Search

Open Search

Start Where You Are

If you are anything like me, then you already want to be at the finish line when you haven’t even started the race.

There are moments in my life where I feel stuck because I haven’t yet completed my goals – or even worse, I haven’t even started. I feel like I am getting older and have no time to achieve anything because I should already have started, I should already have finished. Thinking that I am “too old” to start has limited me time and time again. It has made me unable to commit to anything meaningful to me because I feel like I should already be at the end, not at the beginning. I keep thinking that I should already have “arrived” where I want to be in my professional life, and because I should already have arrived, then it’s too late to start. I realize, however, that this sort of belief is extremely limiting to me and keeps me from making real moves towards what I would like to accomplish.

The truth is that there is no wrong time to start. There is only here and now, and that is always an enough of a place to begin anything. As long as I am alive, I can move in the direction I wish – even if it takes tiny steps. Tiny steps in the right direction lead to large shifts over time.
So the best place to start is right where I am, as I am.

I realize that beating myself up for not being where I want to be does not serve my best interest. In fact, it only helps to sink me further into non-action and makes me feel horrible about myself.
If I want to lose 10 pounds, for instance, beating myself up for not already being 10 pounds lighter does not serve me in any positive way, it only discourages me. I must simply acknowledge where I am and from here, take steps to where I want to be without calling myself “a lazy fat-ass” in the process. Calling myself mean names and telling myself I am lazy, isn’t helping me. It isn’t making me feel any better and it isn’t motivating me to achieve my goal. Rather than being mean to myself I can, instead, tell myself “I acknowledge that I haven’t been very active, but that’s okay because starting NOW, I am active.”

Whatever change we wish to make in our lives is possible. Whatever you were doing yesterday, whether it be committing to the wrong career, relationship or diet, starting today you can move into the direction of where you actually want to be. You can start making changes today without beating yourself up for yesterday. Yesterday is gone, today – NOW, offers you new opportunities to begin a path that is in line with what you truly wish to achieve. If you are reading this, then you are alive – and as long as you are alive then there is still time for you to move towards your goals. Start where you are and with what you have. I know that it is tempting to want to be at the finish line – and you will be – as long as you start just as you are, today.

0

Cry

Comedian, Dane Cook, was not kidding when he said that in life we will do three things: Lie, take painful sh*ts, and cry.

I want to talk about crying and why it’s not at all a sign of weakness but rather a release system that we should embrace whenever necessary. Too often people will say “oh, don’t cry,” and though they usually mean it in a caring way, I want to tell you that if you need to cry, cry.

Crying does not mean you’re weak. Crying does not mean you’re a baby. Crying is your body’s way of purging the emotions within. It is your body expressing itself through tears because our emotions are at times so complex that words are not sufficient to describe or express them.

For men, especially, crying can be a difficult process to embrace because our society conditions most men to think that they must be macho and strong and that crying makes you a “sissy” or a “girl.” This couldn’t be further from the truth. Crying makes you stronger. It is a mechanism that allows you to soothe your emotions by releasing them from your body.

Crying is healing. Crying is completely okay.
So when you need to cry – be not embarrassed about it. Allow yourself to purge. You will feel lighter and your body will feel more at ease.

0

The “Word” of God is Not Limited to The Bible

Disclaimer: Dear reader, this post is coming from the most genuine place of my heart and has zero intention of denying anyone’s knowledge, but rather including everyone’s knowledge to produce harmony by way of unity.

Believing that the Bible is the full and complete word of God is very limiting. First, because the word of God is so infinitely and immeasurably grand that a book is insufficient to contain it. Secondly, because words are extremely limiting and not adequate basis with which to measure the fullness of God.

Everything that IS, is the “word” of God.
The “word” of God isn’t even words to begin with, though it may in part be experienced through words.

To conceive of God through the notions of one book alone means to limit God. To understand more of God we must be able to allow ALL forms of information and knowledge to pass through our consciousness.

When we open a Biology book and we begin to learn about cells, organisms, life, the human body, among other biological aspects, for instance, we are coming into contact with more of the word of God. When we read a chemistry book and we learn about molecules, atoms, elements, chemicals – we are learning more of the word of God.

How do you know when the water has boiled and at what temperature? The Bible does not tell us – but a science book does. And a science book, too, is the word of God.

When we learn about technology and how planes fly, how cars move, how our cellphones operate – the Bible will not tell us this – but a mechanics, physics, and technology book can.  And this too, is the word of God.

How does the optometrist know how to perform laser surgery to restore eye sight? Does he read the Bible to figure it out? No. He reads books on the subject matter of eye surgery. This, too, is the word of God.

When you put together your Ikea furniture, do you read the Bible or the manual? You read the manual. This, too, is the word of God.

ALL information – past, present, future is the word of God. There is nothing that exists outside of the “word” of God. ALL THAT IS IS THE WORD OF GOD.

We must not exclude anything because to exclude any one thing is to limit the unlimited. The unlimited contains EVERYTHING. So to take only one tiny book and claim that it alone is the word of God is EXTREMELY limiting and I urge you to open your understanding and come to see that God is not limited by books. God is not limited by words.

Words are just sounds we make with our mouths as so to communicate ideas which we have formulated by way of experience. We must use the words as pointers for our expansion, not limits that constrain our growth and hinder our full understanding of the universe.

0

There is Nothing Bad About You

Allowing yourself to be means accepting all of you. Even the parts you believe are “bad,” “inappropriate” or “scary.”

For so long I have been trying to deny the darker aspects of my personality. For so long I have been telling myself that it’s not okay to feel sad or mad or angry. I would tell myself that there is something wrong with me because I feel sad often times. I would see myself as a problem when I became angry or upset. I would try hard to change my feelings and to deny my tears with a smile. It is common that when I tell people “I am sad” they respond with something like “don’t be sad,” as if being sad is wrong and something that we shouldn’t experience.
But I am learning that my feelings are valid. All of them. I am learning that my body works in my favor and that my feelings exist to communicate with me.
When I am sad, rather than resisting my sadness, I have to allow my sadness to be. I must allow myself to be sad without feeling sad that I am sad. Feeling sad that I am sad or beating myself up for experiencing “negative” feelings only adds to my negative feeling. It is like throwing more wood, or in this case emotion, into the fire.

Are you sad?

Ok. Good.
It is okay to be sad.
Be sad. Let it be because it is there to help you.
Be there with your sadness right now.
Tell your sadness that it is okay for it to be here and that you have no intention of shunning it away like if it were an enemy. Tell it that you understand that it is here to help you interpret your experience. Tell it that you hear its voice telling you there is something you may want to change or there is something that you do not like.
It is okay not to like something.
It is okay to want to change something.
It is okay to be sad. Breathe with your sadness.

Do not resist yourself. Do not resist your body. Do not resist parts of yourself. Allow yourself to sink deeper and embrace all of who you are. All of who you are is working together for your best interest.
Your body is working in your favor at all times.
At all times your body is trying to heal itself and bring you into homeostasis. Your emotions are working to help you – do not beat yourself up for anything that you feel.
Instead, listen to your body.
Does it feel angry?
Does it feel upset?
Does it feel hurt?
Talk to it.
Listen to it.
Dwell in it.
Know that it is protecting you and trying to bring you into your best place.

Do not feel bad for what you feel.
All that you are, good and bad, is good.
Be. Be all that you are.

0

THE PROCESS OF BECOMING

Who are you?
Answer: ___________________________

You might answer this question by telling me your name. Your age, cultural background, your social security number, and yada, yada, yada.

But see – that’s not really who you are. That’s information you have acquired from what the external world has determined for you.
You are the awareness of these things.
You are not your name, you are the awareness of your name.
You are not your age, you are the awareness of your age.
You are not your cultural background, you are the awareness of your cultural background.

Get the drift? I hope so.

“So what? So what if I am the awareness of that stuff?”

YAY! Great news, my friend!
Being awareness means that you get to choose your own reality!
It is up to YOU to decide what to accept or reject into your field of awareness.

So the process of becoming is simply asking yourself what are you aware of.
What thoughts are you aware of? Your own? Those imposed on you by others? A little bit of both?

If you realize that you have adopted the thoughts of others rather than your own, this isn’t a bad thing. It isn’t a good thing either. It just IS. This is how we grow – by exchanging ideas with one another.

Things are what they are – things ARE. PERIOD. Whether something is good or bad depends on the preference of the aware being.

So, for instance, the experience of eating chocolate ice cream may be good for me because to my awareness I experience something good from eating it. Someone else, however, may be eating from my chocolate ice cream cup yet have a distasteful experience because to their awareness they experience something bad from eating chocolate ice cream. There is nothing in the particles of chocolate ice cream itself that is coded with “goodness” or “badness” – these types of labeling are judgements of the experiencer based on the effect a particular thing has in combination to their particular being – to their awareness.

So what am I ultimately saying?
– Become YOU.

Do you like chocolate ice cream because YOU like chocolate ice cream or have you come to like chocolate ice cream because people might think you are cool if you eat chocolate ice cream?

Or fill it in this blank:
Do you like ___________ because YOU like _________ or do you like___________ because you believe X person(s) want you to like ___________?

Are you YOU because YOU take pleasure in who you are or are you YOU because of what you believe other people want you to be?
And maybe it’s a combination of both.
It isn’t bad to tag along with what others think is cool – that’s fine – we have words for that: admiration, inspiration, sharing, absorption, learning.
It only becomes a problem when you are not happy with yourself because you are not being true to who you are but are living a life that is decorated by what others want you to be.

When we seek to be what others want us to be, we are seeking approval.
We are seeking approval from others because we have failed to approve of ourselves just as we are. Somewhere along the way we adopted the awareness that “the way I am, as I am, is not good enough.”

Not good enough to whose awareness?

See, as long as to YOUR awareness you are enough, then no matter who tells you “YOU ARE NOT ENOUGH,” this statement will fall flat on its feet – it will have no power over you. It would be the same as a person telling me over and over “chocolate ice cream sucks.” This statement has no power over me because to MY awareness – CHOCOLATE ICE CREAM FUCKING ROCKS!

Be YOU Because YOU like it – whatever it is that you are. And if others like you too – AWESOME – if not, who cares? NOT YOU is all that matters. It is not for their awareness to decide what YOUR AWARENESS KNOWS TO BE TRUE FOR YOU.

YOUR AWARENESS IS ALL THE MATTERS.

Become YOU.
🙂 ❤

0

John

I will tell you about John.

John is a good guy. He walks around trying to do the “right thing.” He smiles at people hoping people will smile back. He yearns to connect; he yearns to be accepted and to accept back.

John loves all people. Even people with three or four heads and eyes. Even purple people, blue people, orange people and invisible people.
John is very curious.
John is scared sometimes because he doesn’t like pain. But he does like it when the nurse comes along and rubs alcohol on his boo-boo. It makes him feel loved. Like someone cares about his well-being.

John likes to play. He wishes he could play all day. He wishes he could climb trees and pretend he is a pirate looking out into the ocean for some loot and new found land.
But there is a thing called “job” he has to do.
John doesn’t necessarily dislike the idea of a job – he understands how important functions are to a well operating society. What John doesn’t like is when he is forced to play roles he doesn’t feel comfortable playing.

John wants to walk around the world and give everyone little paper hearts because he wants people to remember how to love.
John wants people to know how to see not just with the eyes, but with their whole entire being.

John gets angry sometimes. He gets angry when the world expects him to be more than what he already is. It is not that John doesn’t want to be more – or “expand” as he would call it, it’s that John wants the freedom to grow at his own pace.

John doesn’t like when he is corrected in a condescending way.
John wants to be the best John he can be and wants to be spoken to in a loving manner, not in a punishing manner.

John is tired now.

I will share more about him another day.

0

Trust Yourself

There are so many people out there saying so many different things that it can become really overwhelming sometimes. One particular type of statement that really gets on my nerves is the one that sounds something like: “It’s not this, but THIS.” The problem with this kind of statement is that sooner or later someone else will just say the exact opposite: “No, It’s not ‘THIS,’ but THAT!”
People will always have something to say about life and how it should or shouldn’t be, but at the end of the day it’s not their place to tell you what you should do or how you should live.
Only you have the power to decide what to do with your life and in which direction to stir it.

Instead of asking what others want from you or what they think you should do, start consulting your own being. Next time you get an urge to ask your friends what they think you should do, stop for a moment and look inside yourself and ask your very own self: “Hey, [speak your name], do you think I should do this?” Start to look within your own self and trust your decisions. Everyone has an opinion, and YOUR opinion is just as valid.

Trust your intuition. Trust the feelings that are guiding you. Let your own person shine. Let your ideas flow. Stop worrying about earning the approval of others and begin to approve yourself.

Every day tell yourself these words:
I am enough.
I approve myself.
I accept myself as I am.
I am capable of making my own choices.
I trust my own being.
I believe in myself.
I believe I will succeed.

Let your own voice be heard. Free yourself from needing the validation of others and start looking to yourself for validation. It can be tempting to want others to pat our backs so that we can feel we are accepted and belong, but once you start to accept yourself it will not matter who is for or against you because you will have everything you need – YOU.

Only YOU can walk your path and only YOU are living your life.
Your life does not belong to your friends.
Your life does not belong to your family.
Your life belongs to YOU – and YOU are the author of your story.
Be free to live your life according to your liking without fear of the judgement of others.
As long as you are not hurting yourself or others, there is no reason to be afraid of being yourself.
YOU ARE FREE TO BE YOU!

3

3 of Many Rants: Subject: Feeling like a slave

SP32-20150412-143752 I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to keep working 40+ hours a week only to receive very little compensation in return, to live in neighborhoods that are not well kept, and be able to afford the bare minimal essentials.

Ugh. This life really sucks when you work, work, work yet have a low quality of life. It’s like I am a slave. Not to mention that many of the high paying jobs out there usually require me to sell people shit they don’t need and profit over the little guy.

WE ARE NOT A PRICE TAG YOU SCUM BAGS!

0

I am not sure what to call this

There is this deep empty feeling inside me sometimes because I yearn to connect on a true level with other humans but there are barriers stopping real communication. Barriers like titles, and jobs, roles, names and personalities, among other things.

I don’t really know what I am trying to tell you, partially because I don’t know if you’ll understand, and partially because it’s complicated.

I often feel like I am not from this world. So much of my perception is not in line with common perceptions. Although I can perceive the common, I am always seeing beyond it.

I want to communicate with more than just words. I want to be able to use hand gestures and a variety of facial expressions that communicate what I perceive so that you could understand more profoundly what I mean. I want to be able to hum you a sound that translates to the idea that I am having so you could understand what I actually mean. I want to twirl and skip and dance my feelings so you could have a more layered understanding of what I am conveying to you. I want to see you – fully as you are and I want you to see me, fully as I am. I want to understand you, truly understand you and I want you to understand me, truly understand me. I want to know your ways and want you to know my ways so that we could have a deeper understanding of reality and the world.

Sometimes while on the NYC subway I observe my surroundings and see that everyone is in their own little world and I think to myself, “There goes my brother/sister, and I don’t even know him/her.”

I want to transcend. 
I want to break free.
I want to be free.
I want to fly. Fly with me.
May there be harmony all around.
Release me, you poison! Disinfect my soul.

0

Blog at WordPress.com.

Up ↑