My Passionate Life: May 8, 2012

Bobcaygeon Sunset

First let me apologize for the delay in your daily dose of inspiration—lol, I feel like I'm in a confessional—I'm sorry friends, it has been seven days since my last blog post. ;)

Things have been a wee bit topsy-turvy in my life recently. I was away for three days at a beautiful writing retreat in Bobcaygeon, Ontario. Admittedly I didn't get much writing done, others far outpaced me in output for the weekend, but my mind and soul were soothed with laughter, good friends, good food, and beautiful scenery. I got out of the weekend exactly what I needed. It was heavenly.

However, when I returned home I became rather ill. So the last few days have been spent running tests and getting thoroughly checked out. All appears well, so I have just been taking it easy to let my body recover. I am feeling much better today. Onwards and upwards! 

Getting sick is a gentle reminder to do the things we need to do to take care of ourselves. It is very important to listen to our body. Here's a little note from the book:

“It’s very important to try to recognize the subtle warnings that the [body] sends us—to recognize the yellow or amber lights, like on a traffic light—before our symptoms turn into a serious risk to our health and well-being. We often receive subtle messages that try and tell us to slow down and pay attention to how we are feeling. Those are the amber lights, but few of us know how to recognize them until those symptoms turn into big, flaming red lights that stop us in our tracks. [We need to recognize the symptoms] early in the game, before we run out of time-outs.”

In yoga, we talk about listening to the body—never pushing beyond the point when our bodies tell us to stop. It's important to take that practice off the mat and apply it as a broad sweep to our entire lives.

Learning to slow down when we need to and learning to say no when we want to are essential to living in happiness and fulfillment every day! Listen to your heart. Follow what feels good, live your passions, do something every day that makes you feel good, that brings you joy. And stop, slow down, smell the roses, take a nap, read, meditate, or rest when you need to. Take care of yourself, mind, body, and soul.

Hugs xo
In gratitude,
Marissa

A Passionate Life: May 1, 2012

I took part in a joint venture between the WCDR, or Writer's Community of Durham Region, and The Durham Theatre Festival tonight. The gig was called Words of the Season and it was a celebration of prose, poetry, song, and community.

I've been working hard at getting over my public speaking phobia and have been putting myself out there as much as I can to help conquer my fear. This seemed like the perfect venue: lots of artsy and writerly types, an open mike, and access to alcohol—it was held at a pub. Now I didn't drink anything, but I figured the more they drank the better I would sound. ;)

So I took the plunge and got up on stage and read a prose poem. And though my knees were knocking, I focused on my breathing (yoga comes in handy for so many things) and just let the words flow through me. I managed to get through the entire poem with some good inflection in my voice and some genuine eye contact with the audience who were not, in fact, naked.

Apart from my own personal drama there were about fifteen other presenters. Poems, works of fiction and nonfiction, dedications, and songs filled the pub. Everyone who was there was engaging in their passion, and they were there to share that passion with others.

There was a lot of love in the room!
In gratitude,
Marissa

A Passionate Life: April 30, 2012

Mother & Son

My oldest son is home from university, and I am so glad to have him back! It was extremely difficult to let him go in September. My first born leaving, going far away—it was akin to torture. That first week was spent in waves of tears: tears of pride, tears of joy, tears of loss.

I have three wonderful boys, and my problem lies in the fact that I love the little suckers way too much; it hurts like Hades to let them go. Both me and my husband missed him terribly when he left—my husband, for the record, cries more than I do, and he made no effort to quell his emotions in the weeks leading up to residence move-in, and the weeks afterward.

It was thrilling to watch my son set off into the world, yet frightening since this was his first big transition away from home, but I was so proud of his accomplishments and of the man he had become. I encouraged him every step of the way and put my own trepidations on hold.

Each weekend when he came home a rush of joy swept through the house, and when he left, he took a little piece of my heart with him. By the end of the year, that little piece didn’t hurt quite so much because he had taken such good care of it while he was gone. And now I feel like everything is where it should be. It’s nice to have him back... even if it is only for the summer.

I love my boys, but I digress. What does any of this have to do with living my most passionate life? What exactly was it that made me feel good today? Well, part of the university experience is the dreaded freshman fifteen, and he was not entirely immune to the sway of limitless pop, pizza, and buffalo chicken wraps. When he came home he decided he wanted to get back into shape and part of that routine involved going swimming with Mom.

I love swimming. The feel of the water rushing over my skin, the feeling of weightlessness, the sound of my breath and the way my body slices through the water with each stroke. I can lose myself swimming. It is as blissful and meditative as my yoga practice and it was a joy to share that with my son today. Even though our exchanges were limited to smiles and sporadic chatter in the car on the way there and back, and to words of encouragement as he made the effort to find his stride once more, it was absolutely glorious because he wanted to be there; he still wanted to hang out with his Mom. :D

I love my boys. xo

In gratitude,

Marissa

A Passionate Life: April 29, 2012

I love Sundays. Lazy and slow, I love to sleep in and just putter around the house all day. The finishing touch for me is Sunday night dinner out! I love it when someone else does all the cooking and cleaning, and I just have to sit back and enjoy! Last night was Crispy Chicken Stir Fry at Jack Astors.

Even my younger kids love going out to dinner because it offers them something different than the 'boring' food Mom makes. Plus they get decadent desserts like Orange Sherbert and Brownies, which they are not privy to at home. And my oldest loves any and all opportunities to eat Chicken Fajitas—a perennial favourite—despite my chagrin that it is usually the most expensive food on the menu.

I love family time, and dinner is a special time in our family. It has a strict no computers, handheld video games, or cell phones rule. We all unplug from the big, busy world and tune into each other. I love hanging out with my boys!

Sundays are a great way to celebrate the end of the week and always give me the opportunity to appreciate and anticipate all the awesome things that I will experience in the days ahead!

In gratitude,
Marissa

Here we are at Chapters!

Since the last picture I posted only showed two empty chairs, I just wanted to prove it was really us! LOL

A Passionate Life: April 28, 2012

On a scale of awesomeness—today was totally awesome! My co-author and I had a book signing at Chapters Indigo in Ajax, Ontario today. We were greeted with free Starbucks coffee by Jennifer, one of the lovely managers, a table right at the front of the store, and a beautiful announcement telling customers all about us and our book Life!

We met some incredible people today. A lovely man buying his wife a mother's day gift, who had just finished taking his daughter to riding lessons. Another gentleman who had just come from a refreshing Tai Chi class. A beautiful woman who had just returned from Taiwan, after living there for ten years. Another delightful woman who regaled us with her latest trip to India... the day was filled with wonderful connections.

By the time our visit to Chapters was finished we were completely sold out of books and had made lasting relationships with some of our readers!

It doesn't get much better than that!

In gratitude,

Marissa

Living a passionate life is all about doing the things we enjoy, it's about finding time every day to engage in activities that make us feel good, that make us happy.

Try to do at least one thing every day that ignites your passion, that fills you with vitality and joy. Then add a comment below and share your passionate life with others!

Join me as we get the happiness snowball rolling!

A Passionate Life: April 27 2012

Today I got to hang out with my writing group because we are planning a writer's retreat weekend in May, and this was the final pow wow for hammering down the planning details.

I love these women. They are supportive, encouraging, observant, helpful and awesome. My life would be dimmer without their brilliant presence!

Writing groups and friends rock!!

In gratitude,
Marissa

A Passionate Life: April 26 2012

I had a blissfully lazy day today! I puttered, I tweeted, I blogged and I learned a lot at a seminar this evening. Not only did the seminar align with my passion: writing and yoga, but I met several people I hadn't seen in a while and made new friends too! It was awesome catching up and sharing smiles and stories.

In gratitude,
Marissa

The Happiness Snowball

When we dwell on the negative we draw negative experiences, feelings and thoughts into our world.When we emphasize the positive our world fills with good feelings, awesome experiences, and happy thoughts.

I love my son dearly, and I am very proud of his accomplishments, but he is extremely hard on himself. Rather than celebrate his accomplishments and successes, he is quick to point out the areas where he underperformed, or didn't live up to his high expectations. Whenever I try to talk about staying positive, he groans and says, "that's just your yoga talk." Now I can laugh, I know my kids may not appreciate my point of view... yet, but I hope one day they will see that their mom isn't crazy and that whatever we project into the world is exactly what we get. Like attracts like. Positivity begets positivity just as much as negativity breeds negativity.

My son is not interested in changing his story because it's too easy to just say, 'ya whatever Mom' and go back to his negative self-talk, and dissatisfaction. Whether it makes logical and rational sense or not, we may find ourselves addicted to a certain state of being—even if that state of being is miserable. After all, we are comfortable there, it's what we know, and we will continue to tell our stories of unhappiness to those around us because misery loves company. I like to call this behaviour Dancing with the Blues. In a dance there are certain steps and there is a specific way we interact with our partners. When we dance with the blues, or anger, or frustration, or negative self-talk, we follow the same steps—the same behaviours, and those around us react or interact with us in familiar ways, in predictable patterns. I say, "I had a bad day; my job sucks." And my friend pats me on the back and says, "There, there, don't worry about it, your boss is a jerk; it's not your fault." In this scenario I threw out negativity and got validation: I'm right, my boss is wrong.

The dance becomes habitual and keeps us dwelling on the negative. So we keep complaining and stay stuck in our rut, and the good meaning people in our lives keep enabling this behaviour by playing along—they keep dancing with us.


No one can force us to become more positive: think of the saying 'You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make them drink.' We have to want to change, we have to want to be happier, we have want to live a passionate, fulfilled life! But when we make that decision, when we genuinely, deep down inside decide that we want more out of life, that we want to be happy, then we have to change the dance. We have to change our steps so that others will have to react to us differently. If negativity was your thing, change your story. Become the most positive person you've ever met!

I loved the movie Yes Man. In it, Jim Carrey played a perpetually negative character, until one day he started changing his dance steps, he consciously changed the way he interacted with life. Low and behold, everyone and everything around him changed and adjusted accordingly, they learned the new steps. He learned to say "yes" to life instead of "no," and by the end of the movie he was genuinely happy. His life changed for the better and he was deliciously positive!

If you desire change, if you are looking for happiness, it starts with a simple baby step. Do something—anything (caveat: as long as it does not hurt another), that makes you feel good! Change your dance steps. Listen to some upbeat, awesome music and burn up the dance floor of life!

A passionate life is about filling our days with the things we enjoy, with the things we love. The things that bring us pleasure and make us happy!

Take one bold step toward a life of happiness and fulfillment every day—get out there and play; have fun, and then tell us all about it! Share your passionate life! Every day I will post something that I did that made me happy. I'd love it if you shared one special part of your day too! Add your comment below! Let's get this happiness snowball rolling!!!

In gratitude,
Marissa

A Passionate Life: April 25, 2012

Living my Passionate Life!

April 25, so far I got up on my spinning bike, listened to some awesome blues - Howlin Wolf rocks - and caught up with my tweeps on twitter! Feeling pretty amazing this morning!


In gratitude,
Marissa

What are you balancing?

I asked my yoga class today what they needed to bring more balance into their lives: ‘money,’ ‘schedules,’ ‘slowing down,’ ‘doing less,’ ‘more planning,’ were just some of their answers.

In our book Life: Living in Fulfillment Every Day, we talk about a key concept: wisdom.

“Grace stopped and turned toward Eve. “If you project yourself forward to near the end of your life, Eve, where do you see yourself? Are you sitting in a solitary chair surrounded by luxury homes, your life filled with material possessions and empty relationships? Or are you sitting on a porch swing beside your soul mate, surrounded by your children and grandchildren? Is it the stuff or the people that are important? Is it the quantity or the quality?” Grace’s searching eyes held Eve’s gaze. “You see, Eve, the answer to that question is true wisdom, the knowledge of what is truly important to us. Everything else is extraneous.”

When we are out of whack, when our lives are out of balance our Alignment System lets us know we have jumped track and are no longer following what is important to us.

“The alignment system is trying to tell us that we need to align with what is important and let go of everything else. Any time we do not feel good—be it about a decision, a situation, a relationship, our thoughts or fears—it’s the alignment system, our soul’s way of trying desperately to get our attention. It’s just like being sick. If we catch a cold, a runny nose, sore throat and raspy cough are all symptoms of an infection in our body. The alignment system works exactly like that, giving us the symptoms of ruts, stress or general feelings of discomfort, fear, malaise, sadness, anger, guilt, doubt, etc. to let us know we have lost touch with our true priorities—what is genuinely important to us.”

If your life feels out of balance ask yourself if you are stressing about the ‘quantity’ in life: your status, your lifestyle, the admiration and validation from your peers, the accumulation and/or holding on of material ‘things,’ a house, a car etc,. Chances are if you really look at what it is that you are trying to juggle, that you are running around like a chicken with its head cut off chasing, that you are stressing and/or lamenting over, you might find that they are just superficial things and ideals.

We cannot take anything with us when we leave this glorious existence. And in the end, we all know that when we look back it will be the love that we shared and felt, and the joy we had in living that we will cherish most. We will not be lamenting the loss of a big screen TV.

Enjoy each glorious moment and remember what is truly important to you. Let go of striving for and trying to hold onto quantity. Follow quality instead. Follow what feels good and you will enjoy a balanced life of happiness and fulfillment every day!

In gratitude,

Marissa

A Passionate Life

With Neil Pasricha, author of the Book of Awesome, finishing his 1000 Awesome Things blog, I thought it was time to up the ante so to speak and start another chapter in Life’s blog called A Passionate Life.

Neil’s journey and juicy contribution to our lives was his commitment to noticing all the awesome things in life. I am proposing that we all join together and share and document the awesome things in life that we are doing! How are you living a passionate life? How are you following what feels good?

Every day let’s take a moment to share at least ONE thing that we did that day that made us feel good. How are you bringing passion into your life, what are you doing today that brings you joy?

April 24, 2012

My passionate life:

Today I took time to edit my novel in progress. I went for lunch with a good friend and I laughed and ate far too much then I enjoyed a piece of decadent chocolate cake!

What did you do today to live a passionate life?

In gratitude,

Marissa

Thank You!!

Thank you to everyone who came out to the Official Launch Party for LIFE today at 3 Steps Up Coffee House in Whitby!!

We have the best fans, and friends EVER!!

Love and Hugs to all!

 

In gratitude,

Marissa

LIFE in the news!!!

Durham authors on 'a mission to help the world'

Self-help book also a work of fiction

Durham authors on 'a mission to help the world'. BROOKLIN -- Annemarie Greenwood and fellow Durham resident Marissa Campbell have co-authored 'LIFE: Living in Fulfillment Every Day'. March 27, 2012 Jason Liebregts / Metroland

DURHAM -- Another self-help book?
Collaborators Annemarie Greenwood of Oshawa and Marissa Campbell of Brooklin already know what you're thinking: they're often heavy and dry.
But think again: they're LIFE: Living in Fulfillment Every Day is not your typical self-help book. It's a work of fiction, a story about Eve, a mom who's balancing family, work and school. While she has a busy life, Eve feels that something is missing. When she meets Grace, the two begin a dialogue and Eve begins a journey of learning about herself.

And it's easy to see something, maybe a lot, of ourselves in Eve.
"LIFE was really written as guide for you to find your own unique path to fulfillment," Campbell says.
"As Eve goes through this transformation, she goes on a personal journey of growth and the reader goes along," Greenwood says.

The women are yoga instructors and took a course together in Toronto. They would talk about philosophy during the trips, asking 'why are people unhappy'. Campbell ultimately said, 'we really should be writing some of this down' and the book was born. They argue that, like Eve, our lives are so busy that we never take a moment for self-awareness, to ask ourselves what it is that motivates us. Instead, expectations are externally placed on us, obstacles that prevent us from living every day with passion and joy.

Greenwood jumps in to stress that the authors aren't claiming to have the cure for depression. But Campbell says they were on "a mission to help the world."

As for the writing, the two made an excellent team. Greenwood says "writing for me takes a long time," but the retired teacher enjoys brainstorming and editing. As for Campbell, she was a published author before LIFE.

They've already received some great feedback on the book. And the highest praise of all has come from some of their students, who have said, 'I feel like you're writing about me'.

"It really makes you feel good to know you're helping people," Greenwood says.

The authors launch their book on April 21 at Three Steps Up, 605 Brock St. N., Whitby, from 1 to 3 p.m.

On April 28, they'll be signing copies at the Ajax Chapters from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Visit www.lifelivinginfulfillmenteveryday.com to learn more.
And check out their blog at www.lifelivinginfulfillmenteveryday.blogspot.com

 Source: Durham Region.com by Mike Ruta

Can LIFE really be that simple?

It can be! 

And our book can show you how.

LIFE is now available on KINDLE!!  Only $3.99

Get your copy today: LIFE on Kindle!

Testimonials!

"Fans of Eat, Pray, Love will enjoy this story." Read2Review, UK

"I picked it up and after starting to read it, I could not put it down." Noanie, Ontario

“I tell everyone I can, don’t wait another day, get the book” Kim, Ontario

"This book is an answer to a prayer." Erni, Ontario

“This book truly changed my life.” Tonya, California

“The LIFE book is as spiritually powerful as anything written by Eckhart Tolle, yet literally, as gentle as two women sharing a conversation by the beach.” Alan, Oshawa

“This will forever be my ‘go-to’ book when I need to be reminded as to who I am and what makes me truly happy.” Moya, Ontario

"Each & every page is filled with truth & wisdom. Thank you for sharing these teachings with me and the world." Irena, PA

"It doesn’t matter where you are in your life, your age, or experiences, this book was written for you!" Laura, Ontario

Embody your fullest potential & live the life you've always wanted!

In gratitude,

Marissa