​I invite you to give this a moment of attention even if you don’t feel much resentment. Let’s get super subtle here and be free free free. If nothing else, check out the bullets below the pic and find one thing to keep in the fore to enhance your well-being (which includes aligned, not exhausting, service).

Resentment has such a bad rap. It has its unfortunate place over with anger, where people relegate unwanted emotions—over in the bad zone. Who wants to be resentful?

Yeah, please don’t sit around resenting. But resentment might show up briefly anytime, kind of like the delivery person, and when it does, there’s something to receive with a thank you.

Beyond the scope of this writing are all the reasons you don’t want to shove resentment down into the cells of your being to accrue & fester there. That happens with denial and vilification, so instead, let’s just make resentment the nice delivery person, who’s in a hurry anyway to get on with the next delivery. Just open the door to briefly, get the goods, and get on with your day.

Resentment as delivery person may put a wrinkle in something you’re doing right now, but you WANT the thing being delivered. That thing’s going to make your life easier or more pleasant somehow.
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Here are some typical message-deliveries resentment brings. And bee-tee-dubs, you might just consider whether one of these might be for you to keep cleaning up even if you’re not tuning in to any resentment:

• you’ve been saying yes without first checking in with yourself
• you’ve been saying yes when you mean no
• you’ve been saying yes when no is the right answer
• you’ve been confused about what it means to be nice or polite or a good person [or fill in a role, like spouse, parent, progeny, worker]
• you keep hanging out with people or in situations that deplete you
• you aren’t making self-care important enough; you’re not taking full responsibility for your own well-being
• you’ve forgotten the importance of fun & pleasure & ease as part of your total well-being (and thus offering your best service)
• you’ve been letting things like guilt or obligation, or someone’s manipulation tactics or fears, or your old habits or tendencies [or fill in something more relevant] determine what you do or don’t do
• you haven’t been telling the truth out of some misguided notion that something else, like someone’s hurt feelings or anger, is more important (and it may be worth identifying your something else)
• you need to keep working on (naming, setting, holding) those boundaries situationally, every time one is called for, now & now & now
• you think you should give [do, finish, show up for] more than what’s actually yours to give [etc.]
• you’re out of balance with giving and receiving, or giving to others and giving to self (and here’s my latest EFT or Emotional Freedom Technique session on that topic)

I love to think in terms of the first whiff. If you get just the tiniest whiff of resentment, pause with it a moment. It’s got something for you. Don’t ignore it. Ask it nicely what it’s got for you. Ask what it’s pointing you to that’s going to support you to be

• more self-honoring
• kinder & clearer to self & others
• more balanced
• lighter, less encumbered
• equipped to further set yourself free free free

Love & blessings, Jaya

​It’s American Thanksgiving time again, when people in the U.S. are urged from all directions to be grateful. And the gratitude craze isn’t all-American: especially in spiritual circles, it covers the globe.

I’m not (entirely) against gratitude, but I have written before about the potentially more solid and powerful aspect of appreciation, as compared to gratitude (which may have stickier components, like that of needing to put out I’m-so-grateful to deserve good things coming your way).

In this writing, I’d like to explore the POWER of appreciation in your process of creating your life.

As you look around you and observe your life from eagle view, or take in this one moment, appreciation is always available.

It’s an option. It’s a choice.

It’s worth reaching for, because what you appreciate really does nourish your total well-being. It feels good to appreciate. You feel good about what you behold when you appreciate it. You set yourself up for feeling more goodness, and hope expands, and your sense that your life is worth showing up for expands.

So then your sense of can-do expands. Your ability to take the next step with ease expands. With appreciation in the fore, you may find yourself more energized and clear in creating your life.

Everything expands as you give it your appreciation. It gets better and feels nicer and turns its best face your way. So …

• Appreciate your home
• Appreciate what transports you
• Appreciate this body you’re in, that is both home and transport
• Appreciate what and how much you can do
• Appreciate your work
• Appreciate your people
• Appreciate random people you cross paths with
• Appreciate what you have access to because of where you live
• Appreciate the animals you get to encounter or interact with
• Appreciate Mother Earth, and her trees & stones & water
• Appreciate the weather

​That’s a good one to stop on (the list could go on and on, obviously). It’s a good one because we’re BOTHERED by the weather these days. It can disturb us.

But note that anything else on the list can go off-kilter! Things (people, places) go wrong or get wacky all the time. It’s all in progress and impermanent, either breaking down or growing & improving.

So something not wanted or not to your liking can be found in most anything most anytime.

These somethings can, could, and do easily make you feel bad, if you let them. They stir up dissatisfaction (and maybe a sense that you're not okay, and then maybe a fear you’ll never be okay). …

Think in terms of where you put your FOCUS.

In any life, any scene, any moment, there’s wanted and unwanted. (That’s Abraham-Hicks language again.) There’s always stuff to appreciate with every fiber of your being, and stuff to bellyache about.

Which will you focus on?

It’s up to you what you animate and fuel and expand with speech and thought and strong emotion.

When you offer & feel appreciation (especially with every fiber of your being), you energize your own being and your very sense of well-being. You also declare and establish that this stuff you’re appreciating is what most matters to you, what’s predominant for you.

And that predisposes you to notice more of it, to make much of it, to lean into all that you appreciate that’s right here, already in place in this imperfect moment & reality.

Thus, you expand and you create more of what’s wanted. By choosing appreciation, you consciously create your life, the life you want.

Call it self-fulfilling prophecy, call it Law of Attraction, call it basic common sense: there it is any way you slice it.

Love & blessings, Jaya