Cultivating Awareness

It takes stillness of mind to hear our hearts' desires.

We might have heard it said that to get what we want we have to first know what we want! To do that, we need to create emptiness.

We have to make space in order for our true desires to emerge, and for that we need to find a place where we can be at peace and silent. This should be a place that we can access only when we remove ourselves from our daily activities and sit quietly long enough to be inspired.

To gain control of our own lives, we need to start practices that allow us to observe our own inner processes. Only then can we turn our lives around from the attitude of What can I get? to one of How can I serve? and let our true selves emanate out to the world.

What is awareness?

To me, awareness is being aware that we are aware. Being aware is like observing from a place of stillness. We see movement, chaos, actions, emotions, and feelings without getting involved.

The first step in the practice will teach us how to become more aware. It will help us understand that we are everything and nothing that is manifesting in our lives. In the fourth step of the practice, we will be able to become conscious creators of our mundane world. Awareness will assist us in detaching ourselves from our drama, our problems, our obstacles, and our negativity as well as from the things we were aiming for previously, like recognition or material success. We will not eradicate them, but we will skillfully flow through them without disturbing our inner peace. Our lives will become more malleable and free from drama.

Training ourselves to become aware is very simple yet powerful. One of the most important things keeping us from being totally aware is failure to commit to a regular practice. Once we have tasted the fruit of awareness, we will naturally engage daily in this way of living life. This is because, once we awaken to the higher realms of consciousness, we will not be willing to go back to the deep-sleep state we were in!

The first step is to find that place of stillness and silence within ourselves and to recognize that we are there. It is a state of knowing and observing without judging. After a while, we realize that we are fully alert and seeing ourselves as detached from our thoughts and physical experience.

Therein lies our true power, when we must trust our inner light and let it emanate who we truly are.

Once we start this practice, we will have doubts and fears showing up in many different ways. The best advice we could get is to let go of the mental chatter and connect to our inner light. We will train ourselves to recognize the resistance, the wounds, the pain and suffering, and the judgments, which all come from the ego, the mind. We have to trust that our inner light will always shine on the right answer, the right path, the right thing to do. If we do the work to emanate the life we intend to live every single day, we will become aware of what is being created every minute. We will acquire the wisdom to choose the path of love and surrender even for things that used to bother us a lot.

How do we become aware?

Mindfulness meditation is a wonderful tool to connect within. To become aware, we must be willing to give meditation a good try. Meditation forms the foundation of this approach. It is about becoming fully aware. It is about being able to discipline ourselves to implement the first step: cultivating awareness.

Meditation brings us clarity, purpose, wisdom, and an inner state of calm that allows us to have the maturity to lead our lives from a place of understanding. Meditation can help us become mindful and fully present, because after a while, we no longer react to the agitation of the mind and we become attuned with our inner light, our true selves.

Of course, we can skip this part and use the following steps to manifest a wonderful life. However, manifesting the life that we really desire — the life that is vibrating in every cell of our bodies, the life that will give us a deep sense of purpose, contribution, and meaning — is possible when we are fully aware. We can also identify the purpose that each of us can accomplish in our own unique way.

This is where attraction meets manifestation. We can probably attract anything we want. But this first step will allow us to manifest from a place of knowing what our true desires are and lead us to make the right choices.

There are many meditation techniques that have helped me create a fulfilling life. With these meditation techniques I am able to maintain a level of awareness that helps me peacefully manifest my true desires. To me, mindfulness meditation is one of the easiest ways to start a meditation practice. I have tested it with my students with great results. Very quickly, it helps us understand our place in the world and accept what is. It causes human beings to have more compassion. It trains our physical bodies to not be as reactive. It gives us a new perspective on our thought patterns. It creates a space for forgiveness, acceptance, and freedom.

In part II of the book, we will do twenty-seven days of meditation practice, wherein I will introduce many techniques that will allow us to experiment. There is a meditation practice for all who have a strong commitment to their own transformation. Sometimes we just need to try a few before we find the right one.

What to expect

The practical way of using the first step is to cultivate a daily meditation practice. Five minutes a day is the minimum.

We notice that we are seeing new angles to daily challenges; we notice we no longer react to what used to bother us; and we notice that stress reactions are not happening as often as they used to. These are all benefits from our meditation practice, and they are all signs that we are becoming more and more aware of ourselves and our world.

Inspired Visualization

I call this step "inspired visualization" because what we envision has to be inspired by the divine purpose of our souls. I believe that we are so powerful that it doesn't matter what we decide to visualize — it will manifest. Thus, by being inspired through a regular practice of meditation, mindful living, and being in sync with the natural cycles of our environment, we will be able to manifest our souls' desires. We will feel more satisfied, peaceful, and grounded. We will become living examples for others around us. Our awakened purpose will create ripple effects.

The visualization has to come from our souls, our inner light. There is a difference between creating from our inner light and from our egos. The line between the two is difficult to perceive. Sometimes we are so overwhelmed with distractions and illusions about what is real that we think we want something and do not take time to stop to listen within.

This is how we can differentiate where our desires are coming from:

Manifested by soul desire (inspiration/inner light)

• Measured by how happy and content we feel

• No attachment to outcome

• The initial idea comes from nowhere (now, here)

• Divinely guided

• Sense of purpose and dedication

Manifested by mind desire (will power/ego)

• Measured by what we call success

• We have a definite goal

• The idea usually comes from something outside ourselves

• Man made (we try to control every step)

• We are driven and motivated to achieve our goal at any cost

So how do we know whether a desire is soul inspired?

We discern this by connecting daily to our inner light and by not letting ourselves be confused by to-do lists. Most of the time we just get caught up in the momentum of manifesting our desires. We do what we think we should be doing, only to realize later that what's shaping up is not exactly the way we want it. Then we are stuck with something that is not totally aligned with who we are.

By taking daily check-in with ourselves, we can cultivate a sense of knowing exactly what we want. Then what we need to do on that day will come as inspiration.

Here's a way to understand the concept of inspired visualization:

• We start with the first inspiration or idea we get out of our meditation, or during a day that we really feel in the flow.

• We picture what it will look like in our world when it is manifested.

• We see ourselves acting and being in that picture, with every little detail.

• We allow our inner state to emanate within the visualization — the emotion that goes with this inspiration is our compass. For example, gratitude and joy are a good sign that we are aligned with our purpose and feeling wealthy and proud might be a sign that our ego is trying to lead.

What to expect

The practical benefit of using the second step is that we will get ideas and inspirations from our new practice of connecting and listening in. It might come up during meditation (if it does, we will just ignore it until we are done our meditation), and it might come up again during the day. When we get an inspiration, we do not act immediately on it unless we are completely sure that it is aligned with our purpose. We leave it aside and ignore it, until it feels we can't ignore it anymore and it is growing stronger within us. We always have to allow ourselves to go back to emptiness, nothingness, and silence. Sometimes the burst will fade away. If it keeps popping up, then we will bring our attention to it.

At that point we can start to visualize ourselves with this new idea, project, or solution. In this step we are really just exploring what it would be like to manifest this idea in our reality. And because we are becoming more aware, we will notice how our bodies react to those thoughts. We will observe the sensations coming up when we think of our inspiration, and we will be able to catch ourselves if we are getting too attached to results like recognition, material goods, or power. If we see ourselves getting too proud, we need to detach ourselves from the results and listen to check whether there is not an ego-motivated desire behind it. We have to make sure the idea is connected to our desire to contribute of our talents, to live meaningful lives, and fulfill our purposes. We have to simply reconnect with what's real within ourselves and adjust our visualization according to how we feel.

Emotional Affirmation

Now here's the action part for manifesting our true desires. We actually have to say out loud what we want to create! This is crucial in order for us to bring our inspiration to life.

There are many dreams out there that remain unfulfilled because people are afraid to actually take the responsibility to manifest them in the world. These may be dreams about designing jewelry and one day starting a business, dreams about traveling the world, dreams about being the perfect weight, dreams about being financially abundant, dreams about creating art, etc.

This step is scary, because this is when our desires could come crashing down with other people's judgments. This is when we declare to the world what we stand for and what we believe in. Trust me, when our inspirations are strong and are aligned with our purpose, no one can stop us from making them happen, and no one can make us feel awkward because of our desires. If they are true to us, they will resonate louder than any critical comments that come our way!

To understand the way this can shape up for us, let us consider these steps:

1. We know what we want to create and investigate the true motivation behind it.

We discern the difference between what our mind/ego wants and what is coming from our inner light/soul.

2. We write it down and play with it. We rewrite as needed.

The mind is a very sneaky part of ourselves, and when we think we want something, the best way to start expressing it is to write it down, with every little detail, just like telling a story! As we write, we ask ourselves whether we are taking example from someone else or it is our own inspiration.

3. We say it out loud.

If words are creating this world, we have to get out of our hearts and heads and use our voices! Once we start talking about what we are manifesting, we will either feel good or awkward when we talk about it. It will feel either genuine or fake. This is our inner compass. We must adjust the affirmation — story — until it feels right to us.

4. Our emotions are resonating.

Emotions are vibrations, and the process is like watering our flowers to make them grow. Repeating our affirmation with a strong positive emotion will activate the process of manifestation. We have to make sure that these emotions are genuine. If we feel proud and gratified, these emotions might be coming from our egos. If we can feel joy and gratitude and really feel happy about serving others, these are the emotions we want to cultivate with our affirmation.

5. We rephrase it as we go.

It is totally fine to make changes to our visions and affirmations along the way. Sometimes, after a few days or even a few weeks, we might feel that we have to tweak and rephrase our affirmation. We have to do it! Because if we're not «feeling» it, our hearts are telling us something. The idea might not manifest — or worse, it will manifest in a way that is not aligned with our soul purpose.

6. It's for the highest good of all concerned.

We always make sure that what we are creating is for the highest good of all concerned. If our vision or actions take away something from others, if we are driven because we think we can do better than others, if we act out of fear, if we react to something in the world or display other ways that are more driven by ego, we will be miserable! Being aligned with our soul purpose cannot be negative to us or others. When we live our purpose, we emanate good vibes. Only good things manifest when the intention is pure!

What to expect

The practical way of using the third step, once we are ready to really own this new inspiration we've received, is talking about it. First, we can talk to ourselves out loud! It might sound funny, but when we do this, we will feel what it's like to own our inspiration. It is also an opportunity to play with the words we will use to tell the world about our new great inspiration!

Writing in a journal is a good way to start. We can play with the words to really get the idea of how we will tell others what we are creating.

It is good to be aware that once we start talking about it, we are really starting the manifestation of our desire in reality. The words we use have to be chosen carefully. The way we talk about it is equally important.

We can use phrases like these:

• "I am publishing my first book!" — instead of "I want to write a book."

• "I am starting a jewelry business! It's going to be so awesome!" — instead of "I am thinking of maybe starting my own business. What do you think?"

• "I am taking salsa dance classes!" — instead of "I would like to take some dance classes."

• "I am organizing a fundraiser event for this charity" — instead of "It would be nice to give money to a charity."

From there, we can be receptive to what others have to say about it. They will have questions, and this will help us get answers on what to do. When we really listen to what people have to say, sometimes they give us our next step, called «conscious action.»

At this point we have to ignore negative comments. By now we know that our paths are right. We start to really embody our intentions, and negative comments should not bother us. But if they do, as soon as we hear something that is not for the higher good of ourselves and our intention, we will quickly move to the first intention we got and recall how we felt when we got it. This will move the good energy forward.

When we are emanating our best lives, we do not have everything figured out before we start. We are creating a space for magic to happen, and that is possible when we are in the flow, when we trust our instinct and intuition, and when we know we are exactly where we need to be and doing exactly what we need to do.

This is when step four will happen.