progress | With an Open Heart

Nov 18

Letting Go: This is How You End Suffering

This post is part of The Awakened Heart Project

Week 41: Letting Go: This is How You End Suffering

“Some people believe holding on and hanging in there are signs of great strength. However, there are times when it takes much more strength to know when to let go and then do it.” –

Ann Landers

Let Go, Be Free

This is not the first time the idea of “letting go” has been discussed throughout this project. And frankly, it probably wont be the last. Letting go, is something that is so important to inner peace. Holding onto emotions, thoughts, believes, perceptions, memories play a role in our lives. Sometimes we hold onto a memory for pleasure, because it brought us joy. Or we hold only a belief because letting it go bring us fear. We can’t image it any other way. However, there is a lot of suffering that remains when we continue to hold onto negative events, beliefs, and/or perceptions of people or events, etc. When we do this, we create another reality. Read more

Nov 12

Rome Wasn’t Built in a Day and Neither Were You!

This post is part of The Awakened Heart Project

Week 40: Rome Wasn’t Built in a Day and Neither Were You!

“Nothing in the world is worth having or worth doing unless it means effort, pain, difficulty… I have never in my life envied a human being who led an easy life. I have envied a great many people who led difficult lives and led them well.”

― Theodore Roosevelt

Progress and Growth

Nothing in life worth having comes easily. Can you hear the voice of your father repeating those words to you as a child? Just as you were trying to throw in the towel and quit whatever it was that you felt was too difficult. No matter where we heard those words, or who said them to us, we’ve all heard, in one way or another, that the best things in life require work. The most rewarding things in life require work.

Personal growth is just the same. It takes time, and it takes works, but the pay off is worth every last second. Don’t forget to give yourself credit for every single accomplishment you make. Give yourself credit for stopping your negative self-talk. Give yourself credit for those five minutes of meditation. However big or small, don’t believe your accomplishments are small. They’re not! They all lead to something much larger, and each and every component towards a more awakened self is a piece of the puzzle. You wouldn’t be where you are if you didn’t make those choice to consciously change.

In Order to See the Path to What You Want, You Must First See What is Hold You Back.

This post is part of The Awakened Heart Project

Week 9: In Order to See the Path to What You Want, You Must First See What is Hold You Back.

“You will find that it is necessary to let things go; simply for the reason that they are heavy. So let them go, let go of them. I tie no weights to my ankles.” -C. JoyBell C.

You Gotta Move Forward, But First…

See what’s’ holding me back? What do you mean? I know EXACTLY what I want, and what path to take, but everyone else is getting in the way. I’m not the problem, everything and everyone else is!

Really? I’m sorry to break it to you, but I highly doubt that everyone else is the problem, and you have nothing to do with YOUR OWN PROBLEM. Yes, sometimes there’s some red tape in your way. And yes, sometimes, people in positions higher than you can deter your progress up the latter of growth (for instance in work situations). However, if you REALLY want to grow, and REALLY want to move forward, why are you still letting these people or things get in your way? Take a minute and really think about it. You can’t control how other people or things pan out, only how you do. If you want things to be different you have to change. Sometimes, that means quitting your job to pursue your passions. Sometimes that means taking the road less traveled. But you always have the choice to say, “No, I will not take this anymore, I want better for myself, and I know I deserve better, so SEE YOU LATER friend!”

When you get into the pattern of saying (and believing) that you are not the problem and your external circumstances are, you get into the pattern of allowing everything and everyone else to control you. When you believe that you have options, and you control your own destiny, that is when you break free from the perceived barriers that are holding you back.

We all have things within ourselves that are holding us back, -some of them small, some of them large. But the real problem is not that these things exist, it’s that most people aren’t self-aware enough to even know they exist. Read more