Daily Awareness

Do you live in the space of “if only”?

2011-03-07T19:50:51-08:00

Do you live in the space of “if only”? If only I had more money. If only I would lose 20 pounds. If only I lived in a different home. If only I had taken the job I was offered in 1995. If only I had saved more money. If only….

Anyone who is focused on the “if only” view of life is missing out on the most important part of life; the present.

Countless individuals are so focused on the past or so worried about the future that they are missing out on what is happening right here, right now.

So how do you stay in the present? It’s actually quite simple; gratitude. When we are focused on what we have to be grateful we can’t help but be in the present.

The key is to focus on those things we have to be grateful for right here, right now.

If I was to list what I have to be grateful for the list would look something like this:

My connection with Source
My health
My relationship
My business
My pets
My friends
My creativity
The abundance I enjoy on a daily basis
The ability to share my abundance with others
My morning walks
Good books
The ability to make great choices that give me a life of joy, passion, laughter, depth and contribution
A blog I can share my thoughts on.

There’s plenty more but this is a great start for my gratitude list.

So what is it you have to be grateful for? What can you do to be totally present and say out of the “if only’s”?

Leave your comments in the box below. Oh yes, I would be very grateful if you would retweet this.

When all else fails, dance!

2011-02-27T22:25:53-08:00

If everything were so easy we would have no need to dig deeper. How often do we find our greatest strength during times when all seems to be blocking our progress?

Life often does not work the way we think it should. The temptation is to resist what is happening, move into a state of frustration and wonder “why me?”. Rather than wonder why me, why not ask with a hint of curiousity, “Wow! Why me? Why now?”

It's not always fun

Granted, when we are in the middle of what appears to be stagnation we may not be so joyful as to get excited about our plans going south. Yet, without periodic road blocks we wouldn’t be “encouraged” to look deeper, dig further and be open to a different way of viewing the solution to something we are working on.

No one is exempt from the times when things don’t seem to be working out. Yet, in reality, everything is working exactly as it should. All we need do is be open.

Quit forcing

Rather than trying to force the answers, the solutions or the remedy, stop and make a conscious shift. The shift may be in the form of taking a walk, reading a book that’s long been on hold because we were just a little too busy, making a call to a family member to just say hi, journaling, or even putting on some high energy music and dancing.

Any one of these actions can shift our energy, focus and attention. Take dancing. Literally everything shifts when we move into a state of high energy dancing. It is in the shift we may find just the answers we seek.

When all else fails, dance.

Comments welcome. Retweets appreciated.

Is it that life sucked or my focus did?

2011-02-26T08:10:19-08:00

Yesterday I woke up in an "off" mood. It seemed the more I tried to get myself out of the mood the worse it got. It was one of those mornings where all I could focus on was what wasn't working rather than what was working.

I also found myself creating resentments for a number of people I know. Now mind you, these are friends and colleagues I love and respect, but at that particular time I was thinking of one or two things I felt justified in being righteously upset about.

Thinking the solution was to put my nose to the grindstone I tried to get some work done, but to no avail. Then I attempted to read a book also to no avail. It seemed the more I tried to get out of my foul mood the worse it got.

Finally I decided to take a drive. As has been a practice of mine for years I had a talk with my maker.

Realizing this was something that left to my own devices I was not going to resolve, I asked God (Universe, Source, Higher Power) to relieve me of the ugliness that I was experiencing. I was willing to let go of these less than stellar feelings and emotions.

Within seconds a song came on the radio from 1979. I was immediately transported to a space in time when life really sucked. It was a time I was drinking way too much, angry almost every minute of every day, resentful at just about everyone and everything, had reached a point where I was completely unemployable and had a dark cloud follow me wherever I went.

Immediately I smiled at the irony of the situation I now found myself in. Today I live a life I once dreamed of and because of my focus the very life that was once a universe away I now found flaws with. Whoa! Time to shift gears... and fast.

All it took for me to shift my perception was the willingness to be willing. From there, I chose to think about the areas of my life that are working.

It didn't take long before I was genuinely joyful and appreciative of virtually everything happening in my life.

Even the things I was pissy about just moments before now brought a smile to my face. After all, if it wasn't for all the blessings I experience on a daily basis the very people I was frustrated with wouldn't even be in my life.

It's amazing how quickly we can choose to be in a good space or bad. Once again I realized it's not the situations that create my state of mind. Nope! It's what I choose to focus on that creates my joy or sorrow.

For today I choose to see all that is good in my life. And in this I know there will be more I will have to be grateful for.

Living life on life's terms

2011-02-17T06:51:43-08:00

Life doesn’t always work according to our plans. There will be times what we think should happen, doesn’t. Perhaps a client cancels a contract we had high hopes for. Maybe a loved one gets deathly ill or a project we are working on is not turning out at all like we planned.

There are times it may appear as if everything we hoped for comes to a standstill with no apparent explanation. Consider this; when life is outwardly stagnant it’s likely a major internal transition is taking place.

Often, the very things we view as obstacles are the very events that allow us to dig to the depths of our soul to become more of who we are meant to be.

During the times things are not working the way we planned we have the opportunity to put our beliefs to the test.

For example, it’s easy to be grateful when things are going our way and it’s easy to accept life on life’s terms when we get what we want.

Walking our talk
To see how deep our level of gratitude is all we have to do is notice our response (or reaction) to things not going our way. Do we still feel and express gratitude?

To discover if we really accept life on life’s terms we simply need pay attention to how we act and what we say when things don’t turn out as we thought they should.

Rather than resist why not accept? After all, there’s so much we can’t and don’t know in the present moment. We have no idea what life has in store. Left to our own devices we tend to shortchange ourselves from the greatest gifts life offers.

We will be well served to live with curiosity, wonder and openness.

Expectations block our serenity
When we try to control all that is going on we raise our expectations of how things need to be. It has been said, “The higher my expectations, the lower my serenity.”

Much of the stress we experience would be minimized if we were to simply relax in the unfolding of what life has in store.

In some ways this is easier said than done. After all, we are a society that has been conditioned to get everything “our way” and get it fast.

“God’s delays are not God’s denials.” I first heard this over twenty years ago. It left such an impression that decades later I find this to be such a powerful statement of truth. Simply because something doesn’t happen when, how and like we think it should does not mean it won’t show up at some point in the future in a much better way than we could have anticipated.

Happiness secret
One of the most profound secrets to our happiness is to suit up, show up and do the next indicated step. After all, isn’t life simply the process of putting one foot in front of the other and with each step our life is created?

What's been your experience? How do you handle the twists and turns of life? Comments welcome.