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Meet today's guest:
Mary Shores
is the founder and CEO of a multi-million dollar business, one of the most unique collection agencies in the country. Recognized as a leader of innovative thought, Mary has spent over a decade teaching businesses and individuals how to inspire others, create new ways of thinking, identify and achieve their goals, and take action to create truly meaningful results. She is the revolutionary founder of the groundbreaking Conscious Communications system, which produces positive results through positive action. Mary travels across the nation giving lectures and teaching courses, and has been featured on local and national radio and television shows, podcasts, and blogs.
Mary Shores is a woman who's had a lot of difficult situations thrown at her in life and managed to use them to better herself and shine her light brightly for others. Our interview went by in a blink, yet left in its wake many wonderful gems, quotes and tips to use in your life right away.
Mary's Story
At 16 years old Mary found herself needing to fend for herself while finishing high school. Not having a lot of options, she moved in with her boyfriend, finished school and at 19 became pregnant. Although she had a healthy pregnancy and went full term, problems arose with the umbilical cord and her daughter was born with severe brain damage. For the next year and a half Mary's life was a blur of sleeping on the floor in children's hospitals, administering some pretty scary medications, feeding her child out of a tube in her stomach and other horrors… until her baby passed away because of all the health problems.
For part of this time, Mary was obsessed with the idea that her baby's brain could overcome the damage it had suffered which started her onto a path of learning everything she could about the brain. This, along with other situations in her life, resulted in her writing a book – Conscious Communications – which released in August 2017 and provided the discussion points for much of our conversation.
"After a rough childhood, the devastating death of my first child, the creation of my own successful and unique collection agency, an unexpected and messy divorce, raising an autistic son, and the ups and downs of over 40 years of life, I discovered that I had gathered enough tools to write a book that would empower others to create the life they had always imagined despite facing various obstacles."
Conscious Communications August 2017, Hay House Publishing
How Do You Describe Your Life?
Mary and I talked about the power of words and how the things we say about ourselves really can become our identity. Mary shared how she was able to change her own story simply by changing what she was saying and especially by choosing to focus on what was working in her life, rather than what was going wrong.
I used to say that I felt like I was walking up a flight a stairs and someone was kicking them out from under me… and that's literally what I woke up feeling like every day. When you're in that level of despair there are not a lot of things you can change, but when I started changing my words before too long I could notice a change in what I was manifesting in my life.
In Conscious Communications Mary wrote: "When we relive our stories again and again, it keeps us swirling in that story—in the past. If we swirl inside the painful stories of our pasts, we create more stories that disconnect us from our desired futures.
What if, instead, you dwelled in the story that makes you feel good, that inspires you, and connects you to the magic in life?"
Cleanse or Clog
Mary shared a simple system she created called Cleanse or Clog which can help a person create an empowered life in relationships, diet, health, finances… in fact, every aspect of living.
It was this chapter in her book (Chapter 5) which she sent in to a Hay House writing contest and they loved it so much, it won first place and a publishing contract!
In essence this simple tool allows you to look at anything in your life and ask…will this (food/action/conversation…) cleanse me or clog me?
If you can answer 'cleanse' 80% of the time you will be strengthening yourself to the point where the 20% clogging can add variety, release and pleasure without hurting your life.
Gratitude and the Brain
We've talked about gratitude often on my show, but did you know the simple act of gratitude actually creates new neural pathways in the brain, which primes it to look for and recognize other things in your life to be grateful for?
When Mary learned about this and realized it needed to be a regular practice to really make a difference in a person's life, she created a closed facebook group for women called Declaring Gratitude, which you can join and share in daily. This programs your brain to look for more things that are good in your life, which causes your vibrational energy to rise and attracts more good things to you.
Even when you are having a bad day, and we all have bad days, if you can still find something to be grateful for – simple things, like your toothbrush – you are doing your brain so many favours.
In her book, Conscious Communications, Mary further explores this topic and shares that, "developing an active daily gratitude practice changes brain chemistry, it changes the ways our genes express themselves in our bodies, and it fundamentally rewrites old scripts in our brain that we are ready to be done with."
Clean Your Lens and See the Truth
I asked Mary to expand on a quote from her book that really spoke to me:
"As women especially, we are regularly encouraged to chin up, stop complaining, put our big girl pants on, or settle for what we know deep down isn’t right. Through this settling, we dim our light and accumulate more smudges and rubbish on the lens of how we see ourselves and our lives. The lens of misperception, keeps us buried beneath layers of untruths, away from seeing things as they really are, and as they could be."
Mary explained that this idea is based on an ancient yogic principle - the lens of perception – which describes our tendency as humans to see things as better than they are, or worse than they are. In this case, the smudging is caused by seeing things as worse than they are.
When asked to express my thoughts on this quote, I shared how I believe far too many of us are dimming our light and settling for a life that is 'less than' it's meant to be. Even our resiliency gets covered in the rubbish making us feel like life is too hard.
After the interview I realized that one of the things I really appreciate about Mary is her strong connection to her own resiliency and her refusal to fall into (or stay in) victim mode despite extremely difficult situations in her life. I don't believe any of us are here to live a mediocre existence or to feel trapped, uninspired or in need of settling.
One final thought…
In Conscious Communications Mary says, "I learned that if you want to change your life, whether big changes or smaller ones, you just have to remember these two things:
- All it takes to begin (or continue) your journey is take a step in the direction of what you want; and,
- Every time you make a new choice, you are opening up an infinite number of new opportunities in your life."
If you're ready to make positive change in your life, you can by using the Action Step Summary below to guide you!
Action Step Summary:
Pick up your copy of Conscious Communications; A step-by-step guide to harnessing the power of your words to change your mind, your choices, and your life, published by Hay House in August 2017
Sign up for your incredible gift Ignite Your Dreams Workbook and find guidance for self-care, getting unstuck, your magic action plan and so much more!
Join the Declaring Gratitude Facebook Group (women only) and watch your life change
Email Mary if you truly want to publish a book and are interested in attending the Hay House Writer's Workshop (where Mary went to get in the contest) in Orlando Florida, Oct 21 & 22, 2017. [Mary@maryshores.com]
Learn more about Mary at maryshores.com
