Keeping the important things truly important.

I got an email from Brasil (spelt with an ’s’ of course) the other day.

I’m impressed about that, and I’m probably showing off by mentioning that the writer is from Brasil. It might appear that I'm attempting to impress upon you that I’m very international, but I am telling you of this, fundamentally, because the writer asked a very cool question.

On the back of the blog of the other day about non-seriousness, what do you do when you are in a serious situation, like when you are fighting an injustice or saving lives (not from death, but from less than optimal conditions)? Which she is - she’s not just posing a hypothetical “what if?”

How do you take action but not be affected by these very serious, very real things?

Well, it depends what the bottom line is for you.

The core of any solution will be the thing that is most important to you.

Do you know what that is for you?

At the end of your life, when you look back, what do you wish your life to be filled with?

Chances are that most important thing is something like peace and happiness and love.

If that is the case, then no matter what you do - in everything you do - have your priority as peace and happiness and love.

It doesn't mean don't take action, but don't lose sight of what is the most important thing. Otherwise you lose everything.

Don’t lose yourself in the circumstances of life, even when the circumstances of life appear important, crucial even.

The true test of a lady or a gentleman of the highest standing is their ability to hold the important things truly important, and not let seemingly urgent things take precedence instead.

To do so, it can help to treat life like a game.

Play to win, but know it is a game. Seriousness only comes in when you could win or lose. Play well and play fully, but the fact is that in the great game of life the only time you lose is when you forget your connection with what is truly of the highest importance to you.

And so keep peace and happiness and love as a priority in all things, have a smile and a light heart, and see what happens from there.

The right course of action always reveals itself from this foundation.

It's mastery in action so don't worry if you forget. You will get better at remembering. The only thing that is truly important is that you remember in this moment.

________________

By now you probably heard that I’m having a meditation weekend here in Richmond, North Yorkshire.

I’m excited about it, I love sharing this stuff. To be able to teach the Bright Path Ishayas’ Ascension over a whole weekend is even better. A privilege.

You see the techniques are so simple, yet so powerful. The truth always is. If it’s not simple, it simply isn’t the truth. I would like to claim that quote but a much wiser colleague of mine got there first.

But these techniques have given me so much, and continue to do so, that to be able to teach them to others is a supreme joy.

If you want to live the best possible life, I recommend booking on the weekend. You won’t look back.

20-22 November 2015 - Friday 7-10pm, Saturday and Sunday 10am - 5pm.

It’s closer than you think too - by fast train 2.5 hours from London and 2 hours from Edinburgh, and then a little drive out to the venue.

And you can come stay if you want (necessary I would have thought if you live down south or up further north) meaning your bed is 30 seconds from the course. Awesome. Roll out of bed, coffee/tea and then the day begins.

For more details click here, or email me, I’d love to chat.

Taking nothing seriously - the most important thing you can do.

The one single biggest thing you can do to have a better life?

Take nothing seriously.

It's such an old Ishaya principle, it's almost a motto.

But it is such an uncommon skill amongst humanity it's worth repeating, frequently.

Taking nothing seriously is crucial to the full enjoyment of life. Obviously. As the joke goes, none of us are getting out of here alive, so why not fully enjoy it?

But it’s also not just being a goof.

When you have a sense of lightness it automatically means you have things in perspective. Perspective means you have clarity, it means you aren’t getting sucked into the thing.

You can then be fluid, adjust easily, be wide open to different ideas. You can make the most of what actually is happening rather than trying to stick with some plan of what “should be” happening.

When you take things seriously it’s the spark that invites a fight.

Instead of laughing and letting it slide, the resistance builds and the fight blows up - unless you back down.

But when you don’t play the game, you are removed from the game. Job done. There is no struggle, ever.

So don’t even invite a fight, just take nothing seriously. Stop playing the game.

Keep what is most important to you as a priority. And that isn’t being right, it’s being happy.

I imagine. Unless being right is more important to you than your mental, emotional and physical health and wellbeing, in which case go ahead and try and be right.

Take nothing seriously. Be aware - learn to laugh at everything, most crucially yourself. If you are able to do that you'll have a source of entertainment forever.

The wisdom of choosing to be happy.

"Oh, I don't really think about that, because it's wasted energy, isn't it? What's done is done, we can't change that, but we can change the way we cope with it."

- Diane Piper, mother of Katie whose face was burnt in an acid attack, when asked how she felt about the attackers

Everyone has challenges. Everyone has troubles in their life.

But what amazes and inspires me is seeing people who have lived or are living through horrific things and yet who shine, full of gratitude and love for their life, as it is.

You might call them “glass half full” people.

Then there are those with comparatively event free lives who grumble and complain through every little inconvenience: “Glass half empty” people.

Why is that?

You constantly choose your response to life.

This choice defines how you live, regardless of the circumstances you find yourself in. This choice is total: You decide whether you live in peace or in suffering. No one and nothing can cause you to suffer; you decide to suffer.

I know it doesn’t feel like this. No one wants to suffer, everyone is looking for a way to avoid it. The trouble is we don’t know how.

Furthermore, suffering has become normal, it’s almost expected as “part of life”.

Being constantly happy is viewed with suspicion by some. If you decide not to suffer it’s almost like you’re not being “real”, whatever that is.

Once, a friend of mine who realised it was her choice to be totally at peace with the world was taken aside by a acquaintance in the street and asked if she was on drugs.

Bizarre isn't it? Happy lady, walking down the street = must be on drugs.

But definitely those, like Buddha and Jesus, who have transcended suffering are elevated to a mythical status, beyond humanity.

Actually, it’s your human birthright not to suffer.

Your birthright is to have absolute sovereignty over your responses to life. Complete freedom from suffering is simple.

It all begins with you deciding to take responsibility for how you feel, how you react to life.

Don’t take this decision lightly - it means you can never blame anyone else for anything. It’s all on you.

Then, decide that nothing will make you happy - you won’t delay your happiness for a future moment, you’ll find happiness right now, however your circumstances.

No longer will you wait for your partner or a new TV to make you happy. Now you’re going to choose to have happiness that is uncaused.

That is it. Take responsibility for your own happiness, and then choose it.

You will come to a point where you'll realise that to choose anything else is madness. And therein lies true wisdom.

The hidden danger of indifference

“The opposite of love isn't hate; it's indifference” - Steven Pressfield

Indifference is a very subtle beast, yet once fallen into leads a long way down a grey and winding path indeed.

Like a sleepwalker wandering deeper and deeper into the forest, life becomes lost not through deliberate choice but through not paying attention.

Its a truism that you don’t know how good you have it until its gone.

What you have to do today becomes more important than what is here, already. The lack takes our attention instead - what is missing.

This focus, continued for long enough, means life becomes one constant question: “Why?”

“Why is this happening to me?”, “why doesn’t life go the way I want it to?”, “why isn’t this working?”, “why does she have all the good luck?”.

Indifference directly leads to living life with the perspective of a victim, one long grey, whiney, blame and stress filled existence.

The solution lies not in the past or in some future time, but here, is this exact moment.

Pay attention, for what you focus on grows. Be not indifferent, or take things for granted. Base your life in the appreciation and gratitude for what you do have, right now.

Through continued nurturing and choice, the automatic - the natural - response and reaction to life becomes not one of “why?” but one of “wow”.

Richness and blessings lie solely in perspective. And now you know.

You may not be able to control the circumstances of your life, but you can control how you react to it. It’s not about the what, its all about the how.

Don’t allow life to unconsciously slip away.

Regrets? Why not make a life so you don’t have any?

I saw an article the other day - it’s from a few years back, but it’s still really fresh.

The author interviewed elderly people on their death beds as to their regrets. Although its about people who are dying, it is really advice for people who are living.

Read it here:

http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2012/feb/01/top-five-regrets-of-the-dying

It’s a quick read, but something you might want to come back to again.

What did you think?

What I see is that the basis of all those regrets is not having balance, of not seeing what is important or making time for it until it is too late.

Not surprisingly, at least to me, the list contains many of the things that the people who come to the Ishayas’ Ascension meditation classes say they want from life.

You see, the people that I meet already know what is important to them, its just that they don’t prioritise it, or they don’t know how to prioritise it.

Actually I think everyone already knows these things, we just don’t do them.

Don’t wait until its too late.

You have to live a life so that when you look back on your deathbed you are filled with joy. That you don’t have a single “I really wish…”

You deserve the fullest of lives, in every sense.

Part of that comes from an attitude of finding the good in everything, of being present and not looking back.

The other part comes from making choices that are fulfilling, of finding a way to prioritise what is really important to you.

Meditation - to me the Bright Path Ishayas' Ascension is the simplest and most powerful of all meditations (I could be biased) - is the thing that enables both. It really does. It changes your approach to life, it helps you be the very best version of yourself.

Take the time every day to stop and go within. Close your eyes, rest. Discover what is there and how when you nourish it, it nourishes you.

It is the secret to living life versus Life.

Just practice - five, ten, fifteen minutes every day. Set a time, sit and don’t come up until the time is done.

You won’t regret it.

Any questions, send them to me, I would love to help.

Your life is your choice.

I am halfway through spending three months in a retreat centre in Spain, teaching yoga and The Bright Path Ishayas’ Ascension meditation. Life is pretty darn good, as you might expect. The weather is sensational and we are surrounded by mountains and forests in which I get to run and explore on my days off.

Best of all, I get to live with all kinds of amazing people. There are some seriously cool human beings here.

One is a young fella from Norway called Thomas. Thomas is blind from birth but has the greatest attitude to life. He doesn’t let anything stop him from doing what he wants.

Try walking around your house with your eyes closed. Try doing yoga - or simply stand on one foot - with your eyes closed. Try just eating with your eyes closed.

Now imagine what it would be like to get yourself downtown and find the shop you want. Or get yourself to an airport and fly to another country where you don’t speak the language.

And everything he does, he does it all laughing, all day long.

The effect on everyone else is huge.

First of all, no one can complain about their small problems any more. Thomas and his attitude puts everything in perspective. They drop their “stuff” and just get on with life, enjoying it, squeezing this moment for what it has.

Second of all, everyone wants to help him out. He’s such a joy to be around, everyone wants to be around him.

You see, life follows a series of fairly simple rules. One of these is that what you put your attention on, grows.

If you focus on what you don’t have, on what is missing, on things that you regret then you end up complaining and in misery.

If, on the other hand, if you focus on the good, on what is great about your life, about what you do have - no matter how small - you will have an amazing time.

Since you have choice, how do you want to live?

Thomas walks into plenty of walls, but he never stops exploring, and he never stops smiling.

You, and you alone, define your life.

When you take responsibility for defining your life, you shake the world. When you refuse to be a victim to circumstance and just play your cards as you have them, you not only live a great life, you inspire everyone.

All your heroes have done nothing but the same: “I’m not waiting for someone to give me life, I'm going to take it.”

Choose to be a hero.

The way to happiness, part 2.

Happiness. Why are so many people searching for happiness? Why doesn’t it come naturally to humans? Well, it does, actually. It is your true nature to be happy. It is very easy to be continually happy when you know how. Honestly, I speak the truth as one who has experienced unhappiness, stress, times of depression, anxiety, fear, all of those things that we don’t like. If I can find constant happiness, you can.

Life does not need to be ups and downs. That is not part of being human, it doesn’t have to be part of the deal. Suffering is not necessary, I promise.

If you like that idea, then you are in the right place. Just assuming it as a simple possibility is the first step to experiencing complete happiness and contentment, in every aspect of your life.

Last blog (see here if you missed it) I talked about how people expect that people, things, possessions, careers etc., etc., will make them happy. It’s not true. Make happiness an inside job, make it about not getting but being. Happiness is an attitude. First be happy, make it a foundation, then live your life.

The second reason why you aren’t continuously happy is this:

• You don’t make it a priority.

What is the most important thing to you? If you could give your loved ones one thing, anything at all, what would you give them?

Everyone I ask this question tell me some version of happiness. When it comes down to it, happiness is the most important thing to everyone. Everyone just wants to be happy.

But they don’t prioritise it.

It is well down the list of things to do.

Their lists are full of things to get and to achieve and to do, and then, right at the bottom, last on the list, when they have time to get to it, is to be happy.

Only because we believe after I do x, y or z, then I can be happy. Work first, finish things to do, and then be happy.

Nope, doesn’t work, you never get there.

If you are interested in being happy you have to be like an Olympic athlete of happiness.

Focus.

Make happiness the core of everything you do. Make it first and the middle and last. Train to be happy. Make everything about internal happiness.

Then, and only then, it comes and gets you. You realise that you are happy for no reason at all. Nothing can give you happiness, you just choose it. Nothing can take it away either. You prefer things go a certain way, but either way you are happy.

Practice. You need to prioritise and practice. Close your eyes every day and meditate. Keep it simple and joyful. If you want it simple, and joyful then learn the Bright Path Ishayas’ Ascension. Fastest path to happiness ever. I promise.

Be happy!

Be the change...

“Be the change you wish to see in the world” - Gandhi It is a fascinating and inviolable certainty of this world:

What you give tends to be what you get.

If you are smart, and you are smart otherwise you wouldn’t be reading this, you may come to the following conclusion:

If you get what you give it would be a good idea to give what you want to receive.

It works at the most basic level: If you want more hugs, give more hugs. If you want happier people around you, be more happy. If you want more love, give more love.

But it even works at a more subtle and abstract level.

If you want more understanding, give more understanding.

If you want more honesty, be more honest.

More clarity? Be clearer.

More patience and tolerance and mutual respect? Be all of that.

It’s the coolest thing once you see it. Loving, open, happy people have a whole world that is loving and open and happy. They attract very similar people. Scared and anxious people tend to create events and people that make them scared and anxious, giving them more reason to be scared and anxious.

Now: If you find yourself pointing the finger at people and insisting that they are more x, y or z, for whatever reason, it's an excellent sign you need to look at yourself.

Be the change you wish to see in the world. That single act, bringing the focus of change to within yourself changes more than you can possibly imagine. It all starts with you.

Ever tried to actually change someone? In fact, do you realise you try and change all your loved ones? Stop, its futile. People dig their heels in deep when they feel someone is trying to change them. But they do respond to a) openness and b) change in others. It all points back to you.

But don’t take my word for it, do it. Even if you disagree, try it. Prove me (and Gandhi) wrong by putting your money where your mouth is.

Save the world starting with yourself. You are the one person you can change. Might as well get going.

Give yourself an "A"

What would you do if you knew you couldn't fail? How would you be if you knew the future was going to turn out perfectly? 

Keep the door of possibility wide open. Go beyond the voice that says you might fail, that something might go wrong, that you are not good enough.

The inner critic can only see limitation, it cannot see potential and possibility. Infinity is far too much for the mind to grasp, and that is why is focusses on the small: on Lack, what you don't have and what might go wrong.

Believe in this and the world gets squashed and grey, and you along with it.

What if you flipped this Lack thought? Do you ever focus on what might go right? That you are more than good enough?

Why not?

Why not embrace an attitude of vision and of possibility? Instead of listening to the "you should" or the "you need to", why not go with the "what if?" and the "how about?"…?

Drop the limitations. They are only imagined, they only have power because you believe them. Instead, give yourself an “A”, in advance - focus on the possibility of the greatness of what could happen.

Assume an attitude that lights up your life, and in doing so lights up the life of all those around you.

Assume an attitude that everything will turn out just fine. Be supremely present in this knowing. How do you live in this knowing?

And why not? Wouldn't this one shift make your life amazing?

Attitude informs everything.

check out Benjamin Zander here in this video for more.

Take not a thing seriously.

The single greatest thing you can do to be more clear, calm and collected is to not take anything seriously. If you don't take anything seriously you won’t take anything personally.

If you don’t take anything personally you won’t get stuck in drama and blame and resentment and anger and all of that.

If you don’t get stuck in drama you can see clearly, you can see the big picture, you’ll have options.

If you have options you can do stuff easier and have more fun doing it. It’ll become an endless upward spirally loop of greater and greater joy.

Let me reassure you: The path to being the best version of yourself is through increasing amounts of joy. The enlightened beings I have met all laugh their arses off, constantly.

And here is the thing - a happy, joyful destination cannot be gained through a serious path. It is impossible.

This is good news. Awesome news actually. and its easy.

As my meditation teacher says, don’t worry about forever, just take nothing seriously today. Start small, but start now. If you like it, do it tomorrow. You may just find you keep doing it.

Find ways to laugh at everything, including yourself. Nothing need to be serious. Nothing benefits from seriousness. Even the most serious discussions benefit from levity.

Hang out with the happy people. Help others laugh at themselves, help them lighten their load. Don’t take anything seriously. Life is too short not to.

Gratitude - simple, powerful, but rarely done.

My computer died the other day. Completely kaput. Funny how I can use something everyday and not really notice how much a part of my life it had become until it was no longer there.

You ever notice that?

How something can be essential in your life and yet you only truly appreciate it when its gone?

One of the most inspiring stories I have ever heard was regarding a woman who lost her legs in a bomb attack on the London Underground. Years later she was interviewed and what struck me was her attitude. I can’t find the interview so I can’t directly quote what she had to say, but essentially she said the day she lost her legs was the day her life started.

You see before that day she was in survival mode, just getting by - alive but not really Living. A cycle of wake, work, sleep, repeat. Her overwhelming response when she came to in the hospital was one of gratitude for being given a chance to live. Her focus was not on the legs that she had lost but the fact that she was still alive.

The bomb was her wake up call - it shifted her attention from merely surviving to truly living. It shifted her focus from what she didn’t have to what she did have. It showed her she didn't have any time to take anything for granted, that life itself is an incredible gift.

I see so many people who don’t realise how truly rich they are. They have so much, and yet they don't realise it simply because they take big chunks of their life for granted.

I had an ear infection the other day meaning I had no balance. Even the act of sitting up in bed and getting to the bathroom was a major achievement. As the infection left, how sweet was it to walk freely? Very.

I can’t tell you how powerful the simple act of being grateful is. Going out of your way to be thankful transforms your attitude to life. The simple fact that you are alive becomes a source of richness and wonder.

If you decide to be actively grateful, even for the small things, the following will happen:

You will become very present

Your life will come truly alive. It will become a continuing source of satisfaction.

Your relationships will grow and become deeper - simply because you are nurturing them.

You will complain less and less.

You will be less able to stay self absorbed, in worry or guilt or doubt.

You will realise how the world transforms according to your attitude.

You will realise that your happiness is your choice.

You will become someone who others want to be around. Your happiness will inspire others to be happy.

There’s probably a hundred more, but try it, live it for yourself.

You want more from life? Start by being grateful.

What meditation has given me

My life has changed immeasurably since I came to learn a simple, easy meditation technique, and actually used it every day. It still surprises me, the power of sitting down every day and closing my eyes.

I really feel like I have become the person I always knew I was, but just couldn’t guarantee I could be.

In the past I would get stuck in these mental loops of thinking and worrying. I knew all about the worries and the fears, it was just that I couldn’t get out of them. They seemed to possess me. I would wake up worrying about something I said the previous day or worrying about what would happen in the upcoming, or about my bank balance.

I was constantly saying one thing to one person and another thing to another person. I was trying to be all things to all people. I would get stressed, so easily. I would lose my cool over the smallest things.

In no way was I a basket case, there was just plenty of room for more enjoyment and ease. Which I now have, which continues to grow.

I also seem to have found my purpose. I had a wonderful life, I had ticked all the boxes on my “to do and to have” list, and yet I was not content. It was a confusing time - my tick list said I should be happy and yet there was a growing unease which said I wasn’t.

The small act of closing my eyes every day and becoming more and more present has meant everything that I do is based in a satisfaction or a sense of wholeness and fulfilment.

There is no more idea that there is something else, that I’m missing out on something, the question “what am I doing here?” doesn’t appear. There is no worry, no fear, no unease.

In many ways, nothing has changed. I literally have gotten nothing from meditation - but everything that is not me has fallen away.  In one word, meditation has given me authenticity… and freedom from worry and fear… and purpose, meaning and satisfaction… and real enjoyment of life… and a million other things

It’s the smallest thing, to become present, to learn to meditate, to actually practice but it gives you so much.

Why not? What have you got to lose?

Why acceptance is the best foundation for everything in life

Acceptance doesn’t mean giving up your dreams. It means knowing that right now the path to your goal looks a little different than you expected. It is working with what you have, not trying to push your preferred way through.

Nothing happens for pushy people. Really, it doesn’t. They just make life difficult for everyone around them, including themselves.

Some might say that “the squeaky wheel gets the oil” - the ones that complain get the attention, but in my experience, the most help goes to those who politely, easily and consistently ask for it, working with what they have and not insisting on having something they don’t.

The whole universe responds to someone who, in the words of that well known prayer, has the strength to change the things they can change, the serenity to accept the things they can’t, and the wisdom to know the difference.

Acceptance isn't giving up your dreams or desires. It is knowing that life can only be experienced now. All journeys are made of single steps consisting of the same intention.

Acceptance is the seed that means you choose to be thankful for what you do have, and not be blinded by what you believe to be missing.

Acceptance is the end of the past and the future. Comparison cannot exist in the light of acceptance.

Accept everything, resist nothing.

What to do when you don't like a situation

In any situation you don’t like you have three options: You can change it. If you can’t change it, you can leave it. If you can’t leave, or - very importantly - if you choose not to leave, then you must accept the situation, as it is, completely and utterly.

Most of humanity goes for option #4: Complain about it.

Complaining doesn’t do much. Perhaps as a very short term ‘get rid of steam’ strategy it is okay, but continued complaining just leads to blaming and resentment, more stress and no peace.

See when you choose to complain. Make another choice - it’s all you rationally can do.

But when you accept you also get to see the situation clearly. You get to work with what you have, rather than wasting your time wishing you had something else.

Making the best of what you have - and all the creativity that goes with it - only can begin in complete acceptance.

Acceptance also means you get to see clearly if you can change something about the situation. So often we don't think we can do anything because "that's the way its always been done" or simply because change sometimes takes courage to say "no".

It really is the path of heroes. Accept everything, resist nothing.

Enjoying the process and doing it "better"

Don’t base how committed you are to doing something on momentary success or failure. An attitude of “well, I’ll keep doing it as long as I am good at it” will never result in anything. Everything that you do will have good and bad days - days when everything seems to be swimming along magically and other days when nothing seems to go right.

If you quit because you don’t appear to be “any good” at something in this moment, you will never get better. All learning has phases of seeming “good” and “bad”.

Don’t quit when you hear that voice.

As a baby you weren’t any “good” at walking. Did you quit?

Consider any top athlete - say the tennis player. How many times do you think they practice a particular shot? Millions of times? Probably, right? No matter what, they are out there practicing - in all conditions and in all circumstances.

They’re in it for the long game, they want to master a skill and they know it involves committing to a process.

They’re in it for constant improvement. They’re not in it to be “good”, they’re in it to be “better”.

So - Remove any idea of “doing it good” and “doing it bad” from the equation.

Instead, become interested in “how can I do it better next time?”

Enjoy the process.

A wise man once said that a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

Enjoy each and every one of those steps for what they are.

That way, no matter what, you’ll make the next step and the next, and you’ll reach the top before you know it.

When you frame each and every action in this way, as part of a continually evolving process (= an attitude of constant improvement based in complete contentment of this moment) long term commitment is easy, the path is enjoyable, and greatness is guaranteed.

Makes life, and getting what you want while enjoying it, so much easier.

Have a great day!

How to be really happy

I love to ask people what the most important thing is to them. Its a question we don't get asked often, or at all.

I’ve asked people from all around the world and they all say the same thing: It’s about being happy and content and fulfilled and loved and adventurous and having a purpose and etc etc…

What is the most important thing to you?

I bet you it has nothing to do with your goals or your possessions or your bank account or your job. It’s not about the external circumstances in your life.

These things are important - and fun - but the most important thing is an internal way of feeling about and being in life.

It’s not what you do, but how you do the things that you do. It’s not what you have, but how you relate to the things that you have.

It’s an important distinction because if you really get this you will connect the dots…

…and see that this most important thing in your life isn’t caused by anything.

It then can be a choice, a way of relating to the world where you get to decide.

It cannot be given to you and it cannot be taken away from you.

How wonderful is that?

You get to choose to be happy.

So: Choose to be happy. Choose to become that thing which is most important to you.

More on this tomorrow. Stay tuned.