When we take on a task like loving ourselves unconditionally, especially if it's coming after years of struggle with self-abuse or self-criticism and things like that, this can seem like an insurmountable task. And one of the funny things that we do with an insurmountable task is we sometimes look for failures to prove to ourselves that it's not worth the effort, or it couldn't possibly work.

We look for things that will support the story of it being insurmountable. Now we want to be able to stay out of that because what happens when we start to get into that mode is we quit. We tell ourselves “I just need to take a break, or, I just need to stop this, or, I just need to do something different” and we opt out of doing the work. 

Maybe we're not seeing the direct results in the way that we think that they should be showing up so we look for a reason to opt-out. I know for some, one of the main choices of opting out is dying. It’s like saying “I'll just quit all together”. But you don'...

Today I want to share one of my favorite poems. It's by James Henry Leigh Hunt, and i was introduced to it in a book by Swami Parthasarathy called Select English poems. The poem:

Abou Ben Adhem (may his tribe increase!)
Awoke one night from a deep dream of peace,
And saw, within the moonlight in his room,
Making it rich, and like a lily in bloom,
An angel writing in a book of gold:—
Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold,
And to the presence in the room he said,
"What writest thou?"—The vision raised its head,
And with a look made of all sweet accord,
Answered, "The names of those who love the Lord."
"And is mine one?" said Abou. "Nay, not so,"
Replied the angel. Abou spoke more low,
But cheerly still; and said, "I pray thee, then,
Write me as one that loves his fellow men."

The angel wrote, and vanished. The next night
It came again with a great wakening light,
And showed the names whom love of God had blest,
And lo! Ben Adhem's name led all the rest.

What I love about this poem is the remind...

It’s interesting that when Adam and Eve committed the original sin and became self aware, the first thing they did was to cover themselves up. It seems that shame was right there at the dawn of consciousness. This presents some interesting philosophical topics, and maybe we’ll take those up some other time. 

In a practical way, it’s important to understand that shame is something that runs deep. It’s a powerful primal force that pulls us into darkness. Hiding away and hoping to not be seen for who and what we are. Or more accurately, who and what we believe ourselves to be. 

Shame hides those things in ourselves that are too painful to face. Too scary to confront. Hiding from those very things becomes so habitual that they shape our personality. In part at least.  

Whether it expresses as the shy one who doesn’t want to ruffle any feathers, or the outspoken rebel picking fights to show how strong and independent they are, it masks the same insecurity. 

The Latin meaning of persona ...

Today we have more wisdom from The Great British Bakeoff.

In the beginning, you just have to not be the worst one. It’s something you hear a lot of the contestants say. I just didn’t want to be the first one to go.

They’re focused on not making too many mistakes. Stretching themselves just enough to keep up and stay in the game, but not beyond that. Not taking too many risks.

However, as the level increases, a transition must be made from “not losing” to “winning”

That’s the difference between ordinary and extraordinary.

You’re ALREADY extraordinary. You are the Divinity in Disguise. The question is will you choose to live into your True, divine nature, or will you settle for being “not the worst.”

The choice is yours. And truthfully, I don’t have an opinion about it so long as you’re at peace with your decision.

But I’m guessing if you’ve made it this far, you have an inkling about what lies beyond the facade of ordinary. Beyond the neatly labeled boxes we’ve put ourselves into...

When I was in marching band, we had a saying, “hurry up and wait.” I’ve heard military folks say this too. 

One of the things many people crave is consistency and stability. We want to know what’s coming. No unwelcome  surprises. 

And want a good flow in our lives and want it to pretty much stay the same, or within certain parameters. We want “balance.” 

But your life is not an automated assembly line. And we don’t see that kind of rigid consistency anywhere in nature. 

There are seasons in nature. In the winter, there is less activity. More things happening quietly below the surface. When spring rolls around all sorts of things start bubbling up and bursting forth. In summer it’s full out fun time. In fall, we start gathering for the winter ahead. 

Often in our lives, when things start to speed up, we start grasping for control. Or getting overwhelmed. 

When things slow down, we get bored and restless, or maybe feel like nothing is happening. 

In other words, we tend to resist ...

How many times have you hear people say, "It always gets worse before it gets better."

How many times have you said that yourself?

Is that so?

Does it NEED to?

Always?

See, I'm not even sure this is accurate. I think it's more accurate to say that things SEEM to get worse before they get better.

For example, health is the natural state. In order to move from illness to health, you don't infuse more health, you remove illness and disease.

But in the process of doing that, you start to find all the little nooks and crannies where that illness has been tucked away.

Real health is not a fragile thing. It takes a significant series of events to move from health to illness. Eventually those events reach a tipping point and BAM! Illness.

And when you turn the corner and start making different choices- more healthy choices- you start to clean out all of those dusty corners and it SEEMS worse.

But it's not worse. It's just showing you what's already there.

If you've ever cleaned out ...

By some accounts of metaphysicians, the human race is as much as 18,000 years behind on the evolution schedule. The evolution schedule is basically the idea that we are evolving or meant to evolve in sync with the universe itself.

Now whether you buy into these numbers or not, it's safe to say that our internal evolution has not kept pace with our technological evolution. Otherwise we wouldn't be seeing the epidemics of stress and anxiety along with the breakdown of our physical health after just a mere six to eight decades of living.

It seems that we humans are particularly prone to being distracted by day-to-day life and the world that we live in. Spiritual development is put off until later, when we "Have the time and the space" to pursue these more lofty goals. We tend to address the loudest problems or annoyances in our lives before we get to the subtle layers yet...

It's the subtle layers, which have the most profound influence on the physical world that we live in. So over a coup...

I was up early and it was completely dark, I started to hear the birds sing and it reminded me of this quote that I learned from my Vedanta teacher.

It says, “Faith is the bird that feels the light and sings when the Dawn is still dark.” And to me, this is the essence of real faith.

The bird knows beyond knowing that the sun is coming up before there is even a hint of light. And in ourselves, it is sometimes easy to get into a place of, ‘prove it’. We have a ‘prove it’ kind of attitude.

You think you can do that, ‘prove it’.

You think you're all that ‘prove it’.

You think you can have peace and healing, ‘prove it’. 

Then we get into a wait and see. I'll wait and see if it’s proven and with that we've implanted doubt in ourselves before we’ve even given ourselves a chance to get out of the gate. And when we don't see the results show up immediately, more doubt or when it doesn't look or feel like we think it's supposed to, more doubt...

This "wait and see" approach is nothing but...

We all encounter obstacles in our life. It's how we meet them that make all the difference in the world.

When things aren't going our way and obstacles are showing up, it starts a story in our heads. ‘The universe is working against me’, or ‘I must be doing it wrong. What's wrong with me?’ ‘I must be broken’. It gets to be very stressful very fast and what we're doing is actually over-potentializing the problem, which is basically giving it far too much energy and attention. When you do that, you're actually using the law of increase in reverse. So you’re increasing what you don't want, making it louder, making it bigger, pushing yourself further into the story and the drama of it. 

Instead, pause, take a deep breath, and say to yourself, “this must be exactly what I needed now”.

Why is that?

It's because the universe is actually working in your favor to get you what you want. As soon as you decided what you wanted, things start to move in that direction. So whatever is showing up...

Knowledge is power, but not in the way most people think.

I'm a voracious learner. Mostly out of necessity. I come from a family of smart, willful humans, so part of it is a survival instinct.

I also have more ideas than I know what to do with, and most of them require some kind of specific knowledge or skill. So I learn as fast and as best as I can to keep up with my own brain.

Yet learning can also be a trap.

In personal development especially, I've seen so many people reading endless books, taking endless courses, learning countless methods in order to "improve" themselves in some way.

It's important to be clear about the REAL goal here.

It's not to become more productive. It's to feel better about your productivity.

It's not to become a better version of yourself, it's to have more peace with who and what you are.

It's not to be kinder or more giving, it's to be happier.

It's about improving your experience of life.

And that's something I can really get behind. I mean, wh...