Tag: freedom

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The door to Heaven is through the heart.

A matter of heart

Whenever we hear of soulmates, we think love. In movies, all too often, the hero ends up straying from the significant other and getting lost. The guide of the story always steps in at the right moment to say something along the lines of “Follow your heart!”. The hero then gets a moment of enlightenment which gives way to some dramatic running towards the partner who thinks they have to find love in the arms of another.

A special personal frequency

To be in Love, we often think of being in love with someone. But its not about the other person. Its about us. Its about being within the frequency of love in our own heart, and because we’re within that frequency for ourselves, and expand upon it, we match the vibration of our significant other who just so happens to be in that perfect frequency at that perfect moment in time when we happen to stumble upon it.

Everything you want comes through the heart.

To be in Love means, to be the most aligned with the higher nature of your heart. It means, you are in your heart with or without another person. And this one thing, to have the courage to feel fully what your heart feels, and to live by it, is what attracts the amplitude of possibilities; the soulmate, the dreamlife, the dream job, feeling amazing, flowing and feeling abundantly…. you name it. The feelings we all long for, the state of being which transcends poets from all ages, its the stuff of songs and art that elevates you to the point of blissful tears.

Stepping out of the frequency of love causes pain.

It’s the attachment to the physical form which happens to match our heart frequency which is the source of pain. Trying to control a human being by focussing on a material construct such as the body, the person who happens to match our heart frequency.

Which is why I don’t believe that we can ‘have a change of heart’, I believe that people who focus on other things and other people and different belifs, and decide to step out of the frequency of love realize that they want something else. It’s stepping away from the frequency of love in which we are.

The cross is a map to the heart of matter.

Being with God, is being in the heart. Why? Well, if you look at the cross, the cross is a map which represents man, and it points to the heart. X marks the spot. So if you follow the map, to live in the heart, you also find God. In other words, if you follow your heart, you access heaven on earth.

Forcing matters

Drinking coffee, stimulants, even dopamin inducing type activies, all have one thing in common. They are an external substance which have the property for us to force ourselfs into a state. The state isn’t natural to us. The point of being aligned with the heart, is that the body, the nervous system, the mind, the mindset… all align naturally. Otherwise we can do meth or cocain or have abundant sex and just live for the highs. That’s not how it works though, because we need to respect and empower the body to arrive at the destination where the heart and mind are. So, it’s about taking the time, going at our own pace, growing into well-being just in time for Love.

In addition, forcing your way to get what you want is ego. While being pulled toward what you want is heart. When you force the way, you miss out on Gods path. When you follow God’s plan, you don’t have full control, but trust and flow with life in a much more fluid way. And when you arrive, everything works out in a perfect way.

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To choose what matters. (A matter of heart)

We usually tend to describe what matters as something that has value to us.
What we like, what we think we need, what we want… Our needs are shaped by the world we live in, the societal standards, the social media, the unexpressed desires, and our world of consumption taylored to make us desire…

But this couldn’t be further from the truth.

To choose what matters, is to choose what is in front of you. To choose what God is putting in front of you when you have to make a choice.

To choose what matters, is to be grateful to have something and to embrace it fully. To choose what matters, or materialises in front of you, is to choose to do something good with it, and to water it and cherish it and give it our attention and cut off from all other options and possibilities.

So when you have to ‘choose what matters’ in terms of dating and relationships. Choose the one person who chooses you, and cut off from all other options and possibilities. Choose to embelish and cherish and love that one person who steps out of the crowd and decides to take a chance with you. They have the courage to step towards you, because they see your value from miles away. To them, your value is screaming to be ceased. You are water to the thirsty, food to the hungry, and air to those who can’t breathe.

If you have the courage to take that leap of faith and embrace ‘what matters’ and elevate that which is presented to you, to the highest level you can. God will give you support and momentum. You will feel like the luckiest person on earth. You will inherit the Kingdom of God.

The only way in, is through the heart. And the only key is honest and true Love. Which is only possible, when two soulmates meet with genuin intention.

All the best,

Cherokee Goldberg

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The blooming of soul

The plant cannot help but to bloom in the presence of the sun.

Its only in its presence that its petals can expand, and once expanded, they don’t retract back to their previous form. It’s a one way flight to a better destination.

The soul, the human, doesn’t expand then shrink back into its original form. In fact, we can only leave our previous state. It’s never a destination.

There is a process, from start to finish. Not a reverse process from finish to start.
Once the blooming process has come and gone, it doesn’t go back to its beginning. It’s linear, in that it evolves from a point A to a point Z. It doesn’t go in reverse from point Z to point A.

The soul only evolves forward through time. And a state, like a bulb, cannot happen twice. A blooming of that bulb cannot happen twice either. And neither does its death.

Your soul, goes through a rooting period, where the seeds strive to expand through the deep dark and cold earth. A difficult expansion period. Necessary to root the plant for what comes next. Pushing through cold soil.

Next the plant, or the flower, grows. It’s previous period of rooting has layed the base for the stem growth. And once, thick enough, that stem will provide enough nutrients for the flower to bloom in to the beautiful flower it is.

The petals open up and strive to get as much light as possible. And expand as wide as naturally capable. Where the photosynthesis uses the external elements and transforms it into energy, it reflects the light back to the world. This is the shining period.

The human being in its blooming period has that same expansion, that same shining, that same attraction as the flower does. Except, rather than sun, its attention and social ability.

But equally, the human also, after its bloom, withers and then the petals of its beautiful bloom fade and die off. Gods natural pruning. Once we shine, we decline. Think of celebrities, they have a shining period where they accumulate attention by the millions, and also capture finance and fame. Then once they’ve expanded through their shining period, they either continue and repeat the process, or they decline. Movie stars who stay out of the spotlight tend to be less vibrant.

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Mistakes early on lead to the divine path

Do you know why you need to make as many mistakes as early as possible?

Aside from the learning experience and entrepreneurial preaching’s spewed from all over the internet to make vain money,

it’s for the self knowledge, how you function, how the world functions, so you can gain a balanced harmony. But it’s also so that you can discover your limitations, so you can get lost and fall down, and in your darkest hour, still have access to who your father is, and uncover a way home through the storm.

Getting lost early on, allows you to access your fathers guidance, to access your fathers care, to see the extent of who he is.

Before that your knowledge of your father its mainly assumptions, and many times false illusions that we never get to revisit.

This is the same for any parent, assumptions are built on childhood distortions without actualization of who parents really are today.

Reactualisation is a beautiful gift one gets to cherish going forward, as are memories. Without it, we run the risk of a life lead by delusion. And to live a life in delusion denotes living an unexamined life: a lie.

Though, to tumble and fall allows us to start from our beginings, to build ourselves up, and witness a fathers greatness in consciousness.

To allow ourselves to be vulnerable and allow a parent a second chance to support us, allows us to go forward in adulthood, to let go of the anger of unmet childish expectations.

To reexperience “helplessness” allows us to reexperience our fathers traits minus unclear mixed up delusions, we get to fortify the truth of who he was.

Without the vulnerability of “Helplessness” one cannot experience the caring nature of one’s father. If we are in control, no one can exert correct control over us.

The “second coming” in the bible, is exactly this, getting to reexperience our actual father after falling and perceiving him for what he is, not our delusional beliefs, or someone we need to use, we get to experience the genuine true love of a father.

One must be willing to go through hell to reexperience this. And hell is created through the thoughts we engage in, as the thoughts we entertain create our emotional state, and our emotional state determines how we feel.

If you cannot go through your own hell, you cannot experience or appreciate or be grateful for any foundation your father has layed before you.

If you cannot witness your fathers caring assistance, while going through a hell of your own making, you will have no real reference as to who he was and if you cannot empathize with your fellow man. One has to shatter one’s false illusions before seeing the truth.

And to be cut off from men is to live in perpetual Hell, limbo.

So, to learn how much your father cares is to learn how to feel, and you cannot access the gates of paradise, which by the way, is right here on earth through the pathway of our own thoughts.

Narnia is not a physical location, its a doorway created by imagination. Equally, paradise is a place that manifests within your life, which you can only see by :

-> Fully embracing one’s father (living or dead) which gives way to fully embracing one’s mind and ability to think.

-> By embracing one’s father and mind, we then get to control our emotional life, which gives way to stability and courage, which gives way to providing safety to the women in one’s life.

And if they feel safe they can provide love and care, which colors the earth we reside on (because the way we ‘feel’ colors our mental experience).

If a woman decides to step into a mans life, she decides to – by her presence and being- color, nurture, provide warmth, etc. to a mans logical and even cold masculine structure.

So, by rediscovering one’s father and embracing him, we rediscover a balanced harmony in our lives.

Now, let me be straight with you, I’ve never read the Bible, I’m not preaching a religion, I’m making observations from my life experiences. But if I’ve never read the bible, how could the bible be false if the information I portray pertains to observations from my experience? And from this statement, I will say that, the way to access God, is through the learning of our biological father, or he who pertains to lead us to Paradise by his example as a man.

No man is perfect, but if he so chooses to live a life according to his higher self, he will lead well. Because to lead with our higher self is Gods will. Danté’s inferno explains the pitfalls to success, and denotes the challenges we face as humans as we strive for paradise. Our higher self is a place from which all those who lead reside and show example from. Just as my father did… he lead by example for me to follow in his footsteps.

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Embracing creativity over pursuing money.

It’s very easy to get caught up in the easy exchange of effort and time against a small amount of money or even a large one. But if we give in to the exchange, we also have to acknowledge that our time and energy are less precious than the money we receive.

We believe we have options most of the time, given the circumstances we experience.
Our heads are “swollen” with the illusion of material abundance and security and the only tangible power we believe we have comes in the form of money, a value that everyone seems to enjoy.

Most often, landlords would rather call the police if you’re not paying the rent,
rather than believe in the bigger picture of your creative schemes. “Money will come,
I just need time…“

We then doubt our vision and our creative process, because we know we are “capable” of holding a job which would take up most of our time and energy. If we give in to the idea of taking a job, it goes against everything our vision and belief system stands for. It also makes clearly abundant that seeking a job is a clear translation of the fact that doubt rules your life, rather than a confident belief that what you are striving for will make sense in the long run.

Although this “hold on until the storm passes” attitude, based of beliefs, also has downsides. And one doesn’t decide to be creative, they simply are. It would be far easier to chose a good University, passing a diploma, getting a “secure job” and working until you can kick your shoes off and live by the beach… But that doesn’t work for a creative. Being creative has downsides one must acknowledge and accept first and foremost, because they define how the individual functions. If I was to say “FLY!”, you’d look at me and think I was bonkers. This is because Flying isn’t part of how you function as a human-being. The distinction of how an individual functions also applies for people.
We are all singular and no two people are alike, even if they are identical twins!

As a creative, I often encounter a downside with jobs, but most specifically any action or intention to directly pursue money. I cannot keep it up, it saturates me beyond sanity. My creative juices stagnate and I feel numb. I start to see the cogs in the machine of how the business works and it gets as repetitive as Taylorism.

The blind pursuit for money isn’t sustainable for me. My nervous system seems to be a highly sensitive tool. One too sensitive for the ups and downs of the markets, the hustle and bustle of everyday jobs or anything which doesn’t require inner growth?

It does however require me seeking to understand things in my own way, at my own speed. Letting curiosity and interest drive me towards a personal comprehension of such and such focus, undisturbed by external deadlines or the possibility of being fired or expelled if the results I discover aren’t enough.

All of this means that, jumping through hoops to please a hierarchy doesn’t work well for creatives. Success and fame and anything related to “making it” in the world,
simply aren’t compatible with sensitive independents with the need to go at their own pace and discover the fruits of their own path. Pursuing money head on will simply result in being miserable. What creatives do need to pursue though is any form of quality creative outputs and developing inner confidence around their expressive skills.

As an introvert pointing out the difficulties I experience, agoraphobia comes to mind. Not that I am scared of anyone in particular, but that my nervous system gets triggered simply by going shopping for a couple of hours. I get home, put the shopping away and get into bed. My body has considerably tensed up since only a few hours prior when I was leaving the house. And this is a recurring pattern I get anytime there is a social event, or simply being seen outside the house. Hence why I run at night.

I am not able to “Force” things, and force an outcome to “become” what I want it to be.
To go out and get it, demands more energy than I have and I’ll end up sleeping more than regular people.

As much as this leads to energetic despair, there are solutions which can be remedied as long as we have freewill and the capacity to endure moments of doubt.

And where the hell is my freewill in all of this?!

Having a strong will, being told what to do can prove difficult. Though, there are two sides to not wanting to be told what to do. The first can stem from fear and often goes a little like “Because someone in my past has hurt me and somehow they were in a position to tell me what to do, and they abused that power. Now I don’t listen to anyone, because only I know best.” We can thank our parents we are so strong…
Or, we have a strong vision and from repeated experience we learn to cancel out the noise everyone around us tends to make while they project their fears, and negative experiences upon the outcome of our path (which is an entirely different one with different skills, different beliefs and different perceptions…).

Though having a strong will and being creative can seem incredible, this also has a downside. I cannot force myself if I don’t want to do something. As I’ve learn’t to listen to my higher self and to listen to my body and what I feel. I often find that doing something I don’t want to do, is more reflective of my intuition telling me not to do it, than it is me being lazy. But this leads to a larger questions…

Why don’t I want to do that specific thing? Is it a fear or actual conscious decision making? And Are my fears ruling the outcomes of what I am striving for?

A while back I read a good quote, and if I remember it correctly, it resembles something like:

” The need for radical independence comes from trauma/ or unrecognized hurt.”
I’m probably butchering the quote, but it goes something like this.

I have the knowledge in mind, I have the understanding, and I can take action upon what I want to do. Though when it comes to being consistent, my nervous system sends me to bed beyond stressed. It’s a nightmare. Being locked in a prison of beliefs I cannot seem to alter. And believe me, I spend all of my time focused on digging deep into my belief system to understand why I’m the way I am.

How can I change my physiological beliefs in order to change the outcome of how my body reacts? And is that even possible?

A few years back, I read about NLP and The game. The idea of practicing something entirely counter-intuitive gave the actors of the practice outcomes and entirely different results than they were initially getting had they not engaged in it. Though this begs more questions:

Do we have a natural, base-line state, which is normal and comfortable for us? A state, which, once we let go, is sustainable. Not a state which, if we stop maintaining effort, crumbles away and leaves us with what we initially had (which counters the concept of effort.).

In order to discover if I had a baseline state, I decided to go find my rock bottom,
which I like to call walking through fire. I wanted to find my lowest point to see what I was made of, and ultimately what would stick.Walking through fire has the characteristics of burning anything or anyone who isn’t supposed to be in our life.
This can also translate as a process in order to see who’s real or not. I believe everyone goes through it at some point. Though, I also believe that the earlier we go through it, the easier life is in the long run. Imagine learning to walk when you’re old as opposed to when you’re young, if you fall your bones would break and the recovery time would take forever. It’s better to discover if we have a soul early on in life rather than the 10 last minutes of our life. It makes for a more harmonious journey.

And even though it opens your eyes to what works and what doesn’t, thus cutting away the superficial unproductive relations, activities, paths, we once thought we needed, but no longer do. It opens up a more adapted, harmonious, peaceful approach to living our life, in sync with who we are.

To the external eye, the idea of narrowing down our opportunities and enlarging our depths in specific areas can seem near stupid. Especially in a world where More is admired, and less is just… well less. But this perception doesn’t work for everyone, especially those of us who enjoy more minimalist type lifestyles.

So what can we do to survive in a world which wants more, when what you create is enough, but not for others?

Hatching down on one’s vision and holding tight to that north star can do wonders.
Obviously, going down the rabbit hole and uncovering our Pandora’s box free’s us from living in illusion, but also disables the generic life “everyone” else seems to have. We become specialists about ourselves. After narrowing down what suits us better, doing anything and everything doesn’t fit anymore. This is a good thing. It’s like having a generic supermarket suit and a tailor made Italian suit. One fits perfectly and it even makes us feel good as a result, while the other makes us look shabby and out of place.
It comes down to consciousness.

With the narrowing of external opportunities, other dimensions open up within between our ears. Which, in contrast, opposes anything forced and unflowing. In other words, trimming off anything which doesn’t enable flow. Meaning, having the ultimate circumstances for peak condition productivity. So, cutting away the trivial stuff which doesn’t make 100% sense and align with who we are is actually good if we want to be productive.

I’m all for Forcing circumstances in my favor, but every time I do I seem to make my life worse. It’s when I don’t do anything at all and let life happen that my life gets better.
I.e. Letting go of control./ focussing on what I’m curious about/ doing what is natural for me.

All of this enables creativity… it helps to materialize / manifest circumstances. It also confirms that supporting my vision is more important than brute force, to confirm to others that I’m doing something. By investing time, energy and even money into creativity and believing in myself, I’m almost garanteed to succeed in creating an art through my prefered medium of expression.

Then it comes down to external factors. Other people’s expectancies and how much time you have to be in an illimited fram of mind without others enforcing what they want you to do on you. It comes down to protecting your personal space and attention.

In a recent interview by Tom Bilyeu, Seth Godin explains the lengths to which Miles Davis, a wildly reknown jazz artist, became bitter as he became a Rockstar.
In becoming so he could no longer simply create his art. The subtle nuance here is that, once you become a commodity, or once you become a product, your creativity is no longer demanded, it’s simply about production and execution rather than the creative process. Which translates as your endurance being more important than your individual spark. The repetition of something meant to only last the time of its initial experience drains all form of emotion from it.

You know when you find a song that makes you feel a certain way, and you love the transcending bubble of euphoria you experience in it’s discovery. But, then you repeat it over and over and over, and after a week the song makes you nautious.

The letting go of emotion is a onetime thing. The process is the same everytime.
But the emotion its self is different due to it being more of less deep within you,
and different synaptic connections at different levels attached to things more or less important to you.

This leads to the inevitable conclusion that individuality and authenticity cannot be captured and reproduced without losing creative magic. In order to create art one has to be unknown, invisible or at least not pressurized and forced to produce results by any external influence. Which is the exact opposite of a job. Creativity thrives in freedom.

Another idea comes to mind where Jim Carry expresses he wishes everyone can be rich and famous to see that being rich isn’t the solution. And many other examples come to mind.

Adam Westbrook in his Vimeo micro-series narrates the beautiful concept of Painting in the dark. I found these videos around 7 years ago, while I was still in school. Westbrook describes that in order to create a masterpiece, one has to be willing to not have any recognition for a long time. Leonardo DaVinci and even Vincent Van Gogh(whom I’ve also read about in “Range” with the example of him trying a vast number of things before finding painting as his preferred medium of expression) spend years being unsuccessful and near invisible as failures in the eyes of society.

The idea that something is an obligation and forcefully done, takes away the magic in the creation process. We become somewhat dependent on performing at a standard others set, rather than letting the creativity and inspiration surge on it’s own, when its ready.

In a previous post, I explained how the quality of the information and the quantity mattered just as much, if not more than the output. Just like when we eat food, eating quality food will give us better health and well-being. Force feeding our minds, just like ducks are forcefed for foigras, leads us to over-saturate and produce on time,
but not at the quality we’d hope for, or with the well-being we seek.

Creation needs an subtle ecosystem. In order to preserve this micro-climate of creativity, the ecosystem needs to function in a rather specific way. In Flow, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi explains the idea of creating a perfect environment where the capacity to be in flow is promoted and supported. Without it, flow gets disturbed from external circumstances. The capacity to create and be inspired is tampered with. As if living in a bubble of creativity. The creator environment must meet specific criteria.

Though, this criteria may change for everyone, I need heat, silence, air, electricity,
Wi-fi, privacy and space. Comfort doesn’t hurt but won’t stop me from ideation.
In idea creation, I generally need to be doing anything but searching for ideas or work.

Having said this, the pressure of having a day job can be disturbing to the fragile and delicate ecosystem of creation and lead the creative’s ideation process to get stressed and produce a lesser result than that of a natural process. Especially if the creative is sensitive.

A lot of writers tend to express Seth Godins idea of “Just Shipping“. Though, I find this process to be a forceful abstraction from where I stand on a creative level. I need to let my curiosity wonder. I follow my curiosity and it leads me down rabbit holes which hold nuggets of information I wouldn’t be able to use had I not followed the childlike curiosity to discover. Then, when I’m out of that creative mindset, I sit and edit patiently for hours on end, until I’m satisfied with the results of my ponderations and criticism. That’s grit.

After reading A technique for producing ideas by James Webb Young in my early twenties. I discovered how my personal creation process functioned.

1) Research:

Deep need to seek information related to current problem/subject. Digging into subjects. Reading. Listening. Etc. The sponge process where my mind imbibes every possible new idea and concept I didn’t know about yet. I do this over a period of time. I compound overtime and I then reach a…

2) Stagnation point.

Where my mind has had enough of researching. This is the time where I’m supposed to let go. Like Sherlock Holms or Dr. House, the process of searching is the same. They have an intense period of research where it gets serious. Then something gets intense and they…

3) Let go.

I personally go for a run or a bike ride or a walk in order to change my mind.
I also get these moments in the shower too… Dr. House plays with a ball, or gets caught up with something entirely different like speaking to his friend Wilson and while bouncing ideas of Wilson, House gets his “AHA moment“. The same goes for Sherlock Holmes, a case comes up, they do a little research, gather clues, then get caught up in something trivial which seems entirely opposed to the case and “AHA!

4)Capture:

Once you have your AHA moment, write the core idea(s) down and let them flow onto paper. Or if you’re unfortunate like I am write them down on your phone while you’re cycling as to not forget them. When I’m fortunate enough to be at home,
I create a relaxed environment where I have heat, some music which appeals to me, and completely forget about the world. The music often gets me to enjoy and not have the impression of working. In that moment I write down all enlightened ideas which come to me.

5) Develop: “Write drunk, edit sober.” Ernest Hemingway.

Your enlightened ideas are maybe brilliant, but you also have to transform them into coherent understandable language for other people. My creative language is that of ideas, that doesn’t mean my ideas are directly translated into a language everyone else understands. Which leads to correcting the content of my thoughts into consumable information people can understand and sometimes making it a little longer with examples so people can grasp what I’m on about.

If anything, the creative process tends toward letting our mind do all the work and if we could just get out of the way… I often find that I have to restrict myself from social expression with friends and even family in order to transfer the need to express myself into writing form. If I have access to too many friends, I get caught up with what they want to do. Expressing my ideas to them becomes hot air. While I cut off from people, my only medium of expression is writing or maybe some form of audio, which makes for better creativity and capturing ideas.


If you liked this article, drop a comment and tell me what you thought.

Here are Adam Westbrooks micro series on “painting in the dark”
https://vimeo.com/84022735
https://vimeo.com/87448006
https://vimeo.com/151128399

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How to Create the ultimate 5 – 10 people list of people you admire and aspire to be around.


“You know how they say
“the 5 people you spend your time with influences who you become” ?”


Hi! Welcome to my blog, I hope this post finds you well in this festive and comfortable season!



You know how they say “the 5 people you spend your time with influences who you become” ?
Well, we don’t always have the possibility to chose the people we want to have around us. Right?

Wrong!

Until recently, the idea that my fate would be tied to my location, the people around me (whether I like them or not, or even if I aspire to them or not…) as well as their minds, was something which created a specific amount of anxiety for me. Not that I fear the people around me or my circumstances, nothing could be further from the truth. Although, I am particularly picky about the time I spend, the attention I give and the subjects I want to devote my time to…
Though, the idea that my life is influenced by those around me and I have no control over those around me can produce a specific amount of worry. I really don’t want to pick up on certain habits, certain mind process’s or ways that don’t suit who I am developing myself to be.

On the one hand, picking people for your life is essential. In the doing we underline the examples we wish to copy. Like monkey’s we pick up on speech patterns, body language and other such subtleties which have made an impression on us because we have either liked the person or disliked them.

Csikszent Mihaly explains in his book Flow that “attention is our most important tool in the task of improving the quality of experience.“. And deciding who and what we give our attention to influences our lives in many subtle and important ways!

If you live in a town, going out and meeting someone specific to spend time with might be a bit of a challenge. Although not impossible, the chances are slim that the exact right people you need will be on your path with the same distinct reasons as you.

In fact, you’d probably waste more time and energy out and about than you would proactively getting done everything on your Important x Urgent list.

Pam Thomas a high end mindset coach describes the concept of energy leakage in his article https://thriveglobal.com/stories/are-you-leaking-energy/

“Depending on how we spend our $100 of energy it’s possible to expend it in ways that create an energetic deficit. When we become energetically deficient we then have to borrow that energy from somewhere…maybe from our own cells (making us tired and susceptible to fear, self-doubt, etc.) or from someone else (making us needy or dependent).”. In understanding that we only have a finite amount of energy per day, it becomes very clear that the attention we have (i.e. 100$ of energy) is better invested in activities which give back to us, individuals who are going in the same direction, or in something with a good ROI. (Sport, Education, meditation, personal development, healthy food, clear uplifting thoughts etc…)

In a recent GQ article on neuroscience, Dr. Lisa Feldman Barrett explains that our minds don’t function the way we think they do. How do we think our minds work? And with such a a variety of answers, how do we go about our everyday lives? On first hand, I’d bet that most people believe that the mind is made for thinking, stocking information… and alternatively the others don’t really wonder what the brain does at all… Though Dr.Barrett’s findings changes our understanding of how it functions and ultimately leeds us to driving our vessels in a more responsable and even more careful way. The concept of allostasis was proposed by Sterling and Eyer in 1988 as a process of reestablishing stability in response to a challenge. Barrett explains that our mind is merely a regulator, a controller to sustain our survival. “Every action you take (or don’t take) is an economic choice. Everything you think, feel, and do is a consequence of your brain’s central mission to keep you alive and well by managing your body budget.”

This being said, you’re probably thinking we’re incredibly off topic. We’re not.

Taking in to account that some people leave us depleted and tired after spending time with them.
Some even go as far as saying specific people are “Energy Vampires”, or “Narcissists“.
Though, lets stay on topic, I nearly lost you a few moments ago…
We’d rather leave conversations with people, feeling empowered, feeling confident and bold, ready to take on the world, right?

So how do we achieve that?

How do we find the people we aspire to?

How do we encounter those so-called people we admire?

And how on earth do we create our team of smart, high achieving, high energy people?

  1. It all starts with Self: We start by focussing on ourselves. Focussing on ourselves is the surest of ways to discover what we like, what we dislike, understand how we feel about this or that, as well as discover what we’re curious about. And this takes time, investment, and even going through the nitty gritty emotions. YIKES, I know you’re hating me right about now.. But it’s true. Going through our nitty gritty emotions by ourselves over and over again is how we grow and ultimately overcome them.
    Be patient with yourself!

  2. Procrastination: Having spent a vast amount of time on naval gazing, as you might put it. I’d like to invite you to reconsider your perception of Procrastination. It is there for a reason, so no pressure, embrace it and learn to invite it into your life.
    I generally procrastinate when my energy is saturated, I’m tired or low energy, or I need to breath from the depths I immerse myself with complicated topics.

  3. FocusMate: Okay, this might perhaps be the most important part of this article. The tool which enables you, with the right perception, to network, to grow, to exchange, and also to stay where you are and save your energy for better things. You know, the productivity and creativity in pt.2 and the
    well-being I’m about to express in pt.4? Yes Ladies and Gentlemen, I’m talking about FocusMate.

    Focusmate is an online Website/App which is meant to help you with your productivity and stay distraction free, focussed on your goals. Thats the primary reason we use Focusmate.
    The secondary reason is not what it is programmed to do, but what is most beneficial to everyone you encounter. Smile, be Warm, be Yourself, and share. You might end up meeting some really interesting, upbeat people you’d never get the opportunity to encounter otherwise.

  4. Energy, energy, energy... Yes, we’ve talked about that a lot haven’t I?
    You’ll need energy if you want to produce, work, focus on anything.
    This means you’ll need good healthy food. This also means that you’ll need to channel the energy you do have into meaningful productive practices which give you an ROI. I’ll talk about this in my next article.

  5. Structure. Yes, in order to use everything I’m talking about and something you can rely on, you’ll need a structure a ‘goto’ reference which is tangible and malleable. For this, I use the good old Whiteboard, a written structured list compartmentalised and the help of some tools
    I will add at the end of the article.


By using these 5 points, I get to meet high energy, ambitious people on a daily basis. I attract them because I am myself on that high level frequency (The exercises, The food help to develop the energy for this). And I’m able to do it often because I’m following a structure I created for myself which allows me to follow it even if I have no clue of what I’m doing that day or even feeling a bit hazy…


I thought I’d add some goodies:

Here are a Few Tools I like and use on a daily basis which get me to better focus, produce or simply keep track of what I’m doing or where I’m going.

Tools:

Create an Effective todo list: Learning how to create an effective todo list can prove invaluable. This article has been life changing in how it has effected my todo list creation. In that before I actually didn’t know how to create on effectively. I also added the notion of the Eisenhower Matrix in that I will only put what is urgent and important & important and not urgent.

https://www.notion.so/: So you need to go to the Office to have a physical layout of what needs to be done and what has been done? NO NEED! Notion is the perfect app for tracking and organising tasks, for business or simply for home. You can keep track of

https://habitshareapp.com/: You know how I talked about developing habits earlier on in the article, the concept that you can track your actions over the course of time and visualise your progress and
percentage of accuracy.

https://slack.com/: I’ve found that if you want to distribute a research, a message, and target a specific group of people, Slack is the best place to do so. Let me explain before you judge me as someone exploiting the indigenous tribes… While I was working on a startup in Fin-tech I needed to find a FullStack Developer capable of building the App. While I had no clue of how to grasp a developer, especially in the midst of a COVID lockdown, I got creative. Low and behold, I found 35 developers by targeting Digital Nomad slack communities in the space of 1 week! Need I say more?

https://discord.com/ People like to use this for gaming, because that is what it is originally used for.
Though, I use it for the TEAM to talk on in order to get work done without the hassle of planning call’s etc. Once everyone is subscribed, its fairly easy, everyone can have a reachable online office to do their work. And the messaging system is pretty simple.

https://www.focusmate.com/ Conceived as a studying platform, I figured out after a while that it could be a place to network and find likeminded people, according that you do it right and don’t overstep boundaries etc. People are generally open to discussing what they do, they’ll tell you about their goals at the start of every session and you can use it for training your elevator pitch for Work, Social, Partnerships, learning about new tools or insights, hek even relationships why don’t you. But really.. do it correctly, no one wants unwanted harassment in the privacy of their own home!

https://miro.com/: “The online collaborative whiteboard platform to
bring teams together, anytime, anywhere.” The Crema team explain the functioning of the app (in this video) pretty well and while is it still a collaborative online whiteboard, what you can do with it is nothing short of genius.

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Finding a peaceful balance between what’s going on in the world and where you are inside of yourself



It is important to be in harmony between how we feel inside and how we are outside.
This isn’t always possible, if so we must learn to love ourselves, and accept it from the inside out. 

Hence why we strive for perfection. People will qualify us through how they see us first and foremost. Which is distressing for anyone who isn’t picture perfect in today’s society. How can we possibly keep up with the constant update of knowledge?trends, tips, articles, news outlets, podcast shows and live to be as great as everyone else? How can we like anything we are, when we consistently compare ourselves with “everyone else”?

We simply cannot keep up. We can’t, even if we wanted to keep up with everything that is happening on a daily basis all around the world. There are way too many people and events occurring.

It is then wise to go in the opposite direction and disregard everything and everyone.
It becomes essential, in order to focus on the one most important ingredient in the recipe known to date, to neglect anything and everything but ourselves, how we’re feeling, what we’re thinking, how we function etc. I’d say the COVID is a blessing, but I already lived like this pre-covid. It’s very much so a blessing for everyone else, whether they can see it or not.

The contrast of one’s objective and virtual presence, is an extension of self. It’s very easy for everyone to get caught up in the illusion that How we are seen by others, How we perform in video games, or media covered games, or any other sort of exposure through a screen. It simply isn’t Who we are, nor is it What we are. It is but an intention, a role we play well, a placement of our time and effort in projecting something for others to relate to.

Take it all away, and all you have is yourself. Have you ever tried sitting in the dark with one candle, with no screen, no book, no kindle or music or anything. Just you and the candle? I bet you’ll get a little anxious at a certain point. Truth is, at first it might seem uncomfortable, maybe even anxiety producing… But by staying with it, we get to experience ourselves, what we’re feeling, why we’re feeling that way and so on… A vital road, in taking time out for us.

In todays world we need to perfect our camera presence in order to feel confident with others. If we are critical of ourselves, we cannot feel confident entirely with others. We’ll often have illogicisms, and discrepancies we need to overcome. Looking at myself through the camera, I see my critical self come out and poke holes at what I am doing as well as how I am corresponding with myself, the camera, and others around. When speaking on camera, I discovered that I was highly self critical. The process of overcoming the camera’s perception, isn’t the camera, but how I’m seeing myself through the lens. 

Have something to say, an exercise to follow. A guide-line and rules to follow in order to overcome and progress. Once we have the rules of the game, we can test, go through trial and error until we become perfect with the camera “in our own perception of perfect”. Above all, we see our flaws. They’re highlighted and in our face. They’re big and bright in contrast to what we’re normally aware of. When other people see us, they take it as a given “This dude has x, y or z… that’s just normal.” But what if, on that day the “Dude” in question had something which wasn’t normal to his everyday settings of normality?

If my writing inspires you, take a look at some of the books which have
inspired my writing. GO TO LIBRARY

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Make the most of your life before you get in the public eye.

Before getting started, I’d recommend listening to the same songs I was listening to while writing this:

“Acceptance” – Johann Eder
“Little Diamond” – Mylo Rivers


For a long while, I’ve only solely wanted to be famous and rich and known, so that people would love me and people would respect me because I was in a high position.

Caught up in facebook ads with annoying clic bait videos which want us to subscribe. Fame filled with stressed out vindicative burnt out stars who are trapped in a merry-go-round of concerts and never get to leave their houses for fear something will happen.

They’ve succeeded, and then found peace only to find that their success takes it away.

Far from the world of social media where everyone is glamorous and never have a day off from their fake vacations and their surgically enhanced lives. Where everyone has decided to be famous and known, I’ve been fortunate enough to have seen it coming. Don’t get me wrong, in desperate times, before working on myself, the idea that wealth would come with being known had pushed me to try a few “I know it all attitude“ type videos.

The idea that we have to continuously be the perfect image of what society awaits of us, is a prison unto its self.

Only, right now in my life I’m in a very different place. I’m enjoying my life, I feel blessed, I feel happy, I am safe, I have no obligations, I can do what ever I want and I am genuinely fine with what I cannot do. This entirely frees me up to enjoy my life as it is.
I am free…

I have a Macbook pro, and I recently found my old toshiba c50 and got it repaired. As an observation from using them both. I am glad I have the power and stability of my mac. Though, I’m relived by the lack of importance my old Toshiba laptop has. Like mucking around while we were children, we weren’t focused on how we were dressed or how we looked. We were pulled towards what our curiosity gravitated towards.

This is something I had lost for a long while. The freedom to be carefree without living in the fear of damaging something expensive, or more importantly not damaging my “precious” macbook pro which could stop working because of a vibration or some shock while putting my backpack down maybe a tad too fast.

My general sentiment is that of not being bothered by the value of something or having it damaged or always being on alert in case we do… This is something I enjoy. Not having to live up to “social standards” of being presentable or having to look picture perfect or any other of the things we’re supposed to do to be accepted and looked up-to in society .

Though, this post doesn’t focus only on computers, it focuses on life and more specifically that aspect before we have to uphold an appearance. I’m currently enjoying discovering myself again, taking my time to enjoy all the little things which seem to become unimportant in the grand scheme of life in the public eye once money and politics and business get in the way.

I recently purchased a 2008 Mac Pro 3.1, and before I compare it to being like an old mustang that I get to build in my garage, I’d like to talk about the memories previous years granted me.

I was in secondary school at that point and my neighbor and his older brother were into computers. I only knew how to turn it on and play Tomb Rader 3 from a cd. While I liked jumping from obstacle to obstacle and trying not to end the game by falling into  pixelated piraña infested waters. My neighbors seemed to have different games and knew more about computers than I.

I devoted most of my time observing, trying to figure out what it was they knew, how they had come to have all these games and how come he was able to enter on to my computer without my password?!

Even though I had a tough start with computers, I soon caught up. By that time, we played Counter-strike and like little engineers, we’d unmount hard-drives, put them in our friends computers and move all the data around, format our drives, and reinstall with the latest OS we had at the time. We’d lug our towers and massive screens around to Lan-parties and stay up all night fragging the hell out of each other on half life.

I remember this vividly because, these were times where I found something I was good at, and I found a competitive purpose. I had my team, my friends and people who I enjoyed being around. I had my tribe!

Back to the mac! I recently purchased an old Mac Pro with the hopes of buying a graphics card which will be accepted under the latest mac OS. Opening up the old tower and seeing the physical graphics card and the hard disk drives brought me back to where I was before getting serious about life.

I’d update and I’d solve problems of how to install an OS on an old device, which one would work, what do I need to get it running. It feels like I’m back in the game! It feels good. None of this integrated macbook pro none-sense where everything is dismantled and soldered in micro-particles all over the device…

Maybe I can get this thing running! Fingers crossed. Its just a man-shed project…  Either way…

Today, things are very different. I’ve since stopped playing games back in 2006, devoted my mind to more productive things like reading or writing or simply exercise.
My friends have moved on and they have jobs, and I’m back at my family home.
Since a few years, I’ve decided to take it easy on the career front. I can hear the “hard workers” already throwing a fit.

I’m at home. For a while, I lost the sense of feeling at home. I felt I needed to work harder and harder and push myself to the edge of all my limits in order to thrive. I felt I needed to become “special”, or have some unknown talent that the world needed. Only to find out that I’ve been exhausting myself trying to keep up with the world and the social movement of “Do anything to become famous”.

I write these words, knowing one thing in my heart. I’m sitting here with my black fuzzy cat who’s on the head of my armchair, I have a fuzzy blanket on, ambient music plays in the background, while I type. I feel a profound sense of belonging, I know I’m on the right path, I feel this is right. I’m happy and inside of me is a feeling of utter contentment.

I’m not striving for anything, I don’t need any money to live the “good life” which everyone is after, not right now at least. I enjoy cooking, I have fresh foods delivered from the local farmer, and I’m not stressed by anything external.

I can dream to my hearts content. I’m not worried about social media because I turned it off, and I’m not worried about missing out because I’m not. If anything, I’m exactly where I need to be.

I get to spend time with my family, as well as take time to heal my body after years of wear and tear. I’m inspired, I’m interested and curious. I’m not competing with anyone for once. I’m simply writing for the love of writing and this fills me with joy.

I live for these moments where, under no pressure at all, a heavenly feeling fills me with a bliss like inspiration. Under no obligation do I have to write anything that I’m writing, other than the effortless joy I get to express what I’m feeling.
This, my friends, is success to me. Being able to write how I feel as the inspiration comes up inside of me.

The freedom we have from being where we are, unknown, without any pressures, is utter wealth. My time is mine, I chose to be here. I have everything I need. I’m happy on my own creating and listening to music. I’m not worried about money. I’m not worried about other people. I’m just here, writing these words in sheer contemplation.

I’m able to focus on pure creation and value the process without it being a JOB. The lack of external obligation allows me to dive deep and evolve at my own rhythm without having to do anything, think about anything, or be trapped in anyone else’s intentions.

I can do my inner work while appreciating everything I have. I’m grateful, my life has changed so much. I’ve lost my anger, I’ve dealt with many of my fears, I’ve confronted my deep demons and I get to relax while my body heals.

The next door in life will come soon enough, that I know. A bit like in Mario 64, where we can push against certain doors as much as we want, but until we have defeated all the primary level boss’s we can’t open the door…

Fame will come or it won’t. I’m not bothered by this. I’m more concerned about not living everything I have to appreciate here first. If I’m always focusing on everyone else and how well they’re doing, I won’t get a chance to enjoy my own life and those around me.
I get this chance and I’m thankful for it.

My wonderful black cat purrs near my head, while overlooking my shoulder, looking at my screen. Who knows maybe she can read?

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What you Need to Know about Social Media (r)

On the one side, being exposed to all things all the time is an amazing source of development, we get to see what we are and by what we are interested.

In other circumstances, we’d have no idea that some things exist. This is a good thing. People also get to exchange and evolve no matter where they are which is helpful.

Discovering many amazing new things, not “feeling” as isolated than as if we had been alone and cut off in a cave the entire time.
It brings great competitivity and progress which comes with competition.
Though on the other, the downsides are felt in part due to the depth at which we are isolated or how “mainstream” we are. And also in part, to one’s degree of confidence or lack there of.
Comparing, which leads us to feeling lesser, unworthy or even unable to live up to “the standard” is a source of pain.
We can never keep up and this turns out to be draining.
No matter how much we share with others, we get nothing in return except confirmation about what we already know. “I’m great”, “I’m powerful”, “I’m rich”, “I’m pretty”… which are vanity criteria based on what we already know.
It also confirms that people who have more financial freedom will be able to show off more, or those who have a standard of beauty which appeals to the masses will be put on a pedestal and valued higher than anyone who is “different” in any way possible.
In a way, its back to high school with the rich kid/poor kid/ Confident kid/Unconfident kid again…
This sense of high school 2.0 is very unproductive for anyone who is observing. Also vain and an empty pursuit due to the fact that it promotes “The popular kids”. It really goes to show the reality of “wanting to fit in”. By wanting to fit in, you naturally aspire to be a product of mass consumption, a product of mass exposure.
Social media also gives the illusion that one is or isn’t necessarily liked based on superficiality.
This is a faulty parameter which cannot give precise and correct results. It bases everything on the Golden Circle but inside out.
Starting with What then how then why. This cannot work; as human beings we function from the inside out, not the outside in.
Why>How>What. Spirit/heart/idea>Method/action>Intention/circumstance.
In terms of effects on our psyche and our time, it is an abomination. Our minds and nervous systems have become overstimulated and over saturated with information that we don’t necessarily need, want or even Should have in the first place.

Over 200 years ago, someones entire lifespan wouldn’t have even half of what we are exposed to in a single day. Imagine what our minds are capable of and what our mental limits are.

Faster, more, better, NOW!

Though, through fomo  and needing to know what the “next thing is “social media has exposed us to an attachment to our devices. We needn’t fear governments putting Chips in us to see where we are. We are already here, our information is passed everywhere, all the time, to limits far outside of our reach.

Our minds are saturated, which means are nervous systems are saturated and this is a clear indicator that we need to let go of all outside stimulation, especially devices, screens, and anything which has power.

We are “PUSHING” ourselves to imbibe information which has nothing to do with us. We are exposed to too much information. None which serves us correctly for what is in front of us in actuality.

When traveling in another country, I have found that being confronted to constant New information, my mind is thrilled, though my body has no time to rest as it is constantly adapting to the upcoming change of scenery and people.

The same is valuable for our brains and nervous systems in front of screens. Day in and day out we are exposed to more and more information which never lets us correctly relax and heal our over stimulated sensors. This can be damaging.

The standards around us have risen above what is humanly possible to upkeep. Over consumption has taken part so much that the world and its natural resources are collapsing. The Ice caps Are melting. Our water is filled with plastic. Governments are actually putting nuclear waste into the sea.
Corporations, making mass profit are pushing their agenda onto us based on our social media usage, what we read, what we look at etc. Everything around us has become a product to sell. Everything we see is for sale. Our lives have become studies like labrats for usage and profit.
Our secrets we now expose with the vain hope that we too will become famous. “But for what?”

We are exposed to cultures and trends that have nothing to do with us. We are born in specific parts of the world and for good reason. While growing up in specific places, we have grown to understand and perceive the world around us. The world we see and have action over is what is in front of us, not what is happening half way around the world. This is a disruption in our ways of functioning and takes away our roots, our individuality and unifies everyone with the same styles, trends and exposure which otherwise wouldn’t exist. For example: I used to meet people and observe how they spoke, their linguistic rhythms and their mannerisms. Though everyone is now exposed to the same people. This makes everyone into a clone of someone else and empowers those who have more exposure and who have trend influence.

Everything you say and do, there is proof to keep you “consistent”. Though as human beings, we are changeable, we are evolving all the time, we make mistakes, we grow, we change… If there is proof of a mistake, you never get to move on, you never get to change, nor do you ever get to be free from something that hasn’t existed for maybe 15 or 20 years.