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I bet there are a lot of ways that we're alike I know I long for my quality of life to be
one where I am filled with joy and peace
Where I feel an outlet for all the creative passion
within me Where I enjoy many levels of intimacy
Where I feel a sense of freedom and movement right alongside a sense of security
I would imagine that if you have if not all of
these desires many of them for your own life The key to having these desires fulfilled
is to live in an awareness more and more moment
by moment. When we spend our days very distracted
we deny ourselves the opportunity to have fullness of
life in that moment But there are many things we can do to help
cultivate this awareness
It's not something we can usually just make one decision
to do or to be for the rest of our lives Usually it's a slow process of learning who
we are In all the ways that we somewhat know but
many ways that we're still a mystery to ourselves
When we practice things like meditation, contemplative practice,
centering exercises When we develop our skills and our gifts we
begin to tap the mystery of ourselves
There are also little things we can do right within
our chosen lifestyle that aid us in living this quality
of life I'm going to introduce you to some of them.
Today I have just one
Oftentimes throughout our day we'll use internal phrases
such as 'I should have done this' 'I shouldn't have
done this' 'Why did I do this again?' 'Why can't I do
this more?' In all of these statements reveal an attitude
of judgement toward ourselves
I explored in a post recently on my Tumblr blog
that oftentimes our judgement if not always is
coming from some false sense of self It's a way we think we can force mastery and
force maturity upon ourselves. But we're not coming from
a place where we touch the true master within
We're not coming from a place that IS mature So there are many little things we can practice
and I'd like to leave you with one today I'd like you to spend the day and notice all
the times that you say 'Should' or some like phrase
that's expressing judgement and just notice it
Just step back as the observer and notice all of the times
and all of the ways Notice that there're certain areas in your
life where that idea of 'Should' comes out even stronger
And then I'd like you to take the day after (tomorrow if
you start this today) and begin to replace that phrase
With something that is more accurate and more true
Challenge yourself do a little deeper How can you all be yourself unconditional
acceptance and see what is true if you're not doing exactly
what you'd like to
For instance: 'I SHOULD exercise today'. Already I am a
task master cracking a whip reminding myself of what I
should do which dampens the spirit What phrase could I replace that with?
How about: 'How would I like to exercise today?' or 'What could I do so that I would desire
to exercise today?'
Or simply going out to exercise without any prompting
Those are more accurate statements that allow me to step
into awareness with myself. Even questioning 'why do I not
feel like exercising today?' allows us to get to know
ourselves. And as we do, we give ourselves the freedom to
make choices that are life-giving