"We attract into our lives what we put attention on."
If you have looked into alternative ways to view the world you have certainly come across those idea, promoted by many of the main stream new age gurus. Science usually had nothing much to say about that as there was not much to measure and science is supposed to be about the measurability of phenomena.
And how can you measure something if the result is not only effected by the measurer but indeed created alltogether?
Now we have TED come to help us. TED, the yearly conference on Technology, Entertainment and Design, held in Monterey, California (now moving to other places) gives speakers the opportunity to speak about their area of expertize for 20 minutes. Speakers are often not the usual suspects, and I have been surprised by the subjects presented.
Today I ran into a speech by Harvard psychologist Dan Gilbert who says our beliefs about what will make us happy are often wrong. He supports this premise with intriguing research, and explains it in in an accessible and unexpected fashion.
What he is actually giving is the scientific confirmation that all those new age gurus are correct.
Enjoy...
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Now comes Matthieu Ricard, sometimes called the "happiest man in the world," he is a Buddhist monk, author, photographer and apparently practitioner of the subject discussed in Dan Golbert's talk...
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Eloquently put by Tony Rush of Liberty League - I don't think I can improve on this so I just give it to you straight...
Yoda Had It Figured Out....Success Advice From The Little Green Guy
Did you know that there is no corresponding result for the word "try"?
It's true. It's a word that has no meaning in the human mind or in the laws of physics. In the world of physics, a cause always produces an effect. But, not with the word "try".
Prove this for yourself by following some instructions for creating causes.
EXPERIMENT ONE: Pick up the phone on your desk. What was the result of that cause? You have the phone in your hand, right? Cool...next experiment.
EXPERIMENT TWO: Do NOT pick up the phone on your desk. What was the result of that cause? You do NOT have the phone in your hand, do you? Now....
EXPERIMENT THREE: Try to pick up the phone on your desk. Don't do it. (That was experiment #1.) Only TRY to do it.
What's the result? You're sitting there with your hand on your phone and you're somewhere in a limbo of picking it up and not picking it up. If you do anything at all, you'll fall into Experiment 1 or 2 which isn't the point.
Trying is a weak word that means less than nothing. It's a noncommittal word that seeks to do two things at once and winds up in a barren wasteland of "no results".
And the reason why is simple: "trying" is not a cause. Therefore it cannot have an effect. It is actually a disempowering state of mind that keeps you from being "at cause" of anything productive.
And yet "trying" is the thing that most people wind up getting stuck in.
Honey, I'll try to spend more time with the kids. Never gonna happen with that attitude. Then they'll wonder why their kids are suddenly 18 years old and don't want to spend any time with mom and dad.
"I'll try to get started next week"....and you never hear from them.
I'll try to get the money to get started"....and you can call them in six months and they're in the exact same situation.
I'll try to get some people to the meeting"....which basically means they're going to trot out there with no expectations at all and then give up before they accidentally "do" anything.
And you guys know this already. When you invite someone to dinner and they say, "I'll try to come"...do you honestly expect them to show up?
When a guy tells his date that he'll "try to see about going out again soon", do you really think she's going to sit by the phone waiting for his call?
When a boss says, "I'll try to get you some more money at the beginning of the next fiscal year"...do you really think he's going to bat for you to get you a higher salary?
"Try" is a weak word that should be evicted from the vocabulary of every person who is cultivating a mindset of leadership. Do something or don't do it. But, for God's sake, don't TRY to do it.
Yoda had this figured out in Star Wars: A New Hope. He told Luke Skywalker to do something and Skywalker replied, "Okay, I'll try."
Yoda said, "No. Do. Or do not. There is no try".
Yoda's right. And by all measures of success the guy who created him (George Lucas) knew what he was doing when he wrote those lines for the little green guy. George Lucas doesn't try. He DOES.
Do you do? Or do you try?
And if you ARE trying...how soon can you stop trying and start DOing?
The obvious reason I passed this story on to you is that it is a great reminder that we should try to do our mental exercise every day, so that it becomes a habit and second nature.
OOPS - did you notice? I hope you did, I have to admit that I did this intentionally so that you notice how we do this if we don't quite trust our own ability. Quite honest, how can you ask somebody else to trust you, if you don't do this yourself?
I looked through Google image search for an image to accompany this article but had to give up. Do it yourself - it is amazing the variety of photos that come up when looking for the word 'try.' Everybody seems to be trying. In many instances that is good, because there are many things that I prefer not to be successful and when those people 'try' that is a good thing.
One point to consider though, and that there is one definition of the word 'try,' that is legitimate. It's a synonym to test, and testing things is a very valid activity. At least until you really understand that you create your world, and then there is no testing any more either - then you just do.
We want to investigate the question what kind of fear we have to deal with in our lives. There is the most obvious fear, the one of physical harm. The scale for this fear is very wide, it starts at the little fears of cutting yourself with a sharp knife and reached to the ultimate death threat - cancer!
Because of the apparent helplessness when dealing with cancer, this seems to the the one fear that actually kills many people a year. Have you ever seen a case, where somebody might not feel quite right, but is not too much bothered by. Eventually he visits his doctor and the C-word is thrown at him. Most people in such a situation go into fear overdrive, seeing doctors over doctors and are getting read for chemo or radiation-therapy, maybe surgery. Notice the decline in well being during the treatment!
Exposing the body to such harsh poisons, combined with the fear of dying is usually enough to kill within a few short month. I remember Dennis, a very positive and happy person, still young, in his early forties, was gone within three month after the diagnosis. I still remember him showing his ambulant chemo-machine on his belt he showed off with. It was very evident that his fear actually killed him, probably with a little help from all this poison.
Then there is my dad. He had dug himself out of some nasty sickness by taking charge of his own life instead of out-sourcing it to physicians or other gurus - and he did great. He had started a full new part of his life, leading dance groups for senior citizens throughout the whole of Germany. But then there was this bit of tiredness which finally prompted him to go see his physician. After a blood test the word leukemia was only hinted, not really diagnosed, only hinted - and that was enough to throw out all the positive change that had been accomplished before and deliver himself into the care of the physicians, giving up all of his self-determination. It took him quite a while to die, but the dying part was not the bad thing, most of us do that anyways sooner or later, no, the sad part was that he finally went whimpering and not proud for all he had accomplished.
Nasty this kind of fear, isn't it?
And then there is the fear of being exposed, for example to be embarrassed, to be found about for some mis-deeds, to be exposed to be dumb, etc. There is no direct physical harm or death that threatens the direct existence of the body, but it is actually a fear that has a bigger effect on the life of a person. Examine for example all the things a person does in order not to appear poorer than his neighbor. He puts himself into huge debts to buy a car better than the neighbor, get a bigger house that the neighbor, at least get a bigger pool, even though he does not like to swim, and even go through all the trouble of getting a prettier wife.
Crazy stuff, but most of us play that game, all out of an unbased fear.
As we looked a the body and the mind, we certainly now also have to look at the spiritual side of us. And here we find the most damaging fear - the fear of God. Wars have been fought and untold numbers of people have died because of the fear to please ones god.
In order to attain universal serenity we will have to investigate all these kinds of fear. We will have to get more data about the subject that appears to be the reason for the fear first. This will defuse the reason for the fear in the present time, then we will have to do training and exercise to remove the reason why we started to consider fear a good thing.
You don't think we consider fear a good thing? If you don't then just stop having it - - - not that self evident how to do this, right? That's because we really think that fear is good for us and that can only be change by removing the decision that fear is good.
There are extraordinary events happening on this planet of ours that give good reason to believe that we are going in the right direction, or at least allow us to go in the right direction in case we choose to do so.
One of these events is the annual TED conference. A gathering of people who are able to look at the world in more unorthodox ways. I don't agree with all of the views, but that is actually good, as - otherwise - it would probably be boring. Each active participant has twenty minutes to show his slant on life. There are talks from the high-tech field to the esoteric.
A talk very much on the esoteric side is by Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor, who gave a very inspiring talk recounting her experience with a stroke...
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She bases her experience still very strongly on physical phenomena, and this is a very valid view-point because it leads us in the right direction. We just have to keep our eyes open, in order not to get lost in the significance of the material side, her experience originated from. I had to think of the stories of Carlos Castaneda in which initially the attainment of higher levels of awareness seem to be dependent on the ingestion of peyote. In the later part of the stories it then becomes clear that this was only the way, but that indeed these higher levels of awareness can be reached - and should be reached - without any help of physical means, as they are above that material realm.
Often we consider pop music as shallow, and I have to admit that most of the time this is a true assessment. But once in a while we find a little gem.
Working on this web site and browsing for something totally different I ran into a video with these awesome lyrics...
You only see what your eyes want to see How can life be what you want it to be You're frozen When your heart's not open
You're so consumed with how much you get You waste your time with hate and regret You're broken When your heart's not open
...
Now there's no point in placing the blame And you should know I suffer the same If I lose you My heart will be broken
Love is a bird, she needs to fly Let all the hurt inside of you die You're frozen When your heart's not open
...
You only see what your eyes want to see How can life be what you want it to be You're frozen When your heart's not open
...
If I could melt your heart
I left out a few chorus verses that don't add much to the message but make, admittedly, the song a lot nicer. Would it not be terrific if everybody listening to this song would actually hear the words and apply them to oneself? Because then the message would spread fast and wide because a song by Madonna is listened to quite often. The song is 'Frozen' and I assume that is from Madonna's Kabbalah period - and here now you have it...
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If you have been studying, for any amount of time, the ideas of improving yoursefl, you must have come across the idea that we create or choose our reality we then experience.
A very basic example that has found entry in the general population is the the difference in view of a glass half full or half empty.
Both persons look at a class that is filled to half of its capacity.One person views this as a glass half empty with a feeling of scarcity, as half of the content is already gone and there is only this much left.
The other person sees this as half full, with the happy emotion that he still has half of the original content for him to indulge in.
Both persons look at the same 'fact', but the emotion during their experience of the glass is very different. I don't want to pass on the idea that one is better than the other, it is not - they are just different, and each person has chosen his or her point of view. I could attempt to suggest the person who views the glass as half empty to try the other view to feel better about the situation. But how do I know if this would actually make the person feel better?
If we assume that the person has chosen that view-point, then it probably has because it serves a purpose. So, let's not get into the habbit of suggesting a person how to feel because this is in the end completely out of our control.
What we have control over is how we see it. In other words, if I try to make another person see a situation in a way that would be more comfortable for me, the I do exactly the same thing I try the person not to do: The person sees the glass half empty and I see the person as not seeing things the right way.
If I want to suggest the person to see the glass half full to feel better - why don't I start by seeing the person good and correct and feel better about it?
Does that mean that I can't say anything to another person where I see that the person could improve?
Yes, exactly!
But what I can do is tell stories and examples on how I handled situations. But the only reason for doing so would be to help ME see this person as being perfect as he or she is.
If I tell a person to see a situation differently and create positive and feel-ggod emotions while having these thoughts, then I only tell myself to do the same thing.
As I write this I realize again that the only reason I do write these words is to help me understand that all you, reading these lines, are perfect and totally right in everything you do.
If you, dear reader, then decide to make a shift in your viewpoints, then this is exclusively your choise and it is equally great from my point of view of you.
But I can't help it - I have to give you this advise on the way: The contemporary literature on this subject often talks about the idea of thinking the right thoughts that help us manifest our dreams. The question of what is thought is very important in this context. You can run around the words - I am rich, I am rich - all day long without stearing into the direction of being rich. But if the feeling, the gut feeling, does not confirm these words, nothing will happen. And we all do these kind of crazy stunts all the time - think in words different than what the feeling says.
This is why we need training. Just like the leg that was in a cast for six weeks, need building up with persistence, we need training to help us accomplish the persistence to align thoughs in the form or words with the emotions that have to go with them to create the desired effect.
Sometimes we experience these moments of great clarity where subjects suddently become self-evident.
I had one such moment this morning on the way to school to drop of my son. Driving up the street it was suddenly crystal clear that I have to be the change I want to see. It was a moment of real understanding and I could feel residue of the cognition throughout the day. This feeling of self-evidence got weaker throughout the day but I was still able to recall the feeling.
Feeling is probably the key here. This understanding occured on an emotional and not on an intellectual level. I was able to feel that knowingness that this is the only way to cause real change.
The experience of emotional understanding make it more intense, very much so, indeed, but it is also its weakness. Facts, that are easily wrapped into words, can easily be memorized and repeated at a later time. In order not to forget the fact, we can even write it down, so we can re-read it and remember.
With emotions that is a bit more difficult, to say the least. I personally have not found any way to record an emotion in any form imaginable, look at it at a later time and recall or experience again that very emotion. There just is no medium for that.
Good, inspirational writers usually manage to write prose in a way that rekindles the intended emotion, but that does not help me, if I have a revelation while driving a car, and want to record that experience. I wish this article were about my great find on how to do this from now on, but unfortunately I have not found the solution to this problem.
The only idea I could come up with, is to recall the feeling and emotion throughout the day in an interval short enough that it does not fleet you. Writing a blog or article like this here can help as well to remember, maybe even the next day - because nights can be a big killer for revelations.
Will see how I am able to recall this feeling tomorrow - maybe I can re-enact this while driving up the same street and experience the external circumstances the same way as today.
What does that now have to do with attaining universal serenity?
Pretty much all of it. During some of the training for universal serenity you will have these great revelatons. After that it is your task to maintain that emotional knowledge until the next session at which point it will get 'recharged." This will lead to the situation where you will have the ability to maintain the emotional knowledge at that level throughout the whole day.
Once this is stable we can go on to the next level.
Thoughts
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Exposing the body to such harsh poisons, combined with the fear of dying is usually enough to kill within a few short month. I remember Dennis, a very positive and happy person, still young, in his early forties, was gone within three month after the diagnosis. I still remember him showing his ambulant chemo-machine on his belt he showed off with. It was very evident that his fear actually killed him, probably with a little help from all this poison.