“Think of cause and effect like watching a video. Imagine that you rented a video, and it was terrible. You just hated it! Would you take a hammer and smash your television or would you change the video tape? If you smashed the screen, you would be dealing with effect. If you changed the video, you would be dealing with cause.” — James Arthur Ray

How many things in our life we attempt to change at the “effect” level of being instead of the “causal” level?

What does this mean really? Well, a lot of it has to do with our thoughts to begin with. What are we focusing on when we want to create change? Are we thinking of the undesired outcome? Or are we focusing on what we want?

It’s like wanting to move to a new apartment that has no cockroaches, no loud neighbors, and is not expensive. When really what we want is a clean apartment with good neighbors, and affordable rent.

Here’s a bit of “tough love” for you. I am simply going to quote Dr. Robert Anthony completely for today’s inspiration because he says it so well.

“If you feel that you were off to a good start but are currently stalled, you need to admit to yourself that you have probably slipped back into your comfort zone.

More than likely you have been deceiving yourself that you are making progress, but at the same time you are really not getting anywhere.

What you need to do is take action. Even if it is a very small action.

Nothing you can tell yourself, nothing you can say to others, nothing you can think or feel or imagine is going to get you out of the mental bog you’re mired in.

The only thing that can rescue you is - to take that next step.

Maybe you know what that is. If you know exactly what it is, DO IT!

If you don’t know, or aren’t sure, allow you intuition to guide you. Do whatever you feel compelled to do, but do it NOW to get yourself going again — even if it means entering. . .

. . . your discomfort zone.

– Dr. Robert Anthony

“In order to grow spiritually, feelings must be communicated. Otherwise, they build up inside and the energy gets denser and lower, denser and lower, until a person is only half-conscious.”
— Marian Eileen Charlton, Life on the Causal Plane, A Glimpse of Heaven

Have you ever had something or someone really bother you, but instead of dealing with the issue, you let it slide by? It could be because you don’t like confrontation. It could be out of politeness that you don’t want to voice it. Whatever the reason, you feel it is better left unsaid. Then something else adds to the pile. Then something else. Before you know it you are full of these past issues and you don’t even know why you are feeling so terrible.

What’s worse is that by this time the slightest irritating thing will, out of the blue, make you either explode or bring you into complete depression. One person explained it to me by comparing it to a bucket. Eventually the bucket gets full and when things keep getting added to it they begin to overflow.

By expressing your feelings you can actually help yourself to heal. Honor yourself and your health by living through honest communication. Just remember to communicate your feelings to the right person — it’s not about taking it out on innocent bystanders either. And you don’t have to be nasty about the things that bug you or get you down. But being honest with others is also being honest to yourself.

“The most powerful thing you can do to change the world is to change your own beliefs about the nature of life, people, reality, to something more positive… and begin to act accordingly.”
— Shakti Gawain, Creative Visualization

You’ve heard it before, and you will hear it again, and again — you have the power to change the world starting with you. As Wayne Dyer points out, “There is no stress in the world, only people thinking stressful thoughts and then acting on them.” This is a powerful concept, but even more powerful is the reality that you don’t need to live in that stressful world.

Start changing your own beliefs and thoughts to something more positive and act on those thoughts. Right there, at that very moment, the world just changed.

“The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make one.”
— Elbert Hubbard (1856-1915)

When you say what you fear out loud, you will often find how ridiculous, or inaccurate, or inappropriate it is for your life. I had a talk a while back with my husband about one of the fears holding me back from making some simple phone calls. I had to call some people that I didn’t know in order to set up an interview time with them. In my mind I knew that this was no big deal for me to do. I have definitely done more challenging tasks or assignments. So what was holding me back? Why was I so afraid to just make these calls? I had been procrastinating for over two weeks now, coming up with excuse after excuse as to why I should put it off until the next day.

Well, with a little self-probing I realized that it wasn’t making the phone calls that was posing the problem, but making the phone calls with my husband within earshot. I was fearing his judgment or criticism of me and my ability to call up strangers to book an interview. No wait, take it a step further, I was afraid he would think that I am not as competent as I always lead him to believe. I wanted to make the calls when he wasn’t around, so that if I said something “stupid”, he wouldn’t know about it and couldn’t criticize me. So really, I was fearing being criticized by someone who I really respect and value their opinion. (more…)

“Intuition is the supra-logic that cuts out all the routine processes of thought and leaps straight from the problem to the answer.”
— Robert Graves

Be in your body because it is where intuition lives. In our busy lives, many of us typically function only with our heads. This is actually very counterintuitive and tends to cut off our vital energy flow and may not lead us in the right direction.

Take a moment to reconnect with yourself, with your body. Your body has wisdom and sends you messages regularly. Your mind is important, but sometimes it is so busy it forgets to check in and see how the body is responding.

When making a decision, notice your body’s signals. Do you feel energized? Comfortable? Is your breathing effortless? Your gut calm? Are your shoulders loose? Or do you have a sick feeling in your stomach? A lump in your throat? In all your choices, tuning in to what your body says is a naturally given gift for keeping on track with your higher self.

“It takes 30 days for a change in behavior to become a habit, and six months for a habit to become the automatic way a person does things, … If they haven’t changed in 30 days, it’s not happening.”
— Mark Goulston

Habits are funny things. At first they seem not so easy to make. And then there are others that seem impossible to break. You know what I mean. Making new good habits like working out, eating healthy, going to bed at a more reasonable hour. Sounds so simple, yet after a week or so, I find the tendency to let them slip. And then changing the old (shall we say bad) habits, how come they seem so challenging to break?

So what can you do? Well, some studies show that it can take anywhere from 30 days to 6 months to change your behaviours (habits) either adding new good ones or eliminating the bad ones. So that means keeping at it until you make it over that hurdle. Often, when you do something especially when your mind and
body is fighting against your better direction, it solidifies the change process.

So, choose an action today that challenges you and moves you forward. Take that action today, in spite of any negative feelings or what your mind might tell you. Write it down first thing in the morning and at the end of the day, write down the feelings that came with accomplishing the action and how it has helped you grow.

“When I look back on all these worries, I remember the story of the old man who said on his deathbed that he had had a lot of trouble in his life, most of which had never happened”
— Winston Churchill

I just finished writing to my step-daughter about worrying. She is in the middle of a worry-fest and I needed to help her release her fears around the situation. Why?

First because she doesn’t even know what she is dealing with, and therefore she is expending a lot of energy on something that she can’t even put a real name to, let alone do anything about right now. Secondly, because she is such a busy person that it is a complete waste of her time to focus any of her thoughts into such an unknown territory. As this anonymous quote points out well, “Worry is like a rocking chair—it gives you something to do but it doesn’t get you anywhere.” And she has plenty of better things to do and bigger places to go.

So my advice for those who fall into the common habit of worry; keep living and solve the issues when they come up, because if they aren’t real enough to fix right now, they may not exist at all.

“For most folks, no news is good news; for the press, good news is not news.”
— Gloria Borger

Turn on the TV and watch the news and what will you see? Most likely you will get a recap of the days violence in your city and around the world. OK, now read the paper. What do you get there? More violence, fraud, and negativity most likely, focusing primarily on informing us of things to fear in life.

It’s no wonder that with all these negative images and stories that we find ourselves focusing on the negative things in our lives as well. This also can help to escalate the fear-based reactions in our day to day living.

What if we were to focus on not only surrounding ourselves with positive people, but positive news as well? Imagine we would celebrate together as a society all the good things that are happening in our city and around the world. Maybe we would be building up the positive energy in our minds to the point where it would be spreading faster than the negative energy?

Spread the positive energy by surrounding yourself with happy news and stories. And then tell others of these happy events as well. Here’s a web site with just happy news for your fun and enjoyment: Happy News

“Nothing splendid has ever been achieved except by those who dared believe that something inside of them was superior to circumstance.”
— Bruce Barton

There are different moments during the year or the month or even the week that seem particularly busy to me. Sometimes I would even use the term overwhelming. However, I am doing my best to not use that particular term, because I find myself feeling worse when I allow my mind to “feel overwhelmed”. Next thing you know I am using words like “burnt out”, “exhausted”, too tired” and the snowball effect has happened yet again.

My new tactic during the busier periods of my life is allowing myself to expand my energy to be able to handle all that comes my way. It all goes back to the Law of Attraction — if I panic when things seem to get busier or move faster than I can manage, I will only be attracting more things to get worked up over. On the other side of the coin, when I allow myself to believe I can handle it all, despite the apparent circumstances, I will succeed. Remember, focus on the desired outcome — avoid focusing on what you don’t want.

Imagine being happy and balanced and successful no matter what is going on in your life. Even when things don’t appear well on the outside, or when circumstances outside your control happen to you, feeling well and balanced on the inside will make all the difference in your life.