2 Meditate on what contentment is for you and see if you can discover a symbol of success that will serve as a metaphor to guide you. one of my clients sees success as a wild kangaroo running free in Australia, while another one sees success as a cushy lounge chair. once you find your symbol, figure out a way that you can interact with it daily. Then watch how much clearer and focused you are!
A couple of years ago, I was on a teleclass call with Ali Brown. She talked about how a hand analysis reading with Baeth Davis had changed her life. Baeth had told Ali that she would become internationally known and help women all over the world to build businesses and happy lives. At first Ali didn't take this seriously, but now she does and is living that life. Baeth Davis is known as “The Hand Analyst.” She helps people to find their life purpose, runs mentoring programs, and founded The Hand Analyst, Inc. A number of other women in the book also had their hands read by Baeth and found the information was a breakthrough for them. So, being committed to helping people to find their life purpose and create businesses and lives that are glorious, I had to learn the hand analysis technique.
When I went to one of Baeth's workshops and had my hands read, I was stunned by how accurate the information she gleaned from my handprint was. I did some research, and apparently hand analysis is a science with very specific outcomes that has been around for thousands of years.
Like Ali, Baeth has a huge vision. As Baeth says, “My intention is to reach hundreds of millions of people and help them discover their life purpose. I want to make the language about purpose commonplace in the world dialogue so that families wonder, ‘what's my child's life purpose.’ It's one of the first things they find out in order to nurture and support that child to truly actualize what they've come here to do.”
Baeth believes that one of the major reasons that people struggle in their relationships and in their work is because they are not connected to their deepest self. She says, “The work I do quite literally offers you a spiritual plan, a set of spiritual tools to understand the ‘why’ and the ‘what for’ of your life on the planet, what you are here to express and accomplish in your lifetime. Because we have not only our own life purpose to fulfill, our own evolution, but we are working together to evolve the purpose of humanity.” As Baeth says, she cannot read everyone's hands herself, so she is training a group of us to help her bring this tool out into the mainstream. I've always been a great believer in prevention, and if parents can use this technology to discover their own life purpose and live it, and then help their child to grow in the right direction toward his or her life purpose, then we can prevent the stress that so many people who are not in touch with their life purpose experience.” I love big visions and this is one that I am thrilled to be part of; it fits my life purpose of Passionate Guide and Mentor in the Spotlight.
So many people show up in my office upset that they didn't have a miracle in their lives where a voice told them at a young age what kind of work or creative expression they ought to pursue. We do a terrible job in this country of helping young people trust their inspirations and pursue work that truly fascinates them. Someone usually tries to talk you out of what you know inside to be true, and then you get into the wrong career and struggle. The Challenges in this book are meant to help you to tap into your inner knowing, your creativity, and your commitment to serve, and point you in the right direction toward your purpose. If you know your purpose already, this book will deepen it and give you powerful tools to unleash it.
Secret Two
Sift Through Your Ideas to Get Heart-Focused
“The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart.”
—Helen Keller
EMBRACE YOUR FLOW OF IDEAS
I was recently searching for my winter clothes; I found my fluffy white suede jacket and threw it on to go to a meeting. After I got home, I was digging business cards out of my pockets and discovered this quote from a fortune cookie:
“Ideas not coupled with action never become bigger than the brain cells they occupied.”
How timely for me, and for all of us with creative ideas popping in our heads. I just cleaned out some file drawers and found papers with all kinds of ideas written on them—book ideas, marketing ideas, big vision ideas, joint venture ideas, watercolor painting ideas, and the list goes on. I put all those papers in a pile (after putting many pages in the recycling bin) and it is now one and a half feet high.
I noted that some of these ideas were written down numerous times and some of them I didn't remember writing at all. My first reaction to this pile was dread. Yet, I stood back from this pile and gave thanks instead.
Many years ago, I took the Johnson O'Connor Aptitude Tests and scored in the 99th percentile on ideaphoria—the rapid flow of ideas. I like to define the word as the ability to generate lots of thoughts and ideas quickly. It is an experience where one feels a constant onslaught of new ideas, creating a euphoric state of idea creation. I should mention that I flunked spatial relations with blocks, which is why I never became an interior designer on the side, even though I love color. My ideaphoria is a true gift—I suspect many of you reading this book have it as well—yet it has to be managed.
It's all about choices. From this abundance of ideas, I get to choose which ones I will do this year and which ones I will postpone until next year or three years from now. Some of these ideas will never happen—I don't have enough time to dance with them all. People with ideaphoria have to learn to take action and execute their ideas, not just let them sit in piles. Idea books and idea folders are wonderful tools. But at some point, we have to use our good sense and intuition and commit to a plan of action and explore one or more of the ideas to their fullest.
This past year I moderated a panel on “The Next Big Idea” for the Massachusetts Women's Conference. We talked about how to activate our ideas and then craft them into something original and useful. Your ideas are your most valuable asset. Write them down somewhere, review them regularly, and tune into which ones you are most passionate about. Be thankful that your brain clicks into gear and that you think of new ideas. Even if they are wild and crazy, these ideas may lead you somewhere.
Each year, in the quiet of December, I take my pile of ideas and select those treasures that are calling to me the most for the coming year. These ideas will be cultivated and nourished. And I will take a moment to express my gratitude for these ideas. I will also carefully make a new file for the next batch for the following year.
I recently purchased four new, lovely, ivory wooden file cabinets with sixteen file drawers for my office. It was a reluctant purchase, since we already have file cabinets all over the house that have been cleared out of junk. But I had to face the fact that I needed these new files to be truly organized. My husband put them together for me, and then I had two wonderful women take my piles of papers (we right-brainers like to make piles so that we can see things, but then we spend too much time going through the piles and get overwhelmed) and make several hundred new folders with printed labels. They put the piles into files where they should be. My desk is now clear except for my Treasure Map of goals, which I use as a blotter, and a small, three-shelf tray with current to-dos.
I feel immense relief, but I do have to remind myself to check the files regularly so that I don't lose touch with the gems in them. As a writer, I collect articles of interest and research about things I want to write about, and I have files on book ideas, book marketing, social media, all of my clippings from fifty-plus magazines and other periodicals,