Think about it for a moment. If you’re going through any challenges right now, this may be just the moment when the tide is beginning to turn. This is a comeback time – a time of resurrection, renewal, restoration, rebirth, and returning again. What may have once seemed to be a breakdown is now a breakthrough. The precedents are endless: Christ returned from the dead and said, “I am the resurrection and the life.” The Chanukah oil lasted eight days in the temple instead of just one, and Chanukah means rededication. Moses was in exile for many years, and after that, he became a great leader. So no matter what’s happening in your life right now, it’s no doubt preparing you for something great. Read on for six reasons that your life is on the upswing.
1. Breakdowns Often Lead to Breakthroughs
Nelson Mandela was sent to prison for opposing apartheid, and he stayed there for 27 years. While in prison, his reputation and strength grew, and he became known as the most significant Black leader in South Africa. Four years after he was released, he became the president of South Africa. His difficult years were empowering him for greatness. If you have a relationship that is ending, it may be that something new and greater is getting ready for you. If your finances need improvement, it may be an opportunity to look at new possibilities for your life. A breakthrough may be just over the horizon.
2. Consider Challenges as Tests of Your Strength and Keep Going
Many years ago, I was an English teacher, and in my last y ear, I was teaching in a school in which the students began to riot. Though I was courageous, I found myself exhausted by the end of each day. I felt hopeless until a spark of inspiration came into me and told me that I could totally transform my life. I began to do yoga and meditate. I changed the way I ate and gave up many habits. And in time, I became a life transformer myself. These years of difficulty taught me strength and compassion, and they gave me the power to make the shift. If you’re going through a challenging time right now, it may be “boot camp” that’s giving you strength for coming back.
3. Keeping the Faith may be the Way to Keep on Keeping On
Once when I was undergoing some difficult times, I wrote to a spiritual teacher about it, and he said, “Times may be difficult now, but with your faith and your devotion, your life will be transformed.” This became the way for me. I knew that there was such a thing as “divine timing” and that everything would open up for me at the right time. So I kept telling myself that it was all getting ready to break through for me. And lo and behold, life opened itself up for me, and I was able to move forward. The same is happening for you.
4. Plan It; Imagine it; Hold the Space for It
Let your imagination help you plan the next steps. It’s important to accept what’s happening in the moment, but it’s also of great benefit to imagine the potentials for yourself. Some people have never let themselves imagine what could be possible. Go ahead and let yourself do it. Get ready for a transformed life. Even in the midst of difficulties, get ready for everything to shift for the better.
5. Affirm It
Speak positive words about the potentials for your life. Don’t give the time of day to your complaints or self pity. Speak words of possibility. You too can say, “I AM the resurrection and the life.” You can also say, “I AM the power of healing and I AM healing myself now.” You can say it over and over, using these words instead of negative ones.
6. Get Ready for a New World
While it’s important to “be here now” and to accept your current say of viewing your reality, it’s also important to project the potentials for a transformed world. While some people say that 2012, for example, is going to be the cataclysmic end of the world, others say that something quite different can be expected. There is the possibility that there’s an optimistic interpretation and that it’s the end of the world as we’ve known it. It could mean the rebirth and transformation of humanity in which we all know universal love and peace.
You’d be surprised how many people worry about being bag ladies or bag men. The image is in their heads as pervasive scenarios. Not very productive thinking, to be sure! Take a look at what worries actually are: They’re negative thoughts projected onto the future. They’re fearful pictures of the worst possible outcomes. Some people feel that they protect themselves by preparing for the worst. But instead, they’re really creating defeated scenarios with their worries. Let’s take a look at what you can do instead. Here are seven alternatives.
1. First, pay attention to your breathing.
When you worry, your breathing is shallow. See if you can breathe deeply, bringing fresh oxygen and prana ( life force) into your body and mind. As you breathe in tell yourself that you’re worrying again. As you breathe out, tell yourself that you’re now letting go of these worries. You don’t want to paint a picture of the worst possible thing that can happen. You have better things to do.
2. Create a new scenario based on expanded possibility.
What might be an alternative vision for you? Instead of the bag lady or man, what is calling to you? How would you like to see yourself? A successful person assisting others to be successful also? A happy, loving being? Take the paintbrush of your mind, and construct something else that’s joyful, prosperous, healing, and full of love.
3. Develop a state of faith that everything is working out.
You can first tell yourself: “Things have a way of working themselves out.” As you examine the events of your life, they may have seemed difficult at the time, but you’re here. You’ve grown beyond them. Something was being accomplished or learned in the process, and everything has a way of working itself out . You might even think in terms of a benevolent universe with difficult things happening to purify and cleanse the spirit. Everything is here to raise your consciousness, and you are on a path of great self knowledge and expansion.
4. Hypnotize yourself into a positive mindset
You may want to close your eyes as you breathe and count some numbers backwards very slowly. Get into a relaxed state in which you can see your worries as scenarios that you’ve made up. Breathe some more as you do the next step.
5. Contact your wisdom
Ask yourself, “What would my Wise Mind tell me about this?” You may want to write out, type out or record your answer. You might want to just speak it or think it. The Wise Mind is supportive, loving, and gentle . See what it would like to tell you about your worries. See if it has some other ideas for your well being and your life.
6. Create affirmations
You can make up some phrases that will help you to think more positively. Or you can adopt such positive affirmations at these:
* “There’s always more.” That’s a really good one, telling you to keep on keeping on. There’s always more.
* “God is helping me and showing me the way.” This is good if you have a spiritual nature, and it allows in the forces of the universe to embrace your mind and life.
* “I AM the power of healing and I AM healing myself now.” This is particularly powerful, and the I AM is capitalized because it invokes the universal power of expanded consciousness to guide and assist you.
* “I AM the power of prosperity.” You keep the pictures positive and open your mind for the universe to give you abundant gifts.
7. Take action.
Doing something constructive will shift your energy, and it can lead you to solutions. If you don’t know what to do, write down some ideas. Brainstorm with yourself, and then take one or two of those ideas and begin to take action. Call someone. Read something. Meditate. Open yourself for all the opportunities that are coming your way. Open your mind to sunshine instead of a cloudy day.
If you’re a person who has no fear at all, you’re very rare and supremely blessed. Most people and other animals have endless fears of all kinds. Did you know that you can reduce the severity of your fear, and in some cases you can transform it completely? Let’s take a look at some of the different kinds of fears and some powerful ways to come out of the darkness and into the light, out of the fearful world and into the world of courage and strength.
The Different Kinds of Fears
Some fear is instinctual and biological, reminders of when your ancestors lived in the forest in primitive times – and when enemies or seeming threats came near, there were rushes of adrenaline that gave them energy to react. Another kind of fear is emotional. Sometimes you react to a current event in a fearful way because it reminds you of something that happened to you at some other time. Some fears are imaginary, like the scenarios of gloom, doom and ruin that may never happen. There are fears of loss of ego states, like fear of failure or humiliation or death. Some of these fears are attempting to keep you from danger; others are blown out of proportion by an overactive mind.
Here are Some Ways of Transforming and Healing Your Fears
Pay Attention to Fear
Stand back and look at your fear. What’s it like? Where do you feel it inside? Does it affect any part of your body? How does it feel in your mind? Communicate with your fear. See if you can treat it like a person and begin to make friends with it: “I know you’re attempting to take care of me, but I need to be clear and free. Perhaps you can relax a bit,” you might say to it. Give your fear some tender loving care. “I know you’re feeling a bit insecure, but I’m here with you, and it’s okay.” You may even want to stroke your own hand with the other hand, saying, “Don’t worry, I’m with you, and we’ll do just fine” – almost as if you were soothing a child.
Breathe into Your Fear
When you have fear, your breath becomes very shallow. Notice that, and take a very deep breath in all the way to your belly. Deep breathing this way is very powerful. It creates a whole different kind of energy in your body and mind. It brings you fresh oxygen, centers you, and deepens your relaxation. Many ancient texts say that breathing can transform matter. If you like, you can even count as you breathe in and out and hold your breath if you like in between. This type of breathing steadies you and transforms your emotional state.
Contact Your Own Wisdom
Say to yourself, “What would my Wise Mind tell me about this?” Then listen to the perspective your Wise Mind gives you on your situation. It might tell you that everything will work out. It might give you alternative ways of looking at your particular situation. It might remind you that you need to remember to breathe or move your body. It might remind you that you’re loved and not alone in your situation. It might tell you that you’re imagining the worst possible scenario. As you listen to your Wise Mind, you can feel a sense of liberation from a limited perception, and you can move into fearlessness.
Make a Decision about Your Fear
See if you can decide to live in a courageous warrior’s world instead of a fearful world. See if you can shift your perspective so much that you’re able to “change the channel” and move from a dark point of view into an altered world of light. You can tell yourself that you’re ready to shed the burdens of fear that may have been in your life for years, if not eons. This takes some discipline, as fears are very dramatic and vie for first place. As you take on the courage and bravery of the spiritual warrior, you can find that an innate strength and power is coming to the surface, and you are now living in a transformed inner world. This then transforms your outer world and helps you to move through life with greater ease and grace.
Cultivate Trust
You may be able to cultivate the attitude that basically things have a way of working themselves out, that at the core, there may be a benevolence about the universe that is apparent when you look for it. You may find new attitudes coming to you:
* That if you fail, it’s just a message that you need to try again and perhaps take a different approach next time
* That you’re willing now to take a chance
* That you realize now that failing may be a stepping stone to later success
* That you train yourself to see the possibilities for goodness happening instead of gloom and doom, and you center yourself in this
Shine Light on Your Fear
With your inner awareness, let light shine around and into your fear. Transform it as if you were Obi Wan Kenobi with his light saber, reminding Darth that no matter what, he’ll still be more powerful than any darkness could ever be. The light heals and transforms, and strength comes to the warrior whose courage leads the way.
Breaking up with a craving can be a hard thing to do. Do you have an actual physical addiction? Is your life filled with stress? Is the craving serving other needs in your life – like keeping you from thinking unwanted thoughts? Do you actually want to make the change? There are many methods for helping you become free if you want to (and you do need to “want to”). Here are two very powerful ways toward the transformation of your life.
Not This, But This
One of the powerful ways to undo a specific craving is through substitution – not just any ordinary substitution, but substitution that serves a very specific purpose. When you find out what needs the object of your craving is satisfying, you can get those needs met in some other ways. If you don’t do this, then substitution may not be as effective as you’d like it to be. You can’t just substitute a rice cake for a birthday cake or a carrot for a cookie, if you don’t get any satisfaction from rice cakes or carrots. The word “satisfaction” is the key here. What needs is the object of your craving satisfying? You may need to take a moment to think about it. Is it a specific kind of oral gratification that makes you feel really content, as if you were a baby at your mother’s breast? Is it a special kind of stimulation or calming that you’re craving? When you figure it out, find something that is truly satisfying that will help you meet your needs in ways that are healthy and positive. I substituted Japanese yams for sweets. You may not know it, but they taste like cake.
Horrible, Terrible, Bad
This is the second method, and it’s called “aversion therapy.” Not very positive, to say the least. Some people wouldn’t touch this method with a ten foot pole. Others think it’s brilliant. You might want to call it the “maggots on the chocolate cake” method. What you need to do is to find aversion statements that are truly meaningful to you:
* “I don’t want that because if I do it (eat it, drink it, smoke it), I won’t live to see my children (or grandchildren) grow up.”
* “My husband or wife) might leave me. I don’t want that.”
* “If I do that, I won’t be able to do my work, and I won’t be successful.”
* “I won’t be able to fit in my old clothes, and I won’t have anything to wear.”
* “That stuff is pure junk, made in factories, calculated to addict me, made for pure profit only, tastes like cardboard, makes me feel worse – not better. I don’t want that junk.”
The litany is up to you, whatever gets to you deeply. You can have it ready in your mind whenever you pass a candy store or a group of smokers or drinkers at a party. You have to have your own good reasons – and you need to talk to the part of yourself that says, “Just once, go ahead. Just have a little.” Say, “No thanks,” do your substituting, say your aversion litany, and keep on walking forward.
Other Approaches
There are a lot of other ways to make these shifts, such as working with positive suggestions and more. You can take what works for you and go out and transform your life in powerful, positive ways. But the main point is: you have to be ready for the shift, and it needs to be the right time for you. Then miracles can take place in your own transformation and healing.
What does it mean to “raise your vibration?” In these challenging times, you can sink into gloom or you can rise into personal power and self realization. The energy of the times supports your transformation into a being of higher self-knowledge and love. Everything is energy, and everything vibrates at a different frequency or rate. If you’re vibrating at a fast vibration, you’re closer to spirit. If your vibration is slower, you’re swimming in the sea of human problems and dilemmas. You can raise your vibration and feel happier, more prosperous, and filled with love
What’s it Like to Raise Your Vibration?
When you shift your focus to the world of light, you become more connected to the energy of the divine, more aligned with your essence, more imbued with experiences of peace, light, wisdom, prosperity, and well-being. When you’re vibrating more slowly, you buy into troubles, struggles and difficulties. “Isn’t that realistic?” you might ask .”Hey, look, I’ve got some big problems here!” you might say. You can do your best to heal, explore, understand, and transform these problems, and you can also move your awareness to another level of reality. Is CNN or your daily newspaper the only reality? Are your health and work problems all the reality that there is? Or is there something that’s eternal that’s on very few TV channels or only in some minds? When you raise your vibration, you look at the spiritual meaning behind the events of your life. You understand that you are made of energy, and you can shift the frequency of that energy by shifting how you perceive and how you live.
What Shifts Are Necessary?
You can become more conscious – paying close attention to all aspects of your life, and step-by-step shifting into greater and greater spiritual power.
You can ask yourself:
* How can I release my self-doubt?
* How can I let go of feelings of impoverishment?
* How can I minimize my fears?
* How can I center myself in my power?
* How can I be more conscious about how I treat other people or respond to how they treat me?
* How can I love people more instead of criticizing them?
* How can I meditate more?
* How can I stop complaining and feel more grateful for everything I have and everything I am?
* How can I choose foods more consciously?
* How can I think more beneficial thoughts?
* How can I bring more light and wisdom into my life?
And there is much more.
You and the Divine Purpose of the Universe
Eckhart Tolle said “You are here to enable the divine purpose of the universe to unfold.” You may feel it deeply inside yourself that you’re here to bring a higher vibration to the world and create huge shifts in every aspect of life for yourself and others. You may love to work with light – white, golden yellow, violet or any other color, and you may be one who shines light wherever you go. This is the purpose you came here for, and you are truly needed right now. May you emerge from your challenges into a new level of existence in which you bring more light, love, and consciousness to the planet on which we live.
Are you going through changes that have taken you out of your comfort zones? You don’t have to do a litany of the difficulties you may be facing. You know them all too well. When challenged in these ways, some people fall into the abyss. Others know the art of turning everything around. You can tell yourself that a great purification is going on right now, and a multitude of blessings are coming from the challenges of the times. Read on to see how to turn everything around to create happiness and abundance.
Turning Everything Around
In the movie “Life is Beautiful,” the hero and his small son are in a concentration camp. The father’s humor helps convince his son that the Holocaust is a contest to win a tank, and the line they’re marching in is a parade. Later when the war is over and the little boy survives, he sees an American tank, and he feels he’s won the game. When the boy grows up, he realizes all his father had done for him to help him shift his consciousness and uplift his spirit. Not that you’re dealing with something that drastic, but you can work with your own mind to perceive the changes in the world in very transformational ways.
What if This is Really the Best of Times?
A number of people truly believe that we’re undergoing a consciousness revolution. One great teacher, Siva Baba, says “Behind the clouds, the sun is shining. We’ll see a Golden Age. There will be some calamities, manmade and natural, but everyone living now is very fortunate. Changes are happening for all humanity, and you’ll be drenched with light.” At this moment, you may be experiencing limitations, but you can experience more freedom and happiness by remembering this light and the huge potentials that lie at the core of your soul.
Are You Ready for a Miracle?
Why not? Why not open to the possibilities of miracles of any kind – especially the miracles that will liberate your life? First look for resources within yourself that you didn’t even know you had. Open your mind to the possibilities of great things happening. You may not know what they are, but you can open to good fortune at any time. Another resource is your creativity. What can you create beyond what you’ve ever created before? Can you imagine new ways to bring in income? Can you create a spiritual openness to give and derive great energy? What resources for the renewal of your life are within you?
Are you Ready to be Infused with Gratitude?
Though there are many things you may not have or be, that is just one point of view. There are many more things that you have and are, and this is a perfect time to become mindful of them. Thanks for your bed, your meals, your home, your spirit, and whatever else you know you’ve been given as the gifts of your life.
Are You Ready to Increase Your Compassion?
For those whose circumstances are challenging, let your heart open in magnanimous ways. Infused with Spirit, you can do whatever you can to give both assistance and love to whatever beings you’re called to acknowledge. This is one of the gifts of challenging times – opening to give to others and to touch them in what Mother Teresa called “their distressing disguise.”
Look at the Growth of Your Soul
It is often through difficulty that the perfection of the inner being is forged. Not always, but often, the hardest times have brought forth the strength of your soul. Some people succumb to their travails, but some people shine beyond them. You may find that you’re being asked to be resourceful, creative, mature, wise, loving, and filled with power. What a time to be empowered it is. What is it that’s coming forth from you? Spirit can fill you with illuminating energy and strength.
Out of Abyss Consciousness
If you’re one who travels into the land of the bleak more than you’d like, pull yourself out through the remembrance of your light and spirit . Remember that the illusory world is replete with duality, and the more you buy into it, the less of the brilliant light world you can see. Meditate, say prayers, affirm, and remember that “this too shall pass.” Everything has a way of working itself out.
Do you have challenges around thinking good thoughts about yourself? “I’m not so good. I always fail. I’ll never get the job I want. I’ll never make the money I want. I don’t think people will love me the way I’d like them to. I’m not very likeable. I don’t like my body. I’m not so smart. I wish I looked better.” And on and on! If this were different, maybe there would be no international or even environmental problems. It all begins inside. Find out why these problem thoughts exist and how you can heal them as you read on.
Why These Mind Problems Exist
One of the reasons for these self-defeating thoughts is the patterns or habits of mind or thought forms that you carry within you your entire life and perhaps in all of your lifetimes. Many people believe that you bring these patterns of thought with you from other lifetimes. In this case, babies are not the innocents that we think they are. You carry scripts inside of thought forms and habits of mind that will determine what kinds of thoughts you’ll think. If you have a strong critic inside, it will do its critical dance. If you have a strong self-defeated voice inside, it will show up as self defeat. The possibilities are endless.
Another Reason for These Habits of Mind
Your patterns can also come from wounds, whether old or recent – of seeming failures and old hurts. Maybe someone influential in your life had these old hurts as well. Some people have hurts in love, some around money; others have them around feeling healthy. You’ve also been conditioned from an early age by those who themselves carried less than positive thought forms inside themselves. You keep on recreating these old patterns because your being is seeking to heal them.
How to Heal the Old Thoughts
The main way to heal these habits of mind is to remember the basic truth: that deep within you, underneath all the problems of life, underneath the anger, illness, grief or feelings of unworthiness, is a great essence of healing, illumination, and love. It’s the basic core of who you are, and it exists as the essence of your very being.
How Can You Remember This?
Experiencing your essence often involves going within, through meditation, hypnosis or other ways to focus inward. You can also experience your essence in motion, at a time when your mind stops chattering for an ecstatic moment and you feel uplifted, in a kind of flow. Maybe you’re playing a musical instrument or running or loving – and you feel lifted up beyond ordinary reality. When you experience this, you know that your thoughts of insufficiency are not real. This experience of your essence can heal fears, anger, grief and all other challenges that come from your mind and thoughts.
You Can Shift Your Reality
First have compassion for yourself and be kind in how you speak to yourself. Then see how everything in your life has been an opportunity to grow and expand. You can alter the way you perceive your childhood, your relationships, and your work. You can shift your consciousness level to be able to go beyond your old views of what’s real, to know that you have true worth, that you are the essence, and you merit everything good – great love, success, enlightenment, and joy.
© Marilyn Gordon 2009
You can use this article if you credit Marilyn Gordon www.lifetransformationsecrets.com
Alfred E. Neuman said it: “What, me worry?” His face doesn’t look like it has a care in the world. All he wants to do is create mischief. Looking like a combination of Howdy Doody, The Little Rascals and David Letterman, Alfred E. Neuman is a major philosopher of our time, helping us to see what potential there is in giving up our gloom and doom proclivities of mind. Now that may not be easy nowadays as we know. Earthly cataclysms and untold personal challenges often bombard our consciousness. So what can we do to move forward in more positive ways?
I Heard it On the Radio
When I was in grammar school, I listened to the radio while I was eating breakfast (would you believe that TV wasn’t even invented yet?) –and at the end of a particular morning show, the host always said, “It’s going to be a wonderful day for you!” I made it a point to listen to this every day. In fact, I even invented a superstition that I had to listen to it before I went to school – and then it would be a wonderful day for me. We can invent such mind games and program ourselves with some affirmation or good omen that will create a wonderful day. Robin Roberts from TV’s “Good Morning America” always says “rabbit, rabbit” on the first of each month – and to her, doing that will make the coming month a good one. You can have blessings, mantras, Hail Marys, simple or complex activities or ceremonies that you can install in your mind as good omens for a wonderful day or a wonderful life. Why not?
What Are Samskaras?
“Samskaras” is a Sanskrit word for habits of mind or thought forms that we carry within us our entire lives and perhaps in all of our lifetimes. Some of us envision the worst possible scenarios. Others have low self esteem and criticize themselves, like the size of their thighs or the power of their brains. Others are convinced the world will end. We need to be able to witness our own minds to see what thoughts are playing themselves out in the movie theater of consciousness, and then we can counteract them if we like with doses of alternate realities or more fruitful thoughts.
Fasting from Negativity
Did you ever go on a fast? You abstain from something or many things for a given period of time for health or just to see what it might be like. Would it be possible to abstain from negative thoughts for a period of time? This may not be an easy alternative to criticizing, thinking depressive thoughts, worrying, or chastising yourself for one thing or another, but it’s a game you can play with yourself. See if you can give yourself a challenge of not thinking negatively for a certain period of time. If you do think that way, that’s okay. Just notice the thoughts and then come back to your negativity-free zone whenever you’re able to do so.
Giving Thanks in Advance
Here’s another idea. If you have a tendency to worry or feel anxious, you can say, “I give thanks for my____.” The thanks might be for your perfect work or your great diagnosis or your burgeoning bank account. Just say it over and over. It can work as a method of mind-creation. At the very least, it feels better than its gloomy alternative.
Your thoughts are flowers in the garden of your consciousness. What kinds of flowers are planted there? Are they drooping, sharp-edged, carnivorous? Can you plant some bright and happy flowers? Can you fertilize them with love and trust that everything has a way of working itself out in this universe that has a perfection of its own?
