2020 is here and making it's mark! Numerology would tell us to take note that this is a "4" year. In numerology the 4 is associated with foundation, clarity and practicality. While the 3 energy lends itself to expression, communication and creativity, 4 is what grounds that creative power. 4 is the 4 seasons, the 4 directions and the 4 elements. 4 is a number of stability and responsibility. We rely on 4s all the time--it's a very balanced and even number. In 2020 we can use this strong foundation to build the ideas that we manifested in 2019. If you had an idea last year that you loved but never got it off the ground, this year is the perfect time to make it a reality. I know from experience it's very easy to come up with New Years resolutions, but it's much harder to follow them. Well, never fear! I've got a big line up of topics and motivational content to share for free because I really want to see more people living their dreams this year! So here's 4 things that will help you start getting those goals in gear!
Visualize it.
Before you go out and impulsively buy a home gym or a drum set... Just sit down in a quiet place, undistributed. Let your self have a moment of meditation. It's important that you let go of other expectations and really focus on what you enjoy, what makes your heart sing or something that lights a fire in you. Just observe and let images flood your consciousness. Continue breathing and just explore where your mind goes without judging it. Again the judgments you observe are likely external and have little to do with your soul's desire. Let your heart and soul speak for this moment. When you let the layers of being a "normal consumer" go, when you let go of living up to someone else's standards (your friend's, parent's or society's) and when you tune into your true desires you may be surprised with what you see. When you have reached something that resonates with you, explore it deeper. Start to allow the screen in your mind to display the "movie" that is your idea. This is a form of visualization and will help you manifest your goals. You may loose focus or get distracted but try to bring yourself back by breathing and acknowledging the diversion. The more you practice visualization the more it will become a stream-lined part of your creative process.
Plan it.
Planning is always incredibly ironic to me because often nothing goes according to my original plan, and the plan is always adapting and growing. That's okay! When we think of planning we think, "I have a plan, things will go according to plan". That's the biggest mistake we can make when planning. Instead, make the plan but be totally open to the life it will take on. Our plan is like our baby, we may be able to control it at birth but as it grows it has a life of it's own. We can choose to adapt and support the direction the plan is going in or we can choose to ignore that. If we ignore it, it's likely our plan (like an rebellious teenager) may abandon us for "cooler" parents. In other words, be flexible enough to see your plan through and accept that adaptation is part of getting your goals accomplished. There may be some trial and error and there will also be lots of re-planning and re-grouping with yourself. It's like a puzzle. The plan is the picture of the completed puzzle and your resources are the pieces. It is your creativity, and your mind that discerns where to put each piece and how to make it work together. I love making annual, monthly and daily plans. Just writing down what I want to accomplish starts to organize my thoughts and ideas in a way that allows them to be more easily implemented into my life. When writing something down in a list, we are activating a part of our brain, (the prefrontal cortex) and making connections that lead us to completing those goals. Writing a plan out helps us hold ourselves accountable. There is something very satisfying about crossing off your to-do list and watching the pieces come together.
Break it down.
This is a huge part of manifestation. As a teacher, I'm constantly reminding my students to break things down into chunks and to take things one piece at a time. We all know that multi-tasking decreases our overall productivity yet we are all guilty of getting stuck in endless scrolling through Instagram, online articles, trump impeachment updates and funny memes. While these things are fun, they obviously won't accomplish our goals for us. What will accomplish our goals is our active role in breaking down our goals into day-by-day actions. Last year, I tried out a system where I made goals for the year, goals for the month, goals for the week and then daily to-dos. While this was my first year trying this out, I did not always keep up with the goals and it was a little messy. However, I forgave myself for the less than perfect delivery seeing as this is part of the process. I invite you to do the same. Be easy on yourself knowing that even if you perfectly planned everything out, old man procrastination may come knocking at your door (fashionably late of course). When he does let him know where you stand in 2020. You can tell him "Hey man, I know we had some great times and I'd love to smoke that bong with you....riiiight after I get these things done!". Let's say you've planned it all out and broken things down but you don't get your tasks done when you expected? Just put those tasks on the next day's to-do and let things shift as they need to. As long as you're keeping a momentum, things are bound to fall into place. Just do what you can when you can and don't give up on this concept of working towards your goals.
Do it.
Finally, we've come to the do or die moment. That's literally what it is, you either do what you've planned or you don't. Our mind likes to rationalize, justify and come up with a myriad of excuses why we didn't do what we set out to do. Sometimes there are valid reasons why we don't go along with our plan. Most of the time though when we don't do something we planned it's because we didn't make time for it, or we feel unsure about the plan or our ability to "do it". When you notice you aren't doing what you planned, it's important to pull yourself off to the side and ask yourself why. Why didn't I do it? What thoughts am I feeling right now? What beliefs do I have around this action and are those beliefs preventing me from doing this action? Have I prepared myself to carry out my goals? For example, let's say you want to go to the gym every morning before work. You plan to go there at 5 am starting Monday. When Monday rolls around though you oversleep your alarm. At that moment you can ask yourself, did I prepare to wake up at 5am today? If you usually wake up at 8am then part of your plan should be figuring out what time you should go to bed the night before in order to be sure that waking up at 5am is easy for you. So then maybe Tuesday night, you decide to go bed earlier
plus you leave yourself a sticky note on your alarm clock to remind you that this is your goal and you want this! Basically, you have to be your number 1 motivator. You have to have a mindset of wanting yourself to truly succeed. You need to believe that you are worthy of succeeding and manifesting your goals. Once you truly believe in yourself, you'll find that the doing becomes easier and easier.
So there you have it! 4 things you can start doing right now to get those resolutions encoded in your noggin. By the way, once something is encoded in our brains it becomes more streamlined and automatic so one of the most important parts of manifesting is staying with yourself through the encoding process. Like all forms of conditioning we need repetition to strengthen any action, so if at first you don't succeed... try, try again and again and again until it's encoded! Wishing you all a productive year, feel free to share your goals in the comments section below and I will send out positive energy to support your endeavors!