Flourish in the Face of Change

FLOURISH IN THE FACE OF CHANGE
OVERCOMING FEAR IN TURBULENT TIMES

Today, many of us have been forced to look at our life and current financial position closely, due to the uncertainty of our economy, the instability of our financial markets, and the unrelenting pessimism of media coverage.

Stop for a moment and ask yourself, “What is good in my life”? Who am I grateful for at this very moment? What do I most value about myself?

No matter what the current situation, you have the ability to turn things around in your life and flourish. You can change your life in the most profound way by modifying your thoughts and expectations, which is a very individual discovery process.

What are you thinking right now? Are you skeptical? Are you thinking about something entirely different? What are you placing your attention on?

You might be reading this and thinking to yourself, “well that would be nice to just change my thoughts and feel better, but I don’t believe it’s that simple”. It is not easy; however, the concept is simple. Self Awareness and positive thinking are the foundations for change to occur.

Our daily repeated thoughts, which are mostly negative, create a chemical reaction in our brain that produces what we feel and how we feel. On average, human beings think over 50,000 thoughts per day, and of these thoughts, at least 85% are negative. No wonder we feel bad.

For example, according to neuroscience, placing our attention on pain in the body makes pain exist, because the circuits in the brain that perceive pain become electrically activated. If we then put our awareness on something other than pain, the brain circuits that process pain and bodily sensations can be literally turned off, and the pain goes away. Your attention has so much effect on you. What we repeatedly think about and where we focus our attention is what we neurologically become.

Are you ready to make a change? How you ask? How do I turn things around? What do I need to do? The answer is in your awareness. By choosing to become Self Aware, you have the ability to modify negative thoughts to positive thoughts, and when you do, you change your brain. Not only do you change how your brain was working moments before, but you change how it will work in the next moment, and certainly for the rest of your life.

Assumptions and Expectations

Regardless of how bad things look and feel right now, we fear the unknown even more than our current situation. Why? We are addicted to control and negative assumptions of how things might turn out. You can create your future preferred outcomes by understanding your thought patterns.

Undoubtedly you have preferences as to how you want your life to unfold. However, we tend to become disappointed when the outcomes don’t match our expectations. By giving up specific expectations, and instead focusing on preferences, you will be able to discover acceptance, peace and even delight in the outcomes that arise.

What are your expectations for your life? Do you think of your expectations in terms of specific things, amounts of money, property? Are you concerned that if you don’t meet those specific expectations something is wrong? Often, our expectations are laced with negative thoughts about what might or might not happen, without even being aware that these thoughts exist.

Imagine that someone has been promised a bonus at work, but instead learns that they are being laid off from the company. Instead of having the financial assets to take a family vacation, they are now wondering how to pay for holiday gifts or monthly bills.

What seems like a crisis might in fact be a wake up call. If you were in this situation, here are some suggestions. Take a deep breath. Take a look at what you had at this point. Were you living in a state of fear wondering when the axe was going to fall? Did you hang on to that job even though you did not find the work fulfilling? Did you find that you were not spending enough time with your family? Did you spend beyond your means thinking that your financial situation would change at some point?

Lessons are not always easy to see or to embrace, but if you take a step back and see things from a different perspective, you can always see the hidden blessings.

Everything that makes us up, our thoughts, our memories, our fears, our hopes, our feelings, our intentions, our abilities, our habits, our pains, our joys, are imprinted in the living framework of our brain cells.

Knowing this, you have the opportunity to change your mind, embrace that change and shift your attention from what is not working in your life, to creating what you want to in your life. Abundance is all around us. We simply have to see, from our unique lenses, the brilliance. It is with self awareness that we can tap into this new perspective.

You can not change your past; however, you can change the way you view your past and focus your attention on right now. Life always provides opportunities to grow from change, to embrace change, to accept change. You can choose to modify your thoughts to the most positive and abundant thoughts, and when you do, you will see your life unfold in beautiful ways. You will flourish.

COPYRIGHT ©
Lisa M. Brazelton
November 2008