personal growth | My Wardrobe, Myself

Fear… Only a Thought

Debbie Roes

August 17, 2010

“Fears are merely thoughts, and thoughts can be released.” – Louise L. Hay

The quote above begins Chapter 4 of the “You Can Heal Your Life Companion Book,” the chapter which focuses on fearful emotions. Although I have been diligently working through all of the exercises in this book, I have decided to only post on those that are most impactful to me and which I feel will be most relevant to my readers. In this post, I share some of the exercises and my responses from Chapter 4, as well as some insights for you to use in your own journey to facing and overcoming fear.
The Price of Fear

Fear impacts all of us. We let fear stop us from pursuing our dreams, speaking our minds, sharing our love, and fully living our lives. We experience fear of rejection, fear of failure, fear of change, fear of the future, fear of intimacy, and even fear of success. Some of us literally become paralyzed by our fears.

Fashion Isn’t Frivolous

Debbie Roes

6 comments

August 13, 2010

NOTE: This post was originally published on my previous blog, Body Image Rehab. Today’s post is dedicated to a topic which some may consider to be frivolous… fashion. I have always enjoyed clothes and shopping, but it has only been in recent years that I’ve come to learn the power of what we wear to …

Six Months Already?

Debbie Roes

1 comment

August 11, 2010

NOTE: This post was originally published on my previous blog, The Healing Project. It’s hard to believe, but it has been 6 months since I started “The Healing Project.” My first post was made on February 3, 2010, and outlined my quest to heal my health and my life over the course of one year. …

Body Gratitude

Debbie Roes

4 comments

August 6, 2010

Those of us who grapple with body image issues tend to spend a lot of time and energy focusing on our physical imperfections and lamenting all the things we feel are wrong or missing. We are often so keenly attuned to the perceived negatives of our physical being that we completely lose sight of the many positive aspects inherent in having a body.

Today, I completed exercise #3 from “200 Ways to Love the Body You Have.” This exercise, simply titled “Gratitude,” challenges us to list all of the ways our bodies serve us, those things we wouldn’t be able to experience if we didn’t have a body. Surprisingly, I had no trouble at all creating my list and within a short fifteen minutes, I had listed 25 blessings for which I feel gratitude toward my body.

My list mostly encompasses the many joys of experiencing life through the five senses of sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch.

Lack of Connection

Debbie Roes

5 comments

July 20, 2010

About a month ago, my neighbor of 2.5 years was taken to the hospital in the middle of the afternoon. He never returned… I since learned that he has terminal brain cancer and is living out his final days in a local hospital. I had passed him in the hallway many times, but had only uttered a quick “hello” to him before continuing on my way. I never took the time to get to know him, or vice versa.

I don’t really know any of my neighbors. We pass each other on occasion, sometimes smiling, sometimes nodding, but rarely interrupting our busy schedules to take the time to get to know each other. We all have more important things to do, it seems.

I have close to 200 Facebook friends, but very few people I can honestly call real friends, and even fewer with whom I connect on a deep level. We have more and more ways to connect with others through the advances in technology, but the level of connection that is happening is becoming increasingly superficial. All of the technology in the world can’t change the fact that we are growing more and more socially isolated in our society. Loneliness is becoming the biggest epidemic in our country, even bigger than cancer, AIDS, or heart disease.