Start From Where You Are – Personal Development In Action
There are many teachings that underpin the raft of personal development opportunities available to you. The teachings of Eckhart Tolle around being in the now, among other things. Those of Buddha about how you interact with others or the Dalai Lama on compassion, harmony and peace. Or you can look to the Abraham-Hicks interpretation of the Universal Laws, particularly the Law of Attraction. All of this can be a little overwhelming to the new-comer, however, to make it easy, each teacher always says “start from where you are right now”.
That alone can be difficult to interpret but the meaning is as simple as the words. You just start right now, from where you are, from what you are doing and who you are being and take a step to where you would like to be. Just do one thing that will help you on that path and you can be sure that taking one step after another will open up a whole new world to you.
It does not matter what it is about self development that you would like to achieve. It may be that you want to have more money, get that amazing promotion that you have been after for so long or become a better person giving back as well as taking. You will not make an almighty leap without making a start and that start comes right now from this place that you are in.
Lets say that one of your aims in life is to have money and the freedom to travel anywhere that you want to. Right now, you are surrounded by small children and a mortgage is big as the ocean. How can you possibly see a time when you will have excess money and freedom. So you pick up the latest best seller on making a million dollars and read it avidly but it does not give you any clear idea on how to get started. My advice is to do something. If you loved the book, read it again or go and get another by the same author or another author who takes your fancy.
Keep going, start to talk to people about what you want in life, listen to what they are saying about their dreams and before you know it, you will be thinking more about what you want than what you have. Now is the time to get really active about the Law of Attraction and I recommend “Law of Attraction – The Science of Attracting More of What You Want and Less of What You Don’t Want” by Michael Losier. It is a small and easy read filled with exercises that you can really use. And it helps you to start from where you are at just as you would for any journey.
Key to getting started is to take action in the direction that you want to go. So apart from learning more about how to get onto a self development plan of your own, you must also be prepared to do something yourself to get you there. Dreaming helps and action is the vehicle for having the dream in your hands. For more on getting started see my blog about working out your life path.
When The Going Gets Tough Use Your Daily Journal
I am a great fan and advocate for the daily journal as a part of the personal development and self awareness journey. I have cultivated journaling each day as a habit and over time have developed an array of very useful tips for assisting to keep the daily journal interesting and stimulating. There could be nothing worse for me than to have a habit which is mundane and boring. And I coach people using the daily journal as a key element to attract and maintain life success. I am even in development phase for a commercial product around a daily journal.
So it came as a great surprise to me this week to discover that 6 days had passed since I had made an entry in my daily journal and 10 days had passed since I had written about my thankfulness, gratitude and appreciation for life. It happens that I had been feeling a bit low in mood and unmotivated over the last three days and yesterday I decided to explore that in my journal. I opened up and noticed how many days since I had made an entry. Well, I thought to myself, be your own coach!!
So I went through my daily habit, entering in my journal what was happening and working through how to move forward, going over my years goals and writing about how I was working towards them, listing my gratitude for what I have right now and what is coming to me in the future. Lo and behold, it worked, got me back on track and I decided on a couple of processes to help me through this low motivation phase. My mood lifted almost immediately.
For the moment, my daily journal will consist of decisions on the actions that I am taking towards my life goals and I will check back over that each day to see my progress. With that inspiration, I completed 2 of my 3 tasks yesterday and one that was not on the list but the time was right. Today I am well on the way with the 4 that I committed to for this day.
Learning? Sometimes it helps to just go back to the basics and I know that the daily journal is one of those basic but essential habits. Oh and just for a bit of fun I had a look back to where I was this time last year. Happily, much progress has been made and some of my big life decisions are coming to fruition right now. Attract success – you betcha!!
More Ideas To Make Your Daily Journal Easy
I am, as you know, a devotee of the daily journal habit. Apart from the fact that the development of daily habits is a contributor to happiness (and who does not want happiness?), it is also pretty amazing to read back over your journal at the same time of the year, from time to time, and see the changes that you have made in your life, for yourself and/or they way that you are feeling. Writing down some of your daily thoughts and ideas can be fulfilling in many other ways as hand writing, which some say it is becoming a lost art, can help you to make sense of what is happening, how you are reacting and why and actions that you can take to make changes where you want them. And it will definitely help you on your journey to success.
Sure, it can be a confronting process at times as you may start to explore some parts of yourself that you prefer not to face but that is where the real value if this lovely process comes in. You are exploring these things just with yourself!! No-one else unless you chose to. And then you can look at them in wonder, at a later date, and laugh about your fears. Some of the things that I have been afraid of in the past have proven to be just nothing later, because I took charge of them.
How does it get any better than that?
So recently, in my quest for more content to help people to work with their daily journal, I was delighted to read “Your Pocket Life Coach” – seriously recommend that you get this one. Carole Gaskell, Author, outlines some of her ideas for the daily “inspirational” journal. So test these out and see a previous blog of mine, 10 Ideas To Get You Started With A Daily Journal, for even more ideas.
From Carole Gaskell:-
- Use your daily inspirational journal to record your thoughts, insights, intuitive ideas and actions
- Write about things that make you happy, confident, excited
- Record your achievements and what you are committed to doing next
- Note the people you love and why
- Outline your plans for the next day, week, month etc
- Put down what you have learned that day or things that have helped you in your development.
Oh, and have fun!! And my congratulations to Carole for such a smashing little book.
Inspiration In The Air, Inspiration Everywhere
Seriously, I think that I can smell and feel the inspiration all around me, not to mention with the people I meet, books that I read and music that I listen to. And I think that I know the reason. I have been focusing on inspiration and am attracting it like crazy. I love the whole inspiration effect and I love how the Law of Attraction works.
Some months ago I was reading a “Business Bullet” written by Andrew Griffiths and he said that we all need to get a daily fix of inspiration just as be do exercise and good nutrition. Well, I took his words to heart and started to be active about my daily fix. And here it is, just arriving in my life. Inspiration in the air, inspiration everywhere.
So here are 5 quick tips on how to get your daily dose of inspiration!!
- Keep your mind, ears and eyes tuned for it; look for it in the people you talk to, the mountains and plains around you, the birds and animals and your own thoughts.
- Read poetry again. It is just amazing what poets write.
- Stop tuning in to the mainstream media and do something different like read blogs, get self improvement books out of the library, beg or borrow some cd’s and listen while you drive to work. I just love “Conversations With God” and “Beyond Freedom“.
- Google some of your favourite gurus and read some of their web page or watch some of their YouTube. Try the Dalai Lama, Deepak Chopra or Brian Tracy.
- Listen to some different music and step out of your comfort zone there. Try some music from a different country or cultural group. I am loving Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu right now; it just touches my soul.
No doubt you will come up with a list of 5 for yourself as well, just do it, because life is so much more exciting when you are getting your daily dose of inspiration!!
1 Million Women Taking Action On Climate Change
Sometimes I see something and think “what a great idea – I must follow up on that”, then move on and forget all about it until it re-surfaces in some way or another. Know what I mean? Done that too? Well lately, I have been surrounded by inspiration (blogged about some of it earlier this week), it is just everywhere!!! I can not get away from it and unlike other times in my life, the ones that really matter to me are staying on my mind. And 1 Million Women is one of those.
This example is the article that I read called “Join the Million” just before I went on holidays four weeks ago. Now I have to say that I did not forget this one; it touched a cord for me and got into my mind and heart. So here it is.
The Australian Women’s Weekly published this article in the January 2010 edition and invited 1 million women – daughters, mothers, sisters and grandmothers to inspire climate change action. The idea is to make small differences to the way that we live and to individually save 1 tonne of greenhouse gas each per year. The target is very straightforward – reduce carbon dioxide pollution, the main greenhouse gas causing global warming, by a minimum 1 tonne each per year.
The website, 1millionwomen.com.au provides you with all of the help that you need to work out how to save your CO2 and even calculates your savings!! So what are you waiting for? Are you up for the challenge? Sign up, learn more ways to cut CO2 and help make the world a better place. And I am sure that it is not necessary to be an Australian woman. How does it get any better than that?
Oh, and just for the record, I did not fail to take action on this one. I signed up and got started just this week and will report on my progress via this blog.
