Tag: self development

Overcoming Weekend Work-Week Blues

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A short while ago, I could feel the pressure of futuristic events that I knew I’d have to deal with. It was that Sunday feeling that 9-5ers have the day before going back to work – because it was the day before going back to work! Since I began working full-time again, I’ve noticed this pressure building on the weekends, that sigh of knowledge harking the end of short leisure time, and the beginning of a long work week ahead.

Because I normally can’t stand that way of being, I decided to try and let go of it, relinquish the thoughts and the ‘netflixing’ of projecting myself into the future and what I’d be doing.

Being Present

Pose a logical challenge to your mind while it ruminates over this. Ask yourself, is this useful? The quick obvious answer is no. Try following up by asking yourself why would I want to sacrifice my present moment, for thinking of what is going to happen? The true answer to your life is that the present moment is all you ever really have. You cannot experience the past again and the future hasn’t happened yet. Try to focus on your present moment wherever you are. It could be at the cinema, with your family or in your bedroom alone. Listen to the sounds, notice the fundamental details of your surroundings, whatever they might be, and accept it. You’ll find not only have you curtailed the ‘before work week’ blues, but can experience joy in the moment.

Surrender

Surrender. Accept whatever it is that is your life. I think we sometimes become transfixed to what we deem as ‘ideal’ and are so dissatisfied with what we have that we refuse to be happy until we get it. However, the goal posts never really stop moving back in life, when you finally get what you want, you’ll soon want something else. It’s the nature of the beast. Difficult at times to accept I know, but know that change is a constancy in our universe, and that the river of time pulls us all downstream. Everything is subject to change, no stone is left unturned. And since what you’re feeling is not of any use, surrendering it means it doesn’t have any more power over you.

Sense of control

You’re 100% responsible for what you choose in life, remembering that you chose to take on the job you’re at will give you a sense of control. Try to remember why you took on the role in the first place – more money to save, supporting your family, climbing the corporate ladder or something else, can help in your resolution of going back to work every Monday morning. Don’t forget your why. It’s what drives you beyond other things such as salary or benefits.

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Staying Strong and Knowing Your Value

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14-10-2016-12-00-16I’ve noticed that last few months that my sense of self-worth and value has decreased, or at least, has disappeared so much so that I’ve lost touch with myself. With what I know my abilities are and what I’m ‘good at’, not having a job can do that to you.

A good way to boost yourself is to write all your achievements down. In an effort to try and recall and remember what it is that my strengths were, I decided to write some of them down from the past 1-2 years. Here’s a quick shortlist to share:

  • Completed a postgraduate qualification that really opened up my mind and helped me realise the various possibilities that I had.
  • I finished my book and managed to edit it nearly four times.
  • Set up my blog and inspired some readers with my stuff.
  • Learned a lot about myself through setting up my own business. What I’m good at, not so good at and what I like doing most.
  • Traveled to far distant countries alone and met some great, unforgettable people.

Besides writing down all your achievements, one other interesting thing to consider is how you measure your self-worth? The ‘Looking Glass Self’ was a theory proposed by a university instructor called Charles Cooley, who said that we only develop a self-concept when we know how others see us. This is supposedly where our self-image stems from. Remaining conscious of that, you could also question the various sources that contribute to your self-worth. Does it come from being a loving parent or family member? Is it climbing the corporate ladder or being the top student in your class? Does it come from putting work into your passion?

Identifying sources of your self-worth is a good starting point of taking control of how you value yourself, and perhaps cutting off sources that reduce it such as negative comments from others.

Here’s a radical question, what if breathing as you are right now in this space was enough? As I write this blog post, I’m telling myself I need to be doing something else, something more of value and importance. And I realise this is how I’m hard-wired to think. When was the last time you felt that being in the moment that you’re in right now, even as you read this post and breathing, concentrating, on these words I write, was enough? What if the only way out of a self-defeating process of negative self-worth, was to first dispel what others taught us was of value to them? When I’ve looked back at my own successes, the road to achievement was so much easier and enjoyable when I accepted myself completely, no matter what I was doing. There was no judgement, only an unconditional love for myself. My healthy self-worth was naturally matched with healthy successes.

When I made a decision to leave my job two years ago to go abroad, I never expected all that happened to transpire. I thought I would stay in Australia and get a great marketing job and find someone and settle down; coupled with a nice, secure future. I thought that when things didn’t quite work out that way I would home and go back to working full-time. But I didn’t because I wanted another adventure, and to improve myself more by upskilling and start a business. I wanted to know how far I could push my limits because travelling alone was one of the scariest things that I’d ever done, and I wanted to know what else I could do. I know now that if I’m not being challenged, I’m not growing and I’m bored. That’s something I may never have known if I didn’t take the chance and leave.

At the end of the day, it’s really how you define your own success, and determine your own self-worth. You devise your own measuring stick for weighing your achievements. Don’t use one that was given to you, distorted and patterned with someone else’s perceptions and ideals.

Grow Through Fear

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I had developed a fear of flying after spending one year abroad. The anxiety never seemed to leave me before and during take off. Those long minutes are tricky, challenging and I always, always have the worse case scenario overplaying in my head even before the wheels leave the tarmac. It usually involves me panicking and clawing for the door, begging staff to let me off. I was determined to figure out how to handle it.

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‘What you resist, persists.’ – Carl Jung

These particular thoughts and feelings are unpleasant to say the least. But hours before I was to travel by plane, I decided a meditation session could help my nerves and the result was that it put things in perspective.

I focused on the details that made me feel panicky the most – the height the plane would be travelling at, the enclosure of a small space with lots of people with no option to leave and the fear I would lose control of myself and have some kind of panic attack. At first it was very difficult and uncomfortable to look at each of them – and that’s when I realised that was exactly my problem. I wouldn’t look at them or acknowledge their existence. The fact I kept resisting them and pushing them away was what increased them in size. It’s like with any phobia or disorder – it starts off small and is then avoided and feared to the point of extremity. I saw how I was contributing to the fear by fearing what would happen (assuming the future), and secondly by trying to deny or push these fears down. Because of this, it festered.

Resistance to fear entangles us.

In order to give peace to myself and to take a first step to transcending these fears, I needed to acknowledge them in a friendly way. I needed to make space for them within myself and house them. I learned that we need to make friends with our fears just as easily as we find it easy to make friends with feelings of happiness.

I travelled to the airport that day in a state of peace that I hadn’t felt in a while, and it made me realise that adversity forces us to rise to higher standards of resilience and courage that we never realise we possessed. These fearful situations not only call for our approaching wisdom, but also acceptance of the uncomfortable. Because for all those long minutes during take off, I was proud of myself for facing it and the holiday I received for a few moments of discomfort was worth it.

Resisting the negative only seems to double its efforts, accepting them helps us move through them more quickly and experience positivity again.

Fears are the dirty underside of the coin that most of us do not want to look at. But we give them power when we refuse their presence, and treat them as an inconvenience for us; but what if we could work with them to relinquish them? Having fear teaches us courage, being sad makes us appreciate the moments when we are happy. The negative and positive compliment each other in the same way as Ying Yang do. I believe if I give my fears their space within long enough, I may eventually find that space unoccupied.

The experience can be almost perfectly encapsulated by the famous poem by Rumi:

The Guest House

This being human is a guest house.

Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,

some momentary awareness comes

as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!

Even if they are a crowd of sorrows,

who violently sweep your house

empty of its furniture,

still, treat each guest honorably.

He may be clearing you out

for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice.

meet them at the door laughing and invite them in.

Be grateful for whatever comes.

because each has been sent

as a guide from beyond.

Feeling Your Way Through Fears

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I have been challenged recently with a variety of different fears that reflect my current position in life, and secondly regarding particular people in it. I have found it’s so easy to lose control and be scared into submission and inaction, especially when there’s a few of them knocking down your door.

Transcendingthroughfears
Feel your way through the fear.

In a bid to manage them, I found I had to confront them. I did this through one hour of meditation where I focused on relaxing my body, then moving onto my breathing and then finally the fears.

I let each one of them rise up, taking the time to focus on each one individually and as objectively as I could. I find we naturally tend to ignore and push away our fears by default, so at this point I found it was good for me to acknowledge them and realise why they were there. Every fear has it’s own reason and right for it’s presence and needs to be respected if you want move on from it.

Once each one was recognised, I found a sense of relief. As though the tension I had felt that was mounting shrank, although didn’t go away altogether.

Knowing the reason for their presence allowed me to accept them more as I knew their individual place in my life then; it was in essence trying to protect me from something.

In the process I learnt where the fears were stemming from.

  • What you assume other people think of you or will think of you. This is a classic and never goes away for me. I remind myself that other’s thoughts are their own responsibility to maintain and not mine. They’re affected by what they think but that doesn’t necessarily mean I have to be as well. There will always be the odd few who don’t accept you but remember it falls in low priority when you look at the grand scheme of life. Happiness, gratitude, openness and love, these are things more deserving of your attention. You’re not living on this planet for very long.
  • What you assume people will do to you. This is a hard one, especially if previous experience has shown their capabilities of hurting you and how well they can do it. For this, I assured myself that I would maintain strong boundaries and always look after and respect myself first no matter what. You will always be vulnerable to some degree and that’s part of being human, but it doesn’t mean that you can’t walk away or that you’re incapable of healing yourself. Remember your power of choice. Pain can’t be avoided in life, but you can give yourself what you need to a certain extent.
  • What you assume is going to happen. True events unfold in the present only and not in your imagination. I’ve found I need to stay in the present and trust myself to be able handle whatever comes at me as it comes at me. If you can do what is outlined in the second point, this shouldn’t be too hard.

As per usual, rarely any of my fears manifest into reality because they’re usually an unconscious reaction to a situation or person that has particular history behind it. It doesn’t mean it can’t happen again, but it’s an opportunity for a new reaction from within. Whether that is pushing up boundaries, giving less value to other’s thoughts and opinions or another workable solution.

The only way to build new neural pathways is to recognise the old ones for what they are, accept them and their current relevance in your life and start to build new ones. Surprisingly, I told someone who I was afraid of that I loved them, because I knew deep down beyond past the fear that I did, and I got an amazing reaction from them which leads me to my final insight.

The best answer to fear is love.

Press the Reset Button Everyday

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Every day is different to the next. Certain situations that happen one day that don’t occur on the next. A variety of people (at times) appear for whatever reason that we need to converse with, and challenges arise that require our attention and problem solving abilities. Sometimes some circumstances can be so intense, so challenging, that we carry them on our shoulders for days. Like a cartoon that continues to replay in the backs of our minds as we try to focus on our work or whatever it is we’re doing. But what if we could consciously press the reset button each day?

press-the-reset-button

Start from Zero

This is a term I think is appealing in different aspects. First, beginning from zero means you’ve rid yourself of expectations, emotions and thoughts on how something is going to unfold. When you do this, you allow space for whatever actually happens, to happen. Of course, positive visualisations can always help but perhaps release them once done and don’t get attached. Instead, accept how a particular circumstance, situation or person proliferates in reality and not get caught up in disappointments. You will be well more equipped to deal with a situation as it arises as you become more flexible and elastic with all kind of occurrences with life. Approaching all things with an open mind means you’ll learn more and be calmer as well in the midst of whatever is going on.

The only way to do this is by consciously letting go of whatever has hurt us, disturbed us or otherwise has thrown us off from our normal mode or way of being. The best way of doing this is ‘catching it in the net’ as it comes. This was stated pretty well on an episode of Soulful Sunday where Michael Singer said to let the things people say pass through us without resistance or cause for defence.

One good thing to remember that when a particular person conveys to us in a manner that is hurtful or otherwise not favourable, it can be in many situations a reflection of how they are with themselves. This can help to take the poison out of their bite so to speak.

People tend to give themselves away in a million different ways and there is little need to allow for it to disturb how you are with yourself. Let the chain of reaction of hurt end with you, let it pass through you.

To be Resilient yet Loving

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Your life is measured by your experiences and what you learn from them. At times, you may find yourself in a testing situation that has happened several times before, and it’s because life is basically prodding you with that same stick again to see what it is that you’ve learned. It’s essentially asking if you can handle that very situation differently now.

The ultimatum I believe it’s looking for is your uncanny ability to be able to be resilient and strong yet vulnerable and loving. And not giving into the hard wall that wants to be built around you. To-be-resilient-yet-lovingIt’s about going through excruciating pain from others yet still seeing above it all and knowing that there are people out there deserving of your love. It’s about staying vulnerable and keeping your heart open despite the agony inflicted by others. It’s terrifying. It’s brave and there are no promises. But I can promise you strength if you do it.

The resilience comes from letting things move around you while you stay centred.

I’ve found during stressful times to focus on my breath and on the centre of my chest to keep me grounded. I’ve found that letting critical feedback from others slide right off my back and keep going regardless; acting like a mesh where it merely passes through without affecting me in any way.

It’s an ongoing balancing act of accumulating learning, and not just accumulating but acting on those key learnings. Because life doesn’t just care that you learn, it cares that you act on what you learn. What I’ve realised is that learning is not enough – you must apply through action. When this is done you’ll transform your life and how you live. Once you stay loyal and true to yourself and your wisdom, it will work with you.

I sometimes get the sense that there is an acknowledgement by the universe that when your intentions are authentic, it helps in a number of little ways. A complimentary product when you buy something nice for yourself, or perhaps an old friend contacting you to meet up. It somehow knows you’re doing the best that you can, and loving as much as you can. And you know what? That’s enough.

Walking the Courageous Path

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Walking that crucial path means being more risky and take actions that are against your status quo. You begin to move in foreign lands and you build new road maps of your life. Consequently, it becomes more accurate, colourful yet deep and meaningful like contour numbers conveying depth.
If you do this long and consistently enough (being sure to comfort and reassure yourself along the way), you begin to realise how illusory your fear really is. As it fades, possibility grows. Liberated, you realise how you thought, act and generally how you were previously was so unnecessary. You stop self identifying with the past.

walking-the-courageous-path
Travelling, for example, was one of my biggest first leaps of faith that required courage, resilience and trust in myself and for whatever was in store for me. I learned that the world is not as scary as the news makes it out to be, and people are mostly good no matter what continent you’re on. I learned indirectly from counselling to be courageous in extending love to others and at times, I’ve even caught people by surprise by my openness with them because I know on some deep level, they resonate with my honesty. I learned from writing a book that nothing is not too late to pursue if you have the courage to implement it. If it doesn’t work out, there is always the small comfort of knowing that you tried. But the important part is that you tried and learned instead of allowing fear to swallow the energy you could have used to go for it.

To have fear and do something anyway stems from our core which is determined to grow. Serious growth can be spurred on from our defining sweaty moments of anxiety, uncertainty and self doubt. These definitive moments are intrinsic to your development of identity and self.

What I would say is lean into experiences that we’re afraid of doing and don’t run away from them. In every situation there is a key learning for you and the more experiences you accumulate, the wiser you are and not only that, you begin to see how strong you really are. And you will be shocked.
Your strength is demonstrated and vindicated through practice, whether it’s through a breakup or losing a job. The critical factor here is that you realise it. Once you do, there’s no going back. Fear is reduced, if not eradicated and it’s taunting doesn’t influence you as much. Love can be found in more places than you realised and you see people have the ability to react to love from others, even strangers. You will see things and people for how they really are, not how you thought they were.

The more codes you break the more you come to know yourself, and the world. And I think you will do humanity a great service in doing so.

‘Now you are no longer caught
in the obsession with darkness,
and a desire for higher love-making
sweeps you upward.

Distance does not make you falter.
Now, arriving in magic, flying,
and finally, insane for the light,
you are the butterfly and you are gone.

And so long as you haven’t experienced
this: to die and so to grow,
you are only a troubled guest
on the dark earth.’
– Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Self Value from Within, Not Others

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When faced with a challenge or situation, I’ve realised that one of the first ports to call is checking your internal strength; your self love and acceptance.

I became anxious recently when faced with a new challenge that involved managing others, and was put into a leadership related position – something I had little to no experience in. Ultimately, it was a real test of how much faith and belief I had in myself and my capability.

Confience-through-self-acceptance

Because I was unsure of myself, it came across very strongly to others and because they verified this back to me, it only became stronger to the point where I was afraid to take any course of action, or apply any kind of solid decision or solution.

I basically froze.

I spent some time agonising over this whilst being really disappointed in myself. Continually refilling myself with negative emotions, it morphed into a vicious cycle that I kept feeding.

Only when I talked it over with someone did I manage to emotionally untangle myself and gain a more objective, less fearful perspective on the situation. It involved detaching my value from what others thought of me and realised that was the key reason for my perception of self inadequacy and my fear in taking action. The fear of being doubted and questioned by others froze me and deprived me of opportunity for growth and learning.

All I can say is that you need to be prepared to be wrong, to make mistakes and not judge yourself because of it. Once you do it’s game over and you’re back in the cycle. Acceptance for your humanity and treating yourself like you would a friend in distress is key. No self criticising is going to make you feel any better so why do it?

View yourself like a plant that needs nurturing and watering. How you do this is focusing on self acceptance and self love, a place where there is no judge, jury or barristers. A place only you can take yourself. Everything else stems from this and will influence the choices you make and life is too short for anything else.

Once I realised all this I was then ‘unfrozen’ to take action, and achieved enough mental clarity to realise what I had to do. I devised the next steps for my group and then took action.

Letting go of being self conscious of what others think of you frees you up enough to focus on acceptance of yourself and from that, confidence. Don’t let the small things stop you.

Transcendence Through Acceptance

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I’ve been driving myself insane the last few days on particular issues that only I’m propelling and keeping alive because thoughts keep giving it energy. I was trying every method under the sun – from journalling to meditation to Tai Chi. That was until I realised, I needed to surrender to it.

Transcendance-post

Our moments of madness (as I call them) that come from anxiety and worries, thinkings over what other people think of us and self-made theories that we create, require some degree of mastery over our fear. But there is no shame in experiencing these feelings and thoughts, none should feel lesser or believe that they missed the basketball hoop because they can’t move on from it. These experiences create our strength and provoke our courage. Through the turbulence, it’s a call to ascend to a higher level of self understanding and being, though difficult to see while in the thick of it. And no easy path will take you to that kind of place.

Peace came only when I gave up trying to stick on a band aid and let whatever it was bleed instead. When I surrendered to my problem and accepted it instead of expending energy trying to ‘fix’ it, I realised that I was not the sum of my problems and it was going to be ok. We transcend when we accept.

It is difficult to see the learning or have that epiphany of wisdom whist weathering through the storm because there is no space; you are essentially in survival mode and there is no time for a shaman’s perspective. You’re manning your ship and it’s all hands on deck.

The seeing only comes afterwards. It leads you to realise just how strong and capable you are. Your identity could be lost or you may feel like you were broken, but in time, it knits back together.

Additionally, perhaps there needs to be a more deeper level of acceptance of where we are in life. A true reflection of not how we idealise ourselves to be, but how we are right now. Paradoxically, I’ve found that once you accept yourself entirely in the present moment, you can begin to grow in different ways exponentially.
Reflecting back on previous times in life where you were brought to the brink of insanity, convinced you would keel over that precipice, you somehow managed to bring yourself back. And here you are today, reading this article that I’ve written. Shouldn’t that be a testament to something?

Loving Yourself and Finding Your Calling

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In the midst of my struggle in liking someone, I knew and felt the torment and lamentation of knowing I’ll never be able to have a relationship with this person. The pain of it in my chest was unbearable.

I began to wonder why such a powerful, obsessive attraction that is so strong it cancels me completely, and makes it difficult for me to concentrate on anything, regardless of the time of day? How did this make me so blind?

Love-Yourself-and-Finding-Your-Calling

As I sank deep into myself in meditation, I explored and found something profound. What materialised out of this conundrum, this dark ether, was the plain simple fact that I Saw this person. I saw their vulnerabilities and it wasn’t my eyes that Saw it; it was my heart. And it was only because I opened up my heart to them that I was able to see that.

We can’t acknowledge people’s vulnerabilities in a humane, understandable and accepting way if we don’t see it from the heart. There and then, I realised that I accepted that person with loving feelings because I acknowledged them not mind to mind, but heart to heart. I also saw some of myself in them, making this connection even stronger.

Once I came to this realisation, something else profound happened. I felt a bursting sensation of love coursing through my body and I knew in that moment I had touched on something deep, like a massive root beneath a tree that goes unnoticed beneath the ground but is of huge significance.

The tree root was love, and it is something we rarely show to the world above. It pumps away giving life to the tree but it’s work goes largely unappreciated and and noticed unlike the smaller, more insignificant roots above are given the limelight.

I noticed how strange it was in how we strive to keep it under wraps.

In that moment, I completely loved and accepted myself as I was. Whether it was obsessing over someone or other perceived wrong doings and things I still think I’m doing wrong, it didn’t matter. Because no matter what, it was all ok.

From this came one final realisation; to spread it. To give it out into the world and from somewhere deep within or deep beyond I found a calling of some sort. A calling to connect people, to unify and strengthen the relationships between humankind. To foster, facilitate and act as a conduit of love. For everyone to realise we are all one. It’s in the silence that we come to know our purpose.

And is there any other kind of calling more beautiful than that?