When we meet someone who is very different from us, we can be quick to dismiss them because how they think and believe doesn't make sense to us. Sometimes, the differences are so fundamental that there can be no reconciliation or compromise.

Is it still possible to love those people?

You reach your wits’ end and your current way of being isn’t working for the life you want, so you decide to make a real change. You have built enough awareness to discover a pattern of self-sabotage you’ve been repeating throughout your life.

Releasing each piece of your truth is like dropping a brick you’ve been carrying in your chest. Except you didn’t know you were carrying it until it was dropped and you all of a sudden felt lighter in the heart.

When his words guided us to visualize our bodies laying still, dying, my mind was on high alert, my emotions triggered, and I felt my body resisting his words and the experience. My mind had anticipated this dreaded moment and I was angry at its arrival, out of sheer fear of what I was going to feel next.

When we fully embrace our feminine energy, it feels comfortable to just be. We know that everything and everyone we come in contact with has been and will be touched by us. The question becomes, how do we want to touch them? Leading to, how do we want to be?

We live in a fast-paced world, where a lot of people feel like they are behind. Burnout is prevalent. Comparison is almost impossible to avoid with more connectivity than ever.

Many people who talk about empowering others to become more motivated and fulfill their potential, yet when they meet a truly empowered individual, they hold back their support or are even quick to tear them down.

Emotional abandonment is leaving our emotional needs unattended, often without acknowledging or addressing it with a response. That can leave us feeling confused, unsettled and unloved for a long time.

That was when I came across the powerful idea of choosing happiness, as a decision. I realized then happiness is a commitment — it is a practice I would have to adhere to in order for it to last and expand.

Cutting off bad ties signifies that we are no longer willing to stay in relationships or situations that make us unhappy, no matter what challenges we may face in the future. It is a testament to the determination of wanting more for ourselves.

Knowing we are whole and complete takes us out of the mentality of not being good enough when pursuing self-improvement, and puts us in the mindset of empowerment instead. This way, we are on a journey of discovery rather than a search for something we don’t have.

Perfection also instills fear in us—fear of failure and fear of our personal imperfections. This fear leads us down a dark path where we tend to avoid challenging situations or competitions because failure seems unbearable.

In order to allow love to enter, our heart will have to be open to it. The wider it is open to receive, the greater the love will enter. The chance of heartbreak and disappointment will always be there… Our mind cannot separate us from love, it can only create fear.

As I went about everyday life cool, calm, and collected, my mind was the complete opposite. It was hyper-alert and restless. Like TikTok, it played, replayed, and commented on every scenario and conversation that happened in the past hours, months, and years.

The world we live in seldom encourages authenticity, at least not genuinely, I often feel. We may hear words of empowerment to be authentic, but when we do we are often reprimanded for being too real.

For three months, I spent most days at home in solitude. I turned off sound notifications on my phone. I prioritized self-care through rest, whole food, exercise, and meditation. I chose to spend time with people and on activities that energized me.

While everyone’s rock bottom may look differently, the feeling of being at rock bottom is probably very similar. It’s that feeling of utter incompetence and unworthiness, that you are as low and insignificant as a pile of rubble and you have no idea how to come back up.

While it’s a healthy stepping stone toward deeper self-discovery, many of those labels can make us feel like there’s something wrong with ourselves and others, when there isn’t. As we read trending definitions and discussions on each of those labels, we can feel as though we either enable one of them or we are one of them.

As someone who grew up in Hong Kong during the 80’s and 90’s and has been living in Australia for nearly three decades, I often ponder questions regarding my identity: Who am I? Chinese, British overseas citizen, or Australian?

We live in a society that often typecasts us in a certain role based on our outward appearance and demeanor. Expectations start to form about who we are based on those impressions that reinforce and motivate us to be that person.