Day 4: Seek Clearness with Others

Seeking clearness is the last step in the discernment process. Clarity - that feeling that you know what you stand for, you are sure of your objectives, you have set the best intentions, and you understand your next move - is liberating and empowering. 

Most of the time we don't wait for clarity; we act on autopilot, or on other's expectations and assurances, or because the situation is urgent. Waiting for clarity seems selfish or exhausting or just impossible.

But being clear in your heart that you are on the right path is a wonderful thing to wait for; it's transformative in itself! When you have gathered all the information, weighed all the possibilities, invited a leading of the spirit or Inner Guide, and you think you know what you are being led to do, it's time to test your leading with other people.

Many times, when I have an idea I'm mulling over, I will talk casually about it with my friends, and listen to what they say. I get to process my idea out loud, and I feel clearer. Most of the time that is enough to go on with, but - especially when I'm making big decisions- it has a major flaw: My friends don't know that I'm using them for clarity, so they might just tell me what they think I want to hear, or they might thoughtlessly tell me what their own fears and inhibitions tell them.

The Quakers have a wonderful format called a Clearness Committee, for when an individual (or a family or other group) is facing a particularly difficult situation or has a leading to test. A clearness committee of two or three other people meets with you for one or more sessions, and is tasked with asking questions that will lead you to consider the idea from new angles, and see it in new light.

Day 2: Truth Walk

Truth is a continual revelation, a constantly unfolding series of insights about how your mind works, how the world works, and how you might best act with more love, generosity, justice, and peace. I'm using Truth with a capitol T to mean an absolute - something that is foundational for you: Your values and principles, and your world view, and the leadings you have for action. 

If you have no Truths (no moral absolutes) then you will have no moral guidance. Everything will be situational: Whatever feels or seems right at the time and in that situation is right. This kind of “whatever feels good” mentality and lifestyle creates a society that regards all values, beliefs, lifestyles, and truth claims as equally valid. If we have no absolutes, then chaos follows.

At the same time, we need to accept that Truth is not the same for everyone, and learn how to listen to the Truth of others without getting angry or confused. And we need to accept that our own foundations change, as we grow and understand the world differently. 

Examining your Truth from time to time is a habit that expands your understanding of life, and gives you greater clarity.

Yesterday you wrote out your conscious, top-of -the-mind ideas about how you wish your world could change, and ideas that could lead you to change your world for the better. Now take another pass at it. This time, access your deeper, intuitive mind - your connection to God, or the Inner Guide, by putting yourself into a relaxed, trance-like state, and seeking a leading of the spirit with an open mind and heart.

Week 8: Transform Your World + Day 1: Journal & Set Intentions

For the first four weeks of this challenge, you deep-dived into your reasons for living, made a map of your path forward, and a plan for how to give full effort to your priorities. And for the last three weeks you centered your living in love by giving open-hearted attention to your daily interactions with the people in your life, to your personality style, and to generosity, equanimity, and other virtues and social skills.

The only thing remaining to do is to go out and transform your world. That's the gift we have - to see what needs to change and do the work to change it. No matter our limitations, we CAN make the world better, one smile, kind word, or conversation at a time. 

When I say "transform your world" I am suggesting a shift towards a better life: It could be mostly an inner renovation, or lifestyle alteration; it could be an adjustment in your relationships; it could be a new project or area of growth; or it could be a move into activism or service. You might already have an inkling of where you are being nudged. 

The work of transforming your world has several steps. This week you will take time to hear your truth, and get clearer on your various missions in life; learn how to test your leadings; and how to open the door to the uncertainty of life, take creative risks, and find the courage to act on your leadings. 

We will go through the steps of discernment - the process of making deeply important decisions in your life - that I set out at the beginning of this book. You will:

-Use your practical wisdom, collect information, reflect on your values, and weigh all the possibilities for action. 

-Seek a leading of the spirit (God or Inner Guide) with an open mind and heart. 

-Seek clearness by inviting thoughtful questioning (not advise) from some people you trust.

A note about your Inner Guide

I've mentioned your Inner Guide throughout this book, but what is it, really? Some people call it intuition, or a gut feeling; others feel it in their heart; and some might call it a leading of the spirit. It's that flash of insight, or creative impulse, or sudden clarity you get when you've been working out a problem; or it might be a leading or itch to act on something you never thought of before. It's sometimes quiet and subtle, and sometimes loud and clear.

Day 7: Review and Plan

Take a few minutes to review your sixth week. Write about your accomplishments and what you need to work on. Did you:

• Brainstorm some goals, dreams, and exciting ideas for your future in the areas of your health, lifestyle, finances, bad and good habits, things you'd like to learn, things that bring you happiness, and your spiritual life?

• Write about your present relationship with yourself, your inner judge and your Inner Guide, challenges and successes, and how your values, beliefs, and priorities support self-love?

• List just a few (2-4) specific Self-Love Goals for this next month (30 days)?

• Use your Love Journal each day to get to know and understand yourself better, look for ways to practice friendship with yourself, and note times when you might need to draw on generous, open-hearted kindness, or extra time, attention, and nurturance for yourself?

• Brainstorm some small generous acts you might do this week for yourself, as practice, that will challenge your growing edge?

• Practice a Love Meditation, and send the "pink light of love" to yourself?

• Discern the top self-care habits that will most help to renew your physical self, and add a few to your priority grid?

• Discern the top 1-4 subjects of learning that will make the biggest difference in your life now, and add them to this month's priority grid?

• Discern and choose the top 2-4 awareness practices that will nurture your spirit, that might make the biggest difference in your life now, and add some combination of awareness practices to this month's priority grid?

• Experiment with building an explosion of inner synergy intentionally, for a particular project, in order to infuse that project with vision and passion, and engage with full effort?

Make a New Priority Grid

We are entering the 4th week of the month and it's time to consider a new month ahead. This might seem like a lot to do, on top of this next week of love practices! But you have all week to do it, and you can do as much or as little as you like. 

At the minimum, please check the links below and review the process; perhaps choose one priority area of your life to evaluate and plan for, as practice.

Monthly

Fourth week of each month (or at the waning crescent moon - time to evaluate, then surrender, rest, and recuperate.)

Make a new Priority Grid:

1. Evaluate last month's Priority Grid to notice trends, analyze your balance, make adjustments to your schedule and expectations, and identify "low-status" priorities.

2. Brainstorm and envision the best next 30-days of your life.

3. Discern your top 4-5 priorities for "regular" action, for the month ahead, and choose your top action goals, to move you in the direction of your most important reasons for living.

4. Make a Month Map, arranging your goals in an order that helps you picture your month ahead, and label it with a theme word or phrase.

5. Organize your next month goals into a Prioritiy Grid, outlining your long term, complex, task-driven projects into small chunks with a backwards calendar.

Day 7: Review and Plan

Take a few minutes to review your fifth week. Write about your accomplishments and what you need to work on. Did you:

• Brainstorm some goals, dreams, and exciting ideas for your future in the areas of your relationships, your family, your friends, and your community, and ways you want to be of service?

• List a just a few (2-4) specific Love Goals for this next month?

• Set intentions to follow through with each of your priorities for the week?

• Open the door to bodhichitta (your completely open heart and mind) with a 5-minute Love Meditation?

• Start a new Love Journal and make notes in it, each day, of conversations and interactions you had the previous day, your general frame of mind with the world, and about the people you will see and conversations you may have in the day to come?

• Write about your growing edge - where you most need to focus your attention when it comes to love?

• Brainstorm some goals for extending kindness to the world; for creating and nurturing your community; small generous acts you might do this week; and a list of bigger actions you could take someday to help your community and your world in the days or months ahead; and some goals for equanimity - and add them to your Month Map or your Inspiration Page?

• Try out the 'Zen Pause" practice to internalize equanimity?

Day 2: Shine Your Love Light

Your first giant step on the path to keeping love central in your life and in your everyday interactions, is simply to set an intention to open your heart - to invite bodhichitta. 

The Buddhist term bodhicitta means "completely open heart and mind". Developing bodhicitta is a journey: You move toward a flexible way of thinking and feeling, releasing fear and a need for security, and embracing the possibility of love.

Pema Chodron, in "The Places That Scare You", says that bodhichitta comes from the soft spot we each have, that allows us to feel the pain of others. "Without realizing it we continually shield ourselves from this pain because it scares us. We put up protective walls made of opinions, prejudices and strategies, barriers that are built on a deep fear of being hurt. ... But fortunately for us, the soft spot—our innate ability to love and to care about things—is like a crack in these walls we erect. It’s a natural opening in the barriers we create when we’re afraid. With practice we can learn to find this opening. We can learn to seize that vulnerable moment—love, gratitude, loneliness, embarrassment, inadequacy—to awaken bodhichitta."

Today I ask you again to access your intuitive mind - your connection to God, or the Inner Guide - and open a door to bodhichitta.

• Set the mood: Light a pink candle and dim the lights. If you want, you can turn on some favorite instrumental music very softly.
  

Recap of 4 Weeks and Sample Calendar

You have been getting your ducks in a row for one month now, and it's time for a recap and re-group before we launch into Part Two.

In week one, you created a Base Map of your possible life path that you can carry in your back pocket. You figured out your core values, the compass that shows you the direction to proceed down your path, and your priorities, that give your days focus and help you to decide how to best spend your time.

In week two, you learned how to discern and plan for one month at a time - how to take the Big Picture Base Map you developed and plot it out into manageable chunks, by choosing your top action goals, organizing your goals into a priorities grid, and scheduling your weekly priorities.

In week three, you learned how to make a pledge for action by setting intentions for your core values and for your top priorities. When you are intentional with your actions, you choose your path on purpose.

In week four, you planned ways to give full effort for your priorities, a mental discipline that requires attention, a spark of energy, and balance.

The ideas and techniques you've covered this month are only half of the picture. A calendar for this might look like:

Day 7: Review, and Plan

Take a few minutes to review your fourth week. Write about your accomplishments and what you need to work on. Did you:

• Set intentions for the week: List the strongest, most compelling reasons you want to do your next week's priorities, and list challenges?

• Create an intention ritual or habit that will remind you, every day, of what your intentions are?

• Practice remembering your intentions throughout the day, every day?

• Make a plan for how you will lean in and spark full and energetic effort day-by-day, for your priorities, and practice this plan?

• Set yourself some targets for acting on your priorities "regularly"?

• Practice being flexible but discerning during the day and touching in with your Inner Guide?

• Begin to recognize your successes at the end of each day and acknowledge that you had a day that was meaningful and satisfying?

• Evaluate and record how well-satisfied you are with your "ducks in a row"?

• Identify "low-status" priorities and values, and create a beautiful reminder of why you want each of these in your life that will help you to give them the equal status that they deserve?

Day 5: Keep in Balance

The third step towards giving full effort for your priorities is balance. I'm not talking about "Work-Life balance" (as if work is not a part of life!); this is about feeling fulfilled and satisfied with your life, having a good mix of work and play, effort and rest, and steadily accomplishing the things that give your life a sense of purpose. 

Balance has two parts- 

-You want to give regular attention to each of your priorities each week, and not create any "low-status" priorities.

-And you want to hold your intentions lightly in the complexity of life. If you are driven to complete everything on your list at all costs, you may miss an opportunity to open your heart, or to grow, or find peace within.

Remember that your vision, mission, values, beliefs, and principles are your compass, and how you want to proceed down your path. I'm talking now about finding the kind of balance where what you are doing leads where the compass is pointing, and you feel relaxed and unstressed as you travel that path. You create this kind of balance with good planning, by remembering your intentions, and also by being flexible but discerning when life offers you choices. 

For example, even though I might start the day with reasonable expectations to do x-y-z, when my daughter calls to ask if she can drop the baby off for a couple of hours I (of course) say "YES!" My family is a priority, and some other priorities can wait for another day.

Or perhaps I just don't have any energy. I decide to take a bath and a nap, and don't wake up until 4 p.m.! I obviously needed to take care of myself - my health is a priority. Such is life. I'm not going to waste energy feeling disappointed with myself.

Balance and Full Effort can seem to be counter-intuitive... How can you sustain personal motivation and determination, and also be flexible and hold your intentions lightly? How can you maintain full effort while also leaving yourself such a large loophole?

Day 2: Create an Intention Ritual

The first step to full effort is attention: You remember your intentions - what it is you want to do and your deepest reasons why - and also notice your emotions, energy, challenges, etc. 

You have already defined and set some intentions for the week. Now you will design a ritual or habit that will remind you, every day, of what your intentions are. You will review your top priorities for the day (most) every morning or evening; it might take 5-10 minutes. (This is an extra 5-10 minutes, above the 20-30 you have reserved for the exercises in this book.)

My preference is to review my intentions in the morning; that's when my head is clear and I am most creative. But the evening has the advantage of allowing you to sleep on your intentions. Whichever you choose, set a reminder for the same time every day so that this habit becomes routine.

Make your intention review into a little ceremony that will become a soothing routine. Here are some ideas - choose those that suit you:

• Get your morning coffee or evening tea and your journal and sit in your favorite chair. Light a candle.

Week 4: Give Full Effort + Day 1: Journal & Set Intentions

Now that you see your priorities clearly and have begun to set intentions, you just need to act on them... But how do you find the inspiration to do that with persistence and vigor, day in and day out?

Full effort (sometimes called exertion) is one of the steps of mental discipline on Buddha’s eightfold path. Buddha urged full effort for awakening the mind, and meditation is the essential practice towards that end.

I'm not going to teach you meditation, though that is a worthy pursuit. Instead, you will practice being mindful as you go about your days, giving attention to your choices in the moment, and aiming for full effort on your priorities. 

Full effort requires:

Attention: You remember your intentions - what it is you want to do and your deepest reasons why - and also notice your emotions, energy, challenges, etc.

A spark of energy and determination: You connect to your excitement for life, and sustain it long enough to accomplish your priorities.

Balance: You hold your intentions lightly in the complexity of life. If you are driven to complete everything on your list at all costs, you may miss an opportunity to grow, to open your heart, to find peace within.

The big question to ask is "How do I find the inspiration that will spark full effort for my priorities, every day, over and over?"

The Full Effort Habit has several parts, which we will take one day at a time. 

A note about wasting time

I am so good at wasting time! By "wasting" I mean playing solitaire, doing a crossword, taking a long bath, reading a mystery novel, listening to music, or watching the ducks swim in their pond.

Day 7: Review, and Plan One Week

Take a few minutes to review your second week. Look through your journal. Write about your accomplishments and what you still need to work on. Did you:

• Brainstorm goals, dreams, and exciting ideas for the next month of your life, and write about what your best month would look like?

• Choose goals, activities, and ideas - at least one for each priority, and no more than about 20, total - that you can do this next month to move you in the direction of your most important reasons for living?

• Start a separate Inspiration Page for any goals and ideas that simply don't fit into this season of your year, or your life?

• Go on a vision walk to access your deeper, intuitive mind - your inner guide - and look at your month from the mountain top?

• Pick a theme word or phrase to describe your month ahead and distill it down to its essence?

• Make a Month Map, arranging your goals in an order that helps you picture your month ahead as a whole? (optional)

• Organize your next month goals into a priority grid, outlining your long term, complex, task-driven projects into small chunks?

Day 3: Month Theme Vision Walk

Now that you have some ideas about your priorities for the month, let's try to access your deeper, intuitive mind again with another vision walk. This week you will get a glimpse of what you are moving towards, an image of the near future that will help you to see the possibilities.

Visualization is a scientifically proven technique for performance improvement, based on the idea that "seeing is believing". It also helps with relaxation and self-confidence. It works because brain neurons interpret imagery as equivalent to reality. Visualization creates new neural pathways, just like a memory or a learned behavior.

Prepare by setting out your journal, and your list of month priority goals. Begin by putting yourself in a relaxed, trance-like state. Seek a leading of the spirit with an open mind and heart:

• Set the mood: Light a candle and dim the lights, and let's try this with silence this time.

• Craft a clear intention: Say something like, "Today I call on the Spirit of Love to bring me clarity and open my eyes to the possibilities of this next month."

• Relax, breathe, walk or float: With each breath, allow your awareness to deepen and become softer. No stress. No rush. Walk or float in an imaginary void (or you might feel the need to stand and walk around your actual space).

• Go through a door: When you feel ready, see yourself moving through a doorway or opening into another space. This time you are moving onto a mountain top - a sun-drenched ridge above the tree line. Find a safe spot to sit, with your back against a warm rock, and take in the view.

• 

  View from South Sister - Photo by Carrie Mack

Day 7: Review, and Start a Map Book

Take a few minutes to review your first week. Look through your journal. Write about your accomplishments and what you still need to work on. Did you:

-- Brainstorm some lists of goals, dreams, and exciting ideas for your future, and write about your most important reasons for living, and what your best life would look like?

--Go on a vision walk to access your deeper, intuitive mind- your inner guide?

--Write a letter from your future self?

--Discern your top 10 (or fewer) core values and principles that describe the vision of who you are and how you want to proceed down your path?

--Discern your top 4 to 8 priorities that seem most important and feel most meaningful to you in your life right now, that will give your days focus and help you to decide how to best spend your time?

--Map out the relationship between your core values and your top priorities to help clarify connections and renew your sense of purpose?

Start a Map Book

Your Map Book is a place to collect your various maps and plans and creative visions as you work through this book. (I use a 3-ring binder.)

• Today, punch holes in your Base Map and put it into your empty Map Book. If your map is too large, fold it!

Summary

Day 6: Create a Base Map

Today you will make a map of your life at this point in time - a chart of the relationship between your core values and principles and your top priorities - to help clarify connections and renew your sense of purpose. Your Base Map is a "mind map", which is a combination of words and diagrams that engages your whole brain in a creative way. 

As with many exercises like this, the process is more important than the end result, so take your time. Start with a messy rough draft to get out all your ideas with no concern for how it looks, and refine it later if you want:

• Get a largish piece of paper and a pencil. 

• Start in the center: Draw a symbol for yourself, or write out ME. 

• Begin to add your core values and principles around the central shape. Add them one at a time in a way that seems natural and right: You can make them equal or rank them; group them according to type or significance; connect them to each other or only to the center; add clarifying words. If anything doesn't seem to fit, put it off to the side with a question. 

Day 3: Write About a Rosy Future

Yesterday you went into a trance to access your Inner Guide. Another way to listen to your Inner Guide is to use your imagination; let yourself get carried away into your perfect future, a utopia - where the world is safe, the earth is thriving, and you are happy and healthy.

In your imagination, you can create a future that is positive and perfect, but you will need to suspend your pessimism about the human race. For this exercise, you will need to imagine a world where the best of humanity has won out over the worst.

Also, you will need to accept that you are capable of anything you put your mind to. Set aside all limitations and imagine yourself accomplishing your biggest dreams.

Take out your journal and pen, put on some imaginary rose-colored glasses, and fast forward your life - Choose a year 5 or 10 in the future:

Day 2: Go on a Vision Walk

Yesterday you wrote out your conscious, top-of -the-mind ideas about where you would like to go in your life; now take another pass at it. This time, access your deeper, intuitive mind - your connection to God, or the Inner Guide.

It's hard for most of us to set aside thinking and doing. We are busy people, involved in what's going on and getting important things done. And rationality is the flavor of the day... but we all use intuition or inner knowing, too, whether we acknowledge it or not. Some of us experience it in the gut, as butterflies, or tingling on the back of the neck, or as a flash that takes the breath away. Or it can be a guiding voice, or light.

Today you will practice opening to this guide intentionally, by putting yourself into a relaxed, trance-like state, and seeking a leading of the spirit with an open mind and heart.

• Set the mood: Light a candle and dim the lights. Turn on some favorite instrumental music very softly - Native American flute, or Shamanic drumming - anything that will help to tune out your rational mind (I usually use a YouTube video such as Project For Gaia - shamanic trance journey (15 mins), or Native American Flute Music.

• 
  Craft a clear intention: