Winter is a beautiful time for self-assessment. There's a powerful biological urge to get fat, find a cave and hunker down in it until spring. While your body is preferring stillness, you have a rich opportunity to evaluate your life. When it becomes time to move again, you will keep moving in the same habit patterns you were in this year, unless you choose to change. You will create more or less the same life. Change starts best through an awareness of where you're at.
Be thorough. You've got all winter to get clear on where you're going next. I suggest working through the chakras to get a better picture of your current situation. For each chakra, meditate on the issues represented. Ask yourself the suggested questions, or whichever ones appeal to you. Write down your answers. Wait a few weeks, and ask them again to see if new insights occur to you. Think aout your life until you're crystal clear on the areas in which you most want to live it differently.
Root chakra: How am I doing with survival issues? Am I confident, each day, that I have a stable roof over my head and food for my belly? Is my health supporting me to create what I want in my life? How is my sense of tribe? Do I know I am part of a community that is concerned for my survival?
Belly chakra: How am I doing with relationship and sexual issues? Do I feel confident in my sexuality? Do I have unresolved sexual abuse issues I'm ready to clear? Do I have what I want in terms of partner(s)? Do I have a good time sensually interacting with my world?
Solar plexus chakra: How am I doing in terms of personal power? Do I feel confident professionally? Am I successful in my work? Am I able to be assertive or even dominant when I want to? Am I able to be compliant or even submissive when I want to? Do I feel I own my own power, and make my own choices?
Heart chakra: How am I doing in terms of making a love connection with my world? Do I have a treasured collection of people I love, and who love me? Can I connect to the natural world, loving trees and rocks and birds and such? Do I feel myself to be part of a larger world, every part intertwined, all sharing love?
Throat chakra: How am I doing with speaking my truth? Can I say what I want to say, when I want to say it? Can I ask for what I need? Can I keep a confidence to myself and keep my own secrets? Can I express myself creatively? Am I creating a life that is esthetically pleasing to me?
Third eye chakra: How am I doing psychically? Am I doing the meditation or ritual necessary to stay in touch? Do I receive the information I feel I need to make good choices? Would I feel life was more fun if I learned to read tarot/remember past lives/channel Seth/see auras?
Crown chakra: How am I doing with spirit? Do I feel a regular connection to the divine? Do I have a deep sense of the purpose of my life? Do I trust that I live in a benevolent universe, conspiring for my good? Do I know, all the way through me, that I am loved and protected, because I feel the hand of God on the top of my head every day?
You've answered a long list of questions, and you've identified areas in which you would like to improve your life. Dream on it. Let this information rattle around in your subconscious for a while. See what patterns emerge. You might decide that your throat issues, your inability to speak up for yourself, are an offshoot of the sexual abuse at the belly. Or that you just can't focus on talking to God until after you've got a reliable way to pay your rent. Look for the common threads, the root causes.
When you've got a picture you understand, choose one area to focus on. One. If you've got health issues, addressing them will magically give you more energy, and that social life will probably take care of itself. If you try to address every issue in your life at once, you'll fry. Choose one, and sharpen your intent. What do you do, now that you've identified the area you wish to work on?
· Set a goal
· Break the larger goal down into action steps
· Do at least one small thing every day.
Set a Goal
Set a goal. Think globally, act locally here. Dream big, allowing yourself to fantasize about what your ideal life would look like. Flesh it out in your mind. Be as specific as you can, and don't short yourself because you doubt your ability to manifest what you desire. Then, once it's very clear in your mind, choose a specific goal as your focus. For example, in the big picture I dream of living in an intentional community of about 200 people, all living rich full lives, sharing a common spiritual purpose and eating really great organic food. Being new in town, I might choose a goal for this year of creating a loving, supportive informal community of friends.
Whatever your dreams, choose a goal that is specific, measurable and attainable. When making changes in neglected areas of your life, or areas that have been problematic, it's much better to build a track record of success than to try and do everything at once. If you've had money problems all your life, a goal for the year of making a million dollars might be a bit much. Dream of that million dollars, and then ask yourself what you can do toward that goal this year. Set a goal of paying all bills on time, or not increasing your debt, or seeking a better job. Concrete and of manageable size.
Break Your Larger Goal Down Into Action Steps
Break the larger goal down into action steps. A goal large enough to be interesting over the course of a year, and challenging enough to affect change in your life, is going to be overwhelming if you try to do it all at once. Especially if you've set a goal in an area that will stretch you. An action step is a task small enough to be done in the amount of time available to you. If you've got no time obligations, and you're good with focus, an action step could be something that takes eight hours to do. But, most of you have jobs, families and obligations. If you have a spare hour in the evening, keep breaking the steps down until they're all things that can be done in an hour or less. Set yourself up for a lot of little successes.
Taking my community of friends goal, what kind of action steps might go into creating this? I might think to join a coven where I can meet like-minded people. That's specific and attainable, but to do it properly will take more than an hour. So I break it down further. The bits might end up being: Pick up Widdershins. Read listings of Wiccan organizations and circle possibilities. Make a phone call. (Repeat as necessary.) Go visit a group. (Repeat as necessary.) Meditate on my choice. Choose one. Attend the first event. Repeat.
I've now taken what on the face of it was a fairly small task, something that might be one of fifty bright ideas I listed for making friends, and broken it down. My new list has at least seven steps in it, each one of which I get to cross off my list and celebrate as a success when it's done. Each item can be done in less than an hour, with the possible exception of visiting groups.
Don't neglect this part of the process. Everyone has bright ideas. In this culture, almost everyone you talk to wants to lose weight, and they'll tell you how they're going to eat less and work out. But most people don't actually do it. The goal may be specific, twenty pounds, but it's not broken down into steps that feel easily attainable. Assume you have a short attention span, and give yourself lots of little goals and lots of little celebrations.
Do At Least One Small Thing Every Day
Do at least one small thing every day. This is pretty simple, but incredibly powerful. You've set your intention, and the universe wants to support you. Your energy and divine energy will be more effectively mobilized through your action. Here's an inspirational word from the Work of the Chariot, "When a man takes one step toward God, God takes more steps toward that man than there are sands in the worlds of time." Your guides, angels, and favorite deities will help you out. The best way for you to let them know you really mean this idea, as opposed to your random fantasies of tying up your boss for a weekend of role reversals, is to keep taking action.
Each small success brings momentum to carry you forward. At the end of one week's worth of steps, I'll be on my way to being a proud member of my new coven. If I didn't break it down, I might have good intentions about it for months before I found a block of time and energy sufficient for the larger task.
Every great work was accomplished one task at a time. You can create a great work of your life. You have all the resources you need. Don't worry about whether you're choosing the perfect course. As they say, the worst piece you ever wrote is better than the best one you didn't write. You are the creative genius of your own life. If you're not perfectly satisfied once you've reached your goal, you get another chance to choose next year!
Freya Ray is a professional psychic, shaman, writer and teacher. She teaches energy work, shamanic journeying, tarot reading and how to live a more blissful life in general. She recently relocated to Seattle after working at Phoenix and Dragon in Atlanta and Rainbow Moods in Tucson. Her writing has appeared in the New Times, the Awareness Journal and the Magical Journal. She can be reached for comment or psychic readings at (206) 276-4290 or freya_ray@yahoo.com.