William Michael Forbes
At first I thought my fear was me...then I realized it was instinct responding to a negative idea. wmf
A Well known fact: Instincts are great when you live in a jungle or in the wilderness...but in the modern world reason will transcend instinct and raise you to your soul.
I was in my car travelling at sixty miles an hour when an off white Lexus suddenly swerved in front of me at an even higher rate of speed, my body reacted by releasing the gas pedal to create an almost instant gap between us...yet the Lexus appeared to increase its speed and continued swerving past cars that were in front of me...I watched as the Lexus swung hurriedly from one lane to another into every gap that enabled it advance quickly through the traffic. In the past I would have been angry at the driver and I would have carried that anger with me into my next meeting...I would have likely complained to others about “bad drivers on the road and perpetuated my frustration way beyond the original time of the event...but no...I won’t do that to myself or others. Through a practice of staying in the moment, I’ve learned to let negatively charged events lose their charge and pass from my mind in order to stay happily in the moment and while this skill is not yet perfected, it is developed enough that I can release myself quicker from the effects of my negative responses to most every day events.
Until we can think and be aware independently of the ideas and thoughts that are stored in our minds we are subjective and reactive to them and the emotions attached to them, whether those emotions and thoughts are our own or projected towards us from others. Awareness is the key to cultivating a sense of mental and emotional freedom that exists in the moment. Awareness is the ability to be able to perceive and recognize that something IS occurring within us, around us and within us and around us simultaneously. To know that we are having a certain thought or that certain thought (s) are being stimulated by the environment...that certain emotions are being stimulated by our own thoughts or the thoughts of others...is the beginning of learning the art of becoming an awakened Soul. An awakened Soul is an individual that has learned to consciously discern between their body, their thoughts, their emotions and the activities of the environment, while also being able to function effectively within it.
This idea brings us to today activity on how to be happy in fifteen minutes or less and will require only two minutes from every hour of the next eight hours. The starting point to this activity is to first notice what you are doing, whatever it is name it i.e. I’m typing these words and aware of feeling excited, I’m calling my friend and feeling nervous, I remembering that I have a bill to pay and it makes me aware of my anxiousness about money. Just notice the thoughts and emotions that are connected to wherever you are and whatever you are doing for the first minute and for the second minute consider if there is a better thought with more positive emotions attached to it that you would like to be thinking instead, then think and feel that for the next minute and notice if how you are feeling improves and...
Have a great day!
William Michael Forbes
Copyright© 2010 by William Michael Forbes. All rights reserved.
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