By Anne Malatt, Australia
I woke this morning feeling out of sorts; a consequence of how I had lived the day before. I had made some choices in how I had used my free time and in what I had chosen to eat that were not truly loving for me, and now I was feeling those choices in my body.
I was about to start giving myself a hard time, as usual, but stopped for a moment and thought “Why not just go for a swim?”. So I did.
Even as I drove to the pool, the loving choice I had made helped me to feel lighter, less sad, less hard, less dense.
As I started to swim I felt those unloving choices in my body – the tiredness, the heaviness, the effort to breathe. Everything was a struggle, hard work.
I slowed down and brought the focus to my breathing and my body.
I felt my breath entering and leaving my nose, allowing myself to relax and go deeper.
I felt my hands moving through the water, brushing past my thighs, moving through the cooler air and back into the warmer water.
I felt my body moving in the gentle rhythm I had chosen.
As I breathed out into the water, I felt the stillness, the quietness, the vastness of me.
As I turned my head to breathe in, I heard the sounds and saw the sights and felt the energy of the people around me. I let it all in, but did not let it disturb the stillness in me.
I continued to swim with myself, in my rhythm, breathing gently, moving in love.
I felt how I could have continued in the struggle, forced myself to keep going, to complete a task, to fulfil an ideal of what I should be doing, to “make up for” the poor choices I had made the day before, which would in truth have hurt myself more.
I felt the grace of just allowing myself to be, surrendering to the knowing of my body and its natural breath and natural rhythm, and how healing that was for me.
In every moment we have a choice, to treat ourselves with love, or not. That is a true treat. That is the true power of now.
The Truth about Serge Benhayon 
“In every moment we have a choice, to treat ourselves with love, or not”, is a powerful yet such a valid statement. Majority of the time its a “not”, so in comes the abuse, the intolerance and everything that is the “not” towards each other. With love, we are such powerful beings, and we can only but reflect this to others, that there is another way of living and it is not from the “not” but from the “love” that is within all that is a part of the whole.
Such a simple truth Elizabeth and so powerful when we allow that deeper connection to and with the body to be with ourselves and all in the now.
When we come back to the body, and its gentleness and its capacity to move with such tenderness, nothing else really matters, all else melts away. We get to feel what is truly of importance – our connection to our Soul and not the bloopers (mistakes) we might make. Life is after all about learning, and this never ends.
Henrietta, thanks for reminding us that the gentleness is such an important way to be with our bodies, as it is so true, it melts everything away.
When we hear a baby giggle, we often see and feel its love and we giggle with it. We observe how tender we are with it, that tenderness is always within us all. It is that simple…
This is a great blog with a simple message – one that says do not waste any time berating yourself, rather take time to love yourself up. I have been and still occasionally am very good at ‘beating myself up’ in the sense of giving myself a hard time if I have done something that was inappropriate, something that hurt someone, or did something just plain silly. I would write off the whole day. But now I am learning that that serves no one, and really, like Anne has shared, it is about us simply getting on with it in a loving way. That really is the best approach and feels so lovely too.
“In every moment we have a choice, to treat ourselves with love, or not. That is a true treat. That is the true power of now.” – super simple yet super powerful blog, Anne! Thank you!
We empower ourselves when we choose to come back to being fully present with our body, and from there we can make new choices.
To connect with and feel our breath entering our nose, or lungs, can be very stilling, ‘I felt my breath entering and leaving my nose, allowing myself to relax and go deeper.’
“I felt the grace of just allowing myself to be, surrendering to the knowing of my body and its natural breath and natural rhythm, and how healing that was for me.” Thanks Anne, one thing I haven’t considered deeply enough is the surrender to the body when moving back to love after a wobble, it was great how you let your body lead the way so it could be treated exactly how it needed to as part of your recovery and re-establishing love again.
This is a great reminder of the constant choice we are presented with.
“In every moment we have a choice, to treat ourselves with love, or not. That is a true treat. That is the true power of now.”
“I was about to start giving myself a hard time, as usual, but stopped for a moment and thought “Why not just go for a swim?”. So I did.” I love the question, it’s like saying “Why not just go back to love?”
Thank you Anne surrendering to Love, True Love certainly eliminates the feeling of being “out of sorts.” And the lessons we can take from everything we do deepens our bodily awareness so our days can become a pleasurable Joy as you have shared.
This is such a great experience to write about, because we can be so hard on ourselves even though it doesn’t actually rectify the situation, it just adds another layer of negativity. It’s so simple isn’t it to just keep retuning to love without placing any conditions on ourselves as to whether we deserve love or not.
It is a great experience to write about, as it is common for people to be hard on themselves, surely we deserve love, and care and nurturing, especially as the outside world can be quite cruel towards us.
It’s true Lorraine, we add to the abuse and cruelty by turning on ourselves when we most need the love.
Such a timely read for me. “I let it all in, but did not let it disturb the stillness in me“ – this in particular really stood out for me. I could feel the hardness I was in in reaction to the snowball effect of poor choices I have been making, as it is given a spotlight, starting to melt, acknowledging the resistance I had been allowing to act out.
This is beautiful to read. We make life so much about effort and doing the right thing all the while all we need is to be and take the next gentle breath and step.
It is beautiful to read, and has a lovely ripple effect on my body whilst reading it, a surrendering.
The art of coming back to a fuller version of ourselves is just pure beauty and simplicity.
Yes, and this blog is such a beautiful example of that.
This is beautiful to read and be reminded that in every moment we can go in rhythm with our body and do not have to push through.
Agreed Esther – there is such an ingrained habit for us to push and to keep pushing, but to let go of that as a default pattern and to instead follow a rhythm is very liberating. I have experienced this and yet find myself going into drive again and again. It is an art to keep extracting oneself from the drive, and to return to a natural way of being and living.
Beautiful inspiration Anne. Your words are so alive and real that for a moment I was swimming with you 🙂 They show me how to remain steady in my body no matter what and how simple can be choosing love for ourselves in every moment. Thank you
Thank you Anne, your day was a very gentle way to be with yourself, and what a great line “In every moment we have a choice, to treat ourselves with love, or not”. Despite what our previous choices have been it can be as simple as just choosing love now.
Every movement we make is simply aligned to love or not.
Simple and clear Anna. And it’s our choice to what energy we align to.
To be love, or not, that is always our choice, ‘In every moment we have a choice, to treat ourselves with love, or not. That is a true treat. That is the true power of now.’
Building a foundation of gentleness, so we can get to self-love and also nurturing would make such a significant change to our daily rhythm.
“In every moment we have a choice, to treat ourselves with love, or not.” This is very powerful to know and to live by because no matter what we have been up to, yes we have to bear the consequences but we do not need to continue down the same road.
Anne it’s very true, in every moment we have the opportunity to treat ourselves with love, the prior moment does not matter as there are no conditions with love. It’s just there on offer all the time.
Beautifully said Melinda. Love is unconditional and offers us with such a clarity the truth. It is our free will to deny it or not, but is always there.
This is brilliant. Keep choosing love, even right after having chosen lovelessness. Why double-up lovelessness by giving ourselves a hard time? I know I do, and you so clearly here expose the ridiculousness of it. If it is love that we want, choose it. Now, not ‘next’ time. Simple. Thank you, Anne.
Going down requires saying yes to it prior to what we do to bring us down and after the fact when we feel what have we said yes to. Yet, at that time we are still on time not to say yes to it and simply move away from it. Of course, we can also say yes to the state we have provoked. It is a choice.
‘I woke this morning feeling out of sorts; a consequence of how I had lived the day before’. Great insight Anne, not many people connect the dots, to the fact that how we are feeling today is because of how we moved yesterday and the choices we made.
We are not being honest if we don’t acknowledge to ourselves that the quality of how we lived our yesterday is the foundation of the quality of our today.
It is powerful when we choose love, self-love, because there is so much understanding which allows us to let go in of anything that is not love, bringing us back to our natural stillness and gentle breathe.
I just read a blog called ‘Making Decisions: The Body is the Key’ and here is your message expressed completely different but with the same message how our body is the key to come back to our natural stillness and that we don’t have to ‘pay’ for choices we have been making previously.
That feels super loving Annelies with the understanding that we do not have to ‘pay’ for poor choices we have been making, but rather use the awareness to make different choices that truly nourish and support our bodies.
That is beautiful Annelies, just connect back to the stillness and grace within – very simple.
I felt my body letting go as I read this sharing.
Continually back to love and stillness, despite previous choices, makes life very simple.
This is a great reminder that wallowing in regret does nothing to change the body so it can make different choices. When you went for a swim it felt like it re-imprinted your whole day and washed away the heaviness of the previous days choices. Very inspiring.
It is so beautiful to feel and be reminder of the truth that regardless of how ever far we have wandered of track, love is always there waiting to be surrendered to, the very next moment. It is through our connection to our bodies that we realise that there is no greater power than being the love we are, it is everything.
A great reminder not to beat ourselves up about past choices but learn from them and make more loving choices as we move on, eventually we learn not to repeat those unloving choices because we get to feel it more and more in our body.
Yes, simply to learn from past choices that were not loving, learning as we go, and making new loving choices.
‘As I started to swim I felt those unloving choices in my body – the tiredness, the heaviness, the effort to breathe. Everything was a struggle, hard work.’
Reading this just now has made sense of something for me. No wonder I have, for the most part if I’m honest, struggled with a lack of vitality in my life. It’s the choices I’ve been making that make it hard for my body to swim through life.
And it’s hard to see those because everyone lives that way and it feels normal and therefore we tell ourselves “I shouldn’t feel this way”, when in fact we should as the body is sharing the truth of the effects of our choices. Thank you Victoria.
This makes it so clear how much trouble we create with the constant self-criticism. So it is a matter of bringing our focus to the love that we deserve and choose it in every moment more.
Thank you Esther, you have expressed the truth about the common human condition of self criticism very clearly and the simplicity of letting go, moving on and choosing to be love. I feel self criticism just spirals us deeper into the harmful energy we just chose. It’s a common habit but it just consolidates the self harm already chosen.
It can’t get any more simple than that. “In every moment we have a choice, to treat ourselves with love, or not.” And this level of deep honouring of our awareness, or its avoidance, is also what determines the impact we have on the whole of life.
I love it, we can support ourselves even if we do make a choices or series of choices that harm our bodies, I mean let’s face it, this whole life could be a hangover! Simply choosing a commitment to supporting ourselves in such a commited way can turn things around to lay a more solid foundation for the next moment, minute, day, perhaps even life.
The importance of our breath is somehow overlooked by society and is not taught in the same Loving energy, as are the breathing techniques with a focus to at-least being gentle as presented by Serge Benhayon.
Greg I agree, the gentle breath technique as taught in the Gentle Breath Meditation is a simple go-to tool to bring us back to ourselves when we have disconnected, and support us to stay with ourselves and breathe who we are in the sometimes chaos of life.
Agreed Melinda, A-go-to-tool that should be presented at pre-school.
It is lovely to re-connect with our breath at any point in our day, whatever we are doing, ‘I slowed down and brought the focus to my breathing and my body
I felt my breath entering and leaving my nose, allowing myself to relax and go deeper.’ Beautiful.
Wow, this is gorgeous to feel Anne, from about to give yourself a hard time to then making a loving choice to support yourself, a great reminder for me and many more people, thank you
This is beautiful not only because it shows us that we have a choice in every moment but how very powerful we are and that every loving choice is enormously felt through our entire body.
This is a great point Esther, as there is not one choice that we make that is not reflected back to us through our bodies. Hence it is a wise move to develop a loving and honoring relationship with our bodies, our truest guide to living in connection to who we really are; love.
Really beautiful Anne. It is about love and when it is not it hurts. So, instead of absorbing the world around us that is not love why not make your world about love, and change the world.
I could feel myself surrendering as I read the description of your swim. I too have sometimes got caught up in feeling I have to make up for bad choices. Now I simply ask myself what new loving choice can I make in this moment?
Perfect timing and perfect guidance. Sometimes the ‘off’ isn’t an enormous deal, it is a feeling that if we ignore can lead to an enormous deal (or not). Bringing it back to the body and the steadiness of the breath, the connection with ourselves is a great take home from this blog. Thank you.
When we feel ‘off track’ it doesn’t mean we are lost forever – making a simple choice and movement back towards truth and a love for the body is all that is needed. This is a gorgeous example Anne, thank you.
Beautifully shared Anne, the simple reminder that there is always a choice in each moment to be loving and if we stray from this to not be hard on ourselves – to focus on the love no matter what comes our way brings an understanding and supports us to move closer to a deeper love and awareness in each moment.
Thank you Anne for the revelation you share with us. It is so true that we will berate ourselves and give ourselves a hard time when we have slipped up but surely if we are love and come from Love then the healing is Love.
How often it is, that in the moment we most need to truly hold and embrace ourselves in love, we effectively ‘go the other way’ – i.e. into sabotaging behaviours that only serve to further disconnect ourselves from what we truly need.
Absolutely beautiful to read of your honouring of yourself here Anne, and the depth of relationship with ourselves that is – if we choose – ever on offer…
I agree Victoria, I will remember this next time I go for a swim. Movement has the power to change our energy.
It makes complete sense to me that when life gets intense, imperfect or challenging rather than give myself a hard time about it, it is far more supportive to treat myself and my body with even more love and tenderness and understanding.
‘In every moment we have a choice, to treat ourselves with love, or not.’ I love what you present Anne. It strikes me, in addition to your own observations, that our ever-irresponsible human spirits love to wallow in self-deprecation. Your decision to cut the self-pity and beating-up by choosing an enlightened and enlightening next step beautifully stopped the spirit in its tracks and returned you to your natural soulful state. I love it!
I greatly appreciate the wisdom Anne has offered here. That the power of now is so simply the choice we make each moment. Nothing more, but knowing it is everything. As the well of wisdom that resides in us all can only be accessed through our choice to live each moment with tender loving care.
The power of love in each moment. A beautiful commitment to make.
This is a beautiful example of how we can simply tune in with our body again and let us be guided by what is needed next. Our body is not unforgiving but very willing to come back to its natural flow.
Yes Esther, it just waits patiently, it doesn’t hold anything against us, it simply has to take more time to heal or the healing may come in a bigger package if the neglect has been going on for a long time. Our body is always calling us back to be the love we are, and anxiousness and raciness just as depression and indulging are not who we are. They are expressions of the unease we feel in the body as we step away from love and we can take steps to rebalance them so they are no longer the dominant impulse in our lives.
Before I came across Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine I did not know what or how to truly support myself. I would watch tv in the evening, lye in bed at the weekend and shop for the sake of it, which were all things I looked forward to but I have come to realise were actually not supporting me at all but I was choosing them as a means of comfort to distract myself from committing to life.
When I’m feeling out of sorts, the last thing I want to feel is that very thing – but if I distract myself, I just push down the uncomfortable feeling and leave it to be dealt with by my body. By being honest, admitting to ourselves that we do feel out of sorts, we allow those feelings the space to be acknowledged, and in doing so they’re released. Quite an awesome process really, and all starts with being honest and expressing – if only to ourselves – what we are feeling.
A great reminder that love is the best medicine. Thank you, Anne. Giving myself a hard time has never got me anywhere.
I love that you speak of a true treat when we are loving with ourselves.
Anne, I can relate to thinking I need to ‘make up’ for my past unloving choices by just moving into something else that will make me feel ‘good’ and ticked that off… yet I don’t truly feel any better or more connected doing that. I felt a bit yuk this afternoon after eating too much and really felt to just vegetate on the lounge because it had left me tired, but instead I chose to go for a walk and absolutely loved it and within no time felt more myself.
At any moment we can choose to stay in the struggle or move to step away from it. I love that you were impulsed to do the latter and in doing so were able to surrender and bring healing to yourself and the repercussions of what you had chosen, rather than continue in the energy you were in and deny the deeper connection to you that was possible.
Thank you Anne for this great and wise reminder of the power we all have at our fingertips, at every moment, through the choice we have to surrender to love or not. And how this choice is ever-present regardless of our past choices, through the grace of God’s love forever calling us to be at one with our love, with Him.
Hello Anne and this is very true, “In every moment we have a choice, to treat ourselves with love, or not.” No matter what the choice before or what has happened we always have a choice to choose love in the next or in the present moment like you are showing. Where does the self critique or the regret lead? Around in circles to again create the same choice. No matter what has happened ‘bad’ or ‘good’ choosing to surrender to all that is there to feel is a wise choice. Having the awareness of the feeling will support you to not go around in a full circle to feel it again. We are here to learn but not learn in the current education model, we are here to learn about energy and feeling again. So with each choice look at it as a learning and don’t do a better job next time just let go, surrender to what you are feeling, appreciate all you feel and allow the awareness of all of this to sink in. The awareness is what will support you not to walk in the same steps again.
I really get that want to make up for poor choices I have made. In my experience, it just creates a vicious circle of punishment and reward and even if I may feel better about myself, it is only temporary, and yes I agree, I often push myself unnecessarily and find myself in even more deeper disregard.
Choosing to make that one supportive choice can change every thing. Last week I set out on a long journey feeling quite heavy and tired. About half way I decided to stop, take a nap and go for a walk to the toilet. I got back in the car and as I started off I was amazed how I was feeling. Something had cleared. I could feel a clarity that was not there before, a presence with my body and a feeling of readiness for what was ahead of me.
‘There is such grace in allowing ourselves to just be’ – this line really stuck with me this morning Anne. Learning to just ‘be’, and be okay with that, without making the tasks and to-do list the priority takes some getting used to.. it exposes that when we’re not connected or don’t know who we truly are, putting the being before the doing feels risky- and sometimes empty. But when we develop that connection to ourselves, by treating ourselves more lovingly and caringly, slowly the need for acceptance and recognition from the outside starts to fall away. The being comes first, and the doing is an extension and expression of all that we already are.
As I was reading your blog my body felt your words and it felt like you were taking me on a gorgeous journey which, in fact, is the power and beauty held in truth.
I find a very similar thing with walking Anne. It’s very revealing when I walk, how my body is, what I am holding onto and then as I bring my attention to my body and my breath I actually feel who I am underneath all of the holdings on. This makes it so easy to let go of this and simply take myself for a walk. My mind definitely tries to bring in all sorts of things for me to complete, but when I stay with my body all I am doing is walking not trying to live my day before I get there or re-live my day more than once.
Yes Jennifer, I too find that walking can be very revealing as to where I am at. It is such a simple activity yet I find it incredibly powerful when I choose to walk in the presence of me and my surroundings.
Thank you for your wise words Anne
I love your powerful simple blog Anne: “In every moment we have a choice, to treat ourselves with love, or not. That is a true treat. That is the true power of now.” It is very worth it to share the true power we have simply because most of us have chosen not to feel it anymore!
It is definitely the simple choice of making a different decision taking us away from the feelings of lovelessness to those of love, that can turn our day around. This lightens the energy we are in and allows the power of Now to be acknowledged and experienced. Thank you Anne.
‘Every moment we have a choice to treat ourselves with love or not’, it is that simple, and the more we treat ourselves with love, the easier it is to let others in and share ourselves.
Yes, Anne. so often the choice we make is to beat ourselves up for being less the day before whether it be because of what we have eaten, how we have related to someone or an activity we may have chosen, but to connect back to ourselves in a loving way is a choice that supports our evolution.
And beating ourselves up just sends us further off track! When we’ve made less than loving choices the way back to ourselves is by bringing more love and care to ourselves -not by giving ourselves a hard time and criticising.
I love how you were able to go from giving yourself a hard time to the next moment where you made another choice. This is actually a profoundly useful tool. I’m very good at dwelling on the choices I made that led me to feel less than amazing. Even right now I’m not feeling my best…but your experience here is offering me an opportunity to make a different choice. Thank you!
Simple and perfect Anne. I just read an equally simple blog post about a bath and how we are in it affects the water. This reminded me of that and is an awesome reminder of the very fact that everything is energy no matter where or what we are doing. Connecting to ourselves and allowing ourselves to be is really all we ever want!
I love the simplicity of this Anne. I often feel as though I need to ‘pay’ for my poor choices but this blog reminds me that I can choose love in every moment and the consequences of this choice are always beautiful.
“In every moment we have a choice, to treat ourselves with love, or not. That is a true treat. That is the true power of now.” So true Anne. We have choice and can change the energy we are in whenever we choose. I am finding appreciation very helpful in stopping my unloving thoughts and behaviours.
I recently was reminded of the fact that we have the power to change the energy we are running with in an instant, once we make the choice to do so. It does not mean struggle and emotions we may be feeling at the time are not real, they can be very real for us, but there is a moment of choice when we can decide what we want to continue to feel. In that we always have a choice. We may not be able to control how others feel or what they may do, but we always are in control of our next choice.
Its so simple to turn ourselves around from a path of self-destructive and unloving choices to being gentle and loving with ourselves. So simple and so often the path we choose is to beat ourselves up which continues us in the same momentum, changing nothing. It’s inspiring to feel how despite resistance and the temptation to beat yourself up, that you went for a swim anyway which immediately changed the quality you were choosing to move in, which supported you to feel the consequences in your body of the choices the day before. If you had continued in the same vein, you would never have felt that.
I’ve also been asking myself what my life would look like if I made everything about love, it’s an amazing question to ask, because suddenly it’s so obvious every area of my life can be more loving – from the way I wake up, to the way I prepare for the day, to my approach to food and time, to the way I end the day. It’s something I can’t wait to explore.
‘In every moment we have a choice, to treat ourselves with love, or not.’ I love this Anne, it makes life so simple – every moment we have a choice and every one of these choices results in how we feel at the end of the day – love or not love – it’s up to us.
Thank you Anne for showing so eloquently that it is with the gentle rhythm of movement that we can bring ourselves back to stillness so that we then make self-loving and loving choices in the way we live.
Thank you Anne for sharing that in every moment we have a choice. No trying to fix or make up for ill choices, but the choice to bring more love in that then dispels the ill behaviour. So simple.
Dear Anne, A beautiful reminder of a loving and different way to be. I have tried a life time in the opposite and it has not worked too well. So lets remember a different way to be and see how this would work for me too.
To me choosing for ‘love or not’ is actually the only choice from free will we have and anything else we have made free will to be is from not being honest with ourselves and choosing not for love instead.
‘In every moment we have a choice, to treat ourselves with love, or not. That is a true treat. That is the true power of now.’ – So beautiful and very true Anne, to not stay in the reaction of a bad choice – every moment we have a choice to deepen our love – it really is that simple.
Acceptance also plays its part in the power of now, eg just accepting where I am at, accepting others where they are at, and just accepting that as long as I stay open no matter how others react or behave, I am staying open to learning, growing and evolving.
Thank you for the reminder that in every moment we have a choice; to treat ourselves with love, or not!
Wow. The way you have described swimming is so gorgeous. I have only just recently touched on this and am looking forward to building this more so the support you have shared here is also felt in my body.
I can feel you moving through the water with stillness and grace Anne, as though it was me. Thanks for the swim, great choice.
We do have a choice as Anne says… Actually we have choices to make all the time… In fact there are so many choices lined up in front of us, and the detritus of the choices we have made lined up behind us, that it behoves us, and indeed this is the only choice that we can make that will really make a difference, to choose to be so conscious and so present, that we are able to feel the energetic consequences of everything that we are doing.
We are so used to punishing ourselves on top of feeling lousy for a poor choice. Love is always available and dwelling on how awful we feel is the less loving choice. I love that you nurtured yourself Ann and let go of the ideals and beliefs. I am tired of knowing what I think I should be doing or what everyone else thinks I should be doing. I want to truly feel what is the right thing for me, the most loving choice, the most nurturing choice.
A great reminder, Ann, that it’s all about the choices we make in the moment – whether we’re making a loving choice, one that honours where the body is at, or one that can harm it.
I’ve had a bit of a light bulb moment here Anne. I realised that often when I have gotten off track that I try to find my way back by trying to ‘make up for’ the poor choices I have made previously. Obviously this is a type of self judgement and self criticism for these past decisions which then just perpetuates the self abuse. Yet the moment of original poor choices is already past and a new moment is happening right now. It’s a golden opportunity to treat myself with love and respect, not to keep beating myself up over the past. Thank you for indeed presenting the ‘power of now’.
Wow, this blog is very inspirational. Throws beating yourself up out the door.
“In every moment we have a choice, to treat ourselves with love, or not. That is a true treat. That is the true power of now”.
The simplicity, wisdom and power of this blog Anne is very much appreciated.
Thank-you Anne, this is worth putting on my fridge as a reminder that “In every moment we have a choice, to treat ourself with love, or not. That is a true treat. That is the true power of now”.
‘I felt the grace of just allowing myself to be, surrendering to the knowing of my body and its natural breath and natural rhythm, and how healing that was for me.’ Thank you for your beautiful sharing Anne which is just what I needed to read this morning as I have woken up and connected to the impact on my body of recent choices. Beating myself up achieves nothing apart from keeping me stuck in an old pattern, choosing the power of now allows me to connect with the grandness of me that is always there but can sometimes get masked by my behaviour.
I can easily judge myself at times when I have clearly made choices that were unloving. Your simple and beautiful blog reminds me of the power we have in every moment to make a truly loving choice – a much better choice than the old pattern of beating myself up.
Really appreciating this simple, yet very powerful offering, Anne. I am learning how a change in the way I move my body affects my thoughts, and how I do not have to aim for a certain posture or movement, but allow my body to find the way it feels good in how it sits and how it walks and how it does anything really, and this being a constant process, even if I go off and drop, I can always make another choice to make the next one to be the one that it loving.
We put so much effort in giving us a hard time that we exhaust the body. To realise we have a choice in what we think about ourselves is very powerful and has made my life much more simple. What I learned from Serge Benhayon, and experienced myself too, is that our thoughts are not at all interested in the state of our body. It is only when we connect to our body and observe instead of judge we get to be honest and can make a true choice which supports the body, as you have made so very clear Anne in this lovely blog.
How timely to be reading this today Anne! I had this same experience yesterday in that I had several experiences which made me question my worth and then made some poor choices with my food which left me feeling bloated, heavy and dull. Today when I woke up I realised that these were choices I’d made but instead of beating myself up, I just reflected on where I had been that led me to making those choices. I committed to my walk and just began to connect back to my body… And this allowed me to come back to feeling amazing, just as I had yesterday!
Beautiful, simple and playful blog Anne – the true power of now – is no more complex than to choose love in each moment.
Beautiful blog. We are so good in giving ourselves a hard time, but why not make the choice and give ourselves a loving time? I am learning that there is no such thing as making a mistake, but that we have choices and that I can learn from them and then lovingly move on.
What a breath of fresh air Anne – I can feel my body let go when reading this blog. It almost says to me ‘Ok, so you’ve made some yucky choices and now I will deal with them for you, all you need to do is be the love you are and that will support me to clear’.. It’s not the body that beats us up for making the choices yet it is the body who loving and effectively clears what is needed. So the message here for me is to stop the hardness as this is just more ‘stuff’ for the body to clear onto of the already yuk choices.
So very true, Anne that we can too easily fall for a way of being that would have us making up today for our transgressions yesterday by effectively punishing the body through abstinence or over-exertion. Not healing, but potentially quite harming. Treating ourselves with love is way more rectifying and as you say, we have the power to make that choice in every moment and that includes right now.
If we all woke up and linked the reason we felt out of sorts was a consequence of how we had lived the day before – and were totally responsible for how we now feel and committed to correcting it, the world would most likely be a different place than what it is today.
‘In every moment we have a choice, to treat ourselves with love, or not. That is a true treat. That is the true power of now.’ Beautiful Anne
Without going into the detail, I simply enjoyed reading about your swim… the connection to your breath, your body and the other people. How delicious is that… so simple and yet so profound. No wonder it is something you want to return to, and of course that we all want to return to.
I love the simplicity of this blog Anne, that it was the choice to do something that you know supported you that then led to more flow and ease in your day.
I can very much relate to this, a beautiful confirmation for me to read morning. Last night I found myself staying up later than I had planned. Knowing that I had to get up earlier than usual, I could feel myself going into resentment and self-critique, then it came to me ‘Well, it maybe later than I wanted, but I am still me. The same. Why change me just because I didn’t go to bed at certain time that I had perceived as my ideal?’ I noticed the change in my body – coming off from the cusp of going into hardness. I woke up just before the alarm went off and I can feel how my body appreciated the quality of sleep I had allowed to give myself.
The idea of punishment and or retribution for so called bad behaviour is so ingrained in us all, in our education and judicial system, particularly parenting. Yet I really don’t think God wants any part of this tit for tat way. Your example shows that once a not-so-loving choice or ‘bad’ choice is realised or revealed or nominated, all that’s required in the next moment is to choose differently, choose lovingly and move on. I feel like God just lets humanity make their crappy decisions, knowing there will come a time when the people would rather feel stillness and joy in their body. There is no need for punishment.
Ahhh, so lovely to read this this morning Anne. After overdoing it yesterday myself I am inspired to relinquish the drive and just allow myself to BE today.
Whilst reading this blog Anne, what came across to me was how our bodies know how to get us back into harmony after making some unloving choices, especially if we listen to it. In your example you could have quite easily chosen to swim too much and over do it but you didn’t, but instead you moved in a way which allowed you to feel the stillness the body has to offer. Great example Anne.
The wisdom of the body is constantly available to us and it is a choice to connect to it or go into hardness to punish ourselves – I have often chosen the latter and love your confirmation Julie ‘instead you moved in a way which allowed you to feel the stillness the body has to offer’.
Beating ourselves up for poor choices gets us to only focus on the small part of us that is not love, and we feel worse – but making the next step (choice) about love, allows us to reconnect to the vast love within.
That we have made choices, and here we are as a result of these choices, and that we can make more choices, and evolve or devolve from where we are now, is a revelation that can change our lives, and we can all explore this now, and start to make these choices.
Every moment we have the opportunity to make a choice, and then we live in the consequences of those choices… What Universal Medicine presents is the opportunity to make choices that are coming from a conscious and connected presence, which then presents the opportunity to connect with oneself even more, which leads to even more self loving choices, and so that inner spiral of self loving reawakening continues.
Thank you Chris I love how you have expressed the ‘inner spiral of self loving reawakening continues.’ What an amazing confirmation that loving choices build on each other and at any moment we can choose to build a deeper connection with ourselves.
Being with ourselves is the biggest treat there is. I realized today that when I try, and work hard, and do things from having to or bettering or a false sense of responsibility then at some point I am going to want to have a break and/or a reward. Where as when i choose to be myself, surrender deeply into to simply being there will never be a moment of me wanting to have a break from that and the yummy, warm fulfilling feeling within myself will be the greatest reward, and treat, there can ever be.
“I continued to swim with myself, in my rhythm, breathing gently, moving in love.” Very much the key to life. The water remains undisturbed yet the ripple effect is amazing.
This is such a beautiful blog to revisit Anne, I especially love this line – “In every moment we have a choice, to treat ourselves with love, or not. That is a true treat. That is the true power of now.”
So beautiful to read Anne, to choose not to beat yourself up, but to make the choice to take yourself for a loving swim, so simple, a choice in every moment, thank you.
Treating ourselves with love in every moment and by that bringing this love even to the smallest of our movements will let us feel the amazing stillness and joy, makes us feel our natural way. Nothing needing to be done or accomplished, just being, living and everything else will unfold at its time.
So often we back over, ruminate, regurgitate, analyse everything we do, in the ‘effort’ to get it right. Your blog Anne has supported the inner knowing that none of this is necessary and how harming it can be. Thank you for your beautiful and heartfelt words – ‘I felt the grace of just allowing myself to be’.
If something does need to be reviewed… a decision, or the choices we made the day before, then the results will be wildly different depending on whether we are feeling bad about ourselves, or have taken the opportunity to set ourselves straight and feel the love again, to then reflect on those previous choices.
So true ch1956 – in the regurgitation we keep ourselves in that same energy where those ‘not so good’ choices were made from. I love what Anne is sharing here as she actively changed the energy she was in by making choices to come back to her body and the Love she is. It serves no purpose to continue rattling around in the darkness trying to find answers or reasons for unloving choices – but when we turn on the light, come back to Love everything is there for us to see.
How powerful simplicity can be shows your amazing blog Anne. You expose that it is possible to chose an other way than blaming and giving oneself a hard time. What you wrote is gold: “In every moment we have a choice, to treat ourselves with love, or not. That is a true treat. That is the true power of now.” – how wunderbar is that!!!!
Feels very glorious and so restorative to have treated and loved yourself in this way Anne, yes you’re right we can either go into hard self-sabotage, or choose to stop that, and instead choose the ease of ourselves and of love.
Thank you Anne beautifully expressed, and a great reminder of how simple it can be to choose something that brings us back to love, rather than continuing the cycle of unloving choices.
What a loving experience. The way you describe it, I could just feel you melting into a loving space. I will take your example in my day. I had a lovely day yesterday, yet at the end I made some unloving choices foodwize and I can feel the consequences now as I woke up. Yes, I can go into bashing myself. And…I can treat myself with love today. See this day as a brand new day, take me for a walk and connect lovingly and then have a breakfast which suits my body.
We can give ourselves a hard time even through just our thoughts! Being Love feels truly empowering and far more honouring.
It is so easy to focus on the ‘negatives’ and give ourselves a hard time because that is what we are used to. To change this around and instead focus on our breath which leads us back to who we are deep within our hearts is a much more loving act. Not to make us forget about the unloving choices we may have made but to support us to not beat ourselves up about them. I have very recently realised mistakes don’t matter. All that matters is being who I really am.
Thank you robynjones11 for this loving reminder which is so supportive in letting go of beating up tendencies and places the focus on living the gloriousness of us in every moment: ‘All that matters is being who I really am.’
Thank you Helen for your comment as it has given me an opportunity to read my comment again and this is exactly what I needed to be reminded of today.
That’s beautiful Anne, we can all make choices that are not supportive of ourselves but being hard on ourselves can make it even worse and not allow us to start making some more loving choices. Thank you for sharing 🙂
We in fact perpetuate the unloving choices by being further unloving in the way we treat ourselves about having made these choices in the first place. It is a vicious cycle that can only be broken by breathing our own breath and coming back to the stillness within.
Anne, this is a powerful blog which clearly demonstrates how a loving choice changes the moment and sets a true foundation for the day. It is such a habit with most of us to beat ourselves up for not doing the ‘right’ thing instead of just seeing that Now is another moment to choose love or not.
Very simple really.
Anne, you capture beautifully that moment when we feel off and we have a choice to continue in that or to choose differently. And you choose what would support you to come back. And it feels gorgeous how you were with you and allowing yourself that space reconnected you to the stillness in you. I have this image of you being in your rhythm taking the time and care needed and gracing all around. This is what building love is about on a daily basis – such a gorgeous reminder thank you.
I love “to treat ourselves with love – or not”. It is so easy to beat ourselves up for not getting it right. This is a pattern from childhood that is a hard one to let go of – if you give the ‘beat yourself up’ pattern space. Treat ourselves with love and in a flash it is gone.
This is simple and powerful Anne, how you share your experience of choice. Many times I have felt that very familiar feeling of struggle and hard work, and often make choices that stem from those emotions. I’d like to think now that I might make a different choice next time this happens; a choice that is loving and supportive for me.
Anne, I loved the way when you felt “off” that you made a loving choice to be able to come back to you. So often we override the “bad” feelings and just carry on. A learning for me in this- thank you.
It is truly extraordinary how the water can show us our choices so clearly and even more so is how quickly we can choose to reconnect and feel amazing again. This was just so beautiful to read Anne, and deeply healing, like I was in the pool with you.
‘I felt the grace of just allowing myself to be, surrendering to the knowing of my body and its natural breath and natural rhythm, and how healing that was for me’. I love this line, and I also felt the grace and the love present in reading your blog Anne!
That sounds lovely. It’s like you are being a friend of yourself and supporting yourself instead of being hard on yourself. Doing that would be better for you anyway because it will make you want to keep looking after yourself thereafter more often.
Thank you Anne, like you I woke feeling a little out of sorts this morning. Instead of a swim, I decided to go for a walk in nature and took a few appreciative photos of the blossom on the trees and the goslings down at the pond near my home.
Totally true Anne! Yesterday I was doing a Workshop on Expression. The first exercise did not go totally well. I was confronted with the option of giving up right there and say: yeah, I did not have a good day (the excuse was already on the making) or not accepting any of that and simply re-imprinting the workshop. I opted for the latter. Everything changed suddenly for the better. An amazing workshop unraveled then.
Oh Anne, another pearler of a read this morning for my very tired self, that is a consequence of some of my not so loving choices yesterday….Thank you!
Powerful, beautiful and so divinely true.
Oh yes, back to the body and choosing the quality I like to be in or know myself to be when loving with myself and life. The power of choice.
Wow Anne this blog is truly beautiful, as are you. I felt my own stillness expand as I read your description of swimming in love. Thank you for presenting the truth that the true power of now is in the choice to be love or not. It is through the teachings of Serge Benhayon that I have come to know that I am love and so the choice to be love in that moment is the choice to be the true me. I feel truly blessed to have received this teaching…it has been life changing to feel that I am not my issues or unloving choices and to accept the truth that WE ARE ALL LOVE!
Exquisitely beautiful to read and a great reminder of the power of choice present in each and every moment…
What a beautiful, loving and yet powerful blog, Anne. Thank you for sharing in such a still, simple and practical way about the absolute power of the choice we can make for ourselves. I was used to being hard and critical on myself after doing something ‘wrong’ and the realization I have a choice, lightened it all up. It also gave me the back the feeling I have influence on how I feel. Off to the pool now :-).
And if we are being hard and critical with ourselves we are also being this way with others. Not very pleasant all round!
Thank you Anne for sharing this practical example, of how to not go into being hard on yourself to making a totally different choice. Thank you for the reminder.
The power in such a simple choice is truly amazing. No matter what ill choice we have made we have the choice to not add to the ill by not dwelling on it.
Choosing to change our focus towards love is immensely self empowering as this blog has shared.
What I love is that no matter what ill choice we may make the love in our hearts never goes away unlike emotional love which can be ‘removed’ or withdrawn when so called mistakes are made.
Thank you Anne, for your blog on not punishing your self for a choosing to partake in something that wasn’t a good choice. Your intuition into how your body was truly feeling and behaving was really special to read, I can learn a lot about recovery from not so great choices.
I loved your post Anne, a delight to read. Thank you!
Thank you Anne, that was a most beautiful post and a loving reminder for me and all.
Your words were soo felt and something I needed to be reminded of. The simple way you’ve expressed your choice of choosing to come back to you by honoring yourself over things to be done, and not choosing to beat yourself up was amazing to read and feel. The every little difference it made slowly in you in choosing a supporting way for you was an amazing and truly loving journey I felt while I read this. It’s all about the choices we make, Thank you!
Thank you Anne, for exposing this weird and twisted desire to add insult to injury by punishing ourselves for not having made loving choices in the first place – how amazingly simple!
Wonderfully put Anne. I love your blogs and thank you so much for expressing this is such a gorgeous way. I found that it was very healing to hear the simplicity that is true love and how important it is to empower our selves with that love and not hide behind the hurt to continue perpetuating the lie of what we did not want to hear or face.
Thank you Anne, this is very beautiful.
Just before I read this blog we had a family chat about the choices we are making that affect how we are with each other at home. Simple choices around what we eat and do to relax, which then mean we are dull with each other or not all of ourselves. What I love with what you shared is that it is a simple choice to judge ourselves and be critical or to make a loving choice. A choice that honours and supports the amazing, awesome and loving human beings that we know that we are. This is very inspiring Anne, thank you.
A beautiful example and reminder for me about how easy it can be to start making more loving choices…thanks Anne…
What a truly yummy post to read. Even though I felt I was right there with you in the pool and it inspired me to go swimming, I realise I can choose to have these yummy moments with myself anytime with or without the pool. Thank you Anne. 🙂
Just what I needed to hear.. feel.. Thank you.
Beautiful timing, I was just beating myself up for being out of rhythm and stopped to read a few emails and your words were just perfect, thank you.
So beautiful Anne – I love your work.
Anne – thank you for highlighting an area that can be easily overridden. Listening to what we need for our being is the key. “I felt how I could have continued in the struggle, forced myself to keep going, to complete a task, to fulfil an ideal of what I should be doing…” is the foundation that we usually choose to ‘make amends’ or ‘get ahead’. Which, as you point out, only creates further harm and another step away from truly caring for you. How many steps away do we all end up taking before our body yells “STOP”. I have, and to some degree still do fall for this ‘have to/should do’ story, and this beautiful tale of choice and choosing you first is a great example for me to come back to and support me.
You described your experience so beautifully Anne, that I felt like I had taken the swim as well.
Gosh this is so gorgeous to read. Makes me want to go for a swim right now and connect deeply with my own loveliness. I am off to the pool right now… Thank you Anne for sharing this experience with us all.
Such a beauty in this…the power of choice, it is profound really…and you shared how you made the choice to come back to love, in such a simple practical way. Thank You!
Thank you so much for this beautiful post, a very loving and timely reminder. I have the tendency to keep pushing, struggling, forcing, having to do or being hard on myself – rather than simply returning to my breath, my body and choosing love. I am going to bed with a gentle smile on my face and feeling very lovely allowing myself to be, in that there is no worry or thinking ahead of what tomorrow may bring, I can simply feel how lovely it is now, in this moment, and the space that this creates around me.
Thanks Anne, a timely reminder. I can and do revert to giving myself a hard time instead of choosing the love and stillness I have developed within. You have expressed so beautifully how simple it is to make a loving choice. Felt like I was swimming right there along side you!
This is an inspiration Anne, true Love and deep nurturing for ones self. I am inspired as I know when I get myself into a slump it is easier to focus on that, and all the thoughts that come with that, than focusing on who I really am and nurturing that back. Thank you Anne
Anne, so simply beautiful – I love what you have posted here.
I love the simplicity of what you have described Anne, and yes, how not beating youself up in any way, made it possible for you to just be love with yourself and feel the awesomeness of that.