Victoria's Compass
 We have access to instant stimulation through online shopping, online dating, interactions on social media and much more. This type of access gives us the ability to become almost hypnotized to the highs and lows of it’s doing. Has stimulation become the cornerstone of our interactions? STIMULATION I like to describe stimulation as a spark of sensation created by something outside of ourselves. Dictionary.com defines it as, “the action of arousing interest, enthusiasm, or excitement”. If we notice closely, we can see that stimulation places us as the receiver of energy. At our fingertips we have access to stir up emotions we wish to feel in our bodies. Whether that is to affirm what we don’t like or validate what we want, we are merely a sponge experiencing the process of soaking up all this energy. Overtime we become familiar with the reactions it stirs in our bodies and because we like it, we stay in the current, like the turtles in Finding Nemo. In the events we find ourselves away from that current of stimulation, we feel an abrupt halt and we feel dazed like we are coming out of a trance. We feel this decrease of stimulation and we are tempted to swim back in the current. Stimulation provides this sense of comfort because we are creatures that believe if we are receiving energy, we are significant. I fear that stimulation has been replaced by our effort to truly connect. Are we getting stimulation and connection confused? OUR SENSES There is talk about having more than 5 senses but the basics are sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch. A book I enjoy reading, “Essentials of Psychology”, mentions how our senses increase and decrease in tolerance. Once you have gotten used to a level of stimulation through one of your senses, it requires more of it to feel the same type of reaction. We are adaptive beings that can adjust our tolerance levels to mold into our environment and survive. This leads to a thought of how people can get lost in the cycle of dating multiple people for short periods at a time. I don’t mean getting to know people in order to find a potential match to date. I mean the quick turn around it takes for a person to break things off with someone they are dating to then dating someone new. The end of dating someone leads to a decrease of happy chemicals in our body therefore one is tempted to find stimulation through someone else. We may not realize that we tend to drive relationships through stimulation rather than connection. Our senses may be useful to point us in the direction of a potential connection but in order to connect, it requires people who are willing to engage in a way that many find unfamiliar. CONNECTION Let's talk about intimacy. “In an intimate interaction, partners reveal their private selves to one another, sharing parts of themselves that are ordinarily hidden” Encyclopedia.com. Intimacy is an exchange of giving and receiving our depths to one another. Unlike stimulation, intimacy doesn’t just happen, it unfolds gracefully among people who are willing to serve. You can’t just be a sponge and soak up all the energy, you must be proactive in the process. Intimacy takes effort but not effort to where it’s forced, this effort naturally grows momentum through people that intuitively want to connect. I say intuitively to acknowledge this mystery that leads people to connect with others whether it is platonically or romantically. When we connect with others around us, we feel refreshed, inspired and our insight of life may even become elevated. We feel as though we were meant to connect with others because it is in our nature to do so. Stimulation does not require us to be present but in order for us to reach a connection we must be. When two or more givers come ready to serve one another, this creates intimacy and that is to truly connect. MESSAGE FROM VICTORIA GOLD I challenge us that in everything we do, we look for ways to be of service. When we create the opportunity to serve, we create opportunities to connect. Peace & Love be with you all and remember, I'm only a message away.
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 Roses bloom, eggs hatch, the clouds begin to appear and disappear with no consistent pattern. The sun emerges in the sweetest moments as though to remind us that a new season has begun. How does spring show up in our life? TRANSITION Whether it may be animals, trees or plants, they all go through a period of transition and it holds purpose. Bears come out of hibernation and go through a period where they start to increase their intake of food and water to get their energy levels up. Trees also come out of a dormant season where they have stopped all reproduction to survive winter and go into their phase of regrowth. If there are phases ending and starting in nature, what should we end or start in our lives to propel us towards the new season? When we have to end or start something new that requires us to change, we must allow a flow of transition. I know transitions are not easy, it calls for a process of change from one state to the other. I’ve personally made the observation that in the generation we are living in, we’re afraid of change. We glorify independence and I wonder if that is so that we can justify our low-tolerance to cut off anything or anyone that brings about change. We pride ourselves in the access to an immense amount of options and we choose the next best thing so that we can avoid change. This truth humbles me in realizing our arrogance and ignorance of the fact that we are robbing ourselves from experiences because of our lack of practicing the process of transition. Every season has its time of transition and Spring has its own purpose for it. LET IT BLOOM Nature around us understands the start of new beginnings. It doesn’t hesitate nor does it fear the unknown of these beginnings. It doesn’t think of these new beginnings as outside of itself but rather takes ownership in the process. It emerges itself and continues this cycle every time spring comes around. As humans, we tend to lean towards the blooming of new chapters that we like and we do our best to close ourselves off from anything new that we don’t like. Whether at first sight we like it or not, many of us forget that life knows the balance we need in our lives. New chapters require new perspectives and this could be extremely challenging for many of us because it requires us to leave behind something we were so used to. Not letting these changes bloom can cause us to, again, rob ourselves from life’s genius-ways to balance us for a new journey. We pray to God/higher power to take us to new horizons yet we don’t like what we must allow to bloom in our life so we don’t and we stay dormant to the same level we are in. What must we allow to bloom in our life to take us to a new horizon? THE SEASON OF SERVICE The season of Spring reminds me that life is much bigger than us, that it’s a season of service. Momma bears know that this season calls her to increase her energy levels because she has cubs to feed. Nature like trees, grass and all that is green around us understands that it must keep up with the work of growth so that it may give new homes for animals. It grows not for itself but to provide great homes to life around it. What kind of growth are you focused on? Is your growth just enough for you? Does your growth only serve you? Does your growth give life to all the areas of your life or just to one or two streams in your life? Can the growth you are focused on overflow to give life to others? I myself have come to learn that my growth can’t be about me but about how it will give a fruitful life to those coming after me. I pray God can use me to bear good fruit for others like God uses a tree. MESSAGE FROM VICTORIA GOLD I hope we can go through this season understanding that life will ask us to grow in ways we may have never thought of before. I hope we can grow the humility it will take to be obedient to these invitations, trusting that life is asking us to be a source of providing life to others. I pray you take the time to reflect and evaluate the season of spring in your life. If you’d like for me to hold space with you and have a conversation about this, I’m only a message away. Peace and Love be with you always!  There’s a sweet and addictive rush we experience when we meet people we have a romantic-connection with. We think about them, we want to spend time with them and we smile when we see their names pop up on our phone. We follow this rush into the abyss, we start to create routines together and we start to picture a life with them until.... IT happens. We start to realize the incompatibility in the connection.
THE MIND’S GIFT OF CLARITY The mind doesn’t always lead us to clarity and I think we all know that but the mind does have a gift of doing so if we can learn to navigate it. It can assist the process of evaluating several choices so that we may make wise decisions. Our mind helps us if we help it. It has the ability to keep us focused in any area of our life if we create a strong foundation to pull us back in alignment. If we don’t build a foundation, which I have come to know as my blueprint, we will become distracted and settle for anything that makes us feel good. This foundation consists of our values, standards and boundaries. I highly encourage all of us to take time to sit down, write these out, make a commitment to stay true to our foundation and elevate it as time goes on. Elevating a foundation requires humility to the fact that life is an unfolding mystery and we must understand we will evolve as we experience it. This evolution often only makes our foundation clear and stronger, but there are times we completely stray away from it which will lead us to feeling confused and lost. These are the moments we go back to square one, write our foundation and reflect whether we have been prioritizing our life through it. Sometimes, it also calls for a new blank slate to undo a foundation that was never genuine to our truth to begin with. The mind has its purpose and it’s meant to be used as a tool in times where our heart’s desires are in contradiction to our foundation. THE HEART’S GIFT OF ROMANCE When looking up definitions for romance, there were a lot of perspectives that caught my eye but I wanted to find the most simplistic and base definition. At the very root, romance is merely a combination of excitement and mystery. Chemistry is the initial spark of the momentum of a romance. Many may say the heart is a fool for love but the heart has its way of making us feel hope through its desire for romance. Dr. Andrew Huberman is a neuroscientist who mentioned in his Podcast, “Neuroscience meets Psychology”, a study in the 1960s, where people were given the option to stimulate different areas of their brain in the clinic. Although they all chose to evoke an array of stimulations, the area they preferred the most was the stimulation that evoked, as Dr. Huberman said, “mild frustration and anticipation that something good was about to happen” which later in the podcast, Psychologist Dr. Jordan Peterson referred to it as hope. They finish this topic by saying that hope is what moves us forward and the most powerful stimulation in the brain. Romance is not something to take lightly, it has the power to propel us towards someone or something without it actually being of benefit to us. Romance is a force that when used unintentionally, can lead us to foolish decisions in our love-life. When intentionality is met with romance, it can do wonders to propel us forward towards a relationship we remain devoted to. HOW DO WE USE BOTH? I reflect on this question and realize how crucial they both are. Being able to touch on their individual gifts and how they bring meaning to each other. They are tools for us to use but it’s up to us to use them intentionally or unintentionally. We can think of them as opposing ideas that cause a chaotic inner-battle. We can also learn from each and recognize them as a duo that help create harmony in our love-life. I personally choose to respect the heart’s force of romance while honoring the mind’s ability to bring clarity. MESSAGE FROM VICTORIA I hope we all create space to have honest conversations about how we’ve been using the mind and the heart in our life. If you’d wish for support through this process, I’m only a message away using the “contact” tab. Peace and love be with you always.  Maintaining a high-self esteem is a practice. There isn’t a pill to miraculously make you feel better about yourself. Being insecure also doesn't have to look ugly per say. There’s this exaggerated view on what being insecure looks like. Whether it’s the overly jealous person, or the overly sensitive person, it doesn’t always look this way. Sometimes the people we love may tell us their perspective on our life which doesn’t always feel so good and we focus on what they said for the next few days. Other times, we may get rejected by that cute guy or girl for reasons that also don’t feel good and that only adds to the distraction of our focus. Notice I keep using the word, focus?
OUR FOCUS I love to best describe focus as the dominant place we are placing our energy. This is highly important because our behaviors, mannerisms, habits, and thoughts can all be influenced by where we focus our energy. If our focus is repeatedly directed towards something that doesn’t make us feel good, it can eventually make us insecure. I remember being in my head about something an ex said to me and for months I was distracted by this not so good impression of me. I walked around with a defensive attitude and it made me critical towards others because a criticized person can become critical towards others. Soon, I didn’t feel like myself and it affected my self-esteem greatly. I noticed that what was affecting me was an idea that someone else had of me and it was limiting the way I was expressing myself. Once I was able to see this, I knew I had to take some time to sit down and redirect my energy. So, after being criticized and rejected, what do we focus our energy on? REFLECTING AND RE-EVALUATING EFFECTIVELY There is an effective and destructive way to do this. There were times I would over think and over analyze situations. I’d vent on and on in my own mind with no purpose! This can only stimulate more frustration and create behaviors that aren’t beneficial. The best way in my opinion to be effective at this is to write things out. Don’t get overwhelmed by thoughts and memories in your mind that validate insecurities, especially since these thoughts happen faster than you can write! This is why I suggest slowing down and writing the ideas that you think have been affecting you. This is the best way to govern your mind and redirect the reflection process. Start to read it over and pick out the dominant patterns you may see and start asking yourself questions. Reflection isn’t just thinking about what has happened but rather seeking answers to the mysteries in our insecurities. If you have trouble finding questions, sit down with a professional to guide this process. Once we detect what has been affecting us, we must start to re-evaluate. Before reflecting, we evaluate that something is off, then after reflecting we evaluate a second time with a new perspective. There may be truth to the ideas we were criticized for and insecure about that may help us improve how we are coming across to others around us. This will be the moment we consciously decide on how we want to express ourselves rather than being the byproduct of these insecurities. DATING SECURELY Dating securely takes constant adjusting and aligning just like a chiropractor would. Just because we went into the relationship secure, doesn’t mean that it will remain that way, it takes work to maintain it. Remember we also need to take a step back to find out if these insecurities are constantly coming from our partner, this isn’t healthy. If we are constantly re-aligning ourselves because we have a careless partner, it’s best to step away from the relationship after attempts in trying to work things out. If we have communicated to our partner how we’ve been feeling due to their actions or words and it continues, I would personally suggest stepping away and leaving the relationship for your sanity. Sometimes it’s not that this partner is manipulative but simply that you both don’t align in the ways you feel you should guard the stability of the relationship. Dating securely is a practice and I hope we prioritize it while we experience the world around us. MESSAGE FROM VICTORIA I hope this entry was helpful and that you may apply it when you feel you need it. If you’d like support, remember I am only a message away on the ‘contact’ tab of the website!  People often use terms like, our inner-genius and our highest-self. I'd like to believe that this comes from a place of knowing that we are much more than just our body.
The Ego Our ego is influenced by situational-change in environment and it’s composed by our past experiences, pride, fear, patterns, and it's strongly wavered by survival instincts. As we evolve, we cultivate personalities that best fit in different situations. We may express ourselves differently at work than we would with our friends and then differently with our friends than we would with our romantic partner; we have this understanding of etiquette. Although this is much appreciated, we can also compromise our reality with triggers and autopilot behaviors in situations where it’s not as effective. For example, there will be events where we may feel attacked even when it has no threat to our life, the ego may still perceive it as a threat to thyself. Our sense of pride tends to influence our perception of what we may consider as a threat and we begin to fight for the validation the ego wants to gain in terms of respect, fear, liked etc. Our ego can almost blind our vision to many points of view in exchange for a point of view that gives it the best possibility of survival. The ego will go as far as the mind will let it. The Mind Our mind is a powerful operation and it’s a tool that helps us react in situations to survive or respond in order to reflect and re-evaluate. . There will be moments when we interact with people and we forget that what we perceive isn’t the same as how others perceive it. We may often convince ourselves that what we feel or say in moments of defense is our truest perspective, I mean why would we feel the way we feel if it weren’t. Then, after the chemicals that triggered this reaction wear out and the body relaxes, our thoughts shift. We calm down into a different state that will bring about different feelings and thoughts about that situation where we will then decide to do one of two things; allow our ego to re-convince our conscience (the decision maker) that we hold the truest perspective, or we can choose to open ourselves up to the full-truth of any situation. Spiritual Eyes I experienced difficulty in finding words adequate enough to communicate what I’ve learned about this. As I finished journaling and praying about a moment in my life where I believe to have used my spiritual eyes, it was more clear to me. I am reminded that this notion is a process and that using our spiritual eyes will require humility and faith. In times where I am caught up with my point of view, I now have this understanding that I must surrender it and yes, it feels just like you would surrender in battle. You put your white flag up in order to invite a perspective much bigger than your own, a perspective that may have nothing to do with you yet it involves you. Your spiritual eyes remind you that there are plans in effect that are much bigger than our own and we are merely a part of this much bigger and beautiful plan. We may at times be judged unfairly so that someone can gain wisdom through it or to strengthen our spirit so that we know how to persevere in tribulations. Our spiritual eyes remind us that there are things happening not known to us and maybe we will never know of them but that it must not come at the cost of our character. At times we think, “well, if this is how the world is, then maybe who I am doesn’t benefit me. Let me seem more threatening so that others won’t mess with me” and we start to rebuild our ego and compromise our authentic selves. Our spiritual eyes remind us that we are all truly connected in a way beyond what we can see with our vision alone. Message from Victoria I hope that while we manifest our soul through our vessel of a body that we continue to have the courage to surrender to this unknown and preserve our truest selves. That aligning to our soul’s expression is much more holy than the influence of our ego.  Energy, what is energy? If we’re going to speak on energy, let's first reflect on what it actually is. Science.org quotes, “...it has magnitude, but no direction. Energy is conserved, which means it can change from one form to another, but isn’t created or destroyed”. This insight starts to turn the wheels in my head around how we can actually embrace and channel energy.
CREATING THE ENERGY WITHIN As human beings we are matter and energy, scientists like to say that we have what is called rest-energy. We at any moment can use our energy to either kick a ball lightly or kick a ball with intensity, this energy is in us waiting for us to take hold of it. If we walked around day to day, moment by moment knowing that we had this rest-energy just waiting for us to create something with it, how different would we be about having an intention over it? I think about the part of the quote that states ,“..it can change from one form to another”, this part reminds me of the ability we have in creating. If we have energy within us, then we choose to create our energy as we wish. As I acknowledge this truth, I can't ignore another that says we are a byproduct of our environment but I'll modify that and say, our energy is a byproduct of the energy of our environment. If the energy of our environment is not ideal, how do we navigate it? EMBRACING ENERGY This, I believe, is where the challenge comes, where our spirit grows stronger. I heard a sermon in church and the pastor said, “Be in the world, not of the world”. I think this is the mental state we must possess when embracing energy, knowing that we are in the energy of the environment but it does not mean we must be one with that energy when it does not serve us well. So, how do we do this? When we embrace, we must acknowledge and accept. Acknowledge the energy, recognize the friction to yours and accept it. Emphasis on the accepting, this does not mean we look down on it or change it, this part of the process simply means to observe it and embrace it. We observe it as outside of ourselves. This reminds me of times where I enter a room and find myself feeling extremely anxious. I have to remind myself that it’s the environment I’m in and it does not mean I must claim that energy as my own, this part is important. It’s important not to confuse ourselves that it is our energy but instead that it’s energy we can feel around us. Once we accept it as our energy, we the creators give permission to allow our energy to change its form and become the energy in the environment. After embracing the energy, the eye opening and extremely transformative part takes place. CHANNELING OPTIMAL ENERGY To better translate the different parts of us that affect this energy we possess, I'd like to bring up the 4 dimensions of our energy. The physical energy, emotional energy, mental energy and spiritual energy. I’d like to believe that we are channeling optimal energy when we are taking care of these dimensions of our energy. We will continue to be of any energy that we come face to face with if we are not implementing practices to build these 4 parts. Everyone has different ways to build these parts and our goal should be to create our own. If you’d like someone to search and facilitate that with you, please send me a message. For now, let’s get back into channeling the energy we have and being a light to the environments we enter. We must keep repeating the part of the quote that reminds us that energy has magnitude, it can change its form from one to another. In order to begin, we must first detach from the outside energy by not giving it anymore attention and start to redirect our attention to the energy that will be responsible for the domino effect; our own. We channel by focusing our attention to the energy we want to create within so that we can transmit it out like a light, imagining that the more we focus on it the stronger it gets. This does not mean the energy of the environment will change instantly so don’t get disappointed if it doesn’t but it means you can start the domino effect of the change. For example, maybe you interact with someone who is influenced by the energy of the environment and you smile, or you give a compliment and maybe you do an act of kindness, you have now channeled that energy. Channeling energy is not to hold it within, it’s for the purpose of sharing it and influencing it from one form to another. MESSAGE FROM VICTORIA We channel energy intentionally or unintentionally, but when we do this intentionally, I have faith and knowledge through personal experience that it can be powerful. I challenge us to ask ourselves throughout the day, “What energy am I creating within and how can I channel it?”. Peace and love be with you all!  We’ve heard how important it is for our health to manage our stress. American Psychology Association states, “... long-term ongoing stress can increase the risk for hypertension, heart attack, or stroke”. We can feel how stress physically affects us but have we ever reflected on how even the tiniest moments of stress can affect our behavior? Now, I do want to say there is a healthy level of selfishness, the kind where we are honest about our limits and we set boundaries. On the other hand, we know selfishness can be a major factor in the lack of care and attention we give to relationships. Now, how exactly are stress and selfishness connected?
BEING IN A RUSH Being in a rush changes our whole aura and I will add that I believe it has a lot to do with the stress that comes with it. Have you ever given your order to a waitress or waiter while they were in a rush? They seem disconnected and uninterested in giving you recommendations on what to order. You leave the restaurant feeling as though your experience didn’t matter. I myself have rushed from one point to another to meet a friend after work and I noticed my energy shift to being considerate of my surroundings to being self-centered on what I need to do. All of a sudden the person crossing the street annoys me now that I’m in a rush or the person driving 10 mph over speed limit is driving too slow for me. Isn’t this something? Haha. Masterclass.com referred to a sickness in an article called, Hurry sickness; being in a constant rush that results in stress and anxiety. This urges me to be mindful in moments I want to rush and ask myself if it’s worth being self-centered and inconsiderate of others? Thinking of being in a rush leads me to wonder how this correlates to the time we perceive we have to give to others. TOO BUSY I remember being in a place in my life where I felt like my schedule was full of so many things I needed to do. These ‘things’ were all tied to what I felt I should do or had to do and it all brought stress in my life. I saw family time as a “maybe”, going to church turned into attending virtually or making a deal with God that I’d pray in place of it, and doing what I loved was out of the question. I was in this cycle of feeling like I had to be busy doing something and being burnt out, then being stressed about being burnt out so I’d get busy all over again. I couldn’t see this self-sabotaging habit at the time. On the rare occasion I'd given my schedule permission to make room for someone else, I was shocked to learn the problems they were facing. I’d tell them, “You should have reached out to me!” ALL of my family and friends said the same thing, “I just figured you were too busy and I didn’t want to bother you”. It pained me that they felt like they didn’t want to burden me with the support they needed. Jodi Clarke, a licensed counselor wrote a blog about stress management, “If your work-life balance is thrown off, you may experience burnout, feeling overworked, exhausted, and disconnected from your social and/or family life”. This illusion of not having enough time made me self-absorbed and it came at a cost in my disconnection with others. I knew my mindset had to change. FINDING A BALANCE THAT CAN'T BE MEASURED Oftentimes we think of balance as an equal portion of whatever it is you have to get or need to give. What if balance was more than just scaling everything so that it appears balanced at all times? I’d like to introduce a term I thought of while writing this, intuitive-balance. Before you start burning your planner, let’s get this straight, priorities and time management matter! Finding a strategy to manage your time after defining your priorities is going to be key, the intuitive part comes after. We all know that every day may have its similarities but they all may have their own ups and downs because the common denominator is ALWAYS going to be us. We may have different needs on different days and this is where intuition comes in. I encourage you to be O.K. with maybe only giving a certain activity 30% of your energy that day because your intuition pulls you to reach out to that family member you keep thinking of. I invite you to prioritize destress methods like meditation, physical activity, art expression etc whenever you feel that you need a little more of that during your day. If this makes you a little uneasy about how you’ll be able to add these like I was, set a timer! Your intuition is the part of us that others have called our inner-genius. They’re our spiritual eyes that see beyond what our physical eyes can’t; trust it. Having a way to manage stress fulfills the part of you that thinks you have to run with it. Get free and start connecting to life again. MESSAGE FROM VICTORIA I know having to start this new process may be new and confusing but don’t worry it works best without a plan at first. Trust yourself in that you will see that it is more familiar to you than you thought. If you’d love a place to start, I’d love to meet you through email or a virtual session to get you started. Peace and Love be with you, always!  This is a question many of us have about the current generation. We all have our opinions on this and each opinion shares different angles on the matter. I thought I’d shed light on some of the popular opinions and some of my own I have observed but maybe haven’t heard others address yet. OPTION OVERLOAD I’ve heard people state the obvious that because of social-media, we have a much wider range of social-access. People meet online in addition to in person and this makes our generation seem more eager to see if the grass is greener on someone else’s yard. People are left “ghosted” or dumped when faced with problems because we can just connect with the next person. To be honest, I’ve heard this one the most. CAREER DRIVEN More often than not, when you ask those who are in the ages of 18 to early twenties if they are looking for a serious relationship, the majority will respond with no. Many of us were told to work and focus on a career until we are well established to settle down and get married. We learn to be hard working on our studies and focus on our careers which leads me to think that this is why many of us don’t know how to turn this off when we start becoming available for a spouse or get married. Come to think of it, it seems like we hold careers at a higher level of importance as a society rather than a family-unit. Most people will gravitate towards what society prioritizes because they (the ego) wants to win in society. FEAR I do think that the entertainment industry has a huge influence on this fear more than we even stop to think about but let’s dive into the actual life-experience of others. Many in this generation who are looking at the outside of marriage have a deep sense of fear. Divorce rates have increased over the years and because of this, there are adults who witnessed these divorces. Many are simply scared to repeat the past and are now more cautious than previous generations to get married. I can bet that there are some who suffered the impact of watching their parents get divorced and have lost faith in marriage all together. Then, we have those who were a part of a divorce and “lost” a lot of their financial success to another spouse that now speaks horribly of marriage to the younger generation. We are survival-beings that do our best to stay away from what scares us the most. KNOWING THEMSELVES AND WHAT THEY WANT IN MARRIAGE Prior generations were encouraged to marry as early as 18, my mom has told me that anyone who reached 25 in her generation were pressured and rushed into finding a spouse. I’d like to bring up a point that this generation has had the previledge in experiencing and that is that this generation that has waited longer to marry, have come to the realization that one knows themselves best past 25. Why is this and is there some truth? Studies have shown that a woman’s brain reaches full development at age 25 and a man’s brain from ages 25-30. Could it possibly be that people in this generation have in part had the opportunity to experience that it’s best to wait past this threshold without knowing that this is in fact the age that a brain fully develops? Psychology.com states that the sweet spot to marry is between ages 28-32. They add that those who marry past 25 are 50% less likely to divorce compared to those who marry at an earlier age such as 20. MESSAGE FROM VICTORIA GOLD We all can argue why it’s better to wait or why it’s better to rush to the altar at a young age. Regardless, we cannot close ourselves from the fact that each generation holds GOLDEN nuggets that benefit us and I think it would be wise for us to learn from them all.  Speaker and Author Jim Rohn quotes, “Motivation gets you started. Habit is what keeps you going”. Despite many views about motivation and the argument whether it works in our favor or not, we can’t deny that we still express motivation at different times of our life. Motivation is ultimately an expression of energy that we may define as passion or emotion and it inspires us to take action. This in turn affects your motives in why you are aiming to achieve a goal. I encountered surges of motivation a vast number of times while working in sales, and I can pinpoint exactly where it derived from. Observing this allowed me to come to a realization that there are different levels of this energy and they all take me to an even higher level of satisfaction that is constructive towards my life.
COMPETITION & REVENGE The first thought I want to bring up is that our mental and emotional state can influence the type of motivation. As you may guess, if we feel angry, resentful, underestimated and maybe even have a sense of proving something, we may derive motivation from competition and revenge. Each type has a different area of focus. As for this level, the area of focus is trying to achieve something through a set of actions that can tangibly show those who doubted us that we are the best or worthy based on achievement. We want those who we felt looked down on us, to look up at us. Sound familiar? For example, I’ll use my own experience when working in sales. A type of motivation they used was competition in the office and outside with other offices. As effective as it was to get numbers up and for sales reps to leap into action, it was temporary and because it was temporary we had to push others to compete again and again. The outcome came from feeling happy to have achieved something but I can honestly tell you that it brought no satisfaction to my life as a whole, I wouldn’t say it brought forth any qualities worth admiring. Everything we do with great tenacity, like motivation, has an effect on who we become. If the focus is “me” and the achievement is based on something that benefits “me” what do you think this does to you? You can probably assume that this will create a self-righteous and egocentric version of you. In this case, we have seen time and time again many people become arrogant in the sports industry. This isn’t to say all people who play sports derive their motivation from this level but I would say that this could be the most common. Although this may be the first taste of motivation to most, I would highly encourage others to discover different ways to express motivation. SELF IMPROVEMENT I’m sure you’ve heard the term, “level up”, “new year, new me”, “boss up” etc. Most of the time, the state of mind we may find ourselves in while deriving this type of motivation is when we aren’t happy with something about ourselves and we want to make it better, hence “self-improvement”. This level will make you hungry to develop better habits, discipline and even a sense of pride for achieving what may be a better version of yourself. When people feel that they have achieved results in the areas they wanted to improve on, they start to tackle another area and then another. They get a high that blossoms from their self-esteem and what tends to happen is they feel like it’s not enough. Now, you have this feeling that you just aren’t satisfied and you never will be satisfied, that it’s a normal-thing. A lot of us can grow happy for all that we have achieved and maybe stay on this level, we think “Well, I’m great! I’m a solid human-being, look at all that I have achieved for myself and my loved ones. I’ll just keep setting bigger goals to achieve the next big thing”. Fortunately, I worked for a sales company that had a business model that evolved my motivation-level to the next. MAKING AN IMPACT Those that have experienced a taste of this level are the ones who have shared their growth onto others. I remember being 2 years in sales and I reached a place where I was achieving multiple awards and recognition for improving my numbers. The company had a system where you could train and lead a team when your numbers met the training-standard. I was promoted and off I went to develop and train a team. I grew a deep desire to act and work like I had never done before. It wasn’t about me anymore it was about helping others, serving them as their leader so that they too could see this grand-potential they had within them. I can’t explain the energy that fuels your soul when helping others until you do it yourself but I believe that’s what we were made for. Another example is when a man named, Mully, went from being what he calls, street-boy, to a multi billionaire and gave that all up to make an impact on others who lived on the streets like he did. He adopted kids off the streets and took care of them until soon he had more than 500 kids! He has now created an education system where all the kids live in a self-sustainable land and get the opportunity to go to college off tuition free thanks to Mully’s impact. Our souls were made for servanthood and to connect with others where the focus is not limited to you. Think about how limiting it must be to derive energy from within you and it only comes back to you. There’s no value being placed to the world outside of you, no impact. The definition of impact is to come into forcible contact with another object. When we work passionately to serve the well-being of others, that force has an immense amount of energy that only multiplies like a compound effect! We all have purpose and we are all valuable but when we speak on how we go about manifesting it, this is how our value truly manifests itself. MESSAGE FROM VICTORIA I hope that in moments where we act through passion, we can reflect and really ask ourselves where this motivation is stemming from. Let's continue to explore who we are and manifest our truest selves. Peace and love be with you!  I was going through journal entries from my early twenties and I ran across several where I expressed my familiarity with loneliness. There was a specific one that stood out to me and I can recall it: June, 2015 No one was home and I had no plans. No one was looking for me and I could feel my body sink into the bed. My thoughts began to follow the anxiety I had developed in my chest and stomach. Thoughts began to surface, "I have nothing to do and that just shows how pathetic my life is. I have no one wanting to spend time with me or care about how I am feeling at this moment". That wasn't the first nor would it be the last time I had come face to face with loneliness. Due to these recurring episodes, I thought it was my fault for facing this over and over. That maybe I just wasn't loveable or maybe I was just pushing people away and all though some of that could have been true, these episodes weren't punishments, they were necessary but I was too blind to see it.
Reacting to Loneliness Loneliness feels different to all of us. As for me, it felt like fear, sadness and like I didn't exist. The mind connects to our feelings and tries to make sense out of it all. Mine conjured up ideas on how to find the cure by scanning numerous options until my body grew anxious, depressed and soon impatient. My impatience motivated me to seek any distraction in order to let the wave pass over. I would finally convince myself that it was the only way to move passed this so I would look for that dating app on my phone, call someone to rescue me or I would scroll on social media. Anything to let the emptiness fade away. I had no idea that my reactions to loneliness were only numbing it but never healing it. I didn't think this could be healed, I thought it was just something I had to runaway from whenever it came. Until one day I was tired of going through this cycle and I confronted it. Responding to loneliness I began to learn that I was not my mind nor was I my body, I am a soul. This beautiful body is a vessel that allows me to express my authentic-self living inside me. The next time loneliness came over me, I decided to observe my body. I observed it like a parent listening to a crying child and asking them what they feel. Once I had begun the interview, the same low-vibration thought began to surface, the same memories that brought me sadness, the future and the past fought in my mind. My body follows my mind like a sibling does when they agree on what mutually bothers them. I, the observer of all of this, began to listen and discern like a parent would. Every time a thought came up I knew wasn't true, I transformed it and when insecurities arose, I committed to making changes so that my current self could be on the path to manifesting the highest most authentic expression. I was finally confronting all the parts of my current self I was ignoring or letting off the hook. I had forgotten my responsibility of recalibrating, it was up to me. I can honestly tell you that this moment was magical. Recalibrating Our body seeks for our guidance. We think, feel, and the body follows. Sometimes if we’re used to a certain type of emotion in specific environments, our body will just repeat the energy we have attached it to in the past. To really understand this, think of what it feels like to dread something, but truly go there for a second. Where do you feel it most in your body when you dread something? Now let’s apply it to the gym, let’s say you dread going to the gym, and you repeat that vibration over and over, we will train that in our body. Our energy changes like water does when you put a drop of dye in it. Observation is the start of our recalibration. Our job at this moment is to seek a shift of perspective. A higher perspective is always at reach and ready to recalibrate our energy. While on my journey of healing my loneliness, I learned that we must be masters of shifting perspective, that’s where the healing emerges. Once I applied this key, I never went through loneliness the same again. Message from Victoria I hope that in moments of loneliness, you can sit, go through the motions like you would to master a cold shower. Sit through the discomfort with the purpose of observing the body and mind. Then, start to slowly but surely take control back consciously and with consistency, you will come closer to expressing your truest-self, your soul. |
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