Law of Attraction #2 - The Good Life

Once in awhile something will fall into my lap that makes the Law of Attraction not only real, but obviously real to me.  It happened recently when I discovered the Abraham-Hicks Vortex of Attraction Alaskan Cruise 2015, signed up and showed up for it.  Before going, I had marveled how much Abraham must love the cruise workshops.  "They must be like shooting fish in a barrel."  If the goal is to feel as good as you possibly can in every moment, who isn't feeling good on a cruise?"

Although Abraham-Hicks' teachings have taught me not to look at other people's struggles or shortcomings, during the beginning of the cruise, I couldn't help but notice not everyone was feeling as happy and affluent.  Letting my 'monkey mind' play with it awhile, I realized what I had done differently.

We look at the world and life around us and we call it reality.  Just as LeRoy Neiman looked at the pages of "Playboy" and allowed it to make the good life a reality for him, if we want to change our viewpoint in regards to reality, we need to seed that change ourselves.  At the end of the cruise, sitting in a Virgin America First Class seat, I realized that was exactly what I had done.

1.  Although the friend who accompanied me on the cruise has long said "Balcony rooms are a waste.  You're going to spend more time out of the room than in it."  I couldn't help but think that I'd like a view from my room.  I thought too about how crowded it might be on deck while we were passing Alaskan beauty.  I wouldn't have to worry if I was taller than the people around me on my own private deck.  Knowing there are fewer dark night time hours in Alaska during summer, I also thought I might be tempted to go out on my own balcony then.  While I might not be tempted to walk all the way up to the deck.  I opted for my own private balcony.

2.  From water to high end alcohol, Celebrity Cruises have a wide range of drink packages available.  I chose the absolute highest, most expensive and most inclusive one.  Without trying to make sure I accounted for every dollar I had spent, I also made sure that I used it.  Every day I picked up at least one very large bottle of water, as well as a mixed drink I had never tried before or the most expensive glasses of wine on the menu.  It turned out that the "most" expensive glasses of wine actually required a little bit more money than just the drink plan.  Rather than get upset and huffy about that, I simply said, "Ok.  Go ahead and charge me the extra two dollars."  Rather than charge me, my waiter said, "I'm going to let it pass this time.  I just wanted to make sure you were aware of the possibility in case you run into another extra charge drink at one of the other restaurants."  The last day I even tried a Singapore Sling, which was a drink my grandmother used to talk about drinking on her freighter trips when I was a little girl.  When pre-choosing my options, I didn't limit myself.

3.  I signed up for an excursion at every port.  Two of the excursions were Abraham-Hicks exclusives where I got to travel side by side with other workshop attendees.  Two of the excursions were personal victories.  One of them was a Sled Dog Mushing Experience that included a helicopter ride to and from a glacier as well as the chance to be the musher for a team of dogs that train for the Iditarod.

Era Helicopter and Sled Dog Return

Era Alaska Flightseeing Helicopter and Dog Sled Tour - Dog Run - July 5, 2015, taken with GoPro Hero3+

I also went on a zip line excursion in Ketchikan, Alaska, but there is a lot more to that story which I will return to another day.

4.  At the airport while picking up my boarding passes, I was offered an upgrade to first class for $70/each.  You know I took advantage of that.  Besides being one of the first on and off the plane, free champagne and real food rather than pretzels or nuts, hot damp towels, and a seat that had a massage setting, I was rewarded by my companion turning to me mid flight.  "This is fun," he said.

What will you do to make the good life a reality for you?
                     

Law of Attraction #1 - The Colorful T-Shirt

(Today was going to be the first entry in a new blog "Cheerleader of Life," but the site had a massive failure "server not found" and I decided the best thing to do was to publish the blog entry on my already established blog.  So without further ado ... my regular Tuesday blog ....)

Day 2 of the Abraham-Hicks Alaskan Cruise 2015 ...
we are in Ketchikan, Alaska in a gift shop when I see this shirt,

(Shirt sold by http://www.themountain.com.  Artist Dean Russo)

and I love it and grab one to buy ...

but before I get to the cash register ... I see this other shirt.

(Shirt sold by http://www.themountain.com.  Artist Dean Russo)

I reach to grab one of those too, but they don't have my size.

I consider buying the one that is too big .... but I've had a shirt like that before .. you love the image so much ..... you buy something too large ...... and it always feels a bit off ..... and you end up getting rid of it barely ever worn. 

The shop is a real touristy place ... perhaps even one in a chain of shops ..... so I think maybe I will get another chance.

In Juneau, Alaska ..... our excursion 

(mushing a team of sled dogs, but that is another story) 

ends late in the day and I opt out of looking at the gift shops in town.

I am wearing my new husky dog shirt in Skagway, Alaska, our last Alaskan town where I will have feet on the ground, when a man walking towards me from the opposite direction with his own group of friends slaps hands with me as we cross paths. He is wearing not the identical shirt to mine .. but very very close .. obviously the same artist.

None of the shops in Skagway have it or anything similar.

I set the notion aside .. thinking I will google it when I get home.

We have a day and a half at sea followed by our final evening in Victoria BC.

We go on the Abraham Hicks exclusive excursion to Buchart Gardens (which simply means we ride there together as a group.)

We won't get back to the ship until at least 10pm. Dinner, pics, and shopping will all have to fit into our slim window of time. 

(I should admit too. I almost didn't go on the excursion. The Abraham workshop was over having just ended that day. I was considering spending the last of my time on the ship quietly processing everything, but during the break between the last two sessions I met a lady who was local to me in the line for the toilet. She had mentioned other people from my town who were at the workshop. I hadn't met them yet and I thought maybe they would go to the gardens.)

It is a 45 minute drive to the gardens. We hit the ground running. Cameras out. 100 pics or so later, I get really hungry and convince my friend Art it's time to go to the coffee shop. I eat a hot dog. He has some sort of pastries. We eat them sitting at a table between the coffee shop and the gift shop.

As we're eating, I see stained glass items in the window of the gift shop. I begin to feel this excitement or urgency to go there .. so much so that Art has only finished one of his two danishes, but I ask if it is ok if I go in ahead?

He has no problem with it and I do.

I spend a lot of time at the stained glass .. they have this stuff that looks very ... primitively artistic and features cats .... I like them .. but don't love them.

I begin to wander around the shop .. I'm not sure what triggered the .. "I wonder if ..." but sure enough .. yes they had it .... in any size I may have wanted.

Now .. really that was good enough for me ... but .. today when I was talking to Art as he left .. I realized something much larger.

See .. before I left for the trip .. I wanted to bring a t shirt or two .. but I wanted them to be a bit more on the feminine side ... not big like a man's but a little more form fitting .. while not being too tight or revealing.

I have this t shirt I bought on a trip to Arizona .. it is beige and has a coyote on it ... the coyote is very colorful, but in a southwest way.

I had wanted to take that shirt, but it was in my laundry and in the mess of my house 

(my house has been under construction for almost a year now .... but that too .. is another story)

... I couldn't find it.

(Coyote shirt - still rumpled from the laundry where I found it - says only "Gildan Ultra Cotton" on the label)

It is only ...

after witnessing the beauty of Alaska
after soaking in hours of Abraham-Hicks material
after enjoying exciting adventures like zip lining and dog sledding

it is only in a casual conversation with Art ...

that I remember .....

One of the last thoughts I had as I finished packing before the trip ....

"I really want to get a few more t shirts with a colorful animal on the front."

• 

Shifting to Harmony

"Happiness is when what you think, what you say and what you do are in harmony."

Mahatma Gandi

My coach Gil McIff would say the cause of suffering is man's lack of awareness of his true nature.  It isn't an obvious point at first, but that is essentially the same thing Gandi was saying here.  In other words, due to our lack of understanding, what we think, say and do can never quite be in harmony.  Abraham-Hicks would say we feel discomfort because we are not in alignment with our source.  We are not in alignment with our true nature.

From childhood to current day, I have been a lot of different Angela(s.)  Angry Angela(s.)  Sad Angela(s.)  Happy Angela(s.)  Each generation of Angela is more loving, more confident and happier.  I am so grateful I am the sort of person who embraces the opportunities to grow and change as well as a person who navigates through the harder changes always emerging better for having ridden out the storm.

More so than at any other time in my life, I know who I am and I know what I need to do.  For years I have compared myself to others.  Even after the years where I let myself emotionally fall short, I compared thinking others would benefit from the things I was learning.  I have transitioned from evangelist to coach to a fully realized individual continually on the path of being.  More and more what I think, what I say and what I do are in harmony.

From a score of philosophical teachings and teachers, I have discovered a few principles to guide me along my path:

1.  As much as possible, follow a path of least resistance.  One of the things that always shook my life up in a bad way was my need to take action, particularly in the forum of needing to speak up, explain or defend myself.  A lot of poorly advised phone and email conversations happened even though it might have been a technical struggle to complete them.  It was like I was given dozens of tiny little chances to change my mind and yet I still pushed through them full steam nearly always to my later regret.

I don't do that anymore.

Back when I was a darkroom photographer, I noticed that some days photographic printing was a struggle.  The harder I tried to fight through; the deeper the pile of wasted photographic paper that ended up in the trash.  I learned that sometimes the answer was to pack it up, go home, and try again tomorrow.  The path of least resistance is found by grounding yourself in the present moment, being open to the opportunities, but not forcing anything.  I have realized that even no action is essentially an action and that I really can't do anything wrong.  What I once would have considered a mistake that impacted my life in a detrimental way, I now consider an opportunity for learning and growth.  I am not the underdog struggling to keep up.  In a very real sense I am the creator of my world and my personal existence and I have adapted the creative lessons of my "real world" writing and photography.  Creations struggled over remain less satisfying because if nothing else, it is hard to determine when to stop.  The best creations are effortless, flowing out of you as easily as your own personal scent.

2.  I have learned, rather than troubleshooting my life and continually looking for potential problems, I am the creator of my existence.  What I look for I will see.

I'm a big fan of the Walt Disney Company and I have been to their parks many times.  In a very real way, Disneyland is a microcosm of the larger world.  Here is a place that exists to entertain, to kindle the fading embers of your childlike joy.  Yet all around you there are people troubleshooting the problems.  Complaining about the crowds or expense.  I have never heard it better addressed than the cast member I witnessed who was trying to direct a large traffic of people through an already congested area, who said:

"Remember why you came here."

I have come to believe I didn't come here to look for holes in the dykes in which to stick my finger.  I didn't come here to tell any emperor(s) they had been hoodwinked into wearing nudity.  I came here to live a human lifetime.  I came here to be alive.  

All that troubleshooting and complaining we think protects us from danger, simply draws that which we don't want to us.  At the same time it delivers a numbing sameness which may feel protective in times of struggle, but which dulls vibrancy and blocks us from joy.  We freeze out our own potential for happiness in our attempts to protect ourselves from pain.  

If what I see is what I look for, I have decided to saturate my environment with textures I find enriching and beautiful.  If what I see is what I look for, I have decided to look for the silver lining in every cloud.

3.  "The rich get richer and the poor get poorer" I have come to understand as a byproduct of the Law of Attraction.  If we believe we are rich in abundance and things come to us easily, we are and they do.  If we believe we are poor and in competition for scarcity and that life is hard, we are and it is.  

I need to show some gratitude to my mother on this point.  No matter her personal struggles, she always told me "things always work out for you."  Even before I understood the mechanics of why it is so, I found comfort in the awareness.  I found comfort in hearing it and in telling it to myself.  We believe the stories we tell ourselves.  We believe them and our belief causes them to be true.  My understanding of this has forever transitioned my self talk from one of "Life sucks and then you die" sarcasms to one of self soothing pep talks.  I can be and have so much more than I ever knew because I have already witnessed it time and time again.  

4.  I have learned that trying to siphon self esteem and confidence from other people's praise and opinions is like trying to use it to fill a gas tank with a hole in it.  No amount can ever fill it and unless or until I find its source within myself, it will remain empty.  

Near the time of my divorce, I saw Albert Brooks' movie "Defending Your Life."  I recognized the main character's fear-driven life struggles as not being dissimilar to my own.  Not liking the picture that painted for my future, I decided to be brave.  The first thing I did was go with some friends to a place called Moaning Cave in Vallecito, California.  Today they have more things you can do there than then, but at the time, you could choose to either descend a staircase or rappel down into the cave.  I went there with the very specific purpose of rappelling. 

After overcoming the fear based sensations of needing to use the toilet and worrying I may throw up, I found myself dangling by a rope in a huge cavern in full view of the optional staircase.  I was completely over my fear and I was sort of wishing the rope ride down moved a little faster when I heard someone on the staircase notice me and say, "I could never do that."  In that moment, I could remember feeling the same.  Simultaneously, I knew how little effort it took to do it and inwardly I revelled at the awareness I had extended that effort and was doing it.  I had transitioned from the Angela who couldn't do it to the Angela who could.  

Self confidence comes from achievements.  It comes from being able to look at something and tell yourself, "I did that."  

My beginning path as a coach was the same as the rest of my life.  I looked for the pitfalls and tried to troubleshoot clients' lives.  I have come to understand, by simply observing and assessing a client's life status and determining that he/she needs to make some changes does us both a disservice.  It is the equivalent of viewing them in a negative way.  In my portion of our co-creation of existence I am seeing them as coming from a position of lack and having made mistakes.  I cannot drag them to my higher position in that way.  Worse, by simply viewing and focusing on the negative, I am far more likely to fall back myself.  Tread once again through waters in which I have already been.  

That's where I find myself today.  

It is time to no longer tell you the stories of where I have been and what I have overcome.  I am and always will be the woman who wants to share her successes with you.  I am and always will be the woman who wants to drag everybody into the lifeboat with her.  The difference is I am no longer willing to see my words as some sort of lifeboat of advice, I am no longer willing to see you as being in any sort of distress or struggle, and I am no longer willing to dive down into the murkiness of my past or my past unhappiness to try and achieve the unachievable.  If I am going to lead, let it be by example.  

It is time to embrace who I am deep inside, a sort of cheerleader of life.  With that in mind, I am crafting a new blog*.  I want it to be exhilarating with stories of rappelling, zip lining, sled dog racing, and perhaps even scuba diving.  I want it to be stories of joy and appreciation.  I want it to be stories that catch the attention of those people walking down the stairs rather than rappelling.  

Maybe, just maybe .... if I share the stories where I take pleasure in being alive .... I can get just one of them to whisper ...

"maybe"

*New blog is already in construction and should begin the first or second week of July 2015.  

Just Stop Talking About It

My life has been positively exploding with opportunities lately!  I have been remodeling my house and so many things began falling into place people pointed out to me I was almost building an entirely new house!  Now, as I decorate the reconfigured rooms, each stroke of paint seems to make me feel just a tiny bit more alive and excites me.   A friend told me it was like I was building my own personal Wonderland.  I couldn't have said it better myself.

At the same time, opportunities for travel are opening up.  I have friends in both London and Paris who have a guest bedroom available.  I visited New Orleans for Mardi Gras this year and in a little over a month I will be in Alaska.  That was a big Law of Attraction moment of delight.  I have been talking about wanting to go to Alaska since the 90's.  Recently, I have been saying I would like to try a cruise, maybe a theme cruise for added entertainment, and after friends went to another workshop since the retreat we attended together, I decided the next workshop I would like to attend would be one with Abraham and Esther Hicks.

Yes I am.  I am going on an Alaskan Cruise with Abraham and Esther Hicks.  After talking with my two friends, on a complete whim I googled some sort of mixture of Abraham-Hicks, workshop and cruise and found an outline of an experience that could have been lifted right off from my vision board.  Including the port visit attractions.  Even with all that, I still messaged a friend who has been to an Abraham-Hicks Caribbean Cruise.  He said, "If you asked me if I would do it again, I would answer, 'In a heartbeat."  Excited almost isn't a large enough word for how I feel.

So I'm immersing myself in Abraham-Hicks teachings.  I would really like a chance on "The Hot Seat" and even though it is probably next to impossible given how long Abraham has been answering Hot Seat questions, but I would like to ask a new one.  I would like to identify the best question I could ask Abraham for my own behalf AND nudge the discussion a little further along.  As I listen to Abraham-Hicks audiobooks and youtube presentations, I have already had my first potential questions answered and I'm becoming pretty well versed in Abraham's Law of Attraction point of view.

If you find yourself unhappy with your life and the opportunities that are presenting themselves to you, the answer is in the question.  Don't understand?  Voice the question you would ask Abraham to yourself lightly.  Is it something along the lines of:

Where is my soul mate?  The love of my life?

Why am I not more successful?

Where is my slice of happiness?

So far the number one takeaway I have from all of my Abraham-Hicks studies is the importance of being happy and having a positive attitude.  The things you want in your life that aren't there are held back by your own repetition of complaint they are missing.  The more you keep "beating the drum" (as Abraham would say) of the bad things that have happened to you; the more you push all of the good things you've been wanting away.  You attract not what you want, not your opposite, but exactly what you are.  The next time you complain about that dimwit fellow employee or that road raged driver who cut you off?  Consider this.  According to Abraham, they didn't just drop into your lap.  You actively attracted them.  So if you find yourself surrounded by bad tempered, combative people, you might want to do an emotional self check.  You want to aim for a high frequency to attract a high frequency item.  You need to be authentically happy to attract more happiness to your life.  

Authentic happiness.  You can't complain about all that baggage, cross your fingers behind your back and say, "Just kidding."  The universe doesn't listen to what you are saying.  It reads the emotional frequency you are broadcasting.  So if you are in a "the world sucks and then you die" place, guess what world you will attract?  

But "misery loves company" right?  We think it feels good to complain to others and get recognition and confirmation of our position.  We feel validated, but do we really feel better?  Or is it like the junk food aisle of happiness?  A temporary, not very filling alternative that frequently leaves us no better than we started after our sympathetic audience has departed?  

There used to be a joke something along the lines of "Why do I bang my head against the wall?"  "Because it feels so good when I stop."   But it's not really a joke.  It's the way life works.  If your life isn't working, you are metaphorically banging your head against things and asking when this pain in your head will go away.  Stop and it will go away.

I've been studying the Law of Attraction for a few years now and that's what I've been trying to do.  I know I've had times where I have found it impossible NOT to drone on about the bad things that have happened in my life.  I remember the feelings of needing to explain.  The feelings of needing to be understood.  Some time not that long ago, a friend gifted me with one of the most important things I needed to hear to begin the process to stop.  

"You talk like you're the only person that has ever happened to."

I immediately recognized the truth in what he was saying because it was also how I felt.  The fact that my friend had had similar experiences and had not talked about them like I did was startling and liberating.  

You don't need to tell everyone your story.  You don't need to explain.  You don't need to justify.  You don't need to set up a context for who you are now or who you want to be.  According to Abraham, all you need to do is, in this moment, find the happiest, highest frequency you can reach.  In the next moment?  Find the happiest, highest frequency you can reach.  Repeat.  Repeat.  Repeat.  Don't beat yourself up when you find yourself slipping.  Slowly make your way to an emotional place where you feel better.  If you feel better, you have raised your frequency.  

Salt your world with music that inspires you, colors that soothe you, textures that comfort you.  Hug, squeeze and breathe in the people and creatures who you love.  Learn to focus your attention on the world you love rather than the news that scares you.  Try this.  Have you ever been driving, your favorite song comes on the radio, you're singing along and all of the sudden, another car cuts you off?  By the time your hearing for anything beyond your own cussing has returned, it is three songs later.  Right?  

There are no fewer than a thousand reasons you cannot be privy to that may have caused the driver to behave as he did.  Your judgement about him is based on you and your fear and has little to do with him.  You don't even know him.  Meanwhile, you didn't die and your favorite song is still on the radio.  I'd say your best and happiest course of action, and the one that will benefit your future the most, would be to keep on singing.  

Stop talking about everything you hate and give some airtime to everything you love.  

The Levels of Consciousness

I need to preface this blog entry by saying you are never responsible for someone else's feelings.  The influence or contamination of emotional feelings that I describe in the blog can both happen to others encountering you as well as to you when you encounter others.  What I am always trying to shine a light on is that, just because you may be having a rough day or going through a bad patch, YOU DO NOT HAVE TO BE UNHAPPY.  Emotions are good.  They are our special gauges that tell us whether we are living life in a way that is happy and fulfilling or constrictive and disheartening.  But just like a gauge in our car that tells us our car needs service, we don't simply leave the triggered gauge on red and talk about it for hours, days or weeks on end.

************************

There is a chart that can be found across the internet, based on Dr. David Hawkins work, which assigns a numeric value to all of our emotions.  The Levels of Consciousness chart.  They developed the numbers via kinesiology or muscle testing.

Now in the Law of Attraction, we learn that like attracts like.  In other words, a high energy frequency attracts a high energy frequency and a low attracts a low.

I was thinking about past relationships and arguments or bad moments that I've had and suddenly I could actually visualize exactly what had happened using The Levels of Consciousness Chart.

Joy is at 540 on that chart and Love is at 500.  Lets call the combination of those two "Happiness" and rather than a numeric value, let's give it a color.  Red.  Fear is at 100 on the chart and Desire is at 125.  Let's call the combination of those two "Getting Your Self Worth from Others" and give it the color blue.  Anger is at 150.  Let's give it the color purple.

In the scenario I was thinking about, a friend and I were together.  Laughing and having a good time. If you could see each of us as glowing in our level of consciousness colors, I'm sure we both would have been red.  Keep in mind, like attracts like.  We're both happy and we are supporting each other at that energy level.  Maintaining it by attracting it back and forth.  I drift out of the moment.  Something happens that makes me think of the past or triggers my lack of self worth and I begin talking to my friend, not from our red place of "Happiness," but from my blue place of "Getting Your Self Worth From Others."

Like attracts like.  In this situation, a few things can happen depending on my companion's resilience levels and skills at resisting others negative emotions.

Because that's what I've done.  I've introduced negativity into the room.  I've done it innocently enough.  I have left the present moment and my ego is running my "Getting Your Self Worth From Others" program.  It actually represents me, slipping from "Happiness" and attempting to reestablish myself there.  I suddenly feel bad and I'm attempting to feel better.

It can never happen.  It is the equivalent of trying to make a dish less salty by adding more salt.

I've introduced negativity into the room and I've broken our attraction.  If my friend is very resilient and has very good skills at resisting, he or she will probably excuse him or herself from the equation and leave the room.  If my friend is very patient and  empathetic, he or she might cajole me back to "Happiness," but I could just as easily drag my friend down.

Downward emotional stations from "Happiness" or Joy and Love on The Levels of Consciousness Chart would be Reason, Acceptance, Willingness, Neutrality, Courage, Pride, Anger, and finally, Desire and Fear or "Getting Your Self Worth From Others."  Some of those may not sound all that bad, but keep in mind they are lower than "Happiness."  In terms of emotional pain or discomfort, lower energy levels don't feel as good as higher ones.  If my friend is very susceptible to negative emotions, I may even drag him or her lower to Grief, Apathy, Guilt or Shame.  In the scenario I was thinking about, I dragged my friend to anger and we had an argument.  I converted us to colors rather than numbers because I think it is a good visual representation.  My friend was red.  I was blue.  He or she took on a bit of my blue and became purple.  Angry.

Now consider this.  You've had a bad day at work.  You come home and your loved ones, your family, are all laughing and having a good time.  They are buzzing along, red and in the 500's and you inject yourself into them, gruff and complaining, somewhere under 200.  The very best you can hope for is that they will draw you up to their level, but you are running the risk of dragging them down.  You are making yourself a burden.  It is as if your entire family was required to carry a certain amount of weight and, instead of carrying yours, you redistribute it among the rest of your family.  I'd like to think you'd never do that. I'd like to think that you would rather take on some of your loved one's burdens than willingly place yours upon their backs.

There is a popular self help meme across the internet.

"Never put the keys to your happiness in someone's pocket."

We tend to look at that from a very self centered viewpoint.  I want to be happy and I can't depend on anyone else to make me happy.    

1.  You can't "make" anyone do anything.  Just as no one can "make" you do anything.  In reality, when someone else has done something and you respond by being happy.  It was your choice to respond in that way.  Understanding this means understanding you also have the potential to choose to be happy at any time you like.  No matter what circumstances are unfolding around you.

2.  Your moods and your life are your own responsibility.  No one else's.  One of the reasons you can't put the keys to your happiness in someone else's pocket is because they are responsible for their own happiness.  No one can be or should be burdened with your happiness as well as their own.  

But what can I do?"  You might say.  "I feel however I feel.  I can't control my emotions."

There are actually a lot of things you can do.  Consider my example.  I said "I drift out of the moment."  By that I mean, I drift out of the present moment.  Instead of being present and actively interacting with my friend, I have allowed my mind to drift.  Probably to the past since what it netted was insecurity and negativity.  Whatever things happened to you at work, they are not present with you when you arrive home with your family.  They can only be there, if you drag them there.  One thing you could do is meditate and cultivate practices that enable you to be more present. You could work to make yourself more resilient and resistant.  You could do this by exploring your emotions, understanding why you feel like you feel and make peace with your demons from the past.  Or you could consider the possibility that, in order to feel happy, we must think happy thoughts and consciously decide to be happy.

One of the quickest routes to being happy?  Do something nice for someone else.  You can't "make" them happy, but you just might "make" yourself happy in the process.

Being Brave Enough for Your Dreams

In 2006 I began trading stocks.  It came after my father telling me I should give it a try for nearly 20 years.  I didn't because I had too much resistance to my father and, once I was interested in the idea, I didn't have the means.  Like rappelling, trading stocks has been significant in that it had so many more gifts to offer than simply capital gains or dividends.

After much baggage I don't want to talk about, I had about $6000.00 to invest.  It was taking a bit of a risk because it represented more than half of my savings, so I tiptoed into the pool.  I only invested $1000.00 and my first purchase was only $281.00.  Ten shares of the Walt Disney Company at a share price of $28.10.  I typed my limit order (I had been watching Jim Cramer's "Mad Money") feeling as if someone was watching over my shoulder ready to challenge my right to do this.  The minute it showed up as being in my portfolio, I stared at it as if the numbers would immediately spin up or down like a gas pump.  In other words, I was ridiculously naive.  The second stock I bought was a royalty trust, SJT (San Juan Basin Royalty Trust,) a friend owned and recommended.  

While I'm writing this, I went to Scottrade to look up some of the information I was going to refer to and found myself drifting away and researching my stocks.  That's how I feel about stock trading.  I love it.  I find it intrinsically interesting BEYOND simply the potential to make money.  You need something like that.  You need two or three things that you don't do for the money.  You do them because you love to do them.  You do them because your life would have less in it without them.  

Now keep in mind, it took me years to believe in myself enough to give it a try and even after I did, I had to have the money needed to do it.  Then you have a learning curve.

The third stock I bought was Rinker Group.  An Australian cement company publicly traded (in 2006) on the NYSE as RIN.  I don't remember exactly how much it cost or how many shares I purchased.  What I do remember was within a week of me buying shares in that company, it received a takeover offer.  I was so excited and scared at the same time.  It was like I had a lighted firecracker in my fingers and I had to do something before it blew up in my hand.  I took the profit and "rang the register."  Honestly, it couldn't have been much.  I think I only had one share.  My experience combined with Jim Cramer talking about buyouts and takeovers taught me my first lesson.  If a buyout offer drives a stock you are holding up, take your profit.  Even though I got out in the first week of negotiations, I watched the Rinker buyout.  At the time I was so obsessed with potentially making a mistake, I couldn't do anything but watch to see if it all had turned out in my favor.  Or at least I thought I had.  While researching for this blog entry, I just discovered there was more to the story than I ever knew.  After I got out, I watched what happened.  In a long ugly battle, Cemex company (Ticker Symbol CX) of Mexico bought Rinker.  The stock never climbed as high as it had at the point where I sold it.  The thing I didn't know until today was that Cemex lost an antitrust suit about the purchase and the purchase was declared invalid.

Think about that.  Although I made only a little money, I made money on a transaction that was erased.  When you are working with the law of attraction, struggling with letting go of the "how I will attract this money," consider that.  I made money on a transaction that was erased.  Now tell me you've fully thought out all the ways money can come to you.

That's a pretty good point right there.  Thank you universe for that.  I was headed somewhere else.

Eight years ago, I decided to be brave enough to try a dream.  Today, not only do I still trade stocks, I still love it and I have gained bunches of confidence because of it.  Consider this:  back when I bought those ten shares of DIS?  I couldn't tell anyone other than my close friends what I was doing.  The "who are you to be doing this" anti-self-esteem headwind created too great a drag.  Now I can talk with other traders and, mostly?  Hold my own.

My point was simply to encourage you to give it a try.  Be brave enough to attempt just one of your dreams.  See where it takes you.

The Law of Attraction Steps 1 and 5 (Be Very Clear What You Don't Want and Letting Go)

The other day I was talking with a fellow coaching trainee and I discovered a point of confusion between the two of us within the five steps to the Law of Attraction.  In other words, he was telling me about his line items from Step 1.  "I don't want this and I don't want that."  While I was thinking, "but look what is happening to Step 5!"  The following day I listened to Therapy Training: How To Make Any Therapy More Effective by Chris Milbank and he made this very good point.

People who hate dishonesty really love honesty.  We need to treat our excess love of something as well as the opposite issue.

Used at their most advantageous and effective, I believe the five steps to the Law of Attraction work together and give you a greater picture about what is going on in your life.  Why you haven't been attracting the life of your dreams.  It can be tricky, though, if you don't consider each step in relationship to the other steps.  For instance, my friend was telling me that he had received a job offer and had declined it because he didn't want to work for a W2; he wanted to work for a 1099.  In other words, he didn't want to be a direct employee for the company; he wanted the company to hire him by retaining his business as a consultant.  He wanted the transaction to happen in that fashion because he saw it as giving him tax write-offs for his business.

I saw some conflicts in my understanding with what he was saying.  So I spoke up and asked for clarification.

Throughout my training and in the materials I've read, I've learned:

1.  Money is a form of appreciation.  Money will flow to you as appreciation for the services and work you have performed.  It may flow to you from other sources than you were expecting, but to the degree of which you have removed limiting beliefs or blocks, money will naturally flow to you.

2.  The Law of Attraction presumes a world of abundance.  If you are begrudging someone other than you the money he or she receives in appreciation, you are operating from a position of scarcity.  You are more in alignment with abundance when you are happy for other people's wealth as well as your own.  In other words, in a world of abundance, someone else's wealth takes nothing away from you.  I don't have to compete with you for that dollar.  There is plenty for all of us.

3.  Step 3 to the Law of Attraction is to "Let go."  This means to let go of any expectations you may have as to how you will receive the things you manifest or listed that you wanted in Step 2 (Be very clear about what you do want.)  An example I have been given is people who say they want a million dollars and then go out an buy a lottery ticket.  You see, when you buy that lottery ticket, you are dictating the terms rather than letting go.  I want a million dollars.  I want to receive it via the lottery and since this ticket is for next Tuesday's drawing; I want the million dollars next Tuesday.

I saw my friend's desire to work for a 1099 rather than a W2 as coming from a place of scarcity and dictating terms rather than letting go.  He answered, of course, "but what about Step 1?  I know I don't want to work for a W2.  I know I want to work for a 1099."  Instinctively, I still felt like I was onto something with what I had said, but Step 1 is to be very clear about what you don't want and I couldn't dispute that he was.  I knew we were in danger of slipping into a impenetrable logic loop.  It seems to me our only way out is by diving deeper in.  When you are centering in on what you do or don't want, you are supposed to be very detail oriented.  I've noticed the details from Step 1 can point you towards limiting beliefs you may need to clear in Step 3.  While the details from Step 2 (Be very clear about what you do want) can point you towards the emotions you would like to tap into in Step 4 (Nevillize or feel and behave as if you have already received what you want.)

Now, how would my friend feel if he worked for a 1099 rather than a W2?  As I see it, he would make more money.  Nothing wrong with that, but why not simply ask for a greater salary?  Why not just list in Step 2, X = the amount of money I would like to receive.  After all, whatever amount he visualizes himself as receiving as a result of the 1099 rather than a W2, couldn't he just receive that in the first place and allow for his employers to get the tax write-offs?  While we were discussing it, my friend began to talk more in terms of life purpose.  It turned out that the work he was talking about was, in his words, "soul crushing work."  He felt that way because, although the work is something he is good at performing, it isn't his first choice in terms of what he would like to be doing.

That is where we get lost in the details.  While we're talking 1099's and W2's and their tax benefits, the essence of what he wants has less to do with the money than something more elusive to pin down but is probably somewhere between appreciation and control.  I think when you find yourself listing details of what you do or don't want and they are beginning to read more like dictating terms, a good idea would be to return to steps 1 and 2 and detail how you would or wouldn't like to feel.  For example, in my friend's case.  "I don't want to earn a living doing work that feels 'soul crushing.'"  Perhaps even write it out in a sort of a beginning to something like an NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming) Script.  In the past I have found my work to feel soul crushing.  It felt that way because x.  I would like to perform work that feels soul uplifting.  In order for me to feel that way, (a b c d) would be present.

There is another aspect to consider.  My friend felt the work was 'soul crushing,' but he was willing to do the work if he were allowed to dictate the terms.  Why?  Presuming a world of abundance, where there are myriad things you could do to earn a living, why would you want to do work you felt was 'soul crushing?'  Everything I'm saying is pure speculation based on a few comments between friends; but if I were examining my own Law of Attraction Vision Board or worksheet, I would consider two things.  First, why the work felt that way.  Is it because of how I have been treated by specific employers in the past?  Is there a chance simply working for a different employer could change how I feel?  Or do I just really hate doing that sort of work?  Second, do I have a limiting belief that the only way I can earn a living or be gainfully employed is by doing work that I secretly hate?

Now it is all well and good to take a page from a friend's Vision Board and dig in and say perhaps he needs to go back to the drawing board, but to be fair, maybe I need to put myself on the spot a bit.  At least my friend has a list of goals and what he wants, frequently I find my own vision, particularly in terms of relationships, much more vague.  A starting point could be a statement I made on a Vision Board very early on.  "I would like a romantic partner who makes me feel loved."  That stemmed from a Step 1 item about a former partner.  (In other words, a complaint about a former partner.)  "Being loved by "x," is like sitting in front of a fire which casts no warmth."

On the surface, it seems very straightforward and simple.  I didn't like that former partner's style of loving, so I would like a partner with another style in the future.  Do you see the glaring problem that stands out like a sore thumb, though?

I would like a partner who makes me feel loved.

Was it on while we were on the schoolyard that we first voiced, no one can make you do or feel anything.  You are the boss of you.  How you feel is an inside job.  Seems obvious that my choices in steps 1 and 2 in this instance point directly to a limiting belief.  Perhaps I need to clear on the belief that I need someone else's love, affection, or approval in order to feel loved?  Perhaps I need to examine whether or not I love myself?  And, if all that is the case, how does that change the shape of who I'm looking for in a romantic partner?

Now what does this have to do with Chris Milbank's assertion that we need to treat our excess love of something as well as its opposite?  He goes on to say that if we really love freedom, we will always recoil at feeling trapped.  It will happen again and again.  In other words, the Law of Attraction is an attraction of energies.  By being overly attached to one side, we naturally attract the opposite due to our extreme aversion and resistance to it.  Actual freedom comes from being in a situation that could cause us to feel trapped and being confident we are still free. 

Everything can be taken from a man but one thing:  the last of  human freedoms - to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way.

Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search For Meaning

Letting go of attachments is also Step 5 of the Law of Attraction and I believe it is important for a couple of reasons.  First, those attachments are probably also tied to limiting beliefs.  Consider the lottery ticket example.  Perhaps you focused on receiving the money through a lottery ticket because you had a limiting belief that you could only receive the sum of money you wanted by winning it.  Keep in mind what that limiting belief could also be saying about your own opinion of your self worth.  It is a Law of Attraction constant that you will receive love or money or any other form of appreciation consistent with the amount you believe you are worth.  In the case of my own example, how can I ever find a partner who will make me feel loved, if I don't love myself?  If I am not worthy of my own love, how can I be worthy of anyone else's?  

Second, we tend to behave as if things will all work out swimmingly if we just get these limiting beliefs we have cleared and get on with manifesting things.  Life doesn't work that way.  For one thing, most experts in the field agree that once a limiting belief is cleared, another limiting belief will surface in its place.  At the same time, change is inevitable and integral to the system.  For example, I had a later partner who did make me feel loved, but the relationship still ended.  I believe being truly clear on a limiting belief is very much like this quote by Buddhist nun, Pema Chodron:  

Nothing ever really goes away until it has taught us what we need to know.

In other words, as long as we are attached to A, we will hate B.  The strong attachment naturally creates an energy of aversion and that energy will continue to draw the circumstances we dislike.  Or more precisely, it will continue to draw circumstances which cause us to feel and react in an opposing way.  I think to truly clear on a limiting belief that is associated with an attachment, we have to find that place where we can be like Viktor Frankl.  We have to be actively able to choose a different response or reaction than the one that has been dictated by our attachment and subsequent aversion and resistance.  

Honestly, as I have told my clients, I can't really say why your life becomes happier when you choose a positive outlook.   Does it actually become happier or does it seem like it is because you have chosen that filter through which to view it.  To me, it doesn't matter because the end result is the same.  I am happier.  The same is true with "nothing ever goes away."  Perhaps it never really goes away AFTER it has taught us what we need to know either.  Perhaps it is just a question of it no longer disturbing us.  We are no longer attached to its opposite.  We are no longer resisting.  

Why, if it all is simply a state of mind, do I even want to bother?  Because when you have cleared away the cobwebs of attachment, aversion, resistance, limiting beliefs or data, as Dr. Hew Len (the therapist I have mentioned in this blog before who healed a ward of mental patients using Ho'oponopono) would call it, that is when you tap into the flow, which is a sort of pure intuition.   The flow is like being immediately connected to the Law of Attraction.  The flow is when writers and artists describe their work as having almost written or created itself.  The flow is when athletes become the ball, the race car, or simply the thing itself instead of someone playing it.  The flow is when you don't question what you are doing; you just do it.  The flow is being truly alive.

Thanks for The Growth 2014, Welcome to the Party 2015: We're Going to Have A lot of Fun

The other day I was reviewing the notes I have made on my iPad's Notes app and one I had jotted down from the "Abraham-Hicks" Facebook page caught my attention.

We want you to have the feeling of sort of freely flowing in this, rather than the attitude of "I'm going to get it right this time."  Because the attitude "I'm going to get it right this time" causes you to remember what wasn't right and activate it within your vibration and then makes sure that you do all those things again, that you don't want to do.

This seems incredibly important to me because it goes against what I once would have termed "human nature."  I've always believed that the best thing about mistakes is that they give us an opportunity to learn from them.  I've lived an incarnation where, if you had asked me, I would have said it was irresponsible to forget your mistakes.  We've all heard that famous quote at one time, haven't we?

Those who don't know history are doomed to repeat it.  

Edmund Burke

There is an interesting counter quote by Kurt Vonnegut.

We're doomed to repeat the past no matter what.  That's what it is to be alive.

Viewed in light of the Abraham-Hicks quote, perhaps we do all that repeating because we refuse to let the past go.  In fact, in light of that quote, I wonder just how often we condemn ourselves to what we don't want by the very methods we utilize to improve our lives.  For instance, New Year's Resolutions.  

res-o-lu-tion:  noun   1.  the act of finding an answer or a solution to a conflict, problem, etc; the act of resolving something;  2. an answer or solution to something

New Year's Resolutions would seem to be the very heart of what the Abraham-Hicks quote is talking about.  We are essentially ending our year by saying, "Ok I didn't like this and this and this about last year so I resolve to change them next year."  From a Law of Attraction standpoint, it would be considered focusing on what you don't want and expecting to get something different.  With that in mind, I would like to propose an alternate year end ritual celebrating our growth and achievements, jaw dropping moments of awe and beauty, and quiet moments of love and inspiration.  

Here, let me lead by example.  In other words, I'll go first.

In 2014, I:

1.  ... more fully appreciated just how sweet my ginger cat, Peabody, is.  I already knew that I was blessed with a creature who I sometimes wake up holding like he is a rag doll, only to hear him purring in appreciation.  I am having some construction done at my house and, as a result, I only have a half bath currently in use.  It is situated on the other end of my house from my bedroom.  I didn't realize until having to walk through two of my larger rooms (one of which is currently under construction) to get to the toilet twice nightly, that Peabody, who tends to sleep next to me, actually accompanies me on every trip.  Not only that, but he tends to lead me as if he is the President's motorcade.  He walks ahead of me, looking back and checking on my progress every three feet or so.  He waits patiently until I am done and then sometimes walks to where his food dish is or the spot where I tend to give him treats, but equally as often, he simply escorts me back to bed.  My love and appreciation for this gentle sweet creature is absolutely limitless.  

2. ... more fully appreciated the value of letting go.  I had a saying painted over my kitchen door before it got demolished.  "Don't push the river, it flows by itself."   A former micro-manager of micro-managers, I put it there as a reminder of who I didn't want to be and what I didn't want to do.  From making more money on a house I was selling than I would have on my own personal time frame to sorting out relationships where I was trying too hard, 2014 has repeatedly rewarded me as I have learned the patience, optimism and wisdom to let life unfold rather than force it through my planned circuits.  At the same time, I have gained trust that even the events which look sad or regretful at the start, turn out to be blessings infused with opportunities for kindness and grace.  

3. ... invested in myself and I was rewarded with wonderful new experiences, opportunities for growth, mentors who shared invaluable knowledge and friends who were kindred spirits.  

4. ... discovered that we never really lose anyone.  On paper, 2013 and 2014 witnessed me losing my final parent as well as friends I never expected to lose.  I realized I lived in a world where, if I chose to view it that way, it could start feeling very cold and lonely.  Instead, I found a wellspring of love and affection.  I realized that, my experiences of other people actually live within me.  My enjoyment and appreciation exists within my own heart and head and, really, are not something that can whither and die or be forcibly taken away from me.  Loss does mean a certain closing of a book, for instance, the last time I saw my father, he was watching television from his convalescent hospital bed.  The expression on his face was remarkably like that of a little boy.  That will remain my last image of my father and we will not build any new memories together, but whenever I want to touch the love or kind feelings I have for my father, I have only to picture that 79-year-old boy, happily watching television as I left the room.  I've learned too that it is a choice.  Dwelling on any number of less kind or gentle moments, will never rewrite them.   While sweet memories, held gently with love, can never be taken away from me.  I can never lose the love in my heart.  

5. .... appreciated friends who helped me clean up after an earthquake; who opened their tubs and showers to me while I had none; who welcomed me into their home for the holidays; or who sought out my company or advice.  Old friendships, new friendships; I know I am enveloped with love and good wishes and I am truly blessed.  

Thank you 2014, you have been a kind and gentle year with unexpected surprises.  I'll never forget you. 

Change is a Dance with Two Left Feet

I was talking with a friend the other day and mid sharing my thoughts about what she was saying, I had an aha! moment that maybe I was completely screwed up in what I was saying.  Have you ever had that moment?  A sudden understanding, mid-sentence, that what you are saying might be codswallop?  I had been looking at what she was talking about from a Law of Attraction point of view.  She had some unpleasant things recently visit her life and I was questioning whether she had learned the lessons they brought and thereby put that particular brand of unpleasant thing to bed.  (The lessons you don't learn will return until you do learn them.)  The conversation brought to mind three important things:

1.  The only thing that matters is this moment now.  We were talking about things she had done and I was speculating, using the Law of Attraction, about them.  In the moment we were talking, she had already done those things.  My speculation, just ego or "data."  Unimportant mind chatter that keeps we humans "busy."  Besides, speculation about something that has already happened and whether or not it was the "right thing" as Eckhart Tolle would point out, is insanity.  You can't rewrite moments that have already happened and the practice of obsessively revisiting them falls under doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results, which Albert Einstein would point out is insanity. (In case you don't follow that one.  You may be doing different things throughout time, but if you are constantly rethinking them and speculating about their accuracy, the thinking and speculating fall under "always doing the same thing.")  Life is essentially one big tennis game with the ball perpetually and constantly landing in your court.

2.  No matter how much I change or try to change, I end up with that moment, egg on my face, realizing I have merged the old way of being Angela into the new way of being Angela.  After a lifetime of using criteria to control my own behavior so I would be a "good" or "valuable" person, I realized the other day that I come to the point where I was doing it again.  This time with the Law of Attraction.  I had shifted to a place where I judged actions by whether or not they would attract good things or bad things into your life.  Or, in this case, my friend's life.  There is no right or wrong action.  I know you're going to fight me and disagree on this point, but I really think there is no right or wrong action.  There is only whatever action you take.  See, life may be a tennis game where the service is always coming towards you, but it is YOUR life.  Those choices are YOUR choices and create your path.  You know what they say about that.  "No one else can walk your path.  Only you."  It doesn't mean I was bad or wrong to share those opinions with my friend, she is someone I care about and I was trying to be helpful.

3.  My own path is the complicated dance of someone with two left feet who is always moving one step backward for every two or three forward.  I think humans are always drawn to that which is familiar.  No matter how much meditation or clearing on limiting beliefs, eventually my guard comes down and my subconscious drifts back to old habits.  It's like setting yourself up in a new apartment in a new town and the first time you let your mind drift during your commute, you find yourself getting off the bus at your old place.  The trick is, when you find yourself doing it on that larger scale, blow it off in a sheepish, "silly me" sort of way.  Just like you would the bus mishap.  Call it a silly freak occurrence, not something that labels you a "failure."

As my mind swum in all of this "data," I realized something else.  A lot of the platitudes we use in personal growth communities, are just that, because they aren't really very useful.  For instance, the one about not caring what other's opinions of you are.  When you read it or somebody tells it to you, it is all about being true to yourself and not caving in to peer pressure.   Many times I have told people who accused me of it, that I do not care what other people think of me.  Which on the one hand is true, but on the other hand is a complete fantasy.  OF COURSE, I care what people think of me.  I have people I care about.  People I love.  For those people I sometimes edit myself or behave in ways I know will bring a smile to their face.  I care that the people in my life experience me in a positive way.  I enjoy people being happy to see me.  I don't think that's a bad thing, but of course, it is subject to the same "nobody's home" subconscious habitual behavior.  It's one thing to turn your car radio station to jazz because your friend who loves jazz is riding with you; it's entirely another to never switch the radio back to your own preferred station because no one but you likes it.  In the former, you are being a gracious and thoughtful host.  In the latter, you are erasing your own existence.

Still, all of it, the thoughts and labels, are all just data.  Just ego "busy work" to keep you entertained while you're alive.  Just like you, your ego thinks all of it is important.  It thinks it has to "sort all of this out and make sense of it."  We gather our data and cling to it as if it will allow us to hold onto our past or somehow predict our future.  None of it matters.

What does matter is what you do right now.

Taking Responsibility and Ho'oponopono

Over Thanksgiving I was listening to Joe Vitale and Dr. Ihaleakala Hew Len's Zero Limits: The Secret Hawaiian System for Wealth, Health, Peace and More.  The recording was done at one of their Zero Limits workshops and included audience questions.  If you're not already familiar with it, The Secret Hawaiian System is known as Ho'oponopono and Dr. Len once used it to cure a mental ward of criminally insane patients without ever personally seeing any of the patients.  Here is a link to Joe Vitale's blog entry about Dr. Hew Len and Ho'oponopono but, essentially Dr. Hew Len would look at each patient's chart and then clear on whatever came up within himself about what he read.  He looked within himself to see how he created that person's illness.  By clearing, he performed the Ho'oponopono meditation which is to repeat the words:  I'm sorry, Please Forgive Me, I Love You and Thank you.  After three years, Len's work was such a success that the unit was closed.  

Ho'oponopono is one of the techniques I was taught during my coaching lessons and it is in the curriculum I share with my clients.  Although I don't have anything as remarkable to report as an entire mental ward being closed down due to my efforts, it has been one of the clearing tools I use in my own life.  Over the weekend, I felt like I understood Ho'oponopono a little bit better and although it feels a bit like juggling slippery goldfish, I want to attempt to explain some of my understanding here.

I had some resistance to Ho'oponopono in the beginning.  Particularly to the words I'm sorry.  At some point it had been explained to me:

When you say "I love you" ... you are touching compassion.
When you say "Thank you" ... you are touching gratitude.
When you say "I'm sorry" ... you are touching humility.
When you say "Please forgive me" ... you are touching sincerity.

I have no problem saying "I'm sorry."  I have spent a lifetime of saying it.  So when I would try to say it in connection with Ho'oponopono, it would get tangled up with a lifetime of baggage.  The last time I told somebody that (my coaching coach) he once again explained that the "I'm sorry" was all about humility.  I spent days asking myself if all of mine had been about humility.

humility:  (noun) a modest or low view of one's own importance; humbleness.

By definition, yes, my apologies were humble.  The resistance stemmed more from who I was saying the words to rather than from where they were coming.  First, I would say those words when a friend or acquaintance would tell me about something that was disturbing them.  I would say "I'm sorry" to express my sympathy.  Increasingly that was being met with, "Why?  It's not your fault."  Which was probably due to the second instance when I would say those words, when one of the people in my life who had convinced me I was responsible for his or her feelings would get upset.  I said "I'm sorry" so often when trying to stem someone else's anger that it began to feel like I was apologizing for my very existence.  Frequently when we use clearing methods, even though we are mostly meditating alone or talking to ourselves, it is when we perceive something is wrong or has happened.  It was hard to separate the new Ho'oponopono "I'm sorry" from the earlier ones.  I even questioned if I had inadvertently benefitted even though I had never understood the greater implications.

This weekend, what caught my attention was the talk about taking responsibility for our lives.  The more I listened, the larger the concept grew and the more different it became from being responsible for how someone else feels.

My assumption is that most people who at some point during their adolescence used the words, "You made me ..." or "Look what you made me do" has heard the lecture that no one can "make" you do anything.  You are personally responsible for your emotions and behavior.  People may be unfair, unkind and unpleasant, but you are responsible for your own response.  There is a meme that floats around the internet:  How other people act is their karma.  How you respond is yours.  

It seems to me that most people think of karma as being a big bad deed boomerang.  "What goes around, comes around."  "You reap what you sow."  During my internet surfing about the subject, I've learned there are two interpretations of karma.  The first is the commonly held one I already mentioned, but the second is essentially that you will continue to be faced with the same life lessons until you have learned them.  In other words, people will be who they are and you will experience the same people over and over, until you have learned how to respond to them.  I would like to suggest Ho'oponopono is the kindest, gentlest, easiest, and most responsible way to respond to them.

In Zero Limits, Dr. Hew Len refers to the stuff you are clearing as "data."  There is us and there is all this data.  Others like Eckhart Tolle, using a model that is a bit more Buddhist in nature, have referred to what Len is calling data as "ego based states of consciousness."  

Think of it this way.  You are sitting at a restaurant and a man at an adjacent table belches.  Loudly.  You mumble under your breath, "What a pig."  The facts or what is:  a man belched at a restaurant.  The data or ego based state of consciousness:  "What a pig."  Data or ego based states of consciousness are your personal judgements about things that happen around you or others' behavior.  Your parents may have raised you not to belch out loud and told you it was an impolite thing to do, but there are other cultures where it is not frowned upon and can be even seen as a way of complimenting the cook.

So the first thing that is important with Ho'oponopono is being able to distinguish between fact or "what is" and your own thoughts, labels, or judgments.

The more energy you have about something, the more it will return as a karmic lesson, so chances are you won't encounter a stream of restaurant belches.  But how about that reoccurring boyfriend?  Or a mean spirited gossipy friend?  You are attracting them into your life for a reason and purpose.  Think of it like the movie Groundhog Day.  Your day isn't repeating, but the circumstances are.

Before I had a life coach, decided to become a life coach or had ever heard about Ho'oponopono, I had a relationship where I really tried to embrace the notion of unconditional love.  I wanted to be the best partner I could be.  With no guidance, my brain created a set of theorems.

1.  Unconditional = no conditions
2.  Loving someone with no conditions means loving them no matter what emotions they have inadvertently triggered.
3.  I am responsible for my own emotions and behavior.

I tried.  I didn't know about Ho'oponopono, but I tried really hard.  When something happened and I was disappointed, angry or sad, I would walk myself through mini pep talks to get myself off the ledge.  Of course, everything that was happening were things one or both of us had a lot of energy about, so karmic lessons were in abundance.  I can say with a great deal of love and optimism that I hope neither of us has that relationship again.  In other words, that we learned the lessons we needed to learn and will level up.  At the same time, even though I had few skills or tools to help me in my attempt, the more I study Ho'oponopono, the more I think I had it right.

The problems of our lives are not what actually troubles us.  It is our reaction to them.  We tend to look for offense like we want to be offended.  One of the speakers on Zero Limits spoke of how using Ho'oponopono had enriched her family life.  When her children would do something that irritated her, rather than chastising them or demanding that they change, she said the clearing words about the feeling within herself.  She said the clearing words about her own judgment that her children were being irritating.  As Dr. Hew Len pointed out, she did not suggest her children or any other family member do the Ho'oponopono themselves.   In her case, she said that she knew if she did the clearing, all of them would be clear and fine.  At the same time, just like you can't control others, Ho'oponopono is taking responsibility for your part in the equation of life, not urging others to do so.

Of course thinking like that, makes me think about my clients.  How much of the service I'm providing should be teaching them the tools I have been taught and use vs. actually using those tools on my part in the equation of our relationship.  After all, using the Dr. Hew Len model, it is not unreasonable to consider speaking the words to clear on anything about which you become unpleasantly aware.

War.  GMO's.  Politics.  Global warming.  Ferguson.

Mother Teresa once famously said that she didn't attend "Anti-War Rallies," but if anybody ever had a "Pro Peace Rally" she would.  You attract things based on your energy.  Focus on what you want, not on what you don't want.  When what you don't want enters your sphere of attention:  Ho'oponopono.

I'm sorry for whatever energy I brought to this situation.

Please forgive me.

I love you.

Thank you.

In Search of "Happy"

This week I've been reading The Ultimate Introduction to NLP:  How to Build a Successful Life by Richard Bandler.  Although I already had the first pieces to the puzzle, it gave me a bit of an Aha! moment.

In a typical NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming) fashion, I ask you to think of something fun.  Think of a time when you were wildly happy.  If the moment doesn't make you feel like giggling right now as you're thinking about it, you probably need another moment.  Think of one of the best feelings you've had.  Maybe something so good, you would be embarrassed to share it.

Got it?

Now notice where you feel the emotion in your body.  Where does it start?  What part of you?  Where does it move to?  Play with the movement of the emotion.  See if it has a color associated with it and see if you can move it through your body.  Visualize a lever named "Fun" in your mind and picture moving the feeling throughout your body by moving the lever.

Congratulations.  You have just created a lever in the control panel of your mind where you can access "fun" or "happiness" whenever you want.

I've mentioned the Law of Attraction before in this blog.  Step 4 of the Law of Attraction is to "Nevellize" (a term coined by Joe Vitale honoring Neville Goddard, an earlier pioneer in the field of the Law of Attraction.)  To "Nevellize" is to feel as if you are already living the life of your dreams.  If you were living your dream life, you'd probably feel pretty happy, huh?  You just built a lever to help you Nevellize.  At the same time, we tend to attract people and events that broadcast at our same frequency.  There's a very good argument that, if you flipped your switch to "fun" every morning before you went to work or whatever else you did during your day, you would attract only more fun and happiness to you.  Even if you didn't believe in the Law of Attraction, couldn't you argue that, by choosing to be happy, your days would be happy?

Now that was not my Aha! moment.  I had already learned that if a person can control his mind and choose to be happy, he/she will be happier.  It had been a slow realization that came from Eckhart Tolle's quote that I no longer con recall well enough to quote.  Basically it was addressing the need to go find yourself and was something like "it takes no time to be you."  It also came from witnessing other people who had the belief that you could simply choose to be happy and their subsequent successes and failures.

Now maybe some of you, when I told you to think of a time when you were wildly happy, were faced with an empty head completely silent of any suggestions.  Maybe you were left with a big, "hmmmm let me think about this a moment."  If so, you're not alone.  I was in that exact same place the first time I was ever approached to do this exercise.  First, my mind was a big empty black hole.  Then, I had a few memories of good times but they were irrevocably intertwined with bad things that happened later.  In fact, a good portion of my life has been lived in search of "happy."  At times it has been a little embarrassing.  My search has come up in conversations with other people.  Friends, who invariably would say, "What about when we did this?  You had fun.  You certainly laughed a lot."  It was embarrassing because I lacked the skills to explain that, while their memories seemed vivid and fully detailed, mine were weak and pale, lacking any real substance.  That was my Aha! moment.  I can explain now because I understand what was happening to me and I know what to do about it.

As Richard Bandler asks in the book:  Have you ever had an argument and then replayed it in your memory afterwards?  Have you ever replayed an argument for what added up to be much more time than the actual argument lasted?  How about this.  Have you ever played an argument in your mind, which hasn't happened, but you anticipate it might?  You might imagine that my answers were yes, yes and yes!  And you'd be right.  In the book, Bandler refers to a client who has replayed arguments she had with her mother for years after her mother has died.

How much of the present moment do you think you experience when you're mentally in the audience for an argument that happened years ago?  As a child, I learned to constantly troubleshoot my environment.  I was always watching my mother's mood, desperate to keep it from switching, but wanting to be aware the instant it did.

Have you ever put a very dry sponge into water?  A sponge so dry that it took it a moment to actually be able to absorb anything?  That was me and "happy."  Basically, I pursued being happy.  I did "happy things."  But I did them like I was the Universe's Secret Service and I was always on the job.

I attracted a lot of other people like me into my life too.  I once went on a trip to Walt Disney World with a man who later told me his every day "base" emotion was anger.  Now that was a fun trip.  He spent his trip being angry about the lines, how much things cost, and the fact the rides emptied into gift shops and I spent my trip micro-managing how to keep him from getting angry.

It's funny.  I got that way because I had been hurt and scared a few times and I wanted to protect myself from it happening again.   What I really did to myself, though, was lock myself in a mental prison of worrying about all the worst things that could happen and I very nearly threw away the key.

But I didn't.  If you can relate to what I've said and have problems naming a time you were "happy" too.  You can retrieve the key as well.

1.  Practice being in the present moment.  Life happens in the present moment.  It is the only moment we actually have.  The past is passed and the future is just an idea.  Be here now.  One excellent tool for doing that is Gil Mciff's Three Step Clearing Method.  I mentioned it in a previous blog entry ("The Law of Attraction and What You Resist, Persists" October 7, 2014.)  But here it is again.

Three Step Clearing Method by Gil Mciff

Feeding what you want is natural and easy, you are already doing this in many ways.

The emphasis of this practice is focused on starving what you don't want by simply observing your emotions and thereby dis-identifying from being them.

Your habitual state of consciousness is the number one determinant of your personal circumstances.  The quality of your consciousness in this moment is the primary determinant of your future.  And what determines the quality of your consciousness is your degree of presence.  

Check in 10x a day with the question: "How am I feeling emotionally in my body right now?"

You can use a reminder app or alarm on your phone, sticky notes placed in random places, paint one fingernail different from the rest, wear your watch on the opposite wrist or upside down, or put a bandaid on your finger.  Every time this catches your attention, ask yourself, "Emotionally, how do I feel in my body right now?"

(A further suggestion my fellow coaching student told me was to do it every time you needed to use the toilet or took a drink of water.)

If there is ANY kind of negativity or if it is simply a lower emotion than you would like to be feeling, the fact is you did not choose it.  It's based on conditioned interpretation and is simply an old program running and it is time to do the following 3 steps:

(If you are feeling what you would like to be feeling then start with step 2.)

1.  Say These Specific Words - There it is.  That's not me.  That's a program.  

2.  Observe it deeply.  What physical and emotional sensations do I feel?  Where do I feel them?  Or simply I feel it (here,) it feels like (this.)  Realize who is doing this inquiring?

3.  Thank you for checking in.  I love you, I love you, I love you.  Thank you for no longer feeding the program.  Thank you for dis-identifying from the program, thank you for catching yourself and for no longer losing energy here.  Thank you for whatever you want to say thank you for.  I love you, I love you, I love you!

There it is.  That's not me.  That's a program.
I feel it here (location,) it feels like this (characteristics.)
Thank you for checking in, I love you I love you I love you.

These steps are not for the purpose of getting rid of the negative feeling (i.e. resisting and therefore feeding what we don't want.  That benefit may sometimes come with it, but this practice is more about implementing a new habit/program.  So every time you observe the emotion, it's an opportunity to do this practice without judgement.  It doesn't matter what emotion is there, what matters is that you simply observe it without giving it any meaning.  When this becomes habit you will have successfully reprogrammed the unconscious perpetuation of the old reaction with the automatic newly programmed conscious response.

It takes less than 30 seconds to do this practice.  30 seconds at 10x a day = 5 minutes
How many days will it take before this healthy response has become a new program for you?

2.  Actively choose to be happy.  Do the "Fun" lever exercise and build a control panel in your head that helps you select how you want to feel rather than being on a treadmill of worry or negativity.  Start each day with a happy frame of mind.  When you are in the midst of a happy experience, really feel it.  Take in all of the sensory details.