SOS Village

Di’s Journey – The Lessons…

In January 2008 I took the biggest leap of faith in my life.  I packed my car with my most treasured belongings, which when it came down to it, were one suitcase of clothes, my personal development books, my motivational CD’s and my Border Collie….. and drove 500 miles south to start again at the age of 40.

Did I feel the fear and do it anyway….. absolutely, in fact, I felt pretty terrified!  I left behind a home I’d built and designed overlooking mountains and sea, a well established business, 20 years worth of personal possessions, the treasured piano my Dad had built for me, all my friends, a large Egyptology collection…. literally ‘lifting’ myself out of my life of 20 years in the Highlands and plonking myself firmly into a brand new life in Warwickshire with a brand new partner. 

I had no idea whether we would work or not…. It really was a leap of faith, a following of instincts, a trusting in life….. so I stepped through my fears and took that leap into the unknown……

My journey into personal development actually began 6 years ago when I reached what felt like the lowest place I could reach emotionally. I had the word ‘Victim’ clearly tattooed across my forehead.  I remember one Sunday, my mother saying to me “Right, you need to buy this new book!”, and so I went out and bought it, along with a 30 minute hypnotherapy CD.  After listening to the CD just once and reading a few pages, my body and mind felt different…. Was this exciting? You Bet!  And so my journey began…

Within one year of starting to read personal development books, instilling positive affirmations and investing time in myself to learn and grow, I fell deeply in love with myself as a person, the kind of love where you trust your own instincts and know that you can handle anything life throws at you. I remember getting out of bed one morning, glancing at myself in a mirror and catching my own eyes.  I said out loud, and it came from nowhere! “Oh my God, you can achieve anything you want with your life!”…the difference here, is that this was the first time in my life that I believed it 100%… that day I booked a hotel conference room to hold my first ever workshop…there was no going back. 

My positive thinking had become part of my identity….. so, was it worth it?  YES, YES, YES!!!  It certainly changed my life!  My life’s purpose had suddenly been lit like a flame inside me that could not be extinguished…

Over the years I set up a very successful practise, which quickly developed into motivational speaking, evening classes, support group and workshops.  I felt so alive, so on fire, when I worked that the thought of not doing this full time was utterly ludicrous to me….. My enthusiasm must have come through in abundance in my work, because it took a relatively short period of time before I was able to live my dream full time….

The difference here was that I truly stepped into my future, claiming it as my own.  I believed absolutely and utterly ….nothing could stop me from living my life’s purpose…

Claiming the Future

I handed my notice in at my full time post of 14 years with the local government on 6 August 2007 – exactly one month before my 40th birthday.  Inside me was the belief that life begins at 40, and so it did.  My last day of being an employee and working for anyone other than myself, was 18 months ago on my 40th birthday.  I went out into the big wide world, I mean REALLY went out into the real world with the belief that no matter what happened, I could succeed with the love and enthusiasm that was living and breathing inside me …..

To me now, the only fear I have in life is the thought of lying on my deathbed many years from now, looking back and wondering why I hadn’t given myself the chance to be everything I could be…. there is simply no failure in my experience of life, even on those occasions when I have fallen…. They are only opportunities to learn, feedback to help us improve, the Universe guiding us in a different direction instead, one which we’re not quite aware of yet….If something doesn’t work for me, then I simply trust that this is the way it is meant to be… somewhere hidden within it, will be the lesson I have to learn.

Over those 6 years, I learned so much and my journey will never end – I am so excited by the thought of continually expanding my mind and challenging my own beliefs until my last breath….so far, each step of my journey has been the logical next step, overcoming fear, followed by learning all about beliefs, the law of attraction, studying the science behind our thoughts, how they effect our biological state and health as well as our mind…then how our energy connects to everything and everyone around us …WOW!  I now sense, feel and see energy around me, and can understand perfectly within just a few minutes of speaking with someone, how and why their lives are exactly the way they are.  I see wonderful things flow towards me when I’m feeling great, and I see everything come to a standstill when I feel low… Thank you Universe, for this incredible gift…

If I had planned the unfolding of my journey this way, I simply couldn’t have done it…. the story just seemed to magically open up as I gave myself to it.

The realisation that I create the outcomes in my life depending on my beliefs and how I choose to respond to any situation is so empowering to me…. no longer does life simply happen to me, it is mine to create.  I can’t always choose what will happen in my life, but I can certainly choose how I allow it to effect me, I can choose the moments where I can respond with love instead of fear or anger, and watch in amazement as to how that changes what comes back into my life. 

Learning the power of forgiveness, learning how to give love in the face of hate and anger and how to learn from every situation in life, are the biggest blessings imaginable.  I no longer carry the burden of blaming anyone else for how I feel… it is literally like having a weight lifted.  When this change first occurred, my energy lifted, my head felt light, and I began to have an uncontrollable urge to extend love and give wherever I could…

The realisation that my beliefs formed the entire experience of my life, in other words, what I choose to focus became my reality, well, this is so exciting to me that I find it difficult to put into words. For instance, take 5 people, all with different beliefs, ask them to walk down any high street together, then ask them what they saw – they will all have a completely different experience of exactly the same thing depending on what they are focusing on and what their beliefs are.

WOW! Focus and beliefs = reality!  The journey over these 6 years has been inspirational to me, to the point of living in awe some days, I have cried with joy on countless occasions…

And so, over these last two years, my journey has stepped up a gear and gone into overdrive!  Take a very independent and positive young lady (me of course!), remove her from absolutely everything she knows….put her in a home that doesn’t belong to her, in a place surrounded by cities as opposed to mountains, no well-acquainted friends, very few personal possessions of her own, living and working with her new partner 24/7, a complete change in diet incorporating raw food and veggie juicing, all chemical-free products…..

Along with that, a wonderful little brother who is undergoing treatment for cancer, a fantastic Mum who also had to overcome cancer, and a not at all well 14 year old Border Collie who is rapidly going downhill…..

So what can we learn?

Well truthfully, it’s more a case of what can’t we learn!…. I’m still learning and always will be, but here are a few snippets of the key points which have affected me most…

Happiness truly is inside of you…. you can take everything you know out of your life, and you can still feel happiness…. this was a gift that I treasure, and has helped me to instil so much trust in myself.  It is all inside of me…… ‘home’ is inside of me……

Not knowing whether I would lose my brother, Mum and little dog all in one year was something I had to handle, so the Universe provided me with the ultimate lesson in acceptance.  I learned that going into victim mode over these things was focusing the attention on me and not giving the love inside me to those who needed it most…. So I learned to give an abundance of love, rather than curl up in grief… people who need our love during these times can feel our energy, so it is kinder to give love while they are alive and to grieve after they have gone….

I learned how to share myself with a new partner, to adapt to new ways of doing things and new ways of being…. I learned how to teach him and how to be taught by him.  I learned how to argue too!  It wasn’t an easy journey for either of us, but we gained more knowledge and understanding in our relationship than we could ever gain from any book ….we become wiser through our experiences and how we chose to handle them. It has been one amazing journey!

I’ve learned to stand back and observe… I now understand that when my ego is removed from a situation, I can listen, hear and respond clearly and with love….

I remember a period when I felt particularly low for a couple of weeks and I’m horrified to say that I actually fell out of love with myself.  I learned how shocking it felt to me, how painful my body and mind felt during those couple of weeks, how difficult and undeserving I found it to accept love from anyone, yet at the same time how needy I became for my lack of love in myself to be filled by others.  Andy was quite horrified by the change in me to be completely honest! It was such a clear reminder of not only how I used to feel every day 6 years ago, but how most of my clients feel when they come for help.  Thank you Universe for that invaluable lesson…. I shan’t forget it in a hurry!

There are gifts in life no matter where we look….no matter what we are going through, the gift is inside us…. it is always there, it is simply a matter of finding it and connecting with it….

Over these last 2 years, so many amazing things have come into our lives that there are days I stand back in amazement.  With a sense of trust and no fear about the future, without any attachment to particular outcomes, I have finally learned how to truly give myself to life….

Back in December 2008, one of our close friends said to me “If you had set out to achieve so much over the course of one year it would have felt like a daunting task!” He was right!  I guess I’d never actually taken the time to sit down and realise how much had come to us in 12 short months, and that was one year ago, during which time even more has flowed our way…..isn’t it incredible what opens up when we give ourselves and life the chance? I could never have achieved any of this without having had the courage to step out of my comfort zone first.

So many reasons to be thankful

Thank you Universe, for the way in which you have unfolded my incredible journey in life….

For always knowing what page needed to be turned next…..
For giving me the wisdom to learn from life, rather than to be a victim of it….
For helping me to understand the part I play in every experience of my life, and for accepting responsibility for them without blaming myself or others..
For helping me understand that my journey will never end…
Thank you for the magic and miracles, and for the wonderful people you have brought into my life…
Thank you for teaching me how to love…

By Diane MacDowall
http://www.dimacdowall-lifecoaching.co.uk
http://www.executive-relationship-coaching.co.uk

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