Warning. Reading this may change your life. Forever
I’m curious. I’m entirely not sure where my curiosity began, but I think I was 21. I suppose you could call it the beginnings of waking up, but I generally find that term a little patronising, don’t you? I’m
also fascinated by people who seem to know more than me, on life I mean. As a result, we applied to be part of a purpose-driven start-up accelerator programme at Learn Shed, so that we could learn from people who knew more than us. During one particular session we discussed who our ideal audience is. Who will love what we do? Perhaps it’s naivety, but I’ve always felt that if we built a platform that interested us, then perhaps it might interest other people, too. We decided that the 3 types of people we attract are the curious, the disillusioned and those who have experienced some kind of life trauma. Are you curious? Or have you become disillusioned with life, asking yourself ‘what’s it all about’ way too often? Or perhaps you’ve experienced a major catalytic event. These are times of huge stress, yet often huge personal growth. Which one resonates with you? Of course there are many reasons why people begin looking at life a little differently, questioning their thoughts, their purpose and even life itself. For me, it has always been a curiosity and a fascination into more than just the every day, more than just the treadmill of life. Some call it living a more conscious life. Do you feel restless? Are you feeling stuck? Are you feeling a shift inside that you cannot quite explain? Do you feel like you want to do more with your life and are you questioning whether there’s a purpose to you, or to it all? Here are 6 invaluable lessons from Vivien Duke, Founder of People Help People and Awakening Heroes Academy (AHA!) and author of ‘These Wings Can Fly’ and ‘Awaken Your Inner Hero’.
Lesson #1 - Life is a journey of unexpected twists and turns - learn to go with the flow. Start by asking yourself some questions, however uncomfortable, whilst trying to open your mind to a slightly different way of thinking.
Lesson #2 – Available to you is a different way of thinking, but you’re going to need to be open-minded. If your answer to any of the questions on p.2 was ‘yes’ then you are probably going through a process of awakening. Awakening to the voice inside who may just be your true self. It’s like following your intuition or even just being aware it’s there. That’s your true self and the one that will guide you to a fully purposeful and fulfilling life – for you. There is a big shift going on out there and many people are going through this right now.
Lesson #3 – Be open to this radical idea of awakening to your ‘true self’.
A conversation Vivien had after reading the brilliant Spiritualise report recently published by the RSA primarily led her to writing these lessons. But what made her story interesting enough to write a book about it? If you had asked her that question two years ago, she would have said, “nothing”. Up until September 2012, Vivien considered her life pretty ordinary. She grew up in a loving, stable family with two brothers; left school and got a job in a bank; got married, had two children and set up her own business in 2000. She went to church as a Brownie and Guide and stopped going as soon as she was a teenager. She’s never been strongly religious and certainly didn’t even think about spirituality, yet was open and curious on the subject. Vivien had a successful small business providing flexible working recruitment and consultancy, but in 2008, the credit crunch hit so she had to close it down. She then went into business with someone else, where her ‘gut instinct’ was screaming “no!” and her head was ignoring it because, on the face of it, he seemed impressive. Something I can certainly relate to. Fast forward to September 2012 and Vivien was experiencing a number of life challenges. She was trapped in a business relationship with a toxic individual who had quite literally sucked the life out of her; her financial situation was not healthy and her dad was dying in hospital.
One evening in September, after a particularly trying day, she was at a loss as to what to do next. She had no more clever answers coming from her conscious mind and all that was left was for her to ask, “why is this happening to me?� It was at this moment that she had the most unexpected and powerful experience, where she was not only told why this was happening to her, she was also told what she was here for. I hear this a lot and in this powerful video biography from Nic Askew revels his subject talking about this very thing. Vivien knew she had connected with something very profound. She was given profound answers that helped at the time and continue to help her. They have been life changing for not just her, but also for others who she has been able to access answers for, transforming her way of thinking, her life and her business. It set her on a path she never expected to be on. Something opened up and the more she had these experiences, the more she realised that most of us have been missing a trick for a very long time in terms of the amazing power of our minds. Lessons are presented to us throughout our lives so that we can learn, develop and progress. We learn a huge amount from our lessons in hindsight, by looking back over our lives and highlighting repeating life patterns. Vivien realised that she had not been learning the lessons she was given, she was ignoring that gut instinct, that inner voice. But when she did, her life began to transform.
Lesson #4 - Understand & accept that life is a series of experiments. Some will succeed, others will fail. Both successful & failed experiments are good, so long as we learn the lesson. Only then we can move forward.
So…what happens to Vivien when she gets these amazing answers and how does it happen? It has been her quest over the last two years to find a simple explanation. As individuals there is a part of our consciousness that most people are disconnected from (to varying degrees) and is hence largely untapped. This is a shame because this part of our consciousness is incredible and will give us creative, innovative and wise answers to any question we might have. There are a lot of names given to this part of our consciousness including: God; Source; Universal Mind; Higher Self; Super Conscious; Angels; Spirit Guides; ESP; Psychic, Channelling. This tends to throw quite a bit of confusion over the concept of spirituality because everyone uses different names for what is fundamentally the same thing. Most of us are just too afraid of using any of these terms for fear of sounding too ‘out there’ or deep. Many people just roll their eyes at the thought. That aside, there is no doubt that this is about connecting to a higher consciousness. I think many artists access this when they paint – a friend of mine says he doesn’t remember anything when he paints, other than the painting itself. He says it’s as if he goes to another place, or he becomes someone else.
I don’t think any of us will fully understand what this is. All I know is that when friends say they tap into this higher ‘power source’ of consciousness, magical things begin to happen to them. Most use meditation for this. For Vivien, it was when she asked the question, “why is this happening to me?” that something changed. She was not trying to come up with clever thoughts like she normally did when she had a question or problem to solve. She wasn’t expecting an answer, either. As a result, she inadvertently connected directly to a higher consciousness. And from that day forward, she resolved to practice the art of connecting. How does Vivien connect? She believes that here is only one thing getting in the way of us connecting to that higher power source and that is our conscious mind…that seemingly clever thinking tool that runs our lives, how we think and feel and yet actually can be a complete block to us accessing our higher consciousness. She has a visual for this. Imagine this great encyclopaedia of universal knowledge floating around above you. It accesses you via a channel that comes into the crown of your head. However that channel is completely clogged up with all the thoughts that are spinning around your head so there is no way the higher conscious thoughts can get in there.
Like all of us, she has often found her thoughts running away; the ‘monkey mind’ going into overdrive, her head spinning with thoughts so she can’t think straight. I’ve been there so many times myself. Does this sound familiar to you too? Our busy thoughts completely block us connecting to this higher consciousness. In answer to the question of how to connect. Some call it ‘mindfulness’. She calls it ‘channelling’. It is quite simply clearing our head space; opening up that channel and reconnecting the mind, body and spirit. There are a number of widely recognised approaches to doing this. They include simple breathing exercises; meditation; yoga; walking; tai chi and prayer. Anything where you are ‘resting’ your conscious mind; being ‘present’ and focussing on that mind body connection will get you to your higher consciousness. It honestly is that simple, yet it does take time and practice to switch your conscious mind off and all those thoughts that persist on flying in. But it gets easier and easier with practice and then you’ll find that the magic starts to happen. You’ll also have to really believe that this is going to work, because if not, your conscious mind will start jumping in again and trying to rationalise.
Lesson #5 – Believe that when you clear your head space, you can connect with a higher consciousness. Vivien has a lot of magic in her life right now. She gets answers to anything she asks. Imagine that?! They are always amazingly creative and wise answers that have hugely helped her business as well as her own health and wellbeing. She knows her true inner self and she knows her life purpose. Since she got herself on that path, she experiences incredible synchronicity in her life where everything she needs appears at just the right time. Her life just seems to flow. She is also the calmest and healthiest she has been in years. People she hasn’t seen for a while says she look ten years younger than she did before. The other incredible development in her life has been the impact on her general approach to life. She considered herself pretty selfish before. Most things she did were for herself and her own gain. We could all recognise that in ourselves if we were completely truthful. Now she finds herself wanting to help others. She also finds herself more deeply connected with others than she could ever have imagined.
Lesson #6 – We are all one and the same. We are all here to collectively evolve and enlighten ourselves and the planet. Vivien sees this in others around her too, those who have found their connection and true inner self. It ignites something in us. It awakens an inner hero in us and when we experience it, we also begin to see people transform into superheroes, all around us. Just imagine what the world would be like if this happened to everyone? We hope you’ve enjoyed reading this publication and we’d love to hear from you once you’ve put these lessons into practice for yourself. Just remember, it’s a lifetime practice, but these tools and lessons are ones you can take with you on the amazing journey. Your journey.
Learn Shed – 21st Century Wisdom for People with Busy Lives
Many thanks to Vivien Duke for sharing her experiences. By Justine Clement for Learn Shed.