The Power of Choice

The Power of Choice

The most fundamental superpower we have is our power to choose. And for so many of us, it is our least developed superpower. We kind of bumble through our lives, mostly in habit and routine, barely aware that we have any choice at all. We do the same, we feel the same, we think the same, and call it security, even if it’s not very nice.

Choosing from awareness is a dynamic thing. It’s powerful, deeply transformative, and a serious act of personal power. Wow.

Why do I choose? What makes me decide? How am I powerful?

By practicing choosing in awareness, I am placing value on myself. For many of us, this is in itself a rather daring act. For many of us, the habit of discounting our worth to bargain basement value is old, deeply ingrained, and we think of it as Truth.

As we practice being aware, of our surroundings, of where our bodies are, of how we feel in our physical selves, in our emotional selves, of our thoughts, we start to claim our lives as something worth living.

This practice helps us notice when we are caught up in habits that hurt us. It isn’t unusual for us to have a nice life, a decent place to live, enough money to manage on, friends and family who love us, and for us to feel bad. I lived there for a long time. I was so sad. I was so stuck in paucity. I lived deep in the Lack Tree Forest, focused on what I didn’t have, and choosing unconsciously to stay there.         

It was an insidious habit that ate holes in my life. Awareness helped me notice that I was choosing to look at everything as a burden. My shoulders ached all the time.

Little by little, I began to choose to appreciate what I have. Little by little, I felt grateful for the help I receive, for my job, for my home, for my friends and family. As I practiced choosing gratitude, I started to move out from the Lack Tree Forest into abundance.

Why can I choose? How am I strong? What makes me competent?

Exercising choice, consciously, over and over every day, a thousand tiny choices, means that when I have big choices to make, the path to choosing is wide and clear. I have come to know my mind. I can choose to change my feelings, I can choose to change my thoughts, my attitudes, my environment, even my relationships.

Exercising choice over and over gives me a sense of control, of my personal power. When I let my life be run by my unconscious habits, I feel helpless, out of control, and often powerless. That feels awful.

When I choose gratitude, I relax. I recognize the fullness and abundance of my life. I can make changes from a place of power rather than a place of desperation. By choice, aware, thoughtful, mindful choice. This is power.

How have I changed from letting old thoughts run my life to practicing my superpower of choice?

(c) Pam Guthrie 2014 all rights reserved 08132014

Changing the Go-To

Changing the Go-To

One of the many things I go on and on and on about is gratitude. It was one of the big things I learned about that really helped me start making significant changes in my life.

Gratitude didn’t come easily. I was so invested in suffering that, as I used to say, I had three feelings; bad, terrible, and I wish I were dead.

It’s hard to feel anything else when that’s what you’re working with.

Most people got the “I’m fine” line. My nearest and dearest got to hear about how wretched everything else was. I had a few misery buddies who would return the favor, such as it was, and a wonderful, sunny best friend who did her best to cajole me up to “okay.” That didn’t happen a lot. We spent our time watching a lot of Monty Python, and playing cards. I think it may have been defensive on her part. And I did figure out years after she passed that she loved me unconditionally.

Somewhere on my path, someone told me that we can only really feel one thing at a time. Now I don’t know if I think that’s true, but I did discover that if I am focusing on one feeling, that is the main thing I’ve got going on.

Why can I choose? How do I decide? What makes me aware?

Noticing what I was feeling, specifically, was something I had to pay attention to. I had to accept that “bad” wasn’t a feeling, and wasn’t even very descriptive. I had to figure out what the feeling was, usually some moosh between angry and scared and grief. Once I got some kind of a handle on it, I wanted to do something about it. I was already addressing my big emo-stuff, this was more about how to manage on a day to day basis.

One of my teachers liked to say, “You can change your feelings as easily as changing your socks.” And while it irritated the heck out of me, I wanted that. He suggested that I try gratitude. I don’t think I rolled my eyes out loud, but I was skeptical. He helped me get to a place of feeling grateful, really feeling it, and had me set an anchor. For this one, I pressed the web between my thumb and forefinger while I was feeling grateful.

This was way before I knew to ask, “How do I feel when I feel grateful?”

What happened when I got really grateful? I was so focused on gratitude that the bad feelings I was having, mostly old habit feelings, went away. And I started to recognize them for habit-feelings. You know about those, right? Our go-to feelings when we don’t really have anything in particular going on.

I had to give up some stuff to change that bad go-to feeling. I had to give up saying, “That’s just the way I am.” I had to take responsibility for my feelings, how I felt, how I reacted to stuff, how I responded to my circumstances. I had to notice what was good about my life. How it was perfect for me where I was in my journey. I had to decide that I prefered feeling good, with its attendant stuff to feeling bad with its attendant stuff.

Now I wake up feeling good, feeling grateful almost every day. When I wake up crabby, I own it, I look at it, I change it. Sometimes just that is enough to let it go.

How have I changed from feeling stuck in bad feelings to choosing to feel grateful?

(c) Pam Guthrie 2014 all rights reserved 08022014