Aspire Magazine: Inspiration for a Woman's Soul.(TM) DEC 2016 / JAN 2017 Aspire Mag Full Issue A Miracl | Page 70

environment I experienced while visiting my dad when I was young. The time had come to let myself and my parents off the hook. Time for a new chapter and verse. When our afternoon came to completion, I changed into my bathing suit and went off to Sturgeon Bay for a swim. It was 92°F with super high humidity that afternoon and I was ready to cool off in the big water. I made my way out to my favorite sand bar and kneeled in the water, closed my eyes, and let the waves wash over me. In that moment, I released a big part of the shame, guilt, and suffering I no longer wished to carry forward. In the mirror of my mother’s reflection, I knew exactly what I needed to do and opened my heart to receive healing from the pristine Lake Michigan waters. If you feel weighed down by guilt and shame and you want to stop suffering, I recommend you practice the following exercises… JOURNALING A therapeutic way to get everything you’re feeling on the page. Everything you feel guilty about. Everything you carry. Write about your wishes for healing and forgiveness. Please don’t judge yourself or edit your words. Just get let the words pour out of your body through the pen and on the page. What standards you’re trying to live up to. Are you trying to be a saint? If you’re trying to be perfect, you may need to remember that you are human. If you were raised in an environment that made you feel small, I invite you to bring this information to the surface. Allow yourself to identify some of the benchmarks you may be trying to measure up to for validation. For instance, when I was younger, I craved validation from my father. I thought if I was a good enough athlete, student, and business woman etc., my father would be proud of me. PRACTICE SACRED SELF-CARE I invite you to start practicing self-compassion and sacred self-care when you start to feel low, unworthy, or overwhelmed. Go for a swim, take a walk, take a warm bath or shower and wash those feelings down the drain. Call a friend. Listen to upbeat music. We all have days when we feel small, when we feel like it’s all too much. When you remember these 70 www.AspireMAG.net | December 2016 / January 2017