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| Rain Maybe? Or is it sun breaking through (photo finola jennings clark, rights reserved) |
Why are bad habits so much easier to get into than
good habits? I mean really, usually good stuff is easy to love, right? We don’t
have problems accepting affection, enjoying good food, taking an afternoon nap
on the sofa…they’re all good things and they’re easy habits to integrate into
the daily routine. Why not the same with exercise, writing, painting? It’s not
like they’re chores that I don’t enjoy…it’s something almost intangible but
very, very real, the reluctance to ‘just do it’. Is it really ingrained lack of
confidence from years so long gone by?
The Artist’s Way
I was listening to The Artist’s Way at Work this
morning which though I find somewhat less than captivating to listen to because
of the narration, has some excellent insights into the creative, productive and
non-productive nature we all have within us. I easily recognized other people
who’ve been and are in my life and I recognized myself too...happily in some
cases it was me seeing my reflection in the good habits, but not in every case!
I could see myself in so many descriptions that were about habits that keep us
back.
Yes, I would like to say I try to ‘do my best’ at my work
but I know that’s not true and as for being really proactive and creative? Am I
really or do I allow myself sometimes still to believe ‘my hands are tied’ by
other’s bad habits, limited resources, urgent important tasks? How many of us
actually really are prepared to step out of our comfortable box with walls
papered with excuses and blame – aka – ‘reasons why I can’t’? How many of us
consistently find ourselves saying ‘Oh I can’t because so-and-so isn’t/hasn’t/won’t/didn’t
…”? But the bigger question is, what did WE do to overcome the challenges the other
person’s bad habits create for us? Did we just let ourselves off the hook,
comfortable in having a scapegoat to enable our failure? Or did we just dive
into the wave and trust that where there’s a will, there’s a way?
Access Consciousness
Recently a bubbly young woman, Christine Caruso, came
back to visit Saint Lucia and I decided to let her ‘run my bars’. I was, to say
the least, astounded at the effect it had on me – I am pretty sure part of that
was that I am in a space where I’m open to any kind of positive vibe – and
prior to going, I had no idea about what ‘access consciousness’ was about…I
just got a really positive vibe off Christine and decided to go. And it was
amazing. The verbal takeaway, conceptual really, was ‘what else is possible’:
when we find ourselves butting up, as we so often do, against our tired old
assumptions of how things are, or when we find ourselves desperately seeking answers
or trying to bend life to our wishes… just stop and ask ‘What else is possible?’
Open yourself up to allow other options to float on in to your life instead of
blocking the way with old assumptions that are most often negative.
The physical takeaway for me was also amazing – during
the session I didn’t experience much other than becoming very, very relaxed and
gradually seeing a rainbow of colour behind my eyes and eventually just lighter
and brighter white light. When I got up, I felt physically taller. Really. I
really felt taller. I could not wipe the glowing smile off my face either – I felt
so much lighter and a deeper peaceful, joyous openness. My friends could not
believe what they saw…yes, it was the ‘old me’ but to them I also appeared as I
felt.
So, I went back a couple weeks later – and this is
after researching what ‘the Bars’ are and realizing it is another of ‘those
franchises’ that in principle I SO don’t like (I have a build-up of negative
assumptions about them!). But I also realized, whatever the tool, how good it
is relies almost entirely on how open we are to letting it work. And then of
course, where therapy is going on, it relies also on how genuine the ‘therapist’
is – and with Christine, it was easy to place your trust in her because she
just poured out good energy. Not the fake kind of hippy-happy all is light and
good kind – genuine good energy – the kind that can exist even in dark places. These
two combined, I think, are of fundamental importance for a positive result.
My second experience was completely different, having
very physical effects during the session and no light shows this time J It was equally, but very differently, good.
Both the Access Consciousness Bars exercises and the
Artist’s Way at Work I realized, work when we are really prepared to let go of
our past that is so full of all the stored experiences of failure and denial
and can’ts and won’ts and don’ts, should, must, mustn’ts etc and open up and
really ask ourselves ‘What else is possible?’ and then, key, key point here…do
it and keep on doing it until we have picked down each and every brick of our
personal walls and built ourselves a nice sturdy set of steps, climbing as we
go.
What they, and any other system are not, is magic
fixes that remove the need for us to take action, so my advice for the road…Open
up and step up and keep remembering to actively seek to let go of the millions
of assumptions we allow to cloud our good judgement. If you want a better life
then you will, at some point has to embrace asking, from the core of your
being, ‘What else is possible?’
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| Skip Monday, Saint Lucian Band - these guys love what they do and it shows! (photo Finola Jennings Clark, rights reserved) |
