From Love or From Fear?

I have a huge vision of a happy, healthy, peaceful world. I can see people living out their passions and all those passions coming together collectively to further human potential and evolution. I can see a world that spins on the power of love and that fear only surfaces in our body because there is physical danger not because we anticipate a future that we don’t like and actively trying to avoid. I see people focusing on what they can do, spending time with people they want to be around, and constantly striving to accomplish something they look forward to seeing come into creation. 

That may seem idealistic and naive to some of you. I am ok with that; I choose to live my life committed to pleasant ideals that mean something to me.  I am willing to not have total agreement on this vision because I have faith it will happen no matter what. I also believe that growth can happen when people don’t believe the same thing and yet come together anyway to create something better than they envisioned separately. I believe we are headed in the direction of my vision or better. 

I have always wanted to make a difference in the world. As I was growing up my dad would always say, “Make sure to leave this place better then you found it.” He was typically referring to our toys scattered in the living room or a campsite where we had spent the weekend. He wasn’t necessarily talking about the world and it’s entirety.

Well that didn’t stop me from taking on that responsibility and I have (at times) felt a lot of pressure to change the world.

I work in the Personal Development/Growth/Awareness/ Emotional Intelligence industry. Which is completely perfect for me because I believe that every individual on this planet has a unique and extraordinary story inside of him or her. I believe that everyone is exceptionally gifted and talented and it is our minds that get in the way of our natural abilities because we have ideas of “should” and “what if” generated from fear that supersedes our passions. 

None of this is a problem by the way. There is no dysfunction in the system; we are all working in perfect order. I believe we are built this way for a reason.

However, to be totally honest; I only just started believing that it wasn’t a flawed system. I felt the suffering that came with not living the life I love because of fear-based thinking and I thought this was SO wrong. I thought to myself, “I am wrong, I am flawed, I missed the meeting where everyone got instructions for living happy, healthy lives!”

Up until last week, maybe even two nights ago, I thought I was broken in some way and needed to be fixed.

When I began the #101DaysofConnection project I started it with the conscious intention to connect with those around me at a deeper level. After #101DaysofAwakening I felt that I had a deeper connection with myself and yet I was separated from the people around me. I wanted to make a conscious effort to reach out more to my brother and friends whom I love deeply. What I didn’t anticipate was how much my spiritual connection would come into play in this project.

I believe in a higher power, I look around the world and see perfection that can only be ascribed to a something bigger then I have capacity to understand. When I was a kid, I let myself feel connected to whatever that was that I couldn’t see. It made me feel like there was magic in the world and I was a part of it. When my mom died, that higher power moved to my sh*! list, but it didn’t change what I believed, it only changed how I treated that belief.

On day 4 of #101DaysofConnection I shared this belief out loud with a group of people. I shared how mad I am, how hurt I feel and how scary it is to think that I am alone in this life. I shared with these people that when my mom died it triggered my belief that I need to leave this world better then I found it and that it was all up to me to do it.

Before my mom died, the higher power and I were in cahoots working together for a better world. After she died, I got it: bad things happen to good people that can’t be explained. It felt like a betrayal to a tacit agreement that if you are good, good things happen.

Fine! Message received: work like hell to save everyone from this unfeeling God.

Well thankfully I had the courage to share that thought with a group of people that do not believe what I believe. They were able to mirror back something to me that I didn’t see in myself.

They said this, “You have the same vision and beliefs you have always had. You still believe in this universal power that you knew before your mom died, only now you resent it. Do you really believe that this power is against you? You are thinking like a victim.”

YUCK! The V word! Blech. Not interested in that mindset at all! “So what do I do now?” I asked.

“Your beliefs haven’t changed. You are still walking around with the beliefs of a 7 year old. How would you, a 30 year old woman, interpret what happened? What do you believe now?”

So, what do I believe? It took some time to come up with my answer. Here is what I have concluded since then:

·       I believe things happen for a reason 

·      I believe the mind lies to me to protect me and the truth will set me free

·      I believe everything will be ok in the end. If it’s not ok, it’s not the end

·      I believe “good” and “bad” are judgments, a human construct, not a universal fact

·      I believe everyone has honorable intentions

·      I believe blame is the cause of all suffering

·      I believe we are all connected, that a little piece of me exists in everyone and a little piece of everyone exists in me

·      I believe in God, The Almighty, a divinity, a universal consciousness, something bigger then words can describe but I know the energy is love and appreciation

·      I believe everyone has unique gifts and talents and when those are expressed the world is a better place

·      I believe creativity is a gift we all possess and is a three-part process: Thoughts- Words- Actions

·      I believe that every single human being is special

·      I believe pain is a part of the growth process; our ability to move through it makes life interesting and lets us know we are getting stronger  

·      I believe that if my mom hadn’t died I wouldn’t be where I am today and I really LOVE my life

·      I believe I am here to deeply connect with people in their experience and share it with them, love them for it, letting them know it is perfect for their extraordinary story if they choose, just like God did for me

Two days ago, while writing my morning pages, sorting out what I believe and it dawned on me. I do believe the above, passionately. I see now that God has been with me through this entire process, sharing it with me. There has been no condemnation or judgment from a higher power. I am free to choose anything I want, there are infinite possibilities and I can choose to be and feel extraordinary or I can choose to be and feel resentful. It is not good or bad, right or wrong, there is just a loving presence no matter what. I want to be with people while they make their choices, I can be that loving presence for others.

I have no idea what is next in this process.  All I know is that I am moving toward my vision with a more mature set of beliefs. I am no longer motivated by fear of it not happening, imagining some higher adversarial power.  I look forward to this vision coming into creation not because it is what I think the world needs but because when I focus on it I feel fully alive. I am now truly and wholly motivated to achieve it because it is what I love.