by Candy Paull
The first step toward serenity is recognizing that you are replaying an old script in a new situation. Observing without judgment is a powerful way to gain better perspective. With this perspective, you are able to make a more conscious choice to respond to a negative situation in a more positive way—you empower yourself and become a responsible actor in the scenario instead of limiting yourself to old, childish patterns.
Feeling powerless is one factor that contributes to our perception of life as being stressful. Modern society is built around concepts of power that make us feel our individual choices are meaningless. A traffic jam on the way to work, an arbitrary supervisor who thwarts our best efforts, the impersonal bureaucratic red tape that complicates even the simplest task, a system of government that increasingly favors the rich and penalizes the poor, or a family system of enablement and denial all seem to trap us into negative-feedback loops that pull us into pointless tail chasing. We can get caught in our own limiting cycle of poor choices, dooming us to forever repeat the same mistakes. One definition of craziness is doing the same thing over and over, expecting different results. Our attempts to control results or overcome negative systems are often frustrating attempts to force change from the outside, and they end up reinforcing the negative-feedback loops. What we resist persists.
However, small, incremental choices that come from a positive sense of authenticity and meaning can create a renewed and vibrant experience. Choosing to see the truth that is beyond mere fact and condition exerts a subtle influence that can lead to consequences in ways we cannot imagine. Chaos theory tells us that a change as subtle as the movement of a butterfly wing can affect the formation of a storm on the other side of the globe.
You cannot predict how or when or even if your choices will change the world, but a new thought and a different choice will certainly help you begin to see beyond a current belief structure and past experience. You can choose to move beyond your own outdated boundaries and limited context to create a more intelligent response to a challenging situation. In doing so, you will open yourself up to new possibilities.
Choices are the hinges of destiny.
—Edwin Markham
Rosa Parks had been working to challenge the power structure of segregation in Alabama for many years. But it was her decision on December 1, 1955, to refuse to give up her seat on a Montgomery bus that was the spark that started a revolution. The civil rights movement was already in motion, but her choice that day was unexpectedly magnified by the response of others to her act of courage. It started the historic 381-day boycott of Montgomery buses and fueled a movement that lead to the 1956 US Supreme Court ruling that segregation is unconstitutional.
Your choices may not influence the consciousness of a nation in such a dramatic way, but you can never predict the complexity of influences a single choice can affect. You can be sure that making better, more authentic choices over time will affect the trajectory of your life in positive ways. One small victory, one affirmative choice to express the highest integrity can exert a subtle influence far larger than the moment would indicate.
Choice is the nature of human free will. Even in the most constrained circumstances we are making choices. One person may choose to give up and play the victim’s role, making an unconscious choice to say no to his own destiny and greatness. Another may make a different choice; conscious of the consequences, committed to following through on the links in the chain of causation to a larger and more spacious outcome. The victim gives up before he even begins; the one who chooses with greater consciousness becomes a cocreator with God, exercising his power and potential in a new way. It is not a question of whether we make choices; we make them all the time. It is a question of whether or not we are making those choices consciously.
Once you realize that you are the chooser and become more aware of your decisions, you discover that you are not only creating new options, you are also developing better character. You open the door to becoming more than you were before you made your choice. Because you have started to take responsibility and claim your power to choose consciously, a new skill and understanding will grow and flourish within your heart and soul.
Small, incremental choices can change the trajectory of a life. No longer a slave to your past or to the popular assumptions of your era, you become maker and creator of the world you inhabit. Conscious choices develop your character as much as they develop the circumstances that unfold in your life. Making a conscious choice is a way to be proactive for your own good. Like the ripples ringing where a stone was tossed into the surface of a still pond, your conscious choice carries a circle of consequences that expands beyond the impact of a single choice. To choose consciously and positively is to say yes to your own destiny.
A Higher Good
Every time you make a more conscious choice for a higher good, you will draw even greater good into your life. When you consistently make choices that create calm and peace, you develop a more serene way of dealing with the challenges and changes that life brings.
Set your intentions for the good, aim toward wholeness and health, and you will be aligning yourself with the natural forces of the universe. This is the true meaning of being “in the will of God.” It is not a forced decision against your own nature but a recognition that the harmony and order of all of creation is in tune with the love of God, and you are meant to be a part of that beautiful music. God is love, and so are you. Choose to live in that love, and allow the loving nature of God to express itself in all facets of your life.
Seek Spiritual Solutions
There is a spiritual root to every problem in your life. The outer situation points to an inner struggle within you. Even when a problem seems to be caused by a person or situation that is out of your control, your response is a spiritual response. Set aside a time to pray and meditate on a specific issue that has been bothering you. Make a commitment to listen to your inner voice, and then to act on the wisdom you receive.
You will discover that when you cease resisting the good and allow it to flow in your life, the very goodness and greatness of the nature of creation will respond, leading you and even carrying you in unexpected ways to ever greater good. Synchronicity, or Divine timing, will appear more frequently in your life, bringing resources, people, events, and opportunities together in ways that may sometimes feel miraculous. The law of attraction will begin to work in your favor instead of against you.
But even more, you will discover that continued conscious choices made in favor of service and goodness will create an unforeseen yet entirely natural consequence: a transformed character. Anger is replaced by forgiveness and patience. Victim-hood becomes unexpected strength to overcome difficult circumstances. Erratic behavior turns into a steady ability to persevere. Calmness and common sense temper impulsiveness and passion. This doesn’t happen overnight. But the changes, once begun, have their own momentum. Your small daily choices grow into life patterns. Whereas once you were chained by unproductive habits, you discover your power to replace those habits with those that serve you better. As you release the old habits that no longer serve you, room is made for the new good that supports and sustains you.
Instead of allowing yourself to feel like a victim of circumstances, take responsibility for your own actions. Even if you are not in a situation by choice, you still have choice within the situation. You do have more power than you realize, and access to Divine wisdom. You have the power to change your circumstances, starting with what you think, then taking inspired action based on inner wisdom.
Today is the only day you have to make a choice. Yesterday is past, and you live in the consequences of the choices that were made back then. Tomorrow will manifest the consequences of the choices you make today. You choose your future in the here and now. You do this one thought at a time, one decision at a time, one action at a time. The eternal part of you that is connected to God is always and only available in the here and now. It is the part of you that knows only
this moment as an eternal moment.
Make a conscious decision to cultivate serenity in your life. Take one small positive action toward the serene life you visualize. Then trust that Divine processes and rhythms are at work, just as the process of a storm finally blows itself out until the sun breaks through the clouds again. There is a river of life flowing in and through you. Instead of resisting the flow of life, align yourself with it. Then let this harmonious and Divine orderly flow lead you to vistas of freedom and love that are beyond anything you could have imagined.
You can make choices that come from the serenity of the heart instead of the urgency of the world around you. A single choice that honors the spirit can be more powerful than a hundred decisions that are motivated by outer circumstances. It can affect the quality of your day and have a lasting impact on the rest of your life.
Activity: Transform Your Thinking
What does it mean to transform your thinking? One way is to become aware of your thoughts and actively choose to think better thoughts. Get out of a negative mental rut and decide to think about higher things. Stop going over why things went wrong or how someone hurt you. Choose to move from negative thoughts to more positive and creative thoughts. Replace complaints with praise. Take it easy on yourself. Be compassionate to others. Remember that everyone is doing the best they can with what they understand at the time. Give yourself room to grow. Believe that a Higher Power is helping others to grow, too. Give the gift of compassionate grace and let love have the last word. It’s your willingness to practice a positive faith that overcomes your fears and doubts. Optimism strengthens faith. Negativity saps energy and often creates the very thing you dread. When you find yourself thinking negatively, create a positive affirmation to replace the negative talk. Allow the light of love to transform your thoughts.
Three Affirmations
I love life and I bring my best self to life.
I am guided every step of the way, every moment of the day.
I release all my egotistical agendas and live freely, joyously, and naturally.
The specific patterns out of which a building or a town is made may be alive or dead. To the extent they are alive, they let our inner forces loose, and set us free; but when they are dead, they keep us locked in inner conflict.
—Christopher Alexander
Somewhere between the conformities of an outdated fundamentalism and the lonely emptiness of unbelief, I have been forging a practical mysticism that works for me. If you are willing to forgo your own attachment to old ideas and skepticism, I would like to offer some new thoughts—a few small adjustments that could help change the trajectory of your life.
We are experiencing a paradigm shift of monumental proportions. People in every era believe they live in times of chaos and transition, but today there is a consensus that these truly are transformative times. Our institutions are inadequate to meet the challenges of the twenty-first century and must be reinvented and reimagined. Political gridlock, financial meltdowns, global climate change, technological innovations, and changes in the belief systems that once seemed so foundational are all part of a shift from the Cartesian/Newtonian worldview to a more integrative worldview. Every discipline is experiencing a shift in perspective. Art, architecture, social sciences, economics, governments, businesses, religions, and more are changing. If you are feeling more stress, it’s not just because of the usual pace of technological and social change; it is truly a global crisis that affects us all, demanding new skills and a more expanded understanding of the way things work. The worldview of life as inert matter that can be separated into parts is transforming into a worldview of everything being connected and alive.
New solutions and more effective approaches emerge with a new paradigm. You have the choice to embrace your own paradigm shift. You can move from being hypnotized by what happens in the material world (the outer conditions of your life) to discovering that consciousness is the primary cause behind everything, and you can make more-conscious choices to affect change in the material world. Your attitudes, beliefs, and actions can create a better reality. Instead of looking at the visible and assuming that the conditions that exist are set in stone, you can consciously connect to the invisible as the source of all change. All that is visible and seems most solid and “real” is actually energy and space flowing from the invisible realm. A spiritual awakening offers you the opportunity to reinvent your own paradigm, liberating you from old limiting beliefs. Shift your worldview and create a new world.
New paradigms do not emerge suddenly in complete form and full power. They are often birthed in fits and starts. Challenges and confusion are the birth pangs of a new world being born, whether in the global community or in your personal life. The rules are being changed, and you have to change, too. The connections between choice and consequences are not always clear-cut or obvious. It is only by looking back later that you can see a new pattern was emerging from the chaos and changes of life.
The initial reason for change may have been to alleviate stress or to solve a problem, but it can eventually lead to new vistas of opportunity and possibility. We make our choices, and our choices, in the end, make us. It is a grand adventure to enter into a more intuitive and organic experience of reality. You may think you are finding some simple solutions for stress relief, but you are actually opening yourself to the possibility of personal transformation.
Create a Sacred Center
It is always your choice either to go more deeply into an experiment in transformation or to resist and hold back. Gentle, authentic, loving choices grow a new sense of awareness incrementally, helping you become more at home in a universe that includes safety as well as expansion. Coming home to yourself includes creating a container for growth and experimentation. We carry an eternal home within, and we create spaces in our physical homes to stay in touch with that inner home.
There is a sacred center, a ground of being, a hidden spring within our hearts that flows ever fresh and is never polluted by the conditions of the outer world. Every spiritual tradition has its own name for this quality that cannot be described in words alone. This philosophy appears in a variety of forms:
Saint John of the Cross found that secret place of the Most High in the dark night of his soul.
Thomas Merton, monk and mystic, sought and found it in silence and contemplation in his hermitage.
In Taoism, there is a life force that holds all things together and is all things.
The Sufis talk about the Beloved, and their spiritual work includes “polishing the mirror” so that the face of the Beloved may be more clearly reflected in a person’s life.
Zen speaks of the direct encounter that cannot be limited by human words or mental concepts.
Christianity talks about the Word, or Logos, that created all that is, and the way a human being can become a new person in Christ, who lives beyond the low carnal or ego-driven state of human consciousness.
Hindus refer to the Atman as the vivifying life force behind all creation. You carry that sacred center within your own heart.
Entering into a sacred center of presence, light, and spirit is both a gift and a choice. You can create a container for it and train yourself in habits of inner attentiveness and awareness. This heightened clarity and sense of homecoming—this peace that passes understanding—can come unexpectedly, helping you through a crisis. Or you can cultivate this expansion of the human psyche through spiritual disciplines and grow into a more peaceful way of living gradually.
Coming Home to Ourselves
You know it when you feel it. It might be the sense of coming home to a place you’ve never been before, as John Denver sang in “Rocky Mountain High,” celebrating his powerful response to coming home to the Rockies. You can feel at home with certain people, even if it’s the first time you have met. It can be the remembrance of a familiar scent from childhood, an aroma as comforting as a loaf of bread warm from the oven, or the calming smell of polished wood and f
reshly laundered sheets dried in the sun. There is something that resonates deep within, and strikes a chord of harmony and peace in you.
Home should be a place of nourishment, a place where we become physically, mentally, and spiritually refreshed: a sanctuary.
—Nicole Marcelis
The spirit of being home can be expressed in tangible ways in the house you live in. Color and beauty and order create an atmosphere that makes you feel at home. The texture of a towel wrapped around your wet body, the spring sun warming your face, the sound of a familiar and well-loved song, and a beloved voice speaking your name all partake of an eternal reality as well as being temporal experiences. These sensations are hints and invitations to experience an even greater reality that calls your name through the windows and lattices of time and space.
But you can be at home in the universe even when outer conditions are not comfortable, when you feel like a stranger in a strange place. God’s Presence is with you wherever you go. Jesus said that the Kingdom of Heaven is within. Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “We lie in the lap of immense intelligence, which makes us receivers of its truth and organs of its activity.” Stress is created by anything that closes us off from this Intelligence, and serenity is a sign that we are entering the gateway to becoming aware of and accessing that Intelligence. We can create lives that encourage and enhance this inner awareness or that close it off.
Sanctuary in a Stressful World
Visionary architect Christopher Alexander has been exploring how process, pattern, and complexity affect the way we build and how we live. He has discovered deep ties among the nature of matter, human perception of the universe, and the way we construct our buildings, cities, and communities. He believes that the same laws apply to all structures in the universe, and that every person has an intuitive understanding of these laws. You don’t have to be an architect to understand what makes a home serene and what makes the modern world so stressful. There is a pattern of wholeness in the natural world, and humanity has an instinctive sense for beauty and wholeness. We can choose to value the intangibles of value and beauty and aliveness over a more utilitarian approach to life. We can create homes that are satisfying and human places that nurture the soul as well as house the body.
