I used to meditate every single day. In fact, I didn't miss a day for about 4 years. I did it when I was on holiday, when I was busy and even when I wasn't feeling very well. You see, I was on a mission to make myself feel a certain way. I wanted to feel calmer, more motivated and better about myself. But it became an addiction because I reached the point where I didn't think I could be okay if I didn't meditate. 

Over the last couple of years, I have considered what meditation actually is especially after I attended a lovely event run by Michael Neill and Dicken Bettinger called 'Living in a State of Meditation.' You see, I now see meditation as a state of mind which available to all of us when we are not so caught up in our personal thinking. I love that Jeff Foster says about it, "What is meditation? Pure fascination with this moment, exactly as it is." As I have explored the truth about how human experience is created deeper and deeper, I find myself naturally spending more time in the present moment.  So instead of meditating every day, I now live in a state of meditation much more of the time.

What I would love you to see is that you are not broken, you don't need fixing and that everything you are looking for through tools and techniques like mediation is available to you always; it's what you are made of. Imagine not just getting through each day but getting into it like you would a mediation; noticing every moment in all it's glory. You don't have to be a guru to experience this.

Thought control has had great PR over that last few years. I did a quick search for 'How to control your thinking', on Google and got 9,840,000,000 results! Ridiculous but I have probably tried a fair few of them because I tried for ages to control my thinking. I tried and tried but the negative thoughts still kept on turning up. It was exhausting and I felt like a failure. Why did other people seem to be able to control their thinking and I couldn't? It was because I was being sold a lie and here's why.

You categorically cannot control what appears in your head. Once you have noticed a thought, it is already there and if you want to change it, you have to pull it back into your awareness. A thought has no meaning until you give it one. In others words having a negative thought does not define you as a negative person. It's like watching clouds of various shapes going across the sky. When you realise the nature of thought, you reach the point of no longer needing to change them. Things can turn up in your head and you don't have to take them all seriously. Freedom lies there.

How many people do you need to change? Your parents, partner, children, friends. Who else is on the list? When we live in the outside in paradigm, it can look like there are some people who have to be different for us to be happy. But have you noticed the amount of work that involves and how overwhelming it can become? I didn't until it was too late and I burnt out. It can be helpful to see the layers to this desire to change people. 

Firstly the idea that other people can make us feel anything is fundamentally flawed because we don't all feel the same way about certain people. Secondly, how you perceive someone is being created through your beliefs and perception of the world. Thirdly, other people find it hard enough to change themselves so what makes you think you can do it. As you start to see these truths about how life works, it makes less and less sense to try to change other people and more sense to bring some awareness to what you are believing which isn't true. 

If you would like to have more ease in your relationships and feel less like your sanity depends on them, then please get in touch.

Do you often find yourself trying to understand things like the decisions of government, the behaviour of other people or the circumstances you find yourself in. I know that feeling well. It can seem like if I rack my brains long enough, the answer will emerge. It does seem to work doesn't it? I often conclude my little internal exploration with a self-satisfied sigh! That's the point at which I think I have worked it all out. 😂

However, the working out I have done is all nonsense. I see that more and more now. The stories I create are made from my conditioned thinking and my beliefs. They look so real but they are not and the same applies to every single one of us. Things that happen in the world come from a complicated set of conditioned thinking of another person or people. We could never really understand that because we are only in possession of our conditioned thinking not theirs. So maybe we are not meant to understand things in the way we are used to. 

It is helpful to know the truth and that is that every single one of us is doing the very best with the thinking which looks real to us. Knowing that can take a lot off your mind and with less on your mind, anything is possible.

Do you ever use the phrase, 'I was miles away'? As I walked up a narrow path a few days ago, there was a woman in front of me. She didn't hear me coming so I had to say, 'excuse me' to get past her. As I walked on by, she said, 'Sorry. I was miles away'. Hearing that phrase really made me think.

Sometimes we are so caught up in our thinking that we have no idea we are miles away. Our thinking might be in the past, in the future or even inside someone else's head. Maybe it is actually miles away as we imagine ourselves on a beach in Bali! Although it can be fun to play in that space, there is something helpful when we realise we are doing it, particularly if the feeling which comes with it is uncomfortable. If you notice that you are feeling uncomfortable, maybe just ask this question. 'Where is my thinking right now?' and see what occurs. Just noticing that you have gone to a different place in time and space usually helps it start to shift and then you just tend to feel better. It's like magic.

If you would like to raise your awareness of your time travelling mind and as a result experience more confidence, calm and clarity just drop me a message on [email protected]

Have you ever considered what is real? In our world of form, there are clearly some things which exist. On my desk right now, there are all sorts of things. A mic, a phone, a laptop, a mug etc. I am not here to deny the existence of things but as you look out into the world and interact with it and the people in it, have you considered how much of what you experience is real. Let's take something simple like the temperature in a room. My fiancé and I often disagree. He (being from the Southern hemisphere) will be cold whilst I am warm. The temperature is one thing, but we perceive it differently. That is because his conditioning around temperature has been different to mine. 

Now take that micro situation across every single one of your experiences. It is a bit mind blowing but, it is impossible for you to see reality objectively. The way you have been conditioned through years of unintentional learning means that you can only see an objective reality. You might be wondering why this is helpful but it really is. That is because in the moment when you are caught up, feeling overwhelmed and stressed, it might just provide a chink of light. Maybe that person isn't being mean. Maybe you don't look stupid. Maybe you are not being judged. Just knowing the mind is unable to create an objective reality can be helpful.

How much time do you spend in the future? I put dates in my diary but other than that I spend little time in the future these days but that wasn't always the case. I used to be a virtually full time worrier. I would make up scenarios in my head and then try to reassure myself that it would be okay. It was exhausting but I know I am not the only one.

Here's the challenge with the future and you might need to read this sentence a few times. We cannot guarantee to the mind that the things we are fearing in the future are not going to happen. But we try don't we. So what is actually happening is that we are making up the future and then trying to manage the thing we made up. It's like trying to run an APP from the future on our 2022 mobile phone. It just doesn't work.

Waking up from this is actually easier than you think. It's all in the feeling. Your off feeling is not telling you about the future scenario, but it is telling you about your thinking about the future scenario. Off feeling comes from off thinking. Realising this in the moment can help that future thinking to make a lot less sense.

How much time do you spend inside someone else's head? This came up more than once in coaching conversations yesterday but I think we all do it sometimes. We make up stories about what other people are thinking and try to interpret the looks on their faces. Sometimes we even do it when we received a message from someone. I did it this morning in a conversation about a chair (listen to the live to here more). It was amusing when I thought about what I had done afterwards. But it isn't always amusing is it? It can sometimes feel awful and it can even make us behave in a particular way towards that person. Maybe we even end up in a place of defensiveness or avoidance. 

What is helpful here is to understand a couple of truths. Firstly that the off feeling you have whilst making up those stories is coming from your thinking not the other person's behaviour. Secondly, you are not able to read people and any story you have about the contents of their heads is coming from you not them. When those truths are really seen, all our interactions (even with those tricky people) can transform and generally we can feel a whole lot better. If you would like to see through your stories about other people, please drop me a message.

Are there some people you really don't get on with? We all have someone don't we? Someone who seems to rub us up the wrong way. We can feel the sensation often before they have even arrived in our space. There might be a clue in that! But have you also noticed when you really get on with someone. When the conversation flows and the time passes quickly. When there is presence and connection. 

There are certain things getting in the way of our connection with other people. Our conditioned beliefs, our perception and our thoughts. Without all that noise, we are connected by love, wisdom and calm (what we are all really made of). Transformation in all our relationships is available when we see this. 

'Don't swallow the storm', was a brilliant phrase I heard on a TV show I was watching over the weekend. I just love the beautiful guidance in this advice because that is what we do, isn't it. We take the things which are not going well in the world inside us then we add to them and make them more stormy. I don't know about you but I can rant and rave about all sorts and it doesn't feel very nice. But worst of all, it lulls us into the illusion  that it is the outside world making us feel that way. The more of the storm we swallow, the more real that illusion seems and then freedom from the storm looks like it is only available in the changing of the outside world. 

But that's not where freedom is. Freedom from the storm comes when we realise that the world works inside out NOT outside in. Then swallowing the storm makes less and less sense!