Day 11 of 30 Day Challenges

The blog series in which I am completing my challenge from 30dayblogchallenge.com!

As well as a self-made challenge inspired by Abraham Hicks in which I self-soothe myself through negative emotion.

At the end of this 30 day journey I intend to be more fully on my life’s path, “all systems go.”

So…

The 30 Day Blog Challenge is moving along now.

Day 2’s Challenge: overcoming fears and empowering myself as an entrepreneur.

I actually really liked this short challenge and loved the message in today’s video.

Let me address the easy part first and then the tough part.

The Easy Part

The video was great and had some major points for reframing my mindset. In the past I have held myself back simply because I was striving too much for perfection. I wanted the product, whatever it was, to be perfect before launch. Whether it was a blog post, a song, a web site, an album.

I would tinker away at these for days, weeks, months, years… Most never get completed or released. Most of them are still ongoing… Truth be told, most of them are still beginnings… Some for good reasons, most out of fear.

I mean it can be a fine line between perfecting the product and accepting it at a good enough stage when launching. Sometimes some work is needed towards the best product you can make, but you can also obsess too much on getting it right that it never goes anywhere.

And I get what the video was suggesting, which is this: just put it out there. “Go for good enough” was the key phrase. And it makes sense. Many entrepreneurs and businesses and products begin as one thing and evolve as they get better at it.

Music Theory…

I recall a story someone told me of a band they saw that was terrible. Technical issues and bad mixing and singing and performing and everyone there just thought ‘what a joke.’

Turns out years later it was a popular and successful band called Phish. They had to go through that shaky learning curve, full of errors, to get to their success. Like all of us, from toddlerhood on. Stumbling until we learn to walk.

But as I was saying, I do feel there is a fine line. There is striving for too much perfection at the expense of never sharing or releasing. But there is also some need to get very good in terms of some products. For instance movies and music and art can be that way.

If I were to go out and sing every song I wrote after the first night I wrote it, people would probably cringe (for a number of reasons: lack of rehearsal, familiarity with the words and notes, lack of confidence… even non musical people can hear an unpracticed note sung off key).

Even more so with recorded music, which should be flawlessly reproduceable on any platform you wish to listen to it: radio, stereo, car, club, etc.

Etc, etc, etc…

Or what of a movie made without great production behind it? It will likely look and sound so unpolished that it will be hard to take seriously.

Or a piece of writing in its first draft could be so filled with errors and inconsistencies that it would be rendered unreadable.

Or a beautiful work of art in its first incarnation may completely flounder…

So there is a level of crafting towards perfection. And the fine line comes to this: when can you begin to allow the product or work to be shared. Does it have to be 100%? Can it be 50, 80, 90 percent towards completion? Can it at that point begin to move the energy forward in fulfilling the work while being shared publicly? And still fine-tuned and perfected as you go?

Releasing earlier and getting the ball rolling certainly beats taking ten years to complete something to perfection before releasing. (Unless it truly is required…)

The bottom line is this, if you are holding back for good reasons, continue to craft and fine tune until it’s good enough to begin the share.

But if it is fear that holds you back, you are tinkering your time away, therefore giving away your ability to strive for your ultimate realization and find the success in whatever endeavor, passion or dream you wish to pursue.

The Tough Part… Fear…

So that brings me to fear. The other part of the challenge today.

Fear is a good place to work on my self-soothing. I have lived in fear for so long I just thought it was normal. I found myself self-soothing away some fear of my current state of finances. Yikes, let’s not go there!

I mentioned the following suggestions in the 30 Day Blog Challenge in-house discussion board. I have found them tremendously helpful in changing my fear paradigm and want to mention them at large here as well.

• First and foremost is Paul Selig…

…who has channeled six books through his spirit guides, and I highly suggest you check them out if this post or blog resonates with you.

The topics of the books are profound and revelatory, ranging the gamut of human experience. A major theme that resonated with me is that fear has the action of creating more fear. It is like the virus that replicates itself.

Think about it. How much fear do you live in? Do you live in fear of death? Of taxes? Of paying the rent? Of your mother or mother-in-law’s judgements? Of criticism for how you dress, what you say, how you act?

Or what else?

How many things in a day do you respond to in the energy of fear? Do you watch fearful programs, as well? The Walking Dead and that sort of thing?

I used to revel in those types of stories. My God, how much fear did I want to attract to my life? No wonder I was full of fear that held me back from all the things I’ve wanted to do in life.

• Which brings me to the second resource: Abraham Hicks

You may know her for her books or her lectures (many of which can be found on YouTube). Yea, she is the law of attraction guru, you could say. But guru is a loaded word, so leave all that baggage behind. Abraham has great wisdom to share if you are in the receiving proximity and are able to resonate with it.

The law of attraction basically is this: whatever you put your attention to, wanted or unwanted, you will get more of it. You cannot say “I don’t want fear, I don’t want fear,” and expect to get less fear. Because you are still focusing on fear. Get it? Maybe not.

I know… it took me some time to digest the ideas as well, and no one sentence or paragraph or blog I write now will clear it all up for you. I’d be naive to think it could. Not after all the words Abraham has offered over the years, most of them the same…

But it holds true. If you focus on fear you will get more fear in your life. More fearful experiences and fearful people and fearful feelings.

What would you do, if you believe this?

If you accept that this is the case, that what you focus on you will get more of, what would you rather attract? What would you rather put your attention on and bring into your life? Money? Love? Health? Wellbeing?

I know it can be hard at times. When our current life circumstances presents us with challenges that seem overwhelming, it can be a challenge to get off the subject of it.

We can get so consumed with our problems that at times we may think there can’t possibly be a solution. Especially not in simply focusing our attention on something else. After all, often our ”problem” seems to demand all of our attention.

Yet we can, if we try, focus on the things we want rather than any hardship that it currently going on in our life. We can, but we must feel it, we must believe it, and we really benefit most when we can override our problem focus with the wanted focus.

As Abraham once said, “Others are hearing me talk not about what I am worried about, but what I am looking forward to.”

The key Abraham is always mentioning is to let go any resistance to allowing what we want into our lives.

That means not demanding or forcing. Demanding or forcing just reinforces the idea that we are not where we want to be and that we do not have what we want. So, to focus on not having will continue to bring us “not having.” What is asked of us is to focus on what we want and what we want alone.

Also it means trying to feel good about it. Life, what you are doing, everything.

Feeling good improves our chances of finding the best outcomes in every avenue of our life. If we feel bad, if we feel negative emotions, than we are off the path, not doing what our soul longs to do, not tuning into our own creative source.

As we feel good more of the time, then we can try to feel better and better and better. That leads us in the direction that we want to go. Feeling worse and worse will lead us that direction, too, towards worse and worse.

It is always our own choice which way we go. Up or down, better or worse, angel or devil. Get it?

There is always more to say…

Well, again, I can try to sum up decades worth of work in a few paragraphs, but I can never touch what Abraham Hicks offers through her own works. So check her out. And Paul Selig’s works, too. Excellent resources if you are trying to improve your life and become all you can be.

Look, I may be sharing these tips, I am no master at it. I am still a student of these works in a big way. I know that I am still working on creating from a better focus myself.

So this is me allowing myself to go for good enough. I have enough to offer now without perfecting anything. So I write and I post where I am with it now.

In fact I feel like that is exactly what this blog and this challenge has done for me as a whole. It has put me in a place of vulnerability where everything is sort of shaky and unclear and unfinished, yet I am publishing anyways. So props to myself. Kudos, me. Shake my own hand. Pat on my back.

I’m feeling better.

You?

That’s all for tonight. Hope you enjoyed and please comment and share.

Blessings to you all,

Matthew

DAY 12