The Key To Unlocking Everything You Want

Hi 🙂

If you have been reading this blog for a while, you will know that I am all about living up to my highest potential. I know that a lot of people say that they want to live up to their highest potential, but I (feel like) I really mean it.

What does my desire to be my best have to do with you getting what you want? We will get there. Promise 🙂 Back to my story for a bit first though.

I believe the reason that most people do not desire to live up to their own possibility, or why people say they do want to and then never actually do it is because there is this notion that it will be hard. It seems that we as a collective have this mindset that it is easier to hang out where we are ‘comfortable.’ To stick with what we know, who we are right now.

I have been thinking about this for a while, and I have come to some conclusions based on my own thought and behaviour patters, as well as those patterns from people I have coached and people that I have in my experience in general.

What I have observed is that there is a tendency to believe that living up to our highest potential is going to be really hard, often painful, a struggle, full of plight and just general gnashing of teeth.

I totally get that. I used to be one of the people who believed this. I really thought that I was being super virtuous and self-sacrificing by trying to be my best. I thought I was doing some great act of service to the world by denying things that brought me pleasure in favour of those things that were going to help me progress along my path. I thought that choosing to step fully into what I am here to do and into who I know I am on a heart level meant never being happy again.

I lived this way for a long time. I diligently went to church. Then when that phase of my life ended, I became a dedicated yogini. I tried to be very strict and ‘pure’ with my eating habits. I rejected almost all forms of play in favor of self help books, spiritual questing, and a lot of long walks alone. I focused my whole world around being better, doing better, not sucking so much.  My intentions were good – I wanted to be the highest version of myself in order to serve the world best - but my way of going about it was totally contradictory.

I was doing all of this with the foundational belief that I was not good enough as I was. That I needed improving. 

This lead me to being really dogmatic. I was hard to be around because I was so set on my beliefs iabout what was ‘right’ and what was ‘wrong’ that I had no kindness or compassion for myself, or anyone else. I also believe that this white knuckling my way to what I believed was purity created a lot of imbalances within my mind, emotions and body.

I wanted to eat a ‘pure’ diet, but because I was coming from a place of believing I was not pure, I continually struggled with food. I wanted to be all loving, all serving and all caring but I was driving myself so hard to become these things that I became harsh, critical and demanding of myself and others – not very loving. I made no room for error. I was a self slave driver.  Life was a constant battle between doing better, being better, knowing better and wanting to relax, have fun and enjoy. I was stressed, frantic, dualistic, rebelling against myself, and not exactly the kind of person you wanted to invite to a party, if you catch my drift.

Now I realize that this may sound strange, even silly. How could living up to my potential mean I was never going to be happy again? Why did it have to mean that I never got to do fun things and was constantly denying my impulses in order to serve the highest good?

The short answer? It didn’t.

I now see that living up to who I know I am has nothing to do with any of the ideals or behaviours I thought it did. I now believe that my journey to becoming all that I am is really a journey of self love, self discovery, a releasing of what no longer serves me in favour of all those things that really do serve me. How could that suck?

The long answer is that I that I had written the sad, painful story about living up to my potential, and that was what was making it so hard, strenuous, lonely and just plain shitty.

I had made up the story that letting go of  the things that did not serve my highest good would be painful.

I  had made up the story that living up to my highest good meant pain and suffering and denial.

Once I realized that this is what I believed to be true - and thus was creating in my experience - I had the power to question it. Through that questioning I was able to move in another direction, to choose different beliefs.

Once I address that the suffering was something THAT I HAD CREATED IN MY MIND I realized I did not have to hold onto it.

I also realized that it made no sense at all. I realized that living up to my potential was not some great universal sacrifice or service. Living up to my potential served ME first. It made me happy. It made me free. It made me joyful. It was first and foremost for me.

Living up to my potential was all about re-discovering how perfect, whole, worthy of love and amazing I ALREADY AM. I am not becoming anything. I am simply remembering who I already am, while letting go of the things that were never really me to begin with.

This lead to the questions. Why would being my best self be hard? Why would letting go of things that were no good for me be difficult and painful? Why did I believe being my highest self meant missing out on joy?

I decided to call bullshit on myself.

Letting go of things was easy once I understood that it was FOR MY GOOD.

Having fun became a priority once I understood that I was beautiful, awesome and unique. I was not an evil sinner that needed to harness in my evil desires. I started to see that the more I trusted myself, the more my actions, thoughts and desires lined up with my higher self.

Once I stopped forcing myself into behaviour patterns that I thought would make me a better person, I found that I naturally wanted to do most of those behaviours. Not because they made me a good person, but because they actually made me feel good.

I discovered that living in alignment with my highest good, with the understanding that there is nothing broken about me, nothing I need to deny, nothing I need to fix, is actually easy. It is way more comfortable than holding onto things that are not me. It is way more fun that forcing myself to be 'good.'

I realized that the only thing that was holding me back from living my potential was my belief that it would be hard, and my belief that I was bad and needed to reign myself in.

So, what was the point of my telling you all that? What is the tool that will help you get everything you want?

Ready for it?

Awareness.

Awareness of what I believed, how my beliefs were affecting me, and how I continued to purpetuate pain in my own life was the key to setting me free.

The true secret to life is this:

Freedom from pain, achievement of goals, moving forward in any way in your life comes from an awareness of what was holding you back. As soon as you become aware of your block, 90% of the work is already done.

For some, as soon as you become aware of what is really holding you back, you will be able to simply let the blocking thoughts or behaviours go because they wont make sense.

For others, you will need to do a little more digging. Generally you will need to ask yourself WHY they are holding onto this thought or behaviour pattern?

Generally it is because they have an underlying belief that holding onto it is somehow less painful that letting it go. With that, you will need to dig deep, but you can do it 🙂

Awareness is the key you are looking for. Do no burry your head in the sand and deny issues. This is only going to lead you to more suffering.

By acknowledging what is really going on, you will be free to move forward. It will not be as painful as you think it will be. I promise. Even if you have been sub consciously denying something for a long, long time, you can still move past it by simply looking it straight in the eyes.

Awareness is the most powerful tool you have for transformation. Use it.

After all, the word 'enlightenment' really means to shine a light 🙂