We often hear people wishing us a long, happy, and healthy life, but what if the length isn't what matters most? What if instead, it's the breath depth and purpose of each day that matters most? Welcome to the Live the Width of Your Life podcast. My name is Aneta Ardelian Kuzma and join me weekly as I interview guests who made changes in their own lives to live more fully with intention, gratitude, and joy. Be prepared to be inspired by their stories of shifting their mindset, taking courageous action, and designing the life they always wanted to live.
Welcome back to the Live the Width of Your Life podcast. Today is another solo episode. It is the first Tuesday of February. This year, I've decided to integrate and incorporate the themes of the Live the Width of Your Life book into the podcast. So, twice a month, you'll get a solo episode with just me.
You'll also have a guest the other two times. I appreciate the positive feedback you have shared with me on these solo episodes. Today's episode and the theme for February are self-love and service to others. February is typically associated with Valentine's Day.
And we focus so much on giving gifts to others. And for me, it was really important to say, how do we turn that love inward on ourselves? Because sometimes we don't give ourselves the love that we give others. And then also, how can we be of greater service to our neighbors, to our family, to our friends, to our communities, and really to others in the world and shine our light a little bit more brightly?
So if you have a copy of the book, I hope you're following along. Hope you're doing all the journal entries and the prompts. I just wanted to share some themes and something maybe that you can do as you follow along with this podcast. So the first thing is to focus on what's within our control. There is so much happening in the world and I have taken a step back from the news.
I've taken a step back from the sources that I choose to read. The information that I'm consuming, I find that I've been triggered by a lot of it. And so I'm very discerning around the sources and what it is that I'm consuming. So focus on what's within your control and what's within your control is our attitude, our energy, what we're doing to keep our energy high, what we're doing to keep our frequency, our attitude, how to be intentional.
About how we show up in this world and how we expect to experience the world. We can also focus on how we treat others, how kind we are to those that we live with, to those that are within our families, our communities, our neighbors, and just making a bigger effort to remember that we are all interconnected, that we aren't separated from one another.
And then just also the small acts of kindness, handwritten notes, which is not something that. I do very often. I wish that I was better at this, but I've made an effort to do it more often because I know how much it means when I receive these notes. Maybe you just take some time to do that, or maybe you just reach out to your parents, to your friends, to family, to others that you work with and just check in and say, Hey, I was thinking of you. I hope that you're doing well.
I know that I love leaving voice memos. I usually like to do those when I'm driving in the car and just leaving messages for people. The second thing is that there are simple ways to spread more love in this world.
So just reach out to folks that you care about. And smiling at strangers just being kind at the grocery store or to the servers when you go to a restaurant or anywhere else, I always ask the servers. They don't introduce themselves because a lot of times they don't. I always say, remind me of your name and they'll usually tell me their name.
And then they use the name repeatedly because it just makes it less of a transaction in more of an experience for them and also for us. So those little things I find go a long way. The third thing to do this month is prioritize your self-care, and this could be as basic as making sure you get outside, go for a walk, that you're take breaks throughout the day.
Maybe you want to be more intentional. Maybe you want to schedule some massages, or you want to go and get some other services. Maybe for you, it's just scheduling some date nights with your loved one, or just being intentional about getting outside of the house. That can be something that's an act of self-care.
It's just taking the time to say what would feel so good right now, what is the kindest, gentlest, most compassionate thing that I can do for myself, and putting more of those on the calendar. The fourth is cultivating mindfulness, and this starts with presence, with intentionality. It's using all of our five senses to take in the moment that we're in, spending more time, your mind, your body, your spirit, and everything in this present moment, instead of time traveling, and calling in our energy so it's not disparate.
The fifth thing is to embrace self-acceptance, I think when I was younger, I just had such high expectations of myself and I would get so frustrated or disappointed or upset if I made a mistake or if someone caught it, it just would be something that lingers. And I just give myself so much more grace and I find that by doing that and releasing a lot of the self-judgment, I'm able to do that for others as well.
And my life is so much better since I started doing that. And of course, I still get disappointed and want to do great work and I expect the same from others, but just giving ourselves a whole lot more grace and acceptance for where we are is important. Some days, a hundred percent is
a certain level, and other days, we just need a little bit more of a break. We need more rest. Maybe we just need to give ourselves more time to get things done. So really it just means checking in with yourself and then being extra kind. The sixth thing is to make a positive ripple effect. Energy.
is infectious. And if you've ever been in a room with someone negative, you may have taken that on and left going, that didn't feel so great. Or maybe you're around someone who is so positive and their energy was so infectious. What if we decided to be that person? Everywhere you go, every person that you interact with, just be so aware and conscious of it.
Choose to be a positive person because what will happen is that the other person will be impacted and then they'll go and they'll impact the next person. We could start to see this ripple effect in our communities and everywhere that we go. Number seven is to develop a gratitude practice. So I swear gratitude is the number one thing I can do and breath work, but really to shift my mindset.
I spend so much time in gratitude. First thing in the morning, I find like it's a great way to prime myself and to focus on just being grateful. It shifts my entire perspective. I walk throughout the day, just being aware of things that I'm grateful for. And it's made such a huge difference in my life to be able to do this and to be grateful.
You can just start your morning and say, what are three things I'm most grateful for? Sometimes I do it just lying in bed before I wake up. Sometimes I journal on it and also do it before I go to bed. Great ways to do it. We have a group text message with our family. We say, what are you most grateful for today?
Which reminds me, I haven't sent it out yet. And those are just great things that you can do. And gratitude just fixes so much. And then eight is setting some healthy boundaries. Boundary setting is something that I wish I learned. I wish I was better at it when I was younger. It's identifying
what is a strong yes and what is a no in my system and the older I get, the more I am looking for a full-bodied, yes. Unless there's a real reason why I feel like I should say yes, but there are too many times in life that we should do something and we do it. And then in my personal experience, I'm either resentful
or upset and second-guess myself. And so just getting much more clear about boundaries around what I choose to say yes to and what I choose to say no to is important. And reframing some of the negative talk that goes with that, with being supportive and saying, Hey, good job today.
So noticing what your energy level was and saying no to something that just didn't feel aligned. And then the final piece of self-care and self-love this month is just to shine our light brightly. It's so easy to get discouraged, to get disappointed, to feel upset, to get angry. All of these lower frequency emotions when we are watching the news or we're talking to someone or
if our feed is just filled with things that are not that supportive, but we can turn that around and we can focus on being the light that others need to see shining our light brightly, and then, in turn, watching what the ripple effect is out in the community. If every single 1 of us chose to do this and chose to be kind every day, and just show up in a positive way for others that encounter us.
It will make a difference. You will feel better. The people you interact with will feel better. The interactions themselves will probably be so much better. And in turn, that turns out to be the experience that we're having right now in this life. In our daily choices. So just a little info for February.
I love going back and reading this in the book and there's a quote that I love from Muhammad Ali, it's for February 2nd and it says service to others is the rent you pay for your room here on Earth. And I just thought that was such a great quote as a reminder to say while we're here, why not? Why not be a positive light in this world? So thank you so much for listening. And I hope that you are enjoying these mini-episodes. I would love to hear from you. And if you're reading the book send me a note. I'd love to hear what your favorite month is. Have an amazing day.
Thank you for listening to today's episode. If today's conversation inspired you to dream again, break out of your comfort zones, or reflect on what it means to you to live more fully, then please follow this podcast because every week you'll hear more stories from people just like you who took imperfect action towards their goals, created more joy and are living the life that they always dreamt of living.