open heart

How To Stop Fear From Devastating Your Life

Fear ruins people’s lives. It can poison your dreams, terrorize your imagination, imprison you from doing things you want to experience, strangle your heart from opening, drown your creativity, blind you to the truth, and cripple you moving forward. Does any of this sound familiar? 

The most interested thing about fear is that it is not real. It always begins as a thought and then turns into a feeling sensation you have learned to call fear. 99% of what you fear is all in your mind.

Yet it still dominates the world. It is so powerful that fear has been used to control the masses for centuries. Just create an imagined enemy and people fall into doing what they’re told. 

Let’s talk about fear and what you can do about it.

Why Being Open Matters So Much

Life has a way of shaping you. Sometimes the formative experiences of life push you towards what or who you want to be and other times they bend you away from what matters. 

Experiences that open you up, make you available for all kinds of meaningful possibilities. Ones that cause you to close, be fearful or unsure can send you down a narrow path of less opportunities.

You can interpret life’s events and situation in ways that close you down. You might close your heart to keep safe, or close your mind to be right. You could even let emotions like fear run your life.

You can also take what comes your way and see it from the perspective of learning and growing. That way all experiences add more to your bank of understanding and awareness. You might actual learn to welcome adversity and challenges.

10 Ideas To Contribute To A Better World Today

The idea of people working together for a better world came to me as guidance from my higher nature. You may have had a similar inspiration. My higher nature is basically the same as yours. This more expanded knowing functions beyond our ordinary thought. If you and I realizing and expressing the potential in us we can encourage the full expression of those around us.  Together we can create a better world.

I found myself wanting to encourage everyone who is interested in co-creating a better world together, so I put together 10 ways you can begin today to make a positive difference:

1.         Be mindful of your thoughts and feelings and encourage those close to you to do the same.  Mindfulness is being tuned inward and self-aware which allows you to be true to who you are and genuine in your interactions with others. Mindfulness is a powerful practice because it helps you be fully present where everything that is possible and everyone who matters awaits you.  A good book to read and share with someone you care about and to encourage mindfulness is Peace Is Every Step by Thich Nhat Hahn a Zen monk who writes with great heart.

2.         Explore and express your purpose because expressing your purpose will fill your life with meaning and inspire others. You have a purpose that will make the world a better place if you express this purpose. If you can’t figure out what your purpose is today then try spreading love because that is most likely a purpose we all share. One of the great teachers of our time – Dr. Jean Houston is offering a powerful seminar on purpose. 

3.         As I said in the previous paragraph love is a purpose we all share. If you want to have a big impact on the world all you have to do is explore ways to open your heart, be caring and have compassion for self and others. An open heart is such a positive and powerful force in the world.  There is a wonderful meditation practice called, “loving-kindness” and you can learn more about this practice by studying with great teachers like Sharon Salzberg.

4.         Make kindness a daily practice and your life will be more joyous. Imagine if your job was to be kind to everyone you interact with throughout your day. How would your kindness enhance other people’s lives? How would this practice enhance yours? Make a list of people who could use a dose of kindness, reach out to them and spread a little love with your acts of kindness.  Check out this site about random acts of kindness. 

5.         Happiness is a choice, you can choose to be happy or not. If you choose happiness, you can bring your light out into the world and people will welcome it. Happiness comes easily when you focus on what you appreciate, when you are fully present, when you give to others, and when you connect with your higher nature.   Check out the Happiness Project for inspiration.

6.         Expand your consciousness, because with higher consciousness you bring greater light to everything you do.  The more aware and awake you are the more expand is your capacity to make a positive difference in the world.  If you take the time to tune inward you can access the highest collective consciousness of all intelligent life on the planet. Two excellent awakening books worth reading are: Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle and The Untethered Soul by Michael Singer

7.         Find your own truth because it will set you free and energize your life. Most of the beliefs and ideas you have came from others. Many of these beliefs and ideas need to be questioned because they are not true. The more you explore your own truth the more you live an authentic life. If you live in truth you can be at peace. No one can tell your what is true for you.  It always helps to tune inward, listen and question.  My own book – Awaken: 100 Questions To Expand Your Mind and Open Your Heart is an excellent resource for exploring your own truth.

8.         Live in the now where everything is happening. Much of the time your mind can be worrying about the future or unable to let go of the past. Today in this moment is all there ever is. In the now is the only place where you make things happen. By living in the now you can connect deeply with yourself and those around you. Joy, love, peace, hope and freedom exist only in the now.  The Power Of Now by Eckhart Tolle is a great resource for being in the now.

9.         Express your creativity, creativity opens you up to your genius. Creativity is very powerful and it comes in many forms including: writing, painting, poetry, movement, healing, parenting, business, humor, organization, loving, design, architecture, peace making, social activism and many other forms of personal expression. When you express your creativity it enriches those around you.  The Artist Way by Julia Cameron has inspired lots of creativity.

10.         Join together with others and have meaningful conversations. Meaningful conversations make you feel alive because you are a social being. Meaningful conversations come about when your heart is open and your feel compassionate for others. An open mind is also helpful for meaningful conversations because then you have the ability to listen and not judge.  After looking for good reference materials, I decided maybe it is time for a group of people to get together and create a meaningful conversations handbook.

There are many more ways to create a better world together than there are ways to create a better world by yourself. If you can find one other person to join you, your power to be effective multiplies. The world is waiting for you and I to step up and get involved. Are you ready to make a difference?