How To Read People Before They Ever Say A Word

Committed to my own personal growth, I continue ongoing academic studies, educational programs, apprenticeships, and volunteer programs to deepen and expand my personal, as well as professional knowledge, experience, and capabilities.

Every so often (and not very often at all!) I come across a personal growth program that I truly believe is worth recommending and sharing. Today, I want to introduce you to a uniquely beneficial program that I implement on a daily basis, and I am certain you will want in your learning library.

This is a remarkable “must have” program. Please indulge me a moment while I explain why.

Joe Navarro is a former counterintelligence officer for the FBI and a recognized expert on nonverbal behavior. He spent his professional career developing a system for “reading” people that is used today by this top government agency.

This is not a program about the meaning of crossed arms! It’s an in-depth, easy-to-learn system for reading people’s true intentions through their body language. The truth is, what Joe has to say in this program is riveting, informative, and tremendously applicable to every encounter you have with every individual you now know or will meet.

I’m sure you’ve considered learning a new foreign language at some point in your life. Why? So you would be able to communicate in ways you couldn’t before. Well, Joe reminds us there is a language that will tell us more about an individual than any words can.

In his new program, The Power of Body Language, (published by Nightingale-Conant) he explains how to “speed-read” people: decode sentiments and behaviors, avoid hidden pitfalls, and look for deceptive behaviors. What’s more, he unveils how YOUR body language can influence what your boss, family, friends, and even strangers think of you.

Filled with examples from Navarro’s professional experience, this definitive program offers a powerful new way to navigate your world. You’ll learn:

? The ancient survival instincts that drive body language

? Why the face is the least likely place to gauge a person’s true feelings

? What thumbs, feet, and eyelids reveal about moods and motives

? The most powerful behaviors that reveal our confidence and true sentiments

? Simple nonverbals that instantly establish trust or communicate authority

(just to name a few!)

If you think learning a new language is important, put it on hold until you master learning about body language. You’ll be armed with the “decoder secret” about people’s motives and attitudes that most people never realize exist — knowledge that will change your life in ways you can’t begin to imagine.

It will take only one listen to The Power of Body Language, for you to learn how to detect what people really mean. It will send your nonverbal intelligence soaring! I guarantee that this program is going to give you an amazing edge when negotiating or even just getting to know a person for the first time. I find it very helpful when being approached by people interested in new business deals … or by guys who want to date my daughter!

Live In Joy!

Lilly

Be Happy!

What is happiness except the simple harmony between a man and the life he leads?

I Beg You

To have patience with everything unresolved in your heart

And try to love the questions themselves

As if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language

Don’t search for the answers
which couldn’t be given to you now

Because you would not be able to live them

And the point is
To LIVE everything

Live the questions now

Perhaps then
Someday far in the future

You will gradually
Without even noticing it

Live your way into the
Answers…

Stephen King, Different Seasons

“The most important things are the hardest things to say. They are the things you get ashamed of, because words diminish them …words shrink things that seemed limitless when they were in your head to no more than the living size then they’re brought out. but it’s more than that, isn’t it? The most important things lie too close to wherever your secret heart is buried, like landmarks to a treasure your enemies would love to steal away.

And you may make revelations that cost you dearly only to have people look at you in a funny way, not understanding what you’ve said at all, or why you thought it was so important that you almost cried while you were saying it. That’s the worst, i think. When the secret stays locked within–not for want of a teller, but for want of an understanding ear. ”

~ Stephen King, Different Seasons ~

Star Journey Symbol System – Exciting Tool for Personal Insights

Use this exciting system to tap intuition, solve problems, and make decisions. You can gain insights about personal topics such as work, career, love, relationship, money, health, and more.

At the core of the system is a set of 96 simple and fun symbols, each describing a facet of the self. In addition, the system’s Circle Pattern diagram shows how symbols are organized and connected, including twelve prime archetypal qualities and seven levels of living.

Star Journey is a powerful tool for self-growth. It creates a profound personal mirror along with a guided process of interpretation to reach resolve. The system demonstrates that the answers to life’s questions are found within.

Star Journey is now in several formats:

Books and cards, Online symbols, Membership, other tools, and expert Phone Help are all available on the website:

http://www.star-journey.com

Online Symbol Set -  Now you can simply hop online and have access to the Star Journey symbol set, 96 in all. Use them now, or whenever needed, to get valuable insights about personal questions. The symbols are colorful, simple, and full of meaning. Use symbols in the Goal Journey format, to help you see where you are now, what the goal is, and what’s getting in the way. You’ll use both words and images to develop meaning. Complete instructions provided for use and interpretation.

Live Phone Consultations – Talk by phone with a Star Journey expert and be personally guided through the Goal Journey experience. Author Richard Geer and skilled expert Vanessa Taylor (RebelMum Slade) are available to assist with personalized service and consultation. Your satisfaction is guaranteed.

New release: Star Journey for iPhone & iPod Touch – Now Star Journey is portable and can always be at your fingertips. Whether sitting in a cafe or riding a train, you can be solving a problem, making a decision, or jumpstarting ideas about a challenge. Use on the spot for insights about love, work, career, money, health and more. (visit Apple’s App Store)

In addition, visit the beautiful, 3D and interactive version, Star Journey island in Second Life virtual world. Here, enjoy free tours and opportunities to meet the author and his talented in-world team:

Direct link into Second Life:
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Star%20Journey/133/124/440/?title=Welcome%20to%20Star%20Journey

Seven Steps From Visions To Reality

Fear is my best friend.
It shows me a path to nowhere;

I choose another way.
they say that a true hero is not one that harbors no fear but rather one that dares to overcome their fear.

fear is there behind you; don’t let it follow you.
if you do, you will spend your life running.

turn around and walk towards your fear; see it shocked with disbelief.
keep walking despite fear’s attempts to scare you; keep walking steadily.

walk through it – a miracle happened!
fear disappeared as if there was nothing there but thin air.
this is the substance fear is made of – thin air.

STEP ONE – BE A FOOL FOR VISION

I tend to say that only the naïve can achieve. The naïve is a fool, don’t be confused by the term and mistake fool for foolish. What is meant by fool is the innocent child quality that lives in an adult. This faculty is the most essential in acquiring vision, for as adults we tend to be cynical, skeptical, insecure, calculated and afraid of failure, while a child looks at the world awe inspired and imagines that everything is still possible. As adults we need to discern how to use different aspects of ourselves properly; when it’s time to garner vision, be the fool, awaken the child and reach for the stars.

STEP TWO – SEE IT HAPPEN and IT WILL

The conscious mind is where we spend most of our life; it seems that there is nothing else but it; it’s where we live and naturally it is that same conscious mind that we use when we try to create things in the world. Here’s a great secret; the conscious mind is very limited faculty of manifestation, it is not efficient at all for that purpose.

The subconscious mind on the other hand is the mind that can communicate your vision to the outside world and merge it there for its manifestation.

Use your conscious mind to plant the vision in your unconscious mind. To do that imagine your vision, see it happen and imagine how it feels – see it, feel it; do that with conviction and you will witness miracles.

STEP THREE – MAKE IT YOUR PURPOSE

Once you’ve summoned a vision and envisioned it happen, saw it and felt it, make it your purpose. You will need purpose when discomfort and pain appear on the scene and sacrifice is needed, for not much is achieved in life without sacrifice.

If you don’t make your vision one with your purpose, you will uphold another purpose, an underlying purpose you may not even be aware of. The most prevalent purpose is to avoid pain and gain pleasure – the mother of mediocrity and the archenemy of greatness. The only way to escape this purpose is to consciously choose another.

STEP FOUR – MAKE THE NOW YOUR HOME

Don’t dwell in the past, don’t allow it to be chains around your ankles, acknowledge it and move forward for this is the only movement there is. The present moment is the only asset you own, elusive as it is, it is home. What is now cannot be changed but it is where the work is done. Take your judgment away from the equation: hone the faculty of clarity; it is not good or bad it is what it is. If you think that circumstances are not in your favor, imagine instead that you’ve invited them yourself to create an appropriate challenge to optimize your growth. Do not harbor aversion to what is. Remember, the present moment is what it is and from here the future is shaped. (Repeat step two the more the better).

STEP FIVE – INITIATE IT

Your vision is in place, a sense of purpose kicks in, the present is acknowledged for what it is; you have used your imagination to plant the vision into the subconscious mind; now it is time to take action. It is amazing how many people expect things to just happen for them. You must initiate, do something to actually take the vision from the realm of your mind and anchor it in the reality of the world. Jot down your mission statement, write an action plan, arrange the priorities, take initial action, do something to set things in motion. This point seems simple and obvious but most visionaries stop here, they just dream and stick to their comfort zone. Remember; action is where manifestation begins: initiate – take action towards your vision, once you do that, you will know you are on track, it’s not a dream any more.

STEP SIX – RESISTANCE IS PART OF IT

Initiation generates resistance – it’s the law for nothing works without resistance, nothing at all. Understanding that resistance is a fundamental and essential part of the process is the most important point of all. Don’t confuse resistance with trouble; don’t let your judgment interfere. Expect resistance, the so called obstacles along the way, they will come don’t doubt that for they are needed and no process will occur without them. Resistance is an organic part of the process itself be ready for it.

Harness the adult to the process as the child tends to crumble when the seas turn rough. Don’t blame anyone or anything, don’t curse your luck; rather, claim responsibility and maintain your power at all times. Don’t say ‘it happened to me’, say instead ‘it happened for me’ and everything will change and make sense, the entire universe will conspire to help you, no force will be able to stop you if you learn the final move in this magical dance.

STEP SEVEN– FLOW WITH THE FORCE

Keep your pace. Maintain your vision, spur yourself, if your sense of purpose is intact any sacrifice along the way will only feel natural. You may need to explore the uncharted, to walk toward your fear. In the process you may discover your power; endurance, persistence, perseverance – this is the stuff winners are made of. Yet remember you are not in control; the force of life is greater than you. Walk with it, not against it, or it will crush you.

When you arrive at your destination, it may not be exactly the place you have envisioned, things have changed in the process; they always do. You are not the same person that took the first step, you’ve interacted with living forces and they’ve left their imprint, respect that and remember the only destination is the journey itself.

(A hint: While all steps are important step number two is the key.)

Developing Soul Consciousness and Overcoming Challenges

In Care of the Soul, Thomas Moore says that the greatest illness of modern times is ‘loss of soul.’ I do not think that we have lost soul, but simply have not yet discovered it, and therefore live in a soulless way.

The new consciousness on the planet today demands that each of us no longer neglect this vital aspect of who we are. Ignoring this reality has dire consequences, as Moore points out: “When soul is neglected, it doesn’t just go away; it appears symptomatically in obsessions, addictions, violence, and loss of meaning. Our temptation is to isolate these symptoms or to try to eradicate them one by one; but the root problem is that we have lost our wisdom about the soul, even our interest in it.”

Becoming soul-conscious or expanding consciousness is not a choice. It is a deep and natural urge within all of us that is being emphasized by the needs in the world today. The only choice is whether or not we will cooperate or resist the expansion of consciousness once it begins happening. And consciousness seeks to expand in all aspects of life where we have gained sufficient awareness and learning.

When we resist this movement of soul within, we become ill or accident prone or unhappy. We experience emotional pain or money problems or our relationships don’t work well. In general, our life sends us signals to which we must pay attention. Through developing soul consciousness, we learn what these signals are, how to interpret them, and then what to do about them.

The evidence of the drive for expanded consciousness, or soul, is found in everyone’s deep yearning for liberation. The liberation we want is the release from duality – the very stuff that the challenges of life are made of. But we cannot find this freedom unless we deal effectively with the challenges.

All challenges that we experience are initiated by the soul, even though it can appear that the challenges come from other people, the world around us, society, circumstances and situations. What is the nature of these challenges? What is their purpose? How can we master them?

As we master our challenges, we gain in wisdom and develop the power, love and intelligence that is characteristic of soul consciousness. When we incorporate the mastery into our identity, transformation ensues and greater liberation is experienced.

The Soul Journey

Blame – Who Did It To Me?

In the fall of 2008, while engaged in the kind of deep self-examination I love to hate, I discovered that when “bad” things happened to me, I reacted predictably. While my emotions might range from annoyance to downright martyrdom, my overall feeling was that life was against me. I was a victim.

Sometimes I was a victim fighting back, i.e., I was angry, resentful, argumentative, but when I found myself in these modes I felt even more victimized, because external events forced me to act in a way I didn’t like to behave.

Since I like to assume the identity of a someone who is in charge of her life, this victim discovery didn’t please me at all. Once I discovered it, though, evidence for for a pervasive victimhood began accumulating, and I decided that instead of resisting it I would explore it.

The Victim Identification Test

When something goes wrong in your life do you:

Blame others?
Feel as if the world (or someone) is against you?
Blame yourself?
Blame no one or take responsibility for what happened?

I am not suggesting you take responsibility for a hurricane which knocks down power lines, just that you not blame the weather, God, or mysterious forces which are out to get you. (I write more about responsibility further on in this article.)

However, if you forgot to pay an electric bill and your power gets shut off, do you blame anyone for not reminding you about the bill or blame the utility company for not allowing enough time to pay the bill? Do you say you can’t help it if you’re bad about paying bills, and those in charge should make allowances for the checkbook-challenged?

Regardless of your immediate answer to these questions, you may find it helpful to keep these questions in your mind as you go through your days. They can come up in these and other ways:

You’re at work, and your boss asks you to work overtime. You ask yourself, “Why me?” “Why me?” is very likely a victim’s question.

Your child brings home a report card which suggests he will be very fortunate to graduate from grade school, let alone any higher form of education. You ask yourself, “What did I do to deserve such a child?” This is a variant of “Why me?” You take bad weather, traffic jams, and long lines personally. You notice how often you say, “That’s not fair.” You decide you have been designated to experience a loveless life. You welcome a blow or disaster because now you don’t have to dread its occurrence.

The important thing is to notice how you respond to any situation which is a problem, crisis, or in any other way disturbs the flow of life as you expect it to flow.

How Victims Are Born

If you discover you have a tendency towards victimization the chances are very good that one or both of your parents were — not because there’s a gene for it, but because our earliest lessons about how to respond to life come from parents and other significant adults.

Our parents can teach us how to be victims in other ways.

Did either of your parents ever say to you, “I’m punishing you for your own good” or “I’m punishing you because I love you?”

Think of the hidden messages in these statements.

Love is punishment.
Love is painful.
Love is suffering.

Children who receive attention only in the form of punishment will seek it by “misbehaving.” This behavior can persist through adulthood: the person who constantly makes mistakes at work and is called in to his boss’s office on a regular basis, the person who forgets to perform expected household duties and is yelled at by a spouse or partner, the person who regularly gets into financial difficulties.

If we have this way of being, punishment can make us feel important. It may even make us feel like martyrs. If we come from strict Christian religious backgrounds, being martyrs can make us feel not only very important, but can reverse our thinking so that we see ourselves not as wrong, but as right and persecuted

The Victim-Guilt Seesaw

In the course of my exploration of my victim syndrome, I realized that I so readily adopted the victim identity because I didn’t want to blame myself, i.e., feel guilty. This is the opposite of victimization. I discovered how flexible I was in going back and forth between the two emotions.

In a victim state, we say, “Life isn’t perfect, and it’s someone else’s fault. I am innocent.” When we are in a guilty state, we say, “I am not perfect, and it’s my fault. I am guilty.”

Let’s look again at the examples I gave above. You forgot to pay an electric bill, and your electricity got shut off. In blaming anyone else for this, you may be resisting another way to react: blaming yourself for being stupid, careless, or whatever adjective you might be tempted to use.

In the case of the disastrous report card, the resisted thought might be, “I’m such a bad parent. Why didn’t I realize he had this problem?”

Power Failure

Whenever we feel either victimized or guilty, we rob ourselves of power. The loss of power became real for me when I sat down to think about certain things I wanted to create. I found myself unable to visualize any of these things without having thoughts such as, “Never happen.” In focusing on the negative thoughts, I eventually came up with, “Don’t deserve it,” and connected that thought to guilt.

I asked myself, “What would happen if these things I say I want came true?” The answer was clear: I couldn’t be a victim any more.

Victimization, like any way of being, becomes comfortable through its familiarity and firmly-set boundaries. A victim doesn’t have to take risks, doesn’t have to do unfamiliar things, doesn’t have to take responsibility for his/her life.

Think of a situation in which you feel victimized, or if you don’t like the “v” word, think of a situation you feel isn’t fair or think of something you haven’t been successful in manifesting. They may be the same. For example, you may want a promotion, but think your boss doesn’t appreciate all the hard work you do. You feel this is unfair.

Focus on a particular situation. Let yourself really feel the unfairness of it.

Now check into how you are feeling emotionally. What sensations are in your body? Are there areas which feel dense or heavy?

Now think of some project you want to create or fulfill. Do you feel empowered to work on it?

Do the same experiment with a situation about which you feel guilty.

A Third Way

The healthy alternative to both guilt and victimization is taking responsibility. Responsibility is NOT blaming yourself; it’s literally the ability to respond. A response is distinct from a reaction. Reactions are automatic and are stimulated by unconscious beliefs, usually acquired in childhood. Someone who unconsciously absorbed the belief that good parents have children who excel in school will automatically react negatively to a poor report card.

Guilt and feelings of victimization are reactions. We don’t deliberately choose to have these or other negative feelings.

When we respond, it’s a conscious act. We may feel the reaction, “My child has let me down” or “I have failed my child,” and let this reaction and the emotion it triggers to pass, then allow ourselves to be in the present and respond to the situation. We ask, “How can I help my child?” We have a conversation with him. We make it clear that we are available. We may speak to the teacher. We respond with the intention of solving the problem.

Being responsible also means acknowledging a mistake without guilt and learning from it. It means not blaming others for their mistakes.

I strongly believe that everything you do to help yourself to a state of unconditional self-love will release the Victim within. When we love ourselves, we don’t experience problems as punishment. When we love ourselves, we don’t experience punishment as love.

This is a two-way process. With every act of responsibility you restore power to your being. Empowerment is contagious. You set a powerful example for others. By not reacting with feelings of victimization or guilt you don’t trigger these reactions in others.

You also bring yourself closer to a state of unconditional love, and generously extend this state to others.

Each act of responsibility you take may feel small, but every time you choose responsibility, you help to make the world a happier, more loving place.

Responsible Crystals

The properties of sugilite indicate the connection between guilt and resentment (a common way in which people express their feelings of victimization). This crystal can help to dissolve both feelings. The general intention of sugilite is to assist us in releasing any feeling which is disempowering.

Azurite can give us a deeper understanding about what goes on beneath the surface of our conscious thinking. It also helps us to bring to the surface those beliefs which direct our reactions to people and situations.

Green Calcite is particularly useful in dissolving emotional and mental rigidities. Once these rigidities are released, we are able to think creatively and solve problems from a more open perspective.

Carnelian is the crystal which helps us to be focused in the present. When we are in a state in which our decisions aren’t based on the past, we are better able to make wise choices.

Flower and Other Essences

Willow (Bach) is the classic essence for resentment, which as I note in describing sugilite, is a common aspect of feeling victimized.

Wild Rose (Bach) addresses another common aspect of victimization: resignation. Everyone is against me, so there’s just no use in even trying any more. Wild Rose helps to get us back into the flow of life.

Pine (Bach) is the most useful essence for guilt and feelings that anything less than perfection in one’s being is personal failure.

Bear (Wild Earth Animal Essences), the animal who sleeps all winter, symbolizes the exploration of the unconscious mind.

Forgiveness – What Is Forgiving?

Many of us, from our earliest childhood, are told that a good person forgives others. What we don’t learn, though, is what true forgiveness means, and when we see forgiveness in practice, it often looks like this: “You’re wrong, but I will tolerate you, because I’m right.”

Come free of the net of right and wrong. Into the Twilight. ~ W. B. Yeats

The net of right and wrong often entangles me. Sometimes I recognize this. I think of someone with whom I’m having difficulty, and I warm myself in the fire of self-righteousness. I am so right; the other person is so wrong.

When I’m comfortable in my protective net, I don’t have to be afraid. I don’t have to investigate other ways to look at the condition of a relationship. I don’t have to take risks. I don’t have to be uncertain. I don’t have to worry about making mistakes. I don’t have to change.

Right and wrong can also be a game, one I call the ping-pong game from hell. You will often see it being played in relationships, especially those which aren’t in the best possible shape. Here’s an example.

X: You always blame me for the smallest things. So what if I forgot to take out one bag of garbage? Does that mean I don’t love you?

Y: It means you don’t care about the things that are important to me.

X: Because the things that are important to you are stupid.

Y: Oh, really? And what’s important to you? Who even knows? You only bother to speak to me when you get angry.

These two are skilled players. They can bounce the ball of right and wrong back and forth indefinitely.

Sometimes, though, one player wins. This can lead to a new game called forgiveness, in which one person is perpetually right, the other eternally wrong.

Being Right About Being Forgiving

Fred and Simon are business partners. Their company has lost money because of an unfortunate business decision Fred made. Simon, furious, threatens to dissolve the partnership.

Fred, who already feels like crawling beneath the nearest log and turning into mold, says he has learned from the mistake and will never make it again. In the future, he won’t make that level of decision again without consulting with Simon.

This satisfies Simon, not so much because of Fred’s promise, but because Fred has admitted he was wrong. This makes Simon feel even more right. He says he forgives Fred, but from time to time, whenever Fred contemplates a risky decision, Simon reminds him of his grave error in the past.

Ron and Sylvia are married. Ron, who was an active alcoholic for many years, has joined Alcoholics Anonymous and has been sober for six months. Sylvia has said she forgives him for the nights he didn’t come home or came home drunk and broke and for his mental and sometimes physical abuse of her.

Secretly, though, she holds herself as a very good person to forgive someone who doesn’t deserve it. Maybe she can forgive, but she can’t forget how much she suffered. Ron was wrong, and she’ll make sure he never forgets it, either.

The Forgiveness Trap

Too often, our practice of forgiveness masks an attitude of judgment. We only forgive those whose behavior we’ve already judged to be wrong. That judgment establishes us as being better. In most cases the forgiven person is feeling somehow condemned and the forgiver feels superior.

Often people believe they escape judgment by finding reasons for “forgiving” the other person. They may say, “Well, he had such an unhappy childhood,” or “she’s not spiritually evolved” (unlike guess-who?). This is a disguised way to say, “They will always be wrong.”

The Judgment Boomerang

Judgment disguised as forgiveness clearly hurts those who are its recipients. It also hurts those who bestow it.

When we become caught in the net of right and wrong, we see the world in those terms. We see every situation and relationship in terms of who’s right and who’s wrong. With such a perspective, there is little room for appreciation and love.

In addition, when we don’t see others clearly, we are equally unable to see ourselves clearly. The real judgment boomerang is that the characteristics or behavior we judge in others are those we resist in ourselves, sometimes to the point that we don’t consciously realize we may have the attributes for which we judge and appear to forgive others.

Simon has made his own mistakes regarding the business. By focusing on Fred’s error, he avoids taking responsibility for his own.

Judgment veiled as forgiveness may also hide our unwillingness for the other person to change. During Ron’s alcoholic years, Sylvia played the role of long-suffering martyr. Not only did she get to be right; people felt sorry for her, and she felt no need to see how she may have enabled Ron to continue his habit –or do any other form of self-examination.

No One’s Perfect

When we hold on to the injuries which others have caused us, we may wisely suspect that there are deeper injuries which we’ve caused to ourselves for others or which we do not forgive ourselves. Our inability to truly forgive another may stem from our own feelings of being unforgiven. In that knowledge lies the potential for true understanding and true release.

Thus, I choose to keep the word forgiveness in my vocabulary, but I redefine it as release. My commitment is that when I forgive someone, it’s over. Forgiveness means means there is no lingering resentment or anger, and no attempt to re-ignite guilt in the other person. It means the release of whatever energetic blockage was preventing the expression of unconditional love.

It means I recognize I have my own shortcomings and limitations, and in releasing my judgment of another, I have the opportunity to release self-judgment and to forgive myself.

St. Francis of Assisi put it this way in this line from his well-known prayer:

“It is in giving that we receive/It is in pardoning that we are pardoned.”

A genuine act of forgiveness is an act of generosity, an act of giving, both towards another person and to ourselves. When we free ourselves from the net of right and wrong, we discover the possibility of unconditional love.

Crystals for Forgiveness

To be able to forgive, you will probably need to take the first step of calming your anger. Some excellent stones for this are green calcite, celestite, and sugilite. Hold the stone of your choice and breathe in and out deeply. Ask yourself which is more important: the relationship or the anger.

The Ability to LET GO of Struggle

Because the belief in struggle is so strong in our world, I wanted to share with you a dream I had which helped me to realize struggle was a choice. At the time I had this dream, I was in a great deal of emotional pain. I, like most people, believed I needed to suffer in order to grow.

The dream did not change my outside circumstances, but it helped me see my life in a new way.

In my dream, I was in a room with many other people. In the process of moving across the room, we had to crawl through a tunnel filled with bees. It was impossible to accomplish our journey without being stung several times. After I had completed a pass through the first tunnel, I came to a resting place. The people here were recovering from their bites while preparing to enter a second tunnel.

Although I wanted to complete my journey, I was not eager to go through the same painful experience again. I looked around the room and I noticed a man standing by a door. I approached him, asking if there was another way to travel without all the suffering. He smiled at me and said, “Yes, you can go through here.” He opened the door into a beautiful garden. I completed my journey by following the path through the garden, enjoying the sun light and beauty all around me.

As I reviewed this dream, I realized most of us go through life experiencing the pain and struggle of life, never looking for any alternatives. The people in my dream assumed there was only one way to accomplish the task before them. When I got tired of being bitten, I decided to look for another route. The man at the door was not blocking the way nor hiding its presence. He was there to assist anyone who asked for help. When I decided to let go of the struggle, my journey became one of joy and beauty.

Over the years, I have shared this dream with many people. Most people are shocked at the idea that struggle is a choice. It is not a concept they have ever entertained. Their experience of life has taught them to expect to struggle. For some, it is a pleasant relief to release this old concept. Others are not ready to make such a drastic change in perspective.

Struggle is a choice. It is your right and responsibility to choose. As shown in my dream, whenever you decide to look for another path, there is always someone there to show you the way.

Letting go of struggle does not mean I will never again run into obstacles in my life. Challenges still present themselves to me. It is my perspective that has changed. I see these events as opportunities to watch as the power of God is demonstrated in my life.

Consider these ideas about “letting be” and “letting go”:

*Feelings naturally are felt and integrate when we allow them to be there or let them be.

*Feeling will intensify and endure if we try to get rid of them, resist having them or try to move them in anyway.

*Words have different emotional connotations. The phrase to “let go” may have different meanings to folks. Consider these typical meanings of the word “go” In the Random House College Dictionary:

(1) To move or to proceed to or from something.
(2) To leave a place, to depart.
(3) To keep in motion or to be in motion.

With such typical meanings, the word “go” can easily be experienced as moving something or putting something in motion. Viewed in this way “letting go” becomes anywhere from subtle to very pure resistance. Couple this “letting go” with the image of letting an object drop and you are neither allowing or permitting which are the heart of integration, you are trying to move something or put it in motion. Here letting go is resistance.

If “letting go” is understood in the Buddhist mindfulness sense as allowing or permitting it to be there, to “let it be” then there is no resistance. “Letting be” leads to feeling and to integration.

Unless someone understands “letting go” as “letting be” then they are doomed to be resist their feelings in a subtle and often not so subtle way. Any methods that try to move something is teaching resistance. Someone may indeed let go of some surface tension, but that’s hardly the heart of a feeling. The emotional coloring’s projection or the emotional charge remains.

The stuff of the intuitive message remains to be reprojected. Naturally this will reform and before long the surface tension starts to make its way back. In a day or two, a week. When the relaxation is no longer there, then the issue begins it’s return.

By all means let your feeling “be”, allow it to be there, or welcome and permit it’s presence. Your feelings and emotions are valuable bio-messengers, not something to be shunted away because they may feel distinctly uncomfortable at times. Every problem contains its own solution. I may not know how things will be resolved, but I am sure a solution will appear.

I can now flow with the circumstances in my life, trusting that the answer will soon be revealed. This perspective creates a feeling of peace and joyous anticipation. Without trust, I resist those difficult situations, creating a feeling of struggle. The feelings and thoughts of fear create more chaos and pain. I may not be able to choose every event that appears in my life, but I can always choose how I will view those situations.

An Affirmation for Letting Go

I am willing to trust. I know that to the degree I am willing to give up my search for a healthy love relationship, I can have it. I know I can have whatever I am ready and willing to receive. Individual receptivity is everything. Without it, nothing changes. With it, all things are possible. I no longer insist upon my choice.

I know that the only thing I lose when I let go of something I am afraid to live without is the fear itself. I am stronger than anything that frightens me!

I let go of the past, and I am free to think clearly and positively in the present. I am not my past.

Letting go is the natural release which always follows the realization that holding on is an energy drain and it hurts. Letting go happens effortlessly when there is no other choice. Letting go does not mean giving up.

** Love Note. . . A life without love in it is like a heap of ashes upon a deserted hearth — with the fire dead, the laughter stilled, and the light extinguished. – Frank P. Tebbetts

Letting go is a journey that never ends. Never. It only begins — over and over again — each time I can glimpse something higher than my own painful certainty over who I think I am. There is always something higher; a life beyond the limits of my present sight.

To see what is farther I must be willing to lift my eyes from their present point of focus. Release always follows revelation and real revelation is always a glimpse of something that was only just out of sight.

I know that stress in my love relationship exists because I insist! What I resist, persists. I am tied to whatever I avoid.

**Love Note. . . The heart loves, but moods have no loyalty. Moods should be heard but never danced to. – Hugh Prather

It is a mistaken belief that I must push my love relationship in the direction I choose that keeps me in a strained and unhappy relationship with it. Reality has its own effortless course, and I can either embrace its way or struggle endlessly with mine.

I do not need power to flow.

I let go of that part of myself that is certain it is better to suffer and feel like someone than it is to just let go and quietly be no one. I give birth to a new me that never has to hold on to anything because it is already everything.

I dare to walk away from all of the familiar but useless mental and emotional relationships that give me a temporary but unsatisfactory sense of self. My true identity is calling me and to hear it I must be willing to endure, for as long as necessary, the fear of self-uncertainty.

This form of seeming self-abandonment eventually turns into my greatest pleasure as it becomes increasingly evident that the only thing certain about fear is that it will always compromise me. When it comes to who I really am, there is no compromise.

Let go of the past. The past is yesterday. It is irretrievable. When you relate to the past, you relate to no one or any thing. You are literally talking to yourself. No one else is listening. You have already heard all you have to say about that, so, let go.

A Course in Miracles says, “You cannot really not let go what has already gone. It must be, therefore, that you are maintaining the illusion that it has not gone because you think it serves some purpose that you want fulfilled.”

It is certifiable insanity to conjure up your own reality based on the past and relate to it, rather than to relate to the present which is the only reality.

**Love Note. . . Relationships are part of a vast plan for our enlightenment, the Holy Spirit’s blueprint by which each individual soul is led to greater awareness and expanded love. Relationships are the Holy Spirit’s laboratories in which he brings together people who have the maximal opportunity for mutual growth. – Marianne Williamson

I say goodbye to the past and hello to the present.

I am enthusiastic about who I am becoming! I know that no one sincerely asks for a new life until they are thoroughly dissatisfied with the old one. I am and I let go. When I allow myself to let go of what is old, I stay true to what is new.

I believe that as with all insight, higher understanding itself contains not only the instructions I must follow, but the strength I will need to carry them out.

Starting life over again is the key to a new me. I see the beauty and significance of starting over – over and over and over. Every present moment is always new and new is always right now! The new dies to the ever-new in an endless celebration of Life.

This is it!

I live in the present. I never let the past dictate the direction of the present moment. I give my best to my endeavors.

What lies ahead for me can only be good.

True peace and harmony are a part of who I am.

I have come to the realization that what is possible for me to become only truly changes when I am willing to see what is impossible for me to continue being.

My true nature is already fully independent and flying freely. I have found my wings.

I let go and let God. And so it is.

Promises To Keep

Have you ever wondered why a resolution you made never got fulfilled or why something you longed for never happened?

Sometimes it’s because your heart wasn’t really in the dream. It may have been someone else’s (often a parent’s) idea of what would be best for you, but, because you either wanted to please that person or because the idea had been around for so long that you forgot it wasn’t yours, you adopted it. It may also have been a dream which had once been yours but which died a quiet death while you weren’t looking.

How are you going to accomplish this? A dream without a plan for fulfilling it will generally remain a dream forever.

A dream needs to be yours; it needs to be clear; and it needs to have a plan for fulfillment. Once you have these three elements you have the equivalent of a vehicle to carry you towards your goal. Then two more ingredients are needed: you, the driver, and motion.

People (myself included) often hope that they won’t be required to do anything strenuous or unsettling in order to have that they want. They would prefer to simply visualize their dreams, say affirmations frequently, and hope for the best. This might work, but I wouldn’t count on it.

The Joy of Inertia

The importance of honoring one’s commitment and taking action was reinforced for me a while back. I have a particular dream: to write and have published both non-fictional and fictional books. Several months ago I was in the early stages of making plans; in fact, my only plan at that point was to make a plan, and I didn’t quite know where to begin.

A friend emailed me a notice about an upcoming meeting of a recently-formed local publishing group for authors, agents, illustrators, and others connected to or interesting in publishing. An author who wrote, co-wrote, and ghostwrote books on spiritual subjects was to speak. I thought that this would be a good place to meet and network with like-minded people, and decided to attend.

My intention to go was firm until about an hour before the event; then it began to wobble. I was really tired, and I didn’t feel like going out. I felt like staying home, reading, and eating ice cream. I didn’t like to drive at night.

I kept on telling myself these and other reasons for not going until I had myself hypnotized. By 6:15 p.m. (the meeting started at 7 p.m.) I had decided not to go.

I was at the point at which many people abandon their dreams. They don’t call it abandonment; they have simply come up with a variety of compelling reasons for not going forward. Sometime in the future when circumstances are more favorable they’ll act.

Beyond Inertia

At 6:20 p.m. I realized that I wasn’t happy with my decision not to go, and also realized that some kind of fear was fueling my reasons (which I now labeled as excuses) against motion. I imagined myself at the meeting, and the first thing I saw was my not knowing anyone there and feeling like a social misfit. That was a very unpleasant feeling.

I then looked to see if any other forms of fear were lurking, and saw that as much as I welcomed the possibilities of belonging to such a group I also feared those possibilities. If I went to the meeting I would be making a commitment to myself as a writer; moreover, I would be to some (as yet unknown) extent be making that commitment public.

At 6:25 p.m. I asked myself, “What are the worst things which could happen tonight?” They were that I would feel out of place and socially inept, and that people would know I had ambitions as a writer.

Then I changed my approach to ask myself what the best things that could happen would be. I imagined seeing people whom I knew and meeting people who would be interesting, that I might have a good time and learn something, as well as become part of a supportive network.

I thought about the commitment I’d made to myself, and decided that I’d rather face my fears than live with regret. At 6:30 p.m. I got into the car and went to the meeting.

I did see some people I knew, and met some new people who were interesting. I learned a lot about the book publishing business, and connected with some people who were committed to exchanging information about self-publishing. There were also some excellent home-baked desserts.

Oh, and I did have to stand up and describe my intentions as a writer. Anticipating this was dreadful, but it wasn’t so difficult, and left no lasting scars on my psyche.

Don’t Give Yourself a Break; Give Yourself an Opportunity

This experience reminded me that when I make a commitment all of the reasons why I don’t want to keep it will come to the surface, speaking in the voice of a part of myself I call the Inner Comforter. The Inner Comforter wants to keep me right where I am (reading a book and eating ice cream). It doesn’t want me to take risks, to feel afraid, to court rejection or failure. It poses as my friend. It is in fact a friend only of my fears, and my fears are no friends to my desire to fulfill my dreams.

Its voice isn’t always as clear cut as it was for me (I’ve learned to listen for it.) You can be suspicious that it’s guiding you into inertia when:

You look at last New Year’s list of resolutions and feel a deep sense of failure. Someone asks you about your plans to: get a new job, move, terminate your dead-end relationship, or whatever you’ve announced as a goal and you a) change the subject, b) come up with a dazzling array of reasons for changing your mind.

A great opportunity arises, and you don’t want to take advantage of it.

Despite all your good intentions your life isn’t happening the way you want it to.

Should any of the above occur you may want to consider using my simple plan for action. Notice that you are a) uncertain about what to do, b) don’t want to do anything out of the ordinary.

Listen to the excuses you’re making to yourself.
Ask yourself what you’re really afraid of.
Ask yourself the worst things that could happen.
Ask yourself the best things that could happen. You will probably not have much trouble thinking of the worst things, but may have to get creative when it comes to imagining the best things.
Get really excited about the best possibilities; imagine them in detail.
Take action.

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