Random Thoughts from May 2023

Pssssssst guess what?

I have lost 20 lbs in the last three months.

After crying in the waiting room of my doctors office at the end of February because I was gaining weight no matter the workout, the diet, the plan ... to dropping weight relatively easily (and almost daily) for the last three months.  It's been wild, to say the least. Thank God (and my naturopath).  What's incredible though, is not the loss itself but the realizations that I have noticed during the process.  Grab a cup of coffee and let's chat!  


p.s. This is decaf with almond milk ... it looks freakin ODD doesn't it?  The dude did the best he could with non-coffee and non-dairy creamer.  He's a magician really cause it wasn't an easy task.  

COFFEE TALK 

After years of attempting to lose weight I knew that I needed to do something different.  I started trusting in someone else, I stepped into an energy of certainty instead of hope, I released the timeline on when it would work.   Also ...  

I started to journal.

I was willing to write out ANYTHING that came through my pen ... no matter what it looked like - sometimes it wasn't that pretty.    I shared an excerpt of my journal with the women in The Power Project.  



In the process of journaling my innermost honest raw thoughts and feelings that I was experiencing, this is what I realized:

- most people struggle with the uncomfortable.  it's hard to write, it's hard to read and the FIRST thing we want to do is to make the discomfort go away.  The transformation comes from feeling it and knowing "you are not your thoughts, they are just things your brain thinks".  I swear that some of the comments I wrote sounded more like 6-year old Sandy than who I am today.  It is fascinating to witness and cathartic as all hell once you're willing to try it.

- a negative thought/feeling does NOT equal a bad day or a bad life ... it is just a bad moment.  Knowing this allows us to move through without judgement.  We aren't etching this in stone, we are writing it out to RELEASE it.  

- FEELING an unwanted emotion and trying to flip immediately to positive thoughts is almost impossible to maintain, long term (for me anyway).  I ACTUALLY feel like I stay in the emotion for longer. Writing out how I feel and what I think, no matter what it is, allows me to process the emotion (vs ignoring it) in order to get to the positive faster.    

SIDE NOTE:   if/when someone allows you into their pain ... just listen.  Don't immediately rescue.  Don't make them wrong.  Don't blame someone else.  Just listen.  Be curious without judgement.  Recognize the courage that it takes them to open up to you and appreciate that you were trusted with their truth.  It's an honour to be trusted this much.  Be there with them.

A JOURNAL EXERCISE TO TRY:

 "Dear Universe this is how I'm feeling now:"
(write out all of the negative emotions/thoughts/fears you have)

then

"I release this all now and I open up to something greater"
(then write out your dreams, what you are grateful for, the best parts of your day)

It's a game changer!

FENG SHUI TIP OF THE MONTH 

One of the things that people often forget, is that OUTSIDE of our homes can bring us positive energy. 



I absolutely LOVE to fill our fountain in the front yard with water and turn it on.  I've got tiny little birds coming to it for water breaks.  I have early blooming muscari (really pretty blue/purple flower) that bring in the bees.  I'm like the Ace Ventura of winged things over here.  

In the backyard we have some flowering trees (which I call our orchard but really it's 5 fruit trees) a gorgeous wind chime a garden and a few flowers.

Adding moving things, growing things, colourful things, "musical" things and things that attract living things ... ALL GOOD FENG SHUI.  More than that ... if you love it ... it's good feng shui too.  ;)




WHAT (or who) INSPIRES ME

You know what I love?  I love seeing people who think outside the box, use their gifts and dare to be different.  I also like when magic happens when you least expect it!

Christian Vieler is a German photographer who has built his career on shooting humorous photos of dogs catching treats. In each of the photos, the dogs are frozen in time with various expressions on their faces while they lunge with jaws open at tasty snacks flying toward them.

When Christian got a new flash for his camera, he wanted to try it out in his apartment.  He put his labrador retriever in front of the camera to test out how it captured movement with the flash.

"For that, Lotte would have had to move. But she did not, because she is a very chilly Labrador. So I started to throw treats to get Lotte moving. How funny the results were, I didn't really realize until days later while cleaning up the hard disk."

His speciality began ... take a look!








 
Pure magic.  Plus ... could you imagine how FUN a career like this would be???   

If you're interested, he has a book out (soon to be two books) or you can check out more of his photos here:  https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/just-54-photos-of-dogs-getting-treats/54/ 


FUN STUFF from the INTERWEBS

This month I've been in an introspective space.  I've seen lots of super deep philosophical life changing stuff but sometimes you just need to have a little more fun.

True story.

I can't wait to try this!!!

Well except we don't have A/C sooooooo maybe I'll have to use the BBQ. 

How much do you love this!!!???  What a cool thing for the University of Tennessee to do for him.  They sent him a huge box of fan gear too!

I can't remember if I've shared this previously ... but it's still true so I'm sharing it again.  ;)

COOL SHIT

Recently Cam and I had been talking about how a) groceries are ridiculously expensive and b) how garden vegetables are just plain tastier and c) how you can't really trust what's in your vegetables ... I mean it's really Russian Roulette with your romaine lettuce these days.  Salmonella with your chicken salad ma'am?

So even though both of us are NOT fans of gardening, we decided to build a raised garden bed in our backyard.  We went to Rona to get wood and found THESE COOL SUCKERS!!!!!

Concrete ends that just hold the boards into place ... you literally have to do NOTHING but put 'em down and put 'em together.




You can create different shapes of course - we saw all sorts of multi-layered raised flower beds etc but we weren't that adventurous nor creative.  




We lined it with poly, Cam capped it with some 2x6's layed flat and filled it with dirt.  VOILA ... peas, carrots, radishes, onions, kohlrabi and beets are on their way!
 
WHAT'S COMIN UP?




INTENTIONAL:  Fame/Reputation

Every single month in INTENTIONAL I start the month off saying how much I love working on the particular gua and why.  Even though most people tell me they want to work on wealth, career, relationships or zen energy .. inevitably the women start to see why I love each one SOOOO much.

When you are standing in your architectural front door looking in, Fame/reputation is the area of your home located at the back centre.  It represents what you want to be known for in the world ... what people think of you when they see you.  

Now, I'm not the one who tells you to worry about what other people think (especially the fuckin idiots ... we DEFINITELY don't wanna care what THEY think).  What I love about this gua though is that it's a way for us to just THINK in terms of our legacy.  What do we want people to feel or think when they think of us?  It's fun to create from THAT space!!

When you start to work on this gua, life begins to shift in such cool ways!

YES I WANNA DESIGN MY HOME WITH SANDRA!



This started as a monthly journaling group ... $40 CAD a month ... with the intention to access your personal power but journaling, with a supportive group led by ME who is awesome.

It has turned into SO MUCH MORE.  

In this group I share not only my journaling processes, but also the things I'm learning along the way.  I've shared some mediumship stuff too!  Each and every day the goal is journaling in a way to access our subconscious mind, to release the stuff that limits us or bring forward our dreams.

It has become so much more than I dreamed it would be!!  You can join us using the link here:

I WANNA CHANGE MY OWN DAMN LIFE




There's a moment ... when you realize that every day is a gift.  We spend too much time in our heads, overthinking and worrying about perfect.  We don't try for fear of failure.  We wait for everything to be ideal before we begin ... but ideal doesn't happen.  We waste time worrying about shit that doesn't matter.

One day we wake up and realize that we've lived our lives for someone else ... and when we look back, it doesn't even look like US anymore.

And that's why I have created this coaching suite.

I promise ... life is not meant to feel like an assembly line of tasks.  It GETS to be good and when we can lean into that "thing" that we are great at ... it gets to be great.  I'm determined to help you get there.

CLICK TO WORK WITH SANDRA

TASTY SHIT!

Well my son is home from University and both he and his friend have been working within a km of us lately.  On their 30 minute lunch break, they come here!!!  After the first day (corn chowder and paninis) his friend said "Cole I'm living my BEST life right now!!!  I told EVERYONE all night long how good the food was".

Game on.

Now every damn day is a challenge.  I need to make the best lunches known to man.  (Welcome to the inside of my brain ... this is the way I work)

So far I've made:  homemade naan crust pizzas (6 different kinds that day, one was a donair pizza!), still sizzling beef fajitas, the ever-so-famous corn chowder and paninis that started it all, reuben sandwiches with japanese cabbage salad and this recipe from my friend Sarah ... chicken salad croissants with homemade tomato soup.

I didn't get time to take a pictures of the croissants but I DID take a quick pic of what I ate!  I just placed it into one of my garden romaine lettuce leaves.  VOILA!  Tasty.

CHICKEN SALAD w/SARAH

p.s. Marley says "hi"

Chicken Salad

rotisserie chicken, shredded (I chopped it cause I'm impatient)
1 cup grapes, halved (I quartered them)
1/3 cup celery
1/2 cup miracle whip
2 tsp worchestershire sauce
salt & pepper to taste

Instructions

Throw all the ingredients in a bowl.  Mix it really well and serve on croissants, buns, bread, bagels or in a lettuce leaf!  VOILA.  Tasty.  The cut up grapes are unexpected and totally great in there!

Our Tips and Tweaks:

My old chicken salad recipe used to add in chopped onion (I think it was actually a tuna salad recipe and substituted chicken for it).  I think I would maybe add sliced green onion to this ... fresh and tasty and a bit of colour!

Our more recent chicken salad recipe came from a fishing trip my son, husband and two friends went to up at Cree Lake Lodge.  In THAT one the "sauce" was a mixture of hot sauce and mayo.  YUM.

Any of these are tasty ... but I'm now partial to the addition of the grapes.  ;)

If you try it, or tweak it I'd love to hear what you do!  Post a pic on your social media and tag me!

***

Once again, from the bottom of my heart, thank you SO much to all of you who regularly email me, recommend my group, my courses, my coaching or this newsletter to your friends and colleagues, your biz besties and your family.  I appreciate every one of you and every message that I receive.  

OH AND ONE MORE THING!!!

If you're loving this email but you're wanting all the blasts from the past, you can now access ALL MY PRIOR NEWSLETTERS on my blog!!

www.thefengshuichick.ca/blog 

"Life is not meant to be an assembly line of tasks ... it's meant to be a masterpiece.  Only you can hold the brush".  

Sandra Priestley 
XO





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