Tag Archives: Success

Become a Creator and Thrive through the Hard Times

When someone speaks ill of you or about something you associate yourself with, they are taking from you. When someone takes something from you, like you dignity or feeling of self-worth, then you want to take back. Often we do this by finding ourselves in an argument or agreeing with them and feeling bad about ourselves. There are two ways in which to work under these conditions in which to grow the most from them. The first is to unidentify from who you think you are and instead realize that you are who you are at that moment. It then hurts because people are creating a split in what you think your reality is versus what they think what reality is and so because of that dissonance we fight to diminish their projected reality in order that we can hold our own as real. We can therefore give no credence to their words or we cannot be attached to our own.

While this can be effective in knowing about our fight for a stable reality, there is another way however that can be more effective and more easily understood and actioned. For this to work we first must consider the age-old law of the Newtonian Universe – every action has an opposite and equal reaction. In other words, by giving you shall receive. This means in these difficult situations in which people are taking from you, you can ensure within yourself that you are not taking but giving through an understanding that they know not what they are creating for themselves. These people will undoubtedly be taken from to balance out the Newtonian equation. It is not for you to be that person to try to rebalance it, but trust that in these actions, there are always consequences in order to rebalance the Universe. Therefore, you don’t always have to be the person that conveys the lesson in what they are doing wrong but show them through your positive way of being how the situation can be. They will experiences the consequences of their destructive behaviour and if you are the person who tries to show it to them it means that you may only be creating an even greater moment of destruction in your own life.

There is always an energy equation in everything that takes place in the Universe and thus will always need to be balanced. When a person expels negative energy out into the Universe this will undoubtedly be rebalanced by the person receiving this energy back. Therefore this provides an amazing opportunity for you to practice compassion Learn more in: Compassion is a Tool to Rule your Heart (http://bit.ly/N0XH6k). In compassion comes an immeasurable act of giving that will unequivocally give back to you ten fold if you can give back to a person that is trying to take from you. When you can transform a negative situation into a positive one, you become a creator. A creator is part of what it means to be an Extropist, a person that changes the spin of the chaotic cycle to one of harmony and greater sophistication. As a creator you work to lift the total energy of this world toward a positive balance. As history progresses we have become ever more complex, sophisticated and conscientious to the point where we will naturally turn the tides from a world that is framed with negative events to one that is ever more connected and harmonious.

So I offer that through these difficult times you find compassion for these types of people who know not what they are doing and find a sense of love for whom they are and the journey they have been on. When you watch a film about a person’s transformation from a bad to a good person, you always see that the hero has been through hell along their journey and so too will the person that is making you feel bad. They are typically fighting a very hard battle with themselves and it just so happens that they are releasing their negativity on you, the obliging person in front of them. So hold strong to the beautiful and powerful person that you are, and understand the consequences of their actions. Instead you can give openly to a person taking and that you can become a creator, who simply in this one act of compassion has helped change the world into a better place.

Your Expectations Color and Create Your Reality

If our experiences have asked us to look at the world as a sad and dangerous place, full of hate and malice, would we not perpetuate that and thus invite more of this chaos into our lives? It makes sense that it would. We so often learn by example. And then this would become the natural and automatic flow of your life. Action – Reaction. Thus chaos begets chaos and we head down the ever slippery slope towards an entropic resolve in which our lives cease to function in harmony.

This seems like the way that life actually operates, and more often than not it is. But thankfully there is also another process of life that exists that allows us to nullify the first. If you add more energy into the system, the system being the natural order of your life, you can actually change the downward direction of it and have it begin to swing in your favor. Instead of the natural and innate downward cycle that exists in life and the Universe, we can redeem ourselves and begin to build up again along the spiral staircase of self by giving more energy to that which serves and inspires us and makes us feel good about our lives.

This new perspective asks that the introduction of energy needed, that results in positive growth, requires you to focus on the good in the system of your life. By giving positive energy and believing in the best in people and those things surrounding you, you may actually create a different perspective and invite a different experience into your life. Actively give thanks for your surroundings and visualize the beautiful world that you want to experience and you will prep your day and life to notice those opportunities and subtleties that will make your dreams come true. In a single scene in your life you will see many things but you will miss many more. Just in that one scene more things than you will register in your entire life is occurring right in front of you but you will only focus on the things that you are expecting to see. Our minds do this so that we can actually give a good amount of cognitive energy to those things important to us otherwise we would be completely debilitated by the infinite stream of information that bombards our brains. Therefore, it is so important to prime your mind because what you expect to see your mind will already be looking for in your life’s scenes.

This has been shown time and time again that our mood and our expectations have us see our preconceived notions and typically miss out on many obvious things that are right there in front of our face. The truth of the matter still holds that we create our own reality, which is a blessing and a curse, because if you have always believed life to be bad, and therefore your next experience to be bad, then your brain is naturally looking to see those things that prove that it is bad. Instead, if you focus on the things that are beautiful and joyful that you are grateful for, your mind will naturally look to see those things and that is your blessing. Your expectations create your reality, however you have the option to change and recreate your reality simply by changing your feelings and thoughts about your life. Hence your experience of life will follow the expectations you set your mind to see. Please watch this video as a demonstration.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IGQmdoK_ZfY&w=560&h=315]

The trick to this is not that you should ‘believe it when you see it’, but instead focus on the fact that you will ‘see it when you believe it’. The change in perspective comes from an active role taken to change, and not from the sitting around waiting for it to be shown to you. You have to go out and make the change. You have to be the change. You are a Human Being, not a Human Waiting. We must be active in our change otherwise we will fall down the natural slippery slope to chaos and despair.

So go out and smile with the world and the people around you. Think about all the wonderful things that surround you in life and you will set your expectations to see them. You will be happier and more joyful, when you see that you are surrounded by the things that make you grateful for your life. Even in the darkest moments if you focus on things that make you happy, your mind will more likely be able to see the brighter side of these typically unforgiving situations. Be vulnerable and know that you may get a bump or two, because if you are willing to learn, you will realize that these bumps are teaching you how to walk without hurting yourself. Then much more often than not the world will smile back at you and you will realize that there is a whole bounty of things and people waiting to show you that your life is a beautiful place indeed.

Understanding the Truth of your Roller-Coaster Life

“Life is a roller-coaster”. Like we’ve never heard that before. But there is more to this roller-coaster ride than meets the eye. Yes, there are the ups and downs. That goes without saying. But there are also the subtler qualities that we don’t normally look at. It is these parts of the ride that I am more interested in.

Life is relative. Our great Einstein showed us this truth. This means that things depend on the perspective from which you look at them. I met a man, who told me about the passing of his son a few years ago. He conveyed his story with such a wealth of wisdom and profundity that I was curious how he gained so much from such trying times. He told me that he learnt to appreciate the small things because sometimes that’s all you have. It is from this idea that I learnt about the relative quality of the roller-coaster we call life. When we are reaching a peak time of our lives we feel great. We continue to feel elated, like a balloon ever rising, however without us even being aware, within a blink of an eye, we have stopped and we are on our way down. Arms up in the air, hearts filled with terror we plummet downwards screaming. None of this would feel all that different from the typical roller-coaster story, except when we begin to think about what happens when we finally reach the bottom. We more often than not, don’t reach our impending doom. We inevitably go up again.

There is always an upside that comes from every down side. We often forget that there is always an ‘up’ again once we reach a ‘bottom’. Instead we become overwhelmed by the idea that we will be going down forever. However as quick as everything can turn bad, so too can we find unexpected joy amidst the darkest moments. The slightest upswing and we can feel as joyful as if we were millionaires. When that glimmer of hope of fortunate possibilities can be seen on the horizon, we immediately feel better and notice that emotional lift again as if we had never been through the past turmoil.

We have been given a gift of respite, a flotation ring, in which an order has washed over the world that felt out of control. Order is emergent, it comes over time and we often just need to find patience to allow a change of fortune. Think about the chaos that existed in the entire evolutionary history of the Earth, it was over a great deal of time that successful strategies eventually emerged to create the order that we know today. This is the relative world that we live in. This is indicative of the relative creatures we are. My friend who lost his child, and himself, in the pit of despair, eventually found that with time, hope and faith his life got better and as he began again his upward trajectory he gained many new joys from the small things that he had in his life. It is so often what we lose that gives us the most because it provides to find just the smallest things that we took for granted. These small things eventually lead to bigger things and finally we find new ways of experiencing life and happiness even amongst all that we had been through and lost.

We can find these relative joys by changing our perspective, or in Einstein’s words, our speed. We are often moving too fast, trying to reach some far out goal as fast as we can, trying to be some ideal version of ourselves now. However, our stress and despair comes from the resistance we feel between the relative distance of where we are and where we think we ought to be. We must endeavor at these times when we feel overwhelmed to break our goals up into smaller parts in order that we can find them more manageable. My friend, who lost his son, endeavored to remember to appreciate the smaller things in life. That just being able to share time with someone you love can literally be the greatest experience in life.

Many spiritual traditions have found great joy in the simple life. By removing the complexities that lead to unnecessary overwhelmment, both physically and mentally, they were able to find a joy from vast discrepancies that exist from who we are to who we want to be. This doesn’t mean don’t aim high, instead it means give to your task in a way that doesn’t highlight the limiting discrepancies of focusing elsewhere but the present moment. Like the great the roller-coaster there is always more than one loop, bump or obstacle on the ride but each one is dealt with as it is presented. Terror is a fleeting physiological but despair lingers as it is made from the mind. Despair on a roller-coaster or great journey arises when we consider how much further is left to go and this is the truth for all experiences in life.

A great saying from a Buddhist monk states, “When you are chopping the carrots, chop the carrots. When you are peeling the potatoes, peel the potatoes.” This highlights that you must be present with what you are doing, wholly and completely. Give everything to the task and you will give your best. When you set such high goals for yourself and hold high standards, the only way to get there is to put one foot in front of the other and don’t focus on the distance between you and the top of the mountain. Know your goal and that you will reach it and that is all you need with it. It is important every once in a while to stop appreciate where you are on your journey. Even in your darkest hour, when you think you are going backwards, find patience and acknowledge how far you have come. With time order, and answers will emerge. Trust in life to present you with an opportunity and yourself to continue managing your obstacles effectively. You will make it and champion your dreams; all you have to do is make sure to enjoy the ride.

Gratitude Lets you Lift a Light amongst your Shadows

So often we find ourselves lost in the stormy seas of our emotions. These ominous feelings tower over us, leaving us blinded by a fog of uncertainty. We try to clamour our way through the shadows but we aren’t able to get a grasp on anything. Who is there? Who are we fighting? We are fighting ourselves – our made up monsters of the past that we are too afraid to look at. We lash out or turn away, we numb and distract ourselves in order to be free from vulnerability. But there is a way to move through these dark moments powerfully. Pick yourself up and shine a light. A light of gratitude.

To stay positive when you are surrounded by negativity, try finding what you can be grateful for about the situation and what you are grateful for in your life. If you can lift yourself higher than the situation then the negativity naturally falls away. If you have ended a relationship, have poor health or lost a job, when we give thanks with every moment to the life and love surrounding us, we will have love and support of life reflected back to us. We see how wonderful the world is by the inspiration we see in the world and in people. It is in others actions that we realize who we are. So I say this to you. You have not lost anything, you have only changed your mirror that reflected how beautiful the love inside you is.

When you are aware of this, the Universe will naturally present an opportunity that you are able to see because you are in the space that will be able to be aware of a more joyous and opportune reality. If you connect into the negativity or even if you resist it rather than reframe it you will not be able to lift above the clouds. It requires you to take a step towards change, a step in which you must exert a moment of effort beyond wallowing in the natural despair of any negative situation. A step of gratitude will infuse the situation with new, fresh energy that will reverse the cycle of chaos toward one of new growth and creation.

It is your Gratitude that will transform the dire situations in your life to shine like gold and open you up to experiences that the average person would close themselves off to because of the fear of letting go from what they have grown to know. These experiences of fear are what typically move us to our more primitive and lower states of consciousness rather than toward our higher selves which is what we need to move to, in order to reach an evolution in our own psyche and person.

These experiences of chaos can be invited as messengers of growth. Were you really happy in that relationship, with that job. Were you really treating your body with love and respect? It is when we act from our highest states of consciousness that we transform dire situations. When people stand tall, true and vulnerable in the face of despair, it is during these darkest hours that people make the greatest leaps in their lives and become the greatest versions of themselves. Our highest versions of ourselves are bred from love and trust. Hold to your gratitude and you are well on your way to success.

Success is not how much you have, but how far you traveled. You might have a million dollars but if you started with 10 million you might not feel that successful. But if you started on the streets and created a life of love, gratitude and respect for the world around, with a roof over your head, food on the table and you end the day with a smile. Then you are one of the most successful people in the world and you are the true 1%.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_urxI9L5Ak&w=560&h=315]

Compassion is a Tool to Rule your Heart

There is a great power in compassion, one that shines a light on the darkest moments and most abrasive relationships. I often found myself in situations where I was overwhelmed by my interactions with people that left me feeling emotionally drained. It took all I had to endure these people and their moods and attitudes. I soon realized that what was draining me was not the person themselves but my reaction to them. I was resisting who they were and who they were choosing to be.

We are typically egocentric beings that look at the world from one perspective. This is because it is typically easier to observe the world from your own perspective than every single person you meet. That means when you are communicating with someone you typically assume that they are looking at the world from your perspective, that is unless their experience is beyond the limits of what your mind can accept, such as if they are too happy for you or too sad, then their emotional experience is separated from your own and typically rejected. Nonetheless, our experience of putting ourselves in another person’s shoes is what has enabled our civilization and global community to grow. For example have you ever noticed yourself crying in a film when something bad happens or get excited when another triumph’s, this is because of our natural empathy.

We are naturally empathetic creatures and because of that we personally experience other people’s hardships. We take on their pain and their joys. This is one of our greatest characteristics as humans but it can also work to our disadvantage, if we let it run our lives unchecked, as it can leave us disempowered and disabled. Therefore as we take on others emotions in our everyday lives we can find ourselves resisting and resenting them for the emotional hole that we have joined them in. For instance have you noticed when your partner comes home from work in a bad mood while you are in a good mood, and soon enough you find yourself in an equally bad mood with them without having even spoken to them? This is because we have resisted them because we have empathized with them – a natural part of being human.

You don’t need to resent yourself for resisting them, it just means that you are being an empathetic being. However you have identified with their story as your own, from your perspective rather than acknowledging that they have been on their own journey that have led you both to the current place you are both in. Therefore there are ways to be empathetic that don’t leave you emotionally drained and that is through the power of compassion. Compassion is a powerful way to still keep love for someone without taking on their pain. When we acknowledge the journey someone else has been on we allow ourselves to disidentify from their pain and instead gain a more objective look at their story. We allow ourselves to move out of the narrow view of the present moment and instead broaden our perspectives of their journey and our own to gain an unaffected understanding.

“No act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted.”Aesop (Ancient Greek. 620 BC-560 BC)

When we realize that we don’t have to take on another’s story we are free to acknowledge another truth – People in bad moods are probably having bad days. These bad days may be ongoing for months or years. Think about it, have you ever met a person that sits in the corner with their happiness and doesn’t care to share it with anybody? No. Happiness has to be shared and we all hold a natural inclination to pass it on to every person we meet, otherwise it loses all its value. So when you see a person that you know who leaves you emotionally lower, think about THEIR journey. Ask yourself the question, “what has happened that have left them unhappy?” When we can take a step back from our own perspective and acknowledge someone else’s we are given the amazing power of compassion. We can share with them our heart in a way that doesn’t leave us emotionally debilitated and instead we are able to take a step forward to give to them and help out. When we realize that their story is not our journey our own happiness is highlighted, and by sharing that joy in our actions to help them we are able to further inspire both them and ourselves.

Remember this: It is as important to be as compassionate for others as it is for ourselves. We exist beyond this moment, so remember your story and the journey you have travelled and give yourself a break. Smile at yourself from your heart and really feel the feeling in your heart of compassion, of giving yourself a break and not taking yourself so seriously.

So when you next are in a situation in which the person you are with leaves you emotionally drained because their attitude is poor, think about the journey they have been on, realize it is not your own story and smile at them from your heart. It is important to truly wish them the best possible outcome in their troubles and that they find themselves smiling soon. This mediation may inspire you to step forward and help them or it may ask you to step away, but either way it will help you be the best possible version of yourself for them and yourself. Compassion helps remove stress from your heart, opening yourself to the radiant possibilities of your health and your life. Your compassion enables you to cultivate greater connections with others as well as yourself. It highlights to yourself the good fortune that your own life holds and inspires you to be the best version of yourself and for all.

Attract Love – Not a Stranger

Whether you have a crush or want back your ex, by trying to attract a specific person you are limiting Love. You are telling the world and yourself that there is only one person out there that can complete you, that can have you truly experience love. There is only one particular person out of 7 billion. You are telling the Universe that they are the only person that can BE Love. But the Universe knows better and so does your higher understandings.

By thinking that another person is Love you are limiting the experience of Love because you can only ever partly know another person and therefore you will only ever partly know Love. It is hard enough to know yourself so imagine trying to understand and be in control of Love if it is another completely different person. Think back to how broken-hearted you have been when the person you thought is your Love treats you poorly and you feel like Life and Love is broken. You feel like this because of your misconceptions about who and what Love is. So then if another person isn’t Love then who or what is? The answer is simple… YOU!

Love is You

Love is generated in you. You are the person that creates it inside of you and you are the person that feels it. When you recenter Love within yourself you will see that Love is infinite and limitless. You will see that you don’t need a specific person for the creation of Love but instead you only want to share the Love that you have created and feel with someone. And that someone who you ultimately choose to share your experience of Love with, and build an even greater experiences of Love with, is someone who is a very blessed and lucky individual.

Love is Inspiration

That feeling of love is inspiration. Inspiration to be the best person that you can imagine yourself to be. We are communal creatures and we create best as families not as cowboys. When we meet someone who we can see the possibility of creating the best version of the world with, we are inspired to be with that person and build that world. We feel excited by that possibility and want it to be real, so we work with that person to build it. Sometimes we get confused into believing it is that person that is the inspiration rather than our own excitement and passion. We each only hold our own passions and our own Love and not another’s. And in that we are free to attract the many possibilities of many exciting and wonderful worlds.

So don’t think that your Love is unworthy because the person you have tried to attract is not coming. Our idea of love is based on the experiences we have had with love. It’s richness comes from how we open ourselves to it. Sometimes we get hurt and stop ourselves from being vulnerable but it is only by opening yourself to love and all the possibilities that you open yourself to the greatest probabilities. Love is not a game to be calculated, it is a leap of faith requiring trust in yourself and another. To open yourself to the experience of Love, Focus on Love itself. Get clear on what Love is for you – inside and outside of you. About how you want to experience it, The ways that you want to inspire the experience of love in your life and how you want to share it. Don’t focus on a person, focus on the experience of Love.

Love Exercise

A good exercise is to think about your last relationship and give thanks for all the things that you appreciated about your partner and the relationship. Give thanks for how they made you feel and all the great times you had together. Then make a list of all the things that you want to experience in and with your next partner that you are attracting into your life. You may have noticed some things that your last partner didn’t do, well take this as an amazing opportunity to give them thanks for that because now you can ask for what you do want in your next relationship. By now knowing what you want your mind is more aware and perceptive of possible partners that align with your new and richer experience of Love. It might be the person you are currently interested in or you may soon realize that they do not meet your needs and instead you meet someone who is even better suited to creating your dream world with you.

The Love Revolution

Know this – when you are familiar with Love you can move into any situation with an air of confidence and familiarity. You are no longer attached to the result and thereby remove the fear of losing something. When you can walk through the shadows without worry you are much more able to respond and receive whatever is presented to you with the greatest clarity and wisdom. This is your Love Revolution because it will no longer be you looking out at others to be your Love, because it is YOU that is LOVE. With this clarity and wisdom you will inspire the greatest experiences in your life that will have you realize that Love isn’t one person but is part of everything in your Universe.

Gratitude: Breaking Patterns and Building Heart

Many people go out and do some form of self-development. Whether mentally, physically, spiritually, or emotionally, they address the development of their inner-selves to have a resounding growth experience and increase their skill set. Normally people will find that both during and soon after the process of their learning they feel very empowered and able to manifest beautiful creations in their life.

The greatest challenge for people who want to live happier, powerfully create and be more in control of their lives, find that soon after learning such teachings these advances are thwarted with the fog of their years of negative programming. Slowly the dust settles and they find themselves falling back into old habits. All that time and effort they gave to their learning is lost, fallen through their fingers. This growth reversal ultimately results in people becoming apathetic about taking an active role in their own life and learning. Our old, non-serving automatic processes often leave people without the will or confidence to actively create in their own lives.

Often this common pattern of negativity about the difficulty of up-keeping these newly learnt ways of being, dampens the power of their intentions and the person drifts back into their unconscious way of being. These new learnings are only recently wired in the brain and like infants needs constant tending to, with a similar love and devotion you would give to a child. Remember that quickly your new-found inspiration gets overshadowed by old life programs of negativity. Our brains are lazy and these old patterns are well carved routes the brain knows well that they can take with little effort. So it takes an active ‘extropic’ effort to redirect these patterns and strengthen them so that they are the new status quo.

By constant daily practice we slowly force a new direction to the currents of our mind. Find and set a routine to help you change to your new patterns. It is the role of our front brain to inhibit impulsivity but sometimes the pull is to great to old patterns so we can anticipate the change of our mind to set up pre-planned behaviours that will nullify our old bad behaviours. This might be things like setting an alarm to get up early to run or meditate. This might be to remove all the alcohol from your house. Whatever your new pattern is, set up routines and plans of action so your lazy brain has to expend the least amount of effort to do the new behaviour. The best scenario would be for it to expend less energy doing the new activity than the old because then you will find very little internal resistance.

I had this experience with learning the power of Thanks. So many people hear and learn the words of the power of gratitude to change their life and feel an immediate rush of inspiration and creative power. They live in gratitude and create positivity through their positivity. But this takes work and the impotence from my old patterns made it difficult to redeem the reawakening to the power of gratitude.

I tried by stopping and being grateful once or twice a day, which would give me a good feeling here or there, but that’s about it. Our life programs of negativity are deep within our minds. Therefore, I learnt how important it was to constantly practice gratitude to increase the richness of life. I set alarms, wrote notes to myself, made gratitude boards and said it out aloud with such conviction I made myself believe it. Gratitude is a muscle and I learnt I needed to work all day every day to make my heart grow. By doing this all the time it changes the automatic (and even evolutionary) programs from one of negativity to one of joy and gratitude. Life was more fun, the colours of my day were saturated, food tasted sweeter and my interactions were richer. I learnt that when you practice gratitude you don’t need to make a lot of money to be happy because you already feel like a millionaire. Contentment is a powerful emotion, because it enables you to create for the sake of having fun. It allows you to create to give rather than take for yourself.

Gratitude is a case, not of seeing is believing, but believing is seeing. By waking up to, and living constantly with gratitude, things to be grateful for will constantly flood into your life. If needs be, fake it till you make it. There is always something to be grateful for and the very act will change your physiology, your chemistry, you perspective and the shape of your daily smile.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nj2ofrX7jAk&w=560&h=315]

Giving is the Key to getting all that you Want

It feels like at times when we think of bad things they so easily come, but when we think of good things, more good things don’t come as easily. This happens because in the Universe there is a natural law called entropy. It means that when things are left to their own accord there is a downward spiral toward chaos and disorder. It is the same way things naturally need up-keep otherwise they will deteriorate and no longer be usable. For example, a coat of paint on a house will only last so long until it begins to deteriorate and more paint will need to be applied to maintain the original coat.

In saying this we say that we see that there is the opposite side of this coin in which we can give energy to something in order to maintain it or even make it even better. This phenomenon is what is known as extropy. It is the process of giving energy to a system in order to, not only maintain homeostasis, but also to put enough new energy into the system to lift it against the natural order away from chaos and towards ever greater functionality, purposeful and organized complexity.

Giving is a powerful tool in which we can create greater extropic cycles. This is done through the process of giving, for the fact that if you choose to give in all your actions you are not only giving more energy to whatever system you are working with, you are also opening yourself up to receive. Sir Isaac Newton gave us this conclusion in his third law of motion, in which every action has an opposite and equal reaction. This means that for every time that you give you are also opening yourself to receive the same amount of new energy back to you. This energetic equation enables you to move beyond the place you were at by introducing more powerful energy patterns in the form of wiser thoughts, richer emotions and more effective actions.

When we think negative thoughts that don’t make us feel good, we are taking energy from our system and leaking it out in the form of stress. This ineffective use of our energy thereby speeds up the degradation of the system towards chaos as that is the natural cycle of the downward spiral. For example we all know that it is much easier to swim downstream, and in a moment of despair it is easy to go with flow of our natural thoughts down to disaster. However when we instead think positive thoughts that serve us in these dire situations, we are in fact putting more energy back into the system that allows us to now swim against the natural downward flow. This reversal of the natural cycle towards chaos allows us to introduce greater order, functionality and organized complexity into our lives. The perpetuation of this giving cycle and the introduction of new energy into the system opens up a space forever more increasing growth and development of ourselves and our lives. This allows for the most powerful and functional version of you to create and manifest all that you desire.

So I urge you to take on the attitude of giving. Give in everything. And know that you are worthy to receive. When you answer a question or are in a conversation make sure that you are not taking but instead give. Smile from within and make sure that your actions are helping the person rather than taking away from them. When we act from a place of giving we undoubtedly neutralize entropy and chaos and create the greatest energetic system in ourselves. This is most pronounced when we feel hesitant to do something. Of course make sure to look after yourself first but giving in all that you do always creates a space in which you welcome the energy of inspiration to create your dreams and make them all come true.

[vimeo http://vimeo.com/13573320]

SO GIVE AND BE HAPPY, JUST LIKE MR. HAPPY MAN!!!! 😀

Why your Dreams Need a ‘Why’ to Come True

It can be difficult to find the joys in life. We are told all you have to do is follow your joy and life will work out. But what if you don’t know what your joy is? Well I will tell you right now what your joy is and where you can find it. Your joy is the ‘why’ you are doing something. If you thought it can be hard finding your joy, you are right! It is hard to find the joy because the ‘why’ you are doing something is not an easily definable goal but it is truly the most important thing to define. The ‘why’ provides you with motivation in achieving what you are doing. Why are you doing what you are doing? Why are you trying to create this dream? ‘Why’ is where the energy of your dreams reside and it is when you have truly found your reasons and embraced them that you will begin to move forward powerfully and unflinchingly towards the creation of your dream.

The ‘what’ is simply the definable goals that have definable limits and values associated with them. We have so many ‘what’s’ in our lives and spend so much time defining them. All these ‘what’s’ though are associated with the external world, all the things that we want, whereas the why is more associated with our inner world, the motivation that drives us towards realizing our dreams in our external reality. The ‘why’ even exists deep in a place in our brain that doesn’t have complete access to our conscious mind. Instead it has to be translated by the cortex, the conscious part of our brain, in order that we can verbalize and understand ourselves what our ‘why’ is. This part of our brain though is heavily connected to our emotions and reward centers which give us the power to follow our dreams. Our ‘why’ is our success fuel and without the ‘why’ we are tapping a very limited energy resource. So we have to spend extra attention and energy in defining our ‘why’, in sitting and being with ourselves. Why am I doing this? Why do I care?

The ‘why’ is then similar in nature to our values. If the ‘what’ is the goal at the end of a journey, the ‘why’ is what drives how you travel along the journey itself. Therefore, as a practice you could imagine how you want people to remember you. People don’t normally speak of the goals (the ‘what’) that we hit but instead how we went about living our life and what was driving us. These elements are key to you understanding why you do things and why you will do things. When you have worked out some of these values you will gain a greater insight into some of these deeper aspects of what is driving you.

However even still sometimes it is difficult to find our ‘why’, even with such practices because people want to know their ‘what’ first. There are many people in this world and all our unique. So for those people who want to know the ‘what’ first I would say this: Follow your joy. What do you do in your week that you look forward to? What do you dream about that you think would be the best thing ever? What thing, when you think about it, makes you feel excited and bursting with happiness? When you have worked out what that thing is, then the next step is the hard one… Take a step towards it. Sometimes that step may feel too big. Too overwhelming. Well then, take a smaller step. Work out what the step is before that step and if that is still daunting, half the step again and work out the biggest step that you are willing to take, but take that step. When you commit to your joy you are committing to your ‘why’.

The good thing about moving toward your joy is that you are never locked in to it. Just because you took a step towards something doesn’t mean that you can’t change your direction. It doesn’t mean that you can’t take a step to the left or do a complete 180 degrees. But you need somewhere to step toward. You need to create that beacon of light, something that draws you to and lights your path. The closer you get the more you feel the warmth from the light. And the more you feel the warmth, the more tactile and real your ‘why’ will become until you will be able to hold onto it and give it a name. From that point on you will be running through every obstacle with the armor of purpose and meaning. For when you have your hands firmly wrapped around these concept of purpose and meaning, when you know the reasons why you are doing something, you can wield it’s awesome power through the darkest moments and create a life worth living in every moment.

To Succeed we Need to Consider the Community of our Future Selves

Life often is about perspective. It is about reframing the shot to bring into focus the things that are really important. We often create the idea of the fairy tale life. We see the way we want things to work out and we don’t want any real hardship as we travel down that road. But what would we really learn if it was all that easy. How would you really progress if life were a series of simple steps that didn’t push you to really know yourself? You would just float through life on a euphoric cloud only connecting ever so lightly with your surroundings and you would never any of it or yourself as real.

We have hardships to create strength. To create growth. To create ever greater versions of ourselves. To learn a difficult math problem is in fact not easy, but with the effort that we put in not only do we learn the solution to the math problem we also learn that we can answer other math problems. Often we need to go and ask people for help to do so, but there is nothing wrong with that as our lives and society is built on communities of people coming together and working on single ideas of ideology, morality, politics, economics and many other more to create great solutions to tough questions.

Often we want to be the knight in shining armour that rides in, solves problems themselves, saves the princess and lives happily ever after however we must not only realize that we are communal, we must remember to strive for community. Most of us are taught to reach solely for the prize as a lone rider but what about if a knight went into the dragon’s lair, this difficult life problem, with a group of knight’s? Not in an effort to attain all the spoils for himself but to share the spoils equally. Rather than chasing the fantasy they instead work together to reach a shared goal. All men would be able to equally share in the spoils and all live well off. This idea is, in part, supported by John Nash’s Game Theory which asks that rather than trying to reach the unrealistic and self focused goal by ourselves we may find a greater and achievable reward with a more cooperative goal.

Whilst this concept takes into consideration often working with other people or cooperative agents, this cooperative goal can also happen closer to home so to speak. That is, cooperation with your present self and your future selves to be exact. Quantum physics has told us that reality and time is an infinite and infinitesimal sequence of moments of now and it is our consciousness that stitches them together to form the flow of experience. Every moment feeds off the next but that is not to say that it is the same moment. It is in fact, in essence, a completely new moment. Your future self therefore is a completely different self to the current self and selves that are reading this. If that is confusing and difficult to digest, when we look at it from the larger perspective and think back to fifteen years ago, it is hard to believe that we were the same person we are today reading this. That is because we are not. Our bodies and minds have completely refreshed and reformed. And so when we think of our future selves in shorter time whilst harder to notice the changes we can know that the present moment we are operating is a different moment from the former and the future.

By working with your future selves for the ultimate goal, you will be able to look at the fact that while you were unable to receive the current prize, you may be able to see that you have worked in collaboration with your future self in order to create a greater future for all of yourselves, both future and present. This may come as an example where you have worked on something but it doesn’t pay off the way that you wanted it. However when you change your perspective, you can see that you have gained a lot of experience, connections and references for your future self in order that they will succeed. You can see that you have sacrificed your past self in order that others will thrive. Sacrifice and surrender is considered one of the greatest, and noblest, gifts a person can give to anyone and to anything.

When you act in collaboration with your future selves you gain a much larger and grander perspective and a much greater vision of what you are doing. You’re your actions have a greater perspective, you then have a greater purpose. You have a meaning and a reason for doing what you are doing. You allow yourself to be more forgiving of actions that didn’t pan out as originally intended for you see that they are only a small, and often necessary bump in the road. You therefore can find a greater appreciation for those little things that do and don’t work out for you, as you and your team of selves are now a step closer towards the greater goal that you are working towards. For with a team you can trust, you know that you will ultimately achieve the dream that all your selves are trying to attain. So please don’t be disheartened by things that don’t happen exactly the way you planned but instead see the bigger picture and be supportive of your greater selves. And remember Aesop’s motto “United we stand, divided we fall” so work in collaboration with your future selves and you will surely be able to reach any goal. GO TEAM!!!