Day 5: Stories of Unexpected Outcomes and the Role of the Universe

The Universe works in mysterious ways. At 11:45am I got a call from my co-worker at the movie theater restaurant.

She needed someone to cover her shift.

I wasn’t going to make it on time for her original schedule, but management was OK for a late start. In the end, I was the only server on duty through a pretty busy dinner too. The 2nd server for the night called in sick.

That sort of unexpected situation with money has been happening more lately. Just yesterday, a good friend of mine sent me money via Venmo so I’d have a nice weekend.

After work tonight, I spoke with a server at Raku, a sushi place near the theater. He was telling me he frequently fixes cars for others or helps them out with service (i.e. picking up stuff at the store). I told him I thought that was the direction of how the world needed to head. This I-I-Me-Me thing wasn’t working right.

Seems to me, while I have been cash poor lately, I have received from the Universe, all kinds of in-kind exchanges and free money (finding change on the ground is a good example).

The unexpected call put my Day 5 writing behind schedule. I still feel committed to writing a little something though. Technically it is 2AM Day 6, but I can write two blogs in one day.

My server friend wasn’t sure everyone on the planet would “get” this way of thinking that we were speaking of. I mentioned that without the care, attention and flexibility of friends and roommates this past year, I’d not have survived.

It wasn’t always easy to receive. It wasn’t what I was brought up to think. However, it made me realize that often, the Universe picks people for whom money flows and uses their allowance and generosity of spirit to create for others. So really, it isn’t up to use to determine who is deserving, more like up to us to listen to the call of Spirit.

Receiving is clearly something I have a problem with because otherwise I’d have everything I need and want.

The Universe has been trying to school me on how gifting and receiving are part of the same paradigm. In other words, was it an issue with receiving or was I just not gifting?

I believe part of this impetus to write daily, no matter who reads this or if they even hire me for marketing / content work or anything like that – is the idea of gifting what I know to others.

I’d been thinking about this issue with my family and what I was taught. There is a Gifting & Receiving Universe and then there is Give and Take. Those who exist in a Gift and Take Universe, are always expecting from others. An example might be someone gives you a meal and then expects sex in return. You know the feeling and it is common in our reality. So, you think, well I can’t ever receive because it come with strings. I don’t want to have sex with those people.

Unfortunately, when you aren’t receiving (even hypothetically) then the money (which is energy) fails to show up. You keep shutting the doors and you wonder – shit why can’t I see a change in my bank account. Or, my bank account is worse than ever!

Money is a relationship and needs the same care and attention as a lover. Gratitude, Trust, Allowance, Vulnerability. Authenticity.

Of course, past traumas won’t make it easy to be any of those let alone one or two. That’s where the work comes in. The energy or somatic healing and therapy. I’ve never seen an easy way out – in this time and space, we’re going to have to address the issues head on.

I was used to a Give & Take Universe and therefore, since I’d cut off my ability to receive somewhere along the line, so that I wouldn’t feel obligated, I had to do the work to shift this point of view which limited my Universe. I wish it were a snap of the finger. It’s a daily practice, really, along with the help of my energy therapists.

Each day I work I value myself, and my choice, and my relationship with money more and more. It doesn’t always appear like I thought. Plus, the results we think we want may morph and change or take longer. Beating ourselves up about a process or trying to fit in doesn’t work.

The day before my friend sent me money, I was clearing some blocks and being in question. At the same time, I was confronted with this reality and the no question universe which seems to be all around me. I felt like I was in a bad mood.

The next day, when the money showed up, I got the awareness that maybe if I had trusted the Universe the night before, I’d have been better off…

Then the following day (today), I received/created a shift at work with cash tips I wasn’t expecting too. So, the awareness grew to “the Universe always has your back even when you sometimes fuck up.”

#2018 #frustrations #Money #breakthrough #ancestraltrauma #mind #innerwork #Winning #knowing #financialhealth #betterchoices #energy #connectiontoself #selfhelp #wellness #bestself #selfempowerment #selflove #soul #Transformation #familytrauma #family #Heartwalls #Relating #Relationship #patterns #newoutlook #personaljourney #mindset #process #finances #SacredJourney #energyclearing #clearing

Coffee and other Addictions on Day One of the Ultimate Reset - Is True Intimacy Possible?

I am posting a picture of my last cup of coffee which was yesterday morning. I started the cleanse this at 8am today when I took my first supplements and there is no coffee, caffeine or alcohol.

I’d say it is just three weeks but you aren’t supposed to jump back in to those items for several weeks after the cleanse. Plus I am going to do the 21 Day Fix after this so I can keep my cooking and food prep habits up but move to a regular menu.

Anyway, this morning, all I could write about in my journal was coffee. My apartment building has an espresso maker in the lobby which is free to residents. Quite frequently, I run into neighbors – often both of us are in PJs, and barely awake. We take a moment to connect while we get our morning joe.

There is a huge social aspect to the restaurant and coffee life for me. I stayed in my apartment making my first breakfast, getting back into the herbs and supplements I will be taking and reading. I missed the smell of coffee and the taste.

A sub request for a curling game came through and I almost said “yes, I’ll do it!” However, there would be beer and other alcohol available and it would be too easy, one day in, to break my cleanse just because it is there. I decided to stay home.

I did two different walks today. One to the grocery store close to my place where once again I had to find a creative solution to the $ issues just to get the missing limes I need and a few other fresh herbs. I came home only to realize that the Ultimate Cleanse people had made a mistake on their grocery list and I didn’t have red bell peppers. Seriously, it is sort of becoming a joke now.

Guess I will be back at the grocery store tomorrow then. I ate the salad today without the peppers.

I’ve managed to make quite a bit of prep food in advance – rice, quinoa, miso soup. In addition, I modified a recipe I’ll be putting together tomorrow. The plan calls for making these veggie nori rolls with brown rice. Last year, I tried it their way and it was a complete disaster. I had to throw it all out.

Reading over the recipe, it didn’t seem like they’d updated it and I wasn’t going to go through that again. I decided that I would use real sushi rice, not the regular brown rice that was called for. I know there is brown sushi rice but not at the Whole Foods I went to. Better that I can get most of it than worry about brown rice. I also bought a sushi roll maker.

As it turned out the roll maker had instructions for making good sushi rice. Sushi has this rice vinegar seasoning called sushi-su which helps bind the rice and make it extra sticky. Another aspect left out of the original recipe! I substituted honey for the sugar called for and mixed it in. The instructions that came with the mat said not to refridgerate rice as it makes it unedible -- so it is in a container with a lid for now.

I came back from my second walk after listening to a bunch of clearing recordings from Access Consciousness and also the relationship healers I work with. I think my body need to process the changes I was making on all levels. The brisk night air woke me up too. I tend to feel quite groggy without my coffee fixes.

I thought a lot all day about habits and addictions. Around the Twin Cities and especially in Lowertown, St Paul, the emphasis is on bars, restaurants and gathering places like the curling club. I watched a couple last night who were at Bulldog for the Lions/Packers game. Shot after shot of tequila. The man was getting more and more inebriated. Talking loudly. Making up stories. Eventually, he had to leave, and couldn’t even finish watching the game with his girlfriend.

That doesn’t feel like relating to me. Not the kind and depth of relating I want in my life anyway. Still, New Year’s Eve at Sainte Dinette involved a different kind of frenzy and I’ve grown close to the staff there. The food is delicious. Course, their business is to make money and even there it is easy to linger and take ‘one more glass of wine.’

How easy it is to substitute alcohol and feeling toasted/drunk for intimacy or even love. To stay stuck in this place where togetherness is equated with the number of shots of whatever you can imbibe.

I feel though the relationships are what I will miss most for the next three weeks. Hopefully I’ll be able to get some sub games in at the club, drink water and be dedicated to my cleanse while curling, socializing and enjoying myself. As a relator personality, though, nothing can really take the place of laughing, joking and enjoying the company of others.

Nevertheless, I had to face that maybe part of the reason me and others go to bars to laugh, joke and make merry is there is something emotional we simply don't want to deal with or face. It brings me back to what is true intimacy?

I ended up renting and watching the movie version of Wild last night. Now I can see how they really made it into a movie story, cutting out characters or compositing them and of course dramatizing situations differently. I like both versions of the story but they aren’t the same.

We’ll see what comes up tomorrow as I plan to get to more organizing processes and set-up my 2017. So far it is off to weird start. Hopefully things smooth out and the direction becomes more clear in the weeks ahead.

If you want to help support my career transition and book publishing business - I am still running my YouCaring.com campaign. You can also reach me personally for direct donations and I take PayPal or schedule a coaching/healing session. https://www.youcaring.com/ginasmovinonupcampaign

#2017 #Food #emotionalsupport #story #change #Journey #process #intuition #Spirituality #WomensIssues #selflove #SacredJourney #Love #intimacy #Relationship #Relating #mindset #DivineFeminine #creative #Vulnerability #life #Money #SoulJourney #Authenticity #Healing #creativity #personaljourney #energyclearing #finances

New Year's 2016 and the Reset Begins with a BIG PARTY!

New Year’s Eve I cleaned my studio apartment, set-up my cleanse journal and sorted my cabinets so I knew what items I needed at the store for the Ultimate Reset cleanse. The fridge was bare except for a couple take-out boxes and a ½ of Jane’s pecan pie we ate for Christmas.

I threw all that out along with the desiccated carrots leftover from one of the summer farmer’s markets.

24 hours left of 2016 and I was ready to leave all that the year entailed behind. The Universe had other plans though. Money I was expecting didn’t come on time.

A ritual of lack that I was used to after several years of a mysterious financial connection to Mercury Retrogrades. You could pretty much predict the size of my bank balance and the various calamities related to money by the constellations and where Mercury was situated in the night sky. I kid you not. At one point in the last few years, I had minus numbers in my bank account the entire six weeks. Ramen and free meals became the norm.

Fourth Mercury Retrograde of 2016, on the last day of the personally tumultuous eight-year cycle we were leaving behind and this one was no exception. I had to fill my fridge and my pantry with groceries for the cleanse. I will spare readers the gory details which included a long wait in the way of last minute shoppers at Whole Foods while I sorted out my miscalculations with already bagged groceries. After a long string of these Mercury driven disasters you get very creative with how you pull things off.

$250 worth of organic produce procured with a brilliant work-around later I drove home to discover I was missing a bag of limes and I was charged twice for my asparagus. The Universe was going to get the last laugh, after all.

I’ve had this weird relationship to food. I love it, that is for sure. Especially when it is lovingly prepared and comes with a beautiful experience. Still, the way I eat sometimes, you’d think I had some past-life recollection of feast and famine in my memory banks. If I get $100 from somewhere you can guarantee a long night at Meritage or Sainte Dinette is in the works. I’ll feel like a Queen and enjoy every last tasty morsel – just in case I don’t get another opportunity.

On the other hand, I don’t get much pleasure from cooking for myself. Here and there I have dabbled successfully and promised myself it would become a trend. The lure of our amazing local farm-to-table style restaurants though soon pulls be back out, night after night. Cooking is tedious, requires washing-up and never tastes as good as someone else’s. Most of the time, it doesn’t taste good at all. I really dislike leftovers.

I did the Ultimate Cleanse once before. Last year, right after the MBA. I’d gained like 50 lbs during my two years in school, had high blood pressure and bad cholesterol. I figured it would help me get back into shape. 2016 was a fickle friend though. I cheated just a bit throughout the cleanse, including beer and wine at the curling club, restaurant meals when I was too tired and potluck samplings at work.

Still I lost weight and ate better for quite some time, until I didn’t and stuff happened and it got too hard to keep up with it all. My career and financial issues, my devastating inter-personal crises, my brother’s wedding, my gut-wrenching come to Jesus (not literally) soul-searching. I did quite a bit of that on the patio at Ox Cart, crying into my second or third, or was it fourth glass of wine?

If 2016 was anything, it was going to make me, come hell or high water, release anything toxic and reset my emotional course from turbulent to one in which I was in the driver’s seat of my own creation. And furthermore, 2016 wasn’t going to do it in that nice motherly way one would prefer. No, it was going to send me through a stone-polishing tumbler of epic proportions and kick my ass along with multiple deaths both spiritual and actual (it got so silly we were all joking about Betty White needing our protection several days before New Year).

One good thing, I took up yoga and managed to keep up my practice fairly regularly the last half the year. I cried on my mat a few times too but the flow kept me pushing through all the crap, one downward dog at a time.

Anyway, back to New Year’s Eve. 2016 was going out with a bang. I envisioned this for weeks and nothing was going to stop me. Not even my finances.

I turned up at Sainte Dinette and there was one last chair at the bar (just for me) in a night that was non-stop from 7:30 to well after midnight.

I ate the amazing Tasting Menu Chef Adam had come up with and Tweeted about it the whole time. I thought it amusing to take pictures of everything as though this was my last meal and I’d be starving after the 2nd.

I found my interest in making every last moment count, including an after-party at Bulldog and an after after party at my neighbor Cory’s apartment, intriguing. You’d think I was going away to a deserted island for a month, not just doing a cleanse. It was as if my life was over as I knew it and I was on some sort of death bed. Still, I had fun. I made sure of it.

I even got a post New Year drunken kiss like in the movies. Hadn't done that in awhile. There's just something fun about being in the moment, a man's hand on your thigh, a full belly and New Year's cheer going on all around. All of us were laughing and drinking. Cory and his sister were practicing their Norwegian. You can't make this shit up.

This morning I went to brunch at St Paul Grill, one of the only places open around downtown St Paul, which was like a ghost town otherwise. Not even the ice rink in Rice Park was open. I walked past Meritage and saw the remnants of last night’s New Year celebration – hats and other items piled up on a table.

I’d spent Christmas Eve at Meritage enjoying (yet another $100 meal) with families decked out in Christmas sweaters and other red-hued finery. I chose Sainte Dinette because I feel at home there and Laurel, the GM gives good hugs. Real ones where your hearts meld as one. She’s the best.

I don't think I know one single restaurant GM anywhere who runs up to you with a genuine smile on their face and offers hugs. Laurel lives in my building. I feel like we are friends now. Maybe one day I'll have my wedding there like the one couple I spoke to a few weeks ago. Course I'd actually manifest my committed relationship. Lord knows THAT didn't happen for me in 2016.

Back at St Paul Grill, I ate my very large brunch - steak and eggs with hashbrowns and a side of waffle - washed down with a spicey Bloody Mary. I got a glass of wine after (free by way of a mistake) and sat there and read Cheryl Strayed’s Wild.

Wow! she and I have very little in common other than Minneapolis but something about the way she dances with her words and describes human suffering stuck me to my core. This world does some crazy stuff to us and it always surprises me somedays how any of us survive and yet we do…clinging to the hope that tomorrow will be better.

Now it is the early evening of the New Year’s Day. I am thinking I should start my prep work for tomorrow's cleanse Day 1 and see how far I get.

Although I really want to get back to reading Cheryl’s book too. It feels like Monday today for some reason but it isn’t. Nevertheless tomorrow, which is the actual Monday I begin a process I have thought about for a very long time. The day has finally arrived. We'll start 2017 out with a very different sort of bang.

And this time - no coffee, caffiene or alchohol for three weeks!

If you want to help support my career transition and book publishing business - I am still running my YouCaring.com campaign. You can also reach me personally for direct donations and I take PayPal or schedule a coaching/healing session. https://www.youcaring.com/ginasmovinonupcampaign

#NewYear2016 #mindset #Food #SainteDinette #Meritage #Spirituality #creativity #creative #learning #Winning #knowing #community #personaljourney #family #Innerlandscapes #energyclearing #Money #SoulJourney #Healing #yoga #process #Journey #SacredJourney #finances #Love #selflove #writing