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Find Your Center – Find Your Strength

Find Your Center – Find Your Strength

Feel like you’re losing yourself in busy-ness?
Find yourself again in meditation.

You’re on a path of your own choosing and you’re working towards your goals. You set out on this journey with the intention of improving your life, becoming more of who you really are and finding more meaning and fulfillment in life. As you continue on this journey and your vision starts to take shape and more opportunities come your way, things can get very busy for you. You can get so busy that you’re head spins and you feel like you’re caught in an undertow and any second you’ll be you dragged under-water. You believe you can’t handle one more thing but yet, you take on another commitment because you don’t want to lose momentum but you feel like you’re sinking.

Of course you can consider ways to become more efficient and productive and though you’d be able to get more done in less time, you’ll probably just end up filling up the balance of your time with more things to do. Do an honest gut-check and it tells you that you’re doing everything you can possibly do with the time you have. It’s not about doing more.

You may not be able to change the circumstances in your life right now but you can always change yourself by shifting your state of mind and being. That is, you can change how you cope with all the busy-ness. Sometimes all you need is a little perspective and a great place to go for that is within. Find your center and you will find your strength.

Finding Center means reconnecting with your true, inner-self, the place within you that is calm, strong and unfaltering. Just a moment or two in this place is enough to regain the perspective you need to remember that everything is perfect, that you will handle all that needs to be handled, that you are doing your best, and that, is all you can ever do.

The more time you spend away from center, the more difficult things seem to get and the more you feel like you’re swimming against the current, trying to make it upstream on a river that’s dark, scary and has no end in sight. The more you do this, the more of yourself you lose along the way, till ultimately you feel lost, tired and full of doubt.

You tapped into your true self before to help you begin this journey and it felt so right at the time but now, the more you swim against the current, the more energy you needlessly waste. “How will it all get done if I don’t keep swimming? If I stop, I fail, things will fall apart, they will unravel and all would have been for naught.” This is what your mind is telling you.

STOP!!!

Just Let Go and let the current take you where it will. Just float and rest for a while. It will take you where you need to go.

How Do You Stop?

Find your center through meditation. Meditation is a practice that helps you let go and empty your mind for a moment so you can relax and decompress. It has numerous benefits on our physical, mental and emotional health and it isn’t just for gurus and swamis – it’s for everybody and it’s something very misconstrued.

Meditation isn’t about the ohms and ahhs, it’s about you, who you really are at your core – your spirit. This is the part of you that you connected with to begin this intentional journey you’re on now. That intention and the work you’ve done, all the steps you’ve taken through your commitment have brought you here but you forgot your spirit along the way and got caught up so much more in the doing than the being. In the doing, you brought up old patterns, mindsets and beliefs that lead to worry and anxiety because they aren’t in alignment with your true self.

Your true self is the current you have been trying to swim against.

STOP!!!

You might hear yourself saying, “I can’t. I’m a busy professional. Besides not getting anything done, what will people think of me?” Have you noticed yourself getting more irritable and frustrated with each new task added to your list of to-dos? Others notice it too and you’re not as efficient in this state as you are when you’re relaxed and centered.

STOP – take a few slow, deep breaths. Slow down.

Begin by finding a word, a thought, a quote or even a piece of music that resonates for you on a deeper level.

Words like:

  • Stillness
  • Grace
  • Love
  • Beauty
  • Truth
  • Joy
  • Peace
  • Harmony
  • Acceptance

Thoughts like:

  • I am calm
  • I am worthy
  • I am grateful
  • I am happy
  • Everything is perfect

Quotes like:

  • Be the change you wish to see in the world, Ghandi
  • We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience, Teilhard de Chardin
  • What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us, Emerson
  • What you are is what you have been. What you’ll be is what you do now. Buddha
  • Tension is who you think you should be. Relaxation is who you are. Chinese Proverb
  • The tighter you squeeze, the less you have. Ma-Tsu

Find any piece of music that soothes you and just listen to it and be with it for a few minutes. When you notice your mind wandering and thinking about work, STOP. Just listen to the music.

These are ways you can slow down and begin finding your center again.

Take a few deep breaths, then ask yourself, “Who Am I?”

Be still and listen to the response.

Ask yourself, “What do I want now?“

Listen to the soft, still, truthful response and honor its request.

What could it say?

  • Go for a walk.
  • Take a nap.
  • Take the day off.
  • Celebrate.
  • Be with family or friends.
  • Create.
  • Be Yourself.

Honor your spirit and do not make it a chore – something you HAVE TO DO – let go for a few moments and do what feels good. Enjoy it.

Then, once you’ve honored your spirit, choose the one priority on your list of to-dos that feels right to do and do it as peacefully and joyfully as you can, remembering that you purposely chose this journey and you didn’t choose it because you wanted it to be stressful and nerve-wracking. You chose it because it was the way you could become more of who you really are.

If you have found any comfort just in reading this, if it resonates with a part of you, then consider learning more about meditation as a way to help you relax, let go, find your center and recharge your spirit.

Meditation is a practice and becomes easier over time. It becomes portable and you can take it with you anywhere you go. The more you practice, the easier it will be to find calm, inner strength, resilience and peace anytime, anywhere and you will find yourself living, working and being happier and more effective at everything you do.

Next time you feel caught in the undertow or like you’re swimming upstream, stop – let go – empty your mind for a few minutes and you will find your center and your strength to continue on with renewed vigor, spirit and enthusiasm.

 

 

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5 Comments

  1. Bruce Carreon

    ahh thanks for the reminder lol

    Reply
  2. Anna

    How can a person learn to let go? When they don’t know how and a challenge to do.

    Reply
    • Guy Reichard

      Thanks for your comment Anna. That’s a very good question and letting go is a challenge for most people. Like many other things people learn in coaching, it’s a practice. It’s not something you learn to do in one day or that I could give you one bit of advice that would make it happen in a snap for you. It’s something you learn to do over time as you learn to live in the present and embrace the power of now.

      The focus of this article is about meditation (a practice) to help you find your center, your core and by focusing on the present, you are encouraged to let any thoughts surface and release them. So give yourself the permission to stop thinking about a particular challenge or issue and for a few moments just focus on relaxation and breathing. That is the start of learning to let go. The more you do this, the more you will realize the benefits of letting go and the easier it will be to do.

      Reply
  3. Eleanor Scarlett

    Thanks Guy, for reminding me what I have been missing out on, I use to do meditation as a part of my spiritual practice, in the last little while I became so busy at work that I have completely stop doing anything so a big thank you. Life is indeed a journey a constant reminder that we need to take care of self, ,emtally, spiritually and physically. I have put work ahead of me and I am very tired.

    Reply
    • Guy Reichard

      You’re very welcome Eleanor and thank you for sharing so openly. I’m so glad to hear that this article has helped you remember what’s worked for you and what’s important to you.

      Wishing you all the best!

      Guy

      Reply

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