Re-Discovering Your Dream

Well yesterday I certainly touched and stirred a couple of people up with my post on What Happened To Living My Dream.

Needless to say I had comments from:

“Ahhh forget it just give me a 100 feet of rope, a box of razor blades, a bottle of Jack and drop me off on a bridge in the dark! ……..LOL P.S. I thought the site and thoughts were poignant.”

To folks who it reeeeally resonated with like:

Tony, Great, Great writing. No one should disagree with this. The poeple who do are the peole who aren’t brave enough to fulfill there dreams because of fear of failure or the unknown, myself included! I wish I had the same drive & dedication that you do in my career, my marriage, & my life.

I knew the post would resonate with people and some it wouldn’t. Regardless as I stated in the video a lot of what I post is for myself. I’m very transparent in my experiences in life and I use it to share with others what I gain from those experiences so that it may inspire them. (Read any of my prior blogs and you’ll see I let a LOT hang out lol)

My goal here is to inspire others through my transparency because we all are truly spiritual beings having human experiences. That means we all put our pants on the same way lol. I’m not different.

I hired a life coach almost 2 months ago and I’m doing a lot of what’s called shadow work. I’m reading 2 of Debbie fords books now and if you notice any of my writing and posts with a darker tone that’s why. More on that in a minute.

Value The Dark Side Of Learning

As in business and life in general many of my biggest lessons don’t come from a classroom nor did they come from a book I read. Many of my biggest lessons come in the form of my experiences. Many of the books I read inspire me to have those experiences. And then again sometimes the experiences just choose me lol.

I get a lot of knowledge from the books I read and the programs I listen to or watch, but I get much of my wisdom from the experiences I allow myself to have. Read that one again because allowing yourself to move through the fear of the unknown and having the experiences is the difference between living your dreams or not.

I’ve stolen this philosophy from Tony Robbins and have wore it out.  I’ll paraphrase,

“It’s not what we learn that will get us to the next level but what we’re willing to let go of that will then free us up emotionally to really embrace and use the new tools and philosophies to move forward.“

Said another way, “What we resist persists.”

In the shadow work I’m doing I can tell you much of it sucked in the beginning. Quite frankly it was and still can be scary confronting layers of crap that I’ve been carrying around for years. And I consider myself a pretty positive person however I’ve had to take a second look at that definition of myself too.

However embracing it, finding out what it has to teach me and moving through it is already proving to be more valuable than carrying it around and pretending it’s not there.

I have a lot more work to do and stuff to let go of but It’s much like a physical detox. Even though you’re eating healthy and getting right, you’re going to experience sickness and even flu like symptoms before you come out on the other end feeling vibrant & healthy again.

If you want to get some further insights as to what shadow work is and how it could possibly benefit you check out Debbie Fords Dark Side of the Light Chasers.

Four Steps to Discovering Your Biggest Fear

I’m going to share with you an exercise to discover one of your biggest competing commitments (Known as fear) that may be holding you back.

I learned this in an experiential learning class that cost a bunch o’ money so hopefully they don’t find this post lol. You will need to have 4 sheets of paper at least to do this exercise so go get them right now and come back.

Ready?

Step 1. I want you to write out your 24 month commitment to what you want your life and your lifes experiences to look like. You need to write them out in the present tense though! Some of the things you’ll touch on will be :

  • Your net worth
  • Your business or career
  • Your house
  • Your investments
  • Whats your relationship like
  • Your health
  • Your spirituality
  • Your hobbies or interests

You get the idea. Provide as much detail as possible and in the present tense.

Step 2. Now ask yourself, “What is it I’m doing or not doing that prevents my commitments from being fully realized?”

Now in each of the area’s in Step 1 (You may have more) what are you doing or not doing right now that is keeping you from moving you in the direction of what you say you desire? This can be very eye opening to say the least.

Step 3. Now that you’ve identified what you’re doing or not doing, address what your fear is surounding those actions or inactions. This is known as your competing commitments. These are nasty little boogers that unless you do this exercise you won’t even be aware of them. These are the real belief systems that drive Step 2 behavior and you must be aware of them in order to address them, let them go and help facilitate change.

Step 4. Based on step 3’s realizations there is One Big Assumption that should become very clear to you that you need to address. My big assumption years ago based on steps 1, 2 and 3 was that “I won’t be needed if I find people better than me and there for I won’t get recognized and I’ll be alone.”

Ouch right?

Now I’m not a mental health professional, hell I may even be a basket case myself lol, but the facts are you gotta do the work and embrace this stuff in order to not self sabotage yourself later on. Quite frankly I’ve done that too many times in the past and got sick of it.

Beginning Steps To Discover Your Dream

This is the work I’ve had to go through and will continue to go through to find my dharma or purpose. Maybe I’m doing it right now by writing this post and plastering my insides all over the net lol. Maybe I haven’t found it quite yet.

Regardless I still believe I’m a little ahead of the curve out there and I’m by no means doing terrible but I have had what I considered terrible times. I realize now they were necessary. Now I embrace and value the lessons from the dark side of learning. They are so very valuable and have much to teach you if you’re willing to embrace them.

Are you willing to do the work outlined above and find what competing commitments are challenging you from living your true dream life?

I’d love to hear your feedback.  🙂

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