BY SHEENA BLAKE
“What do you want?” My elders asked me in a room full of women. “I just want to be happy”, I said, and, believing that that was a satisfactory and reasonable response, I stopped speaking, hoping that they would move on to someone else…
Blink, blink…”What do you want?” they asked me again. This time I listed the things that I KNEW I didn’t want. I didn’t want a job that the employer was self righteous; I didn’t want a partner that was selfish and I didn’t want to miss out on my children’s lives because of working too much.
… “Answer our question,” they prodded once more, but by this moment, my mind was flooding with all of my failures in parenting, partnership, career and life that I could no longer hold back my tears.
Isn’t it amazing how a simple question, “what do you want”, can open up the flood gates of our minds?
I’m so very grateful for my elders’ grace and patience because, after letting out years of tears, I realized that all of this time, I had been standing in my own way! I had been believing that everything and everyone else was to blame for my lack of success. My thoughts had been on a repeat track called fear, worry, guilt and shame…all in all, I really didn’t know what I wanted. All I knew was what I didn’t want-but of course-it was exactly what I had.
The process of getting clear about what I WANTED became and continues to become more and more easy everyday. I have learned that “standing in my own way” manifests from self loathing feelings that I carried for many years. I had to make the choice about what I wanted.
Are you in your own way? When is the last time you asked yourself what it is you really want? When is the last time you took responsibility for your life and all that is in it?
There is a supreme freedom in taking control of your thoughts, feelings and the things that they manifest. The cliché is often true; being positive can change your world. Seeing a situation from a different angle can make all the difference.
But, changing thoughts and seeing different angles takes practice. It’s something to work on every day and as my dad always says, “good, better, best. You must never let it rest until your good is better and your better is best.”
Get out of your way; the world needs you.
