What did I learn today? Lessons on the Journey to Unconditional Self Love

 The real change, the kind that brings true power and freedom, happens when we stop chasing the external gaze—the validation, the approval, or the attention of others. When you start asking yourself the deeper questions and listening to your own wisdom, you shift from relying on the outside world to knowing that the answers are inside you.This shift is where your true power lies. Dr Robin Smith Cape Town, thank you. I am leaving with heart full of gratitude, a multitude of lessons and a reminder of who I am. Confessions on the Journey - I like to be chosen, I want others to choose and validate me, and depending on who decides to not choose me, I fall apart in so many ways forgeting that there is nothing personal in this experience called life and my worth does not depend on certain people choosing me. I was reminded on this trip to hold myself accountable but do not take other people's choices personal. Life remains intimate and impersonal. Once we are in the experience of life we

  In life, you're given the responsibility for yourself, and the opportunity to serve everyone else. True fulfillment and success arrives when you’ve achieved a balance between these two worlds . . .Guru Singh My grandmother would say in response to the question "How are you?"  "My child I am holding on to the balance wheel and holding on to courage" I would laugh, I had no idea what she meant and to ask would start a long conversation that I usually would not want to enter into especially as a teenager. My cousins and I would make fun of it, we would change it up, make variations, sing songs about it.  As I got older I started paying attention to it. I never did ask what it meant, I made up my own meaning and have been using that as a guide I am living my life with balance and with courage no matter what comes my way. An important question to ask yourself as you journey through November when faced with a decision "is this going to support balance in my lif

  When you have a decision to make, ask yourself does this keep me in balance or does this throw me off balance? Carolyn Myss  Cape Town continues to fascinate me with its beauty, its diversity, its history, its realness. I made a decision to do a safari. Of course I did, why would I come to Africa and have an opportunity to see animals in their natural habitat and miss it?  The bus collected me in town at 6.30 as we set out on just over a two hour ride outside of the City of Cape town to the Aquila Game Reserve. The sun was just coming up over the mountains as we headed West. The clouds, the rising sun and mountains combining together made for a postcard setting as we drove towards the reserve.  The mountains started making way for rocky cliffs that looked almost hand made, like little huts with thatched roofs made out of stone on both sides of the road with vineyards in between. There was the choice of going through a tunnel cut amongst the mountainous cliffs or using the road over

  Newsflash: Anger is spiritual too. Anger does two things: responds to real threats in your environment, or lets us know when a boundary has been crossed. The only time anger is unhealthy is when it is not expressed in the present . Your Spiritual Mermaid  I was scheduled to travel to Namibia on Monday morning. So excited, I was I could hardly sleep, the taxi was arranged to pick me up at the hotel at 5AM, I checked in online the night before (as you do with all that excitement) and waited to fly 2 hours to Nambia. It would be my first time in that country. The taxi collected me, I checked in, got my boarding pass and as I was about to take my laptop out to scan a representative of the airline asked me to step out of the line as I was being flagged. He asked me if I had a visa.  "A visa?" "No sir!" "You need a visa to go to Nambia madam" "Can I not get it there?" "No maam" "Step out of the line and come with me" Now I was kic

Today is a good day to learn, today is a good day to die - Prisoner on Robben Island   And just like that I have been in Cape Town South Africa for the past eight days. The Conference came to a spectacular close with a celebration and an opportunity to reflect on what was discussed and learned during the week, The last day offered another opportunity to meet in small groups to discuss innovative ways of philantropy and measurement of what works in giving grants to grassroots organisations and feminists/ Immediately after the last session  on Friday, I rushed out to catch the views at sunset at Cape Point - This is where the Indian and Atlantic Ocean meet,  to see the pengiuns at Boulder Bay.  Natural beauty and landscapes speak to me like nothing else. To experience nature is both healing and a testament that there is something bigger than me. There is no competition amongst the sea and the treas, the sunsets and the clouds, they all co-exist in majesty. Seeing this is a wonderful rem

Part of healing requires you to release your attachments—whether it’s to people, places, or even dreams you once held dear. This doesn’t mean you stop loving your family, friends, or those around you.  Rather, it means learning to love them while also growing beyond the need to be tethered to them . Dr Robin Smith Today we did a sacred circle. Women from Sri Lanka, South Africa, The UK, Vietnam, Australia, Kenya and of course Trinidad and Tobago sat together, made space and shared in a non judgemental space how they felt about doing "the work" What is doing "the work" Doing "the work" is  1. Radically accepting that we are born worthy 2. Giving ourselves grace in times of poor choices, being exausted and in feelings of defeat 3. Forgiving ourselves - as a practice rather than a one-off 4. Supporting each other through it all 5. Letting go of guilt and shame especially for things that were put on us by others 6. Telling the truth even when it is hard - bein