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Self-awareness to better live life in a mad, mad, mad world
Your best ally and most reliable resource is you. Practicing self-awareness puts you in touch with that truth.
Self-motivation
What IS self-motivation? It is finding your own inner resources to motivate yourself to do things.
Self-motivation is not selfish. Putting yourself first is NOT selfish. Selfishness only occurs when an action you perform wantonly denies somebody abundance and prosperity.
Self-motivation is making a way to do something. Consciousness creates reality. EVERYTHING in the universe falls into this.
Self-talk
What is self-talk? When you get inside your own head and look at your thoughts and feelings, often you create an internal dialogue. Sometimes, this dialogue takes no form in true words, but more in feelings and impressions. Sometimes this takes you down a dark path. It can also get abusive.
Despite the fact you’d never take this sort of abuse from someone else, when you do it to yourself you might think that’s just fine. You believe that you deserve it for doing wrong, messing up, and being imperfect in various ways.
You have the ability to use mindfulness to become aware of what you’re thinking and what and how you’re feeling. When you do this, you open yourself up to recognizing just what you’re thinking and saying about yourself and can change it as need be.
Mindfulness and self-awareness
Self-awareness is for everyone. This is achieved via active conscious awareness. That is mindfulness.
Mindfulness is knowing your inner being, and really getting to know who, what, where, how, and why you are. You’re utterly worthy and deserving of this. That’s why self-awareness is for EVERYONE.
The more you see and practice this the more you can help others to do the same. That, in turn, can change the fear base of society to a more reason-based one. You are thus empowered to live that way and use self-awareness to be all that you desire to be in this one-shot you get at life.
One Last Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool
Practice mindfulness and active conscious awareness. To be self-aware and practice mindfulness, pause from time to time and ask these questions:
· What am I thinking?
· What am I feeling?
· How am I feeling?
· What are my intentions?
· Is my approach to things angled towards the positive or negative end of the spectrum?
· What are my actions?
These can all only be answered at this present moment, in the here and now. That happens to be the only time that’s really, truly, real.
Use your self-awareness to change anything about your life that you’re not okay with or desire to alter. You are thus empowered. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.
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They are not, contrary to popular belief, scarce or lacking
Sometimes it feels like it's all spinning out of control.
Is this really the truth of society? Have people become this dominantly sad, depressed, and discourteous? It sure as hell feels that way.
Yet I believe that’s not the truth. Why? Because everyone desires kindness, compassion, and empathy. Unfortunately, too many outside influences make them appear to be lacking, scarce, and something you must compete for.
What if the truth is that they’re abundant and the competition is a lie?
Most competition is BS
Let’s be honest. Most competition, as we are shown it, is bullshit. It’s a lie.
If you’re playing golf, tennis, or participating in a game show, you’re competing with others. Pro sports and the like are competitions. Otherwise? You’re not truly competing with anyone.
This is part of where the weaponization of fear totally comes into play. Multiple types of authority figures will tell you that “they” are competing with you for this, that, or the other thing. If you don’t compete with “them” you will lose what is rightfully yours. This, of course, is utterly untrue.
Everybody wants kindness, compassion, and empathy
It doesn’t matter who you are or where you come from. When it comes to yourself and your life, you desire to receive kindness. You want people to be compassionate towards you. You desire empathy for who you are, your goals, ideals, beliefs, values, and whatnot.
Unfortunately, the biggest problem with this is that many people don’t recognize that to get kindness, compassion, and empathy, they must be given. You set yourself up to not receive them when you don’t give them.
First, let’s recognize this important fact. Kindness, compassion, and empathy are in abundance. They are infinite. There will never be a lack, insufficiency, or scarcity of kindness, compassion, and empathy. They are in abundance beyond your comprehension.
Secondly, everybody desires to receive kindness, compassion, and empathy. However, not all recognize them for what they are. So much time is viewed as being in competition, and so many false narratives about lack, scarcity, and insufficiency are put forth, that they drive people to think they’re limited. That’s not true, as they are abundant and infinite.
Thirdly, nobody is any more or less deserving of kindness, compassion, and empathy than anyone else. The wealthy aren’t more deserving or worthy than the poor. FYI, this applies to the planet, animals, and virtually everything you can think of. Kindness, compassion, and empathy for everything is never bad.
Practice giving kindness, compassion, and empathy
To get more kindness, compassion, and empathy, practice giving them.
You’ll see that the more you give, the more you will find to give. Then, ultimately, the more you give, the more you get.
Practice locally. Because in truth, you have such a limited reach that this is where you can do the most good. You have nothing to lose and everything to gain by practicing this.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
Look around you and figure out where you can give more kindness, compassion, and empathy both to yourself and other people. Hold doors, help old people across streets, and the like.
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The Pie is Not Limited
This is an abundant universe with more than enough for everyone.
The implication, sometimes blatant - but more often subtle - is that the thing you desire is finite. Tangible or intangible, there’s not enough and if you don’t take yours, you’ll miss it. There’s only so much pie to go around because it's limited.
The truth, however, is that the pie is not, in fact, limited.
Abundance is everywhere in everything
This is not a universe of lack, scarcity, or insufficiency. It’s an abundant universe. Stretch your mind and see that abundance is real in both the material and immaterial. Most, if not all lack, scarcity, and insufficiency are artificial.
The pie is not limited. When it comes to the things you want and desire, tangible or intangible, the pie is infinite.
The limited pie is a trick
Implications of lack, scarcity, and insufficiency – limited pie – are false. They’re artificial, created by this person, that government, that industry, or whatever/whoever else to disempower.
People who believe in lack, scarcity, and insufficiency are disempowered.
Why does empowerment matter?
You are the only one in your head, heart, and soul. Nobody else can think your thoughts, feel your feelings, experience your emotions, and so on. You’re it. Outside influences can provide some info and context. However, for the most part, empowerment comes from within.
Active conscious awareness is mindfulness. You gain it not via your 6 senses, but rather your inner being. Becoming aware, in the present, of your thoughts, feelings, actions, approach, and intentions, makes you consciously aware. Using them or changing them is mindful and empowers you.
Empowerment is how you choose and decide for yourself how to live your life. This will show you that the pie – tangible or intangible – is not limited.
This is an abundant universe with more than enough for everyone. The notion that the pie is limited is not true.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
Write out a list of all the things you need or desire to have. This should include both tangibles and intangibles. Divide the list into three parts.
Must haves Not absolute musts Desires you can live without
Figure out the things you can’t live without, the things you really want but aren’t musts, and the things you desire but could live without.
Is there anything on this list that’s not abundant? If not, why not? If you have it, doesn’t someone else go without (or will they just have to wait for the next production run or choose an equal alternative?)
Does this reveal to you how much there is to go around, and more?
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You can’t make “them” understand
People can change. But only if they desire to. When they don’t, they won’t.
Sometimes you’re forced to change. Circumstances utterly outside of your control force change. They happen, and they are outside of your control. Intellectually you know this. The heart, however, is quick to disbelieve.
Change can be terrifying, especially when the other side is incredibly uncertain. You have a choice here, whether the change is of your own making or happenstance. Be afraid and resist from there - or - be reasonable and learn what you can do and what it means.
The weaponization of fear
Fear can be a helpful tool. When your life is in danger and you run because of fear, that can be a game changer. Much of the lack, scarcity, and insufficiency in the world today are utterly artificial. They’re made up to evoke fear. When people are afraid, they’re more likely to look outside of themselves for answers, help, and support. Especially when this is an intangible and not life or death. This has led to some of the deepest divides, without open war, in a very long time.
You can’t make them understand
It’s clear to me that one side of this coming election is all about obstruction, hoarding power, zero ethics, and worse. Sadly, I know they feel the same about the other side – obstruction, hoarding power, zero ethics, and worse. A complicit media and almost four decades of brazen greed and hyper-consumerism don’t help.
Worst of all, perhaps, is that you can’t make them understand. Funny thing is, they feel the same about you, too. You can’t make them understand. It’s infuriating when you see injustice and can’t do much about it. Attend the protest, make calls, write letters, send emails, and for the love of exercising your civic duty vote in elections. Sadly, that’s the extent of the actions you can take.
Try though you might, you can’t make them understand.
So what the hell can you do?
Be understanding
What I am getting at here is all about you and yourself. The only person who you can make understand is you. I could focus a ton of my time and energy on them. There has to be a way to make them understand, right? Reason, logic, science, something?
There’s something more to consider. Will that change anything about your life? Will getting them to understand what they don’t impact you?
The only way you can address this at all is to be understanding. Understanding of yourself. You, and only you, know your mind. You’re the only one capable of knowing what you’re thinking, what and how you’re feeling, what intentions you have, your positive or negative approach, and your actions or inactions. They can’t do that for you just as much as you can’t do that for them.
You can’t make them understand. You can be understanding, but mostly only of and for yourself. This is not selfish. Working with and from this is empowering.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
Actively pay attention to the words being used by advertisers, politicians, various leaders, and so forth. Familiarize yourself with some of the underlying issues that are dark and dangerous and only barely being addressed.
Do what you can so that you are as able to understand as possible. Be mindful, and do what you can to be a good person and a good example of a reasonable, logical, decent human being.
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There are always choices and decisions being made
According to multiple sources, human beings make over 30,000 choices A DAY. That is a lot of choices.
But for the most part, you don’t make them consciously. Let’s face it, if you did, I think you’d probably go mad. Thirty-thousand-plus choices, per day, add up fast. That means that in a 30-day month, you make 900,000 choices. Hence, per year you’re making more than 11 million choices.
It’s a very good thing that so many of the choices you make are automated.
Recognize and acknowledge the levels
When you get down to it, choices and decisions come in four sizes. They are big, medium, small, and seemingly insignificant.
Big choices include major life-changing things like marriage and divorce, moving, college education, bariatric surgery, and the like.
Medium choices include big purchases, vacations, buying and selling stocks, and so on.
Small choices include stuff like choosing what to wear today, where to go to dinner, the route you take from point “a” to point “b”, etc.
Seemingly insignificant choices are the most rote, routine, and subconscious. This includes choices and decisions about when to get out of bed, scrolling social media, what you eat and drink, how you brush your teeth, what tabs you leave open on your browsers, and other seemingly insignificant matters.
Nothing you choose is truly insignificant. Because they’re so numerous, they’re far more important than we often credit them for.
Life’s choices and decisions are yours to make
When it comes to being consciously aware of choices, most people focus only on the big and medium choices. While they are impactful, they’re the tip of the iceberg. That’s because below the visible are the small and seemingly insignificant choices. They are the base structure on which the medium and big choices are based and made.
Mindfulness puts you in the driver’s seat. You can use your knowledge of your thoughts, feelings, actions, intentions, and approaches to alter your choices. The power is wholly yours.
Your choices and decisions factor into everything you do. Big, medium, small, seemingly insignificant, and everything in between, you have the power to use conscious awareness and mindfulness to choose. That can change your life for the better.
Unfortunately, you live in a fear-based society disempowering you at every turn. False notions of lack, scarcity, and insufficiency are bombarding you to believe that you can do little to nothing to take control or make useful choices and decisions.
Nothing could be further from the truth. You have the power.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
For the next 5 days, every morning, take one thing a day that falls under “seemingly insignificant choices” and actively, consciously make a choice or decision about it.
This can include changing how you brush your teeth, what time you eat, what you eat, any habitual action you could change but don’t necessarily need to.
Observe how you feel throughout the day about making choices and decisions. Has altering that “seemingly insignificant choice” made the making of other choices and decisions, actively, easier?
Consider if this has a positive impact on your self-awareness continuing to apply it.
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Patience begins with me
I write about conscious reality creation, mindfulness, manifestation, and the like frequently. Each time I write about it, I explore how it requires combined thought, feeling, action, and a positive approach. Then, from there, you must apply intent with your action to make manifest the tangible or intangible.
Intent and action and time. Seldom, if ever really, is it instantaneous. When it comes to me and my choices, do I apply them?
Not enough, no.
This doesn’t just apply to fencing at all. Overall, my patience on nearly every level of my life has been disregarded, ignored, and shunted away. Ironically, as much as I teach patience here and to new fencers, my own is lacking.
Recognizing and acknowledging the need for greater patience
Upon closer examination, it certainly looks to me like a lack of patience is causing me distress on many levels. The blockage I’ve been trying to identify might all come down to this.
It starts by recognizing my impatience. Recognition is only the beginning. It needs to also be acknowledged. That way, I’m saying not just “I see I’m being impatient,” but also “I acknowledge my lack of patience needs to be adjusted by me.”
Recognized and acknowledged, now I can start to do something about this.
What do I do? The first step is to pause. Pause before I type, pause before I attack when fencing, pause before I get on the road. Then, be mindful, and consciously aware of what I’m thinking, what and how I’m feeling, my approach, then my intention and actions.
Am I being patient or impatient? This is a question I haven’t been asking, but clearly need to be. When I meditate, this should be considered. When I do, going forward I need to be more cognizant that I’m doing as I say.
Maybe you have patience that I don’t. Pausing, however, is good for you, too. In a society where it’s always “go go go”, pausing allows you and me to better get a handle on things. You and I can take more time to be present, here and now, and work smarter (not harder).
I see I have some work to do here.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
Here’s an exercise to invoke more patience. This is a simple 3-step applied patience process you can use anytime you make choices or decisions or do anything at all.
Step 1: Pause. Don’t just go. Pause, reflect, consider first.
Step 2: Be mindful. Be consciously aware of what you’re thinking, what and how you’re feeling, your approach (positive or negative), then your intention and actions.
Step 3: Act. After steps one and two, consciously and mindful, act.
· Pause
· Be Mindful
· Act
Does this added step of patience help you better balance?
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There’s always something to be grateful for
Even on the worst days you might experience, there’s always something that you can be grateful for. It might seem impossible in the face of sadness, grief, and uncertainty, but that doesn’t lessen the truth.
Thank you are among the most powerful words you can say and feel. They might be equal to I am and I love. Whatever follows “thank you” is a powerful acknowledgment of something that makes you feel good and positive. It empowers you not only to recognize and acknowledge the one item you’re saying “thank you” for, but also find and be grateful for more.
Gratitude is the ultimate fuel for empowerment
When you’re distracted, it’s easy to lose sight of your own conscious awareness. Distraction starts to pull you into mindlessness, taking you away from intent and action. That then allows you to lose yourself in your subconscious mind.
The subconscious mind will often take everything put into it at face value.
One of the best ways to begin to access mindfulness is gratitude. Finding and expressing gratitude for things tangible or intangible is a matter of intent borne of thought and feeling.
Practice empowers
The world needs more empowered people. If more people are empowered, those who maintain the fear base of society with artificial lack, scarcity, and insufficiency become visible.
Gratitude is always positive. It always empowers, both when given and received. Gratitude, mindfulness, and positivity are linked because all are tools of incredible empowerment that, together, can change your life and put you more in control.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
Start a gratitude journal.
At the beginning or end of the day (or both) take a moment to write down 5-10 things you’re grateful for. Write them out in complete sentences like, “I am grateful for this life I get to experience. Thank you.” Use both grateful and thank you in your sentence.
After you’ve written them out, read them (preferably aloud). As you read, let the feeling of gratitude that goes with the thought and words sink into your consciousness.
Read them three times each. Note how you’re feeling after you do this.
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Life is impermanent
Life is unexpected and uncertain. No two days are alike. Similar, maybe, but not the same. Change is the only constant in the Universe. That’s because the Universe and everything in it is impermanent.
Buddhism takes a deep look into the nature of impermanence. But outside the Buddhist way, it’s often disregarded, ignored outright, or denied. You strive to create things permanent and enduring, as does everyone.
The reality is that nothing is permanent. Nothing is enduring.
The meaning of life is to live
You are one of 8 billion individual people on Planet Earth. Every single person has one unspoken goal in life. To live.
Think about it. No matter who you are, where you come from, what you know, your goal in life is simply to live. You will go to great lengths to ensure that this comes to pass.
Everything above about what it takes to live is artificial. To live, all you truly need to do is breathe in.
All you can control is your inner being
Nothing at all in the entire Universe will give me control over any of the above. What I do and can control, however, is my reaction to it.
Specifically, my inner being. I control my thoughts, feelings, actions, approach, and intentions. What I do in the face of adversity, pain, suffering, frustration, and the like.
How is this an empowering realization? I can’t control anything external at all. I can and do, however, control my emotions, thoughts, feelings, and actions. This is empowering because it means I can shift my focus and stop trying to control what I can’t control.
What you do control is your thoughts, feelings, actions, approach, and intentions. However, it takes mindfulness and active conscious awareness to do this. The empowerment comes from this realization.
You are the only one in your head, heart, and soul. Nobody but you think your thoughts, feel your feelings, intend your intentions, and take your actions. These are all that you control. That’s a lot because controlling them determines what living looks like for you.
Real, genuine, actual living. Life can’t and won’t always be one given way.
Accept control of nothing and just live
Mindfulness lets you accept what you can’t and don’t control. Then, when you be here, now, you live. You’re alive. Your heart is beating, you’re breathing, and thus you’re living.
“Just live” looks small. But isn’t that, truly, the goal of every single being? Aren’t you on this Earth, here and now, primarily to live?
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
Is there something outside of yourself driving you crazy? Impacting your mental, emotional, and spiritual health?
Take a close look at it. What is it? What impact is it having on you? Write this down.z
Here’s the question to ask and answer:
What, if anything, can you control about this?
Include everything you can think of when it comes to answering this. Then, take that information, and decide if said thing is yours to control at all and how much power, if any, to continue to give to it.
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Discipline and its uses
The word “discipline” gets tossed around a lot. Often, it’s attached to a concept of doing something with full attention, within rigid parameters, and with no room for mistakes. Too little discipline and shit doesn’t get done. Your art isn’t made, your practice isn’t improved, and you leave a bad impression of yourself.
What if I told you that’s not the truth of discipline? What if discipline is less rigid and more about mindful, consciously aware practice?
A different approach to discipline
Discipline is not extreme willpower to get the job done. Instead, it’s an idea of active, conscious awareness to move yourself and your goals forward.
Life is in a constant state of motion. As part of that, change is the only constant. For the most part, there are three ways to live life.
1. Let life live you. Mostly you live by rote, routine, and habit, letting whatever happens, happen.
2. Curl up in a ball and await death. Life sucks, there’s little to no point in anything, the world is coming apart at the seams, so why bother?
3. Take the wheel and drive your life. You do things to live your life, make choices and decisions, and seek growth, change, and so on.
These are not absolutes, other ways fall between these.
Mindfulness is the core of discipline
There are two lies about how art is made that often derail a burgeoning artist. The first is that you must be uniquely skilled and talented, gifted, born to this world entirely to make your art and be a wild success as a bestseller, storied painter, world-renowned chef, and the like. Only those so endowed are worthy.
The second is that only by rigid, strict, ongoing, never-ending practice and extreme willpower can you succeed or be worthy of calling yourself an artist. Only those who give hours of their life, their time, and sacrifice to it are worthy.
Discipline begins with mindfulness and choosing to do your work.
Discipline is active conscious awareness in practice. Recognizing and acknowledging this shows you that it’s easier to act on your goals and create what your heart seeks to share with the world. Practice is important, but perfect practice through strict discipline is not real. Your work - and the choices and decisions that go into it that lead to doing it- is discipline.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
Is there something that you have desired to do but put off doing? Write it down. Also, write down why you haven’t done it yet, any reasonable or unreasonable reasons behind that, and anything else that comes to mind.
Then, work out how to do it. Write that down, too.
Now – do it. Get to it. Discipline yourself to begin.
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Fear is frequently weaponized to be unreasonable
All opposites, like positivity and negativity, black and white, good and evil, are extremes. They’re not, as most would suggest, opposite sides of a coin. That’s because the space between them isn’t so thin as the edge of a coin, but far broader, making it more akin to a cylinder.
Recognizing this is important because you and I live in a fear-based society. From the semi-harmless, like certain forms of advertising, to blatant falsehood and lies, like large swaths of politics and religion; fear is everywhere you turn.
Fear is so deeply interwoven in society that it frequently goes unrecognized.
Reason versus fear
Fear is not necessarily bad. After all, without fear, human beings would never have survived to become the constructive, creative beings we are.
Intangible fear is the main type of fear people experience today. It’s weaponized blatantly and subtly to direct and misdirect you. The only way to combat this sort of fear is not fearlessness, but reason. Reason is looking at the fear and asking if it will truly harm you.
Mindfulness of fear
Mindfulness has two district brands. Internal and external. Part of the nature of this fear-based society is to distract you. Thus, its focus tends to the external.
Active conscious awareness is self-awareness. It’s the key to being aware of you, yourself, here and now. That then tells you who, what, where, how, and why you are.
Choices and decisions
You make choices and decisions every single day. Some are big and especially impactful. Most, however, are small, partially by rote or routine or habit, but still impactful.
When you let fear do the driving, you will be swayed by outside forces. Conversely, when you let reason drive you, you’re practicing active conscious awareness. Ergo, you’re taking control.
Reason in face the fear defeats fear. The more each individual practices reason, the more habitual it becomes. That, over time, as it gains traction from person to person, can turn this world from fear-based to reason-based.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
Is there something you’re afraid of? Specifically, an intangible such as success, failure, love, and so on.
Write down what it is. What are you afraid of? Then, ask these questions:
· What am I afraid of?
· What do I think will happen if this comes to pass?
· How do I think this will change the way I perceive myself?
· How do I think this will change the way others perceive me?
· What will the suffering be like if this comes to pass?
After you’ve asked and answered these, can you apply reason to them? Not rationalization, reason. As in you look at them, detached, and ask if they might be as awful as you fear?
See if this lessens the fear. Meditate on it if you meditate regularly.
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Women are not objects
Women are people, too. When men pass laws that impact women’s rights, body autonomy, and the like, we can no longer stay silent. It’s time for us allies to be more vocal about this.
Women are not baby factories.
NFL Kicker Harrison Butker is an ass who has no idea what he’s talking about.
Men are not better than women just because we have penises.
LGBTQA+ people deserve equal treatment
Who cares who these people desire to have sex with or not?
It doesn’t matter how anyone identifies themselves in the grand scheme of things.
Speak up and speak out
We can’t just sit on the sidelines and ignore what’s going on. Especially in light of this upcoming election. Transphobia, homophobia, misogyny, and other prejudices and biases need to be pointed out and stood against.
Take a stand for what’s right.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
Pause and consider your actions. Speak up. Speak out. Get off the bench and the sidelines and take action to support those being marginalized. Be the change you wish to see in the world and be good.
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You’re only competing with yourself
There are plenty of contests out there where it’s all about competing. Yet, aside from such intentional competitions, you’re not in competition with anyone else for anything.
Let me repeat that for those in the cheap seats. YOU ARE NOT IN COMPETITION WITH ANYONE ELSE FOR ANYTHING. Unless you participate in a contest – a race, a fencing bout, any professional sport, a spelling bee, and the like – you’re not competing.
You’re only competing with yourself
Let’s go back to academia. The truth of placement in any given class has nothing to do with competing for grades between people (not in general). The only person you’re competing with when it comes to grades is yourself.
The funny thing is, once you leave academia and move into jobs and “real life” situations, lots of forces tell you both blatantly and subtly about all the competition you’re in now. Except, the truth is, you’re still only competing with yourself.
The lies of lack, scarcity, and insufficiency
Have you been told that “they” are going to take your money, your job, your way of life, and worse?
All of these messages are tied to lack, scarcity, and insufficiency. Here’s the most shocking truth of this. All of these messages are bullshit.
The vast majority of what you’re told is in limited supply, is lacking, insufficient, or is otherwise scarce, isn’t. That’s because most of these notions are completely artificial.
Maybe some tangible things are in short supply. But they can all be replaced by something else with no true detriment to anyone. The intangibles – including peace, respect, love, empathy, kindness, and compassion – are in more abundance than you can imagine.
The only person to be better than is yourself
Human beings grow, evolve, and change throughout their lifetime.
It’s not really competing to improve who you are, how you treat others, and what you do or don’t do. Maybe some people want to compete with their prior self to make themselves even better. That’s not competing with anyone else but yourself.
You can always win this competition, often just by showing up.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
The next time you’re not alone, like in a store, on a bus, walking down a street, in an office or classroom, or anywhere similar and mostly public, look around you. Notice the other people. Note how they’re the same as you. Observe how they’re different from you. Most importantly, become aware of these people.
That done, ask yourself these three questions.
· Am I better than them? (Spoiler alert – no)
· Are they better than me? (Answer – no)
· Am I competing with any of these people? (Again, no)
When you’re out and about in the world, and you encounter other people, randomly or otherwise, guess what? You’re not competing with them. What’s more, you’re not better than they are nor are they better than you are.
Repeat whenever you find yourself thinking about competing with others outside of playing sports or the like.
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The reality of what a comfort zone is
Comfort zone is an inaccurate term. That’s because, though it implies comfort, mostly the zone is one of familiarity. You know it, what’s within it, how it works, and all that you can expect from this zone.
It’s comfortable only because it’s familiar. When faced with the uncertain and the unfamiliar, having a comfort zone can and will make you feel stabler and better overall.
The problem is that from within your comfort zone, your growth is massively limited. That’s because to grow, evolve, and command change, you must be willing to move into the uncomfortable.
This is the ultimate open cell you can’t leave. Or more realistically, are afraid to leave because outside of it is the unknown.
Trauma is a thing
The truth is that I’ve spent most of my adult life in combat mode. I’ve fought depression. There have been many struggles finding and keeping jobs (and getting paid anywhere near what I’m worth). During most of my 20s and 30s, I moved through a lot of relationships and attempted to put my polyamorous, square-peg self into a monogamous round-hole box. I’ve struggled with my weight, self-worth, and working on balancing my emotional, mental, spiritual, and physical health, wellness, and wellbeing.
In the past 15 years or so, things have shifted. A lot. My life is stable, and I haven’t the foggiest idea what to do with that. It’s like I subconsciously need the challenges, the drama, the issues, and the troubles. Because without them I’m feeling oddly stuck.
Applied mindfulness
Practice active conscious awareness. Mindfulness is being actively aware, here and now, of your thoughts, feelings, actions, intentions, and choice of a positive or negative approach. That present awareness opens the way for you to see not how it should be, or how “they” desire it to be, but how it is.
This, however, can be really disconcerting. Particularly if you have been practicing mindfulness with a modicum of success. For example, via that practice, you’ve also made active choices and decisions for how to live your life, your way.
How to leave a comfort zone
One foot in front of the other. To quote Lao Tzu,
“The journey of a thousand miles begins beneath one's feet.”
The first step is to recognize that I’m in an undesirable comfort zone. The second step is to recognize that it is, in fact, mine to leave. Then, the third step is to acknowledge this. Skipping acknowledgment is the equivalent of recognizing that the first step out the door is a 2-foot drop, but not taking that into account when you take the step.
After recognition and acknowledgment, the fourth step is to leave the comfort zone. There is, however, an important bit to keep in mind here. Why?
What is my why behind leaving the comfort zone? To leave a familiar but not comfortable place is a good answer, but still doesn’t explore the next part. Where am I striving to get myself to? That’s the tough part. It requires that I strike a balance between where I am, here and now, and where I desire to be. To get from here to there, steps must be taken.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
If you’re feeling in any way stuck, examine if there’s a why you can put a finger on.
If so, consider where you desire to be, then take the following 4 steps:
1. Recognize that you’re in an undesirable comfort zone.
2. Recognize that it is, in fact, yours to leave.
3. Acknowledge this. This cannot be skipped.
4. Leave the comfort zone.
Repeat whenever you seek to make changes for yourself and your life.
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What do you do when you can’t find the words?
Sometimes you just don’t know what to say or write. It’s never just the words you use. Even the written word can convey a degree of tone, intent, and attitude.
Communication is a complex mechanism of expression employed to convey ideas. It’s how you and I can share notions, agree and disagree, and expand (or, frankly, shrink) our overall knowledge base.
Communication can be both internal and external.
Communication within and without
Whole people are made up of 4 specific elements. One is tangible, the physical. The other three are intangible, the mental, emotional, and spiritual. Everyone has these four elements to themselves, yet how developed each is varies wildly.
The intangible elements have a rather intense impact on how communication works. This is why it’s more than words. Words are physical. That means there is still a mental, emotional, and spiritual element to all communications.
Most of these are incredibly subtle. That’s because of the intangible nature of the mental, emotional, and spiritual. This is also where miscommunication is frequently born.
Words and body language go hand-in-hand when it comes to in-person conversations. Looks, how you stand, sighs, what you do with your hands, coupled with the words you speak convey an almost surreal amount of information.
Communication is never just words
You can be with a person, in the same space, and still misspeak, misinterpret information, and misunderstand. You think you’re expressing yourself, you think you’re reading another’s cues, and then learn you utterly failed to communicate with one another properly, and now there’s hurt.
Even the unintentional hurt caused by miscommunication feels bad both given and received.
What do you do when you can’t find the words? For me, the answer is to keep searching. Maybe they’re not here now, but they always come when called.
Become more consciously aware and mindful of your own nonverbal, wordless communication styles. I’ve had a real eye-opener into how what I do and don’t do, without words, can create an incredible degree of misunderstanding, which in turn leads to hurt feelings. That sucks.
I can choose to learn a lesson from it, and by recognizing, acknowledging, and being accountable for my failed communication beyond words, I can grow and learn. You can do this, too.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
Before you say anything to anyone, or send a DM or email, no matter what the topic is, pause. Consider your words, what they are, and what they will convey. Think about nonverbal elements that might go into it. Then act from there.
It might not seem like much, but sometimes pausing and considering before acting can avoid confusion, miscommunication, misunderstanding, and other issues before they might even occur.
Be mindful of what words and nonverbal communication you put out into the world.
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Every great began as a beginner
Whether they were a leader, writer, painter, artist, athlete, or whatever, they started as a beginner.
Nobody enters any given field as an expert. Nobody.
Yes, some people advance quicker than others. This is dependent on inherent skill and/or talent, how they learn, how fast they learn, natural ability, and all sorts of other factors along the way.
Still, even those who have the most gifts and innate proficiencies begin as beginners. Nobody starts at the top of their game. Unfortunately, there’s a loud false narrative about the latently able starting at the top.
It’s okay when you don’t get it right at the start
There are, of course, numerous stories of people making lots and lots and lots of attempts before succeeding. Some of the most successful people in history endured tons of failures, false starts, and other challenges on the way to their success. They tried and failed and chose to keep working. They didn’t do the half-assed, half-hearted “try” Yoda warns against in my favorite quote,
“Try not. Do or do not. There is no try.”
They do. It’s an attempt, but an action that is doing rather than half-assed trying.
The process is never the same for any creation, discovery, recognition, or success. The process, however, is similar.
Thought leads to idea à Idea leads to actionable item à Actionable item leads to action à Action leads to learning from success or failure.
The top of their game isn’t necessarily THE top
The GOATs all began as beginners. Not a single one of them appeared on the scene fully formed, greater than any other, ever. Holding them up as the pinnacle of achievement is often touted as inspiring. Yet frequently it has the exact opposite effect.
Mindfulness to reach the top of their game
Very seldom, almost impossibly seldom, does someone luck into the top of their game. Unplanned success and achievement at any given thing is almost mythical, like dragons.
Nobody truly starts at the top of their game. They do the work, they attempt and have small successes or failures, and they make new attempts again and again until they succeed. That action isn’t chance or luck or random happenstance. It’s mindfulness.
Active conscious awareness is mindfulness. Success and what it is varies from person to person. Measuring success is a highly individual matter. What’s more, success is different for every individual. Maybe you’re a beginner, maybe in the middle, or maybe at the top of your game. Wherever you are, mindfulness is the key to getting where you desire to go.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
Try something you’ve never done before.
Is there something you’ve been curious about trying out? Is there something new that has caught your attention you want to attempt to do? Might there be something you’ve not attempted because you were worried that you’d not be good at it?
Do it. Take that thing and do it. OR, if there is nothing already in your queue, take up a new art/hobby/activity that piques your interest. Don’t worry that you might suck at it, that’s how everyone starts. Be the beginner and try this new thing.
Write down what it is, how it goes, and how it’s making you feel.
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Why are choices and decisions so powerful?
What you’re never taught in school is how to be yourself. You’re taught to read, write, communicate with others, and be part of the machine of your given society. You’re never taught how to know yourself, basic psychology is only covered when you reach college (only if you bother with college and take any path along that line), and self-learning is not something you’re taught.
The truth of this life is that you are not just a cog in the machine. Rather, you’re a human, being. You’re capable of some pretty amazing things.
The gurus, demagogues, and supposedly elite of society aren’t better than you and me. They are not more worthy and deserving. They’ve just broken away from the herd, tasted power, and decided to hoard it for themselves and treat the rest of us like sheep. They’ve done what they tell you can’t and shouldn’t be done to maintain the false control and power they perceive themselves as having.
Recognizing that you have the same power is imperative. Accessing it is easier than you realize. It’s simply a matter of employing active conscious awareness and making choices and decisions.
Mindfulness is all about choices and decisions
Leaving the rote, routine, and subconscious living behind can be done by working with active conscious awareness.
To use active conscious awareness to make choices and decisions is a matter of mindfulness. To begin practicing mindfulness, you just need to be present, here and now.
Action often implies the physical. The truth is, it’s not literally what you do as much as it’s choices and decisions that you make.
If you’ve not been a regular maker of choices and decisions, you’d be amazed at how often you have opportunities you don’t consider. Even the most minor choices and decisions build strength to make larger and more impressive/more important things in your life.
Actively choosing and deciding is how you can gain what little control over your life experience is available to you. Yet that seemingly little control is the key to being who, what, where, how, and why you desire to be.
Choices and decisions empower you
Most of the “power” claimed by leaders, gurus, demagogues, and the like is utterly false. The first step in taking the wheel to drive your life and choose your path is to exercise choices and decisions. Turn off the autopilot, and don’t let yourself follow rote and routine and habit. Instead, choose and decide things. Actively and consciously apply mindfulness to make more choices and decisions.
This is the most empowering thing you can do for yourself. You are the only you that is, and you are not just here to exist and survive this life. You’re here to experience, explore, grow, evolve, and thrive. Choices and decisions are how you gain control on any level. You, and I mean you, are worthy and deserving of this.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
Today, take a moment to write down every choice and decision you make. No matter how large or small, write it down.
At the end of the day, mark all the choices and decisions you normally disregard as unimportant or make almost entirely by rote and routine.
Repeat this process tomorrow, and see if you add any new active, consciously aware decisions to your practice.
Once more, at the end of the day, mark all the choices and decisions you normally disregard as unimportant or make almost entirely by rote and routine.
Examine if this has a positive, negative, or neutral impact on your self-awareness. Continue to work with this as necessary.
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You might get broken, but you won’t be beaten
The modern world is obsessed with extremes. So many things are viewed as either/or, rather than the far vaster middle between them. It’s all black or white, never mind the shades of grey and myriad of colors between the opposite poles.
One Size Fits All never fits all. Yet you’re constantly bombarded by messages to conform, to find your accepted place in society, and to be a cog in the machine.
When it comes to your mental, emotional, and spiritual health, wellness, and wellbeing, lots of things might break you along the way.
Nobody teaches you any better
You’re taught throughout your youth to care for your body in numerous ways. Diet, exercise, dental care, hair and skin care, all of these get tons of focus and you’re taught to mind them. This is not true of your intangible, other elements of your being, however.
Thus, stress, fear, anxiety, depression, and uncertainty are invisible illnesses that silently attack the physical via the mental, emotional, and spiritual. This can become quickly overwhelming, especially if you fall for the messages of lack, scarcity, and insufficiency, then turn outwards to solve these matters.
However, the first step to any healing when you’re broken starts within.
It’s all about mindfulness and choice
You have more power than you probably realize.
When you get broken physically, fixing the damage is usually direct. Mental, emotional, and spiritual damage is another matter. There is no One True Way for everyone, with one exception. Active conscious awareness, i.e., mindfulness.
Mindfulness practice of this sort begins with becoming consciously aware of what you’re thinking, what and how you’re feeling, what your intentions are, the positivity or negativity of your life approach, and what you are or aren’t doing.
So, you might (and let’s face it, most probably will) get broken in one or more of the elements of your health, wellness, and wellbeing along the way. However, you won’t be beaten unless you allow yourself to be.
Broken but not beaten is a choice
Some challenges will feel insurmountable in this life. So long as you are here, drawing breath, and capable of independent thought, feeling, action, and intention, you won’t be beaten. Unless you allow yourself to be.
Everyone gets broken along the way. That’s the nature of the human condition. So long as you live, you can recover.
There are always resources to help you heal. No matter how you’re broken – physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually – something is available to you to aid your recovery.
When you get broken you are not beaten unless you allow yourself to be. Unconditionally, you are worthy and deserving of making choices and decisions to heal on any and all levels necessary.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
Think back on a previous experience that broke you. Were you broken physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually, or in multiple ways?
How did you recover? What did you do to help that? Did you take steps to aid your recovery?
Write it all down and keep it handy so that, the next time you’re broken, you’ll see that you’ve been broken – but not beaten - before, and can do it again.
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Tapping into this place between the subconscious and conscious mind
The Void or The Flow State are references to that place outside of time and space where you simply are. They’re the ultimate expression of the here and now — the present moment. In the flow, you ride along aware and unaware at the same time. It’s an amazing disconnect where super cool things happen.
Creativity directly connects you to The Void or The Flow State. That is one of the best ways to see, recognize, and develop your empowerment.
The three states of mind
Everyone everywhere is made up of three minds. The first is the unconscious mind. The unconscious mind is how your neurons fire to make your muscles do things, your heart beat, your lungs breathe, digestive system process food, and so on.
The second is the subconscious mind. This is where your memories, values, beliefs, and habits live. For the most part, they simply are. You can access them at will, but that requires a conscious act.
The conscious mind is your inner mindset/headspace/psyche self, as you perceive it here and now. It’s the conscious awareness of who, what, where, how, and why you are, now. Via the conscious mind, you can access the subconscious to make changes, create new habits, review old memories, and so on.
Two specific and separate places exist between the conscious and subconscious mind. One is the ego. The other space between the conscious and subconscious mind is The Void or The Flow State. This is a place where you simply are, being, doing, and existing, here and now. The Void or The Flow State lacks ego and loses track of time.
How does the void of the flow state work?
When you reach this place, you tend to find yourself in a metaphorical current, being carried along by the act of creating, working your mind, body, and/or soul. It’s a place where thought, feeling, intention, approach, and action are one, moving automatically. Unlike the automation of habit, rote, and routine, however, The Void or The Flow State results from mindful conscious awareness action.
This differs from habit, rote, and routine, because it’s a product of intent. You are doing a thing consciously and intentionally, rather than habitually and subconsciously. The act of the doing combined with the intent leads to The Void or The Flow State.
When you work in this place, it’s one of the most empowering feelings you can get.
The Void or The Flow State can’t be forced
Trying to force your way into The Void or The Flow State will have the opposite effect. Instead of being in that place where you are - doing, being, creating, in the now – you’ll connect to the ego and its artificial reflection and expression of who, what, where, how, and why you believe you are. This will keep you out of The Void or The Flow State because it’s missing the element of surrender.
Why is this so empowering? Because any act where you have reached the ultimate place of present conscious awareness is your doing. Because you thought, felt, intended, and acted on something to make a thing happen, and then allowed it to be, you empowered yourself from the start.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
Set aside 30-60 minutes to do an activity that you enjoy.
To attempt to get into the void or the flow state, begin with a 2-minute breathing exercise. Set a timer. Breathe in as deeply as you can. Then, breathe out completely. Repeat for the full 2 minutes.
Once your breathing exercise is complete, go to it. Do the activity you set the time to do. Allow yourself to get completely immersed in it.
Once you’re done, check how long you were at it. Did you lose track of time? Did it feel as if you simply were doing and being, in the moment? If yes, you experienced working from the void or a flow state.
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Gratitude is essential to our health, wellness, and wellbeing
Gratitude is never a bad thing. It is a matter of positivity and it always builds and never destroys. Saying thank you, and meaning it, expressing the feeling behind gratitude is a tool for change. When we express how grateful we are for things we have, things we receive, tangibles or intangibles, we empower ourselves, as well as those around us.
Gratitude in this way also improves our health, wellness, and wellbeing. On every level, gratitude is important to mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual health, wellness, and wellbeing.
In the face of institutionalized disempowerment and disenfranchisement, we need every tool we can get to fix this.
Gratitude is not selfish
Not to put too fine a point on it, but feeling grateful and expressing gratitude is not an act of selfishness.
How can I express gratitude when so many people are suffering so horridly? Because feeling grateful for things in no way disempowers anyone else. All those people who are experiencing awful things and suffering do not have their lot in life made worse when you are thankful for things.
I know how hard this is. But consciousness creates reality. When we get focused on all this awfulness around us, we discuss it, we rant about it, we feel terrible seeing it, then we inadvertently energize it more. Being grateful and expressing gratitude is positive.
Tangible or intangible, big or small, gratitude is always empowering
There is no such thing as negative gratitude. Sure, there’s false gratitude, but that’s not gratitude. Genuine, true, real gratitude is always positive.
Genuine gratitude is an expression of appreciation. Appreciation is a direct pathway to kindness, compassion, and empathy. Everyone, everywhere, desires kindness, compassion, and empathy. Saying thank you, giving thanks, and offering gratitude are all positive, empowering acts. What’s more, they are just as powerful when given as when received.
Gratitude is abundance
Saying thank you, and FEELING thankful is empowering. When you receive genuine thanks, doesn’t it make you feel good? Giving it is equally – if not more powerful than - receiving it. The number of things for which we can be grateful are infinite.
Mindfulness and gratitude
How can you recognize and apply genuine gratitude? By using mindfulness.
This form of mindfulness is active conscious awareness. It’s not recognizing the world without via your six senses, though that is a factor. It’s more about knowing your inner being. To do that requires active conscious awareness. This is a matter of recognizing, here and now, in the present, what you’re thinking, what and how you’re feeling, what your intent is, if your approach is one of positivity or negativity, and what your actions are or aren’t.
Tangible or intangible, big or small, gratitude is always empowering and always positive.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
In the now, say and feel Thank You at least a dozen times today. Whether to someone or something or to yourself, say it. When you say it, think it, feel it, and intend it.
In this way, you empower yourself to change your life for the better. Gratitude is an expression of appreciation. Because like attracts like, appreciation appreciates. In this way, not only do you empower your life for the better, you empower the world for the better.
To give this an extra boost, at the end of the day, before you go to bed, write out at least 5 things you are grateful for. Read what you write and put the energy into it to feel it.
This practice can be applied forever.
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Growth comes only from leaving our comfort zones
Despite being an actor in HS, a DJ in college, and serving as a court herald in my medieval organization – and speaking publicly in front of hundreds, sometimes – I’m more introverted than extroverted. Ambivert is a fair approximation for me.
Doing this uncomfortable thing is extremely positive for my overall life approach. Why and how does that work?
You can’t grow from your comfort zone
What does it mean to live? It’s not simply a matter of existing, of being half-present, of just surviving. It’s about thriving. Having experiences, learning things, meeting people, doing things, and the like. Unfortunately, this means there will be pain and bad things. However, that’s just a part of the life experience. Living isn’t always comfortable, and that’s okay.
Growth comes from experiences. Some are tangible, others intangible. Actively growing is empowering, and opens you to all kinds of potential, possibilities, and options.
Becoming comfortable getting uncomfortable
This is just like any muscle. The more you work it the stronger you get.
It is equally important that you work and grow your mental, emotional, and spiritual muscles like you would your physical ones. This will be uncomfortable. That’s largely because you are stepping into the unknown. There is no certainty in the unknown save uncertainty and the unknown.
Getting mindfully uncomfortable
The first step in the process is to identify what you desire to change. Mindfulness around this topic begins with acquiring conscious awareness of my thoughts, feelings, actions, approach, and intentions. Just thinking and feeling this out is a step away from my comfort zone. That’s because it points me in the direction of the unknown and uncomfortable.
Mindfulness can only be practiced by each of us individually.
The power of non-toxic positivity
Looking at both the positive and the negative - and choosing a positive approach - is genuine positivity. Toxic positivity ignores, disregards, and discards the negative. That’s unrealistic, unhealthy, and of course toxic.
Doing the uncomfortable thing via conscious awareness is a positive approach that can help you actively grow, change, and evolve. Growth comes only from leaving our comfort zones. Since I would rather take the wheel and drive my life than just go for a ride, this is how I empower myself, and is worthwhile to me.
That’s why doing the uncomfortable thing is positive. How empowering is that?
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
When something uncomfortable happens in the next week – specifically anything that draws you out of your comfort zone, like a conversation, an opportunity to do something new and unusual, or the like - consider it before you act on it or dismiss it.
What you believe – positive or negative – is true. After something pulls you out of your comfort zone or otherwise causes you to feel uncomfortable, it’s easy to go negative. However, you have a choice.
Here’s the exercise:
1. Write whatever the situation is/was down
2. Explain why it generated the emotion it generated
3. How are you feeling?
4. If negative, can you refocus to find and/or create a positive?
This is meant to show you how self-awareness and mindfulness empower you to change any belief you hold. It will also show how you can get comfortable and work with positivity in an uncomfortable situation.
this in mind going forward.
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