You betta Wake up and Pay Attention

I had a group of guys over just for conversation recently. As it usually does, the topic of relationships came up. Specifically the idea that monogamy is impossible for men. Basically the understanding that I hear more and more people coming to is "Men are predisposed to cheating."

Now I wholeheartedly disagree with this sentiment. I disagree because I haven't cheated on someone I had decided to enter into a monogamous relationship with. Now I will say that is not to say that I wasn't tempted, I was tempted a lot. But I decided that I wanted to hold fast to my commitment to this person so I didn't go through with it.

But it did make me think about something. There is ALOT of visual stimulation out there. There are attractive men and women every where. No matter where you go or what you are doing - unless you are sequestered away - you are going to pass by someone you find attractive. You may even find them more attractive than the person you may be dating or married to. But does that mean that you have to sleep with every person you have a sexual attraction to (that is supposing of course that they are also attracted to you) ?? Of course the answer to that is no. But the constant barrage of attractiveness sure does make it hard [pun intended ;-) ] .

It lead me to realize something - how hard it has become for us to focus our attention. In our fast paced world, before we can get too far with one thing, something that looks or feels better comes our way. Opportunities abound and there is always something to take our attention from where we may decide for it to be.

Take me for example. I started this Philosopher's Challenge with www.philosophersnotes.com. All I have to do is read and contemplate one 6-page synopsis of the major points of a different personal, financial or spiritual development book each day for 100 days. Actually let's be clear that it's 100 weekdays, no new information comes out on the weekend. For added interaction and revelation I could also add my thoughts to a message board about the days reading or at least just read what others thought and learned about the readings.

At this moment I am 5 days behind. (HAAHAA)

Mind you, I did say that there were no readings assigned for the weekends. So here I am a full week behind schedule on something I committed to for my own personal growth. I could have knocked out these 30 pages over the weekend with no problem. Or, hell, I sit at my desk with nothing to really do for probably a good 40-50 percent of my day (might be more but just in case a coworker reads this...lol). But at the end of the day, what have I done....

Well in a day I have probably...

• Clicked on the Facebook icon about 200 times to refresh and see if any friends updated statuses.
• Clicked through friends of friends to see who knows who and if I know any of them (or if they are cute...lets be real...lol)
• refreshed my gmail page about 50 times to see if new emails came in (not like it doesn't refresh itself and shows how many new messages in the browser header)
• Played games on my iPhone
• Taken a 20 minute nap

I am sure I could have listed more things that I gave my attention to instead of the things I could be doing to improve my life, but it's depressing me...LOL And when we take the time to focus on how much time we waste, we waste time focusing on feeling bad because of the time we wasted.

So I think even with the idea of cheating, we are not using our God given ability to focus our attention on this person who brings joy into our lives. We aren't paying attention to that person or to what it takes to keep the romance of the relationship alive. We are paying attention to our fears of being hurt and abandoned, fears of being bored, fears of missing out on "better sex", or having a "better person." In our fear of missing out on something, we may be missing out on the greatest blessing to come into our lives.

As Lauren Hill sang in Sister Act 2, "If you wanna be somebody, if you wanna go somewhere, you betta wake up and pay attention!"

Focus on who and what you have right now. By allowing your attention to waver, you are missing all of the blessings that this person who is available to you right now has to bring into your life. Focusing your attention into this person and basking in the joy that you feel when you are with them are the best things you can do for one another.

We will build better relationships and all around better lives when we can harness the power of focusing our attention on what we want and ignoring distractions. As a matter of fact, I am going to grab some lunch and focus on the person I have been blessed with and see what new ways I can come up with to let them know I care. Hmmmmmmm....

Letting People Be

This has been a theme for me over the past few months and a theme for people I am close to as well.

It can be hard to let people be who they are. We sometimes do know a better way, a better option but others don't see it or just don't want to make the shift to incorporate it in their lives. They just won't do it. And it really is their choice. They have the same free will we have and the ability to pick and choose their actions and in-actions as they so please.

We get frustrated because we also have made a choice that we don't want to give in on. The way we want things to be done may seem like commonsense to us - it may seem like commonsense to many, but this one person just won't do it that way. In that moment, we want to take away their ability to choose for themselves. We why they just won't do what we say. We feel that everything would just be better if they would do things the way we have told them.

Our arrogance is the source of our frustration. You can only get stuck between a rock and a hard place when you ARE a rock and a hard place. It's our stubbornness that has us facing off with folks mentally and complaining about their choices - especially when there choices effect us.

So what do we do? How to we handle the situation? Peace comes in understanding that this person has the right and privilege (and free-will) to make a decision - even one I don't agree with. Peace comes in letting this person experience the consequences of their choice for themselves. Peace comes in being flexible, malleable. Peace comes from working within or around the choices of the person(s) you are dealing with. Peace comes in understanding that the only person any of use can control or change is ourselves.

Look at water in a river, it is constantly moving toward it's destination. It flows through, around and above anything in it's way - and even if you were to create a dam, it would rise above it or the pressure would build until the dam breaks (that's why some water has to be let through a dam so there is no overflow and so the dam won't break due to the build up of water pressure). Water opposes nothing, it literally goes with the flow.

Take a lesson from water and go with the flow. You don't want to be frustrated by other people, don't expect them to do or be anything but who they have shown you they are. If you don't like it, choose not to deal with that person. If you are in a situation where you have to deal with a person, rise above their negativity and instead of looking for ways to counter their opposition, look for opportunities to work with this person. When negative energy isn't returned, it diffuses and when it does you will find people so much easier to work with. But by this time you will also know ways to work with or around this person to accomplish the same goals.

Bottom line - you hate it when someone tells you what to do or tries to force their way on you. Generally that behavior makes you want to dig in your heels more. Just don't do to others what you DON'T want to be done to you. Respect their choices and their right to make those choices and find a way, with or without that person to reach whatever end you have in mind.

"When you express your beliefs openly and gently, others will sense your respect for their beliefs, even though they may differ from your own, and be more apt to listen to your thoughts and feelings." (DailyOM.com) And they may even do things your way if they don't feel you are trying to force them into it.

The Old Must Pass Away

For something new to be built, the old building must be removed and destroyed to make space for the new one. Even if the old building is just going through renovations, there is a time of demolition before the new space can be worked on. The new doesn't just magically appear in place of the old. It moves from demolition to construction. And this "work" time is usually uncomfortable and filled with unexpected challenges that are a part of the preparation of the new thing that is being constructed. It works the same in our lives.

We experience something. We don't like it and we formulate in our minds and hearts what we would prefer to experience. We revel in the beauty of the new thing we are experiencing in our minds. But the first step in the process of the creation of this new experience is the removal of the past, of the person we were, so that we can experience the person we want to be - the person who can accept and appreciate the newness and blessing coming into our lives. But this is where we can get stuck.

Misery can become comfortable. It's what we know and what we expect. It is easy to sit quietly in it. Why? Because we fear the work necessary and the unexpectedness of moving from misery to joy. So we make our misery everyone else's fault. We say, if the people in my life change, then my life will be better. We may think that if we change the people and circumstances in our lives, our lives will be better. And while there is some truth to that, if we don't change the person we are, we will continue to experience the same stuff with different faces in different places.

We must let the old us - the old thought patterns that created the life we are experiencing - pass away in order for a new thought pattern, a new attraction point, a new us to be created.

Yet this is where we get stuck. The process of demolishing the old thought pattern and embracing a new one is challenging. The idea of facing our fears is daunting. And the thought of walking through that valley of the shadow of death can be so overwhelming that we turn around and stay the same person who accepts the misery that we expect in our lives.

But the shadow of death isn't the reality of it. It has no substance. The fears you face, when you stand and look them in the eye are not real, they have no power and as you WALK THROUGH the valley and realize that there are only shadows and that the power of God is with you and in you. You see that this power is greater than your fear and you see that it is your choice to believe in the power of this fear or believe in the power of God to bring you through.

Facing these fears and knowing you don't have to believe them anymore tears down the old you. This process creates the space for you to install new beliefs about yourself and your possibilities and you will find new blessings and new mercies as you see the image of the life you want to experience being manifested for you.

As scary as it can seem, the people, places and things of your old life - manifestations of your old though processes - can and must be let go of to make room for the newness of life you desire to experience. Trying to make a new life with old materials will only leave in the same misery you have been experiencing. As Jesus said, you can't put new wine into old wine skins. The old skins will break and be worthless. Be the new person who experiences these new things.

Write a list, or a story, of the life you want to experience. Make it as detailed as you possibly can. Write it in present tense. Now think about who you are now and your beliefs about what you want to experience. Now write a another list, another story, of the person you have to be in order to experience this new thing, complete with all the new beliefs and even personality traits necessary. When you feel hesitation about the possibilities of what you have written, explore it. Ask yourself why can't you have the life you want. You will discover that you (or the beliefs you accepted from your parent, teachers, preachers, etc.) created the boundaries that keep you trapped in the cycles of life you are experiencing and you will know that YOU HAVE THE POWER to remove those boundaries and experience more and better than you have known to this point.

Embrace the process of removing the debris from your life. Removal of the people, places and even things that you hold on to that keep you from standing in your power and living the greatness you are. While it will create an empty space, this is the space that you can begin to fill with the newness of you - and the newness of you will attract new people, places and things that look like the list/story you have written for your life.

I am experiencing this right now.

You are experiencing exactly what you want to experience

Some of you might look at the title of this blog and think "NO the hell I am not where I want to be." And that is only expected. Why? Because we don't have the cars we want, the relationships we want, the house, the job, the money, etc. We are experiencing emotional and physical pains. We are getting older and we are overweight. There is a whole host of things that seem so wrong with this moment right here that we can't help but think, "There has got to be more than this!"

And there is... but before we get to that, lets think on the title of this blog for a bit. You are right were you want to be, experiencing exactly what you want to be experiencing. In this moment, you are experiencing the very emotions you want to experience. HMMMMMM

Now the thought is, WHY would I want to experience this??? And that I can't answer for you. But the question I would ask you is if you don't want to experience it, why are you spending so much time thinking about it?

Our thoughts drive our lives. And the thoughts we think stimulate emotions within us. So if we spend more time thinking about the things that are stimulating emotions we "don't want to feel" - what are we going to feel???? You got it - BAD!!! And honestly, we are gonna keep experiencing the same thing until we get tired of it. So if you are thinking about the negative things happening in your life and how bad you feel about them, more negative things will show up so you can keep feeling bad. Seems counter productive but we do it to ourselves.

So yes, something as simple as a change of mind can change our experiences in life. Right now there is something happening in your life that you get joy from thinking about. Close your eyes and dwell on it for a few moments. How did that feel in your body? Did you experience warm fuzzy feelings? Did you find yourself smiling just a bit? Did something else pop into your mind that was joyful? With that memory and that feeling lingering, how do you feel now? Better??? (until you start thinking about what's going wrong again... stop that!)

Free will is the ability to experience whatever you want to experience in thought and emotion. Material expression/manifestation is the physical counterpart to extend that experience. God's gift is free will, freedom of expression and God will not limit our ability to have the types of experiences we want to have. So if what is showing up in your life are things that cause you to feel sorrow or pain, find out what's going on in your mind. Chances are your thoughts are focused on the sorrow and pain and inadvertently continuing to manifest situations that perpetuate those feelings.

So how do you change the cycle? Change what you spend your time thinking about. Think about the good that is in your life. Remind yourself of the blessings. Spend time with people that make you feel good. Do things for yourself that bring you joy. Pay attention to your mood, when it sinks into a negative space pay attention to what you are thinking in that moment and change it.

You really are in control of how you feel from moment to moment by the power of the thoughts that you hold in your mind. The thoughts that you hold in your mind will manifest as situations to perpetuate more of those feelings - whatever they are. And nothing can or will change your experience except you.

Own that power and transform your life.

“Everything can be taken from a man but one thing; the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.” Viktor Frankl from 'A Man's Search for Meaning'

Life: Abundantly

Life: Abundantly

“Most of you are much closer to a financial fortune [better body, romantic partnership, car, house, prosperous business, etc.] than you are even allowing yourself to purely desire, because, in the thought that it might come, you right away begin thinking of how disappointed you will be if it does not come. And so, in your lackful thought, you do not allow yourself to desire or to expect anything magnificent in terms of money; and that is the reason why, for the most part, you are living rather mediocre financial experiences.” ~ Esther and Jerry Hicks from Money, and the Law of Attraction

I remember having a daydream when I was in my early twenties. In this vision, God stood before me with a gift. It was a miraculous gift, because it was from God. It was just what I needed and wanted and perhaps was just the first of many. As God stood there holding this gift before me, I stood there with my arms at my side. Here it was, all I needed and wanted to have was right in front of my face. Then the thought ran through my mind “You just have to reach out and take it.”

Why, even in the vision, didn’t I reach out at that moment and take what was being freely given to me? I think the answer is both multifaceted and universal – I was afraid. What would be required of me if I accepted it? Was the gift really even for me? What if this wasn’t what I thought it would be? What if I couldn’t handle the gift or the responsibility I thought came with it? So instead of opening myself wholeheartedly to accepting this gift, like a child diving face first into the pile of gifts under the Christmas tree, I second guessed myself and God.

I think it’s clear; we experience mediocrity because we believe in our mediocrity. We don’t allow ourselves to believe that the abundance of the Universe is our birthright. And who are we to deny God the pleasure of pleasing us? Why do we feel undeserving of gifts freely given by our creator who loves us unconditionally? Why do we even feel bad for wanting to be extravagantly blessed?

The Prayer of Jabez tells the story of a man that goes to heaven. During a tour of heaven, the angel reluctantly shows him a building that holds mounds of gifts. When he requested it, the angel takes him to the gifts meant for him. The angel, in the end, tells him that these are all the gifts God had prepared for his children that we didn’t receive during our lifetime.

Have you ever had a person refuse a gift you were giving? What excuses did they give? That they didn’t deserve it? That it was too much? That they were too embarrassed? They didn’t know if they could take care of it? They don’t have faith in their own worth and worthiness to receive the gifts you give in love. And these are the same excuses we give for not receiving the blessings that God has prepared for us.

James 4 talks about the faith of Abraham. Abraham’s faith was counted unto him as righteousness. The fact that Abraham believed God’s promise to make him the Father of many nations, even in his old age he kept to that faith and not only was the promise fulfilled, he was right with God because of his faith.

So if we understand that God is capable of doing far more abundantly than we can think or ask and that God WANTS to do far more for us than we can think or ask, unbounded belief in and acceptance of these gifts, in whatever form they take, is counted as righteousness unto us as well.

So it is actually RIGHTEOUSNESS, not selfishness, to believe that we are BLESSED BEYOND MEASURE and to have the FAITH to accept that all the promises of God are Yea and AMEN!

What have you been promised? Release the full capability of your faith. Set aside your doubts and fears and open yourself to the unlimited resources of the universe there for your benefit and wellbeing. Take the steps of faith that are necessary for your to “reach out” and grab the gifts awaiting you from God – start writing that book, designing those clothes, singing those songs, etc. – and you will begin to learn what it means to be prosperous and blessed.

When Grandma Died

When I was born, my Grandmother told my mother she would live to see be graduate. She almost did.

Even though she was really my aunt, I called her Grandma. She basically raised my mother and took care of me as a baby. I was always close to her and never thought it was strange that I had two grandmothers on one side of my family. I didn’t find out the reality of our relation until I was older, but it never made a difference to me.

It was scary for me when she got older. I never thought about life without her in it. I really got nervous when she was moved into a nursing home because she couldn’t live on her own and started forgetting things and people. But there was something about our bond. So special that she never forgot my name or who I was dispite the Alzheimers. So special that each time I left from a visit with her, there was a knowledge that I would see her again. Even with her going back and forth to the hospital, I knew I would see her again. Until my senior year in high school.

Grandma was back in the hospital, not unlike times past. But there was something different. The moment I walked into that hospital room that night in January 1990 it hit me like a ton of bricks. I knew this would be the last time I would see her alive.

She laid there in that bed with her eyes closed. I don’t know what she knew or didn’t know about who was there to see her. But as my mother and step-father stood beside her bed talking to her, I sat in the corner of the room in stunned silence. I hadn’t experienced a sorrow in my life as deep as that. I didn’t want to believe or accept the finality I knew in those moments. This was my special lady.

It wasn’t until the room was clear that I felt as if I could go to her side. I took her hand and cried like I never had before. I don’t know how long I stood there before I could finally speak to her and tell he how much I loved her. And somehow, by the grace of God, when I could let her hand go I was able to let her go. I knew she would be ok. I don’t know how long it was before the tears stopped that night. But once they were dry, I didn’t cry again - until this moment 19 years later as I think back on that night.

While she didn’t physically see me graduate, I know she was there. I know she’s been cheering me on and watching out for me just like she always did. And I still have po-ke-no, Connect Four, I D-clare War, Dueces, afternoons watching “the stories,” telling her to wake up and her telling we she was just resting her eyes - I have those memories and I know that means I will always have her in my heart.

I do miss her still.

Develop High Energy Habits

A friend and I had a conversation about how much time we waste doing things that are not moving us in the direction of our goals. I, for one, am a Facebook Addict. There I said it. I will log-in in the morning and stay connected all day long. I refresh the page to see if any of my friends have said something I just have to read and know and I play the games and send virtual gifts to my friends all day long. Now while I do get work done, I tend to piddle away any down time I have on Facebook. Then later in the day I feel bad because I didn’t accomplish anything with my day. At night and on the weekends it’s television (while being logged into Facebook). I will spend hours watching TV, even when there is nothing on I want to see. I spend relatively little time focused on the things that will help me create the life I desire to have.

Not to say that there is anything wrong with Facebook or watching TV or whatever it is that keeps us from following our path consistently, we all need to take downtime and just relax and enjoy ourselves. But when our lives become overrun with these things and we feel discontented with the progress we are making in our lives and careers, we need to pause and take notice.
These are low energy habits. These things keep us from the high energy, productive and creative lives we long to live. If you follow the lives of highly successful people, most of their time is spent in the pursuit of their goals and less on time and energy draining distractions. These people have not only keyed in on what they want to accomplish in their lives, they are taking the inspired steps to make those things a reality. And that is the main difference between them and the rest of us.

The difference between high energy and low energy activities is how you feel afterwards. When you complete a high energy activity, while you may be tired physically depending on the level of exertion, you feel the joy of having accomplished something. You feel renewed and more alive. The knowledge that you have made another step towards your goals makes you more enthusiastic and you become a beacon of light to those around you. Low energy activities keep you feeling dissatisfied with your life, you become more lethargic and experience boredom. You can become increasingly depressed because your life seems to be at a standstill, you aren’t accomplishing anything worthwhile or making an impact on the community around you.
And what we all long for inside it to make an impact and an imprint on the minds and hearts of those around us. But as we spend countless hours each week engaged in activities that only serve to temporarily entertain us, we miss out on opportunities to burst through the self-imposed ceiling of success we think restrains us.

But I think I have to ask myself: What do I get out of pursuing low energy activities?

We don’t do anything that we don’t get something out of. Even if what we get is a “confirmation” of our own lack of self-worth, self-esteem or sense of deserving. Perhaps we are afraid that our success will put us out of touch with our friends or family. Maybe we believe that there is a limit to how much we can achieve and these activities hold us below that limit. Maybe our preconceived notions about successful people are negative and by not being as successful we think we are somehow better than them. Whatever the underlying motivation, there is something that has us delaying our success instead of tackling it full force. And most of these underlying beliefs are necessary or true to our lives at this point. When we ask this question, we empower ourselves to choose more productive, high energy activities that make us feel so much better about ourselves.

That’s how I came up with this blog. I made a decision that I was going to log off of Facebook and read some articles in Psychology Today Magazine. I finished reading an article and felt so much better about the way I had spent those 15 minutes. While I thought about how good that felt, I knew I needed to write about that good feeling. These words are a product of that introspection. And you know what, I feel even better having written this and can’t wait to see how I will be inspired to spend my time this afternoon.

So I encourage you to log off that website, put down that controller, turn off that TV and start by doing one thing that moves you towards your goal. Like the Lays potato chip slogan, I bet you can’t do just one.

Some tips for engaging more consistently in high energy activities:

1. Have a specific goal (or set of goals) in mind. Know what it is you want to accomplish. Think of what it will look like when the goal is accomplished. To get someplace, you have to know where you are going.
2. Write down your goals and have copies in places where you can look at them frequently. These will be reminders to you of what you want to accomplish. This will help you keep focused.
3. Notice when you are engaged in a low energy activity and choose to get back to achieving your goals. Many of us habitually engage in low energy activities and we start doing them by default, as if on autopilot. SNAP OUT OF IT. Post your goal reminders near the things that have become used for low energy activities; on the computer, TV, game system or refrigerator.
4. Get an accountability buddy. Have someone in your life (a friend, a life coach, a counselor) who will remind you of those things you want to accomplish and hold you to them.
5. Join/create a Mastermind group. You will not only inspire each other with your passion for what you want to accomplish, you will also have accountability buddies and another source of inspired ideas that could help get you moving in the right direction.
6. When you get an inspired idea, start working on it. When we start looking at what we want to accomplish we can ask ourselves “What is something I can do right now to move me in the direction of my goal?” When the ideas come, we have to get cracking.
   

The more you engage in high energy activities, the more this will become habitual in your life. Then you won’t be able to help achieving your dreams and desires and you will create a sense of success and prosperity in your life that will draw the physical manifestations of those feelings into your experience.