Why? Because, the logic goes, when you are feeling grateful for something, you’re in a state of appreciation and happiness, which begets a greater state of happiness. The more you get accustomed to feeling good about what you have, the more you get to feel good about, and the more good you feel about what you have, and so on… it’s an ever-growing spiral.

But what if gratitude brings you down?

I have to admit, I used to resist gratitude in a huge way. Not because I have anything against showing appreciation, but because whenever I’d do a practice involving gratitude, I ended up feeling small and unhappy, which is the opposite of what it was supposed to do for me.

Not cool, I thought. Not cool.

But, being the ever-curious guy that I am, I decided to probe a bit deeper into why I was feeling this way, wondering if I could find a way to an effortless, empowering gratitude practice, and away from the depressing version I’d been practicing. So, like I used to do with my healing clients, I watched myself while I expressed my gratitude to see what the problem was.

And right away, I realized that there wasn’t a problem. There were two.

One Problem Was Shame

Sometimes, situations in your life can link negative feelings to something otherwise positive, such as gratitude. When that happens, it can cause feelings of contraction even when, for most people, the same situation would cause feelings of expansion.

My habitual way of cultivating gratitude—and I’m guessing this is pretty common—was to think of something in my life that I was thankful for, and then, just like we’re taught when we’re kids, to thank someone for it.

But remember when you were a kid and you got a gift from someone? There you are, staring down at your brand new Lego castle, or shiny new stuffed animal, and you’re just thrilled. You’re thinking about all the fun you’ll have with your new toy, and your parents, mortified that you might grow up to be socially uncouth someday, jump on your back and say, “What do you say, huh?”

You look at them, steeped in shame, and whimper, “Thank you.”

What a bummer, huh? You’re just jazzed about what life just brought you, and you get shamed into muttering a ‘thanks’ when you aren’t really up for it. Now you feel like a loser for not saying it without being hounded. And so receiving a gift and feeling great about it has now been linked to feelings of shame. How wonderful.

That was my experience to a ‘T’. As soon as I felt gratitude, I felt shame along with it. I felt that I wasn’t good enough for what I’d received. Talk about shutting down the fun factory!

The Other was the Other

I also realized that in addition to the shame piece, my efforts at gratitude were at odds with my spiritual beliefs. Not as if I was saying, “We don’t do gratitude around here,” in the same way some folks don’t believe in vaccinations, reincarnation, or going outside without your head covered.

I’m talking about an incongruity in the sense of not-being-aligned-with-my-experience-of-Oneness. My experience of the Divine has taught me to believe that the Oneness permeates everything in (and out) of creation, and therefore, in the deepest sense of things, there is no “outside”, and no “other”. And, therefore, the idea of thanking something “outside of me” for bringing me something, as if I couldn’t have obtained it otherwise, was really, really stifling.

This ego-centric, disembodied concept of God was really putting a kink in my chances to experience true gratitude, because every time I tried to feel good about something in my life, I reverted to feeling tiny, insignificant, and separate from All That Is. Bummer, huh?

So, in short, the practice of gratitude became a shame-inducing exercise in smallness. Rrrrrrrt! Hit the brakes!

Redefining Gratitude

If you’ve got roadblocks in the way of tapping into feelings of thankfulness and gratitude, it can seriously hamper your efforts to move forward in your life, not to mention put a halt on the growth of your business. I mean, what kind of signal does it send when a taste of success comes your way, and instead of appreciating it, you feel shameful and less than deserving? Geez!

So if you know—or suspect—that this is the case for you, here’s what I recommend:

• Take a moment to quiet your mind, and step into the process of expressing gratitude (if you need a cue for that, try thinking about something in your life you like, and simply say, “thanks.”). Notice what happens inside you, emotionally speaking, and with your thoughts.
• Take whatever bizarre thoughts, painful memories, or incongruous emotions come to the surface and apply your favorite healing technique (mine, EFT, whatever).
• Watch and see what happens to your feelings and thoughts about gratitude.
• And once you feel a good degree of resolution from the past, start visualizing how you’d like gratitude to work for you. You can ask yourself, “If I were to have a practice of gratitude that fit entirely with my beliefs and were to bring me incredible peace, energy, and joy, what would it be?

My new practice allows me to experience a profound state of gratitude and appreciation for everything in my life, and it rekindles the sense of intrinsic connection and flow I share with the Oneness, in a taoist-like sense. It’s empowering and paradigm-changing, and I’m really grateful for it.

And that’s the great thing about this: no matter where you’re coming from, no matter what hand life has dealt you, you can create a new practice, a new relationship, to gratitude that is healthy, positive, and empowering.

And that is something to be grateful for.

Image by >lonushi.

© Adam for Adam Kayce, 2009. | Permalink | 18 comments

Why, in seemingly every tradition, are there ritual practices?

Because rituals work, that’s why. They work through repetition; through continual practice, the attentive mind learns the steps until they are memorized. Once the mind’s focus is no longer needed to complete the ritual, it goes on “auto-pilot”, and the adept can repeat the ritual and focus the mind deeper, awakening the heart/soul/whatever (depends on the ritual, of course). This allows for a much deeper level of presence to be had, transforming the result of the ritual, and the mind of the practitioner.

Or, as my martial arts teacher would say, “First, the mind teaches the body what to do. Then, the body refines the movement, teaching the mind how it wants to move. Finally, body and mind are united as one.” He also said that once you performed an action 10,000 times, you had it mastered.

Clearly, rituals rock. In disciplines such as spirituality, or martial arts, that’s a no-duh statement. But what about in your work day? Do you have rituals?

If you answered no, allow me to differ. Uh, email? Twitter? Checking your voice mail?

And those are just the ubiquitous ones… depending on what line of work you’re in, you’ve probably got a bunch more. Here are some of mine:

• Health: CrossFit, 4-5 days a week. And if you think CrossFit doesn’t count as a ritual, you don’t know CrossFitters! We check the Workout of the Day (WOD) religiously, the star-performers of CrossFit are like heroes, and we read the CrossFit Journal like it’s a holy text. Trust me; don’t get in between a CrossFitter and his/her workout.
• Personal Growth: I have a set of practices I do regularly designed to enhance my sense of connection, develop my focus, and keep me moving towards the future I envision. These include gratitude, visualization, self-healing, and more (I’ll be sharing more about this as time goes on, in case anyone’s curious…).
• Business: I write, tweet, and email, like many do. I also regularly search for web design and development knowledge, reading feeds of favorite designers and design compendiums, investigating WordPress plugins and theme developments, etc.

There are more, of course, but you get the idea.

In my mind, these all qualify as rituals, because the more I do them, the more aware I am of the effects of the practice themselves, and the more I transform as a person through doing them (yes, even through Twitter). They make me better at what I do, of course… but it would be easy to do any of these and not get the same benefits.

What makes the difference? Intention. Have the intention to carry your focus and presence deeper as you do your daily rituals, and see what happens. If you’ve never thought of your work as potential for ritual before, take a moment and reflect on your day… where does this idea of ritual make perfect sense?

Some days are just meh.

Of course, some days you’re on, and some days you aren’t. Some days, email is just email. Meditation is just sitting there. Chanting is just mindless blather. After all, I’m no Master Oogway, either.

But that’s not a deficiency in the ritual, it’s a lack of intention and presence. Any regular activity can be transformed into ritual with the proper mindset.

So, if you notice yourself out of the groove one day, you’ve got a choice: Hop back up into the saddle, or let it go, and just be where you’re at (that’s called ‘acceptance’). There’s always another day.

What rituals do you use?

Image by moriza.

© Adam for Adam Kayce, 2009. | Permalink | 9 comments

You’re going to hear more from me about EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique), that’s for sure; I’m a huge fan, and my wife is a practitioner. Even my 8-year-old taps, on her own, whenever she’s nervous or feeling ill.

What is it?

It’s a method of healing that’s based on balancing the body’s energy system, and it gets its history in large part from Oriental medicine. No needles, though; you tap with your fingers on the same points acupuncturists put needles into. And it works for physical symptoms, emotional issues, belief systems, you name it.

I love it. And, I’m not the only one… as I understand the story, the same filmmakers who worked on The Secret were so impressed by EFT, they worked with EFT’s founder, Gary Craig, to create this video to introduce people to it:

If you aren\'t seeing the embedded video, click here to view.

You’ve got to watch it, it’s well worth the few minutes.

If you’re interested in learning more, and want to experience it yourself, give my wife a call. She’s amazing. And if you have experience with EFT, feel free to leave a comment so we can hear your experiences, too.

© Adam for Adam Kayce, 2008. | Permalink | 2 comments

Every presenter at the "Technology, Entertainment, and Design" conference (which happens yearly in Monterey, California) is a thought leader, inspirational figure, or leader in their field, so watching the videos of their presentations is a great way to catch a glimpse of some very influential figures about what’s on their cutting edge. And at about twenty minutes a piece, they make for great lunchtime viewing, too…

The other day I watched Mathieu Ricard’s talk (it’s well worth the time to watch it); Ricard is a Buddhist monk of French origin who has been living in the Himalayas for at least twenty years or so now, and has earned the moniker of "world’s happiest man."

As Ricard shared about cultivating happiness through "mind training", he mentioned, almost in passing, four characteristics that caught my attention: serenity, inner strength, inner freedom, and confidence. They jumped out at me, because I felt that they were four key qualities worth pursuing in the practice of living the Monkish lifestyle.

Serenity

I’d define serenity as the experience of peace; a quietude in your being, as if you are, in body and mind, at complete rest. It doesn’t mean you aren’t in motion, it just means that whatever you’re engaged in, you’re 100% there, and not feeling pulled or pressured to be anywhere but in your moment.

Inner Strength

Strength, in my opinion, is about both power and resiliency. Chapter 76 of the Tao Te Ching states:

…softness and tenderness are attributes of life,
And hardness and stiffness, attributes of death.
Just as a sapless tree will split and decay
So an inflexible force will meet defeat.

Having the ability to marshal your inner resources when needed is one aspect of strength, and so is sovereignty. But equally important is the ability to compromise, flex, and bend with the forces of nature that we are a part of, but often forget that we aren’t separate from.

Inner Freedom

A slave is one who must act not from her own will, but at the direction of another. And while we’d all like to think of ourselves as free, how free are we? Where do you get caught in the tides of popular opinion, culture, or just plain ol’ desire for something you don’t have? When you hand the reins of your self-determination over to anything outside you, no matter how subtly, you’re giving away your inner freedom. Living free means living by a deep, inner awareness of what’s right for you in every moment.

It doesn’t mean that you aren’t open to learning from others, of course. But it does mean that you take what you get from the world around you and trust your own heart’s determination about whether or not it’s right for you. Which leads us to…

Confidence

Defined as, "belief in oneself and one’s powers or abilities", the word "confidence" sources from the Latin roots con + fidere, or "with" + "trust."

Do you trust yourself? Do you trust in your own heart? Your resolve? Your commitments to the values you hold most dear, whether they’re values like compassion, love, honesty, and valor, or truth, virtue, service, and fairness?

When push comes to shove, can you rely on yourself to make the kinds of choices you know in your heart to be right?

Have you had moments like this? Would you like more of them?

With any of these characteristics, the way to cultivate them is two-fold:

1. Pursue them directly, and
2. Learn how to regain them when you lose them.

It’s great to be able to sit in a quiet place and be still; and yet, for those of us who have chosen to be a part of an active society on a daily basis, times of seclusion tend to be much less prevalent than times of immersion in the busy work-a-day world. In an environment rife with distractions, being able to regain your focus when you lose it is critical to your mental well-being.

There was a great line in Evan Almighty, where Morgan Freeman (reprising his role as God, from Bruce Almighty) said,

Let me ask you something. If someone prays for patience, you think God gives them patience? Or does he give them the opportunity to be patient? If he prayed for courage, does God give him courage, or does he give him opportunities to be courageous? If someone prayed for the family to be closer, do you think God zaps them with warm fuzzy feelings, or does he give them opportunities to love each other?

Having time in your day to devote to spiritual practices—time when you sit in meditation, for example, to cultivate awareness and inner quiet—is essential… and, so is the active practice of regaining your calm when life’s events draw you away from it.

For example, being able to stop your cycles of emotional over-reaction, and eventually diffuse them altogether, is just as important—or more important, some might say—as time spent in direct pursuit of serenity through sitting quietly and learning to quiet your thoughts.

How? Well, there are a lot of methods out there: EFT, Sedona method, the Work, Doyletics, NLP, Hypnosis, you name it… I’ve tried a bunch of them, and there are many I haven’t tried… but less important than having a multitude of methods, I believe, is to have one or two that you’re fluent in, and can use when you need them.

The trick, of course, is consistency in using them, though, isn’t it? How many methods of personal healing do you know or have you tried? And how often do you use them? My guess is that you’d agree that the more you practice, the easier it becomes, and, the more likely you are to use them to get you through the rough spots in your life.

Why not get (back) into the habit of cultivating Ricard’s four qualities in your life, starting today?

Image by by GNU license via Wikipedia

© Adam for Adam Kayce, 2008. | Permalink | One comment