When was the last time you experienced a crisis? Did it seem like it was the end of the world? Did you feel helpless, frustrated, burned-out or just down and depressed? Did you say to yourself, “This is the last straw. I am sick and tired of being sick and tired! This has got to stop. I can’t go another day like this.”?
Everyone experiences moments where outer circumstances appear to be an overwhelming crisis. To many these circumstances dominate and rule their lives. To some these crises leave lasting scars unless they are recognized as truly being blessings. When the worst crisis becomes your greatest blessing, you heal. Nature does not deliver crisis without opportunity or misfortune without blessing.
Some people have crises that drag out for years. Others seem to nip their crises in the bud almost immediately. It’s not the outer circumstances that necessarily create the crises. While they may elicit the crises, it is a person’s reaction that actually turns circumstances into crises. The length of time it takes for you to recognize your outer crisis as a blessing correlates with your degree of wisdom. Pure wisdom is the instantaneous knowing that each crisis in life is indeed a blessing. Some misfortunes don’t reveal their blessing easily, while others are recognized immediately. Hidden within all misfortunes are the seeds of an equal but opposite fortune.
With the world’s financial crisis, hundreds of thousands of people were let go or laid off from their jobs. Some of these people were left without income, some without other career opportunities and some, ultimately, without their families. At first sight, this may have been perceived as a crisis, however, many of those same people have undergone an in-depth soul-searching and re-evaluation of their lives, only to discover that they genuinely had a dream in their hearts to be, do and have something more than what they were previously experiencing and accepting. Other people have tapped into a more profound purpose for their life than what they were allowing, and are now making their meaningful dreams come true. They are now doing exactly what they always loved to do but never had the guts to do until the crisis occurred.
Crises are ultimately blessings. They are the flip side of the coin of life. Many people have been temporarily devastated by broken relationships only to discover at some later time that their supposed misfortune was a blessing. Their very loss was their ultimate gain. Whenever a door shuts, a window opens.
The longer you live, the more this seemingly paradoxical relation becomes evident and the more you see the correlation between past crises and future blessings. Through time and experience, your reactions subside and more patient actions result. Since blessings are seeded in crisis and it seems quite easy to be thankful for blessings, why not move wisely ahead and assume that any perceived crisis is a blessing? Be thankful for its strengthening qualities. Why not act thankfully instead of reacting pitifully?
As long as outer circumstances run your life, you can expect a life filled with crises. But as soon as you take charge of your reactions and change them into thankful actions, your life will begin to flow.
Be thankful. You won’t be confronted with a crisis you can’t handle. The next time you’re confronted with what appears to be a crisis, just ask yourself, “What is the hidden blessing?” The deeper you look, the easier you will find it. When you do, you can say “good-bye” to its corresponding frustration, anger and depression.
No tree stood strong without the wind.
No group stood strong without its heretic.
No person can be strong without a challenge.
So be thankful for yours.
Love and Wisdom,
Dr. John Demartini
The Waves of Energetic Movement. (excerpted from an article I wrote for www.courageousleaders.com.au )
It is more widely understood and proven now that everything we experience is energy and that the only thing that differentiates between the wooden desk we sit at and say, our skin or our thoughts is a difference in the frequency of that energy. (more…)
What I notice quite frequently with my clients is the resistance around at least one area of their life. Whether that be relationships, people who are pissing them off – or career, a role that annoys them – or themselves, not clever or skinny enough!
When I remind them that they are always at choice, no matter what the circumstances are around them, they are quick to agree on MOST things….but not THAT thing. That one achilles heel in their life where they really resist and dont want to take personal responsibility for choosing.
So what is it YOU obsess about and find a constant challenge or bone of contention? What can’t you accept is your choosing?
Now I get that its not easy to take responsibility at times and more especially when whatever we dont want to is causing us pain and frustration. After all, we are pleasure seeking missiles and at times that means it’s more more pleasurable to stick needles into ourselves than to face up to those really tough areas in our lives. (That’s the time when we use the saying ‘I’m stuck between a rock and a hard place’)
So how can you bring yourself into alignment with what you’ve chosen?
First of all you remind yourself that you aren’t always conscious of what you are choosing- thats why we are often surprised at what turns up in our lives and drives us crazy. But just because we aren’t conscious of what we are choosing doesn’t mean that we haven’t. And one tip – don’t keep looking for WHY you have chosen whatever it is, just act ‘as if’ you have and invite yourself to TRUST. MMMmmmm the ‘T’ word!
Secondly, have a go at looking at how the situation serves you, what is DOES for you rather what it DOESN’T do for you. eg. How is it helping me to believe that I need to be wary and not trusting in relationship? What am I getting from believing that I have low self-esteem? What do I get as a benefit by playing the rescuer to my friends? This may take sitting down and getting present and being honest with yourself and NOT rallying the army of well-meaning friends and allies to gossip about your story. Only you can connect to the truth for you.
If you can accept the truth that you are the writer, director and videographer of your whole life and that you are always choosing from a loving and wise place inside of you, then you can begin to feel the power that it gives you. You leave the victim energy behind you and start wising up to what is really going on and what you would prefer to be experiencing and focusing on.
If this tweaks something inside of you and you are interested in learning more about this, please send me a message or click here and join me this coming Sunday. x
This is a question I hear from clients and I have definitely asked of my mentors before. And the truth is you can’t speed up your process, it will unfold in its own time and with infinite wisdom. But you can take the brakes off and enter the deliciousness of the flow of your process. This is where it can feel like you are moving more quickly. You know, those times where you are fully present with where you are, perhaps doing something you love and you slip into a timeless experience. All of a sudden, hours have gone by and it only felt like minutes.
When you can learn to flip your perception of your challenge from something you resist and deny to one where you accept and embrace, that’s when you can remember who you are, which is unlimited and always Ok, loveable and valuable, no matter what is turning up. This way your challenge could well still be there but your experience of it is transformed to one of more ease and flow.
What challenges are you facing that you are feeling you just want to get over right away? A wise person once shared with me, “If you are doing something just to get through it, you are missing the value in that experience. And then life (=you) will need to give that experience to you again until you move through it and get the jewel.”
I choose to be conscious as I move through my challenges, I choose to get the jewels embedded in my experiences…whats your choice?
x
Bring the whole of you, the whole of your presence into whatever it is you are doing. Yes, that means that even when you are taking out the trash, if you are changing the baby’s nappy or cleaning your teeth, all of the things you do, bring the whole of your awareness into that place. And look for the joy which is there. I know that sounds challenging! and it can be especially when we are looking at banal, everyday things. However, if you use this as an opportunity to train yourself into the moment, the rest of your world starts to open up and starts to reflect the joy that you find in every moment.
