Day 5: Open the Door

At the start of this second section I asked you to center your living in love. Our main purpose on earth is to grow in love; our world needs more love. With more love, we could do away with war- we would have no prejudice, oppression, or violence of any kind. Everyone would have enough food because we would feed each other. We would care for the environment because we love our planet, and the animals, and our children too much to harm it.

How, then, do we create more love in the world? We simply need to open our hearts wide as often as we can, wider and wider, calmly throw open the door to love. 

If you have a leading to act in love, and you have gone through all the stages of discernment, you might be clear on your next steps. That's where we are often stuck, though - we might hear the Truth, but still have doubts about its absoluteness; we might hear the Truth and see our path forward but struggle against apathy, or mind-numbing fear.

Ed Bacon says, “But however Truth comes, it bears with it just enough of its own sense of rightness to overcome the fear of risk taking. While genuine risk plays a crucial role in all of the Habits of Love, it is perhaps most keen in the Habit of Truth. At too many forks in the road, anxiety stops us from following Truth's suggested direction. What will happen if I say yes to Truth as I recognize it? That question can arrest us in our tracks."

Whatever your biggest mission is now - personal growth, healing, service, relationship revival, activism, or something else - you need to find the strength to open the door. This is your growing edge: To accept that you will be carried beyond yourself; to accept that you will find the strength and creativity to take the risk, walk your path, and speak your message out loud. 

Today you will draw on your organizational skills from the first part of this book to open the door to transformational love. 

• Map out your mission: On a plain piece of paper, start a Mini-Map with this priority mission in the center. Looking at your Base Map, follow the connecting lines to all the values (and other priorities) that relate to this one priority, and add them to the Mini-Map. Have a little chat with yourself in your journal, or just make a list of the values (and other priorities) that lead you to action for your mission.

• Set an intention for your mission using the action + deepest reason model.

• Make a backwards calendar: Brainstorm a list of all the supplies, information, people, skills, and steps you need to take to complete your mission. Group all the tasks into chunks. Organize chunks into the order they need to happen. Plug your chunks of action into the weeks of this month on your priorities grid.

• Make a full effort plan for how you will lean in and spark full and energetic effort day-by-day, for your mission: Brainstorm a list of the things that have worked to motivate you in the past and form your Full Effort Practices into simple steps.

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?

Day 6: Create Inner Synergy

Stephen Covey says "Fulfilling the four needs [spiritual, mental, physical, social] in an integrated way is like combining elements in chemistry. When we reach a "critical mass" of integration, we experience spontaneous combustion-- an explosion of inner synergy that ignites the fire within and gives vision, passion, and a spirit of adventure to life." 

"Inner synergy" is when your body, mind, spirit, and heart are all cooperating to produce a combined effect greater than the sum of their separate effects. I love the image of "an explosion of inner synergy", and I've experienced that passion, but I wondered if it was possible to harness that energy when I want it and need it. 

Can we create inner synergy purposefully and on demand? Can you build it intentionally, for a particular project, in order to infuse that project with vision and passion, and engage with full effort?

I thought it was possible and designed an experimental plan, which I've been testing for a few years now to good effect. Give it a try, over the next few days:

• Choose a high priority project, that connects to your values and principles, something you want to do soon; something challenging but within your abilities.

• Each step below has multiple ways to engage. You can take as much or as little time with the steps as you like - you might want to stretch it out over a few days, repeating each step a few times in different ways, building a little more energy each time. Or you can speed shift through the steps, and explode into action today!

Week 6: Love Thyself + Day 1: Journal & Set Intentions

When Buddhists practice loving-kindness they begin with a self-love practice called maitri, because when you learn to act loving towards yourself it’s easier to act loving towards others. 

Maitri is an honest and direct friendship with yourself: You pay attention to yourself the way you would a good friend, with curiosity, compassion, and gentleness. You get to know and understand yourself, and accept yourself as you are. I'm not talking about narcissism or self-indulgence - maitri requires some amount of tough love. You need to be honest about your faults and attachments, be present with all your emotions and fears, and be committed to "growing up". You just keep making progress, with dedication, patience, humor, and no judgement.

The self-love habit has two parts: The first part is building love skills, such as equanimity and generosity, with and for yourself. If you, for example, learn to resist unkind mental talk towards yourself or practice patience with your own mistakes, it's easier to remember to do the same for others. And self-love leads to self-respect and a deep inner peace: You learn to trust your instincts and rest comfortably within the sanctuary of your being. 

The second part is what Stephen Covey calls “filling the well”- that steady nurturance of your body, mind, and spirit that makes you wiser, healthier, and more resilient. In order to live a life in balance, you must take the necessary time to renew yourself with relaxation, exercise, a little study, contemplation, laughter, or any number of other activities you choose to refresh yourself with. 

This week you will begin the work of being a true friend to yourself so that you may become a better friend to others. 

A note about keeping a sabbath

In the best world, everyone would have one whole day each week to spend as we want; to stay in bed, read a good book, take a slow walk or do a crossword; one whole day to do no work, run no errands, send no emails, and clean no toilets! And why don't we? Mostly because we don't make it a priority.

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 6: Brainstorm Equanimity

Equanimity is another essential love habit - the ability to maintain an even-temper, patience, and grounded-ness in the midst of the chaos of life and the perplexing behavior of others.

Equanimity is an expression of love: It’s the serenity we exhibit when we have to wait, and also the kindness we show to those “difficult people” who don’t listen to reason, who interrupt, who are overly sensitive, or who are so annoying. Equanimity allows us to let go of frustration and irritation, and treat those people with skill and gentleness. It allows us to counter disrespect and contempt with compassion, and to remember that human needs are not always logical, but are always more important than our schedule.

Equanimity is a habit that requires love and self-control; it requires that you cut people slack and allow them to be imperfect; that you relax and let go of time anxiety; and that you acknowledge your impatience and irritation but don't act on them. It's powerful; it opens hearts. People feel liberated when you let them know that you are unruffled and in no hurry. Your patience is a gift to them, and will allow them to heal and grow.

And it's not only useful with in-the-moment situations, but also for grounded-ness in the face of world upheaval and fears about the future. Life is a rainbow of chaos, and equanimity is a super-power that will get you through.

One practice I have used to internalize equanimity, is what I call my "Zen Pause". I practice it when I am calm so that I will be able (perhaps) to use it in times of stress. Stand up right now and try this:

Day 5: Brainstorm Generosity

The work this week is to define and set intentions for cultivating the habits of love, at your own growing edge.  Today we will give attention to generosity, the habit of being open-hearted and open-handed with any undertaking that involves a commitment of time, effort, and/or money.

When we are generous, we share what we have freely - money, food, help, or time- without expectation of reward or return. We put full effort into looking after people. We are open-minded, give people the benefit of the doubt, and grant them our attention and life force. We are of service to the world.

Generosity begins in your heart. It requires extravagant love and alertness to other’s needs. It also requires courage, in order to step outside of your comfort zone and be generous to all kinds of people. Consider your growing edge with respect to generosity: How can you increase the flow of blessings in the world? You might need to push past feelings of reluctance and fear to a place where generosity is spontaneous and fun. Or you might need to get creative with generous acts that fit into your schedule.

(Please note that generosity is not a habit that has come easy for me! I am not by nature an openhanded or open-minded person; I like to hold onto my marbles, and I don't "suffer fools", as they say. But I've worked at this habit for a long, long time, and can attest to it being learnable.)

Take out your Love Journal:

Day 4: Plan to Create New Community

Your community includes every single person you know or meet: Your family, friends, neighbors, co-workers, acquaintances, shopkeepers, and the people you pass on the streets. Your community might also include people you talk with online. 

Community is inclusive and often accidental, and you need this kind of diversity in your community to fuel the most growth in your life. You will be gifted by many chance encounters with people who will propel you towards excellence. 

However, you can also intentionally and strategically create new community that meets your currant needs, gathering in the friendships that help you to grow into a better person. 

For example, two years ago, when I had a clear but undefined impulse to become more active for social justice, I went to a variety of events and committee meetings until I found the two action groups I wanted to join. I based my choice on the people I liked best, and consequently, made friends who are now essential to my life and priorities.

Maybe you want to find someone to talk to or walk with, or a neighbor who can help you with yard work, or an online study group... the options for community are endless (even in a pandemic).

Take out your Love Journal:

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 6: Evaluate, and Make a Poster

Yesterday I said that when situations shift your plans, it's often best to be flexible. On the other hand, if situations are constantly moving you away from your priorities it's time to examine both your priorities and your situations! If, at the end of the week, you feel dissatisfied and out of balance, make a note about why that is. Also, make a note of which of your priorities are getting left out of your life. 

Unfortunately, not all of our priorities share equal status. For some reason, some of the actions that we hold very high in priority just don't get the attention they need. I call these my "low-status (oxymoronic) priorities"; exercise usually fits into that category for me, and sometimes (unfortunately) artwork - for some reason, when flexibility is required, it's my health and creative priorities that suffer.

The same goes for your values and principles, because if you aren't letting them guide your path you cannot feel satisfied. (We will look at this more closely next month).

Choose one day each week to evaluate and record how well-satisfied you are with your "ducks in a row". If things continue to be out of balance over a few weeks, you need to regroup: 

-Maybe you need to lower your expectations for a while because you are running on low energy. 

-Or maybe you need to sideline a committee that is draining too much of your time. 

-Or maybe you can initiate a Home Focus Day to catch up on housework, or a Family Focus Day to give attention to your family.

Today, look again at your list of priorities, and ask yourself which do you spend the least time on, and typically don't really treat like priorities in your life? Also, look at your values and principles and do the same evaluation. 

Create an eye-catching poster that captures why you value each of your low-status priorities and values, and will help you to remember 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 4: Lean In with Eagerness

Urgency of Now banner

The second step towards giving full effort for your priorities is leaning in with eagerness. You must create a spark of energy, connect to your excitement for life, and sustain it long enough to accomplish the important things.

If you are remembering your priorities throughout the day, you are probably already building energy. When the time comes to act on one of your priorities - to write your book, or exercise, or paint a banner - you will want to block out distractions, focus your full attention on this one undertaking, and lean in to it with excitement and curiosity. You need to tap in to your personal motivation and determination.

If you feel resistance ("I'm just not in the mood"), or hit a snag ("I can't find the exercise mat"), try to breathe through it, stay with it, and remind yourself of your deepest reasons. Lean in to the discomfort or complexity of the moment- put your shoulder to it. You need persistence and tenacity.

Personal motivation is complex; it's shaped by our internal will but also influenced by our history, and by the expectations and prejudices of those around us. In order to successfully break free of a pattern of weak or incomplete effort, use the notion of "leaning in" as a body-mind-heart training. 

Try it right now - Stand up, picture an intention you have for today, and: 

Day 3: Remember Your Intentions

Your daily intention review ritual is valuable, but you still need to hold your intentions with gentle awareness all day long. Picture each intention as a gem you are carrying in a safe place - your pocket, or your heart: Take each one out to look at several times a day, then carefully put it back. Remembering your intentions throughout the day is a mindfulness practice, and it will create energy and excitement for your priorities.

Take care to hold your intentions gently, not obsessively. If you begin to worry about whether or not you will complete your intentions, or think about them in an aggressive way, back off a little. Even though you fully intend to take these actions, life might shift under your feet; and it is not anyone's intention to feel anxiety or self-loathing - or to be resentful of your loved ones for thwarting you. 

Here are a few ways that might help you to remember your intentions. Choose the ones that interest you, and try them out this week:

• Turn your top intentions for the day into a short, catchy mantra to repeat throughout the day: "Write a chapter; Sew a bunny; Visit a friend".

• Take your intentions for a walk and speak them out loud to the trees.

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

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

• Brainstorm some exciting new ideas, new paths and approaches for this week's priorities?

• Write about the strongest, most compelling reasons you want to do them, and list possible challenges?

• Practice setting daily intentions using the action + deepest reason model?

• Identify essential intentions for some of your core values and principles, that captures the possibility of daily right action and will be useful in any situation that arises in daily life?

• Map out one of your top priorities to discern all the connections to your values and principles, and (possibly) write an intention or a series of intentions for that priority that speaks to your core values, and reminds you of your deepest, most essential, most passionate reasons for living?

• Set intentions for one or two tasks, activities, or ideas listed on your Priority Grid for your coming week, honing in on the deepest, most essential, most passionate reasons for doing these tasks?

Summary

Day 6: Set Intentions for the Week

I hope that, this week, you have experienced how setting intentions can touch you at a deep place, and bring clarity, inspiration, and motivation to your everyday activities.

Today you will look at one or two of your tasks, activities, or ideas on your Priority Grid for next week and write intentions for those. Hopefully, the other "umbrella" intentions you have worked on - for your values and principles, and for your top priorities - will help you to hone in on the deepest, most essential, most passionate reasons for doing these tasks.

• Focus in on one goal, activity, or idea that you listed this month on your Priority Grid. (I chose to focus on my priority task of painting the windows outside my studio.)

• Have a chat with yourself about this task: Ask yourself, why is this a priority now? Do I feeling motivated or blocked, and why? What are the essential values underlying this task, and who will it ultimately serve? Try to find the words that grab you at the deepest level.

Day 5: Map Out Priority Intentions

Besides the values you listed in Week One, you also listed your top 4 - 8 priorities for daily action - the activities, good deeds, responsibilities, people, and disciplines that matter most to you right now. Today you will use the essential intentions you wrote yesterday as inspiration to make a Mini-Map for just one of your priorities, and a list of ideas that will help you to write intentions for that priority.

• Get out your Base Map, and locate one priority that connects to a value that you defined and wrote an intention for yesterday. (I chose Home, which connects to my value of Simplicity.)

• 
  On a plain piece of paper, start a Mini-Map with this one priority in the center.

• Looking at your Base Map, follow the connecting lines to all the other values (and other priorities) that relate to this one priority, and add them to the Mini-Map.

• Have a little chat with yourself in your journal, or just make a list of the values (and other priorities) that lead you to action for this one priority. My list looks like this:

Home:

1.     Simplicity - lifestyle, simple and ecological.

2.     Earthcare - grow food, forge a connection to the earth.

3.     Love - Friends and Family - create safe, calm sanctuary.

4.     Integrity - maintain my property with honor

• If you can manage it, write an intention, or a series of intentions, for this one priority that speaks to your core values, and reminds you of your deepest, most essential, most passionate reasons for living. Or, if that's too complicated, write an intention for ONE ASPECT of your priority. Write your intentions in present tense, using the action + deepest reason model. Example:

"I intend to care for my home and my little piece of earth with integrity, maintaining my property with honor, and creating a home that is a peaceful and well-ordered sanctuary for those I love.

I intend to grow plenty of food for ourselves and to share, because home-grown food is a blessing for my family and a balm to the planet, and working the soil keeps me connected.

I intend to manage my home with simplicity, using only my share of the earth’s resources, because each person and being in the world, and future generations, and the earth itself, deserves to live with basic needs met."

• Extra effort: Over the next weeks and months, write intentions for each of your top priorities. Take it slow. If you want, you can print these out and put them into your Map Book.

Next Week Schedule, Step 1: 

Thursday- Adjust your Priority Grid for the month: Check off what you have completed, add new items you have thought of, and move anything down lower that no longer fits.