Are You Alive?

 
How sad that he died at forty, with most of his living undone
But sadder still that he hung around… to be buried at eighty-one

- epitath found a gravestone

Are you alive? Seems like a stupid question dosen’t it. Oh, I know that you are still breathing and your heart is still beating, but are you alive? Are you living or are you simply going through the daily motions of life waiting for the inevitable day when you will pass from this earth?

Many people that I see in my day seem to be simply existing, going through life day after day, without purpose. It is very disturbing to see how many people trudge through life as if they were a zombie.  What is even more disturbing is that many people who are essentially sleep walking through their life are very unaware of their zombie like state. Most of these people  would probably tell that life is okay, even though deep down they have a knowing that they aren’t really living anymore, they are nearly surviving. Their journey of life is on a sort of auto pilot.

The interesting thing is that some of these people may be awakened from the existing slumber, usually by some traumatic event such as a near death experiecnce like a care accident or a heart attack. 

Have you ever spoke with someone right after they have had a near death experience? They are so aware at that moment. They say things like, “I am so happy to be alive, I know that I have not been a fully engaged parent, spouse, global citizen, etc. I swear from this moment forward, I will not take life for granted, I will be a better Father/Mother, husband/wife, etc. I will stop and smell the roses. I will take more time for myself.” The list goes on and on, I am sure that you get the point.

The person says these things because they have been jolted out of their slumber, they have had an “awakening”.

The really sad part, is that for the majority of people who are “awoken” in this fashion is that it is usually very temporary. The person seems all too soon to forget what it was like to be on deaths doorstep and they fall back into their old habits, back into their comfortable slumber.

Part of the key here is to be able to honest with yourself enough to ask yourself the tough questions to determine if you are indeed “living” or just sleepwalking through the remainder of your time on this earth.

So, I ask you, are you alive?

The Strength of Purpose & Desire – Oprah’s Daughter’s

 

The strength of purpose and desire is amazing! Last night, I watched a show about Oprah Winfrey’s Leadership Academy in South Africa. During the show they aired the interviews of the girls who were applying for acceptance into this academy. Many of these young girls live in abject poverty, many do not have running water, many walk down streets under the fear of abuse, rape and murder. Most of these girls have lost their parents to disease or murder. From a material standpoint, most of these girls have very little if anything. In our world, they would have every excuse not to try, let alone succeed. Most people would look at their life and understand if they just gave up.

The wonderful thing is what these young girls lack in material wealth, they exceeded in pure spirit! These young girls all beamed with purpose and desire to get an education, to succeed despite their past, despite their present conditions. They were driven by their inner spirit, a force so strong that it just shined right through them.

The power of knowing your purpose, fueled by desire is an amazing thing. It allows you to transcend your past and your present condition to know that you can achieve your dreams, even when it is against all the odds.

I am truly inspired by these young women.

It is amazing how strongly they desire an education and to what lengths they are willing to go through to get an education.

I believe that many people would question Oprah as to why she built this school in South Africa, why not do something like this in the United States instead. My answer for her, would be, I don’t think if you could find a group of  young people in the United States that would all so strongly understand their purpose and have such a strong, no excuse desire to succeed.

These young girls are a wonderful example for all of us to emulate. They are not lost in the world of their ego’s. They are living from their heart, their soul, their inner force, whatever you want to call it. They are a shining example of what it means “to be”.

We all have this power within us! We simply must choose to shed our ego and allow are spirit to “be”!

Pain & Suffering

 

Pain happens to us, weather it be physical pain from an injury or illness or it be emotional pain that we feel when something traumatic happens to us, such as a death of a close one, an end of a relationship, the result of a venture that didn’t work out as planned, etc. We all experience pain to varying degrees at different times in our life.

Suffering is the result of holding on to the pain. Suffering is really how we choose to hang on to the pain. Once we understand what caused the pain and we remove the pain, then we remove the suffering. We do not have to suffer! This means that, yes, we will experience pain in our life, however we do not have to choose to suffer with that pain.

Have you ever been around someone who is suffering from physical pain such as a back ache or headache who refuse to take an aspirin or apply a heat pad to relieve their pain? These people outwardly complain about their condition, however they refuse to do anything to alleviate their suffering. People also do this when they feel the emotional pain that can happen when something traumatic happens to them. They choose to suffer, rather then help themselves or accept the help of others.

Suffering in these cases is a chose. So, why would one choose to suffer?

People choose to suffer for  many reasons, one reason may be that they feel that there is a societal expectation to suffer, other reasons may be that the person who is suffering, enjoys the attention that they receive while suffering, it may give them something to talk about, they like the way people respond to their suffering. Someone who has chosen to suffer may have suffered for so long that it has become a habit or it has developed into depression and now the person dosen’t know how to get themselves out of this state of depression.

Are you suffering?

Are you holding on to pain?

Ask yourself why?

Why are you holding on to the pain?

What good is coming out of your suffering?

What could you do today to release the pain?

Is it simply a matter of forgiving yourself or someone else?

Is it simply “letting go” of the pain?

You have the power to choose not to suffer!

Daily Exposure

What do you expose yourself to in a day? When you stop and review your day, what have you exposed yourself to? What music did you listen to? What shows did you watch on TV? What did you read? What people did you interact with?

We have the potential to be exposed to many toxic things in a day, some of which we may not be aware of.

Toxic vibrations can come in the form of song lyrics, TV shows, the things we read and even some of the people who we interact with in a day.

Your subconscious is hearing and seeing everything that you are exposed to. There are a multitude of memory imprints happening all of the time. Whether we realize it or not, our thoughts are being influenced by outside sources all of the time.

Knowing this is true, why would we intentionally expose ourselves to things which are toxic in nature. You wouldn’t think twice about not ingesting poison. However we are very willing, it seems to ingest poison into our minds.

I do agree there is a certain amount of toxicity that we have to expose ourselves to as part of our daily experience. One that comes to mind is the news. I believe it is important to keep abreast of the news and current events even though the news is usually centered around the negative. The key is to minimize your exposure and even to consider what time of day you are tuning in  to the daily news. Personally I don’t watch the news right before I go to bed at night, because I don’t want that information playing in my mind while I sleep, nor do I watch the news in the morning, because I do not want to start creating my day with all of the negativity that the news brings. I prefer to tune into the news in the middle of the day or the early evening and when I do, to watch what I need to watch. To tune into the news and watch it hour over hour is not a healthy way to spend your time. It is a matter of balance.

I am also aware of what I read, what TV shows I watch and the lyrics of the songs that I listen to. Much of what is passed off as entertainment is rooted in negative emotions and situations.

I love to be entertained just like anyone else, however I also want to find meaning in my entertainment, meaning which makes me think, laugh, and sometimes cry. I also like some mindless entertainment at time which allows me to suspend belief and take a mental trip for awhile.

I also am aware of the people whom I interact with. I want to be around positive, inspiring, driven people who are looking to grow. I do interact with negative people, people who are lost, off the path, hurting, looking for a better way, however I am aware enough to limit my time with these people and very aware to learn from them and not to allow myself to be drug down by their own brand of toxicity.

Today, think about what you are exposing yourself to, assess the levels of toxic messages that you allow into your life.

Remember, you are what you think about and what you expose yourself to influences your thoughts.

“I am, Who I Am”

 

“I yam, what I yam” – Popeye The Sailor Man

 How many of us get locked in this mentality? Many people go through life, repeating the same phrase as an American cartoon character, Popeye the Sailor Man, “I am, what I am”, which basically means,  don’t expect me to change, take me for who I am.

This way of thinking can be viewed from two perspectives, one is that I am confident in who I am, I have integrity, therefore do not ask or expect me to change to conform to your way of thinking or being. The other way this can be viewed and I think how this way of thinking is mostly used, is, I have decided this is who I am, I refuse to change, grow, open myself up to other possibilities, etc.

We all know people who are very rigid in who they are, what they believe and so on. These people tend to be very closed minded, set in their ways and they are darn proud of it! Since you are reading this article, it is very safe to assume that you are not that type of person. You are just the opposite, you are a wisdom seeker, you are looking for a path, you are open and growing as you consider all the possibilities. With that being said, most of us still have some things that we are rigid on, it may be our religious views, our views on politics, our views on any number of things. Even though, we are generally very open and ready to grow, we may have a segment of ourselves where we are set in concrete, where we are not open to the possibilities.

I ask you today to consider what ideas, concepts, etc that you are inmovable on.  Most of us have something, what is yours? Once you identify an idea that you are rigid on, an idea that you know can’t be changed then I suggest that you make a decision to be open to the possibilities that there may be other ways to think about this thing. I suggest that you spend the next few days researching the other side of your idea, what are the thoughts of other people on what you believe. Read  a book or go on line and find people who disagree with your thought on the subject that you are so rigid on. Make a decision to read, listen with  an open mind, be open to the possibilities and see what happens.

You may be surprised by the results.

It is key to our growth to be open to all  possibilities, to allow the flow of ideas to penetrate us, to understand other’s realities.

Once  you begin to do this, you will be amazed at the transformation which will occur.

The Frog and The Prince & Cinderella

 

I have just had a realization that the wisdom that we speak of and seek was being taught to us in the form of fairy tales when we were children. The funny thing is that we did not probably realize the real lesson nor did the adults in our life realize the true wisdom of the fairy tales that they told us.

Let’s look at a couple of very popular fairy tales. Remember the prince who was turned into a frog by the evil witch and he was doomed to remain a frog until he was kissed by a young woman? Most of us, look at this tale  and learn a cynical lesson that “we must kiss a lot of frogs, before we find our prince”. The deeper lesson here is, the prince or princess resides within all of us. The frog represents our human condition, our outer shell if you will, the prince represents the spirit within us. The beauty, the power, all that is good that is within each and everyone of us. We are all truly princes and princesses waiting to be released. The kiss is symbolic, it does not take another person outside of us to “kiss” us to unlock that which is within, the “kiss” is symbolic of the key to look within to find our beauty, our spirit, our soul.

Cinderella is another great story which teaches us the same lesson, that all that we desire is already within us, that we have the power to manifest what we want in life, and that manifestation can start from nothing but a thought. This story also teaches us that we can create our own reality depending how we view things, e.g. the pumpking becomes the beautiful carriage, the mice become the horses. These are all symbolic examples of our ability to manifest. The Fairy Godmother represents the spirit within all of us, the spirit that has the ability to make all of the changes we desire.

Isn’t it amazing how much timeless wisdom is found within the very stories that we grew up with? We keep hearing the lessons, the truth, the “secret” over and over again, however we are not open to see it, or in the case of fairy tales, we dismiss the lesson because it is a story designed to entertain children and our ego tell us that we are way beyond children’s stories.

Keep your yourself open to the possibilities, be aware that lifes greatest lessons are often  right in front of us!

Relationship Games – Finding Fault

 

She/He just can’t be that perfect, there must be something wrong with her/him!

We visualize our perfect mate, we yearn for this ideal that we have dreamt up, we yearn for this person to come into our life and then we meet that person! This person is the one we dreamt of, the ONE! We are elated, it feels so good, everything is going so well! Then it happens, we get that nagging twinge of doubt. You know the feeling, all of a sudden you start to say to yourself, well, no one could be that perfect, there must be something wrong with this person, right? We start to play games in our mind, thinking about all the things we know about this person, still nothing, this person is everything we dreamt of and more! Still that doubt lingers, we begin to watch and listen to this person with a skeptical mind set. We just know that something will show up, after all it always does (BTW – this is called manifesting, remember what we think about is what we get). We wait and we look for that fault, that blemish in their personality which will prove that this person cannot be as perfect as they seem to be. Then it happens, we find something, oh not much, a little thing, however there it is, just as we suspected, a fault, a character blemish. Are we happy now, we found what we were looking for! No, we are not happy, we now start to dig at this blemish, this minor, almost unnoticeable fault. We dig and dig until now, this minor blemish that had no real significance is now a full blown problem. A problem to the point where arguments ensue over it, bitter words are exchanged and now you begin to think, hmm, this person was not the “one” after all.  Congratulations, you have now proved yourself right, you uncovered the fault that you knew was there.

This is just like finding a small blemish on your skin, then you dig at it and dig at it to the point it is now an open wound, you continue to dig at it, it becomes infected and now you lose a limb due to the digging that you did, which never should have happened in the first place.

Why do we do this? Why is it so important to prove to ourselves that the other person is flawed in some way?

Maybe we do this because we were burnt in a previous relationship and we are not going to let that happen again. Maybe we don’t believe we deserve to be loved by someone who is so great.

Whatever the reason, we must learn to expect the best of others and to be open and accepting of people. None of us our perfect, we all have our faults. The truth is that if you try hard enough, you can pick anyone apart.

This not only applies to relationships, this also applies to how we view other people in our world. You know of someone is done very well for themselves, they are living a dream like life and you think to yourself, no one is that good and you begin to look for the fault, the blemish that they have which will make you feel better to know this person is not as great as the appear to be.

It is very easy to point out another persons faults and shortcomings.

 It is so much better for our soul and the other person’s soul if you try to determine what’s right with other people, what makes them great.

Today, look around at the people in your life and make an effort to see what is good about them, what makes them wonderful people rather then looking for the fault. 

Is Your Relationship Surviving or Thriving?

Many relationships I observe seem to be in survival mode. You know these relationships, there the ones where one or both people are hanging in there with each other despite major issues which cause daily stress, arguments and streams of tears. These people are hanging in their relationship because of various reasons such as:

- They believe that they have found the “one” (despite obvious signs that they are not compatible)

- They believe they can change the other person, mold them into the ideal mate

- They believe that things will get better after they are married

- They believe things will get better when … they get a better job, get their own place, etc.

- They believe that there is no one else out there for them

- They believe they are running out of time and that they are willing to settle

- They are comfortable in there misery

-  They are afraid to hurt the other person

- We are “in love” and love conquers all

* note, you can love someone very much and still not be right for each other in regards to a long time committed relationship.

The above reasons for hanging in a relationship which is in survival mode spell eventual relationship melt down.

Is your relationship simply surviving or is it thriving? (note, you should not have to put too much thought into this question, unless you are in deep denial, you know if you are in a thriving relationship)

If you are in a relationship which is in “Survive” mode, it is time to step outside of the relationship and assess your reality, determine if you are in self deception mode. If you are in survival mode, then it is time to ask yourself some hard questions, such as:

- Can we move this relationship from surviving to thriving?

- What would it take to make the change from surviving to thriving?

- Is my partner willing to make the necessary changes?

- How long can I remain sane in this relationship if we remain in survival mode?

- Is staying  in survival mode fair to me, fair to my partner?

Once you honestly answer these questions, you will know what your next steps need to be. The thing is to summon up the courage to do what you need to do! There are no easy steps when it comes to this.

The key is to keep in sight that you and your partner will both be better  in the long run for making honest decisions in regards to your relationship.

If you are in a thriving relationship, you know you are! There will be no doubt in your mind!

Remember to think and act from your soul, not your ego. View your relationship from your spirit and you will be able to better understand the what kind of relatioship you are in and why.

A Carrot, an Egg and a Cup of Coffee

 

I found this story years ago. I came across it today in my files and I was moved to share it with you. Hope that you find the wonderful lessons in it that I did.
A carrot, an egg and a cup of coffee... You will never look at a cup of coffee the same way again.

A young woman went to her mother and told her about her life and how things were so hard for her. She did not know how she was going to make it and wanted to give up. She was tired of fighting and struggling.

It seemed as one problem was solved! , a new one arose. Her mother took her to the kitchen. She filled three pots with water and placed each on a high fire.
Soon the pots came to boil. In the first she placed carrots, in the second she placed eggs, and in the last she placed ground coffee beans. She let them sit and boil, without saying a word.

In about twenty minutes she turned off the burners. She fished the carrots out and placed them in a bowl. She pulled the eggs out and placed them in a bowl. Then she ladled the coffee out and placed it in a bowl.

Turning to her daughter, she asked, "Tell me, what do you see?"

"Carrots, eggs, and coffee," she replied. Her mother brought her closer and asked her to feel the carrots. She did and noted that they were soft. The mother then asked the daughter to take an egg and break it. After pulling off the shell, she observed the hard boiled egg. Finally, the mother asked the daughter
to sip the coffee. The daughter smiled, as she tasted its rich aroma. The daughter then asked, "What does it mean, mother?"

Her mother explained that each of these objects had faced the same adversity ... boiling water. Each reacted differently. The carrot went in strong, hard, and unrelenting.
However, after being subjected to the boiling water, it softened and became weak. The egg had been fragile. Its thin outer shell had protected its liquid interior, but after sitting through the boiling water, its inside became hardened. The ground coffee beans were unique, however. ! After they were in the boiling water, they had changed the water.

"Which are you?" she asked her daughter.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Think of this: Which am I? Am I the carrot that seems strong, but with pain and adversity do I wilt and become soft and lose my strength?

Am I the egg that starts with a malleable heart, but changes with the heat? Did I have a fluid spirit, but after a death, a breakup, a financial hardship or some other trial, have I become hardened and stiff? Does my shell look the same, but on the inside am I bitter and tough with a stiff spirit and hardened heart?

Or am I like the coffee bean? The bean actually changes the hot water, the very circumstance that brings the pain. When the water gets hot, it releases the fragrance and flavor. If you are like the bean, when things are at their worst, you get better and change the situation around you. When the hour is the darkest and trials are their greatest, do you elevate yourself to another level? How do you handle adversity? Are you a carrot, an egg or a coffee bean? Author - Unknown

Create Your Day!

Create your day! When you wake up in the morning do you create your day? If you do, are you creating a positive and productive day or do you create a negative day that you will be thankful to soon call yesterday? Or, are you the type of person who allows the day to happen to them, taking no control or responsibility to how the day will turn out?

 Myself, I wake up and I make a conscious effort to create a positive and productive day for myself. I lay there for a moment or while I am in the shower and I begin to think about what I would like my day to be like. I visualize myself successfully and joyfully completing the tasks that I want to complete. I visualize the people I will be with and visualize the interactions, conversations and the outcome, which I will have with each person. I visualize how I can be positive and radiate my positive energy throughout the day. I also visualize the meals I will have and with whom I will have them. I even go as far as visualizing the end of the day and how happy and relaxed I will be as I get a great nights sleep. I contemplate all that I am grateful for.

What have I done? I have just created my day the way I want it to be! By doing this I have also ensured that the universe is fully aware of my desires, in turn the law of attraction will help to ensure my desired day, is manifested! 

Now, maybe you are sitting there saying “I am not even awake till my second cup of coffee, how can I do all of that?”  First all of that, really isn’t that much and once you make an effort to create the day that you want, this does not take any real effort at all. The beauty of this is you can do this while you lie in bed with your eyes closed, or do it in the shower (for some of you this might be only alone time you have in the morning).

 Let’s consider the alternatives, you could simply get up, not think about your day at all and let life happen to you. We all know this is a crapshoot, you have no idea what will happen, how you will react and you have surrendered all control of your day over the day. That’s just like saying to the universe, “I don’t care how my day goes, do to me as you will, I am content to be yet another person sleepwalking through life.

Or you could, as many people do, think about your day and manifest negative things to happen. You know those days, you wake up and think about the project at work that you don’t want to do, or how you are going to have to deal with someone that you would rather not and just know they are going to say something to make you mad, and you will get angry and have a no good rotten day. You also know that after work you have to go somewhere you would rather not and you will probably end up eating something that makes you sick, which means yet another bad sleep night, ugh! Should just stay in bed!

 So, what do you think, are you ready to create your day?

 Note: I acknowledge that your day may not always go just as you have planned, that things may happen that impact your day, however the more you practice creating your day, the more you will see that your days will turn out as you desire. Also, when things happen that impact your plan, you will be in a positive state and the bumps and curve balls that life throws at you won’t seem like such a problem.

Remember, as you think, so shall you be! It is all up to you!