Terrific three-some on the power of thought!

In the last week I have read three little things that are an incredible combination about the power of our thoughts in creating habit changes and changing our lives.  I love it when Heavenly Father sends experiences/readings like these that come together so sweetly to open my minds to truths and change my paradigm.  Things like these need to be shared :)!

-A short article on the "Power of Habit" (link for the actual book is at http://charlesduhigg.com/) (Thanks, Shara!)

-Another quickie about mission that I have included below

-An ebook that Leslie Housholder made available at the following website:
http://jackrabbitfactor.com/#  Short, sweet, 87 pages, and a "thought-provoker."  I love how she emphasizes gratitude and faith as integral parts of success. I love that she stresses that each of our paths to "success" (of any kind) are unique, as we trust that "inner voice" that we all have within.  I have seen the power of this already in my life, but could definitely improve.  Enjoy!

Here's a video that fit the book, although the book is so quick, I would just read that instead :).

"BONZAI!!!" Time to go and clarify my vision and really see what my future can be...through the grace of God.

Two Strange Clues that Reveal Your Mission

by Stephen Palmer

"Your mission in life," taught the Buddha, "is to find your mission in life and then to give your whole heart and soul to it." You were beamed to earth, "trailing clouds of glory," for a purpose.
You have something noble and profound to accomplish. None other can take your place.
"Let your light shine," commanded Jesus.
Your unfulfilled mission is a gaping black hole of squandered potential. Statues will be erected to honor your name when you fulfill your mission.
The challenge is that finding mission in the first place is usually tougher than actually living mission.
How many times have you asked God in desperation what to do, while telling Him you'll do whatever He asks if He just shows you the way?
I can't speak for you, but for me His answer is almost always, "You think I'd make it that easy for you?" spoken with a sly grin and a hearty chuckle.
Thanks to His calculated evasiveness, I've had to uncover my own clues revealing my mission.
I'm certain that the two greatest clues I've unearthed are universal.
You can know with conviction that you've been shown the path to mission by:

1. What upsets and angers you about society.
2. What you fear the most.

Fix What Angers You

Reading the backs of cereal boxes chaps my hide.
The bland and insipid clichés make me want to strangle each and every obtuse member of the bureaucratic corporate committee who had a hand in castrating the message.
You undoubtedly find it silly that I would even mention something so trivial.
But I'm a writer. I notice things like that. In fact, I can't not notice them. It's tattooed into my DNA. It's my mission to convey meaning, pierce minds, transform hearts.
You can't help but notice and be angered by certain things, too. Things that other people are clueless about. Things far more important than cereal box ads.
Go fix them; it's your mission to do so. Leap from the couch. Yank the TV cord from the wall. Flee from Facebook. Go. Fix. Them.
As Michael Strong wrote in Be the Solution: How Entrepreneurs and Conscious Capitalists Can Solve All the World's Problems:

"...we welcome dissatisfaction as the source of craving for the good. But we never accept whining or criticizing of others or critiques of society.
"If you don't like it, go fix it, go create a world, a community, a subculture in which your ideals can be instantiated, realized, in which you can show us what your vision of beauty and nobility looks like.
"Create a new social reality, so that I can see your dreams come true. I want to see a world in which billions of dreams are coming true constantly.
"Criticize by creating."

Trust & Follow Your Fear

In The War of Art: Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles, Steven Pressfield writes:

"Are you paralyzed by fear? That's a good sign. Fear is good. Like self-doubt, fear is an indicator.
"Fear tells us what we have to do...The more scared we are of a work or calling, the more sure we can be that we have to do it.
"Resistance is experienced as fear; the degree of fear equates to the strength of the Resistance. Therefore the more fear we feel about a specific enterprise, the more certain we can be that that enterprise is important to us and to the growth of our soul.
"That's why we feel so much Resistance. If it meant nothing to us, there'd be no Resistance."

Seth Godin concurs:

"...if you're afraid of something, of putting yourself out there, of creating a kind of connection or a promise, that's a clue that you're on the right track. Go, do that."

What are you desperately afraid of?
I'm not talking about primal fears like snakes and heights.
I'm talking about those intuitions screaming from your soul that you've slammed into a box, locked tightly, buried deeply.
I'm talking about every great idea you've ever had that you've talked yourself out of because the prospect of failure paralyzed you.
I'm talking about those venomous butterflies swarming in your gut every time you think of doing ____________.
Those fears are a laser pinpointing the exact source and nature of your mission. They are not the storm; they are the lighthouse.
Set your course to point straight at them. Man your rudder, adjust your sails. Square your shoulders. Grit your teeth. Strap on a diaper if necessary.
Bellow "Banzai!" and kamikaze through them.
You won't die. You'll come alive for the first time. The universe will shift. And you will know what you were born to do.
No more armchair criticizing. No more fearful paralysis. No more fumbling in the dark groping for mission.
Follow the clues of what angers you and what scares you. And through darkness and confusion will burst the brilliant light of mission."
 *****************************
I just read a follow-up article by the same man that I want to include here as a resource:

An Ancient Sanskrit Word that Can Change Your Life

 

by Stephen Palmer

 

 

Your path to mission is illuminated by what angers you and what you fear. But there's a deeper principle at the heart of those two clues.
Those two clues shine light on the path. But they are not the path.
The path is bliss.
It's ironic, I know. But think it through.
Underlying what angers and scares us is what brings us the most rapturous joy.
Anger is a manifestation of passion. Passion is the fuel of purpose. And living on purpose is sheer bliss.
Swat your butterflies and push through to the other side of fear, and waiting for you is ecstasy, euphoria, exultation.
Follow your anger and fear to discover your path. Then walk the path by following your bliss.
The scholar Joseph Campbell happened upon the power of bliss by studying an ancient Sanskrit word. In The Power of Myth he explains:

"Now, I came to this idea of bliss because in Sanskrit, which is the great spiritual language of the world, there are three terms that represent the brink, the jumping-off place to the ocean of transcendence: Sat-Chit-Ananda. The word 'Sat' means being. 'Chit' means consciousness. 'Ananda' means bliss or rapture.
"I thought, 'I don't know whether my consciousness is proper consciousness or not; I don't know whether what I know of my being is my proper being or not; but I do know where my rapture is. So let me hang on to rapture, and that will bring me both my consciousness and my being."

He continues:

"I even have a superstition that has grown on me as the result of invisible hands coming all the time -- namely, that if you do follow your bliss you put yourself on a kind of track that has been there all the while, waiting for you, and the life that you ought to be living is the one you are living. When you can see that, you begin to meet people who are in the field of your bliss, and they open the doors to you.
"I say, follow your bliss and don't be afraid, and doors will open where you didn't know they were going to be."

It seems so easy: To find success simply do the things that make you happy.
But why is it so hard, and why do so few people do it? Why are the vast majority of people bored and discontent in jobs they can't stand, leading "lives of quiet desperation," as Thoreau said?
Simple: We're afraid of our bliss.
As Marianne Williamson wrote,

"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us..."

You know the quote.
To appease our conscience -- guilty for not following our bliss and living on purpose -- we make up stories like: "Following your bliss is self-indulgent and irresponsible. Life isn't a bed of roses, and responsible adults just have to do things they don't like."
To the contrary, following our bliss is the most responsible thing we can do with our lives.
Ignoring and stifling it is not only irresponsible -- it is a direct affront to our Creator, who planted the seeds of our unique bliss in our heart.
There are problems only we can solve, wounds only we can heal.
Those problems remain unsolved, the wounds are gaping, the good team is losing while we're jabbering on the sidelines about being a "responsible adult."
We have a sacred duty to God and to humanity to follow our bliss.
Think of what our world would be if people like Thomas Edison, Martin Luther King, Jr., Marie Curie, Steve Jobs, Michael Jordan, Oprah Winfrey, and Albert Einstein stifled their bliss in the name of "responsibility," or caved to fear.
And let's be clear: Following our bliss is no bed of roses. As Joseph Campbell clarified:

"When I taught in a boys' prep school, I used to talk to the boys who were trying to make up their minds as to what their careers were going to be. A boy would come to me and ask, 'Do you think I can do this? Do you think I can do that? Do you think I can be a writer?'
"'Oh,' I would say, 'I don't know. Can you endure ten years of disappointment with nobody responding to you, or are you thinking that you are going to write a best seller the first crack? If you have the guts to stay with the thing you really want, no matter what happens, well, go ahead.'"

Following our bliss doesn't guarantee instant success. It doesn't mean a pain-free, challenge-less life.
It simply guarantees bliss through the process, which means we'll push through the obstacles as long as we stay on the path of bliss.

10 Power Questions to Discover & Follow Your Bliss

The following ten questions come from Brian Johnson in his book A Philosopher's Notes: On Optimal Living, Creating an Authentically Awesome Life, and Other Such Goodness.
Write your answers in detail:

1. How can you use your strengths in greatest service to yourself, your family, your community, and the world?
2. How can you get paid to do what you love?
3. What five things are you most proud of? What five things will you be most proud of?
4. If you had all the time and all the money in the world, what would you do?
5. What's your ideal day look like? When do you get up? What do you do? With whom? For whom? Imagine it in vivid detail!
6. Who are your heroes? Why? How are you like them?
7. What would you do if you weren't afraid?
8. If you were guaranteed to succeed, what's the #1 thing you would do?
9. What is it that you and only you can do for the world?
10. How can you live in more integrity with your ideals? What's the #1 thing you could start doing that would have the most positive impact in your life? What's the #1 thing you could stop doing that would have the most positive impact in your life?