The Quality of Your Life is Reflected by the Quality of Your Mind
Q: Dr. Cruz I am a former foster child now in my later adult years and I've been trying to make something of my life. I've had years when things were OK but life seems to constantly get in my way - real hardships, you know, things I had no control over but had to fight my way through them sometimes for over a decade. My anxiety is up, my testosterone is strong, and I carry a lot of anger that gets sparked without my conscious awareness. I'm very defensive and no better off today than when I was in foster care at the mercy of others. I try to exert my will to make things happen but I find I'm just running myself into the ground. I'm not in shape, I'm broke, defensive, and generally pissed off that this is all my life has become. I don't know what to ask you except what should I do to improve my life.
Signed - Older But Not Wiser.
Dear Older But Not Wiser,
Thanks for reaching out. That actually is a very great first step. Let's look at your situation from a perspective of what's going right instead of what's not. This primes your perspective to be healthy and forward focused seeped in the energy of potentiality. I'm guessing your middle aged man, unhappy with the progress you've made, and although understandable, the point that you're still here and haven't succumb to the pressures of life and ended up in addiction or prison speaks greatly of you. Your drive is still strong, your desire is still active, you are not mediocre, and you are still evolving.
Part of what's happened is there's been a massive change in your initial understanding of the world. The business of life is very different today than it was 20 or 30 years ago. That's enough to make anyone defensive, angry, and unhappy especially when it's most likely you may not have had a solid foundation from which to launch. Nonetheless you're still standing.
Why do humans tend to focus on what's not to our liking before focusing on the many, many blessings we have? This is the first shift that needs to occur for you. You see, when we struggle to survive or excel for any amount of time our brain may get addicted to the memory of struggle. If we've programmed or mine to believe life sucks and it's hard, guess what life is going to continue to be? You guessed it, more of the same. So, despite the lack of results you think (or feel) you are witnessing in your life you must first reframe “lack of results” with “I’m on the creative path to my destiny”. You must create (and repeat) the narrative that will propel you, not stagnate you. Yes, just make it up.
Go into your imagination and dream up the biggest dream for your life that brings you a sense of great joy and purpose. This is called “starting with the end in mind” (Steven Covey). From here, continue to progress forward knowing, just like a GPS, your inner guiding system will re-route you while in meditation, so you must schedule time to clear your mind and meditate. Connect with your source energy: align regularly.
This is important because if not, the mind will make up it’s own narrative to keep you feeling more of the same (frustration), but you must push through because everything you want is on the other side of your discomfort.
You do not have to be loyal to your past or to any memory of it. What if you could close your eyes and deeply relax and visualize the life you actually want to live? And what if you could feel it so viscerally that it felt like a real experience? And what if you began to train your brain to feel that reality every day so that you then program your mind to believe you've already experienced it?
Break up with your current reality and marry your desired reality and watch the internal shift you will experience. Add to these visualizations the perspective that regardless of what your life looks like, no matter how many expectations haven't been met yet, you say to yourself, “God, thank you for an amazing life. I'm so happy and grateful now that I understand that my external life is a reflection of my inner life (mindset, beliefs, visualizations), and my inner life makes me feel so good that all I'm going to do is praise you for my blessings - the ones I've already experienced and the ones that are on their way. I recognize I am a co-creator of my life and it starts with my attitude. In fact, all of my success starts with my attitude and that is the main thing I have control over. Everything else is just part of the game of life. I'm not going to live in the energy of “trying” to make anything happen, but rather, I now live in the energy of gratitude and service to others. It is from this energy that I can now build”.
You see, the energy of anger, frustration, and disappointment produce more of itself but when you shift into gratitude all tension is released and your creative faculties awaken. You move into flow, desperate for nothing but actually achieving everything as you now begin to live from a place of creation and no longer suffering and surviving.
The secret is in knowing that the quality of your life is reflected by the quality of your mind. Keep your mind in positivity and peace, find mentors along the way, read the books to guide you, and never, never quit on your dreams
Kindly,
Dr. Cruz
Owner/Editor - Chris Chmielewski