Furious Dancing

As the nights grow longer and various holidays approach, many people find the season difficult. Busyness abounds, people's spirits bounce between happy and desperate, and the continual cheeriness of holiday music adds to the disorientation.

Add to that, the results of the US elections ~ no matter your vote ~ and the occasional rockiness of the financial markets. Whew! Lots of situations out of our immediate control! Together this suggests this is a difficult time.

Personally, I love the concept of furious dancing to counter the effect of the hard times. Women have always found movement alleviates stress. Although men in some cultures dance, they mostly participate in other movement-oriented patterns. Music, dancing, rhythmic swaying ~ all these ways of releasing and changing the energy. The harder we dance, the more we release our sadness, fears and worries. When our bodies are in a strong rhythmic place, our minds move with the same rhythm. The more furiously we move, the more quickly our thoughts slip through our minds. We literally move into a higher vibration of being ~ more awake and aware to our surroundings and less willing to hold onto the darker space. Let's all find time to dance up a storm to whatever rhythm and music we choose. If nothing else, it's great exercise!

What do you do to get through hard times? Can furious dancing fit into your plans? How do you shift energy when feeling overwhelm? What other form of movement could help you get through these times? Does the growing darkness affect your mood? What else can/do you do to alleviate that?

Starting Over

Every now and again, I get the feeling that it's time to start over. Time to renew my commitment to myself so that I can be better and stronger and braver as I step forward into the world. Today is one of those days.

Recently, I've felt a bit lost, a bit confused, and more than a bit scared. Those feelings were caused by patterns of thoughts about my shortcomings and lacks. Those were the emotions of negativity. When I feel that way or think that way, I have difficulty connecting positively with the world. I'm a bit more paranoid about those around me ~~ "They must see how ____ (fill in with nasty, self-derogatory word/s) I am."

I don't feel that way about myself now. I've been working on those thought patterns and recognize that stress and loss can color how I see myself. And with those new patterns of thought come a renewed sense of purpose and belief in myself, in my capacity to be strong, to learn, to love and to keep moving forward. I don't know that I expect it to be easy and have no pitfalls or slips into the negativity. What I do expect is that I will become more quickly aware of the moments when I dip into that kind of thinking and feeling and make the choice to change to the 'higher vibration' of thought.

What do you do when you begin to feel bad about something you've said or done? How do you treat yourself at those times? How quickly or slowly do you forgive yourself and move on? Does it make a difference in your life?