Generosity Practice FAQs

These Frequently Asked Questions include:

• When You Resist the Practice
• When You’re Anxious
• When You’re Phoning it In
• How to Know What to Give Out
• When You’re Tired
• When Focusing is a Challenge
• When Connecting to All-of-Life is Tough
• When You’re Stressed about the Practice

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When You Resist the Practice

There could be many reasons for this. But one place to start is the basics. It has to feel good to you and it has to feel real.

So check on 2 things:

1. Are you conjuring up things vividly? Can you feel it?
2. Are you choosing things that really feel good to you?

When You’re Anxious

This is an indicator that it’s time to re-up. It’s an opportunity for even MORE generosity. Use your will and keep going. Come back to the question: what would feel good to offer to life today?

I gave the world sleep when I couldn’t sleep. Melanie, Field Study Participant

I gave away small balls of tension. I felt tense all day today. A problem I’ve been struggling with has been going on, I did the practice, 15 minutes later a friend called, and the problem is gone. Melanie, Field Study Participant

When You’re Phoning it In

If things get a bit mechanical, you stop offering your brand of awesome all day. This is usually because there wasn’t enough quality time spent LANDING the gift. Right? Because when you land your true offering for the day, it’s EPIC. You shift. Something opens. You get tears in your eyes. You magnetize awesomeness towards you.

If you think you don’t have time, remember that your day flows from your offering. Take the 10 minutes to land something vivid and true and set the tone for the day. It’s a different day. And anyway, who wants a day without your bonkers amazing gift? Not me. Hee hee.

How to Know What to Give Out

In the big picture, many people don’t know what they want to contribute to the world, and try really hard to figure out how to help. Maybe they’re haunted by the question on their deathbed. Most know they want to make a difference. It’s much easier to live as a contribution if you already feel like one now. Why wait?

When you take a few moments and get real about this, you activate yourself as a contribution and everything flows from there. What do you want to give out? What feels good to offer to life today? When you land it (and there’s usually one thing that trumps all the rest), you are stepping into a new way of being. You’re the rockstar who walks in certainty about the contribution she makes. Hot diggity. So give yourself time to try a few things.

What would you offer to a friend going through a tough time? What one thing would change the world for the better? What gift would surprise and delight you? Etc. When giving feels contrived and artificial. This is where your willingness to feel things comes in (and I don’t say that lightly). What supports you to really sink in to a feeling state, even if there’s pain there.

Here are some ways I recommend:

Place your hand on your heart and breathe gently into it.

• Go on a short walk.
• Have a bath.
• Get a massage.
• Snuggle with a pet.
• Do some yoga.
• Do a workout.

When you do this practice, you want to feel centered and grounded in your heart. Otherwise, your thoughts are just nice ideas that don’t change anything. Studies show that we can imagine things so vividly, that it affects our bodies (for example, basketball players who imagine sinking the shot do it easily in real life without physical practice). The key is to actually feel it. This usually requires some slowing down and some self-compassion. So take it easy, breathe, and keep asking, “What feels good to offer to life today?”

When You’re Tired

Friendly reminder that the question starts with “What feels good?” not “What do I have to…?” And when you land THE THING, it energizes you like crazy. You know this, right? It helps to have some FAVORITES that you can give out on those low energy days. What are your favorites? (mine are cups of green tea and small books of wisdom. Others give out peace, smiles and positive energy waves.) The weird version of the practice is about having the courage to give out ANYTHING, not simply the nice things. If you’re irritated, you’re probably going to give out different things than when you’re content and happy. That’s perfectly OK. So open the door a little wider to possibilities you might not have considered yet. What feels good to offer to life today?

When Focusing is a Challenge

No problem. I made recordings for you! Enjoy the guided audios here. Also, get out the book and write things down. This slows down your overly active mind.

When Connecting to All of Life is Tough

Connecting with all of life deserves some loving attention, because once you connect, you can give it lovely things. Wouldn’t that be awesome? You can’t fake feeling connected to all of life and no one wants you to.

I recently taught someone the practice who meditates regularly and teaches yoga. She has an altar in her home. When I asked her to ponder how she’d like to connect to all of life, she decided on a trail between two mountaintops, a place she knows well. It felt right to her, a beautiful, expansive, majestic place. But when she started giving things out, she didn’t feel connected to all of life. Not at all. Hm….what was going on? So she breathed and felt into the possibilities. Was there somewhere else where she felt truly connected to all of life? Immediately, it came to her. Her own altar at home. At her altar, it was much easier for her to offer things and feel like they were going to all of life. Yes! So she gave things out and it worked. Even though the mountaintops were gorgeous, the altar was what worked.

How do you connect to all of life? Maybe connecting with one person gives you that feeling. Maybe running gives you that feeling. Or lying on a surfboard on the ocean. Or just breathing deeply. Do what you need to do to make it real for yourself, even if that means trying something weird for a while. You never know. Let yourself explore. Giving out things to a pile of brown leaves or sitting on top of an elephant might just do it for you.

When Your Stressed about the Practice

Ease Back In…Aaaaah….

1. Use the audio recordings.
2. Go out in nature and do the practice.
3. Let the process be dorky and weird (Weirdness Practice!)
4. Inhale and exhale before you do it. Give yourself some quality time to really listen to yourself.
5. Give out the feeling of relaxation in your practice today.