Motivational Monday–Learning to Accept Your Life in the Moment

It’s easy to look back on your life and wish you were where you are now, a year or two ago. But what I’ve learned is that you can’t get to where you are presently without growing into the person you are now. You will always be a person who is ever changing and learning new things about themselves. You can become a different person every day and every year. Things you currently want you may not have wanted in the past. It’s with time and experiences that make us realize the new things we want in life. And it’s with those things that can reset our mindsets. To create a positive mindset, you must do the work it takes to get there, however that looks like for you whether that’s working out, going to therapy, eating healthier, starting a hobby or new job.

I believe the most important thing you can do for your mind is let it think without any influence from outside sources. What I mean by that is, go into a space completely alone like the shower or a walk outside alone and let your mind process things you’ve experienced whether that’s recently or from past experiences that you still need to work through. The point of doing this alone is to not let your mind wonder into the distractions going on around you. Once you’ve done this your mindset becomes clear and you’ll begin to understand what it is you truly want from life.

Sometimes so much goes on in our lives that we become stuck to the point where we don’t know what we need or how to get it. It can take a lot of self-discovery to understand what we truly need in our lives to become clear and focused. It is okay to take a break from a-n-y-thing in life. A short break or long one, doesn’t matter, if you know within yourself that a break is what’s needed then do so. A break doesn’t mean you’ve given up on yourself. A break means you have a lot going on in your life and need time just be. Time for yourself to rediscover what matters most to you. Learn to be okay with wherever you are at in life and know within yourself you’ll come out of it stronger than before.

I took a break from my blog for a while. I was going through a lot of personal development work within the past eight months of my life and for a short while decided I wanted to live in the moment and not share my life s much as I used to, and I was OKAY with that. While I love to write, share my thoughts and help women around the world with my work, I knew I needed to work on myself by working on the new changes being made so that I could come back stronger. My comeback was remembering my WHY for starting this blog.

Always remember to accept your life where it is today, don’t judge yourself or wish you could be farther along or wish you could have made changes years ago. We all need to process and go through things at our own pace and in our own way and there’s never any judgement for that. The process of change takes however long you decide it needs, and with taking action, change of habits and a positive attitude you can change your life. Always take time for yourself to process and change and accept your life where it is in the moment, today.

Happy Monday Loves ❤
How have you learned to accept your life for what it is?

A Love Letter to Bloggers

Dear Bloggers,

You put your life on the line for everyone in the world to see. You create content that feeds your soul but that you know can help others. You share your personal stories; the good, difficult and personal. Every story you share will help other’s change their lives. Sharing any type of experience, you’ve endured takes courage and you have that. It’s telling yourself that you know you are not alone in what you’ve gone through. Your experience will not be the same as someone else’s, but you are a brave, strong and confident woman to share your story.

You take the positive and negative feedback along with the criticism. Everyone can give you their opinion but remember it’s only an opinion. What’s important is that you stand by your work. The work takes time, patience and thought. A new idea will appear from nowhere and must be acted upon, because if not it will continue to be manifested until released. Once released the idea may have grown from something small to more than you could have dreamed. Let go of any negative self-talk that says you can’t or shouldn’t do something and just start, that’s when all the ideas will flow. The creative process is an amazing art and it should never be washed down as if it doesn’t matter.

And you know those dreams you’ve had about the content you want to create? You should go create them. Stand up for your dreams. Be persistent in writing them all out, plan when you’ll make them happen and execute them. If you don’t, they are only dreams. Dreams were meant to become your reality, if you choose to listen to them. Visualize yourself within your dreams and take action. Dreams are your inner fantasies waiting to be released into the world. By sharing them, you open the gates to a world of people, to help them think differently and change their lives.

Being an influencer means reaching people all over the world with your work, which means you’ll gain friends from everywhere. Meeting your new friends is the best part about being an influencer because you can support each other in your work. Knowing someone else in the world can relate to what you’re going through because they’ve experienced situations like yours is important. However, not everyone will enjoy your work and that is okay, because the people who’ll stand behind you, will love you for you. This means you don’t need to compare yourself to anyone else. In fact, the more authentic you are, the more your personality will shine through. People will love you for you, so embrace those thoughts that keep running through your mind and put them into action. The harder you work at your dreams, the more likely you are to keep going. Remember, if no one ever executed their dreams, this world would be boring, so keep on making a difference.

Love Always, Amy Beth

Motivational Monday: Be the Hero of Your Life Not the Victim

I used to spend most of my life being the victim. Anytime anything would go wrong in my life I would be sad for longer than needed, including becoming depressed. But what I’ve realized over the past few years of rebuilding my life by living alone, having great therapists and a good support system of people I trust, is that you deserve to be the hero of your own life. While I have my support systems, I know that I am the only person who can change my life. No one is going to live your life every single day except you. No one can tell you how to live, where to live, pay your bills, do your job, etc. No one is you.

The moment of change for me, was when I recognized that my routine of unhappiness needed to change. By routine I mean, I’d come home from a job I didn’t enjoy, would be tired, constantly thinking negatively, reliving past trauma I’d experienced and go in the shower to be alone and sulk. One night while in this routine, I’d realized I needed to change. I was SICK of being unhappy. My happiness didn’t truly come until now (a few years later) but it only came because I put in the work. I left relationships that made me unhappy, I went to therapy once a week, I wrote love letters to myself to make myself feel better and eventually I moved into my own place, completely alone. I learned how to live with my past, changed jobs, lived in a place I could afford when everyone else told me to live elsewhere. The point is to know what’s best for yourself when you are stuck and can recognize you need to change. If you don’t recognize this within yourself yet, take a look at your daily routine – are you happy with it? Is it fulfilling? If not, then why? What do you NEED to do to make yourself happy? I’ll bet there is a calling within your mind telling you over and over again what you need and until you listen it will be pushed in the back of your mind. I promise when you listen and set yourself free you will feel better. ❤

Everyone needs a hero, and everyone needs themselves to be their own hero. When you stop playing the victim, you’ll open your eyes to an entirely new life. This new life will be one that you’ll never want to give up on or go back to your old ways. It will be so good, you’ll forget your old routine and only focus on your new one. Start small with your new routine, by picking out one thing at a time to change, and once you get a hang of it, try adding something else to it. This could be eating healthy dinners every night, which includes budgeting for meals, meal planning and cooking. Next, start a fitness routine, it is so good to move your body and once you begin this routine, your body will want to move (you’ll realize this after a month of working out or when you happen to miss a class). You can even try small things like listening to a podcast while doing dishes (a great way to learn while working) or playing music (a great way to make yourself happy and dance to move your body). Journal daily about your dreams and find small ways to make those dreams come true. Start with your big dream (the end goal) and work backwards by taking small steps to get there. Know that your dreams take work but that you can make them happen by putting in the work one day at a time.

Introducing small changes in your life means you’ll be changing your habits which will eventually become your routine. Put the work in to make yourself and your happiness a priority, and eventually you’ll realize you don’t have to be a victim to your circumstances, you’re already a hero because you’re devoting yourself to becoming the best version you can possibly be. ❤

Happy Monday, Loves ❤

Motivational Monday- The True Importance of Knowing When to Say YES to Yourself

Do you ever have those days/weeks/years where everything that could go wrong does? You lose your job, your car breaks down, you slept in late, you get sick, your relationship fell apart. Any time that you have a setback, you still need to say yes to yourself. That project you’ve been meaning to work on, hobby you’ve been wanting to start or anything you’ve been putting off, those are the things you need to listen to yourself about while your setbacks are in full swing. The reason being that the things you’ve been wanting to do, you’ve been manifesting and those are the things you need to say yes to. They will drive you out of the negativity while the setbacks are happening.

When you say yes to yourself, you are giving yourself the opportunity to learn, grow and give yourself a small amount of happiness. It doesn’t matter if you don’t have a clue as to what you’re doing, you learn and grow from the start, but the key is to just start! When you say yes, just one time, you’ll learn to say it more. So much more in fact, that you’ll eventually find and meet people who’ll believe in your mission and you. You’ll learn from these people and become best friends with them. They’ll help you and you’ll help them, because we all need people to grow with.

The true importance of saying yes to yourself is simply, knowing that you can say yes. Don’t let people tell you that you can’t or that you aren’t good enough or not smart enough. The longer you say no, the more disappointed you’ll be in yourself until you say yes.
So, what will you say YES to for yourself today?

Happy Monday!

P.S. This post was inspired from purchasing a ticket to Pays To Be Brave, in California this fall. If any of you are going, please let me know in the comments or on social media, at @stylestomakeyousmile on Facebook or Instagram.

A Love Letter To My Readers On The One Year Blog Anniversary

Today marks my one-year blog anniversary! Thank you so much to everyone whose read/commented/followed my blog! I’ve also loved receiving all your feedback around the motivation I post on social media – @stylestomakeyousmile Whether it’s a post about a barre class, what I ate for dinner or a quote, I always love hearing from you guys and finding out what helps motivate you throughout your life by providing inspiration.

Motivational Monday – This concept came from an idea I had of learning and sharing a lesson with you all each week. There is something to be learned every day, and I took the most important lessons I could think of to share with you all.

Love Always, Amy Beth – This is a new concept I’ll be sharing once a month -they are love letters to you, my readers ❤ I began writing them a few years ago in order to help me get through a difficult time in my life, I thought, what would the strongest version of me say to myself to help me get through this? So, I began writing in a small notebook and decided to write 12 of them, publishing once a month and I hope you love them as much as I do ❤

When I first started the blog, I wanted to be a lifestyle blogger, and I wrote articles on motivation, fashion, food and blogging. The more I wrote, the more I realized what I enjoyed the most was motivational posts. They came naturally to me and it is where I plan to stay with my blog and social media.

While it’s been somewhat of a difficult year in my personal life, I’ve found that blogging was always a way to stay positive and do what I enjoy, and I hope you all can find your passions in life. I find that on social media we all see the beautiful finished pieces of content people have worked on, whether it’s a musician’s music, a book, a popular Instagram account with tons of followers, sometimes we all forget how much work goes into gaining the popularity and the amount of work people do every day to get to a finished product. I’ve learned blogging is not just about creating content, it’s about making connection with others online and meeting them in person. I’ve been lucky to be able to meet some beautiful bloggers who are truly talented and wonderful people and are SO supportive of what I do, and I’m very thankful for them ❤ The other huge lesson I’ve learned is to be yourself online! You don’t have to create the same type of content as someone else just because you see that it’s working for them. You just need to find what makes you happy and share that with the world. Whatever that is is what you will excel at because it’s something that interests you and is what you are knowledgeable in. Nobody is you, has the same mindset as you or can create the same content as you!

I’ve learned that some of the content I’ve put online will take off right away and others won’t. You must put a lot of thought into planning your content and know what you truly want to say. There have been weeks where I won’t put out any content on my blog because I haven’t thought of a good idea or my personal life is too hectic, and I need a break. I’ve realized I’ll always come back to blogging because it is my happy place, just like going to barre makes me happy. The two are similar in that they push me to strengthen my mind by telling myself I CAN do something – hold a plank for 90 seconds or write a new blog post. Do I always FEEL like working out or blogging? No. Somedays I’d rather be lazy and lay on the sofa all day and binge Netflix…and sometimes I need those days or weekends. But I also know I’ll eventually find the motivation to get back on my feet because I’m passionate about what I do.

So, with all that being said, I want to THANK YOU for reading my blog, liking my pictures on social media, following me and engaging with my content. You all have no idea how happy it makes me! I started writing in my notebooks a few years ago and had the idea to create a blog but never went through with it because I wasn’t in the right frame of mind, but I’m so happy I finally started this blog. I’m so grateful to you all for following me on my journey and I can’t wait to share more lessons I’ve learned in the future.

Love Always, Amy Beth

Motivational Monday: Learning to Do Things In Our Own Time

If there is one thing I have learned from this entire year of 2018, it is that people will always do things in their own time. No matter how many people we seek (or not seek) advice from, people will always give their opinions of what you should or should not do with your life. The thing that I have learned is that you will only do things when you are ready to do them. Some decisions may seem simpler than others, however once you process them and can justify your own needs that is when you will make your own decisions.

Once you’ve decided to begin something, it can be easy to look back and wish you’d started earlier. However, you can’t start anything new if you aren’t in the right mind frame.

Sometimes dramatic events need to take place for your life to change and other times, you can get caught up with living a certain way until you are sick of it and decide to change. I think we become so used to making excuses for things even when we have a small interest in doing them, when if we would just start it might end up leading into something we’ve never dreamed of! Or that we might fall in love with doing whatever that thing is. If starting whatever it is that you want to start is seeming difficult, try taking small steps-write out what you want to start, begin for a short period of time to see how you like it and go from there. Whatever it is that’s on your mind that you want to begin, will continually come up until you start it! It’s your brains way of telling you what you NEED to be doing with your life! Whether that is eating healthier, going to bed earlier because you feel exhausted, starting a workout routine, changing jobs, beginning a hobby, whatever that feeling is, here is your permission to start.

I hope that for the New Year of 2019 you will look at things as easy to start because you listened to what you needed. I hope that whatever your desires are or feel your calling is, you can listen to yourself and begin to change. ❤

Motivational Monday: Promises to Myself

 I promise to listen to myself. You know those ideas that your mind keeps thinking of? They won’t go away until you listen to them and put into play what they are. The longer you ignore them (day after day, year after year) they’ll sit in the back of your mind. When your mind becomes clear they’ll appear. It is when you take action that those thoughts will be released. Once that happens, you’ll be able to drive upon those ideas and turn them into dreams and plans for yourself.

 I promise to always do what is best for me. Listening to yourself is the most important feeling in the world. It goes beyond what everyone else is doing, what the trends are-diets, clothes to buy, workouts, etc. You must know what makes you and your body feel the best then keep doing that.

 I promise to keep going. Dreaming is one thing but having plans are another. Your dreams can only go so far without a plan to action. Short or long term, all dreams and plans are important because you can’t get to one without the other. And, while everything seems hard in life, you must keep doing the work. If you give up, you end up going back to where you started. So, if you’ve already chosen to give up the life you’ve lived before, why would you want to go back? Remind yourself of this when times get hard and I promise you won’t want to go back.

 I promise to hold onto the people who get me. No matter what you do in life, everyone is going to have an opinion that you should be doing something different (even if you’re already doing what you enjoy). Very few people in this life will get you, so hold onto the one’s who do. The one’s who believe in your work, dreams and passion to fulfill your desires of doing more than you already are. Learn from the people who are in the midst of and accomplishing their dreams-manifest their lessons of the good times, the mistakes and hardships of what it takes. Listen to all their advice. Most importantly, cheer them on because they are the one’s who’ll continue to push you to your best self.

What promises do you make for yourself?

Lessons I’m Grateful For.

Recognizing that I’m the only person who can control my mood, mind and life.

You don’t need to compare your life to anyone else’s. Why? Because everyone’s life is different. No one can have the same life. Even if theirs is a life you envy right now, it may not always be that way, or it may appear different than it actually is.

Every loved one I’ve ever lost has reminded me that life is so short. Look at their life and replicate the things that made them happy.

Having a support system is the best thing in life-I’ve learned who I can trust that will listen and give advice and then be that person for others when needed.

I’ve learned how to be resourceful when it is necessary. When your entire life turns upside down and you must start from the beginning. It’s made me realize that everything will always be okay.

You know the quote, “Missing someone gets easier every day?” It’s not true. It sucks to miss someone you’ll never see again. I’ve learned to hold onto their memories, laugh about the good times and think about them often. Remembering all the things that you do to make them proud always helps me to do better in life.

People will let you down in life but know that you don’t have to be upset over it forever and can move on.

Realize people can change. Even when they’ve done hurtful things. Everyone can change but it is only on their own time. You can only do so much to help them. Only they can help themselves.

I’m thankful to recognize at 32 that I can live my life how I want and not under the pressure of anyone else. Everyone will have an opinion about my life but I’m the only person who knows what I need when I need it.

Most importantly, I’m thankful for the life I’ve lived because it has taught me that positivity is the only way to get through life. The day will end, and tomorrow is a new day. Spend each day doing things you enjoy, there is always something good in every day. ❤

Motivational Monday: Saying “I Don’t Know” Does Not Mean You Are Not Confident.

I was once screamed at for telling someone that I didn’t know something. They yelled, “Stop saying, I don’t know!” Having people in my life who’d yell at me when I didn’t know something made me feel bad about myself. I internalized their words by taking it out on myself and not ask for help.

That all changed when I had someone tell me that they say they don’t know something but can always find the answer. This made me realize that it IS OKAY to admit when you don’t know something. Asking people for help is good. You won’t know how to do everything in life, especially when starting something new, whether it is with work, cooking, working out, etc., you will spend your entire life learning. I’ve realized I’m attracted to people who are smart and the people who’ll tell me when they don’t know something but can find out the answer by asking the right people or researching the answers. I always feel better when I have people, I can rely on to ask questions or talk myself through the answer with someone else. You might even be the person someone reaches out to when they don’t know the answer, so be patient with them and help them learn.

Sometimes people get into a habit of telling others to do things but not explaining how. I’ve realized it is everyone’s job in life to speak up when they do not know something. It does not mean you are not smart, stupid or have no confidence. To be a confident person, you must ask questions. If people put you down for that, that is on them and not you. I’ve learned to ask how to do things then take notes to remember. If you don’t do the same things every day, chances are you won’t always remember them. I can barely remember what I did an hour after I’ve done it, ha.

I hope what you’ll take away from this is to ask questions, be the person someone else can talk to, always say thank you when someone helps you answer your question and remember: saying you don’t know does not mean you are not confident, it means you are being honest. Confidence comes when you let your walls down, admit what you don’t know but that you can always find the answer ❤
Happy Monday, Loves!

Motivational Monday – Self-Reflections

There are many types of self-reflections that work for people such as journaling and gratitude lists. One night I realized that I haven’t made the commitment to doing these, so instead I thought I’d do some mental self-reflections of how my day went. Reflecting on the day from start to finish. Being proud of the things I accomplished throughout the day or check off my to-do list. Recognizing what I could have done better to accomplish more or change my mood around certain things in my life.

When self-reflecting at the end of the day, this will help shed light on where your mood shifted throughout the day and when you build upon it to change for tomorrow, you’ll know better how to deal with that situation. Mindset and mood go hand in hand, so if you have a positive mindset your mood will reflect this. Although I will admit that not every day can be the best day ever because things will happen, but I’ll bet at the end of the night you can find one good thing about the day.

In what ways do you self-reflect?

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