"I tried that once and it didn't work!"

You may perceive yourself as the kind of person who is overly-sensitive, too easily discouraged and quickly gives up on yourself before you give yourself a real chance. You may forget, but you didn’t always think this way. Something happened to shatter your self-confidence. Right now is the perfect time for a crash course in the benefits of risk-taking.  Choose to remove the foggy glasses to perceive differently.

1) Discern your innate patterns. As an infant, when you were learning to walk, chances are, you didn’t perfect this skill right away. Infants instinctively exert effort to pick themselves up, after each fall. Since you likely walk upright these days, or at least have experience doing so, you weren’t completely discouraged after your first attempt at walking. You can reflect on other instances where you weren’t easily discouraged. Take when you learned to ride a bike, when you learned a sport or another physical skill. You can train your mind to tap into thought patterns that developed your sense of discipline, patience, focus and a growing appreciation for moment-to-moment experience.

2) Uncover causes of inhibited temperament. Differences in temperament influence different thought patterns in each of us. There is a period in the past when most people feel less inhibited than they feel now. Something happens to trigger that mental change. It has been suggested that preconscious activity in the brain triggers the onset of emotions and only though life experience can each of us become more aware of how they influence our behavior. Harmony and equilibrium can be reviewed throughout your lifetime. What you sense would enable you to achieve these states would evolve (or not) with you.

3) Rethink your perception. Six prominent issues tend to adversely affect people’s risk-taking; ignorance, attachment/ fear, anger, pride, misunderstanding and self-doubt. Each feeling or sensation can be broken down into different parts which help to explain why your mind permits it to form and intensify to control you. As you learn to work backwards, you can realize that each one is linked to something you believe exists when you actually fool yourself. Each one is a clever illusion constructed by your ego which has as its purpose to prevent you from proving who you really are and what you can do. How long will you continue to buy into this irony? You can be your own worst enemy yet, you can also evolve your mind to be your own best friend.

Move beyond the Matrix

Some people sense success is basically learning to accept whatever ideas arise in the mind, while recognizing you are a silent observer of what transpires.  Yet, what if the prospect of bending a spoon with the mind is an invitation to step back and recognize that everything is possible with a light heart?

Recall the character Neo in the film The Matrix.  As he begins to let go of doubt, limited view of his physical senses, he deconstructs his memories, and accepts all is possible.  Like Neo, we each become the vibrational equivalent of what we ask for in our world.  Its common to discover we didn't really want what our minds project. Though not everyone chooses to move beyond the Matrix.

How is it a human being can evolve to observe and experience directly without getting influenced by emotion,  and the ego desire to judge?  You may sense heat, pressure, tension and other perceptions, aren't necessarily controlled by your body or mind.  How does that shake your world?  You begin to sense motivation is not required to accept where you are and what you can do.

People are conditioned to focus on steps they think are required to succeed. Yet, who asks you to perform the tasks? Why do anything?  What drives you?  If suffering, fear and desire don't capture your full attention, then you come to observe and master the mind. To stop running backward and forward allows you to savor this moment. 

At a basic level, success is a kind of pure observation.  You needn't be directed or driven by thoughts.  You needn't grasp them intensely or shy away out of fear.  This mindfulness is not indifference. Yet, it means you move beyond ordinary attention.  You discover the nature and underlying motives of thoughts themselves. You unleash a child-like impulse to simply live and love for the joy of it.

Uncover the real explanation

I know a divorced man who searches for his dream partner. By choice, he has repeatedly dated women who don't seem to meet his ideals. His pattern has been to see multiple women at the same time because he fears the one he starts out with won't work out. Just as he predicted, things fell apart. The others broke it off as well, after learning that he hadn't been loyal, honest, trustworthy or faithful.

Whatever the nature of your personal life, your self-image is conveyed in your thoughts and behaviors with others. You do this consciously and subconsciously. Your true feelings will be mirrored back at you by your dates or partner(s). You may seek to avoid relationship failures yet, still invite them in. Its never too late to learn what it takes to develop your faith, renewed courage, confidence and self-love.

1) Stop assuming the worst. The Law of Attraction tells you that you will get exactly what you wish for. Buying into fear of inadequacy, unworthiness and rejection will invite what you don't want. You may need to work through unresolved, emotional wounds to let go of the past. You're never upset for the reasons you assume.

2) Address honestly your ego-based beliefs. You may feel confused about your results or the reality of what minimum success you permit yourself. Rather than sense break-ups are evidence of your faults and weaknesses, or evidence of you as victim, choose instead to examine parts of yourself that are willingly given or withheld.  Facts are non-emotional.  What you give is what you get.  Your soul echoes its safe to give all of you.  Yet, caution doesn't mean you can't open your heart.  You only fear intimacy until you stop fearing your own vulnerability. 

3) Identify what you desire to manifest. Superficial appearances aren't what your soul truly craves. If you believed you deserved a joyful, loving relationship, you would have one. If you believed you had "the right stuff," then the compatible person would arrive. If you don't feel you're ready, it implies you may be risk-averse or fear commitment. Learn about what makes you tick and what you can do to attract that.

Mohandas Gandhi & 6 Lessons to get to my truth

Mohandas Gandhi is one of my inspirational mentors. I got a lot out of his quasi autobiography which he prefers to call, 'The Story of My Experiments with Truth.'

Whenever you choose to learn about someone, its natural certain things will stand out and enable you to rethink what makes you who you are. If you to desire to probe the dreams of your soul, you may appreciate key lessons I've learned from Gandhi :

1) Engage in regular self-reflection. Gandhi favored self-study. He dedicated himself to a life-long moral and spiritual quest to discern what made him who he was. He grew to believe only truly humble humans glimpse Truth beyond ego. He grasped an inter-connectedness with all. His experiments explored the meaning and value of his own salvation. As such, he regularly took stock of his life and considered directions for his future, before measuring himself against his own standards.

2) Shape your life according to your highest ideals. Gandhi came to believe that his decisions about how he lived mattered. He discerned that regardless of how powerless or insignificant individuals felt themselves to be, anyone could evolve to value him or her-self and personal ideals. We exert power from within that enables us to conform with whatever behaviour we feel is right at a given time.

3) Commit yourself to extending personal principles. Gandhi ascertained that the morality and beliefs we choose to live by result from external conditioning. According to him, only by exploring your perceived weaknesses will you embrace your virtues and sense areas of your life in need of reform. In other words, experience we see as moral lapses, mistakes or failures, assists us to open our eyes to the soul.

4) Repeatedly test your own character. Gandhi's life demonstrates to me that we never know ourselves as well as we think we do. Understanding why you deviate from a norm, and loving and accepting yourself as you are, is part of your life-long learning. At a given moment, how you identify your sense of self is a choice that needs to be tested. Peel the layers of illusion and deceit you have created.

5) Overcome any impulses to be intolerant. Gandhi saw hatred was a poison that could spread as intolerance. His view encourages us to forgive what we feel to be injustices. He reminds us mistreating others is undesirable, even if you have felt mistreated. He mused about the power and impact of peaceful resistence before applying it. He grew to believe positive examples were the best ones to set.

6) Realize personal change influences collective change. Gandhi lived as if consistency was imperative. His view is that if you do not practice what you talk about, then you will never be credible. A hypocrite doesn't stand as a role model for peace and truth. Gandhi said, "Become the change you wish to see in the world."

3 Tips to rethink your reactions

Many people are involved in relationships which trigger feelings of discomfort. This may mean you don't get along.  This may mean someone seems to exploit you or push emotional buttons.  It may be your co-workers, your boss, your partner, your parents, your in-laws, your siblings, or someone else you would rather avoid. 

Why not rethink the meaning of your impulse?  What are you really avoiding? Its useful to realize each person you meet is meant to teach you things about yourself and the world.  Before you react harshly or negatively, consider these points:

1)  Realize your judgement hides the truth.  Your instinct may evoke hard feelings like anger, fear and grudges that surface.  This actually invites more of the same from whomever bothers you or, from other people you have yet to meet.  Ask yourself why certain people or their behavior bother(s) you.  Your answer reveals parts of yourself you fear or may be choosing not to face.  How would your life change if you decided these experiences were uplifting and necessary? 

2)  Understand a person's behavior hides inner truth.  If people seem to hurt you emotionally, then they only do so because this is what they learned after being hurt themselves.  Anyone who doesn't love him or herself is unable to demonstrate love to others.  You could also deduce that not knowing how to care or respect for oneself can only lead to disrespecting others.  All of this means behavior that bothers you in relationships may actually be a plea for love, compassion, respect and understanding in disguise.  What does your response say about you?

3)  Be willing to let go of past experience.  Treatment you received in the past can stay there, if you learn to let go of its hold over you.  Many people perpetuate their own discomfort by focusing on what they don't like about their relationships now, what they didn't like before.  They criticize others, show lack of the qualities that are perceived as missing in others. You may forget you could choose to feel overwhelming joy to be alive.  Learning how others think can bring you closer to understanding your own view, hidden guilt, and more uplifting parts of your soul.