Angela Rae Bushman

join me to play with your energy

Join me on Tuesday, May 23 or any of the following three Tuesday mornings for a 9 a.m. (Central) weekly energy workshop designed to enhance your energetic awareness and intentionality, free your mind from daily stressors (at least temporarily), and check in with who you’re BEing as you begin your week.

Each session, we’ll breathe, get quiet and go within; then I’ll lead the group through an energy visualization. I’ll leave time for Q&A as we close each session. While I’ve scheduled these sessions for one hour, it’s likely we’ll take only 20 to 25 minutes, so you’ll have extra time to journal, take a walk — or get back to your day.

There is no cost for tickets, but you’ll need to reserve your spot.

finding gratitude in the chaos

Or what to do when it feels like everything is going wrong.

Earlier this week, I led a workshop on the connection between joy and gratitude, the ways we push our happiness away and how to stop, and how to train our brains to be more grateful. The room was full, energy and engagement were high, and the room was abuzz with possibility.

Still, as I looked around the room, it was clear there were participants in pain. As I thought about some of those I know personally and their circumstances, I wondered if it might be difficult to find things to be grateful for — as it is for all of us, at times.

As I write this, it’s gray, rainy and cold, and it feels as though spring may never come. Between my seasonal affective disorder, some other health challenges and the current state of the world, it’s easy to slip into a bleak outlook.

So how can we keep soldiering on when it seems there’s little to be grateful for?

When things aren’t going well, it’s easy to allow our aperture to narrow and to focus on our own troubles. On a bad day, it can seem as though the only thing to be grateful for is that it’s over — and that’s perfectly valid.

It’s important to give ourselves grace during difficult times. And it can be useful and even powerful to shift our attention to the world outside. Here are just a few ideas of what we can be grateful for, even when it’s hard:

Even bad days come to an end
The sun will come up tomorrow (even if it’s obscured by clouds)
Chef Jose Andres is out there on the front lines of conflict and disaster, serving warm meals to people in need
Something good that happened to a friend or family member
Trees starting to bud, the first tiny hints of a tulip coming up, or a flower in bloom
Someone, somewhere did something kind for a perfect stranger
A child without resources was awarded a scholarship
A refugee was given shelter, food, clothing and water

Being grateful for things that don’t benefit us, specifically, has been shown to have more powerful effects than a gratitude practice grounded in what benefits us personally. It expands our perspective and encourages generosity.

There is always something to be grateful for.

the ABCs of transformation

A few days ago, I was inspired to share the ABCs of Transformation, posting them to LinkedIn, my Instagram and Facebook stories, and YouTube.

What are the ABCs of Transformation? I’ll share a word — one for each letter of the alphabet — that’s relevant to transformation and can help you change your life.

I hope you’ll join me on this journey, share your own experiences or insights and reach out if you’d like to work with me or have me speak to your team or company.

love is my magnum opus

It’s been a bit since I’ve posted. I’ve been busy (dating) and honestly, this feels a little scary to share:

Love and partnership are important to me. I have long dreamt of an epic, life-long love affair; I’ve envisioned it — and I thought I might’ve had it once or twice. And despite getting my heart hurt, I’ve remained determined to find that epic, lasting love story for myself. I am committed to making love my magnum opus, the greatest creation among all my life’s work.

Some context: I have been blessed throughout my life with a number of rich, “peak” experiences. I’ve had a family and raised children to adulthood. I’ve had some career success. I’m surrounded by supportive, uplifting friends. I’ve taken time and space to nurture my soul and spirit. And while I have dreams yet to chase and achieve, the greatest of these is having someone devoted, loving and supportive to share it all with during this next act in my life. It’s the partnership part of my life where I feel I’ve got the greatest opportunity for growth and fulfillment.

So what’s held me back?

Historical evidence suggests I have not been great at partnering, nor have my relationship models been ideal. One might’ve said my picker is broken. Over the past decade, I’ve invested a great deal of resources into overcoming my shortcomings, healing my past and learning new skills by reading books about relationships, going to therapy, enrolling in programs and, finally, by becoming a coach myself.

For a long time, I struggled with limiting beliefs about my worthiness, I’ve flirted with canards like “I’m fundamentally flawed,” and even bumped up against “that sort of happiness is for everyone but me.” It seems ridiculous now to see these spelled out on paper, and I’ve done a tremendous amount of work to move beyond what are common, if nonsensical, thought and energy patterns.

Even just a few months ago, I had tremendous resistance to dating online: it seemed like a chore, like wasted time. What I wanted was a “meet cute” and a foregone conclusion that we’d marry and live happily ever after for the next 50 years. I wanted a predictable outcome: a guarantee I wouldn’t get hurt again. Yet somehow I managed to get into the mindset that basking in masculine energy would be fun and — still hoping my man and I would reach for the same avocado, look into one another’s eyes and just know — I ventured online. It couldn’t hurt to practice up for the real thing.

I’d barely begun dating when I met someone who, despite his initial nervousness (and all the other ways I could find to rule him out, i.e. protect myself from heartache), was genuinely interesting. He asked me to have dinner with him — and then, after talking and laughing for hours over a delicious meal, he kissed me and asked when he could see me again.

During our next dates, we talked and laughed and flirted awkwardly because, now that I had started to feel something, I felt nervous — just as he began to feel more comfortable. I’m not too proud to say I grilled him, and he answered my many questions openly. When I asked him, “What’s the one thing you most don’t want me to know about you?”, he replied, “Nothing; I want you to know everything about me.” His transparency was astonishing to me, and exactly what I’d been seeking.

Still, looking back, I spent the first several weeks of our relationship hyper-vigilant, determined to spot and act on any warning signs I may have missed during previous relationships. And then I spent the next several weeks obsessing about what old, unhealthy patterns I might be re-enacting. (Read: ongoing.)

Where am I now?

I’m happy and content in a relationship with someone I wouldn’t have met if I hadn’t done a lot of work on myself. He’s someone I would have filtered out based on his location (too far), astrological sign (potentially incompatible), and height (too tall — and how is that even a thing!?) under most circumstances (thank goodness the app we met on didn’t have all those filters). And yet we have tons of fun and laughter, great conversations around difficult topics, and incredible chemistry. We genuinely like and enjoy each other. Bonus: he can cook and is well traveled.

We’ve both experienced heartache, and we take ownership of our stuff and processing our pasts. He’s not perfect, thank goodness, because I couldn’t live up to that sort of standard. We don’t have karma or that soul-matey feeling; instead, we have a blank slate from which to create the relationship we want — and we both seem to want to create a life together.

I don’t know where this will go, and it doesn’t matter right now — I’m settling in and enjoying the present and our time together. Whatever might happen down the road, I’m going to be okay — and I’ll never give up on love.

How are you feeling about your primary relationship(s)? Are you starting to date, struggling with unhealthy relationship patterns or at a point of transition? Do you know your love language(s) and attachment style? Let me know if you’d like to talk.

forgiving again

I’m forty-some days into my 90-day forgiveness practice and still having revelations, insights and surprises.

Many days I can sit down, get into a meditative space, and go through my routine in 15 minutes. Today was not that day. I sat and struggled for more than an hour my as attention drifted from forgiving that ex-boyfriend for not taking me with him to the White House to meet President Obama to what seemed like a million other things.

I thought about:

that Chastity Brown song I can’t get out of my head
how Prince Edward Island oysters are always the best
how I should have worn different shoes to the club for dancing the other night
the lovely walk along the river yesterday while temperatures were unseasonably warm
how nice it feels to make out with the man in my life
the fresh blueberries awaiting me once I completed my practice
and more

I nearly got up more than once, having forgotten what I was there to do in the first place! And then I brought my attention back to my forgiveness practice, envisioned the four individuals remaining on my list one at a time, and forgave. Here are some of the things I’ve learned:

When you’ve been called to forgive people in your life for multiple days in a row, you give yourself permission to chip away at it, coming up with some really small, petty stuff, e.g. “…for that time you made me wear that hideous jumper.”
I could tell I’d truly moved on when, instead of forgiving, I found myself expressing gratitude to an ex for ending a relationship. After all, it was an ending that opened the door to a magical new beginning.
It’s still difficult to forgive big wrongs. Each day, I replay the same scene as I forgive or attempt to. I know this practice is for me, and I’ve transcended it. Yet there is a younger me whose boundaries were not respected — and she is still angry, and I have found that I perhaps have yet to re-integrate this younger me back into the whole of me.
Even when I can’t get there fully, I go through the motions. Yes, maybe this means I fake it until I make it. But I still say, “I forgive you” in my mind and hug the other person.
It’s incredibly humbling to continue to recognize that, at least in a general sense, I am guilty of everything with which I’ve charged another. Those boundaries of mine that were overrun? I’ve done it to others, likely in myriad ways. Which brings me to…
I still need my own forgiveness.

Thank you for bearing witness. If you’re curious about the why of this practice or my process, please see my two earlier posts on forgiveness: journey into forgiveness (part 1) and what forgiveness reveals (part 2).

form vs. essence

What are you focused on? Are you putting your energy into what brings you happiness?

In the past week, I’ve heard the words “form versus essence” come up more than once. This phrase contains a clue to why so many of us feel unsatisfied so much of the time.

We tend to think we need to be, do, or have something to be happy, and we often have very specific objects that we’re sure will do it. This sort of wanting is about form, material manifestation — and it’s missing a key ingredient: our feelings.

We forget to focus on how we want to feel. Our desired feelings get to the essence of what we want. Once we know how we want to feel, we can find many ways to invite that essence in.

Seeking form over essence means we’re focused on an object to bring us happiness.

Putting essence over form keeps us focused on how we feel, keeps us present, and opens us to experiencing happiness, joy and fulfillment from many sources.

So how do we honor essence over form?

Stay present. Notice how you’re feeling, and notice the thoughts you’re having; our thoughts generate our feelings.
Savor those moments that fill you up and bring you joy. Take in the details of what your senses are experiencing.
Ask yourself: What is it about this moment that makes it special to me? Why am I feeling this way?
Recognize your uniqueness. What brings you joy may be entirely different from what others around you seek.
Allow it to be simple. Oftentimes smelling a fragrant flower or taking in a vivid sunset can be as magical as any other peak moment.
Practice gratitude. Bring yourself into a grateful state, both in the moment and as you reflect on your day or week.

takeaways from The Science and Spirit of Gratefulness

It was just six months ago that I awoke to a powerful purpose: to share the transformational power of gratitude. More than that, I awoke one morning knowing that, of all the transformational modalities I’d studied along the path to becoming a coach, and of all the life experience I could apply in serving clients, gratitude was — by far — the most powerful and important. And I woke with an 8-part training framework that I immediately wrote down, and which is the basis of my new gratitudeU program.

It was only after this awakening that I began buying books and seeking out research to support what I already knew: gratitude is powerful! And among my secondary research, it soon became clear that perhaps the foremost authority on the science of gratitude is Dr. Robert Emmons of University of California Davis.

So I was thrilled to learn Dr. Emmons would be presenting on “The Science and Spirit of Gratefulness” at Integration Symposium 2022, an event presented by Fuller Theological Seminary. For the purpose of my own work, which is not grounded in a particular faith, I’m focusing on highlights from day one: a summary of research and research findings.

Here were some of my favorite takeaways:

Gratitude has many definitions, and may most often be described as “(1) an affirmation of the good and (2) recognition that this good originates outside the self.” Emmons also described it as “the deepest touch point of human existence” and even “the most passionate transformative force in the cosmos,” a description I can get behind based on my own experience.

More than 300 studies across survey and neuroscience have been conducted on gratitude and published in scientific or medical journals over the past decade — more than in the previous 70 years all together.

Gratefulness increases emotional wellbeing and grateful people:

achieve more
pay it forward
are less depressed
are more resilient

In addition, gratitude has important and measurable physical health benefits. Grateful people:

get 15 – 18% better sleep
consume 30% less saturated fat
demonstrate 50% greater medical adherence
walk 2x more steps per day (in cardiac patients)

If you’d like to learn more about the many powerful ways gratitude changed my life, please feel free to reach out.

what forgiveness reveals

For a dozen days, I’ve risen, fed the dog, grabbed a mug and sat in quiet contemplation to forgive people in my life for past hurts, wrongs, unmet expectations or moving on.

Forgiving the same people day after day is a revealing practice. Here are some of the revelations I’ve experience since beginning my practice:

Self forgiveness. On that first day, after I had forgiven 20 others their offenses, I got up from my meditative space, took a few steps, and laughed. It dawned on me then that I needed to forgive myself as much as anyone else. Because I regularly work with clients on self-forgiveness, it might have been obvious to me from the start. The next day, I began forgiving myself.
Reflection. When we notice faults in others, it’s a sign we have the same trait, quality or behaviors within ourselves, and that we may have disavowed or disowned this part of ourselves. I was surprised to find how I could as easily charge myself with the same misdeeds, and then forgive the others as well as myself.
Patterns. After the first few days, I’d enumerated the major events others had committed against me. I began to allow in whatever thought intuitively arose when I envisioned forgiving a particular person. One day, as I forgave an ex partner for expecting me to heal a lifetime of heart wounds when we’d known each other for just a few years, I realized I’d assigned a different former mate all of my accumulated, unhealed pain: I hadn’t blamed him for it; I hadn’t expected him to fix it; I’d simply and unfairly put his name on it.
Judgements. I was forgiving a friend from childhood when I said “for your judgements and narrow perspective.” Suddenly, it dawned on me that I was making a judgement that may or may not be true. That day, I forgave myself for projection, judgements against others and for my own narrow perspective.
Meditation. One of the surprising benefits of my practice has been the ritual of sitting in quiet contemplation, regulating my breath and calling in the energy of forgiveness as I begin each day. While I spent nearly an hour forgiving 20 people that first day, I’m down to about 20 minutes these days, and I’m appreciating just how valuable it is to give myself that quietude to start the day. I daresay this practice, once complete, will yield to a habit of morning meditation.

With two and a half months ahead of me, no doubt more insights will reveal themselves to me along the way. I hope you’ll check back.

Follow my forgiveness journey: journey into forgiveness (part 1), forgiving again (part 3)

journey into forgiveness

I’ve been called to embark on a journey of forgiving the past and those who have hurt or wronged me, not lived up to my expectations or simply moved on.

When this calling came to me, I used my intuitive tools to come up with a list of 20 family members, exes, friends, and authority figures (teachers or bosses) — and, yes, God — who I also need to forgive. I then asked how many times I needed to forgive each person — one as many as 94 times!

My inner knowing guided me to make this a daily practice. I created a chart, so that I can cross off each day after my practice and track my progress. I also wanted to share this journey with you, as I believe it will lead to useful insights.

There are several resources and ways to practice forgiveness, and what I’ve discovered is working for me is to get into a meditative state, invite in the energy of forgiveness (“What would it take for me to embody forgiveness?”) and visualize each person I need to forgive in front of me one at a time. Then I use the same formula, “What would it take to forgive ___________ for ______________?” followed by a declarative statement: “____________, I forgive you for ______________.”

To share one example, as I invited in forgiveness on day one, I asked, “What would it take for me to forgive my high school superintendent for making an example of me for skipping school and placing me in detention?” Then, I heard my inner dialogue loudly add, “asshole!”, confirming that I have more forgiveness work to do.

As I got up from this first daily practice, I laughed as I realized I had failed to include myself in my list of people to forgive. Self forgiveness is essential to healing our pasts.

On day two, I asked, “What would it take to forgive my mother for her infidelity, lies, truths, reservedness, always being late and any other failings as a parent? Mom, I forgive you for your infidelity, lies, truths, reservedness, always being late and any other failings as a parent.”

And I had another insight. Forgiving myself meant seeing myself reflected in the experience. In other words, the energy I’ve allowed is energy I hold. I found myself following this with, “What would it take to forgive myself for my infidelity, lies, truths, reservedness, always being late and any other failings as a parent?”

For everyone on my list to forgive, I was able to find a reflected truth about myself in whatever I had charged them with. It was a deeply enlightening and profound realization, and enhances my feelings of connection and empathy for the human condition.

I anticipate I’ll have more to share on this practice in the coming weeks.

Follow my forgiveness journey: what forgiveness reveals (part 2), forgiving again (part 3)

pause and reflect

I’ve let go of resolutions these past few years. Instead, I prefer to pause and reflect on the blessings of the past year, as well as what I’d like to create in the coming year.

If this approach resonates with you, consider asking yourself some questions as you reflect on months past:

– what are you proud of?
– what did you learn?
– how did you grow?
– what can you let go of?
– what are you grateful for?

And as you look forward:

– what is something you loved doing and stopped that you can bring more into your life in the coming year? (hint: get playful)
– when you look out onto your next horizon, what do you see? what do you want to see?
– what will you accomplish in the coming year?
– who will you have to be to achieve all that? what must be different about you?
– what might get in the way and how will you overcome it?
– how does it feel, at the end of the year, when you’ve achieved what you set out to do?
– how will you celebrate?

I wish for you blessings, creativity and light in the coming year.