I'd rather you impress me, than love me. I'd rather you be strong in your own opinions, than yield to mine for approval. We should delight in people's lives being full of impressive accomplishments, precisely because we do love and care about them. We should be proud of people having their own opinions, even when those opinions differ from our own, because real love wants every person to be independent, strong, and confident. When we really care for people's development and wellbeing, our admiration of their impressive accomplishments feels even more deeply satisfying, than their admiration of our own opinions and accomplishments. One of the most powerful and practical forms of unconditional love, is being impressed — with those whom we disagree, and even more so, with those we know may not even like us, or our way of seeing the world. Being loved feels good to us all, but when someone impresses us, that commands respect. I'd rather be impressed and respect you first, but if we have both love and respect, well — that is just unparalleled! It is so pleasurable to see people standing tall and thriving with self-reliance. We should rather sacrifice our egos, if it helps another ascend beyond the suffocating reach of our own insecurities. Never allow your insecurities to create insecurity in others. Like any good coach, temporary mentor, or friend should think — you don't have to like me, and we don't always have to agree, but learn what you can from me; throw out the rest, and above all — go out there and be great!
Awareness changes the world, because awareness changes your mind. When you change your mind, how you experience the world changes with it. Awareness makes you powerful. Awareness is power. The greater your awareness; the greater your power. Developing awareness is a practice of deep and active sensing, perceiving, feeling, and most importantly, connecting. And when connecting, it is also important to connect with emptiness. An expanded mind does not mean full to the brim; open spaces are beautiful too. Just as pure silence is more than observation, as it informs from non-observation, greater awareness is not exclusively about observing. Awareness is more than a form of observation, it is also a magical absence of form, which opens the space for that which is unknown to arrive. Life is speaking to you, through the portal of your awareness. Each step toward greater awareness, unlocks gifts and freedoms, which can only be granted from within. Most of what we miss out on in life, is simply because we do not notice. Allow new awareness to bring you the gifts for-which your soul has restlessly been longing. Allow awareness to complete you.
Becoming more aware is the most practical form of enlightenment. Awareness is the carrier of opportunity. What is missing from your life, is often only what you cannot perceive enough to realize. Herein, is a new perspective on problems stemming from, "shortsightedness." Let's make a distinction between "overlooked, missed-it, or, forgot" — and not having the eyes, or the awareness, to see in the first place. There is so much there for you, at the far-peripheral of your vision. This even includes how you see, and appraise yourself, along with how you see others. Real vision is about awareness. The solution to nearly every problem in the world comes down to greater awareness, because when you are aware, you can see more — the bigger picture. Our problems don't exist because we hate each other, they exist because we do not fully see each-other. Hate is only blindness. We seldom actually know people; we only know our misinformed judgements. When we truly see each other, we call it friendship, or love. We consider as sacred, the high points that reach our low awareness, and give little attention to what is below our observation line. That's another way of saying we are missing almost everything. The gifts are everywhere. Special moments are labeled, "touching," or "emotional," — but really, those moments are not rare; they are just the moments we remember, through awareness.
It is only when you learn to listen, that you will finally be heard. When you are waiting for them to one-day hear you, or listen, you are giving them the power. Your self-imposed limitation, is that for you to move forward, they must listen, and meet your demands. This is not true. Listening brings awareness, knowledge, and power. Don't try to make them listen; instead, you listen. Listening is the supreme form of domination. There is no comeback to listening. The more you listen, the more you have power over them. Only people who don't know how to listen, have to walk around on eggshells.
Awareness is like a deep form of listening; something far beyond the cliched business and psychology jargon of, "active listening." Real listening is about full spectrum awareness. Listening is a meaningful form of intelligence. Listening is a receptive form of giving. Listening is an act of both giving and receiving. Listening is a mutual pleasure. Sure, you see yourself as generous and giving, but how receiving are you of others, through listening? You pride yourself on loving people unconditionally, but will you listen to them unconditionally?
If resisting has failed and frustrated you, try to accept what is. As hard as it is to believe, acceptance can open different opportunities for change than resistance. If you resist life, it will refuse you — but if you surrender, the world will give you everything it has to offer. Resisting is not the posture of receivership. Surrender is a state of readiness, awareness, and listening, which says you are ready to hear the transmission and receive. It's all about listening. The observer effect which is well established, means an observer may, through the act of observation, change the nature of that which they observe. This is how listening works with life, and with relationships — through your so-called psychology, and through theirs. The more you listen, the more they change.
Do you want to be heard and understood? Do you want to be touched and moved? Do you want people to listen to you, to see you, and recognize that within you, which is uniquely yours? Well, people will deliver those experiences to you, at a level, nearly always significantly less, than you cater those experiences for others. And, through the law of averages, or call it karma if you like, we all get pretty close to the deal we strike with life, and with each-other. We receive attention to the degree we pay attention. If things have not worked out, don't worry, the contract is not final, and there is still time to make it worse — or perhaps better. Life is a grand barter. Everything is a relationship, and everything is negotiable. Through greater awareness, your super-relationship, which is your relationship with everything, can elegantly negotiate all of your transactions in life, for better or for worse. Whether it will be better or worse depends on just how deeply you are willing to open yourself, so that others may open themselves to you.
Positive thinking is useful, but highly overrated. Being truly successful does not require winning the positivity pageant. Being unsatisfied is healthy too. My whole life is an engine of dissatisfaction. It's why I wake-up in the morning. If you are unsatisfied, moody, discontented, and the song in your heart sounds more like a long frustrated moan, it's fine — groan, grumble, sigh, even growl. But, don't forget this; you are more. Real success is found in the balance of all things. Be fair with life, inasmuch as you wish life to be fair with you. Make your contentment equal to your discontentment. Voice your praise-filled gratitude as loudly, as your shouts of foul. Pray or give thanks in your own way, as earnestly as you bemoan your woes. Savior and sigh in the bliss of affections, as gutturally as your furrowed growls. Shout glory, Hallelujah, or thank you, thank you, thank you, as fervently as your most exquisite rage.
Success was never meant to be an attainment; it was meant to be a testament. Our eye on the prize has moved from freedom, to success slavery. For many, success is the end of the road, that begins with a single step. Don't trust the path success takes you on, or what it leads you to. Most success will lead you to falsity. Quit trying to be successful. Redefine success from this day forward. Put it in its place. Quit begging, groveling, manipulating, conniving, scheming, and wanting with such desperation. Don't allow success to turn you into a desperate, empty, begging fraud. Self-satisfaction and gratitude for your completeness and innate perfection, is the most mighty of all successes. Reach for success, but slap its hand when it reaches for you. Because what success wants from you, is what you want from it — everything. There will never be enough that you want from it, and that it wants from you. Successes' demands are as endless as yours. It will siphon the reservoir of your hope to the last drop. Master success today. Be its master, not its slave. Success is illusionary; an oasis in a desert, but which itself, is already in a true paradise. Success was always with you. You were born a success, and you will die a success — if you can be successful at accepting the victory of living.
Success is a seducer in a marketplace of pimps and whores. Success has turned an Earthly paradise, into a global brothel. Success is ambition porn, and it's addicts need no anonymity, for it is the open pornography of the culture. Success is the father of frauds, and countless bastard children of ambition's covetous wandering-eye, and capital philanderings. Success is legal heroine — it is the cocaine of the culture; an opportunity opiate. Success is a license to kill in the name of, "nothing personal, it's just business." Success is the front-line of class warfare. Success is an object of tireless desire. We have objectified success, even more than we have objectified women. We are success prejudice, more than we are race prejudice. Success is an equal opportunity destroyer. As war often comes in the name of peace, success the destroyer, often comes in the name of creation. The devastation of success is usually unleashed through the pursuit of so-called solutions. Success is the greatest of all panaceas.
