Archive for February, 2011
Gratitude Friday – 25 February 2011
Hello there! Happy 25 February!
It’s been a great week here at Rich Radiant Real – and here are five things for which I’m very grateful this week:
- Playing Junior Monopoly with Evie when she was at home sick.
- Having the lawns mowed (ahhh).
- Big, squeezy, yummy hugs from my girls.
- Sunshine on my skin while I hung out washing.
- Receiving the girls’ ecolunchboxes (stainless steel – no plastic!) in the mail.
I’m off to Melbourne to see family and for something very special… I hope you have a fantastic weekend, and week ahead!
The Power of Affirmations
Louise Hay is one of my favourite people in all the world. Her healing work (including the work of teaching others how to heal themselves) has helped so many people around the globe.
For many years, I’ve referred to a beautifully boxed set of her affirmation cards, called Power Thought Cards.
Every now and then, I pluck out a card, and am surprised at how well the message of the card relates to an issue I may have in my life at that time, or reflects something that I’ve been mulling over or analysing.
Today, I picked:
‘Everything I touch is a success’
Aah, what a nice sentiment!
To some people, these beautifully illustrated cards, each embellished with their words of wisdom, may seem to be frivilous. They doubt that affirmations work.
Well, I’m tellin’ ya that they do. If we want to ‘reprogram’ ourselves out of old beliefs that don’t support us, then we need to constantly soak ourselves in a new way of thinking. We need to surround ourselves with words that reflect the way we want to live. I’m a huge believer in affirmations, because they play a great role in helping shape our inner environment, which, in turn, shapes our outer.
But these things can take time – if you’ve tried affirmations before but became frustrated by an apparent lack of progress, I ask you to be patient. Quieten the inner critic that screams ‘but this isn’t true!’ when it sees or says an affirmation about something that isn’t true for you yet (or at least, doesn’t appear to be true). If you want to create something in your outer world, it must first be created in your inner world. So let affirmations be a part of your transformation, even if they seem to take a while to work. It took you your whole life to get you to where you are now, so don’t expect things, or yourself, to change overnight!
If you’re new to affirmations, I highly recommend Louise Hay’s You Can Heal Your Life Affirmations Kit
John Assaraf’s House
I really like John Assaraf. He’s such a nice guy, and he’s so passionate about what he does. He featured in the movie The Secret (Extended Edition), and in that movie, he told the story of how he actually bought (without realising it) the very house that he had placed on his vision board – as a photo – five years earlier.
He had spent time with that vision, imagining how it would feel to live in a house like that. And then it came into his life.
If you saw the movie, were you ever a bit curious about what the house was actually like? Well, be curious no longer. In the above clip, John takes us on a tour of the house. I love it’s natural light, its interesting layout and the artwork he’s chosen to grace its walls. My dream house is somewhat different, but I can fully appreciate the beauty of John’s house, and why it means so much to him. It’s a real family home, as well as being an inspirational workspace.
Have you created a vision for your beautiful dream life yet? Speaking of which, the fabulous audio course called Your House of Abundance: Laying the Foundations for Clarity, Peace & Wealth Through Guided Visualisation will soon be available for purchase – this course, hosted by me and presented by multi-millionaire and meditation teacher Danielle Storey, takes us through the creation of a house in our imaginations, showing us how to create whatever it is that we desire. Details will be available very, very soon!
Gratitude Friday – 18 February 2011
Whoa! Yet another precious week has flown by! Did you reflect on the things that made your heart sing this week? Did you know that gratitude has a most potent power, and that just truly appreciating what you have now in your life means that even more amazing ’things’ (or experiences) will come your way?
Yep, thought so.
Here are just five of my favourites from this week:
- The big smile on Evie’s face as she played at her tennis lesson.
- Our potted roses starting to shoot out fresh stems after all the rain we’ve had.
- Finding a fresh berry on our strawberry plant, and biting into it.
- Darren receiving a Kindle Wireless Reading Device, Wi-Fi, Graphite, 6″ Display with New E Ink Pearl Technology
(from Amazon) in the mail, which was a leaving present from his previous job. It’s so cute!
- Our roller door remote controls being fixed, and a handyman fixing a few other bits and pieces around the house.
Would you like to share five of your gratefuls for this week?
For the Love of Luxury Part I
In the February 2011 Australian edition of Country Style magazine (one of my favourite mags), decorator and interior designer Cornelius Horgan says:
‘My chief role is not so much as decorator, or even as a designer… it’s being able to assist people to live well. That’s my ambition. It’s not about people being grand or having luxury, but living well. And the good news is that you can do that with moderate amounts of money.’
I do agree with Cornelius when he says that you can live well with moderate amounts of money. But I beg to differ when it comes to defining ‘luxury’ – I think that living well is, in itself, a luxury.
The Macquarie Dictionary defines luxury as: ‘anything conducive to sumptuous living, usually a delicacy, elegance or refinement of living rather than a necessity’. Don’t you agree that living well, for many people, is indeed a luxury? I believe that luxury is in the eye of the beholder. To many, the word automatically conjures up ‘expense’. But why should it?
Having fresh flowers in your house can be considered a luxury, if it’s something you don’t ordinarily have. But flowers needn’t be expensive. You can grow them yourself, quite easily. Having time to yourself can be considered a luxury. But blocking out that time is something you can easily do (even if you don’t feel, right now, as though that’s possible – it really is). Having a clean, orderly house is something you can have – and you don’t need a lot of money to make it happen.
So, what’s your definition of luxury? Does it mean ‘living well’ to you, as it does for me? It’s all a matter of perspective, isn’t it? Even if you take little ‘luxuries’ into your daily life, you needn’t take them for granted and become blasé, which then takes away their specialness. You can choose to appreciate them. Life is all the richer for the luxuries that we allow ourselves, and that we appreciate.
I’d love to know what things or experiences you consider to be ‘luxuries’. Leave a comment below!
Valentine’s Gift for You
Happy Valentine’s Day! Have you been showering the people in your life with love? Have you given your car a kiss? Have you called your mother and told her how much you love her? Just few ideas, there…
If you’re really wanting to push out the boat and lavish love on the beautiful people in your life, why not make them these Luscious Love Cookies? They taste sensational, and, as a bonus, they’re good for you! What a loving gift…
This recipe appeared in the February edition of the Rich Radiant Real Your Abundant Life ezine – these are the sorts of recipes that I give, with love, to my ezine subscribers. If you’d like to be a receive this free ezine every month, simply pop your name and email address in the boxes on the top right of this page.
Have a simply wonderful Valentine’s Day, won’t you?
Luscious Love Cookies
Makes 5–10 cookies, depending on size
Make these special, sweet treats for your sweetheart – or for anyone you know. Leave time for them to chill in the fridge, and then savour them slowly…
Ingredients
1 cup pecan-nut halves
½ cup cashew nuts
5 teaspoons raw cacao (chocolate) powder
½ cup sultanas
1 teaspoon agave nectar
dash vanilla extract
teensy pinch Himalayan crystal salt (or any sea salt you have on hand)
½ cup raspberries (can be frozen raspberries that you’ve thawed)
fresh raspberries for garnish (optional)
Method
1. Roughly chop the pecans and cashews and place in a food processor.
2. Process the nuts until they resemble breadcrumbs.
3. Add the cacao powder, sultanas, agave nectar, vanilla extract and salt.
4. Process until well combined.
5. Add the raspberries, and process the mixture until it becomes a forms a type of dough.
6. On a sheet of baking paper, spread out the dough to a thickness of about 1cm. Use a blunt knife to help smooth the surface.
7. Using a heart-shaped cookie cutter, cut into the dough. You might need to cut around the outside edges of the cutter. If the mixture seems too sticky, put it in the fridge for an hour or so.
8. Carefully push out each cookie onto a plate, and chill in the fridge for at least an hour, until the cookies are firm.
9. Top each cookie with a raspberry, then share, and enjoy!
Gratitude Friday – 11 February 2011
I feel so very, very lucky to have so many things in my life for which I can be grateful. I’m also grateful that I have the awareness of how important it is to feel grateful – to really appreciate all the very real blessings that I have in my life. You have just as many blessings as I do – are you quietly noticing them and sending little love notes of appreciation to the universe?
Here are just five things for which I am grateful, from this week:
- Having fabulous, over-an-hour-long phone chats with friends.
- My girls starting sports that they love!
- Darren starting his new job this week, and really enjoying it (he’s also enjoying having a corner office!).
- Blissful quiet time during the schoolday, so that I can gather my thoughts, speak with clients and get heaps done.
- A friend sharing a special link on Facebook, to the Reflections of Motherhood video – gorgeous!
Care to share? Dare to share? Show us what you appreciate by leaving a comment! Mwuh!
Rock Meh!
You know how you just start humming random old songs? Maybe you’ll think of a word like ‘crazy’, and get the urge to start singing something like ‘…crazy for feelin’ so lone-lee-hee’? Surely that can’t just be ME?
Well, my girls always want to know more about the songs that Darren and I hum or (attempt to) sing at home, so we have started looking them up on YouTube.
Recently, Darren and I broke out with ‘Rock Me’ by Abba, and of course the girls wanted to see Abba in full technicolour.
So we found the clip for them on YouTube. We were soon all dancing around the office, and ended up breathless, collapsing in giggles. Good old Abba!
Thought I’d share this clip – hope it rocks your day, baby! I’m picking up some good vibrations…
Love Necklace
Oh. My. Goodness.
Usually, I’m not much of a jewellery girl.
But I think this necklace is simply gorgeous. Mostly because the small beads and ‘dashes’ upon it spell out – wait for it – LOVE, in morse code.
Isn’t that adorable?
Not least because this is the month for lurve. Valentine’s Day is coming up fast. Must drop a few hints about this necklace to Darren… (Darling, if you’d just like to click here.)
Imagine what good vibrations you’d be giving out when wearing this? Mmmm.
Moving House
It’s been a wee little while since I posted on the blog – apologies!
I got caught up in the flurry of our recent house move. We still have boxes to unpack, but we’re nearly there. It will be so good to feel completely settled.
I’ve learned quite a few lessons over the past week and a bit. I will pass these on in a forthcoming blog post; I just know they’ll be useful for so many of you.
I thought I’d do a list of things for which I’m grateful, in relation to our move and our new home and city. Here they are!
- Having cheerful removalists who were so careful with our possessions (even when they had to heave our exceptionally heavy latex mattress up a flight of stairs!).
- My girls behaving themselves so well on move day and beyond…
- Realising how many wonderful neighbours we had around us at our old place, and being treated to a special goodbye dinner by the neighbours who lived behind us.
- My grandparents providing dinner for us, when our day of cleaning (at our old house) ran later than we’d expected.
- Being able to give my grandparents lovely gifts, thanking them for all the babysitting, handyman help and support they’ve given us over the years that we’ve lived in Melbourne.
- Knowing that we’re not too far from our loved ones.
- Being warmly greeted by people in our new city (they’re so friendly!).
- Having Darren at home now, before he starts at his new job on Monday.
- Knowing Darren will only have a 10-minute drive to work each day!
- My girls enjoying their first day at their new school today – they were so brave, even though they were a bit nervous.
- Living in a beautiful area, in a beautiful home, with peace and quiet and fresh, fresh air. Aahhh…
Have you had a major life change recently? If so, have you been able to appreciate the blessings in it?
I’ll be back SOOOOOOON! Mwuh!
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