Aimee Mullins: How My Legs Give Me Super Powers

This is a great example of raising the level of intention and being able to see beyond to infinite possibilities. Through her playful attitude, Aimee shows us how "disabled" is not even part of her life. She has elevated her prosthetics to an art form. She is a great example of "asking and allowing" many gifts to flow into her life. As the song says, "if you want to change your life, change your mind".

Enjoy!

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Four Steps to Living With Purpose

In October of 2008, I started a one year sabbatical. I knew that it was something I needed to do, and yet, wasn't sure how to explain why. Here is what I wrote at the time:

1. My life "wasn't working any more", in that I was not able to sustain the same pace, interest, drive and wisdom that I enjoyed in the past; and
2. I am not precisely sure "what" it is that I am looking for. On a grand scale, I am looking for peace and serenity, a centered existence where I work from a new personal power that is true to myself. I am in transition to stretch to a new level of maturity that doesn't require me to do more, but rather be more."

I was committed to follow my intuition throughout this 12 month period, and I knew in my bones that this was an important step in my purpose. Throughout my sabbatical, I followed four steps to keep me on purpose and increase my commitment: Clear and Connect, Ask and Allow

Clear and Connect - We talk about four levels of energy: mental, emotional, physical and spiritual. We are born into this world in a pure state, and as we learn and grow, we experience life and record those experiences in our memories and our bodies. In many of these experiences, we make emotional decisions - we label as "limiting beliefs" - of how the world operates. We carry the emotional memory in our body. "Because of the human tendency to perpetuate old emotion, almost everyone carries in his or her energy field an accumulation of old emotional pain, which I call 'the pain body'." (Eckert Tolle, A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose pg 135).

Connecting simply means connecting to three things: yourself, others, and your greater purpose (which may include connecting to God), and is described as a "heart connection". The more that we are connected to our purpose, our real identity without the constraints of societal and cultural expectations, and connected on a heart level with others, the happier we are. The clearer our mental, emotional and physical bodies are, the easier it is to have access to these experiences. Not impossible, just easier. It means staying present in every moment. In many challenging situations, I ask myself, "who am I and what do I want to create right now?" Connecting to myself, others and my highest intention has provided me great wisdom and appreciation.

Ask and Allow - Bruce Wilkerson in his book "The Dream Giver" asks us to look in the corner of our heart where we keep our dreams. We often tuck away our dreams, which are really our purpose for being here. Many times our ego tricks us into sabotaging our dreams - "Do I even have a dream?" "Is mine good enough?" Sometimes, once we clear and connect, a funny thing happens. We find ourselves in a very empty space. We are so used to filling every moment with something that it can be very uncomfortable to be in this space. This is a good sign! We are letting go of the ego-driven "shoulds" that dictate our lives, and clearing a space to allow our dreams to find a place in our awareness.

At this point, we are open to tap into many wonderful, creative forces in our own life. I personally believe that there are many forces and resources that are available to us beyond what we can see, touch and feel. The more that we clear and connect, the more we can ask and allow this to flow into our life.

Because our senses are sharpened, we can ask to tap into vast energy sources that are within us and all around us. How many times have you walked into a room and the "room was alive" or "it felt heavy"? You are likely feeling the energy of the people in the room. Every culture talks about unseen, external sources are available to us. We call them God, spirit guides, guardian angels, ancestors, "Source", Mother Earth - the list is endless. These are all ways that we represent what we feel but do not know directly through our traditional five senses.

Presence, meditation and visualization are powerful ways to tap into these sources because they create alpha and theta brainwaves versus beta ("high" beta is associated with intense stress). This state is sometimes described as "synchronicity" and "flow" where your life just seems to "work". I recommend a book called "The Power of Flow: Practical Ways to Transform Your Life with Meaningful Coincidence" by Charlene Belitz and Meg Lundstrom. It describes in depth many of the principles and ways to create "flow" and synchronicity in your life.

The final step - allowing - requires faith and commitment. The outcome of asking and allowing is known as the Law of Attraction and requires that we are 100% responsible for what we ask for. Ideally our requests are in alignment with our purpose, and keeps us connected to ourselves and others (in other words, does not bring harm). However, we must also be ready to accept and allow the answers, and not be attached to the outcome. There is a requirement of faith that what you have received in response to your request is in your highest good. It requires a commitment to shift your view from challenges and hurdles to a mindset of opportunities for growth and maturity.

I have lived in synchronicity and with this assumption of faith all of my life. In truth, I don't know how else to be. Throughout my life, things have not worked out the way that I wanted, and in hindsight I could always see how it worked out for the better. There were times that I was thankful I didn't get what I wanted! You could say that I color my perception in this, and you could be correct. And, my life is far happier because of this belief, especially after this sabbatical. The sabbatical was one giant step into the abyss, and for that I am deeply appreciative. That "personal power that is true to myself" that I mentioned earlier is part of my purpose. I know that I help people change their life every day. I am most successful when I consciously choose who I want to be in each and every moment.

With much love and gratitude, Mj XOXO

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Crazy (Fun) Day at the Senior Center

Fridays have become my "Reiki" day. Today I went to support a senior health fair. I stayed in the moment, punted for the end zone and had a blast in the process!

In this fair, I agreed to conduct 15 minute Reiki sessions with people who signed up. I got there, and the woman who was coordinating the fair asked me if I wanted people to sit in a circle. Hmmm. This is different than what I expected. I asked her what she had in mind, and told her it would be just fine. Time to punt!

So instead of doing Reiki one on one with a series of residents, I gave them a very quick overview of Reiki. Not a single one had heard of Reiki, prana, chi, life force energy, etc. So, for about 10 minutes I explained the basics to 12 people to people in their 80s and 90s, of which 90% were very hard of hearing. They "got" the basics, and how naturally we do a lot of these things already. We talked about how we "pick up things" about people when we shake their hands, we sandwich our hands around an area that is in pain, and how it feels in our hearts when we care about another person (i.e., expanding the heart chakra).

I got them started, and I went around the room to give them individual attention. They did really well and understood the concept. It was so beautiful to watch this unfold. Within a very short time they were helping each other. Some could really "feel the heat" or tingling between their hands, and the person who was receiving the energy could feel it too. They were astonished that "anyone" could do this and asking how to learn this, and what classes could they take.

And, it was pretty crazy in the room. I was "competing" with a Mary Kay demonstration that was also underway. It was quite loud - not the peaceful, "om" kind of feeling we like to associate with massages and energy work, but energy is energy and it was working nonetheless!

One gent named Gordon was very astute - he had asked if I invoke God or Jesus to help with the healing. I told him that he gets an A+ and goes to the head of the class. He and his partner for this activity said prayers before they started and asked for help with the healing. I thought that was great intuition on their part. Another woman named Amy Rae has a real natural talent for this work. She was moving a lot of energy. I encouraged them all to keep practicing on each other.

I'm glad I did this session, and in fact, am delighted that it was a group event. It would be okay for me to work on them one on one, but I really loved the idea that they could be there for each other. Funny how things work out better than expected. I love it!

With much love and gratitude, Mj XOXO

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Do You Want to be Their “Mom” or the Expert on the Topic?

This article was written by my friend Mark A. Miller Director for the Upgrade Center in Tallahassee FL.

The difference between being the "authority figure" and being the "authority" can greatly improve your communication with your customers while increasing your effectiveness as a leader.

While on paper, distinction between these two terms seems very subtle and what I have learned is that in practice they are worlds apart on how the listener perceives the helpfulness of your communication. It is based on the concept of separating the message from the messenger.

I can best illustrate the difference of the two, by example, in the past, when customers contacted our office, and ask about the current requirements for maintaining their professional license. What they would have most likely got, were statements like; you must have..., you cannot have more than..., you have to have them completed by no later than...

By using these types of statements verbally and in writing, I made myself the dictatorial authority figure by stating their requirements, like a stern parent, a strict teacher, or a mean principal. I made the requirements sound like they were my rules, to some members this would cause them to want to “push back” or rebel against the authority figure as they did in their childhood. (The need to push back against authority figures, for most of us, happens subconsciously, we are not aware that we are doing it). Sometimes the pushing back would be blatant, with them disagreeing or arguing with me about the requirements or it would be a lot more subtle, like a long silence and them saying, "Okay, thanks" and hanging up immediately. Looking back on these conversations, neither one of us was grateful for the exchange.

Of course, most of the conversations with my customers did not end this way, however I did notice that this would rarely happened, if ever, when I stopped responding to them as the authority figure and provided them the information as the authority or expert on the topic. Now when I respond by saying "Sure, I can read you what the current regulation (and state the source)”, when I continue with “Or, I would be happy to summarize it for you now, or I could e-mail it or fax it to you too. What would you like?"

After responding this way, I was far more effective in providing the requested information; first, by providing them with choices, they feel in control. Second, letting them know what the source the information, it separates the message (the information) from the messenger (me). This allows them to more easily hear and accept what they wanted to know, without making me the authority figure or the "strict parent" about what they have to do or else. Finally the benefit for both of us is, a more pleasant and respectful conversation in a much shorter amount of time.

By separating yourself from the information, you have the benefit of being detached from their response. Yes, being “detached” from your customer responses is a very good thing if it can serve them best by empowering them to be responsible for their own actions.

To learn more about The Upgrade Center and other resources that are available, see http://www.upgradecenter.org/

Thanks Mark!

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Living Without Blame, or Living The Dream?

I spent the most extraordinary weekend at an advanced weekend seminar called "Living Without Blame" which is offered by Global Relationship Centers (www.grc333.com). Part of the seminar dealt with defining blame and the reasons why we do blame. I was delighted to see that the session was much more than that. We also talked about our dreams and where we are on our journey.

I have gone through the exercise of defining my dreams before, and with mixed results. I have had my share of dreams in the past - getting married, earning my PhD, running my own business, becoming a Director of Organization Development - to name a few. I have succeeded and failed in many ways. As I have mentioned before in this blog, I always had a sense of a general direction of where I wanted to go.

In hindsight, I equated big goals with dreams. Goals are accomplishments, tangible outcomes and products of our focus and efforts, driven by real motivations. I am not undermining the importance or validity of goals. If we didn't have goals, quite frankly, a lot of stuff - big stuff - would not be realized! Goals - big and small - are important.

Dreams, however, are different. They feel different. In my own life, my goals were driven from my ego. I used them as ways to define me. Those of you who have been traveling this road with me know that I have made great strides on this sabbatical, and I use events and insights as useful landmarks to mark my progress and here is one. This weekend as I wrote out my dream, I was describing me. Really me. Not the titles that I could hold, the goals that I could accomplish, the friends could I have, a bigger home or things I could put on a resume. Instead, they were all statements of my being, how I am and want to express myself in this world. Pam Dunn, the seminar facilitator, kept asking us - "Are you the Dream AND the Dreamer?". To that, I answer a resounding yes! This feels so different and I love being here!

And, if we are truly the Dream and the Dreamer, we reduce our need to blame. If we are living our Dream and living life to the fullest, we don't focus on the things that we think are getting in our way. We will still encounter challenging obstacles, like the rocks and the ocean in the picture. Instead of blaming the rocks and the ocean for being in our way, they become tests that strengthen our resolve, our faith and commitment to our Dream.

Living our own Dream drives our behavior, our motivation, our love and permeates our whole existence. A Really Big Dream lifts up not only the Dreamer, but all who are around the Dreamer. Martin Luther King - like Nelson Mandela, Ghandi, Jesus - proclaimed that he had a Dream. He envisioned a way for he - and others - to be in this world, and we are all better for it. It wasn't a Really Big Goal. It was a Really Big Dream.

For me, it didn't take long for this "new found identity" to be tested. Very soon after the session ended, a part of my Dream was tested. It was also an important landmark for me. If this happened several years ago, I would have been angry for months, maybe years. Living Without Blame / Living Your Dream doesn't mean that I avoid anger, frustration, grief, shock or any other emotions that I may try to avoid or get stuck in. It means that I experience these emotions and understand that they provide important information and clues to where I am at on my Dream. I cycled through those emotions in 48 hours versus months. I am human and this is part of the human experience. And, I was able to center back on my Dream quickly.

Because, after all, the Dream is what I really, REALLY want!
And I bet you do, too.

With much love and gratitude, Mj XOXO

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