The Sensation of Joy – Day 18

January 25, 2009 at 8:35 pm | In 21 Days to 21 Minutes, General Thoughts, choosing happiness, meditation | Leave a Comment
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The idea of Joy keeps coming to me – first through my meditations, then through books, and then just in my everyday consciousness.

I’m beginning to fully understand that the real task is not so much the pursuit of Joy as it is the sensation of Joy.

What’s the difference, you ask?

The first – the Joy we pursue – by definition resides outside of ourselves. It is found in things, activities, people, conversations.

The sensation of Joy, on the other hand, resides within us. It is found in the simplest of fashions: by feeling the feeling of Joy.

One is about bringing Joy to us, the other is about enlivening Joy inside of us.

I go back to this thing that I call the Falling Asleep game (named as such because it’s easy to remember to do when you’re lying down to sleep). It involves nothing other than filling yourself with the sensation of Joy. Just feel it, from your toes to your head.

(If you want to give it a try, and find that you have trouble eliciting the sensation of Joy, try this: imagine you have a giant watering can filled with liquid Joy, and your body is an empty vessel. Start filling, and as you do, visualize this liquid Joy filling you up from your feet to your legs, and so on.

And please, don’t knock it ‘til you try it.

The other piece of Joy that’s been coming to me lately is the understanding that it is really nothing more than a choice we make countless times each day. Doing my daily activities, do I choose to hold a sense of Drudgery or Joy? At work, do I choose to view each interaction as a Power-play or an Open Opportunity to relate to another human being? Making dinner…I’m typically exhausted by that point in the day, but it doesn’t mean I can’t summon an internal sense of Joy – for no reason at all other than that it feels good.

I’ll be the first to admit that it takes vigilance. We have some re-patterning to do before it gets easy. This moment and the next – today, tomorrow, and onward – we must choose Joy as often as we can remember to do so.  Each moment, we must move through our lives holding Joy in the forefront of our experience.

For those of us who are looking to make a shift, to enter our beings into something warmer, wiser, and more fulfilling, it’s more than worth the effort. For it’s both the task and the path – both the challenge and the reward itself.

Effortless Glee – Day 9

January 16, 2009 at 8:33 pm | In 21 Days to 21 Minutes, choosing happiness, meditation | Leave a Comment
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Today I released.

In a big, new way.

And when I did, I felt like I was suddenly on an inner tube, floating down a river, spinning and bobbing and gleefully weightless – just going freely as the moving water carried me.

And then my mind would jump in – of course. At first I wouldn’t notice, but then I would, and it felt like I had put the brakes on, dragged myself, and burdened my being with an unwanted weight. So I would toss the weight off, remind myself that I had released all resistance, and return to focusing on my gleeful, weightless, effortless ride.

What fun! I literally was feeling these sensations. Apparently I’m one who feels things rather than ‘sees’ them. You do whatever works for you.

The way I got to this point is an interesting path.

First I cleared my mind, or tried to.

The I focused on my energy, or tried to. Actually, that did work a bit: it definitely slowed me and centered me, but my mind was still moving around.

And my mind came full into this big decision that I need to make today.

And then it occurred to me that I’d already made the decision.  My heart and instinct were already very clear about which way to go – it was just my brain that was holding me back.

Then somehow, something wise inside me noticed this, told my brain we’d already decided.  And then this wise entity told my brain that it was time to let go.

And let go it did. Right down that beautiful river.

And while I was riding, I noticed all the other things I’d been carrying with me, all the pushing and pulling and worrying and wondering – and I decided to let those go as well. As I did, I returned to the sensation of being carried and spun – perfectly safe, and giddy with the ride.

I can still feel it now. And I would love, love, love to carry this feeling with me at all times. Or if I can’t do that, then at least to return as often as I can, and to the memory that this is the way it can be – and arguably this is the way it’s meant to be – as we make our way down our path.

Effortless glee. What a beautiful feeling!

Holding our own space of truth

July 10, 2008 at 4:03 pm | In choosing happiness, truth | Leave a Comment
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“This stuff is happening every single moment of our lives…” Continued from last post…

What a remarkable opportunity! This means that with every thought, and every word, and every deed we can make not just ourselves, but our collective humanity, stronger and more positive.

I just finished with a client – we did some intense energy work within a reflexology session, and then some coaching afterwards. What a blessing, the fact that I can do work that feels wholly right, and in the process I’m helping to strengthen others.

We talked a lot about how simply by us opening up, and doing what feels right deep down inside, we open up the energy and the courage for others to do the same. Not lecturing them or even trying to pull them along with us – just simply holding our own space of truth.  In doing so, we allow for them to do the same.

And the concept of choosing our truth – hearing it, listening to it, and acting upon it – is one of the ways in which we choose our lives each and every moment. Every time we turn around we get another chance…

The Line between Good and Bad, Strong and Weak

July 3, 2008 at 1:33 pm | In a better world, choosing happiness, good vs evil | Leave a Comment
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Here’s an amazing book: “Power vs. Force” by David Hawkins. If you enjoy quantum physics and chaos theory, go out and buy the book today. Otherwise, here’s an overview. Through millions of trials, Hawkins and his colleagues established the dividing line between “good and evil.” Or better put, they found the difference between things that strengthen us and things that weaken us. They put a number to it: 200.

Anything above-200 gives us strength – physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. Anything below-200 weakens us in those same ways.

Above-200: Courage, Neutrality, Willingness, Acceptance, Reason, Love, Joy, Peace, and Enlightenment. Everything above-200 begins with trusting in things that are stronger than ourselves and our will. They involve a genuine sense of openness and compassion, and a willingness to bend and flow.

Below-200: Shame, guilt, apathy, grief, fear, desire, anger, and pride. These encapsulate such emotions as: desires to be richer, thinner, prettier, more successful; fear of losing a job, losing a loved one, losing our standing in our world, losing money; the fear of things going wrong, of not being perfect, of people being mad at us, of not being in control of things; raging fury, slow-boiling hostility, or general frustration; sarcasm, jealousy, competition, revenge, and a sense of always wanting or “needing” more.

(It makes you feels better just to read that first list, doesn’t it? See…it works!).

We literally make ourselves ill with below-200 things; we literally heal ourselves with above-200 things.

I’ve got news for you: almost without exception, television, movies, news, radio, and advertisements are below 200. That means that every day, when you turn on the news or read the paper or watch tv, you are willingly weakening yourself. There is an auto-immune response to this – it is a scientifically proven fact.

And it’s not just through those outlets. It’s in every thought you have, every interaction, every conversation. Whenever you are thinking/talking/listening to something below-200, you are injuring yourself.

On the upside, whenever you think/talk/listen to something above-200 you are strengthening yourself. This is why it is so crucial to make conscious choices about our thoughts, our conversations, our interactions, our “entertainment” outlets.

We’ve kind of known this, right? We want to be good people, or god-fearing people, or whatever you want to call it. But now there’s science behind it. There’s an observable, measurable cause-and-effect. It’s not just about going to church on Sundays, or praying once a day, or “doing the right thing” when you wan to feel moralistic. This stuff is happening every single moment of our lives.

The way you live your life everyday…

July 2, 2008 at 1:47 pm | In General Thoughts, a better world, choosing happiness | Leave a Comment
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“The way you live your life every day is the way you live your life.” This, from Annie Dillard.

I’d like to add “who you are in every moment is who you are.”

This gets us smack dab into choice. As you choose each moment of thought and feeling, you are creating yourself, your life, your reality. And in the process, you’re creating energy that affects not just you – but everyone, everywhere.

If you’d like to see a better world, this is both the place to start and the place to end. It is the only place – that place inside your brain that chooses your thoughts.

Example? Say you’re nice to the guy pumping gas. Unbeknownst to you, he’d had a terrible day and was about to go to a bar and drink himself silly, and on his way home he was going to get in a car accident that would have ended up fatal to a mother of six, and her kids would have all ended up being raised by their mean aunt etc, etc, etc. But when you smiled kindly and said “thank you – have a good night” – something shifted inside him and he decided to go home instead of out to the bar. No car accident, no lost mother of six, no awful aunt etc, etc.

Sound far-fetched? It’s not – not at all. It’s the ripple effect, or the chaos theory. Everything is interrelated.

We never, ever know how our actions are going to impact another person, and what the ripple effect will be. In the end, and in every moment, the best we can do is to make choices, comments, actions, and feelings from our hearts.

This is how we create the New Vibe – how we reverse the energy of humanity from a downward spiral back towards a stronger, more positive, more healthy vibe.

Remember, the way you live your life every day is the way you live your life. Who you are in every moment is who you are. It’s your choice, every single time.

A New Vibe

July 2, 2008 at 12:34 am | In General Thoughts, a better world, choosing happiness | Leave a Comment
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I am writing a book. The book is about happiness. It’s about finding joy and contentment in the course of our everyday lives.

I am writing this book because I believe we are due – individually and collectively – for an energetic face lift. I’m calling this the New Vibe.

I believe we all want to be happier. We are all tired of the negativity we find around us and within us. But none of us knows quite what to do about it.

I’m writing this blog because I want to begin creating this New Vibe before the book is done.

The New Vibe is easy. It is based on two premises:

  1. Happiness is a choice. We are given this choice hundreds of times each day.

  2. Each time we choose positive over negative, expansive over restrictive, acceptance over judgment, we raise the energy of everyone around us. We become happier and the world becomes happier.

This is the single-most important thing we can do in our lives, in every day of our existence. As we make our choices, we create a New Vibe.

This blog is a point of inspiration, a gathering place, a reminder. I will do my best to keep it accessible, in philosophy and language, to anyone who has ever wanted to make a better Self and a better World.

Welcome to each of you, and thanks from my soul to yours. Please, pass this along.

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