Pathways To Change Module 3: IT’S ALL IN YOUR MIND

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In this module I introduce you to the concept of the whole self with the aim of reacquainting you with all of you. You will know when you’re operating life from a place of wholeness – you feel gently confident, a sense of peace and ease within, and a clarity that you are moving forward in the direction of your intention. The whole self is all aspects of whom you are – the mind, the physical body, the emotional body and the soul body. As a whole, these aspects make up all of you – they each define you to some degree and frame your experience in the world. Life is best lived when all aspects of the self are working in balance and rhythm. However, as a general rule, most of us find it easier to work or operate from a place of the manifested aspects of the self – namely the physical body and the mind, in particular - as these aspects are the most tangible, results can be easily seen and measured. In western culture, we mostly live in the physical and the mental/mind. This is our training via our parents, education and work environments. The spiritual and soulful aspects of the self are the invisible aspects of self and therefore can’t be readily seen. In our Western culture, the spiritual aspects are largely ignored in the day to day of life and so as a rule, we tend to push these parts to the side until we reach a stage in life where we feel as if something is missing, we need to make a large change and shift in life that we are often not equipped to cope with and so the journey back to the spirit begins.

Over recent decades we’ve seen a connection with the yoga modalities and other eastern philosophies and this is a great first step to opening up the path to your spirit self. Fantastic if if these modalities are your chosen form of self connection. However, there are super simple ways for you to connect in with you without having to jump on board these movements if they aren’t for you. The key is to prioritise time for you. In connecting with the spirit self, the ultimate aim is to reacquaint you with the gifts of intuition and trusting. Some find this type of connection tricky as it is not readily seen – but instead felt. And so some retraining needs to take place to get you fully connected in with the invisible parts of you. Why is this so important? Your spirit self can be described as an inner guidance system – the system that most ensures that you are living in alignment with your purpose in life. This guidance system is the most evolved system we have available to us when it comes to navigating decision making and change management. It is the home of the true self. During this module we look at ways that you can reconnect with the spirit aspect of yourself and your inner guidance system with the aim of rebalancing the scales of self. This is your opportunity to assess all aspects of you; and to make any modifications to your routines to ensure that you are coming to a place of change in balance.

What is alignment?

These dictionary words only go a small way to describing the feeling of being in alignment but they are a start. Harmony | Accord | Balance | Symmetry | Well Rounded | Consistent | Even

Alignment is a feeling more than a word description however when you are working in alignment you can see the results of this alignment in all aspects of your life – relationships, daily work routine, health and wellness, a general feeling of joy and wholeness. Alignment requires a connection to the mind, the body, your emotional state, and your spirit or core self for you to get a good read on whether or not you are feeling aligned. To connect in this way you need to bring consciousness and awareness; becoming alert to the reactions in the mind and the body. The aim is for you to operate with a gentle awareness every minute of every day and to calm and slow down you reactionary self so you can respond to life and inevitable stressors with a sense of graceful control.

When making change, conscious awareness is key. Understanding the why you have arrived where you are today, becoming aware of your intention in making change, being aware of the physical impact certain thought and emotional patterns are having on your wellbeing is paramount to successful manoeuvring from one way of living to another. Let’s take a look at where you are out of alignment. Then we can work on putting you back into alignment.

What is alignment?

These dictionary words only go a small way to describing the feeling of being in alignment but they are a start. Harmony | Accord | Balance | Symmetry | Well Rounded | Consistent | Even

Alignment is a feeling more than a word description however when you are working in alignment you can see the results of this alignment in all aspects of your life – relationships, daily work routine, health and wellness, a general feeling of joy and wholeness. Alignment requires a connection to the mind, the body, your emotional state, and your spirit or core self for you to get a good read on whether or not you are feeling aligned. To connect in this way you need to bring consciousness and awareness; becoming alert to the reactions in the mind and the body. The aim is for you to operate with a gentle awareness every minute of every day and to calm and slow down you reactionary self so you can respond to life and inevitable stressors with a sense of graceful control.

When making change, conscious awareness is key. Understanding the why you have arrived where you are today, becoming aware of your intention in making change, being aware of the physical impact certain thought and emotional patterns are having on your wellbeing is paramount to successful manoeuvring from one way of living to another. Let’s take a look at where you are out of alignment. Then we can work on putting you back into alignment.

Exercise

On The Path To Emotional Balance Begin with this checklist to identify what parts of your self need a re-alignment.

List the major aspects that make up your life, for example, family, work, health, relaxation, sleep, study and friendship. Put each aspect into a pie chart dividing up the pie based on the percentage of time you spend on each area. Now, Divide the page into two with a line running down the middle. List all the aspects of your life where you are feeling confident and in control. Break down the list into particular situations. Are there any/many experiences in your life that make you feel confident? Where you shine, where you feel a sense of achievement? How do you act/respond in these situations? As you run through these experiences can you note the emotion and then note how this emotion feels in your body. Can you feel the joy running through your body as energy? Can you feel the excitement? Is there a particular place in your body where you feel the most at peace? Please take a note of it. On the other side of the line list all of the aspects of your life where you feel less confident and out of control. Again break down this list into particular experiences. Are there recurring triggers? Particular people and situations that lead you to feeling off balance? Can you describe the person or people? What are the attributes of their nature that lead you to feeling this way? How do you respond in these situations? As above as you run through each experience take a note of how the emotion feels in your body. Can you pinpoint where you feel the emotion in the physical body? All thought creates a corresponding feeling – in the emotional and the physical body. The aim of these exercises is to help you build a profile around you, your life, the people who share your life and the experiences that are either bringing you balance or throwing you off. It’s a great way to frame what’s coming next, the understanding of energy and how it affects your emotions, your mental/mind and physical states.

Workbook>/h2>

In this module I introduce you to the concept of the whole self with the aim of reacquainting you with all of you. You will know when you’re operating life from a place of wholeness – you feel gently confident, a sense of peace and ease within, and a clarity that you are moving forward in the direction of your intention. The whole self is all aspects of whom you are – the mind, the physical body, the emotional body and the soul body. As a whole, these aspects make up all of you – they each define you to some degree and frame your experience in the world. Life is best lived when all aspects of the self are working in balance and rhythm. However, as a general rule, most of us find it easier to work or operate from a place of the manifested aspects of the self – namely the physical body and the mind, in particular - as these aspects are the most tangible, results can be easily seen and measured. In western culture, we mostly live in the physical and the mental/mind. This is our training via our parents, education and work environments. The spiritual and soulful aspects of the self are the invisible aspects of self and therefore can’t be readily seen. In our Western culture, the spiritual aspects are largely ignored in the day to day of life and so as a rule, we tend to push these parts to the side until we reach a stage in life where we feel as if something is missing, we need to make a large change and shift in life that we are often not equipped to cope with and so the journey back to the spirit begins.

Over recent decades we’ve seen a connection with the yoga modalities and other eastern philosophies and this is a great first step to opening up the path to your spirit self. Fantastic if if these modalities are your chosen form of self connection. However, there are super simple ways for you to connect in with you without having to jump on board these movements if they aren’t for you. The key is to prioritise time for you. In connecting with the spirit self, the ultimate aim is to reacquaint you with the gifts of intuition and trusting. Some find this type of connection tricky as it is not readily seen – but instead felt. And so some retraining needs to take place to get you fully connected in with the invisible parts of you. Why is this so important? Your spirit self can be described as an inner guidance system – the system that most ensures that you are living in alignment with your purpose in life. This guidance system is the most evolved system we have available to us when it comes to navigating decision making and change management. It is the home of the true self. During this module we look at ways that you can reconnect with the spirit aspect of yourself and your inner guidance system with the aim of rebalancing the scales of self. This is your opportunity to assess all aspects of you; and to make any modifications to your routines to ensure that you are coming to a place of change in balance.

What is alignment?

These dictionary words only go a small way to describing the feeling of being in alignment but they are a start. Harmony | Accord | Balance | Symmetry | Well Rounded | Consistent | Even

Alignment is a feeling more than a word description however when you are working in alignment you can see the results of this alignment in all aspects of your life – relationships, daily work routine, health and wellness, a general feeling of joy and wholeness. Alignment requires a connection to the mind, the body, your emotional state, and your spirit or core self for you to get a good read on whether or not you are feeling aligned. To connect in this way you need to bring consciousness and awareness; becoming alert to the reactions in the mind and the body. The aim is for you to operate with a gentle awareness every minute of every day and to calm and slow down you reactionary self so you can respond to life and inevitable stressors with a sense of graceful control.

When making change, conscious awareness is key. Understanding the why you have arrived where you are today, becoming aware of your intention in making change, being aware of the physical impact certain thought and emotional patterns are having on your wellbeing is paramount to successful manoeuvring from one way of living to another. Let’s take a look at where you are out of alignment. Then we can work on putting you back into alignment.

Workbook

Energy is Everything

When it comes to alignment, understanding your energy body and how it affects the balance of your mind, body and soul is crucial to wellbeing and success. You may have heard of the chakra system – an ancient energy system used in yoga, meditation and Ayurveda. Understanding how this system can benefit you when you are moving through growth or change can create a vital support system for your health and wellbeing. Chakra is a Sanskrit word that translates to wheel or disk. These wheels or disks of energy correspond to the nerve centres in the body – when they are swirling freely and without blockage they are responsible for positive states of being. When they become blocked they induce negative states of being within the physical, psychological/emotional and spiritual states of being. There are seven main chakras that run from the base of the spine to the crown of the head (and higher if you are using a more advanced chakra system). They are the muladhara or root, svadhishthana or sacral, manipura or solar plexus, anahata or heart, vishuddha or throat, ajna or third eye and sahasrara or crown chakras. These energy centres are invisible – meaning they are not seen with the naked eye – but if you are feeling off balance with a sense of blockage throughout the body then it’s a good idea to connect into the chakras to feel where the blockage may lie. Each chakra corresponds with an emotional centre so if you are feeling pain or discomfort in the area of a particular chakra then it’s a good idea to address the emotion behind the discomfort. Root – Survival, Security, Grounding, Family, Community Sacral – Sexuality, Creativity, Emotional Stability Solar Plexus – Power, Purpose, Wisdom Heart – Love, Healing, Compassion Throat – Communication, Self Expression, Authenticity Third Eye – Awareness, Intuition, Imagination, Clear Perception Crown – Spirituality, Enlightenment, Interconnection Gaining an understanding of the chakra system and then utilising the knowledge you gain via your energy centres is an effective way to monitor what aspects of self, need refining.

‘If you can see it, if you can touch it, if you can taste it, if you can smell it, if you can think about it, if you can imagine it, if you can conceptualize it, if you can experience it as any form or phenomenon, it’s a transient dream occurring in you. You are the dreamer, not the dream. You are the seer, not the scenery.’ Deepak Chopra.

Exercise

Write a list of scenarios from your life that you feel are your blocks to change or instead, a carrier or conduit to change. Then, write how these scenarios make you feel from an emotional perspective – happy, sad, perplexed, confused, angry, jealous etc. As these scenarios rise in your mind, reflect on any shifts or changes you feel in your body. The chakra system is a very subtle system. Once you tune into the body you will begin to feel the subtle shifts that occur when certain situations take place in your life. Where do you feel these shifts? Can you attribute them to certain chakra centres? Write down what you notice. For example, when I think about my work colleagues I feel a tightening around my abdomen. It feels uncomfortable. And blocked. Given this is your power centre; does this feeling represent some kind of loss of power, powerlessness? Alternatively, when you bring to mind other connections do you feel a tingling, a lightness around your third eye? Does this feeling represent a sense of openness, a connectedness, a sense of expansion. The aim of this exercise is to note the correlation between thought, feeling and the energy centres in the body. Once you begin to become aware of the mind, body, spirit connection you are better able to take action to either clear or enhance the action.

Workbook

We Are All Connected

In ancient energy systems such as shamanic energy medicine, Reiki for example – there is an understanding that humans are all energetically connected to each other and the natural world around us. We are all one. Manifested energy living a human experience. Your personal energy body, that is the energy swirling within and around your physical body, is only one aspect of your energy. Your energy body isn’t just confined to actual physical body. Instead it emanates out from your body for about an arms length. You may have seen images illustrating the aura? Your aura is the energy body that vibrates around the body. It’s important to be aware of your aura as it has an impact not only on you but also, on the people around you. Of course, this theory is the same for every body and so every person you come into contact with has an aura or energy body surrounding their physical body. Why is so important to understand your aura and your energy body? When it comes to wellness, your energy is everything. Clear, strong and uncompromised energy is the cornerstone to good health. When you are aware of your energy body you can better regulate your life to ensure that what you are drawing into you is in alignment with your core desires. Have you ever noticed how when you are in the company of a positive, healthy and elevated person you feel uplifted? Whereas when you are in the company of a negative, unhealthy and toxic person you come away from the experience feeling ill, off balance, heavy and unclear. Imagine you are surrounded by groups of negative and toxic people. The potential for feeling ill much of the time grows. The energy emanating from these people infects not just them but the energy around them. If you are operating within close proximity then this can potentially impact how you feel. It’s important to get a good read on all of the environments, people, situations you are operating in daily. Are there experiences in your life that are making you ill?

Exercise

Exercise: Identify people, situations, places that throw your energy body off balance. How do you feel? Are there areas in the body that are directly affected by these experiences? Can you identify how any toxic scenarios are impacting your ability to move, shift, and flow in your own life.