My Recipe for Happiness is Authenticity over Approval. What’s yours?
My RECIPE for Happiness
Over the years, I’ve come up with my own recipe for happiness:
Welcome the day with
🙏 gratitude & curiosity🌈.
🌸 Be playful.
🧘🏻♀️ Immerse yourself in your physical senses.
🌹 Feel your feelings.
💨 Breathe through all of them.
🌻 Pay attention to your thoughts,
🧘🏻♀️ mindfully without judgment 🤗.
🦸🏻♀️ Live authentically.
💯 Be true to YOU!
All of these ingredients help me to honor myself & live by my new mantra:
💥 Authenticity over Approval 💥
💥 Authenticity over Approval 💥
💥 Authenticity over Approval 💥
It’s completely transformed my mind, my work, & my physical and mental health.
Because there’s limitless opportunity for transformation…
And tremendous Power when we allow our True Self to be seen.
But sharing your True Self can also be HARD.
So I’ve had to tweak my recipe.
When being TRUE to YOU is challenging,
add 2 special ingredients:
(1) Special Ingredient #1 =
🙋🏻♀️ Self-Love
Self-Love’s been my #1 solution. The more I’ve come to accept who I am and love myself — regardless of what other people might think — the more safe & secure I feel to keep learning and keep growing, without that urge for approval I used to have.
(2) Special Ingredient #2 =
🤗 Connection with Community
This is the special ingredient that brings PURPOSE & MEANING to my Life.
And it’s a total 180, compared to how I used to live.
I used to hide who I was.
I used to suffer in silence, all alone.
I used to feel like no one in the world knew who I truly was.
They saw me (and didn’t want to see me as anything other than) as an Attorney.
They didn’t know I loved to do creative writing, art, or music.
And — when I was finally brave enough to share — they not only “didn’t get it.”
They told me to NOT do — or at least hide — these things.
Talk about feeling rejected!
I felt so alone.
Because I didn’t know any other Writers, Artists, or Creatives like me.
Without realizing it, I became a “Shadow Artist” — a term coined by Julia Cameron in her book, The Artist’s Way.
As she puts it, I was one of the “Young writers…pushed toward lawyering, a talky, wordy profession….”
She even described what happened to me: It’s the “rare family, faced with the myth of the starving artist, [that] tells its children to go right ahead and try for a career in the arts. Instead, if encouraged at all, the children are urged into thinking of the arts as hobbies, creative fluff around the edges of real life.”
“They [were] raised to the role of shadow artist and…need to work consciously to dismantle it.”
Dismantling may be hard, but that’s precisely what I aim to do for the rest of my life, however long it takes!
💥Creative Fluff, no more!
💥Shadow Artist, be gone!
Yes, this is the time to fully express and honor who I am: A writer! An artist! A musician!
Now, take a Mindful Minute to reflect on your life:
⭐️ What about you?
⭐️ Are you ready to set your intention for your lifelong Creative journey?
⭐️ What kind of Creative do you intend to fully be?
⭐️ What’s YOUR Recipe for Happiness?
Remember, you don’t have to have all of the answers.
And you don’t have to figure it out all alone, on your own.
You’re welcome to join us in my
This is a special group for Writers, Artists, & Creatives like us, to have deep conversations about the Books that we choose, so we can implement what we learn, and unearth our truest, most Authentic Selves.
It’s the perfect way to
Share Our Recipes for Happiness:
- Have fun together;
- Share our triumphs;
- Vent from time to time — we’re human after all!
- Take a lighthearted approach to private journaling & Artist’s Dates; and,
- Grow the CREATIVE GENIUS inside all of us! 💐🌺🌷🌸🌹🌻🌼
Share Our Work (allow our True Self to be Seen):
With Notes Boost Challenges (NBC), we can share our favorite Notes of the week.
And, when we’d like, we can share our Works In Progress (WIP) and/or Final Posts, Music, & Art…whatever we’re proud of!
So we can Like, Comment, and/or Restack each others’ work to…
Share Our Joy (experience Connection with a kind & supportive Creative Community):
This is how we can come together, to grow through our own individual efforts, and feel the support of a kind & supportive Creative Community, too.
If that sounds good to you, then join us & say hello!
Join Marisa Victus’s subscriber chat
Available in the Substack app and on web
Please Note:
For anyone who does not wish to participate in the Study, Savor, & Support each other CHAT, no problemo!
I will still publish my Newsletter, M&Ms, Sing-Along Storytime, Music, Videos, Science Fiction writing, & more!
If you have any comments or questions, please feel free to send me a DM.
Have a fantastic weekend!
The Creative in me honors & respects the Creative in each of you,
Marisa
Subscribe to my Substack at marisavictus.substack.com
If you love to learn about the science of self-improvement, please Subscribe to my YouTube Channel and signup for my free Substack Newsletter.
Together, we’ll explore all the ways that we can 10x our life — mind, body, & soul.
We’ll learn the scientific, physiological, and psychological reasons why we are the way that we are, and combine that understanding with simple, active practices that will:
• Enliven our emotions & creativity;
• Enhance our efficiency & productivity;
• Foster a greater depth of Self;
• Build the Secure Attachment that we need to develop a Growth Mindset; and,
• Reprogram our minds to pivot from the Sympathetic Nervous System to the Parasympathetic Nervous System when we need it to, more often than not.
I’ve planned so many exciting & fun things to share with you (in addition to music!) and I can’t wait for you to get all the FREE goodies I’ve prepared for you.
We CAN do this, TOGETHER!
Are you serious about self-improvement & want to have unstoppable self-belief?
Then SUBSCRIBE TO MY FREE SUBSTACK and entrain your brain the quick & easy way, with my daily Mindset & Meditation (M&M) practice.
Every day, I write & share 1 handwritten M&M in my “Notes” if you want to grow with me.
To learn how, click this link.
In addition, new Chapters for my serialized science fiction series (THE OBSIDIAN CHRONICLES) are released every weekend, and Subscribers can read the 1st Book in the series for FREE! Just click here (or visit https://marisavictus.substack.com/account) to opt-in + receive my Fiction writing!
Marisa