Intentional Excellence

The Power Within: Embracing the Three Principles of Life

Introduction:
In our journey through life, we often grapple with the fundamental question of our existence. Are we merely separate entities navigating a vast world, or do we hold the power to shape our own experiences? The profound words of Rumi remind us that we are not insignificant drops in the ocean; rather, we are the entire ocean encapsulated within a single drop. This perspective invites us to explore the inside-out version of life, recognizing our interconnectedness and the immense potential that lies within us. By understanding and embracing the Three Principles—Thought, Mind, and Consciousness—we unlock the ability to create a life aligned with our desires and aspirations.

The Outside-In and Inside-Out Paradigms:
To comprehend the two contrasting views of existence, we can envision ourselves in a dollhouse-like world. In the outside-in paradigm, we perceive an array of separate entities, including people, objects, and even a distant deity. Our goal becomes navigating around these entities to cultivate positive emotions and experiences. On the other hand, the inside-out paradigm acknowledges the interconnected nature of all things. We are indivisible parts of a greater whole, and our life is an expression of our unique experience within this Oneness. While the outside-in perspective restricts us to accepting experiences as they are presented, the inside-out approach empowers us to shape our reality according to our thoughts and perceptions.

Understanding the Three Principles:
The Three Principles—Thought, Mind, and Consciousness—serve as a philosophical framework to grasp the nature of our life's experiences. These principles are inseparable from the experience they describe, much like gravity is integral to the act of falling. Thought, the first principle, filters our experiences and triggers our perception. Our interpretations of events are influenced by the judgments we have formed throughout our lives. Importantly, others involved in the same events are also crafting their unique experiences through their own thoughts and paradigms. However, we find greater connection with individuals who share similar experiences, such as our close friends, family, or coworkers.

Consciousness, the second principle, encompasses the field of all possibilities, the formless energy that manifests as our perceived reality. Our Consciousness allows us to be aware of events and circumstances, but we can never truly know another person's experience. Each individual exists within their own world, intersecting with others in the vast field of Mind, or the Universe. Mind, the third principle, is the creator and creation itself—a perfect, infinite, and indescribable force. It is the fabric of the universe, the source of universal intelligence, and the formless substance that underlies all creation.

The Power of Choice and Creation:
Realizing that we create our experiences from within is a liberating revelation. By consciously choosing our thoughts, we expand our Consciousness and establish a deeper connection with Mind. This awareness allows us to shape our lives according to our desires. As we envision the unfolding of our lives, our Consciousness expands, revealing more possibilities aligned with our thoughts. Our actions within this dream-like state are determined by our expectations and predictions of events and circumstances. By acknowledging our power to influence these outcomes, we can break free from habitual patterns and predictability.

Embracing Perfection:
The notion that everything is perfect can be challenging to comprehend, given our inclination to judge events and circumstances. However, it is vital to recognize that Mind, the source of all creation, is inherently perfect. As manifestations of this divine perfection, we too are perfect. Embracing this radical idea can profoundly transform our self-perception and our understanding of the world around us. Our experiences, shaped by Consciousness, are unique and flawless in their imperfection.

Living in Alignment with the Three Principles:
While the Three Principles offer a profound understanding of life, it is crucial not to overthink or force their application. Much like our heartbeat, which operates without conscious control, we naturally live within the precepts of these principles. Rather than attempting to consciously live by them, we can fully embrace our experiences in the present moment. Just as we allow a movie to unfold without dissecting the screen, the projector, or the film, we can surrender to the illusion of life and relish its enjoyment. By relaxing into this illusion, we find greater fulfillment and discover the true essence of living.

Conclusion:
Understanding the Three Principles of life—Thought, Mind, and Consciousness—provides us with an enlightened perspective on our existence. By acknowledging our power to shape our experiences, embracing our interconnectedness, and recognizing the inherent perfection within us, we unlock the ability to create a life that aligns with our deepest desires. Ultimately, it is in surrendering to the illusion of life and living fully in the present moment that we discover the profound joy and fulfillment that awaits us.

Contact David at 1-513-543-6596 or [email protected] if you would like to learn more about the Three Principles, or if you’d just like to have a powerful conversation.

Procrastination - Vice or Virtue

Procrastination gets a bad rap! Whenever most people believe that they are procrastinating, or even hear the word procrastination, it's like fingers on a blackboard in the mind, a snake in the grass on the path to mental well-being. It has an unsettling effect and a heavy emotional feeling. Not often is procrastination thought of as a desirable trait, and you'll find very few resumes or CV’s with procrastination as a sub-heading!

Most people feel that they procrastinate at least some of the time. So first thing, if you feel as if you’re procrastinating, be careful not to beat yourself up for it. Simply (easy to say, eh) relax and accept that it's happening and it's not necessarily “bad”, it just “is”. Once the value judgment has been removed, it’s much easier to create a new paradigm. That new paradigm could be something like “sometimes I postpone activities for no good reason but I know I always complete the things that are important”. By adopting that inner mantra, or something similar that works for you, you’re freeing yourself from your own judgment and criticism, and allowing intuition to create a hierarchy of importance that will fuse your intentions with your actions. And create new results!

Another idea for consideration is that procrastination is not always undesirable. You can likely recall times when you felt you were procrastinating and something good happened that actually would not have had you not been delayed. I recall an instance where I had a really complex and important report due to a government agency by a particular date. Several times I dove in and started and restarted parts of it, but always seemed to get distracted. I finally stayed up all night working on it the day before it was due, sometimes frantically, until it was completed. I decided to take a nap before taking it to FedEx, and was awakened soon after by a phone call from my client. My expectation was that he wanted a status report. Instead he related that they had discovered a problem with their data and was elated that I hadn't sent the report yet. The lesson - it's important to recognize that what seems like procrastination in the moment may not always be that. It could very well be a subtle message from a higher place.

It’s important to know exactly what procrastination is in order to deal with it. It is a feeling and it’s originating from the inside, it’s not the result of outside events and circumstances. The feeling is the result of your thoughts, specifically your judgement thoughts, all of which are built on beliefs about your life that very well may not be true. It’s only bad if it’s judged by you to be bad .

There are solutions to avoid the undesirable feelings around procrastination. Firstly, recognize that all feelings are caused entirely from your thoughts, and other more desirable thoughts are available in every moment. And then you might create a new, desirable feeling by acknowledging that the thoughts are serving you, even though you don’t know how. By all means, love your procrastinating self!

Acknowledging that procrastination is just something you’re Doing, not something you’re Being, will keep you in the flow of life without wishing and hoping things were different. Let your intuition guide you and you will always get things done on perfect time, Universe time!

Criticism is critique made personal!

Nothing matters, and what if it did!

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It all begins with Thought!
Before leadership training, before Myers-Briggs, before innumerable skills, personality, and character assessments, there is thinking. All the training and personality appraisals in the world are worthless and useless if a person’s thinking is not up to the task.
Stinking thinking is an old phrase but very appropriate. And the thinking doesn’t have to reek like decomposing garbage, just the slightest negative or judgemental thoughts can become major saboteurs to success. Thinking, and thoughts, are the foundation for our entire experience of life and we can easily get off track with our goals, aspirations, and day-to-day enjoyment of life through unproductive thinking processes.
So how do we eliminate, or at least significantly reduce, undesirable thoughts and change thinking patterns? Awareness is the key. Becoming aware of the content of our thoughts. We are all aware that we are always thinking, what we don’t usually recognize is the content of those thoughts, what preceded them, what feelings follow them, and what emotions ultimately express as a result of them.
Understanding the source of our thoughts at the elemental level, or origin, is critical. Scientific studies have shown that humans have 40-60,000 thoughts per day so it’s virtually impossible to monitor every one of them. It’s also virtually impossible to replace the undesirable ones or amp up the desirable ones on a moment-to-moment basis. We have to recognize the source of our thoughts and work towards re-shaping the nature of our thinking patterns.
Well, where do our thoughts come from if we don’t create them ourselves? Everyone’s thoughts originate from the same source, the unseen universal life force that exists behind and beyond our physical manifestation in the world. That may sound a little ethereal, or woo-woo, but the presence of this life force cannot be denied. Much as gravity and magnetism exist without any tangible proof beyond the results they inspire, thinking and thoughts emanate from a source that is beyond our conscious mind. The same source that causes our heart to beat, that nurtures a seed into a tree, or transforms a caterpillar into a butterfly. If you don’t believe that your thinking originates somewhere beyond You, try not to think. Close your eyes and turn off the thinking process! Any luck?
So how do we learn to manage, or shape our thinking and thoughts if we aren’t responsible for their creation? By putting our attention where we want our thinking to go! “Energy flows where attention goes” is the saying. No one that I know of has the power to consciously produce thoughts in real time with a 40,000 repetition per day consistency! The best we can do is nurture the desirable thoughts and acknowledge and allow the undesirable ones to move on. Knowing that there’s 39,999 more thoughts waiting to manifest is enough knowledge to allow you to let go of the one you’re having right now that isn’t serving you. One that will serve you is just a short distance away.
Feelings are our guide. Good thoughts create good feelings, crappy thoughts create crappy feelings. It’s always that way! The pattern is event, thought, feeling, emotion, in that order, invariably. Our conditioning and life experiences often cause the pattern to play out so quickly we think the event caused the feeling or emotion, but just as the bullet seems to strike the target at the same instant we hear the explosion from the gun, we know which came first. Follow the feelings, check your thinking and you will always be able to identify their source.
Feeling good is what it’s all about! Not in a physical, instant ego gratification sense, but in the sense that we know all is well in our world, that we are ok where we are. The more we venerate and appreciate the feelings that follow desirable thoughts, the more of them will come. And as we become more mindful of the connection between thought and feeling we will unconsciously cultivate and nurture thinking that assures the feelings we desire.

Stress - What it really is and how to eliminate it from your life!

Stress, we hear about it all the time. It seems as if almost everyone is afflicted to some degree with stress. But what is stress really, and how do we overcome its effects? First I'll define stress. For the purposes of this article, stress is defined as a feeling, a physical sensation that something isn't what it's supposed to be. A simple example is to imagine a three foot wide 10 foot long solid board between two chairs, you would have no problem walking across this board, maybe even dancing across it. However, if we move the board up ten stories between two buildings, the thought of walking across it now is entirely different! Nothing about the board has changed and it's still our same feet that we danced across it with, but it's fair to say that our thoughts about crossing it have changed dramatically.

Therein lies the rub – our thoughts. Our thoughts are the source of our feelings. Simply moving the board didn't change our feelings, our thinking about the board changed them. Our minds are now considering all sorts factors we didn't consider before, will the board break, will the wind blow me off the board, am I sure I can really balance myself on this board? Those thoughts are causing our new feelings. And that is always the case. Imagine a basketball game and a player from one team or the other makes a shot at the buzzer to win the game. Half the fans are elated, the other half despondent. But it's the same event, a player made a shot. Our feelings are not affected by the event itself, they are affected by our thinking of the event and the meaning we assign to the result.

Our thinking is always the source of our feelings, always! We experience an event or circumstance, think about it, process it's meaning, and a feeling arises. And the feeling then leads to an emotion – sadness, anger, euphoria. Our emotions are the physical expression of our feelings which are the internal result of our thoughts. Event – thought – feeling – emotion. That is the natural order for everyone always.

So how do we eliminate or at least greatly reduce stress? The presumptive model today is that stress exists 'out there' independent of us, and we can catch it just as we would a disease. And the traditional way we're taught to control it is to work on one end or the other of this natural chain. On the front end, control the events of our life. Avoid stressful situations, places, people, etc. Or once we're infected, release stress through exercise, meditation, yoga, and the like. On the back end, learn to control our emotions, stuff those feelings, be stoic, vent in a safe place. However, just as conventional medicine is mostly inclined to treat the symptoms rather than the cause, so the popular methods of treating stress also simply address the symptoms. And we're all more familiar than we'd like to be with trying to control events and circumstances, and with stifling our emotions. As often as not that just exacerbates the problem.

Which leaves the natural solution, master our thinking. Ideally, we would like to have a completely neutral thought, or judgment, of every event and circumstance. It's nearly impossible, even for the most enlightened individual, to do that. What we can do though is simply realize that we will have a new thought momentarily, and that new thought will likely not have the same force or power as our current one. Scientific studies have shown that human beings have 40,000-60,000 thoughts a day! That's about 2,500 per waking hour. A new thought is always just a micro-moment away. Consider every event as would someone from Mars who didn't have any stake in the outcome and that new thought will appear before you know it.

The simplest first step to eliminating stress is the awareness of the source, our thinking. Become aware of your thinking, your normal responses to events and circumstances, and pause long enough to consider what your options are. The buzzer-beater basketball shot doesn't have any meaning without your thinking, and neither do any of the other stressful circumstances you experience!

Trust - Make it the Centerpiece of Your Life

Trust is a great topic and I love discussing it! In fact, one of my favorite sayings is "Leap and the net will appear!" Trust is a difficult concept to adopt, easy enough to understand, just not always so simple to practice. The reason, I believe, is that the changes you expect from trusting seem to only come incrementally, and it’s easy to lose your patience. Trust demands faith and you have to be diligent even in the face of what initially seem like negative and undesirable results. And you have to initiate trust yourself, you can't wait for the events and circumstances to change first, or others to trust you first.

As an example, several years ago I was in a difficult relationship and, even though it seemed I was being taken advantage of, I really felt compelled to trust this particular person. I kept believing in it and working at it and what I found was that I became more trusting, as well as trustworthy, at my core. Although I was getting burned time and again, I was actually developing a powerful trust in my myself. As trust began to become a part of me and a guide for my actions, all my relationships including that one synchronistically improved.

The first step in creating a paradigm of trust in your life is to believe that every result you're experiencing is happening for your ultimate benefit, that the Universe, God, Creator of all things (whatever your own concept is) is friendly and always acting on your behalf. As you live into that trust, you create a space for good fortune, synergistic events, and creative opportunities to open up for you. And like everything new and worth learning, it takes practice, perseverance, and dedication! The rewards are huge, however, and the peace and serenity that that accompany trust is priceless!

Continuing my story, at one point two or three years into the trusting process, I was facing a court appearance that actually had potential for jail time. I was meditating early that morning and the little ego messengers in my head were producing one anxious and stressing thought after another. Suddenly I heard a very clear voice cut through all the head chatter, “I'll handle it” was exactly what it said. My first impulsive thought was “Is that really a clear voice or am I making it up?” It was a clear voice however, there was no doubt it was authentic. A feeling of euphoria poured over me, a knowing that all was well. The court proceeding was beyond anything I could have imagined, an incredible turn of events that settled the whole issue. And it was my unconditional trust that created the space for that miraculous turn of events. Not withstanding that I was innocent!

So developing trust, like most self improvement activities, is simple but not necessarily easy. I suggest focusing on one aspect in your life that's been letting you down, a relationship, your job, maybe even your car, and simply incorporate an attitude of trust in all your thinking about it. Don't try to figure it out, or predict outcomes, just flow with your feelings that the trust creates. With diligence and confidence your whole attitude will evolve and you'll be surprised by the unforeseen and coincidental events that proceed into your life. Trust yourself that you can obtain any life you want, trust that all of your needs will be met by allowing yourself to reach for the good in everything, and mostly trust that the universe is a friendly and compassionate ally.

I trust this has been helpful!

Exciting opportunity!

Exciting opportunity! Hi 2013 was a very challenging year for me! I had some health issues that are pretty much resolved, but I lost a lot of momentum with my business. What I did do with all that couch time was write a book titled Your Life Is What You Think It Is. This book tackles the subject of how ou...

Exciting news

Exciting opportunity! Hi 2013 was a very challenging year for me! I had some health issues that are pretty much resolved, but I lost a lot of momentum with my business. What I did do with all that couch time was write a book titled Your Life Is What You Think It Is. This book tackles the subject of how ou...