M.J. Blehart's Blog, page 64

Current Thoughts and Feelings Are Changeable

Thoughts and feelings are changeable. Whatever you are thinking and feeling is yours, and yours alone, and there is positivity in your power to change them as you desire.

Today is a grey and chilly day.

As I sit here at my desk, pondering what to write about, drinking my 3rd mug of coffee, I am feeling some trepidation and dis-ease. It’s not that I am feeling negative – I just am not feeling a topic in the positivity realm to write about.

I know and have written before, that you cannot and will not feel positive all the time. That’s just not possible. As a human being, you are going to have good and bad days, moments that are amazing and times that are godawful.

Some of these are deeply personal, impacting you directly because of choices you have made, people you associate with, the environment you live in, and so forth. Others, though, are out of your control because they are the result of actions (and inactions) on the part of people and things that happen randomly around you. And then, for added fun and entertainment, things occur far afield from any semblance of control on your part.

Because you cannot be positive at all times, it’s actually a part of positivity to feel uncertain. Dis-eased. Maybe even distressed.

What IS up to you, though, is how long you hold onto it and whether you change it or not.

Lingering thinking and feeling

Mindfulness is when you practice being aware of your thoughts, feelings, and actions. These are, in point of fact, the only things over which you have any real control in your life. What you think, how and what you feel, and the actions you take belong to you and only you.

Shit happens that is going to not be positive. Some is simply frustrating, some annoying, some infuriating, and any other negative emotion you care to examine. Things will happen along the way on any given day to evoke thoughts and feelings. Actions you take can also stir what you think and feel or be the result of thoughts and feelings.

When shit happens to you, or your friends and family, or generally around you in such a way that it impacts your life, you will feel things. Congrats on human nature, this is something inescapable.

However, you get to choose how long to hold onto not feeling positive.

You are empowered to choose from a wide range of emotions in this life. Of course, the color and shape of the emotions vary from person to person. My perception of anger is not going to be the same as yours. But we are equally empowered to choose how long to hold onto any given thought or feeling.

So I could take this grey, chilly day, and my current uneasy feeling, hold onto it and let it stop me from writing or taking other actions I need to take today. Or I can make choices to release this, shunt if off to the background, or let it go.

Thoughts and feelings and actions are yours to choose

How does this choice work? First, it’s important to remember that mindfulness is your awareness of yourself. Specifically, your headspace. You are the only one in there, so you have all the power to choose what fills your head when all is said and done.

When you are coping with everyday things that make you feel not positive, you can choose to let that override and overwhelm your headspace or to take control over them.

These are just some basic overviews of your options:

Hold onto it. To be blunt, this doesn’t serve you. Sure, there ARE times to be angry about going on in your life…but if it is distracting you from living it’s not serving you. Still, a lot of people choose this, not recognizing it for the damage it does to their psyche.
Release it. When you are feeling or thinking about something not positive, you get to decide to hold onto it or let it go. Sometimes releasing it can be a matter of mediation, an alternative activity like exercise, shouting, or writing it out.
Shunt it off to the background. This is mostly applicable to things way outside your control. Until the next election, or I write my Congresspersons, or attend a protest, lamenting the state of the government doesn’t serve my mood. Don’t let it go – just shunt it to a place of less dominance in your head.
Let it go. This is like releasing it but a bit more direct. You acknowledge how you are thinking and feeling and just drop it. Release involves more time and analysis than just letting go.

No matter what you choose the choice is yours. Also, you might not enter a place of positivity, but rather one of neutrality. That’s still better than holding onto negativity.

Change is constant

Everything changes. It may be grey and chilly outside right now, but the sun might appear through the clouds and the air could warm-up.

Whatever you are thinking and feeling now will only be with you for as long as you hold onto it. You have the power to choose how long that will be.

Even if you choose neutrality, there is tremendous positivity in the power of that choice.

Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.

Finding positivity isn’t hard but it does require action

Knowing that you cannot be positive all the time, and thoughts, feelings, and actions are yours to control, you get to choose how long to hold onto things. When you choose to take control of and/or change your thoughts and feelings and be mindful of your actions, that ultimately empowers you. When you feel empowered, your mindfulness increases, you become more aware overall, and that tends to spread to other people around you.

As such, you can build more positive feelings and discover more things to feel positivity and gratitude.

Gratitude leads to happiness. Happiness is the ultimate positive attitude. An attitude of gratitude is an attitude of positivity that begets even more good energies – and that, like you, is always worthwhile.

This is the three-hundred-second entry of my Positivity series. It is my hope these weekly messages might help spread positive energies for everyone. Feel free to share, re-blog and spread the positivity.

Please visit here to explore all of my published works – both fiction and non-fiction.

Please take a moment to sign up for my newsletter. Fill in the info and click the submit button below and receive a free eBook.

Name *FirstLastEmail *NameSubmit

The post Current Thoughts and Feelings Are Changeable appeared first on The Ramblings of the Titanium Don.

Living my Philosophy

Living my philosophy is an ongoing practice.

Some days are easy, other days take far more work.

When I began the process of Pathwalking, my original intent was to create a subject matter I could write about weekly.

It wasn’t long before this evolved into my personal life philosophy. The more I wrote, the more I desired to share it with the world.

This began as a self-directed journey through life, employing conscious reality creation to find and create the reality I desired to live in. Sharing this journey is a part of the process, and it wasn’t long before I weaved in the concepts of mindfulness and positivity.

Initially, when you are living from your subconscious more than your consciousness, it takes a lot of work to practice mindfulness and be aware of your thoughts, feelings, and actions. While it does get somewhat easier to do this over time, by no means does it become permanent, flawless, or effortless.

Pathwalking, like yoga, meditation, and medicine, is a practice. As I have experienced with practicing fencing for 28 years you have good practice days and bad practice days.

For example, some days I can maintain proper distance and make my opponents work their asses off to tag me. Other days, though, I fence as though I am still a rank newbie, and I move like someone in a pool of Jello.

Living my philosophy is an ongoing practice with all the associated ups and downs.

Practice, practice, practice

You have little to no control over the vast majority of what happens in your life. For those of you who have control-freak tendencies, which I know I sometimes do, that’s a bitter pill to swallow.

Unfortunately, it is the truth. You cannot control what anyone else chooses or does not choose to do. There is nothing you can do to control the weather or any other aspect of Mother Nature. You have zero authority over airline schedules, traffic, or wait times at the doctor’s office.

The only thing over which you have any control is YOU. Externally this means you can control how you look, but apart from that your only control is over what is in your head. This is the reality of practicing mindfulness, and being aware of your thoughts, feelings, and actions.

It is, for the record, impossible to be completely aware 24/7. Impossible. Why? Because firstly, you get rest and sleep. During that time you are just about as far from mindful as one can be.

Secondly, shit happens. A break-up, a car accident, a death, getting fired, a natural disaster, and other matters utterly out of your control can and will overtake your consciousness.

This is unavoidable, but it’s important to recognize and acknowledge that it will happen. You’re only human, after all, and no matter how hard you strive to be mindful and consciously create your reality you’ll drop the ball along the way.

Nobody’s perfect (or everyone’s perfectly imperfect)

Perfection, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. Ergo something I perceive as perfect you may see as an utterly imperfect disaster.

This ties into the notion that reality is an illusion. As Einstein said,

“Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.”

The practice of living a philosophy requires a certain level of acceptance over what you cannot control. What’s more, you also need to recognize that reality, and how it is perceived, is utterly, completely, and totally variable.

I think the Star Wars movies are an incredible work of science-fiction. Yoda and his wisdom have been a real influence on my thought process, and though The Force is a fictional energy field that binds the galaxy together (much like duct tape) the very concept of The Force is a legitimate description of Universal energy.

You might have a very different perception of this. To you, Star Wars may be a fantasy for children with relatively poor acting and a well-worn story trope. You see Yoda as just a Muppet or CGI goblin. To you, The Force is a silly notion of magic and it’s all just ludicrous escapism.

We are both correct. This is an example of how variable perception is.

Perfection ties right into this. Everybody is perfectly imperfect because perfection is a standard that means something different to every individual. The perception of perfection will be advised by your life experience, education, practices, activities, happenings, and things that occur every day.

This is why living my philosophy has its ups and downs, good days and bad. Because perfection is impossible. Recognizing this can go a long way towards how you approach the things you desire and do.

For this reason, it’s also important to not beat yourself up when your practice falters.

Every day is new

Today will be different from yesterday. Yesterday morning the sun was hidden behind the clouds. Today is a bright and sunny day.

I have a lot of things on my plate today, and that presents me with a choice. I can be apprehensive and concerned with how many things I need to do…or I can be excited and confident about what my day could hold for me. This is a choice that is wholly mine to make.

Along the way, I will have moments of mindfulness and moments without. This is not something to be concerned about or to worry about because it’s the nature of the beast. Practicing my philosophy is an ongoing project, and mindfulness, positivity, and conscious reality creation are worthwhile because I desire to live life rather than let life live me.

So here’s the thing to keep in mind. No quick-fix option is everlasting. There are no magic pills to make you happier, wealthier, thinner, stronger, and more attractive. Instant gratification may seem desirable, but it tends to be hollow and lacking.

Achieving a goal takes time, energy, and work. While that might elicit a groan from you, the work you do makes the victory and success that much sweeter.

It’s not about how much work goes into a thing you desire for your life, nor how hard the struggle is…it’s about the work you do. The journey to get from here to there matters.

Sometimes that’s easy. Other times it’s not. Every single day is a new option, new choices, possibilities, and potential. You are empowered to make choices and decisions that will drive your life from where you are now to where you desire to go.

How you approach any given day is up to you. The choice is entirely yours.

What personal philosophy are you following?

This is the four-hundred and eleventh entry in my series. These weekly posts are ideas for, and my personal experiences with, walking along the path of life to consciously create reality.  I share this journey as part of my desire to make a difference in this world along the way. I also desire to empower myself and my readers with conscious reality creation.

Thank you for joining me.  Feel free to re-blog and share this.

The first year of Pathwalking, including some expanded ideas, is available here. My additional writing works, both fiction and non-fiction, are available here.

Please take a moment to subscribe to my mailing list.  Fill in the info and click the submit button below and receive your free eBook.  Thank you!

Name *FirstLastEmail *EmailSubmit

The post Living my Philosophy appeared first on The Ramblings of the Titanium Don.

Opinions Are Like Assholes

Opinions are like assholes…everybody has them, and many smell like crap. But you can also wash them and wipe them clean.

It is my opinion that consciousness creates reality.

I believe that the practice of mindfulness and becoming aware of what you are thinking and what and how you are feeling is how you become conscious for reality creation.

It’s my opinion that positivity raises your inherent energy levels and opens you up to finding and creating new and better things in life. This is another tenet in conscious reality creation.

This is what I believe. My life experience, things that I have seen and done have caused me to come to hold these opinions.

I am now going to tell you that I could be wrong.

Everyone has opinions. Everyone. Some are held strongly, some weakly. You may have opinions that might as well be set in stone and others that could be blown away like dust in the wind.

With the exception of scientific facts, opinions can be wrong.

What counts as scientific fact? Things like the Earth is round, energy is the root of everything in the Universe, theories of gravity and motion and such. When you form an opinion contrary to scientific fact – and point to a conspiracy theory or some out-there alternate theory or pseudoscience – you’re making a fool of yourself.

No matter how strongly I believe in mindfulness, positivity, and conscious reality creation, my opinions on these topics may be wrong.

Do you know why this is not a bad thing? Because the true facts in place of my opinions could be better.

Making room for growth and learning

I know that my previous statement was very optimistic. I also know that the true facts in place of my opinions could be worse.

The thing of it is, opinions, such as I hold that form my beliefs, are changeable. Thus, there is room for adaptation, growth, and learning more.

When I began to blog regularly I wrote about positivity and conscious reality creation separately. I also didn’t give mindfulness the same level of attention I do now. Why? Because my opinion on these topics has changed. I better see how they are interconnected and how one can directly impact the other.

In my opinion, human beings are capable of incredible potential. You can evolve in ways that may seem impossible now.

In 1919 there were just under 7 million cars on American roads. Today there are 276 million. Just a hundred years ago tools of our everyday lives that we take for granted today didn’t exist at all. Computers, smartphones, even the pop-up toaster (invented in 1919). I have no doubt that back then, in the opinions of many, the connectivity and technology of today’s world was totally impossible.

When I was a kid most of the adults I knew held the opinion that the Soviet Union and Eastern Bloc nations would be a permanent threat all our lives. I then watched the Berlin Wall fall one night on TV in 1989. I have friends who have ZERO recollection of East Germany and their Olympic judges stereotypically giving Western athletes low scores.

The world always changes. As such you need to make some room for your opinions to change.

Be flexible with your opinions

Recognizing that apart from scientific fact your opinions can be wrong leaves you with two options.

Maintain your opinions contrary to reality

– or –
Be flexible and change them.

There are always going to be people with opinions that are different from your own. In some cases, those people are completely wrong, potentially foolish, and even dangerous. In some cases, though, they may be right where you are wrong.

I hold the opinions I hold until such time as someone disproves them. I welcome that. Why? Because it means there will be another chance for me to learn something new and experience more growth and change.

It is my opinion that finding positivity isn’t hard

But it does require action.

Knowing that everyone holds opinions on just about everything you can think of, it helps to maintain flexibility, save in the face of science fact. When you are open to other opinions, including the possibility that yours are wrong, and you are flexible and willing to change, that ultimately empowers you. When you feel empowered, your mindfulness increases, you become more aware overall, and that tends to spread to other people around you.

As such, you can build more positive feelings and discover more things to feel positivity and gratitude.

Gratitude leads to happiness. Happiness is the ultimate positive attitude. An attitude of gratitude is an attitude of positivity that begets even more good energies – and that, like you, is always worthwhile.

This is the three-hundred first entry of my Positivity series. It is my hope these weekly messages might help spread positive energies for everyone. Feel free to share, re-blog and spread the positivity.

Please visit here to explore all of my published works – both fiction and non-fiction.

Please take a moment to sign up for my newsletter. Fill in the info and click the submit button below and receive a free eBook.

Name *FirstLastEmail *NameSubmit

The post Opinions Are Like Assholes appeared first on The Ramblings of the Titanium Don.

Be You for You, Not for Them

You should be you for you and not for them.

It is perfectly acceptable to put yourself and your paths in life first.

When you are striving to find, create, and live a life of your own choosing, be sure that you are doing it for YOU, and not for someone else’s belief in who you are or who you should be. It is not a bad thing, nor selfish, to put yourself first in your own life.

Yet you are frequently inundated with messages to the contrary. This is selfish, that is selfish, and you need to put everyone and everything else before you. However, this is simply not the truth.

How many lives do you get to live? Sure, that might be a metaphorical (or metaphysical) question, but the answer is ONE. At least, this one is all of its own. This life, running around this world in that meat popsicle you call your body is the only one this consciousness has.

What does that even mean? It means that you are the only you that there is. Is there anyone else in your head with you? Even if there is, they are still just an aspect of the one and only you.

What it all comes down to is this: to really live this life as it will most light you up, excite you, and engage you, you need to be you for you, not for anyone else.

Expectations are limiting

When you were a child, in all likelihood your parents expected things of you. Under their roof, you abided by their rules. You had a bedtime, were expected to eat, perform daily rituals like bathing and brushing your teeth, and maybe some household chores, homework, and so forth. There was a level of expectation that you would do these things…or suffer the consequences.

The consequences were variable for everyone. Maybe you were sent your room, grounded and kept from playing outside, having your allowance taken away, or electronics and screen-time eliminated. You may also have been put in time-out, spanked, or made to stand in a corner to think about what you did (or didn’t) do.

Expectations were set, and if unmet consequences occurred. All of this shifted as you got older…but so, too, did the expectations.

Parental expectations met and in some cases gave way to societal expectations. Go to college, get a job, get married, start a family, send the kids to college, retire somewhere warm and watch the cycle repeat. This is the general societal expectations of people today.

These expectations leave little to no room for variation. It is any wonder that there are so many people who suffer depression and anxiety when driven to meet unmeetable expectations?

This is why expectations are limiting. They will cause you not to be for you, but to be for them. Live up to the expectations or stand against the standard. Facing this, it’s not hard to see why so many people tend to be disempowered.

If meeting the expectations of others is not letting you be you, isn’t it time to be you for you and not for them?

Now is the time

Time and reality are both illusions and constructs of the human race. As Douglas Adams quipped in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy:

“Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so.”

Albert Einstein said:

“Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.”

Though one source is fiction and the other a scientist, together these pretty much cover life. The reality you accept as real is an illusion of your own perception. That’s why, despite the collective consciousness and the shared aspects of the world we all live in, perception of the world is so incredibly variable.

How else can you explain how two people can see the same movie and have polar opposite opinions of it? One thinks it’s the most incredible piece of cinema ever created, the other thinks it’s the worst garbage to have wasted two hours of their life on.

Time is a measure of reality. Thus, time is just as illusionary. Ever notice how a minute can both fly by and drag on? This is dependent on what you are doing during that minute. This is why the now, this moment, is the only real time that exists.

The reason I am pointing all of this out and going on about it is that if you are not going to be you for you now, then when? The past has passed and cannot be undone or redone, and the future is not yet written. Or to quote Yoda:

“Always in motion is the future.”

If you are living your life for someone other than yourself, when will you live it for you? What if there is no tomorrow? Do you want to reach the end and regret everything you didn’t do…or recall an incredible experience and stories of a life lived to the fullest?

To be for you is not selfish

I have been going on about allowing expectations to dictate your life and living in the now versus the past or tomorrow to make this point: Be you for you, not for them. Today. Now.

If you are waiting for some happening, tangible or intangible, why? Is there any reason to not live your life, for you, now?

That’s not to say that this isn’t a challenge. I’ve been more-or-less living the life I desire to live for the past eight months or so. I am only just beginning to see means to make this earn me a living wage, and I am terrified about failing at this. My wife is counting on me to provide my share of the income for our household. I desire to be able to do that and more.

There are expectations here, most of which I am placing on myself. They are directly related to me being me for me. Not for them. Yet people close to me have expressed concerns that I am being unrealistic. What I am doing may not work and is putting undue stress on my wife.

It may appear that I am being selfish in striving to live my dream in the here-and-now. Maybe it is. However, I believe this is what I’m meant to do, and apart from the ever-present concerns about my relationship with money I have been happy living like this.

I feel that by being me for me I have more to give. It makes me more capable of greater kindness and empathy for others. I have the support of my wife in this pursuit, and nothing I am doing is denying anyone else’s empowerment.

If it’s not selfish for me to be for me, neither is it for you to be for you.

You are one-of-a-kind

There is only one you. You are a one-of-a-kind, singular being, and you are amazing. The potential to live an amazing life is entirely with you, and you can choose to do what you can to experience it.

Consciousness creates reality. Practice mindfulness and become aware of your thoughts, feelings, and the intent of your actions. Do what you do for you, not for them, because whose life is it anyhow? Unless what you are doing hoarding tangibles or intangibles, or takes away someone else’s potential or rights and freedoms, this is not selfish.

It is perfectly acceptable to put yourself and your paths in life first.

What will you do to be for you and not for them today?

This is the four-hundred and tenth entry in my series. These weekly posts are ideas for, and my personal experiences with, walking along the path of life to consciously create reality.  I share this journey as part of my desire to make a difference in this world along the way. I also desire to empower myself and my readers with conscious reality creation.

Thank you for joining me.  Feel free to re-blog and share this.

The first year of Pathwalking, including some expanded ideas, is available here. My additional writing works, both fiction and non-fiction, are available here.

Please take a moment to subscribe to my mailing list.  Fill in the info and click the submit button below and receive your free eBook.  Thank you!

Name *FirstLastEmail *NameSubmit

The post Be You for You, Not for Them appeared first on The Ramblings of the Titanium Don.

How Can Saying No Be Positive?

Saying No is a matter of self-care and empowerment for your life.

No is not necessarily negative.

This can be an odd concept to wrap your head around, but recognizing the incredible positivity in saying No can open you up to a lot of potential and possibilities.

How can No possibly not be negative? This is a misunderstanding of a word that in and of itself has a simple meaning, but that gets turned into a much broader, bigger, powerful entity.

Though No is used as a negative response to something, the intent of no might well be anything but negative. A lot of times inflection, tone, emphasis, and volume in the word can offer a deeper interpretation. No, all by itself, can convey a stunning amount of weight.

All toddlers seem to go through a phase where “No!” is their favorite word. Sometimes it is completely literal, other times more figurative. It can be petulant, pleading, or manipulative.

Yet this can be a gateway to good. How? By preventing you from entering into a bad situation. When your pals are about to do something you know is completely stupid, telling them No is good for you.

But on a far deeper and more personal level, No opens you up to better empowerment, and having influence and control over your life. In this way it becomes a pathway to choices and decisions for yourself.

Saying No doesn’t make you a bad person

So here we come to the ever-so-popular concept of selfishness. You and I live in a fear-based society, and much of that fear is rooted in selfishness. That selfishness is borne of a belief in lack, scarcity, and a general insufficiency of both tangible and intangible matters.

There is not enough money. Insufficient time. A lack of jobs. Not enough space. Insufficient love. A lack of resources. But all of this is untrue. Every one of these supposed deficiencies is artificial and false. But many use the fear of them being true to drive the masses in largely unhealthy ways.

Seeing the greed and unkindness so rampant in this society causes a lot of interpretation of matters as selfish. But true selfishness is not about self-care and taking time and resources for yourself, but denying them to others.

Yet this false perception of what creates selfishness is a frequent cause of people not saying No when that is truly what they should do for themselves.

How does this work? When you need to care for yourself but put that off for someone else because you don’t want to say No. When you give don’t give a straight answer to someone because you know that saying No will hurt their feelings. This is when you do not want to stay late at work for a project that is not critical despite being asked to do so.

It is not selfish to say No so that you are caring for yourself. You only have an infinite amount of resources, and no matter how strong you are, depleting them will force you to say no after you become exhausted or get sick from not performing self-care.

This can be a word of powerful reinforcement

The word No is not just a denial or a dissent, it can also be a refusal. But that doesn’t make it necessarily a negative.

No is a positive reinforcement of your self-worth, rights, and self-awareness. For example – No, I will not be taken advantage of. I am saying No to these unreasonable fears. No, you will not hurt me. All of these uses empower you.

The meaning of the word No can take on a lot of different aspects. It’s a versatile word that can be used to express displeasure, distress, and even disinformation. But it can also empower you to take control, to use your own reason and mindfulness in order to best care for yourself.

You may have been told about the power of Yes when it comes to choices and decisions for your life. No is just as powerful and can be employed for your betterment, too.

Finding positivity isn’t hard, but it does require action

Knowing how saying No is neither selfish nor unkind of you when it comes to your own empowerment and self-care, you have an excellent tool available to better yourself. When you say No to something that you truly do not desire to do you are being kind to yourself, and that ultimately empowers you. When you feel empowered, your mindfulness increases, you become more aware overall, and that tends to spread to other people around you.

As such, you can build more positive feelings and discover more things to feel positivity and gratitude.

Gratitude leads to happiness. Happiness is the ultimate positive attitude. An attitude of gratitude is an attitude of positivity that begets even more good energies – and that, like you, is always worthwhile.

This is the three-hundredth entry of my Positivity series. It is my hope these weekly messages might help spread positive energies for everyone. Feel free to share, re-blog and spread the positivity.

Please visit here to explore all of my published works – both fiction and non-fiction.

Please take a moment to sign up for my newsletter. Fill in the info and click the submit button below and receive a free eBook.

Name *FirstLastEmail *NameSubmit

The post How Can Saying No Be Positive? appeared first on The Ramblings of the Titanium Don.

Two Roads Diverged – Yet I took Both

You can choose to travel more than one path in life at a time…even when the roads deviate.

Every single day you choose what to do with your life. Or not. You decide what paths you will take to achieve the goals you have for yourself, whether immediate, short-term, or long-term. Or not. This is entirely up to you.

Most people have dreams, visions of their lives, ideas, hopes, and designs for themselves. Some of these are pretty far-fetched, some are almost entirely reliant on other people, while others are perfectly attainable.

Just to add a twist to this, however, these notions change. Ergo, the things you desire in your youth likely won’t be what you want in your 20’s. Furthermore, the things you desire in your 20’s tend to not be the same as those you seek in your 40’s.

As if that’s not enough to wrap your head around, the paths you desire to travel in this life may be terribly divergent roads. Yet you are still completely able to travel more than one at a time.

The roads of life are never linear

If the paths of your life are represented by roads, it’s really important to keep in mind that they are not necessarily laid out as you expect roads to be. Parallel, perpendicular, intersecting, and normal patterns for roadways simply may not apply.

To quote Doc Brown from Back to the Future:

“Roads? Where we’re going we don’t need roads.”

That’s the key. One path may be on the ground, another in the air, another at sea, and yet another beneath the ground. Even more fun and complex, they can exist simultaneously in different plains of the multiverse.

How does that work? The two paths I am currently traversing at the same time are fairly different. On the one I am writing and publishing more and more of my work, seeking to make a living wage. On the other, I am recording audiobooks for other authors and would like not only to expand that but to branch into further voiceover work – also to make a living wage.

Two paths, two roads. Sure, they share some aspects of one another, but they are nonetheless very different pathways. Yet I can take both at the same time, even when they utterly deviate from one another.

Limitations are self-imposed

For a lot of people, they cannot fathom how to take one path in their life, let alone more than one. Yet when it comes to making choices for your life, you hold all the power.

That can seem awfully out-there to some people. They are so heavily indoctrinated in the societal expectations and norms that they can scarcely believe in any power for themselves. This is especially difficult if you get even a little sucked into the news media and world happenings.

Any and all limitations that you believe in, particularly when it comes to yourself, are generally self-imposed.

This is not to say that there aren’t some things you cannot do, or at least can’t do without a tremendous amount of difficulty. I would love to be able to do back-flips while standing. In my current physical state that’s not possible. It could be, but I am honestly not willing to put in the work necessary, because it’s not a major need for my life.

However, that’s a key to much of what you can do in the face of limitations. You put in enough effort and you can do a great many things you truly desire to do.

Which is another factor in this. The paths you choose for your life tend to not be utterly fanciful impractical notions, but possibilities that inspire, excite, and light you up like a Christmas tree.

While they will change and shift over time, sometimes you will still traverse more than one simultaneously.

To quote Henry Ford:

“Whether you think you can or you think you can’t – you’re right.”

Mindfulness is for everyone

Mindfulness is a practice open to every single person on the planet. Everybody has the ability to be mindful.

This entails becoming aware of what you are thinking, what and how you are feeling, and the intentions behind actions you take from there. Ultimately, this puts you in the now, which is the only true reality that there is.

The past is passed, and cannot be repeated – but it can be learned from. The future is unwritten, as your actions in the here and now will create it.

Thus, when you know the roads you desire to travel in this life, the paths you want to take to be the best you that you can be, you have all the power to make it so. You can travel multiple divergent roads at once…but in order to recognize and be in any control over this process you have to be mindful.

A lot of self-helpery makes this look easy. Just give it the thought, be super-positive about it, close your eyes and it will be! Positivity is necessary to raise your vibrational frequency, and that in turn attracts like things to it and to you that can make the life you seek. However, it’s just one part of the process.

Nothing intentional just happens. You have to think, and feel, but then you have to ACT. If you do not take intentional actions to start down any given path, you stagnate. When you make no choices or decisions to act upon your subconscious will nudge you from the driver’s seat and act on what you are thinking about. If you aren’t mindful of what you are thinking and feeling this can lead to less-than-desirable outcomes.

To quote Theodor Hertzl:

“If you will it, it is no dream.”

The roads are open to you

Despite messages telling you that it’s important that you drive this car, drink that soda, have this physique, own that home and such in order to be worthy and deserving of being awesome, that’s simply not true. You are worthy and deserving of finding, creating, and choosing a life that makes you happy.

This life is meant to be lived. Experienced. Enjoyed. You are not just here to slog through each day, but to learn, grow, and discover new things. The paths you see before you that excite you are for you to decide to choose to travel.

You are capable of taking more than one road at a time. Nobody can choose for you unless you allow it. You can choose to travel more than one path in life at a time…even when the roads deviate.

What roads are you traveling, and are they truly those you desire to be on?

This is the four-hundred and ninth entry in my series. These weekly posts are ideas for, and my personal experiences with, walking along the path of life to consciously create reality.  I share this journey as part of my desire to make a difference in this world along the way. I also desire to empower myself and my readers with conscious reality creation.

Thank you for joining me.  Feel free to re-blog and share this.

The first year of Pathwalking, including some expanded ideas, is available here. My additional writing works, both fiction and non-fiction, are available here.

Please take a moment to subscribe to my mailing list.  Fill in the info and click the submit button below and receive your free eBook.  Thank you!

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The post Two Roads Diverged – Yet I took Both appeared first on The Ramblings of the Titanium Don.

Recognizing the Incredible Positivity of Compliments

There is Incredible Positivity in Compliments

These are fundamental building blocks of empowerment that tend to be underused.

You are amazing. I think you are awesome. You make me smile. I love seeing you. You inspire me. I think you look fantastic. You are clever and creative. I am really happy to have you in my life!

Why is it so hard for people to offer up compliments? For real, how did this become so difficult?

Criticism? No problem, you can get that in a heartbeat. Unwanted explanation and advice? Oh yeah, just post something to Facebook about an issue you are contending with and there it is. Discouragement? In a fear-based society overly focused on lack and scarcity this is a frequent go-to for people.

There is so much power in giving and receiving compliments. Reread the opening line. How does it make you feel to have those sorts or phrases directed at you? Genuinely said, compliments are empowering.

Giving them is as powerful as receiving them. Why? Because it feels good to say things that make other people feel good. There is immense positivity in compliments.

Be a builder, not a destroyer

One of the key factors of compliments is how they build you up. They create positive energy, and they are equivalent to providing the scaffolding and materials to construct incredible things. Specifically, a more incredible you.

This applies to both giving and receiving genuine compliments. And by genuine, I mean more than words, but feeling behind the compliments.

It’s true that words have power…but you can offer people more than words (how many of you now have the song in your head, btw?) to express a deeper depth. You build a more solid foundation with words empowered by feeling.

I can say “thank you” over and over again with nothing behind it, and it will have no real impact. But if I say “thank you” and put feeling into it, make it genuine, it has far more power. Gratitude is one of the most powerful tools in creating positivity in the world, let alone conscious reality creation.

On the other side of the coin, criticism, unwanted advice, discouragement, and even sarcastic compliments are destroyers. It’s like taking a wrecking ball to the construction project and swinging it carelessly.

Even when and if you mean well, the above notions can be super disempowering.

Mindfulness in compliments

I push mindfulness like a drug dealer pushing heroin because it can impact the world on so many levels. When more people are mindful, it opens a greater number of people up to being empowered. Empowered people are better at self-care, self-awareness, and combatting fear with reason.

The best way to turn a fear-based society into a reason-based society is empowerment. Why? Because the vast majority of the fear in our society is utterly lacking in reason. The intangibles of lack and scarcity and insufficient this, that, or the other thing are artificial, created to disempower some while empowering a very select few.

For example, do you really think that there is not enough money for everyone to live comfortably in this world? Just look at billionaires and understand that when they are pulling in hundreds of thousands of dollars a day, that is money that could support dozens of other people without lessening their comforts.

Similarly, when a major corporation pays its executives obscene amounts of money while paying less than a living wage to its employees, it’s not got anything to do with lack or scarcity of money. Yet they work awful hard to convince us all otherwise. But I digress.

More mindfulness opens you up to awareness of your thoughts and feelings. That awareness, in turn, builds up your strength and resolve for reason. Real, genuine compliments empower you and can be used to empower others.

Being empowered opens you up to replace fear with reason. That insight can change the world.

There is no competition

Finally, it’s important to acknowledge that you are not in competition for the intangibles of the world (and really most of the tangibles, too). Criticism, unwanted advice, discouragement and the like tend to be by-products of the anticipated competition for things perceived as scarce and lacking.

This is an abundant universe. It really, really is. I know that it can be really hard to conceive of sometimes, but that makes it no less true. You have so much more power than you realize…and that is why compliments and being complimentary can be a fundamental building block to recognizing the true nature of all you may be capable of.

You are amazing. I think you are awesome. You make me smile. I love seeing you. You inspire me. I think you look fantastic. You are clever and creative. I am really happy to have you in my life. Feels good to read that when you know that I mean it, right? Please take that, and pass it on!

Giving compliments isn’t hard, but it does require action

Knowing how receiving compliments makes you feel, you can be more complimentary to people to pass that feeling on to them, too. When you utilize the power of compliments to build other people up and provide them a source of empowerment that, in turn, ultimately empowers you.

When you feel empowered, your mindfulness increases, you become more aware overall, and that tends to spread to other people around you.

As such, you can build more positive feelings and discover more things to feel positivity and gratitude.

Gratitude leads to happiness. Happiness is the ultimate positive attitude. An attitude of gratitude is an attitude of positivity that begets even more good energies – and that, like you, is always worthwhile.

This is the two-hundred and ninety-ninth entry of my Positivity series. It is my hope these weekly messages might help spread positive energies for everyone. Feel free to share, re-blog and spread the positivity.

Please visit here to explore all of my published works – both fiction and non-fiction.

Please take a moment to sign up for my newsletter. Fill in the info and click the submit button below and receive a free eBook.

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The post Recognizing the Incredible Positivity of Compliments appeared first on The Ramblings of the Titanium Don.

Finding What is Needed on the Path

I am exploring finding what is needed on my path. Just because I know the path does not mean I am completely enlightened.

I know where I desire to take my life. When it comes to who I am and who I desire to be, I am completely aware of both locations and the complexities of building the bridge between them.

So here I am, more than 7 months into writing full-time, and I am still trying to figure out how to make the most of my work. How do I better promote myself, market myself, and increase my sales?

Further, I have begun recording audiobooks for other authors, plus my own books. I would also like to figure out how to take my mindfulness/awareness practice to the next step and start public speaking on this topic. It is my belief that this could help people with what they most desire to become.

These are big scary steps to take. Doing this can and will propel me into another life. I have no idea what that will look like, but at the same time, I am all excited to find out.

The thing is, I don’t know how to move forward. What do I do next?

Getting unstuck

I know that on my own I am stuck. Well, ok, not exactly stuck, but instead of swimming in water this is kind of like swimming in slime. Still able to swim, but you don’t move half as fast.

I have reached the point where I believe I am going to need assistance. No, this is not counter to practicing mindfulness, because to get somewhere I have never been before it’s helpful to get assistance. This may be what is needed to move forward.

When you do not know what the next step looks like, it’s time to admit you need help. Depending on where you are in life and what you are doing, this help can take many different forms. It might just require finding a book or online info. Perhaps you need a therapist to work out trauma. You may need a coach, business consultant, or some other form of expert to help you.

That’s where I am at. I have reached a point where I cannot go it alone, so the time has come to get help.

Asking for what is needed can be difficult

I know a lot of people who hate having to ask for help in any way. They feel that when they ask for help they are making themselves vulnerable, are imposing on others in an unpleasant way, being a burden, admitting defeat, or some unpleasant combo of all of these.

This is a familiar feeling for me, too. In particular when I’m over here preaching the gospel of mindfulness and being aware of the self. It ends up feeling like asking for help is somehow hypocritical.

It’s not. In fact, it’s exactly the opposite. While mindfulness does make you aware of your thoughts, feelings, and actions, thus opening you to influencing and controlling them more thoroughly, it doesn’t open some faucet of flowing information. Knowing yourself better allows you to take the wheel from your subconscious. When you do that, you also can better see where you need to learn things.

Education is not in any way, shape, or form, restricted to schooling. Not even a little bit. Education is a life-long activity, and you are constantly growing, evolving, changing, and LEARNING.

One of the most incredible things about being human is our near-infinite capacity to learn. This is why over the course of fewer than 100 years civilization has connected across the globe instantaneously, broken the speed of sound, broken the bonds of the atmosphere, and developed essential, incredible tools to keep growing.

This changes many things. For some, that’s terrifying. Change is unknown and scary. Being mindful can help lessen the fear. Mindfulness can help you see change as opportunity rather than calamity, potential instead of problem.

Being mindful, I know there are lots of things I do not know. To get somewhere I have not been before I might need to ask for help.

That knock on the door is opportunity

Recently I have begun to give LinkedIn more attention. As such, someone connected with me who works with an agency that can offer me help for what is needed to take my brand to the next level.

Though I have not been referring to it as such, in truth I AM a business. Being a writer/editor/podcaster/audiobook voice actor may appear to be a random amalgam of talents. However, it can also be a business model.

That may very well be the next step I need to take. To get where I really desire to go, I need to leverage my abilities and keep doing the things I am doing. But I also need to figure out how to expand if I am going to truly make my living this way.

So here I have this opportunity. I have found someone who can coach me through better marketing using tools I already have, better self-promotion, and scaling up (since I know one of the problems I have is that I can see here and there, but the in-between is cloudy and unknown).

This is scary for several reasons. First, I have to put trust in this unknown to help me. Second, it’s going to cost money I need to figure out how to find. Third, this growth could potentially change my life significantly.

Am I ready?

There are many things I am very content with in my life. Yet I also know that to go where I truly desire to, I need to leave the comfort zone behind.

This is an opportunity, and the timing is serendipitous. I know my path, and this step is probably what is needed to be taken to advance.

Kick uncertainty in the ass

Rather than viewing this as leaving my comfort zone, perhaps I should put this into Star Trek context. It is time to leave behind Federation space (the comfort zone) and cross the Neutral Zone into the unknown.

That’s what this opportunity is. The Neutral Zone. That’s because it is a true learning opportunity that reasonably costs me very little but has the potential to earn me far, far more than I have thus far. I am not a one-trick pony, but the how of marketing the brand that is me requires action I have never taken before.

I am uncertain as all get-out about this. Will this be a waste of time and money? Or is this the knock on my door I would be an idiot not to answer? I know my mindset, my own headspace, and I know that I really could use some help at this point.

This is all on me. So I need to take a deep breath, kick uncertainty in the ass, and determine the best way to take this step forward. I know that this may well be what is needed for my path. I am excited and scared, but more excited because I know I am looking at a means to the end I desire.

How do you find what is needed for you along your chosen paths?

This is the four-hundred and eighth entry in my series. These weekly posts are ideas for, and my personal experiences with, walking along the path of life to consciously create reality.  I share this journey as part of my desire to make a difference in this world along the way. I also desire to empower myself and my readers with conscious reality creation.

Thank you for joining me.  Feel free to re-blog and share this.

The first year of Pathwalking, including some expanded ideas, is available here. My additional writing works, both fiction and non-fiction, are available here.

Please take a moment to subscribe to my mailing list.  Fill in the info and click the submit button below and receive your free eBook.  Thank you!

Name *FirstLastEmail *MessageSubmit

The post Finding What is Needed on the Path appeared first on The Ramblings of the Titanium Don.

The Positivity of Common Ground

Finding common ground is an excellent way to develop pathways of positivity.

Do you like feeling negative? Does anyone actually prefer to feel angry, frustrated, sad, distressed, and unhappy? I know don’t…and based on an utterly unscientific analysis of my friends, I really think that, generally, nobody does.

The world is overflowing with various entities finding and creating divisions among people. Whether physical or not, pretty much all divisions among people are completely artificial.

Sure, there are different genders, skin colors, eye colors, body shapes, and other physical variables. Likewise, people have different ethics, religions, nationalities, ethnic backgrounds, politics, and other made-up immaterial aspects.

While these differences can in many ways simply make everyone unique, all too often they get used to create deeper, wider, and harder-to-bridge divisions among people.

Why? Because that will disempower you. When you are disempowered you tend to look for means of empowerment. Because of the nature of society, that tends to be an external quest.

But real empowerment comes from within, not from without. When it is difficult to see this within yourself, one way to do so is to find common ground with like-minded people.

Sharing common ground

Many of the communities people form are based on common ground. There are things that members of the given group share, like beliefs, faith, ethics, and the like. Overall, this can be a good source of strength, because it gives you someone to turn to when you need support or assistance who is likely to understand you.

This ceases to be good when that community starts fostering unkind intent. This is where religion, for example, tends to go wrong. You begin with a great idea and shared qualities, but then you start to get exclusionary and close people out who are different. This, in turn, actually disempowers you as an individual, in the name of the group normal.

Balancing what you get from those whom you share common ground with your own self is important. Nobody but you is inside your own head. As such, nobody else can be mindful for you, because awareness of your thoughts, feelings, and intent of action belongs solely to you.

Still, there is information in the world that you don’t know. One place to gain more is with those whom you share common ground with. Even though you all think and feeling differently, the commonalities between you provide a bridge of connection that can be used in numerous positive ways.

Human connection is way beyond physical

Even the most introverted people I know need to connect with other people from time to time. One of the best places for these connections is among those with whom you share common ground. Because of the things you share, material or immaterial or both, you are able to communicate in a way that you all understand.

I have been doing medieval reenactment for 28 years now. With the many people I have met playing this game from across the world, I have gained not just amazing friends, but lots of like-minded people who stand on common ground with me.

When my own family doesn’t always get me, the people in the reenactment group, for the most part, do. That common ground is a great source of comfort.

While I am the only one inside my head, thinking and feeling like and how I do, those on common ground with me share some aspects of the how of my thinking and feeling. With that, this gives me a place to turn where I can find understanding, and get assistance and support as I take my life on the paths of my choosing.

Finding common ground with people in your life is an excellent way to develop pathways of positivity.

Finding positivity is not hard, but it does require intentional action

Knowing that you stand on common ground with other people, you have a resource at your disposal to seek understanding and assistance as you do the things you do for your life. When you know that you have people who get you and who you can bounce ideas and information off of, that ultimately empowers you. When you feel empowered, your mindfulness increases, you become more aware overall, and that tends to spread to other people around you.

As such, you can build more positive feelings and discover more things to feel positivity and gratitude.

Gratitude leads to happiness. Happiness is the ultimate positive attitude. An attitude of gratitude is an attitude of positivity that begets even more good energies – and that, like you, is always worthwhile.

This is the two-hundred and ninety-eighth entry of my Positivity series. It is my hope these weekly messages might help spread positive energies for everyone. Feel free to share, re-blog and spread the positivity.

Please visit here to explore all of my published works – both fiction and non-fiction.

Please take a moment to sign up for my newsletter. Fill in the info and click the submit button below and receive a free eBook.

The post The Positivity of Common Ground appeared first on The Ramblings of the Titanium Don.

Your Path is Gone

What happens when the unexpected occurs and the path you have been traveling in life is suddenly no more?

For many, once they find themselves on the path they have chosen for their life, this is apropos of how it makes them feel:

“The way is clear / the light is good / I have no fear/ nor no one should.” – Prologue, Into the Woods

But then, what happens when, like an unexpected bolt of lightning from the sky, the path is gone? Not twisted, not blocked, simply gone and no more?

Unfortunately, because life tends to be unpredictable, this can and will happen.

What causes this to happen, and what can you do when it does?

The world goes mad

This is what happens when external matter causes the path you are on to cease to be very suddenly, seemingly out of the blue. A loved one dies, a relationship ends, a job is lost, all your money is lost, an injury changes your capabilities, your house burns down, and so on. You cannot predict that these will happen, they just do.

Now the path you were on is no more. What’s worse, there is no way to get back on it or another related to it. Similar, maybe, but it will still be quite different.

For example, you love your job. What you do is unique. You have every intention of working there until you are ready to retire, and you’ve given it years of your life. Then, without warning, the company shuts down, and everything you have invested in the job is no more. Too young to retire, you have to find a new job.

Anyone looking for jobs today knows that even the relative stability of employment you could find a decade ago is utterly different. Businesses, for the most part, have little to no loyalty to their employees, which they often “contract” in order to avoid having to pay benefits.

Your whole world, the path you loved, is gone.

You have a sudden realization

This is what happens when an internal matter causes the path you are on to cease to be very suddenly, seemingly out of the blue. This is far more subjective, as all of these matters are yours and yours alone. For the most part, this occurs when you realize the chosen path you are on is not for you.

Now the path you were on is no more. What’s more, there is no way to get back on it, or one related to it. Similar, maybe, but it will still be quite different.

For example, you are a scientist studying physics. You are working on a theory that could, if proven, win you the Nobel Prize. Since college, this has been your whole life, your love, everything you have has gone into this. And then…you disprove your own theory. There is no possible way that what you were working on could be. Your research serves no more purpose. You’re too young to retire, so you have to change your focus or utterly change your area of study.

Academia is a fickle mistress, as most of my friends in education tend to relate.

Your whole world, the path you loved, is gone.

Now what?

This is, of course, the question you have to answer. When matters change suddenly and abruptly they tend to be rife with emotion. When your heart is ripped out of your chest and everything you knew has gone completely sideways, it can feel completely awful.

You may feel lost, hurt, angry, frustrated, disenchanted, distressed, depressed, and all kinds of other negative feelings. Because this situation is borne of the unexpected, you tend to be caught up in a tornado of emotions and feelings as if nothing matters.

The plan was there. The path was clear. And now? What the fuck are you going to do now? Everything has gone to hell, and you just haven’t a clue what’s next.

Without a doubt, for a time you will grieve. This is going to take any number of different forms, in especial because no two people grieve in the same way. This is no different than losing a pet or loved one. Further, your grief in this matter is valid, although many people will press you to cease grieving and move on.

In time, it WILL be necessary to move on. Yet you should express your grief for the loss, let it out so that it doesn’t overwhelm you. That will take whatever form is best for you.

Expressing grief is part of releasing it. If you choose to hold onto it that will allow it to dominate your life and choices therein. Thus it is necessary to let go of it.

Just like removing a bandage, you get to choose to pull it slowly or tear it away fast. Both will hurt, but you can choose if it will be a single painful removal or a lengthy, drawn-out, multiply painful one.

Choosing anew after the unexpected

One of the ways to combat the grief is to make a new choice.

There is always a path to be taken in life. No matter what happens along the way, you can choose to live your life as you most desire to do.

When the unexpected has occurred and the path is gone, though it may look like the end, it is not. Sure, it’s an ending – but the only true ending in any life is death. Not to be too dramatic here, but that’s just the way it is.

If you are drawing breath and living you are still empowered to make decisions and choices for your paths. You can find a new job, start a new relationship, purchase or build a new home, learn something new and take a completely different path.

Do not place blame for your lost path. Whether an external or internal matter caused it to evaporate, blame goes nowhere and wastes time and energy.

You are still worthy and deserving of finding and/or creating the path you desire for your life. The sudden unexpected loss of a pathway is not the result of you being less worthy and deserving (unless your previous path involved intentionally causing harm or hurt in some way to other people.)

You can find or create a new path. That’s your superpower. You are empowered with the ability to be utterly adaptable, but the choice and decisions therein are yours.

I know that this totally and utterly sucks. But I also know you can start anew and potentially grow far, far beyond where you were originally working to go. Grieve, let it go, choose a new path.

What would you do in the event of the sudden and unexpected loss of your chosen life path?

This is the four-hundred and seventh entry in my series. These weekly posts are ideas for, and my personal experiences with, walking along the path of life to consciously create reality.  I share this journey as part of my desire to make a difference in this world along the way. I also desire to empower myself and my readers with conscious reality creation.

Thank you for joining me.  Feel free to re-blog and share this.

The first year of Pathwalking, including some expanded ideas, is available here. My additional writing works, both fiction and non-fiction, are available here.

Please take a moment to subscribe to my mailing list.  Fill in the info and click the submit button below and receive your free eBook.  Thank you!

Name *FirstLastEmail *WebsiteSubmit

The post Your Path is Gone appeared first on The Ramblings of the Titanium Don.