Author: Dialogues Of Discernment

I am grateful for yesterday’s achievements, blessings, confirmations….

• I had a GREAT day of planning out potential future ‘achievements for achieverisation’. My new wall calendar and Action Day planner arrived, and I set them up to make use of the focus (which I developed with the Full Focus Planner last year) on weekly, quarterly and yearly planning and reflection – but now based on lightly anticipating and then spotting, collecting and revelling in all the ABCs (achievements, blessings, confirmations)
• I loved writing down the achievements I knew would float in without my trying, and the ones which I can lean in to and unleash gently… It was fun and I felt a sense of possibility, ease, simplicity and playfulness.
• I’ve already lost four pounds. 🙂
• My eldest hosted me and her sister in the evening, with an amazing rabbit stew she had made herself. We talked and laughed together. It was bliss. I love my girls so much.
• This video from Abraham-Hicks filled my heart and spoke to all the forward-facing joy I’ve been leaning into over the last few years, and learning how to master, day by day by day. Thank you, dear Esther Hicks – you have been a life-changing teacher to me for 10 years now. I’m so grateful. This newer ability to jump into celebrating achievements, blessings, confirmations comes v much from you. And from my G. who constantly gives me great cobweb-wiping gusts of joy, pride and awe.
• Evening: qigong while listening to more Abraham-Hicks and then great reading on Robin Amis and Seth Godin – with my mind on form… Yes! Ty for sobriety again.

So today. I’ve started a new marketing approach – sharing quotes of brilliant writers in my field on social media. It’s a way of ‘offering simple help’ in that it’s food for thought, inspiration, encouragement…  It also honours the writers I owe a great deal to. We’ll see if it flies! Any thoughts?

You are starting off the year as you mean to go on: with simplicity, humility and purpose. This is excellent. 

Humility?

In pointing to the work and wisdom of others. Good. 

Ah, excellent. Yes, it’s a little less ‘look at me – help!’. The Seth Godin book is helping me reframe marketing. He reminds us it’s not a customer’s role to solve a business’s urgent problem (eg lack of customers). It’s the businesses role to solve the customer’s problem – having first taken the time to ‘see’ the customer as they are.

I’m going to the office today. I’ve got some big presentations to get done. That’s the kind of achieverisation that might intimidate a girl…

Offer. Simple. Help. 

Simplify my presentations?

If you want them to fly. If they are so big and bulky they sadden you to develop them, imagine what it will be like on the receiving end. 

Noted. 🙂 What else should I know and bear in mind today?

Last night you were touched by G’s notes on Robin Amis‘s words – especially on the theme of ‘prayer of the heart’. 

Yes! Let me go back to that. G’s notes of his meeting with Robin say:

Ref. Isaac of Nineveh re. methods of preventing this.”

Who is Isaac of Nineveh?

Wikipedia says…

‘Isaac of Nineveh (c. 613 – c. 700), also known as Saint Isaac the Syrian, Abba Isaac, Isaac Syrus and Isaac of Qatar, was a 7th-century Syriac Christian bishop and theologian best remembered for his written works on Christian asceticism.’

Look at this quote…

“What is a charitable heart? It is a heart which is burning with love for the whole creation, for men, for the birds, for the beasts … for all creatures. He who has such a heart cannot see or call to mind a creature without his eyes being filled with tears by reason of the immense compassion which seizes his heart; a heart which is softened and can no longer bear to see or learn from others of any suffering, even the smallest pain being inflicted upon a creature. That is why such a man never ceases to pray for the animals … [He is] … moved by the infinite pity which reigns in the hearts of those who are becoming united with God.” Isaac of Nineveh

This is beautiful.

How does it relate to you? 

I guess, with a charitable heart, or when in a state of ‘prayer of the heart’, I am less self-focussed? Maybe then it’s easier to do the work I need to do, because I am ‘burning with love’ rather than ‘squirming with fear/concern/self-consciousness’?

You are terribly harsh on yourself sometimes, but yes, it is certainly a case of the centre of one’s intention shifting from self to other, which as we noted yesterday and the day before, is helpful in making any kind of human progress. 

How should I begin?

By centring in on the sensations of the heart. Now you have stopped sealing it over with coffee and booze, you have more access to its messages. 

Ok. I can do that. Today I will centre in on the sensations of the heart. Is that right?

Today you are ‘sensing your heart’. 

Got it. Tysm.

Today I am sensing my heart.

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I am grateful for yesterday’s….

• Trip to London with a friend and colleague to spend the afternoon with other friends and colleagues
• The opportunity to practise the ‘folded arms’ concept – especially when others are on their own roll. Yes. I like it. I realise how much I’ve tended to gush energy by being (purposely, but maybe mistakenly) always ‘open’. I quickly realised that, for a woman, this folded arms gesture leaves you cradling your breasts, rather like a ‘babe in arms’! It’s actually quite a comforting, and self-nurturing experience, especially with the consciousness of the heart being held in the centre.  
• Sense of confusion about ‘what next?’… and some clarifying exchanges with G. about one’s own aim, intention… and that which can only be created uniquely through each person, if/as they keep to their own aims… 

So today. My lovely youngest comes home for several weeks, for the first time since the end of Sept – three months! We’d only ever been separated for up to two weeks before then. It will be gorgeous to have her home. 

I woke at 4.15am today. There’s a lot in my heart. I read Reality Transurfing this morning. Nicely it corroborated some of the thinking last night…

“Do not ask, do not demand, do not struggle, just create. Shape your own reality with the help of conscious intention.”Reality Transurfing p640

“What does this mean for me today?”, she asked with her arms thoughtfully cradling her bosom. 

It’s time to think about The Power of No. 

Ha. I see what you did. 🙂 … Hm. This topic…. Yikes. 

What did Steve Jobs say? 

“People think focus means saying yes to the thing you’ve got to focus on. But that’s not what it means at all. It means saying no to the hundred other good ideas that there are. You have to pick carefully. I’m actually as proud of the things we haven’t done as the things I have done. Innovation is saying “no” to 1,000 things.” Steve Jobs 

And how does this relate to you? 

I think it comes down to that ‘conscious intention’ aspect from the RT quote above: ‘shape your reality with the help of conscious intention’. When we step out to create, I believe it often creates a whirlpool of attracted forces, some relevant and some really not – and it fact some of those irrelevant forces are specifically antagonistic in nature, as if testing our tenacity and commitment to that stated intention. These and others are the 1000 things we have to say no to. 

And what is the advantage of folding our arms gently, slowing down, getting into a state of relational presence and saying a warm, deep ‘no’?

Truthfulness? Authenticity? Alignment! We get aligned more closely with our actually intention. 

If a person’s stated conscious intention was to teach peace through dialogue, what might she need to say no to? 

Any thing that wasn’t that? 

That’s useful, yes. But there’s something else. What are those Four Tendencies? 

Ah! She might have to say ‘no’ to her internal Obliger…! 

Right. So this is an important point. It’s tiring to say no to 1000 things, when the Internal Obliger is saying ‘yip, yep, yup’ to everything arising. Easier for you to speak to your Internal Obliger directly first and bring her into agreement with your intention. 

Hi dear Obliger-within-Me. Can we work together on this intention? Why do you say yes to e v e r y t h i n g?

Internal Obliger: Saying no seems rude!

Aah. Can we get ok with being rude? What would that take? 

Internal Obliger: Certainty that the alternative was worthwhile and sensible.

Ok… How can we convince ourselves that ‘being rude’ is worthwhile and sensible? 

Internal Obliger: I am open to the notion that saying yes to things we can’t fulfil properly or in a timely fashion is also rude. 

Ah, excellent. So how about if we do a measure on incoming things like this:

1. Do I want to do it? Y/N – If no – aim to say so, because I’m unlikely to do something well and unwillingly, which would be rude.
2. Can I do it, well and in time? Y/N  ie Have I got capacity to fulfil the request properly and in a timely fashion? (And doing it at expense to health is not acceptable) If no, say so. 

There’s a third aspect here. It’s about saying Y/N to unpaid and low paid work. Why do you/we keep doing that? Why do we fall for the promise of ‘jam tomorrow’ (as G says) so often?

Internal Obliger: To be good enough. To seek permission. 

As RT says: “Do not ask, do not demand, do not struggle, just create.” Can you help me do that? 

Internal Obliger: Well why don’t you try activating your Internal Questioner, rather than bothering me, who is just doing her job nicely?

Ok. Good plan. 

Internal Questioner: What do you want? 

I want some help meeting my own expectations more, and others’ less. 

Internal Questioner: Well why didn’t you ask earlier? 

I really don’t know… You are full of questions!

Internal Questioner: What did you expect? 

Ha! Ok. So I have a question for you. How will you help me meet my inner expectations? 

Internal Questioner: How will you stop meeting others’ expectations first? When will you stop resisting your own expectations? When will you start asking yourself: “Is this in my best interests? What is in my best interest? What are my best interests?”

That’s helpful. I can take a more questioning approach. I can ask myself about my best interests… Ty. 

I’m so tired now. This has been quite long and convoluted, though very helpful and relevant. Can we conclude? 

“Today I am considering my best interests” would be a good start. 

Makes me feel sad for some reason. 

Because you think it’s too late to start thinking about this – that you’ve missed a trick, or the boat. No, now is the perfect time. And no, it’s not selfish. It’s fundamental to self-care, self-preservation, and self-determination. If you want others to look after you, dodge the opportunity to put your best interests first. If you want to be strong and self-determining, start to put your best interests first. It’d be rude not to, right? So…

Fold your arms self-nurturingly, go slowly in that state of ‘feeling groovy’ and ask yourself: “Do I want to do it? Can I do it? What is in my best interests here?” And then take the blessing of Steve Jobs and the angels of heaven and, wherever needed, calmly say “No”. Anticipate many more ‘nos’ than ever before. Breathe deeply of the clean air that floods into that freshly vacated space. 

Today I am learning the Power of No: saying ‘no’ to that which does not serve my inner intentions and expectations

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