Tag: Analogies

What Is Love?

Published on March 29, 2023

Love is an unconditional warmth that radiates outwards from a person’s center towards all other beings. More specifically, a warmth that’s really just a majestic composition of patience, kindness, joy, forgiveness, and gratitude. Different people are made up of different compositions, but each unique composition has the same outward radiating result.

Love is not selective. Love brings warmth even to those who are cold, impatient, rude, upset, angry, and/or ungrateful. Which isn’t to say we accept, ignore, or make it our mission to change these behaviors. It’s merely to say, as the backyard fire pit warms anyone and everyone who climbs near… so, too, will love warm anyone and everyone who steps near.

What you see when people radiate warmth towards some, but act ice cold towards others is blocked love. When too many layers of cold, corrupt, malevolent, manipulative, hateful, “un-burnable” actions/circumstances gets piled on top of a person’s innate love… they’re only able to partially radiate warmth on sides where there are unblocked openings. And cold towards all is a sign of a completely smothered love.

What you see when two people devote their love specifically towards each other isn’t selective love per se. What you’re seeing are two fires who enjoy each other’s warmth so much that they decide to combine to create a bonfire. This magnifies the warmth that either individual could radiate alone and creates a combined effect that (unconditionally) warms at scale.

When a combining of fires has the opposite effect (and cools), you know it isn’t a love that’s meant to be. Love shouldn’t be something that only makes one or two of us warmer… love is something that should warm us ALL.

The 3 Crucial Mind Tools For Clarity

Published on March 27, 2023

1. We meditate to settle the sediments of our mind.

By removing outside stimulation, we allow all of the swishing, swirling, and convoluted thoughts to relax into a kind of order: the crap moves to the bottom and the important rises to the top. Through meditation, our mental priorities become more clear.

2. We journal to filtrate.

We begin by scooping a spoonful of thoughts and pour them down onto paper or screen. Then, through a careful and focused effort, we update and revise what’s poured out so as to make those thoughts more clear, concise, and aligned. What results becomes the new, filtered spoonful that gets poured back in.

3. We speak with professionals of the mind to utilize their high-end filtration systems.

Therapy allows us to, essentially, pour our thoughts through the highly filtered mind(s) of somebody else so that we’re able to get a level of clarity we’re unable to provide for ourselves. Also, when something dangerous, toxic, or overly complex comes up through the filtration process—they can swiftly help us minimize or neutralize the threat. This can be extremely beneficial for the particularly dark and/or murky mind—especially in the initial stages of filtration.

The bottom line is this: our mind is either our greatest asset or greatest liability in life.

The use or disregard of these three tools can largely determine which category our mind falls into. All three aren’t required—any one of these tools alone can lead us all the way to the “asset” category. Applying two or all three, however, is a particularly effective strategy. One that I’d say, if you haven’t already, you at least consider.

Inner Calibration

Published on March 22, 2023

Imagine you had a GPS system that slowly lost its calibration.

When freshly updated, it’s precise to the centimeter.

But, when left ignored too long, it starts deviating in miles.

This is how our inner GPS system works. It’s not a calibrate “once-and-done” kind of system. It’s more like your smart phone and needs frequent software updates to keep it precise and up-to-date.

Now, you don’t need to do every single update (I know I don’t). But, if you skip too many update opportunities… that’s when centimeters start turning into feet which start turning into meters with start turning into miles…

The difference between outdated phones and inner GPS systems is you won’t be able to notice an outdated inner compass as easily. The only way to check the inner calibration of your compass is to do careful and deliberate inner work. Which is, in many ways, counter-modern-culture.

If you can’t remember the last time you calibrated, it’s likely you’ve skewed off course—and possibly in a big way. How much can only ever be determined by you.

This isn’t to say that inner calibration is needed every day—but, it sure doesn’t hurt to do some calibration daily.

The bottom line to meditate on today is this: inner calibration needs to be a regular priority—are you making it one? …Because the destination of your life depends on it.

P.s. Need help calibrating your inner compass? The guide I recently created, The Art of Forward, can help.

Onion Identities

Published on March 11, 2023

We are complex, multi-layered creatures.

What everybody sees are the exposed outer layers of our onion identities.

What we feel are the deeply influential inner layers that are encoded in emotion and symbolism that take quality time to understand.

It’s only when we learn to decode the complex feelings and insights buried within that we can finally change the vibrancy and authenticity of our exposed outer layers.

Trying to upkeep the appearance of an impeccable shell with a rotting interior is futile work. What’s rotting on the inside will inevitably make its way to the outside.

It’s only once we understand that we function as an integrated whole… that we might finally commit to developing and improving our innermost—most influential—layers.

And we can begin the inner work that’ll change our daily mission from “shell upkeep” to “core cleaning” and what used to be a facade will slowly crumble and what’ll be left is a vibrant glow that was there all along.

Balancing Up And Down

Published on March 6, 2023

Our roots entrench themselves deeper through inner work.

Our branches extend themselves out further through outer engagement.

If you find yourself uneasy, ridden with anxiety, like your standing on unstable ground…

It’s root work that’s needed.

Don’t fool yourself into thinking that something more is needed from the outer (money, status, travel, etc). It’ll only end up making you feel more unstable by further extending out your branches without having any effect on the depth of your roots.

Proportional is what makes the tree stand firm.

We move up by going down. And the more we go down… the higher up we can go. Go too high without enough down… and we’ll tip and crash. Find the balance in up and down and stable, calm, secure, is where we’ll be found.

P.s. Know someone who may enjoy reading these? This is me kindly asking if you’d forward it to them :)

Prioritizing Future You

Published on February 26, 2023

Those who prioritize their future self get ahead.

Because while this mostly makes the now harder, it makes the later easier. And there’s A LOT more later than there is now.

The trick, however, is to mindfully walk this balance between future you and current you’s needs.

Consistent misery isn’t a good present or long-term strategy. But, neither is consistent comfort. Too much comfort leads to a lot more later misery.

It’s about making the journey of life an uphill climb that’s as enjoyable as possible—so that you’re able to consistently step upwards towards a greater future self while also getting to enjoy the view of the climb along the way.

Future you will be proud and thankful of this current, reading-this-post-you if you do.

P.s. In case you missed it, you can read the best of what I posted to MoveMe Quotes last week, here.

A Flip Of The Switch

Published on January 31, 2023

I started meditating a whole lot more once I stopped trying to do it perfectly.

What I realized is that a quiet corner, meditation pillow, and chunk of uninterrupted time aren’t required.

What’s required is an intention. Period.

Now, I meditate while walking, driving, waiting in lines, you name it…

What the intention does is declare to your mind that you’re now entering a different way of being. Without it, your mind will unconsciously continue to rambunctiously act non-meditatively—as it always does.

It’s like flipping a mind switch.

Once that switch is turned on and the light of your consciousness turns inward, you can begin to notice the urges that come up (that try to break you away from your meditation/presence), and focus on returning to your practice for as long as you may.

And suddenly, once you realize that a flip of the switch is all that’s required, meditation goes from another task you try to stressfully add to your already busy day—to an easily-intertwined-throughout-your-whole-day kind of task.

There are so many applications for this strategy in life.

P.s. When I do sit down to meditate, I use brain.fm to filter out invasive external noises. I’m a raving fan and currently on a 20-week use streak.