Focusing on your breath will temporarily stop the loop and help with managing your anxiety.
Those remaining are often deeper and maybe a reason to consider talking with a professional; especially, if they dominate your day and are a roadblock keeping you from being productive or keeping you from living life fully.
Everything I’m going to say in this blog is not new. It has been said before in nearly every culture and religion, and in every way humanly possible.
If there is any “new” message it might be this: it is easier to seek, than to practice.
I, and likely you too, live in a culture that is always “selling” something new and improved, and often for sale and profits.
For example, mindfulness is nearly a billion-dollar business. The word “mindful” appears as a selling point on a seemingly endless list of books, magazines, videos, and even in this blog.
Mindfulness is not new, and, in fact, it is free.
It takes minutes to learn and a lifetime of practice.
Realize that a different teacher or new technique will not make you or I more mindful person.
Practicing a few mindful techniques will, overtime, yield the results.
I can hear you saying, “it hasn’t worked for me…”
My answer is simple, “Have you developed a consistent daily practice?”
Each of us must discover what works and yet, few continue with the practice.
I read recently, that positive brain changes are medically detectable in only 8-weeks after beginning meditation; and continued practice has a lifetime of benefits.
Too often many want an immediate benefit without the effort.
It’s a journey, practice is a journey. And along the way, you will discover the real you, the true you; not the editorial-self, the actor you, that you live every day.
The reward is the peace of knowing yourself; and, overtime, the potential to be okay with the you, accepting yourself, loving yourself, the self that you have been hiding from.
It just takes practice. It takes consistent daily practice.
I am deeply aware that the 1st half, or rather most of my life, was lived in destination thinking.
“What is this destination thinking?”
It is a life that is always lived for something in the future, a future time or place.
It’s easy to spot. It sounds like this.
“If I can make it to lunch…”
“20 minutes and then I can fight the traffic home…”
“Wednesday, it’s hump day…”
“One day until the weekend…”
“Vacation in two weeks, then…”
“When I get this done, I will be able to…”
“Can’t wait until…”
Every day, tens, hundreds, maybe even thousands of times was focused on the next, the future!
Very little was lived in the Now; very little was truly enjoyed.
I was physically there, but my mind was always thinking about the next activity, the next to-do, the next workday, the next cool grown-up-toy, the next, the next, the next…
I was rarely aware of Now.
My brain looped, over and over and over; day-in and day-out.
Looking back, it was miserable.
I lived that way for the first 40-years, give or take; even though I started the transition toward the Mindful Pathway in my 30s, it took years to break the habit.
Quickly, my attempts to change grew into thousands of attempts and then countless.
With this post, I’m beginning a tagged series about Self-Awareness. My hope is to share actual experiences and insights into my own self-awareness with minimal editing and allow everyone to see the questions I ask myself through the process.
Awareness is a process; and too often I see how my identity, my ego, is too often in the material world made of many THINGS are not me: not the deeper soul part.
Does anything you or I own truly to who you are or who I am?
Where you went to school? Or even if you went to school?
Does a job make anyone smarter or better or special?
Does money? Or religion? Or political party?
Or physical beauty? Or fitness?
Does comparison really help?
Do we have to keep score?
Do I have to be lessor for you to feel better?
Is being right or winning or betting the next guy what this is all about?
Frank joins 24 healers and coaches in the second in The Ancestors Within book series with The Power of Your Ancestor’s Prayers: Accessing the Energy and Hope of the Past for Your Best Life Today.
October 2021 Release.
Author Chapter 12 The Power of Your Ancestor’s Prayers
