2013: The Year of Thinking Big

Each new year is the time of reflection for many, so perhaps you can take some time, sit quietly and ask yourself, what kind of life do you want to experience? Aim high! Can you picture what you aspire in your mind and actually feel all the joy and excitement as if your dreams already have come true?

Do you want to have a job which can channel your energy in a creative way and let you experience the joy of fulfilling yourself and having the lifestyle you aspire? What is it? Can you picture yourself being at work always with a big smile? Can you see yourself commuting to work whistling as you look forward to another day expressing your creativity and hanging out with people who you admire, respect and even love?

Describe this environment a little more. How integrated are you with your colleagues and friends? Do you see the creative ideas pouring out of you, the love that you share with others, the meaning you have from doing your job?  The more detail you can picture of this job, the more you can connect with this image and feel the joy of doing this job, the better.

How do you picture your life at home? What relationship do you want to experience? Do you want to have a family or do you want to lead a single life? Do you want to enjoy the love of having an extended spiritual family at home with all your soul siblings; share and support each other fulfill each other’s dreams? Or do you prefer keeping your independence at home but expressing your love and care for others in your life mission instead? There is no right or wrong, just ask yourself, what do you really want to experience?

What kind of body do you want to have? A fit, healthy and energetic body? What kind of sex life do you aspire to have? How physical do you want to be at work and in your creative outlets? What appearance would you like to have and what persona do you want to project?

Take your time and ask yourself these questions. When all the images show up in your mind, light up a candle, light up the light in your heart, close your eyes and picture all theses experiences you want to experience, with smile on your face. With the inner light in you, with the inner guide in you, you are able to experience your dream life.

Kerry Spackman presents an excellent way of sketching the life of your dreams in The Winner's Bible. He suggests to collect photos, achievements, goals, dreams and put them together in a folder and update them as the month unfold. Put only things into your folder that are really meaningful to you. If the neurons in your brain light up and your heart-beat quickens, or you just feel incredible joy, love and peace associated with a particular page, you probably are onto something. Think big along the lines we have suggested, but please also be flexible to change priorities over time. Traveling a spiritual path is a process. You have to separate ego fantasies from spiritual facts, have to understand trade-offs and you just have to simply discover who you truly are. The Tao will show you who you truly are and will create the environment that is truly meaningful for you.

Please do not start with preconceived notions of what God thinks is right for you or not. You go after your dreams and everything that is truly meaningful to you will be given to you. It will certainly not be a straight line, it will certainly take a little bit to connect all the dots, but soon enough the contours of your dream will become visible to you and at that point you will go after your dreams with everything you got. With the Tao as your guide, you are safe and well guided. May your dreams come true!

By Christian and Su Zhen

Why to Eat Cake when you are Dieting?

Will-power is a strange concept. Why do some people succeed in keeping their New Year's Resolutions while others fail until they stop bothering altogether. Succeeding in getting what you want is simple if you are close enough to your goal, but seemingly impossible if you still have some psychological baggage to throw over-board. I remember once a woman saying when she heard the expression sexual addiction for the first time, "Why doesn't he just keep his zipper locked up?" Well, that is as helpful as saying, "Why do you eat cake when you are on a diet?" Fighting an addiction or dealing with a pernicious habit is a psychological journey in which many things in the person's life will have to be adjusted. Let me give you a real life example.

A woman working in the financial industry had been overweight to start with, but unfortunately, was steadily gaining weight as the years went by. It never bothered her since her husband apparently didn't mind and she had the money to hide her weight behind tailor-made designer clothes. But then one day her sister went on a crash diet, coupled with an extreme work-out plan and everyone was stunned at her transformation. Given that our financial  analyst had always been the "successful one" within her family, she wanted to do the same. She had already succeeded in shedding 50 pounds when she suddenly realized that in all meetings and professional encounters she had her arms and legs crossed. No matter how much she tried, her arms and legs always moved on auto-pilot when she met somebody. Her husband happened to be a psychologist and explained to her that before the diet her weight had psychologically protected her against criticism. Without it, her vulnerability makes her feel naked, especially in front of her aggressive male colleagues. After that insight  she changed gears and focused on her self-confidence instead. After years of training and reprogramming her arms and legs started opening up, and as her defensive demeanor disappeared so did her pounds.

Addictive behaviours and pernicious habits have a psychological message for us that something needs to be adjusted. If you try to overcome them with will-power you are likely to run into a wall sooner or later. But as you tackle the underlying psychological problems it gets much easier. Eventually you reach a stage when you give the wall a little push and it crumbles. A spiritual path is exactly like that only you are a little further along in your personal development. Every obstacle you face, every step you miss has a message for you. You just no longer get upset when things don't work out for you, just because you have seen over and over that a little personal re-positioning immediately propels you to a much higher spiritual plane. Enjoy your travels and enjoy the cake!

New Year's Resolutions

Do you have New Year's Resolutions? I love making them and don't mind if I can't live up to all my expectations. Succeeding with your new goals is great and failure gives me something to think about how I might do things differently next time around.

Having a goal is a good first step, but completely repositioning yourself is better. This concept implies a change of your perspective. Let me give you an example. I grew up as an introvert and had to pay the price for it at work as part of my job description is to connect with people and share investment ideas. So one fine day I decided to change this and used affirmations, reminding myself daily that I am connected with everybody. This strategy was mildly successful, but in the end my nature sabotaged my conscious efforts as deep down inside I still preferred sitting in my office over mingling with people. The true breakthrough came when one day I realized that every person out there has a message for me, work-related as well as spiritual. Since my spiritual journey is my true passion, this was the day when my connectivity started to take off.

So going back to your New Year's Resolution, make sure you align your goal with a new perspective about yourself or your mission in life. Happy New Year.