What Stands Between You?

You already know you need to stop putting things off, watch news and the tube less, and stop participating in activities that are pure time-suckers. You know you need to be more proactive, set goals and deadlines to achieve them. And if you’re more aware, you know you need a system to track your progress and increase your accountability when it comes to doing the things that need to be done to create your highest and best.

Okay, you know what you need to do, you can see it clearly over there, on the other side of the crevasse which stands between where you are and where you know you want to be.

If you really want to get from here, you need to take a look at what stands between you and where you want to be. Here are some of the things that may be keeping you from having what you really want (what you really, really want):

You’re Afraid

Fear is probably the number one thing that stands between you and what you want, it is by far the most powerful influencer in the mind of all human beings. And in terms of making changes to your life, fear of change, and fear of failure are at the top of the list.

And at any point, if you decide to bail out on pursuing your dreams, there is a mob of folks waiting to welcome you back to your life of mediocrity, they’ll hug you, kiss you, tell you how sorry they are for you, they’ll make you chicken soup and nurse you back to mediocrity any way they can.

The best lives are enjoyed by those who have forged their own trail, conquering their fears along the way, knowing that the road ahead is going to be a challenge.

The road may be longer than you thought it would be, have more twists and turns, and you might even take a wrong turn every now and again, but you must start the journey and follow it wherever it leads if you want to get to where you want to be.

Paralysis of Analysis

Sometimes you can get so lost in the study or preparation of a thing that you become frozen in time and space. There is so much to learn, there’s always another book, seminar, class, workshop, a course of study, or guru who you’d like to meet that stands between you and where you want to be.

As prepared as you could possibly be, you could not possibly anticipate anything that might appear on your radar along the way. And if you tried to study and prepare for any possible scenario, chances are you’ll be lost in the prep and never feel prepared enough to confidently leave.

You’ve got to be ready and willing to act on what you have, and gather more information along the way. Otherwise, you will remain stagnant, a victim of the paralysis of analysis. If you run into an unexpected challenge along the way, you just have to do what every other expansion explorer does, scramble like hell, reach out to others, try to figure out a way to get around it, or slay the dragon and keep moving.

Lack of Motivation

If you really want to change your life, you need to be willing and committed to your continuing to make progress even if you’re not feeling it. Motivation is great, but it is often fleeting, what then?

That’s when your true character shines through, you can be a whiner or a winner. Your choice. If you’re going to pick up your toys and run home to mommy, that’s okay, maybe it’s not your time to be the winner. But if it’s your time to dominate your life and emerge the triumphant victorious winner you were always destined to be… Keep going, even if you don’t feel like it.

Winners make their doingness a habit, which requires no motivation. Doing isn’t just what you do, it’s who you are.

Passivity

There is a huge trend toward using, “Whatever,” as a general excuse for anything that might not turn out the way you like as if it justifies walking away from anything because “shit happens.” And there are a thousand excuses that will sound like it justifies your quitting.

You just can’t have that attitude, if you really want what you really want. If it’s true, and you want it, and you think you can to what it takes to get it, you won’t be dissuaded by the first obstacle that shows up and say something like, “Oh, I guess that just wasn’t meant for me.”

No, it was meant for you, you just bailed out on getting what you wanted. What stands between you and what you want is not, “Whatever,” it’s you.

If it’s you, then start practicing doing things. Make a commitment to do something every day – no matter what – and do it. It doesn’t have to be anything big. It could be something like making your bed every day, or writing in your journal every night, and prove to yourself that you can learn to do something without letting life’s excuses get in the way.

Slow and Easy Wins the Race

Don’t take off in a full sprint toward achieving what you want. It’s better to take small steps toward what you want than no steps at all, and making continual progress assures that every day you are getting closer to what you want.

Sometimes, the over-ambitious person has a clear vision of what they want and they take off with the fervent expectation to be able to get there quickly because it is so clear to them, that they could actually reach out and touch it. Then, fail from utter exhaustion, possibly warranting a trip in an ambulance, then having to start over again from scratch, if they survive the ordeal.

(I did that once in Vegas. From the strip, I said, “Look! There’s the Rio, I’ll race you there…” My friend and I started out… It looked so clear, so close. Not my best moment, but a great analogy, eh?)

When is Now the Time for You to Start

You are ready. In fact, you’ve never been so ready. If you readied any longer, you’d start to rot.

You know what you want. Now go get it.

But keep your wits about you, be cautious but keep going, slow and steady.

What you do today brings you so much closer to what you want.

What are you going to do?

The Trajectory of Personal Growth and Change

If you’re on your own path of personal growth and expansion, your journey will be highly individualized and unique. Certainly, there will be times when your place in time and space and your coordinates align with someone else, leading to a bit of education and excitement along the way, then you will find yourself being led in yet, another direction.

Why can’t you just join hands and enjoy the entire journey with a particular group of friends? You absolutely can do that, but your expansion will be limited by maintaining the familiar frequency vibration of your friends. To be true to your evolutionary potential, there will be times when you go it alone, and in many cases, once you have traversed this rugged trail alone, you find yourself in very different territory and on a completely different trajectory.

If you’re travelling from Seattle to New York, the slightest change in trajectory can land you in Miami Beach. Likewise, your trajectory greatly affects the direction your path will lead. The truth is, while you share similarities with other people that you meet along the way (and it can be fun to hang out with others there for a while), you must realize they are not you. Even if you share camaraderie with them because you have certain things in common, you gotta move.

You can tarry and stay there if you want, and many people decide to do so because it’s familiar or comfortable. Even so, you know something inside you is beckoning you to new vantage points and unexplored territory. You are so very unique and you’re coordinates in time and space are so highly individualized that no one could possibly be on the same journey as you.

No one really knows you. They haven’t lived the life you have lived. They do not know the thoughts that race around inside our head, they do not share the exact same chemistry as you (no, not even identical twins). The YOU of who you are is not like anyone else. This is God’s gift to you. You can decide to accept it and get moving, or deny it and remain the same.

Your evolution is calling to you. You are the change. Your new life is waiting for you to arrive.

But you will not get there if you don’t go.

How do you do it?

Only you can decide. Others who have forged new paths who have given us clues of how to successfully charter new territory start by establishing their starting point, longitude and latitude, inventorying supplies and resources prior to departure. It’s best to establish where you are (to the best of your ability) before your launch.

It’s good to have a plan. Columbus had a plan, to discover an alternate route to Asia. Similarly, you should have your individualized plan based on your dreams, desires and the result of your deep inner work. Like Columbus, even with the best intentions and planning, you could end up somewhere you never intended to be. Even so, when you arrive you will know this was your higher calling and, who knows? Your journey may be celebrated and an inspiration for other “Expansion Explorers.”

Which brings up an entirely oft overlooked detail of documenting ones journey. I’ve never been one to be one for journaling, but many of my clients and friends swear by it, although I have left a trail of writings that painfully document my particular thought process at various times along my personal journey (that are embarrassing to look back on from this vantage point). I can attest to the validity of documentation. In any logical and/or legal (or medical) sense, “if you didn’t document it, it didn’t happen.” ‘Ere, journaling, whether privately or publicly (as in social media), is highly recommended.

This is your time. This is your life. This is your journey.

Establish where you are, have an intention and plan in mind, and move.

Want you ramp up your effectiveness and influence? Chart your progress via documentation.

If you are called to do so, allow your courageous journey to be an inspiration to others, who may be too frightened to do so.

Feel free to check in with me along the way.

Personal Adventurers

Do you see things in your life that ended up being less than what you had hoped for?

Are you okay with the idea that things are fine the way they are and might lead to something even better than you’d expected from your previous ideas?

Are you okay with others doing the best they can with what they have and it is not up to you to try to manage or change their life, in a sense allowing them to find their own way?

Do you love the person you are without having to seek approval or validation from others?

When your life is disrupted by an unexpected life circumstance are you apt to quickly adapt and look for the better thing that is coming to you?

If these questions resonate with you as ideas that you are embracing as you are moving through life, then like me, you are on a path of the personal adventurer. Personal adventurers are able to find value, the lesson, even reverent levity or happiness in even the worst of circumstances. When other people might self-destruct become defensive, strike out in fear, anger, or sink into a deep depression, you are looking to experience the situation from an alternative perspective, you find yourself looking for the treasure in every tragedy or challenge.

Let’s say you lost your job, found yourself in hard times and unable regain your balance. This might be a condition that would throw someone into the depths of depression, but you feel something good is headed your way. Then while taking a stroll down the street in the early evening someone approached you on the street with a stocking cap covering his face and a gun pointed at you asking you for your purse or wallet. There is any number of ways to respond to such a challenge, but you’re likely to smile and with uncomfortable levity, you might respond with, “Really? Did you pick the wrong person tonight, I should be holding you up,” and end up striking up a conversation with the would-be thief.

What would have been a life-threatening event in someone else’s life was an opportunity for you to reach out to another human being without losing the grip on your own life and/or emotions even in a personally difficult situation.

When faced with the most challenging of life circumstances, you are looking for ways to uncover goodness, mercy, understanding and value in the experience which empowers you to move into the futures with knowledge and power which would ether elude others, or may have been obtained via master level training. You benefit from every experience and continue to move ahead with your new found training locked in as a new tool in your tool belt for whatever lies ahead.

It is here that you find a sense of inner peace in all things.

No one can tell you how to think about or process the data presented to you on your life’s journey. Sure, you can be open to insight from others, but only you can apply the learning or appreciate the beauty and elegance of the uncovered treasure no matter how great or how small.

Philosophers and religious leaders present us with their view of a particular concept or ideal and there may be instances where you feel a common resonance with someone else who is on their own individual path and for a while (possibly for a long while) you may find yourself walking in lock step along similar paths at the same time. These times are precious as they foster a sense of belonging and camaraderie which is comforting, though for most of us, that tug from our heart to move forward begins to lead us into a different direction.

If this is you, you have an adventurous soul which seeks to find its own way and experience things that may not be available to others who travel in groups for long periods of time, and that’s okay. Not only is it okay, but really it’s the only way you will find peace, fulfillment and happiness; by making your own way. And who knows? You might be clearing a path for others as you grab your compass and machete and forge your own path. Certainly, you will have access to data that may not be available to others following the well-worn path.

Even though most of us like to feel a part of the greater whole, only the individual is able to see that his or her adventurous propensity is actually a part of the hugely greater whole that others may not be able to see or even consider from their vantage point on their path. We have a sense of taking the high road, one that may be more challenging, but the rewards are so worth it. We long for enormous views of aerial vistas that can only be imagined from below.

Society and the media try to designate who we should be, how we should act and think. This promotes a herd mentality which causes us to divide and to devise brother against brother, to judge other people for conducting themselves in a manner which you have been programmed to accept, “is not acceptable.”

But you have an inner sense of knowingness that you cannot change, control or take responsibility for another person’s actions, you are keenly aware that you are only responsible for you, your thoughts, ideas, behaviors and manifestations.

You are becoming more accepting or tolerant of people and things being what they are. While others are more apt to focus on the tragedies and injustices, you find yourself focusing on the beauty and elegance of all the good things that are taking place simultaneously. To maintain a positive perspective, even in the worst of times, is a blessing and the lever which releases real joy and happiness.

After a while, don’t be surprised if you find humor – even possibly giving way to laughter – in even the most tragic circumstances. While others might think your response is disrespectful and contemplate calling someone to have you sent to a loony bin, don’t take it personal. They have been programmed to have this sense of belief system, and that’s okay. They’re only doing the best they can with what they have. Maybe they will find their own way in the future, maybe not. Don’t take it personal, just give it a shrug and say, “Oh well,” and keep it moving. There is no need to defend your position, just allow everyone to have their own opinion and perspective and bless them as you walk by.

You live in a world where you are surrounded by others who do not have your best interests at heart, and only you can determine what is best for you, so don’t allow these individuals to threaten you or beat you into submission, unless of course, you have come to the conclusion that submitting (or feigning submission) may actually allow you the freedom to move on.