Ani Rich's Blog, page 13

Tiny Bug Story

I stood up from my desk to go grab something from the bedroom. I saw a little bug crawling up the window. The window was closed.

I was in a “hurry” because I had my agenda remember I “had” to grab something from another room. But I wanted to let this bug out so badly because I felt sorry for him to be trapped inside my apartment.

I opened up the window with the intention to pick it up and let it fly out where he would have been free.

I looked at the bug and I knew that I wasn’t going to touch it because he would have found his way out anyway. My only job was to open the window for him, he had to find his own way out. He by himself had to go back to where he belonged.

I left the room because I knew he would fly out by himself. Also, I was too impatient to let myself be present and enjoy the journey of the bug because I’m too impatient to witness my own journey. When I came back bug wasn’t on the window anymore.

I thought to myself I wish I trusted my own soul and the universe this much. I wish I trusted that I will always find my way, I will always find the path as that little bug found its way out.

The bug didn’t belong to my living room nor the window, it belonged somewhere outside, his path was paved for him long before it entered the room. He wasn’t aligned to his purpose for a tiny bit but it didn’t change anything. It returned and kept his journey.

I wish to trust life as much as I trusted that little bug. I wish to trust the universe that it will open up all the windows and doors for me and to have trust in myself that I will find the way, my way, my path.

“But what if I can’t?”
“Then you’ll die in the midst of trying to realize your Personal Legend. That’s a lot better than dying like millions of other people, who never even knew what their Personal Legends were.”

The Alchemist

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My Crazy Sleep Paralysis Experience

“ What we don’t understand, we fear. What we fear, we judge as evil. What we judge as evil, we attempt to control. And what we cannot control…we attack.”

It is easy to label our experiences in life, the ones that aren’t so enjoyable as “evil” but what if you can find JOY in those unenjoyable experiences. Imagine that.

What if everything happens for us and not to us. What if everything that happens in our lives is here to teach us a lesson for us to grow and gain new understandings.

What if every experience is a friend and because you label them as good and bad you limit them.

Oscar wild said that to define is to limit. The moment you define the experience in your life as “bad” that is the moment you block yourself from the lesson it has to teach you.

What if the life you live isn’t the life you were meant to live?

What if you have the power to create your own reality. What if life can get better and better and what if you can be the best version of yourself. Do you even know how she/he looks like? Or have you accepted your life and being as it is fixed in the time, space, perception, beliefs, and location?

Are you making sure to live outside of the box or are you comfortable in that tiny box that was given to you that is called your perception and beliefs?

What if there is so much to life that your mind can’t even imagine?

Sleep paralysis can be an extremely scary experience for the majority of people. I personally have learned a huge lesson from it and enjoyed few experiences because I applied and cultivated those learnings.

With an open mind of endless possibilities let’s hear the story.

Sleep paralysis is a period of time when you cannot move or speak as you are waking up or falling asleep. These episodes aren’t frequent and are said that people only might get it once or twice in a lifetime, or not get it at all. But when it happens it can get scary and accompanied by a wide range of hallucinations. Some are painful and scary and others might involve feelings of bliss.

There are a variety of reasons that can cause sleep paralysis, the most common one is sleep deprivation.

I remember the first time it happened to me, I was horrified. My son was 11 months at a time still waking up 4-6 times at night. I think the major sleep deprivation has caused my first sleep paralysis experience.

Imagine a regular morning. You wake up and you can think, feel and hear everything but you can’t physically move any part of your body or say anything. I was screaming for my husband from the inside but I felt like I was locked in somewhere and nobody could hear me. I realized that I wasn’t able to talk. I was so terrified because I had no idea what was happening to me. It didn’t last for long and the moment I thought I could go crazy I was able to move and talk again.

The majority of the time I don’t make a big deal out of things. I told the story to my husband and eventually forgot about it.

Until it happened again.

For the second time, I wasn’t as horrified because I sort of knew what was happening, but still, I was deeply scared of not being able to wake up, move or talk again. I had no idea that this experience even had a name and was so common until I’ve heard someone talk about it.

Finally, when it happened for the 3rd time I was able to detach from fear and be present during the experience. I was practicing non-attachment and meditation at that time and my subconscious was already programmed and ready for it. My mind automatically surrendered. After this experience, my heart wasn’t beating as fast and I wasn’t left with feelings of fear and anxiety.

My next experience was where it got all juicy and interesting. I was doing the US tour with my husband and my toddler. My husband was driving somewhere in Northern California and I fell asleep in the car. I don’t know if it was the motion of the car, the sun on my face, the information I’ve read and gained about the topic, or the spirit of the northern Californian Forest but this experience was quite strange and extraordinary at the same time.

My conscious mind became active as usual and realized that it was another episode of sleep paralysis because again I wasn’t able to say anything or control my body. But the difference now was that I could feel the “I” wasn’t in the body. I was feeling so weightless and detached from my body, whereas during the last experiences I was in my body I was present inside the body.

After I realized I was above my body I heard the loudest noise in my ears and the pulling feeling and then I opened up my eyes and could talk and move. I remember I was so sad to “be back” because I was feeling pure bliss. The feeling of pure peace inside my whole being. The feeling of being at the right place and wanting nothing but being.

I had few more experiences here and there. Obviously, it’s not happening every day for me but it has happened quite a few times during the last 3 years. Each time I gain a new level of understanding because I allow it. You don’t fear what you understand and you don’t fear what you are open to understanding.

Few lessons here:1.How You do anything is how you do everything

Only because I was practicing being in the moment beforehand I was able to actually be in the moment during the experience. Simply because I was practicing non-attachment in my daily life I was able to apply it to the sleep paralysis experience. How you do one thing in life is how you do every other thing.

2. Intention is Important

When it happened for the second time I set an intention that if it would ever happen again I would try to understand it rather than fearing it. So my mind already had an “order” of what to do. Your brain is like a computer and the thought you think becomes the programming for it. Every single thought becomes an intention for your life.

3. We only fear what we don’t understand

The moment I’ve heard someone else mentioning sleep paralysis and realized it’s common and even has a name the major part of my fear disappeared. So if you fear anything in life start exploring and understanding it. Why is it there, where does it come from, get to know it, and get to know the part of yourself that fears something? Give it the attention that it needs and I promise you the fear will disappear.

We might not have control over which experience will happen for us, but we for sure have control over how we are going to experience them. Are you going to be reactive or responsive when something happens in your life? The difference is huge and both have different outcomes. If I’ve feared my next experience that’s what I would have gotten- the fear. But because I’ve opened myself to the possibility of enjoying the “unenjoyable” I gained a phenomenal understanding that I can now apply to every aspect of my life and I’ve experienced pure bliss, peace, and joy which I will never ever forget and would come back to those feelings inside of me when I need them.

The only intention I have for you, yes you, the one that is reading this is to apply the understanding you personally gained from this story to your own life. To stop fearing what you’ve always feared and to start asking questions, the “What if” questions. Everything is possible but first, it needs to be created inside of your mind and to be executed outside of it.

To Light Burning Fires of Desire For Truth Without Limit and Love Without End

Much Love <3

Ani Rich

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This is Why it’s Hard To Forgive

We say very often to people and especially to our partners that we would never forgive them if they ever cheated on us. Many people haven’t even thought about the reason why they won’t be able to do so.

The reason, it’s so challenging and sometimes impossible to forgive is because of the lack of space inside of us.

When someone breaks our heart or we are in pain we are out of balance.

When we are out of balance we are disconnected from ourselves.

When we are disconnected we aren’t for ourselves, we aren’t loving nor giving ourselves what we need. When this happens we aren’t able to have love in our hearts and when there is no love for ourselves there is no love for others.

Where there is no love there is no forgiveness.

To forgive someone is to free yourself up. To forgive means to let go. To let go you need to move on and to move on you need strength.

It’s why they say that time heals everything. Because as time goes we are able to create that strength in us, the strength and love build up slowly over time and we stretch our abilities to forgive.

We learn to forgive by letting our hearts break over and over, Where there is fear of pain there is fear of love. If you try to avoid pain you also avoid joy automatically.

I think that to forgive someone for any pain they caused us is very challenging. I think that it’s an ability to forgive and to forgive better you have to try better. It’s not like our abilities to forgive are fixed, it is a skill. And as everything is learnable so is forgiveness.

As we try harder we create more space for forgiveness within.

Some of us need more time than others. It doesn’t matter how long it takes as long as you show up for yourself it counts.

Small consistent steps will open up far greater doors than you can ever imagine.

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Stop Living in the Lie, Start Living More Authentic and Truthful Life

Where is the line between being and becoming?

How much of it is the real us and how much is the one we want to be.

What does real us even look like? 

So many haven’t ever looked inside themselves, to see what’s in there. 

How often do you ask the question “who am I”? 

Who are you? Why are you talking the way you talk? Why are you acting the way you act? What are you trying to achieve in this life? What are your intentions? Why are you waking up every day, getting dressed and going on your day? What is your purpose?

How can you know the universe if you haven’t even discovered that you are the micro universe? 

How can you discover the bigger world if you haven’t even started exploring your inner world?!

So often we are lost. We don’t know how much of it is the real us and how much of it is the person we think we should be. 

It’s painful not to know yourself anymore. It sucks the joy out of us.

It happened to all of us. We live our lives the way we think we should to fit in, get positive reinforcement, to belong, to be likeable, etc…

But here’s the truth: If you want to be happy, truly joyful and wake up with fulfilment and contentment in your soul, then you should start asking yourself questions.

Questions will help you to understand yourself. When you understand yourself you can create the life that you deserve and desire. Not the life you think you should be living but the life you were meant to live.

When you lie ask yourself why did I just lie and how can I be more truthful next time?

When you do something you didn’t want, just because you wanted to make someone else happy but now you are miserable, ask yourself why did you just do that and how can you be more true to yourself next time. While also honoring the people you love, while also prioritizing your needs.

Question every single move you make and words you say and thoughts that arise.

I know it sounds like so much work, yes?

That’s why we have very few who are truly happy in this world, Who are living the life they were meant to live and not the life society, parents, surroundings told them to live.

To be unhappy is so easy, everyone can do it.

To be Happy is only a prize for the few special ones.

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This Is Why You Aren’t “Good Enough” For Some People

People value each other according to the values they have in life.

People treat each other the way they treat themselves.

Even if you are the rarest flower, to the one that has no knowledge of flowers you are worthless. You are just like any other flower. But to the one that has a knowledge and understanding of flowers you are one of the most valuable things in life.

If Rob values money the most, for him a deep, beautiful, smart human without money, has less value than the one with a lot of money. He will treat the ones who have more money better. That doesn’t mean Rob is making a good choice or has the right behavior, that simply defines him and how people in his life get treated including himself. 

If Samantha values a man with a corporate job, for her an entrepreneur who is making millions from selling a bottle cap might not be interesting enough.

Connection is formed when there is a shared value system and interests. 

You might think you get connected to people with different value systems. From a broader standpoint we are all interconnected, but on a person to person level you might like and be attracted to a person, but deep connection is only formed and sustained if value system is shared.

The values we have are like MRI scanners. We put people through them, if it matches they become our people. All of this is mostly unconscious and we do it automatically. 

We are always judging and making assumptions. Walk in the street and observe your mind “I like this guy, this dog is ugly, where is my phone, why is this guy walking so slowly, my feet hurts, this kid will fall, everyone is in their phones, it smells so good, should I eat something, that woman was so rude yesterday…” and our minds never stop. 

That’s why you should take control over your mind. But please don’t try to stop your thoughts. Quitting cold turkey won’t work on your thoughts. Just replace them with better ones. 

Thoughts come and go without asking you. What you can do is to choose the right thoughts. Right thoughts are the ones that help us feel great, that helps us grow and contributes to the healing of the world and ourselves. When the thought arises you can decide to give it a power by focusing on it or take its power by letting it flow.

One thing I used to do and still do is to change the messages my brain was getting during the day. If you observe the billboards in the city, the majority of them are negative. When I am driving and I see a sign “Injured?” “Divorced?” “Car Crash” I knew all these words were subconsciously programming my mind and helping my ANTS (automatic negative thoughts). So every time I saw a word that I knew would have an unconscious negative impact on me I would close my eyes and imagine the billboard with a different word “Loved?” “Rich” “abundance?” “celebrated”, “Enough”.

At this point I don’t even need to close my eyes I can immediately change and replace the words in my mind. Now the focus words are contributing to my growth and healing rather than making me anxious.

You can use it on everything. Change the words and thoughts that doesn’t serve you with the ones that bring value. Don’t be rude to yourself and to your thoughts. Welcome them when they come and let them flow. You can even talk to it. I used to say “Hello thoughts I see you are here and you think you are protecting me, but at this moment you aren’t serving me so I choose to let you flow” everytime I got negative thoughts.

You can be loving to yourself, be patient and give it a time to change the lifetime of habbits and thinking patterns. Change won’t come in a second. When you think that you have failed and that there is no point to any of this, remember what Thomas Edison said “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” “I didn’t fail 1000 times. The light bulb was an invention with 1000 steps.”

Maybe your healing has 1000 steps or even more. Don’t put a time limit on your healing. Small consistent right choices will take you way farther than inconsistent big ones.

Love yourself and because you love it so much do what’s better for it.

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Become Who You Were Meant To Be

There is two phase. Being and becoming.

Being means existence. To just be means to simply exist. To be as you are, who you are in the present moment.

Becoming is more active. Becoming requires “trying”. Becoming requires an action. It is an intentional action taken by a human being to achieve the desired state of being.

To be a human means to be in the middle of the scope. To balance being and becoming.

Both is needed for our growth.

Being is more like meditation, in meditation, we practice being. You simply are without a thought and a judgment. You are part of the life force, universe collective existence. You are allowing yourself to feel your core being. You are allowing your soul to take over your physical being and just simply be.

Becoming requires a lot more. Becoming comes after practicing being. When you know where you are you know where you aren’t. When you understand how you work and what you want you can then create a plan. Plan for becoming who you want to be.

Many of you can feel like you aren’t living the life you were meant to live. After practicing being you can understand how you work, what your needs and dreams are. When you know what you know it’ss just a matter of time to become who you were meant to be all this time.

Whoever you become after changing your beliefs, habits, letting go of the traumas, gaining new, better habits will become your new “being” and the process starts all over again.

It isn’t that challenging as it sounds. It just requires dedication, consistency, and a progressive realization of a worthy goal. That’s the meaning of success too.

It is simple not easy.

All the concepts in this universe are simple but not easy. If it was easy we all would do it and then what’s the point of it all?

Be that, minority who is capable of taking control over themselves and their lives.

Give yourself time, it takes time. Be patient with yourself. Don’t expect to change in a second it might take years before you achieve the desired state of being ( you might not even achieve it in this lifetime).

Don’t put limits on your goals. Enjoy the process and do what’s in your control. Your attitude towards life and yourself is in your hands.

Enjoy the process. That’s where all the juices are.

I believe in you. You can do it.

Believe in yourself too.

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Create Space Within

We hear it everyday to declutter our rooms and houses.

But what about the most important place, our real home- our bodies?!

We have this one body since we are born, miraculously it grows from being tiny to now us being an adult.

Our bodies grow but we stay the same inside. Bunch of children with grown-up bodies.

Why?

Because of the unhealed trauma, we carry since childhood. The subconscious programming that runs our adult lives. Because of the pain and unhappiness that inhabits our bodies.

If your house is full of clutter you won’t have the space for new, even better things. So is your body if you don’t let go of the past you won’t have space within to create the future. If your mind is constantly busy with being in the past how can you have the ability to “plan” the future?!

Majority of people are focused on past.

Shift your focus on the present-future reality, but most importantly live in this very moment that you are in right now.

[To understand more about trauma and how it manifests in the body read my blog post-https://anikapanadze.com/everyone-is-...]

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Get What You Want

I don’t know if you have noticed, that your days look very similar. Your life is pretty much same every day. No shame though. Just a reminder.

My life wasn’t any different. Until one day I realized that as we are born we die. Life isn’t a rehearsal, it’s deeply real. And it has an expiration date.

The questions you ask yourself programs your mind and shifts your focus.

If you ask your mind why is your life the worse, boring or why does this always happen to you it will do anything to find you an answer. You will ask a negative question and you’ll get what you’ve asked for; a negative, painful answer. The one that makes you feel like you are not never was nor will ever be enough.

I thought to myself that if my self-talk literally programs my brain, questions I ask myself can be direct orders to my mind. “If I ask the right questions I can get the right answers. If I ask the questions that can heal and improve my life, I will get the healing answers.”

And the light bulb went up.

I started to ask myself simple questions every day “What do I want?” “What do I enjoy?” “what’s the purpose of MY life?” “How can I live a more joyous, happy life?” If I got knee pain I would ask “Why does my knee hurt and how can I heal it?” If I wanted to earn more money I’d ask “How can I earn more income?

Practice makes it better. The more questions I asked the more they got direct and specific. That’s the key; To ask very direct and specific questions. And it would be awesome if most of the questions would contain “How”.

I’m not perfect and I find myself sometimes forgetting the fact that life has an expiration date. This blog is a reminder to me and to you to start living your life, take a different route to home, wake up an hour early and watch the sunrise, walk barefoot, hug your kids, stay up at night late and watch the stars, breathe the fresh air, jump into the cold water, go explore your own city, plan spontaneous moments daily or weekly, let go of the things, peoples and places that have been weighing you down, less doing and more being.

We are supposed to change. We are supposed to grow and explore and it all starts by asking the right questions.

How can I truly experience my life, be more present and reconnect to the joy within me?

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The Reason Everyone Else has Easier Life then Us

We often think that grass is greener on the other side. We think that only we are the ones with the problems, everyone else has easier life than us.

The reason is simple.

When it comes with other’s stories we are detached from it, we aren’t “in” the story so we see things for what they really are.

But when it’s about us we get caught up into the story, we become the problem so we aren’t choosing to detach.

Attachment creates suffering.

Connection on the other hand gives you the ability to see things for what they truly are without becoming one with it.

Connection to yourself is the key. Cause you feel deeply feel the truth in that state.

State of being. Connected to everything and attached to nothing.

Grass is greener on our side, detach from your small limited perception and you will be able to see it.

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How To Know Who You Really Are

Sigmund Freud said that Before you diagnose yourself with depression or low self-esteem, first make sure you are not surrounded by idiots.

So often we measure our worth through the lens of others. We think about ourselves what we think other people think about us. We can’t see ourselves externally as we see others. So we judge ourselves through the lens we think others might have.

Charles Horton Cooley, an American sociologist at the start of the 20th century, said: “I am not who you think I am; I am not who I think I am; I am who I think you think I am“

Children’s perception of the world is also very interesting. They not only see the world and themselves how their parents, teachers, surroundings see it. They see the world and themselves as they interpret the perception of their surroundings.

You see the complexity of identity right?!

As I mentioned above one of the reasons we think about ourselves what others might think about us is that majority of us aren’t able to see ourselves as we see others, so we can’t really observe ourselves externally. You are inside of yourself, inside of your body you will not be able to sit yourself down and actually look at it from outside ( unless you practice astral projection).

When this is the case observation, evaluation and judgement has to be done inside out.

When we meet someone we observe their behavior, body language, words, actions, how they act, what kind of faces they make. And based on our “investigation” we then put a label on that person. If we like them they are good if we don’t then well what can we do they are bad.

To understand yourself you have to spend time with yourself, observe it, and become aware of it. You need to ask questions, meditate, do breathwork, slow down, journal, think. Do whatever allows you to meet yourself.

You have to pause, close your eyes, and look inward, When you do that you will have the knowledge of yourself. Knowing and knowledge are completely different. Knowledge of yourself is more logical, intellectual, based on proof. Knowing is what you feel when you meet your true self. You can’t always put it into words but the emotion and feeling are there.

Intellectual knowledge of ourselves can be manipulated by various things. The knowing of ourselves is pure and true.

The majority of people can’t get the feel of the world and others because they haven’t spent time feeling themselves.

Spend time investigating and researching yourself based on the evidence you find. And remember most often the truest evidence is the one that isn’t seen and obvious; our intuition and gut feeling.

Much Love <3

Ani Rich

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