Success is in the Feeling, Failure is not Trying

Its midlife and you are here. The days go fast, you have filled them with activities, responsibilities, have to’s, and hopefully some want to’s in between.  Your life is this accumulation of the choices you are making in each moment and how they lead to the next moment. Then here you are, “midlife.”  And you have those days, maybe laying bed at night or before you get out of bed in the morning where you think of all the things you’d like to do if you had more time, or all the things you don’t want to do.  And you wonder, What do I Want?

Then you day dream, secret day dreams of another life.  Then the alarm goes off and you are back to “reality” as we call it and all the reasons that those dreams need to stay just that, dreams.

We all have self-limiting beliefs.  We all fear failure and balance the perceived risks in our lives.  Recently I have been offered two pieces a wisdom that helped me define my dreams and what it means to manifest them.

1. Don’t focus on the material aspects of what you think you want, focus on how it feels to have it.    In other words, its not about what the job is, or the money or the location  or size of the house or being 20 pounds thinner.  Its about how you think you will feel by having those things.  Is it a feeling of security, accomplishment, wellness, adoration, peace, happiness, enlightenment?   Once you identify the feeling, then focus on that as your intention.  Meditate on that feeling and while sitting still, embody that feeling as if you already have your desired outcome.
2. Redefine what failure means. Failure is not trying. That simple.  This is so in line with the reason we set Intentions. We know our energy will go where intention flows. We get very attached to expectations and tangible goals as the marker for success. This in itself can lead to more self judgement and doubt for two reasons.  One is that if the outcome does not meet our designed expectations we think we have failed, and second, when your goals are too quantified this can actually bring up issues of fear of change, even if that change is one we know will be good for us. And those fears alone can sabotage our best efforts.

For this week, why not set the intention of just trying something and detach from the outcome, outside of the knowledge that you are doing your best, that what is meant to be will be, and that the learning is in the trying, and then trying again. You may find that those feelings you identify you want to have are much closer than you think. You may even realize they are all inside of you already.