Why You’re Acting Like Such a Monster
If you have been feeling crabby, cranky, controlling, overwhelmed, or “witchy” you are in good company!
No – it isn’t the Halloween season rearing its namesake. These symptoms can be an indication that potentially your soul is just starving and trying to get your attention. I remember the first day that I realized my soul was starving. I was living my passion, doing great work in the world, meeting a lot of my goals, and making enough money to get by. But I found myself at the tail end of a three-week “busy binge” with little room for pleasure and play, leaving me, in one word, CRABBY. So I held an honesty hearing with myself. My first question was simply, “Christine, what is going on with you?” and instantly I realized that I was unhappy, really unhappy, and had been for weeks. My reply was, “What? I am one of the happiest people I know. How could this be?” My Inner Wisdom shot back: “Because your soul is starving. You have been so busy giving, so busy working, so consumed with being a joy for others, that you’ve forgotten to experience joy for yourself.”In that moment it was as if I could feel a hole inside me. I was empty, starving for nourishment — but not the green drink kind. I needed soul food. And the food of the soul is joy.
The problem was that I couldn’t even remember what actually brought me joy. And that was when I knew I needed a radical intervention… a self-love intervention. I am guessing I am not alone in my experience in getting crabby and cranky because I wasn’t getting what I needed. Maybe you can relate. Are you so busy doing, giving and trying to keep it all together or achieving your dreams that you are pursuing happiness instead of experiencing it?I’m getting the sense that a lot of us have work-play equations that get out of balance. This happens when you don’t spend time and energy on activities that deliver only pleasure instead of profit or productivity. As a result, your joy quotient plummets and your crabbiness increases. So you joy-binge in unhealthy ways for a quick fix, but your soul never feels full.
So how joy-full or joy-starved are you?Take this self-love pulse check. It measures the joy levels of the self-pleasure branch of your self-love tree. Your self-love tree has 10 branches, and self-pleasure is the one that makes sure your SOUL is nourished. Answer yes or no to these questions:
1. Do you feel unhappy and you don’t know why?2. Do you play or give yourself pleasurable things only after you have worked hard or finished your to do list? Do you have to feel like you’ve earned playing and doing pleasurable things?
3. Do you try to get pleasure in quick spurts or by bingeing on it? Do you wait until you are starving for fun and then you overindulge – eat, drink or spend too much?
4. Do you have a hard time remembering what you actually like to do for fun and pleasure because it’s been so long? Do you have a hard time naming more than a few things you like to do just for fun?
5. Do you feel too busy to enjoy the simple pleasures of life? Are you so consumed by your to do list or workload you don’t take time to slow down and notice beauty around you, connect with nature or spend the day in bed reading a book?
If you answered yes to any of these questions, your soul is starving for joy and you need to get some soul food ASAP! Luckily, I have some right here. The first step is remembering what brings you joy. Grab a piece of paper and write the word JOY in the middle of it. Then, go through your life from the time you were little to now and write down all the things that have brought you joy – things that make you smile, are just fun, make you feel warm inside, and fill you up. Keep going until the page is full. This is called a “JOY PORTRAIT.” Then commit to saying YES to one of these per day for the rest of your life – or just start with a month! And for starters, today, state 3 joy-generators: three things that bring you joy. Mine are chanting in the morning, dancing in the kitchen or anywhere with my guy Noah, and deep conversations over food with my best friends. Halloween is a time for scary monsters but you don’t need to be one all year round. Commit yourself to bringing back the joy in your life and leave being a witch to the children.
Christine Arylo
Christine Arylo, m.b.a, is an inspirational catalyst and internationally recognized speaker and best-selling author who teaches people how to put their most important partnership first, the one with themselves, so that they can create the life their hearts and souls crave. The popular author of the self-love handbook, Madly in Love with ME, the Daring Adventure to Becoming Your Own Best Friend, she’s affectionately known as the “Queen of Self-Love.” Arylo founded the international day of self-love on Feb 13th and is the co-founder of the self-love and empowerment school for women, Inner Mean Girl Reform School. www.ChooseSelfLove.com