Yin-Yangs and You [Part 3 of 3]

To conclude this essay on yin-yangs and how this insight can affect your life, we have night and day, hot and cold, good and evil, love and hate, and every duality that exists in nature and in our emotional energies. These opposites all serve a purpose. Knowing this, you have the opportunity to integrate your yin and yang, male and female, dark and light, and experience the fullness of wholeness of who you are! You'll thank yourself.

How Yin-Yangs Are Suppressed

Unfortunately, the reality of yin-yangs are often suppressed, not to be recognized or embraced. Rather than admit it, many people prefer to claim they are not affected by any of these aspects of life. By taking this course of action, they actually end up suppressing the negative belief patterns that are ingrained in their lives.

The Problem

Herein lies the problem: What you deny owns you. So much vital energy is wasted in the automatic suppression of denial. In other words, “Deny it and what you resist will persist.” The same thing happens when you harbor negative thoughts about your circumstances and/or other people.

The Other Way

Likewise, what you accept with grace and gratitude serves to empower you and the abundance of vital energy is your gift.

The irony is that the Whole consists of both dark and light. The ancient symbol of Yin-Yang encompasses all duality and pairs of opposites.

Being your own self is such an empowering experience. I observe the unhappiness of so many people who seem to thrive in this dark arena of life. I've been there and know it has prevented some of the best experiences in my life from happening. You might ask, "Well, if it didn't happen, how do you know it could have been one of the best experiences?" Fair question!

A good example might be the start of a new relationship that really did not “get off the ground”. When this happens, you are haunted by what might have been. This feeling of lost opportunity is akin to grief. There probably isn't a human-being alive that has not experienced this at least once in their life.

When our moods are dark we're likely to experience limitation more often. Ups and downs are a part of life, In gaining perspective of this truth, we are able to eliminate the mood self pity, and jump into the present moment of “here and now”. Then you will discover the joy of living each experience with a sense of brand new wonder and discovery.

Conclusion

Now the opportunity to live the fullest experience in the moment is available. I truly hope you will seize this opportunity, and accept the reality that the beautiful person who looks back at you in the mirror is indeed YOU. Discover who you are; the fullness, the wholeness, the entirety of your true being. It's that blend of being and doing. I'm being me, in the moment, with my mood for company, and am living RIGHT HERE and NOW. My feelings just are; and, in accepting them, I also open myself to a new powerful emotional energy to move in. Life is truly a wonder, our bodies are a wonder, and the experiences are rich. Go for it!

Marvel and mimic those people who are so free, able to dance in the supermarket aisle, to close their eyes on a sunny street in the middle of the day, arms outspread embracing the sun. What limited belief holds you back from being, being all that you are? To be free is to be “you” without any limitations or restrictions. Are you ready? It is your choice.

Yin-Yangs and You [Part 2 of 3]

Dark Moods of Procrastination

As I sit down to write this article, my mood is dark with rather strong feelings of procrastination and/or lack of motivation. I realize that many of these feelings are supported by the disappointment I am experiencing from last week’s endeavors. In addition, I am also aware that I am allowing myself to be controlled into submission by not wanting to accomplish the mundane tasks that I need to take care of NOW.

Light Moods of Celebration

My life is busy and alive; and, yet, quite settled in other ways. The weekend before last was one of celebration, for no reason, a new adventure with new friends on a camping trip. It is truly invigorating to enjoy the freedom from the noisy stresses of city-life and being one with nature.

This memory changes the direction of my mood. Now, my mood and thoughts are high and clear.

Spring is in the air with cool nights and the lovely panorama of the greening of the new growth is just outside my window. Winter is just a fading memory of its cold icy weather mixed with snow.

Winter Days

The winter days of our moods, though dark and sometimes dreary, is a good time to ponder the new light and life of the approaching spring days filled with sunshine and new growth and the wondrous opportunities that it will bring into our lives.

Do you ever think about all those things you don't like about yourself? Bad habits, behaviors, attitudes you've been told are not nice; so many unhappy experiences that accumulate to make up our dark side. We all have these pockets of dark sides in our personalities which often spill over into our moods

Unfortunately, they are often suppressed, not to be recognized or embraced. Rather than admit it, we would prefer to say we don't suffer from any of these afflictions and suppress the negative aspect.

Conclusion

Herein lies the problem: What you deny owns you. So much vital energy is wasted in the automatic suppression of denial. In other words, “Deny it and what you resist will persist.” The same thing happens when you harbor negative thoughts about your circumstances and/or other people.

Likewise, what you accept with grace and gratitude serves to empower you and the abundance of vital energy is your gift.

Yin-Yangs and You [Part 1 of 3]

The ancient symbol of Yin and Yang encompasses all duality and pairs of opposites which are existent in all life. We have night and day, hot and cold, good and evil, love and hate, and every duality that exists in nature and in our emotional energies.

All serve a purpose. If you know this, you have the the secret key to integrate your yin-yangs, male and female, dark and light, and will be more able to experience the fullness of life as well as the wholeness of who you really are!

Repeating Cycles of Yin-Yang

Always remember the dark-side of night [yin] is always followed by the new light [yang] of the dawn of a new day. This cycle is repeated in the seasons of the year. The winter is an essential time of rest for the earth just as the night is a time for rest for us. The winter is followed by spring and the renewal of life just as the new day is the time for us to renew our lives.

Using Force Is Not a Good Solution

We all have our own private dark side. Many of us often suppress this dark side and its resulting feelings and/or emotions because of shame and guilt. We brazenly control this part of our being by forcing our dark side and its feelings and emotions either into submission or into hiding. Like the ostrich, we try to bury our head in the sand.

However, by using force as a strategy to hide our dark side, we ultimately give our dark side the power to control us because we are using our energies negatively.

Do we ever really succeed? The answer is a resounding “NO”. The use of force is not a valid tactic. The use of force only serves to bury your "dark side" even deeper within your sub-conscious while it also disrupts the harmonious flow of your inner peace.

Have you considered the possibility that the dark side of your being has you controlled into submission?

Part 2 of this essay

Come back next week for Part 2 next week to find out how you can avoid being controlled by your “dark side”.

Part 3 of this essay

Part 3 will describe the wondrous rewards you will have when you are free from the control of your emotional “dark side”.

How to Make Success Not Just Obtainable but Sustainable

Each of us has a fundamental need to consistently improve our life. Our self satisfaction continues to grow as we feel that we are contributing to the well being of our family members, friends and our community through our influence and actions.

However, it is very easy to become a victim of the materialistic value belief that says the more you own the more power you have to influence others. It is unfortunate that this often becomes the benchmark we use to judge our personal success. Then we become complacent, thinking that once we have everything we our life will be perfect and filled with happiness.

But then there is the “gap effect” part of your subconscious that is always prodding you to strive for the next level. Are you on this “wheel” that that spins on its axle and goes nowhere?

Do I need to add that this is like the computer virus that can bring your computer to a halt? Likewise, this insatiable drive can bring you to a halt both emotionally and/or spiritually.

If you should need further evidence of this, look at the news items relating to the current suicides that take place frequently such as the top fashion models, the immediate family member of international political figures or “fallen” community leaders.

Were you aware that the word “success” comes from Latin and means “to advance” or “to improve”. This implies that success is a continuing process and not a “means to an end”. Stated a different way, success allows you a better quality of life; thus, moving you forward to having a better life experience. This was my lesson for the day.

This brings us to the “sustainable” concept of success.

It is impossible to sustain “inner peace” when you depend on other people or external things to make you happy. The feeling of happiness comes from the enjoyment of external things, things outside of you; and therefore, is temporary. I recommend that you stop and ponder what your feelings would be if other people were suddenly removed from your life and/or you lost your possessions.

Nor can you achieve any level of sustainable success without developing some changes in your attitude. This requires that you honestly examine and listen to your inner feelings. It is imperative that you get acquainted with yourself, i.e., “Know thyself.” And, then, endeavor to accept yourself as you are and to fall in love with that wonderful being.

HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL!!

Obstacles to Self Improvement-Part 5 of 6 - Anger

Good Morning and Welcome Back

In all honesty, "What is your "take" on anger?" Are you prone to get angry often? What is it that makes you angry?

Without being aware of it, many of us spend a great deal of time in the emotional world of anger. Several years ago, my mentor once told me that I lived in the emotional world of anger. I was dumbfounded; and, yes, my 'prideful" feelings were somewhat bruised.

"How could this be," I asked myself. What did I do to make him even suggest that I lived in the world of anger? I guess my error was that I always considered anger as being an outward manifestation of aggressive and belligerent behavior, hostile, outraged,vengeful and violent.

Anyway, I pondered this personal criticism for a long time. If the matter be known, I still ponder it from time to time only because I happen to believe our political environment, no matter what country you live in, cultivates a lot of our anger by nipping away our personal rights/freedoms in the name of religious beliefs or morality. This can and does create an overlying "cloud cover" of stress which effectively blocks the "feel good" emotion of the warm sunshine of the day and the clear starry skies at night.

So, where does this leave us? My own personal solution is to ignore the external influences in favor of seeking the inner peaceful place [heart/soul] of being. This takes a strong intention/determination; but, believe me, it is worth the effort. Unless you can free yourself of the baggage of false teachings/indoctrination, whatever its source, this euphoria of joy and inner peace will not happen.

This series on "Obstacles to Self Improvement" is almost finished. Part 6 of 6 will be related to "pride".

I welcome your feedback. Your feedback/comments are extremely important to me. If you have found these articles to be of help in understanding how these obstacles impact your well being and inner peace; or if you would like additional articles on "Obstacles to Self Improvement" or some other related aspect, please feel free to post a comment.

Until next week, please do take care.

Obstacles to Self Improvement-Part 1 of 6

Good Morning and Welcome Back,

My approach to Self Improvement has been and continues to be to eliminate the obstacle [weakness] that stifles me at the moment. As soon as I recognize that I am struggling, I take action to change my thoughts.

One of the primary obstacles preventing us from achieving Wholeness is "apathy": those feelings of discouragement and despair; those feelings of being overwhelmed or powerless; of being stuck and unfocused.

"Okay," you say, "How can I get rid of these emotions?"

AHA! Now we focus on winning our new and challenging "game" of Self Improvement. When we accept this challenge, we immediately become focused and unstuck. We now have power. And, furthermore, the feelings of being "overwhelmed" along with discouragement and despair fade away as we see the progress we have made. And as your self confidence grows with winning, your power continues to become stronger as you stay focused on this challenging game. You are now on an upward spiral moving toward your goal.

Always, always keep your focus on winning this game,

Come back next week for some more obstacles that can hinder us from winning our game of Self Improvement.