Module 2- Illustrate
Welcome to Module 2.
By now you are making some attitudinal and behavioural changes and before we get started it is important for me to share a little about how this may be having an impact upon the others around you.
A note- Getting worse before better
As you are changing your views, behaviour and attitudes, the people closest to you may not understand what is happening. They may think you are going slightly crazy. They may want to give you advice to ‘stop being silly’.
Just know that you are part of a larger system, and as you change, the dynamic of your family and relationships start to change too. This is why sometimes things can seem to get worse before they get better. Other people are often challenged by your change and they may want you to return to ‘normal’ (aka as you were before) so that their comfort zone and what they know is back. You may have played a role in your family that suddenly you are stepping away from. You may have been the ‘rock’ or the ‘mediator’ or the one who always says ‘yes’. Some of your family may not be able to keep pace with the changes you are making and others will go ‘yes go for it’.
Sometimes as we change we find that we do not relate to some of our friends anymore. Our tastes may change as well as our priorities. Friends and family members may become angry at you. Explore with your partner and/or friends how they are feeling about the changes you are making and ask for support. It is important at this time to care for yourself and be gentle and try to explain things in a way you think they will understand. Be respectful and be prepared to let go of those people who do not support your growth and search for happiness.
At this time, people who are on a similar journey as you can be a source of inspiration, support, knowledge and experience. You can walk together and compare notes. This makes the process of change easier. Finding people who understand where you are coming from to share what we have covered so far is vital to the continued growth process. Doing it all alone is hard and isolating.
Keep in mind this lovely line:
“I want to know if you can disappoint another to be true to yourself; if you can bear the accusation of betrayal and not betray your own soul..” Oriah Mountain Dreamer
In this module you will begin to illustrate the vision you want in your life. To create your own painting. At this time another quote springs to mind:
“..our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us…” Marianne Williamson
This is your time to start shining and putting the authentic you out into the world. Small steps as we build your picture. We are going to tap into the power you already have and start creating the steps and building blocks needed to reach the visions you had in week one. You are going to connect in with the infinite source of power that resides within you. We are revealing your inbuilt empowerment. Let’s go!
WEEK 5
Week 5: reconnect
This week is about feeling closer to everything around you and appreciating and respecting everything and everyone. It is about opening your heart wide and receiving love from within you. It is realising that we are all interwoven and that nothing exists without the other. It is the basis of self-empowerment. Loving yourself because you are part of the all. Your heart is your soul’s vision and your solar plexus is your inbuilt power source. You will understand more as we go along.
Consider this lovely piece spoken by Zen master and poet Thich Nat Hanh. He showed his audience a blank piece of paper and said:
“… you will see clearly that there is a cloud floating in this sheet of paper. “…
“Without a cloud, there will be no rain; without rain, the trees cannot grow; and without trees, we cannot make paper. The cloud is essential for the paper to exist. …. If we look even more deeply we can see the sunshine, the logger who cut the tree, the wheat that became his bread, and the loggers father and mother. Without all these things this sheet of paper cannot exist. …. we cannot point to one thing that is not here: (pointing to the paper) time, space, the earth, the rain, the minerals in the soil, the sunshine, the cloud, the river, the heat, the mind. Everything co-exists with this sheet of paper….”. Thich Nhat Hanh
Activity 1: Connecting & Experiencing
Allow travel and then a minimum of 30mins for this exercise. Visit a beach, forest or other natural place. If you live in the city, go to the nearest park.
Walk around, sit or lie down whichever is most comfortable for you. Make sure you have some geographical space and acoustic privacy if possible. Approach this exercise with an attitude of awe- pretend you are a small child experiencing nature for the first time. Be in silence, open your heart and receive.
If you are at the beach, feel the sand between your toes and look at the silica and other minerals that form the sand. Imagine how far this sand may have travelled to get there. Imagine the rocks it has been washed off. Feel the air, hear the sea and remember that they contain oxygen and hydrogen etc. Remember that the tide works off the energy and magnetic pull of the moon and as you are 70% water you are also affected at some level. Experience the healing and relaxing effect of the negative ions released in the atmosphere.
If you are in bushland, find a tree trunk and examine its bark. Remember that the tree has growth rings for every year it has been alive, and think about the sort of growth rings you have as a person. What have been your significant times? Feel the leaves and remember that they harness the energy of the sun and rain to supply the tree with its food. Feel the living breathing tree that supplies you with fresh oxygen and uses your carbon dioxide or breath for its fuel. Let your breath go near the trunk of the tree and be thankful for the exchange between you.
If you are in an inner city atmosphere or your own mini garden try to connect with the beauty of the plants around you, and appreciate all the care it has taken to get them to grow. Have respect for the trees and plants that do their best to keep the balance of clean air for you to breathe. Become aware of the smog and the chemicals that exist in the city. Imagine what this is doing to the plants. Imagine what it is doing to you. Notice that everything around you is made of the building blocks of nature. Plastic has nitrogen in it, concrete has silica and lime in it, asphalt is made from coal which comes out of the earth, and remember that you are related to all the building blocks.
Try to live your life kindly as a result. Appreciate all the groceries you buy from the store and the effort and energy these plants and animals expended to provide food for you. Appreciate that you are related to your pets, in that you share the same building blocks such as carbon and nitrogen, water and other minerals. Make a commitment to using your building blocks wisely, and try to continue in your daily life, with an appreciation for all things- living and otherwise.
Activity 2: random acts of kindness
I am going to ask you to do something nice for a complete stranger. If you saw the film “pay it forward” you will understand the potency of this action. It is purely to do a kind act that is unexpected.
Some ideas would be:
· carry someone’s shopping bags for them,
· hold a door open
· allow a person before you in a queue
· give someone something of yours
· donate anonymously to a charity
· help out at an animal shelter for 30 mins
· smile at someone who seems sad or grumpy. Say something nice to them- a compliment about what they are wearing, or acknowledge they seem busy.
Do it regardless of the outcome. Do it because it helps your heart transform and you to love others and yourself more. Don’t get mad if they don’t respond in kind. The trick is that you gave them a positive and that is what matters. Never believe that you haven’t made an impact.
“The soul is here for its own joy” Rumi
Activity 3: connecting to your source of power
The ancient Hawaiian philosophy of Huna, states that all power comes from within, and they are right. They also know that ‘now is the moment of power’. So all power comes from within in the now moment. How do you connect to that? Well we have been working on this. When you sit in stillness and breathe deeply and slowly, you connect to the source of guidance within, your intuition. When you are fully present in every moment, you are in your power source. Paradoxically for some, it is when we give up trying to control anything and everything, we actually get power. When we are trying to control things it is from a space of fear. Fear of it not working out, fear of lack, fear of losing something. If we accept each moment as a chance to love ourselves and all things more, then we are seated firmly in a powerful place.
There are various schools of thought on the physical location of this power source, such as the solar plexus in Yogic sutras or the Hara in Japanese martial arts. Regardless of philosophy, it is visualising yourself as the source and conduit of universal power that is the key. Whichever way you do that is up to you. This power though has to be grounded in heart centred conscious thought, action and words. Your heart is your soul’s voice, when you are acting in accordance with your intuition and heartfelt desires you will be self-empowered.
LISTEN to the MP3 for week 5 “Happiest Moment”
WEEK 6
Week 6- Reclaim
Welcome to week 6. You are half way through. Fantastic effort!! Well done.
This week we are going to focus on you reclaiming your power some more. Now that you realise that you are connected to everything, we are going to identify the strengths that you already have within you that you can bring forward to assist you on this journey. You are also going to reclaim your uniqueness and your special gifts to share with the world, your vulnerability and your own agenda.
No-one knows how to be you, better than you!
So let’s get started.
Activity 1: tapping into your aliveness and passion
So, building on from week three, when we were getting creative, take 10 minutes to write down
When do I feel most alive and energised?
Who am I with?
Where am I?
What am I doing?
What are the key elements of all of these? Eg making something, being in nature, caring for others..
Who inspires me? Who do I want to be more like?
Person
What characteristics do they have?
What are they doing?
What are all the ways I am already similar to them?
What do you notice? Are there any themes? When do you feel most authentically you?
Now that you have identified key themes on when you are most energised and the characteristics you already have, you can use this to start mapping out how you are going to share your unique gifts and self with the world.
Make sure you write down any inspirations you have related to this for later.
When you think about ways you may have held yourself back from living your passion, it is useful to ask yourself:
of what benefit was hanging onto all these fears, self-limiting beliefs, old emotions and attitudes?’
What answer did you get?
Remember,
“It is never too late to be what you might have been” George Elliot
So, what gifts can you give yourself each day, that bring you closer to living your passion and sharing your unique talents with the world?
Eg, I will do what I love for at least 2 hours a week, I will create a space in my life and my house for the things I love to do. I will say yes to my heart and my soul. I will honour me and my passions.
Write down exactly what you are going to do to support yourself blossoming.
Activity 2: vulnerability
When we start to open our heart more, we also are letting down our guard. We are trusting that others will treat us with respect and kindness. This won’t always happen, as people are at different stages of their journeys. So, what to do.
It is important that we don’t close up and shut down when this happens. If we let go of our identity that we spent much of our life creating, then it is harder to become offended or hurt as we can see the hurt in another and not take it personally. People’s behaviour says everything about where they are at. It is not about you.
So how do we stay vulnerable?
We have to drop the masks we have hidden behind and we have to send love to ourselves and to others. We have to be authentic and risk being seen for our deepest selves.
See if you identify with the masks below. Which one/s have you hidden behind and what damage they have caused you. Acknowledge why you had them and thank them now let them go. There is a lot of energy required to maintain your mask. Energy much more wisely used in supporting yourself to shine. Relinquishing your mask takes courage, but brings enormous freedom. Time to set yourself free!! You are perfect already, you just have to reveal this. feel free to write down other masks you have hidden behind
Mask
super busy
Took up all my time, stopped me from facing my fears and my unresolved emotions and life experiences, stopped me from acknowledging I was unhappy in my current situation
Victim
I didn’t take responsibility for my life and blamed everyone else for what was happening and where I am. So I became stuck and resentful and disempowered myself
People pleaser
I did not make any decisions and was inauthentic to myself as I let others decide for me so I would maintain their approval and avoid conflict. I lived in fear and dishonoured myself
The rock/or duck paddling furiously under the surface
Pretended to be strong all the time even when I felt vulnerable and needed support. This meant I never asked for help and no-one offered so I was alone in my pain.
Intellectual
I hid behind logic and keeping myself up in my head so I didn’t have to feel my feelings. I had a rational explanation for everything, but no-one could get close to me so I was very lonely
Now you have revealed your mask/s make a concerted effort each day to come out from behind them and share more of your authentic self. How you feel and how you think. Express your vulnerability, ask for help and start sharing with others who you know will respect you. You may even be surprised as they will have seen through your mask all along. Celebrate your ‘coming out’. Time to reclaim you!
Well done. This work on yourself is not easy. I believe it is the most courageous thing you will ever do.
Activity 3: the power you have already used to make things happen
Below is a list of some of the ways you may have already accessed your inbuilt power to achieve something in the past. Tick all those that you have already used and add your own. See you are powerful beyond measure!
Determination – kept going when you really wanted to give up
Resilience – survived traumas and events, loss etc and came through the other side
Commitment to Self-care – exercised to be fit and healthy, ate healthy food
Focus – stayed focussed on a task or goal to get it done
Positive outlook – looked at what I can learn from what happens, glass half full approach
Patience – accepted the things out of my control and prepared to wait for the things I wanted
Open-minded – stayed open to opportunities and having my world view challenged
Collaborative – worked with others to achieve something greater than we could all do individually
Flexible to change – allowed myself to adapt and move with new things and situations
Courageous – took risks to do something I really wanted
Where did the power of all these characteristics of you come from? You guessed it! Within!!
So self-empowerment is not something you get, it is something you have as you reveal more of your self, love your whole self more and take the plunge to be magically, marvellously and miraculously YOU!
LISTEN to the MP3 for week 6 “Your Unique Gifts”
Week 7
Week 7 – Redefine
Welcome to week 7.
This week we are going to checkout and reshape your attitudes to money.
Money is a curious thing. It is a neutral form of energy exchange that over the years has become a sought after commodity of it’s own. Before coinage, people bartered and still do to some extent today. Eg a pumpkin for 6 eggs or a massage for some work done around your house. Now money has become a pursuit in of itself.
So, you already know some of the barriers and blocks that have been preventing you from being all you wish to be in your life and living your dreams. Money can be a big part of these barriers.
do you have any of thees money challenges?
Money issues:
Chronic, debilitating debt
Lack of basic financial literacy
Desire, but lack of knowledge, of how to create passive income
Lack of a strategy
No support system or accountability
Self-defeating behaviors
Distractions and procrastination
Inaccurate or partial financial information
Fear of investing
Indecision about being wealthy
Money doesn’t have any meaning unless we attribute one to it. So let’s start looking at your beliefs about money and what you actually want it for.
Activity 1: meaningful money
Please identify some of your attitudes to money, how can you see money as more of a representation of an energetic interchange, as a tool like a shovel, that is neither good nor evil. It can be something you use to tend your garden where your passions are going to grow and flourish. Maybe this helps you love the job you are in more as it can fund you starting to work in your passions and express more of you. It can also be a training ground for learning to speak up for yourself be more authentic and manage other people’s behaviours in a more loving way for yourself and others.
“Money will only make you more of what you already are.” – T. Harv Eker
Money as T Herv Eker explains , can be thought of as a lubricant, that can help you function more easily with choices in your life, but a word of caution, it needs to be a tool rather than you be a slave to it.
Activity 2: attitude of gratitude
Abundance is all around us. Abundance of air, time, food, water, sunshine, trees, opportunity, choice. Abundance means that there is ‘more than enough’ of something. Prosperity literally means ‘doing well’. This doesn’t have to be the exclusive realm of money. You could be doing well in your studies, your health, as a parent and especially in how you are approaching life in each moment.
So for this week, we are going to start a gratitude and abundance journal. This is not a huge piece of writing, just bullet points you list at the end of each day. To get you started, please List all the ways your life is abundant and all the things you are grateful and thankful for right at this moment. Then add to this list as the week goes on.
Whenever you are having a down moment, put your life in context and think about what you can be grateful for. You always have a choice to be grateful and when you are dealing with life in an accepting and positive way, you are abundant and prospering. You are wealthy and rich in experience and being happy in the moment.
Many people have lots of money but are not happy and live in fear of losing it, or have become a debt slave, overworking to pay off what they think they need in order to be ‘good enough’.
When we adopt a thankful attitude to life and all it brings, we are in a more receptive state of mind for things to come to us in the perfect time and way. (which may not be the way we thought). When we are craving something we don’t have it causes us suffering as it is only possible to be happy on a moment to moment basis in the now. Remember your moving meditations and still ness. So think of what you can be thankful for in each moment. Think outside the box. You may be thankful for the relationship split you had because now you are free to pursue your own goals and be your self. You may be thankful that you have all your arms and legs and your health. You may be grateful for your pioneering spirit.
What did you notice from doing this activity? Do you feel more abundant? Are you clearer what you want money for? If you want more money to buy a holiday to spend more time with your family and have fun, how does that stack up maybe not being available to them on a daily basis because you are working so long? Are you working to pay for things you then don’t have time to use? When you commit to living your passions, you have an abundance of energy and vitality. When you give yourself lots of self love, you create the right environment for abundance to come to you.
Think about being on your death bed and ask yourself have you lived? Loved? Laughed? And if not, time to start now!!
See you in week 8 where we start mapping your steps to your goals from week 1.
LISTEN to the MP3 for week 7 “Abundance”
Week 8
Week 8 – Reshape
Welcome to week 8. You are 2/3 through the program. How do you feel? Are you:
· looking at and feeling your visions daily?
· Breathing deep and slow?
· Sitting in stillness and practicing moving meditation?
· Sending love to yourself and connecting to the power within?
· Cultivating an attitude of gratitude?
· Letting go of your masks and speaking your truth, being vulnerable?
· Doing more of what you love?
· Seeing the good in others and
· Shifting your stuck self-limiting beliefs?
This program is an accelerated process to setting strong foundations for the rest of your life. These things need to become daily practice until they are embedded within you and coming naturally. Just like driving a car or riding a bike. When you do these things daily and live and breathe them you are happier and more empowered in each moment.
This week we are going to be laying the steps needed for you to live your passions. You may like to revisit your future visions of week one and add to or modify them based on the work you have done so far. Maybe your priorities have changed a little or a lot. Don’t be afraid to make changes. This is a sign of growth and you becoming clearer on your life purpose and heart felt visions.
Activity 1: mapping the ground
We have been working on many things up until now that have been laying the foundations for you to be more self-empowered, self-loving and happier on a daily basis. Now that your house has strong foundations, we can start to build towards some of the future visions and feelings you started with.
Ok, let us imagine that when you started this program you were on ‘stagnant island’ and you wanted to get to ‘pleasure island’. Looking at your current circumstances and the future you envision, what are the key things that need to change?
It is important to make your steps into bite size chunks that you can achieve so we need to start with a broad brush on our illustration then break each step into smaller ones and still smaller until we can reasonably manage them.
An example might be:
Stagnant island- feeling unfulfilled, frustrated, procrastinating, don’t like current career, not taking time for me, want to do more of my passion of helping children
Step 1- look up child are training options online or locally
1. check costs and qualifications needed for good job prospects
a. look online at nationally accredited training
b. decide whether face to face or online learning or a combo is best
c. look at who is running the course and the support they provide
2. select a couple of courses that fit with means and vision
3. apply for one or two courses
Step 2 enrol in child care training
1. schedule time to complete study and assignments
2. get support as needed from tutors and others
3. investigate placement options
Step 3 complete child care training
1. contact placements identified in 2.3 to ask re job prospects
2. prepare resume and for interview process
3. celebrate successful completion with family and friends
Pleasure island –doing what I love, working at a child care centre, feeling happy and like I am making a difference in the world
Are you getting the picture of how to break everything down? Often we procrastinate because the visions seem overwhelming and we don’t know where to start. This activity helps you drill down to bite size manageable chunks. It is about making and taking steps towards the things your heart desires.
So please Make three big steps and then break them down into 3 smaller steps, then break those down to 3 smaller steps until you can easily achieve each one. Try making a 7 day goal, a 30 day goal and a 90 day goal to start with.
Eg, to get from lonely to feeling fulfilled you might have some steps like:
1. 30 mins still time each day to connect with all that is and hear my intuition
a. Schedule time in my diary ahead of time
2. Use 20 seconds of courage to ask someone to meet me for coffee
a. Go out for the coffee
3. Look up a group that is interested in the same things as me. Eg a meetup group
a. Make contact with the organiser Focus on your biggest dream and passion.
This is a sizable activity so it is the only one for this week. It takes quite some thinking about. Best of luck and see if you can get others to help you brainstorm ideas for your stepping stones.
LISTEN to the MP3 for week 8 “Liberating your star”
This concludes module 2 – illustrate, where we have been painting the picture for the next phase of your journey.
See you in module 3 – integrate, where we are putting it all together into daily practice. click on the link to the content here