Happy Thanksgiving from My Heart to Yours!


“Gratitude is the inward feeling of kindness received. Thankfulness is the natural impulse to express that feeling. Thanksgiving is the following of that impulse.”~Henry Van Dyke

Happy Thanksgiving!

Wishing you the best of everything! 

May your heart be filled with love,
your belly filled with food, and your 
soul filled with joy!

It is with gratitude and appreciation I thank you for honoring me and blessing my life with your presence and support. I’m so grateful we can share our journeys because in sharing, no one need ever be alone.

Give thanks to those who are dear to your heart not just on Thanksgiving but every day. Life is so very precious and we need to tell those we love how much we love them. There is no such thing as ‘too much’ love and appreciation.Give thanks for all you have. Appreciating what you already have is abundance. Give thanks with love for when your heart is filled with gratitude and appreciation you will notice an overflowing abundance of love in all that you have and in everything you do.

Happy Thanksgiving!
Thank you for following and reading this blog. Thank you for being in my life! Thank you for providing me with inspiration and continually filling my heart with joyful song as we lift each other up.

Bountiful blessings to you and yours!


Count Your Blessings Not Your Stressings!

Rainbow BlessingsRepeat after me “I’m too blessed to be stressed!” There, didn’t that feel good? If you rolled your eyes or your thoughts immediately went to all the things putting pressure on you, it’s time to start counting your blessings not your stressings!

In this world of information overload it’s easy to get overwhelmed and stuck in those things that cause stress in our lives. In our personal lives there are deadlines to meet, children to take care of, demanding bosses, relationship issues and for many money is tight to put it mildly. Add to that your interactions on social media like pets who need to be saved, prayer requests and social or political action that simply cannot just wait.

It seems that everything needs to be done right now and although we’ve been blessed with technology beyond what anyone could have imagined a few, short 10 years ago to help us we are even more stressed than ever. Stress and worry seem to consume even the best of us leaving our minds racing and our bodies with a sense of unease. There is a whole new meaning for the “rat race”.  Stress is “equal opportunity” and no one is totally immune. That said, let’s break down what stress really is so you can start counting your blessings!

Stress plain and simple is your energy and focus outside of you. It is your thoughts and attention on the tasks you have to complete IN THE FUTURE, the fear of what MAY OR MAY NOT happen in the future or the fear a task will not be completed. Stress is your body’s way of reacting to challenges and one reacts to those challenges in a variety of ways. Stress and overwhelm are a part of everyone’s life and more than ever before we all have a lot on our plates (an understatement for me).

The biggest challenge tends not to be what is stressing you but getting “stuck”  and working hard to “get rid of” the stress. When you are working hard or feel stuck you are in resistance; And what you resist you become. When you are in effort (and or resistance) you can be sure that energy is going to stick around for quite some time. Yes there is a lot to do, challenges to overcome and deadlines to be met but when you start focusing on your blessings and allowing everything to simply BE you move through the challenges faster and possibly even with grace and ease.

Shifting your focus can be as easy as looking around you and counting your blessings. You are blessed If you’re reading this to have a computer or device to read it. You are blessed if you have a place to stay and food on the table. If you have friends or even just one friend you are blessed. If you have clothing, you are blessed. Why not start a list of all the blessings in your life and pay particular attention to your immediate surroundings because there are blessings around you now!

Ask yourself if worrying about getting something done will get it done faster? Ask yourself if stressing over an outcome changes it? Ask yourself if anything in the past you worried about came to pass and if it did was it even half as bad as how stressed you were about it at the time? Ask yourself how effective and efficient you are when you let the stress get the best of you. Now find some amusement and give me a good belly laugh at what you just noticed!

Think of it this way, if you’re staring intently or have your eyes clamped shut worrying that the storm might sweep you away you will surely miss the rainbow showing you that light is still present behind the clouds. Yes, there are things to do, people to see and responsibilities to be met but everything WILL get done and you WILL get through whatever comes your way. Take comfort in your blessings for you are indeed blessed. In fact if you start counting those blessings you will find YOU’RE TOO BLESSED TO BE STRESSED!~Shine Your Light Debbie

©Debra Taitel 2013 All Rights Reserved

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