One of the most notable blocks we all share is the way we have been trained to attach to the stories of our lives to define us and to explain why we have the problems we have.

Have you ever found yourself able to thoroughly explain the reason why you have a problem in terms of your personal history but not be able to be free of the problem? It can be disheartening to discover that freedom cannot be found in the reasoned explanation of our personal history.

I wonder if this form of thinking was so prevalent before Freud and the subsequent development of psychology and therapy? Apparently we have missed something if successful explanation doesn’t yield freedom.

My offering to you for your contemplation is to look elsewhere for your freedom from fear, stress, and distress. Look to your view of life — your most influential belief about the nature of life and your place in it, and to your intention for your life — your deepest abiding intention that effects every choice you make. These three elements determine the contents of your life’s operating manual.

Before we begin a journey, we need to understand where we are and what our intention is. It is important to recognize that all beings want to have happiness and avoid suffering, and that all beings are subject to birth and death, regardless of differences in their personal history.

Contemplating and appreciating this simple fact can reduce our sense of fear and alienation as we see that we are essentially the same and are in the same boat. Having these simple insights as our background awareness can prevent us from getting too absorbed in melodrama in our daily life as if our daily life was happening in isolation, and as if it was eternal.

Instead, with this background awareness, our struggles and disappointments remind us that our struggles are not uniquely ours, but that we are experiencing the shared struggles of embodiment with all beings. This awareness reduces anxiety because we don’t so easily take disappointments personally. We see them as part of the human experience, not as our own unique flaw.

Are there habitual ways in which you have considered yourself uniquely flawed? What happens if you reinterpret these “flaws” as just part of the human experience shared by everyone, and KNOWN by everyone — that is, not unique and not hidden, or requiring hiding.

These “flaws” don’t diminish your value, or your right to exist, or your right to full self-appreciation. They don’t diminish the friendliness of the universe towards you, or your rightful access to abundance either.

I invite you to take an inventory of the things that are holding you back. Evaluate to what degree these things seem “big” in your life because you have in your background awareness the belief that your are uniquely flawed and must hide your flaws. Release that belief, or any belief that isolates you from the awareness that you are participating in a shared human experience that is fragile and temporary.

Experience how having a background awareness of shared experience, with all its fragility and temporariness fully taken to heart, changes your state and possibly your priorities. Add to this a respectful new self-conception that includes respect for everyone else and a desire for all to be free from suffering and to realize self-love. Practicing these attitudes will open the floodgates of happiness in your life.

Jack Elias, a Clinical Hypnotherapist in private practice, is founder and
director of The Institute for Therapeutic Learning, a licensed Vocational
School in Seattle that trains and certifies Transpersonal Clinical
Hypnotherapists. Jack presents a unique synthesis of Eastern and Western
perspectives on the nature of consciousness and communication, teaching
simple yet powerful techniques for achieving one’s highest personal and
professional goals. Since 1967, Jack has studied Eastern meditation,
philosophy and psychology with masters such as Shunryo Suzuki Roshi and
Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche. Before beginning his teaching and counseling
career, Jack worked for 20 years in sales, marketing and financial planning.
Jack offers dynamic experiential workshops and seminars, and his Finding
True Magic courses are eligible for credit at various universities.

There are many effective goal setting activities that can be used in all areas of life to help individuals better their own personal experience. Whether you are striving to lose weight or you want to further yourself in your chosen career, there is no mistaking the power of setting goals for yourself. When a person takes the time to state a goal, and then creates a plan that will help them achieve that goal, they have a much better chance of success.

Making a list of all the things you hope to accomplish within a set period of time is a great idea. You can use goal setting forms to do this if you wish. These are really just carefully plotted charts that allow you to keep track of your goals as well as your progress in attaining those goals. If you are trying to better your health by eating sensibly each day or partaking of a specific form of exercise, a chart can be a great ally. Use it each day to track your progress and you are much more likely to stay focused.

If you prefer to use your computer, there’s an option available for that as well. Goal setting software usually is comprised of not only worksheets, but calendars and inspirational readings. If you install one of the available programs on your personal or business computer you can note all the advances you are making each day towards your stated goal. One of the benefits of a software program like this is that you can generally utilize items like free wallpaper that has encouraging messages, as well as daily words of inspiration. It’s almost as though you have your own silent cheering section pushing you in a positive direction.

You can also look beyond your computer when you are searching for goal setting activities. Reading motivational books is another great source of inspiration for many individuals. If you are just starting out on a new business venture, reading the autobiography of a magnate who worked their way up from almost nothing can help you attain your own goals by showing you that it really can be done.

For people attempting to make positive physical changes in their lives, talking to someone who has lost weight or stopped smoking can be a great way to help stay focused on goals. Quite often, when we are striving towards a personal goal we wonder if can really be done. Being given the opportunity to speak to someone who has attained their own goal, that is similar to your own, is a tremendous source of hope. Use the positive experiences of others as part of your goal setting process and you’ll soon be the one aspiring others after you’ve surpassed your own dreams. From self improvement online guide, i2lifeselfgrowth.com.

For more i2lifeselfgrowth.com/goalsetting goal setting activities, forms and software to further your self improvement, go to
i2lifeselfgrowth.com/goalsetting i2lifeselfgrowth.com/goalsetting

Take a page from Eastern wisdom

Meditation, martial arts that focus on disciplining the mind as well as the body, and chi-releasing massage and yoga can all help you reach your goals by clearing your mind, teaching you how to block out distractions, and showing you how to deal effectively with obstacles.  The disciplines of Eastern mind-body arts are a great help when stress or outside influences threaten your progress, and the meditative mindset helps keep the link between the sub-conscious and conscious mind open, streamlining the flow of creativity and flexibility and promoting the intelligent use of internal resources – and, not incidentally, short circuiting some of the resistance and negative self-talk that often create failure where there was none before.

Following a regimen of meditation and mind-body-spirit exercises also has a tendency to bring up old, suppressed issues and emotions that could be blocking forward movement without you even realizing it.  Just think of these issues as psychological and emotional computer viruses lurking in your “hard drive”, quietly and invisibly throwing all sorts of otherwise normal functions off kilter, sometimes dangerously, and even protecting themselves by creating negative thought patterns which not only prevent you from removing them, but which prevent you from even seeing them in the first place.  Yoga, meditation, deep prayer, hypnotic chants and other reflective practices are sort of like virus scanners that can root out such problems, bring them to the surface and isolate them more or less safely in a “quarantine” of conscious awareness where you can study them and their effects, and then get rid of them, in your own time. 

(c) Soni Pitts

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Soni Pitts is the Chief Visionary Butt-Kicker of sonipitts.com SoniPitts.Com. She specializes in helping others reclaim “soul proprietorship” in their lives and to begin living the life their Creator always intended for them.

She is the author of the free e-book “50 Ways To Reach Your Goals” and over 100 self-help and inspirational articles, as well as other products and resources designed to facilitate this process of personal growth and spiritual development.

At the dawn of spring, I am reminded by my children the joy of anticipating new life.

They will usually see a flower or two that has made its way through the soil to a world beyond itself. What starts out as a seedling or bulb is transformed by nature’s capacity to evolve.

Inside each of us lies dormant an awareness, an identity, an ability to grow beyond what we appear to be. Every moment, we are being challenged by others and by circumstances to create a life that exceeds our present state of living.

To move toward our highest good takes a willingness on our part to let go of what we know to what can be known in and through us. You and I are part of the Created Order we see around us, and we are participants in Creating Order out of what we have been given to care for.

With this in mind, let us turn to ways our soul can be described in the characteristics that make up a flower:

1. The Ground.

The ground nurtures, protects, and gives birth to a flower. Inside the womb of the ground, life is taking root long before we can see it. Because we cannot see a flower that has been planted in the earth, does not mean life is not being created. To be full participants in our world means to be fully connected and rooted in the world we have been given.

2. The Stem.

The stem begins its growth in the earth below and into the sky above. This part of the flower is the connecting characteristic of the plant. Much like humanity, we are in this world without being fully of it. This creates a sacredness to our lives. It is our unique ability to live and grow in a way no one ever has, is, or ever will.

3. The Flower.

In full bloom, a flower is the illumination of all the life that has preceded it. The radiance and color that pour out of it create life. Notice the next time you look at a flower how you are affected by it. You may notice your heart open and be filled with joy. Or, you may notice more energy and clarity in your vision for being blessed with great beauty.

4. The Spirit of a Flower.

The spirit of a flower is the life force moving in and through it. It is the essence of a flower that identifies with your spirit. This part of you opens from the inside out and becomes ONE with the spirit of a flower. It is the same energy that runs in and through you. Like a flower, you begin to radiate your own soul from the essence of your own being.

Each spring, take the time to notice the part of you opening up to new life. Just like flowers, we grow from the inside out. What illuminates in our life began inside us. We nurture these inner qualities of attention until they eventually take root and grow into our daily lives. The growth that follows is created from what we attend to or hold our attention on within us.

Like the pedals of a flower opening to the world around it, we create a presence of awareness. In full bloom, the beauty or the lack thereof touches the lives of everyone around us. As our inner patterns of attention move through us, the world illuminates the seeds of awareness contained within us for so long. Here, a life is created. It is the life of our soul.

Sam Oliver, author of, “Integrating the Feminine Spirit: Returning to the Womb of Creation”

soulandspirit.org soulandspirit.org