So true!!!! We all want to change the world, but in reality, we need to change ourselves. We need to change how we perceive the world. We should experience living in the moment with conscious awareness of the mind and body connection, opening a doorway for ease and flow to enter our lives.
How do we do this? We need to better understand ourselves. Understand where our blind spots are. We need to slow down our mind so that we can implement ease and flow into our life. One of my blind spots was lack of confidence. I learned that confidence is a habit that can be honed and strengthened everyday. To restore my confidence, I cleaned up all the loose ends in my life. Anything that was bothering my mind, I addressed it. I felt much lighter!
“When you no longer seek or need approval, you are at your most powerful state. Nobody can disempower you emotionally or psychologically”. Caroline Myss
We all have a belief system. All of us live in the reality of our thoughts. I’d like to share a few thoughts of my belief system. I want to be happy. I am patient and forgiving. I openly receive love, acceptance, and support in my life. I no longer expect perfection from my relationships. Loving myself gets easier every day. I am calm, present, and aware in every moment. I am worthy and deserving of a loving relationship. I am worthy and deserving of achieving my goals and dreams in my life. I deeply like and respect who I am. I am willing to let go of all old hurts and pain in my life. I find value in helping others. I am committed to living my best life.
What we can or cannot do, what we consider possible or impossible, is rarely a function of our true capability. It is more likely a function of our beliefs about who we are. When we say we cannot do something, we have just run up against the barrier of our belief system. It is our beliefs that we use to define our life and what makes each of us unique. Our sense of certainty about who we are creates the limits and boundaries by which we live. When we change our belief system, we change our life. My belief system did a full 360! When our desire for change is greater than our existing habit, we begin to take the steps to implement change into our life. Everything is possible if we believe it is. I sometimes catch myself saying “I can’t do it!” I stop, pause and think, is that really true? I tell myself, forget the past, focus on the now, on the kind of life I want to create in this very moment. I remember that the only limits I have are the ones I place on myself. I focus on what I want, not on what I don’t want. By spending time with myself, by practicing meditation, I began to identify the blind spots in my life. By slowing down and coming into the present, I began to see how I created my own reality with my own thoughts.
Every thought plants a seed. If we focus on the seed and water it with intention, it will grow. Let me ask you, where are you focusing your thoughts and energy? What I do to focus is by practicing mindful awareness. I become the watcher, the observer, and practice observing my thoughts. Take for example, a tiger, it first sits quietly and surveys the landscape, and then acts with determination. By learning how to sit, we learn to walk, and learning how to walk, we create awareness. By slowing down our thoughts and connecting to our inner source of knowledge, we can make choices, we can breathe deeply before we react to an old habit or pattern, we can breathe before we speak and can choose our words and actions.
It is our thinking that determines if we enjoy an activity. What we believe, where we focus our attention, determines if we are in the zone. Intention attention is the most important tool in improving the quality of your experience. If you are happy and feeling at your best, you are in the zone. It is your choice, your decision on how you react in situations. If someone said something that hurts or offends you, you have the choice to keep on walking or get stuck in a circle. Your mind will keep on spiraling, causing you to act incongruently. Or, you can stop, pause, observe the situation, and tell yourself, those are their words, their problem not mine, I know who I am. Believe me, this kind of thinking does wonders! It changed me!
If you want to control your life, if you want to do well in business and your personal life, it begins with clear communication. We all have rules that live inside of our heads, rules by how we communicate and how we live our life. If we don’t communicate our rules, then no one will understand us. For example, a good friend to you may mean that they will call you everyday. To another person, it may simply be an unspoken code that you are friends and talk once a week. Our unspoken rules make up our communication. What we say and how we say it is the result of our thinking. The communication process begins with our perceptions, and how we see the world. What we see as black may be red to someone else. We all look at the world differently based on our conditioning and beliefs. I have learned that there are two methods of communication, of what we think and what we speak. Whatever we are feeling, we project on the world, and that image is mirrored back to us. I learned that I have to be clear about the message that I want to project. I have learned that I want to send a message of congruence, that is calm and confident, not a message that is hurried, rushed, frantic, and antagonistic. I learned that when I am congruent, my communication is aligned with my values, and my message is more clear and concise. Before, I was emotional and filled with doubt and unclear, so my message that I was sending was incongruent and often misunderstood by the receiver.
I am working on this project, “Living In The Zone.” Its whole purpose is to create a positive energy surrounding you. Regardless of what situation you are put in, could be a negative one, your positive energy will make an affect. Just like if you throw a pebble into the pond, it is amazing at how many ripples it creates. Can you imagine what impact you can have? It is truly amazing!!
So what is really being in the zone? What is the one thing that men and women seek? Happiness. It has become mankind’s primary goal. People that learn to control their inner experience, will be able to determine the quality of their lives. Therefore, happiness is determined by our inner experience. The optimal state of inner experience is one in which there is order in consciousness, this happens when our attention is invested in realistic goals. Being in the zone is when we are aiming to achieve a goal for its own sake. You are in the zone when you are engaged, your passions ignite, and you are excited about life. I know I reached my zone by following the Sikhi way of life, and discovering my spirituality. Being in the zone becomes more about the journey, as each day you are present and make the choice to live in the zone. When you are excited and engaged with an activity, you are living in the zone. Remember, it is not the problem that is causing you to suffer, it is your thinking. Remember, thoughts are just thoughts, they are not concrete.
Living in the zone is about working towards your goals every day. Focus on your dreams and your desires for happiness. By working towards your goals, you create a positive flow of energy that uplifts and inspires you. When you are engaged in life and have a sense of joy and fulfillment, you are living in the zone. Focus each day on three goals that you want to accomplish for the day. Make the goals achievable small incremental steps where you will be proud of yourself, congratulate yourself at the end of the day for achieving you goals. My goal was to get up every morning and do Nitnem. It was tough!!! The bed sure did look cozy in the wee hours of the morning. When I would begin to meditate, my mind would be running on a track, thinking it can be the next world Olympian!!! But, eventually I took the time to listen, connecting with my mind and body, searching my soul to find what brings me fulfillment. God. I learned that setting my goals was the first step in achieving my desired outcome. Whatever my mind focuses on, it can achieve. Mind is a powerful creation. God created this beautiful mind, but also taught us how to control it.
As someone said to me once, you cannot find yourself by going into the past, or looking towards the future, you find yourself by coming into the present. Change starts from within yourself. When you control your mind, you rule your world!!!
