INTEGRITY AND JOY

What is this odd photo?  It's me taking my golf cart to the "big store" to load up on groceries.  I strap 'em on the back, feeling a wee bit ridiculous as I buzz down the main drags of Key West with my haul. For the little stuff, I hit the farmer's markets and little grocery on my bike.  So much fun.
 
I'm including this partly for the absurdity value, but also because I want to share a story about embracing our whole self with joy.  In an odd way, it relates to President's Day which we celebrate this coming week.  The presidents we celebrate demonstrated amazing integrity in the face of really stiff challenges.  Were they perfect?  Of course not, but somehow they rose above the doubts and fears that keep us from acting from our strongest, best place.
 
So what do those lofty leaders have to do with me and my golf cart? Well, like every other human I know, I've had my own doubts, fears and challenges.  And when I've shared about the amazing abundance of getting to be in Key West for the winter, I have felt a tinge of embarrassment at times.   
 
So my self-study led me to what was underneath that guilt. And the answer for me was fear, a fear that I hear in different forms and with differing answering responses from a lot of people.  Am I enough/ do I deserve good things?  For a lot of years, my way of resolving that fear was to try and "earn" love and abundance through service.  That was pretty natural.  I'm a nurturer by nature, but like any quality, it can become a shadow quality with a destructive edge. For me that usually means giving beyond my physical capability until I’m ill or injured.  The Universe and my body speak, but I don’t always listen!
 
But what I've been learning is that I AM loved and lovable just by my very existence and me spitting on the gifts of this life or squandering my light and the accompanying joys of living serves NO ONE.  Killing myself to "deserve" that love helps no one. In fact, what I'm learning is that the more I accept and celebrate these Universal gifts, the more I'm able to share and expand the light for others.  
 
What I've found is a calling to help others embrace their own wholeness, help one another shed our old fear-based and crippling beliefs, and assist others to step into their own Divinity so that they, too, may share what they're here to offer the world.  The more we can take on that journey, the more integrity and power we bring to our existence.  
 
If any of this sharing made you uncomfortable, irritated or judgemental, that's ok!  I invite you to explore these and any emotions you encounter as well as the physical places where those emotions land.  What great feeding ground for your own discoveries. Why do you feel something? What's underneath that feeling?  Persist and I know you'll land on your inner wisdom, too, even it it's to say, "She's wrong!"  Welcome to awakeness.
 
And if it made you think, hmm, that’s familiar.  Again, welcome to becoming awake!  I’m always happy to chat, share, disagree, explore. Reach out!