A Personal Note from Orion

I believe happiness is the purpose of life. Every single person on this Earth is entitled to the pursuit of happiness, you included.

It’s easier to be happy when you are on vacation or in love, but life isn’t alway easy. Our busy and sometimes disconnected world sets us up for stress. This is why you should listen to this interview; to get inspired and learn how to deal with all that stress.

On this week’s episode of The Stellar Life I chat with best-selling author, meditation guru and happiness expert Agapi Stassinopoulos. If you’re looking for ways to tap into your joy, don’t miss this one! Agapi shares an abundance of actionable tools, including a live guided meditation to instantly increase your happiness-level and leave you feelin’ fantastic.

 

In this Episode

• [04:05] – Greek people are vibrantly alive, Agapi points out.
• [05:17] – Agapi shares some information about who she is and how she reached the path that she’s on today.
• [06:40] – What are some of the biggest challenges that Agapi has overcome in her life?
• [10:34] – Orion takes a moment to talk about her community for self-love, which is full of goddesses.
• [11:32] – Owning your power is getting to know who you are in your spirit and your beingness, Agapi explains.
• [12:16] – Orion shares a story from Judaism about a holy man in a temple, leading to the concept that sometimes you don’t know yourself until the day you die.
• [12:57] – That’s the great adventure of life, Agapi says in response to Orion’s story. She then tells us what her goal is with her books.
• [14:56] – Agapi talks in more depth about her mother, who continues to be one of her deepest inspirations.
• [15:36] – We hear about an experience Orion had recently in which she took a moment for herself to remember that the answers are in the moment.
• [16:42] – What is Agapi’s definition of meditation?
• [17:59] – Agapi discusses whether she was in a state of bliss, love, and meditation her whole life — and even whether she’s in such a state now.
• [19:15] – How did Agapi come up with 52 meditations for her book?
• [20:10] – Agapi recommends having a meditation practice that you commit to on a daily basis.
• [22:52] – Orion discusses the reasons that she doesn’t meditate as much as she wants to, which she does regularly but not daily. She then publicly announces that she will start a 30-day meditation love affair.
• [24:59] – Agapi leads listeners in a brief but powerful meditation. If you’re listening while driving, be sure to come back to the episode once you’re home to go through this beautiful meditation with Agapi!
• [32:43] – Agapi explains why the guided meditation she has just led listeners through is so powerful and calming. She then invites listeners to email her to receive a free guided meditation as a gift.
• [34:46] – How does Agapi make her health a priority, and what is the “art of doing nothing”?
• [37:44] – People sometimes give themselves the time to achieve their dreams, but don’t give themselves the grace to achieve their dreams, Orion points out.
• [38:06] – Agapi feels you need to have intention about what you want.
• [39:41] – How can we create healthy boundaries and put ourselves first without hurting others?
• [40:58] – What is your ego, and why isn’t it your ally?
• [42:49] – Agapi begins winding things down by reading a beautiful excerpt from the final chapter of her book.
• [44:45] – Agapi lists some ways that listeners can get in touch with her.

About Today’s Show

‏‏Hey, this is Orion. Are you happy? You know, when I lived in Japan, I always asked that question, “Are you happy?” Because in Japanese they don’t say, “How are you doing?” They say, “Ogenki desu ka?” Which means are you happy? Are you genki? For thousands of thousands of years, humanity has been pursuing this elusive idea of happiness. We all wanna be happy and even in the declaration of independence, it was about the pursuit of happiness. Jim Rohn said, “Happiness is not something you postpone for the future; it is something you design for the present.” Because the present is a present and only in the present moment you can be aware of your sensations and your emotions and your true happiness. Happiness is not a memory from the past though a memory from the past can bring happiness to the future. Happiness is not in the future of which you’re gonna gain or have. It is in the moment that you are experiencing right now. My guest today is Agapi Stassinopoulos. She’s a bestselling author and speaker who inspires audiences around the world. She is a Greek goddess with a big passion for life, and joy, and helping people finding their own true joy in their heart. We’re gonna talk about her new book, Wake Up to the Joy of You. Even though she is a multiple bestselling author and she’s got many, many books that are incredible, they’re all about one thing; creating the life you really want. Now, without further ado, onto the show. Hi Agapi, and welcome, welcome to Stellar Life podcast.

‏‏Thank you so much, Orion. It’s so lovely to be with you, finally. I feel like in some ways you are like a soul sister although I’m from Greece and you are from Israel. Right?

‏‏Yeah, I love your soul. I love your heart. I love your energy. First time I saw you was on stage at World Domination Summit in Portland. You just came in like a trailblazer and everybody were on their feet and you were dancing. The energy was so high and you were so inspiring and I was like, “Oh, my god. I love her.”

‏‏Oh, my god, thank you. It’s that big Greek spirit and the Mediterranean soul.

‏‏Yeah. You brought a lot of the Greek sunshine with you for sure.

‏‏Thank you sweetheart. Thank you.

‏‏Yeah. I went to Athens with my mom and my sister just recently and that was beautiful. I was thinking about you. I just love, Greek people are freaking awesome. They’re so happy and full of life.

‏‏They’re alive. I think part of what I encourage people to do and I’m a big advocate for is to really tap into your aliveness. Mel Brooks, the comedian and the director said once, “If you’re alive, make a noise. You gotta make a noise.” Because if you’re all contained and suppressed and don’t express, you just don’t feel your aliveness.

‏‏Yeah. We live in a society where people that are alive are considered, it’s either when they start showing that they might be put down but then eventually people accept them, and then eventually they wanna be like them.

‏‏Exactly, exactly. That’s what I really wanted to write in the book because in my book which we’re gonna talk about, I had to emphasize that in order to wake up to the joy in us, we have to accept all parts of ourselves.

‏‏Yeah. For people that haven’t met you yet and they don’t know your life story and who you are, can you share a little bit about yourself and how did you get to do what you’re doing today? What is your mission in life?

‏‏Well, in the new book which came out a year ago actually, it came out January 1st of last year, Wake Up to the Joy of You: 52 Meditations and Practices for a Calmer, Happier Life. In that book, I wanted to tell different stories of my life and how I overcame difficulties, and challenges, and discouragement. As I said in my talk in Portland, what happens when the world doesn’t give you what you are expecting and you have to learn how to be a creator or your life. That’s how I learned it and that’s how I wanted to share it. I decided to do 52 meditations but it’s really more lessons because everyday, we always encounter different energies, different things that challenge us, with people, with our thoughts, with the world, with the news. How do you stay being a calm and a connected human being? How do you stay connected in a world that really challenges you? Do you know what I’m saying?

‏‏Yeah. What were some of your biggest challenge? Now you look back, you were like, “Wow, I overcame that. This amazing. This was such a gift.”

‏‏Well, I think, my greatest awareness was when I realized that I wasn’t really alone, that we have a spirit in us, that we have a connection to the source, we have 37.2 trillion cells that are breathing us, and living us, and making the life force in us. Those cells are powerful and they are really giving us life everyday so that means we have a life force in us that we cannot disregard. A lot of times when life isn’t giving us what we want, we start to feel discouraged. We start to feel that we don’t deserve it or we are not getting it because we’re not worthy or we’re not enough. My greatest lesson was to realize that God, or whatever each person calls God, that the power of the consciousness of who we are is always with us regardless of what we get or we don’t get. When relationships don’t work out, when people don’t get the careers they want, there is a measure of success, and we go out into the world to get things, to feel and to fulfill ourselves, and we don’t get them, then we tend to contract. For me, my greatest lesson was do I contract or do I expand? In the expansion there is a participation of life regardless of what you’re getting because life is for the living and is for the giving. So many times, we are waiting for life to give things to us instead of claiming that we are the givers. That’s when you realize your richness and your abundance and your god-given gifts when you tap into your own source. Now, people can say, “Orion, how do you do that?” That’s when I wrote my book before this, Unbinding the Heart. I told my story. I had a spiritual path. I met my spiritual teacher in Los Angeles, his name was John Roderick, and he passed two years ago. I was very blessed to have a spiritual teacher and a spiritual path that I followed. It’s an inner journey. It was a journey of discovery. I did many seminars. I did a lot of inner work. I did the University of Santa Monica. I started to find myself. The way you find yourself is by participating in the human growth development experience. A lot of times when people are going through things, I say, “Well, are you doing the inner work?” You cannot live in this life and be fulfilled if you are unconscious, if you are not being more conscious about your childhood, about your beliefs, about your limiting beliefs, about how you are raised, about how to express, how to give, how to open up, how to not have separation with other people, how to stop judging, how to love yourself. In this book, one of the things that I speak over and over again is how do you love yourself, how do you let love in?

God, or whatever each person calls God, that the power of the consciousness of who we are is always with us regardless of what we get or we don’t get. Click To Tweet

‏‏I love it. I have a community, I call them goddesses. It’s all about self-love. People think that self-love is about taking a bubble bath and eating some candy but self-love is, it’s a part of it, it’s a part of it. Nourishing your physical essence and taking care, and connecting to your sensuality, and who you are as a woman. If you’re a man, who you are as a man. But the inner work is a big one; forgiveness, gratitude, all those things. It’s a part of it. It’s a part of self-love because you cannot love yourself if you still hold on to anger. Because you were loving yourself but you’re still in a place of poison. When you are in anger, you’re mostly in a victim mentality, that means you don’t own yourself, you don’t own your power. When you don’t own your power, it’s harder to love yourself.

‏‏Exactly. I think that’s very well put, Orion. I think owning your power is getting to know who you are in your spirit than in your beingness because who we are in our personalities and in our worldly self is very limiting. If you think of yourself as an emotional, physical, and mental being then you’re not your thoughts, you’re not your feelings, you’re not your body because obviously, when the body dies, who are you then? I think that’s a big question to really ask one’s self, “Who are you?” I think knowing who you are takes a deeper commitment than a deeper work.

‏‏Yeah. In Judaism, there is a story about the highest priest in the temple. He worked in the temple and he’s like the holiest man of them all. He’s in direct connection with God and then, at age 80 something, he became agnostic, he stopped believing in God. There is this saying that, “Sometimes, you don’t know yourself until the day you die.” It’s a never ending sense of going deeper and exploring, and exploring, and exploring, and you never know where you’re gonna end up in. It’s almost like how deep down the rabbit hole do you wanna go?

‏‏Exactly. That’s the great adventure of life. People struggle with a lot of issues. I think what I wanted to give to people through writing my books was, “What do you do when you’re feeling stuck?” When people feel stuck about love, relationships, how do I open up to myself, and how do you start? Because sometimes it’s like what is the first step to really realize that you are more than a physical being? That you are a spiritual being. I think so much of it is a willingness to look at yourself, a willingness to have a different perspective, to start changing your perspective, or so much of our stackness is how we see the world. Opening up to that takes a certain commitment, certain awareness, certain courage.

‏‏Yes. Sometimes it takes courage to look at and see yourself in the mirror.

‏‏Exactly. Exactly. To look at yourself in the mirror and to also look at yourself so I think, having a sense of spirituality is a great gift because then you realize that you are connected, and supported, and protected, and that’s been my path. Really opening up to the spirit and meditating, doing my practices. My mother was a very spiritual woman. Struggled with a lot of things and I wrote about her extensively in my book, how she inspired me and how she went through what I call having a Greek chutzpah.

‏‏You talk about using meditation as a ritual of awareness. You said that for your mom, her washing dishes or cooking with friends was her human communion.

‏‏Yes, yes. She felt that you have to live in the moment. That’s when she died. We put a lemon tree in our home in Brentwood where we live. We put a bench that said, “Don’t miss the moment.” That was the big part of her life. It was like, don’t miss the moment of connecting with someone because you feel there’s the next moment. All of us often struggled with that because we’re living in an agenda and living in the moment is not easy because we taught ourselves, because we always think there’s something more important to be doing rather than the moment.

‏‏Yeah. That happened to me the other day where I was so focused on whatever internet they know is doing or email or trying to figure out an answer for something, and then I stopped, and I just sat by myself, just quiet for a few minutes, and I was like, “Wow, I forgot that the answers are in this moment.”

‏‏Yes, exactly. People often don’t meditate because they feel the emptiness. When you start to meditate, you can feel the emptiness, and to go deeper into yourself, into your breath, into your life, into your prayer. I think prayer, Orion is the most powerful thing to open up. People would say to me, “Well, I don’t know who I’m praying for.” Well, I said, “Pray to yourself by giving you life.” Just say, “Self, hello. Agapi here. You’re with me.” I think, it’s a very powerful technique and a strategy to know that when you pray, we open up our hearts to receive.

‏‏Agapi, what’s your definition of meditation?

‏‏Meditation to me, without your heart present, and without your loving is very dry. Meditation for me is really taking time to stop, to breathe, and to connect with your heart. Connecting with your heart is really a place where you start with compassion for yourself, or your human process, and you become more centered. You allow a greater presence in a higher frequency, a higher vibration, a higher level to come in and to open up and to guide you. Instead of the monkey mind saying, “On my to-do list, I have to do this and I didn’t do this.” You’re actually going to a place of presence. Presence is love, presence is the heart.

‏‏Listeners, Agapi’s got something really special for us towards the end of this episode so stay tuned. I’m not gonna reveal the surprise yet. Were you always in this state of bliss, and love, and meditation your whole life or did you just discover it along the way?

‏‏No, I’m not in a state of bliss at all now or ever been. On the contrary, I feel I wouldn’t call it bliss. I would call it centeredness. There’s two states. There is a place of where we are shattered and divided, and feeling insufficient and not enough. I wrote a lot about that in the book. I wrote how when we don’t feel we are enough, when we feel we’re not worthy, when we feel that there’s something always we’re seeking or racing after, then there is another place of where you’re centered and we’re acting from inside out. That’s a place where I don’t think it’s bliss, I think it’s more of a centered place that is your connection. I think what most of us always want is a connection. There were many times in my life, and I wrote about this in the Wake Up to the Joy of You book, how when I didn’t have a connection, of how I went after my connection and why I have. In this book, I have 52 meditations because I feel when somebody is guiding us through in the guided meditations, you can actually get back to your connection.

‏‏How did you come up with 52 meditations?

‏‏Well, I wanted to do one for every week. The year has 52 weeks so that’s why I did 52 subjects. I always say this book, people can open it at any subject, at any part of the week, you can open it and read it like the [00:19:32]. It’s not a book that you read cover to cover. You can read it at any time, keep it by your bedside, and open it, and then it starts to awaken different issues because we all have the same issues.

‏‏I have no issues.

‏‏Okay, there you go.

‏‏I’m just kidding.

‏‏That’s one human being, that’s you.

‏‏No, no. I’m kidding. I don’t have issues, that’s my issue. I’m just kidding.

‏‏Yes, exactly.

‏‏How often do you recommend somebody else to meditate?

‏‏I think it’s more like having a practice that you commit to in a daily basis so that you can do five minutes in the morning before you start you day. You can start with 5 minutes, you can do 10 minutes. But I think that there’s something about the daily practice that it becomes a habit like when you brush your teeth or you take a shower. It’s a daily habit. It becomes part of your make-up. I say start your day with a few moments of meditation and end your day with a few moments of meditation.

Start your day with a few moments of meditation and end your day with a few moments of meditation. Click To Tweet

‏‏I have some people that say, “Ugh, I can’t meditate. I can’t. I just can’t.” How can you help them? How can you guide them?

‏‏I think they should download my book. They should download my book because my book has guided meditation with music. Everybody that I meet and everybody that listens to them, they start to feel much more connected because my heart and my spirit move through them and it really helps people recenter and bring the spirit in. It’s like saying, “I can’t lift weights.” It’s the same thing. You have to start by lifting weights. Those people who say, “Oh, I never do cooking or I never do this.” It’s like, anything, it’s a willingness to open up and say, “Let me try it.” The most excruciating thing is to think you can stop your mind because the mind never stops. But there is something higher than the mind which is our beingness. When we tap into that through our breath and through following the breath, and now you know there are many different types of meditation, we can ride that wave, suddenly you feel you override your mind. So that you go deeper into yourself and that’s where the mind, it doesn’t stop, but you are above the mind. Does that make sense?

‏‏Yeah, it makes sense.

‏‏Do you meditate?

‏‏I meditate not as often as I want to but I definitely do. I also had some crazy spiritual experiences where I had out of body experiences and experienced oneness. I tapped into some higher realms. It’s just that it’s not consistent.

‏‏But when you say you don’t meditate as much as you want, so you wanna meditate more but do things get in the way or do you feel that there is always a resistance in meditating? Is that what it is?

‏‏I’ve started developing some resistance. I don’t know why. Where I’m like, “No, no. I’m just wasting my time. I have to go and do what I need to do.” Things are in the way because I get busy and I forget to, and then I’ll do it but not everyday. Not everyday, unfortunately. I used to have a morning ritual everyday and then something happened and I stopped.

‏‏Well, it’s the love of it that makes you wanna do it. Because if something is giving you more energy or feeling really good about yourself and your life. Meditation is an active thing, it’s not a passive thing. It’s where you’re going and you start to place your intention for the day. You use your creative imagination, and you use colors, and you use pictures, and you go to this place of where you are alive and creative. It’s not falling asleep. Then when you finish it, you feel more energized.

‏‏But I have to tell you, I am very connected where I might not go into a whole meditation but a few times a day I’ll tune in and get answers.

‏‏That’s beautiful. I love that. I think we all the ability to tune in and find the answer. You’re absolutely right. It’s an intuitive feeling and you go, “Oh, I know what to do about that.” It’s wonderful when you’re operating from your intuition.

‏‏Yeah, but Agapi, I’m inspired. I am publicly announcing that I’m going to do, in my end it was seven days, but why not? I’m gonna start a 30-day meditation challenge commitment now.

‏‏How about you call it a 30-day meditation love affair?

‏‏I like that.

‏‏Well, because you say challenge, you feel pressured. You say, “This is my love affair. This is the way I love myself. I’d go in and close my eyes.” Let’s do a few minutes right now.

‏‏Sure.

‏‏Let’s just close our eyes, everybody who’s listening.

‏‏If you’re driving, just listen. But go back and listen again when you’re in a quiet place.

‏‏Yes, if you’re driving, please don’t close your eyes, and just take a deep breath.

‏‏Okay, I’m breathing.

‏‏But as you’re breathing slow down your breath. I’m gonna count to the count of four. One, two, three, four. Hold the breath for the count of four, three, two, one. Exhale. Four, three, two one. This time, start to inhale in the count of four again. One, two, three, four. Hold the breath. As you hold the breath, experience it going into your brain, into your head, and exhale very slowly. Four, three, two, one. As you exhale now, exhale all the air out, all the air out, all the air out. Take a deep breath and it’s like now you’re receiving the breath because you have allowed the breath to slow down. Start to imagine that this breath that’s connecting you to your life force, to your spirit, is giving you life. Observe the rising and the falling of your breath. Observe the rising and the falling of your breath. Now, focus on your third eye. Your third eye is between the eyebrows and focus on you heart. You can take your right hand and put it in your heart. On your third eye, imagine a beautiful diamond, any color you want. A big white diamond. A blue diamond. A yellow diamond. A rose quartz diamond. Just see there. Turn all your attention inside yourself so you are now looking from inside this diamond out into the world. Evoke the light. There’s a light of the spirit that’s connecting us. Evoke the light to surround you and filling you and protecting you. As you go deeper into this connection with your breath, as you hold your hand above your heart, feel your breath, the rising and the pushing out of the breath, and the rising of the breath. Just allow the breath and you heart to be so relaxed, and so deepening, and softening the heart where you feel your whole self and your whole being is in your heart, so there’s no separation. Again, return to the breath and observe the breath. Let your breath fall all the way down to your feet, and now, breathe in and create circles and calmness of energy. Like waves, like the ocean waves in, and waves out. Waves in and waves out. Waves in and waves out. Now stay very, very centered in your heart, in your third eye, remember your crystal, your diamond. Start to flood yourself with colors. The white color, a beautiful blue color, a yellow for clarity, an orange color for vitality, and red for strengthening. See this colors, a pink color showering you all the way down, washing you over, washing over your whole aura. Your whole energy field is being washed over by these colors. Take a deep breath and like a rainbow, raise up your hands, all the way up, raise up, and as if you’re pulling this energy down, take a deep breath and exhale like, “Aaaahhh.”

‏‏Aaaahhh.

‏‏Return and take your hands again and raise them up. Take them up as if you are letting go and being in those colors down, aaaahhh. Now take your hands and place them both in your heart. Say a prayer. A prayer of love, a prayer of well-being, a prayer of serenity, a prayer of a good day, a prayer for health and well-being for those you love. Just imagine a positive wave just going out into your life, everything in your life. Your personal life, your work life, your friends, all your decisions, or your next steps, your projects. Just see this wave of light flooding you and reaching out to many that you want to see receive this energy. Now send it back to yourself. Stay in your own energy looking from inside out into your field of energy. Now we are going to chant the Sanskrit word Hu. We’ll chant it together. It seals the energy and protects you. It elevates you. Take a deep breath and we go, “Hu.” Take another deep breath and exhale by, “Hu.” Take another deep breath, “Hu.” And come to your peace and quietness and calm. When you’re ready, just open your eyes, and stay within yourself, and you open your eyes, and compressing back in the room and where you are.

‏‏Wow. Where am I? This was beautiful. Wow, This was so beautiful. Like you said, very grounding. I feel very centered.

‏‏Very centering, yes.

‏‏Yeah, very centering.

‏‏Very alive. Using the colors, using the diamond. You can bring a landscape. You can bring in sunset in your imagination. A calm lake. You can imagine yourself walking in the ocean. It’s like taking yourself out of the to-do anxiety list of our day to go into a place where you feel calm. That’s why I do this guided meditation, Orion. People can download them from Amazon. The audio of the book is on Amazon. I highly recommend it. I have 32 of those meditations for anxiety, for disappointment, for nervousness, for finding your confidence. As a matter of fact, if anybody who is listening, if you email me agapi@nullunbindingtheheart.com that’s my email, and request for me to send you one of my meditations as a gift to you, I have a confidence meditation, I have a meditation for the health,I have a meditation for finding your inner strength. It’d be my pleasure. If you want more, you can download the book from Amazon. You can download the meditations and see how you shift. It’s all about shifting.

‏‏Yeah. I wanna touch about a few more topics from your book. I wanna touch about making health a priority. You said that you learned how to sleep better from your sister, Arianna Huffington. She’s the author of the book Thrive.

‏‏Yes, and Sleep Revolution, her new book is called. It came out two years ago.

‏‏Yeah. Also, you speak about the art of doing nothing. You have a quote from Rumi, “You wander from room to room hunting for the diamond necklace that is already around your neck,” which I loved. Let’s talk about that. How do you make your health a priority and what is the art of doing nothing?

‏‏Well, you make your health your priority by realizing that if you don’t have your health and energy, you don’t have anything. We take our health for granted. One day, something happens where something is not working well, or your body is hurting, or you feel low energy, or you feel you’ve been eating the wrong things so your digestion is not right, or you start to not feel physically fit. Making your health a priority is realizing this is your temple and you have 37.2 trillion cells. You have a responsibility to hydrate, to sleep, to eat the right foods, to make sure you feed yourself with consciousness. Educating yourself to taking the vitamins that support you. Educating yourself, going to nutritionists, going to homeopathic doctors like I do, going to people who support your health, and realizing that once your health goes, it’s just very, very hard to get it back. All of us know when you get a cold or you get sick just from the flu, you feel miserable. That’s so much part of the immune system. Re energizing your immune system, I always take a probiotic everyday. Again, Orion, this is something that is custom made. Everybody has to find it for themselves. But that’s my advice, that’s my first chapter in the book, make your health a priority. Actually, it’s chapter three. The first one is the art of meditation. The art of doing nothing is really doing nothing is really opening up yourself to your creativity, to dreaming, to just thinking of things that you never thought about because if you’re always in your linear self, saying, “I’ve gotta do this. I’ve gotta do that. What about this? What am I gonna wear? How much money do I have? How am I gonna make more money? I need to send these emails. I need to do this deadline.” You’re always operating from the world yourself but if you go, “Oh, my god. Let me think about the cosmos. Let me read a book about the oceans. Let me read a book about third world countries that don’t have anything, that don’t have water.” The art of doing nothing is really not doing nothing in terms of your to-do list but doing nothing is like taking walks and wondering about how extraordinary nature is, how amazing trees are. Trees have been there way longer than we have. They’re gonna be there after we die. How amazing is that? Children have this ability to be in the moment and to play, and to be alive in the moment. It’s really returning to that child self. I recommend reading that chapter because it’s inspiring to know that the art of doing nothing is really very expansive, and it gives you the energy to do your life.

‏‏I say that people often, sometimes they give themselves the time to achieve their dreams but they don’t give themselves the grace to achieve their dreams.

‏‏Yes, exactly.

‏‏You have this concept of avoiding worries and being patient and waiting for the divine timing. Can you elaborate a little bit about that?

‏‏I feel you have to have intention about what you want. Let’s say if you want the number one thing to everybody, they wanna lose weight or they want to be fit. If your intention is to have more energy and to be fit, then you find the system to do it. If you wake up every morning, say, “When I’m fit and when I work out, when I do yoga, or I’ll run, or walk, or go to the gym, or have a stretch, I feel alive. I feel toned in my body.” And then you start to do that on a regular basis because your intention is to love yourself then you find the methodology. But if you say, “I’ve gotta do a 30-minute cardio everyday. Everyday I’ve gotta do it.” Then that to me, personally, creates resistance. But if I go, “I will do it. I will know how it benefits me.” It’s more like switching your brain from the should to the, as I said, it’s a love affair.

‏‏Talking about love affair, you talk about marrying yourself first.

‏‏Marrying yourself means being devoted to yourself.

‏‏With marrying yourself first and creating boundaries, what do you think people should know? How do we put ourselves first without being maybe come across as arrogant or bitchy? How do we create healthy boundaries without hurting others? But we’d give enough respect for ourselves.

‏‏Yeah, I think that’s exactly it. The things what you said. Having respect, honoring yourself, and realizing that your primary responsibility is to yourself. As you take great care of yourself, that overflows to many other people. But if you’re feeling depleted and if you’re always running around taking care of everyone else, you’re gonna feel depleted, resentful, and not having enough resources. A lot of people do that. Being, what I said, people pleasers. I have a whole chapter in the book about that. Don’t be a people pleaser.

‏‏It’s hard not to.

‏‏Well, it’s hard because we all want approval but when you have your connection with your god-self and your spirit self then it’s so much easier. Because you’re operating from an overflow.

‏‏I’ve yet to master that step where…

‏‏Funny. Orion, trust me, we’re all a work in progress.

‏‏That’s exactly what I tell about myself, “Yes, I’m a work in progress.”

‏‏But we have to enjoy the work in progress. We must not take ourselves too seriously.

‏‏Yeah. Amazing. How do you make your ego your ally? What is your ego and why is it not your ally?

‏‏Well, ego is the energy that propels you to do things in the world. If you don’t have an ego and your ego is low, you’re going to not be as effective in the world. You need a healthy ego to express yourself, to ask for what you want, to go out, and achieve,and to make your dreams come true. It’s a question of educating your ego and boosting your ego but not also saying, “I know everything. I’m the best.” And then you get into ego battles. It’s a real education learning what is the ego and how do you humble yourself and yet feel extraordinarily supportive of yourself. Does that make sense? You have to have an ego. But a lot of egos out there in the world get into trouble because they are operating from a place ‘I know everything’. It’s very hard to build teamwork and to cooperate.

‏‏When I work with my clients, I do what I call shadow works, where we go and it’s almost life fragmenting different personalities inside, and taking that personality that maybe we don’t like or afraid of, and embracing her. That connection helps one use her as those qualities as strength instead of weaknesses because if we push down, let’s say, we can call it the ego or a part of ourselves, eventually it’s gonna be in the way of our dreams, of our relationships, of everything. But when we do embrace everything that we are, and we take those ego parts, and we say, “I love you. I accept you. Let’s work together.” Then we can elevate and move…

‏‏Exactly. As we’re closing our podcast, I want to read something from the last chapter of the book, Chapter 52. I want to read this to our listeners. This is called This is your Precious Life. “Feast on the food you love. Make your home a sanctuary. Bring your heart to your workplace. Love the clothes you’re wearing. Create relationships with your field cherries. Bake cookies for people. Don’t wait for special occasions to celebrate. Do things that remind you of the beauty of life often. This is my precious life. The life was given to me. In this precious life I can choose for myself to live in whatever way I want to live. I don’t need to prove my worth to anyone. I choose to do the things that make me happy, that please me, that mean something to me. This life was given to me to live, to enjoy, to learn, to love, to share, to receive, and to give. This is my precious life. I have every right to live it in the way that works for me, not looking left and right for other people to tell me what to do, looking into myself to the place where you know the answers. This is your precious life, live it, sing your song, be patient with yourself, give it your deepest gratitude, celebrate your fullness, embrace all of your aspects, all of your imperfections, and know that you are perfectly imperfect in the eyes of God.”

Be patient with yourself, give it your deepest gratitude, celebrate your fullness, embrace all of your aspects, all of your imperfections, and know that you are perfectly imperfect in the eyes of God. Click To Tweet

‏‏Wow, that’s so beautiful. So beautiful.

‏‏It’s been such a pleasure, Orion.

‏‏It’s been such a pleasure. I wanna invite myself to your house and I want you to bake me cookies.

‏‏Yes, [inaudible [00:44:38] cookies. Let’s see. We’ll bake them together.

‏‏Yeah, let’s do it.

‏‏I just want to give people my website.

‏‏Yes, of course.

‏‏wakeuptothejoyofyou.com. Instagram which is @agapisees, you can follow me on my Instagram. My Facebook, Agapi Stassinopoulos. I have a page that you can follow. As I said, my email is unbindingtheheart.com where you can email me and I’ll send you the guided meditation. Just tell me that you heard me at Orion’s podcast. Also, you can order the book from Amazon, Wake Up to the Joy of You: 52 Meditations and Practices for a Calmer, Happier Life. You can order the book on Amazon and download the audio. Stay in touch and follow Agapi because she will take you into solutions and inspirations about life and how to make your life easier, more inspiring, and more fulfilling.

‏‏Agapi, thank you much. This was a blast. I really enjoyed our conversation. Thank you for the gift. Thank you for the meditation.

‏‏Thank you, sweetheart. Enjoy, enjoy, and I hope to see you all very soon or sometime on my events or live or on the internet.

‏‏Thank you for joining me on my mission to light people up and change lives around the world. I hope today’s conversation inspires you to step up, go after the life of your dreams, and be who you want to be. If you enjoyed this episode, make sure to go to stellarlifepodcast.com for show notes, transcripts, and other cool stuff. Please subscribe, review, and help spread the word by sharing us on Facebook and Twitter. Have a lovely day. I’ll catch you on the next episode.

Your Checklist of Actions to Take

✓ Decide how you want your life to turn out. You have the power to create the life you desire.

✓ Don’t be discouraged when nothing is going right in your life. Life doesn’t always give you what you want but it gives you what you need.

✓ Find a spiritual teacher who can help you get to know yourself on a deeper level. Their guidance will also help you during trying times.  

✓ Live in the moment. Don’t worry about the future or the past and focus on the now.  

✓ Connect with a higher being. Open your heart and welcome blessings through prayer.

✓ Look inside yourself when searching for answers. Be patient with yourself, celebrate your wholeness and embrace your imperfections.

✓ Find something you love to do and are passionate about. This will help you stay inspired and happy.

✓ Practice the art of doing nothing. Find time where you don’t have to answer emails, be on your laptop or do work.

✓ Make your physical and mental health a priority. Learn how to take care of your body and fight stress.

✓ Learn about guided meditation with Agapi’s book, Wake Up to the Joy of You.

Links and Resources:

About Agapi Stassinopoulos

Agapi Stassinopoulos is a best-selling author and speaker who inspires audiences around the world. In her previous book, Unbinding the Heart: A Dose of Greek Wisdom, Generosity, and Unconditional Love, she shares the wisdom from her life’s adventures and experiences. In her new book, Wake Up to the Joy of You: 52 Meditations and Practices for a Calmer, Happier Life, she takes readers on a journey and inspires them to let go of what doesn’t work and instead create the lives they really want.