I suppose I can say that my new The Secret is Dr. Wayne Dyer's The Shift: Taking Your Life from Ambition to Meaning (2009). The film, which is presented as a documentary within a movie, doesn't really contradict what The Secret says, but it does go deeper into what many people were likely to have missed when watching the glitzier The Secret: That you are not what you have; what you have is what you are.
The Shift takes its three main characters from an ego-directed life to a one that is influenced by purpose: material success-driven husband and wife find themselves reorienting their lives after an unexpected change; a housewife and mother of two children makes time to find herself again; and an ambitious director, after a failed bid for a big film project, finds his true purpose in his art.
What I love most about the film is that it doesn't go down the predictable path of telling viewers to let go of their desire for material possessions to find meaning, but also defines abundance very well as something that you only need to tune into because it is already there.
"The remedy is the experience."
Dyer tells us, "Stop interfering in your own life and let yourself be done." It's not easy, if you're a control freak, like I am. But with my current project to be a "yes girl," I'm opening up to the flow of abundance that God has prepared for me and I'm currently reaping the blessings I've allowed myself to be ready for. And I don't even have to stress myself out planning!
I can only imagine the bigger blessings I'd receive if I stopped telling myself they are too big for me! But one step at a time, one step at a time. I just have to allow myself to experience everything that comes my way.
"I say the comedy is that it's serious."
Dyer tells us, "You don't attract what you want. You attract what you are." This goes along with the Be-Do-Have paradigm I mentioned in the first installment of this three-part column piece.
After three years, I recovered from a failed romance. It's laughable now that I see how my unpreparedness for a relationship gave me a guy who was equally unprepared, and how, for six long years, we nurtured our unpreparedness together.
I experienced some trouble at work with a colleague I often experienced as a bitch, and who, at some point, basically told me I was stupid. She was the type who would be energized by a fight, because her need to be right was so strong—as is mine, if I let my ego rule me.
For some months, it was difficult, but I was aware enough not to unleash my dark side (thanks to ALC). Instead, I met her with all the positivity I could muster. If not, I merely observed her detachedly and, when I could, lovingly accepted her as she was. One day, she simply left, crying, perhaps baffled at my refusal to meet her head on or even recognize the power that she thought she weilded.
You attract what you are, indeed.
“I say the tragedy is how you're gonna spend the rest of your nights with the light on...”
Dyer also says, “If you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.”
I used to be afraid of so many good things: rejection, displeasing someone, greatness, beauty, wealth, success and love. I wasn't afraid of the bad things I was convinced I was already familiar with: unhappiness, distrust, imbalance, dysfunction, poverty and being unloved. In fact, I was close to embracing all the bad things because I had defined my life through them.
Thank God for blessing me with a fully-functional inner compass—and a mother who bought self-help books and left them scattered around the house for me to read.
One of the students of the coaching course I'm taking wrote: “There is no way to happiness. Happiness is the way.”
I'm happily taking that way as well.
“So shine the light on all of your friends.”
A call to greatness is a call to love is a call to greatness! The first of the seminar trilogy, FLEX, will be held on two weekends this month: May 8 to 9 and May 15 to 16 in Ortigas, Metro Manila. Text me if you want to begin your own journey and let me know of any support you may need.
Email your comments to alricardo@yahoo.com or text them to (63)917-9164421. You can also visit my personal blog at http://althearicardo.blogspot.com.