You are searching for the magic key that will unlock the door to the source of power; and yet you have the key in your own hands, and you may use it the moment you learn to control your thoughts.
Napoleon Hill
Hello, My Friends
This week we had a mini get away, we went to a tiny wee fishing village on the East Coast of New Zealand. The sea was rough, a storm had just blown up the coast. We rugged up with layers, jackets, hats and scarves. Walking on the near white sands, avoiding the seaweed that had been dislodged and relocated with the turbulent waters, we rounded the corner and was instantly sandblasted. The ferocity of the wind caught us off guard.
In the few days we were away, we walked the beach everyday, and saw only a handful of the locals out and about. They probably thought us weird, as we were the only ones on the beach, obviously visitors to their snug little seaside haven.
Being new to the area, we didn’t have any preconceived ideas about what to expect. We weren’t party to the politics that surround any group of people living in a community, which meant we were oblivious to any feuds, or miscommunications, we didn’t know about romances or gossip. To us this sleepy little village was an escape haven, a place for us to wind down and enjoy.
Do you have a safe haven in your life? Do you have a place you go to recharge your batteries? Do you have a place where you can forget about the feuds and miscommunications of life, even for a short time?
I recall as a mother of four preschool children, (I had four children under the age of four.) Life was busy, extremely full on and at this stage in my personal growth I was in survival mode. If I flopped into bed at night with the breakfast dishes done and a load of washing hung on the line and dried, I had a successful day. Each day was the same as the day before, and yet each day was so different. Small children don’t care that you are tired and don’t have the energy to chase after them, or tidy up after them. They are only acutely aware of their needs, and waiting is not on their priority list. To find time for me, I would put the children in the bath with bubbles, I would put the lid down on the toilet, then sit and watch them play. It was my quiet time, I could think while they played happily, they were still young enough to need supervising, but old enough to play without adult interference.
Do whatever it takes to make time for you to recharge. When we are tired and run down, when the stresses of everyday living begin to get too much and swamp us, we need to take a time out. Without windows of deliberate down time, we tend to burn out, over react, over compensate and feel guilty.
It takes energy to think clearly, when our lives are cluttered with too many activities, we forget to make time for the most important person in our lives. Us! When we are feeling overwhelmed by, to do lists that never seem to end, we do nothing. We sit on the couch watching TV. We tell ourselves we need the down time. Even though our body may be in the resting position our mind isn’t. As we consume the information that flickers across the screen, whether we are aware or not our brain is in processing mode. It takes in every detail. The information we feed our mind the most, is the information that becomes the most readily available when it is time for making decisions.
This week in Facebook (lindacodlin25 or authenticlivingwithlinda) I have been talking about awareness.
Awareness is the key that opens the door to change.
When we are not aware, we don’t care.
Reality as we know it is built on our awareness. When we don’t know something we travel on by oblivious, it doesn’t touch us, until we receive some information that triggers a response and we become aware.
Once we are aware, we then have two choices, we either believe the information or we don’t believe it. If at first we don’t believe, we may put it aside and act, or pretend that we don’t know anything. Denial only works for a while. Our mind is an information gathering data machine. It collects and stores information and knowledge. One of the reasons for this is, the mind has a duty of survival. It’s job is to keep us safe. What better way to know when danger is coming than by accumulating information that proves we live in an unsafe space.
Have you ever wondered why your mind always runs to the negative first? Why you can see all the things that won’t work before you can see the things that can work? It’s because our mind is doing it’s job of keeping us safe by warning us of impending danger and by keeping us from taking action. The mind is a problem finding, and problem solving machine, it is collecting data to prove it’s point and prevent us from moving out of our safety zone.
Do you struggle to do new things? Your mind is protecting you -it thinks. If your life is cruising along happily without any dramas, guess what your mind does? That’s right! It creates drama, you pick a fight with your partner, it doesn’t matter what it’s over, the point is to create a scene where the mind can step in to be your protector.
Awareness of what the mind is doing is the key to changing your minds resistance to change. By calling your mind out, and letting it know politely, (It is part of your body after all, and we want to love our body) that you see what it is doing by saying, “Thank you for showing me this” Then you take charge and decide whether the thought that the mind has put forward is leading you to your goal or not, and then you choose to take action accordingly.
I am a firm believer that our mind needs something to focus on, when we ask quality questions of ourselves we give our mind a focus, it goes into seek and deliver mode. Then before you know it, you have more information at your fingertips for you to add to your decision making fact sheet.
When we soothe our mind, and let it know that we have heard it’s concerns, and then give it a mission to complete it begins to work for us instead of against us.
It is my intention for you to become aware of what is causing you to feel stressed, overwhelmed, anxious, or burnt out.
Huge hint. It is never anything outside of you. It has nothing to do with the situation in front of you. It has everything to do with what you think about the situation. Awareness is the key. Thoughts are the building blocks of everything. Become aware of what you are thinking, figure out if these thoughts are leading you in a direction you want to move in.
You can think anything you want, imagine that, anything you want. Awareness is the key, are you aware of what you currently think about? What is your number one complaint? What do you complain about most often and why? How could you solve this complaint? Give your mind an assignment, ask it to solve your complaint, then take note of the information and the ideas that begin to cross your path. Your thoughts create your life. Why not create a fabulous life? Why not retrain your mind to work in your favour?
Make time for yourself, recharge your body and your mind, give yourself the gift of space to breathe, to relax and truly unwind, give your mind a rest from worry and fear. Do one thing this week to recharge your batteries and give your mind a challenge that will give you results you can be proud of.
Until next time, this is authentic living with Linda, where I share wisdom and truth wrapped in every day events.
xoxo Linda.
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Email me at authenticlivingwithlinda@gmail.com
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