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Two Steps Past Hard

August 11, 2016 By Cara Lumen

cat restign in tree

I recently noticed that it was hard to hold some of the positions in my standing Qi Gong practice and that I’d been allowing myself to shorten the session. What, I wondered, would happen if I took it two steps past hard. Not one step – that’s easy. But two steps, steps that took a little effort, took some determination. Steps that could also lead to improvement or even a breakthrough.

Acknowledge the stuck place

You know the adage “use it or lose it”? The older we get the more important that is. Particularly with our body – and our brain. I’m giving my brain plenty of exercise, but my body, not so much. I need to take my body two steps past hard.

Baby step or giant step?

I’m a determined person. So once I decide that I really do want to push through something, I settle into the harness and move forward. It doesn’t really matter what size step you take as long as it moves you past your stuck place.

When I was learning Scrivener writing software, I had to watch the beginning tutorial five or six times; and each time I mastered a new small step.

Each time I edit a podcast I get better at the process. The same is true with videos, I’m getting more proficient with each one I do. Sometimes moving past the stuck place is simply a matter of persistent practice.

Choose your steps

My stuck place is that in my creative hurry to get to my computer to start writing, I shortchange my standing Qi Gong practice. And yet this is a valuable part of my morning spiritual practice. I simply need to hold each position for a longer period of time. And yes, my muscles are not particularly happy with that!

So I have to take two or even three steps past that hard place – every day.

Acknowledge your victory

And you know what? The minute I hold those positions longer, I’m going to feel very pleased with myself. I’m going to feel confident that I can do even more. I will feel that I’m on the road to reclaiming some of my body strength. And soon I’ll be back to holding the positions even longer than I thought was possible.

All because of taking two steps past the hard place.

Where are you stuck?

Your stuck place may be a subtle internal stuck place or a noticeable physical plane stuck place. You can work on either – or both. I can identify a few too many subtle stuck places when it comes to learning new technical stuff. But once I take it to the other side of stuck, I find wonderful new opportunities open to me.

What is hard for you?

What did you do in the past that you can’t or won’t do any more? If it has to do with your body getting older, find some alternative strength-building ideas and put them into action. If you are stuck emotionally, go deeper within to find your answers – meditate, journal, mind-map, talk to someone – whatever it takes to identify where you’re stuck and to figure out two steps to take you past that point.

“Hard” is created by being unyielding

Hard is about being resistant and rigid. It’s about being inflexible. It can also come from gradually letting things slide.
But hard also means being strong and unbeatable. Drop your resistance to change. Embrace the goal you know you need to achieve. And start working toward it. Two steps at a time. Two steps past hard.

To Sing a Deeper Song Consider:

Learn to Honor Your Inner Rhythm
The Freedom of Not knowing
Lose Your Attachment to the Outcome
The Power of Exploring the Unknown
42 – The Stuck Place Called Decision
35—How to Hold the Space for Change.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: personal growth, positve change, Self Mastery, success

Can We Think Our Way to Success?

July 11, 2016 By Cara Lumen

top-11

The discussion was about the Law of Attraction, positive thought, and the idea of thinking our way to success.

My friend was being hard on herself because her new entry into the world of solopreneur was not manifesting the way she had pictured it. She felt she had no power, no control and that she wasn’t making things happen the way she wanted to, the way she believed she should be able to do.

But the fact was, she was making very powerful things happen. It just didn’t look the way she thought it would.

Do you have that sort of control problem? If it doesn’t look like you thought it should, it’s wrong, or you failed to manifest it.

I have a different view of the kind of power or control we have over our life – it’s choice. Choice in the moment. Choice that’s aligned with how well we know ourselves. Self-awareness is the key to positive change. Self-awareness is the path to success.

Can you recognize the success that is right for you?

This friend had come from a very big, responsible job in a very large corporation. I pointed out that what she was expecting her business to look like, based on what had been around her for so long, was not what she was going to find as a solopreneur. The “wins” would be on a different scale – a one-person scale. She hadn’t thought about that.

Relax into the power of unfolding

We talked about how she might begin to simply let circumstances unfold. Since I have consciously been practicing allowing my life to unfold, I have been pleased and astonished by what shows up.

There are two steps in allowing life to unfold and they both involve trust. You have to trust the Universe to provide you with the right opportunities and you have to trust yourself to make the right choice.

Making the right choice involves self-awareness

What do you love to do most? What are your strongest skills? What do you need/want to learn next? What do people ask you to do? When you identify your gifts and your passions, they become your guides, your measuring sticks for the choices you make.

The more I honor my natural self, the happier I am. Working and living in my nourishing home, writing from my heart, sharing it with others, making new friends online – it’s perfect. And it has evolved over time as I work to understand myself, making choices aligned with my passion and my calling and simply allowing my life to unfold.

See choice as an exploration

Begin to see choice as an opportunity to discover, to explore, to try something on for size. You’ll find life becomes more fun, more educational, more revealing and more inspiring.

When you make a choice to go down a particular path, you can always choose to turn around and come back, or explore another trail that leads off of it.

A choice is simply that – one choice, in one particular moment in time that seems appealing or right. It will immediately be followed by other choices – to continue, to create a variation of the path you are on, or to try an entirely different path.

Feel your way to success

Use your emotions as a guide rather than your mind. Your thoughts are limiting. Your intuition and imagination have no boundaries.

Stay in the moment and feel your way into a choice. Don’t over-think it. Don’t try to control it. Simply feel how it feels. If it feels aligned, or comforting or fascinating or exciting, go exploring and see where it takes you. See what else unfolds as you journey forward. Then make another informed and aligned choice.

Trust the universe to provide you with the perfect opportunities

Opportunities are always there, you only have to notice them. Pause and take time to examine a new idea, or think about a concept that you just discovered and determine how it feels. Is it right for you? Does it work in this moment in time? What new opportunities does the idea stimulate? What new doors just opened? A range of possibilities open in an instant, in the moment, in the now of simply being.

Can we think our way to success? I think it’s easier and more effective to feel our way to our next step and notice what unfolds. One choice followed by another choice. That’s the path to success.

To Sing a Deeper Song consider:

Our Opinion Requires No Thought
Can You Control Your Own Destiny?
What Do You Do for People That They Can’t Get Elsewhere?
The Power of the Label You Choose
37-Self Mastery As a Choice

Filed Under: Alligned Choices, Self Awareness, Self Mastery Tagged With: personal growth, Planning, positve change, success

How to Fearlessly Follow the Passionate You

March 1, 2010 By Cara Lumen

radioPassionately On Purpose Radio with Cara Lumen, Your Idea Optimizer, who keeps you passionately on purpose while you make a difference in your world. As a Business Coach, Content Developer and Educator she talks about how to uncover your passion, define your purpose, identify your path, make money from what you already know and attract the people you are meant to serve. But most of all, she’ll help you believe you can!!!  Join her Mondays on to stay Passionately On Purpose

 

The Show

How to Fearlessly Follow the Passionate You

When you are at a crossroads, how do you tell which road to take? Kathy Kirk of Applied Spirituality will join me to talk about how to overcome fears and indecision and move in the direction of the Passionate You.

http://www.caralumen.com/radio/lumen_kirk_912693.mp3

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

Filed Under: Podcasts, Self Mastery Tagged With: Kathy Kirk, personal growth, positve change, Self Mastery, self-awareness, success

How Being Judgmental Can Keep You from Success

December 3, 2009 By Cara Lumen

by Cara Lumen

She quit the class. It did not look the way she thought it would look. It was not done the way she had expected it to be done. So she quit. She had a preconceived notion of what she wanted and did not carefully read what was being offered. She had set up expectations not founded on fact and naturally they were not met. She became upset and judgmental and quit.
Have your preconceived ideas ever stopped you from getting the most out of a situation? When the experience turned out to be something other than you expected did you shut down, or did you know that there was an unknown reason you had made the choices leading you there and that you should look around at what was being offered?

There is a vast difference between judgment and opinion. If you have an opinion it’s yours to do with as you will. An opinion serves only as a guide for your own choices.  You can hang on to it or you can change it. You can share it or you can keep it to yourself. It’s simply the sum of who you are and how you are perceiving things at the moment. It’s your opinion.
A judgment sets you and the object of your judgment apart. It makes one of you wrong. There can never be a collaboration or partnership with a judgment because there is no flexibility. But worst of all when you are in judgment you usually do not go exploring to see what it’s like from the other person’s perspective.   Judgment shuts you in. It shuts you down. You never learn or know what gifts the other person or circumstance affords you. Judgment is critical, an opinion is an evaluation. That’s an important distinction.

Your opinion is based on your evaluation of where you are, who you are and what you need. It doesn’t make anyone or anything wrong. It simply makes a choice about its usefulness to you at the moment. When you are in evaluation mode you are open to exploration and discovery. You are open to change.

How flexible are you when you are faced with a new person or a new opportunity or a new experience?
Do you immediately categorize and pigeonhole the person or experience? Do you look at what’s not working rather than what is working? Do you look at the negative before you look for the positive? That’s judgment and criticism.
Or do you look upon it as an adventure? Something new to learn? Something to explore and consider? That’s when you evaluate and sample what is before you before you develop an opinion, before you make your choice.  You open yourself to each new experience and welcome it into your life.

Start looking at how you perceive new people and new experiences. When something new shows up simply pause and let all your senses work. Feel how you feel, look more deeply into what is before you, and step mindfully into the experience. Then your evaluation will be based on what is true for you at that moment and you will be enriched by the experience.

 © 2009 Cara Lumen

 

Filed Under: Self Mastery, Spiritual Expansion Tagged With: change, choice, personal growth, success

7 Ways to Move from Overwhelm to Success

November 30, 2009 By Cara Lumen

Passionately On Purpose Radio with Cara Lumen, Your Idea Optimizer, who keeps you passionately on purpose while you make a difference in your world. As a Business Coach, Content Developer and Educator she talks about how to uncover your passion, define your purpose, identify your path, make money from what you already know and attract the people you are meant to serve. But most of all, she’ll help you believe you can!!!  Join her Mondays on www.blogtalkradio.com/passionatelyonpurpose

This Show

It’s time to plan for the new year, to create our marketing plan, decide what to change in our business, What new products or services to offer? The ideas are swirling and you may be frozen in place just contemplating them. Here are seven ways to keep from going into overwhelm as you plan for your success

http://www.caralumen.com/radio/lumen_782527.mp3

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

Filed Under: Content Development, Podcasts, Self Mastery Tagged With: inner guidance, intention, overwhelm, success

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