Then you’ve come to the right place. My name is Katherine Cerulean and I’ve broken through and started living my dreams and I want you to also.
You know there’s more out there. You know you were meant for something much more than what you’ve settled for. So join me and Come Alive.
How to Come Alive — 25 Ideas to Change Your Life
Please note: This site contains in full my first nonfiction book How To Come Alive: A Guidebook to Living the Life of Your Dreams. While available on Amazon, I realized I want to share and help as many people, including those without the means or inclination to buy something from me. My career is fiction; my nonfiction is just love. I want you all to be amazing. So, read the introduction/afterword (below) if you like, then dig into the individual sections. I hope you enjoy my book, and will visit Katherinecerulean.com if you want to explore my fiction or follow my inspirational blog. Please contact me at katherinecerulean@gmail.com if you have any questions or need any help. And if you enjoy this site please share it with others.
Best wishes, you awesome, amazing peeps.
How This Book (Site) Works
In order to become fully alive you’ll need Inspiration, Freedom, Peace, Energy, and Strength. And I have found that the best way to change your life forever is to increase all five of those forces at the same time.
Is it hard work? You bet.
But it’s doable.
By you.
Right now.
That bears repeating — You have everything within yourself that you need to live the life you’ve been dreaming of.
What you also have is fear. Most people’s aversion to hard work is really a fear of failure. ‘What if I work super-hard, give it my all, and it doesn’t work?’ You would try again until it did work, or you’d find a bigger way to do something or a better dream to have. You can’t really luck into the life of your dreams, and a bad break can never keep you from your destiny. So don’t be afraid of hard work; instead get excited that hard work is all it takes to get you from here to your dreams.
So make a game out of it and tell yourself you are going to slay these goals. Then read through each section and pick one Inspiration, Freedom, Peace, Energy, and Strength goal to move you forward in the game of life. By the end of thirty days, you won’t recognize yourself or your life.
One last thing — each idea is followed by a Beginner, Intermediate, and Advanced goal. You may want to do a month or two of small goals, followed by a month of medium ones etc. Or mix it up with some beginner Energy and Strength goals, some intermediate Peace and Freedom goals and then knock it out of the park with an advanced Inspiration goal. It’s up to you and your excitement level (I’m hoping it’s ‘Through the Roof’ level).
I’ve started these goals small, but if you want to see some real come alive magic, make your goals as big as you can imagine while still having a chance to complete them. So envision writing a book in a month, or cycling 20 miles, or giving up refined sugar — and then watch your life get crazy.
Crazy good.
— INTRODUCTION —
“Don’t ask what the world needs.
Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it.
Because what the world needs is
people who have come alive.”
— Howard Thurman
Breaking Free
We in America have more time, more money, more freedom, and a longer lifespan than any other generation upon Planet Earth in its history. But we use more anti-depressants, are fatter, are deeper in debt, have more storage units for more junk, and are more cynical and less empathetic than any previous generation also. We have it all, and don’t have a clue how to use it to make us happier
Most of us think that if we just keep chasing the ‘dreams’ society has laid out in front of us, someday we’ll reach true happiness. That raise, more money, finding Mr. or Ms. Right. We KNOW that these things will make us happy, because we have heard that capitalism-meets-Grimm’s-fairytale bedtime story our whole lives.
And yet in a happiness race between lottery winners and people who were paralyzed from accidents, a famous 1978 study showed that the people who had gone through some of the worse life had to offer and come out the other side reported more, and longer term, happiness than the lottery winners. And 90% of lottery winners are broke within five years, according to the New York Times. It’s enough to make you doubt if money really can buy happiness. And if it can’t, why are we wasting our valuable time on this earth going after it?
Also not buying you any happiness — the Hollywood-spun fantasy of someday losing fifty pounds, taking a cruise of the Mediterranean, and meeting the love of your life. Let me give you a clue — all those things do exist, but only on the other side of your coming alive and living the life of your dreams. Once you’re truly alive you can’t keep health, adventure, or love away with a stick. Dreams can lead to plans, but fantasies lead nowhere.
And bad news about that promotion. The jobs with the highest levels of satisfaction and happiness are some of the least well-paying — teachers, social workers, nurses. So if you hate your job now, don’t count on the next rung up the ladder making the view any rosier. I worked in a retail establishment for years and my observation was that people got a lot less happy the higher in the company they went; that’s why they were paid more. Now, in a great company that you love, it won’t be that way — but if you’re unhappy now, don’t waste another minute moving up in a company that you hate.
In fact, not wasting your precious time is one of the three most important points of this little book. You are too special, too important, and too wondrous (and you know it!) to waste your life doing pointless, careless, and heartless things. You have a destiny, and it’s a great one.
The other two things that it’s important for you to know: you can live the life of your dreams if you’re willing to work hard; and the world needs more people who have come alive and are loving every minute of their lives.
Perhaps a little background is in order. My life is extraordinary mostly in what it has lacked — I never went to any school or college, and grew up in the country, away from other children. Some of this was by design (my mother, a teacher, didn’t like what she was seeing in the early 1980s in Georgia education and so decided to homeschool us), and some just came from my sister and I both being introverts and enjoying our home and family and not feeling a great pull to play with other kids.
What I long thought was a completely boring, completely normal upbringing, I eventually came to realize was instead a quite amazing opportunity to experience life and growing up without the peer pressure, the attitudes, and the cruelty of some of our American youth.
Now it wasn’t perfect (I’m super-empathic and don’t have many close friends, for example), but the love and unwavering support I received has helped me to sidestep some of the pains that can take years to get over.
I was raised in the countryside, playing with animals and making up stories all day long. ‘Making up stories’ continues to this day as I pursue my life’s purpose as a novelist. My sister is a passionate artist. In 2002 our father left our family and in 2004 our mother passed on. Sarah and I rallied and built a new life — living together, honing our creative skills, and working at a ‘big box’ retailer together.
But by early 2013, we were ready for a change — like you may be ready for a change. We had worked, and honed, and dreamed, and — were still not there. What was missing?
Action. That was the secret spice that started making our dreams a reality. All the thoughts and wishes in the world can’t equal one step in the right direction.
That’s what this book is about. My plan in writing today is to help you to make the goals, find the inspiration, and follow a course of ACTION that can change your life from where you are to where you want to be.
And lastly, don’t be disheartened if my 25 ways to come alive are not the same as yours; that is as it should be. Instead, I recommend you find (on this site or beyond) one item from each of the five categories and then commit to doing those five things every day for a month. If you’re looking for your dream job, then spend 15 minutes every day connecting with things you’ve loved in the past or always wanted to try — take a class, listen to a speech. If it’s ’Make Home Meals’, then commit to one more home meal a day than you usually would eat — pack a lunch, or make breakfast before you leave in the morning. If your goal is to make your home nicer and ‘Give It Away‘, then spend a few minutes each day cleaning an area and packing up at least three items to give to the thrift shop. Some goals in here may not have a daily quota; instead touch on them each day and make sure you are still moving forward.
The main point is to complete your five item list 100% percent every day of that month, no excuses. And then, one day, you’ll begin to see yourself as the awesome, fantastic person you have always been and have always wanted to be.
You’ll start to come alive.
— AFTERWARD —
And Now, Go Become Alive
The ideas in this little book (site) are not the answers; rather they are hints, tips, and above all, a slight wink and a nod of the head to get you moving toward that secret gate, the one buried under ivy years ago, the one that leads you down a forgotten lane to the land of your dreams and the purpose of your life.
If you take nothing else away from this book, take this — you are right.
You feel there is more out there, that you are beautiful and magical and were put here to inspire others and set the world on fire. You are right.
You know that chasing things and money and promotions will not bring you any more peace on your death bed. You are right.
You know that sometimes, around the edges of the boredom and monotony and the disappointment and inertia, sometimes little things appear and your soul lights up — be it because of a phrase, or a bird on a windowsill, or a song, and in that moment you think that life is supposed to always be like this. You are right.
And you suspect that you can change your life, you can choose to become alive in the present moment, and you can begin to live the life of your dreams.
And you can.
“Never, never, never give up.”
— Winston Churchill
It will be an honor to watch as you come alive. Please let me know about your progress by contacting me at Katherinecerulean.com.
Have a great day and a wonderful life,
Katherine
How to Come Alive 