Archive for the ‘vulnerable’ Tag
Vulnerability in Change – Part IV
In the true nature of who I am—cutting through the chase and being transparent I ask you to answer the 
above question. Hygiene is important is it not? What happens when you don’t change your underwear? It doesn’t take long before there is a smell, a stench, a stink that repels others and attracts bugs. We give strong advice to our children about the necessity of good hygiene. We reprimand them for not changing daily.
I know the title might be unappealing and even repelling to some but I believe it’s a good analogy. We wouldn’t think of wearing the same underwear for three or four days: smelly, seedy, downright gross. But, we somehow never give a second thought about wearing smelly, seedy, downright gross energy which is much more harmful.
I work with women who are either leaving tainted and destructive relationships, changing careers, or going through some type of major transition. Many are vulnerable and feel such. Even age, a major birthday like a fiftieth, can leave a woman vulnerable. I can do one of two things for these women: I can tell them they are incredibly strong, amazing, and resourceful beings who are fearfully made.
I can tell them they have the innate power to get up and take control of their life and circumstance. They have the energy to kick ass and take names. They need never, ever give up hope! They do not have to remain vulnerable. Or, I can make excuses.
I can hold their hands, rub their backs and heads and tell them their horribly debilitating, disabling and somewhat diabolical situations are just that and there is no way out. I can tell them they are too broke, too small, too inferior, and too ignorant to change. I can make excuse after excuse. I can tell them they are not responsible for their situation and they are a victim (definition referenced below). I can blame the devil or demonic powers.
What feels better?
Which of the above scenarios feels empowering? The “Oh, life is terrible, poor me,” or the, “I am in control of my life and nothing can stop me. I can make a change!” Or better yet, “I can make the decision to change.” Really, which one? What about my situation again. I could have sat with a pocket full of money, the Gulf at my feet, feeling sorry for myself; or I could make a decision to enjoy my dream-come-true and move forward without being a subject of attack.
The Tools I Used
As mentioned in Part II of this series, I pumped up my grounding. Instead of spending an hour tormenting myself, trying to figure out what I was going to do (my mind didn’t know there was no previous experience) I amped up the prayer and meditating. I amped up the asking. I had to even ask what to ask. I really didn’t know. Have you ever heard of praying or asking amiss? It sounds like “God, Source, Universe,” whatever name you use, “Will you show me the way?” Sorry but that’s asking amiss.
I was in a strange place. I had gone where I’d never dared to go before. “Show me the way” wasn’t cutting it. So instead I asked, “Send me someone who will speak and bring the truth about living in this part of the world. Send me someone or people I can trust in the purchase of land and property. Let me find the true voice.” I got specific and clear in my ask.
In my time of meditation this is what came to me, “You shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free.” This is what also came “Lean not to your own understanding; but in all your ways acknowledge Him, for He is directing your path.” Guess what happened? Go ahead, I dear you to guess. Truth, Trust and Voice showed up almost immediately.
A couple overheard my conversation while having breakfast one morning and they came to the rescue. For no charge they would take me around and show me available properties. There was absolutely nothing in it for them. They weren’t realtors. They weren’t agents.
After they showed me around, they went one step further and began asking locals if they were interested in selling their properties. They then volunteered to pick me up and show me more homes and land. Upon my partner returning, they invited us into their lovely home sharing everything they knew—their experiences of living in theYucatan.
They then took us to a property we had been looking at and were interested in buying. They had no way of knowing we had previously seen or had interest in the property. They told us the “true” price the seller was asking. The property had been previously marketed to us for $15,000 over the seller’s asking price.
Not only did this couple show up but others as well. The truth and nothing but the truth was showing up. My neighbor directly across from me became a heart send. I asked if I could accompany her when she was going shopping inMerida with other beautiful sisters. She said yes. I asked if she would mind taking me to drop my trash at the town dump. She said yes.
Here’s the humility lesson I spoke of earlier. I had to wait for someone to take me to get rid of my trash. Interesting enough, a truck came by often; but, I would always miss connecting. Not until my partner returned. Do you think there was a lesson? This woman, by the way, is the same woman who owned the cat my dog had killed. She invited me to afternoon events where I would eat, laugh and meet other trusting and kind souls.
I told another amazing couple, who are now quite good friends, that I didn’t know how to ride the bus. They told me how much it would cost. They told me what to say to the driver, in Spanish, when I needed off. And, they took me directly to where I would catch the bus to go into town and back home again.
Suddenly, there was a plethora of trust and truth. Why? Because I specifically asked for its help! I had so many invitations, so much help that I was overtaken. I’d arrive at home, late at night, exhausted from all the shear adventure, fun and pleasure: fashion shows, afternoon jam sessions, shopping in the City of Merida, potlucks and then all the gala that goes with the Thanksgiving and Christmas Holidays.
And for the voice, I found the voice of truth all around me. My personal voice as well became emboldened. I also took responsibility for learning the language. I speak with confidence as I continue to learn. The words now come more easily.
It was so simple.
- I realized I was beginning to sink in negative energy
- I took responsibility for the energy
- I made the choice to change the energy
- I asked for spiritual help
- I asked friends and neighbors for help; and when they showed up
- I responded; I didn’t send them away.
I changed my energy. And, change came.
Thanks but no thanks
So many times God, Source, the Universe sends us help and we say, “No thank you.” Our answer shows up or new energy shows up and we say, “Sorry, not today.” Okay ladies, it’s like you have the choice of putting on the beautiful, new, sexy Vickie Secrets and instead you choose to wear the big, old, raggedy and stained bloomers and wonder why your partner is cheating. Yes, I went there. It really is the same thing. Isn’t that sexy underwear energy? You bet it is. Don’t you feel and act sexy when you wear them?
Let me make you a little angrier. Maybe you’ll do something. We choose to remain in the abusive relationship with excuses. We choose to remain on the boring, unchallenging, low-paying job with excuses. We remain in the broken state of sickness and “dis” ease holding onto anger, hate and un-forgiveness, to name just a few of the crippling emotions, because the smelly, stinky, stench is comfortable and familiar. The known stench is more comfortable than the fragrance that will eventually come with the newness and the change.
Your new energy, your answer can show up in many different and simple ways. Sometimes, it’s simply a smile. Other times, it’s an outstretched hand and heart; it’s someone offering to buy you a cup of coffee. Often, it’s your intuitive voice whispering the direction or way to go.
If you can change your underwear daily, you should give just as much if not more attention to changing your energy, for the better, daily.
To be continued
Victim: 1. One who is harmed or killed by another: 2. A living creature slain and offered as a sacrifice during a religious rite. 3. One who is harmed by or made to suffer from an act, circumstance, agency, or condition: 4. A person who suffers injury, loss, or death as a result of a voluntary undertaking: 5. A person who is tricked, swindled, or taken advantage of:
Vulnerable: Susceptible to physical or emotional injury. b. Susceptible to attack:
Vulnerability in Change Part III
To be vulnerable means you’re susceptible to emotional or physical injury. You’re open to attack. Your guard is down and your boundaries weakened. Let’s use my relocation as an example.
I am usually, pretty much, in control of my own life. I know how to take responsibility, get things done and do them right. Ninety-nine percent of the time, okay maybe ninety-seven, I feel good about myself. When I don’t have the answers I know where to turn. But now, I was in a new environment, hence strange. I had no experience to fall back on. I had no blueprint. With all my intelligence I was at a loss. I was handicapped. And because of this loss, I became vulnerable.
I didn’t know how to prime my water pump. I didn’t know how to contact municipalities or services, if necessary. I couldn’t just walk into a grocery store and find what I wanted. I didn’t even know if they had what I wanted. And mind you none of this seemed so bad when my partner was with me. We would have fun with the challenge. We would laugh with the store clerks as they would laugh at us, dumb gringos, trying to communicate.
Did we have Spanish books and translators? Of course we did; but, the translations just aren’t always the same and the verb, adverb thing gets all weird. And things have gender. It didn’t matter. It was all an adventure. But now, it wasn’t an adventure any more. I was dealing with real issues: pumps, the well, the cistern, the pool, and the dogs—all of it. It was all unfamiliar and I was doing it alone! My perspective of my situation changed. It went from being a fun, fabulous and fascinating adventure to being a horrific, harrowing hassle. I was allowing myself to energetically drain.
Am I Okay?
My loss of good energy caused my self confidence, self-esteem, and sense of knowing to be hit and they were hit hard.
Subconsciously, the question that was being asked over and over was am I okay or will I be okay. My partner was gone. I relied on him for transportation, direction and protection in a strange place. We had each other in the unfamiliar. Now, that was gone; it was more loss. Deep down inside, my spirit knew I’d be just fine. But, in my soul realm: mind, will and emotional realm, I questioned. I wasn’t sure.
What did that cause? You guessed: anxiety, stress, negativity, and subtle depression. Creating what? Like one of my favorite oldies groups, The Temptations, would say a ball of confusion. What did that ball of confusion create and attract? You know the answer—anxiety, stress, negativity, and more depression. And what did that magnet create? You see how the cycle is created? I wasn’t consciously asking for any of this.
So, remember the pumps, the well, the cistern, the pool, the dogs and the shyster realtors? (Let me say here that there were and still are very good realtors in this beach area. It just takes flushing them out.) They all became my enemies. The pumps broke down, the cistern overflowed, the pool turned green, the lab chased and killed the neighbor’s cat. And, for the realtors? We’ll just let that subject alone. Confusion begat more confusion. Drama begat more drama.
When the light goes out
When you lose positive; good; and balanced energy due to difficult change or life transition, you grope in the dark, eyes wide open, trying to find your way—trying to figure things out. You bump into obstacles. You stumble. You fall. You can become drained spiritually, emotionally, mentally and even physically. The bumping, stumbling, the falling can cause bruising. The bruising can turn into wounds or hurts, creating and attracting more negative energy.
Might this explain why terrible things seem to always happen to the same and often good people? May this be the reason why some fall and can never get up? May this be the answer to why others drop into the seemingly bottomless, hopeless pit: the abyss? No matter what they do, no matter how hard they try, no matter how hard they pray (and yes I did say pray; I know many believers in this situation) or do the work, they keep coming up short? Simply, in life transition the energy—the brilliance and the light can be drained sometimes going out leaving us in hopelessness, stuck in painful cycles, limiting and blocking our possibilities.
Let’s take a look at four of life’s more difficult transitions: a move, a divorce, a job change, and the death of a friend or loved one. Have you been through any one of these? How did you feel before, during and after the transition? Did you become mentally fatigued? Did your body react? Were there physical manifestations? I would always become ill a few weeks after starting a new job.
Life transition can leave us what? You’ve got it! Vulnerable: susceptible to attack either mentally, emotionally, physically and even spiritually. Long exposure to these transitions can cause grave damage to the adrenal system which can leave you open to “dis”ease: Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Fibromyalgia, heart problems; and yes, even cancer. A cycle of these transitions can lead to distorted thinking: irrational decisions and behavior, borderline personality, and phobias. That is, unless you have a positive solution, a method, a means of dealing with the transition.
Pulling Yourself Up and Out
What can you do to pull you out of the muck and mire, up and out of the attack? First let me start by reminding you of some basics. You are an incredibly amazing being. You are made in the image and likeness of God. You are perfection. You are magnificence. You are awesome. You are beautifully and fearfully or graciously made from reverence in reverence. You are energy! You are atoms (Adam) filled with light! You are truth. You are god in the earth.
We all have ways of dealing with life transition. However, when you’re feeling or have become vulnerable, you may need to amp up the healing practices or learn new methods in order to come through the transition, the trial, the test without too much damage. We’ll look at these in the next episode.
—To be continued
Day #11
Part I— Just Like Junior High Again
I’ve recently experienced a major life-transition. I never knew the physical change I’ve dreamed about for so long would take me down Vulnerable Boulevard which almost lead to Hysteria Lane. Now I think it funny. After so many years of doing the work and after teaching the power of God, Creator and All Energy, I was feeling like a twelve-year-old leaving elementary school headed into junior high: stupid, afraid, and vulnerable.
That’s right! All the fears, all the vulnerability, all the school-girl craziness flooded back. Humbling, terrifying, mystifying; everything I’d ever feared, wondered, questioned all rolled up and delivered in a neat little package—all within seven weeks. Here I was the transitional-life coach right smack-dab in the middle of the weirdest transition ever.
Vulnerable Young Teen
You see, in October my partner and I moved to the Yucatan Peninsula. It was the beginning of our transition into retirement. From the very first time we set eyes on this magical land, we knew this was the place. No questions asked. For several years, we visited each time staying longer. Now it was time to plunge in for the six-month test making sure the place we had pegged, the beach, was the right place in deed.
We knew before setting out, we’d have to return to the States within a month to handle holiday business. We planned to drive down and then drive back to the U.S. In turn, after the holidays, six weeks, we’d make the six-day drive through Mexico to the Yucatan again. After the first trip, we realized not only was it not economical but it wasn’t the sensible thing to do. We couldn’t put our hairy, four-legged family members through that experience again so soon. Nor could we do it to ourselves. So, in our finite wisdom, we decided my partner would return to the States via Frontier Airlines while I stayed behind.
Where we have chosen to stay in the country of Mexico is very safe. We don’t worry about the Cartel or gang and drug violence or anything else for that matter. The Gulf Sea is at our feet. Everyday is Sunday. This thing called time takes on a new perspective here. What could possibly go wrong? My three protectors, my three crazy labs, and I would carry on.
Reflecting back, I don’t know what we were thinking. I would be without a vehicle. The truck we’d driven down would be here, but it is a three-quarter-ton, monster truck with six shifts. My feet can barely reach the pedals. While I’ve been driving since nineteen, the share size and power of the vehicle intimidates me.
I don’t know why we hadn’t thought about a rental. Oh yes, I do! The insurance required would cost just as much as the car rental itself. And, I would need to get to the next town in order to rent the vehicle. My handle on the language was nil at that time. It’s not much better now; but, I now have the confidence to blurt something out even if it’s a far cry from what I’m trying to say. Like, “Can I pickup my laundry on green?” So now, I couldn’t drive and I wouldn’t go anywhere without an escort because I couldn’t communicate with the bus drivers and I couldn’t phone for a cab. (In theYucatan, the bus drivers do not have designated stops. You tell them where and when you want to exit. I didn’t even know how much it would cost to ride.)
To add to the dilemma, some of our first contacts on the beautiful beach were somewhat twisted. At first, they appeared to be good and straightforward; but, in reality they were difficult and some were, what I would define, downright evil. These folk had the personal agenda of making loads of money quickly and easily off the non-suspecting, naive newcomers. There were many good people, of course; great people in fact. But, for some reason they weren’t our initial contacts.
With my partner headed back for the States, I was the new kid on the block trying to sort out the good guys from the bad—the northern banditos with contracts versus the honest realtors. Who really wanted to befriend me for the sake of being friends? Who was telling the truth? Who could I trust? There were days when it was impossible to tell. Yep, just like seventh grade, again.
So now I have: no transportation, limited communication, and the need to sort out the genuine from the frauds, fakes and fanatics.
Let me add one more piece to the vulnerability puzzle. The infrastructure in this part of Mexico is not keeping up with the numbers who are migrating. So, the Internet service is one that can be enhanced. We use the Internet for television, phone service, and of course email. When the service is down all communication in our house it cut off from the outside world. There were days I would awaken and have no means of connecting with my partner in the States. I could have used the cell phone but that was an extremely expensive way to do so. I did, often times, send text messages to let him know I was okay.
There were days I would sit in my house surrounded by many neighbors; yet, isolated. To top it off, the first week my partner was away one of our sweetest, lovable labs let his natural instinct kick in and attacked the neighbor’s family cat. She died within two days of the incident. Would this family still like us? Would they forgive us? What would be the gossip in the Beach Telegraph? This family had brought their pet down from the States and she had been in their family for many years. My partner and I cried on the phone, together, that evening.
Was God trying to tell me something? Was I trying to tell me something? What the hell was going on? Things became so convoluted there were days I couldn’t tell reality from the Yucatan Twilight Zone. When I did connect with my partner in the States, the conversations should have been sweet and cherished, “Hi honey, so good to hear from you.” However, the conversations were turning sour. “Why didn’t you call! I’m sitting here all alone. Don’t you know I need you, you $%&%?” Thoughts lead to feelings, which lead to actions. My actions or reactions lead to a result. What was resulting in my life was distrust, cynicism and paranoia and let’s not leave out anxiety and stress.
Yes! Just like junior high, again. All I needed was an outbreak of acne. But wait! I did have an outbreak of acne. Big welts appeared on my checks and along the insides of my nose. There I was, fifty-six years young, in the local Farmacia frustrated and flustered pointing to the big, unsightly, pus-filled welts, trying to ask for acne medicine using Spanglish.
I’ve often thought, “To only be a teenager and know what I know today, I’d do things differently.” I’d been presented with the opportunity. Life in the Yucatan was unfolding and time would tell if I’d keep those words.
—To be continued
above question. Hygiene is important is it not? What happens when you don’t change your underwear? It doesn’t take long before there is a smell, a stench, a stink that repels others and attracts bugs. We give strong advice to our children about the necessity of good hygiene. We reprimand them for not changing daily.
