Have you ever been presented with a situation and then looked back and wondered why?
Why did this happen, why did they say that? A situation that you later have appreciation for!
Life is continually presenting so much to us. Do we ever truly stop to feel what we are really being shown?
I have had many occasions in my life where something has happened to me and I have gone into the “Why me?” scenario! This has not always been in a ‘good’ way – I have often seen what has come my way as an inconvenience.
However, recently someone shared with me how life presents little packages, and these packages are presented to show you, to reflect to you a part of you or your life. By observing these packages you are able to feel that there is more to life and what happens around you.
For example, some of the packages that I have been presented with have allowed me to feel that there is an area in my life that may need more attention and a change in the way I am – within myself, my life, and with the people around me.
Recently I was presented with an encounter where a person was astounded by how different I looked today compared to the last time they saw me. Knowing I had not long ago had a baby they couldn’t believe that I was naturally carrying no extra baby weight and that I didn’t look tired but was looking great, and even younger.
It was a great confirmation for me to stop and appreciate how far I have come in my life since introducing different choices and making a lot of changes in my life and the way I live it.
As so often happens, at the time I did not really feel what had been said until that night when I got home. If I chose to, in that moment, I could have felt and appreciated how much I had changed and how that change radiates out.
Of course I knew I had changed, but I still had not accepted myself as I am now, or how I now allow myself to be me.
Not long ago I was part of a ‘before and after’ presentation at a Universal Medicine event: I was one of the participants sharing about the way I had changed. I got up on stage to share a few words about where I was at and where I am at now, not realising until I got on stage that I still did not accept and fully appreciate myself or how far I had come.
I realised that it was not just for another to see and feel, but for me also. During my life I have had compliments from others, whether that’s being told how great I looked or how well I was doing with things in my life. Never was I comfortable accepting or appreciating what was said to me, instead choosing to brush them off thinking I was not good enough to accept compliments of any sort. I have always been presented with opportunities to help me to grow, to see the areas of my life that were amazing and the areas that were not so amazing and needing attention. Of course, some I chose to see and some I ran a hundred miles from. This is something I am now more appreciative of and willing to look more and more at. I now see these opportunities as blessings that help me see what needs to be looked at in my life, or simply what needs to be accepted and appreciated.
Have you ever had life present a situation to you where you never bothered to stop and consider that maybe there is more to it than what you have allowed yourself to feel?
With love and appreciation for Serge Benhayon, Universal Medicine and the Way of The Livingness for all they share and represent. It is through this sharing that I have been able to reconnect to who I truly am. I now accept myself for who I am and how far I have come.
By Nicole Serafin, Tintenbar, NSW, Age 41
The Truth about Serge Benhayon 
Nicole I absolutely love reading your blogs, the simplicity and practicality of it all. Who would have once agreed that life presenting ‘little packages’, are a means of healing? In hindsight I would have observed them to be similar to you, an ‘inconvenience’ too.
Since meeting Serge Benhayon, Universal Medicine and the practitioners, life is so much more different. It’s full of abundance and not in the way people think abundance is about. The having the house, big cars, money etc isn’t the thing that fulfils me anymore, it’s more worldly than that and constantly evolving.
I love life more than ever, ‘little packages’ or not, see it from a different perspective…
True appreciation comes with so much that the magnificence of this word will be one day a book about life and how to live in appreciation of the blessings from heaven and the stars that we all live under.
Greg we are continually told that life needs to be ‘good’. Whilst ‘bad’ isn’t received well. Yet they are indifferent in that they leave you with an emotional state.
When magnificence is offered, its unfathomable and universal. It quenches that thirst of unsettlement.
Absoulutely Shushila, lighting the fire within ignites a True way of living.
Nicole this statement is a great reminder what life offers us constantly, ‘some of the packages that I have been presented with have allowed me to feel that there is an area in my life that may need more attention and a change in the way I am – within myself, my life, and with the people around me’. And this is exactly what is occurring for me now. These packages aren’t always obvious but once it becomes part of our awareness, they become more and more refined.
It was good to read this blog, as another area in my life needs to be observed and to just be steady with myself instead of going into reaction. To bring more understanding and love to the situation and be responsible for my part in the matter too.
You are very correct, ‘there is more to life and what happens around you’.
“Life is continually presenting so much to us. Do we ever truly stop to feel what we are really being shown?” I had this realisation today that really anything that comes our way is an opportunity, when faced with anything we can always choose to go deeper into love.
Thats truly the answer for everything.
Spot on, it is an opportunity to truly go deeper into love, and from this more understanding and appreciation develops and then more is offered. It is that simple. We just need to get out of the way, with our opinions of, should have been, could have been ideals and beliefs.
So often it is easier for us to accept criticism or correction (as this is what we are used to) rather than accept compliments or confirmation of something beautiful that we hold. This can come from a lack of self worth and also a fear of standing out and others being jealous. Yet each of us bring something for ourselves and others to celebrate and also our reflection is needed to support another to feel inspired.
Sometimes it takes another person to notice a change in us before we stop to appreciate ourselves deeper. What we live on a day to day basis and then grow our standards is a gradual process and needs to be so – but to take stock and look back is a very confirming process to appreciate the steps one has made to live the current standard.
Life is full of opportunities – when we see it in this light then it is a completely different to seeing things as events that are either here to bring us down or to lift us up. Opportunities are simply presented for us to learn and grow and hence are always a win win situation.
Is there more to life than what I have already allowed myself to feel? Very good question, one worth exploring.
Absoulutely Leigh and when we learn to feel and read what is happening with the energies that can play with us we have learnt how to explore life with our Souls.
We are constantly presented with situations or opportunities to help us learn and grow, ‘ I now see these opportunities as blessings that help me see what needs to be looked at in my life, or simply what needs to be accepted and appreciated.’
I am coming to understand that we are living in a school where we are constantly being reflected what we need to learn this time around the sun. We have allowed ourselves to be so misled by ‘education’ that we have completely missed the point of what we are meant to be doing here.
Thank you Nicole, a situation will always arise where we will be getting a deeper understanding of our own divinity, or inner-connection, will reign a blessing upon us and thus we can start to appreciate with deep-humble-ness the True Love we all are.
Where does that ‘not good enough’ that doesn’t quite allow us to appreciate ourselves comes from? Interesting to observe what we are we measuring ourselves up against.
Today I have been feeling that I’m not truly living the advances I have made, I am in a familiar older version of me but I’m actually ahead of this! It’s a beautiful realisation and there is much for me to appreciate, observe and catch up on in myself, and then allow myself to live and consolidate the more expanded version of me.
Last night before going to bed I was given a gift by the hierarchy; it was in the form of an email very lovingly given. So very much appreciated because I know I have at last allowed myself to reconnect back to what I have always known is the truth and in the allowing I am now back in conversation with all that I have always held dear to me. I’m back in the fold of my true family.
If we are willing to challenge the reality we think we live in then the truth will be shown to us and then the packages that we are presented with can be unpacked with love and care and in the unpacking our awareness grows and we can see through the veil of illusion we are living in.
I took part in an amazing exercise this weekend on the power of appreciation and how it has such an uplifting effect. The opposite is also true, when we gossip or denigrate someone – it is all about the energy.
Well said Sue – we can build ourselves and others or we can undermine ourselves and others.
“It was a great confirmation for me to stop and appreciate how far I have come in my life since introducing different choices and making a lot of changes in my life and the way I live it. ” This is such a great exercise to carry out regularly, as appreciation can do away with self-doubt – a particular bugbear of mine.
Reading this makes me realise that we don’t need to get caught up in situations, that instead we can see every situation as a learning and an oppurtunity to evolve. If we live like this it can bring a lightness and joy to life.
When we appreciate ourselves the body responds so it makes sense that people will feel that also.
Appreciation and what it brings is frequently not appreciated enough. There is much we can appreciate, ‘It was a great confirmation for me to stop and appreciate how far I have come in my life since introducing different choices and making a lot of changes in my life and the way I live it.’
We are taught from a young age that there is a right or wrong or good or bad, but I don’t actually remember being taught about appreciation? Looking back it seems we were taught how to criticize and judge ourselves and others but not how to appreciate so no wonder it is something that we find difficult to do.
Spot on Mary, ‘it seems we were taught how to criticize and judge ourselves and others but not how to appreciate so no wonder it is something that we find difficult to do.’
I had some photos done recently and then I recently spotted a photo of me from about 4 years ago and their was a distinct difference in the photos, I look more beautiful now that I ever have and yet I am older. But its not about how I look on the outside, even though that’s what we see. Its about the way I am with me and how this is deepening, which can help but but be seen on the outside. I felt and feel very appreciative of the choices I have made over the last 4 years.
The importance of self-appreciation is definitely not something that we are brought up to know, and in fact most of the time we are raised to put others needs before our own, and perhaps begin to believe that we aren’t worth looking after, let alone appreciating. How amazing it would be to raise our children to deeply appreciate themselves, as from appreciating themselves they will naturally appreciate others; definitely a ‘win-win’ situation.
Very true Nicole. We have to brush much of what happens to and around us aside in order not to see the obvious that is often even in our face.
It is the way to avoid its true power as this comes out when we truly appreciate ourselves.
Nicole, I was presented with a gift very recently; I was listening to Serge Benhayon and he presented what for me was a pearl into his presentation. I was very clear as a child and this was not appreciated so I shut my multidimensionality down – this was my absolute knowing that I came from the universe. After attending a Walking Therapy workshop I reconnected back to my multidimensionality and it was as though a switch had been flicked – suddenly I knew who I truly am and I have my Mojo back again.
Serge Benhayon presented that as children many of us close this part down; it made complete sense to me and I said to myself that was rather silly, but we do silly things when we are young to fit into the world so as to not not rock a society that doesn’t want to know where we come from
The more we appreciate, the more we are given, for what we are gifted with is never for the one and always for the many.
There is actually so much to appreciate in ourselves once we start opening to feeling who we are and our inner qualities. It’s amazing how much more comes up to be felt and appreciated – it’s like an endless well of beauty within ourselves and each quality can also expand and deepen, so even with qualities we know about ourselves our appreciation of them is never static.
So true Melinda. The door to self-appreciation may be a little hard to open to begin with, the hinges a little rusty from under-use, but once opened it is absolutely amazing how much there is to appreciate about ourselves. As you say, “an endless well of beauty”
I love the visual of the rusty door, appreciation can be a bit like an underused muscle that needs to be worked on and built up. I’ve also noticed that now my door hinges are well oiled I sometimes have periods where I feel completely blocked in my ability to appreciate myself, and though self appreciation is a deeply nurturing activity I feels it may be because others aren’t so comfortable when I live the fullness of myself and express how amazing I am. Something to work on!
What I find very beautiful are the gifts that can come through other people’s expressions: it could be something I’d felt but not been quite fully aware of or able to articulate clearly. It’s not even about paying someone a compliment, but something that when voiced, every part of you knows that it is true. What is offered and reflected in that expression is space: the potential go deeper in your relationship with yourself, and the other.
To appreciate what we bring around us by our loving choices is feeding us back the vibration we were bringing through.
Just being alive is a gift in that it gives us the opportunity to heal so much.
When I can stop and appreciate what I have done and reflect on what messages and gifts I have been given, It helps me complete my day. I do not have to fill it up with food and entertainment.
Yesterday I was speaking to a friend and we were sharing the appreciation we had for ourselves and for each other, and by the end of the call, you could really feel the joy and lightness.
True appreciation shared in a loving way is such an amazing way to expand on the already celebrated qualities. Claiming this in ourselves is equally important so that we can then live it as our new standard.
When I appreciate myself or others, I have a deeper understanding and focus on the love and connection more that looking at the areas that may need to change, for when we truly appreciate we see the beauty and magic that is on offer.
So many say life is against them, but this is never true. Life is simply offering opportunities for you to learn more about your choices and what you are choosing in line with love and what you are choosing that is not.
If life seems against them, were they against life first?
I am starting to appreciate all the signs and messages that I am given which shows me just how much the hierarchy are communicating to me. Sometimes I don’t get the understanding straight away, I get the message don’t read it then something happens and when I look back I realise that is what the message was conveying to me. The more I am willing to let go of the control of life the more I am shown.
We can be so quick to judge a situation as bad, wrong or not working out when in fact we are being offered a gift- a new way of being with, relating to, or doing something.
I had such a package today, I drove miles to see a small company out in the sticks, and met a person who was such a lovely down to earth young man. His company supports a team of aircraft that helps to put out bush fires and he was telling me how communities come together when such a disaster occurs everyone rallies round to support each other and the crews,it is such a shame that this comradery isn’t a continued after the fires are put out. While I was there talking to him I could feel that there was far more happening than just me being there in my capacity to represent the company I work for. I felt I the quality of the atmosphere everything seemed bigger. Looking back on the day it was very magical.
Appreciation of ourselves is a huge topic, we tend to assume we couldn’t possibly be enough the way we are and each day the point we should be at (the picture we hold of how we should be) shifts. We tend to think we need to wait for the finished product, so to speak, instead of realising that who we are is already more than enough (and in fact quite exquisite), and each step we make back to love and the fullness of ourselves is beautiful – so appreciation of ourselves can be enjoyed at any moment.
Very beautiful Melinda, an awesome reminder for me to appreciate every moment and not wait for the finish line but to enjoy the process of whatever it is I am doing and where I am at and embracing in full that we are already exquisite, divine and wise.
When gifts are lived as inconveniences, we learn to hate tension without appreciating that this may be a self made set up.
If acceptance is the gateway to evolution, appreciation is the acceleration of it. Learning to deeply adore that which we have put in place and also the support that surrounds us, truly grows us in quite unexpected ways.
It is indeed Liane, gracefully delivered with power and authority, and I agree appreciation is key to accelerating our evolution and experience of joy.
Beautiful, yes Nicole, those moments of wake up. Today I had one; a lady behind the counter of a tea shop served me, I was worrying in my head about something, she smiled and she was so glad to see me, I stopped and directly felt the unnecessarily of being in my head, I rather be with that smile in the moment!
Thank you Danna, I enjoyed your comment. I recently was walking at the beach when I felt down and not myself, I saw a group of women and men coming towards me from the opposite direction, I looked their way and one of the women was smiling at me with such love and joy and welcoming, like she knew me, and she waved, my heart completely re-opened and I felt the wonder and awe of love shared so unconditionally. It was a beautiful moment.
It all makes sense Doug and as you share, ‘..everything has a purpose.’ when we understand this, it can be life changing.
A beautiful reminder for us to appreciate life and our everyday situations. Each moment is an opportunity for us to learn, grow and appreciate all that is offered to us.
I was watching a webcast recently and I saw on camera one of the elder students of The way of The Livingness and she looked stunning and seems to be getting younger every time I see her. I also know that she has a serious medical condition but instead of looking haggard, Grey and drawn she is full of vitality and is blooming. There is definitely something to be said for the teachings of the Ageless Wisdom.
This article hit a nerve this morning as I read it as I am not very good at appreciating who I am or what I do. It’s as though there is an internal voice that keeps telling me there’s more so that I never actually stop to feel where I am. And I’m starting to feel if there is a lack of self appreciation then it’s like putting up a road block and saying this is as far as I’m willing to go. Someone said recently that our spirit will let us think we are returning to who we are but in reality they are still in charge.
Yes Mary, I know that one too, just keep on going as there is always more instead of appreciating and confirming how far I have come and then having the foundation to go on, without effort or wanting an outcome , to the next round of evolution.
Easily I moved around without confirming my beautiful steps with God.
I experience that it is very important to do so, this way i built the love within me again.
“Never was I comfortable accepting or appreciating what was said to me, instead choosing to brush them off thinking I was not good enough to accept compliments of any sort. ” I used to do this too – but feel there’s a sort of inverted arrogance – and also a diminution of what the other person is offering by way of the compliment. All it needs is a simple thankyou. Does it sometimes seem that other people appreciate us more than we do ourselves? In my family self – appreciation was considered to be an act of pomposity and self-aggrandisement. But how can we truly appreciate another if we don’t appreciate ourselves first?
Because appreciation is such a powerful part of evolution it has a lot of negativity attached to it and has been quite bastardised. Appreciation is so simple really, and how much I appreciate who I am and others is a lovely reflection for others to have. The attitude that it is pompous does not come from love because appreciation is very loving to offer to others and to receive.
“Never was I comfortable accepting or appreciating what was said to me, instead choosing to brush them off thinking I was not good enough to accept compliments of any sort.” How many of us do or have done this? Accepting and appreciating all of who we are (not what we do) is so important – and makes a difference to how we feel about ourselves too.
There is always more to feel. We can forever deepen our connection with the divine by surrender into our body first.
“I realised that it was not just for another to see and feel, but for me also.” It is something to truly take note of here Nicole. I had experienced today how I was working with people not so confident in what was going on. It was frustrating that I could do what I wanted to do, and I was being engaged to assist. It was simple for me to provide what I knew. I had this all day. What I realised was how much I can step up and start to lead in my service. It was lovely to feel the truth of what was being presented.
This is a great article because it raises questions about appreciation for what has been given in true love. For example, I have an amazing life and I struggle to appreciate it all in full because I still do not fully believe that I deserve it, and yet it has been given with love. So perhaps it is not to question whether I deserve the grandness of all that is on offer, but rather to love the awesomeness of life itself and how things seem to find their way even out of the most difficult of times.
Maybe we need to change our viewpoint so it is not about whether we deserve the grandness, but more that we are the grandness and life is delivering us constant opportunities to return to our true selves.
Seeing all life as an opportunity in the sense of being an opportunity to learn more about ourselves, our expression and awareness for the benefit of all is truly enriching.
Often the situation we are the most displeased with comes to be seen as a great gift, in ‘hindsight’ – but why rely on living backwards this way when we can appreciate now?
Great point Joseph and when we constantly apply the science of appreciation we are living the future and not the past.
Even when ‘the little packages’ are not very pleasant I have found it very rewarding and enhancing to appreciate them for the lessons they bring.
Hi Nicole, thank you for this blog, I have only just come to this understanding that we are presented with packages of life and then it is how we deal with what has been presented that makes a difference to our continues evolution or not. I had forgotten this is how it works, so now I have a far more enquiring understanding and suddenly life has become interesting again. It feels a bit like some games my daughter used to play on her ‘Gameboy’ years ago that when you have been successful in completing one task you go to the next level. I have never been into those sorts of games but willing to have a go this time round.
I just came back ftom a retreat with Serge Benhayon in which we looked deeper in what our purpose is. What is true purpose? Do we have purpose? Or is it missing?
Thank you Nicole, it is so true: acceptance and appreciation is what truly marks our steps made and to go forward.
The question well presented and asked:
Have you ever had life present a situation to you where you never bothered to stop and consider that maybe there is more to it than what you have allowed yourself to feel?
This is a great question what I can feel asks us to dig deeper and see beyond what we thought is possible.
It’s common to make a big kerfuffle about ‘a sign’or a specific day. But how blind are we when we miss the fact that we are offered gifts every moment of every day? There’s not enough wrapping paper in this world to account for that.
I had to laugh reading this Doug, because in the dumbing down existence we think we are intelligent.
If we allow ourselves to stop and see the absolute gems we are offered in life to really look at either what we are still holding on to or what we have actually let go of we would be in constant appreciation. A situation that happened recently in my family left me feeling hopeless, overwhelmed, and not knowing what to do… eventually though I saw I chose to feel this way because of the ties and expectations I was still holding on to and that what rocked me, not the actual situation. It was a beautiful opportunity to let go of so much from my childhood and feel the simplicity in what was needed now.
Developing an openness with appreciation is what confirms the movements of love we are saying ‘yes’ to, aligning to, allowing us to continue deepening this relationship so that we live our love with greater authority.
The science of appreciation and understanding how to apply it has been the greatest gift that was presented to me and now the opportunity I can give to myself in every moment. We are not brought up to understand the bigger meaning or truth that each moment presents. It is taught you are right or wrong or good or bad, but not to actually appreciate the confirmation or what more depth can we go to.
Very true Rik. What a difference it would be if we were all supported as children to understand the truth that we innately know rather than right and wrong. For who decides what is right or wrong anyway?
The Before and Afters are particularly beautiful as we do get the opportunity to feel how much we have changed because if what we have said yes to. There is also appreciating what we have been given, which is no different that anyone else.