So, I realize it isn't Halloween time, unless of course you are reading this in October and then, hey, Happy Halloween! But I digress, the little trickster I am talking about isn't the kid dressed up and pulling pranks, it's that little voice within us that can be so convincing of our shortcomings. Call it the critic, ego, or trickster, by any name it can be tamed.

I hope you enjoy this chapter and learn to be happy with your IT.

There is an interesting aspect to our personalities that can be invigorating as much as it  can be  incapacitating.  This is what I have come to know as the inner trickster.  It isn’t evil and it isn’t particularly bad but it is sometimes VERY annoying. Think of a child when they are being impish. That is the energy of the inner trickster. It wants attention and it is very practiced at getting it.  One can look at any human and know that there is an inner trickster in there.  They all have their own jobs and focuses but only because we have trained them there.  It is often based on how we were raised or what we witnessed along our path as to how our trickster plays.

When we are born, there is an innate trusting to this universe and a feeling that all is in order. Why else would we come in with no teeth, not able to support ourselves and believing that whoever brought us into this world has our best interest at heart?   This knowing or trusting is there from the soul level and if we would remember or were taught to listen to it as we grow, there would be no room for an inner trickster to marinate and then become active in our systems. This is often not the case though, I believe it is possible, but for most of us, this wasn’t our experience and we must learn to rewire the messages received by those that did bring us in or that raised us to where we are old enough to listen to our own messages.

If one were to be raised with this knowledge, much like the animal kingdom is, our own gps would guide us to the highest experience and it would all be utopia. That may seem like the best case scenario but we actually learn well through contrast and I, for one, am grateful for the teaching it has given me. For instance, my trickster is often caught up in what will be, imagined or otherwise, and will often tell me stories that are so creative IT should be a writer! It has taken me years and will no doubt be an ongoing process of retraining the trickster to find its attention elsewhere rather than in my ego!

It has been my experience that the ego is a representative and encourager of where we are and where we may be going individually. I believe it to be a good thing and something that should pat you on the back and not hold you back. I also see it as an effective tool in alignment.  While many teachings may be about separating the ego from yourself I just don’t agree that is a good way to go as it is a part of you and if it gets separated, it creates a fear reaction and that doesn’t help any situation. I see it as the part we are to learn how to accept, appreciate and sometimes talk to like it is a five year old that needs a nap, lovingly and with a great amount of patience.  This patience is what the inner trickster requires as well to quiet its comments and to redirect some of that impish energy.

One of the questions I love so much is, is it true? Is what you are talking about, complaining about, worrying about or imagining, is it true? As we learned earlier, everyone has their own inner truth and it isn’t up to us to see it from their angle, only our own but is it true or are you creating something to keep you entertained and feeling activated in your own life? Most often I find that people are so creative and don’t give themselves credit for that creativity however, it could be put to better use in being creative for the enjoyment of life rather than the drama of it.

Do you want to quiet the inner trickster and are you willing to live without the adrenaline rush of “oh, no, what do I do now?”  I know the first reaction may be, who me?  I don’t do that but you only have to look at social networking or any of the other blogging sites to see that there is a high propensity and desire for that feeling of fulfillment if only for just a moment.  This is similar to the rush achieved when one purchases a great blouse or eats a great piece of pizza or chocolate. It’s great to admit it and even better to shift the habit of lining up with the inner trickster.

Here are a few examples of the inner tricksters work and some questions to help you identify if you are dancing with your inner trickster or if you are aware of it and able to acknowledge it as that cute little bugger that quiets down when you don’t feed it.

• What do you feel is your most creative inner trickster energy?  Does it tell you you aren’t smart enough?  You aren’t talented enough or that you lack abilities?
• Is there a part of you that immediately agrees with others when they give their opinion even if it is something that you don’t agree with?
• Do you feel you have to come back with an example of your own drama when someone shares their life?  An example of this would be if someone were saying that they had car trouble and what a challenge it was to get the tow truck there and you jump in with an even bigger tale of how difficult it was for you to get your car serviced and the run around that ensued.  Bigger is not always better.
• Do you have a hard time with the opinions of others and what you “think” they may be saying about you?  This one usually brings a big response as we often think people are talking about us when in fact they are so worried about people talking about them that it is rarely the case that they are talking about us. (I know that is a bit of a puzzle but if you read it a few times you will get the humor in it as well. We humans are so funny in our learned behaviors.)

So what can you do to calm the inner trickster and allow it to go take a nap and only be present when you are not doing yourself a favor and growth is probable?

• You can distract the inner trickster much like you would a two year old who wanted to climb the cabinets just because he can. A way to do this is by getting busy with anything that fills you up or that keeps you busy and distracted until the feeling of wanting drama to fill that hole. You could go for a walk, you could get creative artistically, you could clean or you could call a friend (NOT to talk about the challenge you are having but to share in their day.).  It only takes a short time to redirect that energy that is looking to be filled up.
• You can recognize that it is there and much like the child example, send it for a nap. I used to do this a lot when I first started doing readings. My inner trickster was so creative it would do a conversation before the person even got there… the whole conversation…so what was the point of them showing up? Creative eh? One of the exercises I would do was to picture my inner trickster, or ego, as being dressed as I am that day and imagine it peeling out of my body similar to those old movies where the soul would rise up out of the body after someone passed. I would then send it to the kitchen, as I was doing readings in my home then, to wait for me to finish the session. I have left her on the side of the road, in the shower or standing in that kitchen for long periods of time. There was no anger in it, simply a reassignment. Over time this was unnecessary and only on occasion does she get sent to the other room for her nap.
• You can also learn to love and appreciate the inner trickster. This will allow it to learn acceptance and not feel it has to rear its ugly head to get attention. Appreciate the fact that you are brilliantly wired to self check and accept the fact that it will be a part of you for as long as you are physical and if you learn to love it; you won’t mind having it around.

The beauty of recognizing your inner trickster and being able to work with it is that cooperation happens and that adds to the flow of your life. Learning to love something that isn’t always pretty is a gift you give yourself for then whatever pops up in life can be taken at its value and not feared.  This is very freeing and something I KNOW you can  do.

Loving and dancing with my Inner Trickster, 
Vicki

www.vickibaird.com

Click here to purchase online

Let's be honest, I have created a business helping people deal with the unknown. Whether that is because they are coming for a reading and believe I can give them the picture of the potential (I can and my track record is pretty good thus far!), or whether I am helping them to believe in self so the unknown no longer has the control they thought it did, either way, I hear this word A LOT.

One of the messages I know I am here to help deliver is a form of lighten up people, life is not as difficult as you are making it. Stop creating a soap opera to feel like you have a valid reason to feel. Give yourself permission to feel whatever you feel and that solves that, eh?

Perhaps not so easily once trained to make mountains out of molehills though.  One of these mountains is feeling like you don't know what is going to happen in your life and you need to know. You have to have direction or you have to understand what is up with that other person. What if, rather than freaking out about the mountain of unknown, you saw it is an adventure of not knowing? What if you realized you didn't know for sure where you would be today and you still made it here so you already have the skill to navigate the perceived unknown.

Let me shine a little light on what I hear really freaks people out and they use the word unknown as the descriptor. I believe what is the challenge for people is not the not knowing, it is the limbo that it feels like they are in when they don't know exactly what is going to happen. We are not so comfortable in that limbo space especially the more distracted we get with noise and technology. This limbo place is where one doesn't know what is going to happen and worries about it or creates a story around not knowing being scary. It's not. It just isn't known. So what?  Relax.

Two weekends ago my husband and I took a weekend trip to the Finger Lakes in New York. On the way there, the kayak on the top of the car broke loose and was flapping in the breeze at 70 miles an hour. I let Howard know what was happening above us and he calmly pulled over and we tied the little bugger down enough to get off the thruway and address the issue. As we pull off the thruway, the car overheats. Yeah, it was that kind of beginning to the trip. Now, years ago I probably would have been panicking about not making it to our destination or where were we going to get help on a Friday night at 6pm in the middle of nowhere and he would have been annoyed and crabby. This time, we realized, hey, no one got hurt, a car has needs too and we will attend to it. After trying to eat gas station food and letting the car cool down, we got back on the road. Only to go five miles and realize, the car was in more distress than we could limp along with and we needed AAA and fast.

A lovely tow driver named Francis came to our aid and after a particularly scary moment where he, my husband and myself almost became grill art for a driver not paying attention, we were towed to safety and I got to ride in a very big tow truck!

Limbo, we were in limbo. We obviously were not going to make the next two hours we had to go and we weren't going to sleep at the garage so on to next detail, the hotel. I called one and only one, took the one room they had available (casino town on a weekend in the summer) and we were on our way. Now, I could have been all freaked out about the circumstance and lamented that our trip was ruined because of this issue but thankfully, after helping so many people and doing my own stuff, I shifted that limbo place of freaking out about what is next and shifted it to peace of mind of the situation.

Peace of mind in the unknown is realizing you don't know what is going to happen but not being concerned about it either. Recognizing that the universe really does have your back and acting accordingly with the information you have at hand as well as the skills you have developed thus far. We can't hear if we are freaking out. Addressing the issue of housing first, a ride to the hotel (in the big tow truck again! SCORE!) and then on to food, rest and seeing what the garage said in the morning was how I stayed in the adventure of the unknown.

Where do you spend your time regarding the unknown, or otherwise known as life?  Do you distract yourself from today by worrying about tomorrow? You do know while we are eternal, there is a finite number of days you will have on the planet and to spend it worrying about tomorrow and not really living in today is a bit crazy making, right?

What if you took today to realize that part of the fun of being a human is having a choice in how you live. You have a choice in whether you limbo with the unknown or you do a fun line dance or jitterbug, whatever lights you up in the dance world. Don't forget to use jazz hands!

Sure, life can throw us some pretty amazing dance choreography, but if you are willing to see you have the starter skills in dancing this dance and open to learning some new patterns, life becomes so rich and fun. Time slows down and there is a sweet spot of appreciation that we are not in charge of how the Earth spins anyway, so sit back, trust and enjoy the dance.

The car?  Well, it was just fine after a new part was installed, which happened to be in stock at the garage that was only open for a few hours Saturday morning and after some canine love from the resident pooches, we were on our way to the most amazing lakes and waterfalls I have seen.  More amazing because of the gratitude that Howard and I have learned to appreciate the journey as much as arriving at the destination.

Jazz hands people! They aren't used enough, get them up!

Peace out,

Vicki

p.s.  If it seems challenging to shift from the limbo to the mindful place of peace, give me a ringy dingy and we will re-pattern that.

www.vickibaird.com

Come on in, the weathers nice! Inside self that is. I see people almost every day who are afraid to look inside themselves like there are gremlins living in there. While I will grant you, we are pretty fascinating creatures, most of us are going to be ok delving into what is in there and coming out with a ruby IF we don't create a story around it or "sit in it." Go in, look around, see what could be attended to, gather your tools and then take breaks on the outside again. See?  Not so scary. 

We all know within what is important to us and what could really use some shifting. We all have that Inner Truth. 

When one hears the words inner truth there can be a cringe that goes through the system. This is a reaction, I believe, that inner truth is harder to find than it really is. Of course, it is going to be different for every person as we are all very different souls but it still is something that is very accessible.

It is my desire that everyone would find this, whatever it is for them, and allow themselves to know that peace and the absolutely, amazing, wonderful feeling that comes from connection with self. This feeling, space, realization, whatever the adjective, is what sustains us. It keeps us striving for more and allows us to expand beyond where we are at any given moment. It is very much our personal gps system guiding us to that whole feeling that our soul knew and knows is possible for every being to achieve.

We are not meant to be stagnant. Every organism that is of this universe is constantly growing and raising its vibrational frequency. We all have a knowing that this is the exciting part of our journey. The constant desire for more. For some this will be in the context of stuff, for others it may be spiritual fulfillment, for others it may be cultivating a talent that comes naturally but they don’t really understand. It really is of no matter where that desire manifests itself, it is more that the individual realizes it is great, it is natural and it is something to delve into with excitement.

It has been my experience that we allow fear to hold us back. We allow it to keep us from that place of understanding in self and others. We may have been conditioned to react to good things with a skepticism that wasn’t in us when we came into this earthly realm. This may have come from well meaning individuals, from teachers in our lives, both of the traditional variety and the ones that we meet socially along our journey, or from our own ingrained anxiety. Wherever it comes from it is interesting to me that we, over time, become oblivious to the vibration of energy and that fear and excitement actually have the same vibration in the universe. Feel about this for a moment.

Think of a time when you were anxious, nervous or otherwise zinging with energy that felt negative. Ok, other than if you are in a dangerous situation, could that feeling you had been excitement if you had approached the zing differently?  If you had taken a moment to really feel it, would it have felt like excitement? Perhaps a new chapter in your life or an opportunity to become clear on the direction your life was taking? Have you gotten into the habit of seeing things from a scary perspective?

We will explore this a bit more in the following chapters where you will learn how to shift that reactive muscle from fear to excitement. It’s fun, I promise!

For now let’s look at how to find that Inner Truth that seems so elusive. Take a moment to look at what means a lot to you. This will help you to locate the door to that  truth.

• Is it important that people are honest?
• Does it bother you when you feel something or someone has been “wronged”?
• Is there an aspect of your personality that you deny out of fear of exposing it to others? I call this the what will people think syndrome.
• Do others possess something that you would love to have? This can be in the physical, such as jobs or homes, or it can be in the emotional such as confidence or a sense of peace about them.
• If you were to finish this statement what would you say? “If there is one thing I know I stand for it is...”

Ok, have you found the door? Have you found something that you can feel excited about entering? It is completely ok if you have not. You will, I know you will. Keep asking yourself questions until something creates a feeling of excitement. Remember to be aware that if the feeling is anxiety or stress, to look at that as it may really be excitement dressed in another’s clothing.

When you find the door, you are then going to utilize the key to unlock the door. This key consists of the abilities you already possess. Those that you may not be aware you have or have overlooked and don’t realize how special you really are.

In my groups I have asked many times for those that are participating to do this next exercise and most often they look at me like I have five heads. I am used to that look so for the most part I find it amusing, so if you feel so inclined to say something like has she lost her marbles or she’s got to be kidding. Go for it, I can take it.

Take a few moments to write out all of the positive, exciting, joyful, I’m all that and a bag of chips qualities you possess. Yes, all of them. I’ll help you get started:

• I am at heart a good person.
• I love to help others.
• I bring joy wherever I go.
• I can organize anything.
• Animals love me.
• I sing, dance, paint, write, sculpt, cook, speak, etc. well.
• I have a great sense of humor. (Even if you are the only one who thinks you are funny. ESPECIALLY if you are the only one who thinks you are funny!

Continue to write as many as you can come up with. Use your daily life to give you inspiration about what you do well but also how you interact with self and others.

Now, when you have that completed and are feeling great about yourself ask three other people to give you their list of who they see you are. Please choose those that are going to be honest as well as complimentary. This is the part where the groups usually groan because it is hard to ask others what they like about ourselves but I promise the result is often amazing. While I know how we feel about ourselves is the most important, I also know that we rarely recognize our greatness and others are often happy to do so if we give them the chance.

Once you have compiled some of this data, sit back and absorb it. Allow yourself to revel in the feeling of positive reinforcement. Too much of our lives are based on a negative motivational response system. We do things because we are afraid of the outcome if we don’t but often that garners a completely opposite effect of what we really want in our lives. Energy is energy so what we pay attention to, we get whether that is something seemingly positive or not. When we focus on negative aspects of our personalities it heightens that area so it is my intention to help you re-align and focus on what is great about you and build on it until you know that you have all it takes to connect with your Inner Truth and be willing to live it as well.

I hope you are brave enough to do the exercises above. They aren't to benefit me, but they will benefit you and that is the intention here. You connecting with your Inner Truth will ripple out into the universe and help others to as well then we can all have fun together. 

Inner truth seeking every blessed day of my life and loving it, ok mostly liking it with sprinkles of loving it in there, 

Vicki

www.vickibaird.com

Link to purchase the book!

It seems to be a very nostalgic time right now. People are doing a lot of self review. I LOVE it. I believe that one of the best ways to have an amazing life is to be willing to look at, but not sit in, our stuff. I see it as a personal treasure hunt, sort of like the geocaching people are doing. You may find a gem one time or a piece of costume jewelry, but there is always something of value if you are willing to look. The journey to the location is often the valuable part!

When we use the rear view mirror to look behind us as our past, it can be fantastic. Keeping in mind the rear view mirror is smaller than the windshield for a reason. It isn't necessary to spend tons of time looking back there, but checking keeps us feeling safe and aware of our surroundings. I'll be the first to say, let's move forward from here and let the past be where it is and yet I know how challenging that can be.

I see so many people caught up in what happened, what they got, what they didn't get in relationships or what others got that they wanted. Perhaps too focused on what someone else did or didn't do. We are a complete compilation of our past experiences but we aren't them so to hang onto them waiting for them to be reconciled or corrected is a bit like chasing your own tail, you may catch it but it's going to hurt when you bite it!

I feel like there is a center ground in all of this. I truly believe we can learn to honor the past without allowing it be be an excuse for today. Now, I am not a therapist and I am very clear to say this to people, and I'm not suggesting we just "get over" whatever has happened. I am suggesting we look at our past and be freaking proud of ourselves for where we are today. Let's be honest, if you are hanging onto what someone else did or didn't do, they aren't the ones that are suffering, you are, so then does that make any sense to keep doing it? Sort of like sticking your finger in an outlet over and over again expecting not to get shocked when the electricity hasn't been shut off.

You have the ability to take the charge out of whatever the experience was and to stop shocking your electrical system over and over by remembering the injustice of it all. Perhaps this is through self care, Belief Re-patterning or similar techniques or therapy itself. Each person will have a different way of honoring the journey. For me it is combination of the re-patterning, quiet time and exercise. You may have to find your own combination. Be willing to do that for yourself.

So ask yourself:

• Am I holding onto something that is no longer serving me? 
• Am I doing it to have an excuse not to move forward? 
• Can I be compassionate with self enough to release the need to hold this? 
• Am I ready to give myself permission to live without a rear view mirror as my guide? 

Be kind when asking the questions and be honest. It isn't worth the time to ask if you are going to lie to yourself. The potential for great joy of life is there in any persons life if they are brave enough to let go of the excuses. If they are brave enough to use the past as a way to reveal their greatness.

Want to join me in the, "I am grateful for the experiences life has brought me and I rock this lifetime with intention of using them to propel me forward" movement?  We may need a shorter slogan but this will work for now. 

Utilizing my past as a diving board, 

Vicki

www.vickibaird.com

Thank you for joining me in this walk through my book. I have to admit, it was fun to re-read it again. It was started because people were asking for a Vicki to go version. While I have a few more ideas up my sleeve, I thought I would roll this one out now while the others are coming together. 

The best place to start with any journey is the now right? So, this is why the first chapter of the book is called Your Current IT. 

Identifying what one is currently working on can take a lot of stress out of life. We often push against the energy of change so ignoring what is right in front of us is easy. As one of my brilliant clients said once “but Vicki, it takes a lot of courage to imagine your life different.” Yes, it does, but that ability to see different scenarios is the beauty of being human, being eternal, and being a soul.  Do you have the courage to see your life different? Do you have the courage to believe that your IT, when brought to light, can actually enhance your life? I believe you do. I believe it because I know everyone has the ability to grow beyond where their current limitations are set and I know that with a little encouragement, great heights can be attained.

Being willing to look at whatever is feeling out of sorts with us is one of our greatest abilities. To factor, to sort, to delve into the deepest depths and come up with the oyster is what makes being a human so great. We perhaps just need to learn how to do it without judging it so that it doesn’t hurt so stinking much and so we can find the joy that life is meant to be. So, are you ready to do that? What if I said I would be here to encourage all along this journey, would that make it easier? I am, so let’s get started.

For each question, be as honest as possible:

• What in your life do you find annoying?
• What would you like to change if you had a magic wand?
• How is ignoring the truth helping you right now? If it wasn’t filling some kind of need, you wouldn’t keep doing it.
• Is there ingrained teaching leading the continuation of the behavior or habit?

When I have a current IT I am working on, I can procrastinate with the skill worthy of a PhD in procrastination! What my clients have taught me to do, while in the process of reading for them, is address whatever it is I don’t want to do at the time and bring light to it. Often it isn’t as scary as it seems. An analogy of this is when a child is scared of a monster in their room, often if you turn on a light it is a sweatshirt they didn’t put away. Our internal fears are often the same, when there is a light shown on it though, they are not as scary.

When I do this it no longer has control of me or my day. I may determine the time I spend ignoring it could be used to complete the task such as doing the dishes or writing this chapter!

I may also use my choice to address it later when I am more in enjoyment of what needs doing. When we do something when it doesn’t feel right, we introduce resistance to the very thing we were trying to release. So, if we leave it and come back to it when there is less friction, whatever the task is or the fear, it will dissipate so much easier. This requires a bit of flexibility but also an internal commitment that may have to be developed over time. This commitment is one to self. Basically, giving yourself permission to learn as you go so there isn’t so much pressure on whatever the task at hand is. It is similar to learning to walk, there are going to be times when you fall on the diaper but be glad it is there and get up again. No name calling, no judgment, just get up and try again. A lot of the times a baby will laugh when they fall. Wouldn’t it be great if we could remember that humor when we fall on our proverbial diapers?

So, what is your current IT? What is staring you right in the awareness sector and you are pretending politely to not make eye contact with? I invite you to travel through the following chapters and try the one that jumps out at you when you read the title. Often, it is right in front of us and we aren’t even aware we already know what direction to head. If, like in the example above, your it is how others annoy you, well perhaps you can look at each of the annoyances as a teacher to see what it is really about YOU that you aren’t so fond of. Often when we point the finger at others it is really our own issues that we are trying to avoid. Try this the next time it comes up. It can be really exciting if you drop the judgment.

Come on, it will be fun, ok, maybe not the WHOLE thing but most of it will be enlightening, freeing and so empowering to meet you and really like who you are. I promise you are great, I know it already and we’ve just met.

Give yourself the gift of looking within this week and being pleased at what you see. Go ahead, have fun with it and be nice to you. 

Currently accentuating my It, 

Vicki

www.vickibaird.com

...which I am thankful for, first of all. Second of all, after hitting the snooze button three times, I realized I had this incredible feeling of "let's get this done!"  I am not entirely sure who the company is with me that makes up the let's but I am grateful for the feeling and I hope they are ready to play. I've felt myself wanting to both lay around and enjoy the summer season along with the desire to get as much experience in as possible with the thawed out weather.

I'm sure I am not the only one feeling this as the energy of late has a very hurry up and wait feeling to it. My mother used to say this all the time about my father whenever we went anywhere because it seemed like he knew EVERYONE! A simple trip to the store always included a lot of conversations while we waited for him to be done to drive us back home. I had a good chuckle about this the other day as I tried to explain the feeling of the energy lately. It was the perfect analogy, in our house anyway.

It took me until about ten to realize that wait....I don't have to wait. I can have what I want when I want it. I am willing to show up and do my part so bring it universe! There was an incredible ripple that went through my system which I take as confirmation that I am on to something.

How done are you about waiting for things to happen? I know there is divine timing and all that, but the feeling of having to earn it, work for it, deserve it because I did something nice for someone else is a bit archaic isn't it? How about realizing that we wouldn't have agreed to be souls in this amazing universe if we weren't able to hand the good stuff? (A little universal humor here; as I write this the song Anticipation is on the radio. I love synchronicity!)

Are you willing to show up and be accountable for your part? Are you willing to call the person to connect you for the next step of your life, do the research necessary, go to the gym, turn the excuse-o-meter off in your head? Are you willing to leave the story behind of how tough it has been and start looking at how amazing it could be?

I'm not a Pollyanna who is clueless that life has ebbs and flows but I am a big believer in we don't have to suffer through those ebbs. We can see that as the wait part where we assess the message and decide what we want to feel next.

What if you believed it wasn't about deserving something or earning it or suffering in order to prove you can have it, the ole, eat your vegetables so you can have dessert syndrome. What if you said, ya know what, I am willing to celebrate this life process and rock it while I start with dessert!

Some may want to offer their well meaning fears and be careful's and that is fine. If they want to live like that, let them. It is their choice. You get to decide for you and if you don't believe you can decide for self, perhaps their beliefs are stronger than yours right now and you need to ease into this concept. That is fantastic. Take your time, come see me and I'll help, then enjoy the knowing that it is the perfect example of you showing up. Go you!

I did so love the irony of me hitting the snooze three times (wait) and then the feeling the let's do this energy (hurry up).  Being conscious of where and how I am is so much fun. The messages of the energy are here to help, not define how we live.  We get to decide if hurry up and wait is where we want to leave the statement or if we mix the order up for what works for us.  Be creative people. 

We are in an amazing manifesting space right now. Take advantage of it, see what you are waiting to enjoy and then hurry up and enjoy it!

Thinking the moon is NOT the limit,

Vicki

www.vickibaird.com

I completely forgot I wrote a book. I mean, I know I wrote one, I have it on my shelf and I get a royalty deposit in my account whenever someone wonderful purchases one. However, it wasn't promoted to it's highest degree as life got a bit complicated around the time it was published.  Like, my husband had MAJOR surgery, our house was de-leaded and renovated, and I had three businesses to run.  In hindsight, perhaps not the best laid plan but hey, I know I can do amazing things in any situation and I am really proud to have something in print. 

How does this effect you? Well, I decided having the book sit on the shelf isn't doing anyone any good, so you will see chapters (don't worry, they are short, bite size pieces of Vicki to go.) showing up in every other blog. You can also purchase it through Amazon  or come see me if you like the old fashioned paper version. 

The book is called, Everyone has an IT, a guide to Accept, Accentuate and Appreciate Yours.  Here is the explanation of that title, as well as, the intro to the series of chapters:

Everyone has an It. What it is isn’t necessarily known, but we all have one. What is your it? Do you even know if you have one? If you did, would you want to name it, claim it or blame it? Where could you take your it? Would you want to display it? Would you want others to even know you have one?

Well that would depend on where you are in accepting of self and all the wonderful things that goes with finding out who you are and how many its you have. You see, ITs don’t discriminate. They are like belly buttons, everyone has had one at one time and probably didn’t pay too much attention to it...until they realized someone else had one and wondered “is mine the same? Is mine missing something? Is mine defective? What would THEY say about mine?”

As random as it may sound it resonated didn’t it? You started thinking about what was yours like and does it compare. Silly really when it is our individuality that makes this universe go around and around. Diversity being one of the most exciting things we have going for us as souls. The intention of this book is to help you not only identify what it is you have but to become so comfortable in having an IT that you relish in finding more. Each time you realize you have something that is calling to you, you get excited because that is one more layer of truth and individuality you can uncover. How exciting would it be to be able to look at your IT’s and celebrate them or at least refrain from groaning in their presence.

So, what exactly is an IT? An IT is individual as well as a group of the wonderful characteristics, thought patterns, belief systems and behaviors that have been cultivated during your journey. It can be a great thing, like Inner Truth, or it can be a great thing like an Inner Trickster. Ahhh, you thought I was going to say a bad thing didn’t you? Nope, just because something comes up that isn’t in the most favorable light does it mean it is a bad thing. This is what I would like to help you shift your belief and patterns around. There isn’t anything bad or negative about you or who you are. While there may be some stuff that could benefit from tweaking a bit, it isn’t bad. All of us got to be who we are through the various experiences in our lives and when we accept that and realize we can only move from today, the load gets a bit lighter and the journey gets to be more fun.

When one considers that although we all have different packaging, there is a lot in common underneath, there is often a similarity in our behaviors and our actions. I am not a mental health professional but I have seen my share of individuals in an advising capacity and one thing I have come to notice is just how a like we really are. Individuality is a wonderful thing and I know how special each person’s soul is and honor that uniqueness. It has been my observation though, that while searching for that special sense of self, that we tend to mimic patterns and behaviors and downright quirky trends. One only has to look to the news programs or tabloids to realize how much we all want to be alike while striving for our own sense of self.

It is in this observation that I asked myself, what is IT that makes us all have it, want it, create it and live it? Why is it that we don’t always want to admit we have one too? In this compilation of stories and experiences and techniques, I hope to help you become comfortable with your It and perhaps even be able to embrace whatever it is you are working on enhancing, creating, releasing, challenging, and believing.

This work was created to be taken in bite size pieces. You can read it all the way through and then go back or you can take it one chapter at a time. You could even skip around if you would like. Each chapter is designed to open with an idea, discover who you are through the process and then close with an affirmation that you are wonderful in whatever you were able to offer that day, week, month or longer if you wish. See, it is all about choice. I thank you for choosing to read this book and I appreciate you being a part of my journey.

I hope you enjoyed the first entry. Please let me know what you feel and if you'd like more! :)

Consistently accentuating my It's, 

Vicki

www.vickibaird.com

Lately, I've had this fascinating pain in my left shoulder. Since I am well versed in energetic causes of pain, I did my due diligence to look at all the emotional reasons it could be bothering me so much. I see it as a bit of a treasure hunt. You can actually feel the pain let up when you are close to releasing the issue and tighten when you are ignoring it or brushing it off.  While the emotional and energetic excavation was going on, I supported it with care from my team of keep Vicki thriving practitioners.  As mentioned in a previous blog, it took a lot of practice and re-patterning to be able to allow myself the care necessary to live the life I do being wired as I am.  Part of the team is an over the counter TENS unit.  I love this puppy!

A TENS (Transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation) unit provides stimulation to the nerve endings that are sending messages to your brain saying "um excuse me, you seem to have some unshed issues here and I'd like to draw your attention to them" and does it well.  In a former occupation, I used to dispense the machines, now I go to CVS and buy one to use at home.  I also receive this when my chiropractor deems it necessary in his office.  Anyhoo, I was using the unit to help my cute shoulder that was trying to help me see my issues in my tissues and it needed a new battery.  When I changed it out, and it didn't work because I had it in backwards, I had an "a ha" moment about the two sides to a battery.

We are all familiar with the positive and negative ends or sides to a battery.  Please don't ask me about a car battery, that still stumps me.  So, this battery that I had to replace had it's positive sign and negative sign.  After I figured out how to get it in the machine.  I thought well, hell, we aren't batteries so why do we divide things up into negative and positive?

I hear on an almost daily basis someone saying "I am trying to be more positive."  "I use positive affirmations and they don't work."  "I tell people I don't want to hear the negative in life."  Well, what if there aren't two sides to how we see our emotions, experiences or challenges?  What if we stopped separating them and cut to the chase of "this is how I feel, this is what it is and this is where I'd like to be."

What is positive and negative anyway?  What I may think of a completely supportive process, another person may think it stinks.  I took my older sister to work out with me one night and while she did very well, as we were leaving she said, "I am never doing that again.  You are insane."  I thought it was very funny and complimented her on her stamina and ability to make a choice.  In this circumstance, there is no side to be chosen. She has every right to not want to do that again and I have every right to enjoy it and do it twice a week. (ok, I don't always enjoy it.  This week was hard!)

• What if instead of trying to quantify our experiences we learn from them, move through them and assessed life from an "I like that place"?
• What if we stopped trying to convince others that if they don't like what we are doing, that we have to discuss it, argue about it or think our relationships are lost causes?
• What if we gave ourselves permission to see all experiences as opportunities to assess our I like that meter and adjust accordingly?

Yes, some experiences are going to hurt.  They are going to really, really stink but most of the time, those are the experiences we look back on and say, wow, I am totally amazeballs and lived to tell of it.

For this week, as we celebrate living in this amazing United States of America (for those of you who are in other countries, celebrate your home as well) why don't we see how fortunate we are, how fantastically diverse we are and what opportunities we have to grow everyday without restriction.  No matter your circumstances, you are the only one who can restrict your thoughts and can limit yourself to descriptions of positive and negative.  There are so many colors in between, why aren't we using them all?

• A couple of statements to help you; "I forgive myself for believing life only comes in positive and negative descriptions."
• "I give myself permission to see the amazing opportunities in my life."
• "I choose to be open to appreciating all of my experiences and what I can learn from them." 
• "I am learning to see my world as open and expansive."
• "I am so grateful to my forefathers who believed anything is possible."

I wish you the best of weeks as you open up to having more sides than a watch battery.

Charging through life,

Vicki

www.vickibaird.com

Have you felt a bit off lately? Perhaps a bit more tired than usual and a tad more, shall we say, touchy? Well, I hear ya and have had the duct tape nearby in case I needed to tape the mouth shut. Self awareness is a great thing. I am often appreciative of the push the universal energy gives me to look at my stuff and this one feels very pushy. I have had a pain in my left shoulder for going on three weeks now. I am not impressed. I knew it was emotional in nature, as all of our issues start as, and have been peeling away the layers to see what it was and if the finger that was in my shoulder could possibly get the hell out!

I feel like I could have a ticker like Twitter where I could tell of what is trending. Now, it is not going to be regarding Hollywood or the music scene but it will be what is trending in peoples lives, energetically. This last month has been all about the mother relationship. I saw it in quite a few people but still hadn't really put the connection together that we were in a universal pattern until I got a whammy awareness about my own stuff as related to my mother while in a craniosacral session. My physical therapist could practically smell my brain smoking as I put it all together. I won't get into all the details but suffice it to say I was seeing the relationship as more than hearts and unicorns as my accepting mind wanted to see it all these years. *palm to the forehead*

The universal pattern? Recognizing ourselves as separate from our mothers. Of course we are all walking around without the umbilical cord attached but I was seeing the relationships in a whole new way. When we are born, there is a removing of the umbilical cord as we take our first breaths on our own. Whether we remain with our birth mothers or go on to our chosen parents, the experience is going to be the same. I have been seeing the people I was meeting with, an energetic cord that was still attached to our mothers. I joked with one woman that we could all get together and do a ceremonial cord cutting with our adult selves being the holder of the scissors.

This process is one that I feel is fantastic but it is a bit discombobulating at the same time. I have known something was happening regarding my process both as a mother and having been mothered but I chalked it up to the "I am always looking to see where I can improve and how I can participate in this world most authentically" process. To be clear, removing this energetic cord doesn't remove the person from your life. It does though, help us to be able to see ourselves as individual souls and thereby having a bit more space to really know, and become, who we are.

I believe this is happening as the result of the influx of feminine energy that started to come in over four years ago. Girl power! In order to hold ourselves in a powerful place, we have to be able to appreciate those around us without carrying them or being tied to what their challenges may be. What better energy to start with than your mother? For those who may have been adopted or raised in foster care, or by other family members, it would relate to the mother figure most present in your life.

If you would like to take advantage of the power surge of maternal internal quest, ask yourself these questions:

• What is it about the relationship with my mother that I would want to change? If she has passed, you can still connect and shift whatever wasn't in alignment. (For me, I realized I was trying so hard to not be my mother, I became her in many ways. Luckily, she was a lovely woman who had her own fears and preferred to be home. Unless you said shopping and then she was IN!)
• I may love my mother, but do we like each other?  Would we hang out together if we weren't related?  Would I hang out with me if we weren't related.  (That's fun, isn't it?)
• Is there anything unfinished in our relationship and if she is physical, can we work on it now? If she is not willing, can YOU do the releasing and completion for yourself? 
• Am I able to see we both did the best we could with what we had at the time? 
• If the cord really is released and I am my own self in the great big universe, how will I hold that space and celebrate me, the giver of life to ME?

Take this process slowly. Gestation and birth takes time and birthing ourselves requires patience, as well as, a lot of self care and love. Be willing to nurture yourself and appreciate whatever relationship you have had with the maternal example in your life for it got you to who you are today. Now, go out there and be even more wonderful!

Mama mia, we are amazing, aren't we?

Vicki

www.vickibaird.com