Tag: Empowerment

The Missing and Harnessing Loss

Posted on by Cylvia Hayes

It’s now been a month since Tessa passed. The first few weeks were intense, indescribable really. Missing became a noun, a thing – “The Missing”. I would be going along, doing life, and The Missing would reach up and grab me, freezing the breath in my chest and flooding my eyes. It jumped me even when there was no obvious trigger beyond a lovely memory wafting through. In truth, it was so deep it was akin to a phantom limb; a beautiful part of me I expected to be there that wasn’t. I had to start adjusting to going through life a little lesser, a little less rich, quieter.

I am still grieving, tears still springing at unexpected moments (like now, as I write this) but it is softening – love and gratitude far outweighing the loss. I sometimes now feel her presence on the breeze, and it makes me smile.

I really don’t know if loss, transition and trauma happen for a purpose but I absolutely do know we can make purpose of everything that happens.   Tessa’s passing shifted me out of my normal state of being. After the first week, as the most jagged edges rounded a bit but the grief was still incredibly powerful, I found myself in a softer, slower energy that was just perfect for finishing my book.

I know I announced late last year that I’d finished the book, but after speaking with the publisher, editors and doing market research I realized that for it to fill the niche I’m hoping for the book needed to be a good bit longer. I have worked throughout this year to get it where it needs to be and within a few weeks When Life Blows Up: A Guide to Peace, Power and Reinvention will be headed to the editor, cover designer and graphics team and finally to completion and launch! Whew, it has been a JOURNEY! I am so proud of myself for seeing it through and for not rushing it, for allowing it to become something I really want to put forth into our world.

Loss isn’t easy and grief really can’t be rushed, but it can be harnessed. It can open us to gentler, more vulnerable and therefore more creative energies. Once I get this book fully fledged, I’m thinking about doing another titled, Soul Dog, for all of us who take the beautiful risk and reap the rewards of giving our hearts fully to a four-legged, furred or feathered friend. Thanks for the inspiration Tessa, my sweet pea.

This pic of her has become my favorite since her passing. It was taken just two months before she passed and before I had any idea how soon that was to be. We were out on a hike and, as I had done so many times before, I looked back at her and my heart flooded and I said, “Do you know how much I love you?” As she had started doing in the frosty-faced portion of her life, she looked right into my eyes and smiled, her way of saying, “Yes I do know and right back at you.”

Life is process and man it hurts sometimes. Change is guaranteed even if we wish it weren’t. We are never what we have lost. We are not what has been torn from us and we definitely are not broken beyond repair, ever, unless we choose to build the brokenness and victimhood into our beliefs, our stories and our identities. Even when it all blows to pieces we still are everything we were before. We might not still have what we had — the positions, the possessions, money, the athletic body, the children, the loved ones — but we still are the culmination of experiences, talents, current and former abilities and impactful relationships that make us uniquely us. Every one of us is the sum total of all we have experienced, felt, learned and unlearned before. There is never only one way to view a challenging event and never only one possible outcome.

I still have Tessa’s urn and little shrine on my front room floor. Cards and letters and even lovely drawings poured in from people whose lives she had touched and who cared about us – I am really touched by that and I just love it that so many people loved her. I expect at some point I will spread her ashes in various places that she loved, but not just yet. I will know when that time is right. In the meantime I feel for her on the wind and allow my heart to open a little further.

Love,

Cylvia

P.S. For those of you facing a period of transition and reinvention, whether it be grief, loss or just wanting to find clarity of purpose in the next chapter of your life, I have four openings for complimentary Reinvention and Empowerment Breakthrough sessions. Just schedule a time here — https://calendly.com/cylvia/30min. I very much look forward to talking with you.

The Power of Rewriting Our Stories

Posted on by Cylvia Hayes

It can be damn unsettling to be at a point of major transition and life or career reinvention in our 40s, 50s and 60s. And yet, reinvention at this point in life is unbelievably common. Take heart, you are not alone!

There are more Americans between the ages of 45 and 65 than any other age block in our country AND a whole heck of a lot of us are in the midst of big life transitions and changes.

One of the best ways to harness change as a path to peace and empowerment is to take a deep and honest look at the stories we tell ourselves about ourselves and the world. We all consume stories by media and pop culture and our own families and  we wind up attaching to some of these stories and accepting them as truth even when that might not be the case.

For example, pop-culture media is filled with images and stories of celebrity success and accomplishment that are mostly airbrushed illusion.  Sensationalist news media pours heavy doses of fear into the mix, enticing us to compare ourselves to those airbrushed images in order to get our attention and willingness to spend money on their advertisers’ products. None of this has anything much to do with depth, substance or real life.

The stories we buy into about ourselves, life, limitations, are just that, stories. But they are immensely powerful: they literally shape our experience of life.

When I was forced out of a career I’d spent my whole life building, I felt utterly adrift, heartbroken, terrified and really pissed off. I was also unable to do anything to get back what I had lost. After raging around for a time in anger, resistance and despair, I finally made a decision to take control of what I could which was the way I chose to view the situation. Instead of sticking with the story (however justifiable it might have been) that I had been unfairly targeted and taken out, I chose to view it as an unasked for sabbatical to explore other areas of life and myself.

I wound up growing and expanding so much that when the dust settled and the reshaped landscape of my life came into view, I realized I didn’t even want to do what I’d been doing before! I had grown into new dimensions and directions. In fact, that’s what led to me developing the Launch Your Next Chapter and Jedi Activist programs and doing work that I LOVE.

In recent years I’ve worked with many, many people in the process of reinventing at mid-life. Like all of us they started out pretty afraid but as they began to let go of the old scripts and write new stories they have gone on to launch new businesses and non-profit organizations, find beautiful new loving relationships, sort out difficult financial situations and even boldly pick up and move to new countries they’d always wanted to experience.

One of the most disempowering stories we buy into is that we are supposed to be in a certain place at a certain stage in life. It’s the false story that we “should have done thus and so by now” and are too old to do (fill in the blank), now.   For the most part, that is garbage. Just consider:

  • Mother Teresa was forty years old when she founded the Missionaries of Charity.
  • Jack Nicklaus was forty-six years old when he shot 65 in the final round, and 30 on the back nine, to win the Masters.
  • Henry Ford was fifty years old when he started his first manufacturing assembly line.
  • Ray Kroc was a fifty-two-year-old milkshake machine salesman when he bought out Mac and Dick McDonald and officially started McDonald’s.
  • Pablo Picasso was fifty-five years old when he painted Guernica.
  • Dom Pérignon was fifty-six years old when he first produced champagne.
  • Oscar Hammerstein II was sixty-four years old when he wrote the lyrics for The Sound of Music.
  • Winston Churchill was sixty-five years old when he became Britain’s Prime Minister.
  • Nelson Mandela was seventy-one years old when he was released from a South African prison. Four years later he was elected president of South Africa.
  • Michelangelo was seventy-two years old when he designed the dome of St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome.
  • Auguste Rodin was seventy-six years old when he finally married Rose Beuret, whom he met when he was twenty-three.
  • Benjamin Franklin was seventy-nine years old when he invented bifocal eyeglasses.
  • Frank Lloyd Wright was ninety-one years old when he completed his work on the Guggenheim Museum.
  • Dimitrion Yordanidis was ninety-eight years old when he ran a marathon in seven hours and thirty three minutes, in Athens, Greece.
  • Ichijirou Araya was one hundred years old when he climbed Mount Fuji.

The truth is there are myriad possibilities in every situation and most of them we are unaware of, until … we aren’t! How many times has life delivered an opening you never saw coming? That doesn’t end as we progress through it. In fact, the experience and seasoning we gain along the way broadens the options for what’s possible.

What stories are you telling yourself about yourself and the options before you? Are you certain those stories are accurate? Are they serving you? Remember, you have the power and the right to write your own story.

Love,

Cylvia

Giving Birth to Self

Posted on by Cylvia Hayes

I had a powerful dream recently. I gave birth to myself! Literally.

In the dream I give birth and I know the tiny infant is me. I am flooded with love for her and wrap her in a snuggly blanket.

But then, I put her down inside my large purse and lean it up against the outside of a building. I go inside and start working on some project with a team of people. After a little while I realize, “Oh my God, I left the baby out in the cold!”

I rush out and find the bag with the infant me in it. The little one is basically OK, but cold and I hold her against my body giving her warmth and love.

And then, I put her back in the bag and go back inside the building to work!

After a while I remember her outside and in a panic, afraid I will find her dead, I rush back out and pick her up. I hold her close, rock her gently and promise never, ever to abandon her again. I am flooded with love as the dream ends.

I think we do some version of this to ourselves over and over, when we put aside our true glorious Selves and opt to be something less than we really are.

We do it when we change our true nature to conform to someone else’s idea of what we should be.

We do it when we compare ourselves to others and believe we are coming up short.

We do it when we act with less integrity than we know we have.

We do it every single time we choose to believe we are small, powerless and alone.

The good news is the real us is always there just waiting to be remembered, nurtured and valued.   Always there ready to grow and shine.

Here’s to never abandoning our True Selves again.

With Love,

Cylvia

 

Life Commencement

Posted on by Cylvia Hayes

This is the time of year when lots of us are attending High School and college graduation ceremonies. It’s usually both joyous and bittersweet for the parents.

A good percentage of the clients I support are people who are at mid-life, facing transition and working toward launching the next chapter of life. Having the kids fledge is often part of this period when people start really looking at what’s next.

It occurs to me it’s a little sad that we have ceremonies to recognize and honor important rites of passage like marriage and graduation but nothing at all to honor the incredible feat of making it to full-blown mature adulthood!

At this point we’ve navigated our lives, many forms of education (formal and tough knocks), built careers, raised kids (and sometimes parents), worked our tails off and gained lots and lots and lots of life experience, and yet, there is no ceremony, not time off to celebrate all of these incredible feats.

If this sounds like you, if you’re at that magical but sometimes mystifying place called mid-life, I encourage you to take a moment, or much longer, to pat yourself on the back and celebrate your incredible accomplishments.

And, if you’re feeling a little unsettled, uncertain about what comes next ….. well, congratulate yourself for continuing to stretch, for not just settling and sitting back on your heels! There’s a whole new world of opportunity opening up as you carry your life experience, tempering and wisdom forward into your next chapter.

So huge congratulations to all the grads. And in celebration of all you miraculous people who have navigated enough life to help launch these next generations on their journeys. Here’s to the next phase of your own.

To schedule a complimentary Mid-Life Mastery breakthrough session click here — https://calendly.com/cylvia/30min

Love,

Cylvia

 

Love is Never Wrong

Posted on by Cylvia Hayes

In three days I will be halfway across the country picking up my nephew as he is released from prison. I say nephew, but we’re actually more like mom and son at this point. We’ve been through a lot together. Twice before I tried to offer him a stable base, once when he was a little boy and once as a very damaged teenager but at those times neither of us had the maturity or depth to make it work. This time is different; he and I both have been through a good deal of refining fire and love has grown much stronger than fear or frustration.

At the beginning of 2018, knowing I had about a year to get ready to bring him into my home and help him launch the rest of his life, I set a goal to have the resources in place to do the very best for him. Last year didn’t go quite as planned on the financial front as the legal battle with the Oregonian dragged on and on and extra, unexpected expenses popped up and yet, I leave in three days with the resources I need.

It doesn’t look like I’d envisioned, with me making a ton of money, having a chunk in savings for my nephew and having the drain of legal battles being behind me, etc., but I have what I need to offer love and huge opportunity to this young man. My life partner has been unbelievably supportive, with his time, big-hearted acceptance and a sense of humor about the complication this is no doubt going to add to our lives. He even purchased our airline tickets. Bless you Beloved — truly, I am such a lucky woman. Friends have stepped up out of the blue with financial help, enthusiasm and offers of mentorship. My mom has been saving money for my nephew to purchase clothes. My spiritual community has held this journey and transition in prayer every single day for several weeks now.

It’s just amazing and more than any other experience in my life proves that we really are all in this life together. Whether we notice it or not we are all supported by a vast matrix of people who touch our lives in a million ways big and small. Everywhere I look in this situation I see where other people, even strangers, have supported us. Not just the obvious examples, but also the teacher who delivered the GED program at the prison and the voc-tech director and trainers who helped my nephew navigate through his electrician’s apprenticeship and even other inmates who were rooting for him and helping protect him as he neared his release date. Beauty sometimes shows up even in the darkest of places.

So many times these past few weeks I’d have a little stab of nervousness about the disruption of bringing this big guy into my little home and all the changes that will come with it. But each time that little flicker of fear would slither in, it was instantly replaced with the words, “Love is never wrong.” Over and over again those words ran through my mind. I don’t believe I’ve ever more genuinely just expressed and embodied love for another human being. The ripples go beyond our direct relationship and even beyond those still living.

A few years ago, as I was going through an extraordinarily challenging, traumatic time I was working with a therapist and was surprised to be having a lot of difficult, regretful memories and emotions around my late sister (my nephew’s mother). I found myself wishing I had been mature enough to be there for her when she slipped further and further into drugs, depression and despair and our family pulled away.   The therapist suggested I write a love letter to my sister and as I worked on that I realized the best love letter I could offer her was helping her son make it through the horrific ordeal of prison and launch a healthy life on the other side. “Sis, if you’re listening, and I believe you are, your boy is in good shape and he’s about to be safe and in a stable place with a really good job.  He is full of  hope, gratitude and promise.  I hope you are smiling.  I love and miss you. Thank you for all the kindness you showed me.”

I guess it’s fitting that I keep thinking of the movie, The Shawshank Redemption, and especially the scene near the very end where Red has finally gotten out of prison and is in a bus headed to Mexico to join his friend Andy. Red says, “I find I am so excited I can barely sit still or hold a thought in my head.” Red felt that way from finally realizing freedom. I’m feeling that way in anticipation of witnessing a loved one leave a horrible situation and finally land in a safe place where he can spread his wings and soar.

I didn’t consciously choose it, and I couldn’t see the full pattern of it until very recently, but my nephew and I are on a sacred journey together and if you’re reading this I guess in some small way you’ve joined the adventure.  I share this in part just to express my excitement but also, hopefully, to provide a little inspiration to those of you who may be having a hard time, struggling, and who may feel like the circumstances swirling through your life are keeping you imprisoned. I know how hard that is and I also know no storm lasts forever.   We are always swimming in a matrix of support, new opportunities are endless and freedom really is a choice. And, maybe most importantly, genuine love is never wrong.

We really are all in this together. Thanks for being part of this journey. Stay tuned and YIKES!!

Love,

Cylvia

You’re Invited to Your Own Power!

Posted on by Cylvia Hayes

Are you wanting more from your life? Looking to hit the reset button after life took a hard turn you hadn’t seen coming? Do you want to start or grow a mission-driven business? Do you want to get unstuck, period?

Then I invite you to join me at my upcoming reinvention and empowerment workshop. This is not your typical self-help workshop. Most personal development stuff is about trying to improve yourself, get rid of aspects you don’t like, overcome shortcomings. The problem is, that’s a scarcity-based approach and it just reinforces the message that you’re not good enough! It’s exactly the opposite of what we need to achieve more peace, power and success in our lives.

I learned this the hard way. I know exactly what it’s like to have life as you know it blow to pieces and find yourself reinventing career, relationships and even your basic personal identity at a time you never thought you’d need to. Several years ago, my career and life had reached heights I hadn’t dreamed of and then it all blew apart in a spectacular, public, “fall from grace”. I lost my business and ninety-percent of people I’d called friends or colleagues and, faced with all the legal challenges, I had to file bankruptcy.

At first I was terrified that my life might be broken beyond repair. For once I couldn’t just force my way forward and so, out of pure survival, I decided to treat it as an unasked for sabbatical. For the first time I truly surrendered and faced myself from the inside out and through that epic journey I realized up to that point I’d never really known myself at all, I had never before met my authentic Self.

For four years, as the legal challenges dragged on, I followed a path of study, reflection, growth and reinvention. I got certified as a life coach, completed the first chunk of ministerial school, and received training from numerous beautiful wisdom teachers. I realized that my whole life I’d been seeking power and success from outside sources – the approval of others, the way my business looked, even from the political arena — but the refining fires of life blowing to shreds burned away the BS that had been blocking me from my True Self and genuine power.

I developed a program that not only helped me heal but transformed my life in beautiful ways I never could have foreseen. I am now, happier, more peaceful, more successful and making a bigger positive difference than ever before. I radically reshaped my business because I knew I had to harness the trauma I’d been through and share the empowerment tools, strategies and insights I’d learned so that I could help more people make a bigger positive impact for themselves and our world.

I am deeply committed to helping others rediscover their authentic Selves, reclaim personal power and create lives and businesses that help heal our world. My empowered reinvention workshops are one way I do that and I would love to see you in the next one coming up Feb. 2nd.

In this workshop you’ll learn tried and true strategies to uncover your innate ability to:

  • Transform fear into clarity and a sense of empowerment
  • Find peace no matter what’s swirling in the circumstances of life
  • Embrace the awesome creative power of change and uncertainty
  • Find forgiveness, even of self
  • Develop a sense of genuine self-worth and safety

And the biggest outcome is learning to remember your own divine magnificence and get out of your own bad-ass True Self way!  

The path to power isn’t about looking outside for answers and authorities, trying to “fix” yourself, fill up places you perceive as empty, or even “attract” desirable things. The power is in remembering who you really are.

Let’s do that together February 2nd! Let’s make 2019 the best year of your life so far!

For more info and to register go to www.cylviahayes.net (go to Store tab and you will see the link there)

Here’s what some people had to say about the last workshop.

“It was a wonderful day …. I loved being a participant … your cloud of magical learning and how profound your teachings are. In gratitude for your sharing of your authentic self. – Tam

Thank you for the wonderful experience. It was truly fantastic, and really beneficial to me.  I’m definitely at a crossroads in my life, and a lot of things are up in the air.  I’m in need of finding the path that’s right for me, and in the process, am definitely working through a lot. Our class was right in line with that, and helped me immensely … Again, I thank you for this. – Maggie

You Wow’d me … workshop was amazing!I learned why I have been so withdrawn and lacking motivation. I also learned to get free of limiting thoughts, quit being so hard on myself, and embrace my new beautiful life even more. I so appreciate your workshop. – LD Sullivan

Designing the life you want isn’t about becoming more or better, it’s about remembering who you really are to begin with.  Remembering your True Self enables you to master your emotions, step out of suffering and into the life you really want – no matter the circumstances you’re facing right this moment.

True power is not outside of you and you are already magnificent, powerful and completely capable.

Date: February 2, 10am to 3pm

Location:  Unity Community at One World Center, Bend Oregon 

Register at: www.cylviahayes.net (go to Store tab and you will see the link there)

Before You Launch!

Posted on by Cylvia Hayes

The last day of the year! I don’t know about you, but I am more than ready to see 2018 in the rearview window! However before just saying “Buh bye 2018!” it’s really useful to take a little time to reflect what the year delivered.

These past 12 months have likely produced some beautiful moments as well as same challenges and setbacks. Taking a step back and looking a bit more holistically can offer up some hidden pearls of wisdom and insight.

Before fully launching into the new year I encourage you to spend some time asking,

  • What was the accomplishment, event, undertaking you are most proud of?
  • What was a mistake that provided a powerful lesson-learned?
  • What are you willing to shed, let go of, get rid of, in order to accomplish what you want to do next?

It is really important to WRITE DOWN your answers. The act of writing, even just bullet points, empowers the insight and change you’re after.

My own answers to these questions surprised me. At first, I thought my biggest accomplishment was finishing the first full draft of my book, but going a little deeper I realized the real accomplishment was staying the course. What I mean is that I completed the big projects I had committed to – the book, developing the online infrastructure for my new business, rolling out my new trainings and growing the Empowerment Coaching services – and I did all of that while staying true to my inner growth, meditation and spiritual practices.

What are your accomplishments, creations, major undertakings of 2018? It might be on the professional or personal level. Write down every single one that comes to and take a moment to celebrate all you accomplished. Then see if one or two really jump out.

My lesson-learned mistake was painful. I got burned from a business associate I had considered a friend and lost several thousand dollars in the process. The lesson is I KNEW BETTER! My inner wisdom was shouting, “This person is unreliable – don’t do it!” I ignored that inner voice and my own depth of integrity and made a move I shouldn’t have. In my whole career I’ve only had a couple of times where a client or partner wound up being a problem and EVERY SINGLE TIME I ignored the inner warning flags that were trying to wave my off. No more, I vow to never again ignore that inner voice of wisdom – lesson learned!

What mistake did you make this past year that you can use to learn and grow?

And then we come to the part about releasing the stuff that’s no longer serving us. This can be old projects on your DO list that you really don’t care about anymore, or old habits that keep you from being your best or even old stories you tell yourself about yourself.

My commitment is to release my tendency to compare my life, my work, my self with anyone else so that I step even more fully into the unique niche I have to play in our beautiful world.

What are you willing to release to take your life and work to a whole new level?

Spending a little time with these three questions is so worth it, and so are you!

Here’s to a happy end of the year just passing and to a massively powerful launch into 2019!

Cylvia

I AM Gratitude

Posted on by Cylvia Hayes

Today I Am steeped in deep gratitude for who I Am, just exactly as I Am.  

I Am giving thanks for my life, exactly as it is, where it is, in Divine Order.

I Am giving thanks to Spirit, from Spirit, in advance, for the next growth and changes I desire, for the next beautiful unfoldings in my life and our world.

Comparison, envy, fear and unforgiveness I release to the Universe to be cleansed and corrected. Because I Am incomparable, a stream of individualized expression of God. So are you.

I Am grateful.

I Am gratitude.

I Am.

And so are You.

World Day of Prayer

Posted on by Cylvia Hayes

September 13th is Unity World Day of Prayer. One of the many things I love about Unity is its empowering approach to prayer. Instead of beseeching help from a separate, “out-there” God, Unity practices affirmative prayer, claiming the outcome we want as already being truth. For example instead of asking for healing from an illness we affirm the health and wholeness that is our natural state. Instead of asking for more money, we affirm our place in the flow of infinite abundance where all our needs are met with ease and grace.

This type of prayer is not so much asking something of God or placing an affirmation in our mind as it is lifting our eyes above the appearance of limitation or lack. It’s about cleansing our mind and releasing its inherent power.

In affirmative prayer we enter into conscious remembrance of our Oneness with Source and of our Divine Nature. In a Letter to Adam, Sue Sikking writes, “True prayer is not asking for things, not even the best of things. Prayer is the lifting of the consciousness to the place where these things are.”

Prayer, like meditation, is even more powerful when two or more gather together with shared intention. During this World Day of Prayer for twenty-four hours people across the globe will be joining together activating the inherent power of mind to create good in our lives and world.

Together, we lift our consciousness to the place of peace and wholeness, which is our natural state. Let us all begin to hear the ancient familiar melody reminding us who we really are in full glory and goodness. The love that we are, the only thing that is real, pours forth with such fullness it leaves no room for anything else. Healing dances into every corner of creation. A song of peace echoes through the world with every choice we make. We affirm the Kingdom of Heaven is here now. And so it is. Amen.

Unity World Day of Prayer.

Namaste,

Cylvia

Don’t be Limited by Noisy Relationships

Posted on by Cylvia Hayes

I recently made the painful decision to pull away from someone who has been one of my closest friends. This person did something extremely dishonest and unloving and, although the love is still there, the trust is gone. Even though I miss the friendship I know this is the right decision.

The whole situation proves, once again, that relationships are our most profound classrooms. Now that I’ve gained some distance I can see what a terribly noisy relationship this was. What I mean by that is that this person always has a lot of drama swirling around her and, against my norm, I allowed myself to get wrapped up in it. The uncomfortable truth is that she fed my ego and vice versa. I have no doubt that there is genuine love between us, but there is also no doubt that out relationship wasn’t completely healthy. I knew I was acting unwisely when I put myself into a position of dependency on her but I did it anyway. And I paid for it. And it hurt in more ways than one.

Now that the noise has quieted the most amazing thing is happening. Into that void is flowing the voice of Spirit. I am hearing my own Higher Self, far more directly and more often. The plain truth is no other person can ever fill our need to develop a deep, honest relationship with ourselves.

Noisy, co-dependent relationships keep us identified with voices and opinions of ourselves that are not really ours. They are just an attempt by our small, ego self to distract us from our True Self, in all it’s magnificence.

Today, I respect myself enough to prioritize my inner relationship. Today I am listening to, and valuing, me.

I am worthy of developing my whole self.

I am worthy.

Cylvia Hayes

#CylviaHayes  #Empowerment #ResiliencyMuscles