Sometimes the thing that shifts us is not a grand revelation. Sometimes it is one small sentence we cannot say.

A few weeks ago, after a recent head knock, I was far more emotional than usual. Simon was trying to understand what sat underneath that, and at one point he asked me to say:

I couldn’t. I told him I couldn’t say something I didn’t believe.

A day or two later I thought, What have I got to lose? So I started saying it anyway. Not because I suddenly believed it, and not because I had magically transformed overnight. I simply became willing to try.

At the same time, I had also been practising Ho’oponopono, including the fifth phrase Simon uses in his work: I Forgives Myself. I had also been working through some manifestation exercises.

I expected all of that to make me think about the future, what I wanted next, what I wanted to create, what needed to change.

Instead, something quite different happened.

I started noticing what was already here.

We can carry more than we realise

Life can become very full. Full of responsibility, people needing us, work, family, animals, appointments, money, health, memories, worries, plans and unfinished jobs.

And when we have lived through difficult periods, there can also be an invisible layer underneath all of that: old fear, old hurt, old expectations, and old habits of waiting for something to go wrong.

We can become so used to carrying everything that we stop noticing just how much we are carrying. From the outside we may look capable, the one who gets things done, the one everyone calls, the one who sorts it out.

Sometimes, without even realising it, we begin living more in what has happened or what might happen than in what is actually happening now.

What is true right now?

Recently, Simon and I celebrated our first wedding anniversary. It made me stop and look at our life differently, not in some huge dramatic way, but in the ordinary things that are easy to overlook because they are simply part of everyday life.

Care. Companionship. Laughter. A meal shared together. Animals being fed. A home that feels safe. The little things Simon does without announcing them. The way we have built a life that feels steady and real.

And somewhere in that reflection, I noticed something important.

For a long time, part of me had been waiting for the rug to be pulled out from underneath me, waiting for the next problem, waiting for something good to disappear, waiting for safety to turn out not to be safe after all.

But this time, when I looked around, I realised:

I wasn’t thinking about the rug.

I was simply living. That was a bigger realisation than I expected.

Maybe manifestation is not always about getting more

We often think of manifestation as creating something that is not yet here. A different future, a new opportunity, more abundance, more freedom, more peace.

There is nothing wrong with that. But perhaps manifestation can also ask us a different question:

Can I recognise the things I once wished for, hoped for, or thought I might never have? Can I notice peace when it is quiet rather than dramatic? Can I notice love when it looks like ordinary care? Can I recognise safety when nothing bad is happening?

Can I allow myself to receive the life that is already here instead of constantly scanning for what is missing?

That has been the unexpected part for me. The manifestation work did not simply make me look forward. It made me look around.

And then there is self-love

I think this is where those words come back in:

I love me.
I love Glenda.
I love myself.

When I first tried to say them, they felt false. So I stopped trying to make myself believe them. I simply repeated them, alongside I Forgives Myself.

And perhaps that is where something began to soften.

Loving ourselves may not always begin with suddenly thinking we are wonderful. Sometimes it may begin with not attacking ourselves, not punishing ourselves, and not judging every decision we made when we were frightened, exhausted, injured, overwhelmed or simply trying to cope.

Maybe forgiveness creates a little space. And maybe, in that space, we begin to see ourselves differently, not as the person who should have known better or got everything wrong, but as someone who was doing the best they could with what they understood at the time.

That shift matters.

When there’s so much… yet so little

This is one of the ideas Simon and I are exploring in a new offering called When There’s So Much… Yet So Little.

Because so many people are carrying lives that are completely full, yet inside that fullness there can still be very little room to simply be — little space, little quiet, little clarity, little connection with ourselves.

The answer may not be to fix everything at once.

Perhaps the first step is much simpler.

That is not avoiding reality. It is returning to it.

Maybe the life has already begun

I still have things I want to create. I still have plans. I still have responsibilities. Life is still life.

But something feels different.

Maybe it is the Ho’oponopono. Maybe it is I Forgives Myself. Maybe it is repeating I love me. I love Glenda. I love myself. Maybe it is the manifestation work. Maybe it is simply finally noticing what has been quietly changing.

Perhaps it is all of it.

The peace we were looking for may already be appearing in small ways. The love may already be here. The home may already be here. The next chapter may already have started.

Sometimes manifestation may not begin with asking for more. Sometimes it begins with finally being able to see what is already here.

And perhaps, little by little, being able to say:

I love me.
I love myself.

From Glenda’s Desk ❤️