Paradise Is Where You Are Right Now
Monday, 19 October 2009 07:37 | Author: Administrator | 
“Paradise is exactly where you are right now, only much, much better.” —Laurie Anderson
Living in Paradise
Where is your focus? It sounds like a simple question, but really think about it for a moment. Where does your energy go?
Our lives are a reflection of our intentions — whether we are consciously aware of them or not. We may think that we’re focused on our health or our families, all the while working 80 hours per week at our job.
To create change in your life, you must first understand what really needs changing. A friend once told me she had problems with her weight that troubled her. She couldn’t lose weight, because she was lazy. She worked and went to school full time; she had a husband with serious health problems, and ongoing stress in her life from her mother-in-law.
Lazy? I thought. No way. What kind of toxic tape loop makes a person who clearly is overachieving in her life perceive a failure in one part laziness?
Her instinct that something in her life needed to change was right on the money, but it wasn’t the “Truth” (e.g., I need to be less lazy....read: negative belief pattern) she thought.
Negative self-talk (“I’m lazy,” “I’m stupid,” “I’m a terrible mother or wife”) is a clear indication of a negative reinforcing tape loop of old programming that is obscuring the real problems in your life.
It may be that you want to make changes to your life, but you won’t be able to tackle that pinnacle until you get rid of the manacle around your leg.
To use my friend as an example, adding more rules about eating and more “To Dos” in her life wasn’t the answer. Instead, it was time to understand what needed to go: She couldn’t afford to quit her full-time job; school was the one thing that was working for her; her husband’s health problems were something they both had to learn to live with. That left only one thing left to change: The mother-in-law.
I’m not going to tell you that things changed miraculously for her overnight. They didn’t. However, what I can tell you is that after steady attention to that issue, she is finally in a spot where she will see some movement. Mom-in-law is moving out. Now, finally, my friend will get to put her focus on herself and on the life she wants to build for a clear path forward!
Lazy? I thought. No way. What kind of toxic tape loop makes a person who clearly is overachieving in her life perceive a failure in one part laziness?
Her instinct that something in her life needed to change was right on the money, but it wasn’t the “Truth” (e.g., I need to be less lazy....read: negative belief pattern) she thought.
Negative self-talk (“I’m lazy,” “I’m stupid,” “I’m a terrible mother or wife”) is a clear indication of a negative reinforcing tape loop of old programming that is obscuring the real problems in your life.
It may be that you want to make changes to your life, but you won’t be able to tackle that pinnacle until you get rid of the manacle around your leg.
To use my friend as an example, adding more rules about eating and more “To Dos” in her life wasn’t the answer. Instead, it was time to understand what needed to go: She couldn’t afford to quit her full-time job; school was the one thing that was working for her; her husband’s health problems were something they both had to learn to live with. That left only one thing left to change: The mother-in-law.
I’m not going to tell you that things changed miraculously for her overnight. They didn’t. However, what I can tell you is that after steady attention to that issue, she is finally in a spot where she will see some movement. Mom-in-law is moving out. Now, finally, my friend will get to put her focus on herself and on the life she wants to build for a clear path forward!
Last Updated (Monday, 28 December 2009 11:01)