Lately I have been thinking back to New Year’s Eve last year.
It was a rainy evening so our plan to watch the fireworks on the beach didn’t happen
so my Husband and I took our bottle of tequila and went back to our hotel. When
the rain died down we went outside and watched the fireworks from the little
garden area downstairs. I remember the next door neighbours were having a huge
party with the loudest music ever, so he and I danced to the music, drank tequila
and behaved like teenagers. I had this overwhelming feeling then that there were
big things to come in 2012 and I turned to him and said that this year is going
to be my year. But as this year went by I thought I could not have been more
wrong in saying that. But here I am realising that this year has in fact been
my year, just not in the way I thought. And although it was one of the most
difficult years I have ever experienced, it has been my year for transformation
and for the beginning of a wonderful new journey.
I have always had a burning desire to create awareness and
inspire people to do things differently, but I was never really sure how to do
this, until I realised that it was through my own journey that this could be
achieved.
So I decided to write about what self-awareness means to me because that's really what all of this about.
I have used the word consciousness quite a bit in my entries
and I wanted to explore it more. The term consciousness is used by many Spiritual
Teachers and there are so many different meanings to this word and it means
something different for everyone, but for me consciousness means
self-awareness.
In my experience, self- awareness is becoming aware of
everything that we are with our light side as well as our dark side. It’s about
understanding what triggers us and what drives us to enter into certain
behaviours and really understanding our own dysfunctions without judging ourselves.
It’s being able to face up to our past, understanding where we come from and
how this has influenced who we are today. It’s about acknowledging that any
issues that come up are a part of life, but that they need to be looked at and
not brushed off.
It’s about taking responsibility for everything that we are
and for all our actions. So for example if we have an issue with someone else,
perhaps we could first look to see if this issue is with them or if it is
actually our issue that we have not yet owned up to and need to work on. I have
personally found this very empowering because then we no longer have to be
victims to other people and we can stop blaming. I know for myself that when I
am suddenly angered by what someone has said to me it’s because most of the
time it’s true and this is often a difficult pill to swallow.
But when we do take responsibility for ourselves it has a
ripple effect and those around us begin to do the same. Everything starts with
us, so if we wait for others to do it we will die waiting. We need to be the
person that we wish the other would be.
Self -awareness is about being true to ourselves in every
situation no matter what, even if other people don’t like it. It’s ok to choose
you.
It’s about just being
human because human beings are not perfect and striving for any kind of
perfection is going against who we truly are. I love the truth of the phrase, ‘’we
are perfectly imperfect’’. I know from
experience that constantly wanting life to go perfectly manifests the exact
opposite, maybe to teach me that this is not how things work.
It’s about listening to our bodies because the body speaks
volumes but we often ignore the signs until things get really bad. Our bodies
tell us when it’s time to relax or if there is something we need that we are
not giving ourselves. And also knowing that we don’t always have to be doing
something, we don’t have to try so hard and we can also learn to just be.
It’s also about listening
to our inner voice, but if we find that it’s not there, it’s because we are not
listening hard enough. Our inner voice has the answers to all our questions,
even if the answer is that right now, there is no answer.
It’s about ditching the “people pleaser” in us because the
truth is, people don’t like us any more or any less when we try to please them,
they just land up depending on us to keep up the charade and it lands up taking
a tole on us. People don’t acknowledge us when we are desperate for
acknowledgement, but as soon as we acknowledge ourselves others start to do the
same, it’s a natural process.
Self-awareness is about respecting our emotions without
judgement because our emotions are our truth. For example, our anxiety and worry
tells us that there are certain thoughts that are no longer serving us and that
we are trying to control that which we have no control over. Our sadness tells
us that there are things we need to still work through and our joy tells us
that we are now living in the moment.
And through everything, we need to remember to be gentle
with ourselves because any transformation in life is a process and every change
that we want to happen in our lives doesn’t happen over- night. Self- love is
unfortunately one of the hardest things for us to implement but it’s important
to remember that it’s in our most trying times that we need to be the kindest
to ourselves.
It’s about no longer being ashamed of wanting more from life
or wanting a meaningful life. No one ever told me this so I am saying it now;
we are allowed to have it all, we are allowed to have everything we have ever
dreamt of, but also realising that things do take work. Not physical work but
work on ourselves and getting rid of all the baggage that is in the way of us
getting what we want. Getting rid of all the negative thoughts that we let fill
our heads telling us that we are not good enough or not deserving of greatness.
And then trust; trust in God, in the Universe or whatever it
is that we believe in. Even if it’s just trust in ourselves that everything
that is happening now is exactly how it should be and that if we resist that which
is, we land up being in a constant battle with life. Even though sometimes it
doesn’t feel like it, life always works in our favour not against us and there
is always a bigger picture as to why things happen the way they do. I believe that even if we don’t see it straight
away we eventually do.
Self-awareness is also about surrendering to the fact that
we cannot make sense of everything and that some things are meant to be a
mystery. And we need to give life that respect.
It’s about knowing what we have control over and knowing
what we don’t. We don’t have control over others and their behaviour; we don’t
have control over events, or time, but we do have control over ourselves and
every day we can choose how we are going to behave and react in any situation.
We choose what we are going to tell ourselves and what we are going to believe
to be true.
Change is the only constant thing in life and we have to surrender
to the fact that when it’s occurring, it’s because it needs to. I believe that
life is constantly showing us how to move through the difficulties and move
forward to bigger and better things and the trick is to face up to ourselves in
the difficult moments because those are the opportunities that we need to grab
with both hands. Life is always giving us the opportunity to come back to our
authentic selves without the masks and defences and it’s up to us if we are
going to accept the challenge.
We need to be ok with the fact that there are times when we
just can’t be strong. There are times when we doubt everything and wonder what
the hell this life is. There are times when we feel really alone no matter
whose around and there are times when we want to give up on it all. In my
experience it’s through these times that I personally began to find myself. It
wasn’t through the happy times.
I don’t think the aim of life is to be happy; it’s about
being ok with the fact that it’s not always going to be.
Self-awareness is also about love. Although it doesn’t seem like it, it’s
actually harder to be angry or carry resentment towards others and all it does
is takes up all of our energy. When we operate from love and understanding it makes
no space for anything else and we can feel at peace.
And lastly self-awareness is about being open to knowing
that what we know and believe to be true in our lives may not actually be and
so to be open to new ways of being, new experiences and new ways of thinking.
For me right now, I know that I am in fact just at the
beginning of this journey and there is an excitement within me that knows that
there is still so much more to come.
Here is to the New Year and embracing all that is to come
for all of us.
Love and blessings
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