Gratitude and the Great Life

Happiness and gratitude truly complement each other. Increase one and the other automatically increases too!

Nice, the way that works.

What a magnificent day I enjoyed today. I spent time with new friends, was offered a massage and invited to join a group of people I have long wondered about.

Ah…that is just the beginning.

My friend is a musician. I know lots of musicians, being one myself. This friend, Johnny Downing, is a musician of musicians and an electronics genius too. He created an organ in his home that plays the sounds of a full cathedral-sized organ.

He demonstrated his extraordinary instruments and effects for me and another friend. Truly I was blown away. It takes something mighty remarkable to impress me! Of course Johnny was not trying to impress me, He was simply sharing his passion with some people who appreciated his gift.

So tonight I learned that these two friends, like me, have always heard music in their heads. You know I was sixteen before I learned that not everyone hears music in their heads all the time! Imagine that!

We always think everybody experiences life the same way we do, don’t we?

I left the party early to come home. Tonight is a special night, here in the USA. Today we celebrate our independence, our freedom.

For me, I feel deep gratitude to be an American. As my friend, best selling author, Robert G. Allen says, “We won the lottery just because we live where we do.” Every day I thank the Universe for gifting me this most amazing life in the northwest United States.

I sat in my back yard and on my deck and watched more than three hours of fireworks spanning all across the horizon. I have no clue how many towns’ fireworks I got to enjoy without ever leaving the comfort of home. Most of the displays were too far away to hear the sound. So I basically got to witness a seemingly endless light show!

But it was more than that. As I sat there, right under the Big Dipper, I felt so humble and so small and so much one with the Universe.

I live far enough out in the country that the sky was filled with stars and planets. I felt like I was in planetarium. So many heavenly bodies twinkled all around me.

I recalled as a little kid trying to figure out which start twinkled first. I assumed they were sending messages in a morse code of some sort.

I notice that the better I feel and the more I appreciate who I already am, what I already do, and what I already have, the more smoothly life flows in the direction of my dreams.

Can you feel the peace?

Confidence: Your Ability to Be Downright Goofy Reveals Your Level of Self Confidence

The degree to which you feel free to be yourself, even when acting silly, reveals your level of self confidence.

I used to think if I let go and acted very silly that people would judge me poorly. I thought they would see me as irresponsible or childish. More importantly, I thought looking goofy would damage my credibility.

So I never did anything that I thought caused me to look silly or anything less than serious. I mean never. Not when I was a baby. Not when I was a kid. And certainly not when I grew up!

Do your thoughts run the same way?

If you answered yes let me tell you the consequences of being a serious person all the time all of your life.

First of all it doesn’t feel so great. You do a lot less laughing out loud. Oh my goodness. I didn’t even laugh out loud until I had kids of m own and I laughed with them. No kidding!

Are you getting the idea of just how serious I used to be?

Notice I said “used to be.” The Universe brought people into my life that made me laugh. They live in joy. I watched how differently they experience life than I do.

One of those people is my daughter. She was funny from the age of one month and she just got funnier and funnier as she grew older. Now I am not saying she is comedian or she acts goofy all the time.

I am saying I envied her freedom simply to be herself all her life. What a joy it was raising her! I learned about being silly. I didn’t make my move to that domain while raising her but at least I saw that you can have fun without losing friends or the respect of others.

My life changed when I met my friend, Diane. Diane is a joy. Being around her leaves me smiling and feeling light. Hmm. Actually I mean Light. She is a bright Light that illuminates the world.

From Diane I learned that it is okay to let your little child out to play. In fact it s very healthy to let that child be part of who you are rather than hidden away.

I realized that I did not have enough self confidence to be me, no matter. I lacked the confidence to know that what other people think of me has nothing to do with me.

The only person’s whose opinion of me matters to me is me. As soon as I made that first video that message came through loud and clear!

Diane and I started making videos together. We did pretty goofy stuff. At first I was really scared. Can you even imagine being afraid to cut loose and act silly?

Well, I was. You know how most people fear the unknown? Well, I am somebody who jumps in and does it anyway. Yet it took me more than fifty years to jump in on this one! Mostly because the thought of doing so had not really occurred to me. I thought having fun in a goofy way was for other people but certainly not for me.

Well, Diane and I created a series of videos we call Laughing Ladies. I had so much fun after making the first one, and we got such a great response from friends and even from strangers, that we went on to make two more Laughing Ladies videos.

And me? I learned that being goofy and laugh out loud fun are great stress relievers! And no one thinks any less of me. In fact, people told me how much they appreciated the light videos – or do I mean Light.

I really “get” that self confidence has nothing to do with appearances or behaviors. And when yours is very high you truly can do anything you want to!

Paradise Revisited

What is paradise to you? Sometimes what you thought was paradise turns out to be something different.

Creating Your Reality: How To Watch Your Self Create Your Reality Now

You create your reality. This method allows you to witness your own mind creating your reality in this moment.

I teach a series of classes that I call “Experiencing the Invisible.” Participants get to experience how their thoughts create their reality and impact the reality of others in each moment – right then and there.

One of the devices I created to allow that live experience is a set of dousing rods made from hangars. (You do not need high tech toys to teach and learn how to control your thoughts and create your reality.)

Essentially, here is the exercise. Do it the first time with your eyes closed and then again with your eyes open.

Hold each rod loosely in your hands so they turn easily and move freely. Choose three different objects in different areas of the room: one item on your left, one straight ahead in the middle and one to your right.

Next, without moving the rods with your hands, use only your mind to cause the rods to point to one of those three targets. After a few moments the rods will move – maybe.

How you run your head and the degree to which you consciously control your mind and thoughts show up in the movement or lack of movement of the rods.

Your goal is for the rods to move and point toward your target without you intentionally moving them in that direction by manipulating them with your hands.

I see very interesting results. Sometimes (rarely) the rods fail to move at all. Sometimes only one rod moves. Sometimes the rods go crazy and whirl round and round. (Which is exactly what happened to me the first time I picked up a set of rods – soon after a brain injury. Hmm. NO surprise there, is there?)

I recommend that people either buy some professionally made dousing rods (which tend to be rather long in length – not what I call convenient to carry around) or you can make your own by cutting hangars and bending them to 90 degrees so you wind up with a device that points in specific directions.

Practice that routine, causing the rods to point toward specific objects, every day. The goal is to know and understand exactly how you create your physical world.

With practice you can make significant life changes. After all, your thoughts create your reality. When you control your thoughts in your awareness you create your reality the way you really want it to look.

People use one of two strategies to cause the rods to move toward the target. Some people focus on the target item. All they “see” in their mind’s eye is that target. Other people focus on causing the rods to “move left” or “move right.”

In life, some people focus on the end result, always keeping it in mind while others believe in short term victories and stride to achieve lots of small goals.

The difference in the two styles? The first one is knowing your what and allowing the Universe to provide the how. The second method is doing the what.

Hmm. Which method do you think is more powerful: leaving the “how” part to the Universe or choosing the how yourself?

When you do the how you limit what the Universe can deliver to you.

Would you focus on the scene or focus on moving the rods left, right, or straight ahead.

Stress Comes in Many Forms

Stress doesn’t always show up in ways we easily recognize as stress. For that reason we fail to remedy or eliminate a stressful situation simply because we do not realize it is, indeed a stressor.

Let me give you an example to clarify what I mean.

I live in the country. When I first moved here I pretty much screamed whenever I saw a mouse in my house. It freaked me out! (I know. Big me. Little mouse. You can stop laughing now.)

Well here I am 1 ½ year later. I no longer have a mouse catcher (more commonly known as a cat). I now have an upstairs mouse and a downstairs mouse in my house. Yuck!

Maybe I no longer jump or scream but I no way want pests in my house.

I could not figure out what to do to remove them. They move faster than you can imagine.  Zoom– like a flash they fly across the floor moving from one hiding place to another!

Maybe I don’t scream any more but I definitely feel the stress of the situation inside me. I am not calm. Silly me. Until last night I thought that keeping m bedroom door closed would keep them out!

I discovered they are cagey and tiny and cannot keep them out of any more. I know. I discovered the mess they leave behind in my bedroom closet and in my office closet too. YUCH!

I didn’t stop to think about how stressed I feel until today. We spent hours playing hide-and-seek last night. I tried to think of the mouse as a pet and thought maybe I can have some fun – until I found all its messes on my things and had to clean it all up.

I did not sleep well. After barricading his known hideouts I had no clue where he wound up. Hoped he was not in my bedroom but had no idea really!

Today I definitely feel the stress level increasing.

I asked friend with mice problems what to do. She said she puts out poison. They take it back to the nest and no more mouse problem.

Realize I never liked killing anything – not even a fly. So for me to take steps to kill a mouse seemed impossible.

But here he was running through the room while I was teaching class. Not acceptable!

So I bought poison and put it out, as my friend told me to do.

I woke up this morning to the sounds of a mouse crying something awful. I never heard it make a single sound before. That pitiful squeak accompanied thrashing – behind my stove. I know that is his favorite hiding place.

I got this sinking feeling the poison was not fast acting and that little mouse was dying a slow and painful death,

Gee! My stress level went even higher.

I felt so bad – and guilty. I just did not know what to do.

The thought of a dead mouse behind my stove ran through my head. Pictures of that mouse writhing in pain ran through my imagination as I listened to it cry and thrash about.

Oh man. What do you suppose? Out he came again – all fine and playing more hide and seek.

Now I get to choose whether or not to let the mouse’s presence bother me or…send it love and hope it will allow me to catch it and put it outdoors.

Which do you think I chose? What would you do?