Without order and completion it’s easy to remain in the overwhelm of chaos. This is particularly important in times of great change.

If the overwhelm or chaos is tremendous, which it can be if you are redoing your whole house at once or making a major life or business change, you can add order by simply writing down the steps required to achieve the outcome. Put that order in front of you and check off the completions as you go along. It will make a tremendous difference in your outcome and feeling of overwhelm.

Take even small steps toward progress each day and you will be amazed at the results.

Planning and taking strategic steps helps you harness and direct the powers of creation. The more effective you are at creating a plan and them implementing it step-by-step (even when you don’t see how you can do it all) the greater creation success you can achieve in any and every area of life.

Where are you feeling overwhelm right now?  Take just a couple of minutes to create a plan and notice how you feel.

Do you normally plan your year to intentionally direct the powers of creation toward your  next level of success?

If strengthening your creation planning, to ensure more effective results, is something you need to focus on plan to join me for “Create A Dynamic Year 2012” Jan 8, or work with the replay.

When you register by Nov 30, you can SAVE $30 off the one-day program and will receive an additional power packed training “Nature’s Success System The Workshop” as a BONUS.

Hurry, there is only two days left to take advantage of this great package!

Does the fast paced world we live in sometimes causes you to feel overwhelmed, and results in a shutdown where there is no passion, no impetus to move, or clarity about what to do?

I have learned that the elemental forces of earth, air, water, fire, and spirit can provide clarity and ease when I consciously engage them. I invite you to try some of these steps the next time you feel overwhelmed.

Recognizing what you are feeling (tired, over committed, burnt out, etc) then use the elements to nurture yourself.

There is no greater compass for what to do next then tapping into your own body wisdom (yes, everyone has it.) What does your body want…Rest? Exercise? Healthy food? Touch?  The next, and sometimes less practiced, step is give your body what it wants as often as possible.  No, really.  If you stop often and ask your body what it needs and you give it exactly that, you will feel more vibrant, more in alignment and be glad to be in your body. Any thoughts that your body cannot be trusted or will somehow lead you astray will lessen the more gratitude you feel for your body.

The fastest way to get “unstuck” with the power of air is to breathe. In…out .as deeply as is comfortable, for at least ten breathes. Then, check in and see if some of that fog has lifted. If not, repeat the ten breathes with intention. Breathe in peace and breath out doubt.

Water helps us through our emotional realm. When in overwhelm, what feelings do you want to express.  Ask yourself, what’s under the overwhelm?  How can water assist me to rejuvenate? Where do I need to surrender and give up control or struggle?  Drink plenty of water.  One of the greatest energy zappers is dehydration, if you feel tapped out go some place quiet and enjoy a cup of tea, water with lemon, or any water based drink that feels good.

Sometimes when we are feeling like we don’t know which way to turn, let your body to do the walking!  Move, dance, swim, take a stroll outside. The calm you seek may come only after you have physically moved the overwhelm out of your body. Notice if anything in your life needs to be let go. Releasing that which is no longer serving you frees up energy and space to allow your new creations to be born.

When overwhelmed give yourself compassion. Ask for guidance from Sprit about where you need upliftment.

The elements are always around us and within us. When we feel unclear, or we have become bogged down; using these or many other Natural Rhythms tools can bring clarity, lightness and ease back into your day.

Judy Keating Natural Rhythms™ facilitator and coach

Both The Byrd’s and the Bible tell us there is a time to be born, a time to die, a time to weep, a time to laugh, a time to dance — a time for every purpose under the sun. When the musical group The Byrd’s released their song Turn, Turn, Turn in 1965 they made it easy to sing along to this verse from Ecclesiastes. Even set to music, these simple, yet profound, words remind us of one core teaching: Life on Earth constantly changes.

Staying connected to Earth’s changing rhythmic motion and fundamental principles can help us live in greater harmony with the world around us and in turn, develop increased inner wisdom, balance, and peace. The pace of our modern technology-filled lives sometimes makes it challenging to find what we need most to balance our lives. Everywhere we go, from the gym to the local restaurant, television sets with programs turned on bombard us. Computers bring an overload of information from the Internet and e-mail 24-7, and people can call our cell phones or text us anywhere and at anytime. While technology helps us in so many ways, it also disconnects us from the external and internal place where we can most easily find inner wisdom, balance, and peace — nature.

Nature’s calming and healing energy helps us align with our own inner nature, which balances us vibrationally, thus maximizing our capacity to handle the stresses of our increasingly technology-filled world. Not only does nature harmonize our energy field, her fundamental principles increase our wisdom and teach us about our lives. As Earth’s seasons turn and change, we learn from nature that our lives, too, follow this same rhythm of constant transformation. Sometimes the shift in life from one thing to another expresses in a subtle and gradual change and sometimes it is quick and impactful. Yet the undercurrent of motion keeps the energy turning.

Earth’s constant rotation through the seasons of the year provides a wonderful organic teaching of the natural balance process through nature’s examples of light and dark and life and death. Starting with the dark, fallow time in winter as the earth rests and rejuvenates, moving to the gradual warming of the soil with the light of the sun until it heats enough for planting in the spring, the light then moves into the full brightness of the summer growing time. Then, the light gradually recedes to the fall harvest, and finally diminishes until the crops die and the earth settles in for its period of dark winter rejuvenation once again.

For most of us, life follows this same pattern as we gestate in the womb’s darkness, are born and grow from childhood into adulthood and then into our elder years, moving on to our death and our next expression. The growth and change, as well as the light and dark phases of our lives, happen over time as we move from phase to phase.

If we learn from nature we realize that too much light and outer world activity leaves little time for rest or quiet and burns out our systems. Our busy external lives require balance found during the darkness, the peaceful rest times. Our quiet inner time creates the place where we are receptive to inner voice of Spirit, and where seeds of our desires are planted, developed, and grown. When we learn to work with and appreciate the light and bright times of life that bring us into the outer world for growth, joy, and creativity, as well as those times that take us deep into our inner darkness for rejuvenation, and physical and emotional healing, we create inner balance.

Discovering ways honor both the light and dark times of life creates more trust in life itself. Nature exists in a constant state of balancing light and dark as well as creating the new and letting go of the old. When we spend enough time connected to the natural world and the rhythm of nature, we are filled with this understanding and the grounded wisdom of Earth. Nature, softly reminds us that life and death are interconnected just as are the light and the dark. And each year spring follows winter. Nature’s processes take time, and we cannot rush her season. However, when we listen to her, we hear her urge us to trust that following the time the time to rest and heal once again comes a time to sing and dance.

This article first appeared in the April 2008 edition of Aquarius Magazine.