A recent caller to my radio show told me that although she could forgive other people easily, the hardest thing to do was to forgive herself. In thinking about this very common problem, here’s what you have to consider: Everything that you’ve done in your life up until this moment, you had to do. The proof of this is that you did it!
Everything you did is over now. You can’t take any of it back. In The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám, the poet says, “The Moving Finger writes: and having writ,/ Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit/ Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,/ Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.”
The fact that we can’t erase the past says something to us. We are called on to forgive ourselves, to honor what is past, to love and respect it. Look back and say, “That’s what I needed to do, that’s the person I needed to be at that time in my life. I did that, and I’ve learned from it. Now I can move on.” Continue Reading
A caller to my radio show told me the following story: she had survived a terrible earthquake in her native country, lost her husband in that quake, emigrated to the U.S. with her surviving child, and worked to put that child through college. Now she was trying to follow her dream of establishing a charitable organization to help disaster victims, but she was becoming discouraged because her vision wasn’t materializing as quickly as she’d hoped.
Could someone who had come so far through so much really afford to be discouraged?
I told her in no uncertain terms to hang on to her dream. Be willing to hold the vision!
All of us are here for a purpose; when you find that purpose, hold the vision regardless of what difficulties or obstacles may surface. Holding the vision involves an unwillingness to compromise what you’re visualizing. It means being willing to face setbacks and what appears to be an uncooperative universe. Continue Reading
I love it when Louise Hay talks about how she discovered her own wisdom. As an abused child who didn’t have the support she needed to finish high school, she grew up with the notion that she wasn’t very smart. Looking at her today, it’s impossible not to smile at such a misguided idea. She discovered to her amazement and delight that she was smart indeed and capable of learning anything she needed and wanted to know—and of teaching others how to appreciate their own self-worth, too. Are you someone with the same ingrained notion that Louise had to heal from? Continue Reading
Don’t miss Dr. Dyer’s Public Television special! Dr. Dyer’s television special, Excuses Begone! airs this month. Check your local listings to find out what times Wayne’s extraordinary public television special will be broadcast in your area and get ready to say, “Excuses Begone!”
Learn how to change the self-defeating thinking patterns that have prevented you from living at the highest levels of success, happiness, and health by saying Begone—to all your excuses! You’ll ultimately realize that there are no excuses worth defending, ever, even if they’ve always been a part of your life—and the joy of releasing them will permeate to your very core and you’ll awaken to the life of your dreams.
Move out of established thought patterns and realize that there is nothing standing in your way of living at your highest levels. Find out how with Excuses Begone!
In his PBS special and the Excuses Begone! book, Dr. Dyer also discusses the research of two of his colleagues, Dr. Bruce Lipton and Richard Brodie, Continue Reading
In 1982 I went to Greece to run in the footsteps of Pheidippides, the original marathoner who ran the twenty-six-plus miles from Marathon to Athens in 490 B.C. to carry news of the Greek victory over the Persians. I was part of a big group of runners who were gathered at JFK Airport when we learned that our plane’s departure would be delayed by seven hours. The place became one gigantic collection of grumblers, complainers, and agitated people who now had to decide what to do for the next seven hours.
Amid this chaos was a little old Greek lady, perhaps in her eighties, all dressed in black, who proceeded to take a seat and close her eyes with a smile on her face as if she were meditating. I walked around the Olympic Airline terminal for two hours and then wandered back to the departure area and there sat the little old Greek lady, as peaceful as could be, still in the same position.
I then took a cab to a movie nearby and returned to the airport three hours later, Continue Reading
“No man is an island, entire of himself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main….”
John Donne, 1624
Are you familiar with these classic lines? Here seventeenth century metaphysical poet John Donne expresses the idea of oneness and unity consciousness. Ancient mystical wisdom tells us that in the garden of the mystics, distinctions such as I, you, he, she, and they do not exist. To reach a higher state of awareness and bliss in our lives, we must understand the truth of that first line, “no man is an island.” That can happen only when our ego gets the message.
Our ego insists that we are separate from others and defined by where our boundaries stop and others start. Similarly, our ego tells us that we are separate from our environment and that we are here to sort of push it around as we desire. Yet mystical teachers and poets are always reminding us of our connectedness and the oneness of everything and everyone. We must look beneath the surface and beyond appearances to grasp the unity consciousness they speak of.
Imagine a wave or a drop of water considering itself apart from the ocean. It is weak when separated, but returned to its source it is as powerful as the ocean. Thinking of ourselves as separate from others, we lose the power of our Source and diminish the whole of humanity. When you see yourself as connected to everyone, you stop judging others and begin to see all of us connected to the same unseen silent life force.
Compassion becomes an automatic reaction when you see all of humanity as one undivided and indivisible family. Viewing all others as family members lets you feel more compassion and love toward them. John Donne’s words remind us that we all need each other. Continue Reading
People ask me about writing all the time. How does it work? How can they get their message out to the world? On the recent Hay House I Can Do It cruise, I spoke to the Writer’s Workshop which was one of the programs given on the ship. What a great group of eager, empowered, and energetic people! I told them that it all hinges on what Abraham Maslow taught me many years ago when I was a young doctoral student. He told me to put forth what I wanted, my work, my message, and then Continue Reading
Think of the people you know who give love in response to negative energy that’s directed their way. There aren’t many people who respond lovingly in that situation. The ones who do are able to because they have love to give away. They know that it’s impossible to give away what they don’t have, and they’ve gone that extra mile to acquire what it is that they want to both attract and give away. If love and joy are what you want to give and receive, then begin by taking stock. What have you got to give away? What are you giving out to the universe, and thus, what are you attracting? Remember that you can’t give away what you don’t have, but you can change your life by changing what’s going on inside.
Low energy attracts low energy. Low energy thoughts, such as anger, hate, shame, guilt, and fear, weaken you. And they attract more of the same. By changing your inner thoughts to the higher frequencies of love, harmony, kindness, peace, and joy, you’ll attract more of the same, and you’ll have those higher energies to give away.
Heaven is a state of mind, not a location, since Spirit is everywhere and in everything. You can begin making a conscious decision to look for the unfolding of Spirit in everything and everyone that you encounter. I personally do this by making an effort to look upon my world as if I were observing it through lenses that filter out the form and all of the material aspects of what I’m seeing, and I can only view the spiritual energy that allows what I’m noticing to exist. Try putting on these imaginary magical lenses and see how different everything appears.
I now see spiritual energy in everyone I encounter. When I’m tempted to judge anyone, I remind myself to view them through my special lenses. When I can do so, all negative judgment dissolves. I feel more peaceful knowing that I’m not just this body that I’m destined to discard. I also feel the life-giving Spirit within me on a daily basis, and it’s exhilarating! Continue Reading
When Carl Jung was asked in an interview if he believed in God, he said: “I could not say I believe. I know! I have had the experience of being gripped by something stronger than myself, something that people call God.”1 To be consciously merged into that perfect union with God is a feeling that’s difficult to explain, but ego definitely takes a backseat. You know that you’re allowing yourself to be guided by a force that’s bigger than you are, and if you so choose, you can stay infinitely connected to it.
Here’s Thoreau in 1851 remembering what this connection felt like to him in his boyhood: “There comes into my mind such an indescribable, infinite, all-absorbing, divine, heavenly pleasure, a sense of elevation and expansion, and [I] have nought to do with it. I perceive that I am dealt with by superior powers. This is a pleasure, a joy, an existence which I have not procured myself. I speak as a witness on the stand, and tell what I have perceived.”
I too perceive that I am being dealt with by superior powers. Continue Reading
Forget about those New Year’s resolutions in which you decide on the first day of January how you will be conducting your life in September, some nine months later. Here’s why: any resolution that involves you making decisions about long-range upcoming behavior reinforces the self-defeating notion of living in the future rather than in the present moment. In fact, you can go about resolving until the cows come home, and you still have to live your life just like everyone else on this planet—ONE DAY AT A TIME. The important questions to be asking yourself are “How am I going to use my present moments this year?” and “Will I waste them in reviewing to myself how I used to behave, or how I would like to behave in the future, rather than resolving to live each day to the fullest?”
What you can do is set up day-to-day goals for yourself, and then resolve to begin living with present moment awareness for the rest of your life. For example, instead of deciding you are going to give up sugar for a year, resolve to go one day without eating sugar. Anyone can do virtually anything if it is for only one day. Continue Reading
At such an important time in our world where many people are forced to recreate themselves and re-evaluate their priorities, internationally renowned author and speaker Dr. Wayne W. Dyer boldly tells people to stop making excuses and start living the life of their dreams.
In his 35th book, Excuses Begone! How to Change Lifelong, Self-Defeating Thinking Habits (May 26, 2009), Dr. Dyer tells readers to ask themselves, “If no one told me who I was, who would I be?” By identifying 18 of the most common excuses and providing an accompanying affirmation, Dr. Dyer claims now is a time of immense opportunity to change life-long thinking patterns and access new levels of success and happiness. “The most common excuses I hear are: If I changed, it would create family dramas…I’m too old or too young…I’m far too busy and tired…I can’t afford the things I truly want… Continue Reading
I love it when Louise Hay talks about how she discovered her own wisdom. As an abused child who didn’t have the support she needed to finish high school, she grew up with the notion that she wasn’t very smart. Looking at her today, it’s impossible not to smile at such a misguided idea. She discovered to her amazement and delight that she was smart indeed and capable of learning anything she needed and wanted to know—and of teaching others how to appreciate their own self-worth, too. Are you someone with the same ingrained notion that Louise had to heal from?