Comfort?

Comfort is the greatest enemy of commitment. Comfort is a nicely padded, silk lined, pine box that lulls us off to sleep, forever.

One may think they are committed to health, but the comfort of fatty food or the couch whispers a lullaby. One may say they want to be financially free yet the soft sheets are so comfortable they drag out of bed. Some even fool themselves into the idea that they are committed to a wonderful relationship, but it’s just too uncomfortable to do something nice for their spouse even when they don’t feel like it.

Where is comfort slowly killing you? We American’s are addicted to our comforts. TV, credit cards, playing small. We want a comfortable life so we can drift off to sleep.

Champions love getting uncomfortable. They go to the places that are uncomfortable on purpose. Maybe it’s making that call that’s been too uncomfortable. Maybe it’s having that important conversation with your lover you hoped would just fix itself (it won’t). Maybe it’s starting an exercise routine or meditating (that would really be uncomfortable).

Where have you snuggled into comfort and lost your commitment? Diving into your discomfort is the surest way to discover your true freedom, love, and peace.

Well it’s been a great week of integration. Last weekend I did Debbie Ford’s Shadow Process and I’ll be sharing how you can use this work to enjoy more wholeness and self-love than you’ve experience before. I’d call it radical self-love because it’s about loving EVERYTHING in you, the dark and the Light. And when you truly love everything about you, you will naturally love people around.

A great place to start is with Debbie’s first book (below). In it, she shares a secret in those that have been seeking the Light, most people still honestly hate parts of themselves. Test it for yourself. Do you really love EVERYTHING about you?

We spend our lives, starting with parents, on trying to purge unwanted parts of ourselves. Whether it be over-eating, anger, speaking up, or anything we don’t like about ourselves, it becomes exhausting trying to be perfect.

Stay tuned as we explore wholeness and deep happiness over the next several weeks…

The Dark Side of the Light Chasers: Reclaiming Your Power, Creativity, Brilliance, and Dreams

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gePQuE-7s8c

Gabrielle Bouliane performs for the audience at the Austin Poetry Slam. Her poetry reminds us that whatever happened to us in the past, all the details of the day, really mean nothing. What we focus on drives our life.

This would be her last public performance.

Gabrielle was diagnosed with Stage Four Cancer shortly before this video was filmed. She passed January 29, 2010. So many of the most amazing people, like Lance Armstrong, Tony Robbins, Harv Eker and others have faced cancer diagnosis. They live each day knowing the past really means nothing when presented with the opportunity to live.

What we are hiding from is often the source of our greatest freedom.

One of my teachers said that we only have two categories everything in our life falls into: our commitments or our addictions.

We can ask ourselves: “Is this an addiction or a commitment?” The US is a culture of addictions. Fatty food, cigarettes, alcohol, TV,  anger, separation. Not that any of these are wrong. They just become addictions. This is why we are so in awe of someone with commitment. Take Tiger Woods for example. His commitment to being the best golfer inspires our very soul. What if we could be the committed ANYWHERE in our lives? Then, we are crushed when he has an addiction. It means he is just like the rest of us. We get to sit back down on the couch and play small. Addictions or commitments.

Use the power of your individual commitment to be free. Be honest and ask if your moods, your comfort, and odd little habits are honestly an addiction. The first step to breaking addiction is OWNERSHIP. What we own, what we admit, no longer has power over us. We saw Tiger take this bold step last week. He took full responsibility in a public press conference and said no one, even his wife, is to blame. It seems now he is committed to healing, rather succumbing to addiction. But our ego mind hopes he fails so we can continue to indulge in our own addictions.

Commitment is a form of ownership. Addiction is a lack thereof. The world is waiting for people that are committed. The world is waiting for you! Start today with a small commitment and notice your freedom rise.

“But when I said that nothing had been done I erred in one important matter. We had definitely committed ourselves and were halfway out of our ruts. We had put down our passage money–booked a sailing to Bombay. This may sound too simple, but is great in consequence. Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then providence moves too. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one’s favor all manner of unforeseen incidents, meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamt would have come his way. I learned a deep respect for one of Goethe’s couplets:
          Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it.
          Boldness has genius, power and magic in it!”

from W. H. Murray in The Scottish Himalaya Expedition, 1951

This is another great example of The Secret, The Law of Attraction. Murray found that just getting clear on his vision was the first step. The key was commitment. Bonding completely with his vision, by purchasing his ticket, opened the universe to support his aim.

Providence: a manifestation of divine care or direction; the foreseeing care and guidance of God or nature over the creatures of the earth.

Deepak Chopra is senior scientist for the Gallop Organization. They will be releasing a book soon on the keys to Well Being. Here are the 5 keys to well being they found around the world:

1. Career – Finding at least one person in your business who shares your passion for this work. You will keep each other inspired.
2. Financial – They spend on experiences, not things. They are giving. They have a default system for managing their money and eliminating debt.
3. Social – They have happy friends. That have happy friends. And so on. Are your friends happy?
4. Community – They hang out with many people that share their passions. Maybe it’s a charity, church, music, sport, anything that’s a passion.
5. Physical – They eat good food, exercise, get enough sleep. They eat healthy fresh food, that is red, blue, or green.

Here’s a video with Deepak announcing these finding. http://www.oprah.com/spirit/Total-Well-Being-Defined-by-Deepak-Chopra-Video_1

Want to be happy, there’s a simple recipe above. Get a coach who’s a happy friend that helps you do it helping you do it faster. There are no bonus points from the universe for doing anything yourself. None! Life is a team sport!

I was at an infomercial taping for Alison Armstrong the other night. She’s been teaching women how to have amazing relationships with men for 18 years. When she started the taping, the first thing she said is,

“I’m committed to heaven on earth.”

Successful and happy people are always leaving clues. Just today, when rollerblading at the beach, I stopped for a piña colada and opened a magazine left on the table. There was Lance Armstrong’s coach saying, when Lance told me he wanted to return to Tour de France again, the coach was concerned. Lance said, “I’m 100% committed.”

What are you committed to? What’s the one ideal you are absolutely committed to?

“I submit to you that if a man hasn’t discovered something he will die for, he isn’t fit to live.”  ~ Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

The key word here is “willing”. It’s not saying you “must” die while doing something. That’s an addiction to struggle. “Willing” to die is about commitment. Commitment means “to put together”. It means that nothing will separate you.

If you are a parent, are you willing to die for your children to be healthy? Really? Would you give your life? Are you committed to your spouse? Are you committed to your own health? Is there an ideal that you would die for? For MLK, it was brotherhood.

What dies really is your comfort. Are you willing to give up some of your comfort to truly be free?

What are you committed to in you life? Ponder this question today and discover your freedom.

Some folks watched The Secret in 2006 and now have forgotten it. Maybe they imagine it was a fad, or worse, that “it didn’t work”. One of the master keys of The Secret is the right use of visualization, intention, and will power. It is NOT to make stuff appear out of thin air, or to force people to act the way we want!

The right use of visualization is to impress upon our subconscious mind what we want ourselves to do. When you were young, and visualized having a car & driving it, it was so that you would someday have a car and be able to drive it. And today, you actually drive it on auto-pilot. Thus, visualization is to train your auto-pilot so YOU create love and prosperity FROM you.

You do not need to apply your will to things in order to compel them to come to you. That would simply be trying to coerce God and would be foolish and useless.

You do not have to try to compel God to give you good things, any more than you have to use will power to make the sun rise.

You do not have to use your will power to conquer an unfriendly Deity, or to make stubborn and rebellious forces do your bidding. Substance is friendly to you, and is more anxious to give you what you want than you are to get it.

To get rich, you need only to use your will power upon yourself. When you know what to think and do, then you must use your will to compel yourself to think and do the right things. That is the legitimate use of the will in getting what you want to use it in holding yourself to the right course. Use your will to keep yourself thinking and acting in the certain way.”

Wallace D. Wattles, The Science of Getting Rich

The Secret always has and always will work. The Secret is about changing who we are, not how the world is. Visualize what you desire each day, with love in your heart, feeling good, ready to be the person who could receive it.

If you can go on growing in this intimacy, which is no more excitement, then the joy will arise: first excitement, then love, then joy. Joy is the ultimate product, the fulfillment. Excitement is just a beginning, a triggering; it is not the end. And those who finish at excitement will never know what love is, will never know the mystery of love, will never know the joy of love. They will know sensations, excitement, passionate fever, but they will never know the grace that is love. They will never know how beautiful it is to be with a person with no excitement but with silence, with no words, with no effort to do anything. Just being together, sharing one space, one being, sharing each other, not thinking of what to do, what to say, where to go, how to enjoy; all those things are gone. The storm is over and there is silence. And it is not that you will not make love but it will not be a making really; it will be a love happening. It will happen out of grace, out of silence, out of rhythm; it will arise from your depths, it will not be bodily really. There is a sex which is spiritual, which has nothing to do with the body. Although the body partakes in it, participates in it, it is not the source of it. Then sex takes on the color of Tantra, only then.”

LET GO! DARSHAN DIARY – Osho