Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Imperfect days can have perfect endings.

A day is really just an arbitrary collection of moments, and to lump it all into a 'good day' or a 'bad day' is really unfair to the little moments along the way. One moment doesn't have to have any affect on another, unless we let it. We can choose to keep each moment sacred... and make the most of each one, no matter what happened the moment before.

How often do you let your moments spill over into the other ones? Do you take work home with you? Did the morning rush at home, start your work day off on the wrong foot?

That's what you get for muddying the moments.

Give yourself a break.

Literally.

Create a breakpoint along your journey... maybe it's a landmark to and from work, or your front door at home... just some signal that says "what's past is past, I now focus on the future." You do it every morning when you wake up, so why not do it again before your night begins?

Also create a ritual for yourself, like taking a nice hot shower, where you can imagine all the ills of the day to simply wash away. The key is to start off refreshed.

Then become determined to have that perfect ending to the day. Look around and ask yourself "With what I have right now, how can I make it 'perfect'?"

Don't (and I mean DON'T) think about what a perfect ending would be, and then depress yourself because you don't have what you want. I mean... make the perfect ending out of what you DO have.

It's called "making the most with what you have".

Because that makes it doable... and doable is the perfect ending for an otherwise imperfect day.

Keep the light on!
GuruStu

Sunday, October 03, 2010

Saturday, October 02, 2010

Emotions 101 – Interview with author Luis Angel Diaz

Today I have the great pleasure of being the host on Day 12 of the Virtual Blog Tour for Memory in the Cells by author Luis Angel Diaz.


Newly translated from the popular Spanish edition, author Luis Diaz describes his book Memory in the Cells as “where Eckhart Tolle meets What the Bleep Do We Know, but taking you on a much more practical journey.” He says Memory in the Cells teaches “emotional education” and shows the reader how to transform the “pain body” into the “joy body”, helping to heal all aspects of their lives.

Yesterday, Luis visited Glenn M Smith at http://sensitiveselfhelp.com . For today’s stop on the tour, I decided to ask Luis some questions about emotions and how we can understand them and use them to be happier in our lives.


* * * * *

Stu: I often talk about how thoughts create our spiritual world, while feelings create our physical world. Can you talk about feelings... what they are, where they come from and where they go after we experience them?

Luis: Our thoughts, opinions and beliefs create feelings in us. And the unconscious repetition of feelings determines our inner dialogue and our future actions and behavior.


If you explore your feelings, always, you will find a thought behind each one. Sometimes the belief is very deep and unconscious; these are called, core beliefs or personal lies.


For example, the common core belief many people share (but not many are aware of) is, "I am unworthy". This thought about oneself may trigger feelings of sadness and fear in those who are thinking it. The inner dialogue may say, "I am not important" or "Who cares?" But the opposite of that can also be active where we tell ourselves, "No one should know I am unworthy" or "I have to prove I am worthy!"

When you deeply believe you are unworthy, but you are not aware of it, you can be either totally depressed or totally stressed and overwhelmed with so many things to do. When you need to prove your own worthiness, you don't want to disappoint other people. Therefore, you take on things you wouldn't otherwise do, and you go through life rescuing people.


Imagine the impact of this belief on your health and wellbeing!


Stu: A lot of people let their emotions rule them, rather than the other way around. Why is that? How can they 'turn it around' so they can gain control of their lives?

Luis: Imagine the life experience of the child of a paranoid mother. What kind of feelings would this child have? A lot of fear, probably. He doesn't verify what his mother is saying. He just believes it and has feelings as a result.


Our bodies are always innocent. The mind matures but the body is always like a child. The body wants to love and be loved, play and have fun. It’s curious and likes adventure. That is the reason you see old people becoming like little kids after losing their mental capabilities. Without the mind and its cultural programming, things would be much simpler for us.


Our thoughts create reactions in our innocent body that "believes everything" the mind says, just like the child and his mother from the first paragraph. Harmony and wellbeing are the result of finding the balance between body and mind. It’s not achieved by killing the mind or by ruling over the body as we were told. We need the mind and we need the body working and supporting each other. The old paradigm that says the body needs to be controlled by the mind has created enough suffering in us.


When feelings in the body are allowed and not repressed, they move and we heal. When they move, they become emotions. Moving emotion is healthy as long as I take responsibility for them and don’t use them to blame others. Moving emotion is exercising our nature as energy beings that are created to recycle energy, instead of storing it.


We need emotional education. We need to know that toxic thoughts are going to create toxic feelings in us. We need to be educated in natural ways to release the emotional pollution that is the result of the feelings we have been suppressing.


Stu: How can someone positively envision something without getting caught in emotional expectations?


Luis: What is not true creates pain. What is true creates expansion and wellbeing. If we believe in lies, we suffer.


What you called "emotional expectation" is the effect upon the body causes by the activity of the mind. In this case, the mind imagines a future that matches what that mind believes. Therefore, it creates excitement or positive expectations within the body.


For example, let’s say you meet someone you like, and two hours into the conversation you are imagining yourself having a family with this person. This imagination is called fantasy and is just as toxic as negative expectations. It’s the result of a programming received by the culture we were brought up.


For visioning to be effective and genuine, it needs to be fueled by the person's values. These are the core priorities that generate aliveness inside us and connection with our source. The moment we bring the cultural programming into the process, it gets polluted and the whole thing stops working.


Stu: What advice would you give to people who try to avoid all negative emotions, thoughts, situations, etc?


Luis: We all want freedom and love and peace; isn’t that true? They are what I called "human values". There are several of them, but I am going to use these three as examples.


How do we feel when we don’t have these values? Angry, upset, sad, anxious, afraid, etc.


How do we feel when we do have them? Joyful, calm, creative, inspired, connected to life, loving, etc.


Both negative and positive feelings are important for us. We need to listen to all of them. They tell us how far or how close we are from our values. It’s not true that we need to avoid the first and favor the second in order to have good life. On the contrary, feelings, (positive or negative) are part of our guidance system. And without this system we are lost and confused.


Stu: What's one thing that people can do RIGHT NOW to change the course of their lives for the better?


Luis: I teach and train people to reconnect with their bodies and honor and respect their feelings, especially the negative ones. They are all messages to the owner. If we dismiss those messages, they will keep coming back louder and louder until we finally hear them!


* * * * *


I hope you enjoyed this interview with Luis Angel Diaz and that you’ll check out his new book Memory in the Cells, which is coming to Amazon on Tuesday October 5, 2010. You can receive a complete library of beautiful personal development gifts when you buy the book on the day of its launch, including one from me: a free download of "Toon Up Your Life.”


In addition, Luis is hosting a very special FREE telesummit entitled “Healing at a Cellular Level” on September 27th, 28th and 29th with a distinguished panel of some of today’s most inspiring authors and speakers on the topic of emotional healing and holistic wellbeing. If you’d like to attend, all you have to do is request a “launch reminder” about the book, and you’ll receive all the information to attend. If you cannot make the live event, you can download the audio at your convenience.


To find out how to buy Luis’s book and receive these gifts,
including the FREE pass to the 3-day online telesummit, go to

http://www.memoryinthecells.com



AND you can read all about the telesummit and the guests at http://tinyurl.com/cmr-telesummit


Be sure to follow Luis tomorrow when the next stop on his Virtual Blog Tour is Callie Carling´s Blog http://empoweredhealer.co.uk


As usual, please do feel free to share your comments and thoughts below. I love reading your feedback.