It is every human being’s birthright to live their dreams, to love and be loved, yet often we aren’t even aware that we subconsciously make ourselves the exception to the rule.
My limiting beliefs around deserving trace back to my earliest childhood memories, when it was ingrained in my young mind that being selfless is the right thing to do. When there was something worth sharing, be it a special food, a toy or anything of perceived value, I was to offer it to others first even though I may have wanted the very thing for myself.
Somehow selflessness was supposed to be rewarded, but I never quite got the virtue of giving at the expense of leaving my own wants and desires unmet. Worse yet, I completely misinterpreted that because I was supposed to give to others first, it must’ve meant I wasn’t deserving.
I know now that there is a different way to think, a healthier mindset that acknowledges our fundamental right to feel good about wanting what we want and to deserve those wants, but it requires great vigilance.
I’m fresh off the heels of a refresher lesson in deserving while in sun-kissed Santa Teresa, Costa Rica, a lesson I wasn’t certain to pass at first. When I first set foot on the beach, I looked down and saw a heart-shaped stone at my feet. This immediately took me back to my prior trips to Costa Rica, when I’d first encountered similar, beautiful works of Mother Nature.
I picked up the stone in simultaneous knowing and disbelief: Knowing that this was a reminder from the Universe that love is everywhere, always present if only we would see and receive. Disbelief in my deserving that one of these special symbols had found me again. I walked back to where one of my friends stood and asked her, “Is this a heart?” She laughed at my question of something so obvious and said, “Yes!”
Why did I doubt what my eyes saw, what I held in my very hand? Because I questioned whether I deserved this sign of love from the Universe. I walked along the beach entranced by the sounds of the ocean and the powdery sand gleaming like diamonds in the sunlight when another heart caught my eye, and then another and yet another. I picked up each one in awe at Mother Nature’s deft hand as a sculptor, in even greater awe of the Universe’s persistence for me to see my deserving of endless abundance.
The collection of heart-shaped stones that grew with my daily walks on the beach.
Just as I’d done in past trips to this magical, self-proclaimed happiest country in the world, I lay the hearts on a shelf in my room and marveled at how the collection grew with each of my daily sojourns to the beach. A tinge of guilt actually started to occupy a corner of my mind, questioning, “Why me, why do these special treasures keep lining my path?”
When I finally began to surrender to knowing and believing that I am deserving, the lesson unfolded further.
There is endless abundance in this great Universe, enough for you, enough me, enough for all. I can have what I want. Each and every one of us can have what we want. We simply have to believe in our deserving and then open ourselves to receive.
As though the stones spoke to me, it became clear that I was a vehicle to share the message of love and deserving with others who’d benefit from one of these treasures. Of the remaining hearts, some were to be keepsakes to remind me of my own deserving, and the balance returned to the ocean to be rediscovered.
On my final afternoon walk on the beach, I gratefully placed the hearts on the sand to be reclaimed by their source. A short while later, my friends and I settled in to watch the sunset when the Universe gave me a final, loving knock on the head to make sure I got it loud and clear.
I walked to the water to rinse the sand from my hands, and another heart (pictured at the top) stood in my path plain as day. I picked it up and showed my friend, who reaffirmed with certainty, “Of course you’d find it, Lo. You have to take that one home.”
Yes, there is endless abundance in this great Universe for us all to claim, abundance that every living soul deserves. Believe and receive.
