A Healthy LIFE - 365 Days

I made it!  I really made it!  It brings tears to my eyes, because I have wanted what I have [now] since my first diet in 9^th grade.  I didn’t know exactly what I wanted then, all I knew was that I wanted to be accepted and not looked down upon – not judged by the world around me.  Well, now, ironically after releasing -82 pounds, no one is looking down at me or judging me – everyone is smiling, smiling sincere smiles.  And I am receiving the praise of my life.  And I keep shaking my head in confusion, because I don’t understand why I had to ‘lose’ this weight in order to get the praise?  I’m still the same woman inside, the same woman with all the same dreams – accept I’m healthier, because I eat healthy, I choose healthy, because I now know [and understand] what a difference eating the way God intended does for my body.  My body rewards me with feeling amazing!  Hmmm… then I guess I am a new woman!  I am a born again woman with the knowing of how to love myself one bite at a time.  Wow.

Well, first and foremost, I learned ‘how to eat’ for the chemistry of my body.  I learned that wheat, dairy, and sugar are the reasons for my weight unrest.  Yes, unrest!  I didn’t realize how bad I felt until I felt great!  I now know that [manmade] food can make me hurt.  Make my body hurt, my head hurt, my joints hurt.  How did I learn this? I learned it by eating clean and whole.  And then I really learned it on the [few] days I didn’t do the plan to spec.  When I went back to my old ways, because I had a craving.  A false desire for something that I ‘thought’ I was missing – an old habit.  Only to find out that SUGAR hurts!  Fast food hurts!  Processed meat hurts!  Each one of these things physically hurt my body.  But I had to fall on my butt to learn this lesson.  I had to color outside the lines of my food plan to further understand what ‘I’ was doing to me with food.  Wow again. (Head shaking realization)

I should probably write about what I’ve learned over the past year, right?  As of today – the 365^th day of my healthy eating plan; I now have no excuses to ever be that woman again.  How could I?  Why would I?  It would be like choosing suicide.  A slow painful death by processed crap filled food.  As of today, I have the knowledge and power to choose Good Better Best!  I wish I could walk into Overeaters Anonymous, Weight Watchers, any and all Diet Clinics, and grab each person [lovingly] by the hand and show them this miracle of life!  I wanna grab women who look like I looked and show them what I have that will save their lives!  Every day when I’m out in the public, I see so many people walking around who need to know what I know.  But I understand that they have to want it – I had to want it.  At 309.4 pounds, stuck on my couch because my knees would no longer lift me, I wanted it!  My darkest days were 366 days ago!  A blip in the continuum.  This year went by like a strike of lightning!

Some of the things I’ve ‘gained’ on this journey have been huge surprises. Some of the things I’ve lost (other than weight) have been huge and sometimes sad releases.  I have an entire new set of friends who desire to be healthy, whole, and complete.  I also lost a few friends along the way who couldn’t handle that I was no longer that tragic fat woman. Wow yet again!

Getting right down to IT… I LOVE MY LIFE [now], and I love me!  I get out of bed each day with a true desire to LIVE!  To live each day to the fullest potential!  And to serve my fellow human beings – to help the next person feel the way I feel!  Who knew? Not me.  I didn’t know that my excessive weight; the bane of my existence would end up leading me directly into what I always wanted – a true PURPOSE!  How many times can a woman say WOW without being cliché!?  (As many times as she pleases in a life-changing illustration!)

Before I go, I’d like to express my gratitude to those of you who had a hand in my success during the past 365 days on planet Earth.  And I don’t think you know who you are; I’m pretty sure you didn’t know you were one of the main characters who played a significant role in my personal transformation, development, and success.  So, if I send this letter to you personally, consider yourself one of my Angels of the past 365 days of my life – thank you for everything you did to help me gain the life I have today!  Thank you for encouraging me, noticing my efforts, accepting my changes, showing me my success in your face – you have been the mirror of my truth!  Thank you from the bottom to the top of my heart!

Tomorrows a new day – day number one of my new life – I can’t wait to see what’s coming next! 

Happy New Year – Happy New Me!

Carla ChristinaContreras
Ashland City, TN
September 11, 2014

Wanna know more about what Carla did to be successful? Go to this link: HERE

Follow Your INTUITION

"We often hesitate to follow our intuition out of fear. Most usually, we are afraid of the changes in our own life that our actions will bring. Intuitive guidance, however, is all about change. It is energetic data ripe with the potential to influence the rest of the world. To fear change but to crave intuitive clarity is like fearing the cold, dark night while pouring water on the fire that lights your cave. An insight the size of a mustard seed is powerful enough to bring down a mountain-sized illusion that may be holding our lives together. Truth strikes without mercy. We fear our intuitions because we fear the transformational power within our revelations."

- Caroline Myss, is one of my favorite authors.

True VALUE Investment

"We must learn to invest our time and energy into what we truly value, not just what we have been taught to value.

You can look at two indicators to determine what it is you value most: Your checkbook and your date book.

Where are you investing your money and time? Do those two indicators reflect your highest values?

Invest in what matters most today and you’ll feel your degrees of aliveness expand."

~ Mary Manin Morrissey, Prosperity Plus+ a New Way of Living

The ART of Marriage

One of the hardest things I've ever done in my life was join another human being in marriage...

If someone told me marriage wasn't easy... I probably wasn't listening.  I probably was too young to think I didn't already know everything... yes, young and naive.

I never realized that there truly is an Art to Marriage, to any relationship... really.  But this relationship is everything... Marriage doesn't fit in a box, it over flows the idea of a box, it goes to places of the unknown.  It is so unpredictable, your head just bursts at times...

But the one thing I know... is that I really love it - I love my partner... even when he completely drives me crazy... even when I roll my eyes over something he's said or done... and I roll my eyes A LOT.

Marriage is no easy path... no indeed! But I'm so glad I'm married!

Privledge of a Lifetime

Figuring out who I am has been easy...

Honoring myself by giving myself the permission to be who I am has been a bit of a struggle...

I am so grateful that I have become Me!  Go figure.

I committed to become who everyone else wanted or thought I should be... when all along, I already knew who I was!  But...  that is life, learning, and understanding that YOU know better than all the rest.

From your heart and soul ... do YOURSELF and everyone else a favor - BE WHO YOU ARE!!! 

Thinking of the Person I Intend to Become

“I realize that the dominating thoughts of my mind will eventually reproduce themselves in outward physical action, and gradually transform themselves into physical reality; therefore; I will concentrate my thoughts 30 minutes daily upon the task of thinking of the person I intend to become, thereby creating in my mind a clear mental picture of that person.”

~ Napoleon Hill's second step of his self-confidence formula

Transformative Departure

Hardly a day has gone by since April 25, 2012 (my Mother's passing), that I haven't thought of putting butterflies to canvas... well, just sixteen days prior to the anniversary of her own transformative departure... here is the first of hopefully many... 

This felt GOOD!!! 

Thanks Mom!

This is a 24x36" acrylic painting on canvas.

ASK and IT is GIVEN.... POOF!!!

INSTEAD of continually telling the Universe/God that "something" isn't going to work (before you actually FOR SURE KNOW THIS TO BE TRUE)... Ask God to show you what you NEED to KNOW to move to your NEXT STEP in your Life PROSPEROUSLY.

You have NOTHING to lose to TRY this... but you have to ask, then let it go and know that God is on IT!  ASK and IT is GIVEN! 

BUT, you must LET GO of the outcome and TRUST in GOD!  Easier said, then done... I know for sure...

I have a GOD box, I put things in the box, then forget about them... go in weeks, months, years later... and they have been taken care of...

POOF!!!!

My LIFE is a WONDERFUL pallet of Diversity

Week Two of Positively Perfect Prints!  The Life Mastery training continues and is beginning to show the most amazing promise as I incorporate the teachings to my life on a daily basis.

I am meditating first thing in the morning to Mary Morrissey Life SOULutions CD recordings.  This entire month is on MANIFESTATION!

Starting each morning with such a blessing is making the difference in my day - a loving way to begin each day, a gift to myself.

Have a wonderful day - be well!

Oh yes, and if you would like to have a printed copy of this image and saying , go to: https://www.etsy.com/listing/127244269/my-life-is-a-wonderful-pallet-of

My DREAM is Happening NOW!

A Perfectly POSITIVE Print by CCC

Everywhere I turn there are beautiful expressions of my heart!

I am a student of LIFE! And right now I'm studying LIFE MASTERY!

Each week I plan to introduce a new Positively Perfect Print - I might even start a club for Positively Perfect People!

If you would like to have a copy of this print to frame, go to: https://www.etsy.com/listing/126449368/my-dream-is-happening-now-positively?

I am making these prints so affordable, how could you pass them by?  This is a 5x7" ready to frame print, or just put it up in your office, kitchen, wall, bathroom, or wherever it is you need a little bit more positivity!

HABITAT HOUSE FUND - Pervis Rice Family

In 1992 I moved to Tennessee to start my life over after a divorce, and to pursue my career as a southern country rock artist.  I had fallen in love with Nashville, TN and the surrounding countryside on my initial visit, and thought it would be a perfect place to start my life anew.

After arriving and beginning my pursuit, I started picking up odd jobs here and there to make a few dollars. I worked as an administrative temp, a singer for Pepsi Co., a songwriter, an actor, a cocktail waitress, and on weekends, I'd work at a bed and breakfast cleaning up rooms and dusting the rest of the mansion.  It was at the B&B where I met Pervis.  She too was working there to pick up a few extra dollars on the weekend.  We hit it off immediately, and after a few years when I could afford it, Pervis came to work for me cleaning my house.  But the thing was, we worked together, and she'd spend the weekend with me, and after we finished cleaning, we'd have FUN together.

Many years have passed, and Pervis is now raising her GREAT-Grandson's - there are THREE of them!  She lives in Gallatin, TN where she was raised.  She has traveled around the World, but came home to live with her Mother in her final years... now she's raising three GROWING boys.

She applied for a HABITAT house and was denied. But because Pervis doesn't give up easily, she applied again a few years later and qualified.  She and the boys move into the house in just a couple of weeks and I'd like to help her out with some of the expenses.

So, give what you can - $1, $5, $10, $20, $40, $50, $100, $250, $500 - Whatever your heart moves you to do.  I've put in $100, and two other friends/family have put in another $250.  So I'm already part of the way to my goal.

Thanks so much!!!

PURPLE Bottles

PURPLE is my favorite color - Creating random interestingly artistic photos is one of my favorite pastimes. My iPhone allows me to take random photos that I wouldn't normally get to take with my professional camera. Sometimes when I lift up my pro equipment, I'm quickly told I can't do that... my iPhone has stopped this irritation.

I gotta say, I really LOVE this photo! The light is so beautiful with the shadows pronounced!

THOUGHT

We are powerful beyond our wildest imagination - I'm proving it! And YOU can too! Come with me on this path to fulfillment of every desire... And so it is!

Day 4 - Finding the Reason

365 Days of what I've learned for that day...

Maybe that's what I'll write about...

We'll just have to see.

I do know that today went by really fast.

Mom said it will be the fastest year of my life.

Damn, she's always right... well about life anyway.

Day 3 - Work & Pray

I worked a bit today
Not too much
Just enough so I could say
Thank God for such a
B E A U T I F U L Day!!!