Do you know what we remember the most? Experiences.

Say, “I do to you,” and those experiences are sure to be great!

Sure, we can get a fabulous gift that we will have forever (like jewelry), and when we look at it, we can remember how it came to be. But – living, authentic living, is when we engage with people and create good experiences. That’s what fills in the gaps of our days with good memories.  That’s why vacations seem to last longer than our everyday lives. We are engaged. And when we are engaged, we can marry our lives!

So, what the heck do I mean, right? I mean, we can commit ourselves, like we would make to a partner, and honor it. You love your partner. Okay, then, love yourself too. If you don’t know how start by looking at yourself in the mirror and saying I forgive you.

 

We hold so much yuck inside about ourselves, how we messed up this, or can’t remember that, or how we failed to do this or that. Okay, please stop it. Look at yourself in the mirror and think or say, I forgive you. That’s it. Keep doing it for a few days. However long it takes for you to start feeling lighter, more confident, and able to look, really really look at yourself and then say, I love you, and mean it. It’s amazing stuff and will help us be ourselves.

When we are around our family or friends, we have two choices: engage or disengage. It’s easy stuff, but how much of an experience will we have if we aren’t engaged? Sure, you can be around your kooky family, and even though you’re not engaged, you still hear things and process them. Was it something funny? Did it upset you? The only thing you are disengaging from is yourself because if you choose to disengage around someone, chances are they aren’t the best people in your life anyway. We need to listen to our inner voice that tells us – the experience is not what we want.

And that’s okay!

We are born as individual people who have different minds, and it is absolutely okay to choose yourself over someone else. We are not born to serve another at our own expense. The martyr mindset has got to go!  When we do things because we think we have to and don’t really want to do it, we’re playing the martyr role. This creates resentment. We don’t want that floating inside our minds. It weighs us down and keeps us stuck. Gosh, I felt that way for years! I wish I had known about this sooner to prevent resentment from affecting my life so badly.

The good news is that we can flip that switch and stop feeling resentment or anger any time we want.

All we have to do is think of three good things about the person.

It could be the simplest thing, like they have good taste in clothes, or they have good mechanical skills, or they live in a lovely house. Three things. Easy. What this does is push the anger and resentment away to replace it with compassion. And once you have compassion, you can stop blaming them and take responsibility for yourself.  I hope that makes sense the way I thought it in my mind. When we feel compassion toward someone, it creates a good feeling inside us. And that good mental feeling creates all sorts of great byproducts, like feeling better physically, being more creative instead of destructive, and living with more joy.

To engage in positive experiences, we must be ourselves. Being ourselves might be difficult at first because our minds are so wired to be worried about judgment. And we can’t wholly blame today’s social media. Most of us were raised on a self-worth diet full of movies and television shows that influenced us.  I remember seeing the Rocky movie and wanting to be tough like Rocky Balboa. Yes, I’m a female, and no, I didn’t want to box. I took the message from the movie that we need to be tough to get through life. I’m not sure if that was Sylvester Stallone’s intent, but that’s what I got out of it. Never give up, and don’t let anyone tell you who you are.

Most of us want to get to the end of our lives with no regrets and full of beautiful memories. It could be the time you smiled at the cashier at the supermarket and made them blush. Or when you faced your fears and did something you never thought you’d achieve. These are not things you get and store. They are good memories that we can build upon to create a spectacular life!

This holiday season, let’s marry our life and intentionally have good experiences. When we feel good, we can spread that to others so they feel that way, too. Make the cookies with your kids. Have friends and family over to play Rummy or a board game. Or give yourself the gift of a day of quiet time. Engage with yourself or others. Be thoughtful. Do what you want to create your good experiences.

Thank you for reading this. What kinds of things do you like to do during the holidays that create wonderful experiences? I hope I gave you a nugget of something good to think about.

To experiences,

Francesca