Showing posts with label gratitude. Show all posts
Showing posts with label gratitude. Show all posts
Friday, July 24, 2009
Saturday, February 14, 2009
The Magic of Not Wanting What You Want
As you would probably expect, working in the field of personal development I get to spend a lot of my time with people talking to them about goal setting and visualisation. I cannot over emphasise the power of positive intention when it comes to manifesting an amazing life, but there is a common trap that too many people fall into while “dreaming their way to success”.
One of the most significant developments in my realisation of what true success requires is the notion of being non-attached to the object or outcome of desire. There really does appear to be a reliable universal law that states good things will flow more readily towards you when you let go of your need of having them.
For many people, including me, it has taken a lot of time and contemplation to completely reconcile with the logic that the best way to get something you want is to not place too much importance on wanting it. We can see how this works out in the subtle examples that we’ve all experienced in our daily lives. An obvious one is when you find that little lost object only after you’ve given up looking for it.
How about when you’ve got yourself so worked up about an upcoming event that the only way of coping with that level of anxiety is to just throw fate to the wind and say “Sod it, whatever happens will happen, let’s just get it over with”, and in the resulting relaxation your experience of that event turns out to be far more positive than you could have imagined.
If you’re a golfer you’ve probably been told that you’ve got a better chance of landing the ball closer to the flag if you do not aim for the flag itself but rather the wider area around it.
Each of these examples demonstrate an important lesson in what your future success is waiting for you to do – let go for your need for it to happen.
When you attach yourself to an outcome and pin all of your hope on it, you might be all excited about achieving the goal, but you’re also buying into the belief that you can’t be truly happy unless that situation pans out the way you want it to. You are unconsciously telling yourself “Right now I’m not complete, but this thing will make me whole”. Without meaning to you have put yourself into a lack mentality and that can make life a lot more difficult than it needs to be.
The problem is not in the goal itself but rather in the attachment to the goal; like your happiness depends on it. This attachment is the equivalent of ‘looking down’ when you are half way up the mountain. It causes you to fantasise about how terrible it will be to fail.
You may have watched the film “The Secret” or learned about the Law of Attraction, where you focus on your desire at the same time as ‘sending our’ your emotional intention to the Universe. Well wanting something too much works in harmony with the opposite law – The Law of Repulsion. Think of a magnet being flipped over so that it repels rather than attracts. Dreaming about your desired outcome is good, but doing it from the confines of a lack mentality will rarely get you closer to where you want to be.
So the big question is how do you let go of your need of things while still encouraging them into your life?
Quite simply, by recognising all of the reasons you can still choose to be happy without the goal having to be met. Everyone has innate happiness in their nature; it just gets a bit covered up with the thought that we are not supposed to feel it until we’ve actually done something to earn it.
The best question I have ever been asked came from the success coach, Michael Neill, and it is this:
What would you want to go after in your life if you knew you didn’t have to be unhappy about not getting it?
It might take you a while to get your head around the meaning of that question but it will eventually lead you to that frame of mind where you can have compelling goals, but without an emotional dependence on them. It is a case of “Yeah, it’ll be great when this happens, but in the mean time I’m just going to be happy anyway”.
This Week’s Homework:
Take some time to completely relax and meditate on what you would like to have in your future life. Let your imagination run riot, as if you can order anything you like from the Universe’s menu.
Put yourself into the scene and experience it as if it is happening right now. What do you see? What can you hear? Totally immerse yourself into the fantasy so that it becomes more and more real for you, and intensify the good feelings.
Stay with it for as long as it feels really good to do so and then imagine pushing your thoughts off into the distance, as if you are instructing the Universe to deal with them for you.
Next spend a few moments contemplating everything you already love about your life. What are you deeply grateful for? What do you have in your life today that you want to continue having for the rest of your days? Really feel that. Smile at it. Then happily get on with the rest of your day.
To your success!
Warm wishes
Paul
http://www.life-happens.co.uk/
One of the most significant developments in my realisation of what true success requires is the notion of being non-attached to the object or outcome of desire. There really does appear to be a reliable universal law that states good things will flow more readily towards you when you let go of your need of having them.
For many people, including me, it has taken a lot of time and contemplation to completely reconcile with the logic that the best way to get something you want is to not place too much importance on wanting it. We can see how this works out in the subtle examples that we’ve all experienced in our daily lives. An obvious one is when you find that little lost object only after you’ve given up looking for it.
How about when you’ve got yourself so worked up about an upcoming event that the only way of coping with that level of anxiety is to just throw fate to the wind and say “Sod it, whatever happens will happen, let’s just get it over with”, and in the resulting relaxation your experience of that event turns out to be far more positive than you could have imagined.
If you’re a golfer you’ve probably been told that you’ve got a better chance of landing the ball closer to the flag if you do not aim for the flag itself but rather the wider area around it.
Each of these examples demonstrate an important lesson in what your future success is waiting for you to do – let go for your need for it to happen.
When you attach yourself to an outcome and pin all of your hope on it, you might be all excited about achieving the goal, but you’re also buying into the belief that you can’t be truly happy unless that situation pans out the way you want it to. You are unconsciously telling yourself “Right now I’m not complete, but this thing will make me whole”. Without meaning to you have put yourself into a lack mentality and that can make life a lot more difficult than it needs to be.
The problem is not in the goal itself but rather in the attachment to the goal; like your happiness depends on it. This attachment is the equivalent of ‘looking down’ when you are half way up the mountain. It causes you to fantasise about how terrible it will be to fail.
You may have watched the film “The Secret” or learned about the Law of Attraction, where you focus on your desire at the same time as ‘sending our’ your emotional intention to the Universe. Well wanting something too much works in harmony with the opposite law – The Law of Repulsion. Think of a magnet being flipped over so that it repels rather than attracts. Dreaming about your desired outcome is good, but doing it from the confines of a lack mentality will rarely get you closer to where you want to be.
So the big question is how do you let go of your need of things while still encouraging them into your life?
Quite simply, by recognising all of the reasons you can still choose to be happy without the goal having to be met. Everyone has innate happiness in their nature; it just gets a bit covered up with the thought that we are not supposed to feel it until we’ve actually done something to earn it.
The best question I have ever been asked came from the success coach, Michael Neill, and it is this:
What would you want to go after in your life if you knew you didn’t have to be unhappy about not getting it?
It might take you a while to get your head around the meaning of that question but it will eventually lead you to that frame of mind where you can have compelling goals, but without an emotional dependence on them. It is a case of “Yeah, it’ll be great when this happens, but in the mean time I’m just going to be happy anyway”.
This Week’s Homework:
Take some time to completely relax and meditate on what you would like to have in your future life. Let your imagination run riot, as if you can order anything you like from the Universe’s menu.
Put yourself into the scene and experience it as if it is happening right now. What do you see? What can you hear? Totally immerse yourself into the fantasy so that it becomes more and more real for you, and intensify the good feelings.
Stay with it for as long as it feels really good to do so and then imagine pushing your thoughts off into the distance, as if you are instructing the Universe to deal with them for you.
Next spend a few moments contemplating everything you already love about your life. What are you deeply grateful for? What do you have in your life today that you want to continue having for the rest of your days? Really feel that. Smile at it. Then happily get on with the rest of your day.
To your success!
Warm wishes
Paul
http://www.life-happens.co.uk/
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
DO YOUR FRIENDS KNOW WHAT THEY MEAN TO YOU?
I’ve just arrived back from America where I was attending the wedding of a very good friend, and because I was the Best Man I had to give a speech. Now, I’m used to public speaking and facilitating large groups of people in my personal development workshops, so you might be thinking this was a doddle for me. Well how wrong you are my friend!
What made this different for me was the level of thought I found myself giving to the meaning of my friendship with the groom and having to put into words some emotional stuff that I found difficult to explain.
My original intention was to just spend about 10 minutes ripping the proverbial wee-wee out of him (and you’ll be glad to know that I did fit this in, to great delight of me and the other guests) but I also understood that this would be a powerful opportunity to reflect on the many years we had been close mates, and to analyse why his friendship is so important to me. What surprised me was realising just how many experiences we had been though together. There have been a lot of good times but also a few low points too and as I thought about it, it became clear to me how incredibly grateful I am that he had been there to support me through some of the most challenging of times.
Of course I had always been vaguely aware of this but is was suddenly now apparent that I had never actually told him. In fact there were many things I’d never told him about what I appreciated in our relationship: How I get inspired when he talks about his goals; How he dutifully listens to all my crazy plans and encourages me to follow through; how he can cheer me up regardless of what mood I am in; his generosity; the weird sense of humour we share; his honest (even though it can often be blunt), and much more.
So when it came to making the speech I made sure I told him all of this, and it was quite an emotional affair. We usually spend our time thinking of new ways to make fun of each other, but there I was delivering a list of his best qualities and with a lump in my throat! And the best part was his reaction. He was obviously moved by what I had said and I got a sense that our friendship had just become a little richer as a result.
One of the deepest human desires is to feel appreciated, and the nicest way to receive this kind of validation is by hearing it from someone else. It’s one thing to think of yourself as being a good friend, but it is when others pay tribute to you that it really touches your soul.
Think about your own relationships. What is it that you really value about those closest to you? Ask yourself, do they know exactly how you feel or have you been making an assumption that they do? You can immediately strengthen the bond in any relationship simply by telling that person that you are thankful for them being in your life and then listing the reasons why. This is such a simple thing to do but sadly not practiced nearly enough.
I have now made a promise to myself that I will reaffirm my gratitude to my friends and loved ones on a regular basis. If you want to do the same but have trouble knowing what to say, consider what you would want to tell them if you knew this was the last time you’d ever see them again. How have they influenced you as a person? What are their top three qualities? What would your life be like today if you never knew them?
A nice little payoff for getting in the habit of do this is that you are likely to get some positive feedback too! Obviously it should not be you intention to fish for compliments but it’s always good to know where you’re doing a good job, isn’t it? I know that when friends and family tell me what they love about me it encourages me to more of it and I get to feel great about myself for the difference I’m making to them. The key to a fulfilling life is to simply feel good, there is nothing more complicated to it, so why not help yourself by making others feel appreciated? Win Win!
What made this different for me was the level of thought I found myself giving to the meaning of my friendship with the groom and having to put into words some emotional stuff that I found difficult to explain.
My original intention was to just spend about 10 minutes ripping the proverbial wee-wee out of him (and you’ll be glad to know that I did fit this in, to great delight of me and the other guests) but I also understood that this would be a powerful opportunity to reflect on the many years we had been close mates, and to analyse why his friendship is so important to me. What surprised me was realising just how many experiences we had been though together. There have been a lot of good times but also a few low points too and as I thought about it, it became clear to me how incredibly grateful I am that he had been there to support me through some of the most challenging of times.
Of course I had always been vaguely aware of this but is was suddenly now apparent that I had never actually told him. In fact there were many things I’d never told him about what I appreciated in our relationship: How I get inspired when he talks about his goals; How he dutifully listens to all my crazy plans and encourages me to follow through; how he can cheer me up regardless of what mood I am in; his generosity; the weird sense of humour we share; his honest (even though it can often be blunt), and much more.
So when it came to making the speech I made sure I told him all of this, and it was quite an emotional affair. We usually spend our time thinking of new ways to make fun of each other, but there I was delivering a list of his best qualities and with a lump in my throat! And the best part was his reaction. He was obviously moved by what I had said and I got a sense that our friendship had just become a little richer as a result.
One of the deepest human desires is to feel appreciated, and the nicest way to receive this kind of validation is by hearing it from someone else. It’s one thing to think of yourself as being a good friend, but it is when others pay tribute to you that it really touches your soul.
Think about your own relationships. What is it that you really value about those closest to you? Ask yourself, do they know exactly how you feel or have you been making an assumption that they do? You can immediately strengthen the bond in any relationship simply by telling that person that you are thankful for them being in your life and then listing the reasons why. This is such a simple thing to do but sadly not practiced nearly enough.
I have now made a promise to myself that I will reaffirm my gratitude to my friends and loved ones on a regular basis. If you want to do the same but have trouble knowing what to say, consider what you would want to tell them if you knew this was the last time you’d ever see them again. How have they influenced you as a person? What are their top three qualities? What would your life be like today if you never knew them?
A nice little payoff for getting in the habit of do this is that you are likely to get some positive feedback too! Obviously it should not be you intention to fish for compliments but it’s always good to know where you’re doing a good job, isn’t it? I know that when friends and family tell me what they love about me it encourages me to more of it and I get to feel great about myself for the difference I’m making to them. The key to a fulfilling life is to simply feel good, there is nothing more complicated to it, so why not help yourself by making others feel appreciated? Win Win!
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