Celebrate with Gratitude June 18, 2008

Bonjour mes amis!

Je suis retourner… from a wonderful week in Paris, France and am happy to share a page of my favourite photos.  You will note I am in front of the REAL Eiffel Tower in this post!  And to the right of that, a photo of myself reading a copy of a magazine celebrating the life of the late French designer Yves Saint-Laurent who passed over just prior to my visit to France. 

The message I wish to share with you today is how important it is to take the time to set goals and dreams for your life and that you achieve these through your thoughts, feelings and ACTION.  I wrote earlier this month about my vision board, scrapbook and creation box.  However, it is important to note that some action is required on your part.  The Universal Laws will bring opportunities to you but it is up to YOU to make the decision (this is your first action step) and go forward in faith.    As James Ray teaches, we must go 3 for 3… when your thoughts, feelings and actions are all in alignment the universe will open up and you will step into your full power.

The completion of this dream of visiting Paris has me contemplating all of the opportunities that the universe has presented to me in the past 2 years since I became aware of how the universal laws and principles work.  While in Paris I consciously offered up my thanks each and every day for the wonderment of how I came to be there.  It became clearer with each day there that this was the RIGHT time for me to be in France.  So as your dreams come true, remember to celebrate with gratitude. 

I would also like to encourage you to enjoy the JOURNEY.  Perhaps you are not where you want to be today; perhaps you are facing challenges that seem overwhelming.  Find the lessons where you are today.  Forge ahead in Faith and Gratitude for what you already have in your life.  And know that your true destination never really arrives… we will constantly have new desires, dreams and goals.  Such is life and this is the way that we grow and evolve.  Now that Paris is checked off my list, I look to the rest of my “bucket list” with anticipation and faith that what is meant to be will be.

Paris ne s’est pas fait en un jour.  (Paris wasn’t built in a day.) – French proverb

QUOTE FOR YOUR SCRAPBOOK: 

“The power of imagination makes us infinite.”  ~ John Muir

Dreams do come true June 8, 2008

I am soooooo excited!!!   I’ve been this way for months and it’s finally here, I can hardly contain myself… one of my dreams is coming true!  I am going to the City of Lights for adventure, discovery and romance and will be able to live my dream of living and speaking as the French do!  Since I was a teenager, I’ve wanted to visit Paris.  I love everything French.  

I enjoyed listening to my father speak his native tongue to his aunts on the phone (Alberta francophone slang which unfortunately did not transfer well to the French I was learning in school) .  I enjoy the beautiful, flowing language and find that I am good at it.   Yet I have not become fluent because I haven’t had the opportunity to speak it for any length of time.  

One of my dreams has always been to immerse myself in the language by living in Quebec or France for a period of time.   As a teenager I applied for an exchange program but did not secure one of the few available spots.   I had plans to travel there with a friend after highschool but she backed out and I never went.  As a flight attendant, I flew everywhere around it but never to France.  Then life happened and it did not materialize.

A couple years ago I learned about creating a Vision Board.   The information has been around for a long time but I first learned of it through the film The Secret.   In one of my favourite books Simple Abundance, Sarah Ban Breathnach suggests creating an Illustrated Discovery Journal.  Abraham-Hicks suggests a Creation Box.    Last year I purchased a beautiful fabric-covered box that says Paris all over it.  Inside I drop papers or objects that represent things I wish to accomplish.  Last November I was in Vegas and asked a friend to take a photo of me with the “fake” Eiffel Tower behind me so that I could put it in my Vision Book (yes, I have a Vision Scrapbook… that should be no surprise)!  Another friend created this collage of me that I could view on my computer.

Just 6 weeks after my return from Las Vegas, Mark and I were having dinner with friends who announced they were going to Paris and asked if we would like to come.  My husband, without even looking at me said, “that sounds like fun.”  I did a double take!  Okay, you’re saying, that’s not a big manifestation.  Well, yes, it is!!   First, I’ve had many opportunities to travel in my life and the circumstances to go to France didn’t seem to line up.  Second, my husband has never been to  Europe.   It’s not that he was opposed to going but it was never first on his priority list and I was beginning to think it would be in our retirement that we would finally get there.  Vacations are usually south or centered around golf (I am an active participant so I’m not complaining, just stating a fact). 

Which brings me to my most important point… Mark plays around 170 rounds a year.  So to get him doing anything BUT golf in the middle of Spring is highly unusual.  I’ve suggested other activities and usually he says, “in the winter, when it’s not golf season.”   

Dreams do come true if you dream it and believe it will come.   Do not place your attention on the not having of it.   Twenty-some years later I am getting to Paris in the Springtime… thanks to The Universe who kindly lined up everything to make it the right time to go.  Because if it wasn’t his golf buddy who invited us, I’m not sure that I could have gotten Mark there on my own in the middle of June.   AND, we’re not bringing the golf clubs.    For all of this, I am grateful. 

Voilà la vérité (that’s the truth of it). 

QUOTE FOR YOUR SCRAPBOOK: “Our truest life is when we are in dreams awake.” Henry David Thoreau

CHALLENGE TO YOU:  Have some fun in your scrapbook and create a page of your goals and dreams for your future.  The real fun begins when you have the opportunity to look back on this page and recognize all that has happened.  My example above is only one of many that have come true for me.