Right relationship is about balance, health, and sustainability. It’s also about service–how we help the world with the power we have.

I’m talking about our personal relationship to money–not how the world economies should treat money, but how we personally can come into alignment with the spiritual nature of money.

Money has a spiritual nature?

The truth is everything has a spiritual nature. What makes money magical is that it’s a unique form of condensed energy. As such, it can serve as a mirror, a teacher for us on our spiritual journey.

Beyond “Think and Grow Rich”

Getting in alignment or right-relationship is NOT a way to get rich overnight. “Think and grow rich” and the “Law of Attraction” are often ways to avoid looking at our deep fear of scarcity.

It’s true that as you grow in your understanding of money, creating it becomes much easier. As you learn to charge appropriately, market to the right people, and own the value of what you do, your business becomes much easier to run.

But that part’s not magical. That’s just about learning a system and getting better at it.

Right-relationship is about something deeper. It’s about that subtle inner tension we carry about money, which relates to our sense of power and security in the world.

Right-relationship means accepting that we don’t control everything about life.

Right-relationship means living in gratitude for what we have, being willing to use the power we have to do good, and the cheerful acceptance that we are not ultimately in charge of the Universe. Including our money.

Now this might sound funny coming from someone who advocates a weekly accounting practice, designing passive income schemes, and generally is known to fully enjoy the game of business.

All these things are true. I like the game, I love the game. But I know, in my heart, that I am only a player. Right-relationship to the game means knowing that you didn’t create it and you can’t control it. You can only play it, and play it well.

Is this getting too esoteric? Here are some practical ways right-relationship shows up:

How to get in right-relationship with money.

Stop avoiding. Face the reality, the truth of your present relationship with money. Stop looking for salvation. Stop spending money on overpriced programs that are going to solve all your money problems. Start accepting that the only way anything changes is by facing it on the internal plane.

Forgive yourself. Some people’s issues show up in relationships. Some show up in reckless behavior or addiction. Some show up in money. There is nothing wrong with having issues. We all have them. You’re just where you’re at.

Relax the grasping. Grasping is an instinctual response to fear. Think of a baby, latching on to its mother. Take a deep breathe. Notice when you get in sticky situations with clients and money, or overspend. Somewhere in there are attachments, deep unmet needs for safety and security that you are unconsciously trying to meet through your use (or avoidance) of money.  Get mindful. Breathe into the places that are afraid and dialog with them.

Start owning your own power. Money is a powerful thing in our culture. Knowing how to use it, knowing how it works, having practice and experience–these lead to real power. Let that be OK. Step out of the fear that you can’t, or that you’ll be corrupted by it. You won’t if you take responsibility and own your own choices.

Start using your money, your power, your will…for good. Right-relationship ultimately describes the relationship of the small and personal to the grand and majestic. To be in right-relationship with Source/God/etc means owning your power, and then letting that power be used as a tool for the larger good. Do what is right, regardless of the money. Play the game, but don’t be the game. Be a player in service of good.

These steps are roughly in order. The important thing to notice is you have to own your power before you can truly serve the world. Otherwise, you have nothing to offer. Without a solid vessel, you are useless as a tool. So work on yourself. Then let go of yourself.

Write a credo, a manifesto. Why are you in business? What matters to you?

And then demonstrate it.

For example, let’s say you do massage.

You credo might sound like this:

I believe massage should be empowering. People should feel completely at ease to speak up and ask for what they want during their massage. It’s THEIR time, and it’s most beneficial when they give feedback, know what they want, and ask for it.

Your stand could be anything, but it has to be you. It has to be something you truly believe.

The best credos make you cry. Or expand inside. They feel vulnerable and real.

You don’t have to share the credo itself with anyone. It’s for you. It’s what gives your business heart.

When you have it, then you can demonstra

te it through your website content and processes. For example:

I believe massage should be empowering. Before our first massage together, I’ll have a short form for you to fill out that asks you your preferences—do you like feedback about your muscles as I work, or do you prefer a quiet no-talking space? Do you prefer light pressure or deep? Which body parts would you like me to focus on?

Feeling unsure about disrobing, tipping, etc? I created this FAQ specifically around the questions people are often too shy to bring up.

You can also share your credo with your designer. Make all the parts of your business reflect it. Build y

our brand around what you truly believe.

Be a bigger presence by being different—and expanding on that difference.

Write articles about your stand. Make

your business about more than just getting customers and getting paid. Make it about saying something. Make it about changing the world in some small way that you care about.

For our massage example, start with the question:

“How can I help my customers feel empowered during their massage with me?”

Then expand the question:

“How can I help everyone on the planet feel empowered during massage?”

“What information might help people feel empowered during massage? How can I provide it?”

“What articles might I write that would help transform people’s relationship with massage?”

When you take a stand, you become part of something larger—the larger truth you are standing for.

Your presence becomes larger and more attractive, because you are not just you—you are part of that truth. You are part of an inspiring, cool thing. That makes you and your business attractive.

Bonus: you get more inspired about your marketing. You’re not just selling yourself anymore. You’re being a stand for healing the world in a way that matters to you. There’s a lot of energy in that.

All good. Really.

But you MUST take care of your human ‘vessel’ to do this. That means self-care, self-love, self-nurturing, etc. It means resting, eating nourishing food, having fun, being nice to yourself, and meeting your human needs.

The vessel can’t be full of holes.

If you are running yourself ragged or neglecting your human self, you are just not going to be effective in your mission.

There’s no way around it.

We are here on this planet in human form, and that form has to be respected, honored, and care for or it will not be functioning like it could. Your vessel-ness will be ineffective.

The idea is co-creation. The “co” part matters–half of that is us, the human half. That half matters. That half needs the structure, the nourishing, the health, the time, and the self-love to really show up as half of the equation.

And the Divine half? That is there, that will always be there. It’s through honoring our human selves that we create the conditions where we can be present to that Divine presence.

So if you want to be a conduit for truth, healing, and beauty in the world, get a good night’s rest.

Say no to overwork or busy-ness. Say nice things to yourself in your head. Pay yourself first. Take the time to make dinner and call a friend. Be a friend to yourself. Wear sunscreen. Floss. Create beauty in your workspace and your home. Take a walk and take in the sights, smells, and sounds. Slow down. Stretch.

These things are the foundation and support for everything else you create in the world. They are the structure within which God/the Universe/Spirit/Source can do magic, create miracles, and heal. They matter.

We often live with daily emotional and spiritual scarcity. We don’t feel like enough.

We don’t feel good enough. We haven’t got enough done. We aren’t accomplished or important enough. We don’t feel like we are enough.

This scarcity runs through every sector of society. It infects us with doubts and stops us from pursuing our dreams and enjoying the dreams we have created.

It pushes us to achieve, overwork, and pretty soon we don’t have enough sleep, enough downtime, enough non-business social contact. It’s a constant nagging feeling of trying to catch up, trying to earn our place, trying to be good or do good.

At heart, it’s a spiritual scarcity.

The only true source of abundance, of the feeling of OKness deep in our bones, is in our connection to Source/God/etc, whatever you call it.

Spiritual scarcity means your connection to Source/God/etc is cut off or blocked or has just atrophied through disuse.

It doesn’t matter how much money or security you have, if you don’t have this connection on a daily basis, you will feel not enough. It’s just the way we are built. We can’t be fully satisfied except through that internal connection to Source.

When you try to create outer abundance, but you are doing it to shore up your inner sense of scarcity, it won’t work. Not really. You’ll create more and more evidence that you aren’t really worth it.

The only way to truly heal is to:

1. accept your faults, accept your neediness and mistakes and all your feelings and pain
2. let that connection to source grow anyway

Our connection to Source is the most abundant thing in the Universe. It never goes away. It does not judge, it does not withhold, it does not punish, it does not care who or what you are. It’s there. It’s there and you can access it at any time. You don’t have to earn it. You don’t have to deserve it. You don’t have to pay it back. You just have to accept it.

All you have to do is ask (and let in the response).

The hardest thing for most of us to do is ask for help. To truly admit that we cannot make it on our own. We cannot do everything. We cannot make ourselves feel OK. We just can’t. We rely on something outside of ourselves. Humans are never truly happy until they feel part of the larger Universe and feel they are in tune with it and here for a reason. We simply cannot be happy as islands.

When we try to do it on our own, it’s out of fear. What if we ask, and there’s nothing there? What if there is no answer? What if you open up your heart and then get burned? What if you find out that the world is an empty screaming void after all? What if God wants you to do something you don’t really want to do?

I can’t really answer those objections. Except to say that it’s not like that. Those objections come from a consciousness of fear. Accepting grace comes from a consciousness of love. When you are in that space, the objections no longer make sense.

And it’s kinda beyond words. But it works. Sincere prayers are answered. The answer comes, somehow. I’ve seen it happen over and over. If you pray to win the lottery, it doesn’t work. But if you sincerely need help and pray for help and hand it over, help comes.

But don’t stop there.

Praying only in emergencies is like staying at the Ritz Carlton and sleeping in the bathtub.

Many people, even ones that don’t “believe in God”, will pray when they are panicked. And they get solace from it. But then they go back to their “normal lives”. The ones with the nagging sense of not-enoughness.

To live a truly abundant life, you need to depend on Source.

That means recognizing that all abundance received from the Universe is received through this channel.

Receiving from Source/God is a blueprint and basis for every other kind of receiving.

The outer world reflects the inner world. Your material abundance depends on your spiritual abundance. It all starts inside.

And that’s where you start to build that connection.

How?

It’s a muscle. You exercise it. You change your mind, you change your stories, you change your beliefs. It’s a habit, a practice.

The bottom line is that it’s a choice.

You allow it to happen. You allow yourself to be enough. You allow yourself to feel OK. You allow that feeling of scarcity to disperse. You stop clinging to it. You find that inner stream of OKness and you nurture it and feed it. You find the things and people that help it grow. You choose every day, who you want to be and what you want to believe. You set your sights and you start walking.

Being OK with yourself in this day and age is a radical act.

It’s worth it. You are already OK. You are already enough. Believe it, feel it, choose it.

And the money?

When you know you are enough, when you know the Universe is on your side because you truly belong to it, it becomes a much bigger game than just making money. It becomes about living as a vehicle for Divine purpose.

And when that’s the game? The money figures itself out. Or you get what you need to figure it out. It works, somehow.

Not that you still don’t have to do work in the real world. It’s still a 50/50 proposition. “God helps those who help themselves” and all that. But it’s easier and it flows, and you have a source of support you can rely on. This isn’t about magic. This is about true support. We are truly not alone in our journey. We don’t have to make it on our own. We are here as part of something larger. And understanding that changes everything.

1. recognizing that you are “done”
2. giving yourself permission to be “done”
3. actually completing the thing

When and why is it hard to recognize and accept when you are done?

1. If you think you ought to not be done yet.
2. If you thought you would or should be doing “it” forever, or that it would last forever.
3. If you don’t know how to physically complete it, and the fear that you’ll never be able to has you push away even thinking about it.
4. If you feel like you are “helping people” and “are needed” at the thing.
5. If your identity is wrapped up in doing the thing.
6. If you have family or partner or economic pressure to keep doing it.
7. If you are afraid you don’t know what you might do next.
8. If you have an idea of what you might be called to do next, and are afraid and don’t feel ready (this might be a sign that you aren’t actually done or ready).
9. If change, in general, is scary (which it is for all of us).
10. If transitions are hard for you, or were hard or scary in your family (for instance, kids of divorce, with the drop offs and going back and forth between parents, and the huge amount of tension and layers of meaning between your parents that you couldn’t decipher, brings a lot of baggage to transitions. Or if your parent lost a job, and the way it went down was awful and you witnessed that).

Why is completion necessary?

We learn and grow by trying and doing new things. You will always get bored, eventually, and need a change. That doesn’t mean you necessarily have to leave your job, you may be able to restructure it, or take on something new at it. But, given how a lot of jobs are structured, this might not be possible and finding a new gig might be necessary.

Everyone has different thresholds at this. Even as a kid, I was always starting new things, burning through them, and then being completely done with that thing. As a kid, it was relatively easy to cycle through hobbies. As an adult, it’s taken me a long time to accept this about myself and what it means for my work (i.e. that I’ll always be reinventing it and that’s OK).

Practicing completion clears the space for the new things to arise. Without clearing the old things, you are forever beholden to them, and your energy is stuck keeping them alive. A portion of your energy flows to old, incomplete projects. Is that where you want to spend your energy?

Sometimes, you want to be done before you really are done.

On the other hand, sometimes I have wanted to be done so badly, because the thing I had Sourced was not that fun. It was something I needed to work through, but not something I enjoyed. This happens.

Our souls want experience. Sometimes they want experiences that are painful. Not because they are masochists, but because they seek transcendence and integration of that experience.

If you find yourself trying to be done, but just not able to complete or shift the experience, try embracing it instead. Try being where you are, and accepting that there is something not complete here. Try being with the ambivalence and discomfort of being where you are, and look for clues for what that is teaching you, or why you are still drawn to it. Study it. Let it be OK that you are here. Examine any judgments you have about yourself for being where you are, and let them go. There are no experiences that are inherently better than other experiences. There is no better place to be than where you are, fully. Judgment blocks integration and inhibits the flow of movement through an experience.

What if I’m afraid of the new thing?

That’s a good thing. It’s a clue. You are afraid you aren’t ready, but deep inside you know that someday you will be ready. You are afraid of all the things you know you’ll need to go through to get to the place that you can hazily sense is next for you. Relax, though. This process doesn’t need to be painful. If you have “new things”/”transitions” hooked up with “pain”, the idea of new responsibilities, new competencies, new possibilities can be scary just because it’s new. Affirmations can help:

I accept that change is inevitable.

I choose to embrace change.

I have the ability to handle new things.

I always wanted a life of unlimited possibility and now I have it.

Fear can also be a healthy boundary. “Hiding” is OK if that is what you need to do right now.

Contrary to what you may have been told, it’s OK to stay still until you are ready to move. I’ve done this countless times in my life, and it always takes a large dose of self-acceptance.

Consider chickens. They grow in their egg for about three weeks. Then they peck their way out. But this is a natural process. They don’t have anyone “should”ing them at two and a half weeks saying hey, why aren’t you pushing your own envelope? Don’t you believe in your potential? Come on!

Sometimes creating a shell is the next thing. Or it’s the preparation for the next thing. This is not always well understood in our culture. So create your own culture. Decide it’s OK to hide in a cave, hibernate, create a shell, until you are ready.

People get afraid that they will never leave their shell. I don’t really buy that. There are people out there stuck in ruts, this is true – people who are truly hiding. The difference is, when you make that shell, create that nest, hole up in that cave – you are going to have an encounter with yourself. That’s the thing to do in a nest. It’s not about hiding from the world, it’s about encountering yourself. It’s about ignoring the external and finding the center.

Sometimes this looks or feels like depression. Often depression is what gets you there – because you aren’t hibernating and you need to be. Your body eventually refuses to run around when what you really need is to be still. Listen to it.

If you are afraid you will get stuck, ask yourself if you are willing to look at yourself, truly look in the mirror, while you are hibernating. If that’s true, you will not get stuck. You might look and feel stuck. But you will be slowly, inevitably, growing.

I’ve learned to trust this process. To delight in this process. It’s wonderful to be able to go away from the world, and find yourself again. To find a new self, to create a new self – to watch yourself grow from the inside out.

I think people have different needs for this at different times in their life. It’s definitely an integral part of my process; it might be different for you. Mine is kind of dramatic, and looks a lot like depression. It’s still pretty hard to let myself “drop out” for six months. In our culture, we just don’t do that without making it pathological. But I do it. And it works for me. I emerge, with this essential vibrancy and trust in myself. I need the cave to get there.

And there are always moments in there where I am afraid I will never emerge. It’s those moment that teach me the most though – because when I do emerge, they teach me that I can have faith, I can believe in myself. Encountering the core of your fear leaves you vitally alive, as you realize you are more than that fear, and it doesn’t rule you anymore.

A major purpose of hibernation is mourning. To create something new, you don’t just need to let go of the last thing you did. You often need to mourn and grieve and integrate a host of old painful stuff in order to become the person you need to be to do the next thing.

So if your transition is calling you to hole up for awhile, let yourself. Don’t be too eager to move on if what you need is to be still and face what is most deeply true in yourself.

Whatever you need, give yourself

Whatever your process is for deep transitions is, notice it. Embrace it. Love it. Document it, if that helps, with journalling or artmaking. Remind yourself it is a sacred process.

• Does the thing you are doing, even though you enjoy it, never feel like “it”?
• Do you pick up interests, burn through them, and  then drop them?
• Does doing the same thing “for the rest of your life” seem like a life sentence of boredom?
• Do you  feel like you should know “what you want to be” by now?
• Do you wish you could feel focused and commit to one thing, but you just can’t make yourself do that?

It describes how our culture is skewed right now toward rewarding people who have “one true interest”. The author compares Mozart vs Ben Franklin. The former was all about music, music, music from a young age. Ben Franklin on the other hand, had a lot of disparate interests, from politics to experiments with electricity to creating the first public library–and more. She gives a bell-curve of interests with Mozart on one extreme and Franklin on the other and most people in the middle.

The problem is for some reason (probably due to industry wanting to have highly specialized workers or something like that), our schools and our culture tends to reward people who specialize early and stick to one thing.

People who don’t fit this model often feel broken or deficient. They keep trying to get themselves into a mold that doesn’t fit.

I know I suffer from this self-criticism immensely. I have 4 blogs (and am working on launching 3 more) and I often feel like a freak. Shouldn’t I have just one? If I only had one I could write on it more regularly, and isn’t that what I’m supposed to do? Will my readers feel abandoned? Will I lose momentum? Am I sabotaging myself? Am I diluting my personal brand? AHHH!!!

This post isn’t a “I have the solution” post, more of a “I am working on this one” post.

I’ve been feeling all BLAH about this blog, and about writing in general, and trying to figure out why do I write anyway.

I think what happened is I briefly got caught up in the whole blogging-twittering-”internet famous”-popularity-contest aspect of blogging. Which can be fun and all (I guess), but what seems to happen to me is that I lose touch with my purpose in writing. As in, I literally forget why I started the blog.

There is this idea of intrinsic vs extrinsic motivation: intrinsic is what you do because you feel like it – extrinsic is what you do because it will get you something, like approval, money, etc. The problem is that extrinsic motivation can destroy intrinsic motivation. For instance, if you start rewarding a kid for studying, and then you stop rewarding them, they’ll stop doing it. Even if they were actually doing it of their own volition to start with.And I knew this, of course, but I am surprised at how I didn’t realize it was happening to me.

The thing with me is that I don’t last very long on extrinsic motivation. I just sort of space out and don’t feel motivated at all. And that’s exactly how I’ve been feeling about the blogging lately. But I didn’t put it together.

I think the reason that the idea of “popularity” draws me off-course is because of my personal history with schoolyard unpopularity and a lifelong struggle with isolation. So my mind started fuzzily equating popularity with acceptance or friendship. Which of course are not the same at all – you can have thousands of fans and have few real friends. They aren’t the same thing.

I think this is a big piece of the “fear of biggification” idea I’ve explored before on this blog. Part of the fear is of my unintegrated need for acceptance and inclusion taking over. It’s similar to the way many artists are afraid that if they become successful they will “sell out” – in other words, they are afraid of their unintegrated need for security or status taking over.

I hadn’t put it together before.

Luckily, I had “self-sabotage” to save me.

I think people misunderstand “self-sabotage”. The popular/Hollywood idea is that you start going toward success, and then somehow that success scares you so you “sabotage” it or “get in your own way”. But I think it’s really important to look at what and why exactly you are doing this supposedly “sabotaging” thing. Because I bet it is actually a really healthy thing.

For instance, in my case, about a month after gaining some new readers and commenters from Twitter and whatnot…I started feeling very blah about Twitter and very blah about writing.

But that’s not self-sabotage. At least, not in a bad way. That’s a self-correcting mechanism kicking in.

It’s the part of me that says “uh, I’m really not in this to get more comments”. A that’s me, that’s real, that’s the part of me I want to listen to. Cause it’s true, I’m not in this for more comments.

And if I start feeling like I am, I really want to go back and remember why I’m really  in this.

Over-riding “self-sabotage” without understanding it is a very bad idea.

Achieving outside success is not the measuring stick.

The ephiphany I had was around why I actually do write.

It’s not about other people at all, not directly. I write when I feel this internal nudge. It’s like an internal pushing sensation. That’s it. That’s the whole reason. When I feel the nudge, I write. And it feels great! It’s like I’m channeling something from somewhere.

I think that inner drive, that urge to create, lives in all of us. It manifests in different ways. Sometimes I feel the nudge to write, other times I feel a burning desire to start a project or something else.

I believe that these little (or big!) internal nudges are the voice of our true Self/God/whatever you want to believe in – they are the juice. They are the thing to listen to.

Everything that comes from that, if it comes, or if it doesn’t, or whatever – it doesn’t really matter.  It’s not good, it’s not bad. But the fact is, if you are following your nudges, you will be happy and feel connected to life no matter how many people read your blog. Conversely, if you are trying to get people to read your blog, it doesn’t matter how many fans you have, you won’t feel satisfied.

It’s a weird paradox. External input feels wonderful – but ONLY if we are already fed from within. External input feels hollow and cheap if we are trying to survive on it – it’s not nourishing enough on its own.

So take a moment to think about the internal indicators that you are following your nudges, and the internal indicators that you have lost touch with them. You might want to write them down and make a little “SOS” note for yourself – “Read in case of total BLAH feeling”.

It is sort of a progression as you start at the bottom and go up.

The theme is summed up in the statement in the middle – “The seeds of our inner light and vision germinate as the darkness begins to wane.”

This year’s board came together with a lot more clarity and intention that last year. I started the workshop feeling some inner poutiness: this last year didn’t turn out exactly as rosily as my vision board had laid it out, and I felt resistance to making a new one. I didn’t want to paint some nice picture for myself and then just do the same old stuff again.

Last year I did it semi-intuitively, but this year I completely just let the images find me, much like a Soul Collage but on a bigger scale. I also stopped at one point to pull a Tarot card – Kaya had brought them to help with the process. It was the Osho Zen deck, and the card I pulled was Transformation. It was right on:

“This is a time for a deep let-go. Allow any pain, sorrow, or difficulty just to be there, accepting it’s ‘facticity’. It is very much like the experience of Guatam Buddha when, after years of seeking, he finally gave up knowing there was nothing more that he could do. That very night, he became enlightened. Transformation comes, like death, in its own time. And, like death, it takes you from one dimension into another.”

This year I looked at the vision board as more of a divination/discovery process than a goal-setting one. I wanted to know what this year would be about – not just what I wanted it to be, but what was there to deal with.
I’ve come to realize that, while we can set goals for ourselves and that is good, often our Karma has a lot more power than our conscious intention. So perhaps the most useful intention for those situations where you know you still have “stuff” is to say: “My goal is to accept and work through my Karma to the best of my ability as it presents itself”.

We all want to be at the finish line, but sometimes you still have to run the race. That’s how I’ve been feeling about teaching and writing – there is a lot I want to say, but I’m still halfway through doing my own work.

When you stop wanting divination tools to give you a picture you want to see, and start seeing what is there, they become more useful. Divination tells you what your Karma is – the most probably path as you walk through life. There are many things you can’t change. Knowing about it ahead of time doesn’t necessarily mean you can stop it – but it does mean you can start accepting it and learning from it early so it’s less painful when it shows up.

So what does this tell me? Starting from the bottom, the early months of the year will be about excavating and diving into my unconscious fear patterns – and embracing and accepting the reality of my history. Letting go of the pain – letting it drain away and finding the grace and emptiness of surrender.

And, with that work, transformation will occur. Finding both inner happiness (upper right) and inner power (upper left), and embodying the messages I most want to share: “Suffering is optional” and “The Art of Happiness – Everyone can master it”.

A lot of the images are symbolic. Here are some of the meanings, starting from the bottom:

• monkeys in snow: bleakness of childhood
• bunny: fear response, always tracking, looking
• woman with open arms: embracing, accepting
• archeologist: excavation of the past
• woman on tree: loneliness from childhood
• person behind mask: hiding, fear, suspicion
• underwater diver: exploring the unconscious
• angel with red wings spanning that section: protection, boundaries, and grace
• mountain pool: letting painful feelings release and drain away
• empty bowl and chair: stillness, receiving. there is also a copy of the tarot card I got tucked away behind the chair.
• elephant, on right, you can just make out the eye – elephants are a personal symbol for me of protection
• person climbing rock wall (on left of pool) – climbing in consciousness, doing the work of growing
• forest scene – not quite sure – it sort of looks like where I grew up
• woman on swing – not quite sure yet, I had a swing like that growing up, but of course it wasn’t all idyllic like that (and I didn’t wear high heels LOL)
• llama, on right – looking ahead
• crystal lady in center – transformation
• man, hand with lipstick, J-Lo – power, strength, combining feminine and masculine
• hummingbird – not sure, but it felt like an image of power
• seedling – growth
• penguin – playfulness
• happy face – uh, happiness
• guy on lake in canoe – moving forward

Kaya has directions on her site (link above) if you want to try one of your own. I recommend it!

 We would like you to release the word “achieve” or “earn” from your vocabulary and from your understanding, altogether, and we would like you to replace those words with the word “allow”. You’re wanting to allow your Well-being, not achieve it. It’s not something that you need to earn. All you have to do is decide what it is you would like to experience, and then allow it in order to achieve it. It isn’t something you have to struggle for or try for. You are all worthy beings. You are deserving of this Well-being.

~ Jerry and Esther Hicks

I loved this, and, being a person of action, I started writing up a list of things I am now allowing into my life to put on my fridge. (My fridge is affirmation central in my house – my visits are infrequent enough that I don’t habituate to the messages as quickly – and I rearrange it often for the same reason).

So I wrote my list. And I printed it out. And I was happy about it.

But then I had this sneaking little thought in the back of my head.

It said: Ok, sure, but what do you really wish for? I mean, if you really believed this stuff, what would you write? I mean, what do you secretly want?

Oh. Yeah. Those things.

So then I made a new list. At the top I wrote:

What I secretly want…

And am now allowing into my experience…

Now this was the list. This nailed it. I looked back at the first list, and yes, they are things I want, but they weren’t the BIG things – the things I am not sure I deserve, not sure I could handle if they happened – and most importantly, am not sure I can “achieve”. But the exercise is not about achieving, so I wrote them down.

In fact, looking back at the first list, they look kind of like “things I want to help me cope with not quite having what I really want”. They are things that would make me feel comfortable and content – but not necessarily what I really want, which is to feel a sense of continuously expanding past my limits to the fullest potential I can reach. (This was the last item on my second list.)

If you do this exercise, I recommend writing the first list anyway.

Even though you are going for the second list, there is a principle in writing I find helpful. It goes something like this:

If you write out what is on top, it allows the stuff below the top to come out next.

If you keep it all in your head, all you will see is the stuff on the top, over and over.

Sometimes you have to write down the wrong word to get it out of your head so the right word will appear.

It’s kind of like unravelling a ball of yarn. What you really want is the shiny bit in the middle that all the yarn is wrapped around. But if you go digging into the ball, it gets all mangled, and sometimes it’s wrapped up so tight that you can’t get in there anyway.

But if you just start at the beginning of the thread and unwind and unwind, pretty soon you’ll be inside. No stress or digging involved – just following a process.

As you write, notice how the words feel, and keep working with them until they evoke the exact feeling that you are going for. The Law of Attraction works by matching emotional frequencies, so you are creating a magnet by evoking the feeling in your body of what these wishes mean each time you read the list and get into the zone of how it would feel to experience them.

Have fun! And share some of your secret wishes if you’d like.

I’m struck by the difference. The one I made before focuses a lot on what I want to get. And they are mostly things I didn’t have yet (a business that runs itself seamlessly, more money, nice things, to travel, etc). It was specific and focused (common wisdom on how to make goals). It is very focused on the future, and while it focuses on “abundance”, it kinda whispers “scarcity” between the lines.

I wrote down a new list today. Here it is:

My Heart’s Desire

1. I want to have daily enjoyment in my work.
2. I want to give my business what it needs to grow into its potential and be a contribution to life.
3. I want to release my fears and let love come through me in the many forms it wants to.
4. I want beauty and order and peace in my home, a home that fills me with happiness when I walk through it.
5. I want to give myself to love, to listen and understand the ones I love, and to share my heart with them also.
6. I want to affirm my intrinsic value and the OKness of all my needs and feelings.
7. I want to heal and release every past hurt that bubbles up in me to shed love and light on.
8. I want to remember and renew my connection with Source every day, every moment.
9. I want to live in and appreciate every present moment.
10. I want to relax and trust and let each day nourish me. (give us this day our daily bread)

This new list feels different. It feels peaceful and fulfilled. I relax just reading it.

Here are some more differences:

• It describes things I already have, in most moments
• It describes present-moment stuff, not future stuff
• It is a lot more focused on loving and joyfulness than on acquiring specific things
• It is at the same time more and less specific: more specific about the feelings and needs that are being met – less specific about what that will look like. It says “a home that fills me with happiness when I walk through it”, not “a home filled with beautiful objects”.
• It specifically mentions Source, my last list didn’t.

I think it’s an improvement. I think I’ve learned something about how to stay unhappy: define happiness as dependent on things you’ll get in the future. And about how to be happy: arrange your daily life so that it nourishes you.

What is your heart’s desire? Is it really a specific job, a specific kind of house, a specific kind of lover? Or is it to be a part of the movement of the energy of Love itself throughout life- and feel that in your body every day?

I’ve also noticed it’s a lot easier for me to actually make and commit to specific work-related goals now than it was before. When I had my heart’s desire confused with specific business goals, every goal became a struggle with God, trying to wrestle purpose and meaning out of numbers – money, customers – and always ending up confused and unfulfilled.

Now I get the purpose of goals – to help my business grow and serve life. Not to give my life meaning. Meeting business goals does not nourish my heart directly – my heart is nourished by the daily process of living and serving life. Coming from that place, I make goals that are cleaner, clearer, that work for my business, and that I actually want to do!