Staying Focused

Let not what you can do tear you from what you can.

- Ashanti proverb

Staying focused on a project or plan is one of the most difficult challenges we face. There is always the house to clean, calls to make, laundry to fold, movies to watch, news to catchup on. There is so much pulling on us, distracting us, keeping us from doing what we say - no wonder it never gets done. Actually, there is only one thing that keeps us from our goals, that is lack of focus. Very often, lack of focus is caused by fear. Lack of focus/fear means you can find a million reasons not to do what you say you want to do. Lack of focus/fear means if you do what you say you just might succeed. Success means you would move out and beyond your comfort zone. Somehow, somewhere deep inside, this is frightening. The key is if you would just stay focused, all of those frightening little details would miraculously be taken care of. Before you know it, you would be exactly where you say you want to be. When we stay focused on the end, the details are handled!

Ego versus Spirit

The ego needs recognition. The spirit does not need to thank itself.

- Stuart Wilde

The ego wants to be noticed. It needs stroking, pumping up and limelight. The ego needs to compete to prove it is better. It senses danger around every corner, difficulty in every challenge and trouble coming through everyone. The ego can never be enough, do enough or have enough. The goal of the ego is to be well liked and authorized because, for some reason, it does not feel qualified. The spirit is qualified by light. The light of truth, peace, joy and love. It does not seek to condemn, condone or compromise what it is. It simply knows and is it.

The spirit does what it can and moves on to something else. It does not ask for an award or wait for rewards, it is just spirit being spirit. One of the difficult problems in the world is the competition of egos. They want to be noticed and applauded so they compete and dominate. When we truly understand that we are spiritual beings, we will no longer have a need for recognition. We will do what we can because we can do it by virture of the light of the spirit. Today can we go unnoticed?

How Do We Plant Seeds?

Garden of the Gods, Colorado Springs, Colorado

When we pass a garden and see everything in full bloom, we don't always think about the seeds that were planted long before we got there. We simply enjoy the beauty of the harvest. Our minds work the very same way. It is the law of expression that says we must ultimately express in form those thoughts, emoticons and impulses we store in the subconscious mind. That part of us does not think. It does not reason, balance, judge or reject. It is the fertile ground that accepts any and everything we plant. Good or evil, constructive or destructive, our lives will bear the fruit of the seeds we plant in our minds. If we have no faith, purpose or belief in ourselves, we cannot blame the world. We plant the roses or weeds we see in the garden. We can imagine good big things as well as troubling little things, our minds will accept either one. If we want the lay back and sniff the lilies in our valley, we must tend our seeds of thought with constant care.