Morning Reflection: Realign

Realign

Do you ever get that feeling that your life is out of alignment. Everything is still somewhat the same, but at the same time it’s not. It’s like that feeling you get when you know you’ve forgotten something, but you can’t put your finger on exactly what that is.

You have the strangest sensation that you are supposed to be some other time, some other place, some other life. Like your reality is in the midst of a transition, and you’ve left where you can no longer be, but you’re desperately trying to figure out the destination.

And sometimes the past keeps trying to drag you back.

It’s comfortable, yet confining. It’s familiar, yet fails to resonate with your soul. It’s understood, but underwhelming. Sure, moving back to where you were might feel good for a while, but eventually you’ll come back full circle to the very same problems that made you want to move on in the first place.

So you realize that going back is probably not your destination, but where to go forwards?

It helps if you have a concept of the place you wish to end up in, but that can often be a description rather than a clearly defined destination. Maybe you’re looking for the intersection of authentic and uplifting, right around the corner from loving and kind.

But sometimes, all you know is that here is no longer the place you can feel at home, so you walk out into the universe…

With only your soul to guide your journey.

I’ve been working on a transition for a while now, trying to discover the truths deep inside of me, that have been buried under fears and familiarity. I only have faintest idea of where I am going, and some days even that seems to fade out of view completely. When that happens, I try to focus on the next step, and the next, and the next.

Because life rarely comes with directions, but occasionally, the universe leaves breadcrumbs.

As I consider this move, this next transition in my life, I realize that I have to become comfortable with being uncomfortable; accepting that not having all the answers is in itself an answer from a universe that is generous with its questions, while being parsimonious with its solutions.

If I wait to know everything, I will never progress beyond where I am, and will end up buried under the weight of broken dreams, full of regret and remorse.

So forward I move, each step into the darkness a personal statement of faith, and trust.

Trust in myself, that I can forge a future from the detritus of dreams and desires. Trust in the goodness of others who will show up on my journey to guide and give counsel.

Trust in even the very concept that this is a future to align myself with, and most of all, trust that I can overcome my weaknesses and failings as I seek to serve others on the pathway of purpose with which I am trying to align myself.

Realignment, I have found, is not easy.

But they tell me nothing worthwhile ever is.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: The Collapse of Time

The Collapse of Time.

When I was a teenager in England, we used to play a game called “Smelling the Roses”. It sounds innocuous enough, until you discover that the goal is to have as much of your body as you feel comfortable with hanging outside of a moving car.

My standard protocol for this game was to have everything but one hand and half of a foot inside the vehicle. My record was 104 miles per hour.

It was dangerous, it was reckless, and it was wonderful.

Because in that moment, with the wind trying to blow your lungs apart, every breath was a struggle. In that moment, you knew that one single mistake, or a lapse in concentration could leave you dead, or wishing that you were.

I didn’t do it for the notoriety, or to prove a point. I used to do it because in that moment, when I was closer to death than I had any business being…

Time collapsed into now.

In that moment, there is no past, there is no future. The sensory overload forces every part of your brain into processing this point in time, so that now is all there is.

All the hurt from the past, all the hope for the future just fades away into an incredible clarity of thought, feeling and spirit that is only now, and yet now also gives you an amazing perspective of eternity, of your past, of your future.

It all melds into one, and yet expands into everything.

I found the collapse of time again when I jumped out of an aircraft at 13,000 feet, strapped to a man I’d known for about 30 minutes. The sensation of falling at over 120 miles an hour brought me again into a collapsed now.

I can only describe it as the most spiritual experience of my life, feeling like I was at once separated and connected to every moment, every person, everywhere. Every sensation was alive, heightened, enhanced and connected, and all happening now, now and most of all, now.

If that sounds crazy, I understand. I think you really have to try it sometime to understand what I mean.

So many of us live our lives trapped in the past, or fearful of the future. In our desire to avoid the judgment of others, we trade the possibility of now for the regret of tomorrow. If we live outside of now, we never fully understand the joy and the wonder that this moment, and this one, and this one, have to offer.

If you truly wish to experience life in every breath, you have to make every breath count.

Which means you have to collapse your time into now. Through meditation, through experiences, through excitement and through intention. Once you find your way into now, you’ll see the future and the past as one eternal possibility, and then make your decisions based not on what could be, but on what is.

When you learn time, time becomes your healer, your guide and your friend.

So today, I invite you to try to live in the moment for at least a few minutes, and see how it changes you. You don’t have to jump for it, or risk your life for it. All you have to do is decide that you will live this moment intentionally, focusing not on what was, or what will be, but solely on what is right in front of you.

As the teacher Ram Dass once said, “Be here, Now”.

And you’ll find that now holds all the secrets, excitement, power and wonder that you’ll ever need.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: Lost in the Valley of Right and Wrong

Lost in the Valley of Right and Wrong.

How much of your life do you spend worrying about ‘doing the right thing’? How do you even know what the right thing is? I often talk to people who expend a great deal of their emotional energy every day worrying about whether their actions, belief and behaviors are acceptable and meeting some arbitrary standard.

At some point, I usually ask them the one question that stops them in their tracks….

Why are you allowing someone else’s viewpoint to have more importance than your own?

Which is when they usually stare at me like I’ve suddenly started speaking in a foreign language, which in some ways I probably have. For too many people, the idea of trusting their own instincts and beliefs more than ANYONE ELSE’s is a scary concept for most people.

I think this starts in childhood, when it is necessary, and then as we grow we begin to accept the opinions of others rather than risk sticking our head up above the crowd.

So we find safety and certainty in the crowded world of other people’s opinions.

Now please understand, I’m not advocating narcissism, nor the adoption of the principles and procedures of a psychopath – far from it. What I do find in working with people is that so much of people’s concerns are centered around the thoughts and acceptance of people who really don’t have the right to have an opinion on your life.

Yet we worry constantly about what they think about us.

For me, there are a very few people who’s opinion holds a significant weight in my life. My wife’s opinion is probably the second most important in my life, closely followed by my children, and then my sister-in-law, mother-in-law and a few close friends.

If you read that carefully, you probably realized that the number one opinion in my life wasn’t listed, and yet I’m guessing you’ve already figured out whose opinion it is.

That’s right. Mine.

And if that sounds a little full of myself, please understand that I don’t mean it that way. It’s not that I am so great at working things out – I’m not. I make my share of mistakes like anyone else, and some of them, I have to tell you, are immense.

It also doesn’t mean that I don’t listen to anyone else’s point of view – it means quite the opposite. I listen to the thoughts and opinions of the people in my life a lot.

But eventually, I have to choose what I think is right.

Because that forces me to make my decisions, and not outsource the responsibility for my choices on others. If I make a choice, I try to own it as much as humanly possible, because I think any other way is to live in a way that is not authentic, and allows me to live in a way that avoids the consequences if one of my choices affects someone else in a way that doesn’t sit well with them.

So when I make a choice, you can pretty much guarantee that it’s been thought through.

I wish I could tell you that I never make a choice based on how other people will think about it, but I’m not that far along in my journey yet.

I will say that in the big decisions, the ones that really matter, I am trying to be better at making the choice that I think is right, according to my ethical beliefs, my desires, my responsibilities and my values.

And then I choose, and live with it, regardless of what others may think.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: The Battles You Choose

The Battles You Choose.

If you’ve lived any length of time, you know that every life, no matter how wonderful it seems from the outside, has its own share of troubles. Some days they are few and far between, and on other days they come at you thick and fast, relentless and merciless.

Those are the times when all you can do is try to keep your head above water, and focus on staying afloat, when everything tries to pull you down.

But in the midst of that madness, you find the battles you choose to fight, even though you don’t have to.

I have an amazing sister-in-law who lives close to us. A survivor of a difficult marriage, and an ugly divorce, she has fought her way back into the light after struggling for a time to find the very core of who she is.

As a single mother of 3 incredible children, she’s wears herself out every day trying to make sure that her kids have a wonderful life.

And she’s doing an amazing job of it.

Sometimes, it’s my privilege and honor to help her out with things. Maybe it’s being knee deep in her pool, trying to clean out the dirty water that has accumulated over the winter, or sitting down with one of the kids and standing in the place of a father figure, helping them to find the truths of themselves under the misunderstandings that they absorbed from the distance of someone who should have been there for them, but wasn’t.

Sometimes it’s holding her as she cries, and giving her the space to lay down her burdens for a moment and find a period of rest to her soul.

Through all of this, she feels like she is a burden to me, and while I can understand why she might feel that way, I think there are things that she doesn’t understand, and maybe you don’t either.

I hope that sharing this truth today might help you understand a little more about yourself, and her understand a little more about me.

Because the battles you choose to fight when you don’t have to, are the ones that help you stay sane amidst all the ones you didn’t choose.

The simple difference is choice, and it’s the most important difference in the world. Fighting a fight that you didn’t choose can make you feel like you have no control in what happens to you. It’s something you have to do, and although it often makes a difference in your life, there’s usually little in the battle that uplifts your soul.

But the battles you choose – they’re usually because it makes a difference to someone else.

That sense of being able to serve, give, love and care for another human being is very often the source of strength that we need to go on when our own battles, the ones we did not choose, threaten to overwhelm us and force us to our knees.

But in serving another, in caring for another, we rise.

So today, if someone is helping you when they seem to be carrying the weight of the world on their shoulders, please understand that the ability to help you may be the very thing that is giving them the strength to keep going, the reason to keep rising.

Because the truest definition of a human being is not what they do when they had to , but what they choose to do when they didn’t have to.

Our self assumed responsibilities are very often the things that give us a sense of purpose, of growth, and of contribution, in a world that tries to make us feel like we have little or nothing to contribute, little or no value to our souls.

If someone has chosen to help you, be grateful and let them serve. Because you may never know how grateful they are for the chance.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: Beachfront

Beachfront.

I can feel it. The water rushing over my toes, over my feet, my ankles and the lower part of my leg. The cold startles me, while my mind screams for joy. The smell of the salt in the air enters my nose, evoking memories of years gone by, days spent at the ocean, nights on the beach.

I feel the stress loosen its vice-like grip across my shoulders and I take a deep breath, and release. And like the waves now rushing away from me, I feel my soul rejoice as the tension leaves me.

There’s something magical about the ocean.

For me the pounding of the waves, with their ebb and flow, is the heartbeat of the world. The pebbles on the beach remind me of the planets of the universe, too numerous to count and infinite in their variety. Together, the smell, the sound and the touch of the ocean are the greatest medicine for my soul, allowing me to breathe both physically and emotionally.

Giving me a perspective that I find only at the beach, or in the mountains.

For years, I’ve practiced a meditation visualization involving the beach and the ocean. It began after reading a description of an beach in a book by one of my very favorite authors.

From his words, I began to craft my own vision of the beach, and to make it real in my mind by consistent practice of visualizing myself there, feeling what I would feel, smelling what I would smell and most of all, experiencing the joy and timeless perspective.

I call it “The Nowhere Place”.

For in my vision I kneel in the breakwater as the waves break over my legs. In front of me, there is only ocean, and either side of me, stretching out through eternity, is a beachfront, with waves breaking and retreating.

Behind me there is nothing but sand as far as the eye can see. There are no people present, no other lives, just the constant flow of the ocean, and my presence in this place where none can be.

Not even time.

For in the Nowhere Place there is only ‘Now’ and ‘Here’, which is how we get the word. As I enter the Nowhere Place, I can use the timelessness of the moment as a canvas on which to display my worries, my fears, and my thoughts.

I can use the lack of other people to examine my thoughts without fear of embarrassment or judgment. I use the enormity and eternal nature of this place to gain perspective when I am lost in the distraction of the moment.

For when I am just now and here, I too am eternal in my perspective.

As time fades away, and as the opinions of others crumble, I am able to find my true nature, and listen to the heartbeat of my soul, finding the authentic pathways forwards so that I may resonate a true note within the orchestral majesty of humanity and the universe in which it plays.

As I experience the unification of now as eternity, I realize that I am at one with all and the universe.

And I can think, feel, act and love accordingly.

While I cannot invite you into my Nowhere Place, may I today extend an invitation to you, and ask you to begin to build your own place within your soul where you can find the peace and tranquility of the truth of you, and find healing, understanding, and a wellspring of joy and contentment.

And may you find peace.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: The End of You

The End of You.

It’s a human need to feel connected to someone else, and most of the time, those connections are the source of the greatest joys in life.

Some very special friends of ours just had their first child this morning, and will soon be experiencing the overwhelming joy and terror that is taking your baby home for the first time, and wallowing in the incredible love and connection you have for the new life that has been entrusted to you.

Even when you are so tired that you can sleep standing up 🙂

As a source of connection, the bond of a parent to a child is usually only eclipsed by the relationship between two people who love each other romantically.

In a dance that has been repeated throughout nature since the beginning of time, we give of ourselves into that relationship and hopefully feel the resonance of their soul with ours, each other strengthening, and taking strength from, the other.

Almost like we become one together.

Which sounds like a wonderful idea, and might be, if it really happened. In reality though, we never truly become one with anyone else, and that’s probably a good thing, because to do so would give up the most essential component of both our consciousness and our humanity...our responsibility to be ourselves, to look after ourselves and to care for ourselves.

And to be separate from anyone else.

Too many times I see relationships that have strayed into a place where one or both of the people involved is either giving too much to the relationship, or trying to take too much out of the relationship.

This could be a parent who needs their child to be/act a certain way in order to feel ‘accomplished’ or ‘worthy’ as a parent, or a romantic partner who needs their significant other to prop up their own emotional needs at the cost of that partner’s health, sanity and well-being.

Neither of these situations are good for any of the people involved.

Conversely, it could be a person who has given so much of themselves trying to fulfill a partner who can never be made whole until they do the work needed on themselves, or a child who tries over and over again to become the person their parent needs them to be, weakening their sense of self in pursuit of an acceptance that should have been given without conditions.

In this, I do not intend to assign blame, because blame is the refuge of the immature and the hurt. Both are to be pitied, and loved into a higher state of being.

One of the greatest steps you’ll ever take in your journey on this earth is to realize that you are your own person, and so is everyone else. When you come to understand that your emotional well-being, your sense of self, and your happiness are independent of anyone else’s choices, you begin the journey of becoming the truest expression of you that you can ever be.

Knowing where you begin, and end, allows you the freedom to be who you were born to be, and also grants unto you the ability to gift that freedom to others.

Because only when you are truly free of need from someone can you freely give of yourself to them.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: Why are you not grateful?

Why are you not grateful?

I am probably the most ungrateful person I’ve ever met, and please understand, I’m not using false modesty here. I honestly struggle with being grateful, even though there are people in my life who have been incredibly kind and generous towards me.

And while I have gone out of my way to express my gratitude to them, I really wish I felt it more than I do.

And that’s a difficult thing to admit.

Because I have so many things to be grateful for. I have an incredible wife who manages to put up with my many, many weaknesses and failings. I have two wonderful children, who are growing into incredible young men.

The relationship I have with them is beyond explanation.

I have a wonderful extended family who have welcomed me into their lives without exception, and I love my wife, kids and family more than I can ever fully express.

Yet still I don’t feel as grateful as I think I should.

So I’ve struggled with this question for a long time, and as usual, the answer came to me while I was writing this reflection.

Initially this post was about how our expectations blind us to the things that can make us grateful, because when we don’t get our own way, or life doesn’t meet our expectations, we feel like we have been cheated and focus on what we don’t have, rather than what we do.

But I realized that wasn’t the complete answer, and that I needed to go deeper.

So I spent more time thinking, meditating and wondering, until the truth arrived calmly and clearly. What struck me as funny was that it was the application of a truth I had seen in others, but had yet been unable to see in myself. (I’ll never cease to be amazed at how blind we are to the truths of ourselves). Once I understood this, everything else made more sense.

While I was grateful, the things I was grateful for were not the things my soul desperately hungers for.

Let me try to explain it to you this way. Imagine you found a homeless man on a sidewalk in the middle of winter. He had no shoes, no coat, and nowhere to shelter from the cold. Out of your kindness you gave him shoes, and a coat, and he thanked you for them and went on his way.

While he was grateful for the things you had given him, his soul still hungered for a place to stay, and more importantly, a way out of his personal darkness that had led him to be there in the first place.

His deeper needs were overpowering his ability to feel as grateful as he could have otherwise been.

Thankfully I have never been homeless, and I don't mean to equate my problems with those who are. I use this analogy to explain some of the needs I have because of the feelings in my soul.

Although I have shoes, I struggle to find confidence. Although I have a coat, I struggle to find a sense of acceptance of myself. Although I have a home, I struggle feeling like I am enough, worthy of love and acceptance.

And these deep needs sometimes overwhelm me, and smother the gratitude I would otherwise feel.

Which leaves me in a difficult place, because none of these needs are things that can be given by anyone else.

If I am to find confidence, I must face my fears and work through them. If I am to find an acceptance of myself, I have to find a place in my soul for self compassion. If I am to feel like I am enough, I have to find the ability to love myself in spite of my many flaws.

Once I find those things within me, I hope I will also discover the gratitude that eludes me.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: When the ‘One’ thing turned out to be nothing at all

When the ‘One’ thing turned out to be nothing at all.

I think I’ve always been looking for that one thing. One simple action that I could take that would precipitate a cascade of positive events, and ultimately end up changing my life for the better.

I hunted for it for many years, believing that there was something I could do, some new technique that would bring all my hopes and dreams to fruition.

And as seems to be the case fairly often, I was pretty significantly wrong.

Not that there wasn’t one thing – oh no. There definitely was a thing. It was just that I tried doing all sorts of things, and some of them ended up being helpful, but they simply weren’t the one.

Getting up early in the morning, trying different ways to be organized, leveraging positive motivation, threatening negative motivation. All of them have their place at certain times, but none of them were the one thing.

Because it turned out that the thing was actually nothing at all.

The greatest thing that turned out to be the one thing was trying to do nothing, and most importantly think ‘nothing’. I was surprised when I discovered that the key to becoming more productive, better focused, happier and more connected to my inner self and the world around me was to try resting my mind in a state of calm relaxation, and just allowing my soul to drift.

Which is a lot more difficult than it sounds.

The practice of meditation is so old that no one really knows when it started. There are many different styles, practices and teachers, which is life’s way of telling us that there’s no ‘right or wrong way’. You get to decide what works for you. All you have to do it just do it, which is doing nothing. With all the noise, distractions and opportunities around us, it takes a little bit of willpower to get started…

But once you begin, everything starts to change.

Meditation will challenge you, and at first really frustrate you. Finding a point of balance in your mind takes much more focus than you can imagine. Upon starting my meditation practice, my normally creative and hyperactive mind rebelled hard.

Guess what – it’s still doing that. I still struggle to maintain a balance, that moment of eternal calm and being present that lifts up my soul and allows me to transcend my weaknesses.

But the really wonderful thing about meditation is even just trying brings its own rewards.

As I sit in silence, or with music to guide me, I find a greater perspective on my trials and troubles. My willpower increases, as I am able to reinforce hopes and dreams and actually execute on them in the real world.

I can visualize desired outcomes and invite the universe to participate with me, holding the emotion of gratitude at the forefront of my soul, allowing the energy to resonate out into wherever it goes.

And most of all, I can feel my soul being refreshed and comforted.

If you’ve never tried meditation, I humbly ask you to give it a try. If you’ve tried it before and given up, may I invite you to go back and try it again.

If your practice is intermittent, may you find the space in your world to increase your frequency, and if you practice it every day, may you share that with a friend, and bring a greater harmony into the world.

The purpose of meditation is really to quiet your mind, so you can better discover who you are.

May you find peace in your soul, today and always.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: Dark Points of Light

Dark Points of Light.

I was 17 when I first got my heart broken. We had been dating for 18 months, and at one point we sort of got engaged (we were teenagers – what did we know). When it finally fell apart, as it was always going to do, I took it really hard.

To tell you how long I mourned over that breakup would be pretty embarrassing, but if I’m going to be honest with you, it was probably longer than we dated. She was my first serious girlfriend, and it hurt. A lot.

And at the time, I couldn’t see through the darkness I felt.

I felt very much the same approximately 21 years ago, when my oldest child was born. On what should have been a day of joy and rejoicing, when he was only a few hours old, we received news that he would require open heart surgery to correct a problem in the major vessels of his heart.

There’s no real way to explain how that feels, nor properly describe the enveloping darkness that reaches into your own heart at a time like that.

All I could focus on was how bad it could have been, and what could go wrong.

Over the years, there have been other events that were to rival these. Things that occurred that seemed to usher in a time in my life where everything light and wonderful had been taken from me, and darkness was all that was left.

Although they may not have been as direct as a break up or a life threatening condition, they were still things that left a dark indelible scar on my soul.

In the moment, they seemed to be the end of a dream, and the beginning of a nightmare.

But in hindsight, every time, it was actually something that was changing my path towards something better. The break up that hurt so bad at 17 prepared me for a few more breakups, that eventually led to meeting and marrying the wonderful woman I am privileged to call my wife today.

What looked liked incredible darkness was actually a dark point of light, illuminating a new pathway into my future. I just didn’t have the eyes to see it at that time.

The same was true at the birth of my son.

What I couldn’t see than was the incredible gratitude I would feel 2 weeks ago when he finished the Spartan Race. There were many competitors that day, but I don’t know if any of them have been through what he has, and still had the courage to run, and lift, and fight through it all.

What looked like darkness 21 years ago was in fact another dark point of light.

And this is what I try to remember anytime I find myself in a place where there it seems like the light has gone out, and the darkness is closing in.

I remember that even darkness has it’s uses, and that sometimes the choices we make when we can’t see are the choices we needed to make, but never would have if we could have seen them in the light.

Sometimes, not seeing too far ahead is the grace that allows us to move at all.

Today, I invite you to share your dark points of light, and what you learned and how you grew from them. I truly believe that the more we share our experiences with each other, the more we can uplift, edify and ennoble each other.

Until we all find ourselves in the perfect light of day

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: One Smile Away from a Great Day

One Smile Away from a Great Day.

What are the odds on you being you? I mean seriously, when you stop and think about it, there are so many things that had to go right for you to end up as who you are.

It’s been calculated by people a lot smarter than I am that the odds of just being human are somewhere around 400 trillion to one. That number is so insanely large we really don’t have a good way to emotionally experience it.

How would you even go about defining it?

And that’s just being a human being, to say nothing about the odds of being…you! The experiences you’ve had, or in some cases, not had.

The near fatal accidents you missed because you took a wrong turn, or the firework that could have blinded you, but just left a good sized burn in your thigh (my Fourth of July was memorable this year, as in ‘I will have a nice scar to remember it by’).

When you start to consider all of the things that need to have happened to bring you to the point of right now – it’s staggering, mind blowing, beyond comprehending.

Especially when you consider that it could all be changed or gone in an instant.

I’ve lived long enough to know that the world, or even your very own personal universe, can take a hard detour without a moment’s notice, taking the things you thought you could rely on and turning them on their head.

There’s only one antidote, or one vaccine, that can really help you prepare for and survive these events.

Gratitude.

I know that sounds kind of simple, but the funny thing is, the answers to most of the big things in life are simple. I think we sometimes get so caught up with our technological marvels, and the safety and security that we have created for ourselves in our daily world, that we forget just how amazing we have it right now.

Yes there are things that are scary, and yes bad things happen to good people and vice-versa. But at the end of it all, when you look at it long enough, hopefully you come to the realization that takes you to a place in your soul where you are grateful just for the chance to be here, and to partake in this day to day madness we call life.

And I hope you smile in your gratitude.

I really don’t care how you think we got here. A higher power, an evolved consciousness, a single intelligence of which we are but a part... Who knows. I really don’t care what you believe, it doesn’t matter. Because in the end, if you have enough gratitude in your heart, you’ll find your way to the next emotion that changes everything.

Because gratitude is the gateway drug of love.

You can’t love someone without being grateful for them. One flows from the other. And the funny thing about love, really deep abiding love, is that it changes you, and your world, for the better. The more love we have in the world, the less hate.

Or to see it in the way of Master Yoda… “Gratitude leads to love, love leads to serving, serving leads to happiness”. (Yeah, you read it in his voice didn’t you – it’s ok, so did I).

So today, may you find time to smile in gratitude, and share that smile with someone who needs it. I have had many days recently where the smile of a single person has been the tipping point, bringing me back to a sense of gratitude, and a deeper desire to serve.

May we find love and gratitude in our hearts, today and always.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: Sometimes, the Answer is to Stop

Sometimes, the Answer is to Stop.

As someone who passionately believes and preaches self awareness, and tries to practice it as much as possible, I’m slowly coming to the realization that there are times when I need to stop.

Times when I need to feel rather than analyze, to rest rather than push through, to recover instead of fighting harder. My wife would probably tell you that I am somewhat obsessive in my desire to understand, and to help.

Both of which I am probably somewhat guilty.

But I’ve come to the realization recently that all of us, including me, have limits that we can’t push beyond without risking significant emotional damage. As someone who has taken an isolating sense of worth by pushing myself so hard, this comes as kind of a sad awakening.

I’ve always been able to force myself to another level before, go beyond what I thought was normal and possible, and took pride in my ability to function without sleep, without feeling, without stopping.

All of which, it turns out, was the wrong thing to do.

Because as someone who routinely tells patients to ‘get more sleep’, ‘be kind to yourself’ and ‘take time for yourself’, I’ve been very neglectful of the concept of self care when it has come to my own life.

I can’t tell you the last time I watched a movie without doing something else, like ironing, or writing, or planning. While that is a great use of time, I’m beginning to realize that I’ve actually been robbing myself of the emotional renewal that comes from being immersed in something that isn’t work, or helping someone.

One of the biggest dangers of this way of living is that you begin to lose a sense of identity for who you actually are.

You become engaged to process, to production, to learning and knowledge, and in doing so begin a slow process of divorce from your understanding of who you are. At some point you lose your sense of perspective in your career, your family and yourself.

And then you have to start finding your way back to who you are.

Which begins with an honest evaluation of where you are right now. Maybe your personal rituals (exercise, meditation, journaling) have been left at the roadside in your never ending desire to move faster.

Or maybe you’ve been sleeping shorter and shorter hours, trusting that you can ‘get all the sleep you need when you’re dead’.

Wherever you find yourself, you realize it’s time to begin to nourish your soul, so that you can find your way back to being who you are again.

So I’ve reached a point where I feel that I need to be more focused, but less busy; more present and less preoccupied; more protective of my soul and less destructive to myself.

In short, I need to give myself permission to care about myself as much as I do about others, and treat my needs as importantly as every else’s.

Because in the end, you can wear yourself out in the service of others, and find that you are too far gone to be of service to anyone anymore. It’s like they say on a plane, ‘put on your mask, and then put someone else’s on for them’.

So today I’m asking for your help, your thoughts, your feedback. What do you do to nourish your soul, and find your way back to who you are…

I’d be grateful for any advice you have to give.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: When Time Doesn’t Heal

When time doesn’t heal.

There’s an old saying that you’ve probably heard before, that “time heals all wounds”. Like most old sayings it’s usually right, but on rare occasions, it can also be completely wrong.

In those instances when it doesn’t work, time seems only to intensify the pain, allowing the wound to fester longer, the infection to penetrate deeper, and the scar that desperately tries to cover the gaping hole in your soul to be stretched further and further, until finally it breaks.

And the rawness of the wound is open for all to see and feel.

If you’ve never had this experience in your life, I’m pretty confident in saying that you probably know someone who has. You’ll know it by the way certain topics are off limits, or by the way that they close down when the conversation goes in a certain direction.

Maybe you’ve been present when the covering has broken, and the pain and anguish comes pouring out in a way that neither edifies nor uplifts anyone around them.

Or maybe it was you who had broken.

However you came to understand it, you realize in a moment of clarity that this isn’t going to go away by itself.

Somehow, somewhere, the person who’s soul has been wounded at its core is going to have to go through the pain and agony of finally processing a hurt that should have been worked through many years ago, but for some reason wasn’t.

Maybe there just wasn’t time, or maybe it was just too painful to face right then.

Because some pains are just too raw to experience in the moment. Instead of being guided and comforted through the experience, sometimes the person instead just learns to suppress the pain day after day, year after year, until it becomes a black hole in their soul, pulling in the light around it, until that person has become a shell of who they used to be.

Hurting, judgmental, caustic and in pain.

In our desire to help them, we often feel the urge to explain something to them, some blinding obvious fact that seems so clear to us, that they seem to be missing or unable to understand.

If we give into that desire, it is my experience that we only make matters worse, because the person who cannot right now understand something because of the pain that they feel will become the person who will not thank you for your well intentioned, but ultimately patronizing, words.

The best we can do is give them our love, our acceptance, our presence and our patience.

And when they are ready for them, our questions. I have written before about how the questions we ask determine our journey, and that the answers we find are usually just a way-point that determines the direction of another question.

When dealing with a person for whom time has not healed a wound, the greatest blessing you can offer them is a ear that listens without judgment, and a heart that loves without indictment.

If you desire to be of assistance to those who are hurting, may I suggest that you leave your own concerns, your desires, your beliefs and your judgments at the door, and walk into their lives carrying nothing but a desire to serve, and to allow them the human right and privilege to choose their own destiny and path of healing.

Because the deepest wounds are not healed by time, but by patience, long suffering, and by love unfettered and unfeigned.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: I Could Be Completely Wrong about This

I Could Be Completely Wrong about This.

There’s a comedian named Bill Engvall who had a routine around the slogan, ‘Here’s Your Sign’. It was based on the idea that people who were displaying a remarkable lack of common sense should come with a sign to warn those around them.

I’ve always remembered that, and loved the idea that each of us should come with a warning sign. I know what mine would be.

“I could be completely wrong about this”.

Because I am sometimes wrong. I think that’s why I hold back a lot in my coaching practice. After losing 140lbs in 18 months, and having a Doctorate in a healthcare discipline, you’d have thought that I would have gone into weight loss coaching.

I intended to, I wanted to. I even have a coaching program laid out. I’ve helped people lose weight before, and yet I held back from charging from coaching.

Instead, I get to watch people who have never done what I’ve done, and with no experience or training in healthcare, sell useless pills to desperate people, when I know that there is a much higher chance that I could help them. Yet I hold back for the fear that I could be wrong.

Because when you are wrong about things that affect people’s lives, it’s a heavy burden to bear.

Twice in my Chiropractic practice I’ve been able to catch the mistakes of others, and save a life that otherwise might well have ended. Once when a woman came to me after leaving the E.R.

She had been diagnosed with a migraine and sent home. Her mother and sister who were with her brought her to my office, and after examining her, I sent her back to the E.R.

Her medical doctor told me that had I sent her home, the infection in her brain, heart and lungs would have killed her that very night.

The other was an elderly man who came after seeking treatment for leg pain. He was told by someone in the healthcare field that his pain was not due to a clot, despite his previous history.

After examination, I sent him to the E.R. Ultrasound revealed it was a clot, and skilled surgeons operated to save his leg, and possibly his life. They were the heroes – I was just the person who found the problem.

But someone else’s error could have severely changed, or ended, his life.

Which is why I am sometimes reluctant to reach out and help others. I’ve never had someone come back and tell me that something I have written or said to them had negatively impacted them, but still I worry.

Yesterday I made a good friend, someone who I look up to and admire greatly, doubt herself for a minute over something I said to her that was in retrospect my misunderstanding of a situation.

Which was the very last thing I wanted to do.

So I guess here’s my sign, and the sign for this work, whatever it is. “I could be completely wrong about this”. I try not to be, but as I am human, so will I err. All I can tell you is that nothing written here is done without being thought about, and often rather deeply.

There are times I agonize over these pieces, out of a desire to serve you in the way I feel you deserve to be served.

If I’ve ever written something that you disagree with, feel free to lay aside my thoughts and listen to your own. If I’ve ever upset you, please know that that has never been my intention.

And most of all, if I’ve ever written something that makes you think about changing your life, always remember the sign that should hang above everything I write.

“I could be completely wrong about this”.

But I really hope I’m not.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: But Are You REALLY You?

But Are You REALLY You?

A good friend put a post on Facebook that really got me thinking. It was a text graphic which essentially said “I am me. I don’t pretend to be like everyone else”. And while I understand the idea behind the post, I realized that I had a significant disagreement with the concept.

Not that I want anyone to pretend to be someone that they are not – far from it. I always want people to be authentic to themselves; but the problem goes deeper in a different direction.

I just think sometimes people don’t know who they really are.

Think about it for a moment. Have you ever had a significant realization about yourself before? One that kind of rocked you to your core, when a truth that had previously been hidden hit you so hard, that a different definition of yourself suddenly came into view.

Chances are you’ve had at least one of these, and they are memorable.

Because it teaches us that our definition of ourselves is often wrong, and quite far from the truth of who we really are.

When I start coaching with someone, or if I’m just on a one-hour breakthrough call, I try to have people explain themselves to me through definitions. Because how you define yourself emotionally is a powerful constraint and motivator. Tony Robbins said it best when he defined it as this…

“The strongest force in the human personality is the need to stay consistent with how we define ourselves”.

But if our self definition is so important, why is it that very few people have ever done the work to understand their self definition, and change what is necessary so that they can live a life that is truly authentic and congruent with who they are?

Because if your definition of yourself is wrong, your life will never be fulfilling and wonderful. It’s like trying to find your way around London using a map of New York. It’s just never going to work.

But examining our self definitions can be painful.

I have a very good friend who describes herself as prickly. And while she can behave that way, it’s not who she really is.

When you dig deeper, you find that she is really a kind and gentle person, but because of some beliefs that she picked up during her childhood, she has a hard time interfacing with other people because her normal boundaries that would protect her sweet and gentle emotions are not there.

So to protect herself, she tends to push people away, when all she really wants to do is let them in.

And as long as she continues to define herself as prickly, she will never come to understand the truth of who she is, and be able to heal and find peace.

So the next time you find yourself saying “I am me”, may I suggest you think that through a little bit. Once you lock yourself into a definition, you can spend years of your life believing something about yourself that is wrong, painful, unkind and destructive.

If your definition of yourself is based on a great deal of work, then maybe it will be right, or maybe it will be just ‘less wrong’.

Because the most holy (not in a religious sense) and kind people I have ever met are the ones who tend to have less definitions of themselves, and a greater concern for being kind to others.

And also being kind to themselves.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: Giving Yourself Grace

Giving Yourself Grace.

I feel like I’m in the middle of a ‘divine storm’ right now, where so many of my weaknesses and failings are all coming to the forefront, raising their heads out of their particular little foxhole and taking shots at me.

Have you ever had that – where you feel pulled in so many different directions that it’s hard to stay focused on anything because you are constantly trying to put out fires that spring up faster than you can put them out?

I once described it as ‘juggling hand grenades’.

Because a lot of the time, it feels like if something falls, life as I know it will end. Yet if I examine these particular grenades, I can realize that none of them would actually be ‘life threatening’, meaning actually causing physical damage unto death.

They have the potential to cause some very uncomfortable situations, but nothing that would kill me.

Yet in my mind, I see them as things that could.

And in a moment of clarity this morning, while trying for what must be a least the 1000th time to think my way through a situation, I realized that I was expecting nothing but harsh judgment, and to be shown no evidence of mercy or kindness. It was as if all my mind could see was the worst possible outcome to everything, even before it had occurred.

And I realized I was not leaving any room for mercy, or the concept of ‘Grace’.

I don’t necessarily mean that in a religious sense, more in the aspect of receiving kindness that you do not feel you deserve. Often when I see something that I have done incorrectly, or imperfectly, I see only the negative outcomes, the worst possibilities, an absolute implacable disregard of mercy, and the outcome that fills me full of dread.

Yet rarely in life has this happened, except in some very extreme circumstances.

Because unless the person is a megalomaniac, or a narcissist, most human beings realize that it can be hard to be human. We all come complete with our own issues, traumas, weaknesses and failings. The more we are willing to accept our own faults, the more we are willing to accept and work through the faults of other.

Because ‘grace’ is really accepting that we all fall, and we all deserve some measure of kindness when we do.

So the next time you find yourself being too hard on yourself, or only seeing the worst possible outcome, I invite you to stop for a moment and consider that grace, or kindness, is one of our most enduring human traits.

It’s what binds our souls together and makes possible both our personal happiness, and the growth of our civilization. A world devoid of kindness would never succeed.

But this race of humans is bound by it, and bound to use it.

Grace, or kindness, is something that we should always be willing to extend, because one day, we may find ourselves in desperate need of its application.

When that time comes for you, I hope you will find a wellspring of kindness flowing unto you washing away your pain, and giving you the strength and courage you need to go forward into your future.

We all fall, and we all have it in our power to assist someone in standing back up.

So I ask you to go forward with grace and kindness for all.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: What Do You Really, Really Want?

What Do You Really, Really Want?

Suppose you woke up tomorrow morning and found that some relative you barely knew had died and left you a large amount of money. Let’s say $100,000,000 for a nice round number.

How would you feel about that…excited, scared, ashamed of having more than somebody else, grateful, determined to use it for good? They’re all totally valid and acceptable feelings, and the chances are that you would probably experience all of them in a pretty short space of time.

But the money is not what you want.

You don’t think so – let me ask you this. Suppose I gave you $100,000,000 but you could never spend it, nor borrow against it. You would have it, but could do nothing with it.

Pointless right.

Which just goes to show that’s it’s not the money you want, but the things you think you can do with the money. But ultimately, it’s not even about the things you would get, or do, or see.

It’s about the feelings that you think you’ll experience from the having, the doing or the seeing.

As humans, we are all about the emotional states that we feel. I have a fun practice with patients in my office whenever they say “I’m fine”. I teach them that fine is not a state or a condition, but an acronym. F.I.N.E stands for frustrated, irritable, neurotic and emotional. :) It’s actually a joke between Holly and me, because whenever a woman says she’s FINE, she’s probably in one if not all four of those states.

So our emotional state determines the quality of lives, but when we are craving an emotional state, it’s a sign that we are really feeling a deficit of one of our needs.

What did you think of when I mentioned the $100,000,000 earlier? If you thought about paying off your mortgage, chances are you are looking for more certainty. If you thought about an exotic vacation, what you’re craving is variety.

If you thought about using the money to learn a new skill, then you’re focused on growth. If you wanted to buy new clothes, or ‘get some work done’, then you are probably craving significance, which you hope will lead to connection.

The states you crave are your pathway to peace, passion and power over yourself.

This is why I help people become aware of their instincts, their reflexes and their desires. Because the truth of who you are is found in the whisperings of your subconscious, when everything else is quiet, and you can spend time alone with your soul.

Until you learn yourself, you can never heal yourself, and ultimately come to love and accept yourself.

I truly, deeply, madly and passionately believe that the way we improve our world is by giving people the three things that they need now more than ever. Firstly, the unconditional love to allow them to risk being themselves.

Secondly, the tools of understanding so that they can diagnose their own trauma and injuries. Thirdly, the assistance of listening, and guiding them to heal themselves, and find peace.

Because the person who has not peace in their soul cannot spread it abroad to another. Only when we truly move into a place where our needs are fulfilled can we give without transaction, love without taking, and heal without hurting.

When we are sufficient in our needs, we need not from others.

And then the world will know peace.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: Failing Due to Fear

Failing Due to Fear.

I was supposed to compete in a Spartan race this last Saturday. I say compete, but what I really mean was survive. 3.5 miles, brutal hill climb, hot high desert, 20 obstacles and many chances to fall and hurt myself.

I signed up for this just under a year ago, and have put a lot of hours into training – but not as many as I should have. I still wasn’t sure whether I would compete or not, right up to the check in line, where I chose spectator instead of competitor.

And in truth, I quit because I was afraid of it.

It’s not like I didn’t have good reasons not to go for it. Sometime in the past week something bit my leg (we’re thinking a spider while sitting in a park, or a mosquito, which my body overreacts to) and my leg swelled up, got red, hurt and itched like crazy.

I still have 3 abrasion burns on my leg from scratching while sleeping, all which require dressings to keep them covered right now.

Also add in the migraine at work on Friday that lead to me sleeping from 8pm until midnight, from which I couldn’t get back to sleep, so by race time I had been up around 28 hours with only 4 hours of pain-filled sleep.

So yeah – I had good reasons not to race, but they weren’t what did it for me.

The truth that I can’t deny, deep in my soul, was that I was afraid. As I watched all the competitors streaming in, I realized that they were in much better shape than I was.

I hadn’t trained anywhere need as much as I needed to, and especially not over the past couple of months. I’ve been under a great deal of emotional strain, and finding the energy to train wasn’t something I found easy.

So I was afraid of the race, of looking out of place, of the physical risks of such an intense activity, and of failing.

As I watched my 20-year-old open-heart surgery survivor son run away from the start line, I felt more of a failure than I usually do, which honestly is quite a lot anyway. We were supposed to run this together.

There he was, with a diagnosed heart murmur, being willing to push his body harder than he had ever done before. His courage and dedication moved me while it made me ashamed for my failure to be ready.

So while he ran, I waited.

As he came around the last corner, still facing 5-6 obstacles, he was in great spirits, strong and powerful. I watched him dive into a mud hole, swing from rings, jump over fire, hoist a heavy sandbag on a rope and climb a huge frame. I didn’t see any fear in his eyes, just a power and a determination that filled me with such joy, while reminding me of what I didn’t have that day.

I had to endure feeling weak, ashamed of myself, and knowing that I had let him down.

Since I don’t have a great relationship with my father, most of my role models have been from fiction. In Batman Begins, Alfred Pennyworth asks Bruce Wayne a question, and with his next breath answers it. “Why do we fall Master Wayne?”

As Bruce says nothing, Alfred gives the answer… “so that we may learn to pick ourselves up”. So I got up early on Sunday morning, and hit the treadmill for a bit. I hope to do a lot more of that in the near future.

Because on Saturday, my will and my heart failed me, and I fell in my own estimation.

So now I need to pick myself up. I can’t erase what happened on Saturday – life just doesn’t work that way. All I can do is push forward, and make sure that next year I am ready to stand and fight in the same place where I fell and quit. I’m going to have to fight harder, train longer, run further and lift heavier than I have done before, and keep my mind focused where it needs to be.

Because in the end, failure only beats us when we let it, and I can’t do that again.

I’m sharing this today because I’m sure there is someone out there who feels like a failure right now. Please know that I’m right there with you, and also know that the only way you’ve really failed is if you stop trying.

Maybe all you can do is pick yourself up again and try again to do whatever it is that you want to achieve. To you I would say – please try. Because knowing that you are trying is the only antidote I know to feeling like a failure.

And that’s not what I want for either of us.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: The Double-Edged Sword of Your Instincts

The Double-Edged Sword of Your Instincts.

You know it as soon as you see it. This is the one. All of your senses come alive, and you feel the universe clicking into place. Your heart rate quickens, your respirations increase, and you experience the thrill of knowing that this is it. Everything within you screams that this is your moment….

And you were wrong.

Ever had this experience? It could be over a relationship, a purchase, an amazing hand in a game of cards…. whatever. Although everything felt right, it came out to be wrong.

Your instincts lied, and you were left wondering what happened, and questioning every thought that you ever trusted, ever impression that you ever based a decision off of.

And yet most of the time, our instincts are right.

It’s a universal constant that we filter situations through our instincts, and it’s also a universal constant that sometimes we are going to get it wrong. Because when we talk about instincts, we’re really talking about the millions of small judgments that go into everything we decide, and they are taking palce deep inside our subconscious, where we feel rather than know.

These judgments are based on our experiences, based on our interpretations, and sometimes, based on what we want to happen, rather than what is happening.

Because when our desires drive our instincts, things get messy, and when things get messy, the answers go wrong.

It can be hard to listen to your ‘inner voice’ or your ‘gut’, or whatever euphemism you substitute to describe the whisperings of your subconscious as it desperately tries to get your conscious mind’s attention. Sometimes your instincts talk to you quietly, and sometimes they scream.

But if your wants or your fears are crying louder than your instincts, you risk being over-run with wishes instead of knowledge.

Which rarely ends up well.

So how do you tell the difference, and quiet your mind long enough to make the right choice? It starts by having faith in yourself, and the courage to know that you will be ok, no matter what happens.

Then you begin by examining each answer that your subconscious gives, each instinctive feeling that you experience, and you see if it is making you happy without reason, or sad without consequence.

In my experience, the true side of my sword of instinct is generally a mixture of both.

But once you learn to question your instincts, you’ll find the pattern of the good and the bad, the right and the wrong, and you’ll see in your soul the patterns of needs and desires that can distort the truth of what your instincts have been telling you all along.

When you understand the distortions, you can ‘fine tune’ your instincts to work for you, rather than against you. You can screen each decision, and each moment, against a cleaner, clearer and crisper pattern of instincts that will become the doorway to the authenticity of your soul, and of your purpose.

Once you know your instincts, you’ll know yourself better than ever.

And then you can move forward with a greater faith, and a happier heart.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: Your Personal Desire for Peace

Your Personal Desire for Peace.

How do you define peace? I know that sounds like kind of a crazy question, but I promise you that if you think about it, the process of creating that answer will reveal more of you to yourself than you have probably ever known.

Because our personal definition of peace tells us so much about who we are, and what’s important to us.

Some things you knew, and some that were a mystery.

Because peace isn’t just about what happening to you at the moment; it’s about the sum total of everything you’re thinking about right now. Your challenges and concerns, your failings and your fears.

The malevolent cacophony of questions and answers that suffuse, surround, and sometimes suffocate you. The background hum of our own personal universe can drown out the beautiful music of the moment if we allow too many things to overpower and overwhelm us.

Changing peace into peril, and calm into chaos.

When I tried to define peace for myself, it involved a lot of things. I’d like to share a few of those with you for a moment, in the hopes that you can learn something about yourself in the process.

The truths we see in others are often reflections of the truth we can’t see in ourselves. That’s why sharing and having people around us is so important, because we learn when others are open with us.

As I hope I can be here today.

For me, peace starts out with as much certainty as I can achieve. Coming from a background where we had less than those around us, and even sometimes that was under question, my personal recipe for peace begins with an incredibly profound need for security. Usually financial, but also personal.

But without significance, my peace would be hollow.

Because as someone who felt ‘less than’ for most of my growing up years (let’s say 8 years and older), I struggle with feeling like I have value, so peace to me would also involve a sense of personal significance that is hard to come by.

I still struggle with the programming that teaches me that in order to have value (significance) then I have to achieve something amazing.

Which goes against all I know, but not yet against all I feel.

Yet for me to really be at peace, I must have my wife there. Connection is another of my deep needs, and without her, I’m lost. Her presence comforts and calms my soul, allowing me the freedom to be and create and to dream. Without her, there would be no peace, just a void of longing where she used to be.

My kids run a close second on that, because I have amazing relationships with both of them.

But with all this, there would still be one thing missing.

Because last in the list of the 6 human needs is contribution, the ability and desire to give back, and that’s where you come in. In over 18 months of writing these reflections, I’ve come to love doing this, and sharing my thoughts and ideas with you.

Your likes, shares and comments are so precious and meaningful to me that I can’t express how much you mean to me, and how grateful I am for your kindness in supporting this work.

So in a brief nutshell, that’s how peace gets defined for me.

And now, I’m really, really curious…would you share what peace looks like for you?

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: Letting Go

Letting Go.

It is said that the ultimate desire of the Buddha was to live without want (which if you think about it is kind of an oxymoron, but I think that’s part of the idea).

I’ve been meditating a lot on that recently, especially as I’m trying to let go of some things right now. Some good things that no longer serve me, some things that have been harmful for me…

And some things that just don’t resonate with me anymore.

Our childhood is a time of learning patterns of behavior. Depending upon the people and the circumstances around us, they could be good patterns, they could be bad, or they could be ones that are just outdated. Sometimes we learn to run from pain, and sometimes we learn that we need to face it head on, whatever the cost.

But some pains are caused by the things we used to hold so dear.

In the coaching world, we often use the phrase ‘limiting belief’ to indicate a thought pattern that someone holds on to out of fear, but that actually holds them back.

Unwilling or emotionally unable to let go, the person persists in a painful pattern of repetitive actions that feed back into more pain, until they are finally able to break free from a belief which held them captive, but is now realized as no truth at all.

Then they begin the long walk upon the path of letting go.

At first it’s scary, because we cling to the belief that we have or be something in order to be loved. We fail to realize that our very sentience, our awareness, our consciousness is all we ever need, and that our divinity, and our nobility, comes not from what we hold, but who we choose to be.

When you understand that, and feel it in your soul, you will have begun to learn the lesson.

And that lesson will drive you forwards, and onwards, and most importantly…. Inwards.

Because the secret of letting go is to change who you are so that you don’t need anything anymore. Then it’s not so much about letting go as it is giving away. When you go inwards, you learn a balancing of the self, a point of peace inside your soul that serves as your foundation for everything that happens next.

Which is when the real work begins.

It starts by focusing on yourself, and learning and coming to terms with who you are. It continues with processing and healing the emotional traumas of your past that have been holding you back, and ends when you learn to become self sufficient in the balance of your emotional needs.

Once you have found peace and significance within yourself, you have no more need for things, or outcomes.

You are free to experience life in every moment, without want, without need.

Just being you, surrendering to the wonder of the universe.

Which is why you are really here anyway.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings