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May
10
2017

Our Children, Our Teachers

“A thousand names for joy. “ ~ Byron Katie

For us parents, it is a wonderland of surprises to watch our children grow up and live their lives. Whoever would have guessed as they grew up and became adults, that they would have chosen this or that… or this or that opportunity would have unfolded for them. I gave up trying to control that a long time ago!

Right now my oldest daughter, Holly, is in East Africa and just finished a safari. She actually left Vancouver in September 2016 with a backpack, hiking boots, a swimsuit, and money she had saved from working two jobs. She left Canada on a one-way air ticket, travelling on her own. How cool is that?

She is a young woman with dreams, and one of them is to experience the world. She decided the time for this dream was NOW, and she went for it! Personally, I am very excited that she is following this dream – that she has put this all together, created it.

I am sharing this with you because my children have been, and still are one of my biggest teachers in life. They inspire me to keep growing in ways that are really important to me.

She sent many photos. I loved all the “big 5” animals in Tasmania, but there was one photo that really caught my eye. It’s the one you see… her holding a little creature in her hand.

I was mesmerized by the expression on her face. She is so alive in the moment with total appreciation and delight for this small creature. I remember thinking, “wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could all our lives with such aliveness and appreciation”. It was a reminder for me of how juicy life can be when we are really in appreciation, especially for the little things in life.

It’s wonderful to have an ‘elephant’ of experience or a ‘lion’s’ worth of active fun. Most of us are the most alive when things are going our way. But to be alive because we are simply in delight about a small creature or thing in our life, that is really hitting the jackpot of health and vitality.

From my experience, the consistency of joy and happiness is related to our ability to find delight in the small things in our life rather than take them for granted. Everything can be beautiful. Even the way the wax melts off a candle can have us smiling in wonder.

Day-to-day delight comes from our appreciation of all the small things. Of course I love it when a big thing comes my way, but the daily emotional, spiritual, and physical nourishment comes from our joy in all the small creatures or things in our life.

Now of course there is another layer to this experience that I found really interesting. The small creature she is enjoying is a chameleon. A chameleon can be a symbol for us of the power we have if we use it wisely. A chameleon changes colours… easily and effortlessly. It has the innate capacity to do that. As humans we have the innate capacity to change the colour of our moods, perceptions, and life experiences.

We have been gifted a lot of power with this capability. We don’t have to stay ‘blue’. We can change our colour to bring us vitality and happiness. Both vitality and happiness are inwardly charged. There is a tremendous amount in literature about this. The well known saying, “what we focus on, expands” gives us a great deal of power to change the colour of our moods.

Everything we experience is dependent on how we process it… what meaning we give it. We are chameleons in a very positive way. All the innate gifts we have are dependent on how we use them. Use them well!!!

I would love you to invite yourself this month to be more alive to all the good stuff around you. Bring in appreciation, especially for the small creatures or things in your life. And know you have tremendous power, like the chameleon, to change your colour to a tone that fills you up inside with vitality and happiness.

Tags: acceptance, awareness, Bev Pugh, choice, happiness, life, love, Mastery of Health and Happiness
Posted in awareness, Gratitude, Happiness, Health and Happiness, Health and Wellness, Love, Self Growth, Uncategorized | 4 Comments »

May
10
2016

A Technicolour Yawn

“If you don’t enjoy your life, something else will —-despair, sadness —.” ~ Anonymous

keep-calm-and-be-presentRecently, it feels that many off us are being affected by uncertainty or loss. This is certainly showing up a lot in my caseload, and my extended family.

Part of life is experiencing ‘unwanted’ circumstances. There are many emotional stages related to our internal processing. I am an expert because I have been through them all! We can be dealing with feelings of disbelief, denial, anger, sadness, despair and more.  It takes some time to move into acceptance.

One of the most important things I have learned from myself and my career is that we can determine the amount of time we spend in each stage. Our beliefs, the perspectives we hold and our philosophy can profoundly affect our emotional processing. I have seen this over and over again.

There are two tools I am sharing with you today which recently helped me navigate through the ups and downs of life.

Overwhelm is an emotion we all often feel when facing an unwanted circumstance.

An important resource for managing overwhelm is and exercise called Releasing Internal Pressure. This is pivotal. We can’t move into perspective, recovery or wisdom until we have released all the churning thoughts and opinions that are swirling around inside of us.

I know this is true for myself. When there is internal pressure inside of me my nervous system kicks up, and my mind gets very opinionated and active. Neither are peaceful states! A mistake that I have made many times is assuming that the internal pressure will just go away on its own. Or if I distract myself, it will fade. No, it just pops up again. I have tried avoidance, and I certainly don’t want to drown in uncertainty.

I personally release internal pressure by doing continuous writing. I have an old exercise book, and I keep it just for my continuous writing. I write non-stop and quickly – its more like a scrawl. I can say anything I want because no one will read it. I can swear, have gobs of spelling mistakes, use judgement, and just emotionally vomit.

When I was working in Australia I learned that they call continuous writing a “technicolour yawn”. Great description! Some of my continuous writing is juicy!! You keep writing until there is absolutely nothing more to say, and your breathing deepens.

Then start again the next day, depending on what internal pressure comes up. This is very cleansing. It also keeps us in integrity with how we really feel, rather than trying to avoid it in some way or move to a higher level too fast.

The second pivotal tool is not letting our minds run ahead of us into negative thinking. This can be a real challenge. I know it has been for me. Our minds, when worried or scared, can go all over the place. In the past (how could this have happened?) or in the future (will it be alright?). We usually leave out the present moment. This creates added stress, and slows down our resources – either for ourselves or for someone we love.

Our minds try to figure life out, and are tying to protect us. So they get busy. That’s where the habit of a busy mind develops. Now we have “habit” overlaying initial cause.

Our power exists in the moment. That is where our strength lies. Bringing ourselves into the present is a powerful way to downregulate anxiety and worry. Another tool I like to use is called the Internal Flashlight. I find it gives me extra focus and support.

We can’t control our outer world, but we can our inner world.

When we understand that it is our internal world we want to focus on first, then navigational tools to help us with that become really important. I only go the outside, once I have cleaned up my inside…or as much cleaning up as I can do in this moment.

It is a really good feeling to have an expansion of our internal resources in life. It gives us more peace of mind.

Tags: acceptance, anxiety, Bev Pugh, emotions, life, navigate, power, present, pressure, processing, strength, support, worry
Posted in awareness, healing, managing emotions | 2 Comments »

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Beverley Pugh

Beverley Pugh

Beverley Pugh has international experience in Individual, Marital and Family Therapist services. Areas of practice include counselling in: individual, couples, family, anxiety, addictions, grief, depression, pain management, multicultural, workplace and others.

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Mastery Practice Tool

Breathing in Silence

Create a quiet moment and set a little timer for 2 or 3 minutes. Then sit and focus on the sound of silence. You will hear many inside and outside noises, but your focus is on the sound of silence. Notice the “noise” outside and inside, but allow yourself to simply acknowledge them and stay with your intention of focusing on silence. Notice how the silence sounds to you. Slowly over time you can increase the time you’d like to do this.

Testimonial

Bev's Laughing and Breathing Belly Workshop for Children was one of the best I have attended. She has a gifted ability to gently connect with children and teach and share with them her techniques of belly breathing, rooting, mind vacations and laughter. These techniques soothe and calm them whenever they feel overwhelmed or anxious - be at school, home or before bed time. Whether you have an overwhelmed pre-schooler or a test-anxious pre-teen, Bev's approach works! I love that she gave parents the tools to model and share these fundamentals of meditation with their children. I would encourage families to take her course...your children will thank you and you will benefit from ways to keep yourself calm and allow wisdom in.

Farrah J. - Mother of 3, West Vancouver

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About Beverley

Beverley Pugh has international experience in Individual, Marital and Family Therapist services. Areas of practice include counselling in: individual, couples, family, anxiety, addictions, grief, depression, pain management, multicultural, workplace and others.

Contact

Telephone:
604-925-1513
Email:
bev@beverleypugh.com
Location:
120-1451 Marine Drive
West Vancouver, BC
V7T 1B8
Canada

Disclaimer: The information presented on this site about various psychological conditions, is of a general nature and is not a substitute for an assessment by a competent therapist and/or medical professional. If you believe that you or an important person in your life is in need of an intervention please seek qualified help as soon as possible.

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