Living Life as a Labor of Love

I am an evolving soul.  As are you.

I initially started Path of Presence to help entrepreneurs stay present on the path of building a business online. Social media allows (those who wish to reach a wider audience than the 3 people they know) a means for enterprise - it can be so exciting, and so dreadful at the same time. The process of allowing business and marketing to be a path to return home to oneself is rich with opportunity.

Yet, the calling for me to work with others have always been deeper than just a business transaction. I find myself unable to relinquish the calling on my heart - to practice a presence that I am to integrate into my whole self. 

Life through presence is a labor of love: to reclaim pieces of me that I have lost, given away, or have never known, to transform it and to embody my Truth.

Over the course of the past year, I have come to realize that I took action to support entrepreneurs in the online space because it was a process I needed to go through, and to understand. I needed the time to experience the heartache and the hardship that many business owners, bloggers and entrepreneurs undergo. The hours are long, work plentiful and there is an endless array of things that need to be completed and checked off the list.  

RELATED:  5 Parallels of Social Media and The American Dream You Need to Know

For the digital entrepreneur, the journey is real.  In addition to content creation, or inventory sourcing (if you are a product-based business) there is still communications, marketing, design and multi-media considerations.  If you are smart enough to blog as part of your marketing strategy, the road becomes even more interesting in not simply needing to find eye-balls to your blog, but genuine engagement from the outside world. 

This process has helped me define my calling further: to support the indomitable spirit that is the true essence of who we are be our Truth and Reality, rather than allow the circumstances of life dictate our worth.

Be it building a business, building a family, or building a relationship (with another or yourself), we all succumb to being, feeling and acting human: we complain, compare and criticize others...and ourselves!  

We are, after all, our worst critic.  Most of us have an efficient system to beat ourselves up, be it through thought, or trigger.

However, when we reprimand ourself, the "mean talk" (scolding voice, self-criticism) always comes out as one version or another of these disempowering words:

• I'm not good enough,

• I'm not lovable, or

• I'm not Worth, or

• some version of that.

This pattern of self-talk kills us.  It is a silent killer.  It lurks in the shadows and crushes, in the most devastating way, our hopes and dreams - without us ever saying a word aloud.  

"To Err is Human. To Forgive, Divine"

This timeless quote made famous by Alexander Pope in the early 1700s is a refreshing reminder to live and let live - to forgive ourselves for our own transgressions.

We must forgive trespasses, both in what we have committed as crimes to others, and, sadly, the crimes we have committed to ourselves.

When we are not true to our heart and our soul's calling, we are in err.

Letting go of our attachments allows us to begin anew, awakening to a new consciousness.

Life is Consciousness 

Life shows up and meets us at our level of consciousness.  Whatever we are awakened to, whatsoever we believe to be true (or not true) we are right.

Some of us may feel we must hold tight to everything we own, or to all our relationships that are dear to us. We attach ourselves, cling on to what's important, and we create a life around this identify.  

This is very human, and also devastating. Our temporal lives are but a moment in time: fragile, fleeting and precious.  

We err when we think that our circumstances define us. 

We must always remember that behind the physical is the life force that animates us.  We are a soul, after all, and circumstances are not a reflection of our worth. 

Who you are is a soul that is learning to recognize yourself.

In every moment, clues are available to point your way home. Ours is a magnificent journey of Spirit having human experiences. Regardless of the role(s) you play in life, your worth as a soul is invaluable. 

Your worth is not dependent on what you do. 

In the midst of our processes, our struggles, our striving and our accomplishments, we get caught up with our day-to-day living (our situation or circumstance), and we forget that we are SO MUCH more than the temporal fragility of this life.

RELATED:  The Triumphant Practice of Blissing Out

THE PRESENT is Where Truth and Reality Intersect

Regardless of your religious or spiritual background, truth is, THE PRESENT MOMENT, is the only time we truly have to live awake and to make a lasting impact on our lives.

Living in the past can be the root of depression, just a living in the future may be cause for anxiety. 

There is great power in being present to NOW.

With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility (Gee, where have we heard that before?)

When we live in the presence of NOW, we are privy to great empowerment.  We can take this precious time and do something worthwhile to savor it:  Listen to the call of our heart, breath in the life that flows as us, and bask in the profound sweetness of our intimate and loving relationships.  Where are we to go and what is there to go, after all?  We are simply Spirit experiencing life as itself.

In this space of profound courage, we come to PRESENCE.

Through self-awareness and the practice of reclaiming and integrating ALL of ourselves, we may become conscious of the beautiful gift that is our blessed lives. 

We courageously open ourselves to the vulnerability of The Truth.  We learn what hurts us, what needs to be heal and what parts of us we've left in the cold. More importantly, we answer the question for ourselves, how grace works to bring us home.

Dedication to Awakening Consciousness

This blog is dedicated to those, like me, who, as they say, "feel the fear ... and do it anyway". 

This blog is for YOU, and for me -- to remind us all that our journey here on earth is a precious gift.  Each fleeting moment, each drip, every experience is unique, and unrepeatable.  

When we truly understand the magnitude of this miracle we call our life, we would fall to our knees (as I have many times) in thanksgiving for the gift of every second that passes.

It takes courage to reclaim who you truly are: a soul unflinchingly awakening, conscious, true to it's own path, and to our sacred, beating heart. 

Join me on a journey, in bite sized pieces, either through a blog post, podcast or video, to traverse the amazing landscape offered us: to look courageously at what scares us, and to face the profound in what we might consider as ordinary.

In this journey - we can practice together: to drop our pretenses, and our social masks, which, by the way, I recognize that many of us have come to lovingly cling to!  It's time to come home to ourselves.

Coming Home

Let us come as we are, simply to practice - to remember the wisdom within us.

To come home is to practice the art of remembering and honoring our own Truth.  As we lean in to possibility of our wise, evolving souls, we tapping into something beyond even our human potential  ... onto The Profound Awe that is life itself.

About Evelyn

Evelyn Foreman has pledged to live a live of presence, purpose and practice.  In doing so, she has become intimate with the transformational and empowering process of personal and spiritual growth.

Evelyn started her journey on Earth with great ambition through her early childhood experiences of life as a third-world refugee. Her very first example of life-changing transformation and listening to Spirit’s call was witnessed as her mother made a decision to give up all that she had in her early 40s to pursue a new life by boarding a refugee boat and abandoning all she knew.  Evelyn recognized the great value she gained from her mother’s decision and made her own life-changing decision to follow her passion in her mid-30s.

Having been successful all her life, Evelyn found herself bound for the top of a corporate career. Achieving success and prosperity by popular standards, lead only to her emotional and spiritual bankruptcy.  Living in New York City in 2001, planes crashed into the World Trade Center.  Amidst the tragedy and turmoil, Evelyn realized that life is too short to settle for other’s standards. While she wasn’t sure what her path was at the time, she knew it was not where she was. She made her decision then to follow the road less traveled.

In listening deeply, she initiated a radical shift and lifestyle change that has given her life new direction, purpose and meaning.  She has been blessed to have lived all across the country, growing up in Southern California and then, living in opposites sides of the country:  from New York City to the Hawaiian Islands, and just about everywhere in between.

Moving from The Big Apple to the Island of Maui enabled her to learn, practice and live aloha. This is where she became intimate with yoga, mindfulness, meditation and the gifts of stillness.  Her first days on the islands were a beginning of a transformational inner shift to recognize silence and the divine guidance within.

Her journey unfolded as she met and married her husband affirming for her that all has been, and that ever will be, is a perfect path.  She need only be faithfully present to the unfolding that life is.  The sense of love and community on Maui remains no matter where she may be.  It is her connection to the `aina (land) and to the kai (ocean) that inspires her to remember unity – that we are all connected with nature (be it mother nature, or our own nature).

Reverend Evelyn Foreman, M. Div. is an ordained Unity Minister.  She earned a Masters of Divinity (M.Div.) from Unity Institute & Seminary (Unity School of Christianity) and holds a Bachelor of Science in International Business, Marketing & Economics.

She was host to a spiritual radio show, “The Call of Spirit:  Tune In to Possibility” where she talks with others about their spiritual journey of becoming.  Her guests and co-hosts are successful beings from all over the world who have made a dramatic shift from what they thought they “ought to be” to being true to their authentic selves.

She is the last of 8 children, Chinese-American of Hakkanese descent, born in Vietnam.  She is a bhakti, leading with her heart, a yogini, and committed to a lifetime practice of moving meditation, synthesizing the practice and teachings of transformational paths that led to a greater awareness of our higher selves.

Her relationship with her love and husband Cliff, and being mother to Cayden (son, 16) and Teagan (daughter, 10) has blessed her with the experience that Spirit and Grace are always in our midst.  

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Friends, How do you practice present moment awareness?  When was the last time you slowed down and truly smelled the roses?  Have you been running - striving - and accomplishing on your resolutions?  What one thing brings you back (Snaps you back) to remembering that you are LOVE and the you are Loved? <3 Please reply below as you are called.  I look forward to connecting with you!