In my last post I wrote about how I was finally able to start doing my intuitive work in my office. To feel worthy about starting my intuitive work in my office, I had to acknowledge my discomfort about my less-than-perfect environment, and just forge ahead in whatever circumstances were at hand. I had to focus on the actual starting, and learn to ignore all of the excuses which would have kept me from actually creating something.
I’m learning a lot about these two concepts right now – taking babysteps and dealing with my tendency towards perfectionism – and they often need to work together to keep me moving forward.
What do these concepts have to do with intuition? I can be the best intuitive in the world, but if I can’t operationalize my ideas and goals into living 3D reality, then my abilities don’t benefit myself or others. So I must learn to combine my intuitive abilities and my personal goals in order to bring into literal existence, in the best possible way, what it is I am want to do, and I’m meant to do.
One of the things I know about myself is that I am kind of an extreme person in how I do things. (People who have known my for years, can stop laughing now please.) I can do a lot in big spurts, with periods of respite in between, but is hard for me to keep the committed to a goal, by taking steps on a daily basis. While this is sometimes advantageous, if this is the only way I work, I miss out on some golden opportunities. Perhaps not surprisingly, I married someone who is my opposite in that he is very good in keeping his daily, habitual commitment to goals. Watching him has taught me a lot about areas in which I need to learn to emulate.
This tendency to be extreme, means I also have to be careful not to go too hard with the good things. My old pattern is to over-do a good thing. For instance, with my old tendencies, I would have sat down and instead of writing for 30 minutes, thinking “more is better”, I would written for two hours. The problem is that at the end of those two hours I would have been totally burnt out. And instead of getting me fired up about doing more writing, I would feel so burnt out, that I would not want to write again for 2 weeks.
My new awareness means I have to carefully observe myself, especially when I’m doing those things I really want to. This means I have to locate my own boundaries, and respect them. This means with writing, aiming to come back each day (or whenever I am able) to write for another 30 minutes. So potentially in two weeks time I could have 7 hours of writing (14 days worth of 30 minute sessions), instead of one session of 2 hours.
In the past, I have equated an ongoing commitment with the dullness, and monotony. Perhaps it was a lack of discipline, or just feeling that “the normal rules shouldn’t apply to me”, but I always really balked at taking small gradual steps – “babysteps” – towards anything. I realize how many goals this fear of commitment has actually probably deprived me of. I’m struck by the irony of how many goals I’ve would have been achieved had I implemented small steps each day, rather than “waiting for the big break” or “waiting for inspiration” or any of those other excuses I made for myself. These excuses only kept me waiting for something that is never going to come, instead of moving myself forward towards my goals.
Every day I make my commitments afresh to myself again. I set my intentions for each day, and they mirror my bigger commitments, broken down into tinier bite-sized pieces. Each day, I commit to one babystep for my big goals.
And if I fail in my commitments? My old pattern would have been to just give up. My new awareness means I just get back on the horse, wherever I am, and just recommit again, for that day, and the next and the next. Every day I renew my commitments to myself.
I see the necessity of babysteps everywhere now. As I have been involved helping my child learn to read over the last couple of years, I see the absolute power of just 10 minutes a day of reading over a year, and how each tiny book read, is another sign post on the road to mastering reading.
Want to write a book? Commit to writing 250 words a day.
Want to lose weight? Commit to eating 150 less calories less a day.
Want to do more intuitive work? Commit yourself to using your intuition to assist you each day.
Each day is a new chance to re-commit to yourself again.
Is there an area of your life where babysteps have taken you towards a significant goal? Please share, I’d love some more inspiration.
