4 Simple Strategies to Receive More Happiness in Your Life!
Hey, hey, hey. Welcome to What’s Up Wednesday. This is my weekly video blog inspired by people like you. So, my name is Leigh Ann Betts. I am the founder and creator of Bust Your Busy Badge for women. It’s a 30 day challenge. And basically I guide busy women to get out of that time management trap. And I teach them to learn to manage their energy instead.
So what’s up today? Today I wanted to talk about something I’ve been noticing. I’ve been noticing women are really having a hard time receiving. No surprise, right? Basically they are out there doing it all. And you know, when they are not receiving, it matters, because we have no time. No energy. And we’re just too busy to receive. So, we’re shutting out all that goodness. All that goodness that life is trying to dish up for us.
So, anyway, I’m glad you’re joining me today. I want to give you some simple strategies to give more balance in your life. And to allow yourself to start receiving. So, this is inspired by something that happened at the gym this past week. I work out with an amazing group of people. And unfortunately one of my friends got injured toward the latter part of the workout. And like a serious injury. And she went down. And what I noticed was like everyone in the gym rallied around her. The trainer got her leg up. The guys were around here consoling her. Someone, actually two people were calling her husband at the same time. Someone gathered all of her personal belongings. And she was in shock. And I went over to her and I bent down, and she basically said to me, Leigh Ann, I do not have time for this. I have too much stuff to get done. And my heart just sank for her. Because I know that feeling. I just totally could feel it. And we both looked at each other. And we knew what needed to happen. She needed to let go. She didn’t have a choice. She was basically in the situation, she’s got two small kids, and a husband that works out of town. And, you know what? She’s got to be in receive mode, because she can’t do it all right now.
So she ended up having to get surgery. She actually tore her Achilles and she had surgery two days later.
Anyway, I don’t know if any of you ever felt like that? If you’ve ever reached a point where you had to completely surrender? You had to give in, because you had no other choice? I know, I certainly have. This reminds me of a few years ago, when I was picking up my son from his preschool. My mom was with me, and it had warmed up the previous week, it was wintertime. And this day it happened to be totally dumping snow. And as I was going to get him, I noticed one of the neighbors had left the windows open, and the snow was just billowing in. so I thought, I will just quickly run over there and be a good Samaritan and let them know their window is down. But there was a bunch of snow covering the ice. And I just totally went back and I smacked my head. And I got a severe concussion. This was not convenient for me. I didn’t need this at this point in my life. I was like, my whole world is going to be falling apart here.
I actually didn’t even know my name and didn’t know the year. So thank goodness my mom was with me. But it took me about three months to recover from that. I basically, like my girlfriend said, I don’t have time for this. So, you know, the sun continued to rise and set. And life carried on, even though I couldn’t do anything. I couldn’t watch TV, or text or any electronics. You’re basically just in B mode. And you know what I realized? I actually survived. And I carried on. And life carries on.
And, I received. I received from others. Because I was forced to. And it felt really good. So today, I want to talk about four simple strategies to begin receiving again into our lives. Because when we’re always giving, we get out of the energetic flow, right? It’s going to be like giving and receiving to be in that beautiful movement. And if we’re just giving, giving, giving, we’re totally out of it and we’re in what I call energetic collapse.
So the first strategy to receive more in your life is to take a breath. And when I talk about taking a breath, I’m not talking about the shallow breathing we’re normally doing, but I’m just talking about totally inhaling into the belly and letting it go. And just taking several of those breathes. So, I want to do a little exercise with you today. We can all take a minute to receive a breath. So hopefully you’re game to do this.
What I want you to do is just put your hands on your belly. Put your feet on the floor and sit down on your chair. And totally relax. And I want you to breathe in and out through your nose. And as you do so, I want you to breathe in and expand your belly and feel it with your hands, hold at the bottom, and then breathe out through your nose.
We’re going to do this again, breathing in through your nose, pushing out your belly and holding at the bottom. And now, I want you to relax your jaw on the out breath. Let’s breathe in again and expand your belly, hold. And on the outbreath I want you to relax your shoulders. And now, on the in breath, again, belly out and hold. And now I just want you to relax your bum into your chair.
Let’s just cycle through that one more time. We’ll start with the jaw. So, inhaling in, hold, at the bottom, and relax your jaw on your our breath through your nose. Breathing in again, holding at the bottom and relaxing your shoulders on the exhale. And one more time, breathing in, hold on the bottom, and relax that bum right into that chair on the outbreath.
So I call this the calm your busy breath technique. It’s actually a centering technique that is really good for two things. Number one it gets you to receiving, you’re receiving the breath. And number two, if you’re totally busy and stressed out, it helps you get back in your body and get more present again.
So, put that in your energy tool kit and pull it out whenever you need to, receiving a breath. Okay.
So that leads me to number two, your second strategy for receiving. And this is receiving a compliment. So someone says to you, hey I love your shirt. We have a tendency to go, oh this old thing. Oh, I bought it like five years ago. No. all you need to do is say thank you. So receive a compliment. Or it could be something like someone says, hey, your hair looks awesome. And you’re like oh my gosh, my roots, I haven’t had my hair done in two months. Just say thank you and receive a compliment. Okay, got it?
Alright, now we’re going to move on to step three. Step three is receiving a smile. And hey, there are tons of opportunities to do this, right? We’re around people all the time. So really just take it in when someone smiles at you and smile back. That is a really great way to energize and a great way to get you in the flow of receiving more in your life.
And, now, number four, the fourth way to begin to receive in your life, and this can be really hard for a lot of people. This is to receive a helping hand. Yes, when someone says, hey can I help you with that, say yes. And I know I struggle with this one from time to time, too.
So it might not be done as good as you would do it, but you know what, someone else is helping you get back in the flow of giving and receiving. So, yeah, that’s my four strategies. So breath, compliment, smile and get a helping hand from people.
So, I don’t know if any of you have any ideas of what you like to do to receive. But if you do, just pop it in the chat. And we can share it with other people. If you have got something that works really well, let’s add it to the list. And let’s try it out.
So, the next time you are doing too much. The next time you are just totally overwhelmed and you’re like what I call Busy Lizzy, just worrying around in a tizzy. Just stop and ask yourself, how may I receive in this moment? How can I receive in this moment? And it could be something like, in addition to the four strategies I’ve shared, it could be you’ve got a pet, so you could receive some love from your pet. Some cuddles. You could be outside in the sun. And have the sun beam down on your face and enjoy its warmth and receive that.
Or you could actually take some time to enjoy nature. One of my favorite things to do, and it’s a really good Feng Shui cure is in your bedroom, in your master bedroom, buy fresh flowers. I do this every week. I just enjoy it every morning when I wake up, it’s the first thing I see. And every night before I go to bed, it’s the last thing I see. So I receive from putting flowers in my bedroom every day.
It could be a hug. You know, if you are not a hugger, maybe become one! It’s a wonderful way to receive more into your life. And again, just the breath. You can do it when you are stopped at a light. When you are in the grocery line. There are so many opportunities for us to begin to receive. So you deserve more love. More abundance. More vitality and success in your life.
So try these tips to start the cycle of receiving. Giving and receiving so that you can be in balance. Thanks for joining me today. I just want to give you a heads up that I’m launching my Bust Your Busy Badge Challenge again in November. So if you are interested go to LeighAnnBetts.com and you can get my free gift and I’ll keep you informed of when that’s coming out.
But until next time, I just want you to open your arms. Open your arms to receive. Receive what’s there for you so that you can begin to get in the flow. Thanks for joining me.
Photo by Sasha Freemind