TEEW #02: Finding Your Inner Happy Place – with Rachael Lynn

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Today, published author and thought leader Rachael Lynn and I are having an inspiring conversation about finding your inner happy place, your home within and strengthening the relationship to yourself.

This is especially important for women who moved abroad, married into a different culture and feel a bit lost and disconnected from themselves.

You’ll find out:

* How to get in touch with your ‘inner happy place’ or ‘home within’

Rachael defines this as an inner knowing that you’ve got yourself.

I’ve previously likened it to the feeling of an internal embrace.

When you’re so connected to yourself and nurture the relationship with yourself (which is essentially the only one you’ll have for a lifetime!), you’ll be able to establish trust in yourself that – no matter what happens – you’ll be fine. You’ve gone through hardships before, remember? So now, too, you can find the resources within yourself that it takes to overcome this challenge.

* How re-thinking ‘happiness’ can help you experience it, even in challenging time

In her book. At Home Anywhere, Rachael writes:

Happiness is not a person, a place or a thing. All of those can give you a feeling of happiness – hence the term “it makes me happy”. But they’re not happiness itself. It’s your observation of the person (place or thing) you love or what they do that creates the happiness you feel.
“At Home Anywhere” by Rachael Lynn

What this means is that your happiness actually has its origin inside of you. The outside can provide a stimulus, sure, but if it doesn’t move something within you, it won’t result in you feeling happy.

Again, this showcases the importance of nurturing and strengthening our ‘inner happy place’, above all. When you feel unhappy, for instance upon moving to a different country or marrying into a different culture that overwhelms you, remember that YOU are the constant. YOU can be the safe haven for yourself. YOU can be ‘home’.

So make the relationship to yourself a priority. This doesn’t make you selfish but rather prepares you to show up as your own best version: for yourself, for others and for life in general.

* How the question of ‘identity’ plays into our wellbeing abroad

Our identity is nothing more than the image we have of ourselves: because of where we grew up, what we did, who we hung out with, what we worked as or the way we lived life. This image can be shattered when our surroundings and circumstances change. A move abroad. A marriage abroad. A new chapter of life.

Rachael reminds us that when we are confronted with the need to re-define who we are, it can feel like a re-birth. And the birthing process involves some pain that we’ll inevitably experience.

However, this is also a great opportunity to think about who you want to be (and maybe couldn’t be before). What you’ve always wanted to do (and possibly did not dare to).

After all, our identity is simply a label. Labels may help us to feel like we belong to a community; but they can also limit us to expand and evolve. The bottomline is that we’re all so much more than any label could possibly describe – it’s time for us to tap into everything else that’s possible and available for us!

Watch this video about the Expat Identity Crisis (and why it might be a good thing):

* How journaling can bring you closer to your ‘inner happy place’

As an author, it comes as no surprise that Rachael is big on writing. What she’s found is that journaling can open the gateways to your inner truth and thus helps you to create more understanding, compassion and connection to yourself. She’s provided journal prompts for you (see below) and offers a journaling course “Journaling Within” for those who want to dive deeper into this healthy practice.

Find out more about Rachael at www.rachael-lynn.com and follow her on Instagram and Facebook.

You can order her book “At Home Anywhere” on Amazon and download a free chapter on her website!