L O N G E V I T Y F E AT U R E
MANIFEST
with gratitude BY VICKIE MAGIC
I know that you already know what I am about to say in this article. As a concept we know so many things, but as a practice we don’t always do what we know.
attention towards flowers (things you want). Just keep catching yourself when you are thinking about the problems, sharing the problems and focusing your attention towards the problems.
I have found through practice, over and over again, that the more grateful I am for my life and for the things in my life, the more I get to be grateful for.
Just keep refocusing your attention towards the flowers in your life, just keep reminding yourself of where you are going, of what you want, and of what you already do have that you love. The things you love, the people you love, anything that lights you up – be grateful for that. The truth is that you may actually struggle to find things you love to begin with – that’s how much we have trained ourself to water the weeds. It is our robotic way of being.
The more I focus on the good things that I already have, the more good things I seem to get. What we focus our attention on is what we get more of. Where focus goes, energy flows, and that is 100% fact. You may have already heard the garden analogy. In your garden (life) you have weeds (problems) and you have flowers (good stuff). Whichever of those two things you water (give attention to) is what grows the biggest. The thing we sometimes forget is that we are the ones with the hose. We choose whether we water the weeds or the flowers. As humans, we tend to water more weeds than flowers. The reality is that from birth, we are wired five times more towards looking for what’s wrong, than looking for what’s right. Five times more towards the negative, and that is fact. What is wrong with us? It really doesn’t make sense. Why would we give so much more attention to WHAT WE DON’T WANT? Are we crazy? Well, the truth is, yes, sometimes we are a little crazy. The truth is that if we don’t TRAIN OUR BRAIN to water the flowers, we will continue to water the WEEDS.
The first step towards change is to become AWARE.You must become AWARE that YOU ARE watering weeds. If you talk about a problem, if you share a problem, if you think about a problem, if you give a problem your attention, YOU ARE WATERING IT.
So, rather than water weeds, we must train ourselves to water flowers. I am not saying this is simple. It will take work and it will take practice. But it is most definitely possible. The next time you start talking about a problem, catch yourself. Remind yourself, “What you focus on grows” and ask yourself, “Do I want weeds? Or do I want flowers?” Remind yourself to focus your energy and
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Of course, I am not saying that you IGNORE the weeds. If you simply ignore the weeds, they take over. So it is actually IMPERATIVE that you become AWARE OF THEM. That’s the first step. However, remind yourself that you are not the weed (the problem), you are simply the one AWARE of it. This is the best place to remove the weed. If you are simply the one aware of the weed, you can pull it out, but if you are the weed, well, that’s a whole other story, right?
So, remind yourself, YOU ARE NOT YOUR THOUGHTS, YOU ARE NOT YOUR FEELINGS, YOU ARE NOT THE WEED.You are simply the one that is the WITNESS OF YOUR THOUGHTS, THE WITNESS OF YOUR FEELINGS, THE WITNESS OF THE WEEDS, the one that is AWARE OF THEM. That way, you are in a much better viewpoint to pull them out, to problem-solve the weed removal. You must allocate WEED PULLING TIME – it must be a time when you allocate x minutes to simply brainstorm how you might pull that particular weed in order to refocus on the flowers. In the brainstorming weed pulling session, don’t give it too long. Say, “Okay, for the next 15 minutes I am going to weed-pull this scenario, work out all of the possible solutions to this weed. I am going to ask my friends, family, team, whoever, but from a viewpoint of weed pulling (problem-solving), not whining (criticising).” For just this 15 to 30 minutes, or whatever amount of time you allocate, you can talk about the weed, share about the weed and brainstorm the elimination of the weed. But once the weed pulling session is over, you must revert to watering the flowers. Check out my Wake-Up Club – weekday inspiration for a life filled with more flowers. www.vickiemagic.com.au/the-wake-up-club/ f www.vickiemagic.com.au
