I read this from Neale Donald Walsch recently

Imagine the freedom of giving up your stories – I dare you to just imagine your life without excuses and limiting beliefs and ‘poor me’ about this or that. Or imagine not carrying around ‘I have to be better, smarter, prettier, thinner’  Imagine not having ‘I have to do this or do that to be loved’ in your backpack. Imagine NOT carrying around  “I am not good enough because ….”.

Imagine how far and fast you could travel without all that baggage.

Me? I am imagining – and liking what I imagine. Some bits of my story I’ll keep though. I think I’ll keep my story of  ‘Be true to your heart’ and I’ll keep my story of “You are deeply loved” and I’ll think I’ll keep ‘Sometimes its just about giving it a go – the fun is in the doing, let the outcome look after itself”. I’ll also keep “Other people’s opinion of me is none of my business.” These are some of the stories I’ll keep to use at opportune moments.

Now, what can I ditch …?

What stories are you willing to give up in time for the fresh new year that is nigh?

Ride the wave – what has Hamlet got to do with it?

Life is a feast of many flavours. Equanimity, stability, consistency are not going to be delivered by life. Shakespeare had it in a nutshell in Hamlet’s famous soliloquy: we ‘suffer slings and arrows’, as humans we are heir to heartache and a ‘thousand natural shocks’.

To be or not to be– that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles
And, by opposing, end them. To die, to sleep
No more – and by a sleep to say we end
The heartache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to …

Life will offer up joy and sorrow, sweet and sour, pleasure and pain. How can we maintain our centre and groundedness while being tossed and tumbled by life in human form?

We are often poorly schooled both in managing the joy, the sweet and the pleasure, and in managing the sorrow, the sour and the pain. In the main, our culture tells us to grip tightly to the joy, the sweet and the pleasure, pursue it, at all costs, and attach to it fast, like a barnacle, if we find it. Sadly those messages often advise that we look in all the wrong places: external places like money, position, power, sex, acquisitions. Our culture exhorts also that we avoid sorrow, sour and pain. And if sorrow, sour and pain befall us, as it will, we must strive to get over it, heal and move on, learn the lesson and put very great effort into to not having that experience again. Sometimes we even perceive it as a shameful thing, a failure in ourselves if we experience sorrow, sour and pain or don’t heal quickly and efficiently.

Consider Hamlet again –

‘there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so’.

It is our naming of the experience of pain and sorrow as negative, wrong, to be avoided, and our attachment, sometimes desperate attachment, to joy, sweet and pleasure that creates a problem out of life’s journey for us.

Consider the surfer, riding the wave.

Does she fight against the movement of the wave, does she argue with the form, does she label it?

Does she rant against the power of the sea?

Does she try to own the wave, keep it, hold on to it forever?

No.

She rides it.

She learns to move with the flow of the wave, she learns to understand its form and grace, she learns to appreciate its beauty and understand its power, she balances on the force of that power as she rides it into shore.

She knows the wave is a passing thing.

She knows that her experience of the wave is fleeting, whether it is an exhalant joyful experience or a turbulent, tumbled experience.

And when she washes up on shore, what does she do?

She turns around and paddles back out to the next wave, taking the experience of the last wave with her, she bundles her energy and enthusiasm and greets the next wave head on.

Sometimes she sits beyond the breaking of the waves, and watches.

Sometimes she chooses not to take a particular wave.

Sometimes she learns from other surfers.

Sometimes she rests on the shore.

Sometimes, when she has caught a wave that turns out to be bigger or more turbulent than she thinks she can manage, she just holds on tight, looks after herself as best she can and waits to be washed up on the shore.

 And that is what we learn from her: watch, choose, listen, learn, ride, rest, accept the fleeting impermanence, re-enter with enthusiasm, and sometimes just hold on tight, look after yourself as best you can, and wait – it will pass.

ACTION

Life is a feast of many flavours.  What joys and sorrows have you experienced? Did they pass? Did they lose some of their intensity?

 Consider Hamlet ‘there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so’

 How might you have experienced these joys and sorrows differently if you had not named them so?

Journal your thoughts and over the next three days notice when you label something ‘good’ or ‘bad’ and experiment with not naming it so, just experiencing it. Does this change the experience?

BIG light

elke

Positive thinking and Positive Framing

The concept of ‘Positive Thinking’ can be misunderstood.

A good friend says to me often – what’s the point of positive thinking – if all it does is deny the reality?
And I get her point.
Positive Thinking is not about pretending everything is OK when clearly it's not.
Nor is it about meaningless affirmations that have no basis in reality. There is no point intoning to the mirror every morning ‘every day I am getting fitter and fitter’ when all you do is eat cake and sit in front of the TV.
And in life, often things happen that seem outside our control. Maybe your boss really is a bully. Maybe you really were in a car accident!
We just can’t positive think these things away.

Well, my standard answer has always bee that Positive Thinking is not about pretending that what is real is not – its about choosing how you respond to what is really going on in your life. Which I why I really like the distinction I heard between.

Positive thinking and Positive Framing

Positive Thinking, when misunderstood,  can be little more than responding to the facts with an alternate proposal, in a way, trying to dominate or suppress a truth with an alternative.

Whereas – Positive Framing is responding to the facts with action. Action can look like all sorts of things, internal work or external.

Positive Framing says: “OK so I am not as fit as I would like to be, what am I going to do about that?”

Positive Framing says “My boss is bullying me, I cannot manage alone, what will I do and what will I learn?”

Positive Framing says “I have been in a car accident, I am injured, I am in hospital and I am afraid … now what, what is there to learn, what is there to do now?”

Optimists tend to be positive framers: face a situation fearlessly, find the good and act.

Does this distinction resonate with you too?

In my part of the world, summer approaches – fast.
We are edging towards 30 degrees Celsius already. For me, in years gone by, as summer approached the year drew to an end, school finished and the vast expanse of the summer holidays lay before me – what bliss – 6 weeks off school. This experience seems to have been hard wired in to my expectations now, as each year the weather warms, November and then December approach and I thrill with the expectation of an easing of the busy-ness. And after 40 years away from school, I still haven’t learnt it doesn’t work like that any more. The busy-ness does not ease, there is no 6 week summer break ahead of me. Hmmm where did I go wrong methinks?

So now I dedicate my time to wondering about living a life of depth and richness in this busy modern world.

For me, it’s very busy right now as I experience change on all fronts: work, family, home and even country. These are deep and significant changes on an emotional, psychological and spiritual level, and disruptive and hard work on the physical plane. So in amongst all this, a good friend noted my stress and suddenly I got what the Buddha said:

“Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional.”

For me, now, this means, that some circumstances are demanding and hard work, they challenge me to rise and be better, faster, smarter, stronger … and that’s inevitable. Choosing to ‘suffer’ these circumstances is optional. Yes, right now I am tired, prone to anxiety, unmoored from all that is usual and secure and routine, grieving relationships that are changing and welcoming shifts to new forms for those relationships, floating between here and there, no decisions in concrete, all in flux, gazing forlornly at an empty bank account, and a to do list that wraps around the globe … and that’s ok, that’s inevitable when experiencing life in human form.

That’s change, that’s experience, that’s life’s rich tapestry.

I find that the small things have extra value right now, enjoying a cup of tea with a friend, half an hour in front of a documentary on tv, a swim or a walk, a chat with my daughter. These things have extra piquancy right now. Circumstances are challenging me to rise and be better, faster, smarter, stronger … and more in touch and at peace and in the flow and choosing to experience rather than suffer.
And I like it.

Here is a simple premise – ‘we are all one’. Or in other words ‘what you do matters’.

Your intent, your actions, what you say and do matters, it has an effect, it makes a difference, to you, the people around you, your personal, local and global community.

I remember reading Neale Donald Walsch saying somewhere, something like, if we all understood, really understood, that we are all one, then all the world’s ‘problems’ would disappear in a trice. I understood this to mean that if we understood this truth we would simply not tolerate a starving child in Africa, a hungry child at our school, a bullied worker in our corridor, an exploited labourer in the Philippines, a homeless person in our city, a world divided into rich and poor, a sick person without care. We would not allow our governments to drop bombs, we would not allow corporations to poison rivers with pesticides, we would not tolerate the practice of mistreating animals and then calling it food, and so it goes on. THese things would just not happen if we all understood.

Consider this for a moment. Take yourself to somewhere out in the solar system look back on this tiny speck called planet earth.


So small, so vulnerable, hurtling through space, balanced by the wonders of gravity and motion just far enough from the star we call the sun to sustain life in its current form. What a tenuous, delicate balance of complex systems holds it all together.
See the ripple that each small action has on the whole system.


And yet many humans persist in behaving as though their own close, small horizon is all there is.

Take a moment to dwell with the concept of oneness on the physical plane: poison dumped in this river will kill the fish downstream and destroy someone’s food source, these shoes are cheap for me because indentured children have suffered to manufacture them in a third world sweat shop. And consider this oneness in an energetic sense: my cynicism and anger will bring negativity to the people around me, my good cheer will uplift my workplace. Consider too, how the physical and energetic come together: the intolerance for difference that I express in my vote for this political candidate will result in a law that will hurt other people by preventing them from accessing adequate medical care or education.

But, what if we got it! What if we really understood?

This is not a trivial question.

I invite you to consider carefully how your actions would change if you knew, really knew, the ripple effect.

I invite you to consider too, how empowered would you feel, if you knew, really knew the ripple effect of your positive actions and positive intent.

Contemplate

Contemplation is a dying art. So much of our modern life acts against this sacred space. Contemplating is not the same as thinking. Much of our modern world discourages even thinking, advising you to act on no more than momentary emotional reactions to intense stimuli.

Contemplating is a state of being, not a state of mind.

Contemplating is maintaining a detached and interested awareness, it is a gentle seeing

within (my reactions and thoughts),

without (what is going on around me),

the past (the history of now)

the future (the trajectory of now) and

this moment (the now).

It is tracking and noticing, withholding judgement and refraining from opinion.  It has no material goal.

 ‘Think’ about a problem to find a solution. ‘Contemplate’ a situation to gain insight.

ACTION

As often as you can over the next three days, cultivate the art of contemplation.
Just look and dwell.
Gently seek understanding and insight, rather than problem solving for solutions.

What situations can you apply this to?
When someone comes to you with a problem, when you are confronted by a situation, when you are enticed to have a quick opinion … stop … contemplate.

What new insight do you have?

Recognise the seduction – don’t even ask

You know how when you are really hungry a pizza sounds more appetizing than a salad, and yet you know a salad would be better? And what’s more, if you have the fatty cheesy gooey pizza you’ll be satisfied for a while and then you’ll have that icky feeling when you have done something bad for your body. And you know if you had the salad you would get around to enjoying it once the edge was off your hunger and you’d feel a million times better afterwards?

You know how when you come in at the end of the day, slouching in front of the television seems more appealing than going for a walk? But you know a walk would be better.

Why is it that the less nourishing option is often an easier choice in the short term?   What is it about the seductive allure of sugar, fatty food, sloth, gossip, laziness, anger.

Well, how about you don’t even ask that question, don’t even ask why. Recognise that you are being manipulated and seduced by the easy option. Take the high road. And if you do give in to seduction, just recognise that you have. That’s all, just recognise that you have.

ACTION

For the next three days notice what tries to seduce you, is it sugar, fatty food, sloth, gossip, laziness, anger, feeling sorry for yourself … something else.

Look at your list of seducers ... Imagine them as just that, manipulative seducers.
See them as external to you. There is no need for judgement here - just observation.
When did you give way to temptation?
When did you have the cunning or the strength to outwit them?
How can you outwit them and outsmart them? 
What can you learn for next time?

 

Goodwill  - Think the best

Are you in the habit of attaching heavy significance to every little act or every person around you?

The way she said ‘Good Morning’ in the hallway this morning, the way the boss looked at me in the meeting, the way my daughter’s best friend’s mother just drove away from the school car park this morning with out saying hello, the way that person cut me off in traffic.

You’ll bring your energy down, bring their energy down and drive yourself nuts if you always assume the worst of others.

How about you think “She’s preoccupied with her day’s work” rather than “She is so rude” and why don’t you throw in a gift of good energy too?

 “I hope her day goes well”

It will cost you nothing and you will feel better, and so will she.

How about “The Boss is thinking hard about this, maybe he thinks I have something to contribute”

And

“She’s a great mum, I’ll ask her for a coffee sometime, perhaps we can be friends.”

And

“Oops, cut me off in traffic, we all make mistakes! I’ll take that on board as a reminder to be careful in my own driving.”

Or even better yet – don’t think anything at all.

Maybe it sounds Pollyanna – but you’ll feel better and you know what?  Negativity is just a bad habit, a fashionable bad habit, but just a habit, no more, no less. Change it. Think the best.

Here is a challenge for you:

Over the next three days deliberately cultivate goodwill, that is, think the best in any situation where you might have been tempted to react by assuming the worst in others. Catch yourself whenever you do assume the worst and re-script your reaction.

Journal your thoughts and feelings here. What difference do you notice? Does anyone else notice a difference in you?

Be curious.

Opinions are easy.
But they are not without effort.
They take a great deal of effort.
Most opinions spring out of a lifetime of programming, from our family, the TV, politics, the media, religion and habit, habit, HABIT.
But think of this, your lifetime, your life, is very limited, it is one set of influences.
There are around 6 billion other people on planet earth right now, all with their own unique set of influences, experiences and opinions.
Consider that maybe you don’t have all the answers.
Consider that maybe you don’t have all the information or all the possible experience.
Try withholding that opinion and be curious instead.
Cultivate a detached and benign interest in your own emotions and thoughts. Rather than be swept along by the power of your thoughts, opinions, beliefs and emotions, try asking the curious question
“How interesting that I have responded this way, how interesting that this opinion pops up without any apparent effort.”
And try asking the most powerful question of all 
“I wonder what else is possible?”

Life offers many small pleasures

Life offers many small pleasures, abundant quiet excitements and a stream of gentle joy. Yes, there are the fireworks and the grand adventures. But don’t miss out on the daily nourishment offered up. Here are some of my mundane pleasures and quiet excitements

• Fresh bread and cheese

• Stretching out in a freshly made bed

• Driving my oh-so-reliable car

• Chatting with my daughter on our after dinner walk each night

• Planting a punnet of daisies

• Watching the wallabies from the nearby forest eat my new daisies!

• Feeling the weight of the cat on the end of my bed

• Making pancakes with berries and maple syrup for my partner

• Watching a good travel documentary

Cross out what doesn’t work for you and add your own