Taking Control Of Your Life

You may at times struggle with life. Perhaps things feel out of sorts, or out of control. I developed a 7-step process to help get back on track during such times and take control of your life. I will share it with you:

Take Control of Your Life in Seven Steps

1. Define what bothers you right now. What is wrong? What needs fixing?
2. Define what you MOST WANT in that area of your life.
3. Understand your role in both what bothers you and in what you want.
4. Give your problems to GOD. The act of releasing control is vital in the process to manifest dreams.
5. Determine to make a DRAMATIC SHIFT towards ONLY what you want.
6. Pray and meditate on what you WANT. Create a DREAM COLLAGE and visualize it REAL.
7. Focus on the top three ways to create inertia towards what you want.

Better understanding of the Seven Steps to Take Control of Your Life:

Would you like more clarification? I will define each further for you so you may take control of your life right now.

1. Define what bothers you now.

What is really upsetting you? What keeps you up at night? If there is something you feel worry, anxiety, or fear about, what is it?

Answer: ________________________________________________

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Analysis:

What area(s) of your life are bothering you? Perhaps a relationship is frustrating you. Career choices could be confusing. Health issues might hinder your happiness. A job is challenging you. Dreams are taking longer to manifest? Learning something new is frustrating… Or perhaps you feel something is MISSING? So, it could be something you HAVE NOW that is upsetting you and making you feel like life is out of control, OR it could be something you DO NOT HAVE NOW that makes you feel like life is out of control.

If you can look at the things that are bothering you, you can get a grip on why your life feels out of control. What is your initial response to this question?  How many of the things you wrote down to question number one could you fix, right now? If you cannot fix it now, how can we look at it or frame it to make living with it better?  

2. Define what you MOST WANT in that area of your life.

What is it you desire most (in similar areas like you answered in Question 1)?

Answer: ________________________________________________

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Analysis:

What area(s) of your life do you dream about making BETTER? Again, as in Question 1, the dream is either about IMPROVING something we have now, or FILLING A VOID.

If you understand what you want to make better, you may not realize but asking for what you want, clearly, is VITAL to your success. How closely can you define your dream?

If you want a new house, can you draw the floor plan? Can you take a picture of the VIEW? Or, better yet, can you take a picture of YOU, STANDING in THAT VIEW, in that HOME? If so, you increase the likelihood of manifesting that dream house. I have a couple of exercises for this, but first, simple define what you most want in this area of life.

What I want most: ________________________________________

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3. Understand your role in both what bothers you and in what you want.

In both what bothers you and in what you want, YOU are playing a role in the success or failure of that dream life you wish to create. Therefore, to understand why you are getting what you want, or why you are not, you must look at TIME ACTIVITY. How are you actually spending time? Are you asking questions in the right order? Do you feel alignment in how you wish to succeed? Is there space in your life for what you most want? You must have SPACE to manifest what you most want.

Regarding the dream, I must ask you if there is anything BLOCKING you from manifesting what you most want? How are you spending your TIME? If you MUST keep a job to support a family, then the question for what you are doing outside of that job might hold the answer for manifesting the dream. Are you spending time watching television? Are you talking with friends who actually put down your dream? Are you engaging in activities that support the goal or make it a problem? For example, if you want to have optimum health, are you spending time outside working hours working out, exercising, eating healthy, or are you eating unhealthy food, drinking alcohol and carbonated drinks, and sitting around? You cannot complain about the things you do that do not support your dream. Rather, I suggest you align yourself in activities that support your dreams and goals. If you want to lose weight, join gym and go there either right before you work or immediately after you get off work. Do whatever fits best in your schedule. If you need to eat more healthy, buy a book with recipes to help you eat more healthy, learn one new recipe a day, and start to eat in that manner. Another thing you can try is to take up a hobby that supports that healthier you: such as salsa dancing. I found that when I salsa dance, I drink less alcohol, drink more water, and lost weight from all the movement. As a bonus, dancing salsa is fun! So, identify what blocks you, then find the ways to open up that time in your schedule.

4. Give your problems to God.

Zen wisdom would hold that if you want to love something, let it go. It is the story that if it comes back, that the love is natural and reciprocated. In the same token, give your problem and dreams up to God. If there is an infinite power in the Universe, why not TAP INTO THAT POWER to help us with our struggles?

I give these struggles to God: ________________________________

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I ask God to help me manifest these dreams: ___________________

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You might wonder, “Why is it healthy to release control of the things in our life that bother us most or that we want most?” The answer is because we do not actually control the total aspect of everything that can occur in our life. By releasing the expected outcome, we actually allow for something GREATER to occur in our life. In addition, it gives peace of mind to release the need to control. Just as the person with OCD over a clean house may see dust where no dust exists, we can use so much control to force ourselves into frustration. So, give up control or the demand for perfection and allow God’s plan to work for you.

5. Make a dramatic shift to FOCUS ONLY on WHAT YOU WANT.

Since you released your struggles to God, and you identified ways to fix what you can fix, then take those actions. Now after looking at SPACE and TIME for what you want, you have an opportunity: you get to think, speak, and act in ways that BRING what you WANT MOST into your life!

That is the exciting part of this process – determine to shift your thoughts, speech, and actions ONLY to what you want to manifest the most. That means ridding all negative self-doubt, negative talk, and actions that sabotage and replacing those with positive belief, faith-based talk, and steps towards success. Just writing the latter part of that sentence FELT better than writing the former. So, consider the EMOTION you wish to charge with manifesting your dreams. FEEL that way NOW.

The actual journey is the fun. The outcome is a result of right thought, speech, and action during the journey that allowed us to manifest or attract to us the things we want most. So start each day with the thoughts that support your dream, with the speech that makes it possible, and the actions that bring it to you. This shift is the biggest change in bringing your state from one of failure, lack, and sadness to one of success, abundance, and happiness. Are not these three things: success, abundance, and happiness three things that will bring us more LOVE and FULFILLMENT? Then focus on what you want and make it so!

6. Pray and meditate on what you WANT. Create a DREAM COLLAGE and visualize it REAL.

Specific activities tend to support the thought, action, and speech. These are the way we use our mind when it is silent, and how we focus intention when we communicate with our higher power. So, each day, when you meditate, meditate on allowing space for your dream to manifest. Meditate on what it looks like… how it feels… how you feel when it happens. When you pray, pray only to align your goals with God’s goals for your life. Put yourself in the dream. If you want to manifest a dream house, can you DRAW the FLOOR PLAN? Do you have a PHOTO of the VIEW? Alternatively, can you take a picture with YOU standing IN THE DREAM HOUSE? Put yourself in the dream to take control of your life. For my birthday, I went to my dream house. What was especially fun about taking pictures in the dream house is the seller staged this house with a dream car, too! My dream car was in the dream house! Therefore, I took a photo in the car, and in the house, to put myself in the dream. Whatever you can do to create a picture of the dream, with you in it, I suggest you do. If you create a dream collage, you can put your PHOTO over the pictures of what you want. This is easiest to do with a computer. You can edit images to put YOUR face in the face of the people you wish to emulate in your dreams. If it is a dream job… what are you doing? Show pictures of YOU doing that. If it is a dream body, put YOUR picture on the dream body. If it a dream car, put YOUR picture in the dream car – or go get a photo taken sitting in your dream car! Dreaming is fun, so have fun with it.

7. Focus on the top three ways to create inertia towards what you want.

It is great to put ourselves in the dream; however, we might need to take actions to make these dreams come true. I am a fan of praying as if God will answer all prayer and then acting as if God might not… in other words; I ask, “What effort must be done to make the dream become reality?” I urge you to take those actions.

Name three steps or actions you can take this week to bring forth your desired results:

1. ____________________________________________________

2. ____________________________________________________

3. ____________________________________________________

Now, DO IT! Be a MASTER in your life. When you focus on how YOU can change, and make the shift to change yourself, back it with your higher power, and then TAKE ACTION, you are a POWERFUL person in control of your life!

I recently felt blocked. As I started putting forth what I describe above, and especially as I made effort towards these three actions, I realized that the blocked feeling went away. I know you will experience success in a similar way. Follow the seven steps I outlined above, and any time life feels out of control will immediately re-center much the same way a skipper rights a ship by focusing back in the direction he needs to go. Point your ship in the right direction, lose the weight that sinks your effort to sail, release the ropes that bind you, and allow space for wind to fill the sheets and push you forward toward the port of your next destination. Last, note the dreams you MANIFEST – CELEBRATE successes along the way! Be a master of the seven steps and take control of your life.

 

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Worship and Gratitude: The Alpha and Omega of Happiness

If you examine how the most successful people in the world become successful and how those the most happy people find their happiness, you may notice these people are those who maintain a rich and deep connection to their creator and express gratitude each and every day.

Now, I know some of you who read AspireNow are probably Atheist. And, you know, what? That's okay with me. You may say you don't believe and that is your choice. And, as you know, I rarely get on a soapbox and preach. Today is no exception. But I will ask you: "Do you want to be happy?" Because if you want happiness, everything I've studied leads me to these two qualities: worship and gratitude.

I am not on a soapbox. I will simply state what I, myself, believe to be true. I believe that Worship and Gratitude are the Alpha and Omega of HAPPINESS.

My parents have a plaque on their wall that always struck me as especially wise. It reads:

"A family that prays together, stays together."

The state of prayer is one of communication with our God. To me, our God is one. The "Christ-consciousness" is only shone to us through the angel those with near death experiences report - the white light. But works of nature and the Universe abound all around us. I love both the simple and elegantly complex nature of life. I am in awe of things like: a sunrise... the birth of a baby... a sunset... the stars... our sun... and the power of prayer.

In my book I am publishing about "Using Solomon's Wisdom to Build a Kingdom," I maintain 10 basic tenets that Solomon created and followed to build a kingdom. He started by asking God for WISDOM. He aligned himself with his maker and started from that place. He maintained worship as a vital part of his rulership and was considered the wisest man who ever lived. Could this be connected? I believe it is. Solomon's kingdom and influence ended up the largest his people ever experienced.

A path to abundance is one that begins in service, and one that begins by submitting our will to God's will. Because God has greater plans for us than we can imagine! My own path and my will focused my efforts on being a salesperson for a large corporation, then a manager for corporations. This influenced a few dozen people directly, and perhaps more indirectly. God's will has me writing books and speaking in ways that influence the lives of MILLIONS. Can you see what I mean? It isn't all about money, but when you influence millions you usually have more value in the world than if you influence dozens, would you not agree?

Worship of GOD begins by submitting to God. Worship and Wisdom, therefore, are uniquely linked as the paradoxical moment when we begin to manifest a larger vision for life.

In addition, you will notice people who are amazingly successful are very GRATEFUL. They express their gratitude to people they love, and those they just meet.

I am so GRATEFUL for YOU, right now!

See, because it is one thing to become "empowered" with the wisdom and vision that we may manifest God inside us. It is another thing to realize that FEAR and RESENTMENT block LOVE and hold us back, and even more to realize that FORGIVENESS and LOVE propel and lift our plane of life energy into the clouds. But it is another thing altogether to recognize that GRATITUDE is the key to BLAST OFF into the stratosphere of realizing our dreams! And this, my friend, is true.

Are you ready to blast off? Start showing gratitude everywhere you go! Laugh, smile, and let people know you love them and are grateful for their presence in your life.

Just as worship is the alpha; or, the beginning, gratitude is the omega; where it ends: the missing link to discover happiness.

Think about it.... if you can live a life filled with wisdom, filled with love, where fear has no place, and let go of all resentment through forgiveness and acceptance, and then are grateful for the blessings that come your way... is that not a life of abundance?

This is what AspireNow is all about. I encourage you to live that life of abundance. I can show you what I learn on my own journey. It is up to you if you wish to pick up the seeds of life sprinkled throughout these pages and say, "Yes, I want to plant these seeds in my garden." If you do, hopefully my articles will help, along with wisdom you receive from other friends, and other people and events will come your way to guide you and help water that garden, so these seeds turn into strong and powerful plants, trees, and eventually new life that you share with those around you.

I encourage it, I pray for it, I am grateful for the opportunity to help make it so for you.

May you integrate worship and gratitude as a regular part of your life activity and see if the beginning and end of happiness are not present for each and every day.

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