Follow Your Own Path

Be yourself everyone else is taken. Six powerful words made from love that can set an intention to steer you on your own path in life. Words that invite you to trust and embody who you are from your soul's perspective. What a beautiful idea...No two souls are alike...Go ahead and answer the call of your soul. Be yourself everyone else is taken.

How different our world would be if children were guided from a young age to keep listening to their hearts and to use their creative imaginations to embrace and trust the incredible vastness and spaciousness of their own inner guidance system. Encourage your children to listen to their own heart's knowing and to follow their intuition.

Interest tests were filled out by me in junior and senior high school that helped me a little bit narrow down and discover interests. I listened intently and followed advice given to me by my guidance counselors about options that were out in the world beyond high school graduation. They didn't truly know me or what was in my heart. They helped with the college applications and testing scores needed for each college.

Leaving behind the small town where I grew up and attending college were two priorities for me. I was shy and unsure of what I wanted to do so I followed a few friends to a nearby college an hour away from where I grew up. Unlike them, I did not know what I wanted to do for the rest of my life. What a task to put upon the shoulders of an inexperienced high schooler who was never taught the power of following my heart's knowing. The college we attended was a good place to begin my life post high school, but it felt a lot like high school. It did not feel like a great fit for me.

My friends seemed to know what they wanted to do and who they wanted to be when they grew up...or so it seemed to me. It was not that easy for me to decide what I wanted for myself...so I followed blindly down someone else's path. Where was that fearless girl I knew as a child? The brave girl my fourth grade teacher called a leader. I definitely needed to get in touch with her and reacquaint myself with her courageous heart.

While attending this smaller university I met a wonderful young woman down the hall from me in my dormitory. We have become lifelong friends. She is the gift I found in my first year of college. We studied abroad together and attended classes in Guadalajara, Mexico for a quarter during our second year of college. Five hours per day of Spanish and Cultural Studies. We earned one year, 18 credits of Spanish, in one quarter. It changed the course of my life in so many ways. It gave me the courage I needed to keep moving forward in my life. I transferred to a larger university and moved to a bigger urban setting. I joyfully kept the friend, but left the school to continue to find myself.

There is a lot of pressure placed upon high school students to know exactly what they want to be or what they want to do as a vocation. I was not taught to follow the inner knowing of my heart and soul...or how to listen to that inner guidance system with trust and love for myself.

Words I share to my younger self and anyone who longs to be free to embody their true essence. Breathe and be yourself. Listen to the whispers of your heart and follow her path. When you live from a heart that is wide open it enables you to set your soul free to live the life you came here to experience. What did you want to be when you were a child? How can you create that life here and now?

Surrender and let go of the judgements, guilt, shame, and limitations set from people in your life that want to make decisions for you. You know the ones for which I am referring. The people in your life that think they know what is best for you. Send forgiveness and healing to yourself, your parents, and others that thought they knew what was best for you. Forgive the conditioning and programming you received from parents, siblings, friends, churches, teachers, society, and the subconscious fears held onto from past lives. Forgive it all and release its current hold on you that perhaps is blocking your ability to follow your own unique path.

Release the conditioning that keeps you stuck and has settled deeply and rests in the cracks, crevices, and tiny spaces of your being that have been hidden and tucked away and out of sight. There is no time like the present moment to step in to your power and live your life by developing your own sense of self. What do you love? What brings you joy?

Breathe in and bring healing energy to reclaim calm, peace, and clarity to where there are any jagged thoughts, stuck beliefs and emotions, words said and heard throughout your lifetime that told you what to do, how to be, and what to believe in. Let go of any punishing thoughts you may have ruminating in your mind of how you should be. (It's time to stop shoulding all over yourself.)

Be gentle and loving. Your open heart and open mind will lead you down the path of endless possibilities and the knowing that comes from the deepest part of you and the truth that resonates in your soul. Find the connection to your highest self, your witnessing mind, and your ability to connect to the universal mind.

Start where you are in this moment and begin to live an authentic life by standing in your truth...even if it feels wobbly and you feel misunderstood! You are moving in the right direction when you choose to be yourself in the highest expression of yourself. We can certainly find inspiration in teachers, books, experiences, but in the end, be yourself. No one can do what you can do. The path is a journey inwards to find your gifts. It is an inside job.

What creative connections long to be laid bare with your heart fully open? Nurture connections that nourish your soul's journey. What whispers have you felt, heard, known from your soul's urging? Be love and let go of fear. You embody love. Step out of your comfort zone...that is where your soul likes to play. You are loved.