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Over the years, some of her family members had very strong opinions about her writing. Sometimes mocking and sometimes being jealous, they put her down by saying that she was not going anywhere with it. It did puzzle her but made her more determined, with her mother’s support on her side. But she stopped sharing that part of her life with them.
– Written by Shashi
“Heal yourself through the power of your good feelings.” - Christine Ellis in ‘The Happiness Switch’
My friend, Christine Ellis, from Brussels - Belgium, Author of the book “The Happiness Switch: How to Transform Anxiety, Depression and Other Negative Moods by Focusing On and Cultivating Good Feelings” herself suffered from anxiety and depression for more than two decades. As she had a series of revelations about how her emotions were working, she thought of sharing her stories in order to help others going through the same. The purpose was to relieve suffering. To show people that there is a well of love, of goodness, of health and of utter well-being at the very core of who they are. To remind them that they are pure, blissful spirit poured into the flesh and bones form, not the other way around.
Yes, for her it is important to recognize that she has done something with her life and that something is to help someone reconnect to their sense of well-being. Healing them from some sort of pain. This sense of purpose comes from way back, when she was witness to her father's struggle with cancer, her mother's depression, aunts and uncles’ tortured life that had loneliness, alcoholism and all kinds of soul-twisting pain. Back then, in her early childhood, she felt responsible for all of it, like it was somehow her fault. She says that some of that guilt still lingers in her. But then, she accepts that, this is where her enthusiasm comes from. Relieving suffering and connecting people to love are worthy life-goals. She feels that the path has taken her to do that through writing.
“I am good with words. People respond to them. So I am using the words to teach - and, ultimately, love them back.” - Christine Ellis
“I am good with words. People respond to them. So I am using the words to teach - and, ultimately, love them back.” - Christine Ellis
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| The Desk |
Over the years, some of her family members had very strong opinions about her writing. Sometimes mocking and sometimes being jealous, they put her down by saying that she was not going anywhere with it. It did puzzle her but made her more determined, with her mother’s support on her side. But she stopped sharing that part of her life with them.
“It is no good discussing something that brings conflict.” - Christine Ellis
She likes to write in her office at home, at her desk to which she is quite attached. It belonged to a great-uncle of her husband’s. It has a big hole in the back, where a German officer shot his rifle or gun during the Second World War. This great-uncle was a teacher, who taught Latin in school.
“I love objects like this - full of stories. I have the impression that it is an old friend. It has adopted me, this desk. I am part of its life as much as it is a part of mine.” - Christine Ellis
She works at her computer, which was set up by her husband, at the table - and she feels loved when she sits there, even if she is not writing.
BRIEF NOTE ABOUT THE AUTHOR
CHRISTINE ELLIS is a former teacher who discovered, after being diagnosed with depression and PTSD, a lasting way to transform her life each and every day: focusing on good feelings.
She now writes books and designs online courses about good feelings and feeling good.
She has more books in the works about feelings and how to manage moods and build dreams and heal... One of them is coming out in March of 2017.
All of her stories have a happy ending.
Christine lives in Brussels, Belgium with her husband and young son.
HER INSPIRATIONS
Words are beautiful. Words are magical - they carry emotion. They carry information. They are capable of carrying wisdom that can thus travel very far - and for a very long time. Books have always been with me and have given me worlds upon worlds, especially early on when my horizon, in "real" life, was very small. I am home in those worlds, which are as infinite as the Universe itself. There is LIFE there, there is friendship, there is love, there is great healing. I connect to all that and it resonates with a very deep part of me in a profoundly fulfilling way.
HER CHALLENGES
I had some sort of belief that people will not be attracted to a book that talks about feelings. Perhaps it was there because the same people who made fun of my writing were also making fun of emotions. "Too much drama... why talk about feelings? Just LIVE! DO! Why do you need to talk about it?"
As always, the biggest challenges have to do with self-confidence (or self-doubt).
QUOTES FROM THE BOOK
"The human mind has long been likened to a garden. Wise men tell us to cultivate good thoughts and weed out the bad ones. Indeed. It is the highest of practices. High it may be. But easy, it is certainly not."
“Practicing just “feeling good” by contemplating pure good feelings will not only make you stronger but it will spill over into everything else.”
"Have you ever tried to write down all the positive feelings that you feel on a regular basis? How long do you think the list is?"
“Just because something is good for you, doesn’t mean that you will do it.”
THE BOOK
How to use the built-in power of your emotional system to shift out of depression, anxiety and other negative states
I suffered from anxiety and depression for more than two decades. I was even diagnosed with PTSD at some point. I tried for a very long time to get a handle on my moods and become the sunny, happy person I was occasionally, but I always bounced back. After the birth of my son, I was determined to get better. And better I got. I had a series of revelations about how my emotions are working and that it is actually possible (and it becomes easy!) to guide them.
I am not a medical doctor and I have no medical training though. What I offer you are my own stories and my own method. I'm just a regular teacher, mom and wife who has figured out how to live well inside her skin. Or, better said, inside her mind.
The book will guide you:
1 - How to generate positive feelings and emotions at will
2 - How to stay in good feeling states, moods and emotions consistently
3 - How to coach yourself out of “the blues"
SOME INTERESTING FACTS ABOUT CHRISTINE ELLIS
I jumped out of an airplane on my 27th birthday. Yes, of course I had a parachute. But I was incredibly scared. I would not do it again but I don't regret having done it. It was part of a "Face Your Fears" campaign I was running with myself: I confronted some fear, no matter how big or small, every single day for a year.
TWO BIG THINGS OF HER LIFE
Loving my son and my husband.
Having a few life-long friendships.
HER FAVORITES
GENRE: Books
It is hard to choose. I love literary fiction, mythology, psychology, self-help, economics, children's books, fantasy etc. The genre really does not matter much. It is the book itself.
BOOKS:
"The Hero with a Thousand Faces" by Joseph Campbell. He made me see patterns in life, human behavior, and societies... that I had never seen before. He changed the way I looked at life and opened my horizons immensely. I love everything he wrote but this was the first book of his I ever read.
"East of Eden" by John Steinbeck. I was 14 when i read this book for the first time and I still think of it as one of the best I have ever read. It is beyond epic. It is life itself. There is love in it, the kind that hurts... it has a strange sense of humor too. It is not sentimental at all... you have the impression that you are watching the Universe come into existence for those people in the book - and then slowly dying again... only to come back to life.
TO BUY THE BOOK “The Happiness Switch” by Christine Ellis … CLICK HERE
– Written by Shashi
CEO & Partner ICUBE Projects
Speaker | Author of “Songs of the Mist” | Haiku Poet
Writes India’s #1 Spiritual Blog “Shadow Dancing With Mind”
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ॐ नमः शिवाय
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