The Art of Inner Happiness
How do we stay centered so that we can continue to stay on purpose regardless of the changes going on around us?
How do we begin to transcend the external ebb and flow of daily life? How do we find inner stability in an environment of constant change? How do we rise above the pull of the tide or the ups and downs of our emotions so that we can achieve our goals and dreams?
The secret lies in our attention. Attention is like the flow of electrical energy through a light bulb. Or to put it another way...
Attention is energy. And where our attention goes, our energy flows.
Think of yourself as a light bulb. By focusing your attention within, you can increase the electrical current or voltage to this light.
Further, by taking our attention off the outer world and focusing our attention on our inner world, we start to rise above the ebb and flow, the ups and downs of life. Even more importantly, we start to rise above the ups and downs of our emotions.
What we focus our attention on expands.
Expand the light!
Here is a simple activity that will expand the light and raise your energy. At this energetic level, negative thoughts and feelings can't pull you or have an affect on you.
- Imagine a golden ball of light in the center of your chest at about the heart level.
- Take a deep breath and as you do imagine the breath increasing the electrical flow to the golden ball.
- With every breath, expand the inner light until it fills your chest with it's glow.
- Imagine that glow getting brighter with every breath.
- Steady your attention on the inner world while you take action in the outer world.
Remember to remember to practice this as often as you can during the day. Make a game of it! Ask yourself, "Where is my attention now?" Then, refocus and turn up your inner light.
Let your light permeate the atmosphere and notice that as you do, you begin to attract new and happier more fulfilling circumstances.
A perfect compliment to focusing your inner light is my music CD Daybreak and my centering CD, New Beginnings. One features baroque music to enhance learning and creativity, and the other includes a guided meditation to assist you in focusing your attention.
If you are reading this in a reader or email, please click here to visit my blog page and keep abreast of anything you may be missing. Don't forget to leave a response and let me know your questions or successes in using these tools.
Take a Stand for You!
Take a stand for a vision of who you intend to be, even in the face of no physical evidence... until the evidence shows up!
Don't wait for others to show you who are. Don't wait for circumstances to dictate or define you! Define yourself!
This is not grand-standing. It is not wishing or wanting. This is the heart and soul of be-coming. I am speaking about living life as a creative act! At its worst, it's living with paradox on the creative edge of life... At its best, it's exhilarating, inspiring, heady and wonder-ful (as in 'full of wonder').
Human beings are deciding beings. Decide who you intend to be and how you want your life to be. Then, create yourself and your life in the image you envision in your mind and heart!
Ask yourself these three questions:
- Who do I intend to be? - In other words, who do you wish to be. But turn that wish into an intention.
- What qualities do I intend to exhibit in my life and in relationship with others? These might be things such as kindness, compassion, resiliency, optimism, enthusiasm and so on.
- What is my purpose and what will my life look like when I am fulfilling my purpose? (Envision what you will be doing and how you will be doing it.)
Hear and Heart – One Letter Apart
We listen all day long... to our peers, friends, family, co-workers, children, partner. But do we really HEAR what they are saying?
The ability to listen and the ability to really hear are two different things. One is mechanical and the other is an art form.
I have been a student of listening for over thirty years now. My journey with my mentor has been a never ending journey of awakening and discovery. Listening is the most profound master teacher that I have ever studied under.
I have had a few great master teachers in my life time! But not one with the power to carry me through multidimensional levels of awareness in a moment by moment process. My Listening Mentor wears a coat of many colors and just when I think that I have become my own master, my mentor morphs, showing me a depth I never saw before.
The very first lesson that my master teacher shared with me is that HEAR and HEART are only one letter apart. So the first teaching I received at the feet of my master teacher was, "To really hear what is being said you must connect with heart!"
Action Step - try this over the next week:
- Whenever you are in a listening situation during the coming week, imagine opening a channel from your heart to your head.
- Be aware of your heart and your hearts' capacity to "hear" or feel what is being said.
- Be aware of your heart as you listen and notice what if you discover. Without judgment or opinions, just listen from your heart and notice what comes up.
Repetitive Thoughts Create Reality
Thoughts are things!! Every repetitive thought that we think eventually becomes reality.
Our brain is magnificent! In fact, neuro-scientists tell use that the human brain is the most powerful processor and solution generator on the planet.
We know that human intention can and does influence material and properties in a significant way. We are all equally powerful in our ability and our creative capacity to shape the world around us and to have a direct impact on our planet. We affect the world around us whether we are consciously intending to or not.
When we we utilize our heart and combine our thoughts with our feelings, scientists tell us that this energetic combination is more powerful than a radio transmission. With constant random thoughts and repetitive patterns of thoughts and feelings we are accidentally or unintentionally creating our reality all day long.
It is time to practice a higher heart wisdom and practice mind management.
This will allow us to
direct our energies in a significant way so that we can consciously create a life of our choosing.
Remember to remember that you will rise to the level of the visions that you hold and the conversations you have with yourself. Consciously or unconsciously, your inner visions and your inner voice direct your reality. So lets be conscious!
- Envision the life you would like to have.
- Create a powerful positive present tense mantra that states that you already have it
- Repeat the mantra every morning, every evening and whenever you think of it.
- Energize it with gratitude that this new reality is happening now.
- Continue to do this every day and your world will begin to shift from so-so or even good, to sublime
Here are two simple examples:
- I am so thankful and happy now that money is coming to me consistently and on an ever increasing basis from various sources.
- I am ever grateful for my personal presence and energy in working with my team as I inspire them to achieve our team goals.
So there it is! Keep your heartfelt emotions and thoughts positive. Create a powerful positive mantra for your success in an area (one at a time). Repeat the mantra as often as possible. Act as if it already is what you want it to be. "So be it as I speak it," is the thought that activates and attracts the energy of success!
The Happiest Man In America
There is always magic in the air (literally) when I fly and my trip to LA was no different. I was offered a seat up front and when the plane was fully boarded, I said hello to the couple sitting next to me.
At first, the banter went back and forth "Where are you off to?" - a filming for the Heroes for Humanity Project.
"And you?" They were on their way up for one of their niece's wedding. A bit more chatting and it turned out that I was sitting next to Al Wong, named by the New York Times, as the Happiest Man in America, and his wife Trudy.
We talked about love, joy, living in Hawaii, family and a lot more. We shared about heart happiness and how the happiness of our heart plays a central role in our overall happiness. We spoke of the power of a smile and the implicit joy that happens when we say "Aloha" and connect with other people.
Then Trudi shared how Al received the award. It turns out that over the last three years, Gallup has called 1,000 randomly selected American adults each day. The interviewers asked each person about their emotional state, work satisfaction, eating habits, illnesses, stress levels and other quality of life indicators.
Trudi shared that the call was amazing. As the interviewer was going through the list of questions with Al, she suddenly shouted to everyone in the phone room, "We've found him! We finally found him!"
"Meanwhile," she said, "Al thought the whole thing was a joke. He couldn't even believe that there was really such a search."
It was truly a memorable flight of the mind and heart as well as getting my physical being to LA for the filming. And the insight gained from this unforgettable few hours? It's good to reflect about our lives along some of the key indicators...
- How is your sense of emotional wellbeing? Are you happy during the day or do you have times of sadness?
- What is your stress level? Do you experience frustration, get annoyed or irritated? Or are you fairly consistently balanced and happy?
- Do you smile a lot every day? Do you connect with others, even strangers?
- How is your financial situation? Do you save regularly?
- Do you enjoy your work?
- Is your family situation happy? Are you divorced, single or married? And are you at peace with your situation?
Then set some goals for improvement in the areas where you fall short. And HAVE FUN with it! That's one of the keys to happiness... enjoy your life or change it!
To learn more about the award go here.
