They have faced challenges, been victimized, have seen their dreams go up in smoke and have had their hearts broken.

The one way they might be different, though, is that they did not let their obstacles, “stories,” or excuses stop them from living the life they were born to live. They made being who the are their #1 priority … it drove every decision they made, even when that choice had some unknowns and fears attached.

What if Oprah Winfrey had allowed her childhood abuse to prevent her from becoming a media mogul who helps transform people all over the planet? It could have easily become her reason for not shining in the world.

Beethoven went deaf … and yet he went on to create beautiful music that lives on to this very day. Why? Because creating music was who he WAS, not just something he did.

What if Lance Armstrong had believed he would never be a champion again once his testicular cancer was discovered, and worse yet, spread into his brain?

Your life can be amazing, joyful, and prosperous once you know who you truly are and live your life with passion and purpose.

There is a split second that we all experience daily — usually dozens of times a day.

It’s a little flicker where we are given an opportunity to choose — we can go down our usual path or we can choose something new.

It is like a little dot of light asking you to notice it. That’s your true self — your higher self — calling you up. It’s asking you to be willing to be yourself. It’s asking you to go deeper, to move past your story of why your life isn’t full and abundant and find your light.

Are you open to the idea that you are perfect just the way you are and an ideal life is waiting for you — whatever you definition of that is? Are you willing to discover what that path is?

Are you willing to notice the flicker of your own light in that moment you are given to choose, and make a new choice? The choice to step into who you truly are and discover how you can create a life around being that person?

Your Dreaming Big! Creating Reality Assignment:

In the next 24 hours, make a new choice that allows you to further discover who you are and allows your actions to follow being that person, and not the other way around.

Want help discovering your Soul Purpose? I recommend Michelle Casto’s Soul Purpose Accelerator program to help you dig deeper into who you are and let go of your story of what’s been holding you back. You are enough! Align with your higher self today … it is the most important step you will ever take. Click to learn more: http://budurl.com/soulmichelle

Want to use this article on your website or your own ezine?

No problem! But here’s what you MUST include:

“Conditional happiness” is the way of the ego, and not the higher self. Your higher self is not invested in deadlines, money woes, whether someone behaves in a way that pleases you, or even whether you’ve found your life purpose.

As a human being, you have many facets. You have a spirit, a body, and a mind. The ego is a part of your mind, and it’s not “bad,” although you may have heard this. Your ego is a part of you and serves an important purpose. Well, two purposes, really. It gives you your sense of self, and it tries to protect you.

The problem is that the ego believes that by perpetuating the familiar, it is helping you by giving you a predictable outcome. This is true even when your familiar patterns aren’t good for you. It forms identities for you through your patterns, the roles you play (like your occupation, the way you look, your relationship dynamics, and even things like being a victim or feeling like a screw-up.

The ego does not understand the higher self at all. It believes that your happiness comes through external stimuli or experiences: This is why when you set a conscious intention, your ego will sit patiently for a few hours, days, weeks or months, as long as it believes it is in control of the outcome. When it decides that what you desire isn’t coming to you, it will secretly jump for joy because it can perpetuate whatever you are used to in your life. Believe it or not, it believes it’s keeping you safe by keeping you stuck. Anything else is a risk to its very existence. When you allow in worry and doubt, it fuels the ego in helping you perpetuate whatever is familiar to you.

At the same time, you have a part of you that sort of rises above this fear-based what of living. This is where you want to dwell. It is your higher self. The higher self has all the answers you need, it exists in a state of unconditional love (it even unconditionally loves the parts of you you don’t like) and it only dwells in one point in time: the NOW.

The ego spends almost all its time rehashing the past, whether that’s a moment ago or 20 years ago, and projecting into the future. It actually believes if it just keeps thinking about the past and what it didn’t like, it can actually change it.

This way of living is in a way like being in mental prison, and it is truly futile and exhausting. One minute something “good” happens, and you’re on top of the world. Someone loves you, or you make a sale. Yahoo! Then, the next moment, someone does something mean or you have an unexpected expense come up, and boom, no more happiness.

Instead of living in reactionary mode, you can learn to align with your higher self, and become the “watcher” of your ego. This means that life is no longer a series of reactions to things out of your control. And even when things don’t go your way, you don’t fall apart. You simply watch it happening, observing it, while you remain aligned with Source, which allows you to feel happy and attract more of what you want with ease.

It is the difference between responding vs reacting. In the SOURCE Blueprint program, this is accomplished in Phases 1 and 2: Surrender, and Observe Your Reality.

Your Dreaming Big! Creating Reality Assignment:

Start to notice your thoughts. Are most of your thoughts about the past, the future, or the now? You might be surprised what you find in that head of yours!

Want to get off the rollercoaster of conditional happiness? I recommend the S.O.U.R.C.E. Blueprint for Creating Reality to help you disengage the reactionary, fear-based ego, and align with the part of you that exists in a constant state of happiness. It’s kind of like the sun. Your higher self is the sun. Just because it’s cloudy out, doesn’t mean the sun stopped shining. Your job is to clear the clouds away so you can see the sun again. You can learn more at http://www.yourquantumsuccesscoach.com/source. Are you ready to let go of the struggle?

——————————————————————————————————–

Want to use this article on your website or your own ezine?

No problem! But here’s what you MUST include:

Elizabeth Grant, “The Quantum Coach,” is a spiritual mentor and personal coach who specializes in helping people let go of the struggle. Clients learn how to integrate day-to-day the power of now and universal laws to achieve ease of life, deep happiness and effortless attraction of what they desire. More info: yourquantumsuccesscoach.com. To schedule media interviews email info@thequantumcoach.net.

© 2010 Elizabeth Grant. All Rights Reserved.

But what’s important is to see past your reflection and honor yourself for man you are. Senior citizen is not a synonym for old person! Being old is a function of age; being senior is a subtext of attitude. It depends on how you look at the term; seniors in high school or college for example, are student leaders, the respected upperclassmen called upon to pass on their experience to the younger undergraduates.

It behooves us to ignore society’s perception of “old people” as obsolete and irrelevant. You do not lose the beauty of who you are no matter what your age. As the poet Martin Buxbaum wrote, “You merely move it from your face into your heart.”

When you embrace the person you are and become comfortable in your own skin, the possibilities are endless. How rewarding it is after years of working nine to five to finally put less emphasis on “doing” and more on the pleasures of “being.” That doesn’t mean to shut down the plant and put your abilities in mothballs. It means take a good honest look at paths to fulfillment that are not relentlessly tied to dubious achievement, driving yourself to outdo the other guy and feeling elated or depressed dependent on the applause from others.

Too many retirees move from the corner office to a corner of the den and feel diminished by the loss of the props that shored up their self-esteem, the big time job, a top spot in the pecking order, the external “stuff” you accumulate as perks of the endless grind. For these men and women retirement is more of a punishment than reward for years of hard work.

The secret is to have something to retire to rather than be left adrift when your time card is called from the rack. I’m not talking about a “bucket list” of stuff to do before you die. It’s reviving the dreams that necessity and circumstance and timidity and naivety forced you to store in the “What If” file, closed shut so many years ago you can barely remember where the key is.

Your eyesight may dim as you grow older but you can see things infinitely more clearly as you acquire the capacity to look inside yourself. My inquiry meant an honest appraisal of my career in advertising, an evaluation of what I enjoyed most and what I liked least, not only about the job and the work it entailed, it’s redemptive values and how I felt about myself in relation to my moral principles. Doubt about the field’s unrestrained goal of creating consumption – often from faux desires more concerned with vanity and ego than genuine need – made it clear that phase of my life was over. Still, I had thoroughly enjoyed the creative side of the work. I decided that writing commercials for Doritos and Phillips 66 gasoline and literally hundreds of advertised brands was foundation for transferring my creative chops to a more rewarding endeavor. So I decided to write a book as a way to feel useful and productive. Plus I wanted to dispute the societal assumption that older people are like used cars ready for the junk heap. My characters definitely are not looking at the odometer!

It would be presumptuous to pose as the voice of the country’s senior citizens, but there aren’t many authors my age writing candidly about the regrets and revelations that accompany the aging process. But each main character in the collection of short stories entitled “73” is, in fact, age seventy-three, and the hero or heroine of storylines that provide insight into the pain and pleasure of living life as a Septenarian. The stories taken all together paint the full portrait. After almost two years the book is still being sold at Amazon.com and other on-line book sites.

I’m not an Internet guru selling advice on how to age properly. Candidly speaking, I skip those web sites. Usually they’re corny, relying on tired bromides and trite generalities. But sometimes all of us need some help to re-assess, re-focus and face the bedrock truth of what you really want to do, and what’s realistically possible.

Age is opportunity no less,
than youth itself, though in another dress,
And as the evening twilight fades away,
the sky is filled with stars, invisible by day.

~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, from a poem written for the 50th anniversary of his college graduation.~

Further commentary from Howard Englander can be found on his blog at http://www.howardenglander.wordpress.com
He can be reached at howardenglander@sbcglobal.net
Information about his book, 73, can be found at http://www.howardenglander.com

My answer is this: Your entire life is based on faith and trust. Everything you do every single day, you do through faith and trust.

Do you get in your car, needing to get to work, and think the whole time you’re driving there, “Oh my gosh! What if I don’t make it to my destination? I have to get there safely. I mean, I really need to.

What if that car cuts in front of me? What if I blow a tire? Once, I didn’t get to my destination on time, so that must mean there’s a chance I won’t get there! I am filled with anxiety over the question of whether safety will actually come to me!!!”

So why does almost everyone do this when it comes to the other things they want in their lives, like money, a partner or something like getting their book published or winning a Grammy?

Do you worry when you eat an orange that you’ll get salmonella? (There are oranges that contain this bacteria.) Of course not.

Do you go to bed each night, obsessing over whether or not you will wake up the next morning, or do you just assume that you’ll live another day, and the sun will come up again, and things will continue on as usual? (Can you just imagine living that way? Where you wake yourself up all night asking, “Am I still alive? Whew!”)

You need water to survive. Do you worry constantly that you will not have a clean water supply to draw from each time to turn the faucet? Or do you have a deep trust that you will have it available, and that someone didn’t put some sort of poison in the water supply? I mean, even if the pipes were turned off temporarily — your usual way of getting water — aren’t you pretty darn sure you’ll be able to receive some clean drinking water into your life?

Yet, when it comes to money or other opportunities, we often obsess about whether there will be more of it. We want to know where it will come from, and we aren’t entirely sure more of it exists at all. We want a guarantee that it will be here by a certain date.

Here’s the thing: you DO have a guarantee. The divine realm always answers, “Yes!” But it answers yes to the thing you put your trust in.

Are you putting your trust in having more money, or are you putting your trust in your doubt — being absolutely trusting and faithful in the idea that you won’t have enough by the date you need it? The divine realm simply answers, “Yes!” to whatever you put your absolute certain faith in.

So if you can look at money or whatever else you perceive you need in the same way you look at these other things, you will find that trust. Look at it like drinking water, like oxygen, like an orange, like driving to work. These things are a given, and so, too, is your prosperity — once you find the almost cocky level of trust in the divine realm that it so eagerly responds to.

It’s that worrisome feeling, even though you’re doing all kinds of money affirmations. It’s that repetitive self-talk that you should be more on top of your business habits or that you don’t really believe people will buy from you.

If you are wishing you had a life partner, maybe it’s that feeling lurking in the background that you’re not good enough, or that it’s too scary to put your heart out there again.

How do you change your background programming? The key is to bring out of the darkness and shine some light on it. Once you are aware that it’s even going on, you’re half way there.

The next step is to identify what the feeling really is, what the background noise is saying. Body dialoguing is a good way to do this. Money background noise tends to be panicky, desperate, frustrated, critical of self or others, or perhaps a nagging feeling there is action you should be taking, but for some reason you never do it. That’s the action that will be your key to freedom.

Background noise is a form of resistance. It creates a feeling of pushing away or resistance to what you want to draw toward you, because the feeling is being a victim, feeling inadequate, being desperate and clingy, feeling frustrated with what IS.

Energy flows where attention goes. The thing is … your background noise IS your attention. It is a much stronger indicator of where your attention actually is than the few conscious thoughts you direct each day toward your dream.

How do you let this go? You do just that … acknowledge it, notice it, in some cases take action, then get really present so you can break up the thought patterns and let it go. You surrender fully to where you are right now. You stop wishing the moment was any different than it already is. Just let it be. Then, you pay attention for any background noise coming up again, and you have awareness of it, so you can acknowledge it and take different action, love a part of yourself more, seek out help to move past it; whatever the case might be.

Planning for the future, too, puts your attention off of that background noise and on what you want. Like answering the question, “What will I do with the money when more of it arrives? If you can’t see how it will happen, plan something for five years from now, if that’s believable for you. Say it’s your dream to go to Paris. Where will you go? Where will you stay? What will you do? Get your attention off lack and onto abundance. I didn’t say dream about your trip, like it’s some fantasy that will never come true. I said plan it! Declare that it is a part of your future.

If it’s your dream to be on stage, bring your background noise into the light, and then take one step today that will put you a little closer to getting there. Move forward.

What is your background noise? Leave a comment below if you’d like. Mine was, “I’m not good enough,” for many years. When I brought it into the light, my whole life changed.

There’s a small squirrel in my back yard running with an acorn. I watch him for a minute when suddenly he is attacked by another squirrel attempting to steal his acorn. After a long struggle, the smaller squirrel runs away, unfortunately without his acorn. I wonder if that squirrel will still be holding angry thoughts toward the squirrel that stole his dinner?

No other life form on planet Earth seems to hold so much negativity in their mind, body, and life as the human race.

Think about it; you may see an angry squirrel chasing another for an acorn, but I’ll bet the anger is forgotten once the other squirrel has eaten the acorn.

Wouldn’t you agree?

There are millions of patterns in the subconscious mind.

The patterns that actually work for you can be left alone, but the patterns that aren’t working can be explored and retrained.

But how do you find them?

How do you bring them into your conscious awareness?

These “dragons” are stopping you from living the life of your dreams.

Let’s talk about how you can uncover your own unique hidden limiting beliefs and mental patterns (dragons).

Step 1: Observe your thoughts first. The thought precedes that habit/addiction/pattern/dragon.

Step 2: When the thought comes up ask yourself, “Is this thought of
past, present, or future? Is this true for all mankind?”

Step 3: Redirect the mind into the present time. (The past is a mere memory and the future is a mere fantasy. This means that you need to deal with issues in the now.)

Step 4: How do you experience that thought/dragon and feel right now? How does it feel?

Step 5: Write down the situation in your journal and name your dragon.

Want more?

Take The Dragon Quiz and get the details for my next complimentary class – Feb. 16th at 8 p.m. E.T.

Many people have an awful time with this, and the more they try to change, the more that pull back to inertia happens.

The thing is, these are just neural pathways. They have been ingrained in your mind over many years. But you can also think of this as your reality. This familiar place you dwell in is the reality you’ve chosen.

One fun way to break these patterns and take a leap into a new reality is to look at your life like a play or a movie.

The thing that’s really fun about the play called your life is that you don’t even have to audition. At any particular point in time, you can simply declare that you’re going to play a new part. You can shift the storyline, and you always win the audition. I mean, even if you were up against Meryl Streep, you would still win the part. And the best part is, Meryl would be happy for you! Because all of the players in this play understand that there are plenty of parts to go around, and that everyone gets to play the part of their dreams. In fact, if they choose a part and don’t like it, they can snap their fingers and play a different part, too! Cool, huh?

Sometimes you might watch them choose a part and you wonder why they would have chosen it. But you understand that it’s their life and they have the power to choose, and the power to change their role and their script, just like you do, so you let them go about their day in their own play.

Let’s say your finances are a total mess. You’ve played the role of the financial screw-up for a long time. At some point, if you are going to change your life, you will have to take the actions of a financially secure person.

Now let’s say you take the crucial step of meeting with a financial planner. On your way to the appointment, you feel discomfort coming up. You’re going to have to reveal to a virtual stranger all of your weaknesses.

Now, listen up! In that moment, you have a choice:  you could wallow in how difficult this meeting is for you, and how embarrassing, continuing to play the part of the “lesser than” financial person, or you could choose a different part with different lines, like, “Wow, you are so savvy with money. Look at this important step you’re taking! Doesn’t it feel great?”

The energy associated with these two polarities feels SO different! One is a feeling of shame, and the other a feeling of being powerful and proud of yourself.

If you have difficulty imagining the script for your new role, you could simply ask yourself, “What would so-and-so do?” Someone you admire — either someone you know personally, or perhaps a famous person you admire who is playing the part you really want.I really want you to get this — to have this click. Your life is just a play. If you don’t like the part you’ve chosen, choose a different part, and play it every day.

Don’t worry — you’re still you. Since it’s your play, you get to inject your own personal signature into the role and tweak the script at will. You can change the entire storyline in a matter of seconds.

What role will you choose?

Why not play the part of the person for whom everything comes easily?

The person who attracts kindness and generosity (I’ve been playing that part for years … it’s a good one!).

The person who has healthy relationships?

The luckiest person in the world?

The person who goes through life with a calm confidence and deep trust that everything they want will fall into place with ease?

The person who is great with money?

The brilliantly creative person?

The person to whom really good partners flock in droves — regardless of whether or not you’re perfect?

There ARE people who live those realities every single day, right? Of course. You probably know some of them personally. Or you’ve at least read about them.

This week, pick a new role. Make it whatever you want. And as you go through your day, really play the part. Talk the way you would if that was your life. Talk about your future in these new terms. Imagine you have a different past — perhaps a healthy family environment or a perfect history with managing money. You always treated everyone with kindness — never made a mistake. All those times you “blew it” — completely wiped out in favor of a new script. Choose the thoughts of that role. Imagine what that person’s self-talk must be, and choose that instead of your usual “beat myself up” chatter.

The key to changing your part in the play is to be present enough to choose something new. If you catch yourself slipping into your old part, just change the script! You are producer, director and actor in the play called your life. Have fun with it!

“‘Dear Elizabeth, Thanks for the great story!’ Tim.”

Those 8 words changed my life — it was the moment that I realized my dream was becoming my reality.

Doing strategy sessions with the Dreaming Big! participants this week has brought to mind my own dream of being a freelance writer and how much I wish I would have had the support and guidance these folks are going to receive.

Back then, I was totally out of my comfort zone, had no idea what I was doing from a practical standpoint, and had a lot of fears coming up that I didn’t really know how to handle.

With no training in journalism, I was so clueless about how publishing worked that I actually wrote the editor after I turned in my story asking him if he needed my byline. I didn’t know that “byline” just meant you get your name on the story. I thought it was that thing you sometimes see at the bottom of an article with a little description about the author. He must have been awfully confused! It doesn’t matter, of course, the important thing was that I was finally published — and received a nice check, too!

That scribbled note has been on my bulletin board for five years now. It is the symbol that I made my dream come true.

It’s already mid-January — time really flies! Pretty soon it will be February, then spring, and before you know it, the year will be gone, once again.

Where are you in making your dream a reality in 2010? I encourage you to consider these questions as you move forward:

1) How are you going to prevent things like procrastination and self-sabotage when that pull to go back to the familiar happens — and it will?

2) If you listened to the free teleseminar last week, how did you answer that one key question? It’s really important that you answer this question before you begin taking action toward whatever it is you want to do. (E-mail me back and let me know what you came up with!)

4) What is your support system? Without it, your dream is toast.

5) Do you understand how to get into the “vortex” so you can let go of the struggle and do a beautiful dance with the divine realm?

If you haven’t listened to last week’s teleseminar, you can get instant access here: http://www.yourquantumsuccesscoach.com/teleseminar-01-07-10

If you have ever experienced self-sabotage or procrastinated your own happiness, you can’t afford NOT to be in the Dreaming Big! Creating Reality program. It’s budget-friendly, you’ll receive unwavering support toward your dream and you’ll have the accountability you need all year long. Best of all, you’ll learn how to let go of the struggle and allow life to bring you what you need and desire with ease and grace.

In addition, I lead every call to guide you in quantum concepts and help you get into the vortex like I did (you’ll hear my vortex story when you listen to the teleseminar).

Life isn’t a dress rehearsal. It is a myth that “someday” it will be a better time to create the life you truly want. The truth is, when someday comes, you’ll just be in another “now”!

There is still room in the program for you — grab your slot before it’s too late: http://www.yourquantumsuccesscoach.com/dreaming-big-2010

I can’t WAIT to hear about your dream!

Warmly,

Beth

PS Here is the link again to get instant access to the teleseminar recording: http://www.yourquantumsuccesscoach.com/teleseminar-01-07-10

Here it is: What is the truth of my life when it comes to my dream and where I’ve come so far?

The most common answer I receive from people, after they sort out their analytical mind’s reaction is, “The truth is that I have tried to launch my dream on my own, and I haven’t been able to do it.”

For 95% of people, this is a basic truth about their dream. It certainly was for me for over a decade. I vacillated between taking the leap to the life I wanted and being pulled back to the familiar territory of a life that wasn’t really me.

I see it happen all the time. The pull to inertia is just too great.

It’s a myth that you’ll be able to do anything great in your life completely by yourself. Think about it. What achievement have you ever seen take place that didn’t involve the support or help of at least one other person?

It’s for this very reason that I created the Dreaming Big! Creating Reality program. If you haven’t had a chance to check it out, don’t you owe it to yourself to at least take a look?