Have you ever wondered how you are going to take your life to the next level? Asked yourself why some people seem to “have it all” and others just stay stuck? It takes reflection, work, dedication, and commitment, but once you get clear, the doors will open and you will find yourself floating easily downstream in the river of your life. Most of you would probably agree that downstream is the preferred direction versus desperately trying to paddle upstream, right?
The New Year is a perfect time to focus on what you want to manifest in your life. I would like to share a process with you that I have used successfully in my own life and have seen it work for many others. In fact, it is the process that resulted in my website and these blogs that I am now sharing with you! Use this process to help you generate goals, get clear about what you want, and focus into a mindset that will propel you in 2017 towards the life that up until now you have been longing to live.
Step 1: Make a List
- Take a sheet of paper and make 3 columns.
- Ask yourself 3 important questions and use these as the headings for each column. Better yet, have a friend or your partner ask you these questions and write down the answers for you. (Then you can do the same for them!) Continue to ask these three questions in rapid fire succession, over and over until you have at least 10 items. Don’t think too hard about it, just let the answers come:
- 1) What do you want?
- This can be anything: material, emotional, spiritual, physical, financial, business, etc.
- Let your imagination run wild.
- 2) How are you going to get it?
- What will you have to do in order to get what you want?
- 3) What experience are you looking for?
- Focus on the experience that you want rather than the specifics of HOW to make something happen.
- For example, you want a “new house,” you will get it by “working harder,” the experience you seek is “security.”
- 1) What do you want?
- Create a summary mission statement.
- Once you have all of your items, take a look at the “what experience are you looking for” column and see if you notice a theme. Maybe freedom came up several times; maybe you seek peace, comfort, security, or independence. Complete one of these statements: “I am at my best when…”, “I am living in my full potential when…”, or “I manifest the life of my dreams when I am experiencing…” Put this into your own words. Don’t be limited by my stem sentences, be creative here but use a summary statement that captures your dream in a couple of lines. This will become your beacon to measure your steps from here. As you generate actions steps and make choices, allow them to be in alignment with your mission statement and you will stay on course.
Step 2: Tell a friend; remind yourself
- Share your dream with someone you trust and help each other to stay accountable with each step you take.
- If you do this exercise with a partner or friend(s), this will become a great alliance to lean on as you continue towards your goals. Also, speaking your dreams out loud makes them real.
- Post your goals somewhere you can see them regularly, recite them to yourself.
Step 3: Develop Your Relationship with the Universe – Gratitude, Surrender, Trust
- Cultivate gratitude in your life as it is now and as your goals come to fruition.
- Each week, set three (no more than this!) concrete, short-term action steps that you can realistically accomplish within a week that move you in the direction of your mission.
- Release fear and resistance.
- Keep yourself accountable by sharing these three action steps with your partner or friend.
- Don’t cap your vision, use open ended language to describe your dreams.
- Allow and Surrender: release the need to control outcomes; receive the gifts that come to you.
- Release fear and resistance.
- Make choices that are true to who you are and what you want and trust as your destiny comes into focus.
- Stay in line with your vision and others in your life will either change or drift out of your experience.
- Release fear and resistance.
So there you have it! I encourage you to call up a friend or talk with your partner about sitting down (either in person or on the phone) and implementing this process. I will say that the first two steps are the easy part. The challenge comes when your vision begins to take flight and requires you to continue your commitment to yourself. This reveals the true nature of your relationship with Life. For many of you, issues around receiving may surface, or ways that you sabotage your life may become more clear. These can be amazing opportunities to learn about yourself and shift out of old patterns. Counseling can be a helpful tool to generate clarity, release old patterns, and coach you towards a new way of being.
I wish you success as you move forward and discover the power of your own creativity. The life of your dreams exists within you, give yourself the gift of time to pause and listen to what your heart is calling out for (hint: what you hear belongs in the first column above!). Review your list periodically to see what you accomplish, and to add new goals. The concept of a “New Year’s Resolution” takes on new meaning within this context.
May all of your dreams come true! I look forward to hearing your stories. Here’s to an amazing 2020!
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