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I have learned that the universe (or that from which the universe is created) offers us an enduring opportunity for a cosmic do-over. If we’re unhappy with the unfolding of our lives, we can change things up. We have the ability to invite in a greater wisdom, make different choices, and think in different and more intuitive ways, which is how we create a better experience of living.
We are designed to be malleable beings, to be open to the currents of evolutionary growth and transformation. We have the ability to learn from our bad choices and create different roads for ourselves. This ability is like the software we humans run on.
The ideal fulcrum for human change goes back to the initial programming we brought in with us on the day of our birth. The underlying intelligence that is the source of life, that turns acorns into oak trees, also imprinted our minds with an impeccable operating system. That underlying system is the most skillful scaffolding for life guidance and choice making. It’s amazing that so many of us don’t choose to use it.
The closest our tiny ego-minds can come to understand that imprinted operating system, within the limitations of language, is to say that we were born with a set of original instructions. Simply stated, those instructions are: we humans are all deeply related and all of life is sacred. We have within us access to a greater intelligence that can guide us the same way it guides acorns—if we choose to let it.
If we’re not happy with our life’s trajectory, we can open up to that internal intelligence and give it the space to retool our thinking and actions. This retooling, if done with humility and the sincere desire to align with our operating system—those original instructions we came in with—will point to new ways of being in the world. But it’s no small task to believe and act like we are all related, everything is sacred, and guidance is available, despite the fact that this is how we were designed.
This mental/emotional retooling opens up our lives to our fundamental potential for juicier experience. It creates the ground for intuitive inspiration to rise within our consciousness, leading us to unthought-of possibilities.
The way of retooling begins by taking responsibility for our internal experience. This may not be easy. Often, we identify ourselves with a label that lays the responsibility for our experience on to forces outside of us. “I am the victim of my upbringing, my job, the system, that criminal,” etc. And while sh*t certainly does happen, we have a marvelous aptitude to heal, transcend, and reclaim our personal power as long as we have breath. We just have to learn how to use it.
The plasticity of the human brain is a reflection of the plasticity of the human spirit. We are designed for self-healing and empowerment, as long as we can remember who we are under all the ego silliness that is so loud today. We are much closer to that greater intelligence than we are to our pain and struggle—though it often doesn’t seem that way. Hence the need to change the way we think, make choices, and move through the world, to retool.
When we turn within, settle our minds, and remove our focus from the external drama, we can begin to experience the original instructions. It’s a deeper awareness, patiently waiting within our inner stillness. This is one of the fruits of the meditative mind state, which is a state useful for the practice of retooling.
The mental/emotional content of our mind flows in neural-grooves that create an on-going experience of our choices. Are we generally angry or calm, frightened of life or enthusiastic about the day’s possibilities? Are we contracted and closed or more flexible and open?
How we experience our inner energy and outer interactions are like a shiny mirror, always reflecting back the nature of our interior landscape and the results of our choice making. Peace of mind, or its lack, is a great yardstick to measure how we are doing on the path, and what may need to change.
The greater intelligence that is life does a pretty good job with acorns and keeping our hearts beating. It effortlessly keeps the planets turning and the sun firing. So, why not invite it in to offer guidance in all areas of our life: our work and relationships, how we spend our time and money, how we take care of our health and wellness?
The universe offers us a current of cosmological support that fuels our existence and promotes our evolutionary arc. And to align with that intelligent current we only have to remember those original instructions, repeatedly calling them up throughout our days. What is the feeling of entering a mind state where we are all related, everything is sacred, and guidance is available? This is what we call up, that feeling, over and over. This prepares the ground for heightened awareness and the arising of intuition, that inner voice of wisdom. It is a powerful mantra to have handy.
Much of the unnecessary suffering in this world is the result of our individual and collective bad choices. Just have a good look around! We don’t have to accept the state of things as if this were the only road for us humans. We can be the change by opening up to that greater intelligence and inviting in more intuitive choice making!
Mindfulness, the meditative mind state, is where we access that still small voice within, the hushed observer of our thoughts, opinions, beliefs. It’s the quiet center that can inform our movement through life and the process of choice making. It’s within that still space where we align with the flow of that greater intelligence, allowing it to rise out of all the internal agitation, providing relief, ease, and intuitive insight.
How many choices do we make automatically or unconsciously, without any considered thought or the space for inspiration? There is a real power in conscious choice making, acting from that internal operating system.
Mindful awareness brings the question of why we do what we do into the front and center of our lives. The answers may surprise us, and we may find we often just stop choosing things that no longer serve, that are not in alignment with the original instructions. It’s a very natural process. This is how we are made to function.
There is nothing better than the deep experience of that greater intelligence in real-time. It’s the most natural and most glorious state of being and it’s a mystery why so many of us chose to turn away from its brilliance. Maybe now is a good time to mindfully invite that intelligence into the mix. We are all related, everything is sacred, and guidance is available.
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