Allie Atkinson
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Reflections from a 34-year-old me

12/10/2015

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It seems so melodramatic to say that there is a big shift from being 33, to being 34, but for me there really was! 
It was my birthday on Saturday and I had a delightful weekend celebrating. I thought I would probably get the post celebratory slump, especially as I ate sugar on Sunday at my afternoon tea picnic.
Yesterday I was relatively okay. Rick came over after work, we did a few errands and then I was really wrung out. I put it down to walking a LOT at Mitre 10 Mega and the aforementioned sugar and party slump. Today, however, it has really hit me that I am in my MID THIRTIES. I am single (well, unmarried), I don't have children (hopefully just 'yet') and life is not at all what I planned it to be.
In theory I know that The Universe has my back. Some amazing abundance came my way the other day and my health is at an all-time high! I am dancingI am dating a wonderful man and he also wants babies, should our journey take that path together.

I should be really happy, but today I am grieving for the 'life that didn't'. You know all of those dreams that you thought would be yours, but you decided to go in other directions. Directions that I am so very happy I went in. Yeah, them. I am grieving that thanks to my advanced age and my Chronic Fatigue, the chances are high that I won't get the large family I always dreamed of. I am grieving for the friendships that couldn't get through my mental health issues and the business that has been put on hold while I sort out the Chronic Fatigue. I am grieving for the many, many, many hours I spent getting to know people who are no longer in my life, for the projects that I then went on to abandon and the plans that I had but never achieved.

I SO love my life and I am oh, soooo grateful to be where I am. I know that I needed to explore those areas and to go through that loss to get to where I am now. No one said however, that it wouldn't hurt. A LOT.

I decided to go easy on myself today. To trust that I would be okay. However, I kept being guided to reads stories about mamas. I am hoping that it's to prepare me and that I will get to have my own mamahood journey before long. I pray that I will get to experience that particular joy. I was talking with a friend about how I feel really 'empty' right now. Of course that's the absolute worst time to have a child. I never want to bring a baby into the world to try and fill a gap. In my opinion, a baby should only EVER be an addition to an already rich and rewarding life. Otherwise how will I cope with the lack of sleep, the feeling like crap all the time and the inability to leave the house without a lot of planning. Oh hang on a sec, that sure sounds a lot like my life over the last seven years with ME/CFS and food allergies ha ha Maybe things wouldn't be as hard as I think :P

So, an honest look at where I am in life right now...


  • Making: Love with my beau as often as we can ;) I love the long slow days in bed where you talk about life, feelings and direction you plan on heading in. I LOVE falling in love!
  • Cooking: Stirfries, my ol' regular curries and surprisingly after being vegan for almost 3 years, a little meat. I joke to my friends that Rick is the drug dealer of the meat industry. As in, he literally distributes meat for a job :o It sure is taking a little getting used to, but I have been pondering moving to a paleo diet for a while as the research I have done suggests it's good for people with auto-immune conditions. I am scheduled to see the gastrointestinal dietitian at the hospital in Nov, so we'll see what she has to say. The community dietitian thinks that I may have to go onto a FODMAP diet, but that seemed a lot less restrictive than my current diet, so I have my fingers' crossed! 
  • Drinking: Water! I was getting too dehydrated and the dietitian was concerned about my coffee consumption (although I know MANY people who would drink a LOT more coffee than me! I was drinking one regular and 2-4 decaf coffees a day and she felt that it was too much). I do not eat enough calories and she thought that if I drank less coffee, I might eat more food. Unfortunately not the case, I am still not hungry much at all and the thought of food leaves me feeling a little nauseous. Oh well, less than a month until my hospital appointment and more water can only be a good thing!
  • Reading: Right now I am loving NZ Your House and Garden. I was really looking forward to a subscription for my birthday from my mother, but she decided at the last minute to just give me money again, so I have to go without. I try to go to my local coffee shop 10-15 mins earlier if I have a coffee date and pour over it. It's fabulous! 
  • Wearing: Rick and I went to the local Save Mart on Sunday and I found lots of gorgeous new clothes! I am feeling so much more in alignment with who I really am when I wear them and I only bought things that fit well and made me feel fabulous. I now have a large pile of things to go to an op-shop. I love to purge after buying new things. If I have anything that doesn't feel as great to wear as the new things, then out they go! It's part of my minimalism plan, but it also means that it's so much easier to get dressed every day!
  • Feeling: Grief, gratitude and soooo, sooooo much love! My man is always telling me how much he loves me and I am loving him in return. Of course, we've not been together very long, so that love will only grow. Such wonderful times! Abundance has been flowing into my life lately and I am so grateful for it. The grief that I am feeling will flow past and I am allowing it to be part of my life without wallowing in it. So proud of how well I manage my emotions these days. Being mentally ill was some of the hardest times I have ever been through. I am so grateful for having a different way of seeing the world now and moving past a very difficult mental health condition!
  • Needing: Time to recover from the birthday. Time to be okay with being emotional and lots of loves.
  • Listening to: Spotify 'Throwback Thursday' when I want music and lots and lots of Abraham Hicks recordings on YouTube! I had gotten too far away from Spirit and they've really helped me get back in alignment. I'd been getting abundance in small trickles. Now it's flooding in!
  • Saying yes to right now: Nurturing myself and doing things that feel fabulous. Opportunities. New love. Abundance. Space in the calendar. Living life in alignment with Source. 
  • Saying no to right now: Things that drain me, or that I have an energetic discord with. Spending time with people that are not good for me. Pressuring or talking negative to myself. Too many commitments.
  • Thinking about: Babies and finances.
  • Worrying about: Not getting to have babies and whether my new career direction will be a factor in that.
  • Noticing: How amazing life is when you follow your inner guidance system!
  • Working toward: Living my Core Desired Feelings consistently! I have my list outside the toilet door and every time I pee, I read through the list and allow the positive emotions to flow over me. 
  • Pinning: Information about being an ENFP and for some random reason about mothering twins. I have always had a 'premonition' that I would have twins, but after my boys (twin kittens) came into my life 9 years ago the feeling dissipated. Several months ago the feeling of twin girls came into being and I am not sure what that means yet. Rick has twin sons from a previous relationship, so that might be the reason it's on my mind? I am not too sure, but for some reason today I was called to look at wrapping twins. I am a big believer in wearing babies/toddlers and as long as my body can handle it, I would love to do this if I am blessed with children. When my Goddaughter was born I purchased a Moby wrap for the new parents and I love wearing her in it as I plodded about the house. It felt very right and natural to me. I have NO idea why today I felt called to investigate this, but I was and I pinned several images and read througha couple fo blogs about parenting newborn twins.
  • Finding most nurturing: Knowing that I have a friendship group of women. Being friends with women is a relatively new thing for me and as I feel called to step into my feminine, it's becoming more and more important to me. Spending my birthday with 10 women, was pure magic!
  • Dreaming about: I am not normally much of a (night time) dreamer, but lately I have been having really vivid dreams about loss, death and endings. They feel so real and hard to shake throughout the next morning. Pretty understandable as I go into a new phase of life with a new relationship and business. My daytime dreams involve mainly relationship and business goals. I am so excited about life and where I am heading!
  • What I’m grateful for right now: I am sooooo grateful for Rick. On paper we are so incompatible and perhaps we are long term?, but he is so good for me right now! He excites me, yet calms me simultaneously. He encourages me to go after my dreams with gusto and he lets me cry in his arms when it all feels a little too tough. He dances Ceroc with me and is likely to take part in a dance competition with me at the end of Jan next year.  We go to town and party like a couple of teenagers. He makes me laugh and grin and make goofy faces. He gives me hope that I may get to be a mama yet and he will make such a great father! The way he speaks about his boys makes my heart sing! 
Want to also play along? Copy my list and fill in your own answers or just pick a couple of categories that jump out at you. Post in the comments or share a link if you post it somewhere else. I got this idea from another blog and I want to hear what’s up with you, too!

As always, take care and know that you're loved! 

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How can I stop living so small?

30/8/2015

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I have vulnerability issues. I literally never, ever feel safe in the world. As you can imagine, this causes many problems for me in day to day life, but it seems to be making the creating of a business next to impossible.

I am sick of this self-sabotage and I want to play bigger, but when it comes down to fundamental belief systems, you can’t just do a couple of sessions with a Life Coach or spend a week or two on it! 

I have spent the last 5 years working on this on a daily basis and I am only just getting to a place where I can see a glimmer of possibility. That’s pretty big! I am tired of people telling me that it’s easy to fix and seeing me as faulty. Guess what guys, that’s my issue and if you continue to see me that way, how am I ever meant to get better?

As many people know from their own childhoods, that there are many families that function with the philosophy that ‘children are neither seen, nor heard’. As an only child whose parents worked long hours, I learnt to live in my own world, to be independent. That is not natural for me, (I am an ENFP and need a lot of people time) but as a highly sensitive person, it was the only way to cope. 


I am scared to live big, it is so ingrained in me to be in the background, to meet other people’s needs and to not have any of my own, that I struggled for many years to even have a personality of my own! These days I am living authentically ME and I am a whirlwind of ‘Allie’ but still, every time that I come out of my shell, I get extremely vulnerable and need to cave again, sometimes for weeks, or even months! before I can summon enough bravery to try again.

When I was running OnlineCoachSupport.com with Colleen Roberts, I would do something big, something that I was proud of, but the first hint of negativity and I literally shut down. In the past this meant ‘checking out’ and I had severe episodes. I cannot remember anything about these periods. The longest lasted three months in my early 20s. When I was with my ex-fiance, they happened a lot. I would put my ideas forward, he would disagree, we would have a fight and it would send me into an ‘episode’. Apparently I would lie in bed and stare vacantly at the wall for hours, days, or sometimes weeks. I have no recollection of these periods, except for the intense emotional pain washing through my body.

I am soooo very proud of the fact that I no longer need to ‘check out’ to cope with life. Although it has taken a lot of work and commitment to get to this point. Some of the examples include:

  • I don’t spend time with negative, confrontational people. We all have them in our lives, the people that want to disagree with whatever you say, just to be dicks and cause drama.
  • I only go to places that fill my heart and soul with positive feelings such as joy, bliss and happiness
  • I am no longer on Facebook etc. I make time to see people in real life and I have let go of the fake ‘friends’: the people who wouldn’t invite you to their birthday party, but are your Facebook ‘friend’. I don’t want to be a part of someone’s life unless they get joy from having me in it. 
  • I have extreme reactions to food, for example, sugar makes me incredibly emotionally sensitive, much like having extreme PMS. I am on a strict diet to ensure that I am as emotionally stable as I can possibly be.
  • I am working on releasing everything from my life that causes me stress (and learning how to read that stress in my body!)


Life is incredibly hard for me still. An expert in my condition likened it to having no skin on your arms and dealing with the pain that would result. Every time someone rubbed up against you, every time the wind blew etc Yet, we would be careful with this person. Having a condition where my emotions are raw however, people just mock me. I am labled as ‘mentally ill’, ‘crazy’, ‘worthless’, ‘overly sensitive’, a ‘drama queen’ etc. I really have NO idea how I am going to manage to be successful in a world where ‘doing’ equals successful. 

However, I am soooo incredibly proud of where I am in life and what I have achieved already. Going to dance classes and being willing to be a complete beginner is hard, yet I am doing it. Learning to not be devastated when a boy I like is not interested is hard, yet I regularly still ask them out and I am learning rejection coping strategies.


I yearn to matter in the world, but it’s still a major issue for me... I want to LIVE BIG!

I just watched a Webinar on creating and launching e-courses. I have been writing ‘Have a Love Affair with Yourself’ for the last six months. I have been living it for a lot longer. Yet I feel like I have no right to tell other people how to live. I believe so strongly in people being independent and respected for being who they are, that I don’t want to change them. I do not believe in ‘one size fits all’. I believe I have taken this into consideration in my course, but I am scared to see. I am scared to see if this will be a success, because then there is no going back. No possibility to ‘check out’ and what if I cannot cope…? 

But then again, one of the techniques that I mention in the course is about setting up a support network ‘before’ doing the work, so perhaps I should take my own darn advice and get started…

Action Step One: Actually post this on my blog.

Wish my luck my darlings, I so am going to need it.

Oh, and if you want more information on my e-course as I get braver and start telling people, join my mailing list at 

http://eepurl.com/bxcPZz

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Realigning my human-self with my spirituality

10/6/2015

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Most days I am in alignment with the fact that I am a spiritual being having a human experience. 
Some days, like today, I get so bogged down by my 'humanness' that I forget and need reminding.

When I struggle to 'be me', when I feel that I am being shaken around, like being caught in waves at the beach, not knowing which way is up, I often need to get out of my 'drama' and remind myself that everyone goes through this. That the drama is not 'who' I am, but merely a part of my human experience. 

Of course what I am going through IS important and it is necessary to go through to become even more in alignment with my true self. Anything that is important, is worth fighting for. One way that I can remind myself that I am on the right path, that living authentically IS the right way to live, is to read or watch content from people who I feel speak a similar message to what I believe.

Today, when things got hard, I watched the following two videos. They spoke directly to the part of my spirit that was seeking and they were just what I needed today. I put them here in case anybody else needs them too.

The Power of Authenticity

This video is a great reminded that what we speak, is a vital part of who we are as authentic beings.

Learn it, Live it, Give it.

This video really made me look at whether i am loving the life I am living NOW and the visualisation exercise at the end, really helped me to see that what I am doing now, truly IS setting me up to have the future that I desire. 

Allie gets naked...

After watching these videos, I managed to calm myself down enough, to do enough self-soothing, that I then recorded the following video for my business OnlineCoachSupport.com. It took a bucket-load of courage and i am so very proud to have taken such a big step. Let me know what you think :)
So, I am now feeling a little vulnerable, and using my own advice that I am 'good enough' just as I am :)

Take care and talk to you again, sometime.
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Meditation Mandala Monday: Love Yourself First

5/1/2015

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Be open to life.
Let people in, let opportunities in.
Be vulnerable, Be courageous.
Know yourself...

Love Yourself First

Don't expect any one to be able to meet your needs if you don't know what they are yourself!
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Test Post for Fiona

30/12/2014

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Will this work I wonder, well soon we shall see :D
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Oh, hello 2015

30/12/2014

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I love the New Year. 
I love the symbolism, the fresh start, the NEWNESS.


This morning as I watched my dawning of a new day, of a new year and possibly even a new life, I said YES. Yes to the possibility that this year is bringing. Yes to organisation. Yes to doing things a different way. Yes to stepping more and more into my true self. Yes to opportunities. Yes to authenticness. Yes to love. Yes. 

I welcome this year with open arms and I am so very grateful to be alive and to be watching the sun rise this morning.

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All I Feel is Love

30/6/2014

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I am being called to be a Mama

My babies have been spiritually calling to me for a while, letting me know that they’d chosen me, but I wasn’t ready. It just didn’t ‘feel’ right to me. I knew that it wasn’t happening yet. I knew I would be a mother, just "One Day".


Then my life changed dramatically last week when I held a five-week-old baby. There was no actual ‘Helliluyay’ My spirit guides didn’t shout out. I didn’t even get a great surge of emotion. It was a simple feeling of ‘rightness’ and I knew I was ready. I felt called to become a Mama.

Logically I know that it’s all wrong, my business is not fully set up yet, I am not financially secure yet, I have only JUST started dating my boyfriend etc. There are a million reasons why it’s NOT a good idea and only one reason why it is. Because I am ready to be a Mama. 



A mere week passes and my period was late. It felt like a sign. I was ready because I WAS pregnant. Okay, not planned, but it felt right. It felt good. I was happy.

Logically I knew that I was probably likely to be late with my period this month. I have been eating sugar and that delays my period every time. I had had the mucus that comes before my period and I could smell that faint blood smell that I get for a few days before hand. I had had the PMS symptoms of a little grouchiness and then a huge burst of energy. I knew that my period was coming. I often even get several of the ‘pregnancy symptoms’ such as sore breasts and swelling and faint nausea, so they didn't really count in the ‘I am pregnant’ hope. This month I had all that. All the symptoms of my period coming were there. I knew that the chances of me being pregnant were slim. 

But this time just felt so different. I had a feeling of peace and security about me. This inner ‘knowing’ that I was ready to be a Mama. But I had this strong sense of rightness in the world and for the first time in my life I was praying to be pregnant with all my heart and soul. Despite all the reasons to not be pregnant, I wanted to be and I thought that I was. 

I honestly thought that I was pregnant and my time had actually come. Understandably my boyfriend was freaking out, but all I felt was love for the baby growing inside me and this feeling of calm certainty that everything would be okay. 


Then yesterday I started cramping and I knew that I wasn’t pregnant. My guy came over and we did a pregnancy test. As expected, it was negative and my heart broke. I know that it’s probably for the best, but I am actually really upset. I then got my period today and I am genuinely grieving. I am bleeding this hope out and there is nothing I can do about it…

 There seems like little hope. I can not even actively try to conceive because M and I are not in that place in our relationship...


Yet, this feeling remains. I am ready to be a Mama. The time has come for me to set my life up to welcome a baby into it. I don’t know how, or when, this soul will come into my life, but I need to be ready. 

They're on their way and all I feel is Love….


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My 'Purpose' Binder: Full of Adventures in Purposeful Living

15/1/2014

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This binder is changing the way I view the world, well that's the intention. I want to purposefully sit down with my binder on a regular basis and engage fully with it. It's just a basic 3-ring A4 binder that I have decorated. I plan on keeping track of my goals in here in the form of One Little Word, Sea Change and using Leonie Dawson's Workbook. See post here for more information on these programmes. I want to use this as a modified Project Life album too. It'll be a purposeful mish-mash of authentic Allie. I am really looking forward to exploring and creating my ideal life with it. The outside alone fills me with joy and excitement! Go 2014.
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Sea Change 2014 - Week 2: Mindful Eating

10/1/2014

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Another habit that I am working on cultivating this month, along with drinking my litre of water in the morning, is mindful eating. In Sea Change, Leo suggests two minutes of Mindful Eating. In a bid to get healthier and release some excess weight on my body that is no longer serving me, John and I have started eating our meals with cake forks. I have a bit of a 'thing' for wee things and cake forks are one of the ultimate utensils in my mind. No only are they a tiny fork, a lot of them have a little built-in knife. Woot woot! (As it happens, I seem to love multi-purpose utensils. I also really like sporks, but that's a story for another day.) 

Soooo anyhow, back to mindful eating: each meal I sit with my food on a small plate or bowl with a little fork. I focus on each mouthful, savouring the taste, the smell, the sensations. I feel how the food sits with my body, whether I have any resistance to it. I feel when I am starting to feel full and I stop eating. 

A friend read that the ideal mouthful size for best chewing and digestion is about the size of a cherry. This is perfect with a cake fork, even if you load it up, it never exceeds this. Of course if I was shoveling food in with the wee fork I would still over-eat, but the mindfulness of purposefully eating each bite and tasting it has stopped me from doing this for the most part. If I am really hungry the first few mouthfuls can be a little rushed, but I am practising slowing down and being aware of this. 

Leo suggests mindful eating for one meal a day, but as I have already practised that, I have upped my goal to all food that I consume. It's really making a difference and I really want to continue with this and ensure it becomes a firm habit!
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Sea Change 2014 - Week 1: Drinking Water

10/1/2014

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So these two water bottles sit next to my bed. Each evening I fill them with filtered water and place them on my bedside table and every morning I drink both of them before I eat or drink anything else. 

WHY?

As I said here, I am participating in Leo Babauta's Sea Change programme. January 2014 is the month of Mindfulness. He encouraged us to start the year off with 2 mins of Mindful Sitting (basically the start of meditation). However he had an alternative for people who struggle with creating habits or keeping them going long enough for lasting change. He suggested choosing a 'easy' win to focus on for the month. I knew that the one thing that would make a big difference in my life was drinking a litre of water first thing in the morning, so I decided to focus on that.
A while ago I watched the Food Matters DVD. It really spoke to me! I had heard of David Wolfe before and I loved what he had to say and this part of the video captured my attention. I have been percolating on the concept of drinking a litre of water every morning for a while. I had done some research. I knew that it was something that I wanted to do. I had even tried it here and there. I just hadn't committed to turning it into a habit. As part of my vow to live more purposefully in 2014 and to follow along with Leo's Sea Change programme, I decided my first habit would be to drink this litre of water EVERY morning before I ate or drunk anything else. 

SO HOW AM I GOING?

I started on January 1st, 2014. This wasn't overly intentional. I had gone out the night before and had a few drinks, something I rarely do because my body doesn't process alcohol very well, and stayed out late. I woke up and drank a lot of water because I was super thirsty.
The next morning was harder and I didn't finish the entire litre before I had my coffee, but I did consume the entire litre and I am calling this a win. I signed up to the Sea Change programme on the 3rd and committed to continuing for January. The 3rd until the 10th I have drunk the entire litre before any food or other drinks. The first few days took a LONG time to drink. I felt full and uncomfortable. Now I drink it in 15-20 mins and it feels great. 

I had intended to just focus on this for the month and make it into a habit. I think I have finally committed however as I am managing it easily. Perhaps having John staying with me has made a difference? Maybe it's that I am motivated after deciding on my One Little Word – Purpose? I am not entirely sure. All I know for certain is, it feels right and I want to continue!
So instead of only focussing on building this habit during the month, I have decided to incorporate the second week Mindfulness habit of Mindful Eating as well. This adds a little complexity to the table as I am still continuing with the Week 1 habit, but I am bringing in the Week 2 habit as well. 

What habits are you purposefully cultivating in 2014?
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    Allie Atkinson

    A recently engaged girl in her mid-thirties living and loving life as best she can. Passionate about health, art and personal development with a side order of getting organised. A business woman, a sexual authenticity coach and a mixed-media artist. 
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