door in hopes that when I walk through my door each day, I am constantly asking myself, “Who am I?” because the me that I am is always changing each and every day.

Here is our permission slip to ask ourselves this question: “Who am I?”

We might find that we are scared to know the answer. Feel into this fear because never asking yourself the question is an even scarier notion.

The good news is we always have the ability to create the life we want and desire. I firmly believe that we are all inherently creative and that we have the ability to cultivate the life that is meant for us. Seriously.

What is stopping you from making the changes you want to make?

The answer is (and you might not like it): you.

That is the only thing standing in your way. You.

We can come up with a bunch of excuses in our lives to blame our circumstances on, but the hard truth is that no one can make the changes they want to see happen but themselves.

Don’t wait for the perfect moment either. This will never exist. If we keep waiting for it to happen, we will spend our lives looking out the window while the world keeps spinning. The world will not wait for us. But the world does call for us to embrace these changes and to embark on the journey that we are meant to go on.

So what are we waiting for?

Take the leap and jump into the unknown. I have done this many times, and each time, I have been deathly afraid. I have clutched onto so many things that did not serve me, yet it was so hard to let go for what I thought I “knew.”

But I can promise you that the unknown is always worth it. Walking blindly through the dark and damp cave and not knowing where you will come out have always been worth it.

Why fight the cycles of growth and change? Why not lean into them instead?

To get a different outcome, we have to do something different.

And I promise, to do something is what makes all of the difference.

Re-Wilding Ourselves to Find Our Truth:

“I am worthy!” I exclaimed to no one but myself, as I tightened my fists into two roundly-knit balls at my sides.

Shouting with all of my might, with all 120 pounds of my being, I yell again “I am worthy!”

At this, I felt as though I was almost starting to believe this ridiculous line. But then again, my rational mind told me that I am in a ridiculous situation in the first place: shouting and yelling at no one but the empty backdrop of Lake Superior on a cool Saturday morning.

What is worse to my agitated logical brain is the notion that I’ve not only been shouting at this great body of water, but that I’ve actually been conversing with her as well. I feared that I might be slipping into madness, but it is also in this madness that I felt the stirrings of someone who I had lost a while back—myself.

Nature has always spoken to me. Whenever I’ve needed someone to talk to about my problems, whenever I needed to work through the anxious tape recorder that is my mind, I lace up my hiking boots, or, if I am really feeling a need for connectivity and presence, I’ll explore the wonders of Mother Nature through the bare soles of my feet.

Through the many hours and countless excursions that I have spent wandering her curves, crevices, and creations, I have come to find not only parts of myself that I had lost, but I’ve also found the answers to the many questions that I had been asking of myself and my place in this world.

A lot of us are confused about who we are as well as our roles and where we fit in. Whether this be related to our roles in society, family, career, or others. The truth is, most of us have no idea what is going on; we are all confused about what is the “right” path for us and where we should go, as well as who we should turn to for guidance.

Our modern world has also made this hard by alienating us to just our core families instead of a whole tribe or community of people to show us the ways and wonders of life.

I have often asked myself the question, “Where are my elders?”

Most of my elders did not have elders to show them the way and their place in this world. This is no one’s fault, just the sad conclusion of a loss of cultural roots, ties, and stories that would normally help guide us through the ups and downs on our journeys.

Luckily, we have the wisdom of Mother Earth to offer us insight and guidance. You may be wondering how plants, animals, stones, and rivers could offer us any amount of wisdom that the internet cannot. I am here to tell you that just by spending a few moments under the shade of a tree or by the current of a stream, we can learn a great deal about what it means to be alive.

For example, by looking at the seasons we can see the cycles of death, birth, and growth. This is perfectly natural and even beautiful to some of us, yet a lot of us are afraid of this part of being human. Like the fish swimming upstream, we are trying to fight the current of life. We are trying to fight the path we are on, the path that is meant for us. Yet nature will nudge us in the right direction, whether we like it or not.

The wonderful thing is that she is always there to nature us when we fall. To hold us when we need to rest on a bed of pines, and to move us along when we need to take action! Like the passing of a storm, we can take this lesson and know that nothing is permanent. Perhaps this will give some us comfort in knowing that the bad times won’t last forever and that the bliss that we feel now will soon give way for another type of feeling.

Like the ebb and flow of the waves in the ocean, we are at times riding high and on top of the world, and at times we are sinking low, so low that we do not know how we will rise again.

But by spending time beneath the limbs of the trees and on the peaks of mountains we know that we are not alone at any part of our journey on this earth. We know that we are not separate from what is happening to us, but instead we are a part of everything that is happening, for we are everything that is happening.

At the edge of the shore, when I felt crazy and alone for speaking to a body of water, I realized here that I was not alone at all. For the rocks below my feet carried me to this shore and will carry me forward when I depart. It was at this point in my life, when I decided to break open and welcome in the wisdom of the natural world, I opened up something that I had long suppressed: the natural part of myself.

I had traded her for a more civilized version that I thought I had to be to fit in. What I did not realize is that I was trying to “fit” myself into a container that my wild and beautiful self was never meant to be in.

As I shouted at the water I awoke to another version of myself, a truer version of myself.

As I awoke to my true self, I realized that I was not going mad, I was finally becoming sane in our world that encourages us to mold ourselves into something that we are not. To me, this is actually what is insane!

When we decide to take the path less traveled (aka the one that is meant for us), we invite in more creativity, spontaneity, love, and compassion into our lives. We know what it means to climb the highest mountain, even when we are tired and want to turn back. We know what it means to feel like we are drowning in the depths of our fears from leaping into the unknown, but jumping anyway!

This is what it means to reconnect with our wild and natural selves. To wander the path and see where it leads. To be curious to and open to the many possibilities that await us, for our life does not have to be the scripted version that we have been fed. Like nature, we are all inherently creative. We can design and make our own reality, whenever we want.

When we form a close relationship with our inner world, we form a close relationship to the natural world. When we feel the excited beat of our heart below our chest at the thought of making our wildest dreams a reality, we are close to the heart beat that runs through us all. Aligned with the giant drum of creation, we move with the rhythm instead of running away from it.

The greatest lesson that I have been given from nature is that we are all one and are all connected. When I follow my own path, it opens one up for someone else. When I say yes to my wildest self, I say no to what is not meant for me. Yet this no could be a yes for someone else.

I invite you to open yourself up to the possibilities of the natural world and what she has to offer us all. She is not just a lifeless entity that our western world imagines her to be.

She is full of life, and more importantly she is full of wisdom. The wisdom that I believe all of us can benefit from. She is always here to guide us back to our truest and wildest selves, for she is within us.

If we take a moment to connect and listen, we will have much to gain from her.

Mythical Story About My Journey:

Greeting lovely humans,

I wanted to share this story I wrote that is based off of my journey diving deeper within, chasing my dreams, and moving to the beautiful islands of Maui and the Big Island. Leaving my old self behind was not easy for me to do. Listening to my inner voice or my soul was also not easy. I faced a lot of backlash not only from my inner critic, but from external sources as well. I think that we all face certain challenges and times in our lives when we must take a journey (whether this be symbolically or literally) to shed the layers of who we thought we were in order to uncover the person we are meant to be.

The power of story is so important in culitivating meaning in our culture and in our communities. Unfortunately , the wonder of story and myth around the campfire or dinner table has been replaced by TV time. Though I do think some media has its place in telling captivating story, it is the stories passed on from generation to generation. From our elders to our young ones, that tell us about our lives and our place within the great web of the world. If you’re interested in learning more about me and my story, keep reading below! If you’re interested in sharing your unique story here, feel free to email me @ wildwhealing@gmail.com:).

The Story of Water Woman:

Water Woman was born in a small village in a place called Minnesota in the United States. Though she was made of water, she was surrounded by a tribe created of fire. They burned so brightly that their heat and desire for consumption and conformity dried out water woman’s elemental roots. As she grew and her limbs became longer, she too became acquainted well with Fire. She forgot about her water beginnings and who she was.

During this time of forgetting, she burned so hot and bright, that she destroyed not only those around her, but herself as well. She was hot to the touch, and this fiery rage that brewed within her, drove away any real chance for love and intimacy with herself and the world around her. Her heart became black and charred. She grew into a deep despair. She suffered greatly and each day was a struggle for her. There was something inside of her, deep deep down that whispered “come home”. Was this the whisper of Water she wondered? She would soon find out.

She knew that she was not a fire person, she was created to be something else. She longed for this soft peacefulness that she felt as a young being, before being taken over by the flames of Fire. She knew she had to change, to shed her skin and leave her charred remains in her wake. She knew she had to leave everything she thought she knew behind. Of course, her tribe of fire would never understand a water person.

They told her she was crazy and that she should not leave. She would never succeed and survive on her own. But what they did not know is that if she stayed she would surely succumb to her burning rage and would be nothing more than a pile of ash, waiting to be blown away by the wind. She could feel the call of her true essence, her longing within. The nudge was here, in her heart center. Powerful and profound. It called out to her very core. She was scared to take these steps forward into the unknown, away from her tribe, but she was even more afraid of staying. 

She packed up what little belongings she had and traveled to a new place, thousands of miles away from her village of fire people. She traveled to a place surrounded by nothing but what she longed for, Water. It was here she began to peel away at the hardened shell she had grown during her time with the fire people. She began to take on more of her water nature. She slowed down and brought peace into her being and her blackened heart. Slowly, she began to soften and open. She met new friends along the way who also longed to return to their natural essence. Together, they helped each other on their journeys and explorations into the depths of themselves. Water Woman grew more rooted and joyful. She felt as though she had finally found her tribe and most importantly herself.

During this time, she grew more confident in who she was, she was not afraid of her differences and her true self, even if it was unlike her tribe back home. Eventually, she knew it was time to leave this place and her friends to continue on her journey. Though she was sad to leave, she felt excited by the idea of going to a place where Water and Fire meet one another. She felt she was ready to face what she had so long pushed away-the truth of who she was, so she could remain small to not risk rocking the boat her and her beloved were on. But she knew she was meant to help the fire people remember that they too were of Water.

Like her, they had simply forgotten this. It was at this time Water Woman realized that she could not have one without the other, she needed both her watery essence and her fiery roots to remain whole and balanced. She spent much of her time in this place where Water and Fire meet, cultivating a deeper connection with herself. For so long, she despised who she was-the turbulent depths that took her up and down and up and down. But she stuck with these storms, she rode through her fears; knowing that eventually they would subside and she would again know peace and tranquility. Each time she came out of each storm with more wisdom and a deeper knowing of herself. 

By now, her blackened heart had given way, the layers had shed and she emerged forth into her true self. She knew who she was born to be was for a reason. The Stars had shown her as she lay beneath their illuminated canopy each evening. She watched them shine as nothing but who they were designed to be, she realized that she was one of them.

One day, while communing with her plant brothers and sisters in the jungle, she felt the call of her tribe below her feet. They were signaling for her that it was time to acknowledge her roots again, for she could not have one without the other. She was born as Water but she was raised to burn fiercely and to wash away the suffering of herself and her people. But Water Woman felt that she still was not yet ready to face the flames that burned within her so fiercely. She was afraid they would again overtake her and she would forget her essence.

The cries of her people grew louder and louder and they shook the Earth of the place where Water and Fire meet so much that she awoke in her sleep one evening. One day, she ventured to the place where Fire burned so bright against the backdrop of night that she awakened to Fire’s beauty. Before this, she had disowned Fire and thought she merely existed to destroy life. But now she saw that Fire was here to make us see, to illuminate the darkness so that we might once again discover our true light. Water Woman was changed after this night, and she finally agreed to return to her tribe in her village. 

When she returned, she found that everything had changed. But this was not because her tribe and her village changed, but because she had. Her reconnection with her truth had washed away the hate in her heart that had driven others away. She knew at her core that she was not different from her tribe, like her, they all were born as Water, but had been taught to dry themselves in of Water in favor of Fire. She knew that her people still suffered, and from her travels and time spent in the place where Water and Fire meet, how to guide them back to their true essence.

Like the Stars she watched at night, she knew that we all are here to shine brightly as the beings we are meant to be. She spent her days using her water powers to lead others in balancing their fires so that they too knew peace in their hearts. Slowly, she began to see the work they were doing unfold like a petal and flower into a community filled with more compassion and love. She knew that more communities like hers were suffering. With the cycles of the moon and turn of the tides, Water Woman again felt the call to return to the place where Water and Fire meet. A new era approached her, she was ready to start anew and share her gifts with the whole Earth community. 

The End, thanks for reading!

Esiah's Story Vimeo

I watched this short video in class about the cycles and journey of life and death. We all had our own experiences and interpretations while watching this video and i am sure you will too. I thought that it was important to share with you all.

Unity:

Greetings readers!

Today I want to talk about unity! Unity sounds like a great thing, right? We all say we want unity in our world and that it will bring more peace to our lives and our greater existence. But what does this actually mean? What does this really look like in our everyday lives?

With everything that is going on in our lives right now, unity is more important than ever. Unity can feel out-of-reach for a lot of us because we all have differing beliefs that can make us feel separate, misunderstood, and alienated from one-another. Diversity is not the issue here. In fact, diversity in who we are and what we believe in is actually a great thing. According to Sherri Mitchell (2018), author of Sacred Instructions as well as activist, speaker, and lawyer from the Penobscot tribe, “diversity and distinction are essential for a healthy system. It is our diversity, not our singularity, that allows us to grow” (p.118). Trying to be the same as everyone else and fit into societies tight-knit box of what it means to be “human” is what contributes to the problems of our modern-day species. “One of the things that colonization seeks to accomplish is to make everyone homogenous, or the same. We were not meant to be homogenous.” (Mitchell, 2018, p.118).

So what is the problem then? If diversity is so great and is the natural order of things, why is it so hard to find unity within our manifold species? One problem is the notion that we are not open to looking at both sides of certain issues. We are not looking at how EVERYONE will be affected by the decisions that we make. We are narrowly focused on only one side of the issue. This way of thinking only contributes to the problem at hand. When one side is chosen over another, someone always loses. It is a never-ending cycle of thinking we are “winning” or “on-top”, when suddenly we end up on the losing side just as we first started.

What we miss is that there does not need to be this competition between us. There does not need to be this scarcity mindset of “my way is the only way” or “my way is the right way”. The cool thing about the multitude of perspectives we have is that there are always new ways of looking at the current problems that we face as a human race. It is only when we can work together; when we can take everyone into account when we make our decisions that we can really unify and make the change that we all truly wish to see in this world.

No one wants to be on the losing side. No one wants to feel misunderstood and unheard. We all have our beliefs and yes these beliefs are important to us and our lives. But what is more important is our capacity to hold space for others beliefs; to hear their side of the the story. This is where true growth can occur. “Oneness is not a measure of sameness; it is transcending our resistance to difference and embracing the full integration of our diversity”. (Mitchell, 2018, p.119).

Perhaps take some time in your life this week to ask yourself, “am I open to hearing another’s side of their story? Can I hold space for them without judgement for their beliefs and their actions? Can we engage in dialogue that is open and healthy for both of us?”

Of course this is difficult to do, especially when first starting out. If you cannot hold space for someone in a healthy and compassionate way at that moment in time, it might be best just to take some time away from the conversation, cool down, and then re-enter it at another time when you feel more emotionally balanced. There is nothing wrong with this, so don’t beat yourself up if this happens to you. (It has happened to me many times).

The most important part is that we are trying to let others express themselves as they authentically are. We are opening up our ways of thinking, being, listening, and making decisions to make room for the rest of humanity and not just what we believe to be right (even if we may think this way). This is so important in making lasting change on this planet. The time for fighting and turning away from each other has come to an end. A new dawn approaches. It rises in unity.

Feel free to reach out to me with any questions or comments about this!!

If you haven’t read Sacred Instructions by Sherri Mitchell, I highly recommend you do. She has a great deal of insight not just from her, but from her experiences in life, as well as her interactions with others.

Here is a link to her website: https://sacredinstructions.life/about/

Aho,

Rylee

References: Mitchell, S. (2018). Sacred Instructions. North Atlantic Books. CA.

Image: Jakki Moore (2016) Moon Sisters

The Stories We Tell Ourselves:

Hi everyone!

I know it has been a while since I’ve written anything, thanks for holding space for me as I took time off to travel and reconnect with people in my life:).

Today I want to talk about the stories that we tell ourselves. I was recently at a woman’s gathering in northern California that allowed me take a hard look at myself and my inner world. In the quiet of the woods I took some time to become introspective and a witness to what was happening inside of me. I realized that I was telling myself stories that were holding me back from the person that I truly am.

What do I mean by these “stories” in the first place? I am talking about the scripts that we live by. We get wrapped up in these scripts that make us think that “we are who we are” and that this will never change. For example, one script I have is “I am not good at math”. I told myself this for years and ya know what? I was bad at math! But not because I was actually bad at math, but because I BELIEVED that I was bad at math. I told myself constantly, over and over again that “math is not something I am good at and I should just stick to reading and writing". I believed this with every fiber of my being and others believed it about me too because I told them this was true about me. Then we all somehow came to a mutual agreement that this was a true story about me. There was no going back, this belief was locked into my system and my life.

It was only a few years ago that I realized how limiting this belief was. One day, I thought to myself, “I am actually not bad at math”. You know what happened after I changed this belief? I was not so bad at math anymore. I actually enjoyed solving equations at times! I never would have imagined this could be me. This is how powerful these stories can be. This is what happens when we tell ourselves these stories about ourselves and believe them to be true. They limit us. They keep us in closed spaces and they confine us to be small people that never grow and evolve.

But we are not small people. We are big people! We are all always in process and progress; growing and changing as we experience this wild trip called life! At any point in time we can decide to believe something new about who we are and what we want to be. We can re-write the script whenever we are sick of the character we are playing. We are all creative and we all have the ability to weave whatever life we want for ourselves. It is a matter of getting out of our own way so that we can be open to the experiences and opportunities that are here for us every step of the way. However, if we remain “stuck” in our beliefs about who we think we are, we will remain closed off to these new experiences that help us grow and see things in a novel light.

In order to be aware of the stories that you are telling yourself, I invite you to examine the beliefs that you hold about who you think you are. Continue to ask yourself the question, “who am I?” As you continue to grow and experience, keep asking yourself this question. We are more than we think we are. We have the inherent ability to be whoever we want to be and to create whatever life we want for ourselves. Exciting right?! I think so too. As always, it is important to remember to be kind and compassionate with yourself as you explore what you think makes you “you”.

I hope you all have a great week and continue to be open to what arises as well as express gratitude for yourself and the abundance that surrounds you:).

Peace,

Rylee

Jane Beal Poetry:

Aloha everyone,

Here we have our newest submission by the talented Jane Beal. She shares three poems with us that touch on her experience of the struggles of growing up as a female within her familial structure. Thank you so much Jane for your wonderful words that cast a light onto the issues of gender expression within the family as well as the greater society.

Questions that arise for me when reading these poems are “in what ways does the labeling of gender constrict us into suffocating roles?” “How can we move past what we think we know about gender and the stereotypes that are placed within each gender role in our society so that the full expression of who we truly are can be shown?”

Here is a bit about Jane:

Jane Beal, PhD is a poet. She has created many collections of poetry, including _Sanctuary_ (Finishing Line Press, 2008), _Rising_ (Wipf and Stock, 2015) and _Song of the Selkie_ (Aubade Publishing, 2020) as well as three audio recording projects: “Songs from the Secret Life,” “Love-Song,” and “The Jazz Bird.” She also writes magical realist fiction, creative nonfiction, literary criticism, and music. She teaches at the University of La Verne in southern California. See http://janebeal.wordpress.com.

She says about her work:

“Of the many types of oppression in the world, oppressive gender dynamics within families can be the most devastating for the developing female person. When I read the poem, "My Real Battle Scars" by Sophie Szew on Ishvara's Wellness website, I was reminded of three poems of mine that explored related issues: "Working Construction," "Battlefield," and "I Dream of Horses." I hope these will speak to the very real issues of unwaged labor and psychological oppression that girls face growing up in their families today.”

She also says about being an artist, “I’m a poet. When I was fifteen, I got my first paying job as an optician, so I developed the habit of looking at things closely, through different lenses, and from different perspectives. I later became a teacher and a midwife. So I like to share what I’ve learned with others in ways that are creative and meaningful, and I know how to care for pregnant mothers and welcome babies with love (and stop hemorrhages and resuscitate newborns if I have to), which I’ve done in far-flung places like Chicago, Denver, San Francisco, Uganda, and the Philippines. I haven’t lost my faith in God despite everything I’ve seen – the opposite, rather – I am in awe of the Creator. I like zumba dancing and birdwatching. I love music. All of this (and more) goes into the poetry. I write poetry because I want to. Poetry bears witness to everything that matters in life.”

“Working Construction”

When I was a kid,

I stripped

a roof in the summer,

peeled up

a linoleum floor

with a blow-torch,

and hauled brick

across an open yard.

I would work

like a man

just to eat 

almond chicken

chow mein

at China Station

for lunch

with my dad.

At the end

of the day,

I swept up sawdust 

with a push broom,

though the wooden handle

was too long for me

to manage

easily.

I would wait

for my dad

to notice

what I did

and approve

of me,

his first-born 

child.

But one day

when I was eleven,

I looked up and my dad 

was gone –

his skill-saw still 

turning in the garage

on nothing 

but air. 

“Battlefield”

My family life is like the Civil War.

Our Gettysburg comes every December.

I stand, a lone fife player, overlooking

a field of dead bodies.

Beside me, my brother, the little drummer boy,

holds his sticks still, unable to tap out the time.

Will one of the Confederate soldiers roll up

off the ground and wink at us like our father?

Will a Union nurse trudge toward us through this 

muddy, bloody battlefield with a world-weary look on her face?

We cannot hallow, we cannot consecrate, this 

ground: as the snow begins to fall, the cold 

truth settles into our bones.

“I Dream of Horses”

At my old house, next to the horse-barn, under 

the pepper tree, I saw my soul 

standing shoeless in the flood. 

The water was rising above my ankles 

to wet the hem of my crimson dress.

I watched as all the neighbors tried to get out, 

hauling what they could salvage

in cars about to become boats without rudders or anchors.

I wondered if Noche, with the white star 

on her black forehead, and Spook, all pale 

like a ghost in the night

could swim in the rip-tide river like sea-horses,

like mares without foals, like unicorns.

I wondered if I should climb the pepper tree or wait 

for my horses, for manes like rough ropes gripped 

in my fists, for the wild ride.

I looked out empty, full 

of my loss, with no sugar cubes 

or apple-cores or hand-fulls of grass –

nothing to give, nothing else to lose, 

not even my shoes,

in the deep water, 

where my soul was standing 

still waiting to see if my horses

would come and rescue me 

before I drowned.

Confronting Our Shadow:

Hi everyone,

Today I thought I would talk about the importance of confronting our shadows. Like most of my other posts, this is something that has been showing up in my life recently and I thought it would be best to share my experience as it is unfolding for me.

What is the shadow? The shadow parts of ourselves are the parts that we do not like or agree with. They are the parts that society has deemed “unworthy” and consequently are forced to take a backseat within our being. They are suppressed, but are not gone from who we are. They tend to show up in other ways in our lives. For instance, when you feel triggered by something and become upset and say or do something that you felt you had no control over and usually regret- this is your shadow showing itself. This has happened to me many times and continues to happen to me now. Anger and rage have been a big part of my shadow self. Because our culture says that feeling and expressing our anger is a negative thing, I learned that instead of expressing it in a healthy way, I should try to instead suppress it and force it away in fear of being judged or ridiculed.

But my anger and rage do not leave me. They continue to build and build until something sets them off and they appear in worse ways than if I had expressed them in the first place. I then feel immense shame for this and think, “I am a bad person” or “my anger and rage are bad and should be suppressed even more”. The cycle continues.

Showing our emotions is not an easing feat in our modern, technological society. It is considered a weakness in most cases, especially if one is considered male. But holding our emotions in is not healthy and only makes the situation worse when they do decide to show themselves. Suppressing who we are fully can lead to illness within the mind, body, and spirit.

So what can we do? Our shadow is not going away. No matter how hard we try to hold it in and cast from ourselves, the more it continues to manifest itself in other ways; some that may be unconscious to us.

In order for us to grow and evolve into the people we long to be, we need to first accept all parts of ourselves. I need to accept my anger and rage and when they arise within me I need to welcome them, feel them, and let them pass as they are meant to. This habit is very hard to break as our learned-behaviors are wired into us. But the more conscious we become of the habits that do not serve us, the more we will be able to take our power back and decide what habits we want to keep and what we want to leave.

It is all about perspective. Our shadows are not a negative thing. They are not something to run from. There is no light without the darkness and our shadows are here to show us the beautiful experience of what it means to be a human. Facing our shadows can have an enormous effect on our relationships with ourselves and others as well as how we react to what comes up in our lives.

Yes it is scary to confront the parts of ourselves that we deem “unworthy”. But perhaps ask yourself, “why do I feel that this part of me is unworthy?” Ask the question, “where is this coming from?” and then listen to what answers arise within you. Journaling has helped me immensely when confronting my shadow self and I have learned so much about the various aspects of who I am.

I encourage you all to confront the darkness within yourselves. We all have it and it is nothing to be ashamed of; it is what makes us human.

I hope this resonates with you, if you have any questions or comments feel free to reach out:). Happy New Moon as well.

Rylee

Hi all! Here is another beautiful piece by Noe Pina depicting the emotional effects of oppression. A lot of the time we cannot see how much oppression takes a toll on us and on those that are effected by it every day. This painting can help us put this into perspective by giving us an image of how debilitating the structures of oppression really are.

Some questions are arising for me are “how can we use art to help open up the tough conversations about oppression?” “what questions do we need to be asking one another when talking about oppression in our lives?” and “What can we do when faced with these strong emotions of vulnerability when thinking about oppression in our own lives and in our society?”

Most times we do not want to bring the topic of oppression up when we experience it or see it happening because we are afraid of disrupting the status quo or making ourselves and others feel uncomfortable. But it is exactly in these uncomfortable times when we can break open and let change happen. This is where true growth lives; in the uncomfortable times of uncertainty. Art can help lead us there. Thank you so much Noe for submitting your work and engaging in this process.

Here is a bit about Noe and his project:

Noe Pina, Noē Piña, was born in Los Angeles, CA as a first generation American. He grew up traveling throughout Mexico and in those travels visiting museums, galleries, and cultural institutes. He studied at Instituto Cultural Cabañas in Guadalajara Mexico. In Los Angeles, he studied at The Los Angeles Music & Art School, Plaza de La Raza, and Otis College of Art and Design, where he received a Bachelor of Fine Arts. He helped establish the arts program at Oxford International School. Later he taught art to inner-city students at Soledad Enrichment Action Inc., a non-profit organization founded in 1972 by mothers in East LA who had lost their sons to gang violence. He taught Art and Language Arts as part of The J. Paul Getty Museum: Art & Language Program at P.U.E.N.T.E. Learning Center in Boyle Heights. He owns a vintage store where he gathers some of his inspiration and items for his recent exploration in assemblage art.

“The painting that I submitted is where the figure expresses a feeling of being crushed, defeated, vulnerable, restrained, and censored. Emotions that accompany oppression. I hope that my visual representation of oppressed individuals can be used to illustrate the subject at hand, alongside the blog or text.”