Tag: #seattle

Lifestyle, Recipes

Why you Need a Berrylicious Diet

by Ana-Maria1 Comment on Why you Need a Berrylicious Diet
Why you Need a Berrylicious Diet

I l o v e berries (blueberries being my favorite).

Not only do they provide you with essential antioxidants but are also very low in calories, making them a nutritious and tasty weight-loss hack. You can add them to your smoothies, oatmeal, chia pudding, home-made desserts, eat them with coconut yogurt, or simply drizzle them with raw coconut flour and sweeten them with stevia.

According to WebMd, blueberries contain the following:

  • Antioxidants. These chemicals, which include vitamins A, C and E, protect cells from damage and possibly from disease. 
  • Resveratrol. This is found in grapes and some other berries, as well as in red wine and dark chocolate. It may help lower inflammation, prevent clogged arteries, and offer cancer protection.
  • Flavonoids. These nutrients give berries their brilliant colors and may help protect against cancer, inflammation, and heart disease. 

 

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Here is my favorite smoothie recipe with blubs:

Blend one large banana with a cup of blueberries, spinach and coconut water and one tablespoon of chia/flax.

If you want to make a smoothie-bowl just use less liquid and you can eat the thicker consistency with a spoon. You can add toppings like dried mulberries,  cacao nibs, coconut flakes, pumpkin seeds and raisins.

The protein powder I use and recommend. 

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Enjoy and share this post with a friend.:)

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If you would like to learn more – check out this post: 

Fortify Your Smoothie Bowl in 7 steps

 

Empowerment

Get Back Your Power!

by Ana-Maria1 Comment on Get Back Your Power!
Get Back Your Power!

We, human beings, have the precious gift to GROW from any challenge.

To either let the obstacles burn our passion, or ignite our strength.

To make us stronger and eager to move on.

And as phoenixes, to transpose our ashes to gold. 

🔥🔥🔥
*To make peace with the past
*To forgive and detach

*To owe our mistakes

*To admit we have failed

*To send love to our wound

*To allow healing to bloom

*To be bold to take action

*To monitor our reactions

*To peacefully let go of what we don’t want in our day

*To trust something better is coming our way

*To take responsibility to come back on track

*And, determinedly, take our POWER back!
🔥🔥🔥

If you know somebody who needs to be reminded of their power, please forward them this post.

 

 

~ With Love and Care,

Ana-Maria

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Empowerment, Lifestyle

Coping With Challenges: In 3 Strategic Steps

by Ana-MariaLeave a Comment on Coping With Challenges: In 3 Strategic Steps
Coping With Challenges: In 3 Strategic Steps

Challenges are, no tautology intended, challenging and always require a direct investment of mental courage and cheering self-talk.

When we perceive difficulties as welcomed transitions to something inherently better, we adopt a more peaceful and determined mindset that we can deal with everything that Life sends our way: both positive and negative. 

In fact, very often that which we have perceived as negative gifts us with a precious opportunity to learn a new skill, experience a new sensation and grow as human beings.

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The steps I follow when I am dealing with any transition/challenge are the following:

1) Search for signs; 2) Show up for the assignment; 3) Understand the lesson.

I. Searching For Signs 

Signs are sneaky to catch and quite often blurry. To dismantle their euphemistic nature, we have to spend time in silence decipher their rooted meaning in meditation. Our gut and intuition are impeccable in their advice but, in order to understand it, we need to detach our ego-mind from interfering with the message that we are receiving.

And that only happens if we don’t maneuver the interpretation of the sign towards the direction we (think*) want. Because our intuition would often tell us to do the opposite of what our comfort level is.

II. Showing Up For The Assignment 

That one is very individual depending on our current situation and life circumstance: can be anything from ending/reshifting relationships; moving to a new job/location; going back to school/or leaving it altogether; transitioning to a new career path, etc.

But it has to be done in order for us to experience whatever it is that our heart truly wants.

III. Understand The Lesson 

Understanding the lesson can only happen after we have learned it, and there is no shortcut to learning without showing up for the practice.

As Charles Bukowski said: What matters most is how well you walk through the fire.

In that context, we can’t learn how to walk through any challenges unless we take action and experience the lesson.

***** ⤵️

To Recap: 

I. Our meditation practice shows us how to interpret the sign(s).

II. Showing up for the knowledge we gather is our initiation to the lesson we must learn.

III. Experiencing going through the passage discloses the purpose of the lesson and its significance for our growth.

 

***

Please let me know if you have your own strategies for dealing with challenges and subscribe to my blog to receive notifications for my next posts.

~ With love and care,

Ana-Maria

My Social Media: IG/FB

 

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Empowerment

The Importance of “Preserving” Positive Feelings

by Ana-Maria3 Comments on The Importance of “Preserving” Positive Feelings
The Importance of “Preserving” Positive Feelings

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I personally love traveling to places that rejuvenate my body and revitalize my spirit with inspiration, wanderlust, and zest for pursuing my goals and dreams. And what better time for such an expedition to exploration than the end of summer?

In a way, I perceive the fall season as the beginning of the year. And it is such, for all of us that are students (in an academic institution, or in life). I look at the falling leaves and reminisce about everything that has fallen from me in the past four seasons: fears, judgment, limitations…all of those tiny tricksters that snatch our motivation and recycle it into hopelessness and lack of motivation.

In his book Hardwiring Happiness (which I recommend!*), the author Rick Hanson speaks about the neurological pathways that either impede or enhance our sense of contentment, calm and confidence. A practice he mentions, that stood out for me, is consciously remembering in details the memories, events or feelings that made us feel our best. And to rehearse the chosen moment in our mind until it paves a cognitive canal that can, later on, lead us to emotional salvation when we are feeling sad, unmotivated or discouraged.

For example, imagine the event (or place) in the last six months that made you feel your happiest.

For me, that was being at the Black Sea and swimming in the azure waters while soaking up the sun, eating gooey figs, writing in my journal and listening to the sound of the waves.

Whatever your chosen memory is: close your eyes and track back every moment as vividly as you can. Remember to not only relive it in your mind to also to feel it: paying close attention to the emotions that were produced by that experience… The joy. The laughter. The experience itself. The company you were with.  Whatever it is for you. Then, take a few minutes to reflect how those depicters made you feel. And, most importantly, why? 

I suggest you either do this exercise mentally or, even better, take a journal and free-write. Choose a time in space that made you feel extraordinary and observe closely your thoughts and feelings. Your mind, heart, and body know best why you felt so liberated and happy experiencing those emotions in that particular moment.

The purpose of this practice, as Hanson suggests, is to provide us with mental tools to recreate the palette of positive emotions that already exist in our memory so that we can adhere to their vibrational content to color our current canvass with the same positivity and excitement for life.

I am curious to hear about your happiest memories from last year. If you are willing to share, let`s create a discussion!

Leave your comments below and share this practice with your friends.

~ With love and care,

Ana-Maria

*If you follow my posts, you might remember I recently mentioned his work in this post here.

 

 

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Empowerment

Peace Begins With Surrender

by Ana-Maria1 Comment on Peace Begins With Surrender
Peace Begins With Surrender

I heard this affirmation in one of Deepak Chopra`s speeches and it instantly sunk into my mind as an imperative of how I shall choose to act in my daily endeavors.

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I find that a more effective way to approach uncertainty and disappointment is by allowing the events of our discontent to unfold without our interference.

It is when we surrender to life, that Life happens. We can never possibly gauge what the future holds for us from a place of fear and aggression. The future is a direct result of our actions today. If we choose to live in a state of peace and kindness we will attract reciprocity of those emotions. But if we dwell in self-pity and anxiousness we will automatically “subscribe” for more unpleasantries and dissatisfaction.

So let us not oppose anything that happens to us – beginning with #Today. And it can be anything of the following:

  • waking up later than what we demanded from our bodies
  • experiencing sabotaging thoughts and harsh self-talk
  • wishing things were different than they were
  • avoiding the responsibility for owing our power to accept 

Instead, let us focus on reversing those attitudes and embracing the reality-of-everything-we-cannot-longer-change with kinder thoughts, compassion and complete acceptance:

  • accepting what our physical body requires today to recover and be healthy
  • accepting our relapse to judgment and negativity and kindly letting go of those thoughts
  • accepting things exactly as they are and moving on
  • accepting our responsibility for owing our power to accept and shift our mindset

We tend to worry the most for the things that we can control the least: unexpected expenses, change of relationship status, cold weather when we are on vacation, etc… And those are exactly the kind of opportunities I believe we must dedicate to learning how to trust more and surrender to the unknown with a firm belief it is for our ultimate benefit.

In my experience, the sooner I release the control grip and loosen up the tension I quickly gain a fresh perspective and motivation to deal with the reluctance to find the wisdom (and the lesson) amidst the undesirable circumstances I am experiencing.

Yet, we can worry all we want but things as just they are. And we can either adapt to their ebb and flow or drawn in misery and chronic worry.

So let us oppose nothing that happens (to us) today. 

~ With love,

Ana-Maria

 

 

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Empowerment

How to Scientifically Conquer Negativity

by Ana-Maria1 Comment on How to Scientifically Conquer Negativity
How to Scientifically Conquer Negativity

A negative bias is a term used by psychologists (as Dr. Rick Hanson, in his book Hardwiring Happiness) to describe our human tendency to concentrate on the negative and neglect or minimize the positive. ✂️

According to Harris, back in the day, when our predecessors’ mere goal was reproduction and survival, every abrupt noise was perceived as danger triggering the fight or flight impulse.

Evolutionary, it was a safety measure to remain ‘negative’ that the unknown sound is a tiger and we better run rather than remain “positive” that it is not.

In today’s terms: imagine you are having an exceptionally marvelous week!

You feel good about yourself, find time to exercise, eat nourishing food, get enough sleep, feel productive at work and even get a promotion.
Yet, just to contrast those peak moments, ONE day, for example, you don’t hear your alarm, get up late, spill coffee on your shirt, get stuck in traffic, miss your workout, eat poorly and, accordingly, don’t perform your best.
The latter unfortunate chain of events usually leads to (either) your own dissatisfaction with yourself, or to a negative comment from an external source (or both). Once offset, negativity usually goes downhill attracting more negativity! Because of our genetic make-up, we tend to ignore ALL the positive feedback and focus on the tiny little mean remark or incident that pulled us out of our happy place.

↕️ Yet, you can rewire your brain to focus on retaining the good memories and use them as leverage to pull you out of an unhappy place.
I hope this information serves you well and you remember not to forget all the great achievements you have accomplished just because of occasional setbacks or negative people.

If you like this post, please share it with your followers and subscribe to my blog for weekly inspiration on how to be healthier and stronger: physically and mentally!

~ Ana-Maria

🙏🏼💫

 

 

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Empowerment

A Return To Love

by Ana-Maria1 Comment on A Return To Love
A Return To Love

The quote in the caption belongs to Marianne Williamson whom I respect deeply because she has the gift to write about our human imperfections in a compassionate and non-preaching way. 

In her book, A Return To Love, she shares her own experience of transforming fear into love and overcoming behavioral traits that prevented her from attracting love. Ultimately, the harsh truth is that sometimes we are own enemy when it comes to happiness. Somehow we choose to remain in the “comfort zone” of being miserable and a victim of our circumstances than to be brave and start giving love first.

Being a carrier of love is the only path towards unconditional acceptance and freedom from fear. It is when we condition our state of being loved on external circumstances than we get stuck into old patterns and behaviors.

As the wise adage goes: “Nothing happens until I make action!”

What is the last book quote that inspired you?

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Please let me know in the comments below or DM me on my Instagram: ana_maria_georgie.

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