Jesus tried time. and time again to tell the crowds and his disciples that everyone was like him that each of us has the power to heal, the power to change our lives and the world just by changing our thoughts.
It was so 2,000 years ago and it is so today. There was no magic formula to Jesus’ teachings beyond a willingness on our parts to forgive and be grateful. Of course, it’s more complicated than that in practice, not in its essence. I left out one thing though and it is essential to making any change anywhere, anytime. It is the essence of Jesus teaching,
L-O-V-E!
It was not only the essence of his teaching, but was the essence of his life. He tried to always live from love. And most of the time he was able to do that. He also proved that he was human from time to time like throwing the money changers from the temple and often showing frustration with his disciples.
So, this thing Jesus was teaching us or trying anyway, what was it? It was that if we can be grateful for our life as it is right now even though it may not seem perfect, and if we can forgive ourselves for our mistakes, then we can choose to move into a new idea for our life starting right now.
Of course our story is what has made our life and brought us to this place and time, but is it how we want our life to continue? Does it allow for a new idea to emerge for us? Does our “story” allow us a place to grow from or does it just keep us shackled to our old boring story?
Do we have the courage to make a change or do we want to stay with that which is comfortable even though that comfortable place may actually be painful? Most people don’t have the willingness to make the honest assessment to move beyond the place of stuckness that they are presently in because they don’t believe in themselves. That’s a stark truth and one we often aren’t able to admit.
It can cause great upheaval in ones life to have the courage to just walk away from your past in order to move into a new and greater idea of you. And, it requires a huge leap of faith. Sometimes it can feel like you’re doing a high wire act without a net. But, the net is there. You just can’t see it. It’s the belief that what you’re doing right now, making that move, believing in yourself and the direction you’re going above all the nay-sayer’s comments that makes it happen and carries you through.
I’ve made that leap many times. My first was from banking and a weekly paycheck to being a self-employed carpenter-contractor with little professional carpentry skills and a partner I barely knew on a small island in Rhode Island in the middle of Narragansett Bay. All I knew was, I didn’t want to be a banker anymore, and I loved working with my hands. I never thought I would fail. Then, eighteen years later, I added hot sauce manufacturing to my resume, built a factory in an outbuilding on my property in Puerto Rico and succeeded at that, and then… The list goes on. That’s not the point though. I had faith in myself. I was doing something I loved and because I believed in me and what I was doing, Another reason I succeeded where others failed, was because I didn’t listen to those around who thought I would fail. The power of love manifests itself in your beliefs of what you can or cannot do. By that I mean, if you believe you can succeed at something, then you must have enough love or belief in yourself to do that.
So, I leave you with this question.
Do you believe if you make a change that you will succeed, or do you believe it will fail?
Ultimately, if you believe you’ll fail, you will! If, on the other hand, you believe you will succeed, you will. It’s all in the thought.
What’ll it be?
~ jt starke
What do you want? Have you stated the intention of your desire?
