Part 2: Moving from one year into the next
“Don’t ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive. And then go and do that. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.” Howard ThurmanThis Part 2 of "Moving from one year into the next..." is an invocation or a "call". You are invited to glimpse your unknown future, to look into your heart and the year ahead and petition God/the gods to release you to your destiny, to your bold angels. To the part of you that is courageous, even while fearful, and that is joyful and grateful even in the face of loss. To the part of you that is ready to "come alive".In this part of this reflection exercise, you are invited to notice what may want to emerge in your life and in you at this time. When I celebrate the beginning of a new year, I ask myself: "What is the quality or energy that I want to bring into my life in this brand new year?" Consider taking the wisdom of Howard Thurman’s words to his black congregation in the middle of the civil rights movement. His congregation, some would argue, needed everything, but listen to what he said to them:“Don’t ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive. And then go and do that. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.”So at the dawn of 2013, why not consider answering the questions below and see if you can glimpse what your bold angels might want for you this year:
- What makes you come alive now?
- What would fill your life/your world with "lovely"?
- If you knew you could not fail, what might you do or pursue?
- Where in your life do you want to live or need to live fearlessly?
- What could you get truly excited about bringing forward in yourself? That feeling of “really, really I get to do this or be this?”
Now set this aside for a day or so and come back and reread your answers. What is the new future you declare for yourself in 2013 and why does it matter to you? See if you can write that in a short sentence, maybe in the form of a declaration:I am a commitment to ________________________________for the sake of _________________________.The secret in making a declaration an incarnated reality is to keep it top of mind every day. Make a daily habit of creating 3 small steps you can take toward your declaration. Do this every day.Happy New Year. Happy New You.
Earth's crammed with heaven
"Earth’s crammed with heaven, And every common bush afire with God;" This could have been written by Elizabeth Barrett Browning about my son Zachary Robert Dearing who is celebrating his 23rd birthday today. Since his arrival he has grabbed for this earth as if it were indeed crammed with all things divine. At age 2 in the grocery store checkout, he would stretch away from me to watch the cashier, mesmerized. (He received a toy cash register for his next Christmas). At age 5, he pursued T-ball, basketball and any other sport with such focus and determination that he was typically the coach's example to the other five year olds. At early as 3 years old when he was giving his new birthday roller blades a trial, he fell. Then promptly picked himself up with "Good fall, Zac" and went back after it again.Zachary has treated this world as if it truly is sacred, as if it were indeed created by God, (whether in 7 days or via the big bang and evolution), matters not so much to him as loving planet earth well. Loving it though, not with a mother's or father's love, but as lover. He devours this world and is the most present person to each of his experiences I have ever known. He expects to fall in love with all aspects of earthly life and so he does and has; now for 23 years. You know with all the focus on saving this planet I wonder if we are really present to it? Do we truly experience it? Do we love it and more importantly our own precious lives as if they will never come again? Because each moment will never come again. Somehow Zachary, from the moment he arrived (he slept only 10 hours a day as an infant... until he was 14 years old) has intuitively known how to love this world and his life here as if he had only this one shot at it.I know something about loving one's life. I was raised by a man who truly loved his life. Zachary's grandfather, Robert Wonders loved all the days of his life. But more quietly than Zachary. Zachary's enthusiasm for the world can take one aback, especially in his younger days. He takes up space. He has big ideas and pursues them and most importantly he does not focus on outcome. He focuses on the hunt. He celebrates each achievement, mourns his losses but never for more than 24 hours, then on to the next pursuit. It is clear that victory is not the point. The point is life. The point is being "all in" his life. The point is being truly alive.What does this have to do with you and with me?Ask yourself,"Where am I concerned with outcome?" or"Whether something makes sense enough to give it a shot?" or"How will I look doing it?" or"What so and so might think of me?"or some other form of doubt that is distracting you from channeling your inner Zachary Robert Dearing and simply loving this "earth crammed with Heaven?" Happy Birthday, Tiger boy!
Vote your desires not your fears.
What happens if we each tried actually trusting that whatever happens we will all move forward? What happens if we vote based on our deepest desires not our fears? That won't be easy as both campaigns have painted their opponents winning the presidency as a fearful thing. But because the adds did/do that doesn't mean you and I have to. So if you haven't voted yet, I invite you to get quiet and locate your primary values. Make a list of your top 5. Mine looks like this:
- Inclusion ... no one left our or behind.
- Dignity of meaningful worthwhile work.
- Empathy/compassion but more for how it helps the giver. Without compassion, I seem to be filled with fear.
- Passion/wholeheartedness/Desire
- Creativity/innovation/discovery/originality
Not sure that they are in order. Whatever your list, take the time to locate your top values and then look at both candidates for President and all the candidates running for office and ask yourself this question:Whose life best demonstrates my top values? And whose life has best demonstrated these values over his/her lifetime?Your choices will not only be clear, but you will have owned your choices in a different way. Neither Obama or Romney are perfect men or leaders. Far from it, no human is perfect. Now you won't expect them to "do what you want or what you would do if you were in their shoes". And when we focus on leadership in that way, we can't help but focus on problems and end up feeling disappointed and even anxious. Instead why not focus on how they are living the values that their lives have already demonstrated and that you value. That question takes you out of critical right/wrong thinking. It takes you out of Problem Focus and puts you in TED where TED stands for The Empowerment Dynamic. AND that my friends makes all the difference in the quality of your life.By the way, this doesn't mean you never recognize mistakes nor does it make you Pollyanna. Leaders are human. They aren't always true to their values. But it is easier to call someone to their greatness when they go afield of it, by singing the song that lives in their hearts (values) than it is by criticism. By the way, this works really well with oneself! :lol:So today truly celebrate what this great country makes possible...the right to vote based on our unique values. To stand for what matters to you. And remember, you can stand FOR something without having to be AGAINST anything or anyone!
2012 is the year to learn how ...
2012 is the year to learn how...to put fear and anxiety behind you and keep possibility and the larger meaning and purpose of your life, in front of you...e.e. cummings said it is the privilege of a life time to become who you are.Or something pretty close to that. There was a recent cover on Newsweek that said "Heaven is Real". It went onto describe a Neuroscientist's experience while in a coma. According to him his journey could not just be attributed to the strange firings of the brain (as he used to believe) because the part of his brain that could do that was out. He journeyed to another dimension and was met by a feminine guide. She had a message for him that he in turn is offering to us.Her Message:You are loved and cherished dearly and forever.You have nothing to fear.You can do nothing wrong.So, today is Halloween or Samhain as it was called in ancient times. It is said to the be time in the calendar of the year where the veil between the manifest or visible world and the invisible, unseen world is the thinnest. This is why there are Day of the Dead celebrations at grave sites in Mexico. It is time to commune with your most dearly departed, because it is said to be the best time for this.The moment I read the message in Newsweek I knew I would blog about it. I am asking myself, my clients and now you the reader ; "What would you do differently if you 100% believed the message given to this doctor?" In another such experience, an Indian woman was dying from a body riddled with cancer that was miraculously cured right at the end of her life. she was in a coma for 36 hours and she had a near death experience during that time. She wrote a book "Dying to Be Me". (on Amazon) describing what she learned. You can hear her discuss it at length on you tube.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jFN9XQeEn4But the message is similar. We are here to be ourselves. Our whole authentic selves. And these authors don't say this but I would add, and help others do the same or at least allow, make space for others to do the same. So on this ancient holy day, when the gods are able to best hear you, what do you want to tell them that you are ready to begin? If you truly believe that in the eyes of the Eternal you cannot make a mistake, you have nothing to be afraid of and that you are loved beyond your wildest imagination...how would you lead your life? What bold action would you take now?
Purposeful, Wholehearted Living
To be purposeful is not to be goal oriented, but to seek to reconnect to the source of one's life. Michael MeadeThese past few months I have seen so many example of this with my clients. When we make something a goal, we make it a thing or an object and typically we make it a reflection on us. We achieved the goal or we didn't. More specifically we make it about our ego/identity. If we achieve the goal "we" are successful and talented people, if we do not achieve our goals we are somehow less. Less smart or talented or whatever. In a sense the goal lives in the control of our strategic minds/our egos.But Meade says living on purpose, being purposeful is NOT goal directed but instead it is the desire to reconnect to the source of one's life. For Meade that would be what he would call our soul. Some of you might call it the true self, or wise self, or essential self. That which is second nature or true to the pattern that is authentically you. It is a relationship you enter, when you choose to live purposefully, a conversation between you and the source of your life. This has little to do with achievement or success (although those may well happen) but they are not what your actions are about, the conversation is not controlled by the vocabulary measurement and numbers.One of the tools I use with clients who want to live wholehearted lives is a declaration, a declaration has two parts: It declares a future, who we are becoming and the second part is why it matters. That is called the For The Sake Of or FSO for short. A declaration is not a goal. It is a conversation, a relationship between you and your becoming. This is important because if I treat it as a goal, a thing, I hand it over to my strategic mind/ego which somehow always manages to suck all the joy and energy out of the process of becoming.I think Meade's statement might make a good description of being wholehearted. Wholehearted living appears to me to be connected to be in some kind of internal conversation with the source of being or life that resides at the core of each of us. So, ask yourself right now:"How connected am I to the source of my life? And if the answer is 'not very', then ask yourself what are three small steps I could take today that would reconnect me?" And go do them. Do this everyday for 3 weeks and watch your life transform itself. You will be running your life rather than it running you.