Poor Me Tea: The Strengths Within You

04/30/2020

04/22/2020

🌱Morning intention meditation...what do I need today? 🌱

Resilience: The ability to regroup and recover after an emotionally draining situation.

“Change is the only constant in life.” -Heraclitus

The great mystery of shifting emotions...

Sometimes there’s an obvious external cause...an argument, being pulled in so many directions, taking care of others when I barely have time to take care of myself.

Other times, I don’t know what happened...I all of a sudden just feel different...an internal shift as if a switch was turned on, or maybe the switch was turned off...leaving me feeling so drained

Sometimes I just need to ride the wave and remind myself ‘this too will pass’. Because I know it will pass.

Other times I can expedite the change. I take a slow, deep breath and ask myself...,
“What do I need right now?“
“What do I want right now?”
“How do I want to feel?”

“What is this situation trying to teach me?”

Taking a moment to take some deep breaths and reflect can do wonders.

A shift in perspective.
An increase in compassion.
A call to take better care of myself

With practice the shifts in emotions aren’t as drastic.

The practice...Daily reflections, meditation, a focus on the breath.

https://poormetea.com

04/20/2020

🌱Morning intention meditation...what do I need today? 🌱

Today’s strength is Vitality: The ability to wake up feeling rested, refreshed, and energized.

This has been a struggle for me as long as I can remember.

For most of my life I have hit the snooze button multiple times as I fight through a sticky web of dreams and emotions before emerging from the covers dazed and confused.

I like the idea of waking up rested, refreshed, and energized. It seems like the way it should be. You have a busy day, you go to bed when you are tired, and wake up excited for the new day.

If I am going to make an attempt to have a better morning tomorrow, I may have to change some things.

It seems to me that the evening routine may be where this power lies. Everything that I choose to do in the hours before sleep will have an impact on tomorrow’s morning. My choices on when and what I eat at night, whether I continue to look at my devices while in bed, and when I turn off the lights...all of this impacts how I feel in the morning.

Just as important are the thoughts I choose to think as I drift off into sleep. The subconscious mind will carry these thoughts into my dreams. This takes practice...choosing your thoughts as you drift off to sleep.

Tonight I will do my evening reflection meditation to release any residual, negative thoughts and focus on the things that brought me joy today.

My intention is to wake up feeling rested, refreshed, and energized.

https://poormetea.com

04/19/2020

🌱Morning intention meditation...what do I need today? 🌱

Today’s strength is Purpose: An understanding of the significant meaning of my life beyond personal gratification.

There is an energy source that I am able to access when I am helping people.

I can be completely wiped out, listless even, after a long day and someone can “need” me and I will be off the couch and out the door. I will feel focused and invigorated.

However, I am not always able to tap into that energy source. If I haven’t been replenishing my own energy reservoirs, I will not be able to “plug in.”

But right now, in the world, I see the countless people in health care and other essential services who seem to be tapping into this source despite the extreme fatigue and emotional turmoil that it is causing them.

They are being driven by a powerful motivation of helping that is extraordinary...doing for others despite putting themselves and their families at risk.

The essential workers have become the motivation for others to stay home despite the loneliness and isolation that is felt in this social distancing.

Never before have we experienced this combined purpose as a world, to do what we must to save each other, to keep each other safe.

This shift has left us behaving and acting in a way that goes way beyond personal gratification...We’re not doing this for ourselves, we’re doing it for each other.

On my exhalation I release feeling isolated, lonely, and resentful
I feel motivated, grateful, and optimistic on my inhalation.

https://poormetea.com

04/17/2020

🌱Morning intention meditation...what do I need today? 🌱

Today’s card is Acceptance: Patience and tolerance of other people’s actions and reactions.

This is a strength for which I find myself grossly unbalanced. Sometimes I can be wildly critical and judgmental of other people’s actions. But then other times I can be forgiving and tolerant of the most aberrant behavior.

I suppose that these reactions are really dependent upon my internal state and have very little to do with the other people involved. They simply become targets onto which I can project my inner experience at that moment.

If I am patient and tolerant of myself, I can be patient and tolerant of other people. I am going to say that again because I really want that statement to become a part of me.

If I am patient and tolerant of myself, I can be patient and tolerant of other people.

https://poormetea.com

04/16/2020

🌱Morning intention meditation...what do I need today? 🌱

Gratitude: The ability to see the many blessings in my life.

In our society we are almost encouraged to focus on and share bad news. If you watch the news you know that most stories are fear based, sorrow filled tragedies. Nothing spreads faster that bad news. “Did you hear that so and so died today?”

We are taught not to brag about good things that we have done or are just simply lucky to have. While it’s good manners not to rub your good fortune in someone else’s face, it is not healthy to only focus on negativity. Why not be thankful for something everyday?

Gratitude exercises are relatively simple and very effective. “I am thankful that this morning I was able to get myself out of bed, walk to the kitchen, and make my own coffee. I am thankful that clean water comes out of the tap when I turn the handle. I am thankful that I can take a deep breath without coughing.”

The above examples are very simple, every day occurrences that if they were to change would make for a very different day. Appreciation can absolutely alter the outlook of a day, an evening, or a moment.

It is healthy to want to improve yourself. However, focusing only on the things about yourself that you wish were different is not going to make you feel better about yourself.

How many things can you list in a 5 minute gratitude exercise?

https://poormetea.com

04/15/2020

🌱Morning intention meditation...what do I need today? 🌱

Today’s card is Openness: The ability to open my heart and welcome in all that I desire.

Why would this be necessary? Why wouldn’t I be open to my desires?

Many of the things that we want are big, life changing events: A new job, a bigger home, a healthier body, a new relationship, a dream vacation, etc.

Often these wants can be very complex and quite life altering. It is very easy to become overwhelmed with the flood of thoughts that contradict our desires. “Would I have to move to get my dream job? How will I afford my dream vacation? To lose 20 lbs will I have to exercise EVERYday? What if I get this new, bigger house and my job changes and I can no longer afford it?”

Our mind can easily block our openness to new things with old fears. Some of us are very adept at this.

Today I exhale and release feeling uncertain, pressured, and noncommittal.
I inhale feeling open, courageous, and qualified.

What can you do today to open your heart and welcome in one of your desires?

https://poormetea.com

04/14/2020

🌱Morning intention meditation...what do I need today? 🌱

Today’s card is Manifestation: The ability to become everything that I desire.

This is a very powerful strength and can be rather intimidating to meditate and journal on.

It is easy to become paralyzed thinking about it. “But I don’t even know what I want!!”

It feels like having found the genie’s lamp, being granted 3 wishes, and then being unable to speak.

I find it easier to think of this strength as a muscle that has not been used for awhile or is underdeveloped. Most do not run a marathon on their first time out. One needs to achieve smaller, reasonable goals to be successful before taking on loftier ambitions.

The desire to run a marathon can begin with “I want to run 3x every week for a month.”

Once I have decided on a goal, I can then bring in other strengths that I have been developing to help me. For example, Vitality: the ability to wake up feeling rested, refreshed, and energized could be very helpful in my goal of running 3x/week.

My intention today is to become everything that I desire.

https://poormetea.com

04/13/2020

🌱Morning intention meditation...what do I need today? 🌱

Harmony: The ability to deepen my connection with the significant people in my life.

My first thought of how to deepen my connections with the significant people in my life was to give more of myself away.

This idea raises some red flags. It would easy for me to do at first, but the chances of me being left feeling empty and resentful are very high and this would probably cause me to retreat. This leaves the important people in my life wondering “what happened?” It can be confusing if I am inconsistent and would accomplish the opposite of deepening my connections.

So what is something I can do to deepen my connections with the significant people in my life?

I believe what I need to do is to first understand my needs and my boundaries and gently make them known to the significant people in my life. The better that I am able to understand myself, the easier it will be for people to know my needs and abilities.

We teach other people how to treat us. If I have a clear understanding of my own needs and boundaries and am able to express them in a kind and consistent manner, then that makes it easier for those people in my life to clearly understand me. This is also very good role modeling to demonstrate how others can do the same for themselves.

“People, people who need people, are the luckiest people in the world.” From the musical Funny Girl

https://poormetea.com

04/11/2020

🌱Morning intention meditation...what do I need today? 🌱

Creativity: The ability to awaken and reconnect with my innate creativity.

I love when this happens. I drew this card 2 mornings in a row. I guess I need to work a little more on this.

How did I do with Creativity yesterday? I started off strong by playing piano, writing, and doing vocal exercises. I lived in a creative space for a couple of hours. Not too bad.

My downfall was when I recorded my progress and became critical of how well I was doing and shut down. 😞.

The rest of my day was reading, Netflix, Podcasts, and general life activities (quarantine version).

I must admit to a small feeling of depression and a bit of downheartedness.

To work on Creativity today I want to bring in a strength of the same name, but from the 5th Chakra.

Creativity: The ability to move forward with my creations and share them with the world.

It is one thing to have creative ideas and to entertain myself in my head. But what I really want is to be able to share my ideas. Allow them to go out into the world and exist without me. I want to contribute and share my ideas. Progress comes from practice and not perfection.

My intention is to awaken and reconnect with my innate creativity and move forward with my creations and share them with the world.

https://poormetea.com