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Make Your Relationship a Priority or Suffer the Consequences

Those of you who have been following me for a long time know that I was a divorce attorney for 20 years in Omaha, Nebraska before I had a life-changing experience in Sedona that led me to start Sedona Soul Adventures. And since then, for the past 21 years, we’ve worked with thousands of couples, helping them to save their marriages and deepen their relationships.

One of the biggest things that I’ve seen in working with couples now for over 40 years is a problem that is so easy to solve it’s almost magical. And that’s making your relationship a priority.

Are you feeling like the spark has faded in your marriage? Trust me, you’re not alone. It happens to the best of us. Life gets busy with all the responsibilities of marriage, kids, and work, and before you know it, you and your partner are drifting apart. But don’t worry, because there’s a way to reignite that flame and save your relationship.

Remember those early days of falling in love when you couldn’t get enough of each other? Well, it’s time to bring back that connection.

One of the biggest complaints we hear from couples is the lack of quality time and communication. It’s so easy to get caught up in the daily grind and forget to nurture your relationship.

So, here’s what you can do to address this issue. Choose a calm moment to talk to your partner about it. Skip the dreaded phrase, “We need to talk,” and instead ask sincerely, “I’ve been thinking about this lately… What is one thing I could do to let you know that you’re a priority in my life?“ 

Listen attentively without criticizing or judging. 

Once you’ve addressed this issue, express your desire to spend quality time together, just the two of you, having fun. Remember those activities you used to enjoy together? Suggest doing them again, but without demanding it. By making this suggestion, you’ll make your partner feel appreciated.

Now, let’s talk about intimacy. I know it can make some people blush or feel uncomfortable, but it’s essential to address it. Studies consistently show that happy couples have regular and mutually satisfying sex. So, if you’ve noticed a decline in your sexual connection, take the initiative to initiate it again. Surprise your partner tonight or even right now! – It’ll certainly grab their attention!

But it’s not just about grand gestures or sex. Small, thoughtful actions can make a significant difference too. Personally, I love receiving flowers, and those small gestures always melt my heart. A while ago, Richard surprised me with a Big Hug sent in a massive envelope while I was away for a week. It was the cutest thing and made me feel so loved and cherished.

So, think about what you can do for your beloved. If one person usually takes care of certain tasks, surprise them occasionally by taking over those responsibilities. Is there something they’ve always wanted to do but haven’t given themselves permission due to cost or time constraints? Invite them to do it and assure them that they are worth it. Let them know that their happiness and fulfillment matter to you.

A few months ago, we had a couple come to us and they were at the end of their rope. They were fighting all the time and they were ready to split up, especially the wife. They both worked really hard, they had two young children and the husband’s mother was very involved in their lives. They had all kinds of issues of “he does this” and “she does that,” which were very important to them, of course, but when we really sat and listened to them, all of those things were kind of inconsequential. And of course, their sex life was non-existent.

When we dug deep with them, we got down to “What’s really going on?”, we got down to the truth which was neither of them felt like they were a priority in the other’s life. “I’m not a priority in his/her life.” They both felt that the other’s jobs were more important, he felt like the kids meant more to her than he does and she felt like his mother meant more to him than she does, especially because there were many times he was taking the mother’s side. 

And underneath that was, “He doesn’t really love me” and “She doesn’t really love me,” and here’s the real kicker because what we finally got to was that for both of them underneath that was, “I’m not loveable. My own wife/husband doesn’t love me, that must mean I’m not loveable.” They weren’t thinking this consciously of course, but when we dug deep, they both got it, that that was the culprit.

They both grew up in homes where they were starved for love, both the husband and the wife, and he kept trying to show up for his mother and doing things for his mother because he wanted so desperately to have his mother’s love, not because she meant more to him than his wife. 

We had them do sessions individually to get at those core wounds, to dig them up and fill them back up with love. What was really amazing was that even though they both did separate breathwork sessions, each one of them had an experience of a vision of the two of them coming together in this incredible bliss and joy and love. 

In their final Integration session, they said they have never been more in love and they totally know that the other person is the most important person in their life. They also told us they had more sex in the 5 days they were with us than they had in the 5 months before that. 

When you can get to the root of what’s really going on, like these two did, everything else just falls away and you can come back into the love that brought you together in the first place.

How about you? Would you like to come back into that love? If so, give us call and do a couples retreat with us. Each retreat is completely private, not in groups, and custom designed for exactly what the two of you need and want.

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The Connection Between Spiritual Awakening and Mental Health

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“Don’t you DARE settle for fine” – quote from “Ted Lasso”

It’s the end of an era. The finale of “Ted Lasso” has just aired. Have you been watching it? I have to say it’s one of the best shows I’ve ever watched, because it is so funny, so sweet, and so uplifting (although it does also have lots of F-bombs, so it’s good to know that in advance!).

Now, I must confess that when I first heard about the premise—an American football coach taking charge of a premier soccer league in England—I was a bit skeptical.

I mean, why should I care, right? But oh boy, was I in for a delightful surprise!

With each episode, “Ted Lasso” managed to win our hearts…

The show’s charm, sweetness, and uplifting spirit left us wanting more. We’ve happily binged the entire first and second seasons twice and eagerly savored every moment of the third season, including that epic finale.

It’s so adorable, very often I will come into Richard’s office and if he’s on his laptop laughing or smiling, I know he’s watching a snippet of Ted Lasso. He’ll do that as much as once or twice a day because it’s just so inspiring and makes him feel so good.

In the second season there was a scene that struck me so deeply that I wanted to pass it along to you.

One of the main characters is a woman that I absolutely love, Rebecca, the owner of the soccer club which hires Ted. The series begins with her soon-to-be ex-husband (the co-owner of the team) having dumped her for a much younger woman. She’s scorned and depressed and is humiliated in the press. She starts out the series with some really negative aspects (which I won’t spoil for you) and during the course of the series we watch her as she navigates being a single woman who is “out there” dating again.

But here’s where it gets interesting—another character (Roy Kent) asks her how her new relationship is going and she says “Fine.”

He then steps in and delivers a powerful line that I can’t resist sharing with you.

Brace yourself for this gem:

“Don’t you dare settle for fine.”

And that’s not all, he follows it up with:

“You should feel like you’ve been struck by lightning.”

Boom! Mic drop!

These words hit me right in the soul. Because let’s face it, life is about choices. We can either settle and let joy, excitement, and bliss slip through our fingers, or we can embrace the thrill, the electrifying moments that make us feel alive!

So, let me ask you this: What does your life look like? Are there areas where you’re settling? And are you genuinely excited about the various aspects of your existence? These questions are worth pondering.

Look at the major areas of your life:

Work – Are you doing work you love? Does it align with your life purpose? Do you wake up each morning feeling energized and inspired?

Love Relationship – Are you experiencing a connection that makes you feel like you’ve been struck by lightning? Have you settled for less in any of your past or present relationships?

Friends & Family Relationships – Do you surround yourself with people who uplift and inspire you? Are your relationships harmonious and fulfilling, or do they drain your energy?

Health – How do you feel in your body? Are you taking care of yourself physically and emotionally? Do you love and appreciate your body? Or do you constantly wish it was different?

Money and Abundance – Do you feel abundant? Or do you constantly worry about money and not having enough?

By exploring these areas, we gain insights into what truly matters to us and uncover the areas where we may have settled for less. Remember, life is too short to settle for anything less than what you deserve.

With all the parts of our lives, we’re either living in connection or not. And all the parts of our lives add up to the sum total of our existence.

So if the total sum of your existence isn’t operating most of the time in happiness, joy, peace, abundance, and excitement, you need to do something about it.

First of all, I highly recommend watching “Ted Lasso” (even with the F-bombs) or something else that makes you feel happy and uplifted.

But typically watching a TV show doesn’t get underneath the real issues that are holding you back in life or causing trouble in your relationships. That’s where we come in. If you don’t know your life purpose (or even worse, if you know what it is, but you’re not living it) — we can help you with that. If the sizzle has gone out of your relationship — we can help you with that.

If you want to come back into the joy and happiness that I believe are your birthright, do a Soul Adventure. We’ll find what’s holding you back or causing the trouble, we’ll release it, heal it, and bring you back into connection.

Call us at (928) 204-5988 or request a call and one of our Soul Guides will call you. They’ll connect with you (or both of you if it’s a couple) and custom design a retreat that will take you from where you are to where you want to be.

Tammy says after her Soul Adventure, “I am full of JOY and purpose and excitement for the next phase of my beautiful life!”

Wouldn’t you love to be full of JOY, purpose, and excitement for the next phase of your beautiful life? You can. Call us.

Did you know Sedona Soul Adventures was named “Best of Sedona”
for Retreats for 2020, 2021 & 2022,
“Best Marriage Retreats in the US” 2015-2023 and
one of the “11 Best Couples Retreats Around the World”
by Bride’s Magazine in 2022? We were recently named one of Global Radiance Review’s “20 Most Trustworthy Companies of 2023”

It’s because what we do gets results – call us now, let us help. As I always say, if you knew what could happen, you’d be calling right now.

What area of your life do you need help with most right now…

Your relationship?
Finding your life purpose?
Loss of a loved one?
Healing & pampering?
Or is it something else?

Because we’re here for you – and we’re even open on Sunday!

Remember, there’s no cost or obligation to speak with a Soul Guide and have them custom-design the perfect retreat just for you in Sedona or At Home.

Call us at (928) 204-5988 or request a call from one of our
Soul Guides and they will call you.

Wishing you a week filled with joy and excitement!

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What is a Vortex Anyway?

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Cancer Linked to Unexpressed Anger (7 Different Studies)

My mother died of cancer at the age of 51. She passed away over 30 years ago and I still miss her everyday.

This week I read about 7 different studies that all come to the conclusion that (in the words of the report) “unexpressed anger causes cancer.”

I’ve always felt that the circumstances of my mother’s life and the pain it caused her are what actually caused her cancer. In the past, people would tell me that was just my New Age weirdo mentality, and not based in any kind of reality.

It’s heartbreaking to now have the validation from studies from Stanford University, Harvard School of Public Health, University of Rochester, King’s College in London, University of Michigan, University of Rochester, University of Tennessee, and the National Institutes of Health.

My father had an affair with another woman that went on for over 13 years before my mother’s death. My mother acted like she didn’t know that it was happening. This woman worked for my father and, bizarrely, was always referred to as our “good family friend.” If you can believe it, she even spent time with our family during holidays, including Christmas. My father married her 9 months after my mother died.

Although my mother always acted as if this wasn’t happening, I found out by accident 2 months after her death, that she not only did know, but that it (of course) shattered her. I had lunch with my aunt (her sister) who was a Catholic nun and had helped care for my mother during the last weeks of her life. My aunt started talking to me about it, assuming that I knew. I was so dumbfounded that I could barely speak, as my aunt went on to talk about how this had completely destroyed my mother.

As I looked back over those years, I saw the pattern emerge. My father started a new business in another town when I was 13. None of us wanted to move, but the business was a big success at first. My father moved in June, the family didn’t come until September when school started, because we wanted to stay in our old town just as long as we could. I found out later that this is when the affair started, when my dad was on his own in the new town.

In his feelings of guilt, my father started drinking heavily and within about one year, his business was in financial trouble. I can’t even imagine what my mother must have been going through with the combination of the affair, my father’s alcoholism, and now financial trouble. And worse, she kept “acting as if” everything was okay.

There’s a day I talk about in my book (“The Journey To Happy”) that was really what I see now as the watershed moment when I knew something was very wrong with my family. I had already felt on an emotional level that something was going on. There was a lot of tension between my mom and dad and my dad was constantly throwing up in the morning (from drinking). Mother would say, “Dad isn’t feeling well,” but I realized he wasn’t going to the doctor or doing anything to fix the problem.

I was 13 years old and it was summertime so we were just carefree and playing. Mom had gone down to my dad’s business and came home with him and locked us out of the house. We lived in a small town in Iowa and we never locked our door ever, not even when we would go to church, so this was completely unusual. I found out later that mother discovered the business was not open, my dad was drunk, and she found a pile of unpaid bills.

From that time on, everything changed. We had been a happy and successful family — we had a nice house in a great neighborhood, my father had a business that had been very successful, all of us kids did great in school, we were active in sports and dance, we belonged to the country club, and on the outside, it looked like we had it all. Suddenly, it felt like everything was in jeopardy and that never changed. All through high school and until I left for college, I lived in a home where everyone was walking on egg shells, my mother was in constant worry about money trouble and the prevailing energy was fear and frustration.

My mother lived through all of this and somehow putting up with my father having a relationship with another woman and acting as if it wasn’t happening and never talking to anyone about it (she only spoke about it at the very end to my aunt). All those years of it festering inside her, with her doing nothing about it and not even allowing herself to talk about it.

So a few years later, after all this anger, frustration, and fear had festered inside her, my mother was diagnosed with cancer of the cervix. She had an 11-hour operation where they removed everything they could and she then had a colostomy bag and a urostomy bag (for urine).

About 6 months after the operation, mother was doing surprisingly well. The doctors were giving her a clean bill of health. It looked like everything was fine. Then they found more.

I found out after her death that dad had come back and stopped the affair when she had the operation. After it looked like she was going to be okay again, he resumed the affair and my mother got sick again. Then he came back again and she got well again. He left again and she got sick again. This went on back and forth for 5 years.

By that time her children were handled – 2 of my brothers had graduated from college and had great jobs, one brother had just established his dental practice and my youngest brother was almost finished with medical school. I was in law school and my sister was about to graduate from college. My mother’s constant mantra as we were growing up was that we were all going to college. Once she felt like we were all taken care of, she could give herself permission to leave.

There isn’t any question in my mind about what caused my mother’s cancer. She drank coffee and ate red meat, but I don’t think any of those factors had anything to do with it. She was hurt and angry from the deep pain that resulted from all this and she was so focused on taking care of all of us that she placed no focus on herself. She told herself that there was nothing that she could do. And the worst part was, she believed that. She felt angry and stuck and that festered inside her for years until it showed up as cancer.

She had told me many years before when she was upset with my father that she could never divorce him. She was a strict Catholic, plus the financial realities would have been so difficult. So instead, I believe she left in the one way that she felt she could.

I wish I could have done something to have helped my mother. It makes me so sad that she felt like she couldn’t talk to me about what was really going on.

I became a family law attorney one year after her death. I know that in the 20 years that I was doing divorce work, I helped a lot of women who felt stuck and powerless and I saw many of them go on to lead really happy lives.

After I had practiced law for 20 years, I realized that I had become stuck in my own life and I was feeling angry and frustrated. I came to Sedona for the first time and the message that I was given in a vision was, “You either leave your law practice now, or you’re going to die like your mother did.” That was the wake up call I needed. That was 24 years ago.

We don’t have to stay stuck. We don’t have to simmer in our anger and we know now that if we do, it’s killing us!

If you aren’t living your best life or are having problems with your relationship, there are things you can do about it. Come to Sedona. We’ll custom design a retreat that will release the anger and frustration and we’ll give you tools for living your best life or having the relationship of your dreams.

My story has a happy ending. I hope that yours will too.

Contact us, connect with one of our Soul Guides. Request a call and one of our Soul Guides will call you. Or if you’d prefer, call us at (928) 204-5988. Our Soul Guides will connect with you (or both of you if it’s a couple) and custom design a retreat that will take you from where you are to where you want to be.

Martha says before her “life saving” Soul Adventure, she “was lost, depressed and angry at everything…SSA helped me find myself, helped me understand my life purpose and gave me the tools I needed.”

Did you know Sedona Soul Adventures was named “Best of Sedona”
for Retreats for 2020, 2021 & 2022,
“Best Marriage Retreats in the US” 2015-2023 and
one of the “11 Best Couples Retreats Around the World”
by Bride’s Magazine in 2022? We were recently named one of Global Radiance Review’s “20 Most Trustworthy Companies of 2023”

It’s because what we do gets results – call us now, let us help. As I always say, if you knew what could happen, you’d be calling right now.

What area of your life do you need help with most right now…

Your relationship?
Finding your life purpose?
Loss of a loved one?
Healing & pampering?
Or is it something else?

Because we’re here for you – and we’re even open on Sunday!

Remember, there’s no cost or obligation to speak with a Soul Guide and have them custom-design the perfect retreat just for you in Sedona or At Home.

Call us at (928) 204-5988 or request a call from one of our
Soul Guides and they will call you.

Wishing you a week filled with many blessings!