ReMindEd   •   July 8, 2017

Wow: we are in July! The financial year is done (boring I know, but I own a business so this is my calendar), and with it brings another point of reflection, as July 1 always does each year.

For me, the changing of dates was marked by a mini getaway with my little tribe, to celebrate the previous financial year, and twelve months since my husband and I took the BIG leap and opened OUR OWN mind health clinic and BOTH stepped into it without abandon (or a Plan B or any other employment elsewhere- yep, really BIG huh!)

Last week, I was reading back through old journal entries and I found this scribed on a whole page from January first 2017, as part of my usual week-or-two-long new years’ writings:

If not this, than what?!

I then followed it with a long list of things that would otherwise be labelled goals, resolutions or something similar. But somehow writing it under this heading instead made me approach the list differently. Lists usually fill people with dread, even when they are ‘list-makers’ and love writing lists (yes, this IS me). This is because we write these lists mostly as ‘to-do-lists’ which already implies the ‘should’ word. It’s a task. And who likes tasks or needs to be reminded about anything else we have to do.

The if not this, than what list is filled with hope, with promise, with a sense of excitement and adventure. It’s a dream list. It’s not the ‘have to’s’, it’s the ‘really want to’s’. Oh, I love that!

You may like to stop reading now and wrote yours out. Be brave, dream wild, hope with bravery!

……………….

I love this invitation to dream as it doesn’t focus on what is wrong now, what we are bored with, what we are done with, what we are unhappy about. This invitation only asks us how could this look instead? If change was to happen, if something were different, how might life be? What may be better?

What does your better look like?

…………….

It’s often easy, simply because we spend so much time making this list, to focus on the negative, to list the issues, to notice the emotions we’d prefer weren’t felt. That list we know all-too-well! Imagine what may be possible if we shifted the way we wrote the list, and chose not to sit in the now but instead looked ahead into hope for the future. Imagine if that were the key. Just a different heading on the list. I’m suggesting it is that easy!

This sits alongside gratitude. The practice of being mindful of the things in your life you already have that you are thankful for rather than only focusing on the things you don’t yet have.

Anyone who practices this daily knows how well it works to change our own mind about what needs to change. We quickly realise it’s our mind that needs to change and from where all change is written into reality.

What I’m suggesting is this: acknowledge where you are at, be real with your emotions, face your fears and heal from the past (I encourage you to seek professional help in this area- we are rewriting the way therapy was done, where you no longer need to go through your past trauma and pain, but instead focus on the beliefs you hold today and challenge them to replace these to move forward: it’s easy, fast and works!) It’s about being real and brave. 

Once you make a decision to face your fears and feel your emotions, you allow the deep desires of your heart to resurface and point you in the direction you wish to walk in. There’s a freedom that comes from clearing out your mind and making space for creativity, for dreams and for direction. It takes intention. It won’t just happen on its own. Nothing great just happens. It’s takes a decision, a choice. And these often need to be made over and over again. One step at a time. One decision. One change. One breakthrough. One healing. One moment.

Your moment of breakthrough may be today.

So, if not this, than what…?!

Than what…?!

You get to answer that question. You have a choice. So choose.

Try something different. Try something new. Make a change. Be brave. Choose brave.

Here’s to your brave,

Sal