Lovers: Beware of B Words

Baby
Babe
Bae
Boo

and about a million other terms cute expressions of endearment.

Just a short post today to tell you to be on the lookout for B words. . . 

Sometimes these terms of affection are full of love. Like nice little baskets you fill with good intentions to reinforce how you feel about each other. I'm all for that! Nicknames can be connective and bonding.

And sometimes these terms of affection are manipulative. Empty. Flat as on old shriveled balloon. They can be used to control and influence you. Lead you to believe someone cares more than they do. 

How do you tell the difference?

Trust yourself. Listen to your intuition. Most of all - notice if the person's walk matches their talk. Do their actions align with their words? Do they consistently treat you like you are special to them? Or only once in awhile?

Notice when they use sweet little nicknames. Notice when they don't. Do they use them to greet you? Do they use them when they want you to do something or not do something? Do they use them to appease you? Or do they pop out spontaneously and real like honest feelings do?

B words mean nothing without an open heart and loving intention behind them. Don't give B words more meaning than the person using them.

*Photo by Rémi Walle on Unsplash

Love Chooses You Choose Love

You know relationship pain.

Online profile lies, misrepresentations, deceptions, cruelty and judgment by people you don't know. You've had enough.

Vulnerability.

You have been hurt in the past and in order to avoid the pain, you vow to do it different this time.

Close your heart. 
Filter how much and when you share yourself.
Close down altogether.

What the hell do you reveal and what the hell do you hide?

You are afraid to try again and afraid not to. The definition of stuck.

How much or how little do you reveal of yourself when you start a new relationship?
What are your guidelines?
How staunch are your love boundaries?

Ready for new and next?

It's time to close your mind to confusion. Make room for new and connect to the emotional compass you have inside of you. Use your emotions to help you. All of them, they are your personal GPS. 

It isn't easy, in fact it's hard work. Beyond difficult and so worth it. 

You begin to listen. Inside.

Get quiet, turn off the noise and go off grid. Close your eyes to look within. Breathe until you relax. Melt. Visualize. Trust yourself, you have your answers.

Although you've been taught love is outside of yourself. Or that there is a magic formula. Or that someone knows better than you do.

Not true.

You know. Open up space in your thoughts to connect with your intuition, your wisdom and your heart. Stop disconnecting from your emotions, they are your guides. They provide information.

Align with what feels better. 

Get still. Breathe in your own way. Listen to the one person who knows what you want and what is best for you. You.

Plug into the inner wisdom you have been taught to ignore. Revive your inner voice. If something feels wrong to you - run. If something feels nice - pursue it. 

Forget what you should do, should sucks. Toss should and do what brings you joy. Now.

Ditch mind games. Unlearn social conditioning. Shift the rules.

Claim your relationship bliss.








Photo by Denys Argyriou on Unsplash

Love and Starfish Arms

You seek safety, yet you won't be shackled.

You crave certainty, yet you need choices.

You've had your heart stomped to bloody hell, yet you might try again.

Nothing about you is consistent. Humans aren't consistent. Emotions, thoughts and mindsets change with your experiences. 

How then, can you commit to a love partner? And trust someone to commit to you? How can you be sure that you will love each other in the long run?

You can't.

But you can unlearn the social conditioning that one person will make you happy. You can take responsibility for your emotions and actions yourself. Trust yourself deeply and purposely cultivate your unconditional love.

Know as people shift out of your life, it will hurt and you will grieve but nothing can deplete the unconditional love you have deep inside but you. You. You can't be cut off from your unconditional love unless you choose to separate yourself from it. Unless you abandon it. 

Like amazing starfish that grow a fresh arm when one has been severed, as you offer your unconditional love, more love takes it's place. Unconditional love regenerates. 

Unconditional love is infinite. 

Unconditional love is eternal and with you always. It thrives and thrums within you as you focus on it and take care of it. Share it. The more unconditional love you offer, the more you have.

So unlike other people, money, possessions or status, unconditional love won't leave you. Unconditional love won't break your heart, it will mend it. Your love enhances who you are.

Your challenge is to connect with unconditional love inside your heart. Meet the love and power you are. Allow yourself to enjoy it. Grow with it. 

Base your relationships on that and see what happens.  

***Photo by Karen Cantú Q on Unsplash

Amber Alert: "The One"

Bliss. Acceptance. Physical touch.

Having someone love you feels amazing. Beyond words. Few things feel better.

So you received the idea that love comes from the outside into your heart. And sometimes it does. Sometimes it doesn't.

What can you do when feel alone and separated from love? How can you turn on the love faucet that you have inside right now?

Close your eyes now. You were born to imagine, allow yourself to imagine. Picture in vivid and healing detail:

A time when you felt completely safe and happy. Imagine that you are cuddled up in a clean warm white blanket. You feel snug and secure. Stay with this feeling and grow it. Consciously expand this feeling of being protected within yourself.  Feel the soft cotton on your cheek, smell the fresh air and sunshine that dried the blanket and absorb the light and infinite warmth that embrace you. 

Breathe gently and know that in this moment all is well. You are in touch with your inner source of strength and wisdom. Deep inside you are connected. You are one with everything.

This is an unconditional love visualization tool. Put this self soothing tool in your tool belt. Use this or your personal memory of unconditional love to feel more at ease, more calm and peaceful inside. Anytime, anywhere. 

Stop laughing at "go to your happy place" and try it. Stop waiting for someone else to take you there. Start adding more harmony to yourself and everything you do. 

Love yourself from the inside. Your relationship with unconditional love will elevate, amplify and enhance every relationship you have now and will have.

Imagine what a love relationship would be like when the partners love themselves deeply and choose to share this love from an intention of discovery and bonding instead of desperation and neediness. They love themselves and create a new and different love together to explore and enjoy. 

Blows the doors off waiting to be rescued.

for more and to get your free love guide, click here: https://optimizedrelationships.com/free

or visit: https://optimizedrelationships.com/optin

Photo by Joe Mania on Unsplash

Baby Stop It

Close your eyes and visualize.

Imagine yourself walking in a gorgeous forest on a bright summer day. Notice the amazing birdsong, plants, flowers and trees. You feel alive and connected on your walk until you step into something sandy and soft that sucks first your left foot and leg and then your right. 

Quicksand.

You are in up to your waist and don't know how to get out. You do know that if you struggle, you will sink fast. Fast. In the next minute or two you will be in way over your head. 

This is what crossing strong boundaries in love relationships feels like. You are having a great time until you're not. It happens in an instant and then there's no going back.

Create strong healthy boundaries in your relationships to keep yourself centered and calm. Give yourself and your partner plenty of space to grow, change and adapt in. Consciously chose to reduce relationship claustrophobia.

One area clean boundaries are especially important in is thinking for yourself. Clarify what you want and what you want to express. Communicate your truth to be heard and respected.

Avoid the temptation to analyze and try to figure out what your partner is thinking. Don't get in their head, you don't belong there. You don't know what they are thinking better than they do. You don't get to play both sides of the relationship.

Unless you want to create a snarled mess.

You can't possibly think for another person and trying to results in painful guessing games and tangled communication. Figuring out and speculating about what is going in your relationship on sub and multi levels increases misinterpretation and possible hurt. Don't get caught up in the intrigue, connect with the love. Attempting to get in their thoughts stems from a need to control.

Authentic love can't be controlled.

Stay in your own thoughts to reduce misunderstandings. Allow yourself and your partner to own and be responsible for your own words, emotions and actions. Cut the drama in your relationships by thinking for yourself and allowing your partner to do the same. Share from an honest loving intention.

Forget and unlearn mind games that lead to pain. 

The Highest Mountain

Ever felt the stinging bite of the sharp toothed, green-eyed monster?

You know jealousy. The out of control, I have lost my mind, blood boiling emotional throttle of full on romantic jealousy. You want to force someone to love you like you know you deserve to be loved. 

Powerlessness.

Few emotions compare to feeling jealous. It's sharp, deep and jagged. Feeling jealous feels awful. When you perceive that your love is separate from and outside of yourself, emotions become tricky, tangled and tumultuous. 

You have it wrong. Social conditioning has set you up to feel this nasty inadequacy or jealousy over and over again. You can untangle your feelings and shift out of jealousy.

You are jealous when you feel you aren't enough. You are enough. You don't need to be fixed. It's time for you to mindfully release your jealousy.

Let it go. Unlearn the mindset that love is only outside of yourself. Love isn't a person or an object or an experience. Love is inside you, you are love. You are loving, lovable and loved. Truth. You can't fill up with love from the outside in.

Feeling unconditional love from inside is empowerment.

Authentic, genuine, healing, pain-free love is an inside source. Your powerful connection to love is within you. Unconditional love is inside of you and connects you with the energy of all that is everywhere. 

Remember this.

Remember that you have brilliant luminous love inside of yourself now. Your power source of real love is internal and eternal. You intuitively know an exquisite, calm, painless love that dwells in the depths of your being. Honor it, nourish it, and help it grow.

Then the next time you feel jealousy begin, help yourself remember that you can not feel love through another person until you feel it within yourself first. Strong self love will allow you to pick and choose who you share your love with. You won't need conditional love desperately from an external source because you have your own column of unconditional love and light within. Jealousy dissolves.

Unconditional love is your infinite supply of energy. Plug in your body, mind and heart to the infinite power of natural love that you have always had, you have now and you will always have.

Your self love will allow you to love others from choice instead of neediness. Start with self love. You are the one you have been looking for.

Eye Love

Obituary photos. 

Have you noticed them? Thought about them?

I used to work in a bank. One of my daily tasks was to check out the obituaries and make note of our customers who had passed so we could freeze their bank accounts.

I was young and I saw a lot of obit photos. I was slightly bothered by them because many seem to be of the person at a younger age. A much younger age. Some of the pictures were of the person who passed 20 or 30 years before they passed.

A big chunk of their life and experience went missing. Something important was hidden. 

These pictures didn't seemed aligned with who the person was and how they looked around the time they passed. I was curious about them. I wanted to see them as they lived their full life a year or two before they passed.

Oh I get it. The younger photos represent someone who hasn't  been ravaged by old age or illness. The younger snapshots represent the person as their friends or family want to remember them. If they were in pain when they passed, I understand not wanting to publish it. The younger photos keep our loved ones from being judged. 

But that's just it. The photos represent what used to be instead of what is. 

As I age, I find beauty in the face of someone who has lived a long time. I value seeing life experience and someone who has lived with courage in times of challenge and sickness. A person's story is in their eyes and each story is different and valuable no matter where they are in their life. 

Some of us have been fortunate to know someone who has now passed that we were able to love through the whole process of life and death. And we love now. Is there a deeper love or gift?

It's time to focus with compassion and understanding on the entire circle of life. We grow when we reveal the natural process of living and dying. With acceptance comes peace.

My mom was a patient in hospice twice before she passed. The words of a Japanese proverb are painted on glass at the entrance to this hospice that simply read, "The sun setting is no less beautiful than the sun rising."

A new visual.